A Dress for the Wicked

by Autumn Krause

  The sinks are leaking. Three barstools are too tipsy to use. The stove is broken but functional. Will probably need to be replaced in six months.

  “Of course it’s stressful.” Sophie cut into my thoughts. Impatiently, she tossed her head, making her hair fall over her shoulder. “Secrets always are.”

  “I suppose so.” It came so easily to Sophie. But it wasn’t the same way with me. I’d never kept a secret like this before. I forced the thought away. “Let’s make the most of the night. Have you done any sketches?”

  “I did this one.” Sophie pulled a sketch out from underneath the small cabinet in the corner of her room and handed it to me. She picked up the single candle on her table and held it up so it cast light onto the page. “I think it will go perfectly with the girl-coming-to-the-city theme.”

  Sophie’s lines were thick and slashing, bordering on abstract, but precise enough to understand. Layers of rigid organza formed lines down a full mermaid skirt topped with a military-inspired jacket. The skirt had a long train, and the neckline plunged all the way down to the navel. Sophie had pinned small swatches of fabric to the corners of the sketch, and I ran my fingers over the nude organza and navy corduroy. Goose bumps ran up and down my arms, and I shivered, unsure if I was excited or alarmed.

  “Can people wear such things here?” I’d never heard of a fashion show where so much skin was exposed. Sophie raised a shoulder in a half shrug.

  “Maybe. Maybe not. But it’s beautiful, and it goes with the look. If we are going to stand out, we have to do things that the Fashion House has never done before.”

  “I love it.” The intricacy of the skirt and exaggerated lines of the military jacket were perfect—my girl, the one who came to the city, would wear it as she found her footing and her style.

  “I also did this one.”

  True to Sophie’s look, the second design was also edgy. The gown was made from dark gray lace on a nude lining. The lace had a wide, detailed pattern so that it appeared to climb up the model’s body. The shoulders morphed into points arching above the wearer’s head like black lace wings, showcasing the intricate fabric. I closed my eyes, picturing the piece. It was beautiful, but it could be . . . even more unexpected.

  “What if we made a huge skirt out of netting to go over it?” I asked, my mind brimming with possibilities. “We can use a delicate netting. There won’t actually be an underlay. We’ll just layer hundreds of pieces of netting on top of each other, and eventually it will become opaque.” The design appeared fully formed in my mind, as though it had been there all along, waiting for me to discover it.

  “Yes!” Sophie smile grew even bigger. “It’s perfect!” She started to draw over the sketch, creating a skirt over the slim silhouette.

  As she sketched, the line of—concentration? Annoyance? Displeasure?—disappeared from between her brows. Since it was always present, I’d come to think of it as a beauty mark or freckle, something one couldn’t be rid of.

  “What do you think about while you design?”

  “I think about . . .” She started and then stopped. I waited, listening to the scratch of her pencil across the paper. “My family, my parents. I draw . . . dark things.”

  “Why?” I whispered, almost scared to hear her reply. I didn’t know much about her parents. Just what Kitty had told me long ago—that they were extravagant people who loved attention.

  “There is a bad streak in my family, Emmaline, and it’s inside me as well,” she said. “But sometimes, if you name something or put it down on paper, it’s not as powerful as before.”

  She held the sketch out to me. I looked down at it. In addition to adding the skirt, she had blotted out the figure’s eyes, leaving dark holes that nearly took up the entire face. I shuddered and raised my head. In the dim light, Sophie’s eyes seemed blacked out too.

  Chapter Seventeen

  WE SKETCHED, CUT PATTERNS, and sewed every night for the rest of the week and into the next. We worked in Sophie’s fitting room on her sewing machine during the night and then, because customers came to her room during the day, we brought the pieces up to our chamber and hid them under our beds. It seemed like we were always rushing up the stairs with the pieces stored in our sewing caddies, or back down to work on them in the fitting room, all while we prepared our wedding gowns for Lady Harrison’s viewing.

  Sometimes the stress and exhaustion made me want to scream. Other times, it seemed to be the only thing inspiring me to sew another stitch.

