A.N: So, this was sort of inspired by some really, really old Chinese movies I was forced to watch for a class I took a while back. Anyhow, hope you enjoy!
Disclaimer: I don't own DCMK.
Pairing: KaiShin [KaitoxShinichi]
Warnings: Extremely alternate universe since I eflt like writing something more fantasy-ish.
A Touch of Magic
1: From the River
It wasn't that Kaito hadn't expected the challenge. In the ten years he'd been living with the Nakamori family and their apprentices, he had noticed how the blonde always looked angry when he saw Kaito talking and laughing with the Nakamoris' only daughter. It had been going on for almost the entire ten years after all. It would have taken a monumentally oblivious person not to realize that the blonde liked the girl. And Kaito was anything but oblivious. It was just that he had never thought the blonde's jealousy could lead him to do something like this.
When the challenge came he'd expected the usual contest of spells. It wasn't as though it hadn't happened before. Hakuba Saguru was always trying to outdo him. Not that he ever came close. He was fairly skilled as sorcerers went, but he didn't have the imagination, power, or natural talent that Kaito had been born with. It had amused Kaito to watch him try, and he'd tried to give the blonde advice on a few occasions, but it only ever seemed to fan the flames.
He'd thought today would be like one of those days. They would meet out in the forest where Nakamori Ginzo (and his daughter) couldn't see them, maybe with one or two of their fellow students as audience, and duel. He'd win, Hakuba would vow to defeat him next time, and they would go their separate ways.
Instead he had arrived to find that Hakuba had snuck one of the Nakamoris' secret artifacts out of the house—one of the artifacts that were never supposed to be used because the reason they had been collected and locked away in the first place was because they were too dangerous. Because they couldn't be controlled.
This artifact in particular released a beast made entirely of crackling, blue white energy whose bloodlust was clear in its soulless eyes. It had attacked him without being commanded, tearing right through the shield he erected as though it was nothing more durable than paper. He would never forget the terrible pain that shot through him as it tore at him with teeth and claws no weapon of wood or steel could have deflected. He would also never forget the shocked look on Hakuba's face.
When he tripped and fell into the river, he was almost relieved. Running water had a tendency to destroy spell structure, and despite its power the blue white beast was still a magical construct. Its body fizzled and dissolved as it tried to follow him into the river. And as the waters closed over him along with the darkness of unconsciousness he wondered how it had all gotten so out of hand.
Well, at least he'd be seeing his parents soon.
X
Honestly, he hadn't expected to wake up again. Gaping wounds and running water didn't mix well after all. But there was no denying that he was awake now and the ache of every muscle he owned was telling him he was very much alive.
Forcing his eyes open, he found himself staring up at an unfamiliar ceiling. So he wasn't at home. Where was he then? It took some negotiating but he managed to turn his head to the side and look around the rather small room. It was very simply furnished but clean and utterly unfamiliar.
He was debating whether to get up and go look for whoever it was that this place belonged to and ask them where he was when he was saved the trouble by the opening of the door.
The boy who walked in looked to be about his own age, maybe a year younger, with neat, black hair and eyes a brilliant shade of blue. Surprise flashed across his face when he noticed Kaito watching him before his expression broke out into a relieved smile.
"You're awake, that's good," he said, stepping to the room's small table where a pitcher of water and several cups stood. Filling one of these, he brought it over. "I was starting to wonder if I needed to call the doctor again. Here, you should drink something. Can you sit up?"
Deciding that his mouth and throat were too dry to attempt speaking with, Kaito simply nodded. It took a few moments but he eventually managed to get his limbs to cooperate with each other and levered himself into a sitting position. Offering the stranger a grateful look as he handed him the cup, he downed the entire thing in a few long gulps. It took another five cups for his throat to stop feeling like his own, personal desert.
"You should probably eat something too," the stranger continued. "You've been out for four days."
Four days! That was a rather long time. No wonder he felt awful. Then again, awful was better than dead.
"Where is this?" he rasped, grimacing slightly at the sound of his own voice.
"Sorgan," the stranger replied, naming a small village some distance downriver from where he should have fallen in. "This is my house. My name is Shinichi, Kudo Shinichi."
