Almost

Chapter 39: Calculated

It had been a long Friday with Picquery. Ezra had refused to take the whole week off work, leaving Katherine and the auror to travel to London alone for a dress fitting. Under normal circumstances, it would have been fun, and she'd have appreciated his assurance that Crawley would like her dress as much as she did. But he still wasn't really speaking to her. She didn't quite know why—they'd bickered before, even worse than their standoff about the tempering—but she wouldn't force him to speak to her. Even though she had planned on filling him in, at least to some degree, about what she'd found in the logbook.

He'd waited in the front without her asking, pretending to peruse while she was sure he was actually scouting out exit paths, points of attack, and the few other shoppers milling from robe to robe.

Madame Malkin, on the other hand, was all chitter. She hemmed and hawed and fussed over tiny stitches that Katherine would have never noticed.

The fabric hadn't come in from France yet, but where it did fall, down her arms, it practically danced in the light. Gone were the halter straps, replaced by thin a thin seam that met the organza and bridged it to the bodice. And where it met the silk of the dress, the movement of the vining leaves took on a gentleness, a subtlety, that seemed so perfect. The cuffs, the buttons, the movement all made the dress powerfully her.

"How do you feel about the height of this neckline?" Madame Malkin asked. "I almost wish it scooped just a touch more. Maybe even squared off at the sides."

Katherine watched as the woman adjusted and pinned and corrected the fabric until it fell to the middle of her sternum. It wasn't quite round, wasn't quite square, and for some reason  something about it made her think of Pride and Prejudice.

"I like that," Katherine said, smoothing the skirt. "Any word on the fabric?"

"I've twisted some arms, and I think we'll be in luck. Final thoughts on a veil?"

Katherine looked in the mirror as Madame Malkin brought in other organzas. Too many organzas.

She couldn't help it—they all looked the same. And the minute differences she could see didn't have a clear benefit. She sighed, rolled her eyes, and gritted her teeth.

"Picquery?"

He came waltzing around the corner, holding a pair of Hogwarts robes in his hands as he did and muttering something about how the pockets compared with Illvermorny's.

But when he looked up, he stopped in his tracks. Then covered his eyes with his hand.

"You said you didn't want anyone to see the dress," he protested, turning around on his heels.

"I need someone with an opinion," she said, staring at him in the mirror. "Turn around, you look ridiculous. I'm not going to blind you; I need you to look at organzas. They all look the same to me."

"Okay, but if you decide later—"

"Do you promise not to tell Crawley anything you see here today?"

"Yes."

"Then please turn around and help me."

Her voice let up on the last words, an undeniable plea. So, he turned slowly and let his hand down from his face, walking quickly to the fabrics without looking too hard at her save a few glimpses at the fabric she already wore.

"We can either do a plain veil, a veil with this pattern embroidered, or a veil that is all this fabric," she said, gesturing to her sleeve. "What do you think?"

He looked the options over. "Embroidered," he said within minutes, picking up a bolt of fabric in the middle. "This one is a good weight. If you use the fabric you have on, it'll be too much. And harder to see your hair."