rodeo drive, baby.

[tender]

WHO: Chaos shoppers
WHAT: Preparations for fancy party
WHEN: Mid-Kingsway
WHERE: Kirkwall
NOTES: We're here to peer pressure Ellie and acquire some fancy clothes, folks.

The invitation had said Formal attire required.

There is, of course, some question as to what exactly "formal attire" means when it's an Orlesian issuing the invitation, but without a doubt it means a trip to a certain swath of shops in Hightown where formal attire is available in a variety of different options. Does formal attire mean dresses with hip-high slits? Does it mean a silk tunic with an abundance of ruffles? Does it mean velvet or brocade or chiffon?

The shopkeepers will be sure to advise, if given even a breath of opportunity to swoop in with their suggestions. A budget? What's that? Surely it's not applicable to such a momentous occassion. Why, just step this way, look at this garment, one of a kind, isn't the color just divine—

Comments

[illithidnapped]

Somewhere, from behind a row of clothes, comes a very familiar disembodied voice:

"—Don't be a coward, darling."

[acreage]

Look —

"we can't all be as pretty as you are."

[tender]

An immediate smile for that voice, regardless of whether or not it's seen.

"You will be, after we find the right thing for you to wear," Derrica reassures. "Astarion, are you going to help?"

Help is a broad word, but still. There's possibility.

[illithidnapped]

"Absolutely not. I trust you both. Deeply."

He does not.

[acreage]

He leans down to Derrica, close enough to say, in a stage whisper,

"I trust you more than I trust him with this."

He's seen the way Astarion dresses!! Derrica, on the other hand, surely won't lead him astray.

[illithidnapped]

"I have long ears, you know. I heard that."

This is not a stage whisper, for reference's sake.

[tender]

"Are you going to come out from behind there and prove him wrong?" Derrica prompts, flashing a smile up at Holden before releasing his arm. There's a comforting, second squeeze to his wrist. No, she won't let anyone put him in ruffles.

Stepping around the rack, Derrica ruffles through a few pieces hung on the rack and tips a dark green coat towards Holden with a questioning look.

[acreage]

This time, when Derrica looks up at him, he mouths, Don't encourage him. He straightens as she lets go, approaches the rack and frowns at the options faintly.

"Maybe," he allows, pulls out a pair of trousers at random and then immediately replaces it. Nope, that's a no.

[notathreat]

"What, you don't want the red and purple stripes?" Ellie pipes up from behind the rack, popping up to lay her forearms over it.

She gives the shopkeep a smile when he glares at her.

[acreage]

So fucking dryly —

"They're not my color."

topples back in here

[tender]

A fond smile for Ellie, in spite of the suggestion.

"No, I think we need a darker color. Maybe blue," Derrica suggests, pitched a little louder for the benefit of their audience. Astarion has not materialized, which Derrica takes a invitation to begin flicking through another rack with a critical hum.

takes your hands

[acreage]

"That," he admits, "sounds a lot better."

Hard evidence that he's right to trust no one but Derrica with this task!! He looks through that particular rack till he reaches the end of it, then frowns as he glances at some of the displays. They don't all look too outlandish, if he's being honest, but,

"I don't even know what I'll do with these clothes after the party." Then, "Unless someone else gets married."

He's already attended one wedding, it's not impossible.