I Brought Home a Cthulhu - Chapter 5

At least she was light.

I carried her into the kitchen like a cat and tried to cook with her in my arms.

Cooking one-handed was difficult.

When it was time to cut the vegetables, I said helplessly, “I need to use the knife now. Could you get down?”

Qi Wuzhi locked both arms and legs around me. “Cut.”

“…”

Technically, both my hands were free, but…

“You’re blocking my view. I can’t see the knife like this, and I might cut myself.”

Qi Wuzhi did not answer. In a movement so unnatural it made my scalp prickle, she “crawled” around onto my back.

Every hair there stood on end.

She touched the cold sweat on my neck.

“The taste of fear.”

She laughed softly beside my ear. “Are you afraid?”

I was utterly speechless.

“Who wouldn’t be? You’re like a ghost!” I snapped. “Can’t you act normal?”

She let her head droop against my shoulder. “How should I act normal? I’m not human.”

My eyes flew wide.

“How are you not human? You have arms and legs, you talk, you walk. How could you not be human?”

She gave a derisive little laugh.

“…Keep cutting.”

“…”

—

With Qi Wuzhi still riding on my back, I managed to cook dinner.

Her demands about seafood remained as extreme as ever. I would not have touched a bite of the shrimp or shellfish I prepared for her; they had to be unbearably fishy. She ate with obvious enjoyment.

After dinner, I cleared the dishes and tried to return to the studio. Qi Wuzhi insisted on coming with me.

I laid down three rules. “You may come, but you may not touch anything, interrupt me, or lie on my back.”

Qi Wuzhi looked at me in silence.

“…………Fine.”

I sat beneath the lamp and used a soft brush dipped in distilled water to remove loose soil from the bowl.

The harder calcified deposits required a cotton swab dipped in a two-percent oxalic-acid solution. I applied it to one small area, waited several minutes for the deposit to soften, then scraped it away gently with a bamboo pick.

The process took two hours. I changed the swab every fifteen minutes and measured each drop of solution with a pipette to keep the concentration exact.

Qi Wuzhi sat across from me and watched the entire time.

Eventually, she asked, “Why not finish it all at once?”

Jolted out of my concentration, I stared blankly for two seconds before I understood that she had spoken—and what she had asked. I still was not used to having another person in the studio.

After thinking, I said, “If I apply too much at once, I can’t control it precisely.”

She said nothing.

She had noticed that before every application, I tested the solution on a discarded ceramic shard to make sure it would not corrode the glaze.

“You’re afraid of breaking it,” she said.

“That isn’t quite right.” I explained patiently. “I want to preserve as many of the marks left by time as I can. Of course I could restore it until it looked brand-new, but then there would be no point.”

“The marks of time… do they need to be preserved?”

I shot her a look. “What do you think makes something a cultural relic?”

Qi Wuzhi did not answer. Instead, she said something that seemed entirely unrelated.

“If a thing is broken, why not simply rebuild it?”

I looked at her.

“It isn’t broken.” My voice turned hard. “It’s only wounded.”

Qi Wuzhi lowered her lashes.

She came to my side and touched my neck.

“The taste of anger.”

One brow rose. “You’re angry? Why? Only because I called it broken?”

I dodged her hand.

Her brows immediately drew together.