A/N: Hi guys! This will be continued at some point. It is a multiple chapter story however I have only wrote out the first chapter. I hope you enjoy it and I will update this as quickly as I can! Thank you for reading :)
Ichiruki – Bleach – Monthly Challenge – Day One
Fantasy AU
It was raining the day he saw her for the first time. Standing beneath the cherry trees next to a taller man with long black hair, she was breathtaking. His heart pounded in his chest at the secret glimpse he had managed to see of her. Hair as white as snow framed pale cheeks and small ears, tickling the edges of her jawline. A large barrette made of ice that resembled a frozen comb framed her left side, sharp and deadly yet chillingly beautiful. Her lashes were also a pure white and sparkled like freshly fallen snow. Maybe it was the ridiculous outfit she was garbed in – a pure white ensemble with high collar and a ribbon that twisted and turned behind her as if alive – or maybe it was her cold as ice expression but the woman drew him in.
Her very presence alone sparked something inside him as she stood beneath the cherry tree in the pouring rain. For a horrible moment, he thought she would melt but she stood firm. Rooted next to the man beside her, he blinked and leaned forward to shoulder the branches out of his way as he peered down at her. His brown gaze was transfixed, stuck on the way she held her hands loosely in front of her white collared kimono. Even from his perch in the branches he could feel the cold that enveloped her body seeping into his bones. He shivered, the frigidness of the Ice Queen – aptly dubbed from henceforth – soaking into him.
The man next to her leaned down, elegant, but the Ice Queen remained standing. The only indication she wasn't made of ice herself was when her white lashes fluttered slowly closed, brushing against pale cheeks as her head tilted slightly downwards in acquiescence. Leaning forward a bit more, his eyes softened when he saw the small stone grave marker at the base of the large cherry tree. It was a famous tree as it hadn't bloomed in centuries but it was large enough to encompass not only the garden below but it's branches reached out over the stone wall encasing the Kuchiki Manor.
The forests surrounding the Manor were his home and had been for as long as he can remember but even he couldn't recall a time the tree had bloomed. Sitting back on his haunches, he watched quietly, rain drizzling and creating a lulling hush. When the man with the black hair rose to his feet, he didn't even bother to look at the beautiful woman next to him before he strode back into the open shoji door. He narrowed his eyes at the empty doorway, his shadow clad hand dug into the bark of the tree branch he was perched upon. Filled with a sudden rage at the dismissal of her presence, he grit his teeth behind the bandages wrapped tight around his mouth and half way up the bridge of his nose.
He wasn't sure how long he had been like this – black, bandages wrapped from around the middle of his face and down his chest ending in a ripped, shredded black hakama. His arms were both wrapped tight in the black-gray bandages and swirling from his shoulders down to his fingers, black, wispy shadows coiled around his arms. His long, thick black hair was loose, getting heavier from the rain that dripped onto his head. Despite everything, all he had brown eyes for was her. She stood, silent and still, hands folded in front of her waist with her head still slightly tilted and those icy lilac pools closed.
He waited there, watching her, until the cloudy day faded to a dark, starless night. The moon fought against the clouds, stabbing light through as it rose into the sky when he made a decision. His heart lurched and pounded excitedly against his ribs at the thought of speaking to her. Somehow – he smirked – he thought she would be rather hard to thaw and probably wouldn't speak to him or even spare him a glance. Anyone left out in the Rukongai Forests were ignored. Or forgotten. His smirk faded as he remembered the smiling faces of his twin sisters.
He had never forgotten them and it was for his family – his always smiling sister Yuzu, his quiet fiesty sister Karin, and their bumbling oaf of a parental figure Isshin – that he was out here. He was chosen to enter the Forest and once chosen, you can never go back. He was not allowed to see his family again until he returned from his task. All he had was a riddle given to him by the Gotei 13 when he left home, his sisters crying behind him and his Dad's frown at his back. They had already lost their mother and now to lose him, too?
No one had returned from Rukongai Forest alive. And there were rumors that those who did survive were only remanence of who they were. Monsters, demons, that had come to be known as Hollows for the soul wrenching, tear jerking sound they made: a hollow, empty cry that left your bones shaking. Thrust out into the darkness of Rukongai Forest, Ichigo Kurosaki had been granted an immortal life – like all the other creatures that existed in this Forest outside of time – to fulfil his task, return home to his family, and be granted protection of the Gotei 13 for his whole village.
The Hollows were getting more dangerous with every year and without that protection, no one would survive much longer. Blinking, he refocused from his thoughts to find the woman still there except she was no longer looking at the grave. She was looking up into the trees of the Forest, she was looking right at him. The moment her cold gaze met his, he felt time trickle to a pause as their reiatsu clashed together. His vibrant, heavy reiatsu met her light, frigid energy and the two tangled together, entwining in an intimate embrace.
His brown orbs widened and he could see the shock reflected back at him not from her own eyes but from the way her pale lips parted ever so slightly and her hands fell from their clasped position before her. He couldn't turn away from her and she remained, frozen, staring right back at him. He had to protect his family, his village, his friends from the Hollows. He didn't have time to be ogling some breath taking Ice Queen. He had to find the heart of the White Moon, tear it out, and return it to the Gotei 13. Or his village would die.
