My emporium in another world

I woke up before the sun rises and quickly started to get ready. One time with Madam Charcoal screaming at my face was enough for my brain to decide to get ready for schedule.

Put my second old dress, which was ivory colored with an attached ribbon in the waist of the same color as the dress. While this dress didn't have the apron, I found that the dress I wore yesterday had the apron as an accessory, therefore I took it from it and attached it to my waist.

This time, since I had time, I decided to wear a French braid with a ribbon attached to it.

Since I had a few more minutes, I decided to see if I had something to cut some of my hair since I noticed a few of broken ends and found some strings of hair easily falling to me face.

I quickly found and old pair of scissors in one of the desk drawers and . . . Well. . . My French braid which was almost reaching up to my knees, was now down my waist. The hair was just so damaged that not every a hair dresser would take it for a few cheap coins.

I remade my ribbon to the braid and taking a section of hair from my forehead, I brushed it gently, I quickly cut it to make a fringe that went below my eyebrows.

That fringe cutter section could do be sold for a few cheap coins, but the rest was no longer valuable.

I sighed putting the scissors away, carefully tucked my good chunk of hair in my pocket and I went down stair to throw the bad chunk of hair.

Since I was the only one up and with good enough shoes, I decided to take care of the animals outside despite being windy.

'Note to self: add a light coat and a winter coat to the list for survival.' I said to myself as I took the food for the chickens and went to the chicken coop. 'Time to eat ladies!' I exclaimed making the bucket of food sound with the food inside.

The chickens quickly went for breakfast as I throwed the food to the other side of their zone and as they ate, I gathered all the eggs I could before they came back.

Then I went inside to gather from heat for myself while getting a bucket for the turkeys and the geese. I did the same process as with the chickens. Although the geese a bit faster eating and I was almost eaten by one of them.

I gather all the egg types and quickly went inside to turn on the furnance. Well, it was not exactly a modern furnace since it was turn on by firewood, but it was indeed effective as far as Amelia's memories went.

Then I separated the eggs in 3 buckets and as soon as that was done I gave the leftovers to the pigs, I carried the hay for the horses, sheep and gave the goats corn. Afterwards, I let the animals roam through their zones freely, but then I looked inside their sleeping places and saw a whole lot of. . . . Poop.

'Hm. . . Well, the maids need something to do.' I shrugged my shoulders smiling mischievously. Although I quickly went inside as soon as I felt a chilly wind through my neck. 'Brrrrrr….' I hugged my self and went inside, took the buckets with eggs and brought them to the kitchen.

When I came to the warm kitchen, I witnessed Madam Charcoal waiting for the stupid maids while tapping her foot on the floor while looking at the coockoo clock.

'Madam.' I called for her. She looked at me in surprise. 'I have chicken, turkey and geese eggs.' Showed her the tres buckets on which I separated them. 'Should we sell them? I don't think we can eat all of them in a week even if we give at least one to everyone even workers.' I noted while putting the buckets in the kitchen table.

Madam took a look and nodded in agreement. 'You are right. We might be able to eat the geese and turkey eggs, but chicken eggs are the ones which are in danger so it's better to sell them.' She thought out loud with her hand on her chin. 'The problem is, Lord Meadowood is stubborn, and even if there was no cent in his bank account he would most definitely not want to sell his own goods.' She murmured a bit annoyed.

I thought about it and I had an idea. 'What if. . . We sell the eggs for ourselves?' I suggested. 'If Lord Meadowood doesn't care, then he doesn't need to know.' I smiled mischievously at her.

Madam gave a mischievous side-eye in approval. 'But I'm not willing to share the winning with the other maids.' She murmured more quietly.

'It's only the 2 of us.' I reminded her. 'A fifty-fifty division between the 2 of us. How does that sound?' I stretched my hand to her. 'I sell the eggs while making errands and you cover for me.' I added.

Madam nodded in approval. 'Deal.' We shook hands.

'But no one must know, not even my mother, she will practically blab to Lord Meadowood.' I remind her while putting a finger in my lips. 'A secret between us, got it?'

Madam nodded in agreement. 'Changing of subject, what should we make for breakfast?' She asked in a normal voice volume.

'How about I get started while you go and rage—I mean,wake the maids up?' I offered.

'Nice.' Madam nodded in approval. 'At least have some eggs ready, that way we have less work.' She ordered.

