Chapter Nine

                                    

                                          
Aldine, enjoying her second sweet roll of the morning, joined Cassie in the sewing room.
"How is the new stich coming on?"
Reluctantly, Cassie held up the knots that were meant to be simple Xs. No matter what she did, it was impossible for her to make a single good stitch. It was like the thread was more cursed than she was.
"Ah..." With that one word, Aldine encompassed the entire situation: Cassie's frustrated frown, the ripped cloth, and the misplaced, gap-toothed stitches.
"I cut the cloth in the wrong place, and I tried to fix it, but..."
"Yes, you've been working very hard," Aldine murmured.
Had she! Finally someone was noticing. She was constantly exhausted from the work she had had to do since coming to Telyre.
"These things do happen with cloth work. I wouldn't fret too much."
Aldine's soothing words brought immense relief. Accidents happen to everyone—perhaps even Aldine had made huge messes of her work before. And had learned from those accidents how to make the perfect, even stitches she always produced now.
"Cassie, we're running low on bread," the seamstress said, resuming her work on a half-completed bodice. "I need you to get more from the shop in the square. Can you manage going alone?"
It would have been too humiliating to say no, so Cassie nodded, gladly dropped her latest mess, and left the house. It felt good to be outside again, she decided as she took a deep breath. Felt better to leave behind that laughable, abortive attempt at a sleeve hem.
Cassie tugged her cap down and resisted the urge to hide in the shadows of buildings every time she saw someone. The time she had spent exploring Telyre had done nothing to make her less aware of the gaze of every person she passed. What if one of them recognized her? The fear was ludicrous, Cassie insisted, giving herself a mental shake. They were only curious. She was a stranger in their little village. Nothing more.
Her mood lifted when she was able to easily sniff out the bakery rather than having to ask someone. The freshly baked bread that the warm breeze promised made her mouth water, even as the swell of voices put her on guard again. A mother and two children were collecting water from the fountain in the square, but the most babbling voices swelled around the bread shop. Some held parcels of food, some were perusing the few options on the outside counter, and all kept up a steady stream of talk.
As Cassie approached on measured steps, there was a momentary hiccup in the flow of conversation, but after only a glance the villagers carried on. Cassie released her nervous breath. No one glared, stared, or edged away. They did not know she was cursed. She could do this.
The whispered gossip increased once she moved through the crowd, but that was nothing new.
"I saw her come in with the Gemmaros—"
"Heard there was something with a bandit—"
"She doesn't look like one."
"Thomas wants her to face—" 
Cassie gritted her teeth and kept moving forward, peering over the counter and into the dim shop. The only person within was a woman with curves Cassie could only envy, her arms coated up to the elbows in flour. She threw four loaves in quick succession to a man near Cassie, who had more than the usual amount of dirt clinging to his legs.
Surely she wasn't trying to make the poor man drop the loaves? Cassie half-opened her mouth, considering protesting, but the man caught all four like a master juggler. He laughed openly. Was it a game?