Bullying his facial muscles into forming something that hopefully resembled a smile rather than the horrible grimace he suspected it wanted to become, Kaito nodded. "Kuroba Kaito, just call me Kaito. I'm sorry for intruding."
"You don't have to apologize. It's not your fault anyway." He paused for a moment. "Unless you mean to say it was your fault."
Kaito laughed but stopped quickly when his throat complained. "I assure you it was an accident. I have no intention of dying any time soon. There are still too many things in the world to do."
"That's good to hear." Shinichi pulled a chair over to the side of the bed and put the water pitcher on it so that it was within easy reach for his houseguest. "Wait here. I'll go get you something to eat."
"Wait!" Kaito called out hurriedly before the other could leave the room. "When you found me, you didn't happen to also find a monocle, did you?"
Shinichi nodded and Kaito felt a surge of relief. "It's in the desk drawer, but…"
His heart sank. "But what?"
Instead of speaking, the other opened the aforementioned drawer and picked something up from inside. Holding it gingerly, he returned to the bedside and handed it to the occupant.
Kaito turned the eyepiece over in his hands, noting the long, white crack that now ran down the middle of the lens. Seeing it sent a pang through his chest, but at least no pieces had fallen out. He let out a quiet sigh and set it on the chair beside the water pitcher.
"That's all right. It's nothing I can't fix."
"All right. I'll go see about that food then."
Kaito watched his host disappear from the room before lying back down with a quiet breath. Four whole days…
X
For as far back as he could remember—which was pretty dratted far considering his good memory—Kaito had never been a sitting-down kind of person. He liked to be active. "It's always better to be doing," he remembered telling Aoko once. "After all, life's only so long. When my time comes, I don't want to think back and realize there's something I missed just because I decided to sit on my hands for a day."
However, he wasn't stupid and he knew that invalids needed their rest if they ever wanted to be healthy. Still, it was driving him up the wall to have to lie around and do nothing all day. The only times he wasn't bored out of his mind was when he was asleep, eating, or talking to his host. The problem there of course being that he was getting sick of sleeping, he could only eat so much, and he couldn't reasonably demand that Shinichi spend all hours talking to him. His saving grace came in the form of his host's small collection of books (apparently Shinichi's father had been a writer), but he was a fast reader and by the fifth day of being awake he had already finished reading everything that could be read in the house including the three dozen pages of scribbled notes on various ways to prepare different dishes that served as Shinichi's cookbook (written for him by some girl called Ran). And now he was back to square one, except that he was now able to totter stiffly about the little house.
"If you over strain yourself you're just going to end up bedridden longer," Shinichi had warned him.
"I'll be careful," Kaito insisted. "Besides, if I have to spend one more day just staring at the ceiling and counting dust motes I know I'm going to lose my mind. And trust me, you don't want to see that."
"Well, on your head be it."
"I know, I know, and then you can tell me 'I told you so' as many times as you want. Sound fair?"
Shinichi had given him a dour look that made Kaito want to laugh (though he was trying to keep the laughing out loud to a minimum until his side didn't burn at the mere thought of laughing) before heading out to run his afternoon errands. Apparently Shinichi spent most of his afternoons running errands and doing odd jobs for people around Sorgan in order to make a living. His mornings were spent tending to the house's little vegetable garden.
It wasn't until he'd gotten up early one morning about a week after first waking that Kaito discovered that his host was actually a painter. Shinichi never said anything about it, but every morning after he'd finished tending the vegetable garden he would spend about an hour painting in the front yard. He always set up his equipment so that he was facing the river and from what Kaito had observed the river was the only thing he ever painted.
He wondered about that, but since Shinichi had never even mentioned that he painted Kaito decided to keep the question to himself. He'd always had good instincts, and they were telling him that this was something personal. Besides, overly nosy guests tended to get kicked out.
Still, he kind of liked watching Shinichi paint. So each morning since his discovery he would listen for the sound of Shinichi coming back in from the garden to get his tools. Once the painter went back outside, he would get up and make his way to the chair by the window that looked out into the front yard where he'd spend the next hour watching his host paint the river.
