A/N: Okay so this is my first finfiction...ever. Anyways I know right now Mai and Takigawa seem a little OOC, but just give the story some time and I promise I'll try to get them back into character! I'd love some reviews telling me how my story is and what I need to fix or change. I don't have a beta right now so I've been doing all the editing. I'm super sorry if there's any mistakes! I really have tried my best. Anyways Rate and Review and please no flames!
Mai watched in slight awe as the iron gates with the ornate leaf design opened of their own accord, as if an invisible hand was pushing them along. The grass smelt freshly cut, and was immaculate; drops of dew were clinging to the blades of grass like little encrusted jewels. All around her was a garden made from flowers and plants that looked like the belonged in a travel brochure instead of this garden. A fountain gurgled merrily before her, water spraying from the always smiling cherubs' jars and pots.
Slowly and carefully Mai stepped onto the stone path that lead to the front entrance of the house. For a moment her body refused to move as the reality of what she was about to do sunk in. Her arms instinctively wrapped around her small frame, as if to protect herself from an unseen danger.
"Can I help you?" a soft, almost musical voice called from the other side of the garden. A young man probably five or six years older than she was poked his head up from where he'd been laying down. The man had light brown hair that was tied into a pony tail and brown eyes that shined as he jogged over to Mai. He wasn't necessary muscular but he wasn't out of shape either.
"A-are you Houshou Takigawa?" Mai asked, cursing herself slightly for stuttering. Instead of facing the man head on Mai opted to simply tug the cap on her head over brown eyes, hoping the man hadn't heard her stuttered.
"I am." The man said and I could almost hear the smile in his words. "Although most people prefer to call me Monk."
Mai took a deep, calming breathe before looking the man right in the eyes. "I wish to become your apprentice." She stated, trying to keep her voice calm and steady.
Houshou Takigawa's eyes widened slightly as the realization of what the young girl just said sunk in. "You're a girl." He said finally as if she wasn't aware of her own gender. Although Mai was also slightly annoyed at how easily he'd seen through her disguise. Mai once again cursed herself for not paying more attention to her outfit before looking back up at the man.
"I know that." She grumbled with an annoyed sigh. "But I need a teacher, and you're the best one in the country."
Takigawa's eyes glanced around the garden quickly, ensuring that no one was within ear shot. "I don't think you understand, it's against the law to teach a girl any of my trades."
He said girl with distain clearly in his voice, almost as if the word girl was a bad word. Mai resisted the urge to roll her eyes, since she doubted he would appreciate that and at the moment Mai really needed him to like her.
"Please." She said, tugging her hat down slightly. "I-I don't have many options at the moment. I know the risk to both our lives would be great, but I've got no other place to turn too."
"Do you even realize what you're trying to sign up for?" Takigawa spat. "I don't teach art girl."
"I'm well aware of what you teach." Mai replied softly. "I know being an artist is only a cover up."
"And you really want to become an assassin?" he said the last word softly, so that no one could hear them. Not like there were any people in the garden, but Mai supposed in his line of business it never hurt to be too careful.
Mai gave on short nod. "I'm quite skilled in weapons; I almost never miss my mark. Last time I was tested for accuracy I got a ninety-eight percent."
This bit of information seemed to pipe his interest slightly as he reached into his pocket and pulled out a small throwing knife. "Can you hit any target I tell you too?"
"Yes sir." She replied, reaching for the throwing knife, which he handed over easily.
"See that tree over there?" Takigawa asked, pointing to an old oak tree that looked out of place among the beautiful garden. Although from the scars on its trunk Mai had a feeling it had been planted there for practice, rather than beauty.
"Anywhere on the tree?" Mai asked, raising an eyebrow at him.
"Dead center." He replied.
Mai nodded, testing the blade in her hand for a few seconds. It was slightly heavier than any of the knives her father had made for her. But if she adjusted the amount of force she used to throw it she was fairly certain it wouldn't cause a problem. The wind was blowing slightly to the east, but because of the weight of this knife she knew it wouldn't affect it enough to cause concern. With a small sigh Mai placed the blade between her thumb and index finger. With a quick flick of the wrist she sent the blade sailing through the air, hitting the mark Takigawa had asked her to with ease.
Takigawa looked slightly impressed for about half a second before beckoning Mai to follow him. "We need to work on your disguise. While the one you are wearing will fool people at first glance it won't fool them if they take two seconds to look at you. We need to find baggier clothes. The ones you wear are far too form-fitting, which shows your figure and your figure is not one of a man. As for your face it isn't too feminine but you don't exactly look like a guy either. You're a pretty girl, which makes this slightly difficult. Hopefully with a proper outfit people will just believe you are a baby-faced male. Your voice isn't as deep as a man's should be, but it's enough to get by so don't bother trying to change it. How old are you?"
"Sixteen." Mai replied, practically jogging to keep up with him. "I just turned sixteen this past July."
Takigawa paused, clearly not expecting the age the young girl had given him. "You're still a minor? Where are your parents? Don't tell me you're doing all this to get out of some arranged marriage, because I assure you you'll be better off marrying some rich nobleman than becoming a cross-dressing assassin."
"I'm an orphan." Mai snapped in annoyance. "And don't call me a cross-dresser that sounds weird."
"What's your name?" Takigawa said, quickly jumping from one subject to another. Mai was actually having a fairly hard time keeping up with this man.
"Mai." I mumbled, glancing away. She knew it sounded too feminine, but she hadn't exactly had time to come up with another name.
"You have to change it." Takigawa informed her with a sigh. "We might as well think of a name now, have you got any ideas? You need to pick a name that's easy for you to remember, we can't have you calling yourself Aaron one moment and Mai the next."
