º º º
Her father couldn't manage her. Zero, her childhood friend, couldn't either. Mainly because he had an unwavering desire not to waste energy on hopeless and fruitless subjects. He knew from an early age that Yuki was a perfect example. He wouldn't dare change or suppress her motives. She moved with inhuman grace and will that could surpass anything in order to reach her goal: if she wanted to live, she would live. If she wanted to die, she would die. And if she swore to kill, her target did not last.
Zero didn't decide to accompany Yuki to Kyoto, he actually found that he didn't have to since his entire life one way or another revolved around the girl, and it was with this preface he followed her wanderings. It was easy for him to tag along, and in the event of an emergency, they expertly diverted skirmishes and adapted to each other's habits.
Who else knew why Yuki scaled the palace walls to sneak inside at night? And who else had any idea why she was adamant to go to Kyoto—of any place in the world? No one but Zero heard her frequent whimpers during sleep, and no one but Zero held her hand warm. He was also the only one with inhuman dexterity to match her distracted and wayward habits. He knew her motives and thought patterns to a fault, but neither he or Yuki were willing to acknowledge the fact, and it was why he pretended to sleep when she snuck away.
Zero regarded the palace at the heart of the city.
º º º
No one deserved the blame for her current predicament other than her irrational habit of acting—irrationally. As the seed of defiance, her single father had much to deal with during her growth. Not like many beauties of her hometown who were molded for subtly, docility and artistry, Yuki disobeyed tradition by picking up a knife at the age of three from her father's secret drawer. He didn't know at the time what a hassle it would be to exchange the tool for a paintbrush, Koto or the Shinobue. Her nature wasn't soft like the gorgeous city girls, which she brazenly flaunted and which earned criticism in return.
Growing up she watched her father ponder over his desk silently. One hand under his chin, eyes downcast, and many times Yuki believed the weight of a recalcitrant daughter was graver and more entrapping than his time as Lord of Kurashiki. Though she was rough around the edges and unmanageable, she had been a keen audience, and now he felt responsible for her brash desire for leaving cities without notice, sparring like mice and cats on streets until she scarred. She was a disgrace. While beguiling council daughters trotted with eligible and refined men, Yuki was denied the chance to court. She was prime in age, yet her personality received scorn.
Yuki was godly beautiful like the iconic purebloods among the likes of Shizuka Hiou, Juuri Kuran, Maria Kurenai, and Sara Shirabuki. What value was beauty when she scaled walls, slept with horses, went unclean for weeks and rubbed elbows with beggars at inns? Little. And she wasn't concerned because a good-for-nothing vampire such as herself didn't warrant any significance. An intolerable woman as her had an incorrigible mind that overtaxed men. Her sole comfort resided in her friendship with Zero Kiryuu, who despite being an uncommunicative stern vampire complied with her odd customs.
Swinging her foot over the wall, she steadied on the ledge and dropped on the ground with the grace of an agile feline. Times like these, Yuki dissuaded Zero from joining in her escapades. Personal matters best remained personal.
A snide hiss triggered the back of her mind that Zero was aware of her intentions. Zero, her best friend, the half of her soul knew her gruesomely well. He would wait for about twenty minutes and follow in her steps. No way on earth would Zero let her head to dangerous grounds alone.
She moved briskly in the shadow of pagoda roofs. Whirling and sweeping, her cloak enshrouded her slim frame. Years of pursuing street vermin helped Yuki navigate deadly alleys efficaciously than the recommended sleuth or guard. Her skills had brilliant results when least expected. Past the broad courtyard, she slinked by the columned exterior of what was the pureblood palace. Mid-way to the gates, a dawning scent of blood emitted profusely, nearly dislodging her focus. Yuki hesitated and lingered in the allure of blood. A deft jump at the wall lip and she scaled with miraculous speed directly to the source.
So much blood.
A hidden shack barricaded the derriere of the courtyard. Wedged in the blinding shadow, sentries crossed passages in sequence at the mouth. She leapt over deteriorating bricks and slinked toward a row of pillars. The sacrificial norm was notable and most humans couldn't fight off noble vampires that Yuki swore the degenerate class was pure design for the pleasure of purebloods. Bereft of elemental conveniences majority of low-class humans had no power over their livelihood and since death was the easier solution, most had submitted to the purebloods' will.
Her long fingers padded over traces of blood from bodies that had been dragged not long ago. She backed into the posterior side of the column. Another pair of sentries circuited from the left. She decoded their brief mumbles and buckled a hand on the blade at her waist, ready.
