A/N: My beautiful sister agreed to model for me, so this story now has a wonderful cover photo!
Chapter 2: A Ghost, A Magi, And An Empress Sit Down For Tea.
The next morning was glorious. For one thing, I was still around and had not faded into sparkly energy, and for another-
"Judar, Judar, hey Judar! Guess what I can do?!"
The magi groaned and stuffed a pillow over his head, batting at my poking finger with his free hand. "G'way..."
"That's right, I can touch you!" I watched ecstatically as his hand passed through mine with each swipe. "And even better, you can't touch me back!"
There was an animalistic growl and a blast from his wand that passed right through me and knocked over a chair but did nothing to stop my gleeful cackling.
"This is so fantastic, I won't be bored to a second death because I can mess with you!"
Last night had been dreadful as far as boredom went but I had valiantly managed to entertain myself until dawn when I'd finally gone searching for Judar again. I'd found him via the monks. They seemed to patrol a few hallways one of which was the one I'd found myself in the day before when this whole ghost thing first started.
Inside I figured out that the Emperor certainly valued his magi very highly. 'Luxurious', 'opulent', and 'fit for a king', were all things that came to mind when I got a look at the place. I'd call it a room, but I'd never been in a room so large. I was kind of scared of what the Emperor's quarters must look like. The furniture was all done in that Kou style, mostly low stuffed seats with bright patterns of dragons and birds and there was one of those divider screens in the corner depicting a rather gruesome battle scene complete with severed heads and a river of blood. Lovely. That had to bring on the good dreams.
I'd made a point of running my hand over every polished surface and gold lined edging in the room though I'd avoided the pretty china pots lining the dresser because the laws of the universe demanded I would drop and break them should I so much as lay a finger on one. The most impressive thing was undoubtably the bed. It was a thing of beauty, with luscious silk draping over it and lovely green and blue sheets even if they were wrapped like a cocoon around a sleeping magi.
I'd wasted another hour methodically sorting through all his stuff which was decidedly creepy of me I'll admit, but then when have I cared? And hey, creepy comes with the territory of being a ghost, right? I was simply fulfilling my duties. There was a surprisingly lack of personal belongings among the necessities obviously provided by the palace staff. I'm not sure if the books and scrolls counted, they were obviously his going by the scribbles marring them but for all I knew they came with the How To Be A Magi manual. The only thing I really found was a small box in the corner full of knickknacks. There was a string of glass beads I'd seen sold on the streets of Balbadd, a tiny mask from Heliohapt, a large sea monster scale tourists loved to buy from Sindria, and many other trinkets from places I couldn't identify. That was it though. It was kind of depressing. Did magi have some Thou Shalt Not Attach To Material Objects thing going on?
After that I plopped down on the bed beside Judar. Though plopping didn't really work seeing as ghosts don't exactly weigh very much. There wasn't much of Judar to see under all the sheets except his braid, which I was a bit jealous of actually since my hair had to be kept cropped short to keep the red mess of curls under control. This train of thought had led me to trying to touch his hair and discovering that I actually /could/.
"Sadist." He whined when he realized his spell wasn't going to work today either. "Just finish dying already."
"And miss the opportunity to drive one of the famed magi insane? I think not." I reached out both hands and mussed his bangs happily.
He hissed like a cat and rolled away from me, miscalculating and falling straight off the bed.
I peered over the edge at the tangle of limbs and sheets as he fought his way out of the mess. "Wow, that was graceful."
"/That/ was your fault!"
"No way, I refuse to take the blame for such a fail."
Grumbling Judar threw the sheets he'd managed to escape from at me and stormed behind the changing screen. The sheets fluttered unhindered to the bed.
"So, Judar, magi are supposed to pick kings, right? Are you also the reason there's so many dungeon conquerors in Kou or is that a happy coincidence?"
Judar's voice sounded bored as it drifted back to me. "Magi are the ones who raise dungeons in the first place, you know."
