K folks this is my first fanfic so be nice okie?

Disclaimer: I do not in anyway own YYH, its characters, or its plot/storyline. I DO own my original characters (OCs) and this story's plot. You steal it. I get pissed. Track you down. And break your neck. Comprendai? Good.

"blah blah blah" dialog (for you linguistically challenged, stuff in double quotes means people are talking out loud)

'blah blah blah' thoughts of the character. Could also be the telepathic conversation of two (duh) telepaths

(blah blah blah A/N) authoress' notes. I may or may not insert comments or explanations of certain things in my story.

Ok! On with the story. Btw, the YYH characters don't come into the picture until chapter 2.

Child of the Night

Chapter 1 Training with the sensei from hell

"No trespassing," read the girl. She chuckled, 'Why do people even bother putting those signs up?' she thought to herself while hopping the fence. She landed on the soft loam of the forest floor and sighed. It was good to be back in a forest untouched by human culture. 'Stupid human excuse of civilization; they corrupt the soul of their own earth.' Pulling her sapphire streaked black hair up in a pony-tail, she took a deep breath.

The girl glanced at Earth's one sun and squinted. It was around 10 am, or so she guessed. She always did have trouble remembering the sun's positions. So she had about two hours give or take to get back to her destination. Her pace quickened. If she was late, her teacher was liable to go berserk on her. Again. Her boots hastened over the brown and orange leaves on the ground and half an hour later she finally reached the base of a colossal oak tree.

Pulling off her leather gloves, she placed one hand on the rough bark, and held her dragon's claw pendent with the other. It had been a gift, that pendant. Golden wire holding the fifth claw of an imperial dragon captive. It dangled on a steel chain that had hung around her neck since she was five. It was their fifth claw that allowed the dragons of royal blood to travel through time and space, and the girl found it rather useful.

As she gripped the claw, her surroundings spun around her, faster and faster, until they were no more than a blur of color and unrecognizable smudges. Stomach churning, and teeth clenched, the spinning abruptly ceased allowing the girl to catch her breath.

As she regained control of her body and bearings, a man stepped out from behind a tree. Raven black hair streaked with gold was spiked high. He wore a black tunic, loose pants, and black cloth boots. On his hands were a pair of fingerless gloves, and over his shoulder hung his bow and quiver. He leaned casually against a tree and sighed.

"You're late again, Kayam."

Kayam rolled her eyes. "And a 'good morning' to you to Marth," Marth opened his mouth to say something but was cut off by his student. "And don't give me the 'if-you're-not-serious-about–this-, don't-waste-my-time,' speech. I'm here now aren't I?" Marth chose to ignore her comment.

"Come on, I want to work on your senses today." He led her to a large clearing with a leafy green foliage. The sunlight filtering through the canopy of leaves overhead made patterns of dappled light play across the forest floor. "Stand in the center and close your eyes. I'll be in the trees; I want you to dodge my arrows. This will help you not to depend so heavily on sight and sharpen your other senses at the same time. Do not open your eyes until I tell you to. I'll get you started with rocks, but as soon as you've dodged five of them, I'll switch to my arrows." Kayam eyed her teacher warily.

"So I'm supposed to just close my eyes and let you use me as target practice? You're kidding me right?!" she yelled after Marth's disappearing figure. Kayam sighed and walked toward the center of the clearing. "Well, this will make an interesting topic for discussion. 'So, what'd you do in training today?' oh, I closed my eyes while my teacher threw rocks and shot arrows at me." Kayam quipped. She continued muttering to herself as she walked. "What kind of demented idea is this?! Did this guy just randomly sit down one day and think to himself. 'Hey, I know! I'll have Kayam play blindfolded dodge ball with rocks and arrows! Then, I'll sit in the trees cracking up wile she tries to stay conscious from loss of blood and head trauma! Yeah, that sounds like fun…' " She rolled her eyes. "Stupid baka…" she muttered as she reached the center of the clearing and closed her eyes.

Taking a deep breath, she cleared her mind as her senses heightened. Silence. Suddenly the air whistled behind her. Too late, the fist-sized rock smashed into her shoulder as she tried to dive out of the way.

"Owww…. That hurt." She rolled her closed eyes. "Ok memo to self; 'Don't get hit by hard flying objects.' " In her mind she added, 'Especially if those objects are leaving the hands of someone with repressed anger.' Despite her throbbing shoulder, she gave a small laugh. There were times when she thought Marth was going to simply drop dead his blood pressure looked so high. You could practically see the steam rising from his head at those moments; and in the winter you really could.

