Kingdom Hearts fic: All Strange Wonders - Chapter 6

[mistressofmuses]

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Riku may not have noticed Sora’s dismay, but Kairi did.

“What is it?”

“She’s my—”

The curse cut the words off, tightening around his throat and stealing every bit of breath he’d had in his lungs. He fell to his knees, clawing at his throat, but of course there was nothing there. Nothing he could touch or loosen, anyway.

Then it let him go, air rushing back down his throat hard enough to burn. He coughed, his lungs aching as he sucked air back in.

“I”—he licked dry lips—“I knew her.” The curse’s fingers were still at his throat, ready to squeeze, but it seemed to accept that as a compromise.

Kairi had pushed her way forward to the edge of the hearth, flame-fingers gripping the edge, looking more solid than usual. She let out a sigh of her own, a crackling whoosh of relief.

Sora pushed his way back to his feet. “I have to warn her! About Riku. I can’t let her heart get broken.”

Xion was a smart girl, and while she made friends easily enough, she guarded herself emotionally. If Riku charmed her and then left, she’d be so hurt…

He was halfway to the door before he realized he didn’t know where Xion was. All he knew was that she’d set herself up as a witch’s apprentice in the middle of nowhere. Even if he raced off, figured out where Riku had gone, somehow managed to beat him to her… she still wouldn’t know him. He’d be a stranger to her, and there was nothing he could do.

He almost fell to his knees again, under the weight of the curse reasserting itself. Sometimes he almost forgot about it, but now…

“Please come over here,” Kairi said, gentle voice breaking through his spiraling thoughts.

Sora numbly obeyed, falling into the padded chair in front of her. It may have been his imagination, but it felt like she grew a few degrees warmer. It was comforting despite his misery, like being wrapped in a blanket, or a hug.

Kairi began to hum something. It was an odd sound from a fire, a sort of hollow resonance, combined with a human voice.

“You could read one of the books,” she suggested a bit later, once his breathing was no longer ragged, and he felt nearly calm. He was a little embarrassed, but mostly touched to realize that she was trying to comfort him. The warmth, the calming singing, now offering a distraction.

He sat up a bit, swiping at his eyes, where tears hadn’t quite overflowed. “But none of the books here have the details of your contract, do they?”

“Well, probably not. But maybe there will be something useful in one of them. Or at least interesting.”

Sora shrugged, and crossed over to the bookshelf. It seemed to have grown a couple more shelves than it had the last time he’d really looked at it, and several of the tomes he’d stacked off to the side now had homes on the shelf.

The feeling that evoked was strange, knowing that Riku had somehow decided to participate in the cleaning up of the castle, which he’d seemed so aloof from.

Sora swept his finger down the spines of the books closest to eye level. Magical Properties of Fungi Vol. III, The Harmonic Potential, The Atlas of All… none of them exactly sounded like an entertaining, light read. Halfway across, one of the leather-bound, but modestly sized volumes caught his eye. The Power of Wishing.

It sounded a little… childish, maybe. But Sora had an awful lot of wishes he felt like he could make right now.

He curled up in the chair with the book, trying desperately not to think about Xion, or how she could even now be getting closer to Riku, not realizing that he was going to leave as soon as she started to care…

“Hmm… That could be a good one,” Kairi said, cocking her head.

“You think so?”

“Wishing used to be my expertise.”

That was kind of a cryptic statement. Though he was almost more surprised that she could apparently read the title. Not that he thought she shouldn’t be able to read, or wasn’t smart enough. Just that it didn’t seem like something a fire would be able to do. Even if she could read a book, it wasn’t like she could hold it.

“Do you want me to read it aloud?” he offered tentatively. Reading aloud might be a better distraction for him, anyway. And since she couldn’t touch a book herself…

“I’d like that.” She sounded almost shy.

He opened the heavy cover. “For as long as there have been people, there have been wishes, for who has not looked at their life and longed for something different?” he read. His throat started to feel tight, and he almost wondered why the curse wouldn’t want him to read. Then he recognized it as ordinary tears. He pushed through.

“We live in a world of magic, of things beyond ordinary human ability. Sometimes, this leads to humans finding things that could grant them the wishes they so desperately long for.”

For a little while Sora thought the book might yield something after all, as it started discussing people who’d encountered inhuman spirits of some sort and tried to get them to grant wishes for them. That seemed at least kind of similar to a sorcerer making a contract with a fire spirit, or a demon, or whatever Kairi was.

Unfortunately, that was where most of the similarity ended. None of the spirits in question ended up making contracts with people. The wishing and granting was a transaction, not some ongoing deal.

