by Miya Kazuki
“What?! You’re not gonna sell them?! What the hell are you thinking, Myne?!” Benno blew up at me while I was wondering if the orphanage’s winter handiwork would be enough to earn my money back. I jerked in fear and blinked multiple times.
“It’s not that complicated, Benno. I won’t be able to use them as textbooks if I sell them.”
“Why would you make something you won’t sell?! They’ll make big money, sell them!”
“No way! I’m going to use them as textbooks! And they’re a wonderful investment for the future since they’ll raise the literacy rate! I’m just planting the seeds to grow future customers here.”
This winter would be an important time for seeing how well holding school sessions in the orphanage would go. I wouldn’t sell my textbooks before the big moment. Really, I wanted to buy as many stone slates and calculators as I could get my hands on. But despite my best attempts to explain myself, Benno just shook his head with an exhausted expression.
“I just don’t get you.”
“In the first place, we don’t know how well people will take to these picture books, do we? I think that religious stories haven’t really worked their way into the mainstream since most people just hear them at the temple once or twice and then that’s it. At that point it would be better for me to just make new picture books more suited for the public and sell those instead. We would make way more money that way.” I would rather start making new picture books that could sell than let Benno take away my textbooks.
“New picture books?” said Benno, interested.
“You’ve already thought of the next story?” asked Lutz.
Both Benno and Lutz looked pretty surprised, but I had a huge stash of stories hidden away in my head. It’s just that not all of them matched the art that Wilma could draw.
“I think that a story about a princess could work, since Wilma served a noble that was basically like a princess. I’ll write down a rough draft and see what the High Priest thinks before making it into a picture book.”
It shouldn’t be too hard to make a picture book based on Cinderella. Sister Christine would probably be a good model for basing the princess on. The prince could be... Well, since all attendants accompanied their masters to the Noble’s Quarter during the Star Festival, Wilma would probably figure something out. She must have seen someone princely in her time there.
“Guess we can talk about this once it’s made. So, how much do I gotta pay for this book?”
“That’s a gift from me to you for all your help, so no money necessary. But, well...” I looked up at Benno, faltering, and his lips curved into a slight grin.
“What do you need this time?”
“I want to go shopping for winter clothes the next day Tuuli has off. Please take us to a secondhand clothing store.”
“Yeah, sure. I’ll make sure Mark or I have time that day. Anything else?” asked Benno, prompting me to take out and open my diptych.
“This is about butchering the pig meat in the orphanage, but we’ll need salt and spices, right? What should I get ready, and how much? I don’t know anything about butchering since I’ve always been stuck in bed when it happens, but since it’s the first time the orphanage will be doing it, we need to get the tools and everything ready.”
“That’ll cost you. Do you have enough?” Benno narrowed his eyes at me. I looked back at his dark-red eyes and gave a firm nod.
“I’m prepared to dump all my trombe paper earnings on this.” I had established the workshop in the temple to improve the lives of those in the orphanage. Far be it for me to worry about spending the money on its intended purpose, not to mention that the money was earned by their labor in the first place.
“Alright. I’ll get what you need. But to be clear, I’m gonna be putting the men over there to work. My staff can’t do everything on their own.”
“That’s fair. Oh, and how are my ceremonial robes coming along?”
“Right. Corinna was saying that she wanted to do a first fitting with you.” Benno stood up immediately and went to his desk. There he rang a bell to summon a maid, who he asked for Corinna’s plans.
“If you’ve got time, Myne, go over to Corinna’s today.”
The servant said that she would summon me when everything was ready, then went back upstairs.
“You can get back to work if you need to, Benno. That’s all I had to talk about.” Benno, as the head of a successful store with a lot of logistics to keep track of, was especially busy as the time for winter preparations approached. I couldn’t ask him to entertain me forever despite our discussion having ended.
I discussed the story of Cinderella with Lutz while waiting and started writing out the text to my next picture book. Eventually, I heard a bell ringing somewhere. Benno looked up, told Lutz to take me to Corinna, then looked back down. Lutz took me through the door in the back of Benno’s office and up the stairs to where Corinna lived.
“Mrs. Corinna, it’s Lutz. I’ve brought Myne.”
“Hello there, Myne. And thank you, Lutz.” After watching Lutz leave, I looked at Corinna. She was wearing looser clothing than last time, a style that wasn’t tight around her belly. That made her belly look a little bigger than it might have otherwise. Good to see things are going well.
“This embroidery is quite lovely, isn’t it?” Corinna had drawn large lines for cutting the blue cloth, along which flowed embroidered water with flowers of all seasons stitched in as well.
“It’s so pretty...”
“Now, this is for your first fitting. Please try it out. I want to see if there will be a problem with the length.”
I put on a first fitting outfit made from different cloth than the actual outfit. It fit me perfectly, which made sense given that she made such precise measurements before. But a perfect fit meant that I would grow out of the robes in no time if she made them at this size. See? I am getting bigger! Eheheh.
