Practical Test

See also: Delicious Dream.

A Statue in the Woods 7: Reconnection

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A little while after they got back to the house, Elise cheerfully made dinner for both of them. It was as good as the breakfast had been, although it was certainly much more "Asian" this time...or maybe specifically "Japanese". Perhaps the Kitsune had wanted to hide her country of origin initially for some reason, but figured it didn't matter now that that was out in the open?

"What'll we do tomorrow, Master?" she asked cheerfully, once they were about midway through the meal.

"Uh..well." Ty took a second to scratch the back end of one of her ears. "I kinda need to get back to work. I mean—I originally planned on getting some work done after Ronan's whole, adventure, or else today..but that, didn't really happen. I'm not really..like, in trouble yet, or anything, but I will be if I don't get a good amount of writing done tomorrow. And—I do need that job to pay for, y'know, all those clothes we bought today—besides food, bills, taxes, and..so on."

"I see.." She didn't look particularly upset by this information, just cheerfully nodding. "Well, don't worry about me—I'm perfectly capable of entertaining myself."

Ty wondered whether the fox-girl would do more damage playing more of her video games, or going outside and finding people to 'play' with. But..that wasn't really her problem, right? "That's..good. Yeah," she said kind of lamely after thinking through all of that.

Elise leaned forward slightly, seemingly inspecting the wolf-girl's face. "Is something the matter? You seem concerned," she said.
"Uh, well—it's just." This wasn't exactly what she'd been concerned about a moment ago, but it was something that had been in the back of her mind nearly all day. "I don't, really know how to feel about this situation at this point? I mean—I don't get why you want to..stay with me? Or, just suddenly decided to take me on as a 'master' and try so hard to get me to accept it—including turning into a girl for, maybe the first time? I mean, I get that you're 'grateful' I freed you, but that was basically an accident. It just seems, kinda more like you're doing all this on a whim?"

"Ah, well. There's nothing to worry about, then," she said with a small nod. "My friend...all of life is built out of whims and accidents. A young man decides on a new hobby, and enjoys it enough to keep at it—and one day he finds it has become his lifelong passion and occupation. Two people accidentally bump into each other at a party, one spilling the other's drink—and they come to enjoy each others' company enough to become companions forever afterward. It isn't all quite so positive, of course: A whim can lead to one's death, or an accident to a crippling injury, or a generations-long blood feud. But accepting that everything in this life comes down to accumulations of such small events has allowed me to live in general contentment so far. And—I find that I like this whim and accident in front of me all the more, the longer I spend with it," she said, gesturing Ty's way with one hand. "I hope you'll forgive my impertinence in saying, I think you're enjoying it just as much?"

Ty's face felt a little red after this last part, her heartbeat picking up a little bit. "Uh...y-yeah." It was pretty surreal—in a way, Elise's speech had betrayed her age, seemingly showing off some kind of wisdom from a long life of experience..but it also, somehow, made her even more attractive than before.

As they worked to put away the dishes, Elise said, "Master, do you dance?"

"Uh—well." Ty had to think about her answer for a second. "Not—I mean, I don't really know how to do..anything I think you'd recognize as 'dancing', at least."
"Oh?" she said, tilting her head a bit to show curiosity.

"Like—a lot of 'dancing' these days is just, people kind of twitching or jerking to the beat of the music. Or—some songs just give you a list of basic moves to do, like 'step to the right' or whatever."
"Ah, like square dancing?"
"A..little bit, I think? Anyway, I definitely don't know how to do like, any real dancing."

"Well then—perhaps I could teach you a little? I was able to find recordings of some of my old favorite songs, you see..and since you were kind enough to share your games with me last night...?"
"Uh, well." The expectant expression Elise had on wasn't the usual, irresistible one; Ty felt instead like she'd be rejecting a lavish gift to say no to this one. Anyway—it couldn't hurt. "Sure, I guess?"
"Very well," she nodded, looking beautifully pleased.

A little later, they stood in the living room with the coffee table moved aside to make space. Elise set her phone down on the couch, already playing some sort of classical music. "Hmmn.." She looked the wolf-girl up and down, then suddenly grew back up to her taller, 'original' form, her clothes shifting with her to still fit. "I shall lead you through a few simple steps. Please don't be nervous, now—I'd hardly expect you to be an expert at your first try." With that, she took hold of Ty's hands, and began guiding her slowly through the dance.

"...Uh—like this?"
"Yes, just so. You're doing very well!"

