A/N: I would have made this in first person point of view. But then, I couldn't help thinking: Weren't fairytale or fantasy stories always in omniscient or third-person limited? ^^ And so, to have the wicked feeling of rambling narrators, this would be in third person.^^
Terms;
Nippon=Nihon=Japan
Wō=is another name for Japan that's introduced first in China. It's an extremely ancient name and means 'dwarfs' (which I think sort of refers to the people =.=)
Maou=is a made-up contraction of Majo no joou, the witch queen, in the land of Wō
Mochi=glutinous rice cake
Geta=wooden clogs, Japanese style
Makizushi=sushi that's rolled
Miko=shrine priestess
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I. In which Mai is bewitched .I
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Mai Taniyama sighed for the umpteenth time that day. Business was booming in the tea shop as usual, and she'd been rather busy enough to kill boredom in her midst.
But that was not the reason why she'd sighed more than she'd blinked her chocolate brown eyes.
She had caught her dark-rimmed eyes oftentimes in her small oval mirror on the counter. Lately, she had been bombarded by her dreams―dreams of past and future, to be exact―and she always found herself waking up in the middle of the night and then not again and then again...
It was making her crazy.
Though, it was not really something out of the ordinary for her.
Consecutive dreams, like what she always had, occurred when she would have a lot of customers the next day. They're mostly about the customers: about what situations they have, why they would like to buy tea, what they expect to gain from the tea, and etcetera. At rare times, Mai would dream about ominous things like a kitten dying on the street or house fires that were about to happen―and so far, they all had come true.
Now, what was truly problematic about her dreams was that she had to keep in mind all the details about them―especially every dream regarding prospective customers. The tea shop was her life, breath, key to survival, or whatchamacallit. She had been stuck to it for the entire sixteen years, and she would probably be glued to it throughout her lifespan.
Once more, Mai soughed and blew her auburn fringe out of her face after flipping the tea shop's door sign. The Cherry Blossoms Festival would be held today, and everyone else had retired from their inclinations earlier than her to meet up in the spacious areas of Market Nippon or Market Nonagon.
Mai was quite fond of festivals, actually. But since her parents died and her sisters went off to different places, she'd been left with herself. She had friends though―Michiru and Keiko; yet, the two of them were too busy with their own gossips to notice her dilemma. She had to admit, though, that if not for her friends' busybodying, she would have been continuously nonchalant. Somehow, if not because of Michiru and Keiko's gossiping, Mai wouldn't have been acquainted with the cursing Maou of the Waste or the scuttling castle of Wizard Shibuya on the hills over Market Nippon. Indeed, if she hadn't heard of the two terror freaks, she wouldn't have started to be wary for herself―especially when she's always alone in the tea shop.
But there's nothing much to worry actually, she thought courageously.
Maou of the Waste was said to be insecure, and in Mai's self-perception, she was not pretty enough to be envied by the Maou and be annihilated on the spot. With her 'beauty,' she's also confident that Wizard Shibuya wouldn't tear her heart out and gobble it.
Mai glanced at the wall clock across the door. She must be off. She turned away from the tea shop's door and approached her small teal counter to grab a simple straw hat―with wax-made strawberries and cherries and silk trimming―and slung over her white leather knapsack. For the occasion, she didn't bother to change her plain gray kimono and cedar geta into fancier ones and just let her plaited auburn hair be fastened securely by a bland crimson rubber band. Albeit she didn't mind spending time for grooming, she had long ago passed the ladylike job to her sisters whom she regarded as more comely than her and, thereby, more suitable to do such a task.
Making sure the containers were well-placed and orderly, Mai looked around her tea shop one more time. Then, after checking the appropriate contents in her knapsack, Mai strode off and locked the door.
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Market Nonagon was a town that's famous for its...er...nine sides―well, nine stores actually. Such stores were situated in the heart of the town's numerous apartments and townhouses. A marble fountain with a pavilion lay in the middle of the shopping center. Around the fountain, cherry blossom trees occupied what the bermuda grasses did not grow on. The so-called Sakura Park―surrounding the fountain and resting inside the seclusion of the stores―was a classic for wandering circus, bards, couples, soloists, and children. Beyond the nonagon-shaped park lay a wide pavement where people (of Western or traditional Wō clothing) schlepped to and fro different shops.