But his body didn't move. He relaxed his grip on the tree and the shadowy tendrils that billowed off his body in little wisps slowly crawled to a halt. All the breath, all the air, was stolen from him in a single look. Something heavy fell between their reiatsu, twisting into his heart with the grip of cold, icy fingers. As the clouds parted, the moon's light fell on the Ice Queen and she glowed like an ethereal Goddess fallen from the sky, a star lost amongst coal. The corners of her lips twitched, like she wanted to smile but had forgotten how. The thought that this woman had forgotten how to smile tore at his tender heart.
Whoever had hurt her enough to make her lose smile would fucking pay on their life. His brown gaze never left hers, even when they both heard the call of her title – "Kuchiki-sama, Kuchiki-sama!" – from inside the traditional Manor. Her body pivoted, facing him, and for some reason, he felt oddly defeated. Whatever this was between them, he was losing. He hadn't smiled since the last time he had left Karakura Village and seen his sisters being held by their Dad. He had smiled with misty eyes, gave a single wave, and headed off into the Rukongai Forest to fight his Fate and create a future for his family.
That was the last time his lips had ever stretched upwards. Ever since he was never without his scowl or his angry frown, eyebrows drawn together over narrowed brown-red irises that screamed 'get the fuck away from me'. But for the first time in centuries the corners of his mouth curled slowly upward into a haughty grin, as if he had been smiling this way all his life. Elation erupted inside of him when she narrowed her icy gaze on him, white frost-ridden lashes closing half-way in a glare. Her mouth never lost the thin line but he fancied, in the deep lilac purple of her moonlit eyes, he could see the ice melting.
The next call of her name was colder than even the breath of the night that had fallen on them and she jumped, spinning to face the man she had been standing next to before at the grave. Ichigo's gaze snapped to the taller man and his grin completely faded, scowl etched onto his lips. There was a quiet conversation he couldn't hear but it didn't stop him from noticing the drop of her shoulders or the duck of her head to shield the wince he felt echo inside him. He felt like a hollow – empty but filled with a deep seated need to soothe the ache her presence left behind. He didn't like this man who dared make the Ice Queen bow her head to him in defeat.
As Ichigo flew through the Forest, he took a deep breath. The words of the Gotei 13 Captains rang in his ears:
"Kurosaki, to bring protection, honor, and happiness to your family and Karakura, you are hereby sentenced to Rukongai Forest. Find the heart of the White Moon, tear it from the Sky of the Soul, and bring it back to us. Then, and only then, may you return home."
One way or another, he would make her smile. A haunting, desperate Hollow roared to fill the desolate void in it's heart. More cries rang out, deep and guttural like beasts. Rough, hollow, and empty, their sounds filled the night with a symphony of pain and despair.
The weeks flew by and as time carried on, as it always does, it brought forth Spring from Winter, releasing the Earth from Winter's icy clutches. As the weeks drug on, Ichigo found himself perched in that same tree overlooking the Kuchiki Manor gardens. Not that he was looking for the Ice Queen, pfft, yeah right…! Except, he found that when she wasn't in his sight, a piece of him physically ached for her. Some days, he waited until the sun had set and the moon had risen before he gave up and other times, he would scowl and tell himself it didn't matter in only a couple of hours of waiting. It didn't matter he couldn't see her on those days because on the days he did see her, standing beneath that tree, everything faded except the sight of her, alive and breathing and oh fuck – It did matter.
Spring came but the Sakura tree still refused to bloom, it's branches bare, and it was this one particular day when the red string of Fate tightened it's hold around him. He was perched in the tree, lying sideways with his head propped on his hand and one leg bent at the knee as he gazed out over the Manor gardens. It was sunny but cold, the last dredges of fallen snow melting in the ray's of the Sun. Yawning wide, he blinked to clear the sleep from his eyes and looked down only to find those lilacs staring up at him, one frosted brow raised in amusement. Her hair grazed her jawline in icy strands and for the first time, Ichigo couldn't sense any reiatsu but hers.
She was alone. All the weeks he had kept an eye on her – he wasn't spying on her, no, he was just-just protecting her, yeah! – she had been with the tall man he learned was called Byakuya who also happened to be her older brother. Ichigo found he still didn't like him and if given the chance, would run his sword through him. Many a night and through the desolate calls of the Hollows, he would hear the pain of her soul crying out to his. Rushing to her, panting and wide eyed, heart thumping painfully, he would find her at the base of that tree on her knees and lilac gaze cast to the ground. She never cried or whimpered but he could feel the tears in her reiatsu, feel the warmth sting behind his own eyes. Her pain was his and though it baffled him, it also felt right in a way he could never explain.
