As the doe-eared Nimah heads back towards the tent, she hears Miyuki's voice call out for her, then she comes from around one of the buildings, approaching. The human-form fox then stops, blinks, then inquires, "Okay, what did you do to my brother to warrant those?" That question comes with a slight gesture towards her head. "Or did you ask him for those? I do not know what you foreigners do in your free time."
"He.. I was.." Niamh stumbles. "I don't know why he does what he does! They keep moving on their own too. This isn't at all like when I was a deer.. Oh, why are you calling for me?"
"Well, did you tell him not to do that?" Miyuki inquires and leans in. Even as a human, she manages to twitch her nose a little. "You don't smell like a doe, at least," she adds. "Now, as for why ... because it has been summarily decreed by the emissaries of the shrine that if you are staying here that you will be helping out. Tonight, you have been assigned to help cook dinner. You are also expected to inspect and examine everything there for spirits. Consider it practice."
"Spirits? In.. the food?" Niamh asks, and tries to tuck her ears under her hair, which just gets her hair more tousled. "Can you do anything about these ears?"
"I can make them longer," Miyuki offers. "Or ... oh, right, pierce them for some rings and decoration?"
"And spirits are in everything. You are so much the newborn cub," Miyuki remarks.
"You are enjoying this, aren't you?" Niamh asks, looking beaten. "Just admit it. I'm probably going to wake with a tail or something. And.. I'm used to nature spirits, not.. everything spirits. But I'll try. Down to the basement?"
Miyuki puts her hand to her chest. "I would never be so uncouth as to take pleasure in the torments of a human," she claims, and even with a completely straight face. "And yes, the basement. I believe the old lady, Akari, will be there. I should warn, she does not speak your tongue, but she does use a large spoon."
"And.. I'm not allowed to 'cheat' in order to talk to her, am I?" Niamh asks.
"That is between you and her," Miyuki says and even shrugs slightly. She pauses a moment, then gives Nimah an odd sidelong glance with her left eye. "Are you truly so unhappy here? Having no fun at all?", she asks, then explains, "Your ears are drooping."
"Fun? I.. haven't had the chance?" Niamh offers. Fun! She's supposed to be learning how to deal with evil spirits. Foxes.
"You have had plenty of chances. So short-lived and yet humans still cannot find joy. It is both astounding and sad," Miyuki laments. "I feel for you."
"I haven't really had a chance to relax you know," Niamh points out as she heads for the kitchen stairs. "If you were on the other side of the world from everything you knew, would you do better?"
"Of course," Miyuki claims and somewhat puffs up as she follows. "The only person preventing you from relaxing is you, you realize. You want to fight everything."
"Everything here has tried to eat me, or seems determined to confuse and tease," Niamh pouts. "The cherry trees at the shrine were nice, even if they did think I was a nymph."
"Everything? I have not, and nor has Noboru, well, the eating part," Miyuki notes. "And we are part of everything. The problem is you see everything as conflict, instead of what just is and going with the flow of the world. It is probably why humans are always so unhappy; they focus on what they cannot do instead of simply enjoying what they can and what is. When was the last time you simply sat and watched a storm?"
"There was a storm in the Indian Ocean," Niamh says. "It wasn't as nice as ones on dry land. I thought the ship was going to sink." She pauses at the top of the stairs, and tries to listen to what Akari might be doing.. if her ears will do what she wants anyway.
There's some clattering, but not much else. Also, it feels weird when sound seems so much more directional. "Hmm, you need ear lessons," Miyuki remarks. "And there you go, again. The ship will sink. I will fail. Why are you so pessimistic? You're amongst Gods and great spirits like me. How can you not be happy and excited?"
"Well, the spirits I need to deal with are angry and powerful," Niamh says, and just grabs her ears. "Is Akari a nice old lady?"
"Well ... " Miyuki waffles a little, "That rather depends on your definition of nice. What would you consider nice?"
"Not throwing things at me because I'm a foreigner.. with doe ears?" Niamh suggests. "Or shouting. I'm.. not sure I could handle shouting."
"The former I can promise. The latter ... not so much," Miyuki admits. "It is a peculiar thing with the island humans, as the women age, they get smaller, and yet somehow stronger and, well, grumpy."
"And she doesn't have any grudges against deer?" Niamh asks. "Or red hair?"
"I'm sure she has forgotten all about the time ... " Miyuki starts to say, then they reach the door. "Ah, here we are. Well, I'll leave you to it. I'm sure the trees ... need dusting." The young kitsune then starts backing away, quickly.
