A/N- Just a scene I'd written for Threads Intertwined, but if hadn't quite fit so I had to cut it. It's supposedly set between the fourth and fifth chapter, so after Yato's given Yuzuriha the scarf, but before they've made it to the ocean.
A series of wracking coughs rang out through the small confines of the room they'd rented. Yuzuriha, fresh water basin tucked in the crook of her elbows, closed the door with a thrust from her hip, turning to regard the pile of blankets that occupied the cot in the corner of the room.
"Feeling no better?" Yato's red hooded eyes glared up at her from beneath the mountain of blankets. Ignoring his glare she stepped inside, saying "I really would have thought that after the first mountain run off stream you would have learned your lesson about jumping head first into them."
"But this one really didn't look cold, and the sun was so warm." Yato's voice was coarse and sleepy, long since having been worn by his constant coughing. He'd started to come down with his sickness four days before, and she'd finally relented to his moans to stop travelling. They'd taken room in a lodge and had been there the past two days. She had suspected that some of his claimed sickness stemmed from his constant wish to sleep under a roof rather on the road, but she now had to admit that he was looking a little akin to death warmed over.
"Mhmm? I bet it wasn't half as warm as your forehead is right now," Yuzuriha mused. "Besides, it's barely spring. You should just assume that all the water's still cold. Especially any that looks like it might be coming down from a mountain."
Yato yawned briefly. "Is that food?" He asked, effectively moving the subject away from his poor judgement of mountain streams. He snuggled down deeper into his blankets, and looked at her mournfully. "I can't eat food."
Yuzuriha rolled her eyes. "No, it's not food," she replied. "And you better eat when I bring you something, or else you'll never get better." The sad moan he responded with was pitiful in its attempt to gain her sympathy.
She knelt beside Yato's cot, and peeled the white cloth off his forehead. It was nearly dry, and had soaked up heat from his burning skin. She let her hand rest on his forehead for a moment, and determined it had grown hotter since the time she had last checked on him. Worry would start to gnaw its way into her mind if his fever didn't break soon.
Setting these unpleasant thoughts aside Yuzuriha focused on what she could do to help him. She dipped a fresh cloth in the basin of water she'd brought with her, acutely aware of how Yato's eyes, even bleary with fever and exhaustion, tracked her hand's movements. She tried her best to ignore his gaze as she wrung the excess water out of the new cloth, then draped it over his forehead.
She found her eyes resting instead on his chin, examining the faint layer of stubble that was now growing there. It had appeared as soon as he'd fallen sick, but this was the first time she'd really noticed it. The thin line of hair that darkened his chin looked strange to her. It reminded her of how much time had passed since they had first met, and how much older they were now. Neither of them were children anymore.
She must have been more focused than she thought on the hairline on his chin as she didn't realize his hand slip out from under the covers and catch her forearm gently. His grip was light enough that she could have pulled out of it easily had she wanted to. Instead she found herself watching with wide, but guarded eyes as he turned over her wrist. His thumb moved to trace the line of one of the many scars there.
"You must have revived a lot Cloths with your blood." His thumb moved from one scar to trace another. She didn't move. She didn't say a thing. Yuzuriha wasn't even sure she could have worked around the lump that had built up in her throat to speak. She wasn't sure what to make of the strange sensation that was now trailing a burning pattern along her criss-crossed skin.
"You probably don't miss this part of it all, eh?" Yato's eyes flicked up to her face at that moment, seeming to gauge her reaction. They then fell back down to his hand, still tracing the scars on her forearm, blinking slowly. He was getting tired.
She her own eyes followed the path his thumb was tracing over her scarred forearm, mesmerized by its movements. "It was an important job, someone had to do it," she finally managed to say, her voice hoarse. In a smaller voice, hoping not to broach another argument about the subject, she asked "Why do you still keep bringing up the past?"
Yato's fingers loosened on her arm, and his hand slid down her wrist, only to fasten on her hand, gripping with new found vigor. His fingers interlaced with hers, and he started to sway their now clasped hands back and forth slowly in the open space between them. His eyes closed, and his lips spread into a sleepy smile. "Because you never do," he answered simply. He was responding with one of her half-truths, a fact that surprised her, but she knew it to be true.
She sat there for a moment contemplating his words. She'd done a lot in her previous life as a Saint, would she ever be able to escape it? Before she could decide whether or not press Yato for the whole truth, his breathing fell into a steady rhythm. He'd fallen asleep.
Quietly, so as not to disturb him, she unlaced their fingers and pulled away from him. Her fingers still tingled as she backed away, as though she could still feel Yato's grip there. It echoed comfortably of times gone by when these feeling were commonplace.