Demi was so surprised by her sudden translocation that she landed with a whump on her behind.
The ground underneath her was a little uncomfortable, hard and somewhat dusty. She appeared to be at the edge of an open area with dry, swaying grasses. An optimist might have called it a meadow, but it felt a bit too desiccated to qualify for that word as it was currently. She seemed to be at the thin edge of a woodland.
When she looked down at her hands, she realized that she was still tightly gripping the prettily embroidered cloth napkin from Hollyhope’s table, along with the first volume of The Shadowstep Alchemist.
Well, Shadowstep Alchemist, it looks like it’s just you and me now, she thought weakly. I do feel bad about running off with the first volume though. I hope Hollyhope won’t be too upset about it.
She stood up and dusted herself off, tucking the book and napkin into the pocket of her dress for safekeeping.
Upon her arrival in Hollyhope’s “weekend getaway cottage,” the goddess had kindly provided her with a change of clothing more suited to their discussion than a pair of pajamas. Demi wasn’t sure where her original pajamas had gone, as Hollyhope had accomplished this feat with a sparkle of magic.
(It had had the feeling of a magical girl transformation. Demi had already put “learning how to change her clothes like a magical girl” high on her list of priorities as a fledgling Harvest Goddess.)
The clothes that Hollyhope had furnished her with had likely been to her taste, and they ended up being to Demi’s taste as well. She had a calf-length skirt made out of a soft and durable material over a pair of frilled leggings that approached her knees. They gave the appearance of being something like pantaloons, but they felt more like pajamas, which was something Demi could absolutely appreciate. For socks, she had pretty clocked stockings with ribbon garters that went to just above her knees. Her blouse was fitted, given structure by delicate pintucks down the front and small pearl buttons carved in the shape of flowers. There was extravagant ribbon embroidery down both of her sleeves, a line of crimson flowers over crisscrossing silk trim. Her cuffs were fitted at the wrist, but belled gently with frills that were tied with red ribbons.
Her dress was quite folksy and trachten in its style.
Ahh, I look like a maiden from the Alps, she thought to herself, turning around in a circle. I feel like I ought to sing a song to the mountainside.
The dress was predominantly a rich hunter green with a fitted bodice trimmed with red piping and the delicate embroidery of roses, clover blossoms, and woodland flowers like forget-me-nots, wood sorrel, and daisies. Five gleaming red buttons in the shape of four-leaf clovers ran down the front, and a robust Tyrollean ribbon was tied in a bow at her throat, with a red rose brooch pinned to the center.
The dress’s pendulum skirt was a confection unto itself, a profusion of frills, ruffles, pintucks, and picot edging. It also had two very ample hidden pockets, big enough to hold light novels, chocolates, accidentally purloined napkins, and other sundries a girl might find herself in possession of.
She even had a very practical half apron, or well, it was practical in the sense that it was an apron, at least. It was embroidered with roses and clover and ornamented into the stratosphere with ruffles, two different kinds of jacquard ribbon, flowery lace, and rickrack trim.
Roses and clover were Hollyhope’s primary motif, and it seemed as if they were bound to be Demi’s as well. Fortunately for the both of them, Demi approved of Hollyhope’s design sense. Perhaps that was to be expected. Hollyhope had insisted that she and Demi were simply different versions of one another. According to her, they were closer even than identical twins. It was probably understandable that they liked the same kinds of things: the same kinds of colors, the same kinds of patterns, and the same kinds of cuts when it came to dresses.
They even had similar sensibilities in footwear. Her new shoes were very reasonable work boots that came to mid-calf, two tone in chocolate and milk tea, with scalloped trim and little flower patterns in the decorative brogue cutwork. The toe boxes were large and rounded, giving good stability, and the soles were hobnailed. Of course, the laces danced heedlessly into the fanciful: red ribbons with pompom tips tied into generous bows. The best things were both lovely and functional.
Of course, for all the similarities in their sartorial sensibilities, there were some differences in the details. Hollyhope’s decorative roses were pink while Demi’s were red. In general, Demi’s color scheme was deeper and more jewellike than Hollyhope’s had been. Demi’s dress was a deep, saturated green, and the ribbons that trimmed her skirt were a beautiful cardinal red. Hollyhope had favored lighter colors: aquamarine and Persian greens, apricot, and of course, rosy pink.
That suited Hollyhope well, given her mass of almost luminous milky-jade-green hair. Demi’s own hair and very fair skin made her more suited to jewel tones, and this was one reason she favored them in her own wardrobe. But the truth was, Demi simply loved colors, and she loved beautiful clothes. They weren’t simply pretty things to wear. They were armor, and her own kind of defiance. They were courage and joy, a way of becoming the self that a person aspired to be, even when they found themselves lacking. Clothes were practical magic, and Demi adored them.
Given their similarities, Demi suspected that Hollyhope had taken extra care in preparing Demi’s clothing for a very good reason (beyond the fact that she had probably thoroughly enjoyed herself in putting together the coordinates, just as Demi herself would have).
Ultimately, a very pretty set of clothing was good bribery to make up for the fact that Hollyhope had dumped her down on the planet without adequate time to prepare for, well, anything.
Just then an incredible thought occurred to her.
I wonder if I’ll be able to make clothes like this at some point? Demi wondered with vaguely suppressed delight.
It was enough to make her do a little hop dance, turning around in place.
She loved imagining and sketching out dresses on drawing paper or even the blank pages of her lesson books, but she was not particularly good at sewing nor was she patient enough to embroider. She hoped that the process for creating clothes in this place was more gamelike than reality-like. Demi always had a robust wardrobe in any games where that was even a remote possibility.
Her impromptu dance had caused her hair to swish out behind her. She reached back to smooth it lightly. The top part of it had been pulled into a pollyanna that was adorned with some sort of ribbon. This was a way she commonly wore her hair when she wasn’t wearing a hat that precluded it. It had been nice of Hollyhope to take her habits into account. Perhaps it would have been more expedient to braid the mass of it, but Demi honestly preferred to have it loose down her back, although she did braid it fully when it was absolutely necessary.
It was a lot of hair to braid, after all. She usually ended up looking like Rapunzel by the end of it.
Although she didn’t have a wide-brimmed straw farmer’s hat, she did have a head covering. There was a neat, frilled kerchief over her head that she assumed was there to keep her hair from going absolutely everywhere, but a stray strand was still sticking out from it, curled into a question mark that was a good barometer for her feelings at any given time.
Perhaps overalls or trousers might have been more practical for a farm girl, but there had to be some perks for being a goddess, right? Demi had long ago resolved that looking cute was nonnegotiable.
Fortunately it seemed that some inherent goddess blessings were in effect over her current clothes. Although her work boots were extremely cute, they also felt very sturdy and comfortable, and despite the fact that she wasn’t wearing a petticoat, her dress behaved as if she were, taking on a very nice shape, and keeping itself out of her way. And perhaps most miraculous of all, her great mass of curls seemed contained and managed by nothing more than the kerchief on her head and the ribbon in her hair.
Cute shoes that were also comfortable and a skirt that looked nice and yet stayed out of the way were truly the blessings of a goddess, to say nothing of the magic that went into containing her massive amount of hair.
Still, although she was quite satisfied by her current coordinates, Demi did hope that her pajamas hadn’t been lost entirely. They had been favorites of hers, fluffy and well suited for autumn weather.