My Familiar

by Nuit du Loup

This story is fairly light on sex and heavier on the characters.

As was the norm for Meilin Syoaran, she was running late for school and she bounded back and forth across her room as she tried to gather all her necessities. She always slept in late past when her alarm went off and today was no exception.

Hurriedly she whipped open her closet door, grabbed one of the navy skirts hanging there and quickly drew the garment up her skinny, naturally tanned legs, covering up her old and obviously worn pair of blue panties. After buttoning the catch on her skirt she grabbed a white button up shirt, put it on and tucked it into the skirt. Then after putting on a sweater-vest of a darker blue than her skirt, she quickly slipped on her socks and shoes.

Dressed, she crossed to her large rectangular mirror which rested on her dresser and leaned back against her wall; a wall which quite obviously needed a repainting. She stared at her reflection. The short, skinny girl in the mirror frowned back at her.

"Ahhh, God! I don't have time for this!" she growled.

Her shoulder length black hair had already dried and it was a mess. Grabbing a brush she tried to make it behave, but in the end she just gave up and pulled it up into a ponytail. Her school's dress code required good grooming, but this would have to do for today.

Finally ready, she grabbed her black messenger style bag, slung its strap over her shoulder and made her way down the heavily beat up wooden stairway to the first floor. As her feet touched on the rug placed at the bottom landing, she heard the voices again.

"God damn it Laurence, I'm tired of this shit form you!" called a shrieking female voice from a short distance a way.

"What do you expect me to do?!" An angry male voice responded.

"To get a fucking job, that's what I expect," the woman snapped. "You know we can't live on my salary alone and yet you still sit here on your ass!"

"I've been trying—"

"Bullshit! I saw you go into that bar yesterday in the middle of the afternoon. Where did you get the money for beer?"

Meilin tuned it out and made her way to the front foyer. This was normal behavior for her family. Her parents largely ignored that she existed except to give her food and before the money troubles, a clothing allowance. Now they argued like this nonstop when mom was home from her job driving a city bus. Dad spent all his time drinking and despite his claims to the contrary, he really did just sit around doing nothing. At least she had yet to see him go out for an interview or look through want ads.

She pretty much knew how this was going to turn out in the end. She was 14 for god's sake, and she certainly wasn't stupid. Any day now mom was going to call it quits and divorce her father. She highly doubted either of them would want her when it happened. She had been a very unplanned and unwanted child when she was born. The only reason mom didn't abort her was because her now long deceased grandmother had argued very strongly against it. Meilin knew her future was far from certain, but she didn't care really. She was ranked third in her grade, only a tenth of a percent away from second, so she knew she could make a future for herself, regardless of what her crap-hole family was like.

After slipping on her windbreaker jacket, she made sure to slam the door hard when she shut it. If she didn't do small things like that, she thought her parents really would forget that she existed. She walked down the heavily cracked steps of her small, modest home and then slowly sped up into a run as she tried to make it to her bus stop on time. **********

Aki too ran down a sidewalk, but above her shone a late afternoon, summer sun. The warm and bright atmosphere fitted the small girl's mood. Today was an extremely important day for Aki. She had finally, at the age of fourteen, been granted permission from her mother take the next step in her advancement and tonight she was going to do it. She would be performing the crucial ceremony that every aspiring mage must do to make a place for themselves in this world and especially in their clan.

Aki came to a stop in front a rather small, but important building. It was a brightly colored wooden structure with a covered, wrap-around wooden walkway on all four sides. Aki bounded up three steps and crossed under those eaves then passed through a doorway that was only sealed by a blue cloth curtain with her family's crest emblazoned on it in white. Inside was a large, empty room with a highly polished wooden floor. At the door on the opposite wall stood a tall, creamy white skinned woman who like Aki, had the white-blonde hair of a born family member. The woman bowed her head once and gestured with an upraised palm toward the portal.

Aki nodded her small head in respect to the woman, making sure to almost close her eyes as she did so. Then she entered the doorway into a much smaller and unlit room. In the center of that room sat the dark square of a stairway. Swallowing once to steel herself, Aki crossed to and then began to descend those steps. She went down several flights before she reached the bottom. She knew, from both experience and from family history lessons that she was almost 100 feet underground. At the base of the stairs was yet another door. From this one there came the bright warm glow of flame.

When she entered that door, she stood in a good sized, rectangular chamber that had been carved out of the underground stone. Despite the anachronism of doing it here, this ceremony had been performed in this chamber by every single member of her family throughout their long history and now it was her turn. Within the chamber stood roughly thirty women, each one dressed formally for the occasion. She heard a few whispers in disparaging tones, but she set her mouth into a tight line and ignored them.

"Hime-sama," said a young woman, addressing Aki by her social position. Aki didn't recognize the woman, but that wasn't unusual, her clan was fairly large now. All she had to know was that this person was important because she was here.

"Hai," Aki responded, and bowed again. Her long, white-blonde hair curled in front of her emerald eyes as she did so.

"Aki-hime, your mother is waiting."

Aki raised her right hand as she was expected to do. The woman took it lightly in the fingers of her left hand and led her slowly into the center of the room. They crossed the gray-tiled floor and came to a stop in front of a tall, statuesque woman. The escort and Aki both bowed again and then the woman bowed once to Aki and then departed to join the rest of the assembled women. Aki looked at her mother and wondered, not for the first time, how this woman could have given birth to her.

Aki was a still a small girl despite being a blooded woman for almost three years now. She was less than four feet tall and had little in the way of womanly attributes. Her breasts were tiny things capped by nipples that were small and rosy colored. As a member of this family she was forbidden to have pubic hair, but when it had first grown it had been thin and wispy. Her butt was still bubble-like and she barely had hips at all. Even now she could hear the other women and girls in the room whispering the nickname they had given her. Ningyo- hime. It meant the Doll Princess.

In contrast, her mother was tall, rising above Aki like a giant by comparison. The woman had ample curves and the proud hips that said that she had born a child. In the eyes of the clan, she was the ideal of feminine beauty. Aki fell far short of this highly raised bar and it often infuriated her. Unfortunately there was little one could do about the body they were born to.

But then, like every member of the family, her powers as a mage had kindled alight. Despite her small body she carried a tremendous gift. She had heard the talk that she was unworthy of such strong abilities, but she would show them eventually. Today was one such day.

An important rite of every mage, not just those in her family was the summoning of one's familiar, a being that granted a mage a number of gifts. A familiar guarded and protected its master from harm. The second benefit of having a familiar was that through your connection to it, your conduit to the magic you could wield widened by a tremendous degree. No one knew why this was so, but it was a long proven fact. A mage would happily cut of her right arm before allowing any harm to come to their familiar and vice versa. The familiar gained in intelligence and was often granted powers in the process of the ceremony, a boon for both sides.

"Heika, I have come as requested," Aki said, using her mother's honorific as leader of the clan. "I am ready to begin at any time."

"Then you may do so, my daughter," Aki saw the small smile her mother allowed herself and felt buoyed by it. "Feel free to begin at any time."

Her mother left her and joined the circle of watching women. They were all here to witness this event. Normally only a dozen or so direct family members would be present for the ceremony, but Aki was the heir-apparent to the clan. That meant others had to be here to witness her change in status from a mage trainee to that of an acolyte.

