The First Battle Dress
Bariya spent the night wide awake.
Terror that, without her Authority, she might truly have died. Elation at having used it properly for the first time—not merely to lull someone to sleep, but hard enough to leave her feverish. Fear that her possession of an Authority had been found out. And, surging over all the rest, a breathless joy that the power she had always been desperate to hide had let her save someone's life.
So many feelings crashed through her at once that sleep was impossible. A fragile hope even rose among them: the Caliphs already possessed an Authority of their own, so surely they would not covet hers the way the Mariners had. She lay there with her eyes nearly open until dawn.
She had been fretting over how she would face the Caliph family come morning, and then—
A lucky star? An honored guest? A banquet?!
What is any of this supposed to mean?
"There's no guarantee that what happened yesterday won't happen again. And if you were hurt, we would have no right to protest to the Mariners."
Sabrina explained it calmly to the bewildered girl.
"We're nothing more than a contractual relationship. If something happened to you, we wouldn't be in any legal position to help."
"So we mean to announce that you are an honored guest, cherished and received by the Caliph Clan."
Sirka joined the explanation.
"But legally we'd still be nothing to each other."
"A pretext would exist, though. To lay a hand on someone we have officially declared our guest would be to declare enmity with us."
A pretext mattered more than one might think—all the more so in a relationship unbound by law, like theirs.
In truth, it would be far simpler if we became the child's guardians.
But that would weigh on Bariya, who had yet to open her heart fully to the Caliphs. Such a thing could wait until she had settled in. For now, establishing a pretext came first.
"It has to be widely known, so we'll need to invite guests. The Caliph vassal houses, of course, and the other carnivore clans as well."
Having said that much, Sabrina stole a glance at Bariya.
"...It isn't a command, of course. The choice is yours. If you hate the thought of being seen, we'll find another way."
If the girl grew overwhelmed and slipped away some night, that would be a disaster, so Sabrina chose her words with the greatest care. Bariya was no longer merely an ally joined to them for revenge against the hyenas. She was a precious benefactor of the Caliph Clan, and they had to protect her.
"As I said before, I'm tired of running."
Bariya swept Sabrina's worry aside in a breath.
"Standing in front of so many people is frightening, of course. But I've already decided to fight the hyenas, so I'll have to overcome that too."
She could do it.
The moment she decided, the faces of the three Caliph beastkin eased as one.
"The sooner the banquet, the better. Let's hold it in a week."
"What do I have to do?"
As if she had ever attended anything like a party. The only one she had known was a modest birthday shared with her mother and no one else. Honestly, she was less afraid than excited.
"All our little one has to do is one thing."
And what's that?
Bariya tilted her head, and Sirka grinned.
All at once, she felt deeply uneasy.
To think this is what I have to do.
From the very next day, Bariya was busy.
"How lovely to see you again so soon, young lady!"
"Hello, Madame."
She exchanged a light greeting with Madame Renouage, the tailor as lively as ever.
Yes. There was exactly one thing she had to do for the banquet.
"Shall we fit you for a banquet gown, then?"
She was to be dressed to the nines.
"You have such fine, soft wheat-gold hair, young lady. I suspect any color would flatter you."
Madame held cloth after cloth against Bariya as she stood still. Pastels suited her, and because her features were so distinct, surprisingly vivid colors did as well.
"Is there a color you prefer?"
At the question, Bariya shook her head. She had never lived a life in which she could freely choose something like a color. Of course she had no favorite.
"Hmm. What shall we do, my lady?"
In the end Madame turned to Sabrina, who stood beside them.
Sabrina did not so much as glance at the colors draped over Bariya. She answered without hesitation.
"Blue."
"Pardon?"
"A very deep, vivid blue."
"As it happens, I have just the thing."
From the cloths she had brought, Madame chose the most expensive and the loveliest blue and wrapped it around Bariya. It was a mysterious shade, nearly navy, yet flashing a brilliant blue wherever the light struck it.
"Mm. Good. White for the ground, that cloth as the main, and embroidery in gold thread. Perfect."