Some of the stories were completely positive: humans who rescued fairies or spirits, and were granted wishes as reward. More seemed to be cautionary tales, of people trying to trap creatures and force them to grant their desires, which invariably ended poorly for the selfish people. A few were about malevolent spirits that delighted in twisting wishes into something harmful, granting them only in the most corrupted of ways.

Sora got up after a couple of chapters to eat something, but then returned to reading. It wasn’t exactly what he’d been hoping for, but it was interesting, and it was nice to have something to focus on. Plus, Kairi seemed happy to listen.

He’d made it through about a quarter of the book when his eyes started to feel heavy. Sitting by Kairi was warm, and Sora hardly even noticed when he trailed off and his head began to droop.

---

“I hope you weren’t waiting up for me,” Riku said.

Sora blinked himself awake. Morning sunlight was coming through the kitchen window that looked out on Traverse Town. A blanket fell from his shoulders into his lap as he sat up. He was still in the chair instead of his bed, and he didn’t remember falling asleep.

“No, I wasn’t,” he answered. Both because it was truthful, and because he’d hate it if Riku thought he had been waiting up.

“Good. I was back late. And we have plenty to do today, so get up and get ready.”

“Where are we going?” Sora asked through a yawn.

“Does it matter? You’re my assistant.”

“You haven’t brought me with you before.”

“If you must know, I have business with a witch today. I promised her that I would be there, and that you would be with me. Now do whatever you need to get ready.”

“To go where?”

“The middle of nowhere.” With that, Riku headed into the bathroom.

So no real hurry, then, Sora thought, rolling his eyes at the closed door. “How long do you think he’ll be in there this morning?” “At least an hour, if he follows the recent pattern.” Kairi spat a tiny shower of sparks.

Sora made a noise of agreement. He grabbed an apple from the kitchen, and ate it slowly.

He’d heard of a witch who lived in the middle of nowhere, since according to Roxas, that was who Xion had decided to stay on as an apprentice with. If he’d had some vain, impossible hope that Riku was courting a different Xion, that killed it.

He’d only eaten about a third of the apple, but had already lost his appetite for it.

“Hey Kairi, are you hungry?”

“You aren’t?”

He shrugged and tossed her the remainder of the apple, core and all. As usual, it was burned to ash before it would have hit the ground. A flicker of flame gave the impression that Kairi was licking her lips, and Sora smiled despite himself.

He was here because he’d run away from home, terrified by the prospect of seeing Roxas or his mother. Xion had been the one member of his family he hadn’t worried about running into.

It was probably too late to pretend he was sick, like a kid trying to get out of a test at school.

But, he reasoned with himself, just yesterday you were ready to rush off to try and save her from Riku. Now at least you’ll know where she is. Even if she doesn’t know you, maybe you can warn her.

Or maybe this isn’t the same witch after all. And a different Xion! There could be more than one, right?

Those two thoughts were what he consoled himself with while he waited for Riku to come out of the bathroom. Kairi was right: it had been almost an hour.

“All right,” Riku said. “And now you get to see what those speed spells you’ve helped me with are good for.”

Riku took four of the packets from their dish on the counter and then gestured for Sora to follow him out the door with the dial green-down.

Sora shouldered his bag, just in case, and waved to Kairi before the door closed. She’d slowed the castle down enough that the step from the stairs at the castle door to the ground below was barely jarring at all.

“I guess that answers how we’re making it to the middle of nowhere, when we’re getting such a late start.”

“If certain assistants hadn’t slept in…” Riku grumbled.

Sora did not point out that he’d just been waiting for an hour for Riku to finish fixing his hair, or whatever he’d been doing in the bathroom. There was still that one deliberate pinkish streak in the silver, so apparently he’d decided it wasn’t an utter crisis after all.

“Now, take a packet”—Riku handed him one—“and carefully tear it open. A corner is best.”

Sora did as he was told, tearing the smallest bit of the paper off that he could.

“Now you sprinkle a bit of the powder on the front of your shoes. Carefully,” he emphasized again. “Make sure you don’t accidentally take a step while you’re leaning over to do this part. No clue where you might end up.”

Sora swallowed hard, and then carefully poured the glittering silver dust onto his shoes. Riku did the same next to him.

Riku held out a hand. Sora cautiously reached out to take it. Riku gently grasped his hand, and then tucked it along his arm as if he were escorting Sora out for a pleasant stroll somewhere.

Sora hoped his face wasn’t as red as he thought it might be. If Riku was this effortlessly charming with someone he wasn’t even trying to interest, no wonder he left a trail of broken hearts behind him.

