Bound Together (6 page)

“A True Relic is permanently bound to its wielder. There is only one way to sever the connection,” Misaki murmured. I noticed that she wasn't looking at me anymore. Her implication wasn't hard to figure out.

“Let me guess: it involves killing me.”

Misaki nodded. She looked pretty bad just thinking about it. I wasn't enough of an idiot to believe that her ex-family wouldn't try to contest my ownership of the Relic at their earliest convenience. That left me in something of a predicament.

Understatement of the century.

I got up from the bed and walked into the kitchen, suspending the conversation long enough to set the coffee maker to work while I made Misaki another cup of tea. She accepted the offered beverage without protest this time and began sipping at the hot liquid slowly.

I flicked ashes into a nearby tray and walked over to my closet, trying to figure out what I wanted to wear. It was late enough in the evening that I really had no excuses at all to still be walking around half-naked.

“Do you wish me to help you dress, Karin?”

I turned and stared at Misaki. “Um, I can dress myself.”

The response I got was the expected one; her ears drooped and she looked as if she'd somehow failed at some major responsibility. This kind of culture shock was going to take some getting used to, and maybe I needed to take it a little slower.

“I get the feeling that you want to be more useful, right? Well, how about this: do you know how to cook?”

Misaki's ears perked up. “I know a little. Are you hungry?”

“Yeah, I should eat something for dinner.” I pulled on a pair of socks and then a fresh pair of jeans. A fitted camisole came next. Being off today meant I wouldn't need to worry about being armed. That was good news and gave me more clothing options. I chose a light, gauzy long-sleeve shirt to wear over the tank top.

The rest of the good news was Misaki apparently had the foresight to grab my gun, which I'd dropped during the fight with that eyeball thing. I drew the weapon from its molded thermoplastic holster and ejected the empty magazine. The slide wasn't locked open on an empty chamber. Misaki must've known a bit about how modern weapons worked if she knew to hit the slide release before holstering the weapon.

“What would you like to eat, Karin?”

“Whatever you want to make,” I replied. I picked up the cigarette from the ashtray and pulled on it a few times before stubbing it out. The damn thing smoked most of itself while I was getting dressed.

While Misaki busied herself in the kitchen, I started field-stripping the pistol for cleaning. There was a kit nearby in a small, battered cookie tin; I opened it up and pulled out a bottle of gun oil, a bore ram and a few cleaning wipes and set to work. I did my best to keep the weapon scrupulously clean. Inconsistent care could lead to a jam at the worst possible time.

As I had the weapon disassembled, cleaning out the barrel with a cleaning wipe attached to the end of the bore ram, I turned my attention to the girl in my kitchen. She didn't seem to know where half the utensils and cookware were kept, but I decided I'd let her figure things out herself. Misaki seemed to be put off balance every time I refused to let her perform some manner of mundane task for me.

It's not like I could really blame her. She'd been created to be female and spent most of her existence during a time period when women were little more than domestic servants and fuck-holes on demand. I felt a slight shiver go down my spine, trying very hard not to think about what
other
possible indignities Misaki might have endured.

I turned my attention back to my own work. I kept my gun clean, so there wasn't a lot of residue to take care of. I'd only fired a single magazine's worth of ammunition since the last cleaning. This was nowhere near as bad as the mess I'd end up with after an afternoon at the range with four boxes of ammo to shoot off. I started fitting the various pieces back together—the guide rod and spring went back on along with the barrel, then the slide went over those. It was still really pristine on the inside, so I could probably make it another few months before I had to do a full teardown.

I dropped the magazine out and checked to make sure it wasn't loaded, slapped the empty mag back in and hit the slide release. Keeping the weapon pointed well away from either myself or Misaki, I pulled the hammer back and pulled on the trigger, checking the safety. Everything seemed to check out, so I removed the magazine again and opened up a fresh box of fifty nine-millimeter rounds.

“It'll be finished in a few minutes,” Misaki called out.

“Okay, I'm putting this thing away once I get it loaded.” I didn't have an automatic loader, so I had to do this the hard way. It was a rough process on my thumbs, and I had to be careful because the magazine spring was strong and the edges were sharp enough to inflict some pretty nasty cuts.

After a minute or two of struggling and cursing under my breath I'd gotten all twelve cartridges into the magazine. Into the pistol it went and I cycled the action once to chamber a round before checking the safeties again. Everything seemed in order so I stuck the gun back in its holster and set it on a nearby shelf.

I walked into the bathroom to wash the gun oil and residue from my fingers. When I came back into the common area of the apartment, Misaki had already arranged the dishes, artfully presented on the small table. What she'd made looked very skillfully prepared: a steaming bowl of rice, stir-fried vegetables and some fish left over from the day before yesterday, raw, sliced thinly and arranged in concentric circles on a plate. It didn't escape my notice that she'd only set one place at the table.

“You're not going to eat, too?”

Misaki's eyes went wide. “Would that not be disrespectful? I would always eat in the kitchen, at the maidservants' table—”

I raised a hand to stop her. “No, Misaki, it's not disrespectful. Come, sit with me. Don't eat your food standing up in the kitchen.”

“I suppose that makes sense.” The girl obtained a second plate and a pair of chopsticks from the vase I kept on the counter. She sat these down across from me and reached out to take my plate.

“You don't have to—” I stopped myself, but it was too late. Instinctively her ears flattened again. I was really bad at this, apparently. It just felt so alien to let someone else do things like help you dress in the morning, serve your meals and fetch anything and everything you needed. Maybe it was a good thing my salary was terrible. I'd make a shitty rich person.

“Misaki,” I began, giving her as big a smile as I could muster, “try not to think of me like you thought of your Masters. Did you ever have any friends?”