X
At the end of his second week, the peaceful routine they had developed was interrupted when a tall young man with chestnut brown hair came wandering into the yard like he owned the place. It was the first person that Kaito had seen visit the house and he watched with curious eyes as the stranger glanced around the yard. Shinichi had looked up from his painting at the stranger's arrival, a slight frown flitting across his face at the sight of the newcomer.
"Why are you here?"
"I heard you got yourself a houseguest," the newcomer remarked, wandering across the yard to where Shinichi had already gone back to working. "I thought I'd come by and say hello. Make sure he's not going to cause trouble."
Shinichi snorted at that, obviously unimpressed by the answer. "An injured man isn't going to cause trouble."
"Really? Well, if you're sure, but just remember, you'll be responsible if he does start anything since it was you who brought him here."
"I know," Shinichi said shortly, picking up a different brush.
"Still painting?" the man drawled, derision dripping from every syllable.
"Yes," Shinichi replied, not bothering to look at him.
Green eyes cast an uninterested glance at the canvas before returning to their observation of the painter. "And still the river, I see. I don't see why you bother. It's not like you're ever going to be able to make any money with this rubbish."
"That is my decision to make."
"Still as stubborn as ever, I see," the other laughed. It was a rather nasty sounding laugh. "Tell you what, I could hire you as a servant. Then you'd at least have a steady income."
"No."
"Well, if you get tired of being nobody, just come see me." Still laughing, the man finally took his leave.
When he was gone Shinichi let out a breath that might have been a sigh of relief and set about cleaning up his tools. Once that was done, he picked up the basket of vegetables he'd collected earlier and headed inside to start preparing lunch.
"Rather unpleasant acquaintance you've got there," Kaito remarked, looking away from the window and moving to take a seat at the table. "I hope he doesn't come here often."
Shinichi glanced at him in surprise before shrugging. "Only when he's bored. I didn't realize you were awake. I'm…sorry you had to hear that."
"That's hardly your fault." Kaito paused for a moment, watching Shinichi begin to clean the vegetables he'd brought in. "Why did you let him talk to you like that?"
Shinichi rolled his eyes. "Toma's a jerk, that's just the way he is, no amount of complaining from anyone's ever going to change that. That and he's Lord Nokota's favorite son," he added, voice growing much quieter. "They own most of the land around this village and several of the others nearby. This house became theirs when my parents were killed. I was supposed to leave, but my friend Ran's mother is a highly respected sorceress and she talked them into letting me stay. But they can still kick me out if they change their minds."
"Your parents…were killed?" Kaito asked slowly, wondering if he'd heard that right. Of course he'd wondered why Shinichi lived alone, but he'd always assumed he'd just moved out of his parents' house.
Shinichi paused for a moment in what he was doing as though just realizing what he'd said. Then he went back to work, eyes fixed on his hands. "Because of the feud with the Osei clans six years ago."
"I remember that," the magician noted, recalling how Uncle Ginzo had spent days ranting about how stupid the whole thing was. Something about 'all that fuss over three damn lakes'. "Were they part of the fighting?"
Shinichi shook his head. "They—they were executed as spies. They said that my father's writings contained information for the enemy. It didn't help that they were against the fighting and did a lot of traveling in the borderlands advocating it."
"I see." Sensing that it was probably time to change the subject (and frankly feeling slightly sick to his stomach at the story), Kaito gestured towards the assorted vegetables set out on the table. "So is there anything I can do to help?"
"I don't know. What do you know about cooking?"
"Nothing at all. Well, except that I was told never to try it again—but I can chop things up or something."
Shinichi cast him a look with raised eyebrows before shaking his head, a smile tugging at the corners of his mouth. "Why don't you just let me know when the water in the pot starts to bubble?"
"If you'd like I could make it boil right now," he offered. "Magic like that is pretty basic. I won't even have to get up."
"I'm sure you can, but then I wouldn't have time to finish preparing everything else."
"I suppose that's true." Kaito heaved an exaggerated sigh and propped his chin up on his right palm. "Ah the cruelties of fate. I have been reduced to watching water boil."
TBC
A.N: And there's chapter one! Hope it wasn't boring. And I'll see you next week ^_^
