Book 1: Gemaris Island

Chapter 4: The Costume Shop

Gemaris Island. How fitting. It was a dazzling, unfettered name for a dazzling, unfettered people. Gemaris Island really was the gem of the sea. From the sky, it sparkled in the ocean like a jewel that was flooded with every color of the rainbow due to the vast gardens. Ora thought it looked like a topaz, but its personality reminded her more of a pearl. Sweet, pure, innocent. Protected by a shell. Sheltered from the world. How hopeful Ora would be if not every island was oblivious like Gemaris Island.

The girl in the small red dress had pulled Amien into a costume shop as soon as she saw it, despite Amien's objections. Eventually, Ora gave up, let go of Amien and scurried into the shop by herself. Amien rolled his eyes and after his one hundredth groan that day, he followed Ora into the store.

The costume shop seemed bigger on the inside. From the town square, it appeared to be a hole in the wall, squished in between two larger, more important buildings. But stepping inside of the costume shop was like stepping into a storybook. A theater story. Ora was in Heaven. Every costume she saw, and even every tiny accessory told an entire story. Every necklace and glove and hat introduced a new character to the writer. All the intricate designs and ornate decorations on the suits and dresses inspired Ora with new ideas and new feelings. Every wig and prop had a personality. Yes, there were props, too! And even though the mannequins were faceless, their poses and suits gave them so much character. One eyeless palace guard in a blue suit held a thin sword with a curved golden handle. His buttons were white gold with a crown etched onto each one. Another mannequin was a dancing ballerina with pink flowers and ribbons in her hair. Her dress was fluffy and bright like a cloud over a sunset.

There was a sad statue with its head bowed down. She had long charcoal black curls and wore a black hat with red and black roses in it. In her gloved hands hung a scarlet purse. Around her neck hung a heart-shaped locket.

Perhaps she isn't sad, Ora thought. Maybe she's thinking. Maybe she's regretting something. Maybe she's leaving her home and it's bitter-sweet...

"Ora, what are you doing?"

Ora jerked back up to see Amien peering at her. She realized that she had been bending way to examine the details of the sad girl's purse.

"In fact, what are we doing here at all?" Amien wondered.

"Amien! Haven't you ever wondered how I write my theater stories and how I come up with the characters? Well, this is how!" Ora whispered, excitedly.

"How? By shopping for costumes?" Amien asked. "Seems like an expensive way to get inspired."

"Window shopping is free," Ora shot back. "All you have to do is look at the costumes and wonder what kind of person would be wearing it. Why are they holding what they're holding? Where do they come from? What do they do? What-"

"Yes, yes, yes. I sat in on your class," Amien interrupted her. He bent down to examine the red purse Ora had been studying. "It was actually somewhat interesting. Believe it or not, I once wrote...or tried to write a theater story and it was not as easy as I thought it would be."

"Wait, really? You wrote a theater story? When? What was it about? Where-"

"You've seen it," he told her, standing back up to face her. "It was part of the competition for the crown."

"Really? Which one was it?" Ora asked, her face lighting up with anticipation.

Amien opened his mouth to answer, but stopped himself. He sighed through his nose and stared at a little girl mannequin sitting behind Ora. She was having tea with a quaint set of china.

"Forget it. You'll only make fun of it," Amien said, moving past Ora to examine the tea set.

"No I won't!" Ora argued. "I promise!"

Amien crouched down and tried to see a story in the sunset design on the china cup. He was still hesitant to answer Ora. His theater story had been the only one with such young children playing the characters. Although the audience had applauded, Amien knew that it was out of sheer politeness. He himself didn't even like his story that much. He had just wanted the crown. No, he had just wanted to get noticed. Amien was never noticed. Not when he deserved it, and definitely not when he didn't deserve it.

"Amien? No matter how bad you think it was, it couldn't have been bad as Reignald's," Ora shrugged, grinning down at him.

