Disclaimer: So, I've only watched the Lost Canvas anime, and haven't read the manga. This fic is set after the end of the manga, but as I only have the vaguest idea of what happens in it, this fic may not agree 100% with canon, and may even be a borderline AU.
Without a Cosmos, Yuzuriha felt disconnected from the world, the universe and even herself. She could once feel the stars in the palms of her hands, the mysteries of space in each step she took. In Italy a part of her could always still be in Jamir. In Jamir she could still feel the Sanctuary. In the Sanctuary she could be in a thousand places she'd never been, feel the lives of the millions she'd never met.
Now she was just Yuzuriha. A lone woman, a lone vessel which held a single soul. She could feel the wind on her skin and the grass beneath her feet. She could smell the fresh spring dew and see as far as the next rise of a hill, but nothing more. How small her world had become.
She took to travelling. If she couldn't feel every place with her heart anymore, she would feel it all with her fingers, see it with her eyes, taste its air on her tongue.
She saw mountains. Bathed under waterfalls. Trekked across a desert. Slept under stars, rocks and thatched roofs. She met faces of every shape, skin of every colour, and eyes of every emotion. But she was still just Yuzuriha. She still couldn't feel past the edges of her own senses. Couldn't feel any heartbeats aside her own.
The taproom of the inn was a loud one, full of boisterous patrons, and warm from the their laughter and the fire roaring behind its grate. Outside, the late spring rain hammered against the window panes, her reason for seeking shelter other than those provided freely by nature. Yuzuriha sat in the back of the taproom, a mug of ale which she had tasted both better and worse than tucked between her hands. She looked out at the busy room, but as always, she felt apart from it. She could see all the life bustling before her, but feel no more than her own.
She was just contemplating retiring to the room she had rented for the night when a hand landed on her shoulder. Broad, work hardened fingers caught her in a strong grip. She hadn't been alerted by any extra sense of their approach beforehand, and any sound they had made was covered by the activity of the other inn patrons. If it weren't for the hand in contact with her shoulder she wouldn't have known they were there at all.
Yuzuriha turned her head and looked up into a pair of familiar blue eyes, and a grin so wide it could barely be contained by the face that held it.
"Yuzuriha! Funny meeting you here!"
Yato. Foolishly stubborn, and idiotically impulsive Yato. Yato's whose Cosmos was once as brash and overbearing as his personality. A Cosmos that usually flowed off him in waves, but now there was nothing. Just the touch of his fingers on her shoulder.
He didn't wait for an invitation. Yato didn't even give her a chance to say something. He pulled out the seat opposite her, dropped his traveling pack on the floor beside it, and plunked himself down. He propped one leg up on the remaining chair at the table, and just grinned at her, rain still dripping off the ends of his hair.
"The drink any good here?" he asked, hailing the innkeeper over anyway.
Yuzuriha shrugged. "Better than piss." To prove her point she took another swig of the ale. With Yato's exuberance apparently not having waned in the years since she'd last seen him, she was thinking she might need it.
"A ringing endorsement," he flashed another grin at her. "And since when did a lady like you start to talk like that?"
Yuzuriha fidgeted in her seat. She'd been a lady once, long ago. Then she'd been a warrior, but even that had started to fade into the past. She was saved from having to answer Yato by the appearance of the barkeeper.
Yato asked for two mugs of ale ("Your's is almost empty," he said at the look she gave him), and then the barkeeper left, leaving the two of them alone.
Yato leaned back in his chair sticking one arm behind his neck, while the other drummed a rhythm on the table. "So, it's been a while."
"It has," she confirmed. Yuzuriha slid her fingers idly up and down the side of her mug. Was she supposed to say something else? It had been so long since she'd seen someone from her old life that she wasn't sure how she was supposed to act.
"How've you been?" Never perturbed, Yato just plunged forward. He hadn't changed at all. All of his energy and excitement was still there, even if she could only see what he expressed rather than feel that added layer which had only been present in his Cosmos.
"Good, I suppose," she let her gaze turn to the rest of the room as she said so. 'Good' may have been pushing it. 'Surviving' was adequate. 'Existing' may have been the most apt. "I've been travelling."
"That's what I've heard," Yato replied.
Yuzuriha turned back to him. "Heard? From where?"
The drumming of Yato's fingers on the table intensified. "I went to Jamir, oh, a year or so ago," he mused. "You weren't there."
Yuzuriha downed the rest of her ale so she wouldn't have to react to that. He'd gone to see her? A warmth spread through her which couldn't be attributed to the alcohol. It wasn't an unpleasant feeling.
"Atla said you'd been travelling. Said you hadn't been back since well, you know, everything changed." Yuzuriha could feel imaginary hackles rising on her shoulders. She crossed her arms in front of her, trying to hide her discomfort. The unease she was feeling, at the reminder of what had happened to them must have been apparent, as Yato's voice trailed off uncertainly.
