Disclaimer: CLAMP owns the library that is Card Captor Sakura. I just borrow the books without permission and forget to return them on time.
The Tomoeda Arcana
Chapter Three: The Sun, The Moon & The Star
The china clinked slightly as the tea set was carried through the lounge room; the tea cups interrogating the milk dispenser as to why the sugar bowl wasn't there. Nakuru placed the lacquered tray on the glass tabletop and stepped back to allow Spinel to pour the tea. Spinel always insisted on pouring the tea.
Unwilling to sit down just yet, Nakuru wandered around the room, treating everyday objects as if they were new discoveries. There was the fireplace, the mantle covered with pictures of Touya, pictures shot with a telephoto lens; the lounge set, the fabric shredded in places because, while Spinel wasn't a cat, he was in the form of a cat and so took some of a cat's characteristics. Suddenly Nakuru froze; this hadn't been here yesterday. He pounced on the white form draped over the sofa.
"Eriol-sama!" Nakuru squealed delightedly, holding the dress against him and dancing around the room. "I love it. Thank you so much." He held the dress out at arms length and looked at it critically. "But you made it a bit small."
"That's because it's not for you." Eriol didn't even look up from his book.
Nakuru pouted for a moment but then smirked. "Well, if it's too small for me then it will definitely be too small for Mizuki-sensei," he said smugly. That earned a warning glare from Spinel, who was carefully pouring the milk. Nakuru poked out his tongue and went back to modeling the dress, even if it was too small.
"That dress is not for Kaho either," said Eriol and calmly turned a page.
A frown creased Nakuru's forehead, "Then who is it for?"
"Daidouji-san." Even Spinel looked at Eriol curiously when he said that.
Holding the dress out again, Nakuru said, "Daidouji-san? I guess it would suit her wonderfully, but Daidouji-san?" Nakuru whirled back to Eriol, sending the skirt and sleeves flying. "Why?" he demanded.
Eriol kept his eyes between the book cover. "I need her to take her clothes off," he said distractedly.
A cushion, thrown through the air with much speed and force, smacked him in the head, knocking the book out of his hands and his glasses half off his face. Eriol blinked to clear the stars from his eyes and tried to shake out the bells ringing in his ears. After adjusting his glasses, the first thing he saw was a scandalized Nakuru getting ready to launch another cushion.
"You are a sick, perverted little boy, Eriol-sama," screeched Nakuru as he threw the cushion. Eriol somersaulted off his chair and scampered behind the couch. The cushion rebounded off the headrest and bumped into the coffee table, rocking the teapot; Spinel quickly put out a paw to avert a disaster.
"It's not what you think!" protested Eriol from his antique furniture refuge. Nakuru, not wishing to relinquish his final piece of ammunition, began to chase Eriol around the room, swinging the last cushion in an attempt to brain the little pervert. Spinel, figuring his master was capable of defending himself, decided to protect the next important thing in the room, the tea set.
"Daidouji-san is a sweet girl," Nakuru shouted, "Don't even think of taking advantage of her." The cushion arced over Eriol's head and shattered a Greek amphora: Spinel winced.
Eriol crawled commando style towards the window, while Nakuru leaned over the backrest and battered him with a vengeance. "How dare you think that way of Daidouji-san! You are sick, sick, SICK!"
"Nakuru! Stop it! Listen to me! I am your master!" Eriol commanded, his voice threatening dire consequences, but Nakuru insisted on beating those impure thoughts out of him. The cushion finally ended the 'discussion': after being subjected to such abuse it did what cushions, pillows and even teddy bears do under such circumstances, it exploded.
The air became saturated with feathers; they danced through the air, stuck to surfaces and tried to worm into noses. Spinel flapped his wings in an attempt to create a vortex that would stop the feathers from falling into the tea. Now that he wasn't being beaned by a cushion, Eriol was able to get to his feet. He eyed Nakuru warily through the feather storm.
"Can I explain now?" he asked sarcastically.
The only response Nakuru gave was to blow a feather off his nose.
