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“I don’t know if they’re married, and at this point I’m too afraid to ask.”
Ruth was quick. To-the-point. Angelica was having none of it.
She pursed her lips as she stirred her coffee. “They exchanged rings, didn’t they?” Angelica scoffed. “I made them, after all.”
Ruth sighed and ran a hand through his dark hair. He did not appreciate the constant prodding into his little sister’s love life. Not from Angelica, not from Lindel, and definitely not from Simon. There was something about that preacher man that rubbed him the wrong way.
“They have rings, and that’s all I know.” Ruth said dismissively.
“They’re not affectionate?”
Ruth glared at Angelica. She was playing a dangerous game.
“They’re always affectionate,” he muttered. If they were any more affectionate, the familiar would have second-hand diabetes.
This has been Ruth’s entire day: listening to Angelica’s conspiracy theories about his master, and drinking insane amounts of coffee. The master in question, Chise Hatori, had been called to London by Alice, who she was out with at the moment.
“Girl time,” Chise had told his pouting form as she pointed in the direction of Angelica’s home. “Have fun!”
It wouldn’t be the first time in the past few years he’d been handed off to someone of their extended family while Chise went wild. It would not be the last, he feared, either.
Angelica refilled his coffee cup. She was looking at him, waiting for Ruth to meet her eyes. Sighing, he did.
“Look our for her, Ruth.”
Ruth was annoyed at this remark. “I always do. That’s my entire job.”
Angelica held up her hand. “And you do a great job. But just know….” She trailed off, looking behind her as if someone, or something, was overhearing.
“Know what?” Ruth pushed. He hates the twinge of anxiety that pulsed through him at her words.
Angelica’s eyes bore into him. “Elias … isn’t human. Or fae. Or even demon. We have no idea what he is.”
Ruth swallowed. The anxiety mounted into a warning bell.
“What’re you saying?”
“I’m just saying,” Angelica concluded. “That he doesn’t feel like we do. He doesn’t understand what he’s experiencing, and may never understand.”
Ruth swallowed down anxiety. It was true. Elias wasn’t a man, even in the loosest form of the word. He had hypothesized at one time that the lumbering bonehead might be a chimera, to which Chise preferred to ignore.
Angelica was absolutely right. Chise wasn’t guarding herself- or her emotions- around Elias. And she was heading for a world of hurt if she did not-
“Just look out for her, Ruth. Promise me.”
Ruth stood up from his chair, big brother instincts kicking in so fast his chair fell to the floor.
“I promise.”
———-
The next few days passed. Nothing out of the ordinary happened, that Ruth could tell. His master would awaken in the morning, continue on with her studies, eat dinner, and then retire to her room at nightfall.
The entire time, as usual, Ruth did not leave her side. He slept by her at night, dutifully facing the door, lest a certain mage walk through it. He watches her concoct sleeping potions for the neighbors, even refrains from growling at Simon when he walks through the front door, completely unannounced.
He’s been a good boy. A good dog. But even a good dog cannot stop the inevitable.
It’s the evenings when the line between “friends” and something more is blurred. They sit as a family would in the living room- Silver knitting a fluffy green scarf, Ruth laying in front of the fire, and Elias sitting in his chair, book propped up on his knee.
Then Chise will walk in, clothed in her purple pajamas, hair still damp from her bath. Ruth perks up at the sight of her, tendrils of his tail wagging excitedly.
But Chise walked straight past him, straight past Silver, and sat herself unceremoniously into Elias’s lap.
Elias, to his credit, or maybe his stupidity, barely blinked (if he even could) at the 19-year-old’s forwardness. Instead, he simply rearranged his book to sit on the armrest, and propped his remaining arm around his apprentice’s waist, supporting her back.
Ruth couldn’t help it. He growled.
“Ruth?” Chise questioned. “Are you alright?”
He blinked. Blinked again.
Why did he growl exactly?
Oh, yes.
Angelica.
He had to protect her.
“You two are awfully cozy,” he said to his master, making sure his mind was linked only with hers.
Chise cocked her head. “Cozy?” She said out loud.
Dammit. The girl had no sense.
