A Dress That Looks Strong
"Hm. Not quite."
Sirka's hopes shattered in an instant.
"...Even so, don't you think you might feel differently once you try it on?"
Sabrina, who had been pretending not to care, slipped quietly into the conversation. The disappointment had barely settled over Sirka before courage stirred in him again.
"Mother's right. Clothes always look different on the body than they do to the eye."
"Quite so, young lady. A dress exists to be worn, after all. Might you try it on, just the once?"
Quick to read the room, Madame Renouage rushed to their aid.
"No. This looks like something for little children."
Bariya's taste, however, was immovable. The dainty frills and the cute oversized bow on the yellow dress struck her as hopelessly childish. Recommending a dress like that to a predatory beastkin who's already ten. Did they truly see her as a baby? A sigh escaped her at the disappointing state of Sirka's eye.
"Then would you care to look for yourself? If nothing suits you, we can make anything to order."
Leaving the crestfallen Sirka where he stood, Madame Renouage placed the choice in Bariya's own hands.
"Made to order is fine. I'm only buying one dress anyway."
While Bariya wove through the atelier, the adults traded looks behind her back.
Only one?
Madame Renouage sent Sirka a questioning glance.
Not a chance. Every dress the child so much as glances at goes to the manor. Quietly. Behind the little one's back.
Sirka shut the idea down at once. If they had meant to buy her only a single dress, they would never have brought her all this way. Say as much to Bariya, though—she saw no need for more than one—and they were certain to get an earful. Which was precisely why they were buying ready-made clothes rather than bespoke.
"Whoa, this one! I really, really like this!"
Bariya cried out, her voice bright with excitement. Sabrina and Sirka whipped around, eyes alight.
"..."
"..."
And promptly despaired.
"This is it. This is exactly the kind of dress I wanted!"
The unprecedented excitement on her face was adorable, but the two tigers could not bring themselves to share it. A colossal collar stood stiff all the way to the crown of the head, the shoulders were padded to absurd excess, and the skirt billowed so enormously that four grown adults could have hidden inside it and still had room to breathe. Even the color—a deep blood-crimson—made the whole thing so violently striking that no one who saw it would ever forget it, not even in their dreams.
"Why is this even here? Don't tell me someone actually wears it...?"
This went out of fashion centuries ago, didn't it?
"Th-that was merely something I made as an experiment."
Madame Renouage was every bit as flustered. She had sewn it out of curiosity about the fashions of the past and put it on display as a keepsake, nothing more. She had never imagined anyone would choose it—least of all a ten-year-old young lady under the Caliph Clan's guardianship.
"Little one, do you truly like that dress...?"
Sirka asked, desperate, but Bariya, oblivious to the plea in his voice, nodded hard.
The child's eyes sparkled. They hadn't shone like that even on the carriage ride here. Sirka's head spun.
Those hyena bastards! How badly must those sons of bitches have locked the child away for her to think like this? Fury toward the hyenas surged in him hotter than ever.
Sabrina felt the same.
No. We can't leave her like this.
Madame Renouage, swift to read the naked emotion on both their faces, stepped in at once. The dress was hers, so the damage had to be hers to undo.
"Young lady, I'm terribly sorry. This piece isn't for sale, and even if we were to make it to order, fitting it to your size would be exceedingly difficult."
"It would...?"
"Yes. That towering collar and the lavishly swollen skirt are terribly heavy. They put a great strain on the neck and the waist. Especially—"
"Especially?"
Drawn in before she knew it, Bariya listened as the madame spoke with a grave face.
"It is not good for a child who is still growing. If one is not careful, one might never grow tall at all."
Bariya, who had been failing to hide her disappointment, sucked in a sharp gasp.
"That absolutely will not do. I'll pick something else."
Growing taller mattered more than anything, and she gave up at once. Sirka, Sabrina, and Madame Renouage all sagged with relief. Sirka vowed, with iron resolve, to tip the madame handsomely.
The dress Bariya chose was a pale lavender one-piece trimmed with lace. The design was comfortable and light, and it did nothing to hinder movement—a garment that would never strain a growing body—and that was exactly why she liked it. There had, of course, been a small ordeal along the way. She had chosen only one dress, and the madame had pressed five more upon her.
"I don't have the money."
To the flustered girl, the madame answered with a bright smile.