  “You look tired, Sophie,” I said. She was hemming the duchess’s gown while I worked on a skirt for the collection. We’d brought both pieces up to hide before Tilda came in to tidy up, but decided to take a few more minutes to work before we put them under the bed. For once, Tilda’s neglect of my side of the room worked in our favor.

  Sophie’s creative output seemed to have turned her inside out. Her cheekbones were pronounced, and her eyes were bloodshot.

  “I’m fine,” she said. I paused to stretch my fingers. They were numb from sewing for hours, except for my thumb, which was raw from forcing needles through thread. I’d finally started wearing a thimble, but it only served to inflame my finger further.

  I pulled the skirt I’d created for our collection over the head of a mannequin, painstakingly working it inch by inch to get it down over the shoulders. I handled the charcoal-gray charmeuse delicately, trying to maintain its sharp pleats. It had taken me hours to iron them one at a time with a lead iron and a measuring tape.

  Carefully, I added the next part of my look: a leather corset. It was easy to put on the mannequin because it closed via a series of gray ribbons in the back. I tied it on and stepped back to look. It gleamed just like the tackle and saddles for the workhorses back in Shy.

  “It’s seven,” Sophie said. We lifted our sore necks and aching heads from our work to look at the clock Sophie had brought into our chamber from her fitting room. Its hands were exaggerated curlicues, so it almost appeared that the time could be eight, seven, or nine. I peered hard. Seven. We’d worked through breakfast. Francesco had squeezed one final fitting in for me this morning before I’d have to change for my press duties—my first appointment in a while—so we’d both be needed downstairs. This was the second time we’d worked through breakfast, and I wondered if anyone had noticed our absence. Suspicion was the last thing we needed.

  The thought of removing my gown from the dress form was almost too much, but I couldn’t leave it out. I unlaced the corset and then gently eased the skirt off. I folded both items up, praying it wouldn’t undo the pleats in the skirt, and slid them under my bed where they would rest next to the other finished and half-finished pieces.

  I found a pair of heels beneath my vanity and slipped them on, even though the red flowers painted onto their toes clashed with my gown.

  I peered into the mirror, trying to straighten my hair. I almost didn’t recognize my reflection. Dark circles were forming underneath my eyes. My skin was ashy and thin, pulled tight over the bones underneath. I sighed and followed Sophie out of our chamber and down the stairs.

  Later on today, we were scheduled to present our wedding gowns to Lady Harrison. We both had barely managed to finish our dresses. Before, I would’ve agonized over every decision, falling into a tizzy of stress about whether Lady Harrison would like it. But now I was consumed by my own collection and Cynthia’s gown. Lady Harrison’s dress was just a far-off thought, something I only saw in terms of maintaining the appearance of normality. The challenges that had held such power over me no longer did.

  “I love it, don’t you?” Sophie’s voice was low in my ear as we joined the other contestants heading down the hallway.

  “What?”

  “All of this. Designing. Even the secrets.” Her smile looked severe against her bloodshot eyes and pale skin. I almost grimaced at the sight.

  “Well . . .” I trailed off. We’d been sewing so much. Everything was a blur: the fabric pieces I’d handled, the need
les I’d threaded, and the sketches I’d redone over and over and over again. Every other part of my life seemed like a distant dream—even Tristan.

  But my designs weren’t just paper and plans anymore. They were real. I’d made them real. And, like a real established fashion line, we would have a famous client wear one of our looks, and the press would review our collection.

  “I do.” I couldn’t lie. “I love it, too.”

  We walked the rest of the way down to the fitting rooms with heavy, fatigued steps. I passed by the schedule posted on the hallway, hardly bothering to glance at it. Francesco had told me yesterday that I had just the one final fitting, so I only gave it a cursory glance.

  But as my eyes passed over it, my name leaped out at me. Usually my name was toward the end, alphabetized by my surname. This time it was at the top.