“Corinna, I would like for you to make it longer than this. I would like to have leeway to fold the hem and such so that I can keep wearing them even after growing.” I grabbed the hem of my skirt and folded it up, which made Corinna tilt her head.
“As you did with your baptism ceremony outfit? But would such frills be welcome on ceremonial robes?”
“I only did that so I could wear clothes made for Tuuli, but it’s the same idea. You can’t really sew on new cloth to make it longer after you’ve cut it short, right? You don’t have to make frills from the folds. You can just take the hem, shoulders, and so on, then fold and sew them.” I spoke while squeezing my sleeve, which made Corinna blink in confused surprise.
“Why not just order another one when this one no longer fits? One must consider changing fashions, and ill-fitting clothes won’t look as pretty.”
Kimonos for kids had tucks in the waists and shoulders so they could keep wearing them while growing, but in general the style here was to sell clothes that couldn’t fit to buy new ones. Long-term use wasn’t viewed as important. But I begged to disagree.
“That’s what nobles would do, maybe. They can just buy as many of these expensive outfits as they want, no matter how much they grow.”
It was just coincidence that Benno had given some of his best cloth to the temple as a gift. I had skated by just paying for the dyeing and the commission itself, but in the future I would need to custom order cloth to be woven from thread, which would balloon costs enormously. I didn’t have the money to buy pair after pair of ceremonial clothing that required extremely expensive fabric.
“...A fair point. It seems my sense of context has been skewed since l only ever use this expensive cloth when making clothes for nobles. You are indeed not a noble, Myne.”
“I don’t think fashion trends will matter much for a simple pair of ceremonial robes, so please focus on making them long-lasting.”
Corinna nodded with understanding. “In that case, could you teach me those methods you were discussing? Do you know how to fold the clothing
in a way that does not harm the appearance?”
After that we talked about how broad to make the tucks and how to make the outfit long lasting, which marked the end of my first fitting. Oh no...! I think Tuuli might cry if I tell her I had my first fitting without her.
Cinderella and a Book for the High Priest
I needed to change into my blue robes once arriving at my chambers in the temple, but I wasn’t allowed to change on my own. Delia would throw a tantrum whenever I tried. I had to bend and extend my arms as she pulled the robes over me.
At the start, our cooperation was so poor that it would have been a lot faster for me to change on my own, which was reasonably frustrating. But lately it was going pretty smoothly. Maybe I’m finally learning to act like a rich girl now, I thought while Delia did my hair with lowered eyes.
“It was even more splendid than I imagined,” she murmured, but I had no idea what she was talking about. I said “What?” with clear confusion, and she glared at me with her light-blue eyes narrowed.
“Geez! The picture book you asked me to read first! You’re the one who said you wanted to hear my thoughts on it, Sister Myne!”
“Oh, the picture book. I just wasn’t sure what you were talking about for a moment. Thank you for your thoughts. Did you read it all the way to the end? You must have made a lot of progress with your letters.” As far as I knew, Delia was studying on her own and thus learning to read a fair bit slower than Gil. I honestly didn’t expect her to finish the whole book so quickly.
“...I had Gil help a little. He showed me the karuta.”
The thought of Delia wanting to read the book so bad that she asked her rival Gil for help made me smile. As I was grinning to myself, Rosina entered the conversation with a somewhat stern expression.
“Sister Myne, please finish your discussion post haste so that we may begin our harspiel practice. There is not much time.”
“What’s wrong, Rosina? You look a bit tense.”
“The High Priest has instructed you to perform the second song during your meeting.” Rosina’s answer explained everything. Of course me playing in front of the High Priest would make her tense.
“I suppose I will need to take practice especially seriously for a bit, then. When is the meeting?”
“After lunch,” she replied. The lack of a date made me extremely uncomfortable.
“Um, Rosina. After lunch on what day?”
“Today. The meeting is after lunch today.”
According to Fran, who read the letter sent in reply, the High Priest would soon need to travel to a nearby farming town for the Harvest Festival. He wanted to finish our meeting now while he still had the time. I appreciated the fast assistance, but I wasn’t emotionally ready to play the song yet.
“Panicking is not very graceful, Sister Myne. Please take care not to show others the fear in your heart.”
After practicing nonstop like a madwoman until third bell, I went to the High Priest’s room and assisted his paperwork until fourth bell with a completely casual expression, silently signaling to him that I wasn’t nervous about playing the song at all. Once that was done I scarfed down lunch and resumed my blisteringly intense practice with Rosina until the very last moment. I would hope that my behind-the-scenes labor is appreciated.
I was in fact getting better thanks to taking my practice seriously, but playing in front of someone still made me nervous. Especially since this time I had to play a song of my own—one I remembered from my Urano days. It was originally a romance movie’s theme song, but I changed it to a classic song I used to sing in music class. Translating the lyrics directly was a nightmare, but making up lyrics of my own was just too hard. I changed the lyrics bit by bit each practice session, and Rosina always got exasperated when I started humming out the English lyrics directly.
“You will be fine if you just stay calm,” advised Delia. “You’re better at it than I am, Sister Myne.”
“Thank you, Delia. I will do my best.”