Why are there guards in a hurricane of blood?
Two seconds was all it took. One, for her blade to glide like a flying ribbon cutting air. Two, for her body to rocket over the wall with a force that left the guards trembling in the balls of their feet. Some strange thread nipped their skin. Confusion pervaded their wide eyes as they gaped at the shadow landing merely one feet in distance. Yuki hooked the bloodied knife back in her belt. The men shriveled to ashes just when sentries from the door fumbled with guns and began shooting at point blank.
There was something about the huntress named Yuki Hanako whom those that had the opportunity to clash with learned too late, and that was her half-pureblood speed. She was an illusory contender. Winks of her hair and clothes fluttered as particles of her fleeting presence that it was no wonder the armed guards choked before bullets spurted in her direction. Her winding blade had nicked open their windpipes and they plummeted as if never were. While Yuki wiped her blade clean, the door fell agape.
She forwarded as if beckoned and found another pair of doors. The third door led her to a room filled with human corpses. Yuki covered her mouth in the sinful scent of bloody death. Majority of them were young and flanked the locked entrance, a failed attempt to escape. Noiseless and meticulous, she skipped over the bodies and scanned the wooden columns, which were strangely tucked with tubes. She held back to search for esoteric guards before soaring over the banister in a single jump and grounded herself in the mouth of the depression.
Here it is in all of its glory.
The tubes connected to the bodies were piled in a depression the size of a well, blood pooled into a crimson fountain. Yuki leaned in, a hand tested the pond and sampled thirstily. She rolled back on her heels in satisfaction. "No wonder they live long."
Food for the royal purebloods was foremost and a good-for-nothing-vampire like her normally starved for months prowling streets and deserts until a paltry meal. Quickly, she retrieved her canteen and filled her appetite before her conscience bested her with a firm reminder of her environment. Yuki saluted the corpses. "I shall drink it well and not waste a drop, not everyday a mouse like me finds a goldmine." If she were even more precarious and ruthless, she would've drunk until she gorged but decided against it.
A thing called self-discipline yanked her to her height and escorted her away. Her feet screeched on floorboards, and she found herself blaming her father's lectures on moral, selflessness, and integrity. Then she swayed with indecision and inspected their terminated pluses, from one end of the room to the other. Bodies hung upside down for faster drainage of blood. She righted them on the floor, mumbling about the wretchedness of the slaughterhouse all the while. Yuki slung the ropes cut and delicately set their corpses in a presentable manner. Judging by the warmth of their flesh and the hot crimson flowing in the tubes, she deduced their deaths hadn't been long ago.
Suddenly a strangled groan hollered from her left. She sprang like a dart in the direction, galloping like an untamed and restless mare in the fields and grabbed the twitching girl who hung by a rope. With practiced ease she slashed her tethers and set her free, cradling her against her knees gently. A head of copper brown hair smeared with blood filled her palms. Somewhere between the tangled hair, a pair of hazel brown eyes blinked widely at Yuki.
"Pl-please!" She stammered, "They c-cc-cut me. Pl-please—help me!" She wailed in pain as her blood flooded around them.
Yuki apologized for her mechanical handwork on the girl's bodice as she ripped her dress apart. She trekked the imbedded tube tucked in her womb. A croak of guilt, fear and remorse struggled out of Yuki's throat, hands that were once restive stilled and clamped on the excision.
The woman shifted and clawed the floor. "Hur-hurry."
Had she known sacrifices for the purebloods did not survive, she immediately would've thought 'screw ethics, I'm out.' And because the thought hadn't occurred, her current predicament would be nonexistent. Yuki folded a hand over her ribcage, paralyzed by the blood dripping in the tube. Like the others the woman was meant to die based on the procedure. She was aware the Internal Affairs of the palace used the particular method specifically on women. The woman howled and whimpered from pain and distraught. Yuki realized she couldn't bear sitting mute-faced, holding her hand as she died.
"Sorry." Yuki whispered hoarsely. "I can't remove the tube. There's not much else I can do."
"Nn-noo!" Violently she shook her head and clutched Yuki's arm. "Don't! You must—hel-help me. Pleasseeee!"
Her ruby eyes shimmered brilliantly like her raised silver blade. "It'll be easier to kill you right away."
She bit her lip and froze. "F-fine, go…ahead."
