Princess Adelide

I wrote my first novel when Iwas 14. I finished my sixth draft of that novel when I was 19. Since then I have tried to get it published. However, after re-reading for who knows how many times, I decided it really wasn't that good. I could write it again, but I just don't want to do that. Instead, I am writing a totally different book. I have a really good feeling about this one.
Meanwhile, would you like to read a different story I started on when I was 14? To say, YES, read on. To say, NO, oh wait if the answer is "no" you probably already stopped reading.

If every girl got the chance to be a Princesses what would happen? Would every girl marry a prince? Would every girl live in a castle? I propose to you that there is such a place. A place where every girl gets to be a Princess at some point in her life, and for Adelide Spooner that point in her life was her tenth Birthday.

At first she was thrilled beyond belief, she was to be sent to a castle on an island off the southern coast. There she was to be trained to have, beauty,brains, and blue blood. It was going to be magical. Everything she ever wanted to be was at her fingertips.

Then life hit her. Yes, she was picked up from her Father's house by a horse drawn carriage, but it wasn't a comfortable gliding ride. It was rough and bumpy going down unpaved country roads. Not to mention the smells that came from the unmentionable end of the horse. Then the terrifying ferry ride to the island during the midst of a typhoon! At the shore the wheels of the carriage got stuck in the mud, and she was rather rudely told she either had to walk in the rain back to the ferry or on to the castle.

The mud squished beneath her leather shoes. She recalled as a child how she used to like to walk in mud with her bare feet after a summer rain, but now it brought her nothing but disgust. Her wet clothes stuck to her cold skin. The water was weighing her down, and slowing her progress. The darkness was so strong she wasn't even sure she was going the right way. Then lightning...

The light filled the whole sky and for a brief moment it became as bright no brighter than day. A day with pure white light, and against that pure white sky stood, towering before Adelide, a limestone castle, with long narrow windows of stained blue glass.

Adelide exhaled, and as her breath hung in the air before her darkness consumed the image of the castle. She now knew which way to go. She mustered the strength to arrive at the castle's door.