D.E.M.O.N.S: Getting Summoned Weekly isn't so Bad

— Kat —

“So how do you think you’re family will react?” asked Lily trying to remove that smirk from Asteodia’s face.

lightsΝοvεl ?οm “Why don’t you tell us first? We are sharing our stories after all,” shot back Asteodia. Now that she was more used to the teasing Asteodia wasn’t so easily flustered.

Lily looked ready to say something back, perhaps just deflecting, perhaps something ruder so Kat jumped in instead, “Well like Nixilei I’m an orphan. I got together with Lily not too long after I was adopted, but the only reason that happened is because Sylvie designated my as her big sister and refused to allow herself to be adopted without me coming along. So I act more like a third parent or older sibling to Sylvie, while acting like a sibling to Callisto and Vivian, the two people who adopted us, or wait…

“Hang on, Lily do you know if officially it’s just Vivian that’s adopted us or does Callisto also have her name on the papers?” Lily shrugged, not knowing the answer either. “I think it’s just Vivian… though now that I’m considering it, that’s somewhat odd. I’m not sure that single men or women are usually allowed to adopt… eh whatever not important. What IS important is that the orphanage is run by a man I refer to as Gramps.

“He was, and I guess still is, my primary father figure. He’s looked after me for almost as long as I can remember and the almost is only because I moved out and don’t need that care anymore,” Kat said ignoring the fact that Callisto still did most, if not all, of the chores. She volunteered at least. “Anyway, I keep getting distracted. Gramps’ reaction was basically just ‘makes sense’ and then he moved on. Oh he was happy for me, but not at all surprised.

“I suppose considering his affection for his late wife, he probably understood that the two of us getting together didn’t change much. Lily just gets more cuddles and kisses now. We’re still as close as ever. We just spend less time and school and more time off on Contracts. Vivian and Callisto had about the same reaction, though with Vivian and Sylvie both thinking that we’re cute together,”

Lily sighed, having calmed down and picked up from where Kat left off. “On my side of things it was a lot more complicated. My mother, Evaline, saw Kat as the next Stella. It doesn’t help that they have the same general appearance red hair, nice legs, that sort of thing. Kat looks much better of course, but for my mum that wasn’t necessarily a good thing. She just thought I was going to get my heart destroyed a second time. She was wrong of course, but she wasn’t a fan of me being a friend with Kat so when we finally got together it was… awkward for a while.

“Mum couldn’t believe that I’d asked her and Kat had said yes, but with my dad, Harold on my side and the fact that well… Kat accepted my affection, it was hard for mum to keep playing her angle and we’ve… worked on our relationship. I won’t say it’s entirely fixed, but we’re in a good place. There, now I’ve shared you can as well,”

Asteodia didn’t look entirely pleased, chewing worriedly on her bottom lip. Seeing this Nixilei stepped in to give her a bit more time to come up with what she was going to say. “Well, as you all know I grew up in an orphanage like Kat. Unlike Kat we had more than one person looking after us… and I can’t say I ever really got along with any of them in particular.

“I spent a lot of my time training, or just in the library reading. I kept in shape… but a lot of the other kids were either running around or doing chores. Few of them considered books fun, and the ones that did consider books fun thought I was weird for training to be a spy, thinking it a bad profession, especially when learning to enchant was on the table, or just going into a research position,”

Nixilei laughed coldly, “Of course most of those ‘smart’ children that liked to think so highly of themselves realised later in life that you need to be truly intelligent for both fields and they were usually lacking, but alas, I wasn’t really part of their club and it was too late for me to be friends with them once they’d pulled their collected heads from their asses. Not that it was any true loss for me, but it is what it is,”

Nixilei didn’t miss the pitying look Asteodia sent her, but she didn’t really care either. Nixilei considered her life good and she was too busy as a child to feel bad about her lacking social life. Doubly so when you considered the minor friendships she made wither instructors. “Anyway, I suppose the closest people I have to parents would be Green’s? Even if that sounds a bit weird. I’m not sure what they’d do. Either massively overreact for the amusement factor, or just accept it,”

“Isn’t that a bit lenient considering you’re a spy?” asked Lily.

Nixilei nodded and explained, “Perhaps but assuming we win this round of the tournament, I’ll have enough merits to leave their service if push comes to shove. Not that they’d ask such a thing of me. I don’t have plans to retire either… and while I can’t say I’d choose this new relationship over my old life, if they DID ask me to ignore this chance at romance then perhaps they aren’t the people I think they are, you know?”

“I see what you’re saying. It’s not that you’re new relationship is strong enough to survive such a request, but that such a request would be massively damaging to the image and relationship you have with Green’s parents,” outlined Lily.

Nixilei nodded in confirmation. “Yes exactly. Other then them… my spy trainer would probably tell me off for getting attached on a mission, even if I’m not technically a spy at the moment, or if I couldn’t convince them of that, at least I’m being myself instead of pretending to be someone else. Um… my healing teacher would probably ask me if I understand enough biology to know that two women can’t have children, then give me books to study that proves with magic two women CAN have children, but that’s more the stuff of legends. Suppose Thyme might know though… hmm…”

“Is that something you and Lily would be interested in?” asked Asteodia.

Kat and Lily both shook their heads immediately. “No way,” they said together.

“Why not?” asked Asteodia, a slightly desperate tone in her voice that only Nixilei could pick up. Not sure why the hint was there, Nixilei kept her face as it was so as not to give away her notice.

“Do you want to take that way or shall I?” asked Kat.

“Um… for at least some of it I’d like explain. I can chime in later,” said Lily.

Asteodia tried to look interested in the potentially juicy gossip before her, but her heart wasn’t in it. Luckily for her, Lily was too embarrassed and Kat to interested in watching Lily’s embarrassed face to notice. Eventually, Kat did start to explain, “Right well the first thing is that we have Sylvie already.

“Not that we think of Sylvie as our child. She’s too old for that, and much too mature but we care for her a great deal… but we also don’t have time for her as it is. We’re on Contracts regularly and while we don’t regret going on these, we also recognise we’re not around as much as we used to be, and that’s not ideal. Especially not for raising our own kids.

“That’s not even getting into the fact that Lily and I haven’t got to ‘the sex’ part yet,” Lily looked mortified, and so did Asteodia. Nixilei had a wry smirk, it was very Kat to call it ‘the sex’ instead of something else. “So getting a kid seems really premature. If we’re not comfortable enough with each other to get that intimate, we really shouldn’t be having children…

“At the end of the day though, a lot of that counts as an excuse. Not that they aren’t good reasons, but they are obstacles that could be overcome. We could cut back on Contracts, probably, and that would give us more time for Sylvie, and each other which would possibly fix the second issue…

“As it stands though? We’re both more or less immortal, emphasis on the more. Neither of us feel any sort of pressure to have kids soon. We’ve got centuries to get around to it, likely longer. We’ve both got things we want to do before then. I want to get stronger, Lily wants to learn more magic, and honestly? It’s just not something we’re all that interested in right now. Without any time pressure the idea of just… having kids this early? It’s barely come up, and not something we want,”

That was when Lily jumped in, her nerves somewhat calmed, “Asteodia, shall we talk about YOUR parents now?” Asteodia’s face fell. She’d really rather not.