Sharna grabbed another chair from the dining table, and pulled it over to the sewing table. Sharna and Myra pored over Myra’s drawings.
“Did you consider doing three-quarter sleeves rather than the cap sleeves?” Sharna asked, “then you could still use at least some of those amazing buttons.
“I thought it might be easier to remove them altogether,” said Myra, “and then just add a little of the lace back for the shorter sleeve?”
“But this way you could just reattach the ends here,” Sharna gestured to the sleeve, “and then you could include the scalloping as well, it would be nice to keep what details you could.”
They threw a few more ideas around, and Sharna was gratified to find that Myra seemed to value her input. Eventually they settled on a final plan, and Myra went to call Deidre and get her approval on the changes.
While Myra was gone, Sharna grabbed a blank piece of paper from Myra’s table and used her image-manifestation to project their proposed final product in a couple of views. As it was only a basic outline, she used the techniques that she had learned earlier. She wanted to try and untangle what exactly it was that caused her unease with this awkward technique but found nothing new to add.
Sharna walked around the dress so she could see it from different angles, pleased with their plan. This wasn’t really an area of image-manifestation that she had considered before. She had definitely gone through phases of colouring her clothes over the years, even her hair and body she had decorated with bright colours and elaborate, short-lasting tattoos.
Sharna knew that some people viewed fashion as frivolous and unnecessary, but she had personally always found it to be an important area of self-expression. Everyone wore clothes but not everyone had the money to change up their wardrobe as they wished. This was something that could potentially bring a lot of value and joy to someone’s life.
Myra came back into the room and gave Sharna a thumbs up. “Deidre sounds excited by the changes, she's looking forward to seeing the final product.” She sat in her wheely chair by the mannequin. “We should draw up some plans, she wants to come and drop by this afternoon if she gets a chance.”
In response, Sharna held out the paper she had illustrated with their proposed fashion sketches.
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“This is beautiful, they look perfect,” Myra enthused, “and that was so quick, you used magic?”
Sharna nodded, “I used a blank piece of your paper, I hope that’s okay.”
Myra nodded her assent, “of course, this looks great.” She tilted her head and looked up at Sharna appraisingly, “I noticed that you haven’t interrupted my wards since your assessment, not even in the workshop earlier, are you using a different technique now?”
“I had never used the method that you all used to perform your image-manifestation, so I have been trying it out.”
Myra blinked blankly at Sharna, “what?”
Sharna smiled, “your movements and melodies seemed different to what I learnt with my grandmother so I wanted to try them out too, I enjoy learning new skills.”
Myra closed her eyes and pinched the top of her nose. She breathed slowly and opened her eyes, looking intently at Sharna, “I know that you said earlier that you wanted to use our technique but I think that I didn't fully understand. You are saying that you produced this, and the napkin earlier, from your very first attempts at using our technique.”
Sharna froze, “yes?” she said hesitantly, alarmed by Myra’s sudden intensity.
“Sharna.. I already knew that you were extremely talented, and intelligent, but this is something else entirely. No one just flawlessly uses a brand new technique of magic. Please don’t mention this to anyone else.” Myra ran her fingers through her hair as she looked for the right words, apparently unaware that she was messing up her neat bun. “We work actively to appear inconspicuous here. The palace appreciates our finished product, which gives us a modicum of protection, but not enough that we could keep you safe if your exceptional skill became known.”
“I’m not exceptional, it was just a couple of images, it’s not even sou-” Sharna cut herself off, looking sideways at Myra, shaken by the woman's warning.
“It’s not even what? Is there more?”
Sharna didn’t respond.
Myra closed her eyes again, “I don’t think I’m quite ready to hear what skills you haven’t shared, if you didn’t think twice about what you’ve already achieved this morning.”
Sharna slumped, thinking of all the questions she had been hoping to ask Myra, and deeply missing having someone to safely confide in.
“Don’t worry,” Myra said briskly, visibly calming her face, “I’ll just talk things over with Anna and we’ll see what we can work out. I’ll also mention something to Beau when he comes in later this morning, but maybe try to avoid using your magic until then.”
Sharna was confused, “why Beau? What does he have to do with this?”
“Beau is the one who set up the house’s wards. They give us a little more privacy and I get an instant warning if they are breached. He has them connected to my mana but he has to remain linked too. He would have been aware immediately yesterday of your.. mana expansion? I’m not sure what you call it. But I reset the wards immediately so that he wouldn’t be alarmed.”
“I have never called it anything, it has always just naturally been part of my image-manifestation until I tried something different. I wasn’t aware it was an anomaly.”
“You must also have massive mana reserves..” Myra looked pained. “How are we going to keep you a secret? How in the world did Evelyn keep you a secret from your family? They must be unaware or they wouldn’t have let you out of their sight for a second!”
“They didn’t have a choice. If they didn’t give me the option to come here, all of my grandmother’s estate would have gone to charity.” Sharna looked suddenly bitter, “also, most of them avoid thinking about me at all, as they avoided thinking about my mother when she was alive.”