NOVEL NEXT Chapter LXI A New Friend?
Aya stretched a bit which allowed her thin blanket to slip off her small frame exposing her bare skin to the cool air in her room. The light on the wall was already lit. She sighed. While she didn’t have a window, that light was all she needed to tell the time. It was morning, and that meant her mistress would show up before long. With her arrival would come, yet another embarrassing feeding session followed by hours of religious schooling. Not to mention chores and awkward questions. Her mistress always had that light turn on a few minutes before she came in the room. She was expected to use the time to pray, but Aya never did. It just didn’t feel right to her to be praying to the goddess that turned her into a girl, and a lesser dark elf at that.
Sitting up, she folded the blanket next to her and shifted position. Her stomach grumbled a bit, reminding her that she was hungry, and hadn’t eaten since yesterday. She ignored it and began feeling the mana around her. Aya had taken up the habit of practicing the basics during the early morning, and while she hadn’t made as much progress as she would have liked she had made progress. She was getting close to a breakthrough, and while nature mana was sparse in the temple she was beginning to understand it better. Her practice had made it easier for her to manipulate mana again and helped her learn her new affinities. Speaking of affinities, it turned out that her new ones were for nature, dark, water, ice, and lightning magic. Thing was that outside of the few spells that Rumina had gifted her with she knew little about those elements. Something that was making it difficult for her to make progress, and she felt that was intentional.
Her magic practice was interrupted by her mistress unlocking the door and entering her small room. Her mistress sighed, and said, “You haven’t said your daily prayers yet have you?”
Aya didn’t bother with trying to lie. It had never worked in the past, and she had already given up trying to lie to her mistress. She shook her head and admitted that she hadn’t said her prayers. Her mistress shook her head, and sighed, “we do this every morning. Don’t you think it will be easier just to say your prayers in the morning first?”
Aya couldn’t deny that it would be easier, but that didn’t change the fact that it didn’t feel right to her. When she first got here she fought on every point, but now she couldn’t muster the energy to do that. Reluctantly she offer up a prayer to the goddess, but she could see the disappointment in her mistress’s eyes. Her mistress moved closer and sat down next to her and gave her yet another lecture.
All she could do was listen. She hated these morning lectures. They changed a bit every day, but the gist of the lecture was the same every time. It was yet another lecture on the importance of daily prayer and ritual with a special focus on her. She stressed every lecture that she needed to gain favor with the gods. It had gotten rather old, but she didn’t feel right praying to the goddess. Prayer, in general, didn’t sit well with her.
After the lecture, the vampire exposed a breast and Aya barely hesitated before latching on. As she started to suckle she turned a bit red again. She still found this embarrassing, but she was getting used to it.
After breakfast, she followed the vampiress out of the room. Heading down the corridor, they stopped at a door just a couple doors down from hers. Aya was a little surprised about the stop, normally they just went straight to the temple baths. She was feeling a little impatient about the stop, but she tried not to show it. Unlike with her door, her mistress didn’t reach for the lock. Instead she simply knocked a couple times on the door, and spoke through the door. There was no response after a few moments of waiting, and the vampiress opened the door.
Aya didn’t follow her in, but she did notice that the door wasn’t locked. Unlike her door, which was always locked from the outside when she was in the room. Evidently, her mistress trusted the occupant more than her. Not that she had done much to earn any trust. A couple minutes later she was joined by a tired-looking elf girl. She clearly wasn’t very old, and was about the same size as Aya. In fact she was a little bigger than her. She had lightly tanned skin, and her disheveled hair was a light purple in color. She had a very cute round face with bright purple eyes that seemed to take in the room. Unlike Aya, the new girl wasn’t naked, but instead had a simple set of temple robes to wear.
Despite seeming tired, the girl was quick to note her presence and ask, “Why are you naked?”
Aya hesitated for a moment before replying, “Mistress doesn’t let me wear clothes.”
“Why doesn’t Mistress let you wear clothes?”
Aya just glanced at her feet, her skin flushed a bit. She had no idea how to tell this curious girl that she wasn’t allowed them because she hadn’t earned that privilege. Before she could even consider how to dodge the question, her mistress answered it. “Little Aya here has been rather naughty, so we don’t let her have things like clothes. I was hoping that you would be a good role model for her.” Then she continued on to introduce them more properly and during this introduction, she took a moment to set Violet straight on how she was to address her. Violet didn’t need to call the vampiress mistress but was expected to be respectful.