"Oh sure, relax, have fun, get scalded by a tiny angry grandma," Niamh says, then takes a deep breath to try and calm herself before opening the door and entering the kitchen.
Tiny was putting it mildly. If the woman is more than four-foot tall, Nimah would be surprised. She's also thin, and it looks like a stiff wind could blow her away. The woman turns, and that's when Nimah can see her craggy face beneath her bun of snow-white air. Her eyes are dark, and smolder with what seems like all the anger in the world condensed into two small marbles. And before Niamh can blink, the little woman waves at her in a rather animated fashion with a spoon almost as long as she is tall ... and starts saying stuff very rapidly.
Niamh can only stand very still and smile like an idiot (without showing her teeth of course), and hope that her ears aren't making rude gestures. So, thinking about what she, as a cook, would be concerned about most by a stranger intruding on her domain, she holds her hands out to show that they're clean.
The old woman makes a loud huffing sound. She points the spoon at Niamh, then a large bad of rice, then a bowl of water. There was also the matter that Niamh was supposed to check for spirits too, while not raising the ire of an old woman.
Looking at the rice, the girl wonders if she's supposed to wash it. She goes over to the bed of rice and.. wonders how to check it for spirits without upsetting the old woman. It's probably not good to get ectoplasm in the food. So she just sort of angles herself so her hands are hidden, and tries to get a wisp of ectoplasm from the tip of her right index finger to see if anything comes to investigate. All of the spirits in this land seem to be hungry, after all.
Apparently Niamh is either taking too long, or the old woman doesn't like what she's doing ... because her rump is smacked with the spoon. Wow, those things can hurt. More chattering and gesturing follows, then she goes over to a side board and starts cutting up vegetables with a cleaver in her hand that looks more like a battle-axe given the size difference.
"I don't know what you want me to do," Niamh finally risks saying. She's pretty sure doing a language read from the woman will get her chopped and thrown into a pot.. and she hasn't had the best experiences using it on old people.
She also reaches to rub her rear, but figures that would just get her another reprimand for getting her hands dirty or something.
Bam! The old woman sinks the blade an inch into the tabletop and turns around. Her eyes are the very definition of murder as she comes over. Up close, the top of the old woman's head is just under Niamh's bosom.
Niamh reflexively pulls her hands to her chest, fearing for her fingers, and looks genuinely terrified. "I'm sorry!" she blurts. "It's still my third day in your country."
The old woman sucks in a breath, then lets it out slowly. Then this tiny ball of terror does something unexpected, she reaches up and pats Niamh's hands. "Watashi wa anata ga kitsuneda to omotta," she says, her voice surprisingly soft for one who looks like they could split a boulder with their forehead. And then she takes Niamh's hands, and actually places them in the water, and makes rolling gestures with them, then nods towards the rice.
"Ah, I think I see," Niamh says, and tries rolling the rice into balls with wet hands. She isn't sure how big to make them, however.
The old woman waves her hand a little, then dips her hands back in the water and guides Niamh a bit more. It seems that yes, she did just want her to wash the rice.
"Ah," Niamh says, and smiles. She didn't know you had to wash rice. But then she's not very familiar with rice. While she gets into the groove of the process, she remembers that she's supposed to be looking for spirits. I can't just try to lure them to me, she realizes. If it were that easy, Miyuki wouldn't have told her to do it. So.. she needs to feel them out. But she's never done one of her 'feel them out' pulses when another person was in the room with her. Akari shouldn't be able to feel anything though. Niamh frowns in concentration. Maybe there's some other way? She can move ectoplasm around inside of her body, so what if she tried coating her eyes in it? Either it will do something unexpected.. or make her need to wipe her eyes. But she needs to experiment, so tries it.
It feels .... icky, somehow. It's like stuff is there and not there, and makes her eyes seem blurry and unfocused. The rice she's currently working on doesn't look any different, other than a little blurry ... but the broom in the corner, however, looks funky. It's giving her 'the eye'. Seriously; it seems to have a single eye and is staring at her.
So Niamh squints right back at the broom. She's never seen one with an eye before. She then says, "There's something wrong with your broom." She turns to look at Akari then.. and checks to see if her spoon is also possessed.
"Nani?" Akari asks and turns to look at her. She looks pretty much the same, small, and sort of like a raisin. Her spoon also looks pretty normal, too.
"Sorry," Niamh says, and just smiles and shakes her head as she goes back to washing the rice. This method of spirit spotting definitely has drawbacks.. such as having to be close enough to spot one before everything becomes a blur. Miyuki didn't tell her to do anything after spotting the spirit though. It's in a broom. Maybe it's supposed to keep the floors clean, and is harmless.