"Really? I didn't know that... So how many conquers are there in Kou anyway? The rumors can never seem to agree."
"The three Imperial Princes and two of the princesses." Judar ambled back out, now dressed in more then his pants and fiddling with his bangles. "I'll get that Hakuryuu to capture one soon too though."
"Five? And you're going for a sixth? Why so many, I mean, don't you just need one king or queen?"
"They're king /candidates/, I can have as many as I want."
"Okay, now you've confused me."
A knock on the door interrupted what was probably going to be a scathing remark about my intelligence from Judar.
"Honored High Priest?"
"Come in."
The door slid open and a maid bowed herself into the room. "Breakfast has been prepared, honored priest."
Judar marched out the door without looking back and the maid made to start on the bed. I traipsed after Judar as he wandered into another room with a large table decked out in enough food to feed all my cousins and more monks lining the walls. I was starting to think they might not be monks after all... Judar flung himself into the chair at the head of the table and dug in.
I noted a couple more chairs but they were empty so I carefully completed the rather complicated process of sitting in one without pulling the seat out and freaking out the monk dudes, which meant I had to faze through it and then sit solidly on it without ending up in the table. "I'm not stealing this chair from anybody, am I? Are other people coming?"
Judar ignored me which, yeah, there were other people in the room who couldn't see me, so that was no surprise.
"I'm going to go out on a limb here and assume you eat alone every morning. That seems like something rich folks with too much money would do."
I waved my hand through the bowl of peaches. "But dude, where are you supposed to put all this food?"
Judar ate another bite of some rice porridge thing but I saw his eyebrow twitch.
"Yeah, yeah, no talking around poor normal people. Seriously though, you're too skinny to eat it all. Do they throw it away? They do, don't they? What a waste!"
Like I predicted Judar was not able to eat it all, however he did make an alarmingly big dent in it.
"...the heck? Where are you putting this all?!" I hissed, more out of habit then anything because, again, nobody else could hear me. Did I mention nobody else could hear me?
Judar threw a spoon through my head and proceeded to pretend he wasn't crazy when one of the monks dubiously went to pick it up.
...
So apparently magi need to eat lots to replenish their magoi. They're like, doomed to be skinny. Who knew.
At the moment I was stalking Judar through the halls of the palace, alternating between bouncing a pebble off his head in revenge for the spoon and hiding it in my fist whenever we passed anyone. This actually appeared to work. Yay invisibility. Judar himself was fuming, which I, being the cruel person I am, found absolutely hilarious.
"Sweets, I can see the smoke coming out of your ears." I tossed the pebble again.
Judar snatched it out of the air and threw it with all his might out of the window we were passing.
I sighed. "You steal the joy from everything."
"I'm going to find a way to exorcise you if it's the last thing I do!" He snarled and continued his mad flight if rage down the hall.
Now, I know it might seem like an odd thought to have when you piss someone off, but all I could think was that this new stage of my (after)life was going to be incredibly fun for me.
I wondered after Judar at a much more sedate pace, allowing myself to be entertained by the way everyone bowed as he stormed past. Considering the amount of respect and frank awe he must be used to receiving I could see how I might be a bit irritating. Ah, the woes of the higher class. We reached a hall stationed with at least six guards (Judar wouldn't slow down, I didn't have time to count,) who bowed Judar through a door and shut it on me. Literally, I was half through a piece of solid wood and I felt absolutely nothing. It was very, very disturbing.
I extracted myself from the door with a wince of mental confusion and looked around. We were in a sitting room opening onto one of the gardens and sitting in the center of the room surrounded by monks was a women. She was dressed in the finest fabrics and held her head in an unmistakable sign of royalty, her mouth twisted into the most perfect smile I had ever seen and her fingers poised perfectly around a cup of tea.
"Judar, what a pleasant surprise." She chimed with the voice of a song bird. The butterflies around her were pitch black. "And who did you bring with you?" Her pretty grey eyes slid over to me.
