chichen itza armor

She rested a fingertip thoughtfully upon the end of her nose, staring at me. Then she said, "Let us begin with silk."
She murmured a word, passed her hand over me, and my clothes started writhing as if they'd been made out of a single, flat organism, and one that hadn't yet had the courtesy to expire. It was the damnedest feeling, and I hit my head on the roof of the limo as I jumped in surprise.
A few seconds later, clenching my head, I eyed my godmother and said, "I don't need any help."
"Harry," Susan said in a strangled voice. She was staring at me.
I looked down and found myself garbed in silken clothing. My shirt had become a billowing affair of deep grey silk, fitted close to my torso by a rather long vest of midnight black seeded in patterns of deep amethysts, green-blue opals, and pale, exquisite pearls. The tights were also made of silk, closely fit, and pure white, while the leather boots that came up to my knees were the same deep grey as the shirt.
I stared at me. Then at Susan.
"Wow," Susan said. "You . . . you really do have a fairy godmother."
"And I've never been able to indulge," Lea said, studying me absently. "This won't do." She waved her hand again. "Perhaps a bit more . . ."
My clothing writhed again, the sensation so odd and intrusive that I all but banged my head on the roof again.
We went through a dozen outfits in half as many minutes. A Victorian suit and coat, complete with tails, was nixed in favor of another silk outfit, this one inspired by imperial China. By then, Susan and Lea were actively engaged in the project, exchanging commentary with each other and ignoring absolutely every word that came out of my mouth. By the seventh outfit, I had given up trying to have any say whatsoever in how I was going to be dressed.
I was given outfits drawing inspiration from widely diverse cultures and periods of history. I lobbied for the return of my leather duster stridently, but Lea only shushed me and kept speaking to Susan.
"Which outfit is really going to get that bitch's goat?" Susan asked her.
Finally, Lea's mouth curled up into a smile, and she said, "Perfect."
My clothes writhed one more time and I found myself dressed in ornate Gothic armor of the style used in Western Europe in the fifteenth century. It was black and articulated, with decorated shoulder pauldrons and an absurdly ornate breastplate. Gold filigree was everywhere, and the thing looked like it should weigh six hundred pounds.
"Cortés wore armor in just this style," Lea murmured. She studied my head and said, "Though it needs . . ."
A weight suddenly enclosed my head. I sighed patiently and reached up to remove a conquistador's helmet decorated to match the armor. I put it down on the floor of the limo and said firmly, "I don't do hats."
"Poo," Lea said. "Arianna still hates the Europeans with a vengeance, you know. It was why she took a conquistador husband."
I blinked. "Ortega?"
"Of course, child," Lea said. "Love and hate are oft difficult to distinguish between. She won Ortega's heart, changed him, wed him, and spent the centuries after breaking his heart over and over again. Calling for him and then sending him away. Giving in to him and then reversing her course. She said it kept her hatred fresh and hot."
"Explains why he was working in bloody Brazil," I said.
"Indeed. Hmmm." She flicked a hand and added a Roman-style cloak of dark grey to my armor-broadened shoulders, its ties fastened to the front of the breastplate. Another flick changed the style of my boots slightly. She added a deep hood to the cloak. Then she thoughtfully wrought all the gold on the armor into a spectrum that changed from natural gold to a green that deepened along the color gradient to blue and then purple the farther it went from my face, giving the gold filigree a cold, eerily surreal look. She added front panels to the cloak, so that it fell like some kind of robe in the front, belted to my waist with a sash of deep, dark purple. A final adjustment made the armor over my shoulders a bit wider and thicker, giving me that football shoulder-pad profile I remembered from Friday nights in high school.


Changes Chapter 38, Page 397-399