The Power and the Glory

Book 1 Chapter XIX: Day of Comets

You do not see as quite as well as you think. -- C. S. Lewis, The Silver Chair

"Well? What do you think?"

Abi stared at the collection of dresses with a mixture of emotions. On the one hand, all of them were very pretty. On the other, she couldn't quite see herself wearing most of them. They were all far too brightly-coloured, had too elaborate patterns, and were generally not the sort of things she would buy for herself.

Hartanna's patience began to run out. "You've tried all of them on. Which one do you want to wear?"

In spite of their name dresses in Saoridhlém were not actually all one garment -- and like almost all Saoridhian fashions they were worn by both men and women, usually with no obvious differences to distinguish a man's outfit from a woman's. They were made of a pair of trousers called kelfin, a skirt called a jórnin that almost always only went half way around the waist and was open at the front to display the trousers, an inner blouse called a laroth, an outer blouse called a nithenol that was more like a cardigan without buttons and was left open to display the inner blouse, a sort of sash or thick belt around the waist called a ralos, and possibly a cape or capelet called a kathen. The different pieces were all the same colour, the same pattern, or in some other way showed they were meant to be worn together. As Abi eyed the selection an idea struck her. True, the pieces were meant to be worn together. Yet there was no law saying they had to be.

She selected a royal blue skirt with pleats and silver embroidery, a plain silver inner blouse, and an outer blouse of a bluish silver colour. Hartanna watched in shocked outrage as she finished her selected outfit with a black sash, blue trousers and a waist-length black cape embroidered with silver galaxies.

"What in the world?" Hartanna couldn't take this any more. "None of those pieces are meant to go together!"

"I know they're not," Abi agreed calmly. "But I think they suit each other. There's nothing to show they aren't parts of the same outfit. And I prefer them to any of the actual dresses."

Her mother spluttered indignantly. "You're going to make a fool of yourself!"

Abi thought of some of the fashionable eyesores she'd had the displeasure of seeing in both Saoridhlém and Seroyawa. At least her chosen outfit didn't include magenta or puce. "I'm sure I won't be the only one."

~~~~

Irímé eyed the outfit his mother had chosen for him with trepidation. Why do I feel like I'm going to make a fool of myself?

There was nothing actually wrong with the outfit. It wasn't a garish colour or blinding pattern. It was made of a white laroth, a white nithenol with birds embroidered in red and orange thread, a red ralos -- not the brilliant blood-red of funeral and mourning clothes, which would have been a terrible faux pas to wear at a festival, but a duller, less vivid shade -- with pale grey kelfin and a jórnin that was white at the top and faded to become a pale greyish-gold colour near the hem. It was a perfectly normal outfit and wouldn't cause any raised eyebrows.

It was also too long.

More accurately, he simply wasn't used to wearing an ankle-length jórnin. In his home province the fashion was for jórnin that were knee-length at the longest. Unfortunately in Eldrin that would have been seen as a daring innovation at best and a bizarre crime against fashion at worst.

"For heaven's sake what's wrong with you?" his mother demanded after the third time he stumbled and almost fell flat on his face.

Thank goodness Abihira isn't here to see this, Irímé thought miserably. It was quite bad enough that the tailor wore the poker-faced expression of someone who desperately wanted to laugh.