Author's Note: This fic will go through Kurama's life, the known, the unknown. The setting of this chapter is in ancient China, during the Han Dynasty. I left plenty of clues for that, but I'll make it explicit in this note. Enjoy!

Morning Poem

by Mary Oliver

.

Every morning
the world
is created.
Under the orange

sticks of the sun
the heaped
ashes of the night
turn into leaves again

and fasten themselves to the high branches -
and the ponds appear
like black cloth
on which are painted islands

of summer lilies.
If it is your nature
to be happy
you will swim away along the soft trails

for hours, your imagination
alighting everywhere.
And if your spirit
carries within it

the thorn
that is heavier than lead -
if it's all you can do
to keep on trudging -

there is still
somewhere deep within you
a beast shouting that the earth
is exactly what it wanted -

each pond with its blazing lilies
is a prayer heard and answered
lavishly,
every morning,

whether or not
you have ever dared to be happy,
whether or not
you have ever dared to pray.

Pomegranate Morning

.

They were intertwined, like kits exhausted from strenuous play, lying on a mat of tough, springy grass overgrown from the ki rolling off of Kurama's skin. Kuronue fingered a green blade, running it between his claws to slice it, his seed from their latest fuck cooling on his thighs. Sickles glinted in the sunlight a safe distance away, though this grove was full of Kurama's traps and spies. Kuronue could be armed again in moments.

Youko flicked his eyelid open indolently at the minuscule tremor in his power, and healed the grass blade with a few moments' concentration. He reached up to a spindly branch twining down to him and cupped the ripe pomegranate it deposited in his hand.

"The humans of this land," Kuronue asked, curious, rolling over and stretching like a cat, "what are they called?"

"The Han," Youko hummed, "ruled by a dynastic Emperor." His claws ran gently over the indent of Kuronue's spine, marveling. "They think this," he said, holding up the full red pomegranate for inspection, "grants you fertility."

Youko's tail curved to stroke over Kuronue's hip, which glistened with languid sweat. His claws dug violently into the rind of the fruit, ripping it in half with a single motion. Several of the bittersweet, edible seed casings popped, and juice flowed down over the jagged edges of the fruit's skin to pool between the ridges of his chest. Youko had eaten several already, and his fingers, claws, palms, mouth, chin, and neck were all stained a color like blood. Yellow eyes curved when he smiled at Kuronue, who muttered, rolled again, and leaned in, his pale lips mouthing kisses over the spilled juice, one of his wings flexing, crushed beneath him. Youko's legs shivered at the sensation. He moaned deep in his throat and plucked out a single casing, doubling the sugar production and then slipping it between his lips to suck.

Kuronue watched Youko's face turn sensual. Finally, annoyed by the teasing, he clambered onto Youko, crushing their lips together so Kuronue could lap at the treat. Youko let him in, let him steal the seed, delighting in the melding flavors and the slickness of Kuronue's tongue. Having claimed his prize, Kuronue didn't suck, but bit, hissing at the sharp taste.

The grove was a prettier place now than when they'd found it. Flowers who felt their master's pleasure bloomed fuller in joy, their seeds dripping to the ground, going through full life cycles. Seedlings grew tall after the briefest of interludes, an ever-shifting phantasmagoria. A pond beside them, originally drab and grey, was encased in water lilies with wide white flowers and rounded pads. The algae choking the pond's flora, with a twist of Youko Kurama's power, had died down, clearing the water of everything but silt.

Though they had spent the night lovemaking and sleeping in turn, Kurama had never remembered to replace the grass they'd lain on with a softer bed of moss, and now it was too late.

A butterfly mounted a nearby blossom, its white wings, each with a single brown spot like two eyes, flexing daintily open and closed. Youko was distracted by the sight, absentmindedly popping another casing into his mouth, while Kuronue rolled over yet again, restless, and watched the clouds form. Birds chipped and chirruped at the sky, at the bright sunlight of late morning.

Tonight they would ply their trade as bandits. The portal they wanted, which would lead them within scouting distance of the impregnable fortress of Kal Ad'dhun in a southwestern point of the Makai, was only a few dozen jō west.

Youko, finally deciding they'd waited long enough, yawned and slid into the water of the pond, growing soapbark from the seed of it he kept tucked away behind his ear. Kuronue joined him, both blinking at the bright sunlight, Youko tossing Kuronue some aloe and more soapbark. They didn't need to speak, comfortable with one another, bodies warm from the sun and cool from the water.

Youko was done first, shaking himself like a dog and wringing out his tail. Vines swished over his skin, twisted in his hair and over the fur of his ears until the excess water was gone. Youko Kurama stepped into his tunic. He watched Kuronue for a moment, and then began undoing the changes his power had wrought, pulling back the flowers and trees, pomegranates sinking back into the branches, leaving a few overripe fruit to hang, and several rotten fruit that had turned to saplings devolving back, until the rancid mess littering the ground returned. A murder of crows with black wings landed back on their nests, sidling and cackling in annoyance, though hardly daring to challenge the kitsune who had deposed them. The troop of monkeys who had camped here originally was smarter: they wouldn't return until well after the two demons had left.

"I'm in the mood for some meat," Kurama declared, eying the murder. The crows quieted, sensing the sudden sharpening of his interest.

"Leave them," Kuronue replied, bored. "Crows are tough things, scavengers. They taste foul."

Kurama sneered, but finished checking over his kit anyway, knowing Kuronue was right. "I've never liked them. I can't imagine why those Northwestern human tribes worship them."

"They worship death," Kuronue said, shrugging his shoulders. "What creature could be more appropriate?"

Kurama's sneer deepened. Death came, and ate away at joy. Death was in someone else's hands, the Gods', or the Reikai's, or an enemy's. Kurama had no love of death, or of people who had the weakness to seek it. Rather than reply, having finished his silent inventory, he turned to Kuronue and smirked toothily. "Help me erase our tracks?"

Kuronue grinned, cheeky. "At your service," he purred. Hefting his sickles, he did up his belts and re-wrapped his leathers while humming a Persian folk tune, watching the lilies fade and the algae build in the pond with regret.

Glossary:

Jō – From the Shakkan-hō, the traditional Japanese unit of measurement. Each jō was about ten feet in length.