Being a witch, Lina decided some time ago between this story and the last, was highly overrated. She had spent four hours a day back when she was a student studying curses and hexes, which among other things was the so-called forte of witches. During her entire time here in this cottage, she had never once had a legal excuse to curse or hex or even give the evil eye to someone. Hell, she felt more like the stereotypical 'wise woman' for all of the 'good' she's been doing.
Not that she had any particular leanings toward evil but simply creating potions and simple frivolous charms day in day out was enough to drive any healthy beautiful young girl (and especially Lina Inverse) insane!!!
Being a witch had at least looked slightly promising before, even if the general consensus was that they were evil. I mean hey, you get to tick off nobles and royalty and would-be heroes and the like and get away with it. No one could fault you with being ill tempered or anti-social and there were damn few regulations or regulating bodies.
That was of course until Lina entered the Academy when a paper detailing the precise history of witchcraft was made public. It dispelled most of the misconceptions that people held in general about the craft, setting up the establishment of a governing body of elder witches to ensure that witches were given their due respect and that practicing witches all followed a 'union code' of conduct.
Yup, people actually began keeping track of what various witches were doing. It did help having an organized convene to rely on, plus it was great for swapping recipes and spell materials. The Circle, as the group of governing witches were called, were very serious in making sure that all licensed witches behaved appropriately. They were the ones who administered the licensing tests and renewals.
With this more professional look to the craft, public opinion against witches went down and it was now a mark on the social ladder to have a witch taking up residence in the nearby forests. Even the annual, or even in some places monthly, burning of witches was halted and considered a crude and barbaric practice.
Of course, it was this entire image concept that was getting to Lina.
"Oh shut up," Lina grumbled out loud, directing the complaint back to her complaining familiar. He was making his displeasure known quite well through his thorough knowledge of how to curse in about a hundred languages, some of which he had picked up from Lina.
She almost throttled the thing when she learned he actually knew human words. And to think all this time, he had been pretending he couldn't! It certainly made discussions a whole lot easier though she never could get out of him how he knew human speech or even the wide range of (human) topics their discussions touched on.
Yes, Lina was bored enough to be talking with her frog. But that wasn't her only problem.
"It's required and I can't afford to get any more demerits or my license will be revoked!"
A train of happy thoughts replied to that idea. Other than through death, the only way to cancel a witch and familiar contract was through the loss of witch status. However, since familiars are supposed to support their witch, he hadn't been able to actively work in getting that to work. Not that Lina needed much help in that department.
"Yeah, I love you too," the no longer teenaged witch snapped, irritated by both her current chancy license status and her familiar's joy about it. It's been several years since we've all seen her last and nothing has really changed. As for news, Lina's job dissatisfaction has been increasing steadily. Not that that was really new but what was new was the corresponding increase in demerits on her formerly unblemished record.
Oh it wasn't nothing much, minor things really. Use of unlicensed magic, use of magic outside of job parameters, behaving out of job parameters mostly. Hey, it wasn't her fault she didn't look very 'witchy'. Lina wasn't about to tangle her hair and dress in rags to play the part. A job only went so far.
"Yeah, yeah, change jobs you say. As if it was that easy." Lina stomped out to the back porch and glared at the calm pond. Being autumn, the air had a chill nip to it and creatures that knew better were getting ready for the long winter sleep. Frog was trying to get a jump-start.
Oh yeah, and he refused to give her a name too so 'Frog' it was. Or even 'Froggy' when Lina was feeling more irritable than usual.
"Look, I've got a nice moist," Lina wrinkled her nose at the thought, "box for you to travel in. It's covered and dark and you can sleep all you want in there. You are coming with me and that's final!"
Why should I? came the low voice from the shallow depths of the placid pond. You're ashamed of me anyway.
And yes, that was still a sore point between the two of them.
"As if not bringing you with me is going to make things better. I'll get another demerit for sure for showing up without my familiar. 'A witch's familiar should always be by her side'," Lina quoted bitterly.
That rule of conduct naturally didn't take into account the fact that one could have a frog for a familiar. Not that any witch in living or written memory ever had a frog for a familiar. It was too close to the prince-cursed-to-be-a-frog stereotype that was often attributed to witches.
Frog needed to keep his skin moist constantly and the only one time Lina ever tried to follow that rule ended up nearly killing him and possibly her as well. It was all for show for a visiting witch and Lina...kind of forgot about him. Him being the stubborn thing that he was, didn't say anything until it was almost too late. His panic from suffocation had been transmitted to her mind a hundred fold and Lina was barely able to cross the short distance it was from inside her cottage to the pond outside in order to dunk him (and herself) in water.
That was also when she learned he could talk.
But anyway, afterwards, Lina was a bit more careful of her familiar. Sure she always knew that she and Frog had a mental bond, and that as stated in the 'Handbook for Witches', that bond allowed them to see each other's mental states. There was also, in very tiny print, the warning that if anything adverse happened to the familiar, the resulting mental backlash to the witch could kill her.