For a long couple of minutes she simply stood there and breathed slowly and calmed her racing heart. This was expected so her audience didn't get impatient just yet. Finally, when she felt calm, she looked across the open, circular gap and locked eyes with her mother. When she got one reassuring nod, Aki began.

She reached deep into that place inside herself where the ocean of her power lay waiting. She drew it up and out of her and began to manipulate it into the form of her spell. Below her feet a large glowing circle of blue light took form. Within it other circles, sigils of power, lines, and geometric shapes placed themselves at her direction. When the complicated image was done she cast her power outwards and another identical circle formed in the empty space on the floor a few paces away.

She kept on drawing power. More rings and sigils took form in an ever increasing radius around her. Every summoning was unique and every mage knew when they performed it how to construct the spell. Hers was substantially larger and more complicated than any she had ever heard of, but she never flinched and continued her task. More circles of power took form in the air in various places and the circle she had placed first across the floor was soon part of a box of circles as five more took form vertically and then horizontally in the air. The room throbbed with power and spell light. She heard concerned whispers and muttering, but she kept on working. Nothing would stop her from completing this task.

****** Meilin stood up as the final bell of the school day rang and shoved all her notebooks and books from her last class into her bag. As she slung it up into a carrying position, she let out an involuntary yawn. The day had turned out to be remarkably boring for some reason and she felt sleepy from a severe lack of interesting stimuli. It was getting close to exams so every class had just been a lot of review stuff. That meant it was dull, dull, dull! Ugh.

Without anything new to go over she had ended up slipping into a kind of half-sleep for most of the day. She knew she would be regretting it shortly though. After school every day she had her training with Kotoro-sensei. He taught Okinawan martial arts and Meilin had been taking classes with him every weekday for the last seven years. She paid for the lessons by cleaning and maintaining his facility on the weekends. It wasn't a bad exchange and Meilin had gotten really good over the years. At least she thought that winning three falls out of ten during spars now was a sign that she was always improving.

As she walked down the crowded hallway to make her way to the bus stop she felt an odd tingling sensation spread over her skin. Stopping she looked down at her hands and frowned. They didn't look any different but she felt weird. Then she heard people gasping and shouting and when she looked up everyone nearby was trying to get away from her.

"Hey what's going—"

She cut of as a sudden bright blue light burst forth from the ground beneath her feet. Snapping her head down, Meilin goggled at the oddly glowing diagram beneath her beat up shoes. She tried to step off it but simply followed her and stayed centered on her body. Just as he was about to call out for help there was a cracking, whip-like sound and four thick strands of light shot out of the floor and snagged her limbs and yanked downward.

"Oh god, this is impossible!" Meilin yelled. "Someone get these off me!"

But no one moved. No one wanted to go near the strange and possibly dangerous things. Then Meilin saw she was slowly moving. When she looked down she realized she was sinking into the weird diagram and her legs were no longer visible below her knees. She tried to yank her arms free, but the light cables didn't budge. She kept right on sinking until eventually her head was covered and she could cry out no more.

******

Aki was exhausted. She had been working and building the summoning spell for over an hour and she was finally coming to its conclusion. Around her the room was filled with glowing spell forms and throbbing symbols of power. The very air reeked of her magic and the gathered women were no longer whispering. She heard their concerned mutterings but she didn't care. She knew the spell was on track. She didn't know what manner of creature required such a massive summoning spell, but she was managing it just fine. And her mother had still said nothing. Aki would only be concerned if her mother intervened.

Then she felt it. The last strand of her spell fell into place and the very fabric of reality in the chamber shivered visibly. Through her spell she felt something vast and infinite. Through that vastness her power shot like an arrow and she felt it connect with something. Then all of the spell light and spell forms in the room began to vanish and all the power rushed like a thousand rivers into the circle beneath Aki's feet and into the one across the room. Within that other circle a column of light shot up and speared the ceiling. The ground kicked beneath everyone's feet and then the all the light from the braziers began to fade until there was only the column of light and Aki's glowing circle.

The column began to narrow quickly and Aki caught her breath as it left behind the glowing form of something humanoid. At first she thought she had managed to summon a higher being somehow, but then the glowing figure moved slightly and she saw it had a skinny but distinctly female form. The light flowed down and off the figure like an oily liquid.

Aki's breathing stopped entirely then. When the light finally went away entirely and the last remnants of the powerful spell vanished, a small girl no taller than Aki stood there in the returning firelight from the room's braziers. She was completely nude and stood calmly with her slightly slanted eyes closed. Aki saw she had pretty face with small, delicate seeming features, darkly tanned skin compared to that of her family, and black hair held back in a tail that trailed down her smooth, nude back. Her body looked slightly muscular but not in an unsightly way. She had no discernable pubic hair near her tight looking womanhood and her small, slightly upturned breasts were capped in small perky nipples. On the left breast, on the inside slope, blazed a bright symbol in blue spell light. It was Aki's symbol; two V's, one upside down and overlapping the other inside a circle.

Aki stared at the girl and couldn't make herself look away. Just looking at the girl made her body feel hot and her pussy throbbed. Her mouth watered and her heart pounded. She couldn't make herself speak. Her mind felt stunned at what had happened. She had summed a human girl as her familiar; something that by all rights should be impossible for her to perform. And not just any human either, if her body's reaction was any indicator, this girl was someone very important to her future.

"What in the four burning hells is that?!" asked a scathing voice.

Aki's eyes very reluctantly left the tantalizing form of her familiar and looked to the source of the familiar voice. It was Junko. They were the same age, but Junko was more like Aki's mother than Aki was. Junko was all curvy femininity and sensuality. She had hated Aki since the days when their powers had awoken. Junko hated that Aki was easily more powerful than she was despite her talent at wielding it. Junko had summoned her familiar over a year ago and she had taunted Aki with her vicious little fae-dragon ever since. Aki hated the tiny little beast. It was only a foot long, but Junko kept ordering it to slip into Aki's quarters whenever she managed to pierce the wards on it and to burn Aki's stuff. She'd lost a large number of her favorite things that way. She'd been forced to build compartmentalized wards on things she thought important to protect them.

No one dressed Junko down for her rude words despite the fact that tradition dictated her silence until everyone left the chamber. Some frowned disapprovingly, but no one openly said anything. Most of them probably wished Junko was the heir instead of her. She looked the role more than Aki did.

Aki felt seething anger at her antagonist's words. No one insulted another's familiar. It just wasn't done. Aki looked to her mother and saw she had her arms crossed and was looking back at her levelly. That meant Aki was on her own for now.

"What does it look like you blind fool?!" Aki snapped. "Your future is quite dim if this is the extent of your memory, Junko. Only a couple of minutes and you've already forgotten what just happened? She is quite obviously, my familiar."

"Familiar?" Junko sneered. She left the circle and approached the girl who still had her eyes closed. "All I see is a scrawny looking girl, chibi-hime." Junko smiled and Aki heard a few snickers from Junko's friends among the women. Aki felt burning rage. Chibi-hime, it meant little princess. From her mother it was a term of endearment, but from Junko it was a pointed insult, and a crass one.