He looked up from the teacup he had been holding and met her hopeful blue eyes.

"The pirate one," he answered, standing up.

"Which pirate one?"

"Exactly."

"What?" Ora demanded.

"My story was unoriginal. I had no idea what to write about when it mattered most. So I took parts from different popular pirate stories and mashed them all together. And I had kids play the characters and paint the sets. It was horrible, I'll admit that," Amien shrugged.

"Yours was the one with kids?" Ora gasped, suddenly growing excited. "They were so cute! And the way they threw themselves into their role was so touching! It drew me into the story more than I thought it would! I mean, they were still kids pretending to be pirates, but it was so interesting to see the story through their eyes. The eyes of children."

Ora threw her hands on her heart causing her red bracelets to jingle against each other.

"You don't need to be polite. You can be honest!" Amien scoffed, trying not to smile at her.

"I am being honest! I will say, it was definitely more memorable than...The Spirit of the Tree or whatever it was called," Ora groaned and scoffed, throwing her head back so many times, Amien thought it would fall off.

"You hated his theater story that much?" Amien asked, eyeing her suspiciously.

"Of course I did! I mean, it was about a stupid tree that everyone cared too much about!" Ora laughed loudly, crossing her arms. "And it had some..special power that they wanted and they got greedy and got what they deserved! That's great! Everyone's dead! The tree's all alone! Now what?"

"I mean, I didn't like it, but I will say it was a good cautionary tale," Amien mentioned.

"Cautionary tale? What did you learn from it? Don't kill trees?" Ora snickered, still scowling.

"Don't be greedy!" Amien pointed out. "It teaches people not to be greedy."

"Well...everyone knows that!" Ora said, stuttering.

"Do you not think Reignald is greedy?" Amien asked, suspiciously.

"Of course I do! But...but-"

"Everyone knows not to be greedy, but they forget. Cautionary tales remind us of simple messages that we tend to forget," Amien simply stated. He couldn't believe he was defending Reignald's story, but he also couldn't believe that he wasn'tthe only one who had hated it. In all honesty, he had only hated it because it had won and Amien's had lost. But Amien didn't remember much about The Spirit of the Tree.

"You're right," Ora sighed. "I'm just...so sorry that Reignald won. Maybe he deserved to win the contest, but he didn't deserve to be crowned king."

"Of course," Amien murmured. "I don't know what Lindo Que was thinking to make that contest. It's all his fault. It always is."

Ora recalled what Sir Grenton had said to Amien out in the town square.

"Sir Grenton said that Lindo Que got all the credit for the Mirror Gates. But they were originally your idea?" Ora asked him earnestly.

Amien didn't say anything. He started walking away, but she persisted.

"Well?" Ora demanded.

"It doesn't matter, alright?!" Amien exploded at her.

At first, Ora was saddened by his sudden outburst and clutched her hands nervously while backing away from Amien. He awkwardly shook his head and began walking away again, pretending to examine an elf costume. But Ora suddenly rolled her eyes and began scolding Amien.

"You deserve credit for your work!" she called across the maze of costumes, seeing that Amien had turned a corner and was out of sight.

There was no answer.

"Amien!" Ora shouted, marching towards the elf costume. He was clearly intent on ignoring Ora no matter how many times she yelled his name. But Ora was intent on getting her point across. She turned the corner to see Amien lunging towards her. He muffled Ora's screams and pulled her to the ground behind the elf mannequin.

"Sir Grenton followed us in," Amien whispered, straining to see the knight. "I don't know if he heard anything and how much he heard."

Ora slowly pulled Amien's hand off her mouth and turned around to try and spot Sir Grenton.

"Well, we can't just be hiding here in plain sight! This is way more suspicious than just standing up and facing him!" Ora whispered.

Amien rolled his eyes in frustration and fear.

"He's going to find us soon anyway, let's just hope he didn't hear us..." Ora said, but trailed off. What if Sir Grenton had heard them? What then?

