The Season (Season Series #1)

Chapter 2.1: Ella and her Ladies

"Is your mother sending along any more clothes?" Ella asked, looking past me towards where Rosanna had laid out the ball gown, travelling outfit, and three plan grey uniform dresses on the bed.

"Well...I can't be certain, I came as soon as I got your letter," I said, clasping my hands behind my back in an attempt to hide my nerves.

"I'm sure your aunt is sending something, she understands how important the Season is," Rosanna said, coming to Ella's side.

"I didn't leave very much by way of dresses at home," I said, shrugging. Rosanna pursed her lips as Ella looked down at the five dresses on my bed. There was a click and a rustle from the next room and I heard Emily asking quietly for a seamstress before the door closed again with a snick.

"We'll make do with one of our dresses for tomorrow, but the seamstresses will have to pull through for the rest of her wardrobe," Ella said, as if making a decision on something, "Is there really nothing your mother could send to you? Perhaps she was having something made for your graduation ceremony at the end of the summer?"

"I doubt she would go to that kind of trouble," I said, following as Ella and Rosanna exited to the sitting room, "The truth is that the day I received your letter, I was on my way home from Hargrove,"

"You finished early?" Ella asked, looking around in surprise. I screwed my mouth up as I looked away, searching for the polite way to say I'd been expelled.

"She's been kicked out of Hargrove?" Emily exclaimed, fixing Ella with an incredulous stare. Ella's surprise quickly turned to dismay.

"Oh don't be absurd, Emily! That's not what you're saying, is it dear?" Rosanna asked, her eyes silently pleading. I shot a glance from her to Ella.

"Oh no," Emily said, shaking her head vehemently as she came to stand next to Ella, "No no no, Ella I really must protest. You absolutely cannot have a Hargrove dropout as a lady in waiting!"

"My ladies?"

The voice made us all look around as a woman with a roll of measuring tape around her neck and a sewing basket on her arm emerged from behind a tapestry next to the fireplace.

"We need dresses," Ella said, clutching my arm and dragging me over towards the seamstress. I could almost feel her hands shaking as she released me, Emily still fuming in the background but clearly not wishing to continue her argument in the presence of a palace servant.

"Very good," the woman said, setting down her basket and unravelling the measuring tape before stringing it around my waist. I didn't miss the way her eyes popped ever so slightly as she took in the condition of my current dress.

"What kind of dresses would you like, Lady Canterbury?" she asked, slipping the tape up to measure my bust, followed by my shoulders and each arm. She marked each measurement on the tape.

"We'll need five day dresses, four formal dresses, and at least two ball gowns," Ella said. The seamstress nearly dropped her tape.

"My lady, that's practically a complete wardrobe," she said, looking over in shock at Ella.

"Have them put on my account. And I'm sure you can understand that we'll need at least a day dress and a formal dress by tomorrow," Ella said, pointedly meeting the incredulous look of the seamstress. I gathered from their interaction that most girls never needed this many dresses so early in the Season.

"Of course, my lady," the seamstress said, pulling the tape down to measure my height, "I'll do what I can to have something ready for tomorrow evening, but I can't promise anything before then,"