"These are a gift we offer only to guests visiting our atelier for the first time—a token of our hope that you will favor us often in the days to come."
"A gift...?"
"Yes, so there is no need to pay a thing!"
Do ateliers have rules like that? Startled, Bariya shot a glance at Sabrina and Sirka.
"That's right. We received them too."
"So don't worry. Just take them."
The two of them nodded as if it were the most natural thing in the world.
"Uh, um—then I'll accept them gratefully."
Since they said so, Bariya took them. If the dresses were free, she wasn't indebting herself to the Caliph, and there was no reason to feel burdened.
"Then please do visit us again!"
And so Bariya left the atelier with a box of dresses in her arms, without the faintest idea that Sabrina, Sirka, and Madame Renouage were wearing deeply meaningful smiles.
The next stop was a restaurant. True to a place that Sabrina—famously particular about her palate—had carefully chosen, Bariya melted the moment the steak touched her tongue.
"It's so good."
Sirka, who had cut the steak for her with his own hands, smiled, thoroughly pleased by the happiness on the child's face.
"If you want more, just say so. As much as you like."
"No, this is enough. Besides, I feel like I've been eating meat too often."
Not only today—yesterday, the day before, and the day before that. Come to think of it, ever since she had come to the Caliph, she had eaten meat every day, at every meal.
"Once a week is plenty for me. That's what the contract says, too."
She liked eating it often, but they were bound by a contract, and that worried her. Food, clothes, a place to sleep—she was only receiving, and for now she was giving the Caliph nothing at all.
"We're doing exactly what the contract says, aren't we?"
Sirka shrugged, perfectly unbothered.
"The condition you demanded, little one, was 'meat at least once a week.' We've met it."
"That didn't mean meat all week long, though."
"It isn't a breach of contract, in any case."
"Thaaat's true, but..."
"Then that's that. Don't worry. We'll keep the contract, no matter what. We even had it officially attested."
A few days ago, Baden had in fact shown Bariya the contract, stamped with the seal of Aldros, the ibis beastkin house whose word carried public authority. If the contract were broken, even the Caliph—ruling house though they were—would not be able to escape punishment. That was precisely the Aldros family's Authority.
"So eat up. The meat's getting cold."
Sirka popped a piece of meat straight into Bariya's mouth. She ate it on reflex, but something about it sat wrong. There wasn't a single false note in what he had said, and yet she couldn't shake the feeling she was being had. Was it just her imagination?
"If you want to grow up big and strong and punch those hyenas with your own fist, then you'd better eat well."
The moment Sabrina added that, the unease vanished. She was right. Bariya might be taking from the Caliph one-sidedly for now, but if she grew up well and beat the hyenas down, the Caliph would be glad their investment had paid off. All the care they were pouring into her was for that day. So for now she shouldn't feel sorry. She should just eat.
Clothes, though—I won't accept any more of those. Eating and sleeping were essential to growing. Clothes were not. Two or three outfits that fit, whenever she shot up, would be more than enough.
"Thank you for buying me clothes today."
Even so, Bariya did not forget her manners.
"Today was the first time I ever chose clothes with my own hands."
In the Mariner family, she had lived on the one or two garments the hyena bastards tossed her way. After she ran, she hadn't even had the money to buy clothes, and had worn her rags patched over and over. And yet the Caliph fretted, nearly frantic, that they couldn't give her something better.
Honestly, it wasn't only that the yellow dress was childish. The dress Sirka had picked out for her at the start—she had rejected it for being too childish, but the truth was that the lavish trim had looked expensive at a glance, and that was why she had refused. And that wasn't all. Every garment in the atelier was showy, and she had broken into a sweat hunting for something plain.
"I really love it. I'll wear it with care. Thank you."
Even so, this dress was the finest thing Bariya had ever owned.
"...Good."
"I'm glad you like it."
Having offered her thanks, Bariya went on with her meal, her heart a little lighter. Which was why she failed to notice the look that passed between Sabrina and Sirka.
We bought more than fifteen dresses at the atelier today.
She really didn't notice. With the madame's help we managed to pass five of them off as free gifts, but how are we supposed to talk her into wearing the other ten?
As if an atelier would ever give away five dresses for nothing. It had, of course, been a scheme the three of them cooked up together. Ten dresses still remained, and already they were fretting over how to get her into them.