As disgruntled with her life as she was, Lina wasn't ready to die yet. There were still tons of things she wanted to do, food she wanted to eat, spells she wanted to learn.
She just had to find a way to get around her job restrictions. Without being caught.
Lina stomped her foot on the ground, glaring down at the pond, box in hand. "Stop being such a stubborn blockhead and come up!"
No.
"Don't make me come down there and get you!"
There was a definite ring of smugness. I'd like to see you try.
Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh!! Frog was driving her crazy! He wasn't nearly this arrogant before they started talking. Of course, before then, she tried to have as little to do with him as possible so that might have been part of it. They used to have an unspoken agreement of 'you don't bother me, I don't bother you' but slowly, they've built a cautious respect and dare I say it, friendship. Sad and pathetic as it sounded, Frog was the only friend Lina had.
If she was going to spend several days in the company of people four times her age and over, she'd better have someone else to talk to. Even if it was only Frog, or would that be only if it was Frog?
Knew you wouldn't. Now let me get some sleep - WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?!?!?!?!
Lina paused, undoing the clasp of her belt in one hand and preparing to drop her black overrobe with the other. "What does it look like I'm doing? I'm going in to get your sorry wet ass out of the water and into this box."
No, I meant your CLOTHES!
"What? You don't expect me to jump in and get my clothes all dirty with whatever pond scum and mud you've got in there now do you? Which reminds me, I'll have to pack some 'normal' witch robes. I don't think any of those old bags will let me get away with these red trims. Hey, how do you know what I'm doing if you're supposed to be in the bottom of the pond?"
...
"Why you, you haven't been in the mud trying to hibernate at all! Inverse Slipper Strike!!"
A pink fluffy slipper that Lina produced out of nowhere (actually, the dimensional pocket in the sleeve of her witch robe) appeared in her hand and landed smack between the eyes of a frog sitting just below the surface of the water near some reeds.
"Will you stop complaining already? I didn't hit you that hard." The grumbling and sulking didn't cease. Lina rolled her eyes and placed the box on the table of her room in the inn. Frog had been knocked out cold by the slipper and Lina had plopped him into the box without delay. She hadn't opened the box since then either, not too assured that he wouldn't try to jump out and escape the moment she did so.
He could be quite the stubborn idiot at times, her familiar.
...how would you like it if a door suddenly fell onto your face? My nose is probably smashed in.
Okay, so maybe Lina was feeling a tad guilty right now. She wouldn't have been too happy if someone knocked *her* out and stuffed her into a dark box for the last day and a half. Heck, she'd be breathing fire and throwing it.
"Just wait a sec and I'll open the box."
...what are you preparing to do now? Dress my legs for dinner?
"Hey, I'm trying to be nice to you!" Lina protested, easily dispelling the magical lock on the box and pressing the button to undo the mechanical one. You could never be too careful. The lid popped open and Lina rested her chin on her arms on the table to be eye-to-eye with Frog. "Hmmm, you don't look any different."
...
"Well? Do you hurt anywhere? Not that I'm any expert on frog anatomy but I suppose I could try to whip up something to help. After all, anything that hurts you will eventually transmit back to me anyway."
Frog still didn't say anything. Lina leaned forward.
"Hey! Say something already!"
What are those clothes...
"This?" Lina pointed to the pink nightshirt she was wearing. "Pajamas. Never seen them?"
No. I'm just surprised to see you wearing something like that. So you still do have some feminine taste.
"What is that supposed to mean?!"
Nothing really. I was just thinking...
Lina waited for him to continue.
It's late. Shouldn't we be getting some sleep now?
"More sleep? Didn't you sleep enough in that box already?" Lina asked in disbelief.
You silly. You're the one whose doing all of the walking.
"No, no, I'm fine."
Why aren't you flying anyway?
She snorted. "In those witch robes? The only way you don't give everyone below a view up your skirt is if you sit sidesaddle on the broom and I've never been able to keep my balance doing that. I'll fly in when we get closer but not now. No way."
Frog sighed.
Oi, Lina. Wake up.
Lina mumbled something incoherent and just rolled over. Frog rolled his eyes. If she didn't wake up soon, they won't be able to get to another time before nightfall. It's rather convenient, though odd, that all towns seemed to be exactly one daylight's width from each other such that you can always arrive at another time by nightfall.
Frog, whose box had been placed on the nightstand next to Lina's bed, scrambled out of the box in a way only frogs could. He hopped over to the bed and onto the slumbering Lina, waddling unsteadily over the young witch's slight frame.
Lina moved again, causing a dilemma for Frog. If he just let himself fall, he'd be landing right onto her chest. Not the best place to land in his opinion, if only because his life expectancy would shorten greatly. That left the other option of hopping right now and landing just above her chest.
Well, he didn't really want to die now anyway. Certainly not looking as he did now.
Lina was having this incredible dream about meeting her prince on a white horse who just pronounced his eternal love for her, the prince that is, not the horse, and was ready to seal that vow with a kiss. Yes, she was a romanticist at heart. Young girls can dream can't they?
