Kuchisake's Magic

Every few steps, a stray breeze would send another sharp pain through Elias’ tail.

“What did that Leon man do to me?” he mumbled more so himself than those kind enough to escort him.

Serena spoke up.

“Leon has fire magic,” she said.

“Sounds like he let it get to his head,” muttered Elias.

“Yeah.” Serena nodded. Her voice carried a certain wistfulness.

“When I talked to your father, he called himself the Azure Mage. But if he’s a mage, then he should have books or something to learn from, right?” Elias smiled at her. “We could try to learn together, if you want?” And it would give him a means of defending himself from Leon if the man ever tried that again.

Serena stared at him for a moment. Her brow furrowed, and then she relaxed.

“I’d like that.” She smiled. “Thank you Elias. I’ll ask Bill or Kuchisake about those books next time I see them.”

“Not your father?” Elias tilted his head.

“I don’t see him much.” Serena shrugged. “He’s a busy man.”

Elias winced. He wondered if Tibby was busy back at home as an office manager. If she was that busy, would she ever find time to visit him and their mother back home? Then the truth struck him–his world had been destroyed, at least according to Merloine.

“Was he like that even before you came here?” said Elias.

Serena paused for a moment.

“I don’t really know. There’s a gap in my memory, but he told me that he was busy. Also that Leon had been one of his apprentices.” She grumbled before shooting a glare over her shoulder. “It’s hard for me to believe that sometimes, with the way Leon is, but he wouldn’t lie to me.”

If nobody else here was capable of magic, then it would make sense that the man that could wield magic would learn from the more experienced mage. Nevertheless, Elias’ nose wrinkled as he remembered Leon’s cocky smirk and arrogant attitude. “So he was your old roommate?” If Serena had dealt with someone like that, then it was no wonder that she would make sure Elias wouldn’t be tempted to try anything with her. “I’m glad your father stopped that.”

“I’m sorry again for what he did to your tail,” said Serena. “I don’t think he was always that bad. Me rejecting him made it worse. The way he looked at me after I turned him away, it was like a part of him had died.”

“After the healers help your tail,” Lin interjected. “Could I capture your essence Elias?”

Elias blinked and looked over at Lin and Marcel. He’d gotten so engrossed in chatting with Serena that he’d almost forgotten they accompanied him. From Marcel’s smirk and waggling eyebrows, he seemed aware of the lapse, and the reason for it. Then Elias’ gaze fell to Lin.

The suddenness of how the long-haired shorter girl entered the conversation earned a bewildered look from Elias, but he nodded.

“You can, sure,” he said. Lin did deserve something after walking him to the infirmary. The idea of recapturing his home in a painting, his world had died according to Merloine, brought a sense of comfort.

The long-haired girl beamed and clapped her hands together.

“Then come to my room after this,” Lin said. Marcel gave her a pointed look, and she rolled her eyes. “Sorry. My room that Marcel has the luxury of living in.” She looked at him. “Better?”

“Barely.” Marcel rolled his eyes. He held the door for Elias and the two women, before walking inside as well. A faint vinegar smell squeezed Elias’ nose, and beds separated with curtains lined the walls. All of the workers they came across in the infirmary were women, all of them appearing around Elias’ age.

More than a few of the younger nurses gave Elias a passing glance as he strode by, and he offered a wave and a shy smile in return. They also gave Serena a wide berth like the younger people sitting on the red flowers had. As he took notice of them, Elias realized that the only old person he’d seen was Merloine. Everyone else had looked around his age. Even Bill had only looked five years older.

Eventually Serena led him toward one of the nurses, her skin darker and contrasting against her white uniform.

“Could you take a look at Elias?” she said.

The nurse gestured to a nearby empty bed.

“Lay on your stomach,” she said, her stern tone giving Elias no opportunity to refuse even if he wanted. He did so, and breathed a sigh of relief as the nurse drew one of the curtains to preserve his modesty.

“It’s definitely fractured,” she murmured. “Not bleeding, at least. But this redness…” She hummed. “Did you get it stuck in a fireplace?”

“A man named Leon burned me with his magic,” said Elias. “Stomped on it with his foot too.”

At the mention of magic, the nurse drew back instantly.

“I’m not getting mixed up in any magic,” she said. “If you need help with that, go to Kuchisake or Merloine.”

“But it’s just…”

“No buts,” she said, before turning her back on him and sticking her head out of the modesty curtains. “I’m sorry, Serena, but I didn’t realize there was magic involved. I wouldn’t want to make it worse by accident somehow. Can you fetch Kuchisake or your father to take a look at him?” Elias huffed and got to his feet. If she wasn’t going to help, he wasn’t going to lay down. Kuchisake and Merloine were whole islands away besides.

He stepped past the modesty curtain into the infirmary hallway and rejoined the rest of the group. Many of the other nurses refused with similar reasoning, and Elias’ shoulders slumped.

But Serena smiled at him.

“Nothing for it then. Let’s get Kuchisake.”

Elias stared at her. “Wait, is there another boat? Bill took the one we used to bring the keg over.”

“There is a spare, but Kuchisake doesn’t need…oh, you’ve never seen her magic, have you?”

Elias shook his head. He wondered if that magic let her walk without sound.

Marcel leaned back, a grimace on his face.

Meanwhile Lin leaned forward with a wide smile.