"I hadn't thought of it." Mai admitted with a small sigh.
"Of course not." Takigawa said in annoyance. "Gray, your name will be Gray."
"That's kind of an odd name." Mai pointed out to him. "What parent would name their child after a color?"
"I came up with that name based on what you are wearing at the moment." Takigawa answered. "Since someone didn't think of a name before coming here I had to think quickly. Besides I'm sure Gray will be an easy enough name for you to remember. And plenty of parents name their children odd names. It'll be fine."
"I still think it's weird." Mai said, smiling at Takigawa when he sent her a sharp glare.
"Now moving on, I'm guessing you'll need a room here to live in. I'm sure you don't have the money to pay room and board, so I'll give you chores to do around the house in order to pay for you meals and room." Takigawa said, once again jumping to another subject.
Mai's head was starting to ache, partly because this guy couldn't stay on one subject for more than a few minutes but mostly because the journey here had been long and without much sleep. But at least she knew tonight she'd have a bed to sleep in. It was a drastic improvement from the park benches she'd been calling home for the past week.
"Are you listening?" Takigawa snapped, causing Mai to jump.
"N-no, sorry." Mai mumbled, casting my glance to the floor.
"As I was saying," Takigawa continued, deciding not to scold the girl although Mai was sure he wanted to. "Try to keep interactions with my wife to a minimum. While she's not a genius she's far from being an idiot. And if she figured out you were a female she'd know I'd figured it out long ago. But she doesn't normally interact with my students, so I don't see that being a big deal. I'm not worried about her maids either, they prefer to keep their distance from my students as well and they won't come into our side of the grounds unless ordered to do so by me. My only true concern at the moment are my other apprentices. The beginners and the intermediate students probably won't notice anything but I don't think my advance students will be fooled so easily."
"How many advance students do you have?" Mai questioned.
"Three at the moment and only two of them stays on the grounds. However Yasuhara is very perceptive and isn't known for his kind heart." Takigawa sighed. "If your skill wasn't so great I wouldn't even think about doing this, but with proper training you could probably surpass any of my past or current students. You could probably go to par with me in a matter of years."
"Good to know you aren't doing this out of the kindness of your heart." Mai grumbled, following him into an older looking building that was tucked away behind the huge house. "Where are we?"
"You need to start paying attention to your surroundings." Takigawa sighed, using a key to unlock another door within the building. He stepped aside, nodding her through.
Mai eyed him warily for a moment, before stepping through the door only to be greeted with mass amounts of clothes.
Do people really have so much money they need a separate house for their clothes? Mai wondered, glancing around the room.
"It's a storage room." Takigawa explained. "Very few of my apprentices come from families with money, and their clothing shows that clearly."
"Does it matter how people dress?" Mai questioned, annoyance edging its way into her voice.
"I don't care how they dress. However they need to look professional if they are going to get any costumers. Noblemen won't hire someone that looks like they've been living on the streets, even if they were one of the best assassins in the field." He glanced back at her. "Besides, I'd be grateful if I were you. Without these clothes you'd never pass as a man."
Takigawa spoke freely now as he shifted through various clothes, tossing out ones he liked before continuing his search. Obviously this wasn't a place anyone but him visited often, and therefore his guard was down a bit. Not completely, Mai noted when she saw his eyes dart over to her a few times. He still didn't trust her, but that was understandable since if she had the choice she wouldn't have trusted him either. However Mai didn't have that luxury, at the moment she was completely depended on him.
"Come here." He ordered, holding out a rather nice looking black shirt, although it appeared too large for Mai to wear.
I'll probably end up looking like I'm wearing a dress. Mai sighed to herself.
As if coming to the same conclusion Takigawa sighed and tucked it back away. "You're an awkward shape for a man." He admitted after a while. "It has to be baggy to hide your figure, however not too baggy or people would get suspicion. On top of that we've got to make sure you can move effectively in them as well. This is getting far more troublesome than I'd first thought. My wife would be able to dress you properly, but I'm not sure I can come up with a convincing story. Plus I'd rather not see her."
"You don't want to see your wife?" Mai asked, cocking my head to the side. "Why not?"
"Simply put, she's bothersome and slightly abusive." Takigawa sighed, finally settling on a smaller version of the black shirt. "We married far too young, I'd divorce her but if anyone caught wind that she had been married to an assassin she'd be killed. At least if she lives here I can protect her. No one is stupid enough to try to attack my estate when I've got at least three highly skilled apprentices in my estate at all times." He shifted his eyes over to Mai, offering Mai her first real smile from him. "Soon to be four highly skilled apprentices."
Mai grinned back at him, causing him to blush slightly before throwing a shirt and pants at her. "Go try those one."
"Aye, aye Master Takigawa." Mai said.
"Don't call me Master." Takigawa said. "It might give people the impression that you actually listen to me. And I thought I told you to call me Monk."
"How can you say that when we haven't trained together once?" Mai argued, resisting the urge to place her hands on my hip. If she did that he'd lose all faith he had in her of keeping her secret. "And you never told me to call you Monk. You only said that people normally call you Monk."
"It's not in your nature." Takigawa replied simply. "Step one of becoming an assassin is learning how to read people." Takigawa paused for a moment. "And from now on call me Monk."
Mai opened my mouth to protest, but he was right. Even when she was a child she'd always found it difficult to listen to her parents, no matter what the reproductions might be.
"Fine, then I'll call you Chief." Mai grinned, spinning on her heel without another word.
A heard a heavy sigh from behind her. "Go to the back of the building and you'll find a door. Use that room to change." He called. "And for the last time it's Monk."