Market Nonagon was a neighboring town of Market Nippon. Only a lord's farm separated the two, so the townsfolk could just travel by foot when they needed to cross over. Mai was in a hurry though, so she took the fastest vehicle she could think of.
It was still early in the evening. The sun had not set yet, and the people were just starting to gather in the park. Besides the cherry blossoms viewing, fireworks also assumed their roles in the annual festival.
There will be a lot of people soon, Mai mused.
Hopping off from a red and yellow bus, Mai found her way to SPR, a simple mochi shop. Its walls were in lemon chiffon, and it only had a wide counter on the front. Shelves of boxed mochi were located at the back of the counter. From afar Mai spotted Madoka's maroon-ish brown-haired form and a pink-haired girl in between the counter and the shelves; in a clearer view, both were in a creamy dress with peach-colored apron and a matching nurse-like headdress.
The front of the shop's counter was packed with people; almost everyone was calling for Madoka, and almost everyone were men of all ages. Madoka, as best as she could, would wink to anyone who called her name lovingly as a sort of fan service during the wait for orders. Indeed, Mai couldn't help thinking that the shop's increase in profits depended on Madoka.
Anyway, amidst the ruckus, Mai inhaled and exhaled and called, "Madoka-nee!" She jumped up and down while waving a hand, and Madoka instantly whipped her head to Mai. If it had something to do with affinity, the sisters would always immediately notice and hear one another's calls ever since they'd grown used to one another's presence.
"Mai!" Madoka returned excitedly. After giving a boxed mochi with blown kisses, she whispered something to her pink-haired partner and then proclaimed to the crowd, "I'll be taking a break for a while! Kira will be in charge."
"Madoka, don't go!" some men cried morosely.
Madoka just winked. "Now, now. I have to talk to my sister!"
She ushered Mai to a small door beside the counter, and they headed to a storeroom at the back of the kitchen, which was behind the shelves of boxed mochi. Boxed mochi of any kind were piled from floor to ceiling in the ambry, and their smell invigorated Mai's stomach. Madoka, knowing how Mai's stomach works, gave her a box of taro mochi to devour while they sat and conversed on crates. In exchange, Mai handed her two-tiered lacquered box of home-made makizushi from her knapsack.
"You're amazing, Madoka-nee! You've attracted quite a lot of people!" Mai commented after biting a piece of her mochi and offered some to Madoka, who refused politely.
"Yes, indeed," Madoka said with unease and shifted in her seat before leaning and whispering to Mai, "Look, Mai. Actually, I'm not Madoka; I'm Ayako."
Mai almost choked on her mochi.
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"Wha―Huh?" Mai gawked at the woman before her.
What the woman afore Mai confessed was so impossible to comprehend as the latter gazed at everything that was Madoka━her reddish-brown hair, her brown eyes, and her pouty lips. Having a very good memory, Mai could recall Ayako's slender face, scarlet hair, and seldom snobby voice very well, so for her second oldest sister to be like Madoka...
"Yes, I know. It's shocking, right?" Madoka―or rather Ayako―smiled slightly. "Well...you see...the person who teaches me medicine and trains me as a miko? She's actually a good witch, and well...I ventured upon a spell and got excited. I'd visited Madoka last month and told her about it. Then, well...she brought up how she's tired of the mochi shop, and I talked to her about how dull my life was becoming━besides the magic part. Madoka was intrigued about magic for so long too, so, you see, we arranged everything and ourselves and well...placed each other in disguise."
"S-so... Madoka-nee is in Upper Straightening Valley...rather than y-you?" Mai sat in bewilderment.
Ayako, in Madoka's body, nodded and said, "Madoka and I were going to visit you! But then, you see out there; this place is so busy! It's three times rowdier today, and it's been going on ever since early morning too! Madoka left me with regards for you, though. I've heard she's having fun through her letters."
"She sent me one too..." Mai blinked and remembered that she had actually noticed the inconsistency of their handwriting but thought nothing beyond it.