"I need Daidouji," he said slowly, making sure Nakuru absorbed every word, "to take her clothes off," he paused, waiting for the expected outburst. When it didn't come, he said, "so that I can plant this." He drew out from his pocket a handkerchief, which he unfolded and held out for the others to see. Nakuru crept forward, and even Spinel gave into his curiosity and fluttered over for a look.
The light blue handkerchief appeared to contain nothing, till Eriol shifted a bit and suddenly light flashed in the center. Tucked into the fabric was a plain sewing needle threaded with a thin black thread. Nakuru and Spinel peered intently at the thread; to a guardian they stared at Eriol, then back at the thread.
Finally Spinel asked, "Is that your hair, Eriol-sama?"
Eriol rolled his eyes. "Yes."
Nakuru jumped back. "That is so gross!" he whined, dancing on the spot.
"Magic isn't all wand waving and flashing lights, you know," Eriol said defensively and refolded the handkerchief. "Hair is the best thing to use if you want to track someone. Or would you rather I use toenail?" Nakuru's dancing became more frantic.
Spinel was more practical. "But why do you need to track her movements? Haven't you and Daidouji-san become closer over these last few days? Surely she would tell you if something strange were to happen."
Eriol sighed and fell into a chair. "Daidouji-san tolerates me, I'm even inclined to think she enjoys my company, but she doesn't trust me." He ran his hands through his hair to dislodge some feathers. "And if she doesn't trust me then she won't confide in me."
Nakuru came over and perched himself on the armrest. "Why do you have to use that icky hair thing anyway?" Nakuru shuddered slightly. "Why can't you track her by her aura?"
"Because Daidouji-san doesn't have any magic," Spinel answered for Eriol, "and people without magic have auras that are very difficult to follow."
Eriol mused that in Tomoyo's case that was only partly true, a magic users aura did tend to be brighter and more vibrant than a non-magic users aura, but Tomoyo's had been much fainter than the average. Eriol wasn't immediately alarmed, auras were often dictated by emotional states, and Tomoyo hadn't been feeling the brightest lately.
Nakuru had apparently spotted a flaw in his plan. "So you plan to thread this hair into an item of Daidouji-san's clothing, and you can then track her by following that hair. But what if she isn't wearing that item? If she's wearing something else, you've lost her." Nakuru crossed his arms in triumph, daring the others to question his genius.
"But once I've threaded it," Eriol replied smugly, "I'll cast a replication spell that will copy it into every item of clothing she has."
"Every item of clothing?" Nakuru asked ominously.
"Every item within the bounds of good taste, Nakuru," Eriol deadpanned back.
Nakuru sniffed in righteousness, "I should hope so."
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A tiny pink star sauntered through the air, dancing with the breeze, ducking and swooping like a swallow, but still falling inevitably downwards. For a second it stalled, suspended in the light of the late spring day, and then plunged like a thunderbolt, striking into black night. Eriol gently reached out and removed the wayward cherry blossom from Tomoyo's pigtail; he released it on another windborne journey. Tomoyo sent him a look of apology, keep your hair long and it tends to catch things, not just tangles.
The last half of lunch break was just beginning, the usual suspects had gone outside to eat their meal under their usual tree. Most of them had things to do and places to be very soon, but for now, all six were content to watch the sunlight fall through the canopy of leaves, pattering on their faces like rain.
Naoko had started talking, the novel she had been reading lying forgotten beside her. "Have you gotten a letter from Sakura-chan yet?" she asked Tomoyo.
"Actually, one arrived just yesterday," Tomoyo said as she bent over her bag and drew something out. "It's addressed to all of us, but it's not really a letter, more of a postcard."
She flourished a picture of a herd of deer grazing in front of a pine forest. The little fawn earned coos of "It's so cute," from Rika and Chiharu; Eriol smiled indulgently: girls.
"I'll read it out," said Tomoyo. Putting on the voice she normally used for class presentations, she read, "Hello everyone. Hope you are all okay. I am having a great time in Daisetsuzan. It took us a whole day to reach the site, even though we started at five am. We had to hike and climb from the very start since there aren't any roads to this temple. Dad and Oniichan had to carry me over some of the steeper bits. Archaeology is just like camping. I think I'll study to be an archaeologist. Running out of room. Miss you all. Love Sakura." Tomoyo looked up expectantly, as if she was waiting to field comments. Looking over her shoulder, Eriol noticed that someone had scrawled in the corner: 'SEND CANDY' and signed it with a paw print. The wilderness was obviously not agreeing with Kero.