Junko reached out a hand to touch the familiar and Aki's rage redoubled. Did Junko have no propriety at all?! No one ever laid hands on another's familiar without the master's permission. Aki gathered power to her and as it crackled ominously in her hand those near her and in Aki's line of fire hurriedly scattered out of the way. Before Aki could cut loose and let Junko have it, Junko let out a scream of pain.

Aki blinked at the sound and the she saw that her familiar had now awakened. Somehow she had snatched Junko's arm and had wrenched it behind the girl. Aki watched, dumbfounded, as her familiar calmly dropped Junko to the ground where she fell onto her back. Junko tried to gather power into a spell against the girl, but Aki's familiar simply drove an open palm into Junko's stomach. Junko let out an odd grunt and her gathered power dissipated unused. As Junko heaved for breath, the girl looked up and straight into Aki's eyes.

Aki felt as if she too had taken a blow to the gut when those eyes landed on her. They were a warm brown and they held both intelligence and anger. Then the girl suddenly seemed to realize her nudity because she squawked and quickly tried to cover herself with her hands and arms while blushing furiously. She snapped out something but whatever language it was in, Aki didn't understand it.

Aki reached into her mind and felt for her connection to the girl. She found it as a blazing cord of fire within herself. Using that connection, she used her magic to share her language with her familiar. The girl made an odd face and then looked at Aki again in confusion.

"Who the hell are you?" the girl said, this time perfectly understandable. "Where am I?"

"One moment," Aki said quickly. She had to end the ceremony or no one else would leave. She reached out and before the girl could react she placed her hand on her symbol which still glowed on the girl's breast. She felt the warm, firm flesh and felt a hot flutter inside stir. Using the girl's confusion against her, Aki quickly leaned forward and gave the girl a quick peck on her lips. Aki felt a hot flash under hand and the girl gave a soft grunt before dropping to her knees.

"The familiar has been accepted," Aki heard her mother intone. "The ceremony is ended. Disperse immediately."

With visible reluctance all the gathered women filed out of the room. One stopped to assist Junko who was still coughing from the blow she had taken. Five minutes later the room was empty except for Aki, her mother, and the girl.

"Why on earth did you kiss me?!" the girl said incredulously as she sat on the floor and tried to hide her nudity. "And what did you do? I feel like my chest is on fire!"

Aki frowned at the girl. She was unsure of how to handle this. In all other cases, a familiar was supposed to be an animal or some kind of creature. She had never heard of another human being summoned. And what this girl also represented made it even stranger.

"I kissed you in order to seal the summoning spell and confirm you as my familiar," Aki said slowly. "That is what I did. What you feel is the magical connection to me as your master."

The girl stared at her in plain disbelief. "Magic? Familiar? Master? What the hell is wrong with you?"

"Nothing," Mother said sternly. "It is exactly as my daughter says."

The girl frowned deeper, "Look, I don't know what you guys are into, but I don't want in on it. Just give me my clothes back and let me leave. I need to call my instructor and apologize for not showing, thanks to you. You can play you magic games with someone else."

"Sorry, but that can't happen," Aki said quickly. "Look." She raised the hem of her shirt a little and showed the girl the symbol that sat just above her belly button. All mages had their own mark on their bodies somewhere. "It's the same as the one on your breast. It marks you as my familiar."

The girl lifted her arm and looked at her marked flesh. Then she glared at Aki. "If you guys tattooed me while I was unconscious, I am so suing you for this."

"Gah! What will it take to convince you that this is real?" Aki snapped. "I summoned you here with magic, like this." Aki help out her arm and with a pulse of power she brought a pair of cotton shorts and a white shirt to her. The girl stared at them as if they were venomous snakes.

"Holy crap! So…" the girl's eyes got really huge. "So I really did sink into the floor of my school? Oh man." Then anger appeared again she stood quickly and glared into Aki's eyes. "That means you abducted me, so you're still a criminal. Send me back."

"I can't, it's permanent," Aki said through gritted teeth. In her mind she wanted to smack and kiss the girl at the same time. "You are my familiar until one of us is dead." Before the last words were out of her mouth Aki felt burning pain bloom on her right cheek and then felt the clothes get yanked out of her surprised hands. The girl had slapped her; her own familiar had struck her! "How did you do that?" she asked incredulously. She saw her mother looked equally stunned. "A familiar isn't supposed to be capable of causing her master harm."

"Harm?" The girl snorted as she tugged the shorts on and snapped them. "Think of it as an education about stepping beyond your bounds. It's not like I actually injured you."

The girl bent over to pick up the shirt and Aki licked her lips and felt her heart race again. When she bent over, the tight pair of shirts rode up a little and Aki had a clear view of the girl's crotch through the leg hole. Unconsciously she clenched her right hand to her chest and felt an enormous desire to reach between the girls legs and touch her. She wanted badly to feel the wet warmth of the girl on her fingers. She felt hot again deep inside her chest. When the girl stood up and slipped the shirt on she snapped out of her odd trance and blinked confusedly and she saw that her mother was looking from the girl to her and back again in a very strange manner. Had her mother noticed her massive, debilitating desire for the girl? If she did she would draw the logical conclusion.

Aki sighed in frustration. Today was not going how she had envisioned it. "What's your name? I can't just go around calling you girl."

"Hmmm?" The girl smiled and held out hand. "It's Meilin." When Aki carefully took the offered hand Meilin blinked at her oddly. "Whoa, maybe you really weren't kidding. I think I can feel you inside my head or something."

"A familiar and its master are always aware of each other," Mother commented. "As they grow together they become closer to one another. When one of you is in trouble, the other will know the instant it happens."

"Is that so?" Meilin said musingly. "So who are you two then?"

"I am Aki Saito," Aki answered. "And this is my mother, Reiko. She is the current head and matriarch of the Saito clan of mages."

"Saito clan? Mages?" Meilin shook her head in confusion. "Where on earth did you guys bring me?"

"You are not on this Earth you've spoken of," Mother said. "I recognized portions of my daughter's summing spell. It bridged the dimensional void and brought you here from another world entirely. This world is named Sohoro."

Aki watched as Meilin absorbed that bit of surprising information; Aki hadn't known that bit either. Meilin frowned at the floor in thought and Aki took the opportunity to look at her familiar's face again. Aki thought it was really pretty. The girl's features were all small and delicate seeming, and yet she had shown on Junko that she was capable of defending herself. Yet again Aki felt a desire to touch the girl.

"So what your saying, is that I'm stuck here in another world, with you," she said, pointing at Aki, "as my master because you summoned me here with your magic?"

"That's pretty much it exactly," Aki nodded.

"Well, that kind of sucks a whole lot," Meilin sighed. "What am I supposed do as a familiar? You can screw off right now if you think I'm gonna be your servant or something."

"A familiar is supposed to assist and aid their mage in any way the mage asks of them," Aki huffed. "And a familiar protects its master from harm. It's supposed to be a partnership. Mages love their familiars."

"I have no reference for any of this so I have no idea what you're talking about," Meilin sighed again. "I suppose all I can do is go with the flow for now. So now what?"

Aki looked up to her mother for a suggestion.

"She's your partner," Mom laughed. "You may as well show her around the compound and your quarters. Other things can be worried about after you two have settled in together. I think you two match each other quite well."

"How so?" Aki found herself saying at the same time as Meilin. For a second they looked at each other and for some strange reason they both found themselves grinning.