It probably shouldn't have been very surprising, but for as impressively good of a learner as the Kitsune was, she was also an exceptional teacher—at least, it seemed so when it came to dance. Ty seemed to have some of the basics down (at least enough to no longer step on Elise's toes) by the end of that first song and the start of the next.

"Listen a moment, this is a waltz—groups of three. One-two-three...you hear it?"
"Yeah."

"All right. I'm certain I don't have to tell you, you've only got two feet. So don't get tripped up now—"

They spent an entire hour dancing like this, but it only felt like a few minutes. Elise seemed satisfied to stop the lesson just when Ty was physically tired enough to start making clumsy mistakes. She led the way over to the couch, gracefully picking up her phone to stop the music and then setting it down out of the way on their way down.

"Well, Master~..did you enjoy yourself?"

"Uh...hfff.." She was surprised to find herself slightly out of breath, and had to take a second to catch it before she could answer. "Yeah. Definitely. But it's way more of a workout than I expected.."
"Eheheh—I thought the same thing when I was first learning. I believe the expert's trick is, as in many things, to make it look effortless."

The fox-girl grinned mischievously for a moment, seeming to wait for something. Then, just about when Ty felt she had her breath back, Elise pounced on top of her, knocking her over onto her back on the couch. "Wha—aah!"
"Heeheehee~!" Elise giggled, pulling her arms around the wolf-girl in a close hug. After that, she lowered her ears slightly, still smiling. "Well, Master—you know by now the price of keeping a fox around."

"Oh, uh.." Ty's face flushed, her tail starting to wag and her own ears going a bit lower. "Y-yeah. Not that that's really, costly or anything..." she said, the last few words trailing off into a low, quiet mumble while she reached her hands up to start rubbing the Kitsune's ears.
"Mrrrh~.." Elise churred happily and pressed her nose into Ty's cheek. She muttered: "Feeling that way is a mark of a good Master..."

---

After a fairly early breakfast (and having Elise turn her male again), Tyler went to work. The Kitsune headed outside to..probably explore the neighborhood or something, so the house was quiet and he was able to concentrate very well for a few hours.

It was somewhere close to lunchtime when the doorbell rang. He finished writing the sentence he'd been on before getting up, a part of him hoping that it was some kind of salesperson and, further, that his delay would make them give up before he got to the door. But he opened it anyway, and the visitor was still there.

"Hiya." Tyler was faced with the sight of a woman, about average-height, fit and reasonably pretty, dressed in a combination of stylish clothes and jewelry that his vague sense of fashion gained through his friendship with Ronan informed him might actually cost more than his house. She'd said this greeting with a brisk, friendly wave, and then continued: "Is, this where Shigenori is staying?"

"Uh..I don't know anyone by that name," he said.

"But you are Ronan's friend Tyler, aren't you? Allow me an introduction—" She produced a business card seemingly from her sleeve and pushed it at him. "Valencia Hammond, maiden name Tanner. Ronan works at my company, and he—or she, I guess—posted recently about accidentally 'waking up' a fox sealed in a statue."

"Uh-huh.." Glancing at the card, she wasn't kidding about it being 'her company'. It would be accurate to describe this person as, maybe, Ronan's boss's boss's boss...or maybe five or six levels higher than that. "So..you have a special interest in that fox, then?"
"I sure do. See—my parents, Azlathoth and Tezalel Tanner, would be very happy if she'd come over for supper tonight, or whenever's convenient, to catch up."

"Could I bring one more with me, then?" This was Elise's voice, coming very unexpectedly from behind Tyler, and causing him to jump and make a slight 'aack!' sound of surprise. Turning to look, he found her to have just appeared right there, leaning in past his shoulder. Valencia also jerked slightly, betraying some surprise, but managed to maintain most of her composure.
"Oh, certainly! Plus ones welcome," she said after only a brief hesitation. "Shigenori, I presume?" She put out her hand.

"Indeed." Tyler turned himself slightly sideways to make way, and Elise moved into that space to shake the offered hand. "Although I am introducing myself as 'Elise' most recently."
"Got it."

"So uh—you know this..Azla...whatever?" Tyler asked the fox-girl.

She nodded. "A couple of demons, good friends of mine from back...what must have been long ago, now. I attended their wedding, but they had no children before I was sealed."

"Yeah—me and my siblings are all adopted," Valencia said. "And we have this weird family tradition of going off to a forest on the tenth birthday to go poke some statue in a forest somewhere. Guess we'll have to come up with something else to do now though, huh?"