She shook her head.

“Never? You're going to learn what that's like, then.” Before she could react, I reached out and picked up her plate and dished some of the meal out onto it. Misaki just stared at me, those vivid green eyes wide, as I set the plate down in front of her.

“Go ahead and eat.” I sipped at my tea and served myself, taking a little rice, a lot of vegetables and even more of the fish. I wasn't the best when it came to chopsticks, but for some reason I didn't want to get up and grab a fork. It would have just made Misaki feel even more inadequate and out of sorts.

“This is really very good,” I said around a mouthful of vegetables. It was just some random stuff I had in the fridge, but Misaki displayed a great deal of skill when it came to cooking. I wasn't the worst cook, but the uniformly paper-thin slices of sashimi told me that her abilities were several levels beyond mine.

Once again the ears gave her away. It was pretty obvious Misaki had never really been complimented, especially not by someone who filled the role of “Master.” I tried my best not to grimace at the thought. She may have had her own mind, but it was clear enough to me that if I ordered her to do something, anything, she would do it without question.

“T-thank you,” Misaki managed, the words coming out almost in a squeak. Her ears were flattened, her cheeks flushed and her speech thick with embarrassment. I tried not to stare at her too obviously, but it was becoming increasingly difficult not to. I mean, she's
really
easy on the eyes.

“Things aren't going to stay this peaceful for long.” I clumsily picked up a piece of sashimi with my chopsticks and dipped it in a small dish of soy sauce before eating it. Misaki was already almost finished with her meal, obviously being used to having to eat quickly in order to resume her tasks as a maidservant before the important—the
male—
members of her clan were done with their meal.

“N-no, they won't.” Misaki's voice was obviously troubled. “AEGIS will come for you eventually.”

I drained the last vestiges of my tea. “So will your ex-family. AEGIS I'm less worried about.”

Misaki nodded, but she looked unconvinced.

“Look, AEGIS is the government. I work for the government already, so I know how they operate.” I took a moment to chew a bite of rice and fish before changing the subject. “You mentioned earlier something about a 'True Relic.' What's that all about?”

“The sword I am imbued within is a True Relic.” Misaki placed her chopsticks on the table. “All True Relics are much the same; a new spirit created from the remains of slain specters, imbued into a master-crafted weapon using a powerful invocation ritual.”

I arched an eyebrow. “So it's magic, then?”

“Yes and no. It is an approximation of magic, sometimes called magecraft or astral thaumaturgy. Spirits can draw upon the lines of force to safely pull mana from the astral world and into the physical world. Humans cannot do this safely and must draw upon the loose mana in the world around them.”

“But you can use magic,” I reasoned.

“Yes. I was born from a seed crafted from the remains of purified specters. Like all spirits, I can use magic, but I can't draw new mana from the astral world. I depend upon channeling mana through my Ma—I mean, through you.”

I smiled. “Show me something.”

Misaki nodded and lifted her right hand. The air around her seemed to crackle and pulse with power. From the empty air a swirl of flame appeared around her hand, shaping itself into a sphere that glowed brighter and brighter until I could no longer look upon it. Waves of heat pulsed off the ball of fire, raising the temperature in the room by several degrees.

I averted my gaze and Misaki clenched her hand, dispelling the effect. The room cooled almost immediately, as if the glowing sphere of flame had never really existed.

“The spell-flame requires only the smallest trickle of mana,” Misaki explained. “Through the Relic, I can do far more by drawing upon the mana contained within you. This relationship between the wielder, the weapon and the bound spirit is what makes a True Relic.”

“So... why does AEGIS care so much about True Relics?”

Misaki's ears twitched. “They are unique artifacts of an ancient time long since past. No one alive today knows exactly how they are created. AEGIS wishes to obtain control of them or their wielders, not only to bolster their own strength and deny their enemies, but also to learn. They wish to strengthen the Relic-like devices wielded by their own hunters.”

It wasn't too hard to figure out where she was going with this. “I get it. They want to get their hands on real ones so they can reverse-engineer them and use the data to make their copied weapons more effective.”

“Yes. My former Master spoke of these Emulated Relics on occasion, insisting that they were nothing but a hollow imitation that paled in comparison with a True Relic.”

“What do
you
think?” I asked.

“I... well, I have seen their effects,” Misaki ventured. “I can't tell you anything about how they work, but they
do
work. Like the blade you now wield, these devices are capable of permanently destroying a specter's miasmic core.”

I suspected the both of us would find out soon enough, though I doubt either of us appreciated just how “soon” it would be. Misaki's ears perked up and swiveled, tracking some sound that was far too quiet for my human ears to detect. The fur on her tail bristled, causing the already fluffy appendage to gain even more volume.

“There is a person approaching the door,” Misaki whispered. “The person is armed, but they are making no effort to conceal their presence. They aren't here to fight.”

“I knew it wouldn't be long before the chickens came home to roost,” I muttered, standing up and walking to the door. “I don't know where you can hide here but—”

I am already hidden,
Misaki's voice echoed through my mind. I glanced behind me, but she was nowhere to be found. The shock must've been evident in my mental voice, because I
felt
Misaki smile faintly.

I recalled my body into the Relic, within you. It will be completely impossible to detect me so long as I remain in this state.

Good thinking
, I replied mentally, “speaking” at Misaki with my thoughts. I felt a sort of pleasant warmth emanate from the mental connection, but she didn't reply.

There was a knock at the door. Not the loud, rapid bashing against the door that was characteristic of a cop chasing a perp. Instead it was a soft, polite rapping, the sort of knock you'd expect from a door-to-door merchant or a neighbor wanting to borrow a few eggs and a cup of sugar.