But she decided to take a chance. The girl stood up and walked over to Sir Grenton with confidence in her stride.

She didn't get far though, because Amien jumped up from his hiding place and held her back.

"What are you doing?!" he hissed, grabbing her arms.

"Trying not to look like someone who is hiding from the palace guards!" Ora whispered loudly, trying to free herself from Amien's grip.

When the pirate wouldn't let go of her, and Ora spotted Sir Grenton on the other side of a row of costumes, she finally called out, "Sir Grenton! Fancy seeing you here!"

Amien jumped back as Sir Grenton turned his head and did a double take.

"Miss Ember! What a coincidence! I didn't think you would be here!" Sir Grenton said to her in his usual, confident voice.

"Why wouldn't I be here? I'm looking at costumes for my theater stories!" Ora replied.

"I know," Sir Grenton suddenly said, smiling less and less as he spoke. "I heard you two talking about the king again."

Well, we're dead, Ora thought as she tried to hide her fear with a false smile.

"Oh, really?" she asked, innocently. "That's strange, because I didn't think you came in here to eavesdrop."

After tensing up, Amien slowly closed his eyes and shook his head. Sir Grenton wasn't smiling at all anymore, but instead just peering at Ora with his fist clutching his sword.

"I didn't," Sir Grenton replied. "I came in here to look at costumes. Gemaris Island has one of the best costume shops in the kingdom."

"Really!" Ora exclaimed, sounding too enthusiastic. "Because I've also noticed it's a GREAT place to eavesdrop on people's conversations! You can hide behind racks and mannequins and never get noticed!"

Sir Grenton furrowed his dark eyebrows at her.

"Miss Ember. You do know that I am the king's main knight, right? I can eavesdrop if I want. I don't care if it's rude or not," Sir Grenton stated, firmly.

"Yes, it makes perfect sense," Ora quickly replied, holding her hands behind her back and nodding.

"And you know I have the authority to arrest anyone I suspect of treason against the king, right?" he asked, his face becoming fiercer and his bright eyes colder. How could his eyes be so cold and fiery at the same time?

"Right," Ora replied, staying calm. "And it's a good thing to do, because anyone suspected of treason should be arrested, even if they turn out to be innocent."

Sir Grenton stopped. Behind Ora, Amien was hiding his face. He knew that Ora was being sarcastic even though she sounded serious with her furrowed eyebrows and professional posture. The black knight amber eyes were wide with suspicion. He even stepped back to get a better look at Ora's body language. He couldn't tell if she was being sincere or not.

"I don't like arresting innocent people," he finally answered. "I arrest people that I suspect, but I only suspect them if I have solid evidence or reason to believe they are committing a crime."

"But doesn't suspecting someone mean you think they might be guilty but you don't have evidence to prove it? Don't you search for evidence because you suspect someone?" Ora asked, curiously.

"OH MY GOODNESS, ORA! STOP!" Amien finally shouted, grabbing his hair. "I'm sorry, Sir Grenton. She's a very curious and talkative and disagreeable person. I don't know I can stand her and I don't know how you can stand her. Please pardon her for wasting all your time. If you'd like, I can get her out of your way right now."

Amien started leading Ora towards the front door of the costume shop, walking right past Sir Grenton.

"I didn't actually hear you two talking about the king," Sir Grenton suddenly said, breaking the silence.

Amien and Ora turned around and saw the mischief twinkling in his sunny eyes.

"I just wanted to see if you would admit it or not, because yes, Miss Ember. I do suspect you and Amien of conspiring against the king," Sir Grenton said with his hands on his armored waist. "So my question is, why wouldn't you admit that you were talking about the king?"

