The morning of October 14th came with a careful knock at the door. Callum sleepily got out of bed and threw one of the bathrobes that hung at the foot end of the bed over his pajamas. Rayla rolled over to watch him leave.
The crown prince opened the door to a very nervous elf in some sort of uniform. He was pushing a little cart stacked high with food and drink.
"B-breakfast, Excellence?", he stuttered.
"That sounds good, thanks", Callum said and the elf moved to step past him. When he didn't move, they gave each other surprised looks.
"You do not wish to be served, Sire?"
"No, uh, we have our own hands, thank you", Callum snickered, twiddling his fingers. The ring pulled on his skin and he flushed slightly. That had actually happened.
The server nodded, giving a nervous smile, then departed with a small bow.
When Callum closed the door, Rayla stepped out of the bedroom, also dressed in a bathrobe. She seemed to be rather enthused by it.
"Something wrong, fawn?"
"It's so fuzzy I'm gonna die!", she cried happily, petting the fabric, then stopped when she caught his amused glance. "Wha'?! It's nice! Look at you feelin' all at home! This is… this is like a dream to me!"
"Welcome to the rest of your life", he said adoringly.
She laughed brightly, "You're such a sap!"
Then a shadow fell on her mien. "Rest of my life, hm? First thing's first, though, right?"
Callum hugged her, the bulky robes bunching up between them.
"Let's not think about this stuff today. We should have some fun."
Rayla nodded slowly. If this was her last day of unlimited freedom, she'd like to make the most of it. "I saw there's gonna be a public dance tonight. Did you want to go?"
He nodded enthusiastically. "You'll wear the dress, right?"
She chuckled. "Only if you find somethin' that fits with it, otherwise we should just wear our uniforms. Let's go look! I saw a few tailor shops out there that had some clothes in their displays. Maybe we can get somethin' on short notice?"
They sat on the sofas, across from each other and started eating.
"What would that even look like?", Callum said after a moment, not quite sure about what would fit with her startling orange-red dress.
"We're in Tiram. It's ocean territory. We're gonna find lots of coral red stuff here, you'll see."
"Are all ocean elves dressed as crazily as Honsa, then?"
Rayla shook her head and tried to chew faster to answer. "Of course not. You've seen a few and they didn't all look like rainbows. It's just a popular color, cause under water it's pretty noticeable. Most colors are a bit muted down there."
Callum tried imagining a suit made from coral red fabric and shuddered. The burgundy of Katolis was bad enough.
When they had finished eating, they took turns in the bed- and bathroom, getting dressed.
"Ready to go?", Rayla asked eventually while grabbing some more tradeables from her bag in the walk-in closet.
"All good!", came the answer.
Stepping outside, the guard next to the door smoothly joined their side. It was Yasra's colleague, Goroth, judging by the voice.
"Good morning, Excellence, Sicarius", they said, sounding somewhat confused. It was difficult choosing a formula when the targets of one's greeting were of such different social status.
"She can go by `Excellence`, too, Goroth", Callum grinned and Rayla gave him sort of a half-frown.
"I-I'd rather not!", she said with a confused snicker.
With mischief in his voice, the crown prince said, "You're going to have to get used to it, eventually, Lady of the Starl-"
"No!", she groaned, flushing slightly and pressing her index to his lips, "Look! You said it's not official until Opal or whatever her name is puts it in the stupid book! So stop!"
He snickered and grabbed her hand off his face. "Let's go collect some more stares"
Walking the streets hand in hand with Rayla was a very different experience from when he was alone. Where yesterday, people had been antagonistic or angry, most of them now were simply dumbstruck. Moonshadow elves were about the only people who would still consistently shoot them purely disgusted looks, presumably because they assumed that they were not summands just yet.
After writing so many letters that his wrist had ached, Callum had asked Rayla to explain the entire ritual of the bloom again, and she had actually pulled out her little book to read him passages that went into excruciating detail about it. The crown prince had written it all down, to make it easier to memorize. They were planning on asking each other questions, as though preparing for a test. For all they knew, that was exactly what was going to happen in Parliament.
A gaggle of gaping elves formed whenever the two of them stopped to look at a storefront. Callum almost wanted to lose the Canon Guard to see what these people were actually thinking.
Finally they found a tailor's store and went inside, leaving their confused entourage behind.
"I'll be with you in a moment", the tailor said. She was turned away from them, pinning fabrics to an adjustable mannequin.
While they waited, Callum studied Rayla's distracted face. Hm… she seemed a little different today.
"Did you…?", he started, then took a second glance when she turned to face him. "Did you put on makeup?!"
She laughed at his incredulous expression. "You just noticed that?! Oh, dummy! Yes, I did. I know it's not a lot and all but I figured if today is a date day I might as well dig in the depths of my bag and pull out this stuff. I haven't put anythin' on in a long time, so… yeah. Does it look okay?"
"It's… yeah, it looks great. I'm just surprised, is all."
"Surprised that your angry warrior princess might want to bother with her looks for a date?", she chuckled.
"Well, I mean, I did, too, so…?"
"Whaaat?!", Rayla went, then bent forward to examine his cheeks. It was true! He'd put on some kind of foundation to dampen the imperfections in his face!
