The Eroturge Ch. 02

As she stepped out onto the cobblestone walkway, she looked wildly around her, trying to reorient herself, when she heard the call again.

...are you out there?

East. She turned to her left. Her dorm was a good few blocks away, with dozens of buildings between her and the source. She took a breath to steady herself, stretching out her arms and legs. The first building in front of her was the tavern, one of those places that was much nicer-looking on the outside than on the inside, with a cluster of much-taller classroom buildings behind it, almost like a staircase.

Evie started towards the tavern at a brisk walk, focusing all of her energies on her feet as they landed one after another on the pavement, the muscles of her legs pulling and contracting, creating and burning heat as her heart began pounding in her chest. Her brisk walk turned into a jog, which turned into a sprint. She felt the wind pick up behind her, propelling her forward until she found herself at the brick wall of the tavern. With nowhere else to go, she leapt, the combination of wind and her own magic bringing her up a good few feet; the ball of her foot landed against the wall and she leapt once again, scaling the side of the tavern in just a few steps. She landed on the roof and brought the wind's full force against her back, allowing it to carry her to the next building, which she scaled just as easily.

From there, she could see the roof of her dorm building. Someone was there, but she couldn't make out any details on who. She sprinted once again, leaping from building to building like an acrobat, until she was there. Her feet slammed against the concrete roof of her building, and she collapsed to her knees, the energy she expended on both running and magic finally beginning to catch up with her. The wind—completely natural this time—blew a gentle breeze across her forehead, so covered in sweat that it felt more like a wintry gust. Her lungs burned, and her legs were killing her, but she remembered why she had come here. She dragged herself to her feet, and looked ahead to see the last thing she would have expected.

A girl. Wide-eyed, with skin even paler than Lisette's, and a delicate face framed perfectly by her hair, which flowed down her shoulders and back in perfect ringlets. Curiously, it was a deep shade of violet, though there wasn't any unevenness to it, or any other sign of it being dyed. She was short and fairly petite, but her features were fully-formed and she carried herself in a way that made Evie suspect she was around Lisette's age.

Also, she was completely naked, yet when her eyes met Evie's, she made no effort to hide her nudity. She merely clasped her hands in front of her chest and said, "Are you okay?"

Her voice had a lilting, almost melodic quality to it. Her lips struggled slightly with the words, as though she wasn't quite used to saying them, but Evie couldn't place what sort of accent she had. Taken aback, she didn't respond at first, as she was still struggling to process what was in front of her. Normally, running into a completely—and unashamedly—naked girl in a private space like this would have been a complete boon for her, but considering this was almost certainly the person who had been calling her, Evie was stumped.

"Mistress?"

When the girl said this, Evie jolted back to reality. Or whatever was left of it, anyways. "I'm sorry?" she asked, only vaguely aware that she could hear once again.

The girl stepped forward hesitantly. When she looked up at Evie, she almost looked...fearful.

"You...you're the one that summoned me, right?"

Seemingly thrown off by Evie's confusion, the girl parted her bangs to one side, revealing her forehead, at the center of which was set a glowing, pink crystal. Evie suddenly recognized what she was feeling—that strange, alien presence she felt when she was observing the Lust Crystal. It was now inside of her, all around her...

And most of all, it was right in front of her.

Evie spoke slowly, slowly piecing things together with each word. "You're...a familiar?"

The girl nodded, as though it was the most obvious thing in the world.

Familiars were by no means an unfamiliar thing in Academian Magic, but they weren't something that anyone could summon. They required three things: a mage of exceptional power...

Which would have been Evie. Check.

...a talisman of some kind, to house the spirit...

Evie's eyes flicked back to the Crystal on the girl's forehead. Check.

...and the spirit itself. A mystical, ethereal spirit, not created by the mage themself, but something dwelling within the natural world, invisible to all corporeal beings until given a home. And where in the natural world they dwelled depended on the forms they chose to take when made corporeal. And a familiar that took the form of a naked girl was completely foreign to Evie.

"Where did you come from?"

The girl tilted her head, still clearly unsure of what was going on. "Corsaea, obviously." She looked around her. "So how far away are we, anyways?"

Evie barely heard the question. She was already sinking to her knees, her face turning gray. Her stomach churned, every nerve ending in her brain firing up, filling her with the awareness of how completely, unequivocally, abso-fucking-lutely screwed she was.

The girl waved her hands in front of Evie's face. "Mistress? Are you okay?"

"Peachy," she muttered, dazed. "Never better."

"So how far from home are we?"

"Home?"

"Corsaea! And where are we anyways? I've never seen buildings quite like this." Her eyes scanned Evie's body. "Or clothes like yours for that matter. I guess you're probably not actually from Corsaea yourself. Have you heard any of the news out there? Is Demosthenes still running the Council, or did his son finally take over?"

It took a moment for Evie to gather herself enough to interrupt the girl's torrent of questions, but eventually she was able to hold up a hand to the girl's lips, her brow furrowed.

"How long have you been asleep for?"

"Dunno. Feels like its been ages though."

Oh boy. "Like...maybe fifteen hundred years or so?"

The girl laughed, a clear crystalline laugh that wrung Evie's heart like a dish rag. "Yeah, almost."

Her laughter ceased when she saw that Evie wasn't laughing as well, a grave expression slowly taking over her face. "You're not..."

A cold breeze swept over the both of them, causing them to shiver. Evie stood up, hand clasping the girl's shoulder, and said, in as calming a tone as she could manage, "Why don't we go inside?"