Amien stared open-mouthed, at Sir Grenton and then at Ora. She paused before calmly answering, "We WERE talking about the king. We were talking about what kind of theater story he would want to see and remember forever. I had the perfect idea for a story and I want it to be a surprise. I also wanted it to be a surprise that I am now on a journey to the king's palace to present my theater story for him. But it's not a surprise anymore. His head palace guard now knows. But that's the truth. I didn't mean to look or sound suspicious, Sir Grenton."

Ora sounded a little worried toward the end of her rant, but even an innocent person would be worried if suspected of treason against the King of the Twelve Islands.

Sir Grenton stared into Ora's timid blue eyes. Then he let out a short laugh.

"I feel like I should find you suspicious based on the banter we just had, but something tells me you just like to argue, Miss Ember," Grenton said with a smile. He straightened up and bowed his head to her as Amien actually smiled and nodded in agreement. "Well, I wish you well on your journey. I have to get back to finding the Willow Wanderer."

After hailing the king, Sir Grenton strolled out of the costume shop, finally leaving Amien and Ora alone.

Amien quickly glanced around, then desperately whispered to Ora, "We NEED to stop being so careless. Let's use code words or SOMETHING."

Ora nodded in agreement. She soon had a brilliant idea.

"I know, Amien! How about whenever we want to talk about something that the palace guards would find...questionable, then let's just talk about it as if we were planning on writing a story," Ora said excitedly, finally bringing her sweet smile back to her face.

But Amien didn't get it.

"I'll show you!" she whispered. Ora stuck her chin in the air and began speaking at normal volume. "I don't know, Amien! I think we should portray the king as a tall, scrawny man in our story! Don't you agree?"

"Alright..." Amien mumbled. "Well, Ora, I think we shouldn't call the king 'the king' in our story, because...we don't want to send the wrong message to our audience. How about we make the king...a teacher instead?"

Amien had raised his voice, too, and Ora understood what he was trying to tell her. Talking about the king, even a fake king in a story would attract attention from nosy palace guards. Everyone was paranoid about conspiracies against the king. It made more sense to do away with the word "king" altogether.

"Good idea, Amien! 'Teacher' it is! So, where were we again, anyway?" Ora asked, biting her lip.

Amien sighed the deepest of sighs and hung his head back in utter exhaustion.

Suddenly, Ora's big eyes grew round like sapphires as she spotted something on the other side of the store. She sprinted past Amien who reluctantly hurried after her. Ora ran past extravagant, colorful dresses and suits as if they were dead shrubs, often neglected and easy to ignore. She stopped in front of a suit of armor on a female mannequin with long, lavender-blue hair. Her armor glistened in the sunlight streaming through the window. It was silver with a tint of lilac and little swirly designs carved into the metal. Each long silver glove had a cross on the back of its hand and metal dove wings decorating the wrist and the knuckles. A few silver-purple petals peaked out of the short, puffy sleeves of the suit. The shoulders were bare but the neck and chest were covered with a sparkly, lilac-colored material. In the middle of the chest plate was a silver carving of two angels kneeling on either side of a bright silver chalice. Along the waist of the outfit were tiny carved columns, making the angels appear as if they were kneeling on the roof of a temple. The suit of armor had a skirt instead of pants, a skirt shaped like a giant purple tulip with long, flowing petals. And the ornate boots that went up to the mannequin's knees were covered with giant twelve-pointed stars, stretching their rays to the sky. Her chain belt was slanted and decorated with silver and purple roses and leaves. There were pale blue and silver roses in her purple hair, too.

But Ora noticed what the mannequin held in her gloved hand: a long crystal sword with a flower on its guard and many blue and purple colors in its translucent blade. Each point on the handle was shaped like a fleur-de-Lis. On the handle gleamed another silver cross. The colors danced in Ora's swirling eyes.

"It's so beautiful," Ora whispered, gazing at the long diamond blade.

"It's a bit much, but quite stunning I suppose," Amien commented.

"I want it," she said, looking at him.

Amien saw the pleading look in her eyes and said, "Well, don't look at me! I'm poor enough as it is!"

