FATE\Deus Decipit

Chapter 7: Of Closets and Skeletons

11:20 pm, Basement Workshop of the Alghul villa

Aisha sat in an armchair placed in the corner of the room. Though this was fundamentally a workspace, she still maintained a small sitting area on the far left side of the room from the door to make the space more cozy. It had previously been more centralized in the space, but was pushed farther back as a part of making room for the summoning circle. From here she could see the entire room spread out before her.

She was thirsty, and very much longed for a cup of her favorite honey tea, but she wouldn't dare leave Caster to poke around her workshop without supervision. He had been inspecting the room for several minutes now, though she didn't know how long it had been. No, she was far too watching her Servant to bother about watching the time. That, and she had become somewhat bored, even tired, as one inevitably would be, such as on Christmas day when watching others open their presents when you're all-too ready to open your own- not that Aisha had ever experienced that specific situation.

What she had mentioned to him before about "permissions" was true, but this was still very different from free range. She gave him a unique signature so that she knew where he was and when, with the only allowance of not triggering alarms and defense mechanisms when he moved. But it was far from a flawless plan. Had she summoned another class perhaps she could've gotten away with it, but, as a Caster, he would recognize exactly the tricks she was pulling, but then she would also know if these 'tricks' were disabled or deactivated; meaning that, even though he was perfectly aware, he couldn't do anything about their arrangement without bringing suspicion onto himself.

This ought to restrict his actions well enough before his inevitable betrayal, she thought, though given that she was dealing with a god, she couldn't assume everything was peachy-keen just because there wasn't any obvious defiance. She had already made up her mind never to trust this man; not for a second.

'This man', as it were, was currently looking through the closet on the opposite side of the room. Master and Servant had remained in almost-complete silence since Caster had begun his inspection, not making eye contact even once. Though she wasn't terribly comfortable with his scrutiny, she knew that, as a magic user himself, her workshop would have to be modified for him to be maximally useful regardless.

Otherwise, the only communication was a brief tongue-in-cheek apology by Caster while fiddling with the powdery remains of 'Pan' that still lay within the center of the chalk circle. At that point she had been tempted to ask about why the statue had been reduced to such a state, but decided against it and responded only with an embittered "It's fine."

After all, what point was there in asking when he was almost guaranteed to lie to her?

Besides even that, what did it matter if Dionysus had some unspoken grudge against the satyr god, or if there was some special element of his summoning? He was here now; his past was only relevant in how it affected his actions in the here and now, and in going forward. Though it was true that her inner academic longed to press the demigod about his life, the gods, the differences between the Age of Gods and now, and maybe she would- eventually-, but she had difficulty perceiving the creature in front of her as a person, as someone with a history, as a being one-in-the-same with the mythological Dionysus. She could hardly believe he was even real.

Whether she was willing to admit it or not, this strange feeling was a result of her mixed emotions regarding him. On the one hand, he was a tool, a non-person that existed only to serve her. On the other, he was a powerful phantasmal being that would turn on her at the best, which is far more frightening than 'the first', opportunity. In short, she was far more concerned with what he was going to do than what he had done, though logically she understood that one would inform the other. She assumed that Caster felt more-or-less the same way towards her, but was proven wrong when he suddenly began to ask questions about his Master; strange questions that would never occur to a 'sensible' person.