The True Confessions of a Nine-Tailed Fox

Chapter 32: Meet the Family

Oh Great Goddess, send a sign to this unbeliever!

Soul Number 11270's voice crackled out of Aurelia's seal of office, which she kept on the side of her desk. Topped with a gem-encrusted phoenix, the seal was a solid gold block that measured a foot on each side. On the bottom were calligraphic runes for "Bureau of the Sky" that produced a stamp representing the bureau's formal approval.

When Aurelia had first come up to Heaven, after her life on Earth had fallen apart and that evil fox demon had persuaded her own husband to depose and murder her, she'd been assigned to this bureau as a junior star goddess. Her new attendants, Ladies Grus and Dan, had gotten her settled into the Palace of the Hundred Stars and then taken her on a tour of her new workplace. They'd finished in this very office so she could receive an official welcome from the then-Overseer, the Eldest Weaver Maiden.

At the time, Aurelia had thought that the Seal of the Bureau of the Sky resembled a scaled-up version of the seal that she had possessed as Empress of Serica. Now she knew better: All seals on Earth were merely pale imitations of the ones in Heaven. Because the Seal of the Bureau of the Sky was far more than just a stamp or even a symbol of office.

It also functioned as a farseeing device that projected images and sounds into her mind. Technically, it was meant to allow her to supervise logistics throughout Heaven, but recently, Lady Grus had mentioned that using it to survey Heaven only was a tradition, not a restriction on the seal itself. In fact, it was a weaker version of the ones used by the Evening Star's deputies, She Who Hears the Cries of the World and She Who Sees the Suffering of the World. Theirs allowed them to hear and see everything on Earth all at once, with perfect clarity, while Aurelia's required her to concentrate on one specific location.

Aurelia had a feeling she knew why Lady Grus had "happened" to remember that fact, but she'd chosen not to question it. Yet.

Whenever she was alone in her office, she switched the projection to Honeysuckle Croft and watched little Taila grow up. The images and sounds were fuzzy, and the seal drained starlight out of her, exhausting her by the end of the workday and forcing her to hide it from everyone, especially Lady Dan, but it was worth it.

That was how she'd seen the confrontation between Soul Number 11270 and Mistress Jek. Long before the turtle raised its head and called on her for help, Aurelia had already dispatched a note to the Bureau of Reincarnation clerk, Flicker.

Urgent attention needed at Hon. Cr.

She'd sent it via her most trusted star child runner, and the little girl had gotten it safely to the clerk right in time for Flicker to streak down to Earth and calm things down.

Soul Number 11270 seemed particularly impudent, even for a Green Tier soul. Briefly, Aurelia wondered whether she should have waited for a different opportunity and a different soul to assign to Quarta, but then she shook her head. She'd made her choice. She'd weighed her options and gambled on this one.

Now she could only wait and watch to see how it all played out.

All right, if you're done questioning my authority, I have changes to implement here, I informed the peasants.

"Yes, yes, Great One!" agreed Mistress Jek at once. "Anythin', Great One!"

Mmmm, "Great One." I did like the sound of that. All those echoes of subservience and implications of slavishness. After so many powerless centuries, it felt good.

Now, where should I start? There were just so many changes I wanted to make to Honeysuckle Croft and its inhabitants. The dirty walls, the filthy rushes, the splintery "furniture," the open fire in the center of the room, the pig and chickens sleeping in the same space as the humans.... Oh – what was I talking about? There was one thing that had to go, right this instant. Without delay. I wouldn't brook its continued existence.