  MADAME JOLÈNE:

  6:00 A.M. APPOINTMENT: HRH AMELIA/WINTER COAT PREVIEW—NO ASSISTANCE NEEDED

  7:30 A.M. APPOINTMENT: PRIVATE CLIENT—ATTENDING CONTESTANTS: SOPHIE STERLING AND EMMALINE WATKINS

  I blinked at the list. Just a week or so ago, seeing my name at the top of the schedule would have thrilled me. Now, my heart sank all the way down to those horrid red heels. Maybe I had made a huge mistake. Madame Jolène was giving me a chance after all.

  “Well, let’s go. We don’t want to be late.” Sophie was standing behind me, looking over my shoulder. She gestured toward the stairs at the opposite end of the hallway. They weren’t the ones we’d just come down. Instead, they led to Madame Jolène’s private fitting rooms.

  The blue-and-green carpeted steps leading up to Madame Jolène’s rooms stifled our footsteps. If it wasn’t for the dread in my stomach, I would’ve felt like I was floating. “Sophie?”

  “What?”

  “Do you think what we are doing is . . . wrong?”

  I could only see part of her profile. She started to climb the stairs a little faster, her hand gliding up the banister.

  “Of course.” She spoke without hesitation.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Well, it is wrong.”

  “Then why do you do it?”

  “Have you ever seen one of those hedge mazes, Emmaline?” Sophie asked. “The really tall ones?”

  “No. But I know what they are . . .”

  “Well, some of those mazes are cut in such a way that no matter which turn you take, you will always end up in the middle. You can turn right. You can turn left. It doesn’t change anything.” She stopped on the stairs and turned to face me. A few steps above me, she towered over my head. Somehow, she no longer looked tired. “That’s me, Emmaline. It doesn’t matter which way I turn. I’ll always be like this.”

  Our rector at church had always said that nothing was predetermined. It was up to us, he said, to choose who we wanted to be. Grace was just as accessible to us as evil. Yet I understood Sophie. There was a strange streak in her . . . and it seemed like there was one in me, too, one I’d never known existed until now. I gripped the banister, suddenly wanting to undo everything I had done. Sophie held out a hand to me, seeming to sense my uneasiness.

  “Come,” she said. “Madame Jolène is waiting.”

  I took her hand. As always, it was icy cold.

  Madame Jolène’s private fitting rooms were on the highest floor, next to her personal chambers. Sophie was the only Fashion House Interview candidate who had seen them before, and she entered with practiced ease, immediately striding over to a dark-gray fainting couch and sitting down. I hesitated at the threshold before walking over to stand next to her.

  “Where is Madame Jolène?”

  “She’ll come when she’s ready,” Sophie said. “She never waits for anyone. We always wait for her.”

  The walls were covered in dark wood panels. Floor-to-ceiling windows opened to views of the perfumery’s fourth floor directly across the street. A row of gowns arranged in a gradient of length and formality hung on a gold rolling rack, and an army of mannequins stood nearby in an orderly line. While our rooms had cotton forms, the ones in Madame Jolène’s were silk taffeta with mahogany bases.

  There was only one mirror in the room, a bold choice. Usually, customers demanded a trifold mirror and a large handheld mirror to see the front, back, and sides of the gowns. It appeared Madame Jolène did not cater to that desire.

  Everything was oriented around the dresses, aside from a table scape of gilded birdcages, the only decoration in the room. The cages were empty and the doors stood open.

  “I was expecting more opulence.” I thought about the Fashion House’s lavish wallpapered and chandeliered lobby. “This is so bare.”

  “This way there is nothing to distract anyone,” Sophie said. “The focus is on the gowns.”

  Madame Jolène, it seemed, let her art speak for itself.

  “Good morning, girls.” Madame Jolène swept in from the side room, bringing with her a spicy aroma of patchouli. She wore a navy-blue gown that had shiny jet buttons stretching in a long, ant-like line up the skirt to the bodice and wrapping all the way around the collar. Her measuring tape hung around her neck, her permanent replacement for a necklace.

  She was carrying a standard Fashion House sketchbook and, just before she turned her attention to it, her eyes swept over both of us. The tiny muscles around her mouth tensed, and then released. It happened so fast I almost wondered if I’d imagined it. The sight, as brief as it was, made my stomach clench and twist.