“Haven’t you already seen her magic before, Lin?” said Serena.

“I want to capture Elias’ reaction to it in my mind’s eye.” Then Lin whirled to face Marcel. “And no warning him, Marcel! It needs to be full and complete, authentic. If you warn him, I’m not letting you sleep tonight, understand?” She glowered at him.

“Fine, fine.” Marcel rolled his eyes.

Elias grumbled, but when Serena led the group down the infirmary hall and into a storage closet, he followed without protest. Along the way, however, he caught sight of one of the younger nurses tending to a cut in the man’s arm. He didn’t have long before she wrapped gauze around the cut, but it leaked fluid too dark to be blood. He squinted at the wound, wondering why the black liquid that dribbled from it looked familiar.

Then his blood chilled. He shook his head, pushing away that nonsensical possibility for the time being.

“Elias, you coming?” called Marcel from further up the hallway.

“Be right there!” Grateful for the distraction, he left behind the wounded man.

They rounded a corner and opened a closet. Within the closet stood a shelf that bore a television, identical to the one that had been in Bill’s and Kuchisake’s home. Serena pressed one of the buttons and turned a dial along the bottom of the side that faced them, and a black and white picture of the dining room appeared on the screen. The television hummed faintly.

Elias made sense of the picture before him, and his eyes widened in recognition. Based on the slightly elevated vantage point, he must’ve been looking through the television on the shelf in Bill’s and Kuchisake’s shack. The two were connected in some way, and he pressed a finger to the image. The surface was warm.

“No distractions!” Lin said. Her eyes juggled between the black and white surface and Elias’ face. The intensity of her gaze made Elias shift uncomfortably, but he moved his finger away from the screen. Eventually Kuchisake came into view on the other end.

Then Kuchisake walked up to the box in her home. The way she glided across the room, as though her very existence was stilted and unnatural, made Elias shiver. The distance that this television offered only exacerbated the unsettling feeling. He knew that this was the woman that had watched over him after Bill had rescued him from the ink, and she’d only ever been kind to him, but a part of him couldn’t set aside her creepiness.

Kuchisake reached toward the box, her hands growing larger as they drew near. And then they emerged from the television before them, and reached out toward Elias. He shrieked and stumbled away from her. Kuchisake’s hands set flat on the floor and the rest of the woman’s body emerged. Her bones twisted and her muscles contorted at unnatural angles to accommodate her squeeze through the face of the television.

In his haste to get away from Kuchisake, Elias backed into Marcel. His injured tail pressed into Marcel’s torso. Elias yelped in pain.

Lin laughed and clapped her hands. “That was perfection! Exquisite!”

Marcel gave Lin a withering look before shaking Elias’ shoulder.

“You okay, Elias?”

“I’m fine,” reassured Elias. He watched as Kuchisake finished emerging from the television and stood up. Her body swayed as she drew near.

“Huuuurt?” she warbled. Her neck creaked such that her hair-obscured face turned to face each of them.

Serena stepped forward.

“Kuchisake, Leon stepped on Elias’ tail. He used his magic, so the other nurses don’t want to touch it. Can you give it a look please?”

She nodded and glided past them. They followed Kuchisake out of the storage closet, and back to the main hall with a row of beds lining the walls. She warbled a few words to the nurses, and they somehow knew to bring supplies to her.

Then Kuchisake led Elias to a spare bed and drew the modesty curtain closed.

“Thank you,” said Elias as Kuchisake tended to his tail. “That magic of yours is really handy. Sorry for, err, screaming.”

“Saaaaafe.”

“I’m safe, thank you.”

Kuchisake dabbed some ointment on Elias’ tail, wrapped it in bandages, and then placed it in a splint with delicate fingers. At the end of the treatment, she scritched behind Elias’ ears with jagged nails.

“Leeeoon.” A dark edge crept into her tone. Elias shivered as he got up from the bed, and swung his legs over the side. As she turned to pass through the modesty curtain, Elias remembered what he’d discussed with Serena only minutes ago.

“Wait,” he said. She stopped abruptly in the middle of her turn, which only just made Elias’ heart suddenly quicken. Once he’d calmed down, he managed a smile. “While you’re here, Kuchisake, I saw you use magic. And I was wondering if you could teach me and Serena how to cast something too? It would be good to defend myself if Leon tries to hurt me again, right? And he was badgering Serena too.”

Kuchisake’s eyes closed. There was a deep inhale and exhale.

“Feaaarful.” A weight lingered in her voice. Despite this, however, her gaze lingered on Elias for a long moment. It reached deep into him, as though she was peering past his flesh. Elias shuddered. He wondered why she needed to look at him so intensely, before he remembered how Serena had talked about Kuchisake. Maybe Kuchisake was protective of the girl, and wanted proof that she could trust Elias with Serena’s wellbeing.

“I won’t hurt her,” assured Elias. “She already had to deal with Leon as a roommate. I already told her that I wouldn’t try anything.”

Kuchisake stared at him for a while longer before eventually managing a nod. Elias wouldn’t have even noticed the acquiescence if he hadn’t been focused on the smallest of her movements.

“Tomooooorrow,” she warbled. “Daaaawn. Shoooore.” Then Kuchisake walked out of the infirmary, striding past the waiting figures of Marcel, Serena, and Lin.