Daybreak:Alpha Chapter

(pre-alpha)

Chapter 13 - (need a name...)

Kaede spent most of the next two days in bed, skipping even mealtime trips to the dining hall. Thankfully, Pascal brought a tray of sumptuous aristocratic food back for her every time. Even better, he told her that Parzifal started inviting him over to join Ariadne, Reynald, and others during meals, so she didn't even have to feel bad about leaving him to eat alone again.

Although he would have deserved it, as all of her discomfort for the past days could be explained as 'his fault'.

By Monday afternoon however, her menstrual cramps had lessened enough for her to effectively concentrate on other things. Kaede only missed dinner due to being completely engrossed in her book on Weichsel's history:

Today's National Day was actually the 505th year anniversary of Weichsel's birth, declared the night after the Battle of Konigsfeld in Faith:61. The previous Kingdom of Amudaria had always been a loyal protectorate of the Imperium of the Inner Sea, which declared its 'Holiness' only sixty-one years prior, beginning the Age of Faith. But when religious unrest turned into the War of Cataliyan Independence and drew all the available legions south, the Holy Imperium could spare nothing as a fresh Northmen invasion shattered Amudaria.

With the king dead and the capital burned, it was House von Drachenlazen who took up the banner, rallying nobles and commoners alike by enacting the Writ of Universal Conscription. In a single decisive engagement, the future King Ferdinand I, the Great, the Crusader, the Saint, etcetera etcetera, crushed the invaders and founded a new realm. It also established Weichsel's tradition of the military aristocracy, ever vigilant and periodically tested by raids and invasions from the North Sea.

The von Drachenlazen dynasty still ruled Weichsel today. With their name 'Dragonlance' a very literal reminder of their proud ancestry from the Dragon-Demon War of millenniums ago, Kaede found it hard not to feel awed as she read their noble history...

...Until the door opened and the scent of mouthwatering wiener schnitzel wafted in.

Except Pascal wasn't carrying anything as he strode into view.

"You are being invited to dinner, sort of. Ariadne is just outside the door."

He announced with a scowl and a noncommittal shrug, followed by a silent reminder:

"You should get dressed properly first."

According to Pascal, Ariadne had mostly put away their past after her epic -- and publicly humiliating -- slap. But not hating his guts wasn't the same as being on good terms with him either.

Kaede nodded back and rushed to put on her white 'uniform', which went far easier than any of those dresses. Pascal then stopped her before she could walk out, taking care to make sure her appearance was immaculate and wouldn't embarrass him before the noblest of ladies.

Two of them, as it turned out.

"Good evening Kaede. Thought you could use a little chat and company after two days," Ariadne smiled from just beyond the room's doorway, with a food tray hovering above one palm and the other hand waving at her. "My friend Cecylia just returned from holidays. Would you be interested in joining us?"

"Nice to meet you," the petite girl who stood beside Ariadne's strawberry-blond cascade smiled and waved energetically.

Kaede wasn't exactly in the mood to meet new people tonight, but this wasn't an offer she could refuse politely.

"The pleasure is mine," she curtsied in return. She was definitely getting better at it.

Cecylia was around Kaede's height, with deep-chestnut-brown hair trimmed short and pull back by a red ribbon. Standing next to the mature and elegant Ariadne, she seemed almost fragile with her petite and thin figure, which only enhanced her undeniably cute appearance. Her small nose and lips lay under a pair of vibrant, deep-red eyes that held something odd about them, giving off a mysteriously alluring light. Her skin was fair to the point of being nearly a translucent silky sheen, accentuated by the standard crimson-on-black uniform officer cadets wore.

As Kaede neared the doorway, she gasped and nearly tripped into the wiener schnitzel tray and its steaming bowl of soup as she realized what that 'something odd' was:

Instead a round black pupil within her deep-red iris, Cecylia's eyes held tiny scarlet-red crosses instead.

The new girl's hands gently steadied Kaede as she looked back up, her gaze drawn straight back into those eyes before she could pull back and glance away:

"I'm sorry. I didn't mean to stare."

"Hehe don't worry about it," Cecylia's soft soprano replied with a chuckle. "I'll explain when we get back to my room."

She then turned towards Pascal while reaching for the doorknob:

"See you later Pascal! Don't worry we'll take good care of her!"

Her cheery voice gave Kaede bit of a surprise, who mentally asked in curiosity:

"Made a new friend already?"

"Good night," Pascal bid before sending Kaede a somewhat wistful response:

"No, we spoke quite a bit before I fell out with Ariadne. Cecylia Renata von Falkenhausen is the third daughter of General Wiktor von Falkenhausen, father's second-in-command. Since we are the same age, our fathers had us meet when we were six. She is actually the one who introduced me to Ariadne."