"She is so lucky," sighed Naoko. "Imagine, no school to worry about, no tests, no cleaning duty, surrounded by nature." Naoko's eyes lit up, "There's probably heaps of monsters and undiscovered creatures in that national park; like Bigfoot, a Japanese subspecies at least. And that temple her dad's working on, it's probably loaded with ghosts and curses and zombie monks and…"
Rika was getting restless, so Tomoyo decided to put a stop to Naoko's gore-fest – Kinomoto-sensei and the Temple of Zombie Monks indeed. "I'm sure it's just an ordinary temple, Naoko-chan. Sakura-chan wouldn't have been allowed to go if her father thought it would be dangerous. And it's no holiday for her, she has to help out with the excavation."
"But uncovering the fractured skull of a sacrificed monk would be much more interesting than boring Physical Education," insisted Naoko.
"Will Sakura-chan be able to send any more letters? She's high up in the mountains, after all," Rika butted in hastily.
"Probably not," said Tomoyo with regret, "They're pretty isolated up there. The postal service only goes as far as the Asahidake Onsen."
"There's probably no electricity at their campsite either," Eriol said and exchanged a smile with Tomoyo. "No video games."
"Or quiz shows," she shot back. Naoko and Rika blinked in bewilderment.
Chiharu had missed the whole exchange as her attention had been focused on Yamazaki. "Well?" she glared at him.
"Well what?" Yamazaki asked in confusion.
"Aren't you going to tell us a story?" she demanded, "About how in Daisetsuzan the pine trees have needles that are full of sugar and their cones are like fire crackers and that every new year all the animals in the park get together to chew sugar needles and throw exploding pine cones at the moon?"
Everyone else was smiling but Yamazaki looked downhearted. "It's not the same," he said dejectedly, "Li-kun and Kinomoto-san aren't here; they were always willing to listen to my stories, unlike the rest of you." His gaze singled out Chiharu.
She was instantly contrite. "We do like hearing your stories, Yamazaki-kun." Everyone nodded in agreement. "It's just that they seem so unlikely and…" she searched for a word, "weird. We can take only so much weirdness in one sitting. I'm sorry if you thought we didn't like them."
"In that case," he switched to his Professor of Another Useless Fact persona, "did you know that brown bears were not originally brown?"
"They weren't?" said Chiharu, unable to adjust to this sudden shift in mood.
"No," Yamazaki continued, "originally they were invisible."
"What!" blurted Naoko.
"This isn't like how pandas got their black marks, is it?" Rika asked shyly.
"This is a completely different story, Sasaki-san," Eriol couldn't help jumping in, "The panda story is a legend, the transformation of the invisible bears has been scientifically documented."
"The scientists had to stand up in court and take an oath," said Yamazaki.
"And it was a very special, very binding oath because it involved–" said Eriol
"Singing," ended Yamazaki.
"Yes, singing. Yodeling to be exact, for five hours straight, and standing on their head and–" Eriol was interrupted again.
"Enough about oath-taking singer scientists," Naoko shouted, "Get back to the bears."
"Oh yes, the bears, the invisible bears." Yamazaki put a finger to his chin and tried to look knowledgeable. "Well, not only were the bears invisible they were also–"
"Bouncy," said Eriol: it was his turn to interrupt.
"Yes, they were bouncy," said Yamazaki, unsure of where this was heading.
"That's how they got around. They didn't walk, they bounced there way all over the forest," said Eriol.
"But this was a big problem for all the villagers," said Yamazaki. "They'd be walking in the forest, collecting firewood or berries or going to see Grandma, and suddenly an invisible bear would bounce into them, knocking them to the ground."
"The villagers decided that something had to be done. They had to make these invisible bears visible," said Eriol.
