Sebastien grew up with people staring at him, his mother and father were rather wealthy after all. They were pretty influential people in France and in some other countries. With that much power, came the publicity and eyes constantly on his family nearly all the time. He was taught early on never to return the gaze, and to stay relaxed. He was taught that, because all eyes would be on him, he needed to maintain a good posture. He was also told to maintain the way he looked, but his parents were nowhere to be found and most of these people didn't seem to care about his family's status, just his fairy tale status. Still, while the training on appearances wore off, the training on good posture never did. He held himself up much like people imagined a prince would. His back straight, head held up high avoiding the gaze of the freshman staring at him, and his feet pointed to where he wanted to go.
He sighed in relief the moment he opened the door to the outside. Most freshman didn't know there were even benches to eat at during lunch. They stayed in their little packs and didn't stray too far from where the most people were crowded. The upperclassmen paid less mind to him, which was something he was very thankful for. He didn't have to feel the constant stares on his back or seeing people staring at him in his peripheral vision. It was creepy. It made the hairs on his neck rise. The warm air and the slight cooling breeze made him forget all about that though. It was also a lot quieter outside, with people all spread out, and in smaller groups. It was easier to hear the birds chirp.
Sebastien glanced around and spotted an table to sit at. There was generally an open table outside and inside for him, since most of the upperclassmen stuck primarily to the same tables. With the combination of that and Gabrielle sneering and threatening anyone else that took their usual spot, most people just left an outside table and an inside table open for the prince. Though, he was sure it had nothing to do with his title, he did chalk it up as one of the few perks he kind of liked. It meant he didn't have to go searching for somewhere to sit, and he didn't have to sit next to people that were going to stare at him the entire time he was eating.
On his way over to the table however, he heard someone call. He stopped walking and turned around to see who it was. It was Artem. He raised an eyebrow, not too sure what was going on. The two barely had any interaction before, and now the blonde was acting even more weird than just the confusing wave in the morning. Still the confusion didn't stay long on Sebastien's face, it relaxed before turning into a small smile. How he usually was when anyone came to talk to him, though with him being at the top of the high school food chain there wasn't many people just walking up and talking to him.
The smile grew a little when Artem asked to walk with him. He let out a little chuckle. "Well, uh...I was going to sit actually. You know, to eat and all before the girls go crazy about me missing both breakfast and lunch," He raised the tray in his hands slightly as if to prove his point, and turned toward the empty table. "You can sit with me if you'd like. I've got to eat fast so I can go run to my room to grab my phone before afternoon classes start, so not a whole lot of time to talk. But I do like company."
The prince sat down at the table and looked down at what he had gotten. He usually avoided most of the cafeteria food as much as possible. Preferring to eat at a restaurant when he got the chance, or even buying groceries at the nearby markets and stocking a mini fridge he had sneaked into his dorm room freshman year after figuring out how terrible the food was. He had actually managed a few times to get into the school's kitchen and cook up better food with the same ingredients the school uses. That only happened once or twice a year though, he had to convince one of the kitchen workers to leave the doors unlocked and assure that nobody would notice he had ever been there. It did lead to a very great feast for him, his brother and their friends though. He had chosen to go with a salad and some bread, for now. "And, I'll have to pass on the pain killers, my headache isn't that bad. Offer them up again when I have my private sword fighting class after school today and my instructor insists that Prince Charming fought a dragon without getting a scratch on him."
Olivier held in a chuckle when Claude had muttered to herself. She wasn't wrong, outside was much better than inside the main building. Though, most of that contributed to the bleak white walls, and dreary decorations in the that classrooms. The school had put much more effort in the dorms, and the landscaping. It gave Olivier the feeling of actually leaving home and going to school when he left his dorm in the mornings. Which only made him homesick, knowing very well that he didn't even leave the school property to sleep at night. "It is so much better out here," He agreed.
