A/N: I know I get some plot stuff wrong. Get over it. =P I make it a bloody war. What's life without a little death and destruction? =)
Charra was the village medicine woman. Or that's what people liked to call her. People weren't fond of accepting magic as a means of help, so they told themselves that Charra was just gifted with herbs and potions. Deep in their hearts they knew she was powerful. The village of Kana was full of inactive people. No one ever advanced or moved forward. They all just stayed happily content with their simple lives and no one objected. Not even Charra.
Charra knew well enough by now that her dreams were not fantasy, and she often acted accordingly, trying to make contact with others who might share these dream worlds. She went places and met people who looked like nothing she had ever seen before. Her favorite person to meet up with was a woman named Tomoyo.
She wore elaborate clothes and spoke in words that sounded far wiser than her age would let on. What Charra enjoyed most of all when she met with Tomoyo were the girl's stories; stories of her life and the people who served her, for Tomoyo was a princess. She particularly liked this one servant: Kurogane, even though he was so hot-headed and stubborn.
She told her stories about Kurogane's latest adventures, travelling with a group to search for another princess' memories and how Kurogane learned true strength when he sacrificed his own arm to save a magician he had grown to love.
Another person she met in her dream worlds that she liked was a woman named Yuuko. Yuuko also told her stories of this Kurogane and his travel companions, because it was Yuuko who had given them the means to travel. She described this Mokona as a little white animal with long ears that talked and could transport people from world to world. Charra had a hard time wrapping her head around these ideas, but she enjoyed listening to them all the same.
There came a time when Tomoyo paid her final visit. She was giving up her dream-seeing power as a price to Yuuko for a wish, to bring Kurogane home and offer his group help in their search. Charra was sad, but she knew how important it was that Kurogane and his companions succeed in their mission, so she said goodbye.
Yuuko refused to go into details of what was happening, but she made it sound ominous.
"It's not possible that all this war and fighting could come here, is it?" Charra asked the question that had been nagging at her mind for some time. Yuuko looked grave.
"I'm afraid it is," she stated simply. "Your world has not yet been visited by our travelers, but it is only a matter of time. I am sure one of Sakura's feathers is going to appear there. It may not be in your lifetime, but it will happen." She sighed. "Things are getting intense. If things keep going the way Fei Wang Reed wants, then this could end in an all-out bloodbath. We have to fight. And I told them this wasn't a good time for that," she added to herself, rubbing her forehead. "Stupid vampire… mage… blonde… idiot."
"Fai?" Charra asked, recalling the magician. "What did Fai want?" Yuuko sent her a small smile.
"It doesn't matter. But I'm going to have to leave you for some time," Yuuko said. "I will return to your dreams eventually, but I have to focus on the war." Charra nodded.
"I understand," she said. Yuuko looked up.
"It's almost morning," she said. "Farewell, my friend."
Charra's dreams were relatively quiet for almost two years. She waited for the night when Yuuko would return and give her news of the war. She hoped it didn't turn out horribly bad. And she was ever-curious about Fai's wish, even though she knew it was none of her business.
Then one night, her dreams weren't like they usually were. She could hear awful sounds. Screaming and fighting. Sounds of devastation and war. Then she heard a young man's voice.
"Yuuko! Yuuko, help!"
Charra could then see her friend Yuuko in her shop. A little black creature was projecting an image up on the wall of a blonde man with one startlingly blue eye. The other was hidden behind a blindfold. His face was bruised and bleeding.
"What do you need?" Yuuko asked. The man held out a young child, sleeping peacefully, oblivious to the destruction taking place around it.
"Please save her! Just get her out of here and some place safe!"
Yuuko's eyes shifted in the direction of Charra for a moment.
"The only place safe enough resides not in this world. You know full well the price will be high." The man steeled himself for his future.
"I know…. Please."
"Very well."
Another voice rang from behind the blonde man: a deeper, rougher voice.
"Fai! Fai, where are you?"
The blonde looked over his shoulder quickly, then he kissed the child tenderly on the forehead.
"I love you, darling one." He placed something around her neck and handed her out to Yuuko. "Take her. Save her!"
"Mokona," Yuuko ordered. Suddenly the child was in Yuuko's shop and the blonde man and the sounds of war were gone. Yuuko held the child carefully and turned to Charra. "I am sorry for getting you involved," she said, walking closer. "But you should be safe. This child has not done anything against those waging war and should most likely not be sought after." Yuuko handed the child to Charra. She couldn't have been more than a year old. "She will grow up almost like you: with power. There will come a day when she will surpass your abilities and it may come sooner than you'd like. Try to keep her in your village with a low profile. All you can tell her about her past is that she was given to you for her protection and that you know nothing more. Fai has paid dearly to save his daughter. She will become important to all dimensions, so raise her right. I know you can." Charra looked down at the sleeping child.
"What is her name?" she asked.
"You name her," Yuuko said. "It will help if no one from my world or Fai's knows her true identity. I'm afraid this is the last time we will meet. Now go."
Charra woke up quickly only to find that she was indeed holding the child in her arms. She didn't know how she would explain this to the village, but she would find a way. She went back to sleep, searching in her dreams for a proper name to give the child.
Almost as if she was being led, she appeared in a snowy world, covered in ice, yet her skin was not affected by the cold. She was standing in a deep, empty ditch. In the middle of the ditch was a tall tower with a single window at the very top. Something grave had happened here, she could tell.
Suddenly, a horde of voices started ringing in her ears. She didn't understand the language at all. She spun around, looking for a person or creature that could be talking, but found none. She heard a child's voice amongst the others and it sounded sad at first. Then it grew angry. It started talking over itself, like there were two of the same child. The other voices faded away and all she heard was the children. They were both crying, but one was filled with rage.
As she felt herself waking up, she caught on to a word that was repeated by the calmer voice: Yuui.
Charra opened her eyes and looked down at the still sleeping child.
"Yuui," she said. The child wiggled in her sleep, her little fingers closing around something that Charra hadn't noticed before.
A necklace.
The design on the pendant was unlike anything she'd seen before. The bronze parts resembled wings and the blue stones shone brilliantly in the early morning sun seeping through the window. She examined the pendant, trying to decipher the writing on the back. But it just looked like a bunch of funny lines to her. Also contained on the chain was an object completely foreign to Charra, for no one in her world had a use for a key.
The child squirmed again and opened her eyes, blinking a few times before focusing on Charra's wrinkling face.
"Good morning, Yuui."
Yuui smiled.