The Executed Empress Proposed to His Scarred Brother novel · Chapter 19 of 24
Chapter 19: The Fitting
The drums had been going since dawn, and the dresser flinched at every one.
She was a small gray woman with pins in her mouth and a cloth tape round her neck.
She worked on Iseult's hem on her knees.
The long looking glass stood against the wall by the hearth, tall as a door, in a gilt frame.
Two porters had carried it up and fled.
"Turn, my lady," said the dresser around her pins.
Iseult turned.
The gown was ivory silk, heavy, cut close through the bodice, with a low square neck and a skirt that fell in a pool.
She hardly knew the woman in the glass.
Her copper hair was pinned up off her shoulders.
Her breasts rose out of the silk, full and pale, and her waist looked small.
Ilarion sat in the chair by the window with the drainage book on his knee.
He had not turned a page in a quarter of an hour.
"It needs another inch at the waist," said the dresser.
"No," said Ilarion.
Both women looked at him.
"It fits," he said. "Leave it."
The dresser pursed her lips, spat out her pins, and bobbed a curtsy.
"The lacing is only tacked, my lady. Don't sit in it."
She gathered her things and left, and the bolt shot home behind her.
The drums went on, a low beat through the stone.
The rest of this chapter is part of the paid portion of the series. Chapters 1–6 of The Executed Empress Proposed to His Scarred Brother are free to read — start from the beginning, then unlock the rest with coins in the app.
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