Ora's shoulders fell as she looked the armor up and down.

"Where's the shop owner?" she suddenly asked, scouring the costume racks.

She made her way through the maze of costumes as Amien struggled to keep up with her. Ora finally stopped at a desk with a man furiously sketching a costume design on some parchment. He wore a brown vest and a red ascot. His brown hair had grey streaks in it. When Ora approached him, he slowly raised his and smiled when he saw her.

"Hello. Can I help you?" he asked, putting down his ink pen.

"How much is that silver armor suit with the purple wig?" Ora asked, pointing.

"You mean the Crystal Lily?" the man asked.

"That's what it's called?" Ora asked with an eager smile.

"Yes. It costs 900 gold," he told her.

Amien whistled in surprise.

Ora responded by opening up her suitcase and taking out a little brown chest, lined with yellow metal. She opened it up on the man's desk to reveal little compartments of gold inside.

"Each compartment has 100 gold in it," Ora told the shop owner. "So," she removed nine compartments and set them on the desk, "Here's 900. You can count it if you want."

"No, I believe you," the clerk said, nodding and taking the money. Ora put her chest away as Amien gaped in awe.

Without another word, Ora skipped over to the suit of armor and immediately grabbed the sword out of the mannequin's hand.

"It looks real," Amien said, as Ora tapped the crystal blade. "Isn't this a costume shop? Isn't the sword supposed to be a prop?"

"Sometimes, people like using the real things in their theater performances," Ora told him. "It makes the story seem more real."

"But isn't it dangerous to fake a sword fight...with real swords?" Amien asked.

"Yes. It makes the risk more real to the audience as well as the actors," Ora replied, keeping her eyes on the sword as she carefully ran her fingers along the blade.

She removed the wig from the mannequin and was delighted to feel the soft texture of the purple hair. The flowers pinned to it had crystal beads that gleamed like dewdrops in the sunlight.

"Where did you get all that money?" Amien asked Ora, pointing to her suitcase with his head.

Ora gave him an insulted look.

"I did once have a job, you know," she said. "I may be an unemployed, traveling theater director right now, but I did work for a living and I worked hard."

"What did you do? I mean, to earn all that money you must have had a top tier job," Amien remarked.

"Oh, I was all over. I didn't live anywhere because it was too expensive to take care of a house, and so I just traveled and did all sorts of work like waitressing, cooking, sewing, fieldwork. Then I saved all my money by...not spending it that much. It wasn't exactly easy, but as you can see, it paid off," Ora motioned to her suitcase.

Suddenly, she started browsing the rest of the store, eagerly touching and even taking different costume pieces and props.

"Ora...what are you doing?" Amien asked her worriedly.

"Amien, about this story we're writing...about the bad teacher that the students don't like..." Ora stammered.

"Right," Amien nodded, thinking of the tyrant king.

"What if the students, instead of...fighting the bad teacher...what if they perform a theater story for him to show him a mirror of himself. To change his mind. To change his heart?" Ora asked, hesitantly.

Amien only shook his head as he squinted at her. "What?" he whispered. He couldn't tell if she was speaking in code or not.

"You mean...you actually just want to show a theater story the k...the teacher?" Amien asked in disbelief.

Ora nodded, grinning.

"No fighting?" Amien asked.

Ora nodded. "That's correct."

After a moment of gaping at her, he scoffed loudly.

"What is that supposed to mean?" Ora demanded.

Amien once again grabbed his long hair in frustration. He kept shaking his head and giving Ora a disapproving look.

"What? You don't agree?" Ora asked, raising her voice.

Then Amien snapped. "What do you expect a theater story to do?! 'Inspire' him off the throne?!"

As he screamed this, Amien slashed the air angrily, nearly hitting Ora who leaped back in surprise. Amien turned around and started pacing as his breathing grew heavy. The short girl hugged herself in fright, wondering what to say next.

