Chapter Text
Of course, the seam has to be difficult, of course it does.
Kai sighs and rolls his neck, wincing at the knot that’s formed. Nevertheless, he picks the fabric back up and leans over, much farther than necessary, and does his best to keep the stitches even.
“Sewing together silk and leather is not for the faint of heart,” he mutters as the thin fabric nearly rips again. The fine silk, a gorgeous golden orange, is extremely delicate and does not take well to the leather needle.
“Shut it, Marian.”
“Who said I was going to say anything?” She exclaims, crossing her arms while she peers over his shoulder.
“I could feel the judgment on the back of my neck,” Kai responds, chewing his cheek as he pulls his stitch tight.
“Well if you’re giving me the opening-”
“Shut it, Marian!” Yes, he should have waited for the arachas silk thread to finish processing. Yes, he should have put a reinforcing trim on the silk if he wasn’t going to wait. He knows this, but he’s far too close to finishing to change it now.
Marian chuckles at his grumbling while she goes back to pinning samples of her chosen fabrics to her finished pattern.
“Good luck, Kai,” she calls as she leaves his tent. He mutters… something back, but truly he’s not paying attention now that he’s down to about ten stitches left. Scissors thud against the table after he cuts off the extra thread with a triumphant yell.
The silk drapes over the leather wonderfully, cowling at the neckline and flowing down to a smooth seam at the bottom of the piece. Excess fabric hangs off the sides to be used for the back, yet to be precisely designed, but the orange disguises the leather better than he anticipated.
“I could be on to something here,” Kai proclaims as he sets the bodice on the form next to the worktable. He laces the chest piece to the backplate of armor and sets to pinning, constructing then dismantling different possibilities.
He’s still there when Priscilla stops by and the sun has dipped enough to cast long shadows. Standing back from the form with Priscilla just makes his squint in dissatisfaction harder.
“Yup, that’s terrible,” Kai states before striding over and plucking the pins out with a huff, “At this rate, you’ll be lucky to have this by your name day.”
“Kai, my name day was last month.”
“Exactly.” The loose fabric drops onto the grass floor and Kai chews on his cheek again as he turns to Priscilla, “Oh you’ve got to be kidding me.”
“What?” She yells, “I wasn’t even doing anything!” Kai ignores her in favor of grabbing his fabric shears.
“You’ve got to be kidding me .” A square of silk gets cut from a tail and pinned on the back panel of leather. The now lopsided excess fabric gets gathered across the back then wrapped around the front and pinned at the waist in a similar fashion to Priscilla’s dress. An embellished buckle gets plucked from a basket and secured where the fabric meets at the front.
“How long have you been here, Kai?”
He slowly looks up at her, hand still on the buckle, “I don’t want to answer that, Priscilla.” Kai plops back down on the workbench at her inelegant snort and joins her laughing.
“Well the drape is decadent and I can’t wait to see it completed, but your sister made Gamble Dumplings and would likely skin us both if they’re cold by the time we get there,” Priscilla says, holding her hand out to Kai. He takes it, ignoring the obnoxious cracking from his back, shudders at missing Gamle Dumplings.
“Honestly, I’m more worried about how creative she can get with the wooden spoon, it was a lethal weapon by the time she was five.” They leave the tent, tapes still hanging from Kai’s neck, and head towards the open-air kitchen at the center of camp, led on by the smell of cabbage and fried dough.