Chapter 37
By nine o’clock, Caspian’s note was in my boot, my mother’s brooch was tucked inside my coat, and I was carrying the dress box into the east preparation room.
The room sat two corridors beyond Cosima’s, behind a pale door with no number and a handle polished smooth.
Three mirrors stood along the far wall, and a low platform waited in the center of the room, surrounded by urns of wilting Lillies.
Two fitting women stood beside it. The same two who had delivered the dress. They wore the same dark gray dresses and the same trained absence of expression.
Caswell stood by the door.
A narrow table held pins, thread, scissors, a basin no larger than a serving bowl, and a sheet of paper with my name at the top.
The paper bothered me most.
The paper had arrived ready.
Caswell didn’t bother to greet me. He only said, “Place the box on the table, Verita.”
So I did.
One of the women opened it. The other lifted the tissue with gloved hands.
My mother’s dress appeared again: green silk, silver branches, the left sleeve waiting with its bright new band.
The Mark on my wrist throbbed but I kept my hand at my side.
“Remove your coat,” the taller woman said.
“Is Cosima Verraine attending?”
Caswell’s attention shifted to me.
“Verraine has requested attendance.”
“Is she attending?”
“Her request is under review.”
“What a surprise.”
“Remove your coat.”
I didn’t move.
One of the mirrors caught me standing there: ordinary uniform coat, messy hair, chin raised too high because if I lowered it I might collapse completely.
Caswell stepped closer.
“The fitting cannot begin while you are wearing your coat.”
“Then it sounds like we’ll have to wait for Verraine’s attendance to be approved.”
The taller woman set the tissue down.
The shorter one glanced toward the small basin.
Then the door opened.
I didn’t turn fast enough to hide my relief.
Cosima entered first.
Rev came in behind her with a tray of pins in both hands and an expression so mild I had to bite back a laugh that I knew would turn hysterical.
“LeJoi is not assigned to this fitting,” Caswell said.
“She is carrying pins,” Cosima said.
“Any attendant could carry pins.”
“Then you should have no difficulty treating her as the attendant I have chosen to carry the pins.”
Rev lowered the tray onto the table.
“I am very easy to overlook,” she said. “I won’t be a problem.”
Caswell disagreed with every word of that judging by his face but he had the discipline not to say so.
For the first time since I entered, I let myself breathe.
Cosima came to stand beside the table. She wore her ordinary dark dress, her hair pulled cleanly back, her small notebook tucked under one arm. Her attention touched me only briefly before moving to the dress.
“The fitting may proceed,” she said.
Caswell’s mouth tightened.
I finally removed my coat.
Rev took it from me before either fitting woman could reach for it. Her fingers brushed mine, quick and warm.
“Awful room,” she murmured.
“Terrible flowers,” I muttered back.
Then she stepped away and became, with alarming ease, a girl holding a coat on the edges.
The taller woman lifted the dress.
“Arms.”
I raised them and the silk came down over my head.
For one second, everything went green and dark. The fabric slid over my hair, my shoulders, my wrists. It smelled faintly of cedar and something else less pleasant. The stale air of a closed trunk. A life folded away before it had finished being lived.
Then my head came through the collar and the room returned.
The dress was too long.
Too loose at the waist.
Too narrow at the ribs.
It remembered a body I did not have.
My mother’s shape.
The thought hurt in a place I hadn’t braced for.
The mirrors gave me back to myself three times.
In all three, I looked like a girl being dressed as a ghost.
Rev looked away from the mirrors.
She didn’t want to see it either.
“The brooch,” I said.
The shorter fitting woman had been reaching for the left sleeve.
Her hand stopped.
Caswell’s eyes moved to me.
“What brooch?” he asked.
“My mother’s.”
“The brooch is not listed for this fitting.”
“It belongs with the dress.”
“The fitting first,” the taller woman said.
“No.” I looked down at the green silk. “No, I need the brooch.”
My voice broke on the last word, just enough to sound convincing.
Rev shifted behind me, and Cosima looked at me from under her lashes.
“I had it,” I said, panic rising in my voice. “I know I brought it with me.”
Caswell clenched his teeth and stared at me. “Verita, I am sure you left it in your room.”
“It was here. I know it was.”
I let tears fill my eyes. It wasn’t hard. I’d been fighting back tears for days.
The room had to pause then, because grief was one of the few things Zenith Hall still pretended to respect.