“Yes. Cozy,” He almost seethed. “An unmarried woman sitting so casually in the lap of a man she knows nothing of the origins of-“
“Ruth, stop it.”
And, because he was trained, and a familiar, he did as he was told.
Elias, to his credit, did not seem to notice the exchange, nor the outburst from his “bride.” So Ruth did the only other thing he could think of.
He climbed into Chise’s lap, puppy paws digging into the soft skin of her stomach, and sat himself down.
“Ruth!”
But he was having none of it. He continued to sit there for the rest of the night, and the giant oaf of a creature still did not budge.
Ruth had to go harder.
———
He would never, ever forget Elias coming to him in the night, asking him how far he’d go for his master.
He would always choose Chise.
So he’s choosing her now.
He had recruited Silver, much to he chargin, to stand guard outside of Elias’s room with him following the events of another one of his monstrous outbursts. To make a long story sort, Chise, and by association him, had gotten stabbed. Again.
He would be lying if he said he was surprised this kept happening.
So there they were, a man-dog and a fae of a woman, armed to the teeth with a kitchen knife and a hammer, waiting for war.
(What exactly “war” was remained to be seen, as Chise was in her room, safe and recovering, while Elias moped in his room. There was literally nothing to be anxious about.)
“Hmm,” Silver grunted.
“I know, I know. He’s gotta come out soon,” Ruth responded, muttering.
“Hmm” Silver said again, as if to say “And why are we here?”
It was around four in the morning when Silver finally gave up, and broke down the door. Elias was dead asleep, not noticing the instruction, nor the splintering wood falling around him. He looked completely, unequivocally, normal (if that’s what you could call him).
“Hmm.”
Silver did not hesitate to bonk him in the head. She gestured rather half-heartedly at Elias’s sleeping form, then disappeared down the hallway.
Fine. So Silver wasn’t taking her role seriously. He would find someone who would.
———-
Here was the thing about his friends: they were also Chise’s friends, and by association (or marriage), Elias’s friends.
This made for an awkward trip to London by himself, on which he showed up on the doorstep of one Mikhail Renfred. He knocked on the door, though he could have easily phased through it, and waited.
He knocked four times before the door opened, revealing none other than Renfred’s apprentice and bodyguard, Alice.
She looked a little worse for wear, if he was being honest: blonde hair thrown up into a messy bun, dark circles under her eyes, and clothes that looked like they had been slept in for days on end. However, when it registered on Alice’s face that Ruth, specifically without Chise, was standing in front of her, her eyes got wide.
“Ruth? Where’s Chise?” She grabbed him by the collar of his coat and ushered him in, which he was used to. What he was not used to, however, was the state of Renfred’s apartment. Papers were strewn everywhere, books piled haphazardly on the tables, the chairs, the fireplace.
Ruth looked at Alice quizzically, not at all acknowledging his friend practically vibrating with anxiety.
“What happened?” Ruth asked finally, to which Alice hit him across the face.
“You come all the way here alone, and that’s the first thing you ask? Where. Is. Chise?”
Alice was practically foaming at the mouth. Ruth instinctively took a step back.
“She’s fine,” Ruth said, though he didn’t know for how much longer, judging by how close she and the demonic entity they lived with were getting. “I’m here for a favor.”
At this, Alice deflated visibly. Grabbing him by the collar once more, she pulled Ruth into the kitchen, where Renfred was sitting, or rather half-laying, on the table.
“Once again,” Ruth asked. “What happened?”
Surely they wouldn’t have been attacked: Elias would have been the first to know if they had. Perhaps they’d been preparing to move?
Renfred jolted into a sitting position upon hearing foreign voices. “ALICE!”
Alice had the tact not to look surprised at her master’s outburst. “Ruth needs a favor,” she stated simply, instead.
The next hour was spent beating around the bush, with questions of “How’s your master?” And “Where is Cartaphilus these days?” Ruth answered all of them dutifully as he sipped the cup of what he assumed was water-down tea Alice had jammed into his hands.
Finally, Ruth decided it was time to pounce.
“I have concerns about my sister,” he announced gravely.
At this, Alice pointed a finger at him. “I knew it! You’ve lost her or something? And you need us to go find her!”
