They had given her five minutes to get ready.

Five minutes before she had to go.

Five minutes before she'd be [i]sold.[/i]

The fake smile Leonora had painstakingly put up slowly dissolved into a frown. Only barely managing to keep herself from mumbling out her frustrated thoughts, the girl swept hair from her eyes in one quick, aggressive motion, her every action reflected by old, half-broken mirror she stood in front of. She still didn't know how things had come to this, nor if the situation truly had been desperate enough to warrant her 'prolonged trip' to the Litter. Surely there could have been some other way to handle things. Surely, if she'd just persevered and thought things through...

She let out a dry chuckle all of a sudden, her reflection mimicking her actions. Yeah, as if she hadn't gone through every other possibility long ago, many a time, even. This most certainly hadn't been a spur of the moment decision - anything but - and her mulling over ifs and buts did nothing to help her cope. No. There was nothing else for her to do than this, and she knew it. She wouldn't be here otherwise.

Too bad that she kind of... sucked at this whole slave business.

Letting out a frustrated sigh, the girl gathered her long strands of red hair once more in a doomed attempt to get them up in a pretty, decorated bun. Hailing from the kind of family that she did, she never was one for appearances or acting particularly lady-like, and that extended to her choice of hairdos and clothing. Social norms and etiquette were both foreign words to her, and she always did have a problem of speaking out of turn, to boot. Heaven help her if she was bought by some rich, snobby, son of a-

She caught herself before she could finish that thought, sticking two pins in her mouth to silence herself as she leapt into the tenth attempt to tame her curls. She would really need to watch it. Her tongue, that was. Much as she believed she would hate her future job - unless she'd become a librarian or a fencing a tutor, neither which sounded too likely - she did want to try and be on her best behaviour and be well-liked by whoever invested money in her. She didn't want to let down her parents or her little brother. Especially her little brother. Poor sap deserved a better life, and a better life he would get, if she could help it. Now if only she could get this damn hairdo to-

"Time's up, Leonora, let's go. We don't want to keep the customer waiting," a well-dressed man announced from behind the door with a sudden knock, startling the girl enough to have her release her hair back into its default position of sticking every which way across her back. Damn it...

"Yeah, comin' in a se- I mean, right away, sir!" She shouted back, giving up on her quest and spitting out the pins she'd been holding. She wasn't ready. She really, really wasn't ready, but she knew telling that to the people of Litter - or the customer, for that matter, probably wouldn't do her any good. She didn't want to be labeled a difficult case right off the bat. That would inevitably come later, anyway.

So, giving her reflection one more glance and grimacing at the flowing, dark red dress she found herself in, she headed towards the door, steps just a tad uneven. Heels. The bane of her existence, she'd found out two days ago. She missed her boots.

"Leonora Winfield, miss," the man introduced as he walked into the lobby with her. There, waiting for them with an umbrella, was the woman about to buy her. Wait... woman? Leonora did an involuntary double take, her heart skipping a happy beat. She had very much feared her owner to end up being some weird creep with messed up power fetishes, but this woman looked... mellow, even? She didn't carry the aura of what she had expected of a future master, certainly. She seemed nicer, more humble, and like someone who'd actually listen to her requests. Perhaps this wouldn't be so bad, after all. Perhaps she could even get out of these heels, eventually!

"Miss," she rushed to greet with a nod, offering a somewhat awkward, but all the same heartfelt, curtsy. It took her a while to find a place for her hands now that she didn't have pockets to stick them in, but in the end she settled to just having then hang on her sides limply. She knew that crossing them would be no good, at least. She'd been lectured by the workers here about it quite a few times. 

"It's an... uh, pleasure...? Yeah, a pleasure to meet ya!" She continued after a while, the words she'd learnt and practiced vanishing from her mind one by one. "Hope we can get along and all!"

It was then that she noted the umbrella the woman was carrying. "Oh, 's it rainin' out there? Awesome, makes the air fresh!" She leant forward and mumbled, nodding towards the man that had escorted her and the way she'd come from. "Been a bit stuffy in here, y'know."