"So they went to the wise man of the village and asked him what they should do." Yamazaki threw the story thread right back to Eriol.
"The wise man said that the village's tailor and baker should work together to create each bear a jacket made out of chocolate," said Eriol.
"It took the tailor and the baker many weeks, but finally they made the coats. The villagers then went into the forest and hung each coat on a branch, so that when a bear bounced by it would get caught in a coat." Yamazaki went into the home stretch, "When the villagers went back to check on the coats, they found a bear in each one. That's why bears are brown, they're covered in chocolate," he ended in triumph.
The two boys beamed at the four girls who stared back speechless. Then Chiharu wrapped her fingers around Yamazaki's neck.
"Never again," she spat out between strangles, "will I say that I like listening to your lies." Yamazaki's head rocked back and forth like it was at sea, but he still kept that grin. Chiharu's arms must have started to cramp because she jumped up and began to drag Yamazaki towards the main building. "We have a science project to do," she called to the others. "See you in class." Her angry mutters to Yamazaki could still be heard as they made their way across the lawn.
"I better be going too," said Rika and got to her feet, "I have a study session in the library."
"I'll come with you," declared Naoko. She waved her book and said, "I want to return this: it is so boring."
While the two girls were walking away, Eriol heard Naoko suggest, "Maybe Yamazaki-kun should write a book." He smiled: he had been thinking the same thing.
He turned to Tomoyo and said, "I wonder what Cerberus would think if he heard that he was sharing a park with chocolate covered bears."
"Knowing Kero-chan," said Tomoyo as she idly stacked flower petals on the grass, "he would probably try to eat them. Tsukishiro-san would try as well, but he'd be much more polite about it."
"Yes," Eriol chuckled, "he'd say 'Excuse me, Mister Bear, but would you mind if I ate one of your legs? Perhaps the left one?'"
"But Kero-chan wouldn't even bother to ask." She toppled the flower pyramid and started to arrange the flowers in a line.
For all her pleasant banter Eriol could tell that inside she was hurting. He stared at her; she sat right next to him but she may as well be on the moon, she was so distant. It seemed to him that she was like a reflection on water, you'd reach out a hand to touch it but instead you'd slip right through, shattering the image with ripples. Her aura, a faint and ghostly mist around her, only confirmed his impressions.
"Do you miss them?" Eriol asked.
"Who? Kero-chan and Tsukishiro-kun?" she looked up surprised, "Of course I do. And Kinomoto-sensei, and Sakura-chan." Her voice trailed off on the last part.
"You were really close to Sakura-san, weren't you?"
"Were?" she seized upon, "I still am close to her, Hiiragizawa-kun. She's just in Hokkaido," she said while twiddling a flower between her fingers, "it's not like I've lost her."
"But in a way you have lost her, you've lost her to Syaoran." He hoped that she wouldn't see this as an attack but as a gesture of friendship, a desire to earn her trust and share her pain.
"You're being ridiculous, Hiiragizawa-kun," she dismissed, "I think you've been out in the sun for too long." And like that, the matter was dropped, there was to be no more mention of Sakura and Syaoran, She had rejected his offer of help. For a while all that could be heard between the two was the leaves rattling above.
"And how are Akizuki-san and Spinel-san?" Tomoyo enquired.
Leaning against the tree trunk, Eriol replied brightly, "Very well actually. They didn't want to leave Tomoeda in the first place. Nakuru was a bit annoyed that Kinomoto-san had left, but he's found other things to chase since then."
"And what about Mizuki-sensei?"
Eriol froze. It felt as if winter had come six months too early: the sun seemed cold, the birdsong muffled, his senses as if they were shrouded in snow. That well of loneliness that he always carried with him began to leech up and flood his being, starting with his heart, which it drowned in its dark, empty depths.
Tomoyo must have realized that she'd said something wrong. She glanced at him swiftly and said, "Oh, I'm sorry Hiiragizawa-kun. I didn't mean to pry." She turned her attention back to her pattern of flowers.