'Okay!' I nodded but then thought about it. 'Em, what type of eggs again for each person?' I asked for a reminder

'Lord Meadowood likes geese eggs boiled, Lady Meadowood likes turkey scrambled eggs, lord Gideon likes turkey eggs sunny-up, Lady Narcissa likes geese scrambled, and young Theodore likes boiled geese eggs.' Madam Char clarified me quickly and she went upstairs.

'Wow, no wonder she said that chicken eggs were more in danger than the other eggs, the whole family doesn't even eat chicken eggs.' I shook my head in disapproval. 'Well, time to work.' I rolled up my sleeves and took 5 geese eggs. 'I will put the geese eggs to boil for my little brother and stepfather, while I make the sunny-up eggs for Gideon.' I did the work as I talked.

After a few minutes, the eggs for Gideon were ready and I quickly set up a plate for him. 'No I shall do the scrambled eggs for mother and Narcissa since the boiled eggs are still boiling.' I said to myself getting the things needed.

Soon I was finally done with making not only the scrambled eggs but also the boiled eggs. I put a gray thingy that is used to keep the food warm and decided to cook some bacon. 'Bacon and eggs are a good combination.' I said myself. 'Should I also add some bread?' I thought to myself. 'Most likely.' I noted.

As I was frying the bacon, I heard stomps of people upstairs, along with Madam terrifying screams and rage. 'Poor unfortunate souls.' I shook my head in desbelief their audacity in making Madam wait.

I finished the bacon and putted three strands on Lord and Lady Meadowood, two strands for Gideon and Narcissa, and one strand and a half for Theodore.

I also made the Theodore's strands extra crispy while Lord Meadowood's strands were a bit bland. I giggled to myself. 'If he reclaims, I can easily say it's the maids fault for not getting up sooner, which it is not a lie. I shrugged to myself as I started to do old fashion toast.

Since there's no toaster, I quickly thought in doing some toaster with the pan, some butter and putting the bread to toast while absorbing the butter.

As soon as I finished all the plates, the maids finally came down looking exhausted and terrified.

Madam walked down with the reddest face I've ever seen on her.

'Madam.' I made myself notice.

'What have you done?' She asks still quite angry but holding it together.

'Well, I made the eggs just like you wished me to make them, I also added bacon and toast.' I told her.

Madam frowned upon the word "toast." 'Toast?' Raised an eyebrow.

'Yes, em, I just thought about it. It's bread going through basically the same process as bacon, just instead of oil, salt and pepper it would only be butter and without salt or pepper.' I tried to explain as best as I could while hugging myself. Dear fucking motherfucker, I didn't there was not such a thing as "toast" here! Now I'm definitely toast myself! I cursed inside while waiting for Madam's benedict.

Madam went to take a look at the toast and she nodded in approval. 'If it looks as good as it tastes then I'm pretty sure the lord's family will like it with no complaints.' She took a wheeling cart with two levels and put the food. 'Amelia, I will make you run some errands for me.' She declared giving me the money and the list of things. 'The rest of you better have FINISHED the lunch by when Amelia arrives back!!' Declared.

The maids gasps indesbelief. 'But why?! It might not be much time!!' One even had the audacity to reclaim.

'Excuse you!! Amelia literally made a WHOLE breakfast meal for FIVE people while the rest you were asleep!' Madam screamed at the audacious maid and the maid shrunk. 'If Amelia can pull it off BY HERSELF then the rest of you can ALSO pull it off!!' Madam looked down the maids with a disgusted look. 'Better get started, because that ALSO includes finishing the dishes!!' Madam pointed out all the pans and dirty cutlery that was used yesterday and wasn't washed yesterday.

'B-But what about the animals?!' Other maid asked.

'I already gave the breakfast to the birds.' I answered as I packed up my things. 'I woke before the sunrise and couldn't go back to sleep so I decided to start with that.' I went to for the basket to carry the things I needed.

'Well, someone needs to feed the—' A maid was about to say something.

'I already fed the pigs, goats, sheep and horses.' I added as I walked to them. 'But don't worry, ono or two of you can easily clean the barn full of. . . Dung.' I smiled to them sweetly.

Madam had to hold a smile while looking at the maids' pale faces.

'Don't worry Mam, I'll try to be back before lunch time!' I exclaimed happily going out of the door, leaving the maids to their tiring fate.

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'Okay, thank you!' I thanked the farmer who was selling the vegetables. 'Just drop them at the Lord Meadowood's home, Madam Charcoal will show you where to put them.' I told him as we shook hands.

As soon as I finished all the errands, I decided to be benevolent and wandered around the town to help Amelia's memories pop up with more clarity and easily.