Her attention was rudely snatched from her thoughts as another chunk of rock (this time roughly the size and shape of a golf ball) bounced off her stomach. Kayam groaned. 'Gotta stop daydreaming. Focus!' She took a deep breath and listened with new awareness. The next time she heard the rock cutting through the air she carefully judged its angle before neatly sidestepping it. Up in the trees Marth smirked.

"Good, she's finally stopped fooling around. I'll throw one more rock, then let's see how well she deals with an arrow." He chuckled thoughtfully. "She's going to kill me for this…"

Kayam smiled as she heard the rock kick up pine needles as it slammed into the ground. 'Ok, I've got three more rocks to dodge before I have to worry about those arrows of his.' She grimaced, 'I hope he's not using those barbed arrowheads of his. Those things hurt like hell when you pull them out.' A whistle to her left. She stepped back effortlessly and waited. As Marth cocked his bow, he wondered what would happen if he had underestimated Kayam, or her abilities.

Arms crossed, Kayam was slightly relaxed as she speculated if Marth's challenge was supposed to be this easy. 'He'd better not try anything…'

Marth released the arrow and watched as it flew towards its target.

Back down in the clearing Kayam heard the twang of a bow and felt her heart jump in shock. No time for thought, she propelled herself high into the air and did a back flip landing ten feet away from her original position. When she landed opened her eyes were blazing more with fury.

"WHAT THE HELL WAS THAT MARTH!?!?!" she roared in the general direction of the arrow's owner. "You said you'd give me until after I'd dodged five rocks!!! You didn't even THROW five rocks you jerk!!!! You see, THIS is why I'm so paranoid! Because if I wasn't, I'd be dead right now, since I can't seem to be able to trust you! You deceitful, prevaricating s-"

"Calm down onna." Marth leaped out of a tree and landed beside her. "When you're actually trying to avoid arrows or throwing knives, do you really think the person is going to tell you when or what they're going to throw at you? I was just trying to get you used to thinking on your feet; which you did quite well by the way, good job." Kayam said nothing as she continued to silently glower at him. Marth sighed. "Oh come on, let it go. You still have to dodge the rest of my arrows; don't think you're getting out of your training that easy. Close your eyes again." Kayam sighed.

"I really loath you Marth."

"Of course you do," Marth laughed as he gave her a friendly punch in the arm. "Don't forget, I'll be shooting arrows at you this time. Though, I might do the occasional throwing knife just for kicks." He added with a thoughtful expression.

"You wouldn't…"

"Are you sure about that?" he grinned. "Come on, eyes closed now. Empty your mind. Take a deep breath and just let everything flow through you." Kayam relaxed and closed her eyes as Marth continued. "Listen carefully to your surroundings but don't lose yourself in thought trying to analyze everything. When the arrow comes, don't try to think, just react." Kayam just nodded.

As Marth slipped away Kayam took another deep breath of the cool, clean forest air. Then she let herself go. At first everything seemed silent, but as her senses heightened it was like someone had turned up the volume knob of the world. She could feel the pinecone as it made impact with the ground. And the wind quickly took on a life of its own. She sighed as she felt the various air currents swelling up around her before swirling away.

She smirked to herself as she allowed one lone thought to float across her mind. 'Give me all you got Marth. I'm ready for you…'

"She's got spirit," Marth mused. It had been over four hours since Kayam had last used her eyes. Her speed, patience, and most of all endurance was incredible. She had gotten hit half a dozen times or so, but those were mostly from the time he had shot multiple arrows at her in an unending attack. Marth shot five more arrows in quick secession then jumped down to the clearing.

Kayam heard the impact he made on the ground and whipped around. She tensed as she rested one hand on her katana's hilt. If possible, her closed eyes narrowed even more. 'I swear to the gods, if he makes me spar blind….'

"That's all. We're done for today." Marth smiled as Kayam slowly opened her eyes and shook her head to clear it. "You've improved significantly in speed, agility, and you've honed your senses to an amazing degree. Go home and rest." Kayam's hard gaze disappeared as she suddenly broke out into a grin. And in an uncharacteristic gesture she bear-hugged Marth. Then she pulled away and ran off into the woods still grinning. At this point Marth was looking at her disappearing form somewhat like so: o.O

"Who slipped opium into her green tea?"

While Marth mused over his student's sudden mood swing, Kayam was running as fast as she could up a long-forgotten mountain path. She was lost in the joy of movement, taking in great lungfuls of the mountain air. As the wind rushed around her, she felt her spirit lifting higher.