The loneliness that had come so suddenly was now swept away by a rampaging anger; it sent power coursing through his veins, tingling at his fingertips. He wanted to destroy her in that moment: summon up a firestorm and reduce her to ashes. He had given up his life for her, put it on hold till who knew when, and all she could do was sit there, indifferent to him, the one person who could save her.
He had to get away from her.
"Excuse me, Daidouji-san," he was pleased to see he got up gracefully; no stumbling to his feet for Hiiragizawa Eriol, he had maintained that modicum of control, at least. "But there is something I have to do before class." It sounded like a lame excuse, even to his ears.
He stalked away then, leaving her in the company of her cherry blossoms.
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Tomoyo trailed a hand along the wall as she mad her way to the school sewing room: she had, at the last minute, decided to work on her project at home. The corridors were deserted, it was after school hours and all the students had already gone home. It seemed as if everyone was doing that lately, leaving her alone.
She paused outside the door. The classroom was supposed to be deserted but she was sure she could hear voices. Slowly and quietly, she inched the door open, pressed an eye to the crack and peered inside.
There were three people sitting on the floor, right under the window. Though they were partly obscured by the cutting table, Tomoyo could see that they were sitting in a circle and had their heads bent over something that lay in front of them. One of them murmured something that set them all off into giggles, they were girls.
Stepping into the room, Tomoyo coughed politely, intending to just grab her stuff and quickly leave. "Sorry to disturb you," she said, "but I just have to–" She broke off in shock. The three girls beneath the window were Chiharu, Rika and Naoko.
"Tomoyo, come and sit down. We were just about to start." Tomoyo realized her mistake, the person who just spoke wasn't Chiharu, it just wore her form, like Joker Clow and the two in the classroom. Tomoyo started to back away.
"Don't be frightened, Tomoyo," said the imposter Rika, "we won't hurt you."
"We just want to have a little chat," added the fake Naoko.
Common sense screamed at her to run right out the room, but her stubbornness and pride got the upper hand and forced her to round the table and walk closer to the group.
The first thing that she noticed were the flowers, they littered the whole area. Roses, lilies, violets and hyacinths were jumbled together in baskets; carnations, poppies, bougainvilleas and gardenias lay scattered on the floor; sweet peas, hydrangeas and paper daisies sat confused in laps; Tomoyo even spotted more exotic species like frangipani and kangaroo paw on the windowsill. It looked as if the trio had robbed a florist, or the botanical gardens.
The fake Rika scooted to the side and patted the ground, indicating that Tomoyo should sit.
As she dropped to the floor, Tomoyo looked intently at the trio. All of them were dressed like Jane Austen heroines, all high waists and puffy sleeves. The only thing that distinguished them was the print on the fabric: Chiharu's dress was splashed with red suns, Rika's covered in orange moons, and Naoko's sprinkled with hundreds of yellow stars. That motif was continued in their hair, with each symbol nestled in curls and tresses.
Tomoyo's attention shifted to the thing that lay on the floor. Her first thought was that it was a patchwork quilt and she was partly right: the squares weren't made of fabric but of petals.
"Do you like it?" asked Stellar Naoko.
"It's beautiful," was all Tomoyo could say. She reached out a finger and gently stroked a star of jasmine. "But what is it?"
"Why, it's you, silly," chirped Solar Chiharu.
Tomoyo jerked her hand back. "Me?"
"More like a representation of you," said Stellar Naoko.
"Think of it as a map of your heart," said Lunar Rika.
"My heart is made of flowers?" Tomoyo was all disbelief.
"Why do you think we give flowers to the ones we love?" said Lunar Rika sweetly.
Solar Chiharu pointed out a burst of chrysanthemum petals. "This represents your cheerfulness." Her finger drifted to a bluebell and said, "While this represents your humility."
"This tiger lily, however," Stellar Naoko butted in, "is your pride. Your sense of refinement, your grace, is this orchid over here." A burning lily, striped in black, flashed brightly next to a delicate pink orchid.
"This is your gentle nature, this your habit of watching, this your innocence, and this your appreciation for the strange things in the world." Lunar Rika gestured to a burst of everlasting daisies, a strand of royal blue violets, the crumpled white petals of a carnation and the orange slashes of a bird of paradise.
Tomoyo was captivated, the quilt before her was a riot of color, a marbled rainbow. Each petal was a different shape, a different texture, but they all meshed together perfectly, each occupying its own special space. "It's amazing," she whispered.
"Yeah, it is quite pretty," agreed Stellar Naoko. A soft, sleek sound cut through the air. "Too bad we have to destroy it."
Tomoyo looked up in alarm, Stellar Naoko was holding a pair of scissors, their blades a dull black, like coal.
"Why?" cried Tomoyo.
"Because no one wants it," said Solar Chiharu. Wielding her own pair of matte black scissors, she snipped at the patchwork-petal blanket, the blades coming away red; with every cut, Tomoyo felt a little jab of pain in her chest.
"No. Stop it." Tomoyo tried to wrench the scissors out of their hands, but they laughed and pushed her away. She then tried putting the pieces of quilt back together, as if her hands and will could make it whole. "Just because no one wants it doesn't mean it has to be ruined," she yelled as blood and petals seeped through her fingers.
"Why not?" jeered Lunar Rika, she had abandoned her scissors and was now ripping the petals apart with her bare hands. With every tear blood and flowers were tossed in the air. "It will only go to waste."
"It will only rot or shatter or freeze," sneered Solar Chiharu.
"Better to end it now," said Stellar Naoko, "better to avoid all that."
"No one wants you, Tomoyo," they started chanting. "No one wants you."
Tomoyo shut her eyes as blood and petals rained down on her.
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Eriol stalked through the empty school corridors, a paper bag swinging from his hand. All through the second half of school, as he sat behind her in class, he regretted his reaction to Tomoyo. Such an emotional response wasn't professional, a person's very existence was at stake, and he shouldn't allow his feelings to come before that.
He made his way to the sewing room: he had overheard Tomoyo tell Naoko that she had to pick something up from there, so he decided to follow her. He stopped at the door; it felt as if a chasm of hopelessness lay beyond. It reminded him of the time he went to return Tomoyo's notebook, the classroom had been inhabited by something similar. At the time he thought it was Tomoyo herself, that when she was alone, she allowed her feelings to run rampant; she always seemed to carry a shadow of sadness with her, a seed of despair.
He was greeted with the sight of Tomoyo kneeling by the window, forehead pressed to the floorboards.
"Daidouji-san, are you okay?" he rushed over.
Tomoyo sat up in shock and she looked around in bewilderment. "I'm okay," she said, recovering quickly. "I just dropped something."
"Okay," Eriol decided to play along, even though he knew she was lying. "Can I help you look?"
"No, no, it's okay." She held up a pencil. "Found it." Eriol didn't mention that he saw her take that pencil from her pocket.
Eriol helped her to her feet. "I've been looking all over for you," he said, "I need you to try on this." He shoved the bag into her arms.
"What? Why?"
"No questions, just try it on. You'll be doing me a big favor." He guided her to the folding screen in a corner of the room, where students would change into the clothes they were making. If she hadn't been so disorientated he wouldn't have gotten away with it.
Eriol stood by the divider as Tomoyo got changed; she had draped her clothes over the divider. He took his handkerchief out of his pocket, then grasped one hanging sleeve and quickly pulled, sending the clothes sliding to the floor.
"Oh, I'm sorry," said Tomoyo, as if it was her fault.
"Don't worry," said Eriol, "I'll get them."
Eriol quickly picked up the nearest item of clothing, it happened to be Tomoyo's jacket. He flipped the jacket upside down to expose the bottom hem. He unpinned the needle he carefully threaded one of his hairs into the lining, embroidering a little sunburst in thin black. He then covered it with his palm and muttered the replication spell; his hand glowed red briefly as the magic activated. Eriol picked up Tomoyo's shirt to see if it worked. As he expected, threaded inside on the bottom hem was a tiny black sun.
He stopped admiring his handiwork when he heard a small gasp as Tomoyo pulled the dress out of the bag. "It's beautiful, Hiiragizawa-kun," she sighed. "But who's it for?"
