Chapter 2

He closed his eyes and leant back in his chair, stretching his arms behind his head, and tried not to think about how late it had got, and how very tired he was. On the stereovision screens before him, he did not notice the subtle change in information relayed from distant stars. 2

“Let’s go, magcat!”

Curled up around his own tail, the creature opened one eye, viewed the child standing before him, and then slowly closed his eye again, drawing up a wing of dappled feathers to hide his face and thus avoid further interruption of his slumber.

Fourteen years old, their unkempt brown hair peeking from beneath the brim of their straw hat, Eirian stood with hands on hips in their cabin aboard the great cruise liner, watching the magcat as the beast remained immovable atop a pile of laundry, and waited for some sign, as unlikely as that might have been.

They sighed, blowing a strand of hair from their right eye, and resolved to try once again.

“Let’s go,” they said, louder this time, with more force, “mag—”

“Having trouble with your homunculus?” a voice asked from the doorway.

They flinched. Not even off the boat and they were already having trouble. Preparing a broad smile, they turned and was confronted by a girl roughly the same age as them, maybe a year or two older, dressed in denim dungarees cut off high above the knee and white Converse baseball boots, her long hair tied up in loose bunches, dyed the colour of Parma Violets, the kind of hair that looked as if it might smell of sugar and syrup and soap, Eirian thought.

“Hey,” the girl smiled, thrusting out a hand in greeting, “I’m Mauve, nice to meet you.”

Eirian nodded slowly, the hand hovering between them for a moment, as, with a blush, they realised they were expected to shake it, and, tentatively, made an effort do so.

Mauve’s grasp was warm and friendly.

“My name’s Eirian,” they offered weakly, “nice to meet you too.”

In truth, they had always been uncomfortable around girls, uncertain of what they wanted from them, and what, in turn, girls often seemed to want from them. Fourteen years old and never been kissed…Eirian felt a deep sense of awkwardness at the sudden arrival of this girl, and a faint sense of embarrassment at their lack of motivational skills when it came to the magcat slumbering on the laundry.

As if sensing Eirian’s chain of thought, Mauve glanced over their shoulder again at the winged homunculi and smiled warmly.

“You know, I’ve got a pretty good reputation when it comes to these little guys. If you like, I can help you get him up and moving.”

With a wink, she reached into her pocket and drew out a narrow summoning card, the sigil of an unfamiliar homunculus decorating its surface in thin ink and neat brushstrokes.

“Oh. Oh, no, you’re fine, honestly.” Eirian smiled weakly. “He just, well, he gets like this sometimes. I’m sure he’ll move when he’s ready.”

Still standing in the doorway, the girl with the violet hair raised a dark eyebrow.

“You’re sure?” she asked, looking over Eirian’s shoulder again at the general untidiness of the room. “Aren’t you supposed to be disembarking right now?”

Eirian smiled weakly in return.

“Yeah, kind of, but, ah, what can you do, you know?”

The girl turned the card over in her hand.

“Well, you can let me help you, for a start!”

Eirian offered her a worried look, and tried to find a way to express the fact that they found the situation uncomfortable and embarrassing and didn’t really want any help, but, whatever it was about the smile, the girl clearly interpreted it as conformation that her assistance was required.

Again, she turned the card about, and lifted her left wrist up, revealing the wooden box bound by boramtezleaf and plastic, pulled the card through a narrow slot in the far side of the box with a flick of her wrist, its shape dissipating in a shower of light between her fingers as she did so.

“Apprentice Summoner Mauve requests your presence! Epimeliad, I call unto thee!”

The light coalesced into the shape of a slender homunculi a head shorter than her summoner, long white hair coarse like the wool of sheep, flesh the colour of ripe, red apples, almost human, save for the curling ram’s horns that rose from her temples.

Eirian let out a short gasp, surprised by the shape of the creature, having never seen a homunculus her like before, and not quite knowing how to respond to her, to the obvious womanhood of her shape, her small breasts, the lips of her mons pubis, her sullen yellow eyes as her gaze met their own and she seemed to understand what it meant for the child to have been staring at her nakedness.