"Don't be melodramatic!" Beatrice squawked, letting her spoon clatter into the remnants of her porridge. How dare he! How dare he act like she shouldn't be bothered by this. "Oh really? Do you really want to go with that? A perfectly timed trip that sees him depart just weeks before my debut?" Like she didn't spend months as a terrified sixteen-year-old little questioning her self-worth, crying herself to sleep each night, because even her own father didn't have enough belief in her to wanna stick around and witness it? That he didn't care enough to help?

"Frankly, Victor, it doesn't matter how much you try to say he didn't because everyone knows he did. Every single person in society knows that 'Virgil Daphnel has been gone for years when he should have been here doing what his son is doing' and that his trip has been three to four times longer than any of his other ones have ever been." Perfectly timed with the time Beatrice had spent out in society.

"I'm just the poor little freak who chased her father away, that's how they see me Victor. I'm not a fool."