Cosima came to the platform.
“Stand still,” she said.
It was almost gentle.
That made it worse.
She turned me by the elbow, as if checking whether the brooch had slipped into the dress or caught in the lining. Her hand moved over the shoulder, the collar, the left sleeve.
Then she stopped.
“What is this?”
Caswell went red along the cheekbones.
“Verraine.”
Cosima ignored him. Her fingers hovered just above the sleeve.
“This is not the original fabric.”
The taller fitting woman’s hand closed around the silk.
Rev leaned in closer.
Caswell stepped toward the platform. “You were asked to attend as documentation, not to interfere.”
“I am documenting.” Cosima opened her notebook with one hand. “The left sleeve contains material inconsistent with the preserved garment.”
“It is reinforcement.”
“Then it should have been listed.”
“It was approved.”
“Then that should have been listed too.”
Caswell’s color deepened.
Cosima held my arm up. Anyone with eyes could see the difference: the faint bright band inside the sleeve, too smooth, too new, waiting exactly where my Mark would rest.
No one could deny it.
Cosima’s pen touched the page.
“Post-storage alteration observed at left wrist,” she said.
Behind me, Rev cleared her throat.
“I found the brooch,” she announced.
I had to press my tongue to the roof of my mouth to keep from smiling.
Rev set it on the tray beside the pins.
The woman at the basin touched the water.
It brightened.
Everyone stopped.
Words formed across the surface.
Proceed with full garment preparation.
The order held in the water, silver and calm.
Cosima stared at Caswell.
“You know exactly what this is,” she accused.
Everyone in the room held their breath, including me.
Caswell’s voice took a warning tone. “Verraine.”
“This is not preservation. It is a restraint.”
The taller fitting woman took one careful step back from me.
Cosima’s pen stayed in her hand, but she was no longer writing.
“You altered Selene Verita’s dress to quiet her daughter’s Mark, and you put it in a room full of witnesses hoping no one would notice.”
Caswell’s color had gone flat and ugly.
“You are very close to refusing a Council instruction, Verraine.”
“No,” Cosima said. “I am following the protocols everyone here respects so much.”
The taller fitting woman reached for the sleeve again.
My Mark moved.
Pain snapped through my wrist.
The woman hissed and jerked her hand back.
A thin red line had risen across her fingertips where she had touched the altered band.
For one second, no one spoke.
Then Cosima’s pen hit the page.
“Mark response observed before sleeve fastening,” she said.
The woman stared at her hand.
Rev reached toward me, too far away to steady me and trying anyway.
Caswell’s gaze landed on the burn.
Then on my wrist.
Then on Cosima’s page.
“Verita,” he said, “will you permit the left sleeve to be fastened?”
“No,” I said.
The small basin flickered.
The word stayed in the room.
Caswell’s gaze went to the water but no new instruction came.
“Record the refusal and complete the fitting without the sleeve fastened,” he growled.
Rev let out the breath she had been pretending not to hold, and Cosima wrote almost feverishly.
The fitting continued.
They pinned the hem. Adjusted the waist. Measured the shoulders. Spoke over me in short, careful sentences that did not mention Marks, quieting, or refusal.
At the end, the dress came off, and Rev helped me into my coat before anyone could offer.
Cosima closed her notebook.
Caswell faced all three of us.
“This fitting is incomplete.”
“And?” I said.
His attention settled on me.
“That will be recorded.”
“Fine.”
Cosima wrote that down too.
Rev picked up the tray of pins.
“Do I need to return these somewhere,” she asked, “or is everyone pretending I was never here?”
No one answered.
“Excellent,” she said. “I prefer to stay off the record.”
Caswell opened the door.
The corridor outside held three students and one faculty woman who had very obviously found a reason to linger outside this specific door.
I hoped they had overheard.
Not because witnesses made me safe.
Because silence had started to feel like another kind of trap.
Rev left the tray sitting by the door and stepped out of the room.
Cosima followed with the notebook.
I came last, carrying my mother’s dress returned to its black box, the left sleeve unfastened and the brooch re-pinned to my coat.
Behind me, the small basin lit again.
No one spoke.
I turned.
The words formed slowly.
Report to Headmaster Quill at noon.
Rev read the water aloud.
Cosima turned to me.
The box suddenly felt heavier in my arms.
“Well,” Rev said softly. “He noticed that.”