Bet your breakup came as a personal embarrassment for her then, Kaede thought as Cecylia took her hand and began dragging her down the hall with Ariadne following behind.

"Be careful though. She likes to drag others to her pace before drawing them into spilling any secret she is interested in."

But rather than cautionary, Pascal sounded almost... admiring.

So Kaede wrote down Cecylia's name on her mental list of people that Pascal actually respected.

----- * * * -----

The third-year girls' dorms were just one floor above, and Cecylia's room turned out very... feminine.

It was bright scarlet, white, and pink, with an abundance of lace and frills.

Even before the door closed behind them, Kaede found herself greeted by a plump cat with lush white and gray fur. It laid down before Kaede and gazed at her with teal eyes before giving an adorable purr.

She knelt down to pet and stroke its wonderfully soft fur.

"Kaede you might want to finish your dinner before getting too friendly with Ania," Ariadne said as she took the tray to the writing desk by the window. "She loves to steal food, and it's hard to keep watch on all of them."

"All of them?"

"Ania is a matryoshka cat from Samara," Cecylia grinned with amusement. "She's also my familiar."

Kaede stood back up, puzzled.

"Matryoshka?"

Even as Kaede asked, Ania looked up, and another feline face, identical but slightly smaller, emerged from below her furry stomach. The smaller cat soon pulled herself out, laid down next to the larger Ania, and the process repeated itself.

Kaede soon found herself wide-eyed and speechless, surrounded by seven purring cats of decreasing size.

"Are they... separate...?" she struggled to find the right words.

"They share the same psyche, as far as we know," Cecylia answered her unfinished question. "Matryoshka cats use shadow magic to make duplicates of itself to scout for predators and trap prey. The largest one is always the main body, even though tapping its senses always feel like the smallest one is the primary."

"Speaking of eyes and ears, are you..."

"Not since I got annoyed with him and told him to stop. Pascal did promise not to intrude upon my senses without permission," Kaede answered, wondering how many times she'll have to deal with this in the future.

"Good!" Cecylia grinned. "Not that he's the voyeur type, but we don't need him to catch an eye-full during girls' night."

Oh... this must be the equivalent of 'slumber party' boys are so intrigued over in the old world.

Kaede began to fidget just inside the doorway. Her cheeks heated up and her eyes glanced away as Cecylia wasted no time before starting to undress, a set of soft pink velvet pajamas laid out on the bed before her.

Ariadne was quick to notice as usual, soon commenting in her cheerful smile from the other side of the room:

"Cecylia you're making our guest uncomfortable."

"Uh-uh no way, she's not a noble so I am not dealing with all the stupid formalities."

"I think changing in front of someone you recently met goes far beyond just 'casual'."

"Hehe well, we'll just get familiar that much faster then!"

Before Kaede knew it, Cecylia had finished changing and bounced back. Her first thought was that Cecylia's exposed shoulders easily had the smoothest, pearly skin she had ever seen, even with modern cosmetics and skincare products. The girl also had a prominent chest bit more mature than Kaede would have expected for her size, and the pajamas' neckline went down just enough to expose some tantalizing cleavage.

"Eek!"

Kaede found herself backed into the wall and yelped in surprise as Cecylia's delicate fingers snaked in and started undoing her buttons.

She looked towards Ariadne for help, only to see the noble lady gaze back with a shrug under her tilted head and an expression that went 'sorry, can't help it'.

Pinned down and assaulted without reinforcements, Kaede soon found herself stripped down to her white undergarments.

Finally satisfied, Cecylia skipped a step back and looked over Kaede's shivering self.

"Hehe, I knew Pascal had good taste! It's perfect!"

Hugging her small chest and still pressing herself against the wall, Kaede could feel her exposed skin reddening as they met the warm indoor air again. Oddly enough, she found this far more embarrassing than wearing the same thing in front of Pascal.

Girls by themselves are way too scary...

Kaede wanted to leave already.

It was then when the goddess Ariadne finally decided to intervene by dragging Cecylia further back:

"Alright alright, you've had your fun. Now give Kaede some room before you really drive her off. She's already getting tears in her eyes."

"Oh Sylv is going to have so much fun with her."

As though trying to defuse the situation, Ariadne herself pulled out a pair of pajamas before starting to change.

It didn't have quite the effect. Kaede merely looked for more inconspicuous objects to fascinate over.