  “Good morning, Madame Jolène,” Sophie said, rising from her spot on the fainting couch. If she was nervous, it didn’t show.

  “Good morning, Madame Jolène,” I repeated.

  “We will be having a forty-minute consultation today,” she said, preoccupied with the sketchbook.

  “Is it an initial consultation?” Sophie asked. I didn’t understand how she was so calm, especially now with our secret collection well on its way to completion.

  “Yes. We will take basic measurements and discuss the client’s needs,” Madame Jolène said. Typically, when she made her rounds of the fitting rooms or previewed our work in the sewing room, she was brisk and annoyed at our incompetence. But today in her own chambers she was animated; her tight brow lines of disapproval were gone, and her steps were light.

  “Ah! Here she is now!” Madame Jolène set the sketchbook down as the doors to the fitting room swung open. I turned to see the client, a polite expression fixed on my face.

  Cynthia?

  Her name leaped to the tip of my tongue, and I barely stopped it from escaping. I was seeing things. A woman had entered, and I had transformed her face into Cynthia’s. I was exhausted. That was the only explanation.

  Next to me Sophie sucked in her breath sharply and didn’t let it out.

  “Cynthia, welcome,” Madame Jolène said, extending her hand. I blinked, desperate to change reality, but she was still there. Cynthia. Our Cynthia, whose gown was the centerpiece to our new line.

  “Thank you, Madame Jolène,” she replied. “It has been too long.”

  She sashayed forward, reaching out to take Madame Jolène’s hand. As she did, she looked over at me, and a small smile quirked her lips.

  “Please, sit.” Madame Jolène motioned Cynthia toward two chairs opposite the fainting couch. They both settled onto the furniture, their skirts spreading out over the upholstery, their faces masked in courteous smiles.

  On the surface, they epitomized their roles perfectly: wealthy Fashion House customer and powerful Fashion House owner meeting for an appointment. But things stood out to me—the way Madame Jolène had them take the chairs facing us, how Cynthia didn’t seem surprised to see us—and the tightening in my stomach turned into churning.

  Cold fingers suddenly curled around mine. Sophie. She raised a shoulder in an imperceptible shrug and shook her head.

  Stop, she was saying. Calm down.

  Her eyes were empty and her mouth was firm. I tried to mirror her expression and subdue the whirlpool of thou
ghts in my head. If I didn’t, I’d say something that would give us away. Ever so slightly, I took a step back so I was standing shoulder to shoulder with Sophie. Whatever happened, I needed her by my side.

  “It’s been quite some time,” Madame Jolène said. “Have you been well?”

  “Yes, thank you.” Cynthia’s voice was clear, strong, and slightly smug.

  I didn’t even recognize her. In the morning light, she looked nothing like the drunken woman who had met us outside the gala in the rain. For the first time, I noticed her eyes were green, not brown. They were piercingly alert as she leaned forward on the edge of her chair, as though waiting for something.

  “Who has been handling your fashion?” Madame Jolène asked. Even though Cynthia was a titled, affluent woman, Madame Jolène ran her eyes over her clothing as though she was no more significant than one of us contestants. A flicker of annoyance flashed over Cynthia’s face, but she answered with poise.

  “I have a private dressmaker.”

  “Ah,” Madame Jolène said. “A seamstress. That makes sense.”

  “I beg your pardon?” Cynthia asked.

  “Oh,” Madame Jolène said insouciantly, “I was just noticing your outfit. It’s very well made. In fact, I dare say it’s perfect.”

  “Thank you,” Cynthia said. This time, she faltered just a little and her brows furrowed, confused at the compliment. She glanced down at her cowl-neck, rose-print dress.

  “It’s so hard to find good seamstresses.” Madame Jolène was not done. “Then again, I wouldn’t know very much about that. I never hire experienced seamstresses here. Certainly, I hire girls who sew and train them in the art. I’ve discovered seamstresses are good for, well, copying outfits. They hardly have the imagination to design their own. But yours did a wonderful job replicating my gown.”