Snippet from the Edge

Lark drank from a tiny cup, holding it with effortless grace.  Charlotte sat across from her.  In the three days she had spent with her, Lark soaked up information like a sponge.  She was a natural mimic in the best possible sense of the word – she imitated not only the action, but the air, the atmosphere Charlotte projected, and the change in her demeanor was immediate.
The door swung open and Jack strode into the cabin.  Moving in complete silence, he approached the table and dropped a crystal in the middle of it.
“This is everything.”
“Thank you,” Charlotte told him.
He surveyed Lark sitting in a simple pale peach gown and crouched by her, his eyes big on his handsome face.  George had the elegance, there was no question.  But Jack was wildfire.  There was something about the child, about the way he held himself, the raw potential for unpredictability, perhaps, or the air of danger, that gave Jack an allure all of his own.
“I have an idea,” he said.
Lark tilted her head, looking at him with her dark velvet eyes.
“Ditch the dress and come hunting with me.”
“You’re such a child,” she told him.
“You’re turning into an old lady.”
Lark smiled and stabbed a dagger into the table.  She moved so fast, she was a blur, but somehow Jack had moved his hand and the dagger pierced wood instead of flesh.
Charlotte sipped from her cup.  “One more, and both of you will be down with dysentery for a week.”
Jack moved backward and sprawled in a chair, exasperated.
Charlotte slid the crystal into the complex metal spiderweb of gears of an imager.  A light filtered through the crystal, forming an image of a young girl in a powder-blue gown.
“Next.”
Another young blueblood flower, another powder satin.
“Next.”
More young girls.  Cornflower blue.  Royal blue.  Skye blue.
“Boring people doing boring things wearing boring clothes,” Jack said.
“Blue is in season.” Charlotte surveyed Lark. “What shade of blue looks good on you?”
“I don’t know, my lady,” Lark answered.
“None,” Jack said.
Lark arched her eyebrows at him.  “When I want your opinion, I will cut it out of you.”
“In this case, he’s right.  You would be surprised, but men do usually have an excellent eye when it comes to female clothes.  You have a beautiful bronze skin tone and light powder blues are not your colors.  A deeper blue could look brilliant, but you’re too young for a vivid color.”
“I could wear white,” Lark offered.  “Lady Renda says white is always in season.”
“White is for wussies,” Charlotte said.
Lark choked on her tea.  Jack chortled in the chair.
“White is a neutral color – everyone looks well in it.  There is no daring in it, no sense of style.  Wear it and you might just as well announce that you’re playing it safe. We don’t play it safe. We make a statement.” Charlotte passed her hand over the crystal to reactivate it.  “Color wheel, stage twelve.”
A complex color wheel ignited in the air above the reader.  In the center twelve bright colors formed the inner core: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet and between them six transitional shades.  Past the center the color wheel split, each of the twelve inner colors fracturing into four shades.  Just outside the center, the color shades turned dark, nearly black.  Hair thin lines sectioned off the wheel into individual tones, each new color a  shade lighter then the previous one, until at the out rim of the wheel the colors became nearly white.
“Remember that first powder blue gown?”  Charlotte nodded at the wheel.  “Find the color segment.”
Lark stared at it for a second.  “Number twenty-six.”
“Very good.  It’s a light, less saturated derivate of cobalt blue.”  Charlotte touched the gears.  The color wheel slid higher and the row of pictures she had viewed ignited below it.
“They are all within the same segment,” Lark said.  “The color varies slightly, but they are playing it safe.”
“Exactly.  These are the unmarried young women who are supposed to be on the cusp of fashion. The older the woman, the more vivid a color, but none of them are deviating from the blues.  This is the daughter of Duchess Ramone.”  Charlotte pointed at the next to last picture of a tall, slender young girl.  “I’ve met her before.  See, she’s wearing green.”
“Shocking!” Jack opined from his chair.
“She has enough status and daring to do whatever she wants, but if you look at the dress closely, there are notes of blue in it.  The idea is not to spit in the eye of the current trend but subtly twist it to make it your own.”
“This is ridiculous,” Jack said.
“Fashion is utterly ridiculous,” Charlotte told him.  “And ninety nine percent of the fashion is who is wearing it.  Some no name wear an ugly hat, and people say it’s an ugly hat.  If Duchess Ramone wears an ugly hat, people say, ‘What an interesting new trend.’”
“So it’s about money?” Lark asked.
“No.  It’s about poise.  You must be supremely confident in what you’re wearing and comfortable in your own skin.  Being a blueblood isn’t just knowing the rules.  It’s knowing the precisely correct thing to do in every situation and then doing it with unshakable entitlement.”