Soon I found myself in front of the boutique where Amelia liked the dress from last week.

I took out my pouch and swallowed up nervously as I went inside the boutique.

I looked around and a lot of dresses with different styles and colors. Neverminds the skirts volumes and height sizes.

There were even wedding dresses of different colors besides white!!

'Wow!' I was amazed. But then I saw moths flee off my pouch before me as soon as I saw the price tags of every single type of drees. 'Wow. . .' I gulped nervously.

'Can I help you?' A voice call for me. I turned around to see a middle-aged woman with glasses and a beautiful red skirt, white blouse and red mini jacket. 'Your name young lady?' She asked while holding a notepad and a pen with ink.

'Em, I'm just looking around.' I told her while scratching my head.

'I still need your name young lady.' The lady said in a monotone voice.

I kinda frowned by her cold behavior but I swallowed my anger. 'I'm . . .' I suddenly remembered that if someone from the house came here and asked for me, I would be in trouble, therefore I quickly thought in another name. 'Are you going to tell anyone?'

'Only if your father, husband or anyone is looking for you and you did something or went missing.' The lady answered. 'Otherwise we keep things anonymously due to morality and privacy.' She held her chin high.

I sighed in relief, but I still didn't want to take the risk so I just came up with the name. 'My name is Aria. Aria Hope.' I said smiling more calmly.

'From?' The lady asked.

I looked at her confused. 'F-From who or where?' I asked back.

The lady sighed. 'A lot of people have the same name as you. To make sure we know especifically send the right item to the right place, we must know where is it that you grow or where you live now.' She explained.

'Oh~~.' I nodded understand. 'My bad, I-I didn't know because,' I struggled to make an excuse, 'well, because my town was extremely small we didn't really need anything like that.' I lied.

'Understandable. But please, let me know where you live.' The lady said.

I started sweating but then said, 'le-let me see if I find something to buy and then I'll tell you!' I put my hands in the air. 'I'm not comfortable telling someone I don't know where I lived if they don't really need to come!' I exclaimed.

The lady rolled her eyes and sighed. 'Very well.' She tucked her notepad and put the feather in another place. 'Anything specific you searching?'

I thought about it. 'Well, I'm sure you know that winter is coming right?' I asked.

The lady scoffed. 'Of course, the wind this morning was chilling down my spine.' She shook her head annoyed with the cold. 'Searching for winter dresses?' She asked.

I nodded. 'And winter coats too.' I said. 'One light coat for autum and spring and one that can resist winter.' I told her.

The lady immediately grabbed a book and started to look through it.

'And. . . Oh! Neither dresses nor coats need to be fashionable!' I told her. 'As long as they serve a purpose and they don't. . . Need to be washed so often, we can agree on a price.' I smiled nervously.

The lady looked straight at me, closed the book y relocated her glasses. 'Wait here and take a seat for a momet.' She turned around and walked through a door.

I saw a small coffee table and a few seats. I sat close to the desk but not before finding a few newspapers piled up on the coffee table. I took one and sat down while starting reading it.

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I got bored from the newspaper before long. The news of this town were boring, barely yearning from a coyote eating the trash of a farmer, to a drunk man being beaten by other drinkers and throwed to jail.

'I have the things ready.' The lady appeared again and she looked at me holding a newspaper. 'Boring news, right?' She raised her eyebrow.

I nodded. 'I wished they would just send a few truthful gossip for entertainment.' I murmured putting the newspaper in the coffee table gently.

'Those kinds of news tend to reach out here in the skirts until the weekend.' The lady told me. 'Just in case you don't have that much hope in the start.' She winked at me. 'But anyway, back to the subject, let me show you up.' She brought inside her workplace and I witnessed good dresses before my eyes.

The autum dress wasn't that pretty, but it had a long and heavy orange skirt which had its material wind proof, long sleeves with mini wrist puffles and brown waist coat. The drees covered up from at the connection between collarbones and neck, down all the way to my talons.

The winter dress was a blue grayish dress with white furry puffs on the sleeves and a puffy-fluffy line at the end and around the skirt. While the skirt seem light I took a look and saw that it had layers for wind and cold protection, and the dress would cover from my upper neck down to the floor.

The Coats were beside the Autum and winter aufit repectevly. The autum coat was brown with a hood attached and it would reach me up to my knee. The winter coat was even longer, it reached to my ankles, it was sky blue color and had white puffy wristlets and a puffiness in the hood.

'. . . Are you sure it's the most average style?' I asked impressed.