“Keep hold for a moment. Don’t want to get separated.”

Sora nodded. Then Riku took a step forward, so Sora did too, and…

Whoosh.

It was like he’d suddenly run for miles in the course of that single step. Everything around them practically flew past in a blur of colors and sounds.

Now they were in a completely different part of the hills, in a lower part of the valley, near a pleasant lake.

Another step, and they were at the other end of that same valley, into a field of knee-high wildflowers.

A third step brought them to a small wooded area that Sora thought he might have glimpsed from the field, but their next step had taken them through it entirely, to a hill overlooking a patchwork of unfamiliar farms.

One more step, and they were in another open plain of grasses and spring wildflowers, past the farms. Each step so far had seemed just a bit slower than the last, like they were going a half-mile now instead of several miles in an instant.

“Good,” Riku said. “Just another couple should do it.”

Another step took them just across that stretch of the plain, and another up onto a hill. In the distance, Sora could see a pleasant-looking cottage, and with one more step they were at the bottom of a path up to that very cottage.

“Just about perfect,” said Riku. “Though sometimes you’ll have a few more steps that don’t land just the way you want them to.”

Riku dropped Sora’s arm, and he tried not to feel a bit lost without the contact. He saw what Riku had meant as he took what he expected to be a normal step, and instead wound up a yard away, nearly falling on his face.

Riku was more graceful about it, taking a couple careful steps that zipped him a few feet one way and then the other, wearing the spell off.

“Better?” Riku asked.

Sora nodded, and followed Riku up the path to the house. The cottage was at the top of a small hill, and the entire pathway was surrounded by flowers. It was early in the season, just into mid-spring, but the garden was already the kind Sora had always liked best: the kind that seemed just a little overgrown, with flowers covering every inch of space. In between early-blooming roses and a stand of something tall and blue, he spotted one of the wire and glass sculptures he’d made and sold back at Key and Blade. It was a slight jab of nostalgia, but he was glad it was somewhere it could be appreciated.

The hum of bees accompanied them the whole way up the walk. Sora thought it seemed perfect, and if this was where Xion had decided to stay, he could certainly understand why.

Riku swept a hand over his hair, which hadn’t been disturbed at all on the trip, and then knocked at the door.

The journey using the speed spell had been a wonderful distraction, but now all of Sora’s nerves were bubbling back up. He was suddenly worried about making his new first impression on Xion by throwing up in the beautiful garden. He didn’t know how to pretend not to know her.

The door opened, and Sora bit his lip until it bled.

The woman at the door was not Xion. She was a pretty blonde, dressed in a white sundress.

“Hello, Riku,” she said. Her voice was warm and welcoming.

“Naminé.” Riku took her hand and bowed over it, placing a gentle kiss to her knuckles. “You are as lovely as yesterday, and as every day before and to come.”

“And you’re as overbearingly charming as ever,” she answered with a laugh. “But I recall that you’d promised to visit today. Ah, this must be your assistant?” She looked past Riku to Sora.

“Indeed he is. If I were to inquire after yours?”

One side of Naminé’s mouth quirked up. “Xion is in the back garden.”

Sora’s heart skipped a beat in his chest at the name. He thought he’d prepared himself, but…

“Well, I will go pay her a visit. And I’ll leave my assistant to you,” Riku said with another bow. He stepped down the winding garden path that led around the house.

Sora turned to follow him, regardless of what he’d said, but Naminé placed a gentle hand on his arm. “Please, come inside with me.”

Sora wanted desperately to do so, to not have to see Xion. Though he also wanted desperately to pull away and run after Riku to see his sister. The moment of hesitation helped Naminé to make that decision for him, as she used her surprisingly strong hand to steer him back toward the door.

“Let’s sit in the kitchen. It’s lovely this time of day,” she said.

Sora followed her. It was a beautiful room, wide and sunny, with big windows open onto even more flower gardens. The bees hovering around the blooming vines at the window provided a soothing background hum. He took a deep breath of the perfumed air, trying to calm himself down further.

Naminé gestured for him to sit at the table, while she went to the cabinets along one wall and started rummaging.

What Sora could see of the rest of the little cottage was similarly idyllic. There were paintings on the walls, and he could see an open sketchbook on a small table in the sitting room. He wondered if Naminé was an artist. She wasn’t really what he’d expected of a witch. She didn’t seem much older than Xion, honestly.

Naminé set a plate of cookies and a pair of cups and saucers on the table. She poured Sora a cup of tea, then scooted the plate a bit closer to him, before sitting down and pouring for herself.