"See?" Mom laughed. "And you're both the same size too!"

"Ugh, even here I get short jokes," Meilin said rolling her eyes. "So where to Aki?"

Aki led them back to the stairs and then paused as mom waved a hand at the now empty chamber. The fires guttered and then snuffed out. Together they climbed the stairs and Meilin's bare feet made soft slapping sounds on the steps. At the top the door guard bowed at them, but Aki saw her curious gaze linger on Meilin. No doubt the entire compound had heard about things by now. When they stepped out of the curtained doorway and onto the wooden deck, Meilin stopped cold.

"Whoa! What is this place?!"

Aki took in the view too so that she could answer properly. "This compound is the property of our clan. That large wall you see in the far distance is forty feet high and runs in a square, five miles on a side. It contains a large number of layered wardings and protection barriers. The main gate is over there on the east side," she pointed in the general direction she spoke of. "That tall, red stoned building in the center is the administration building where my mom holds office. The rest are houses, equipment manufactories, storage buildings, instruction facilities and other things. All trees and fields are open land. I'll show you where the important places are."

After mom summoned up a pair of shoes for Meilin, Aki set about doing that. For A short time of walking around, Aki felt like a tour guide. Occasionally Meilin would stop and ask a question about something, but for the most part she kept silent.

This awkwardness was not how a familiar/mage bond was supposed to be. They were supposed to find that each was a compliment to the other. She noticed Meilin kept looking at her thoughtfully, but she had no idea what the girl was thinking behind those eyes. All she knew from the link with her was that the girl felt contemplative.

"Aki?"

"Huh?" She mumbled, snapping out of her reverie as they walked on. "What?"

"Why exactly did you summon me?"

Aki dropped back on the paved path they were on to walk beside Meilin. The current route they were on was wooded with maples and well shaded. "It wasn't you specifically I was summoning," Aki clarified. "As part of our growth as a mage we must all summon a familiar to reach the next step in our development. The spell is supposed to bring the ideal partner for the mage in question."

"So I am your ideal partner?" Meilin said in an odd tone. Aki thought she sounded interested in that. "So what happens with me now?"

"You'll live with me and go where I go," Aki answered. "We will also take lessons and training together. Here, let me show you."

Aki led them down a smaller side path and they came to an open grass field that had a rectangle of posts set into the ground. In the field was a group of women, all of which had the family look. Two older teen girls face each other in the middle. Beside one sat a large black dog and a bird rode on the other's shoulder. Both girls wore blindfolds.

"Heeaaa!" One girl flung out an arm and something made of bright white light ripped through the air. The second girl with the bird raised a hand and a glowing red barrier formed and deflected the bright projectile. The errant shot then slammed into an invisible shield where the posts ran. A resounding boom shook the ground and series if ripples ran through the air and showed an invisible wall

"See?" Aki smiled. "Those two are using their familiars in place of their own vision in this exercise."

"Hmmm," Meilin frowned thoughtfully as Aki brought them back to the main path.

The path then emptied at a large, heavily trafficked, paved square that was at least a hundred feet across. Directly ahead of them was one of the main residences. It was a huge, sprawling, brick structure with eight floors. Aki pointed it out and explained that it contained a large number of the sub-families of the clan. To their right was another large building. It had its own low, black painted, metal fence that penned in a well groomed garden space. A well maintained flagstone walking path led from the paved area to the door of the house.

The house was, like the building they had originally left, made of wood and it had a painted, wooden shingled roof as well. The outside was ornately carved and two women stood guard at the double front doors.

"Whose house is that?" Meilin asked wonderingly.

"It's mine and my mom's," Aki answered. "And yours now since you'll be rooming with me."

"I don't get my own?" Meilin pouted with grinning eyes. "This place is huge."

"I told you, familiars live with their masters." Aki snorted. "Mom will likely make you share my bed."

"At least we're both small then," Meilin laughed. As they walked up the path to the front door Meilin paused and pointed to a low, nearby structure that had a number of people going in and out of it. "What's that place?"

"That?" Aki grinned. "I'll show you it later. I think you'll like it. But I'll show you our place first."

When they reached the door guards, Aki raised her shirt to show her symbol as proof of her identity. Both guards nodded and then frowned at Meilin.

"What?" Meilin asked.

"Show them the symbol," Aki instructed. "Otherwise they won't believe you're with me and they won't let you in."

Blushing, Meilin tugged down the neck of her shirt and showed the marked breast. Aki saw one guard nod, but the other eyed Meilin with interest. Aki frowned and grabbed Meilin's hand possessively. "Come on!"

Aki dragged Meilin into the house and ran the gauntlet of greetings from the house staff. They were her mother's servants, but as the heir they also gave respect to her. They all gave Meilin bowed greetings as well which seemed to amuse the girl for some reason. She took them deep into the building, through the center courtyard garden and then up to the second floor of the rear of the building. After going down a relatively empty hallway in a section of the building that wasn't used for much else, they came to her home. Aki placed her hand on the sliding screen door and felt the wards that she had placed acknowledge her.

"This is your room!" Meilin said incredulously when Aki slid the door aside.

Aki actually liked her room when Junko wasn't trying to light it on fire. Technically you would probably call it a suite. Just inside the door there was a lower, wooden floored entry area. At the rise to a floor of soft paneled mats was a row of ten house slippers.

"Yeah, this is mine." Aki smiled proudly. "In all private places and homes here, you always take off your shoes in the entry area and step up and into the house slippers." Aki did so herself to demonstrate and then knelt to turn her shoes around so they faced the door. "Like so."

Meilin nodded and did as instructed. The woven mats of the floor were soft under their feet as they enter the main living area. Within was Aki's sitting area. It consisted at the moment of three chairs and a long matching sofa. There was a black, wooden table in the middle of the room with a sunken area under it. The walls were furnished with paintings of nature scenes and in random places there were tastefully sized potted plants

"If we eat any meals here, we have them at that table," Aki instructed. "You sit on the floor with your legs hanging over under the table. There are backrests that are used during these times, but I don't eat here very often. Usually I eat with my mother." Aki flipped a switch on one wall and turned on the overhead light. It had a shield over it to give the room a warmer and softer look that Aki greatly preferred.

"You have electricity?" Meilin asked in a confused tone.

"Of course," Aki responded, baffled. "Why wouldn't we?"

"Well, this place gives of a bit of an anachronistic vibe," Meilin shrugged "I figured it would be like that first place with candles and fires for light."

Aki then brought them to one of the attached rooms. "This is our bedroom." There was a large ovular bed on the floor consisting of a thick mattress and layers of carefully folded sheets and warm looking comforters. On one wall was a sliding door that Aki opened to reveal a sizable closet. Meilin approached the bed and knelt down to press on it experimentally.

"Damn that's soft," she said approvingly. "Do you not sleep with a pillow?"

"I do," Aki answered and opened another sliding door. Meilin followed into a tiny tiled space. Within there, Aki slid one wall open to reveal a storage space. Stacked on a shelf were more sheets and four pillows. Aki opened the other side to reveal neatly folded towels and toiletries.

"Let me guess, that's the bathroom?" Meilin said, pointing at the end of the short space.