The prince's lips were soft and warm. Lina could feel him...wait, wasn't this a bit too real for a dream? As much as she loved to believe in her dream prince, Lina was also a realist and knew that in real life, she wasn't about to meet someone like that. So she knew this was a dream but there were parts of that dream, like the kiss, that were just too real.
Their lips pulled apart and Lina opened her eyes.
To find a lavender hair framing sapphire eyes set in a face, a guy's face. A guy who was currently lying right on top of her, well, there was a blanket between them. Still, it was a guy.
"Um, Lina, I can explain this..."
"Pervert! Inverse Screw Crash!!" she screamed, slamming her fist into the jaw of the would-be rapist (or so she thinks), sending him flying off of the bed and onto the wooden floor. Where she got her second (un)pleasant surprise of the morning.
"Hentai! Ecchi! Put something on you pervert!!" Lina continued screaming, albeit redder than the red trim she so loved on her black witch robes, not giving the man an opportunity to do that by throwing her blanket onto him and proceeding to stomp the life out of him. "Frog! What the hell are you doing still sleeping when your master is getting attacked by some sex-crazed maniac!!"
"Will you just calm down!!" yelled Lina's attacker(?), wrestling and pinning the rabid Lina against the bed with his superior strength. "I've been trying to tell you - "
"FROG!!" Lina yelled, nearly deafening her attacker. She looked over to the nightstand but the box was empty. "Frog?! Just where the hell are you? What did you do to Frog!!"
The blue eyes looked at her with exasperation. "That's what I've been trying to tell you. I'm...uh, I'm Frog. Ur, not that my name is - I mean, I was the frog - Lina!"
Lina had tried to knee him.
"How do you know my name!"
"I just told you! I was your familiar!"
"Alright, let me get this straight."
Lina glared narrowly at the young man she had sitting in a circle of protection, we won't go into exactly whose protection it's for, and crossed her arms. He had extracted a binding oath from her that she wouldn't do any harm to him before he agreed to release her. She really hadn't wanted to do that but one, it was the only oath he would accept, and two, she was getting really uncomfortable having him pressing against her like that.
"You," she pointed accusingly at the now dressed stranger, "claim you turned into a frog and then by chance happened to be summoned by my spell to become my familiar." Lina was highly skeptical about this. "Yeah, as if that was possible."
"It's not supposed to happen," the man agreed but shrugged. "The standard summoning spell shouldn't summon creatures bearing enchantments which would exclude magical creatures such as pseudodragons, brownies, and even a human-enchanted-into-a-frog for use as familiar. Plus, that spell isn't the one that's taught to new graduates getting their first familiar..."
Lina did NOT like the studying look he was giving her. Well, okay, so perhaps the spell she used to summon a familiar wasn't exactly the one her professor had given her to learn. What was wrong with wanting a special familiar?
"Well anyway," Lina nervously tossed her hair back over her shoulder, trying to squash that errant thought in her head that she sure did get one hell of a special familiar and it was a damn handsome one too. The squashing attempt was failing utterly. "If you were cursed, then why didn't you ever tell me right in the beginning? The Circle probably would have found some loophole to break the contract and I could get myself a real familiar and you could get yourself kissed by a princess. Speaking of which, how did you suddenly 'revert' back to being human?"
He mumbled something behind a hand with his head down.
"I didn't hear you," Lina said in a menacing, singsong voice. She had a sneaky idea of how he did suddenly turn human. His story was true since the flawless lie detector she had woven into the spell circle hadn't signaled anything to her.
"Well, cough cough cough."
"I still didn't hear that."
"Um, Lina," he looked rather like a trapped animal which he was, "Remember your oath..."
"You don't mean to tell me," Lina was smiling waaay too sweetly, "that you kissed me?"
"It was an accident!" he protested, losing the composed calm he had earlier. "I was trying to wake you up and you moved so I was about to fall onto your uh chest so I tried to jump past that but I misjudged and ended up too close to your face and - "
"What's your name?" Lina interrupted.
"Huh?" His blue eyes were confused by the suddenly change in topic. "Zelgadiss. It's Zelgadiss."
"Right, just wanted to know what name to give the undertaker."
"Lina!!"
"Diem Wind!!"
Lina felt like she had been run over by a herd of horses. Or that she had drunk herself into a two-day hangover. She pulled the pillow over her head.
"You're awake?"
She blinked. That sounded like Frog except it was a physical voice. Well, maybe she was just imagining things. She had heard Frog's voice too many times, that was it.
"They do teach about the consequences of breaking a binding vow don't they? Casting that spell to hurt me, something you vowed not to do, caused it to rebound on you. That was quite a spell circle you cast, I had to wait until it finally expired before getting out."
...no way.
"Did you hit your head? I really don't know that much about healing so I couldn't tell but - "
Lina jerked the pillow off of her head. "You're real?!?"
Zelgadiss sweatdropped. "As real as you are."
She groaned and ducked under the pillow again.
"Hey, are you alright?"
Give me back my first kiss!!!!
"That was...your first...?"
"How can you hear my thoughts?! The familiar spell should have been broken by now!!" Why does this have to happen to me?!?!