“Come in, come in,” Lina said. “You’ll freeze out there, and I have plenty of mannequins already.”

  The woman didn’t wait for a response, and grabbed Adah’s hand to pull her indoors, with the rest of the girls and Grace following close behind. The shop’s door shut behind them with another ring of its bell.

  Inside, the Magi-Melo shop appeared to be half-studio and half-store. The right half of the interior resembled any other boutique store, albeit with a much sparser selection of clothing on the display floor. That side of the shop featured only a couple dozen items in total: a few full dresses as intricately decorated as the ones in the shop window, a quartet of hats placed atop mannequin heads, and an eclectic collection of accessories—garters, necklaces, tiaras, and bows—laid out on shelves protruding from the far wall. All of this clothing shared what seemed to be Lina’s extremist style.

  To the left lay what must have been Lina’s studio, or part of it anyway. Rolls of fabric stood up in each corner of that side of the shop, and the wall between them was covered in swatches of even more varieties of fabric and an endless collage of reference photos. A long work desk spanned the whole length of the shop, with what appeared to be several different projects in progress resting atop it.

  “Not too much to see here,” Lina said. “Makes it easier to focus on what’s important. I don’t need anything fancy for visitors anyway. Most of my work up to this point has been one-offs. Wedding dresses, anniversary gifts, special occasions like that. You four are my first real experiment.”

  Lina herself was an image of simplicity, as well. Adah had pictured a fashion designer as someone in colorful, eccentric clothing, but she supposed that a simple and effective outfit was possibly even more indicative of someone’s expertise. Lina only needed a few articles of clothing to make the impression she wanted to give.

  She had on a charcoal dress shirt, with the top two buttons left undone and the sleeves rolled halfway up her forearms. Over that was a gray blazer, though she wore it almost like a blanket by merely draping it over her shoulders and keeping her arms out of its sleeves. Both the shirt and jacket contrasted sharply with her white capris and deep purple slip-on heels. Even her hair was simple, as her bangs cut straight across her brow, and the rest of her locks fell smoothly down to her shoulders.

  Perhaps by mastering the straightforward style she chose for herself, she could unleash the full extent of her creativity in the pieces she designed for others.

  “To introductions, then,” Lina said, standing before the lineup of magical girls and their manager. “Lina Versa. College dropout and once stylist for a very irresponsible man. Now I make extremely cute clothes.”

  Her clear image even extended to her personality. She had no doubts about who she was or how she felt about her work. Adah could admire that, though she did have to wonder why so many capable people wound up involved with Michel. Apparently he really did have some special charm. She was thankful to be immune to it.

  The four magical girls and their manager introduced themselves as well, then thanked Lina for the opportunity to work together. As they spoke, Lina looked them up and down, even walking closer at times to see their features better or view them from a different angle. Grace, at least, was spared from this treatment.

  “Yes, and thank you very much as well! You were cute in your photos, but Michel didn’t tell me you had this kind of texture,” Lina said, still eating the girls with her eyes.

  “Texture?” Ami repeated, instinctively touching the skin on her neck.

  “Working with one model is fun,” Lina said, “but a group has a whole different flavor. You each bring out the details of the others. Together, you have a texture, like walking through the woods. A hiker walks past the tall trees and the low ferns. Over the well-worn dirt paths and the rough roots. They take it in all together.”

  “You’re a fern,” Rika whispered to Adah.

  “Okay, root,” Adah whispered back.

  “Ah,” Lina said, stepping back for a view of all four girls together again. “I don’t even know where to begin.”

  Grace took this opportunity to exemplify her own strength by digging into logistics.

  “This is the first time our team has participated in something like this,” she said. “Whatever we can do to help the process, please don’t hesitate to ask. Michel mentioned taking measurements today, but if there’s anything else we can get a head start on, I’ve made sure the girls’ schedules are free.”

  This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.

  “Did that scoundrel tell you the theme of this series,” Lina asked, “or did he send you here clueless?”

  Of course, he had sent them here clueless.

  Lina laughed to herself and shook her head. “Let’s catch you up to speed first, then. My original idea for this line was to capture all the forms of desire.”

  “Desiire?” Ami asked.

  “Yes, desire,” Lina said. “I wanted to make a series of outfits that spurred on those different forms of desire. A long gone past. A dream for the future. The beautiful forms and the ugly. Greed and envy. Love and lust. So, you can see, the theme is flexible. Before I take any numbers from you girls, I want to see who you are. How you might embody desire.”

  “How should we do that?” Adah asked.

  If Lina had showed off her simple side before, now her more creative side was coming out to play. The way she spoke was interesting but vague. Adah needed a little more to work with.

  “For now,” Lina said, “you can stand. Relax, if you like. Or don’t. These designs are a conversation, and this is only our introduction. I probably won’t even recognize today’s ideas by the time the project’s finished.”

