Disclaimer: Shaman King belongs to Hiroyuki Takei, not me.
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The child was around three years old, very small and delicate- looking. She kept her eyes downcast, but it was easy to see the sharp dark bruising on her face. The little girl knelt at the feet of her aunt. Kino eyed her carefully.
"She's had the basic training," the child's aunt explained. "Already she can control shikigamis. And she has a spirit of her own."
Kino tipped the child's face towards her. "She's very fragile," she said, her tone disapproving. But she couldn't help but feel guilty when she looked into the girl's dark, frightened eyes.
"I wanted her to stay here so she can become a full shaman," the woman said.
Kino shot her a look. "There is more, I believe."
"The child's uncle- my husband- is not right in the head," the woman confessed. "More than once I've caught her. I want her to stay safe."
For a long moment, Kino watched the child. "I accept her as a student," she finally said.
The woman bowed low in gratitude. "Arigato," she said. She patted the little girl's head in vague affectionate. "Be a good child," she warned her. Then she was gone. The toddler's chin trembled.
"Don't cry, little one," Kino said, shuffling through the papers on her desk. "One of the other shamans will keep an eye on you until you are more confident. Go out of the office and look for one of them." The girl nodded obediently and vanished, closing the door behind her.
Kino slid her glasses up her nose as she focused on the application papers the woman had given her for the child. They were written hurriedly, without thought or care. Papers written for Annabelle Rose Kyoyama.
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Anna sat alone against the wall with the other first years, her small hands fumbling with her chopsticks. Her lips trembled. She wanted to go home, to her mother and her father and her brothers. Then she remembered. Kaa'san and Tou'san were dead. The little girl set down her chopsticks and cried. No one noticed her.
At nighttime, she followed the other young children to the south dormitory, where she was given a small futon and a yukata. Frantically she looked around for something familiar. Anna ran up to the teenage girl watching over them and tugged on her skirt. "Where are my own things?" she asked.
The older girl looked down at her. "Asakura-san has put your things away for you," she said. "You'll receive them when you graduate."
Anna stepped back, biting her lip. "But I want them now!" she sobbed. The girl's face was uncertain, torn between sympathy for the little girl and her desire to please her teacher and follow the rules. So she said nothing.
That night, Anna slept alone in her little bed. This time there was no warmth from her brothers' sleeping bodies curled up next to her, and no soft blanket to bury her face in when the tears came.
"Lydda," she whispered. "Lydda." The wind spirit materialized beside her. She was in the form of a slender, wispy blue-purple fairy. Her eyes were the color of gold coins. "I'm cold, Lydda," Anna said. The spirit nodded, sad for her small mistress, and blew soft warm breezes until the child fell asleep.
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Kino slipped into the back of the classroom to watch the tests for the first years. She shielded herself carefully, listening to the talk of the children between tests.
"Hey, shrimpy." The voice was loud and shrill, belonging to a large five-year-old. "Hey, shrimpy, hey, shrimpy! You're gonna fail!"
"No," Anna said, her voice quiet but threatening. "Shut up, Noshi."
"Hey, shrimpy! You and your wind spirit are gonna do so bad that Kino- sama will toss you out in the snow!"
"No."
There was a sharp slap. "Hey, shrimpy! Hey, shrimpy!" Noshi continued taunting. There was another slap.
Anna said nothing, but there was a loud crack.
"Sensei!" Noshi wailed. "Sensei! Anna hit me again! Anna hit me!"
The sensei, a younger shaman, took Anna by the arm, led her away from the other children, and proceeded to lecture her soundly. Anna's small face was expressionless and pale, except the angry red slash on her cheek where Noshi had slapped her.
"Kyoyama Anna," the testing sensei called. Interested, Kino stepped behind the senseis to watch the child's test.
Anna stood in the middle of the floor, her long blonde hair braided neatly. "Anna, summon your spirit," one of the senseis ordered. Obediently, Anna called out the necessary words and her wind spirit appeared at her side.
"Five point two seconds," the timer murmured, surprise in her voice.
"Pass."
"Wait," Kino said. Anna jumped in surprise. "Anna, integrate with your spirit."
"I haven't tried before," the child tried to protest.
Kino cut her off. "Even the first years can integrate. They just can't hold it for long. Integrate with your spirit, Anna."
Fear in her eyes, Anna held out her small hand. "Lydda- spirit ball mode!" she called in her high, clear voice. "Integrate!" With all of her strength, Anna, tried to integrate. The spirit ball sank into her chest , but bounced right back out. Anna collapsed on the floor, quietly retching in pain.
