Elias was, understandably, a little upset.
"You have to go away?" he pouted when she told him. "Why are you leaving meeeeeeeeeeee?" he whined dramatically, shedding his best crocodile tears.
"Oh shut up," she rolled her eyes and smacked the back of his head, but she was smiling.
He grinned back at her, dropping his sad look, and took another sip of their tea.
She gazed sideways out to the garden and Eli slowly let the smile drop from his face.
He really would miss her.
***
Alexandra saw the smile drop from Eli's face as soon as she turned her head. She knew he would be upset. And she would really miss him too. But this was for the best. She needed to get stronger, and their father would never let her do as she liked if not for this arrangement.
"Hey Eli," she said.
"Yeah?"
"Let's go do something fun this afternoon!"
"Okay!"
During these next weeks, she would try to spend as much time with him. Training and studying could wait for now. She only had a month and a half to hang out with her baby brother. She had to make the most of it.
***
On the other side of the mansion, Marie finished hanging the last of the laundry out to dry. She could hear the distant sound of laughter coming from the gardens.
She smiled. It had been a long time since she heard that sound.
***
"We're going shopping!"
Alexandra groaned, burying her head under her pillow. A month had quickly flown by. She and Eli spent every free day together. They went on walks, went out to eat in town, and had many many tea parties together. However, there were now only two weeks left until her debutante ball, and EVERYONE in the house was bustling around, trying to get things ready for the "big day." Alex, of course, couldn't care less about the whole affair other than the fact that it marked her first day of freedom, but people in high society really cared about these kinds of things so she needed to make it successful. Hence...shopping. Apparently these kinds of things mandated new outfits. But why did she have to get up so EARLY? She and Eli had stayed up last night to go stargazing, and she really wanted to sleep.
"5 more minutes..." she muttered. Marie, undeterred by her lady's sleepy behavior, yanked the covers off.
"Ugh...Marie whyyyyyyy"
"WE'RE GOING SHOPPING!!!" Marie squealed happily. Her maid was way too excited for this. Old Alexandra would have been excited too, but Aiko-Alexandra was not that kind of girl.
"Can't we go tomorrow?" she whined into her sheets.
But Marie was extremely persistent, she had learned over the past few days.
"No! The shop is so exclusive, we had to make an appointment a month in advance! You CANNOT miss this!"
"Okay, okay, I'm getting up," she mumbled, rising reluctantly from her comfortable bed. After being squeezed into a nice lavender dress, they left for the capital city of Valen.
***
"How about this dress, Lady Sinclair?"
"I don't like the color."
Atelier Deveraux. The most expensive and exclusive dress shop in the entire kingdom. The owner, Madame Deveraux, was a renowned designer sought after by every elite lady. The Sinclair family had booked an appointment with her so that she would have the best dress for her debutante ball. However, Alex was probably going to be their most difficult customer yet. They had been there for 15 minutes already and she had yet to find a dress she liked.
A seafoam green dress, a large lavender dress, and a slim red dress were all rejected in quick succession.
Alex was getting really tired of looking through dresses, when—
"What seems to be the problem here?"
A tall blonde woman descended from the stairs at the back of the shops. All the workers gasped.
"Madame Deveraux!"
Ah, so this was the owner and designer. She swept over to Alexandra and looked her up and down, appraising her.
"So this is our difficult customer. It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance, Lady Sinclair," she curtsied.
Alex responded in kind. "Thank you for having me here, Madame Deveraux," she curtsied back.
"Might I ask what part of my dresses aren't to your liking?"
"It's not that they aren't beautiful, because they are. They just don't really fit my personal style."
"Would you tell me what you have in mind? I can make a dress suited to your taste and have it delivered in a week."
The shopkeepers looked shocked, Alexandra observed. It seemed that Madame Deveraux never really made these kinds of offers.
"You are most gracious, Madame Deveraux," she smiled. "I will take you up on that offer, thank you."
An assistant brought out some paper and a pencil, and Alexandra began to sketch out an American prom dress she had seen in one of Kana's magazines in her past life. Its straps wrapped around the upper arm, with a fitted bodice and a skirt that was shorter in the front and longer in the back, with several layers of stiffer wavy fabric.
"I've never seen anything like this!" Madame Deveraux looked at her with stars in her eyes. "What do you call this skirt design?"
"A tiered high-low skirt."
***
"Ah! I'm finally done!" Alex cheered as she exited the store. Marie looked at her tiredly.
"Thank you for accompanying me, Marie. I'd like to rest on this bench. Why don't you go buy yourself some sweets?" she handed her maid a sizeable sum of money. Marie's eyes lit up and she quickly scurried off.
Alex plopped herself down on the bench and took a deep breath. With the dress acquired, there was no more left to do in terms of preparing for the actual ball. Now she needed to prepare for her trip. She had decided to actually go to Moshu to start off her training, as they had amazing mages in that country. It would be beneficial for her to learn from them.
Currently, she had unlocked her primary element: wind, but other than that, she had not progressed at all in terms of magic. As the daughter of a ducal household, she had never needed to, and Old Alexandra had been preoccupied with...other things.
She was so absorbed in her own thoughts that she didn't notice the man approaching her until he was right in front of her.
"Lady Sinclair?"
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