So she just looks around the rest of the kitchen as best she can before she has to clear her eyes.
The old woman peers at her now, then mutters something. Niamh's probably used to that. The old woman shrugs it off, then gestures at Niamh with her spoon, and to some bamboo basket-think sitting nearby.
Niamh is still a bit squinty, but she fetches the.. basket? "Do I put the rice in this?" she asks, gesturing from the rice to the woven item.
The old woman sighs a little, and nods. She might think Niamh is either a really big child, or slow...
Unsure of how to do this while holding onto the basket (or flat woven bowl, she isn't sure), Niamh tries to find a clear space to set it while she deals with the rice.
Niamh finds some papery material that seems strong to put the rice on. That seems to hold fine, and might make it possible to transfer it into the basket.
The girl is careful not to spill any. She also wonders if she's too tall for Akari to see that she has deer-ears. She tries blinking a lot to clear her eyes.
Her eyes clear pretty quickly and she manages to get the rice into the basket easily. "Wow, if I knew Akari could make you behave like a woman, I would have brought you here myself," comes the unfortunately now familiar voice of Noboru from the doorway.
"The broom is looking at me funny," Niamh tells Noboru, and finally picks up the basket before turning back toward Akari for the next instruction.
"The Hahakigami? Pay it no mind. It's a bit stiff, for a yokai," Noboru notes, and then it hits Niamh that's he's back in his mostly human form, tall, with fluffy white ears, and four flowing white tails. He's also dressed quite well in a silk robe of black and purple cranes. Akari, meanwhile, actually glares at Noboru for distracting Niamh and then waves her spoon at the basket, then towards the stove, and what might be a clay pot of water.
Niamh looks to see if the water is boiling before trying to dump the rice into it. Maybe after washing, it just needs a bath? "I didn't try to do anything to it," she claims to Noboru. "Miyuki just asked me to look for spirits in here."
Akari sighs, and marches over. She takes the basket from Niamh and sets it over the starting to simmer pot of water, without dumping it in. She also turns to Noboru and waves her spoon at him. "Noboru, ningen o nayamasu koto o yamete!" she chides, then sweep-waves the spoon several times. "Yakkaina kitsune o hanare nasai," she says. This makes Noboru's eyes actually go wide and all four of his tails to puff. He bows and quickly departs, leaving Niamh with the old woman. She just gives Niamh a look, and mutters, "Kitsune, ni?"
The girl reaches up to her new ears, and nods.
"Kare wa shinpaishinaidekudasai, kare wa chodo toraburumekadesu," Akari says and actually rolls her eyes. Steam starts rolling up and through the bamboo basket near Niamh.
Niamh watches the basket. Or the rather the steam, just in case it takes on any suspicious shapes. If there were other spirits in here, the broom would have let her know, wouldn't it?
The old woman goes into a container, then hefts out a really big hunk of fish. Tuna, probably? It looks almost as big as her. She heaves it onto a nearby counter and goes to work on it with what seems some disturbingly sharp knives as she cuts it apart into squares of fish, all somehow almost exactly the same size.
"Do you need me to do anything else?" Niamh asks. She also thinks to look up at the ceiling and into the corners to see if there's anything moving. She's not going to blur her vision again if she doesn't have to.. and the local spirits don't seem all that shy about showing themselves at times.
The old woman waves her hand dismissively over her shoulder. As for the room, so far the rest of the room seems disappointingly normal.
So Niamh moves away from the stove and loiters near the doorway, and the broom. She looks at it again to see if she can still see the eye.
She can still see the eye. And now it has a tongue, too, and it is wagging it at her. Other than the bubbling sounds of the rice steaming, and the scary old woman dissecting a fish like a surgeon, the place seems a lot like a tomb.
"Is there something about me in particular that brings out the tongues?" Niamh whispers to the broom. "Or do you do this to Miyuki too?"
Just because things have tongues doesn't mean they can speak. Mostly, it just stares at her and waggles its tongue.
Now Niamh wonders what Akari said to Noboru. It was nice to see him get yelled out by someone and actually seem chagrined. She looks back up the stairs to see if he's still lurking.
Noboru is nowhere to be found. Not that it means he's not there; he could be hiding, invisible, pretending to be something else and so on.
"Hmm," Niamh mutters, and moves up the stairs to check the hall.
The hall is empty too. The silence is deafening, as the saying goes.
"Noboru?" Niamh calls. "Miyuki?" Did they just abandon her with a lewd broom and the cook.
There's no response, so ... maybe? Niamh was just pouting about how they were treating her ... and now she's missing them already?