Delia encouraged me as I went to the High Priest’s room with Fran carrying my children’s bible and the text for Cinderella, and Rosina carrying my small harspiel.
“My apologies for the short notice. Now, allow me to hear how much you have improved,” said the High Priest with a flat expression that spoke volumes about how sincere his apology really was. He gestured towards the table in the center of the room. I took my harspiel from Rosina and rested it between my thighs before taking a deep breath.
With my heart beating so hard I could feel it in my ears, I played the assigned song, then sang “Under the Spreading Chestnut Tree,” a classic children’s song. I went ahead and swapped out “chestnut tree” for a more local tree to avoid suspicion. The High Priest nodded at both songs, giving me very high praise.
“You’re quite the fast learner. Here is the next song for you to learn. And I must say, I found the song you composed to be very interesting. Prepare another for next time.”
I looked over the sheet music he gave me. It was depressingly hard, but I was mainly just relieved to have survived this encounter.
“Here you are, Rosina.” I handed Rosina my harspiel and reached out for the tea Arno had prepared. Tea always tastes better after a stressful event. The High Priest did the opposite and set his tea cup back on the table, having finished it while listening to me play.
“Now then. You said you finished your children’s bible?”
“Yes. Here is the picture book.” I looked at Fran, who nodded and smoothly presented the picture book to the High Priest. He looked at it and tapped a finger against his temple.
“This, a book? What have you done to the cover?” The High Priest largely remained expressionless when we weren’t in the hidden room, but his sharp tone made it clear he wasn’t impressed. What about that cover would make him mad?
“What have I done...? It’s just paper.”
“I can see that. Why is there a flower in the paper?”
“Um, because I put it there?”
“I could guess that. I am questioning why you put it there.” The High Priest’s voice sharpened further with frustration due to my failure to give him the answers he wanted. I had no idea why his mood was plummeting like that. Benno thought the flower would please the daughters of nobles, but maybe it was actually banned to put flowers in paper.
“I put it there because it looks cuter with a flower. Is there a problem with that?”
“Because it’s cuter...? No, that is not what I... Nevermind. Follow me.” The High Priest shook his head with sheer disbelief, then stood up and headed to the hidden room beside his bed. I stood up too, just as confused.
“Sister Myne, take this.” Fran hurriedly held out the paper with my Cinderella story written on it. I thanked him and took it from him, then followed the High Priest through the doorway.
The hidden room was as messy as ever. I went to the same bench as always. When I started moving aside the documents on the bench, I realized that they might be the legendary magic documents themselves.
“Stop. I believe I told you not to look at those.” The High Priest noticed what I was trying to do and pulled the documents out of my hand, stacking them on his desk. No doubt all the documents on his desk pertained to magic. I looked around the room, and oddly enough it felt like an entirely new place now. The High Priest furrowed his brow while bringing over his chair.
“Do not get distracted either.”
“Sorry. So... what are we doing here?”
“I was asking you how you fit a flower into paper. I won’t force the answer out of you if it’s a trade secret, but you must admit that putting flowers into paper is strange.”
“I don’t think so. You just scatter them into the pulp when swishing it around.”
“...You scatter them?” The High Priest didn’t understand me at all, not even when I wiggled my fingers to act out scattering flowers over a suketa. Only then did I realize the High Priest was only familiar with parchment, paper made
from animal skin. Of course flowers in paper would be strange if you only knew how to make parchment. Wrapping flowers within a tangle of fiber just wasn’t possible with parchment.
“Well, plant paper is made in an entirely different way from parchment, so if you really want to know, you’ll probably want to watch it being made in the workshop.”
“Indeed, that would be for the best. It is impossible to glean anything from your explanations.” The High Priest gave up on getting an answer from me and crossed his legs, putting the children’s bible onto his lap. He opened the front page, and upon seeing the first illustration immediately grimaced and glared at me.
“Books are works of art. They must be beautiful, with gold and gems in their leather covers and their pages filled with color. This book has little value as art. You are wasting this high-quality art by leaving it in black and white. Add color.”
It seemed that the High Priest viewed books as works of art created by calligraphers who provide beautiful writing, artists that provide illustrations, and leather craftsmen who provide the covers. Thinking back to the books I had seen in the book room, I could understand what he was getting at.
“Adding color would be the waste here. Just how much money do you think that would cost? I’m going to use these to teach the orphanage kids to read. I would rather make more than add color to some.”
“Books are works of art, and each is one of a kind. I don’t understand what you are saying,” said the High Priest, and I wanted to shoot that right back at him. And so I did, without really thinking about it.
“I don’t understand what you are saying, High Priest. Books aren’t just works of art, they’re crystallizations of knowledge and wisdom. I’m not trying to make art to look at here, I’m trying to mass produce affordable books that everyone can read.”
“Mass produce? You intend to make people write them en masse? That could work if you teach all the orphanage children to read, but it will still take a staggering amount of time to produce that many books.” The High Priest rubbed his temples and tapped his fingers, bemused. But I was focused on printing, not the kind of mass production he was thinking of that would take forever.