I'm pulled from my thoughts as Lilith tugs on my sleeve to get my attention. I pull myself out of my own head to look down at her, and sip on my little teacup, pretending I'm drinking tea from the empty cup. "Yes?"
She pouted at me. "You weren't paying attention were you?"
"Nope. Sorry."
She scoffed, running back to the other side of the splintered table. She grabbed her own little empty tea cup and took a fake sip. "I said, we should discuss adult things! Like tariffs, or boys!"
Amused, I swirl my imaginary tea in its chipped cup. "Oh? Any boys catch your eyes around here?"
"Uhm…I met the crown prince once."
I keep myself from tensing at the title of the bastard. The crown prince. The main villain, and the one who would manipulate Lilith. I want to push her away from him immediately, but he's the type that would get more interested in her if she was creating distance.
Better to let them have an un-interfered with relationship which should leave them mostly distant from each other. She looked at me, eyes sparkling. "Do you have any boys you're interested in?"
Does she not register me as a man? Or was I supposed to be playing a woman in our little game of make believe? I don't think homosexuality was ever mentioned in depth in IRAAS "Afraid not."
She blushed, and looked down at her imaginary tea. "Any…any girls?"
Clever. "Nope, afraid I'm destined to be forever alone."
She twirled one of her strands of hair on her finger shyly. "I don't think that's true at all.'
I take a considering sip of my imaginary tea. "Well, who knows what the future will bring right?"
She nodded, and I heard a rumble from her direction. She blushed harder, and averted her eyes. I let out a huff. "Hungry?"
"Y-Yeah…Y-You really don't have to if you don't want to, I can live without drinking blood."
"Yeah, but you'd be constantly starving." I stood up, and walked over to her, bending down so she could reach. To be able to have our little fake tea party, we had to move her shattered table over to her bed, so that we both had seats.
Again, this room alone was far too depressing. I bend down for her to reach, and her arms go up around my shoulders. She pulls me down a little closer, and sticks her fangs into my shoulder.
I've been getting more and more used to the feeling of having my blood drained, and outside of a little lightheadedness or weightless feeling, it's totally harmless. Her grip around my shoulders tightened, and I felt her claws dig in again. Ow. If telling her it was painful wouldn't send her into a depression spiral, I'd be tempted to beg for mercy.
She pulls away with a little gasp, and takes a deep breath, sucking in air after chowing down. I roll my shoulders again. "Tasty?"
She nodded, wiping her mouth with one of the napkins we were placing our cups on. "It's hard to describe, but it's really tasty."
I take that as a win. I don't know if she's ever even tasted other people's blood, but I'm preemptively claiming that mine is the tastiest. My one job is getting my blood sucked, I'd hope it was tasty.
"Am I supplying you enough on my own? I can't help but think you'd need more than the little amount you take out of me."
She looks up at me, a little of my blood still on her chin. I wipe it off with my own little napkin while she speaks. "I eat normal food too, I just need a little blood every couple of months to stay well fed. If anything, I'm probably being spoiled."
"Better too much food than too little." I've been eating good as well, [Starving] has already disappeared as a status after only about a week of being here. [Malnourished] hasn't changed though, that's still a B rank.
Most of my time has been spent with Lilith, just trying to make sure she has at least some fond memories of her childhood. I won't say it's not a little depressing on my part, to be mentally 18 and have my only friend in this world be a 9 year old, but it's better than my last lifes zero friends.
I've made a few library runs, both to pick up new books for Lilith, and also to see if I can't find any new information on [Eastern Magic] or on the [Slave] status. I didn't find anything. The Edgar family mainly comprised business heavy families, the kind more focused on maintaining a treasury than an army, and most of the books in their library are boring economic ones. Don't get me wrong, I'm sure the right person would find it all fascinating, but I'm not that person.
I've done some soul searching as well, just hoping to see if I can't get some of the original Poe's memories. It's all come up empty though, and Lilith kept throwing pillows at me while I tried to concentrate.
She's at the point in our relationship where she's comfortable enough to mess with me, which I think is very positive.
I've always had an…odd relationship with children. That being, they seem to pick up on the fact that they can do whatever to me, and I won't really care. I used to work for a summer camp to pay for school supplies, and I was in charge of dozens of 5 to 10 year olds.
Kids were funny like that though. First day you meet them, they're all shy and bashful. Cut to week 2, and you're stuck to a table threading bracelets because they decided they needed to make bracelets, and now the kid is stressing out because you aren't working fast enough to hit "The Quota™", a totally arbitrary number they made up on the spot.
That was the point I was at with Lilith, where she decided that now we were drinking tea like good noblewomen should. Again, if I was supposed to act as a woman in this game of make believe was up in the air.
I stumbled a little getting back to my seat, and Lilith shot straight up, panic in her eyes. I caught myself on the table, probably getting a splinter thanks to it. I raised a hand up towards her. "I'm alright, just stood up too fast."
My words placate her, and she slowly falls back into her seat. I sit down on the small chair with a groan, retaking my position and my chipped teacup. "Where were we?"
She clears her throat. "We were discussing adult things!"
