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She gestures down at herself and shakes her head. “I packed sensible clothes. At Mt. Qaf, I’m going to look like your accountant.”

“Which is exactly why I asked to meet with you today.” The car turns away from the main avenue, and the storefronts outside become progressively more expensive. “Before we go to Rakan’s wedding, we have a stop to make.”

Madame Eleni’s boutique smells of floral perfume, steamed silk, and something faintly metallic from the tailoring tools. Reinforced ladders and fitting platforms rise toward the high ceiling, built for clients whose proportions have very little in common with Valerie’s.

A velvet curtain sweeps aside almost as soon as we enter. Madame Eleni emerges in a severe black dress, her silver hair arranged in an immaculate updo. She is an Arachne, and her six elegant arms move around her in practiced coordination.

Her attention goes straight to Valerie. “A human! Sigurd, you neglected to mention such a delightful presence. Where on earth did you find her?”

There it is. Cassian anticipated exactly this kind of question when he prepared our cover story, but delivering it with Valerie standing beside me feels stranger than reading it on paper.

“I met her near Saltweather,” I tell Eleni. “I was swimming past the coast when I saw her walking along the shore. It took me three weeks to approach her, even though she’d already noticed me.”

Valerie turns her head toward me. For half a second, I wonder whether she remembers the same version; then her mouth twitches.

“He was very hard to miss,” she tells Eleni. “I thought he was a very large, very lost whale at first.”

Eleni laughs, several hands fluttering toward her chest. Valerie keeps going before I can decide whether I should be offended.

“It took me a while to realize he was lingering there on purpose,” she adds. “Apparently subtlety works differently underwater.”

It’s only a lie, but the image comes to me with irritating clarity while she speaks. I can picture Valerie walking beside the water while I linger beyond the breakwater, waiting for another glimpse before finally approaching.

The old kraken greed in me likes the picture far too much. I recognize the impulse and leave it unanswered.

“A silent admirer in the deep,” Eleni says, delighted. “Very romantic. Slightly alarming, perhaps, but romantic.”

“I was discreet,” I tell her. Valerie glances up at me, amusement bright in her face.

“You were the size of a fishing boat,” she says. “Discreet might be generous.”

I nearly argue, then think better of it. For one foolish second, I can almost remember a courtship that never happened.

Eleni finally turns from gossip to business. Two of her hands hold a measuring tape, while another carries a pincushion and a fourth keeps silver shears ready.

“Cardigan on the settee, Miss Priest.” She gestures toward the fitting mirrors with another hand. “I need your measurements before I decide what can be altered in time.”

Valerie slips it off and crosses toward the mirrors. By the time she reaches them, Eleni already has the measuring tape looped between several hands.

“Sensible shoes too. Excellent.” Eleni looks down approvingly before beginning with Valerie’s shoulders. “I like you more every minute.”

“I’m very attached to clothes I can move in,” Valerie replies. “And shoes that don’t qualify as a workplace hazard.”

Eleni laughs and keeps working. The measuring tape passes neatly from hand to hand while another records numbers, and Valerie submits to the process with admirable patience.

A few minutes later, Eleni reaches for a length of emerald silk. She drapes it over Valerie’s shoulders, gathers it loosely at the waist, then steps back to assess the fall.

“Beautiful. Now I need the hem.” Eleni points toward the high fitting platform beside the mirrors. “Up you go, Miss Priest.”

Valerie turns toward it and stops. The first useful step was clearly designed for someone with much longer legs, and the platform itself rises nearly to her chest.

“At the risk of pointing out the obvious, I’m not built for mountaineering.” She looks back at Eleni, who doesn’t appear remotely concerned by the problem.

Two of Eleni’s hands keep hold of the emerald silk while another gestures toward me. “Mr. Eiriksson can help you. That is what attentive men are for.”

Valerie turns toward me, then looks back at the platform with obvious suspicion. “I was afraid you were going to say that. Please don’t make this unnecessarily dramatic.”

“I have no intention of it.” Her expression tells me she has very little confidence in that promise.