"Correct!" Aki laughed and opened the door. They stepped inside and Aki watched Meilin frown oddly at the room. It had the requisite toilet and sink to one side, but on the other was a covered wooden box with knobs and computer controls on the side. Next to this on a wall without any kind of tub was a showerhead and a faucet.

"Where does the water go if there isn't a tub?" Meilin asked in confusion.

Aki pointed at the edges of the room. "The whole perimeter is the drain."

"So what's the box thing?"

"It's a furo, a heated bathtub. I don't really use it much though."

"That's a bathtub?! If you sat in it the water would be all the way up to your shoulders."

"That's the whole point," Aki told her. "You clean off first with the shower, and then you soak for a while in the hot water. When you're done you cover it up so that it stays nice and hot for the person after you."

"Weird, but okay," Meilin said, looking at the room bemusedly.

Walking back to the connecting hall, Aki grabbed a towel and threw it at Meilin who caught it out of instinct and grabbed one for herself. Then, with the baffled familiar in tow she went back to the bedroom and grabbed two soft cotton robes from hangers in her closet. She handed one of them to Meilin.

"What do we need these for?" Meilin asked.

"We're going to that building you pointed out earlier," Aki smiled. She planned to enjoy what was coming and she hoped Meilin would like it.

After she reset her wards, Aki led them back out of the house, across the square and to the other building. Aki paid the attendant who sat just inside the curtained entrance at her booth and then they walked into a large room filled with large stands of shelves. Aki watched amusedly as Meilin's eyes bulged as they walked down the rows of shelves. Down many of them were women in various stages of undress. Aki turned down a row that was empty and from a shelf she pulled down an empty wicker basket that had a cloth lining. She set it on the bench that ran down the middle of the shelves and grinned at Meilin.

"After you pay the attendant like I just did, you put all of your clothes in one of these baskets."

"Why are we doing this at all?!" Meilin asked in embarrassed confusion.

"Because I got all sweaty and gross today summoning you," Aki laughed. "This place is much better than my tiny little bathroom."

"Okay," Meilin said, sounding unconvinced.

Aki sighed dramatically and yanked her sweat soaked shirt over her head. Her shorts and panties soon followed and she chucked them all in the basket. When she looked she saw Meilin was staring at her nude body with bright crimson in her cheeks. Aki smiled, walked to the girl and began pulling her shirt up.

Meilin made a sputtering noise of resignation, and then pulled the shirt off herself and then took her shorts back off until once again Aki could see her wonderfully naked form. Aki felt herself getting wet at the sight. And that odd heat grew in her chest again.

"Why can't we just take a bath at your place," Meilin whined.

"What are you complaining about?" Aki asked with a smile. "It's not like you have anything to hide here. Everyone here is a woman."

"I guess," Meilin mumbled. "And all those women when I arrived already saw me naked anyways."

"Good! Now come one!"

**********

Meilin felt strange and she had since she had arrived in this weird world. There was an odd feeling in her chest and she could feel Aki in her mind. She could tell exactly where her "master" was and vaguely what she was feeling. And the world was beyond strange. Aki's house was a damn mansion where she had her own apartments and she had yet to see a single man in the entire place. Then Aki had dragged her here to this huge, luxurious looking bathhouse. She had figured at the very beginning that these people had little in the way of nudity taboos, but this was to damn fast for her.

She nervously followed Aki out of the changing room into another where an attendant sat at a desk. The woman, wearing only a loose pink robe herself, handed each of them a small basket containing shampoo, liquid soap and a washrag. As they were walking to a sliding glass door Meilin noticed that the woman was looking at her in a very interested manner. It was the same look that the door guard got when she had showed the mark on her breast. It felt decidedly odd to be considered in a sexual manner by these women.

And then there was Aki herself. As Meilin walked behind the pale skinned and white-blonde haired princess, she found herself staring at the girl's bubble-like butt and wondering what it felt like. That had never happened to her before. Sure she'd had sexual thoughts before and had masturbated often enough, but she had never just looked at another girl and thought 'hey, she looks pretty damn cute' before. Even worse was what she felt in her head every time Aki looked at her. She knew Aki was attracted to her in a powerful way and for some reason she couldn't understand, it didn't bother her. Even now she felt oddly excited that Aki was looking at her body's reflection in the glass door.

Aki slid the door aside and they stepped into a very hot and very steamy room of cavernous size. At the front of the room where they were, was row after row of the weird faucet and shower set-ups like Aki had in her suite with a plastic stool and a bucket. Seated at many of these were dozens of women. All of them were either washing themselves or another person. In the far back was a very large pool of water with a number of women submerged in it. She felt heat rise into her face as she saw that many of the women in the room were quite obviously engaged in sexual acts. Sometimes she saw there were more than two involved. Also for the first time, she saw women that didn't have the same pale-blonde hair and milky skin that Aki had. She turned and saw that Aki was watching her with a small smile on her cute face.

"Ah…Aki," she said, trying to speak. "Those other women, the one's that don't look like you. Who are they?"

For some reason this made Aki grin. "Those women are the mates of mages in our family. Perhaps you've noticed that there are no men here?" Meilin nodded. "That's because our clan, among the many in this world, is unique. We are made up entirely of women. While the given reason varies depending on who you ask, we all have to reproduce with another woman. The predominant theory is that we aren't fully human. We go into the outside world and sometimes we meet someone and then boom, we know that person is compatible as a mate. It's like my link with you. We can only mate and reproduce with that one person. Most of the time that person comes here to live with their mage-mate. For our family its the final step in being considered a fully mature mage."

Meilin blinked at that. A whole small village of only woman and all of them lesbians? This world just kept on getting weirder.

"Well, let's go," Aki took her hand again and Meilin felt her chest constrict with nervousness as they walked among the many naked, bathing women. Most didn't even notice and many seemed to be conversing casually with their neighbors. Then they walked past a woman who was very obviously masturbating as she washed and no one gave her a second glance either.

"Is this really bothering you?" Aki asked, sounding genuinely concerned.

"Yes!" Meilin answered emphatically. "We don't do a lot of public bathing where I come from, let alone the rest of this."

"Then there's another alternative." Aki turned them and went down a tiled side hallway. They passed other woman as they came out of the open doorways of rooms. Aki turned them toward one of these and they entered a much smaller version of the main bath area. It had only two spigots and showerheads and against the back wall was a deep pool of steaming water with a tiled mural of a fish as a backdrop.

"Is this better?" Aki asked. "It'll only be the two of us."

"Yeah, much better," Meilin agreed quickly. She moved toward the bath but Aki snagged her wrist.

"Maybe it's a good thing we're came here instead of the main room," Aki smiled. "Remember what I said back at the house? You wash at the showers first, and then you get into the water. Otherwise it's very bad manners to get dirt, grime or soap in the bathing pools."

Meilin frowned, but she followed Aki over to the showers and after hanging her towel with Aki's on a provided rod she seated herself on the provided stool. Aki sat next to her and smiled as she turned her shower on. Meilin fiddled with her own control knobs until she had a temperature she liked. Feeling incredibly self-conscious she soaped up her wash rag and began bathing. Next to her Aki hummed to herself happily and stared unabashedly at Meilin.

