Cutting lines from Princess Academy 2

As I tweeted earlier, I always overwrite similes/metaphors, so in the final drafts I can cut all but the best. Here are a few lines I cut today.

The princess academy had been held in an old house near the mountain pass, as grand a structure as Miri thought could possibly exist. But if the Queen’s Castle were alive, it could eat the princess academy in one crunchy bite.

Change was wonderful, but also made the world feel unstable, a cliff ledge that shifts. What else would change?

Rather than dance, she felt like curling up in a barrel like a lot of salt fish