Title: A lacklustre haunting
Fandom: Magic Knight Rayearth
Rating: General
Length: 1000ish words
Content notes: None
Author notes: Set in the same universe as the fic I wrote for 'shipping', a while back but it shouldn't really be necessary to read it, Umi/Clef AU where they're both university lecturers on earth (on other sides of the earth) in historical magic, for deal and also for elusive (or ephemeral) for my bingo card.
Summary: "So, what's the deal with this ghost?"

oOo

"So, what's the deal with this ghost?"

"Ghost?" Clef looked away from the student essays on his desk and over his shoulder, at the visitor lounging in his doorway. It was still a shock to hear Umi's voice at all. To see her stood there, in the flesh-

It was only five days since she'd charged in to the back of his conference talk, and his world had trembled a little. They'd spent most of their time together since then - Umi's University back in Japan was out of term time, and she'd given herself time to have a bit of a holiday, as she explained about thirty seconds before he invited her to come back with him to Norfolk for the week she had free.

From the way she had grinned, that had been her entire plan. At least, as long as they hit it off. As she was here… he could only hope she was enjoying his company half as much as he found himself enjoying hers.

He only had a few obligations back home this week, but the pile of marking that had built up while he was fretting over his presentation - and, more than that, over meeting Umi for the first time - was certainly one of them. So here they were, visiting his office, in one of the buildings which was now part of the university but had originally been built as part of an abbey in the thirteenth century. He had a window through the two-foot wide wall which he'd had to fill with plants to stop himself piling it full of paperwork after the third time they all got mouldy - the glass wasn't as old as the wall, perhaps, but it was still at least four hundred years old, and the condensation was incredible.

On the plus side, the forest of spider-plants managed to survive while he was out of town even when none of the people he asked to check on them managed to do so. This year Ferio was actually back in the country, at least for long enough to finish his degree, and had managed to come check on things at least half the times Clef asked him to.

"The ghost that haunts this place," Umi continued. "I looked it up on the internet, way back when we were first yelling politely at each other over emails, and there were students talking about seeing at least one ghost in this building. So, how do you summon them? I want to meet a real British ghost while I'm touristing about."

"Were you hoping she was haunting me?" Clef raised one eyebrow at her, and tried not to grin when she laughed and came right in to his space, dropping into the chair at the side of his desk. Their relationship - their conversation - had started off with a tipsy and irritated email from Umi at an inaccuracy in one of his articles. He didn't imagine she'd been feeling sorry for him, working in a supposedly haunted building.

"She - it's a lady ghost?" Umi leaned one arm on the desk, looking about the room with blatant curiosity. "I thought this was an abbey full of monks. Or is it the ghost of a student?"

"Abbeys could have monks or nuns or both, historically. I don't know which this was, but the only rumours I have heard are of a 'grey lady', or at least a lady in grey. The monasteries were dissolved in the tudor period, so there's been plenty of time to collect extra history since then." He turned to the window and waved at the little diamond-shaped panes of glass. "I think that the windows are from when this building was split into several houses, and then got split more and more over the next few years and fell into disrepair and by the eighteen hundreds it ended up getting used as a press - there was a fairly radical newspaper written and printed here. It only became part of the university in about nineteen fifty when this one was started."

"Not a student, then?"

"Unlikely," he agreed, shooting a grin her way. "I think we would know about any likely happenings from the last seventy years or so. But there is one way it could be students anyway - we do have a very well respected school of illusion at this university, and they are in fact based on the floor above us."

"Well, that's no fun," Umi sighed. "So either this ghost is very elusive, or never existed?"

"Sorry, I don't think I've ever seen her." Turning back to his desk, he pushed the drawer back in and locked it, then grabbed the papers to shove them into a straining cardboard folder and that into his bag. "You'll have to do your best to haunt me instead. Though we could go visit a few of the old houses that swear they have a few ghosts, while you're here, if you really want to go somewhere fairly haunted?"

"I'll have to haunt you?" Umi leaned back in her chair. "Is that permission to turn up unexpectedly whenever you aren't expecting me?"

Looking at her, Clef took a breath, and tried to look casual. "I suppose it might count as that. If you wanted it to."

Grinning, but flushing slightly, Umi grabbed his bag and headed for the door. "I might. Depends on whether you're going to keep your promise to show me around! Are you coming?"

Clef shook his head, but pushed himself up, trying his hardest not to smile nonsensically. That seemed a fair deal to him.

Not that he was going to tell her so, not yet.