Slowly Meilin relaxed a little and let herself enjoy the damp heat of the room, the heat and spray of the water and the heated stare of her strange new partner. It felt weird bathing this way, but she admitted to herself that it wasn't actually that bad. She also found herself watching Aki as she soaped her skinny and smooth, milk skinned body. There was a trough in the stool that they sat on and Meilin found herself watching closely as Aki's hand dipped down and cleaned her lower regions thoroughly. She was surprised then when Aki suddenly stood and approached her.

"Turn your back to me," Aki commanded in a playful tone and a smile.

Meilin heard the open sexual desire in Aki's voice, but she found herself complying anyway. She felt Aki's hands on her back as they cleaned her hard to reach places. She felt a shiver as Aki set her head on her shoulder and spoke. "Meilin, before you get into the bath you have to wash thoroughly. You skipped a bit. And it's always considered good manners to help the person next to you when you bathe."

Her shivering increased as Aki's hands went downward. They felt and caressed over her toned ass cheeks. Then she let out an involuntary gasp as a hand slithered between and onto her tight back hole. Fingers played with that hole and one teased it as if it would enter her. Meilin knew she could stop this, but she didn't think that she wanted to do that, this felt too good. She'd never felt this good before.

Aki's other hand went a bit further forward onto her lower lips. She gripped her legs tightly and closed her eyes as she took in the sensations.

"Did you clean this part?" Aki asked cheerfully.

"Y-yes," Meilin mumbled out. She twitched as a finger found her clit and pressed on it. That finger started wriggling and she felt her pussy contracting in the precursor to an orgasm.

"I think I should make sure," Aki laughed.

"OH god!" Meilin couldn't help crying out. Aki slid a finger simultaneously into both her holes and she came hard. She could feel her pussy clenching on the invading digit and her ass was doing the same. She heard Aki giggle happily and then the fingers pulled out. It took all her willpower not to demand them to be put back inside. She didn't want it to stop.

"Wow, you get really wet," Aki commented. Meilin heard a slurping sound and she knew Aki was tasting her fluids. She didn't care though. She wanted a repeat of what Aki had just done to her.

"Do…do people here just have sex wherever they want?" Meilin asked when she felt more composed again.

"Pretty much," Aki smiled confidently. "You're allowed to do so when you turn seven as long as your mothers allow it. It's frowned upon when you're out in public, but no one will tell you no or to stop. The women of our clan always have really high sex drives, so we just enjoy ourselves. And we can only impregnate our mates so that worry isn't there. People outside the family compound in the cities are more normal, but they're boring."

Meilin laughed at that. She would have been considered one of those boring people before today. She'd been so busy concentrating on her classes that she'd barely even paid attention to anything sexual before now except. She had masturbated occasionally when the mood had struck her, but she hadn't really looked at any other people her age in a sexual light. Now that it was thrust right in her face and she wanted more. She wondered if being bonded to Aki meant that she shared in the mentioned sex drive. She certainly felt like she was still ready to go again.

She turned back around to face Aki and wasn't at all that surprised to see that the girl's finger was between her legs and inside her tight looking pussy. Like herself, Aki looked positively tiny. Maybe Reiko was right when she said they might be good together. It wasn't as if she had much to miss on earth and Meilin was finding Aki to be very attractive.

"My turn?" Aki asked in a hopeful tone.

"I guess I can try," Meilin answered with a smile. She still felt incredibly horny and she'd wondered even before she'd come here sometimes, what another girl would feel like. Now she was going to find out.

Aki turned her back to Meilin so she soaped up her hands and slowly placed them on the smooth, pale skin of her partner. As she washed Aki's back Meilin felt a desire to touch her own pussy badly. When she ran her hands over Aki's rounded little bottom she felt something hot and liquid drip from her own pussy and down her kneeling legs. She had never penetrated her ass before Aki had today, but Meilin had enjoyed the sensation immensely. She ran her fingers through Aki's smooth bottom cheeks and found her tight hole. She found that it accepted her finger almost eagerly. Meilin figured that Aki must be well experienced back there and Aki responded immediately.

As she slowly fingered Aki's ass the girl cried and moaned and Meilin could feel the finger penetrating the girl's pussy through the membranes inside the girl. They pressed their fingers toward each other and suddenly Aki was the one cumming. She felt hot fluid soak her knuckles and when the twitching subsided she pulled her finger out and scrubbed it clean with soap.

When Aki turned around to face her, all smiles of course, she held out a dripping wet finger. "Have you ever tasted another girl?" Meilin shook her head and found herself leaning toward the hand. She took the finger into her mouth and felt Aki's other hand slip between her legs again. "Feels like you're really enjoying things now." Aki laughed playfully and fingered her quickly. Again Meilin found herself cumming on Aki's fingers as she tasted the other girl's fluids from the fingers in her mouth. This time she felt slightly more satiated from the shivering pleasure coursing through her body.

"Now we can get into the bath," Aki grinned. Meilin found herself following the girl and they both climbed into the deep, blissfully hot water. Instead of sitting apart, Meilin found herself sitting skin to skin with Aki who had yet to stop smiling. "You know Meilin; I think I am going to like having you as my familiar."

Meilin smiled back slowly. "This really isn't so bad if I can live like this. I know this is only the first day I've been here. But I don't think I'll mind living in this world. So far it's better than my old one."

"That's very good news," Aki gave her a roughish look. "Want to know why?"

"Sure, it can't be any more shocking than anything else you told or shown me."

Aki turned in the water and Meilin found the girl sitting her naked body onto her lap. Reflexively she found her arms wrapping around behind Aki. For a long minute Aki smiled and looked into her eyes. "The reason it's good that you like it here now, is because you and I can have a much deeper connection than that between a master and familiar."

For a moment Meilin didn't understand the statement. Then she ran through everything Aki had told her and came to the obvious and stunning conclusion. Aki saw that she understood and then slipped back off her lap.

For a very long while they just soaked together in the hot water and Meilin thought over what Aki had just revealed to her. The only thing Aki had mention in regard to a relationship was all that stuff about finding mates. She wasn't sure what she thought about that. It didn't necessarily sound like a bad thing, but it would be yet another huge change.

Hell, this was her very first day here in this world and she had already found herself the familiar to a young mage who was the heir of an entire clan of lesbian magic users. And not only that, she had already and quite willingly engaged in some rather exciting sex play with that same girl and she had found it to be extremely pleasurable. And they would be sleeping in the same bed from now on too. All of which seemed to indicate her future was already very firmly welded to Aki.

She had a fleeting thought of her parents and what they might think of all this but she cast it aside immediately. They didn't really matter anymore. This world offered her a completely new future with unknown opportunities. So what if she was likely to end up having sex with Aki every day, it wasn't as if that was going to be torture. Even now her ass was still clenching every once in a while in remembrance of the digit that had invaded her there. Sure people back home would probably call this perversion and deviancy, but they weren't here to cast their unwanted opinions into things.

The way she figured it, she may as well run with things as they were. Aki had been fairly pleasant company so far and her experienced fingers had felt pretty amazing. Even now it felt pretty nice just to their skin touching in the bath. She didn't see any better choices than being alongside Aki either. Fighting things would only cause problems. When she reached that decision she leaned against Aki's nubile body with her own and closed her eyes.

"You know, its bad idea to fall asleep in the baths," Aki said humorously even though she made no move to shift Meilin off her.