Some nights she would be looking up at the moon, the remanence of a smile ghosting across her visage and on those nights, he would find himself comparing her to the moon itself. White skin that glowed, her entire form covered in white like freshly fallen snow, light blue and transparent ice decorating her body. Some days she would sit on the engawa, shoji door slid open and bask in the sun. Sometimes she would stand by the pillars holding up the engawa, one dainty hand anchoring her to it on cloudy and windy days as if she was afraid the wind might one day snatch her up – like hell would he let that happen, over his dead fucking body.
Ever since that first night, she had never acknowledged him again but he knew she knew he was there – he could tell by the way her small back would tighten slightly the moment he arrived. Her body would jolt or her hands would clench together, squeezing tight. Once she knew he was there – he didn't take pride in this at all or anything! – and the familiarity of his reiatsu would brush against hers, she would relax and her feeling comfortable with him made his heart lurch in excitement. He couldn't keep the grin off his face whenever she relaxed but never once had her reiatsu brushed back, never once had she physically acknowledged him since that first night, and she made sure to never alert anyone else to his presence.
It had become more than a habit for Ichigo and sometimes, he wondered how in the hell she had managed to ensnare him with only a glimpse of her. Other times, he couldn't be bothered to give a shit why. Now, she stared up at him with that cocked eyebrow, lilac gaze glittering with amusement and humor, as if the very idea of him being there was funny to her. Agitated by that thought – did she not feel the connection, too? …..Wait, what!? N-No, there's definitely not any connections…! Pfft! – Ichigo pulled his legs up and sat back on his haunches, black bandaged hands and shadowy wisps gripping the tree branch.
He took a deep breath and opened his mouth, realizing this was the first time he had spoken in years and it was to a woman as a pale as the moon and as striking as ice itself. "Yo."
She snorted at the single syllable and then her eyes widened as she raised a small hand to her parted mouth. Her eyes rounded and she took a single step backward at the sound that left her and Ichigo smirked, his feathers ruffled that he had caused her to lose composure. By the Kami, did he want her to melt before him and show him the woman underneath the icy Queen. His eyes lifted, scanning the Forest with quick flicks, before he shot up into the sunny sky. The sun was behind him, the large ball casting light and heat against his back. His shadow fell right over her as she looked up at him, those lilac orbs still wide. The surprise had lifted as she watched his descent into the garden. He landed right at her feet, on one knee and head bent, smirk curling his lips.
He knew his bow was mocking to her and when he lifted his head, the smirk was wiped off his face when this small demure Goddess who was as gentle as the moon kicked him in the fucking chest with her tiny ass foot. He careened backwards, his back hitting the ground with a thud as his hands clutched at his bandaged chest. Pain shot through him and irritation rumbled in his gut as he shot to his feet in haste. The damn woman didn't even look ashamed and in fact, she looked proud, her head lifted and eyes gleaming. Her lips still hadn't mastered smiling and as he dusted off his ripped hakama, he shot her a glare.
"What the hell was that for, midget?"
The word had slipped out but when he looked at her, he smirked and stood to his full height. He snickered and stared down at her as he towered over her small frame. She was smaller than any woman he had ever met before. It had been hard to see from his perch in the tree and though her brother was significantly taller than her, he had deemed it a play of his height above them. But now, standing in her personal space with her having to crane her neck back to glare up at him, he realized just how small she was. She barely reached the middle of his chest!
This brought forth two feelings surging up inside of him. A desperate need to shelter that small body with his own and protect her, keep her safe and hidden. The second was to use her stature and break the icy mask she wore. He went for the latter.
He leaned down over her, smirking at the way she held her ground despite her height disadvantage. "Is that how you rich folks greet people? Thought you had more manners miss noble."
Her jaw ticked and he could see the flames rearing up behind her eyes, darkening the lilac to a deep violet blue that nearly stole his breath away – nearly. "It's not miss noble, jackass. It's Kuchiki, Kuchiki Rukia."
Something stirred inside him at her name, pulsing throughout his reiatsu that had curled – when the fuck had his reiatsu tangled with hers!? – into her own. A rush of emotions passed through him too quickly for him to grasp a single one but his smirk faded the longer he stared down at her and Rukia began to fidget, eyes flicking towards the engawa then back to him. She was going to run but before she could take flight and leave him, his hand shot out. He had no control over his actions but the moment his hand cupped her cheek, her icy skin burning a white hot cold into his palm, he found he could not move away.
She froze like an ice sculpture, eyes no longer blown wide but still round. Her shoulders were tensed, back taut and stiff. Her hands were clenched into fists at her sides as he held her cheek, tenderly so as not to shatter her. The frigidness of her body soaked into the hot warmth of his own palm, searing ice flowing through his blood. His feet moved forward, toes nearly touching her own and stepping so close that he had to strain his own neck downwards to see those eyes that kept him captivated, day and night. The shadows that clung to him sparked down his arm, over his wrist, and threaded into her snowy hair.
Her breath hitched in her throat and at the sound, his eyes darkened, smirk long faded to a thin line. Something whispered in the back of his mind and Fate looked on with sad, tired eyes as he whispered the words that would seal their Destiny:
"Ichigo. I'm Kurosaki Ichigo."
And so the tale begins.