So she goes back to the kitchen to see if Akari has anything more for her to do. Unless the food is nearly done. "Is she going to cook the fish?" she wonders to the broom.
"Pththththbt," goes the broom in reply. Akari is now checking the rice. At least she's poking it with a smaller spoon. She doesn't look happy. But then she hasn't looked happy since Niamh has been there.
"Do you sweep the floor with that tongue?" Niamh has to ask. "I mean, do you taste the floor?" She tries to turn the broom so its 'face' is towards the wall.
No matter how much Niamh turns the broom, the eye always faces her. And worse, it just licked her hand. Akari looks over at her, clucks her tongue, then just shakes her head. "Kodomo," she mutters. She prods the rice again, then lifts it off and takes it to another table where some greenish-looking paper is spread out. She starts scooping rice onto those pieces and then pats it out thin and flat. Next, she starts setting the tuna on one end, all in a line.
"You can see the face?" Niamh asks the woman. "And.. does it lick you?"
If the woman understands her, she doesn't seem to react to the question. Instead, she goes over and grabs one of Niamh's now long ears to try and drag her over to where she's working.
"Owowowow!" Niamh says, having to bend over as she shuffles after the woman.
"Anata no te o aratte, kore o maku," Akari says and then gestures to the spread rice and tuna.
"Yes? What?" Niamh asks. "Anata?" She wipes the licked hand against her pants.
Akari takes a long breath, then sighs. She drags Niamh by her ear over to another bowl of water, then washes Niamh's hands for her.
"I didn't think the kodoma would lick me!" Niamh says in her own defense.
Akari looks at Niamh as if she were an idiot. Now she's drying off Niamh's hands ... then it's grabbing her other ear and pulls her back over to the rice and fish.
"Owowowow!" Niamh protests. "What happened to the patient lady that showed me what she wanted!"
Well, she did show Niamh that she needed to wash her hands. Now she's taking Niamh's hands and showing her how to roll that paper ... no it's dried seaweed, so that it becomes a long rice roll with tuna in the middle. Then she turns it, and putting a knife in Niamh's hands, then guides her in cutting it into bite size pieces.
"It's seaweed.. I didn't know it was edible," Niamh admits, and bites her lip as she tries to slice the roll without squishing it.
The old woman stands on her tiotoes and pats Niamh on the head as if she were a good puppy, or a small child. Then she's off to work on something else, leaving Miamh alone with her fish rolls and licking broom.
Niamh tries not to think about the broom as she works. She also wonders if they have bread in this country if they have to use seaweed to make sandwiches.
After some time, a lot of rolling, and cutting, Niamh has a reasonably cut up pile of fish-things. That's about when Akari returns and peers at it. She frowns even more, even if it seemed that was not possible. "Mmmmnh," she commends, then nods. Grabby she goes onto Niamh's ear as she pulls her to the door of the kitchen, then lets go. Next, she starts making shooing motions with her hands.
"Watch out for the broom," Niamh says as she rubs her ears and walks up the stairs. "Where do I go now?" she wonders. Maybe she should just wait for the old lady.
Noboru's head comes out of the wall. "Is she gone?" he asks.
"Ahh!" Niamh jumps, and tries to swat the errand head. "Why would you do that? What did she say to you? Stop acting like a ghost!"
"Ow," comments Noboru when she hits his solid head. He steps out of the wall without making a sound afterward. "Why would I do what? Act like what I am?" he asks, head cocked to the side. As for her question, he says nothing.
"Popping out at me like that," Niamh says. "She's still in the kitchen with the broom that licked me. Why do creatures want to lick me, Noboru? Why are you afraid of Akari? Is it the big cleaver? Or that she has a demonic broom?"
"What did you do to the broom to make it lick you?" Noboru asks. "And I haven't licked you," he points out.
"Do you want to lick me though?" Niamh asks, looking at the kitsune suspiciously. "I just tried to turn it away so it would stop waggling its tongue at me. I tried to talk to it, also."
"So, you showed it attention. It thought you were flirting," Noboru explains. "And no, I would never lick you, unless you bathed first. Humans do not taste particularly good."
"Then why do monsters want to eat me?" Niamh asks. "The Enenra thing doesn't taste what it eats?"
"Because many yokai don't have strong senses of taste, unless what they eat is also some kind of yokai. So, you're like a candy, whereas everything else tastes like stale rice," Noboru tries to explain, while his tails curl around her legs, and arms.
"What do kitsune taste like?" Niamh asks. "Do you have bread?"
To answer that question, the tip of one of Noboru's tails goes into her mouth. "What is bread?" Noboru asks. "Describe it."