When their parents died, Mai and her two sisters had been fending by themselves. Since neither of her older sisters wanted to take over the tea shop, Mai volunteered (among the three of them, she was the one that's talented in tea-making, anyway), and the three of them separated paths. From then on, they had not personally encountered one another, so Mai had finally decided days ago that she would visit Madoka and Ayako consecutively when they told her, at last, where they had settled for the meantime.
But the tidings that awaited her was perplexing.
"Ha-has no one noticed it? I mean... What if you liked someone from those guys out there?"
With a wave of her well-manicured hand, Ayako shrugged and beamed. "Well, if I ever fancied someone, I'll show my real face to him. And if he likes me for who I am, then everything's settled."
Mai gazed at her for a while and then smiled in return. "I think that's a good idea, somehow..." But in my case, if I'd be in disguise...I think the guy would rather have my mask than my raw exterior...
Mai the youngest was as self-depreciating as usual.
"Isn't it? Anyway, enough about me." Ayako smiled Madoka's smile. "What about you? How are you faring in the tea shop? Aren't you bored?"
Mai shook her shoulders and was about to say that she's okay, but she bit her lip. She hated lying to her sisters, so she suspired and blurted to Ayako, "Actually... I've...been feeling very dull too."
Ayako looked at her sympathetically and squeezed her hands. "I know how it feels, Mai. And I think the feeling of dullness is heavier on you. I mean, you've been making teas since I-don't-know-when, and the task has been taking up the entirety of your life when mother and father died. I don't suggest you'll put up something like what Madoka and I did, but I think you should do something you'd want to do rather than do something you must do."
Mai nodded and sighed. "I know, Ayako-nee... but it's just...I'm confused too. I don't know what I want to do. I'm at the end of my wits―if I even have such―in finding the thing I'd love to do forever. And so far my search is just...utterly pointless."
Ayako squeezed her hand in assurance again. "You'll find one soon, Mai. I'm sure you will! Mind me, your tea-making is fabulous, and you know what they say about entrancing a man's stomach."
Mai didn't know how the subject veered to love-hunting, yet she just went along and frowned. "That's about food."
"Well, tea goes through the stomach too."
Mai chuckled. "Alright, alright. I wish that too, Ayako-nee."
The two changed the topic and started to chat about anything. From a friend who married a lord to a neighbor who gave birth recently, their conversation consisted various information exchange. They spoke of nonsensical things just like in the old days, and Mai had gradually felt lighter than ever at Ayako's chirping.
So when a scrawny man slipped his head in the storage room to tell Ayako that she should go back to the counter, Mai was feeling so enlivened already like her usual cheerful self.
Ayako bid her with cheek-kissing goodbyes and another boxed mochi before returning with her to the counter and seeing her off. Mai waved to Ayako but observed that the latter had become preoccupied then with the customers. Smiling, Mai squeezed out of the rowdy men and into the wonderful night.
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When Mai got out of SPR, the crowd at Market Nonagon had already increased a hundred times. The sun had already set, and Mai would have appreciated the night sky if she weren't sandwiched by the streaming populace.
A slight headache was starting to form around Mai's temples. The noise of the people who probably went there to see fireworks were getting to her sharply. If she weren't alone, it would have been alright since she could at least have some distraction. But she was, and being squished by sweating and greasy people wasn't really her definition of fun and distraction in a quite warm night of May. So, avoiding men trying to accost her in the way, Mai paved and fought her way to a deserted alley. When she finally reached her intended destination, she heaved her hundredth or so sigh and began sauntering alone in the dimly lit path.
The sky was a clear navy blue with few dark fluffy clouds from here to there. The moon was full, and it shone over the town beautifully. Mai could hear some fireworks starting, but she didn't crane her neck to look.
The sky's lovely as it is...
She opened the boxed mochi Ayako gave her and ate it with unwavering delight. It was only when she was halfway the alley that Mai discovered she made a wrong turn. Inexplicably, the air had gone chilly, and a prickling feeling had climbed up her spine. She felt as if she were being watched...
Mai shook her head. I shouldn't think like this!
In the land of Wō, even just thinking of something probable would make it come true.