"I know that we can't change him completely with one single story," Ora muttered. "But you should never underestimate the power of theater, Amien."

Ora was still trembling a bit, even though she was fully confident in what she was saying. Amien rolled his eyes, but he realized she was right. The Twelve Islands admired theater stories so much that the king's advisors crowned the person who made the most popular theater story. If Ora could impress the king with a brilliant, inspiring and moving story, maybe he would respect her. Maybe he would listen to her. And even though Amien hated the idea of Ora being his only hope, he wondered if there was any chance at all that he would find Diamond the Willow Wanderer.

"Ora," he finally said. "I say we find the Willow Wanderer, then we figure out what to do."

But the disheartened girl sighed quietly.

"We know for sure that she is on our side!" Amien whispered. "She can help us! And you can help me find her! I'm sure of it!"

"I know..." Ora mumbled. "But as we continue our search, let me show you how influential theater stories can be!"

She was clutching her suitcase which had been filled with numerous outfits and props.

"I can get all the costumes I need from this shop and wherever we go, we can find actors and actresses who are willing to perform, and we can show our theater stories to whomever is around and willing to watch!" she proposed, pointing to the different costumes around her.

Amien raised an eyebrow. "Our theater stories?" he said.

Ora stopped moving. "Why not?" she asked.

The wizard watched the girl as she stopped next to a tall window with a dark wood windowsill. Her alert face was lit up by the sun outside. Her eyes matched the clear, spacious sky.

"Well..." Amien started to say. "I'm sure you're going to buy more costumes than you can fit even in that large suitcase. You can use my magic bag if you need it."

Ora was stunned. She suddenly crawled out of her shell of uncertainty and felt her face muscles tensing up into a wide smile.

"Thank you, Amien!" Ora suddenly cried out, throwing her arms around Amien's neck.

He hesitantly hugged her in return, awkwardly patting her back. Before he could let a chuckle escape his lips, he coughed and pulled away.

"We don't have all day. Start buying and packing," he quickly mumbled, walking away from her.

Ora was too delighted to say anything. She tried not to grab everything she saw, but story ideas flooded into her mind with each costume she touched.

The first thing she did was hurry back to the elf costume she had seen earlier. The mannequin had long ebony hair that was ornamented with bright gold strings of beads. The green robes it wore were lined with black and gold leaf patterns. Two gold leaf belts sat on the elf's waist. He also held a chestnut brown bow in its hand and had a leather quiver of white-feathered arrows on his back. Ora immediately began creating a story in her head about the dark-haired elf. He was searching for his long lost love in the Dark Enchanted Woods. She was waiting for him, but couldn't move from where she stood unless somebody sacrificed his life for her. The elf doesn't know this as he searches for his lover. When he finally finds her and realizes that he must die to save her, he weeps and mourns before finally sacrificing himself. His lover, she buries his body and proclaims that since he died for her, she in return will live for him.

Yes. It was perfect, Ora thought. A smile snuck onto her face as she pictures the final scene, merging from tragic to determined and powerful. She began packing up the elf costume as more wonderful dialogue popped into her head. She would play the lover for whom the elf was searching. And the elf would be played by...Amien? Was that really Ora's only option? She snickered just picturing the bearded pirate playing a polished, clean-cut, elegant elf with fair skin and proper posture. Ora couldn't stop giggling about it when suddenly, she realized that if she was playing the female lover and Amien was playing the male...that meant they would have to play lovers!

"Ha! No!" Ora laughed to herself.

She jumped up from her suitcase and continued perusing the costumes, stumbling across a gorgeous gown that resembled a night sky studded with large yellow stars. Ora gasped in delight and began eagerly taking it off the mannequin, completely forgetting what she had previously been thinking about.

On the other side of the costume shop, Master Amien waited patiently for Ora to finish her shopping as he racked his brains for the reason which had led him to grant her request.