Caster is smaller than her. Hakuno really doesn't know why the thought hasn't registered before; everything Caster is is tucked inside finery and a love for life, both purposely designed and expressed to make everything appear larger. Such as the purple that flares out from thin arms, and the voice that is always carefully modulated to appear cheerful and bubbly until she gets serious; even the fabric in her hair helps to make it rise, shielding the space around her ears so they look like part of an assortment, like just another decoration instead of a body part.

So when Caster slides off her shoes with a sigh, Hakuno finds herself staring down at those tiny heels and admiring the way the curl of them is so much smaller than the bones that litter her own arches. And Caster sees her gaze and catches it, holding it with a slippery smile.

'Oho? What's this? Do you have a foot fetish, Master?'

'I...' Hakuno bites back her tongue before she can say anything incriminating. 'I...just think they're pretty, that's all.' She immediately hides her face in her hands, feeling it warm against her touch, certain that her skin has now been dappled red.

Oh, nothing incriminating? They're pretty? Nice one Hakuno, you just know Caster's going to take hold of that and run a mile with it...

'Does that mean you would like to suck them master? Swirl your tongue in around my toes?'

See! See!

With a great deal of mental effort, Hakuno raises her head.

'No, Caster, I would not like...to do that. I meant pretty as in the way you admire art, like a marble statue or something. You know the sort.'

Caster raises an eyebrow, now lifting a foot into the air, high, with an artistic flourish, almost like a ballerina. Her leg slides through nothing as though she's expecting velvet to suddenly swath the muscles, to swim against them in a display of luxury. She probably think the whole thing looks sensual as hell, and damn her, it does.

'Hmm? Yes, master, I know the 'sort', as you call them. There's a very fine line between sex and art, you know. Many artists have an obsession with depicting beauty and that often goes hand in hand with what they find attractive in a sexual sense.' She grins lavishly. 'I'm all for it! All those men from buff to skinny, faces and abs and pretty, pretty eyes...'

'Did you have a point?'

'Yes! If you're trying to divorce aesthetic beauty from what you find pleasing in a sexual manner, you're going to fail. There's no higher appreciation here, no way of pretending that you can remove your mind from your body when it comes to pleasuring your eyes.' She reaches out with a smile to cradle her foot against Hakuno's cheek, toes sliding up to press against the delicate hollow that glides just under her hairline, the one that marks the indent in the skin that caves in to protect the eye.

Hakuno tries not to flinch. She doesn't hate the attention and any sort of reaction, she's come to learn, only serves to encourage Caster. In some ways, she acts like a little kid, staved for attention at the most inconsiderate of times.

But that doesn't mean she shouldn't bite back.

'What? You don't choose to admire all the nubile young women that inhabit such paintings in droves?'

'They're not to my preference,' Caster readily admits. 'Though Master, you are.'

Quick as a whip, her upper body curves forward, her breasts hanging open to brush against the bend in her leg. Hakuno, caught by the sight, is unable to quite tear her head away as Caster's fingers drift, just managing to catch hold of her face in a movement reminiscent of an artist's brush. But her nails snag, just a little, on Hakuno's chin, almost, but not quite, drawing blood.

The gesture is lovingly meant, of that Hakuno is quite sure. But she still has to breathe out, her teeth jutting against her lip to create a little nub of flesh there, as a jetty to distract her from the faint scratch Caster will leave behind. She can picture it in the mirror later, a faint blaze of white that will speak of discarded skin cells or, perhaps more accurately, a trail of disused data fragments. For it's hard to understand how biology works in here and it will take a far cleverer person than Hakuno is to work it all out.

But Caster, naturally, is horrified, flinching backwards with a sharp snap, that coming from anyone else, would mean a broken spine.

'Master! How shameful! I brought harm to my own master...'

She stares down at her hands like they have betrayed her, a thin, nettled look coming into her eyes.

'Uh...' Hakuno eyes her, feeling distinctly uncomfortable. More so, in fact, than when Caster was draping her breasts against her leg. 'It's only a scratch...'

Caster lets out a desolate wail.

Working very hard not to roll her eyes, Hakuno let her hand glide out, her fingers swiping across the messy fringe that Caster now allows to fall against her face. 'I face far worse in the arena every day. Remember when I was poisoned? Yeah, that was fun. And for the record, definitely hurt a lot more than this.'