The china was so delicate Sora was afraid he’d break it just by picking it up, but he took a careful sip. It was a lovely, floral blend of some sort. Lavender, maybe? Though with something more herbal underneath, possibly rosemary? It was already sweetened with honey, though Sora briefly thought how it wouldn’t meet Riku’s standards for sweet.

Sora didn’t often drink tea, but it was nice enough. He knew some people drank tea to help calm themselves down, and he hoped maybe it would work for him.

“So, you’re Riku’s assistant,” she said. “Tell me a bit about yourself.”

“I don’t think there’s much to say, really.”

“Really? Not even a name?”

“I… no,” he said. The curse tightened its grip on his throat. He tried to take another sip of tea, but found he couldn’t swallow. It wasn’t cutting off his air yet, but was certainly warning him not to say more.

Naminé didn’t push, but just hummed in reply.

Finally he forced the tea down, and hurriedly changed the subject. “And anyway, I haven’t been Riku’s assistant for long. Less than two weeks, really.” It startled him to realize it had been such a short amount of time.

“And before that? Have you always had an aptitude for magic?”

“Before that, I was just a-” he hesitated, unsure what the curse would let him get away with. “A shop attendant,” he settled on. “I don’t think I have an aptitude for magic at all, really. I just help Riku with his, sometimes. I’m not doing any of it.”

She took a slow sip of her tea. “You might be surprised. Did you have a magically-inclined parent? An aunt or uncle? Grandparent? It often runs in families.”

He shook his head. Xion was the only magically talented one in the family at all, and there was no way he’d be allowed to say that.

“Should I call you something besides ‘Riku’s assistant’?”

“It doesn’t matter. I answer to that, these days.” The words sounded bitter, even to him, and he was a bit dismayed at how much he liked getting to channel that bitterness into them. It was almost like he was getting one over on the curse, though clearly he wasn’t.

“All right. Riku has mentioned you before. He said he thinks you’re from Twilight Town?”

Sora nodded before he thought better of it. The curse didn’t punish him for it. He supposed there was no real harm in someone knowing where he was from; if anything, it was just another little twist of the metaphorical knife. People could know where he was from, because he’d been rendered so unimportant that his life had made no impression on anyone there.

“Twilight Town is a lovely town.” Naminé sighed happily. “I don’t visit it often, but it’s always been a very nice place when I have. Do you have family there?”

Sora took another sip of tea. He had a feeling, from the tightness in his throat, he wasn’t allowed to answer that one. Or maybe he just didn’t want to.

Naminé laughed, though not unkindly. “Please forgive me for prying so much! Apparently I just can’t help myself when I have visitors. Please, have a cookie.”

She pushed the plate a couple inches closer, and he took one. It was delicious, crumbly and buttery, and tasting like lemon, honey, and rosemary again. He wondered if he should ask her to share her rosemary with Riku—he’d never found it off of the list of ingredients to fetch.

“I hope you like them,” she said. “I suppose I should have asked to be sure you like honey; I keep bees, so honey finds its way into most of my recipes. And my spells.”

“They’re very good,” he answered honestly. “I heard the bees in the garden while we were coming up. The flowers are all beautiful.”

“Aren’t they? They look better than ever this year, I think. Maybe having an apprentice agrees with them, too.”

That was as good a conversational opening as any. “About your apprentice…”

“Xion? She’s wonderful.”

“She is!” Sora agreed, before considering that might sound too familiar. “But that’s part of why I wanted to talk to her. Or to you about her.” He was uncomfortably aware that he was babbling. “I want to warn her about Riku.”

Naminé’s eyes widened. “Warn her?”

“Riku is charming, completely. But he’s heartless! I know he’s been coming here to see her, and I don’t want her to get hurt.”

“That’s… quite something to say about your employer. But I don’t think Riku has any intention of hurting my apprentice.” Naminé set her teacup down with a little clink.

“Maybe not on purpose, but he still will.” Sora thought back to what Kairi had said. “It isn’t because he wants to hurt anyone, but it’s the way he is. He isn’t able to give his heart to anyone, and that means he pulls away as soon as someone starts to get close. He loses interest in them, and leaves them heartbroken.”

“I appreciate the warning,” Naminé said. “But I don’t think you or I have any reason to worry about Xion.”

Sora bit his tongue. He wanted to snap something about how yes, he knew Xion was special and smart and careful, but that didn’t make her immune to heartbreak, and he didn’t want that for her.