And here I thought I'd be happy if another person could see me... Nope, definitely not happy about this, though I'll be damned if I know why. Am I developing a sixth sense?
"I've got a pest problem." Judar declared. He threw himself down across from the lady at the table, no obvious sign of respect in sight, and jabbed his thumb at me over his shoulder. "I can't get rid of her."
The lady tilted her head. "Oh? A spirit walker?"
"Dead and lingering. And usually worse then a chattering monkey." Judar twisted around to give me a look that was part innocent curiosity, part evil cat. (The kind that stole my fish when I was three.) "What, are you actually showing respect for someone? Well, she is the empress."
Empress. Of course she was.
"Have you tried banishing her? I'd have thought you'd think of that." The empress said lightly, turning back to her tea with a dismissive air.
"Of course. It does absolutely nothing!" Judar exclaimed in obvious frustration, throwing his hands up. "She's like a leech!"
That got the empress's imperial attention again. "Is she feeding off your magoi?"
She waved Judar off before he could answer. "No, I can see she is not, her ruhk is too white for it. In that case banishment should be simple enough."
"But that doesn't-"
"Show me."
To my surprise Judar did so without complaints, standing and drawing his wand. I made sure to blink strategically when he cast it so that I wouldn't have to suffer temporary blindness again. The spell rattled the doors behind me like a strong wind, and Judar turned back to the empress expectantly.
Her Ladyship Of All Things Perfect And Pretty was looking at me like I was her next meal, which quite frankly was making a sick feeling twist in my stomach. She lifted the little pot of tea and gestured daintily to the empty spot beside Judar. "Come, won't you join us?"
I probably should have felt incredibly honored to be invited to tea with an empress, but somehow I felt like speaking or moving would be admitting defeat. What exactly the battle was, I had no idea.
I made no move to join them, the empress didn't retract her hand, and Judar gulped his tea.
Finally, the empress lowered her hand and went back to her tea. "I wouldn't be bothered, Judar. Her mind is strong to linger this long, but she will fade soon enough. It is a small matter, and you have more important things to see to. The dungeon in Qishan needs looking into. You will accompany Markkito."
Judar downed the last of his tea with an ill concealed grimace of distaste and stood to leave. I could see him frowning at me from the corner of my eye as he stalked out and I was too happy to follow.
I really did not like the way the Empress was looking at me.
...
"Alright, what is her deal, and is ruhk related to the butterflies and bats?"
"Damn, and here I was hoping you'd been struck mute."
Judar was stomping down the hall like he wanted to put holes through it and I felt decidedly light footed walking next to him.
"Not in this lifetime. Err, afterlifetime."
Judar snorted and reiterated. "What were you doing back there?"
I shrugged. "Drawing battle lines."
"Battle lines." He repeated flatly.
"Hey, don't look at me, she started it." I wasn't going to mention that those battle lines were probably more then a joke. Now I just needed to figure out what we were fighting about... "Answer for answer, start talking."
Judar muttered something under his breath that was probably very rude. "Empress Ren Gyokuen is the leader of Al-Thamen, the organization behind this place." He waved his finger around in a way that was obviously supposed to clarify everything for me, though I wasn't sure if by place he meant the palace or the country. "The ruhk is manifested as birds, not butterflies or bats. Most people can't see them unless they are in unusual number."
"Okay..." I said slowly, trying to process that in some way that made sense. "And I can see it because I'm a ghost."
"There's no such thing as ghosts."
"And yours and her pretty majesty's are black why?"
Judar gave me a really weird look at 'her pretty majesty's'. "We deified fate."
I did my best to copy his weird face. "Uh, okay?"
I would like to say Judar enlightened me with a lengthy explanation but all he did was roll his eyes and quicken his pace to leave me behind. Yeah, real polite this one.
A/N: Review. Seriously, if you want more you're going to have to leave me something to feed my poor underfed motivation.