Caster looks up at her, a fey light drifting into her eyes, just enough to make Hakuno feel uneasy again. She is never sure, at times like this, how much of Caster's theatrics are purposefully embellished, and how much of it is simply Caster, allowing herself to fall wholeheartedly into the role of being the loving wife fate had denied her.

'Ah, master, you're so gracious...'

Hakuno allows a small smile to quirk her lips. Well, no matter how much of it is acted per say, it is still admittedly, rather nice to hear. At least, if she dies, she will have the memory of someone caring enough to play pretend with her.

Caster must take her smile as encouragement, for she slides forward, her knees moving across the floor as though they are dividing water instead of dust. 'It would grieve me not to make up for my error in judgement. Mmm, master, how shall we settle this. Perhaps...with a kiss?'

Her expression breaks out into enraptured joy on this last word, the hiss of it diving out with her breath before it's sucked back in...just in time for her face to flash out and leave behind a wet, tingly sensation on the white line that now mars Hakuno's chin.

Someone else, Hakuno thinks drily, might wear a little shame on their face for pulling such a stunt. But not my servant, oh no. Instead she looks like the provincial cat who's won the cream!

Indeed Caster is giggling to herself, wrapping her hands together into a knot, one that, as the seconds pass, she tries to smooth out from a niggle of clumped together bones into a graceful slide of palms, creased together at the lifelines as they touch. Perhaps she is going for a praying gesture, but her excitement courses through her, rousing her into another unsteady fit of giggles and she can't quite bring herself to finish the motion.

Hakuno sighs.

'That felt more like a lick than a kiss,' she remarks.

Instantly Caster perks up, her ears twitching sporadically. 'Hmm? What's this? You're not content, my master? You want me to level up? To step up my game? Yosh!'

Hakuno blanches. 'No, no, don't-'

I should have known, she thinks, resigned, as Caster's lips press against her chin, a sensitive quiver running along the very line of them. It's like an earthquake runs through their very frame.

I should have known, should have guessed. And perhaps if I were a better person, a more human person, I would fight against this.

But she isn't. She is computer code and pixels and very, very scared. And there is only one person, who she can remember in the whole of her very short life, who has ever claimed to love her.

So when Caster's lips definitely find her own, she does not push her away. Instead she rests, letting her hands press down on shoulders that poke out, from behind the largeness of Caster's sleeves, and marvels at their smallness, at the way they bunch up under her weak fists like balls of clay. But it is she who feels stupidly malleable as Caster's bones slip softly beneath her skin, as her mouth draws Hakuno's fake breath into her own, as electricity, (which is probably real, Hakuno guesses, or rather hopes) explodes down her spine in a rush. Like drawing breath, on her own, in a world that is truly real.

'Hush now,' Caster murmurs against her lips, sounding uncharacteristically older. 'I will be what you need master, if you so desire.'

Hakuno grabs hold of those small shoulders more firmly and tears her mouth away, using her teeth to grasp at Caster's neck with viciousness, which, if old fashioned novels are to be believed, is primarily male.

Caster says nothing. Simply pets her hair as if Hakuno is part animal, as if it is she, and not her, who wears fur and possesses ears that twist out of her hair.

But it is this human motion that makes Hakuno pause. That makes her unbend, unbreak, and lift her head back up.

'I'm sorry.'

Caster smiles.

'To give into the aesthetic, to dig into its inviting curl is excessively human. You must remember this master.'

She does not try to kiss Hakuno again. But if she looks a little victorious as her hands drift down brown hair, as they tweak at the knots a computer program sees fit to faithfully reproduce each morning, Hakuno cannot bring herself to mention it.

For in truth, it feels as though she has won something also.

'Mmm', Caster purrs. 'Yeesss. This is all very, very nice. I think, perhaps soon, we can both level up together.'

If there is a double entendre nestled within those words, Hakuno tries very hard not to think of it. Instead, she nestles her head into the crook of Tamamo's neck and sleeps. She needs the rest. After all, dealing with her servant is full-time work.

Usually I hate, hate, hate writing thoughts out in italics. So why did I this time? Maybe because when I didn't, they seemed to jumble into the main text too much. I don't know, maybe one day I will go back and change it. But for now, it's staying this way.