  Lina had yet to bring out any measuring tape, but her mind was clearly taking notes on each girl’s proportions already. Even if the way her eyes scanned the girls hadn’t made it obvious, the nonstop flood of ideas from her mouth would have. She paced a circle around Ami and Emi now, moving fast enough that Adah thought she might spin herself dizzy.

  “The twins are too perfect,” Lina said. “I’m going to use your numbers for my next lotto ticket. It’s a guaranteed win, then I can retire. Although I’d carry on anyway. A working retirement.”

  “If you got the numbers from me, I’ll take the money,” Ami said.

  “Fifty-fifty split,” Emi suggested.

  Lina laughed, then took each twin by the shoulder and shifted them to face each other, about two feet apart. The designer stuck her head in the middle and turned back and forth. After that, she moved back and observed them from a few steps away.

  “Long, of course,” she declared. “A wave, a world in the skirt. Some contrast or a complement…”

  She paused to groan and scratch at her forehead before smoothing out her bangs again.

  “You two will be the biggest experiment,” she continued. “Trial and error is the only way. We’ll be very good friends by the end of this. Or you’ll despise me. Either way, we’ll shatter the mirror and rebuild it into a more beautiful mosaic.”

  Finished with the twins for now, Lina walked a circle around Adah. She wasn’t sure what to make of the designer’s personality just yet. The woman seemed to say whatever was on her mind, and she inspected Adah and her teammates like they were livestock, but she had an undeniable aura of affability. Lina looked at you as if you were an art piece, but one of her favorite art pieces. It wasn’t necessarily an unpleasant feeling, just an unusual one.

  “How short can you go?” Lina asked, staring down at Adah’s legs.

  “Excuse me?”

  Maybe it was unpleasant after all.

  “Your skirt—how short is too short for Heartbreak?”

  Adah glanced over at Rika, then said, “I’m not sure. How short were you thinking?”

  Lina knelt down in front of Adah and asked, “May I?”

  Adah gave her the go-ahead, so the woman touched her legs to find the exact location of her knees. Lina put two fingers together and ran them along the front of Adah’s jeans, up toward the top of her thighs, stopping only an inch or two below the inseam of her pants.

  “Here abouts.”

  “I don’t think I’d be able to move very much,” Adah said.

  “If you were going to perform in it, you’d have safety shorts. Bloomers, probably,” Lina said. “In photos, we can pose you properly. The camera only sees what it sees. The question is whether or not you’ll be comfortable in it. When you wear these clothes, I want you to wear them, not hide them. So, what’s your limit?”

  Adah hadn’t ever considered her limit; she’d never had a reason to. Her transformation already included a thin pair of bloomers, as did just about every magical girl’s combat transformation. Even if Heartbreak’s costume included unnecessary adornments like her shawl, there was a baseline of practicality required if she wanted to be able to fight Cruelties in it. She certainly couldn’t afford to limit her range of motion out of embarrassment—she’d never be able to fly if that was the case.

  When it came to photos, Adah wasn’t sure where she stood. On an individual level, she didn’t particularly care about showing skin. It was even less of a concern whenever she was Heartbreak. Everyone’s eyes ought to be on her anyway. If Lina’s dress was cute, she’d wear it at any length.

  “Heartbreak doesn’t have a limit,” she said.

  “Lovely,” Lina said, baring her fangs again. “Asymptotic, yes? Or maybe not? I can’t remember. But the dress will be.”

  Adah had no idea what she was talking about.

  “The stockings to here?” Lina said as she moved her fingers back down Adah’s thigh. “Thereabouts. We can test after the dress is finished.”

  The woman stepped back, squeezed her eyes shut for a moment, then looked Adah over once more. Her eyes looked as though they were imagining a second outfit projected over Adah’s own.

  “Another fantasy,” Lina continued. “A princess, a distance, a longing. You’ve seen her, but she looks different now. You look at her skin, but it’s an illusion. It goes on forever, but it’s not there. Her dress is endlessly short. The less of it there is, the more of it you see. Whatever you’re searching for in her, you never find it. Oh, and the lover.”

  Lina turned to Rika and motioned her over. She had Adah and Rika stand shoulder to shoulder and inspected them again, with a particular attention to Rika’s face.

  “Some strong makeup, a few charms, and she’s the perfect garter,” Lina said to herself.

  “Garter?”

  Adah and Rika shared a look, but they could only guess at Lina’s meaning. The designer was fully immersed in her imagination at this point.

  “I can already see the poses,” Lina said, giddy with delight. “I should make a list for Neil.”

  Neil—Adah was sure she recognized that name, though she couldn't remember from where. Before she could dig through her memory, Lina clapped her hands.

  “Okay, time to see what we’re working with,” she said. “Head to the back and strip down. Jackets, shoes, anything loose or baggy. I work in millimeters, I’ll need to measure you in them.”

  She pointed to Adah and smiled. “Captain first?”