CHAPTER 424: ARC 6, CHAPTER 40: A NIGHT OUT OF STEP

"Planning on eavesdropping all night?" a certain blonde uttered with a constant half-lidded gaze and low sultry voice, both spawned from the drinks she’s had.

Hotaru’s cheeks puffed as she nearly choked on her drink. She gulped it down and puffed out a relieved breath. With her eyes shut, she spoke calm and poised, "Unhealthy habit, I know. Is your friend gone?"

Jotou leaned her hip against the table the redhead sat at and crossed her arms, "Well, he’s done for the night; we’re both tired from travelling."

"Off to bed then?"

The blonde leaned further till her feet were off the floor and she sat on the edge of the table. She looked down at the wolf-girl and nudged herself closer, "I was gonna go for a walk actually. Care to join me Ms Kinoshita?"

Hotaru’s eyes had to open to gaze up Jotou’s figure till their eyes met, "It’s past midnight," she said in a little hush.

"So?" Jotou tipped her head to the side to glance at the tavern still making merry with booze, music and roughhousing. Her head fell back to face Hotaru, "I think you’ve proved you’re not the stealthiest, but I think we’ll be fine if anything happens."

"Insult me more why don’t you, I’m sure I’ll be convinced," Hotaru’s ears flickered as she propped her face up in her palm.

Jotou smiled, "Of all the things that would get to you, that’s where you’d be offended? I know my girlfriend’s a lot tougher than that~"

She dug her fangs into her bottom lip and avoided eye contact, "You’re not making it any easier."

"I think if you wanted easy you wouldn’t’ve played so hard to get in our early days," Jotou said no more and unfurled each finger to offer her hand to the other.

Hotaru leered at the hand being offered and sat still for a moment. She then begrudgingly placed her palm into Jotou’s hands, to which Jotou’s fingers curled and caught. "Will we always be playing games?" she asked rhetorically.

"Unfortunately firefly—unfortunately~" the blonde held a smirk as she slid off the table and led Hotaru out of the tavern.

_

The two wordlessly meandered hand in hand, backed by a chorus of cicadas and crickets, with a sudden hoot from an owl or two.

With each crunch of the leaves and grass to their footsteps, the lamplight grew more and more distant. Jotou raised a hand crackling with yellow sparks while Hotaru did the same with her free hand, making it glow dimly with a bluish hue.

Throwing her head back, the blonde looked up to the sky. The wolf-girl darted her eyes to the left to notice it and then glanced up... only to see branches and leaves interweaving to give the view of a fragmented sky.

She furrowed her brows before looking at Jotou, questioning what she was even gazing at. Hotaru shook her head and peered forward through the woods.

Meanwhile, Jotou spied with her brown eyes, the stars through the gaps in the leaves and the faint moonlight bouncing off of the thin clouds; she smiled.

Hotaru felt a thumb grazing over her knuckles in circles and the grip on her hand tighten slightly. She tipped her head away from Jotou, facing the grass; she hid the joy that curled her lips up while her tail swayed freer.

Jotou then felt the other’s hand clutch her own tighter. She glanced down, then to the wolf-girl who was shying her face away. The blonde pouted to one side to shake off the approaching gleeful grin.

They walked—no particular direction, no specific destination. Shadows of trees crowded less by now and the babbling of a small stream prickled at their ears, as they had stepped into a glade.

Both of them lowered their hands, dispelling their light sources for they needed one no longer. Yellowish-green flecks of light flickered and fluttered around—fireflies.

Watching the sight, they both paused to catch their breath. Fireflies sparkled around, passing in between and over them. Jotou’s head gradually tilted rightwards, before it landed against Hotaru’s head and brushed against her left ear.

Hotaru’s ear could not flicker, but she conceded and accepted her circumstance. They watched the fireflies dance and twinkle in silence. The air was chilly and refreshing—the symphony of bugs unending.

Quietly, Jotou began to hum. It was not to any particular rhythm or song; perhaps it was a tune from her world subconsciously drifting in her mind.

The redhead’s eyes darted to the side, only able to see golden locks of hair and the soft peach skin of her cheek. She unintentionally nudged closer against the blonde.

Jotou took notice and pushed right back till they rocked from one side to the other. While they swayed, Jotou reeled herself around till she no longer stood beside Hotaru, but instead in front of her—face to face.

Hotaru ducked her head down and yet still held the hand that the blonde had not let go.

Jotou placed a finger under the wolf-girl’s chin, tipping it up to see her face proper.

Hotaru barely gave any resistance and kept her brilliant blue irises stuck in the blonde’s gaze.