"I see..are we busy tonight, Master~?" Elise asked.
"Uh, I guess not. So—where, exactly..?" He trailed off, seeing that Valencia had already produced another card seemingly from her sleeve and was offering it to him. This one had a phone number and address handwritten onto it.

"Only like a half-hour's drive from here," she added. "Shall I tell them, around six PM maybe?"

"Uh..sure."

Once Valencia was gone, he shut the door. "So...'Shigenori', huh?"
The Kitsune shrugged. "A fairly common name, where I was born—but also a masculine one. I chose 'Elise' after the title of a song I'm fond of."

"Got it," he nodded. "And, how long were you here but invisible?"

Elise grinned. "Not more than half an hour; I thought it best to not disturb your work. Are you hungry for lunch, Master?"

---

"So, like...did you have any idea your company was owned by the adoptive child of two literal demons?"

"No way! That's awesome!" Rona said, over the phone. "I'm kinda jealous, too..."

"Do you really want to hang around the person who could decide to fire you if she just felt like it? Let alone her whole family?"

"Eergh, okay, maybe not, if you put it like that. Then, like, you better not make a bad impression either!"

"I'm sure we'll be fine...I mean, unless Elise goes out of her way to antagonize them or something."

The fox-girl gave Tyler a look like, I'd never do such a thing! But he figured that came with the disclaimer: '...If it wasn't funny enough.'

The doorbell rang. "..Hang on, I've gotta get the door again." Tyler stood up, setting his phone down. "I mean—unless you want to." Elise just shrugged, so he headed that way.

A fairly familiar face was waiting...that of the cashier from the day before. She was wearing an oversized shirt rather than the dress, but the face and hair were exactly the same. "Er, hello there," she said a bit nervously. "I don't suppose you've got a..sister or such? Someone with the same hair color? Or, know a redheaded young woman with, er.."
"Fox ears? Yeah." Tyler turned half-around. "Eli—oh." The Kitsune had already come up to just barely behind him, and had also shifted herself back to the smaller form so the cashier could more easily recognize her. "This is who you meant?"
"Yes," she said.

"It's just that, err..how do I put this?" It had to be a little more awkward to explain this to Tyler, who as far as she knew 'hadn't been there', but she pressed on: "'Fore yesterday, I was an old man, and all of a sudden I'm looking like this? And after reviewin' some security footage and thinking about the evidence, it seems like you" (she was saying this to Elise) "or one of your two friends who were there must've been responsible? 'Specially since you said somethin' about a reward..."
"How ever did you find this house?" the fox-girl asked, and Tyler immediately realized that he probably should've had the same question.

"Well, that's eh—let's say, the store's owner was keen to help me out once I explained the unusual situation and all..."
"Surely nothing illegal was involved, was it?" Elise continued in a kind of innocent tone of voice..but Tyler could tell she was just teasing her.

"Errm."

"Uh, that aside," Tyler said quickly. "If that did happen, you...want to be turned back or something?"
"Well. Er. N-not necessarily. That is, I'm awful grateful to get to be young again, it's just that this has made things awful strange with my wife..."
Those last two words made Tyler's ears jump upright. From what the old man had said that day, he'd assumed he was single, or at least a widower..but apparently not. So that did make things really awkward, when neither of them was, say, a magical Kitsune with the power to shift them back and forth at will.

"Okay, yeah," he nodded after that, and turned toward the fox-girl. "Elise."
"Yyyes?" she said with a winning smile.
"As your 'Master', I'd like you to fix this. Do what you need to to make her and the wife actually happy with the results. You wanted to reward him yesterday, not punish him, right?"
"True enough. All right then~," she said, looking very pleased. Maybe just at him claiming or using the title of 'Master' himself for once. "Could you bring me to meet with this wife of yours, perhaps~?" she suggested, moving past Tyler to speak to the short, young girl.

"I, suppose so," she said, seeming fairly surprised by how quickly the decision to 'fix' things for her had been made.

After they left and Tyler shut the door, he took a deep breath and let it out. This would probably take at least an hour, so...he could get the rest of his work done undisturbed. Once he finished talking with Rona on the phone, at least.

Elise showed up again with still an hour to go before they'd need to leave and meet her demon friends. She didn't really seem to need a key, or even to open the door apparently—she simply walked into Tyler's office-slash-bedroom and said, "I'm back, Master~!"
"Uh, great. So, you fixed things? Everyone's happy?"
"They are indeed! That young woman's husband couldn't be more pleased," she said with a big grin. For her to put it that way...well, Tyler could've guessed she'd offer to solve the problem like that. But, as long as they were happy with it...