"Thppts!" Niamh tries to spit the tail out. "Bread? It's.. not quite like cake. It's made from flour. Wheat flour. And there are different kinds, and when you smell it fresh out of the oven it makes you feel happy. And you can make sandwiches with it."
Noboru tastes like ... hair. "Ah! You mean Anpan," the kitsune says. "We have that, and something similar made from red bean paste. There is also some Chinese dishes that have something similar. We have not had any of that at the Temple in a long time. Perhaps you should get us some."
"Is there a bakery?" Niamh asks. "One that isn't run by a little old lady that likes to grab my ears?"
This makes Noboru grab her ears. "Do you not like my present?" he asks, his own ears splaying, then drooping.
"Ow! Why must everyone grab them? Please let go," Niamh asks and winces. "I don't see how Miyuki expects me to relax and have fun.."
"Because they are cute and they move, ", Noboru explains and lets go. "Maybe it is because you do not have a tail to match," the kitsune comments. "I should add one."
"I knew it.. you want to turn me into a deer before you take me to the forest," Niamh accuses, wagging a finger at Noboru.
"No, I am trying to make you more comfortable, and all you do is fight me," Noboru claims. "Tails are good for relaxing, you can wag them, or twitch them. They are outlets of mood."
"I can't control the ears," Niamh says. "How can I wear pants with a tail? You.. have an odd notion of comfort. Do you normally find that humans find being turned into animals relaxing?"
"Of course," Noboru says and looks confused. "And you wear dresses, not pants, do you not? Plenty of room for a tail."
"But then what is the point of having a tail?" Niamh challenges with a grin, thinking she finally has a good counter-argument.
"The point is having one is better than not having one," Noboru claims. "Why do you think kitsune grow another for every century they live?"
"It.. it isn't just something that happens, like trees growing rings every year?" Niamh asks. "They don't grow out all at once right?"
"Yes, they do. On the century-anniversary of our birth, we sprout a new one under the light of the moon," Noboru explains and starts petting Niamh's ears.
"The petting is nice," Niamh admits. "I helped make.. rolled up rice things. Those are for our supper, I think?"
Noboru keeps on petting. "Yes, they are. We will be dining in an hour or so. Do you wish to go relax in your room until then?" he inquires.
"Relax? Will you bring me something soft and comfortable then?" Niamh asks.
"I could make you soft and comfortable," Noboru offers...
"I'm.. already soft," Niamh points out.
"But you could be softer," Noboru purrs at her. He's also grinning.
"And fluffy I suppose?" Niamh guesses. "I think you mean soft and comfortable for you."
"Why are you so against being more of the wild?" Noboru inquires, head tilting. He puts his hand to his chest. "Am I so horrible?", he asks, then shifts to the larger fox form he has in a blur of fluff and blue glow. "Running in the wilds, scenting the breeze. Feeling the rush of the blood in your veins and hearing the call of the world all about you. Why is it humans are so terrified of this?"
"Because we don't want to be eaten, I suppose?" Niamh guesses. "I don't know. What if I don't ever come back? Just.. not come back to being me?"
"Define 'you'?" Noboru prompts. "How can you never be you? That makes no sense. You are always you, regardless of trapping."
"When I was a deer it was.. not like that," Niamh says. "I wasn't me until I was.. back to being me again. I just remembered what it was like." She then hugs herself. "It's about feeling safe, maybe. I.. don't feel safe yet."
"Are you afraid of us then?" Noboru inquires, drawing close until his nose is an inch from hers. "Do I scare you? Does Miyuki, or my parents?" he asks, and my, what big teeth he has.
"Yes," Niamh says. "You're more powerful than me. You're like the Sidhe, in that I don't know what you'll do. Did you want me to be unafraid?"
"Have I given you any reason to think I would actually harm you?" Noboru asks.
"You're looming at me," Niamh points out.
"I am not," Noboru claims, then licks her on the nose.
Niamh's eyes go wide. "You licked me. Yokai do want to lick me."
"You are entirely too self-absorbed," Noboru comments. "Your room is down this hall, then up the stairs and to the left. Miyuki will come for you at dinner time. do try and calm down before dinner. We like our meals without panicking guests."
"I.. do not understand you," Niamh says and goes to wait in her room as instructed. "A tail.." she mutters to herself. "I'd be too cute then."
Niamh sits on her mat once she gets to her room, and tries to relax. Then she gets up a moment later and makes sure the mat doesn't have a face or tongue. Then she sits in the corner to be safe, and practices getting her ears to do what she wants them to. "I can relax. I'm fun," she tells herself. "I don't need a tail to have fun. Maybe Miyuki will pet my ears later.."