"As I thought," Kino nodded. "Anna cannot be trained as a traditional shaman. She is to be an itako."
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Anna stared at the bare ground. The courtyard was dead and barren, hardened for winter. She sighed softly. "Lydda, where are my brothers?" she asked.
The wind-spirit's shoulders sagged as she shook her head. Anna sighed again. She missed them. Kenji and Kanri. It had been four years since she had been brought to the training hall, and three years since her training had been switched from normal shaman training to that of an itako. At the moment, she couldn't really tell the difference. She just knew that she was different from the other children.
A harsh fluttering sound startled her out of her thoughts. "What's that, Lydda?" Anna asked. The spirit zoomed around in a blaze of lavender light, searching for the source of the sound. She stopped and pointed frantically at the ground.
Anna knelt down. "Oh!" she gasped in surprise. A small mourning dove was lying in a bush, one wing frenetically flapping and the other motionless. Anna caught the dove in her small hands. "Sh, love," Anna cooed, stroking the bird's feather's. "It's all right. I'll take care of you." The bird settled in her hands, calmed.
The nurse at the infirmary told her the wing was broken. With a little concealed laughter at the child's concern, she splinted the wing and gave her a small box to keep it in. That night Anna slept soundly, with Lydda on her left and her pet on the right.
From that moment on, Anna was never seen without her beloved bird perched on her shoulder. The mourning dove, christened Nii'san, was her constant companion.
Then one day in the spring, it happened.
Anna was in the garden again, teaching Nii'san to come at her command. "Fly over there, Nii'san," she ordered, laughing. The bird flew away. A few minutes later Anna whistled. The soft rustle of feathers answered her. Then there was a sharp crack, and then nothing.
"Nii'san?" Anna called. "Come, Nii'san!" She began to run, searching for her pet. The clay-colored bird was lying in the middle of the path, a slowly widening patch of red under him.
"Nii'san!" Anna screamed. One small hand stroked his breast, but there was no movement. She cried out again and ran away.
"Kino-san!" Anna sobbed. She hurtled into the hall, past the students and teachers, into Kino's office. "Kino-san!"
A young woman stood up. "What's wrong?" she asked.
"Where's Kino-san?" Anna demanded.
"She's not here right now, dear. Are you all right?" the lady asked. She was very pretty, with long dark hair and gentle dark eyes. It might have been her sweetness, or the fact that she called her 'dear', but Anna tumbled into the woman's arms.
"They killed my bird!" the child wailed. "They killed him!" Anna showed her the red stains on her palms.
"Oh," the woman said, kneeling down to hug Anna. "I'm sorry, sweetling." She stroked Anna's tangled hair gently.
"Keiko?" Kino asked, entering the office. "What is this?"
Keiko straightened, one hand still pressed against the sobbing girl's back. "She came here looking for you, Kaa'san. She said that someone killed her bird," she explained.
Kino nodded gravely. "I see. I'm sorry, child," she said. Anna sniffled hard and nodded. "Keiko, this is the girl I told you about. This is Anna."
Keiko smiled. "So you are Anna," she said.
"Anna, this is my daughter-in-law, Keiko Asakura," Kino introduced.
Anna bowed. "May I go please, Kino-san?" she asked. "I want to take care of Nii'san."
Kino nodded to her and the child fled, running to the solace of her pet's dead body.
-----
"I'm sorry you had to see her in such an unfavorable light," Kino said.
"Unfavorable?" Kino said. "What is so distasteful about a little girl weeping over her dead pet?"
"Ah, yes. Nii'san," Kino remembered.
"She named her bird Brother?" Keiko asked.
"In honor of her own brothers."
"Where are they?" Keiko asked.
Kino shrugged. "Who knows?" she said. "Anna and her aunt showed up one day in the dead of winter. The aunt said that the girl's parents were dead and her uncle was a lech. So she left Anna here." She handed Keiko a piece of paper. "This is all the information I have on her. Her name, an approximate age, and the aunt's signature. No address, no parents, not even a birthday."
"Poor child," Keiko sighed.
"But she is strong, and her sixth sense even stronger," Kino reminded her. "With the proper training, she will be a suitable wife for Yoh."
Keiko stared wistfully out the window. "My baby's too young for a wife," she said. "But if he is to marry eventually, then I approve of Anna. Besides, I think she'll need him just as much as he'll need her. Yes. I want Anna to become a part of our family."
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Author's Notes:
No, I don't know why I gave a little Japanese girl the name Annabelle Rose.
No, I don't know why people would shoot a mourning dove.
No, I don't know what possessed me to write this story.
Gaugh.