However, Jotou glanced down lower, noticing the adornment around the redhead’s neck. Her finger drifted down to lift the silver necklace that twisted in a helix pattern, interwoven with black strands of hair.

Hotaru’s eyes darted down while her chin was still tipped up, realizing what the other tugged on softly. She plucked the blonde’s finger away from her neck and moved it away, displaying a similar silver helix pattern around Jotou’s left wrist, with red strings of hair.

The redhead slipped a finger under the bracelet, making it much tighter around the wrist; she almost did so mockingly, as if to tease that Jotou was wearing hers too.

Jotou paid no mind to the taunt and instead curled her fingers to capture and hold up Hotaru’s hand, before she promptly laced her fingers with the wolf-woman’s.

Hotaru tilted her head back, keeping her gaze on the other.

The blonde let go of the hand she held for this long and inched it upwards till she held Hotaru by the waist.

Hotaru’s back stiffened up, jolted by her touch. Watching the fireflies sparkling in the blonde’s dark eyes, the redhead’s now freed hand drew further and further up till it settled onto Jotou’s shoulder.

...

Jotou took one step to her left—Hotaru followed. Jotou continued, each slow step weaving through the grass that brushed up above her ankles; Hotaru met each step in tune with the blonde’s rhythm.

They swayed, then turned— moving in circles within the glade. Frogs croaked, crickets and cicadas chirped, the stream gurgled, the fireflies flickered all around—and their eyes could not look anywhere else.

Both of them beamed brightly till their eyes creased; neither of their feet wanted to stop. Her ears bristled and tail wagged in sync. How long had it been since they left the tavern? Minutes, hours, seconds—they all blurred together and it mattered not.

Hotaru’s brilliant blue pools flickered a sprinkling of blue rainwater. Jotou’s smoky quartz-like irises sparked in yellow all around, circling in a ring of lightning around her pupils.

...

...

The blonde leaned her face in closer and so did the redhead. Both their eyelids began to close—their lips within a hair strand’s distance. Their breaths tickled the other’s skin...

Jotou moved her face close to meet her lips, but Hotaru pulled her head back, sealing them shut tightly instead. Their footsteps came to an abrupt freeze.

Jotou’s head stayed in the position she leaned into, and her eyes remained shut; her lips faltered into a frown. Hotaru kept her eyes closed as well, and the same frown painted itself on her; her tail wilted to a stop.

The blonde’s hands loosened and let go—snappily and blunt. She turned without a word and headed back towards the tavern and guild, never looking back.

Hotaru retracted her hands, but they still hovered in the air. One hand reached out. Her lips parted to speak and a disappointed breath of air was all she could muster.

Disenchanted and guilt-ridden, she waited for a moment to let Jotou get further ahead of her, before she would follow behind.

Hotaru looked around with a crinkle of her nose. The bugs were just insistent noise, the fireflies were annoying against her ears and hair, the grass dirtied her boots and her eyes were heating up from not having slept yet...

_

’What’s it gonna take, huh? Does hell need to freeze over first!?’ Jotou slipped into a nightgown before massaging the bridge of her nose, while trying her to stop her brows from knitting so intensely.

She took a deep breath and let it all out in one big go. She sparked bits of her hair, drying it out consistently after her long bath.

Her eyes closed and she could feel sleep about to overtake her. Flumping down onto the side of the bed, she sifted her hair through her fingers bit by bit—playfully so.

She collapsed back onto the bed with a sigh, bouncing her head against the pillows. With her eyes shut, she drifted off to... Just, give it a moment.

...

...

Well, it seemed that she could not quite drift off to anywhere. Jotou whined, rolling and turning in bed for the next thirty or so minutes. Her tongue clicked and she darted her eyes to a clock in the room.

’It’s past two in the damn morning. End me...’ Lamenting her situation, Jotou stared at the ceiling for a few seconds, replaying the recent event in her head—the fireflies, the sway, the scent of sea dandelions...

Jotou closed her eyes and pursed her lips. Her fingers traced along her own jawline and down the side of her neck. She pressed the skin of her shoulders to her collarbone methodically and without haste.

Her lips parted open to moan the release of her stress before she cupped her own breast and kneaded it firmly. Meanwhile, her right hand slipped under the covers and teased down her waist and thighs, moving under the hem of her nightgown.

"Knock-knock-knack!"

Jotou’s eyes bubbled and her entire body lurched in shock. It was immediately followed by the sharpest of glares at the door and a loud guttural groan as she slid her hands off of herself.