“I mean it,” Naminé said. “I really do appreciate that you want to keep Xion safe. I understand, because I will always want what’s best for her, too. If I thought Riku presented any threat to her, or if she was in any danger from him, I would step in. But I assure you, she’s the only one who chooses where her heart goes, and it isn’t at risk from him.”

Sora hoped Naminé was right about that, though he had his doubts. He almost asked if he could talk to Xion directly, but he lost his nerve before the words made it out. He shifted uncomfortably in his seat, eyes wandering around the kitchen.

They settled on a small, familiar, sheathed knife on the counter. It wasn’t a kitchen knife. “Is that Xion’s?” he asked. There was no reason he should have known that as a stranger, but the curse didn’t even stir.

Naminé raised an eyebrow. “Think she should use it to keep Riku at bay?”

Sora felt his cheeks heat a bit. Maybe that had been a strange thing to focus on, given the subject of conversation. “No, I didn’t mean it like that.”

“It is hers,” Naminé confirmed. “A gift from her brother,”—

Sora’s heart leapt almost painfully.

—“Roxas.”

And it plummeted back down. Of course. Xion still had a brother. It just wasn’t him.

Naminé didn’t seem to notice, as she continued, “He doesn’t visit much, but every once in a while he has the chance to. You might have met him, if you’re from Twilight Town. Xion too, actually.”

“Maybe,” he said. The delicious cookie was sitting like a rock in his stomach, and his mouth was dry despite the tea.

“Do you want to see her?”

“Xion?” Yes. No. “I probably shouldn’t. She doesn’t know me.”

Naminé’s lips pressed into a thin line, but her bright blue eyes were unreadable. “If you go to the kitchen window and look to the left, you can see the garden where she and Riku are likely talking.”

Sora swallowed against his still-dry throat. Then he got up and went to the window.

Riku and Xion were sitting together on a garden bench, underneath an apple tree in full bloom. Riku was turned toward her, one hand resting where it just brushed her leg. He was saying something to her, bent close. The sweet-smelling flowers framing the window rustled slightly in the breeze, but it wasn’t enough to carry his words.

Worse than Riku’s attention was Xion’s. She was tilted toward him, too, her attention completely focused on him, even as flower petals rained down and lodged in her hair. Together, they were the picture of a devoted couple, totally lost in each other for the moment.

It was still good to see her. She looked happy, even beyond the way she was looking at Riku. Sora was relieved at that, that she was as happy as Roxas had said. Unfortunately, he was more afraid than ever that she was going to have her heart broken by Riku.

When Riku stood up, then offered her his hands to help her up as well, Sora stepped back from the window. He didn’t want either of them to see him.

“I think we’re about to leave,” Sora said.

“All right. I’ll walk you to the door,” Naminé said.

As they left the kitchen, she said again, “Please don’t worry about Xion. I promise you, her heart is perfectly safe.”

“I hope so.” He tried to smile, but felt it fail.

Their timing was good, and they reached the door at almost the same instant as Riku, coming around the house. Xion wasn’t with him.

“Ah, ready to go back?” Riku asked. “I’m sure Kairi is waiting.”

“Sure,” Sora said with a nod. Turning back to Naminé he added, “Thank you so much for the tea. And the cookies. It was very nice to meet you.”

“Any time.” Her smile was soft and sweet, and made him feel even worse that he couldn’t give her a convincing one in return. “Please, take a jar of honey with you. I have more than I’ll ever need.”

The jar she handed him matched the one from Riku’s kitchen, with the label of small white flowers. He hadn’t noticed it before, but they appeared to be hand-drawn.

As Sora turned to head back down the hill, Riku stopped and exchanged a look with Naminé.

“About that issue of yours? I did try,” she said. “But it’s just not that type of spell. A memory charm isn’t going to help, because that’s not what the spell is targeting. I’m sorry.”

Riku nodded. “I appreciate it. I’m sure I’ll be back before you miss me.”

“Of course you will.” She laughed, a lovely, musical sound, and then pressed a jar of honey into his hands as well.

When Riku joined him back on the road at the base of the hill, Sora said, “What spell was she working on for you?”

Riku didn’t quite meet his eyes when he answered, “I told you I had business with her, and not just with her lovely apprentice. But it doesn’t matter. She was trying to help me with something, but I don’t think I presented the problem correctly. I’ll have another go at it at some point.”

Riku handed him another of the speed spell packets. “For now, let’s head back to the castle. Remember how we did it before?”

Sora did, and didn’t mind the change of topic. As beautiful as this place was, he’d had enough of it. He was ready to go home, and with a painful twinge, he realized the castle was the closest thing he had.

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