She nodded.

'Because these girls look better than the dresses outside.' I told her.

The lady blushed lightly due to the indirect compliment. 'They might be beautiful to you now, but it's because you haven't seen the winter and autum collection that will be brought all the way from the capital.' She assured me. 'These are the cheapest and most useful things I was able to find from last season, therefore they have almost no value.' She shrugged it off. 'But since you follow your need instead the fashion wants, I can finally get something out of them while getting rid of them.' She said happily.

I frowned at her. 'Th-That's going to depend on how much money it's going to cost me all these.' I reminded her. 'If it's so expensive, then I might have to just choose the winter coat.' I said.

The lady giggled. 'Don't worry, the original price of the autum drees was a 100 copper, but since it's last season it's reduced about 75% of its original price.' She told me.

I gasped like there was a goddess in front of me. '75% out of the 100, would make about . . . 25 copper!' I gulped down. 'Okay Amy, breathe.' I hugged on my pouched. 'You only have 165, you still need that diary, ink and pen. . . First let's hear the rest of the prices.' I breathe. 'An the rest?'

The lady smiled.'Well, the autum coat used to cost around 34 copper but now that the 75% is on—'

'8.5 copper.' I answered quickly. 'Those are good offers. But I still need to hear about the winter clothing, I don't want to spend out of my 85 copper budget.' I said a bit ashamed.

The lady looked at me impressed. 'Well, the winter dress pieces was 250 copper and the coat's price was 53 copper.' She crossed her arms.

'That would make about. . .' I made some head calculations. '62.50 and 13.25 copper.' I said out loud. 'That would make about. . . More than a 100 copper, I-I can pay that much.' I sighed a bit sad. 'The most pricey thing here is the winter dress therefore—'

'I can let you have it.' She told me.

I turned around to see her. 'Really? Why?' I asked a bit distrustful.

'Those are one of the very las times that were left from last season, you would do me a huge favor by taking and giving me more space in my store.' The lady explained. 'Also, I noticed you can make calculations quickly, have you got a job yet?' She asked.

I gasp as I witnessed this golden opportunity. 'Yes and no. I-I'm actually being forced by my stepfather's to work as a maid in their house and barely being given about 5 copper per week.' I admitted to her.

She raised her eyebrows in surprise. 'That's horrible.' She looked at the dresses. 'These things will surely be destroyed as soon as he sees you on them.'

I nodded. 'Which is why I've been receiving help from the headmaid by getting errands done so I can find something else or place to run off before my stepdad has a "great" idea like . . . Selling me off as a bride to an older men!' I exclaimed horrified myself at the thought.

The lady nodded. 'Horrible to just think about it.' She went deep in thought. 'How long have you been gone?' She asked.

I saw the clock. 'Well, not much, just two hours, a whole group of maids were caught in eating the family buns I made for dinner so they will soon be fired but not before proper punishment.' I told smiling. 'But I did promise to try and be back by before lunch time, which is in another 2 hours and a half.' I noted. 'And it takes me about 10 minutes to walk back home therefore it's not much issue.' I promised.

The lady smiled. 'In that case, let's pack these things. I can also help you get a job in another place if you promise to help me with the store every chance you got.' She declared. 'And don't worry, I'll pay you MORE than your family does.'

My eyes stared at her quite in shock. 'Re-Really?' I asked.

The Lady nodded. 'Your way with numbers can help in the store, work with me for about 200 hours and I will also get you a new job at a unknown city.' She promised extending her hand.

I smiled while holding my tears, and softly shook her hand. 'Thank you mam, pleasure doing business.'

'No problem, and if you help me advertise the old clothing of last season, it will be counted as extra time.' The lady winked at me.

I winked back.

Before I could take the clothing and the errands home, Lady Cottonwood, the tailor, made me try out the dresses and coats and was able to find that the clothing were a bit tight on both chest and hips.

She promised that they would be done next week, and I promised to pick them up. That way, I didn't have to tell her where I lived.

I was able to make it back home with the errands 25 minutes BEFORE lunch time.

Madam gave a new scolding to the stupid maids and I was given a raise of 5 coppers. Now I make 10 coppers per week while 25 coppers per hour in the boutique.

Oh! And I only had to pay 89 coppers for the items in total. That plus the 6 coppers for the ink, feathers and journal, I still had 70 copper. While I still spent more money than I anticipated, the dress that Amelia wanted was completely 85 copper but I paid 89 for a set of two dresses and two coats.

It was definitely a good day after all.