As quick as his voice dropped, Yato's cheery demeanour reappeared. He gently slapped the table, his voice light once again. "Glad I found you here though. It's been too long."
Yuzuriha caught herself wondering at his appearance in the tavern. Out of all the places in the world he could have been he'd happened on the one place she was. Was it only by chance? He'd gone to look for her in Jamir. Had he still been looking for her right up until his hand landed on her shoulder?
Yuzuriha's line of thought was cut off by two mugs of ale being set down between them. Yato pounced on his, probably to relieve any of the lingering tension at the table.
He reeled back from the brew as quickly as he'd jumped on it. Liquid sputtered from between his lips as his face scrunched in disgust. The tavern owner, who had only just begun to walk away didn't even falter in his step. A common reaction to his drink apparently.
Yato raised his head to meet Yuzuriha's face, eyes accusatory. "I thought you said this stuff was okay?" His brows and nose were scrunched tightly as he glared at her.
"I said it was better than piss." She reached across the table to the other mug, and brought it to her mouth. Her lips curved around its rim in a faint smile at the look Yato was giving her. She took a drink then smirked. "What's your problem Yato? Have you been living on fancy drinks in posh establishments?"
"So what if I have?" He stuck his lower lip out in a half pout, an expression she'd seen on his face a dozen times over. "I don't know how you can drink this stuff."
Yuzuriha ran a finger over the rim of the mug. "Trust me, I've had worse," she replied. "There was this one place I stayed where I'm almost certain their drink was fermented urine from the goats they kept out back."
Yato curled his lip back and shook his head. "That's disgusting," he said. "But, I bet you drank it anyway."
"I might have," Yuzuriha replied, eyes crinkling. She leaned back in her own chair, letting shoulders she hadn't notice stiffen relax. It was odd talking to him again after all these years. Almost like old times.
Yato took another, more cautious, sip of his drink. He swallowed it without spitting any this time. "I guess it's drinkable," he muttered darkly. Yuzuriha barely resisted the urge to call him a baby.
"So?" Yato straightened slightly in his seat. He looked at her expectantly. "Aren't you going to ask me what I've been doing all this time?"
Yuzuriha favoured him with a half-smile. "What have you been doing all this time Yato?"
Yato's grin stretched so wide she was sure it would pull apart his cheeks this time. "Absolutely nothing, and absolutely loving it." He crossed his other leg over the one already resting on the extra chair, the image of comfort and relaxation. "What about you? Do you prefer travelling to the life and death situations of the old days?"
It was posed innocently, but it was a much more loaded question than intended. The lightness Yuzuriha was feeling dissipated in an instant. She took a long draught of her drink to bide for time.
Any sane person would say they preferred her current position. Travelling on her own will with nothing pressing her onward. Finding new wonders in each place she visited. Sounded like paradise. Except it wasn't so passive. She was driven to find meaning in everything, to feel something like she used to. To find a purpose, where she'd once known her role was to fight for what was right. After years, she was still searching.
Yuzuriha placed her mug on the table harder than she intended. She kept her eyes trained on it rather than rising to meet Yato's, and nodded, replying shortly, "Of course."
"Well, that was convincing." Yato's words bled sarcasm.
Yuzuriha sighed. "No, it's nice. The road is, it's peaceful." She struggled with the words, but they were at least honest in some regard. She once again picked up the now almost empty mug of ale and took another drink, eyes losing focus over its rim.
Yato's eyes lingered on her face, his gaze searching. Then he shrugged, whatever was bothering him lost as he said, "So, I'm sure you've seen some interesting things, tell me about some of them?"
She didn't know what they talked about for the rest of the evening. Benign, safe things no doubt. She finished the drink Yato had ordered for her, and few more still, until her fingers started to tingle, and the lopsided grin on Yato's face was starting to look amusing, rather than stupid. Yato in turn managed to finish his drink, but only with copious amounts of manly determination.
When the morning sun had started to glow around the edges of the surrounding mountains, Yuzuriha was downstairs, paying the innkeeper for her board. Just as she was about to step out the door slow, heavy, footsteps sounded down the stairs.
Yato, bleary eyed and yawning, with his travelling pack slung over his shoulder tossed a few coins to the innkeeper. He rubbed some of the sleep out of his eyes and mustered up a smile for Yuzuriha. It lacked some of the brightness from the night before, marred by his exhaustion.
"I forgot how early you rise," he tried to put cheer in his voice, but Yato's words came out as more of a grumble than anything else and the end was cut off by a yawn.
Yuzuriha couldn't remember inviting him to travel with her the night before, but then again she couldn't remember not doing so either. Regardless, he followed right behind her as she stepped out the door, and back into the wide open world.
A/N- So there we go, first chapter all done. This isn't going to be a super long fic, to be honest it's more of a glorified one-shot that got out of hand than anything else. It's probably going to end up five chapters long, most of which I already have written. I'm planning on weekly updates, but that depends on how well the editing of the rest of the chapters go. Con-crit is welcome!