"Shut up, this feels nice," Meilin admonished with a laugh. "And you won't let me drown anyway."

"Does that mean you'd rather stay here than go to dinner?" Aki asked. "It starts precisely at seven and not a minute later. If we don't leave now we'll miss out."

"Uughn," Meilin moaned. "That's not fair. Just when I was getting to like this you tell me it's time to leave."

"But you do like being here, with me I mean?" Aki asked, sounding very interested and concerned.

"So far, yeah. Though I know it's only the first day here," Meilin smiled. "This bathhouse thing was a bit odd at first and I was certainly surprised by your finger going in my ass."

"But you really liked it though!" Aki laughed, interrupting.

"Will you shush and let me finish?" Meilin grinned and gave Aki a gentle poke in the ribs. "As I was saying, this is all really weird and all, but it doesn't seem to be terrible. I have no idea what I'm going to do from here on out, but it's not like my life on Earth was going to be any better than this. All I had to look forward to there was college and then some job. I'll just view this as my opportunity to change my future."

"It doesn't bother you that you're going to be stuck with me from now on?"

"You haven't given me any reason yet to worry about that, Aki. I'll admit that I'm a bit confused as to what I'm supposed to do with you, but I guess that's just a matter of learning about it all. And you've been rather nice to me so far, even though I did slap you. And for reason it really doesn't bother me when you touch me like you did, even though that was the first time I've done anything sexual with another person. Do all mages dote this much on their familiars?"

"Pretty much," Aki grinned, her tongue sticking out in a playful manner that Meilin found to be a bit cute. "I told you, familiars are supposed to be the ideal partner for the mage that summoned it. Though I doubt most of them have had sex with theirs. And don't worry about slapping me; I'm not bothered by it since I really must have been confusing to be dragged into an unknown world by some random girl. You ready to out now?"

"I suppose," Meilin sighed dramatically. "But this feels so good."

Aki snorted an amusement. "It's not like this is the last time we'll come here Meilin. If it was practical to do so we could do it every day, but that would eat up a lot of time. But we'll definitely be back here soon."

"Then I'll just have to look forward to next time," Meilin said with a pleased nod. Then she rose up, turning around as she did so, and climbed up and out of the water. She noticed Aki taking a peek between her legs as she did so and the look of desire in the girl's eyes made her body shiver in anticipation again. She also felt mild astonishment that she was responding so strongly to Aki every time the girl showed these kinds of signs. It was so weird.

Aki followed her out of the heated pool and they gathered their toiletries back into the provided basket. Then Meilin made to grab her towel from where she'd hung it. Before she had done more than lift it off the rod, Aki was suddenly grabbing it from her.

"Wait, wait. Can I do it?" Aki seemed to want any excuse to touch her, Meilin thought with a small grin.

"I thought I was supposed to be the one serving you?" Meilin retorted.

"It's a partnership," Aki said firmly. "You can do me afterwards."

"That's not what I was trying to say," Meilin laughed. "But I don't have any objections. It's not like you haven't already touched me more intimately."

"Awsome!"

Meilin lifted her arms up horizontally, and Aki eagerly moved in with the towel. The soft, fluffy towel and Aki's small hands roamed over her body and caressed the water off of her. It wasn't just a quick wipe down, Aki carefully and thoroughly ran her hands everywhere. Meilin found herself wanting to lean into Aki's touch. When the hands left her it felt like a tremendous loss.

"That felt nice," Meilin said and grabbed the other towel. "Now for you."

Aki assumed the same stance she had been in and Meilin approached her with the towel. Under the shower she had been too filled with lust to actually pay attention to how Aki had felt against her. Now, under her hands she felt the girl's smooth skin and soft flesh. Her hands lingered in a few places and she noticed that Aki's breathing had begun to deepen. When she finished the upper body and stooped to get Aki's legs she saw a thin bead of wetness starting to make its way down Aki's right leg. Meilin reached out with a bare finger and scooped up the escaping juice.

"You weren't kidding were you," Meilin asked and then slurped her finger clean. Aki really did taste wonderful. "Already just out of the bath and you're already dripping wet."

"I can't help it!" Aki moaned indignantly. "It's because you're the one who's touching me."

"Hmmm?" Meilin resumed her drying, making very sure to get between Aki's legs. "I suppose that's a nice thing to know. There! You're all set."

"Uhn," Aki groaned. Meilin grinned at her. Aki was very obviously and highly aroused and unsatisfied now as well. "Then let's go."

Meilin followed Aki back into the main area and she felt slightly less bothered and embarrassed by all the naked women around her. She even managed a returning smile when one young woman who was sitting by herself gave her a flirtatious smile as she soaped her crotch. They returned the baskets at the counter and retrieved their belongings. Aki handed her the robe she'd been given and she unfolded it. When she slipped it on it was wondrously soft and warm once she tied it shut.

"Is it really alright to walk back in just the robes?" Meilin asked. "I'm not even wearing any underwear."

"Sure it's alright," Aki smiled reassuringly. "I told you, we're very free about such things here in our compound. People would certainly look at you if you were naked, but they wouldn't be upset."

After gathering up their clothes, they left the bathhouse and stepped out into the evening sunlight. As Aki had promised, no one looked at them strangely. Many of the women leaving the baths just wore robes out. A couple of these gave them nod in greeting so they returned them politely.

Back at the house she again had to bare her chest to the guard and this time she tried to be more casual and less concerned about flashing herself out in public. Like before, the guard in the right side appeared to be interested in her body but soon they were back inside the sprawling structure and traversing its corridors to arrive back at Aki's apartment. She felt absurdly proud of herself when she remembered about the slippers without being reminded.

They arrived back in Aki's bedroom, and without a word Aki pulled off her robe. Meilin watched with interest as the tantalizingly naked girl walked to her closet and opened it again. Aki threw her robe into a basket on the closet's floor.

"This is where you put any dirty clothes you have," Aki instructed, and then frowned. "We'll have to get some clothes of your own. But for now we'll have to find something of mine that looks good on you for dinner."

Meilin was more than half convinced that all the clothes Aki pulled out for her to try on was just an excuse to see her naked some more, but she really didn't mind. In the end she dressed in a knee-length blue skirt of a very light material, a white, thin strapped shirt with another long-sleeved shirt worn over it. Aki deemed the outfit "very cute" on her so she went along with it, somehow feeling pleased by the compliment. Then they spent another few minutes in the bathroom brushing their hair into order and then Aki finally deemed them presentable.

They left the apartment and again they walked through the house. When they arrived at their destination Meilin saw from the entry area beyond the door that this too was someone's personal apartment. Aki's mother Meilin assumed.

Like Aki's apartment it was well furnished and absolutely clean looking. There were several windows that let in the evening light and it gave the place a homey feeling. She heard the jumbled sound of voices nearby and the occasionally raised laughter. After again slipping into the provided house slippers, Aki led her down a short hall with paintings of birds hanging on the wall. When they came to an open doorway they entered a fairly large room that was divided in the middle by a sliding partition wall. At the moment it was open and on either end of the room was a table like the one in Aki's room except much larger in size.

