The Prisoners Throne by Holly Black

"Sister….!! Sis…..!!!" A small child named Lorene ran home from the market, when she arrived she went inside and found her sister in the kitchen.

"Where were you Lorene?" she was asked

"Read this!" she was shown a piece of paper and she took it, looked and saw an advertisement

"What is it about Lorene?"

"Oh sister, don't you see?"

"I don't know how to read my little one" the sister replied sadly.

"ooh, I forgot sister, it is written here that there is a competition for the best chef that will be held tomorrow and the winner will enter the king's palace, that is, she will be a maid in the king's palace" the child replied

"Are you really reading what was written Lorene?!" the sister asked skeptical

"Yes, Sister Emily, how can I lie to you?"

"Dude, I have to go and..." she started saying but then,

"What do you think you’re doing??" they heard a voice behind them asking before she finished her sentence, they all turned and saw aunt Eliza standing with her stern face looking at them. Emily and her younger sister, the aunt's daughter, looked at each other while Emily was holding the paper in her hand and hiding it behind her back

"No mom, I was telling Sister Emily that we will go, we will go..." Lorene stuttered, unable to speak in front of her fierce mother.

"Lorene, come out and play with Emily, what are you hiding behind you?"

"I'm not hiding anything aunty."

"So I don't have eyes and I'm lying, right?"

"Actually, aunty, I'm not hiding anything" Emily answered while shaking her head, denying the fact that she was afraid of her fierce and merciless aunt, who followed her slowly and approached her. Then she stretched out her hand asking for something that Emily had hidden behind her hands, and Emily had no choice but to slowly take out the piece of paper that was brought to her by her younger sister, Lorene, for the cooking competition advertisement

Emily, a very attractive and beautiful girl, was a talented cook with a unique talent that she inherited from her late mother who was a very talented cook.

Aunt Eliza took the advertisement and read it, she looked at Emily with a sharp eye and then she tore the piece of paper into pieces and threw them on the ground.

"Do you think you can cook that well? That you can go where you think you can go?" aunty Eliza asked her mockingly.

"I want to go try aunty" Emily answered.

"Just trying, who do you think will adopt you again? a poor girl without parents who even I took in when you were little just as a help so that you could live with me because even your late father is not related to me, he is only a distant relative and I only brought you here to work and not to play around. You’re not a family member here, you're just a maid, make sure you cook good food for us to eat, because that's what keeps you here in town, understood??!!"

"Yes aunty"

"Yeah, that's right; forget about something called marriage or going to any competition. Firstly you don’t even know how to read and write, you don't know where you are, who do you think will accept you and come to marry you, a stupid, stupid girl like you?" her aunt said slanderous words to Emily, the girl remained silent and had nothing to answer in front of her aunt, at the same time the woman's eldest daughter named Linda came to the kitchen and found her mother scolding Emily.

"Mom there are visitors" he told his mother

"What guests?"

"I don't know but they seem to be very important people" she answered.