Mai hastily threw the empty box of mochi into a nearby bin. She nipped her lip and trudged on, although unsure about where she's heading. The alley stretched forever, and the windows of the buildings she passed had not streamed light to her steps for a while now…
There should be a corner to turn to where there's light and less people…
Mai heard it faintly at first, but soon it was far too obvious not to notice; someone else's footsteps were echoing with hers on the cobblestone path. Half-running and half-gliding, Mai increased her pace. Yet, wearing quite a vertical kimono and inflexible geta, she couldn't really afford to run…
At such instance, Mai bumped her head against something fleshy that materialized out of nowhere, toppled backwards, and unceremoniously fell on her bottom.
"What the―!" she yelped. She was sure her path ahead was clear before…
Something crash landed near her; some glass-shattering sound reverberated to her ears, but she didn't bother to look and know. Her eyes scrunched in pain, she massaged her bottom.
What the bloody hell was━?
"Are you all right?" a mellifluous male voice rang out.
Mai perked her head and un-squinted her eyes.
A dashing young man knelt before her. He had pitch black hair and a mix of ash mauve and cerulean for eyes in the moonlight. He was clad monochromically in a dark shirt and trousers. However, a blazer made of some dark and shining material with a diamond pattern draped over his shoulders; its long sleeves, unoccupied by his arms, dangled and trailed on his sides.
If it were going to rain men everyday―for it was really like he came from the clouds and fell down suddenly―Mai secretly hoped they would be identical to the lad before her.
After a few minutes of Mai's agape staring, he raised a lovely eyebrow at her. Mai, thinking it was rude not to reply to his query, stammered while transfixed, "I-I'm alright, t-thank you..."
The lovely eyebrow went down. To her astonishment, he smirked at her. "I wasn't talking to you, actually."
Her mouth continued to hang open. "W-what?"
The lad narrowed his eyes. "I was talking to my mirror which you have broken, apparently." He pointed on the floor where shards of reflecting glass━its glimmering golden frame a few inches near them━lay before her; it must be what she heard shattering a while ago.
"Oh..." Growing cognizant, Mai's jaw went slack, but she recovered swiftly. T-t-this jerk! Not even apologizing for coming out of nowhere to collide with me! And was instead worried about his mirror! She glared at him and gritted out, "I will buy you a new one then."
"There's nothing like my mirror wherever." He frowned, icily staring at her in return. "My precious mirror was custom-made."
Oh, the heartlessness of the man because of his shattered mirror...! Mai's indienance intensified, but she held herself. This is why beauty has its downsides! She reproached herself for being a fool and for starting to adore the young man a few seconds ago. "Fine! I will fix it then!" she snarled brazenly.
She didn't really know how, but maybe thinking of good things would make them come true just as when she was thinking of the opposite.
Yet when she extended her right hand, an unfamiliar transparent one shot up from the floor and grasped her outstretched arm before she could grab a mirror shard. She gasped at the immediate coldness seeping from the pale see-through hand into her body. This must be what it's like to be frostnipped; her skin turned excruciatingly itchy, cold, and numb.
Screaming in fright, Mai briskly flailed her right arm off the transparent hand's grip. Luckily, the iron grip broke away, and the transparent hand slipped off from her arm as she moved backwards. Whatever part the transparent appendage was connected to, it was stuck underground―unseen.
Mai blanched. Ah... She forgot indeed. There were those too.
Ghosts.
She'd seen enough of them to keep her from sleeping at night when she was still a child. She'd tried to pretend she couldn't see any of them ever since, but they were too...ever-present that she had hard times at some point.
But not one ever touched her until then!
And with the intention to harm me! She stared, horrified, at the...thing.
Mai gulped nervously and grew paler within seconds as, gradually, the rest of the ghost started to emerge from the ground. A hollow-faced old man appeared and grinned at her so creepily and wickedly that she would have screamed again if another hand―a fleshy and un-transparent one―did not snatch her arm and usher her behind a barrier, which was the overweening young man's body. The latter whirled his head to her and squeezed her arm comfortingly.
"It'll be alright," he assured.
Mai become nonplussed thereupon because, amazingly, 'alright' she felt indeed. Oddly, she reddened at the feel of the warm hand holding her and at the presence of the seemingly broad back in front of her. She shook her head abruptly though. I won't be tricked! Never in my life will I be bewitched again by this young man!