"Hime-sama," said a smiling woman who a approached them and bowed her head quickly and back up. "It's good that you are here in time for dinner, come"

Meilin figured the woman had to be a servant of some kind because she led them to two places set next to the head of the table. There were many other people in the room and as they were being seated they all greeted Aki warmly. To Meilin they just gave a casual greeting. When they got to their places Meilin copied Aki and slipped her legs into the empty space under the table and sat directly onto the soft mat of the floor. Once seated the servant took two wooden backrest things and slipped them into places behind them. They were held in place by an 'L' piece that hooked into the opening under the table. Meilin began to feel a bit nervous about eating with a bunch of strange people.

"Relax," Aki whispered encouragingly. Meilin also felt a feeling of safety leaking to her from that weird connection she now shared with the girl. Just that one word and the feeling seemed to set her at ease.

They heard the sound of talking and feet approaching and through the door entered Aki's mother who was talking to another woman who walked at her side. The servant greeted them immediately and guided them toward Aki and Meilin. Reiko was seated at the head of the table as she had expected and the woman was seated opposite of them.

Reiko gave them both a knowing smirk. "Well hello again daughter mine, Meilin. It's good to see that you two made it for dinner. And I also see that you were quick to drag Meilin to the baths Aki."

"I was just showing her everything like you said," Aki said, blushing furiously. "You make it sound like I had other motives behind it."

"And you can tell me in complete honesty that you did nothing more than bathe?" Reiko looked once at Meilin and she knew her face must have shown something because Reiko just laughed. "See? Meilin has outed you."

Aki gave her mother an exasperated look. "Mother, she didn't mind. I didn't force her to do anything."

Reiko quirked an eye at Meilin for confirmation.

"It's true," Meilin felt her cheeks heating up. "I could have stopped her if I hadn't wanted to go along with it. I didn't mind it at all."

Aki smiled viciously. "See? She enjoyed it."

"Then I suppose everything's alright then," Reiko said. "I'm not really all that surprised that you tried to get your hands on her as fast as you could. I saw they way you looked at her." She game Meilin a more welcoming smile. "I'm sorry that you got stuck with my insatiable daughter."

"It's alright," she smiled back. "I really did enjoy myself today. Aki didn't do anything that I found to be bothersome."

"My my, maybe you two really are well matched," Reiko chuckled. She looked around the table and Meilin saw that while they were talking the rest of the places had been filled. Reiko called out to the servant woman. "Chisato, please go ahead and get started." The woman nodded and left the room.

She returned very shortly with several other women who each pulled a small cart with three shelves. On the shelves were covered dishes of food. In a quick, orderly manner the woman distributed plates and food to everyone. One woman went around and filled glasses with what smelled like tea. When Meilin got her plate filled she saw that the fare consisted of a plate of rice covered by a sauce coated concoction of peppered steak strips, red peppers, onions and cubed potatoes. It smelled spicy. She also got a slice of some really good smelling bread.

A jar of some kind of jam was passed around so she imitated the others and slathered some onto her bread slice. Some of the other women she noticed raised a small white saucer that was next to some of the places and a servant poured a clear liquid that smelled both sweetly and of alcohol into it. When all had been served, the servant women went into other half of the room and set out three more portions and then seated themselves there. Meilin guessed that the other table must be the servant's table or something.

When all was in readiness, Reiko smiled at her. "Meilin, it is considered good manners and an important tradition for a guest or the new member of a table take the first bite before the others may begin. So would you do the honors of starting our meal?"

Meilin saw that she was suddenly the center of attention from all the strange women. She nodded affirmatively to Reiko and took up her fork. She scooped a small portion of rice and meat onto her utensil and brought it to her mouth. The stew-like meat dish was just as spicy as it had smelled, but it tasted incredible as well. As soon as she swallowed the assembled women all said some kind of blessing on the meal and then they too dug in.

The rest of dinner turned out to be fairly pleasant. Reiko led all conversation and Meilin learned that all the women were in some way or another, direct family of her and Aki. They were the current occupants of the house. After all the introductions were done they all started asking her about Earth. Apparently they knew about the existence of other worlds, but meeting someone from one was obviously uncommon. Meilin tried to answer as best as she could.

By the time the meal was done Meilin felt full and incredibly tired. The day's events had taken a toll on her and the food made her relax. After considering it for a bit she realized why she was so tired. The clocks of earth and this world hadn't been in synch. She had been awake for much longer than she usually was after being dragged magically to another world.

Aki noticed her drowsiness and turned to her mother. "Mother, I ask that we may withdraw. Meilin is very tired from the day and we should be getting to bed."

Reiko nodded knowingly. "I surprised you're not exhausted as well Aki. Summoning is not a small thing, though you have much more raw power than I do. But go ahead, permission given."

"Thank you, mother."

"Uh, thank you…."Meilin frowned at how to properly address the woman.

"The proper term you're looking for is Heika," Reiko said.

"Yes, well, thank you Heika."

"You're very welcome Meilin; just make sure to take care of my daughter from now on. Good night."

Aki led them back to her apartment and they immediately went to the bedroom. After they each used the head, Aki stripped down completely and tossed her clothes off to the side and smiled at Meilin.

"I'm tired too; I just didn't want to look like I was in front of everyone. Do you really not mind sharing the bed with me?"

Meilin answered her by first taking her own clothes off. She stood nude in front of the girl and smiled tiredly. "Which side do you want?"

Aki climbed into the low bed on the right side so Meilin did they same on the left. For a few minutes they just looked at each other. Then Meilin felt a very strange compulsion to be held by the girl. It felt like some kind of primal need for physical contact of any kind between them. Without even asking if was alright to do so, Meilin slid over and sighed in appreciation as she felt Aki's arms slip around her. It felt as if she absolutely had to sleep while in contact with the girl. So much so that it kind of frightened her.

"This is normal," Aki said softly. "Familiars often sleep with their masters. And in some cases familiars have a constant desire to have physical contact whenever they can get it. You must be such a case. Have you felt anything like this before now?"

Meilin thought about it and realized that she had felt some kind of weak unease during the few moments in the day when she hadn't been very close to Aki or been touched by her. She nodded into Aki's smooth chest and felt the rubbery nub of a nipple against her cheek. She heard Aki breathe in sharply from the light stimulation.

"Then I'll just have to make sure that I touch you a lot," Aki sounded pleased by the prospect and Meilin smiled sleepily as she went on. "I really do hope you'll enjoy being my partner Meilin. I was a bit thrown when I summoned a human girl, bit I think that I like this outcome."

Meilin hugged her own arms around Aki. In her drowsy state she idly ran her hands over her partner's body, exploring it again with her fingers. She knew by now that her connection to the girl was having a direct affect on her decision making abilities about this, but it just felt good to be like she was. Between the thick sheets and the pleasing warmth of Aki's body she didn't think she had ever felt anything so calming and relaxing. She knew intellectually that there were probably going to be moments where she would be concerned about being with Aki and in this world in general, but for now it was just so very, very nice. As long as there wasn't anything truly horrifying, she thought that she really might be happy living here.

Unfortunately only the future would reveal whether that would be true or not. For now could only enjoy cuddling with Aki as her tired mind grow more and more slow and lethargic. Eventually her exhaustion won out over her musings about her life and her heavy eyes closed. The last thing she felt before sleep took her was the light press of Aki's lips on her forehead before spoke two words as soft as she could manage and still be heard.

"Thank you."