oOo Chapter 1 oOo
Violet Hill
Now he had finally arrived at his destination Ichigo found himself unable to recall what had compelled him to set out on this journey.
Maybe it was her prolonged absence; the weeks since her disappearance turning into months and then into years. Or his preoccupation with the afterlife and the need he felt to be a bridge between the living and the dead. Or maybe, he thought, brushing snow from the headstone with shaking fingers, he needed a tangible connection to her. Proof that she had existed, a physical reminder of the one person who had truly understood him.
Ichigo crouched down in front of the grave, his hand sliding down the cool stone to trace the words that were carved there.
Fujita Hisana: 17 March 1915 - 23 September 1923
Fujita Rukia: 9 January 1923 - 23 September 1923
The two sisters had been buried on the very edge of this tiny graveyard under a large oak tree, its limbs stripped bare by the winter winds. The characters on the weathered headstone were barely legible, but there was something about the soft, worn lines that suggested that they had been inscribed with a deep affection.
The memorial site itself was neglected; the deep snow unbroken by paths of any kind and the misshapen stones laying haphazardly about, a few hardy wild flowers and weeds providing the only splashes of colour in amongst the varying shades of white and grey. Yet there was a whimsical quality to the sanctuary, an untidy beauty, which he knew Rukia would have loved.
"This place," he said, his voice cracking slightly, "it suits you."
His throat seemed to tighten as he spoke and he withdrew his hand from the headstone reluctantly. Although she had been absent for just over a decade the snow was so evocative of Rukia he almost expected to feel her small fist hitting the back of his head, berating him for his foolish sentimentality. But the only sound was that of the cold wind rusting through the branches of the skeletal trees which encircled the graveyard. He briefly rested his head in the palms of his hands, the pain still as raw as if she had left only yesterday.
His friends had told him to move on, to live his life as she would have wished him to, unable to understand that it was not enough for him to know what she would have said and wanted. He needed to hear her voice, to see her narrow her large violet eyes, and to feel whatever physical blow she would have used to underscore her words.
He needed her.
He sighed, shifting slightly so that he sat cross-legged before the grave stone, indifferent to the sensation of the cold snow melting into his clothes, his thoughts consumed by the dark haired shinigami who had changed his world all those years ago.
"I would give anything," he whispered, "to have you here by my side."
There was no reply but, for the first time in years, he felt almost at peace with the world, the hauntingly familiar quality of the graveyard soothing his ruptured heart.
He reached out again, his fingers tracing the characters of her name.
Rukia. Lucia. Light.
In so many ways she was still his guiding light.
It was Rukia who had led him here; to Violet Hill, and so he would continue to wait for her, just as he had done for the last ten years. The journey to this place seemed to have taken a lifetime, but the obstacles he had faced had only renewed his hope not broken it.
Because she had made a promise and he knew that, eventually, she would find her way home to him.