"So they've chased me here too," her 'shield' murmured to no one in particular.
What? Mai nictated.
It was then that she noticed that other ghosts had started to pop up everywhere―from the walls that secluded the alley, from the rooftops of the near buildings, and from the floors near them. Mai was going to faint if the apparitions kept up, and thoughtlessly she clung to the blazer of her shield for reassurance. Sans any reaction to her clinging, the young man waved a hand over the mirror shards, and each broken piece shone and emitted blinding rays of multi-colored lights.
Mai's breath was caught between amazement, bewilderment, and fear at the demonstration. The display was more beautiful than any firework she'd ever seen.
"Begone," the young man bellowed.
Slowly and swiftly, the ghosts were disintegrating.
Mouth hung agape once again, Mai rubbernecked at the evanescing spirits. He-he's exorcising them?
He glanced at her and commanded, "Cling tightly to my shirt. I'm going to raise a wind."
"A wha―?" she said absentmindedly.
He mumbled incomprehensible words then―so fast that Mai thought he was tongue-twisting. Before long, Mai felt her geta push the soles of her feet upwards, and she gazed down at her toes in perplexity. An extraordinary scene occurred at that instant, and it was not only her who experienced it, actually; a cyclone had started below the young man and Mai's feet, and they rose from the ground.
Snapping to her senses, Mai whipped her head to the stranger beside her. "Why are you involving me? You said they were chasing you, you jerk!" she said in midair.
If the man was a wizard, he could have just made Mai invisible to the ghosts and run away by himself. Mai needed to come home early that night after all; she must wake up early the next day to pluck fresh tea leaves.
And she wanted to go home safely.
"Because you must compensate for breaking my mirror," he responded, his back still facing her.
Mai was unafraid of heights, but her feelings could vary with great distances. They weren't falling, however, so she decided to trust the guy...one bit. She turned him around. "I told you I'll fix it!"
The man glimpsed at the cyclone below them. It glimmered with lights; the ghosts trying to fly to them were hit by its random flashes and shimmers before they vanished into mists. Finally, he answered and quipped, "It's irreparable when broken. That's why it's precious."
While she's unprepared, he held her arms and brought her in front of him. She was the one with her back to the young man then. Subsequently, he whispered, from behind, to her left ear, "We have to run in the sky."
"Wah―you━!" Mai spluttered.
He flicked a finger on the sides of her kimono, and her legs poked out through the magically made slits as he led her into a skitter across the night sky. Mai's astounded voice promptly reverberated in the atmosphere while he guided her on top of a pointed roof to another one and to more distinctly shaped roofs. Mai whirled her head back to the cyclone, but the lad told her not to and ordered her to look straight ahead.
Screw distance; it was the uncertainty that she would remain in midair which frightened her. No matter how loud and shrill her cries of fright though, no one from the bustling crowd came to look at her tantrum in the sky.
"Wah―aaaaarrrrrrrrrggggggggggh! Youuuu vainnnnnnn jeeeeeeeeeerrrrrrrkkkkkk!" she shrieked as they leapt a long distance; her legs flung fecklessly in air space for a moment before landing to a very far thatched rooftop.
The young man led Mai through the whole ordeal, but it wasn't like she had another option besides imminent death. At least, she'd thought that if not for the hands that gripped her own, she would have been falling like a star to its demise.
"Just one jump," the young man instructed, and one jump they did.
Yet after the jump, the comforting hands released Mai way above a grayish tiled roof. She hovered, left flapping and screeching helplessly―like a young bird trying to fly―for seemingly infinite seconds.
Afraid to look at the rough and hard-looking roof she would be crash landing, she shut her eyes and crossed her arms to protect her face. Before long, gravity pulled her body down.
Another long shriek resonated.
And then it all ended with a whimper.
XDXDXDXDXD~nya~
Mai jolted awake because of some jabbing on her sides. Instinctively evading the jabber, she groaned and rolled to her side. Another poke came, and she swathed the poker's hand grumpily. When the prods still came, she giggled, "Stop it. It tickles!"
She heard a sigh and then... "You're finally awake, mirror-breaking idiot."
Her eyelids flew open, and she bolted upright hastily. "W-Who's━?" she inquired sleepily, disoriented yet alarmed.