----- * * * -----

"You still haven't introduced like you promised," Kaede grumbled before she leaned over the bedside counter and bit into another slice of wiener schnitzel.

The delicious food always made her feel better about things.

she even stopped obsessing over the fact that she wore nothing more than lingerie as the three of them sat on Cecylia's king-sized four-poster bed. Although it would take a while before she could grow accustomed to it, if that were possible at all.

"Hehe I do still owe an explanation don't I?" Cecylia replied cheerily. "I take it you've never met a dhampir before?"

Kaede nearly choked. 'Dhampir' of slavic folklore was the child between a human and...

"One of your parents... is a vampire?" She asked as her coughs subsided with the help of Ariadne stroking her back.

"Ah... you really aren't from our world are you?" Cecylia's eyes grew fascinated as a mischievous grin lit up her expression. "The vampire clans were wiped out centuries ago by the not-yet-Holy Imperium, although not before their curses destroyed six entire legions and left the Dead Mountains perpetually filled by murderous mist. Dhampir are the descendants of vampires. We still carry the core of the fiendish blood curse that first created them during the Demonic Invasion. But the magic have at least diluted enough that the church could seal its effects, which..." she pointed to her eyes, "is what this cross is. I've had it since my baptism, colored by my own ether over the years."

"So... excuse me if this sounds blunt, but you don't drink blood anymore then?" Kaede asked as her hands rubbed one of the furry Anias stretched lazily across the bed, finally noticing the little fang of a canine Cecylia sported. Oddly enough, only one was slightly bigger than usual.

"We don't have the urge for it. But we still can..."

Kaede had never felt so aware of her Samaran body, and the fact her blood was literally 'health food' for the grinning girl before her.

"The church frowns upon it, but most dhampirs follow the cultural tradition of imbibing the blood of our beloved once we get married. We don't have the regenerative vitality that vampires do, so drinking blood is kind of a touchy issue -- diseases and all that. It's also a very private affair."

Kaede nodded apologetically, which Cecylia responded in kind as she continued:

"But even though we don't need it, consuming fresh human blood does make us appear younger. Hehe you should see my father, one-sixty-eight years old and still drawing the attention of every lady across the hall like a stud beefcake. Mother gets jealous all the time, even though he's never cheated on her once after a century of marriage. We dhampirs tend to be rather devoted in matrimony, blood of our loved ones flowing through us and all."

"He's quite a dedicated man then," Ariadne joined in, her hands already back to brushing her long flowing tresses. "Almost all noble lords have at least one affair. It's almost something of a prestige thing among them."

"Complains the girl whose boyfriend has eyes only for her," Cecylia's sigh was almost longing.

"You've got how many boys chasing after you? Including both Reynald and Gerd, I might add."

"Reynald flirts with half of everything female and walk on two legs, plus I prefer someone taller than me," Cecylia retorted with a laugh. "Gerd is sweet, but if I court him he'd expect me to become a housewife or something. Nope!"

"What are you aiming for?" Kaede asked as she ate her last two slices of veal. She could swear at least four slices were missing, although that was still an acceptable price to pay for the adorable kitty.

"I'm on the intelligence track. Shooting all the way for the King's Black Eagles!"

"She's also a foreign culture expert. I could have sworn her crosses turned into glittering stars when I first told her about you Kaede," Ariadne joked.

"It's not like I live in Samara. How often do I get to meet someone from another world?" Cecylia said as she scurried forward and leaned towards Kaede. "Soooooo... how similar is your world compared to ours? Other than the no magic part."

"Well... there's actually a surprising amount of similarity. To start off, Weichsel is pretty much Prussia from my old world. Although Prussia didn't start developing a strong military tradition and become a power player in continental politics until after the prevalence of muskets."

Kaede was surprised by how easily her words came out. As an introvert, she didn't normally start in-depth discussion during the first meeting; it was better to learn about the other side's preferences and interests. But after being nearly stripped by Cecylia, this conversation felt almost... generic and insignificant.

"Muskets?"

"Weapons that use black powder to propel a small metal projectile."

"That stuff used for mining? We've had it for well over a millennium, just not for military use."

Kaede grew confused. Even the most conservative of nations didn't take long to realize the potential of black powder in Earth history. Those who refused were too quickly shown the error of their ways.

"Why?"

Cecylia raised her eyebrows as she answered like it was the most obvious thing:

"Can you imagine infantry carrying that stuff when a fireball or lightning blast strikes? Legion Resistance spells won't save them when the soldiers themselves start exploding."

It was the first time Kaede realized that the existence of magic did more than just replace aspects of technology. It completely altered the advancement paths of civilization itself.