"Right. There were a lot of books on the boring stuff, economics, tariff policies, maintaining trade routes." Her thin lips pursed in a straight line. I huffed a small laugh. "I don't know any other adult topics."
She groaned, pouting. After a moment, she spoke up again. "What about gossip? Noblewomen always gossip in the books!"
"Do you have anything to gossip about?"
"...we could make up gossip?"
I shrugged. "Sure. What's the gossip?"
"Um…I heard my tutor slept with the northern duke."
Those books could not be child appropriate. "Oh? How did a relationship like that happen?"
I let her ramble at me about secret love letters and magical monster slaying adventures as I ponder. Tonight. I'd experiment with [Ritual Of Flesh] tonight. It wouldn't be long before the tutor moved, and I'd like to have at least one of my abilities understood.
Our gossip session is interrupted by the door opening. Which is unfortunate, she was getting really creative at the end there. The northern duke had just saved the tutor from a rampaging magical beast.
The tutor in question walks in, glaring at me as was tradition. I glare back at her to complete the daily ritual, then hop off of the chair to go fade into the background. Lilith runs up to the tutor, like an excited child, and the woman jumps back, holding her hand out to stop her.
It leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I'm helping as much as I can, but she's still a little girl, she needs mother and father figures in her life. I guess it's better that she's distant than close, considering she's going to try and skewer the 9 year old, but still.
Lilith visibly sobers, drooping a little at the refusal of contact, but not throwing a fit like a kid normally would. Thus begins another set of lessons.
I watch the tutor carefully as time goes on, staring at her every moment as I try to gauge her impatience. I'm not the best with people, but I think she's getting fed up with the current situation. She would probably strike soon, within the week if I had to guess.
She notices my gaze, but I don't retract it, continuing to stare at her. She glares back for a moment, before returning her attention to Lilith.
On my way to my room for the night, I make a stop at the kitchen, and swipe a knife. I poke the tip against my palm, wondering how I should go about this. In the movies, people always cut their palm to draw blood, but I'd like to have my ability to grip things in tact.
I probably look manic, pressing a kitchen knife to my hand while I make my way to my room. It's going to look worse once I actually do it. I open the door to my little room, sitting down on my bed.
I let out a sigh, hanging my head back. Was I really about to sashimi my own body on the off chance it helped a little? In reality, though I had read pretty much her entire life from start to end, I had only known Lilith for a week, and I was about to carve a sigil into my body for her sake.
There was a swirling discontent in my chest. Lord knows how many emotions I've already pushed down, I should probably at least unpack this one.
Some people were naturally good, and probably wouldn't hesitate to cut themselves open for the sake of a little girl but, I couldn't help myself from hesitating.
I don't really want to cut a symbol into my body. That much makes logical sense. It'll hurt a lot, I don't wanna. But thinking about the alternative, not being able to help out Lilith at all, having to watch the bright little girl I'd come to know hide in on herself, to have to watch her become such a tragic existence, that seemed to me, the far worse option.
I took a deep breath, and put the knife tip against my thigh. What symbol though? What kind of image do I want carved into my body? This was why I never got a tattoo in the past life. I should go for something simple, to save my own pain if nothing else.
I was doing this all so I could help protect Lilith right? Keeping it simple, a shield. I pressed down with the knife, watching as my skin pushed down until it couldn't anymore, and like the fangs that drank my blood so often, the knife pierced through my skin.
Unlike Lilith's bites, this fucking hurt. I grabbed one of the two pillows I owned, and shoved part of it into my mouth, my teeth clamping down hard on the soft surface of it. Lets get it over with all at once, c'mon.
I took a shaky breath through the fabric of the pillow, and dragged the knife very slowly cutting through my leg. The first side's curve, the small crater as the top connected to the other half, then back down, and a final half circle down as the image connected at the bottom.
I pant, the knife falling out of my shaky hands and clattering to the floor, as my pillow likewise falls out of my mouth. My leg is covered in blood, but the wound is shallow enough that it should just be bleeding and nothing else.
"Statu-"
I'm cut off as my door opens. "Young Po-? Oh my!" The head butler has a look of horror on his face. I glance down at my bloodied leg, and at the knife on the floor covered in my blood.
"This…Isn't what it looks like?"
"I hope it isn't, because I frankly have no idea what this is."
I huff a breath, sweat streaming down my face. "How'd you catch me anyways?"
He sighed, calming himself down and retrieving the knife from the floor. "Your slave contract, it alerts the current owner when you pick up anything that could be classified as a weapon, and what it is. You are owned by the Edgars, but I'm the one in possession of the contract for management reasons."
I didn't know that. The man shook his head, running his hand through his slicked back hair and messing it up once more. "Stay there, I'll go get bandages, and you can prepare a proper explanation." He walks off, leaving me to my shame and embarrassment.
Man, I really wasn't expecting to get caught in the act like this. I can hear him walking off in a hurry, and restrain myself from following him. My leg is aching a little after, well, you know.
I hope it was worth it at least. "Stat-" I'm cut off a second time as I hear the head butler's footsteps suddenly stop, and the sound of a body hitting the floor. At this point in time, there's only one reason that would happen, and it's the tutor making her move. Ah fuck, it's happening tonight.