Beast [Irregular at Magic High School fanfic] (Boyxboy)

Chapter 18

Weeding was hardly difficult. It took time, but time was something I was rather unconcerned with.

It took another full week before Genro finally left. He was replaced by my guardian, an extremely quiet fellow who fit the physical characteristics perfectly. He was a tall, broad individual, with a sharp jaw and brown hair kept short. He also had green eyes. His name was Hiromoto, but I rarely said it. You don't really need to say a person's name when they're the only other person in the room and are always waiting for your orders.

I gave a few. But mostly I just talked. Not really to him, but more at him. He listened, or maybe just zoned out and appeared to be listening, to my small stories and admittances, the little things I would tell him about. He didn't often reply, but when he did it was never along the vague lines of 'that's nice' or 'interesting story'. It was always a question, to which I would answer and then we would fall back into silence.

The next weed was removed a month later. This time not even by my own hands. My guardian dismissed one of the maids that frequented the house to go work elsewhere after discovering she'd mentioned something to another family member she worked for that had been a private discussion. All other maids were given a cold, crisp warning: Yotsuba Minoru was not interested in nor entertained by politics and secrets. There were no further problems, and in the end only two maids made regular trips to go about their work in silence.

I liked and hated the silence equally. Normal silence is one I enjoy, but the silence of my home is a silence born out of the naturally quiet and those too nervous to speak. So I started chattering to my guardian, telling him ridiculous things. Things along the lines of 'did you see the robin go by earlier' or 'I think my plant has grown, how about you'. Silly things. Within a few days, my guardian made a habit of having music playing in the background during the day. It made me calmer, and my chatter returned to the occasional talking.

Not entirely the music. It was the fact that my guardian was learning to read me, the silent signals and habitual movements that meant things I did not say out loud. It didn't take too long before he would be fetching me an extra blanket before Ori would get up and do it, and bring me a cup of steaming tea right about the time I was going to ask for it. Even so, I still talked to him. Perhaps he saw this as something else to be remedied, as he came forward with a question one day.

"Why do you not speak to Ori?"

I looked at him, and then at the furred face staring back at me. And then I looked at him again and my face twisted into something not quite a smile.

"Because that would be talking to myself."

He didn't say anything more, and the subject was dropped. I kept quiet the rest of the day. I returned to talking to him the next day. He did not try to fix this behavior again, and we settled into an odd sort of peace. He did his duties as my guardian, and I spent my time designing and building weapons.
That peace was disrupted by an invitation, delivered first to my guardian and then passed to me.

An invitation to an elite social gathering to announce the engagement of Saegusa Mayumj and Juumonji Katsuto.

I felt completely numb. The paper fell from my hands to the floor, where Ori growled and snarled at it as if it were an enemy. My guardian picked it back up and set it on the table. I stared at it in empty silence. And then began to cough.

And cough and cough and cough, until I could hardly breath and my guardian was doing everything he could to help while my own body rejected the information. He took away from it, back to my room where the coughing finally stopped and I could do nothing but lay in silence and wait for sleep.

The next few days, I did not hardly leave the safety of my room. When I did, it was only because my guardian insisted I get a breath of outside air and would wheel me out to the backyard. He would play with Ori, throwing a ball for him to catch and bring back. Almost like a dog. I didn't mind it, and neither did Ori. In some respects, we were technically two beings after all. Though that was mostly in body.