His fiance stood up straight. "Is that a normal thin' for human guys to do?", she asked, confused.
The tailor seemed to perk up at the word `human` but shook her head as though she wasn't sure what she had heard.
"Uh, I don't care? Look, I don't know if it's a prince thing or a regular guy thing, I just thought I'd like to look a bit surreal for you today. What's wrong with that?"
This buckled Rayla. She guffawed, "Su-surreal! Hah! Oh, that's p-precious!"
The tailor seemed to chuckle, as well.
When she had finished laughing, she hugged him. "This is plenty surreal already, but I'm happy you went through the effort."
He kissed her. "I'm not nearly as good with the stuff as Honsa. There's the masterclass. I didn't even realize she was wearing anything before she pointed it out"
The elf in his arms chuckled. "Yeah. Where style's concerned, we both could learn a lot from her. She's a dapper dunker."
With the last word, the oceanwave tailor spun, wearing a mien of bemused anger. "Come on! I'm right here, you Scotian twibligh-"
The pinning needles she was holding dropped from her hands as she realized that they were, in fact, not two moonshadow elves, heckling her people.
"Hi", Callum went, lifting his five-fingered hand in greeting.
The tailor took a moment to stare between them, then asked, "Uh what can I help you w-, uh, do for you?"
"We're looking for somethin' that would fit with a sleek, coral red dress. For him", Rayla said, suppressing a snort.
"For the human, a suit. A suit, for the human", the tailor muttered, totally blindsided, "Uh. I- do humans wear, uh, ...?"
"We wear anything that fits us", Callum said, bending over to pick up the needles on the ground. When he handed them to the tailor, she appeared to snap out of her confused stupor.
"Thanks f-for that. L-let me, uh, take your measurements", she got up and grabbed a measuring tape.
"Stand with your legs slightly apart and your arms outw… yes, thank you", she instructed a very compliant Callum.
While she was busy running the tape over his body, Rayla studied the fabrics that were set out in spools on the walls.
"When do you need this done?"
"Tonight. We'd be happy to take something from your stock, if you have anything", Callum said, "We have gem shards as well as some plants from the mountains and the plains."
"Any Salis Anur leaves? I was looking to get some soon, anyway"
Callum nodded. "They're dried and ground up. Is that okay?"
"Even better, saves me the work. So gems and Salis Anur. You wanna show me how much of each you have and I'll go over the stuff I have lying around?"
They spread their tradeables on her counter and she eyed the gems carefully. "Yeah this is a good amount of stuff. Let me check the back."
She vanished in a door behind the counter and the Prince and Rayla went back to examining the store.
A moment later, the tailor came back, three outfits draped over her arms.
"Now these were all made for some guy who traded for half their value up front and then decided to never come back. I figure now that a month's passed, I can pass them on. Anything catch your eye immediately?"
Rayla and her fiance studied the garments. She opened her mouth to point one out, but Callum was faster, "I like this one. It's not too crazy", he said, pointing at an angular looking suit jacket that was mostly dark gray with an equally geometric white design running all over it. It looked as though it could be part of a stylized Precious White. The jacket had coral red accents on the shoulders, collar, cuffs and the lower part of the notched lapels.
His fiance beamed at him. "I was gonna pick that one, too! I really like the white pattern, reminds me of my passport."
"I'm not surprised. Scotians apparently love their Precious Whites. I actually borrowed the design off my customer's papers. But yeah, hooray for easy choices, right? Go on, put it on. I'll adjust it for you, if it needs it."
Callum took the suit off her hands and vanished in the small room she had motioned him towards.
While he was busy, the tailor turned to Rayla. "A human, dear? Care to tell the story?"
Rayla frowned. "It's gonna be all over town by tomorrow, ma'am. Just give us a bit of privacy for today"
The tailor nodded sheepishly. "I'm sorry. I should've guessed, what with talks of princes. I'm a curious old shark, forgive me"
The moonshadow elf shrugged, "It's fine. Even for us, it's all a bit crazy. I'll be honest, we've been really lucky so far. I didn't expect us to be able to just walk about without gettin' rotten Solanum thrown at us."
"That is surprising. Maybe it's because of that hunk of metal you're dragging around", the tailor gestured at Goroth who was silently standing next to the door, then smiled, "Or because you two are sweet like candied rodgrass. That little talk about makeup had me just… melting"
Rayla flushed a little, "Uh, thanks?"
Callum walked out of the dressing room, pulling at the cuffs to straighten them out. The suit fit rather well, safe for the pants that would need a bit of trimming.
"How do I look?", he asked.
The only person whose opinion mattered nodded approvingly. "It's like when they gave you sky elf armor, dummy, you look way more manly than you have any right to."
He chuckled, then pulled an idiotic grimace, "There! Does that make it seem more like me?"
Rayla stepped toward him and wrapped her arms around his neck. "You can be more than just a wee mushy sook, Callum..."
The Tailor squeaked quietly when they kissed and couldn't help a small clap with the tips of her fingers.
"That's exactly what I mean! Candied! Rodgrass!", she said, grinning mischievously at their annoyed faces.