Though, the moment he glanced around, he spotted his brother not too far from them. He frowned a bit, hoping that Sebastien wasn't going to ruin this for him. He wanted to make a good first impression, and he didn't want his older brother getting in the way of anything. If he could, he didn't want his older brother ever meeting Cinderella, but he doubted that was ever going to happen. He knew that at some point Sebastien would come along and introduce himself so that all the attention could be right on him. Like it always was.
It seemed his brother had picked up on the glance, and unlike with any other gaze, it was as if the older sibling could sense when it was him. Sebastien looked right over at Olivier and noticed the girl next to him. He gave his younger brother a smile, which only made Olivier believe more that Sebastien was going to wander over and ruin in. Of course, his luck was never that good. It would all be ruined on day one. The boy quickly mouthed the words, "Stay away." It didn't matter to him that his older brother didn't look like he was going to stand up, or that he was too busy with his conversation with someone else that he had never seen his brother talk to before, or that the smile was more of an encouraging, proud smile than the smile of someone wanting to join the conversation.
Sebastien only put up his hand and waved before turning back to his friend. Olivier held in his sigh of relief and continued on with walking Claude over to the gardens. "Oh, no I don't have the time. The school has me signed up for a mandatory after school activity, ballroom dancing. It's basically the school signing people up for private lessons, like my brother has been taking a sword fighting class the entire time he was here with as a private class, or Anneliese has to take private singing lessons. When I'm not doing that, I have school work, or my brother's dragging me along in one of his little adventures," Olivier answered.
It wasn't hard to see the gardens from where they stood, it was a huge plot of land, and the smell of flowers was overwhelming. Patches of flowers already blooming, and vegetables nearly ready for harvest. Hedges and flower bushes bordered the garden on three sides, and a few students were sitting near the area eating or just keeping themselves busy until afternoon classes got started. "This would be it," Olivier stopped walking, "Students aren't really supposed to go in the area unless they're in the club after school, but the teachers don't really enforce that rule very well."
Cecile relaxed a little when he faced her and she was able to see him clearly. There was no fur spouting anywhere, not large paws or fangs protruding from his mouth. Just the same old Zhihao, looking the exact same he had that morning. Well, minus the smile, and any bits of that lighthearted personality that he had. That was to be expected, something was still wrong after all, the rose was there in the glass case. She knew that rose, it didn't matter if it wasn't the same one, it still looked the same and gave her the same feeling. That feeling of dread mixed with anxiety. There was always the time limit with his curse, an arbitrary time limit judged by the magical rose.
She couldn't bring herself to try and be encouraging to her poor prince. She knew what was going on too well to just act like she knew nothing about the rose anymore. Too many past lives have gone by with the same story for her to not know that this rose meant that Zhihao was hurting. Something was wrong, there was still a curse, it just wasn't visible at the moment. She could only return a look of sympathy, and feel bad for what had happened. She had hoped that this time around, he'd be able to fight it. He had made it so much further than his past lives, and he was doing so well. The school must have done something to intervene. All the staff members were so obsessed with destiny that it made them sweat when even one of them fought against it. This was too far. This could possibly be categorized as child abuse, and if this wasn't a magical school filled with the reincarnations of fairy tales and the rest of the world wasn't so accepting on the idea of magic being real, she would be calling the police.
"I don't think magic and natural preservatives mix. Besides, the rose always lasts years before the last petal falls, without ever being put in water in the first place. I don't think there's a way to make the time limit longer, unless it's through magical means," Cecile sighed. She could have given him false hope and told him that it was worth a try, but she felt like being more down to earth on the matter was better. Besides, a time limit was still a time limit and in his case it wasn't like that changed anything. The transformation was just temporary and curable under the time limit, then became permanent and incurable when the time ran out.
When he explained things, she could tell that he was distressed. All that hope of ever being just a normal person had been thrown away. It must have been terrible. Cecile walked closer to him and gently put her hands over his while he was holding the glass case. "Zhihao, I know how much this hurts you. I've seen you deal with this time and time again. I'm sorry that the school did this to you, that....that they took it into their own hands to put this curse on you...to hurt you like this. It's not fair. But, I'm here to help you, if you want my help. I still care about you."