There came a 'hmph' and, "You're quite forgetful. To think it's only for a few hours."
Mai rubbed her eyes and blinked numerous times. Everything that happened came rushing back to her little by little as she faced a sable-haired young man.
"Y-you!" she squeaked, inspected herself, and then goggled at him. "You're real! Wha―how did I━?" Checking for wounds and bruises, she patted her body with her hands but found none. She took a gander at him, mystified. Didn't I smack my head on the roof? And-and...fainted, maybe?
But she felt refreshed, somehow, as though she just had a decent and satisfying slumber last night. She eyed the young man with disbelief.
"I...fell... smacked on the roof... fainted and slept?" she queried uncertainly and then added with a second look at herself, "A-and was unscathed?"
The young man just shrugged. "You went through the roof and, yes, fainted then slept. For two and a half hours. Snoring too, I might add."
Mai would have glared at his last remark, but then she got distracted. The young man sat on an all-too-familiar floral-upholstered spring green couch in a very kingly and I'm-used-to-this-place pose. It was on that occasion, when she swiveled her head sideways, that she found herself actually nestling on her tea shop's mint green carpeted floor. She was using her knapsack as a pillow...
"How did you―?"
The image of the ghosts, the illuminating mirror shards, the cyclone, and the scurrying across the night sky flitted back to Mai's mind. Then it all clicked into her head; the earlier events linked together to form a train of thoughts and a general conclusion.
In shock, she wondered aloud, "You exorcised those ghosts, but you're a wi―?"
"Enchanter is the correct title," the lad interrupted as-a-matter-of-factly.
"What?" Mai's eyes expanded.
He airily smirked and drawled, "I'm an Enchanter: an alchemist, wizard, and exorcist."
Enchanter?
Although the magickal world wasn't that new to her, Mai was so far uninvolved with the witchdom around her―enough for her to be quite uncaring of whatever terms the ones with such profession used.
So she gawked at him. "You can't be serious."
He released a breath, looking weary as though he'd encountered the same reaction a million times. "Do I look like I jest?"
Mai just shrugged.
He looked away and added, more to himself, "Although, it's just expected. I had asked that guy to blacken my name, after all."
Mai blinked at him. That guy? He has an associate? She squinted her eyes, pursed her lips, and mumbled, "Nevertheless, you're that Shibuya who's said to be frolicking and munching on━" She stopped and paled when she recalled that the young man in front of her was the Shibuya-freak-who-eats-girl's-hearts and that he's only an arm's length from her―
As fast as a mongoose (or maybe faster), Mai scrambled to her feet, got a broomstick from a corner, and waved it in front of the so-called Enchanterwhile slinging her knapsack against her chest like a breastplate. "Y-you! Don't you dare come near me!"
Her defense was truly incomparable to and easily conquerable by his magickal powers, but at least she got something.
What else can I do? What should I use? Becoming jittery, she bit her lower lip.
'Enchanter' Shibuya just arched his eyebrow though. "I have no intention to."
Mai's eyes fluttered, and then she growled accusingly, "You eat hearts!"
Amused, he lifted a corner of his mouth, and Mai cursed herself for the heart-leap produced by the motion.
Dang the━!
"Perhaps, indeed," he intercepted her vehement thought.
"T-Then, get out." Mai shooed him with a sweep of the wooden end of her broomstick.
"No," he said firmly.
Not frightened, she regarded him with vexation. She pointed out, "There are more beautiful girls who have more delectable hearts out there, you vain jerk!"
"That doesn't matter." The young man loured and sighed again. "But since your idiocy could not understand, I shall tell you instead: you broke my mirror, and―hopefully, your little head can remember now―I am here to get the compensation for it."
"W-What compensation?" Mai swallowed hard. Just the thought of being made into a slug and then whip-lashed by the magickal lad―
Enchanter Shibuya broke into an insolent smile and voiced coolly, "I'll have your most expensive tea. Served by you. Now."
XDXDXDXDXDXDXDXDXDXD~nya~
A/N: Muahahahhaha! How was this chap? You may share your thoughts ^^
Who's Calcifer, 'Michael', and Witch of the Waste? You'll find out in the next chap! See y'all! XD