Wind fluttered from Yuki's mouth as she hovered the open wound. Instead of slicing her throat like she expected, Yuki cut the tube and pulled the damn appendage out. The woman screamed. Her tremendous echo shook the walls. Stark pain colored her eyes. Yuki suppressed the surging blood by applying pressure.
"You've lost too much," Her murmur hardly calmed the woman, "But I'm gonna have to close the wound." Instantly Yuki bent over and licked the deep cut with the hope that her saliva's healing enzymes did what it was able. She snatched the ripped clothes from the floor and proceeded to bandage her around the waist.
The woman babbled miserably in her half-crazed pendulum of life and death.
"Sucks being human." Yuki said to herself. "You can't heal or survive. You can't do nothing." Taking her wrist, she pierced the skin and rested it against the woman's lips. "We don't have transfusion so you'll have to drink this now."
Her eyes were hazy and lost, prepared to give up. Craning her lips wide impatiently, Yuki let the drops of blood tickled her mouth.
º º º
Every bone in his body propelled him to move with his might. Zero hurled past sentries at the gate of the courtyard. His sword tore bodies apart with animalistic ferocity. Toward the shack whence the smell of her blood emitted, he didn't stagger and shot past his assailants. Easily Zero rippled through the throng of strident fights, leaving only a despondent graveyard at his heel.
Upon the door he yielded at the abhorrent mixture of fresh blood, with a rough shake of his silver head, Zero thrust inside, eyes ablaze on the valley of corpses. Were it a normal venture or some investigation, Zero would've stopped to search for survivors. He found he didn't need to. The resentful existence of the shack behind the royal courtyard hinted its revolting significance, and that the shabby walls of the shed were the last things the humans had seen. Such a deplorable and poignant thing for humans who were reduced as food for the high-mighty purebloods. He distracted himself by moving further into the room, lips tugged back in a snarl and fangs murderously bared at the sight of recurring dead bodies.
She was bending over one of them. Her small white hands, though gentle and angelic looking, only Zero knew they were capable of subduing tough vampires on streets. Yuki lifted her head to meet his eyes. Her mask immutable and beautiful as always. "You're late."
Coming from defeating a large army of royal guards, for a second Zero didn't have the power to move and felt his spine stiffen as if a sizzling blade stuck through the cord. His grip on the weapon remained unbending and fervid than her expected stare.
"I'm not hurt." Yuki notified. "Take her from here before someone sees." She started in the opposite direction.
He spurred and stepped in the half of her shadow.
Yuki glared over her shoulder in warning. "Take her now, Zero." She ordered. "I have a lot to do."
He didn't even pass a glance at the woman she'd been tending to.
"It's a personal matter, nothing for you to worry about." Yuki insisted, disliking her words the moment they graced his ears. As long as either remembered she'd never kept things from him. "You know, it's uncomfortable." Never believing secrets would encumber their friendship, she suddenly frowned at herself. Zero knew her better than himself. Better than her father or Ms. Laison, her nursemaid, and just about anyone in the world.
She clutched her knife and cursed under her breath in annoyance.
Zero's eyes narrowed on the door in Yuki's vicinity.
A group of guards crowded the doorway. Both hurled into activity, in a heartbeat Yuki's searing blade knocked two of them out of the way just as Zero collected the desperate woman from the floor. Their eyes met in understanding before she swung another detrimental blade on three oncoming guards. He slipped through the back entrance with the unconscious woman.
A claw swiped at Yuki. Expertly she dodged and snaked a hand around the sleeve, twisting the arm. The guard shoved her back as she kicked him in the ribs. Her knife swung up with scathing speed and slit his throat. Yuki emerged outside with the remains of vampire dust on her clothes and shoes. She peered into the multitude of royal guards waiting for her expectedly.
"By the order of the Internal Affairs and royal palace, you are under arrest."
Her enshrouded eyes fleeted on the many faces that surrounded her, armed at the ready for anything. The army waited patiently for her to move. The stillness in the air was heavy and dry, bird's flapping wings cluttered from somewhere in the world and a breeze shuddered their uniforms. A sliver lining twirled out of the darkness from where she stood. The guards stared austerely while she casually wiped her knife clean on her robe and stepped into the moonlight. The quick patter of shoes hinted more armies encircling her from the other end of the courtyard.
She brushed the back of her head as if to unknot a tensed muscle. They stood watchful of the loose weapon in a tiny hand that seemed too fragile to wield such a heavy tool. