And it wasn't the only unpleasant conversation she had over the rest of this trip either. After a comparatively brief stop in the apothecary — nobody wanted to stay there longer than necessary, the place smelled awful — they moved on to Madam Malkin's. Or, some of them, anyway — Ailbhe was going with Tori to Ollivander's, Dorea went next door (she needed shoes), but Liz had lost track of Daphne and Susan at some point. No idea where they'd gone, they'd been with the rest of them but between walking down the street and being met inside the shop by an attendant she'd lost them. Weird. Nobody else seemed concerned about that, so, probably fine.
Apparently, they were already busy dealing with other people, so the four of them would have to wait their turn. So they just kind of hung around for a little bit, poking at the clothes hanging up on racks here and there — the vast majority of which were only meant for display, Malkin's didn't really do standard sizes, things tailored to each person instead of premade and sold off the rack. (The only real exception were underclothes, like the shorts and vests Liz wore all the time, and those shifts over there.) And talking, of course, though Liz didn't really participate much, since it was mostly about clothes and she honestly could not give a damn.
Though, they did all end up talking about what exactly they were here for, and Liz was directly asked, so she couldn't just say nothing. New school robes, of course, and her quidditch uniform — like Malkin's made the Hogwarts school uniforms, they made the ones for the quidditch teams too. Of course, Liz hadn't come all the way out here for that the first time, but they'd still needed her measurements, so she'd taken them herself as best she could. Which hadn't been very well, unfortunately, her quidditch uniform had ended up fitting her kind of awkwardly — not so awkward it'd been obvious looking at her, but it had been slightly uncomfortable — and also it'd just gotten stained and torn in a couple places, so she needed a new one. Or more than one, she guessed, in case one got ruined during the year.
Hannah frowned through this explanation, her lips curling a little. "You should get robes."
"What?"
"It just occurred to me, I've never seen you in robes before — other than the uniform, obviously — you always wear muggle clothes. Which is fine at school or in Charing, but if you're going to the Ministry or the Wizengamot or something, it's really not appropriate for that. And we're thirteen now, and you are a Lady of the Wizengamot, so I was just thinking..."
Glancing away toward a nearby rack, Liz frowned. That...might be a valid point. If nothing else, waltzing into the Ministry — as she very well might be doing soon, to do those interviews to get out of the trusteeship thing — looking like some poor, sloppy muggle would attract unwanted attention. If that could be avoided by just dressing properly, Liz didn't see why she shouldn't. Besides, it wasn't like she couldn't afford it. "I don't know what to get. I don't know what would be, you know, appropriate."
Tracey, who had been muttering over an intricate-looking enchanted cloak with Hermione, looked up. "For a young Lady of a Noble House? I guess it depends."
"On what?"
"On what kind of impression you want to leave people with."
Lifting a shoulder in a shrug, Liz said, "I don't really care that much, honestly..."
Tracey's lips twitched. "Not caring is one of the options."
...She honestly couldn't tell whether Tracey was making fun of her or not. Tracey wasn't even giving much away for her to overhear either — her occlumency really was quite good now, much better than it'd been during that incident in the bathroom — it was throwing Liz off a little bit. "Just, nothing too flashy or whatever, I mean. And a lot of these are just— They look uncomfortable..." Liz grumbled, plucking at one hanging nearby, sending it swaying a little. The thing was in dark but dramatic colours, the middle all stiff, with laces at the back — a built-in corset like, which, just, no.
"Oh!" Hannah chirped. "No, you wouldn't have to get anything like that. I mean, that would be kind of weird on someone our age, you know?" Because Liz was a cheating mind-reader, she knew Hannah really meant someone who hadn't properly developed yet — it'd probably work fine on, say, Hermione or Daphne, but Liz still kind of looked like a little kid, so.
Hannah was trying to be diplomatic about it, which was slightly silly. She could have just come out and said Liz didn't have the tits for that kind of thing yet, it's not like she would have been offended...
After a little talking about what would work best — mostly between Hannah and Tracey, because Liz knew very little about this sort of thing — the door toward the back opened, a woman trailed by a couple younger girls coming out. Twins, they looked like, Hogwarts-age... Oh, Flora and Hestia Carrow, right — Slytherins in the year under Liz, she recognised them though she'd never actually spoken to them before. After finishing their order with the lady at the counter, they crossed the shop, Hestia giving Liz a blank-faced but friendly sort of nod — they were identical, but Liz knew that one was Hestia, though she couldn't really say how (she assumed it was weird instinctive mind mage stuff) — and then they were gone, gracefully sweeping out the door onto the street.
"Those girls give me the creeps," Hermione muttered, low enough none of the staff would hear them.
Shrugging a little, Tracey admitted, "Bonded twins can be sort of off-putting, to people who aren't used to dealing with this sort of thing. They're alright, though, once you get to know them."
Hannah looked a little skeptical. "Aren't the Carrows a Death Eater family?"
"Different branch," Tracey said, shaking her head. "Amycus and Alecto definitely were, but they're kind of the black sheep of the family. The Carrows are vassals of the Monroes." Tracey didn't spell it out, but Liz knew the Monroes were one of the big families in Ars Publica, the more traditionalist Dark, they hadn't liked the Dark Lord any more than the Light had. "I'm not certain the twins have ever even met Amycus and Alecto, their parents really don't like them."
...Liz had had trouble enough keeping track of which family was on which side, so clearly they needed to stack on divisions within families for extra confusion. No way in hell was she going to be able to keep all this shite straight...
Hermione asked about the vassal part, and while that was being explained — when mages said "noble" families they did kind of mean that literally, there was weird confusing feudal shite Liz still didn't really get going on — and Hannah was still explaining that, using her own family as an example — she was from the Common House of Abbott, who were vassals of the Noble House of Abbott, which just seemed unnecessarily confusing — when one of the attendants came up, saying they were ready for them now. Given the room they had and the workers they had in right now, they'd be taking them two at a time, Hermione and Hannah ended up being shuffled off together.
...Leaving Liz alone with Tracey. Damn.
"I was thinking red and black, primarily."
Liz blinked. "What?"
"For your robes," Tracey said casually, as though this weren't at all coming out of nowhere. "The Potter colours are red, white, and gold, but I've noticed you prefer...well, nothing too flashy, as you said earlier. I would say green, for contrast, but that might end up looking kind of Christmas-y — not that that would occur to most pureblood mages, but you know, I would feel weird if it were me. So, black."
Liz guessed that made sense. A weird kind of sense, but. "Is that normal, people walking around wearing their family's colours?"
"In formal situations?" Tracey shrugged. "Sure. Not regalia, though — every noble family has arms, but actually putting them on your clothes is really gauche, outside of very particular ceremonial contexts. Seen as sort of a nouveau riche kind of thing to do, you know."
She didn't know, actually, but she didn't think it was worth asking what exactly that was supposed to mean. "Okay, that would be fine, I guess."
"And I'm guessing you'd want to wear your duelling boots with it."
"Probably." She did like these things, and it wasn't like she owned any other shoes anyway. Besides, she wasn't an expert with this sort of thing, but wasn't black supposed to go with anything?
"Right. Well, I think a more casual, practical sort of style would work best for you — you'd probably be more comfortable, and you wouldn't have to worry about being overdressed if you wanted to wear it on an ordinary day. So, I was thinking..."
Over the next minutes, Tracey asked her opinion on various things, which was both somewhat tedious and also just a bit awkward, since she actually didn't have opinions on a lot of it. She just...didn't care about what she was wearing that much, honestly. Tracey was surprisingly observant — though not surprising, when she thought about it, she had noticed Liz was cold all the time back in first year, when Liz herself hadn't even realised — pointing out things like, literally the only time she'd ever seen Liz wear trousers was when she was in her quidditch uniform. But, like, she didn't hate wearing trousers, it was just what she was used to — she suspected her aunt and uncle would insist denims were for boys (plus Dudley's cast-offs would simply never fit her), and at this point it was just a force of habit. She did admit she might end up feeling a little self-conscious wearing trousers, if she didn't have something like quidditch or duelling to distract herself, just because she wasn't used to them.
And then there was more babbling about the different styles these things came in, which, obviously Liz had never worn any of this stuff before, so she couldn't say she had any idea one way or the other. So, awkward conversation, was what she was getting at.
Though, at least it kept an uncomfortable silence from developing, or from needing to address what had happened last year, so Liz guessed it could be worse.
After what felt like several minutes — but not nearly as long as the Carrows had been in there, she didn't think — Hermione and Hannah were out again, talking with the lady at the counter. Before they were done a short (though taller than Liz) middle-aged woman with delicate half-moon glasses and a bright green tape measure hanging around her neck, Madam Malkin herself, walked over to Liz and Tracey, smilingly waving them toward the back, they were ready for them now, "dearies."
The back room was smaller than the shop front, and rather less busy-looking, without the racks and shelves and such, the plain wooden panels hidden only on one wall by a couple cabinets, toward the other side with an accordion divider thing (for privacy changing underclothes, she assumed, she hadn't used it last time she was here). And, of course, one whole wall was one big mirror — a magical mirror, the surface reflecting everything before it perfectly, without the minor distortions of perspective seen in normal mirrors. Which did make it slightly disorienting to look at, but only if Liz thought about it too hard.
Malkin waved them inside, asked them to please undress quick, "dearies," she'd be right back, before closing the door again behind her. Pushing their bags against the wall, they peeled off their shoes first, Liz loosening her boots with a tap of her wand on each rather than doing it be hand, Tracey stepping out of her muggle-style trainers without even bothering to untie them; Liz then whipped her scarf off (Tracey had made this for her, she remembered), dropping it on top of her bag. Before going any further, Liz snuck a quick sip of her calming potion — by "undress" Malkin didn't mean all the way, but taking her measurements would require getting poked at by strangers far more than she was comfortable with, better not risk doing it unmedicated.
Tracey definitely noticed, but she pretended not to.
Hanging her dress off a hook on the wall, she turned back to the rest of the room. Tracey had finished ahead of her, already sitting on one of the platforms built into the floor, fingers idly tapping at the wood. She had one of those magical underclothes vest things, like Liz, but not the shorts — those were knickers, Liz knew, the cloth soft-looking linen, like little shorts held up by laces at one hip, too short and the cloth too thin to really seem appropriate in public. Not entirely unexpected, the shorts Liz had weren't supposed to be worn under trousers, but still, Liz was a little surprised despite herself.
She still preferred muggle-style knickers herself, she didn't have any magical ones. Those things just seemed...uncomfortably loose, she suspected she'd feel self-conscious about it.
Malkin was back a moment later, the door opening with a crackle of privacy wards — the inside of this room couldn't be seen properly from outside — shortly followed by a younger woman in similar narrow-sleeved robes. (Robes for professionals, like healers or potioneers and apparently seamstresses, tended to avoid the baggy sleeves that normal robes usually had, instead wrapped almost skin-tight from wrist to elbow.) The younger of the two looked like she could be a sixth or seventh year, but Liz assumed she had to be a few years older than that, it was just hard to guess a mage's age sometimes.
"Okay, then. Go ahead and step up onto one of the stools, Miss Potter." The younger woman twitched with surprise, nearly dropping her little notebook — apparently she hadn't recognised Liz, now staring at her wide-eyed. Trying to ignore that, Liz glanced back, seeing Tracey had already popped back up to her feet, on her little platform, which she guessed explained why Malkin hadn't told both of them to get on one of those. "Now, as we get started here, what are you looking for today, dearies?"
Having her measurements taken was, as Liz had fully expected, extremely uncomfortable. At least Malkin waved the younger woman off to Tracey, being prodded at by someone getting all nervous and fidgety about the Girl Who Lived might have just made it worse. She had known what she was getting into, from the first time she'd had to do this, and it wasn't as bad as it had been then, the slight floatiness induced by her potion putting her at enough of a distance that it didn't bother her as much as it could have. Yes, she did feel Malkin's eyes on her skin like ants, and she had to focus on her breathing to keep herself from getting carried away, but it really wasn't that bad.
Mostly, anyway. Last time she hadn't been getting trousers, so Malkin hadn't needed to take her inseam before, and ugh, nope nope, nope...
As much as Liz didn't really care about this sort of thing, the conversation was a surprisingly welcome distraction. Most of it was pointless — talking about what kind of materials she preferred, what kind of enchantments if any she'd like added (which was at least moderately interesting), and even quidditch for a little while. For both of them, Malkin recommended getting a different style for their school robes. The ones Liz had now, that Malkin sold to first-year students by default, did have little ties here and there to tighten and loosen in places, but for the most part were just one piece, pulled over the head little different from a normal dress. (Though obviously they looked different, and boys wore them too.) Older students, especially girls, required a different kind of fit, she started recommending something else around their age.
It looked practically the same from the outside, she assured them, still met the uniform standard, but instead of just having ties here and there it laced all the way up one side. Well, not all the way up — the laces started just at the top of the thigh, and ended right under the armpit. (Liz was pretty sure she'd seen that before on the older students, just the way the billowy cloth of the robes sat the laces usually weren't visible.) The point was to be able to adjust the fit of the robes freely along the entire length of the wearer's body, so they didn't have to come in and get new robes every time their figure changed a little bit. This style was a little more expensive, but given a girl could wear the same robe from twelve to twenty if she took care of it (and didn't get too much taller), yeah, it was almost certainly worth it.
Tracey agreed immediately, Liz did too after a brief hesitation. She didn't have the same problem of things getting too tight over the chest as she assumed Tracey and the other girls must, but she was also the youngest of them — there were only a couple people in their whole year younger than her, her birthday was only a few weeks before the cutoff — so she assumed puberty couldn't be that far off.
Ugh, dammit, almost forgot. She still needed to look into those spells Tamsyn had mentioned, periods did not sound fun. Snape did healing stuff, right, he must have books about this sort of thing sitting around somewhere in his library...of course, she couldn't just ask, that would be awkward...
Malkin assured her she could do something similar with her quidditch uniform, though it was somewhat more complicated — the uniform was multiple pieces, there were things that could be done on each, but it involved laces over the outside of her trousers, so the hips could be adjusted, which was somewhat awkward to pull off and very visible, but Liz suddenly recalled the Gryffindor chasers (all girls) all had those, so, it wouldn't seem uniquely awkward, at least. Also, the range of adjustments that could be made was smaller, something to keep in mind. Still sounded worth it, Liz was willing to pay a little extra, especially since Malkin said she could just have the trousers sent in to add a couple inches in length if she needed it. (That was much easier of an alteration to make, but obviously couldn't be done with adjustable laces like the other stuff.)
And then they were done with school stuff, and it was time to talk about her other thing. Awesome. Tracey popped off her own platform to come and talk about that with them, since Liz really didn't know what she was doing, which didn't make it any less uncomfortable. It didn't help that Tracey didn't bother getting properly dressed again, still standing around in her vest and knickers. When she'd been coming over, Liz had caught the idle thought — Tracey's occlumency was pretty good, but she didn't keep it up perfectly all the time — that she didn't want to make it so Liz was the only underdressed person here, thought she would be even more uncomfortable surrounded by three fully-dressed people. The problem with that, Liz realised mages considered these shorts and vest to be underclothes, but Liz didn't, she had no problem walking around Snape's house like this, only avoided it in the common areas at the Slytherin dorm because she knew other people considered this not enough, so it attracted more attention than she wanted. (And she always knew when she was attracting unwanted attention, because mind magic.) But Tracey did feel she was underdressed — Liz would too in her place, but Liz wasn't standing around in her knickers — so she was faintly uncomfortable (though trying to avoid thinking about it), which was making Liz uncomfortable...
Really, she'd rather Tracey just go put her denims on, at least. But blurting that out with Malkin and the other girl right there would be weird, people didn't know she was a mind mage, so.
Though, Tracey actually knew what she was talking about when it came to magical clothes stuff, having been raised in a fancy noble family and all, so it could have been worse, Liz guessed. She was talking about a thing, using jargon Liz didn't know, but she was pretty sure... "Are you saying this thing only goes over one shoulder?"
Still wearing that bland, warm smile she always seemed to have, Malkin said, "Yes, dearie, though the style Miss Davis is describing truly doesn't expose much, it isn't indecent for a girl your age. And in most formal situations you would be wearing a jacket over it anyway — the jacket will be included, it's considered part of the—"
"I don't think that's a good idea." Getting a trio of curious looks, Liz let out a sigh, her eyes tipping up to the ceiling. She shoved down the tingle of anxiety (much easier than it might have been, her potion still in her system), nudged the strap over her left shoulder to the side, the neckline dropping a little.
Tracey and Malkin were temporarily startled into silence, but the younger woman openly gaped, staring wide-eyed at the scars on her chest. (The top edges should have been visible without Liz moving her vest, but maybe they just hadn't realised what they were looking at.) Her voice low and breathless, the woman asked, "Is that where—?"
"Yes," Liz snapped. A little bit of magic might have slipped into her voice, she wasn't sure — the woman instantly shut up, but maybe she'd done that on her own, and not just because Liz wanted her to. Straightening her vest again, she said, "It doesn't sound like it'll be very obvious, but..."
Everyone was quiet for another moment. "It's higher on the left side, right?" Tracey asked.
"Yes...?"
"Right, we'll want to cover that shoulder then," Tracey said to Malkin. Then turning back to her, "Let's give it a try, Liz. There is the jacket, of course, you never have to wear the robe without it if you don't want to, and, if it makes you too uncomfortable you don't have to get it at all. I just think you should try it first."
"...All right, fine." It wasn't like her scars would show too badly if it was the right shoulder uncovered, assuming the rest came up to her collarbones at least (which it did sound like it did). And she didn't mind walking around in these vest things anyway, and she could see the top edges of them in the mirror...
"Let's get a blank robe in here quick." Malkin leaned toward the young woman, whispered a couple words, sending her off through the door. Her voice dropping a little, gentler, "If you want to get a good picture of what it'll look like, you'll need to take off the vest, dearie."
There was no way in hell that was happening. "Er..."
She wasn't really sure what to say, but Tracey took care of it for her, if not quite in the way she'd been thinking. "You do sell one-shouldered shifts, right? She'll need appropriate underclothes for it anyway."
"Oh." Malkin blinked for a second. "I'm afraid you would have to purchase any underclothes you wear. The enchantments in them are designed to adjust to the chemistry of the wearer, if they're worn by too many people they lose their reactivity."
"That's fine," Liz said, "we can do that."
Malkin glanced down at her notepad, then back up to Liz, her eyes quickly trailing down shoulder to hip. "Right then. One second, I'll be right back, you can change and then we'll try the robe." She turned on her heel, and sauntered off. But she wasn't gone for long, returned a minute later, handing Liz a small bundle of pale silver-ish blue-ish cloth. And then left again, to check their swatches — apparently, they had the colours of all the major families on file, Malkin wanted to make sure to get the exact proper shade of red the Potters used — and check on her assistant, who was having trouble finding an appropriate jacket. She'd be right back, "dearies."
So Liz was left alone with Tracey again. And she was expected to change out of her vest.
(Oh, this was going to be so awkward, she hated this...)
Taking a slow breath, desperately trying to ignore the pointless tingles crawling across her skin, Liz moved behind the divider — making very sure the mirror was blocked. She could still feel Tracey out there, and she was thinking about something, distracted enough her occlumency had weakened a bit. If Liz wanted to, she could pretty easily watch everything Tracey was thinking, but she only looked close enough to make certain Tracey wasn't paying her any special attention. It was fine. She was fine.
The movements unreasonably stiff and awkward, Liz traded her vest for the new thing Malkin had brought. It was longer than her vest, falling over her hips partway down her thighs, probably meant to be worn instead of the vest and shorts, but she was not taking the shorts off, it wasn't long enough for her to be comfortable only wearing her knickers under it. And above the waist too, it was kind of... Of course, she'd known it would only have one shoulder, sort of like a vest with the top corner chopped off. That wasn't a surprise — felt kind of weird, yes, but she'd been expecting it. That doesn't mean it wasn't uncomfortable. The lowest point was under her arm instead of the middle of her neck, but lower than she'd thought, low enough a lot of the upper right of her chest was visible.
And showing plenty of the scars, of course. They did look better than they had for most of her life (the uncovered parts, at least), with the bit of the Dark Lord gone now allowed to heal properly, the edges kind of smooth and lumpy, weird-looking, but much paler, not the angry red colour they'd been before. She still wasn't comfortable with the idea of this much of them showing, though, she was pretty sure nobody had ever seen all this before. (Well, Pomfrey, that time she'd been hospitalised, and she guessed Petunia when she'd been really little...and Vernon, obviously...and also Snape, come to think of it, supposedly he'd helped Pomfrey with the healing, but she would have been unconscious for that.) And even more uncomfortable, the edge was low enough her right nipple was just barely covered — grimacing, she twisted the thing around her a little bit, making it sit slightly skewed, which was better, but still not great.
Yeah, this was going to be uncomfortable...
"Liz?"
She jumped at the unexpected voice, it took a couple seconds to get her heart out of her throat so she could talk. "Yeah?"
"I've been meaning to..." Tracey trailed off for a moment, clearly not sure how to say whatever she was getting at — her head was messy enough it wasn't immediately obvious, Liz would have to intrude if she wanted to figure it out. "You remember, last year. In the bathroom."
Oh, so they were talking about this now. Liz was wondering whether that would ever come up. "I remember." Leaving her vest hanging from a hook on the wall, Liz stepped out from behind the divider. (She'd been working up the nerve to go out into the open before, but thankfully Tracey had distracted her. Good timing, that.) Tracey had sat down on one of the little platforms again, her back to Liz, her arms folded over her stomach. "If you're about to ask me to apologise for the mind magic, I'm not going to." She realised she probably should, or at least Dorea (and definitely Snape) would say so, but she wasn't sorry — and she was also under the impression she wasn't supposed to lie.
"No, I wasn't going to—" Shifting awkwardly in her seat, Tracey cleared her throat. "You could have been gentler about it, yes, but... I meant to thank you, actually."
"...Oh." Liz...hadn't expected that, honestly. She'd kind of thought Tracey hated her now...
Tracey didn't stand up, or turn to look at Liz over her shoulder, still staring toward the other side of the room — by the anxiety simmering in her head, she probably thought she wouldn't be able to get through this conversation if she actually had to face Liz while doing it. "I've been at the Greenwood all summer, and... We're moving in with one of the cadet families. Mum is there already, but, they're making some changes to the wards, just in case..."
Just in case one of her racist cousins decided to come by one night and murder her in her bed, she meant. Tracey didn't actually know that had been Snape's idea, to take those kinds of extreme precautions, since she hadn't been in a lot of these meetings arranging things, but she suspected it was.
That part remained unsaid, Tracey cleared her throat again. "So, I... I just wanted to thank you."
Liz noticed she hadn't thanked her, actually — she'd said she meant to, wanted to, but hadn't said the words directly. Which was slightly silly, but also Liz wasn't going to bother pointing that out, would only make Tracey all the more distractingly awkward. (Her squirmy discomfort was crawling across the air all around her, it was unpleasant.) Besides, "Don't really know what you're thanking me for, but sure."
Tracey quick glanced over her shoulder at Liz, shock ringing high and clear in her head. "Liz, you saved my life." There was something slightly awkward about the way she said it, uncertain — still with a toe in Tracey's mind, Liz had the impression the idea was sort of surreal. Part of her was still convinced her grandfather would inevitably murder her, but she was trying to believe she had a life ahead of her. No matter how weird that thought was.
She tried not to roll her eyes. Not that it really mattered, Tracey had only glanced her way for a couple seconds before looking away again. "No, Snape saved your life, I hardly did anything. And I'm sure Daphne would have done something about it eventually anyway."
Tracey almost laughed at that, her shoulders shaking a couple times with a weak chuckle. (She would have tried, Tracey thought.) "Still." Then, low and muttered, Liz could barely hear it from here, "Thank you."
There it was. "Then you're welcome, I guess." Honestly, she didn't need Tracey thanking her or whatever — it wasn't like it'd taken that much effort from her, and really, she'd prefer Tracey just stop being all weird around her all the time. And, that meant acting grateful (if still confused) or whatever as well as getting all skittish of the scary mind mage, just, back to normal, before it had happened, please.
Really, if she got to pick between Tracey being all nice and grateful for saving her life or hateful and frightened over the mind magic, she'd rather have the latter — that, at least, Liz knew how to deal with.
For a few seconds, an awkward silence filled the room. Liz folded her arms over her chest — partially because she was cold, partially because this damn thing was still making her feel uncomfortably exposed (if not quite so intensely anxious as she'd been before Tracey had provided a convenient distraction). What the hell was taking them so long? They had to have been gone for a few minutes by now...
"Liz?"
She frowned, staring at the back of Tracey's head. Her head was an anxious, jumbled mess again, clearly having worked herself up to saying something else really uncomfortable. Though, again, Liz couldn't tell what without looking closer, and Tracey would notice the intrusion. "Yes, Tracey."
In a whisper, soft and with a nervous edge to it Liz couldn't interpret, Tracey asked, "Are you okay?"
"Um..." Liz wasn't entirely sure what that question was supposed to mean. It had to be something serious, for Tracey to be this uncomfortable asking, but without context, she had no idea. "I'm kind of cold, I guess, I wish they'd hurry it up, whatever they're doing..."
"No, I meant..." She trailed off again, taking a long, slow breath. When she spoke again, her voice was louder, almost at a normal conversational volume, though the words coming slow and even, cautious. "I had some time to think about what happened then, over these months. And at some point, it occurred to me...that things might not be alright." Tracey paused again, just for a second. "You never talk about home."
...Oh. Tracey's eyes crawling over her skin like ants, Liz had to look away, staring at the back wall — which was ridiculous, Tracey wasn't even looking at her, how could she be self-conscious about Tracey's attention when she wasn't even looking at her?! (Liz hated her own brain sometimes.) She took a few conscious, careful breaths, picking over exactly what she was supposed to say in response to that. In the end, she didn't come up with anything besides, "I'm fine."
She hardly even had to look in Tracey's head to know she didn't believe her.
(It was a long time ago now, Liz had been tiny, when Uncle Vernon had first sat her down — in the sitting room on the sofa, but not the sofa, the old one, they replaced it the next year — and insisted she was not to talk about what went on at home. They'd taken her in out of the goodness of their hearts, fed her and clothed her, going out and complaining about all they had done for her was bad, she would be bad, and bad little girls couldn't expect to keep getting fed and clothed, could they...)
She wasn't to talk about what went on at home. Surely Tracey knew that. It'd been much the same with her, after all — Liz had had to force her to talk about it.
But, there had been a good reason for Tracey to talk about things. She would have died if she hadn't. Liz was fine, she wasn't in any particular... She hadn't even seen him in two years now. (Except in nightmares, that didn't count, obviously.) Even if Liz wanted to tell Tracey anything — which she didn't, she'd rather try to forget the Dursleys had ever existed — there would be nothing to gain by doing so. All it would accomplish was make Liz dreadfully uncomfortable.
Surely Tracey knew that.
Except, she didn't know all of that — she had no idea Liz was living with Snape. She was just...trying to return the favour, Liz guessed. Or, at least, suggesting that she could return the favour, if Liz needed help. She didn't, but Tracey didn't know that.
Fighting down the pins and needles crawling across her skin, the bile itching at her throat, Liz took a long, slow breath. "I don't live with him anymore."
"Oh. Okay. Good."
Thankfully, Malkin and her assistant returned not long after that, because Liz had absolutely no idea what the fuck she was supposed to say now.
The whole trying the thing on process was rather uncomfortable — she was already unsettled by that little conversation with Tracey, and it didn't help that the robe wasn't the right size for her. (Obviously, since they didn't do sizes it wasn't like they had things just sitting around.) That meant there was a bit of prodding from Malkin every once in a while — not the assistant, she just hung back with the jacket folded over her arm, joining in on the chatter Liz was really only half listening to — occasionally transfiguring things to fit better. That wouldn't be possible on a finished robe, since they had enchantments worked into it that would be messed up by the fibres being magically moved around, and one of those enchantments was even to prevent them from being transfigured in the first place (which seemed like a perfectly reasonable safety precaution, when she thought about it), but this was, like, one of their store things, to be hung up where people could see it or to be tried on, so it didn't have all the enchantments the robes they actually sold did.
Though, her weird one-shouldered slip thing got a transfiguration too. Only a couple seconds after walking in, apologising for taking so long "dearies," Malkin took one look at how the thing was sitting on her, said something that was sort of half apology half asking permission, pulled the strap up a little, dragging the neckline up a bit, pinched the cloth together right over Liz's shoulder, and tapped her wand to it. The cloth sort of dissolved, the fibres splitting apart and then re-weaving themselves, after a couple seconds having fully reformed, the slip thing now sitting at a much less uncomfortable height, a couple inches of cloth left behind in Malkin's hand.
Okay, that was cool. She wondered how Malkin had done that...
From what Liz had picked up over the last couple years, mages typically wore three layers. There were underclothes, usually the shorts and vest Liz wore all the time, but also these slip things, and also, like, corsets and that kind of thing, though she hadn't seen normal bras at all in a magical store yet. (Liz honestly wasn't sure if people were supposed to wear knickers under the shorts or whatever, she'd never seen someone undress that far and she'd never asked.) And then there were the actual clothes, like robes, and also dresses and trousers and shirts and the like, in somewhat different styles from the muggle stuff she was used to but still recognisable as the same thing. And then people were supposed to wear a layer over that — a cloak or a jacket, and also a hat.
Technically, you needed to be wearing a cloak or something to not be considered underdressed when in public — "in public" here meaning whenever outdoors (unless doing something active, like playing quidditch), or at Hogwarts outside the dorms, it was fine going without in the common rooms — though this was a much looser rule, Liz had gotten the impression it was a generational thing, that it had once been required but was gradually getting less important. (They could still get yelled at by professors for skipping the cloak at Hogwarts, though usually only when going to classes.) The necessity of a hat was also fading out, though kids had apparently been an exception even back when it was absolutely required. Of course, Liz hated hats, her hair always refused to cooperate, so she never wore those, and the only times she bothered with the cloak was in classes and when it was especially cold out. Which meant she was always walking around Hogwarts slightly underdressed, by the mages' standards, but she didn't actually care.
The robes themselves, she'd noticed, tended to have two layers. (Though not separate, they were stitched together, considered one thing.) The inner layer wasn't really supposed to be seen, and held the enchantments for, like, keeping it clean and for warmth and stuff. This was also the fitted layer, with any ties and laces needed to hold the thing in the right place and proper shape. The top layer was usually looser folds of cloth draped over the inner layer (and attached here and there), giving the robe most of its thickness and bagginess. All the decorations and stuff were also on the outside, obviously. If something had defensive enchantments, like against hexes and stuff, those went on the outside, where they'd be most useful.
The inner layer in the robe she was trying on now was somewhat more complicated than her school robes. The very inside was made out of the same smooth, silky cloth — the same stuff as the shorts and vest, which honestly kind of made her wonder why they were supposed to wear both — but built into it was another layer of...leather, maybe? The only place it showed was around the laces, and it kind of looked like leather, but it was really soft and flexible, kind of like in her gloves but even more so. Anyway, it was somewhat thicker and stiffer than the cloth, this was what was supposed to hold the shape the laces were tightened to, which did make sense, she guessed, it was just new to her.
And really unpleasant...at first anyway. The laces were on her left side, starting under her armpit and running down to her hip, which was kind of awkward to reach and pull at while she was wearing it, but she also didn't have to. The finished, properly-enchanted robe would have enchantments that would tighten it for her. It was freely-adjustable at every point along the length, just tapping at the holes with her wand, though they could also be done all at once, running her wand up top to bottom — automatically, they'd stop tightening once they hit enough resistance and stay there, but she could do little tweaks if she didn't like how it turned out on its own, was the point. However, those enchantments hadn't been put on this one, so Malkin would have to do it for her by hand, just this once.
That hadn't been fun, not at all. The laces tightening, the inner layer clenching in around her, Liz's heart had immediately jumped up her throat, hot, stinging prickles running over her skin — just for a flash, she felt surrounded, trapped (the echo of it on the air like a bad smell, inescapable). For a second there, she nearly lashed out, struck out at Malkin's mind to defend herself. But it only lasted for a second — biting her lip, holding her breath, her clenched fists shaking — Liz soon relaxing out of that inexplicable moment of panic with a sigh. A definitely audible sigh, but there was nothing she could do about that now.
(She had no idea what might have happened if she hadn't taken a sip of her potion. Probably nothing good.)
In fact, once her stupid brain had been convinced she wasn't, what, being grabbed or something (she didn't know what had been going on there, honestly), it was sort of... Once Malkin was finished with the laces, the inner layer was hugged close around her, from her hips — above her thighs, it wouldn't restrict her movement at all — most of the way up her chest — not tight, it wasn't uncomfortable, she could still breathe and bend around just fine, and she wasn't sure this leather(?) stuff would be stiff enough to hold if it were tighter anyway. Just a light pressure along the whole length, not constricting but enough for her to be very aware it was there.
It was weirdly comfortable. Much more than she'd expected.
The upper layer was a bright red — not, like, painfully bright, just more vibrant than the sedate, rusty sort of Gryffindor red she saw a lot at Hogwarts — run through here and there with very narrow streaks of black. It sort of looked like it was wrapped around her? And it was, kind of she guessed, just not directly, attached to the inner layer instead. It was kind of hard to tell, the way it was folded and draped around, but it looked like it was made of a single length of cloth, starting somewhere on her back, looping around over her chest, then down around her stomach, then again low over her hips — which required crossing over the laces, Malkin had had to push it around to get at them — where it then hung down below her knee. (It was actually attached to the inner layer the whole way around, she thought, it looked like a strip of cloth wrapped around her but she'd just stepped into it and pulled it up.) But it wasn't supposed to stay there, once the laces were done Malkin grabbed that dangling end and pulled it back around in front, draping it over her shoulder — there were buttons high on her back that held the end in place, Malkin said she just had to get it close enough and they'd fasten themselves automatically. (Though, again, Malkin had to do it by hand just this once.) Getting it all to sit right was slightly awkward, Malkin tugged things around, doing more of that odd cloth-melting transfiguration to draw out a bunch of the material, shortening it here and there.
The skirt wasn't part of the whole pseudo-wrapping thing, though, instead attached to the inner layer independently. (Though it was made out of the same material, and there was no obvious break, so it was kind of hard to tell for sure just looking.) It was about knee length and pleated, the relatively heavy cloth zig-zagging back and forth, though there were also a few slits in it here and there, reaching uncomfortably high up her thighs. Getting her first glance at it, she'd thought that would be a problem, but carefully watching in the mirror it was actually impossible to tell — the skirt was using more cloth than it really had to, the pleats sort of giving it multiple layers, so the slits weren't actually visible. Which was weird, made Liz wonder why Malkin had put them in at all.
And it was...surprisingly comfortable, honestly. Liz really hadn't expected it to be. She'd thought, with the one arm bare all the way up to her neck, she'd feel far too uncomfortably exposed, but she didn't, really. Maybe...because of how the rest of it was clinging to her? She meant, she didn't like the loose, silky magical knickers, preferring the familiar clingy cotton ones, and it'd honestly never occurred to her the same principle might apply to a dress (or robe, whatever). And since she couldn't actually see it clinging to her, with the upper layer in the way, she got the benefit of actually being able to feel that it was there, without needing to be self-conscious about...
She didn't think any of this made sense, really, she couldn't rationalise the feeling even to herself in her own head. Just, it was much more comfortable than she'd expected it would be, she thought she actually liked it.
Like, way more than she'd expected. She even noticed herself almost smiling in the mirror, which was weird.
And, while she didn't actually care about this so much, she also thought it maybe didn't look terrible? She didn't know. It looked kind of weird and foreign to her eyes, what with being kind-of-not-really a strip of cloth wrapped around her a few times, which was weird, but not, like, bad? She was terrible at this sort of thing, she didn't know, but the girly instincts she'd picked up from that piece of the Dark Lord that cropped up sometimes weren't grumbling distractingly at the back of her head about how terrible and sloppy she looked, so it was probably fine.
Watching her from nearby, kind of smirking to herself a little bit, Tracey explained that, people actually did most of their duelling in trousers, but it was pretty common for duellists to dress like this on normal days, or for formal occasions and the like, just in case they ended up needing to fight unexpectedly. See, they had a problem with their clothes occasionally being caught with a curse, or some kind of alchemic poison or something, or just set on fire. Skirts were only rarely below the knee — besides, proper duelling boots were often knee-length anyway — and one arm was usually left uncovered. Of course, it was supposed to be their off arm they left uncovered, since their wand arm would be protected by whatever shield they cast or whatever, it was the arm trailing behind them or extended for balance that was likely to get something on its sleeve — which meant Liz had the wrong shoulder covered, since she was right handed, but still, that was the original idea behind it.
So, if she understood this correctly, Tracey had decided to dress Liz up like a professional duellist on her day off? Okay? Good to know, she guessed...
She was mostly just relieved it was so much more comfortable than she'd expected. She was still marveling over that a little, she hadn't expected to feel like this with this sort of thing, she thought she really liked it. And, the new school robes had an inner layer like this one too, with the laces and stuff, she thought? So, that was good.
If that sort of thing was normal, she should consider wearing magical clothes more often...
The jacket was more familiar, not really so foreign-looking as robes tended to be. It was made of thick wool — meaning it was very warm, though the enchantments on the robe would stop her from overheating too much — and long, the hem reaching past the robe's. It was a perfectly ordinary coat, really, save for the sleeves being weirdly baggy (so the wearer could comfortably fit gloves and wand holsters under them) and also the buttons being all glittery silver, though Malkin changed them to gold with a few taps of her wand. Apparently, in the finished version these would be actual gold (if alloyed with something to make it harder), and the enchanting would be done with a lot of gold (and copper) wire, which would give the black cloth a sort of golden glintiness under the light, which was weird, but mages did that sort of thing, Liz decided to not overthink it.
The only really weird thing about it, so far as the wearing of it went, was the way it was supposed to fold over, the buttons not fastening in the middle but way to one side — not quite under her arm, but pretty close. (They could fold either way, women were supposed to do it to one side and men the other, but Liz doubted she'd remember which was which, and Tracey assured her people didn't consistently mind it these days anyway.) The way jackets like this were supposed to work, she was told — by Tracey, of the three other people in the room she was the one who'd guessed Liz didn't know any of this — it was supposed to be worn closed while outdoors, the buttons unfastened and left hanging open while indoors in public spaces (like Hogwarts, or restaurants, or Ministry offices), and taken off in private spaces. (What counted as "private" was kind of vague, but the host would ask to take her cloak/jacket, so she really didn't need to think about it.) Which was slightly more complicated than cloaks, but also cloaks were just kind of weird? Jackets were at least a thing normal people wore, that she was more familiar with, even if the buttons were weird.
The jacket thing was kind of unnecessary — she thought she'd prefer just wearing the robe, honestly, but Liz didn't make the rules. But, she didn't hate it, and she actually really liked the robe part, so. Good? She thought it was good. Tracey also said it was good — volunteering things about it working well with her colouring and overall attitude too, which, honestly Liz wasn't even certain how to tell — so. Yes, good.
They spent a few minutes longer in the fitting room after Liz decided she would be getting it, Malkin doing a last couple measurements and discussing the enchantments that'd go into it. Above the standard stuff she put in everything, Liz asked for an upgrade in the defensive stuff up a couple tiers, on both the robe and the jacket. Nothing that would block serious curses — though the heavier, sturdier wool could support more powerful enchantments, she might actually get lucky with that — but definitely nuisance hexes and stuff wouldn't be a problem. It was maybe slightly paranoid, but there was all this stupid Girl Who Lived shite, if she was going to be going out in public in the magical world more, places she was likely to be seen and recognised like the Ministry...
It wasn't like she expected to be cursed in the back, but she thought taking precautions was just a reasonable thing to do. She'd have to pay significantly more for it, but she could definitely afford it — if she was doing the math in her head right, she could afford a thousand of them, and still never have to work a day in her life, because these magical noble people were completely ridiculous — and it was better to have the protection and not need it than not have it and need it.
By the time they were all finished up, Liz and Tracey dressed again, Hermione and Hannah weren't in the main room anymore. But then, Liz really hadn't expected them to be — the other two girls had already been finished here, so they'd probably left for Fortescue's to wait there with the others. And they were there, lingering around a couple of the tables outside pushed together — they didn't have ice cream yet, they were just preparing for everyone to get here — along with Dorea and Ailbhe and Tori. No Daphne and Susan though, and finally other people were noticing they weren't around — apparently the only reason no one else had wondered where they'd gone before was that Liz was the only one who'd noticed they'd slipped away.
...Maybe Liz should have said something. Whoops?