Ruth didn’t dignify that with a response. He was Chise’s familiar. He knew exactly where she was at all times, whether he wanted to or not.
“I’m concerned about the nature of her relationship with Elias.”
There was a beat of silence, before Renfred, who has been falling asleep on his hand, deadpanned:
“Aren’t they married?”
Anger flared in Ruth’s chest. No, they were not married, though everyone in the world assumes that they were.
“Yeah,” Alice was talking as if she was reading the Sunday paper. “They have matching rings. And stuff.” She paused, realization dawning on her thin face. “Wait, is Ainsworth hurting her?”
“No!” Ruth suddenly felt a pull to protect Elias’s name, though he did not know why. “He’s never purposefully hurt her. And never would. What I’m concerned about his the fact that my master is unequivocally in love with something that cannot love her back!”
The silence that followed his outburst was the loudest fifteen seconds of his life. At some point, he realized he had stood up from his chair, and had begun hitting the table during his confession.
Finally, Alice sighed. “Look, Ruth,” she took his hands into her own, something the man never thought she would do. “I don’t think Chise’s love is… unrequited. If you can even call it love.”
Ruth narrowed his eyes. “What do you mean?”
Renfred looked up from his drink. “I think what my apprentice is trying to say is that Ainsworth and Chise have puppy love, if anything at all. They’re not ready for anything else yet.”
“But they’re so affectionate!” Ruth objected, and it was true. Chise was always in Elias’s lap. They nuzzled each other at the breakfast table upon seeing each other every morning. They shared the same bed half the time, for crying out loud.
Alice nodded. “Yeah, they are. But have they ever actually came out and said they love each other?”
Ruth paused, thought for a moment. Well…
“No. But-“
Alice held up her hand. He dutifully shut his mouth, being the good dog he was.
“Then I don’t think you have anything to worry about.” Alice squeezed his hands, which he had forgotten she was holding. “Master and I have talked about this some, and we agree. They might grow into something more, but right now Ainsworth and Chise are figuring out what they want from life.”
“And that can take some time,” Renfred added, looking at his apprentice as if she made the world itself spin. It was at this point Ruth realized Renfred must have been drunk, because the man started tearing up. Alice looked back at him, just in time for him to start sobbing, going on about fate, and whatnot.
Ruth took this as his chance to leave. He slipped out almost unnoticed, and did not stop walking until he got to Angelica’s door some time later.
By the time he got there, it was nighttime and snowing, and Chise was sending an anxious question down their bond.
I’ll be back soon.
Angelica answers on the second knock. “Ruth! What a surprise.”
“I think they’re going to be alright.”
Angelica blinked. “Alright? Who?”
Ruth gulped. “Chise and Elias. They’re… figuring themselves out. But they don’t want to hurt each other.”
He spoke the truth. He had said it himself, Elias had never purposefully hurt his little sister. Not that he would have let him.
Ruth sighed. “They love each other, but they aren’t in love,” he explained.
Angelica put a hand on his shoulder. “And when they do fall in love? Because they will.”
Ruth smiled for the first time in weeks. “Then we’ll be there to help them. All of us.”
And he meant it. Angelica would make them new rings, and Silver would whip them into shape after fights, and Alice and Renfred would find a way to make sure everything went beautifully, whether they admitted it or not.
Ruth would be there, too. He always was.
Angelica smiled back at him. “You’re right.”
And with that, he went home.
———-
When he arrived back at the Ainsworth house, he is almost crushed by Chise’s embrace.
“Where have you been?” She demands, squeezing him tighter.
Ruth pries her arms from around his chest, and after taking in a much-needed breath, begins to speak:
“We’re going to be here for you. All of us will be.”
Chise looks confused at his words. “What do you mean?”
And maybe it’s because they share a bond, or they could read each other like a book, but Chise suddenly blushes so furiously her hair paled in comparison.
“Ruth-“
“You’re figuring yourself out. But you won’t always be.”
He ruffled her hair and began walking inside, to where Elias stood leaning on the doorframe.
“Welcome home,” he told Ruth.
Ruth looked back at Chise, then to Elias whose eyes had not left her back.
Ruth smiled, knowingly. “You too.”