Finally she reached the cliff and with a last whoop leaped off. In an explosion of feathers jet black wings burst out of her back. For an instant they threatened to rip cloth but soon found the ready-made slits already there and slipped out of those instead. She gave them another strong flap and glided another good hundred yards or so before giving another one.

She was practically gliding above the lush green giant-bamboo forest. Swooping, low for a moment she felt the soft leaves brush her arms for a moment before a warm draft lifted her once again high above the clean emerald green expanse. The air was crisp but she cared not, when she flew she was free. There was nothing that could replace the joy she felt when she looking down at the seemingly flawless world with adrenaline pumping through her system. She did one last loop before diving for a particular spot in the endless sea of giant-bamboo. A huge hard wood tree (she never had figured out what kind of tree it was) with branches wide as sidewalks quickly came into view.

Kayam slowed down before diving for the landing platform she had built a year ago when she'd first discovered this world. She sighed and stretched her wings one last time before folding them to her back. She closed her eyes and concentrating for a moment, envisioning her wings dissolving into her back. She felt the familiar warm as her beautiful wings became pure energy than was reabsorbed into her body. Sighing, the girl walked along the branch until she reached the trunk. Laying her bare hands once again on the rough bark she gave the tree a kiss and whispered gently to it with a small smile on her lips.

"Guess who's back Izanami? Only your favorite roomie. Sorry I'm so late, Marth kept me late with his newest training exercise from hell." The tree's leaves rustled and Kayam could have sworn her heard her old friend chuckle. A lithe branch bent down and touched her gently on the shoulder. Kayam took her cue and held on tightly. The branch bent back up and set her down carefully on another one of her branches where a rope ladder hung. The ladder was the only way to get up to her home, and Izanami was the only means to get to the ladder. Even she probably couldn't get to her door with out the help of both, or at least one.

Taking a firm grip on the hemp rope, Kayam started up. As she climbed, her house slowly came into view. Near the top of the ladder she reached across and pulled open the trap door at the tree house's floor. The (much smaller) rope ladder tumbled out and she grabbed hold of it as she transferred her body onto the smaller ladder. She never used the 'front' door. In fact, the door was a decoy so that those who weren't previously informed would trigger a trap that would shot sixty or so arrows out the door at all different angles.

At last Kayam pulled herself through the trap door and began re-rolling the ladder. She reached out and closed the trap door, placing the ladder onto of it so it would fall out next time. She started to walk to the next room calling,

"Lei! I'm home!!!!!!"

"Ouch! I've got sensitive ears you know Kayam!!" The small dragon flew into the room. Its long supple body practically flowed into the room, and its front feet were held over its ears. One of his feet had only four claws. Kayam's nearly life-long companion was glaring at her. "Where have you been these past two weeks?! Do you have any idea how worried I was?!?! You told me five to six days tops, not sixteen!!!!!!" Lei was livid. Kayam sighed, 'I'm SO screwed…..'

"Sorry I'm so late, got caught up in the some crap that I had to deal with. Apparently I got the flu or something like that. I had it really bad so Jade wouldn't let me leave her house until she deemed me cured. I got better just in time to meet Marth at our scheduled time to train. Lucky me. Anyways, Marth just let me go. So here I am!" she grinned in a cheerful, slightly hopeful, please-don't-kill-me sort of way. Lei growled, but dropped the subject. Kayam let out a relieved sigh.

"I'll go make us some dinner k? I doubt we have much of that deer left, so I'll just make us some Ramen." Lei's eyes brightened a little. The dragon seemed to have taken quite a liking to human food every since Kayam had introduced him to it. A few minutes later the smell of noodles, ginger, venison, and basil made its way to Lei's nose. The little black wraith happily sped towards the kitchen. The two gulped down the hot meal before sitting back satisfied.

"I'm going out for a walk Lei, want to come?" Lei, who was curled up like a cat did not look like he was going to be moving anytime soon.

"No thanks, I'm just going to sleep for a while. Be careful out there though. If I don't find you in your bed by morning I'll hunt for you. In my true form." He added looking her straight in the eye. Kayam shrugged and tried to brush it off, though in truth she was worried. There was nothing scarier than an angry imperial dragon, and to tell the truth if anyone did manage to murder or kidnap her, she'd feel bad for the idiot who'd just invited Lei's wrath upon them. Lei looked at her hard for a moment before she sighed in defeat.

"Point taken. Don't get hurt, or kidnapped or else I'm basically signing half the Makai's death certificate." Lei smirked closed his eyes.

"Very good. Don't come back too late."

"I won't. G' night Lei." But too often, the fates have different plans for us.