"A friend of the family," Eriol lied: he had no friends; he had no family. Carefully folding her shirt, he said, "I'm not sure if it fits properly, so I appreciate you modeling it for me. You're about her size."
As he shook the crumples out of her jacket, something fell out of the pocket, three somethings. They were cards, but their edges were out of focus, as if they were out of step with reality. Each card had something written on the bottom, The Sun, The Moon, and The Star and each had a picture of one of his classmates, Chiharu, Rika and Naoko respectively. They reminded Eriol of the cards he had seen with Tomoyo, that time he went to return her notebook; they must be apart of a set. For all their oddness, there was nothing magical about them.
Tomoyo had started to step out from behind the divider, so Eriol quickly stuffed the cards back into the jacket pocket and placed it over the clothes he had already folded.
"You look wonderful," exclaimed Eriol.
"I'm not sure," she ducked her head and blushed. "It's a bit loose in places," she said, trying to divert attention from how great she supposedly looked.
"That was to be expected." Eriol opened a drawer and grabbed a pincushion. He walked up to her and began adjusting the seams, starting at the shoulders.
Tomoyo couldn't pull her attention away from the dress. She brushed her fingers down the skirt, the material was light and soft, it fell to the floor and through her fingers like water: she felt as if she was wearing a rainstorm. She had to ask, "What fabric did you use?"
Eriol put a hand under her chin and tilted her head up. "It's made of clouds," he said simply and had to tilt her head up again after she dropped it down in amazement. "Now stand up straight, otherwise it won't fit properly." His arms circled her waist as he worked on the side seams. "I wove the fabric from spun clouds," he explained, "cumulus clouds actually, specifically the silver linings, because they shine in all lights and offer hope. Stratus clouds can be too dull and weary, while cumulonimbus clouds are too temperamental."
"How can you spin fabric from clouds?" she thought he was joking.
"The same way you spin wool from sheep and cotton from…cotton." He checked to see if the sleeves were the right length. "But first you have to collect them. Nakuru refused to help me, said the moisture would make his hair frizz, so it was just Spinel and I on cloud gathering duty."
Tomoyo glanced down to look at the cuffs Eriol was fiddling with. "The lace is made of clouds too?"
"Yep, cirrus to be exact." The lace, which trimmed the cuffs and the skirt, did look like the wispy, delicate ferns you could see sailing high in the sky. "Spinel had to wear little woolen bootees when we went to collect them."
Tomoyo smirked at the idea of Spinel in bootees. "I suppose you knitted those yourself?"
Eriol didn't deny it, "And a matching hat as well." He knelt down to check the length of the skirt; she followed the movement and noticed the embroidery that rippled all over the dress. Eriol had stitched dozens of birds and feathers into the fabric, yet they were practically invisible and only flashed into view if you tilted your head the right way.
"What thread did you use for the embroidery?" She caressed a dove, wings stretched in full flight, which soared above her knee.
"I didn't." He worked his way around the skirt. "Use thread, that is. I used light instead."
"Light?" She looked over her shoulder, seeing if she had heard right.
"Yes, light," he smiled up at her.
Tomoyo traced a finger along a shining filament, with something as beautiful as this, she could almost believe him. Eriol had returned back to his starting point and now stood before her. "All finished. You can take it off now. Just watch out for the pins."
Tomoyo seemed reluctant. "You don't want to take it off?" Eriol asked, taking each of her hands in his.
"I just realized that I've never been fitted for a dress before. Funny isn't it, I've fitted others but never been fitted myself. Now I know why they fidget so much."
"That's just your nature, Daidouji-san. You give so much and never ask anything for yourself."
"I just want people to be happy."
"And what about you?"
"It's not me that's important," she said, casting her head downwards. "Or so I've heard people say, anyway." She was fading, he held her in his hands and she was still fading.
"They're wrong, Daidouji-san." He brought his hands up to either side of her face, forcing her to look into his eyes. "You are important."
The sun burst into the room then, sending flights of birds along her dress, yet for all its brilliance it couldn't compare to the hope that kindled in her eyes.
AN: No, it's not finished yet. I just have to go renew the prescription for my motivation pills. Can't think: brain broken, eh.