"My, your eye is as superb as ever."
Inspiration already upon her, Madame Renouage fell to sketching like a woman possessed.
"Our little one hates frills, so use lace. Ribbons should be several small ones rather than one large. And the embroidery—something other than flowers."
Sirka studied the sketches and piled on detailed orders of her own.
Bariya was the one who had to wear the dress. She could not understand why Sabrina and Sirka were taking it more seriously than she was.
Do they just like clothes?
Thinking back, the two of them had been the eager ones at the atelier last time as well.
"And what of the ornaments?"
"Ornaments. She's still young. Heavy jewels would be difficult, I think."
Jewels?!
"I don't want jewels!"
Bariya shot to her feet, fists clenched tight.
What if I lose them? How am I supposed to walk around wearing things like that? I don't even have the money to pay anyone back!
"But it would be unthinkable for an honored guest of the Caliph to wear not a single jewel."
Tyreen, who had been standing quietly by, had somehow joined the fray.
"She's right. We'd be wasting the Caliph name."
Not one of them paid Bariya's protest any mind. A necklace far too heavy for a child who still hadn't put on much flesh was out of the question, and so was a ring. Piercing her ears felt wrong as well. That left only one option.
"A pretty hair ornament would be best."
At Tyreen's solemn pronouncement, everyone nodded and put their heads together again.
"What about a truly splendid headdress?"
"Mother, you'll break the child's neck. And it would hide her face. That lovely face deserves to be shown to the whole world—and even that wouldn't be enough."
"Indeed. Then what about a sweet little hat like this?"
"A hat might do for an outing, but not for the first time we present the young lady. What if we tied her hair with a ribbon like this instead?"
"Hmm. Not bad."
The four of them began tying and untying Bariya's hair, deliberating in earnest. Last time they had simply bought ready-made clothes, so she hadn't known. Who would have thought commissioning a single dress could be this complicated?
"Do we really have to go this far?"
She asked it of the others, who had fallen to whispering among themselves again over whatever they had just decided.
"Oh dear, you must be very tired, young lady. Even so, because my lady and the Young Clan Head asked, we've already simplified this as much as we can. We can't cut any more, so please bear with us."
"This is the simple version?!"
Bariya was horrified.
"Yes. A grand banquet held by one of the leading clans is usually prepared a full month in advance."
What on earth did they do, that a single party took a month? Lost in a world she could not begin to understand, Bariya only grew more confused.
Sabrina settled that confusion in a single sentence.
"A banquet is, in the end, another battlefield."
"A battlefield?"
"Which means formal dress and gowns are no different from combat uniforms. You must never wear them carelessly."
Yes, yes. Madame and Tyreen nodded along.
"They are...?"
"We don't come to blows, as a rule. Instead we fight with words for blades. Of course, if things grow heated, the occasional fistfight is permissible."
A battlefield. A combat uniform. Bariya's face turned grave. Whenever the Mariner clan threw a party, the noise had reached all the way down to the room underground. So that was why—it had been a battlefield fought with words!
"Then I can't afford to lose."
Light flashed in her once-slack gaze. If it was a fight, she refused to lose.
"Let's do this!"
"Yes—that's the spirit!"
At the sight of Bariya brimming with determination, everyone smiled with satisfaction and closed in. And so her first combat uniform began, little by little, to take shape.
The Caliph Clan was famous for almost never holding banquets.
Sabrina, the lady of the house who ought to have hosted them, spent fewer than ten days a year at the estate, and none of the direct line cared much for banquets in the first place. At most there was the New Year Assembly, and birthday banquets for the clan head and the young clan head—Sabrina's own was never held at all. The tiger beastkin had been left to console themselves with banquets hosted by other clans.
Then, one day—
The Caliph Clan shall hold a banquet to welcome a precious honored guest. Every vassal house is commanded to attend.
The sudden missive from the Caliphs threw every vassal into an uproar.
"An honored guest of the Caliph!"
The Glossa clan, one of those vassal houses, was no exception.