Aya learned that the new girl was named Violet, and her mistress was hoping that they would get along. She didn’t really know anything about this girl, but she seemed nice enough. Not to mention full of questions. Just she didn’t know how well she could along with a little girl. The fact that she was a young girl herself was something she was still getting used to. Especially given that she used to be a grown man but then again there were a lot of things she was getting used to. Things she was constantly being reminded of. Even her small breasts were a constant reminder of the change. She had gotten used to the way they moved when she walked, but she was still aware of them. That was just one of the little reminders that she was a small elf girl. Then there was the bit about a role model that her mistress had mentioned. That was something she didn’t see happening. The very idea of basing her behavior off someone younger than her felt weird even if technically the other girl was older. The goddess had just given her a head start with her reincarnation and letting her keep her past life’s memories.
Following the introductions, they headed for the temple bath. The temple baths were a large open room with a nice pool in the middle. The water was always warm, and it was here that the residents of the temple cleaned themselves up. They didn’t stay in the main room but instead made for one of the side rooms. Bathtime was honestly her favorite time of the day. It was the only time of the day that nothing was expected of her, and she didn’t have to sit through a lecture. All of this meant, that she could just relax and enjoy the water. She also got to stare at naked girls, but she had mixed feelings about that. Mostly due to the fact that it reminded her of her changed equipment.
Reina kept an eye on Aya as she bathed while helping Violet with her bathing. She knew Aya didn’t think much of Violet as a role model. At least not at the moment, but Aya really did need a role model. True Violet was a few years younger than Aya’s apparent age, but she was also much better behaved. More importantly, Aya needed a friend, and she was hoping Violet could fill that role. For today she was going to let them spend the day together, and get to know each other.
Honestly, she probably should have gotten Violet up first, and fed her. However it was her first day here, so she had let her sleep a little longer. Besides children needed their sleep. Anyway, she had things to do in town, so after Violet has her breakfast she was going to leave the two here in the temple. She had already left a few instructions for the servants to keep an eye on them, and this was in part a test. Reina needed to see how well Violet could handle Aya. Aya had already proven with her recent stunt that she couldn’t be left unsupervised, but Violet was old enough that she didn’t need much supervision, and this test will let her ascertain how responsible the young elf was.
Speaking of the young elf, she seemed to be handling her recent loss quite well, but children were quite adaptable. Reina knew she was still grieving in her own way, but a new friend should help.
Aya didn’t know what to say as she watched Violet eat. It wasn’t anything special, but it was solid food, and she was jealous. She knew it wasn’t exactly appropriate to be jealous, but she couldn’t help it. The only thing keeping her from asking for even a small taste was her mistress. She knew very well that her mistress wouldn’t let her have anything solid, but that didn’t change how she felt. Aya also knew that watching equated to torturing herself, but again she couldn’t help it.
It took a great deal of will to look away, and take a glance at her mistress. However as she expected there wasn’t an ounce of sympathy in her expression. Aya already regretted some of her past decisions, but she was beginning to truly understand why most people said it was a bad idea to cross the vampire clans. The only thing keeping her from breaking down and begging her mistress for things like a proper meal with solid food was what was left of her former pride.
She sighed and idly considered how she had changed since she got here. She had been here for only a few short weeks, and she had already changed. That wasn’t something she could deny. When she first got here, she remembered how she had stubbornly refused to breastfeed, and now she barely hesitated to suckle. At least mistress had already fed her or being here would have been completely intolerable. At least she hadn’t told Violet how she was being fed, even if she had mentioned that she had already fed her when they sat down. Something she was grateful about, as didn’t think she could handle the embarrassment of Violet knowing exactly how she was being treated,
Her mistress finally broke the silence giving her a welcome distraction from her thoughts, “I have a few things to do today, so I will be leaving you two to get to know each other. I will, of course, be checking in on you two from time to time.”
Aya didn’t know what to say, but she felt happy to hear this. If mistress wasn’t around that meant no chores, and no lectures. Then she heard something that led to her immediate protest. “Now Violet, I want you to keep Aya out of trouble. Think you can do that?”
Violet merely nodded her head, as she took another bite of mashed fruit. Aya protested, “Hey! I can ...”
Reina silenced her with a glare, and said, “Don’t say it. We both know that you will find trouble if someone doesn’t keep an eye on you.:
Aya looked away. Understandably she wasn’t pleased to hear that Violet was going to be in charge. The feelings this evoked were naturally unpleasant. She perceived herself as older than Violet, and as a result, this didn’t feel right to her. However, she knew a great deal of this was due to the fact that her mistress simply didn’t trust her. Over the next few hours, Violet managed to keep her so distracted that she was able to forget those feelings for a while. At least until lunchtime came around.