Magical Girl Quest - The Fire That Burns

You lean back in your seat, sliding out of it and collecting the plates around the table. Karen gives you an appreciative smile as you put your significant amount of experience in using unfamiliar kitchens to use, finding the cloth and getting to work cleaning up. Una joins you half-way through, taking the plates and drying them without a word. You give her a smile for her efforts, ruffling her hair with a wet hand, smile growing wider as you hear the resulting squeak.

When you are done, you slide the plates back into the cupboard, turning to see Karen watching the two of you with a relaxed air. She makes her way to her feet, cracking her back with a long and satisfying crunching noise as she stretches, washing out her mug and setting it upside down to dry on the draining board. When everything is in place, she turns to the two of you, apparently shaking off some lingering thoughts as she nods at the kitchen door. "I guess I should show you around then."

You nod, stepping out of the way as she moves towards the door, closing a curtain as she goes. "This is the Kitchen, there is a storage room attached through there" She points to a door in the corner of the room, the door nearly hidden by a Liquor cabinet on it's left and the fridge to it's right. "I've emptied it already, so there's only a small bit of food there, I'll go shopping soon." She steps backwards, into the corridor, doing a little spin. "Hallway, a couple of old paintings, the shoebox and the cupboard under the stairs."

A pointed finger directs you towards a door on the backside of the stairs, you'd missed it on the way in, half hidden behind a coat rack as it was. "Nothing really in there, might be some old things of mine, but I doubt it." She takes a few steps to the right, through an open doorway and into a sitting room, several large glass walls showing a view of the garden outside. The carpet is thick and soft, as is the arm chair you passed. There is a large book-shelf against the wall and you can see Una's fingers twitch forwards for a moment before she restrains herself. Mmm? Normally she would already have run past you to dive through the books.

Karen interrupts your thoughts as she stops by a plant, nudging a leaf out of the way of the window. "Garden is a little overgrown, I've kind of let it overgrow lately I guess." She looks a little sad as she says that, but she lets the leaf move back to it's previous position as she turns around, moving back into the hall. She waves a hand at the living room as you pass it. "Living room is here, not much else." Moving past it, she guides you up the stairs and onto the top floor.

"Master bedroom to the right." She points at a large wooden door set into a slight indent. "Bathroom next to it and two guest rooms on the left, feel free to pick whichever one you want. They have bedding setup, otherwise they are empty." You look into the guest room facing the back of the house, it's fairly standard. There is a large double bed against the middle of the wall, with bedside cabinets on either side. A large, ornate wardrobe rests in the corner alongside a chest of draws. A small beige rug sits at the end of the bed.

The wallpaper has little sheep along it in rows, when you turn an eye to Karen, she looks a little sheepish as she scratches her hand. "My parents had that put up, I could never bring myself to cover them up." Her parents? You look back at the wallpaper. How old is this place? Karen claps, bringing you out of your thoughts as you turn to look at her. "Well, what do you think?" She looks a little anxious as she waits for you to say something, shifting her weight from one foot to the other. The way her hair shifts to cover one of her eyes is almost cute, but you know better than to fall into her little traps.

Your sister is apparently not so well learnt. "It's comfy." Ignoring the occasional spot of dust. "I like it! I think sis would have picked this place as a stop too!" She looks up at you with eager eyes, pushing you into praising Karen in the strangest way you've seen in a while.

"It's homely, you obviously love it." The way she looks away, a little guilty as she runs a hand along the bannister tells you that there is probably a longer story behind that, but you don't pry. Nothing to do with me.

She pats the bannister, looking up to you with a more honest smile. "Yes, thank you." She lets the silence sit for a second before she pushes off of the bannister, looking over at the two of you with a question. "Anything else?"

You remember Una's aborted attempt earlier, reaching for the books. "Do you mind if we could look at the bookshelf downstairs?" She hums for a second, nodding and hopping down the first step of the stairs. You stop by the bookshelf, kneeling down at the bottom and leaning closer to Karen. "Is there anything I need to keep her away from?"

She thinks about it for a second before shaking her head. "I never kept anything of particular note here, mostly just curio or interesting books I've collected over time."

You nod, leaning back over to your sister and tapping her on the head to get her attention. "See anything you like?" She looks back at the shelves and you can almost see her intense desire to start picking through the available books, but she restrains herself, shaking her head. "What, you don't want to read anything?" She shakes her head again, still not saying anything. You are seriously worried now, this is completely out of character for her, you were expecting to have to pry her from a book with a crowbar later.

"Is something wrong?" She shakes her head. "You just don't want to read?" She shakes her head again. What. Try a different approach. "Why don't you pick a book then?" She leans into you a little, mumbling her answer once below your hearing. "What?" She presses herself closer to you, but speaks loud enough for you to hear.

"'M not allowed."

What. "Why not?"

"Broke my promise."

You wrack your mind for any promises she could have broken or words she could have misinterpreted. You stroke her hair, gently letting a bit of heat seep into her and calm her down as you think.

A flash of memory comes to mind, a very similar situation in the past, your sister resting against you and basking in your warmth as you think about your failures. Don't touch me while I'm using magic. The ship, fuuck. You pull her closer, resting her head against your chest as you sit back against the shelf behind you. It's a little tricky, keeping the heat off of the books behind you while making sure the magic you'd been giving her was stable. But the way she burrows into your arms and lets out little mumbles both soothes and hurts your heart.

You sit there for a while, Karen silently stepping out of the room as you hug your sister. Eventually, you poke her until she peeks an eye open at you. "What happened there wasn't your fault."

She looks away from your face, curling a little tighter. "Was." The sadness and guilt in her voice hurts because fuck it was my fault. "Shouldn't have touched, broke promise." The way she tries to both isolate herself and bury herself deeper into your arms is enough to trip every flag in your head. "Punishment for being bad." She's punishing herself for my mistakes?!

The feeling of guilt churning in your gut is heavy, but you don't let any of it show in your face as you smile down at her, shifting a long bang out of the way of her eye as she tries to hide beneath it. "No no no, you didn't do anything wrong there, no-one knew that could happen." If they did and didn't fucking tell me... You keep your thoughts to yourself as you gently rub circles in her back, making soothing noises as she makes little hiccuping noises, on the verge of crying.

You lean back, gently shifting her head from your chest to your shoulder as you reach behind you, snagging the first book you can feel. You glance at the title, Eurasian Myths and Legends - Discovering The Truth, Perfect. You flip the book open in your hand, shifting your other to curl up around your sisters shoulder and hold her in place comfortably. She looks up as she hears the pages ruffling, looking up to you a little lost as you smile. "If you aren't going to read, then I'll take responsibility for my mistake and read for you."

She doesn't say anything as she rests her head back on your shoulder, looking down at the book in your hand as you open to the introduction page. "In this section we will cover areas closer to home, confirmed legends from the European area..."


Karen pressed a hand to her mouth to muffle the scream of ohmygodthatistooadorable.

She just barely managed to keep the sound from echoing out through the house, through judicious use of the throw pillow on the sofa. A soft smile and warmth in her chest staying with her for the rest of the night.

POV
[] Sisters
[] Daiyu
[] Sabina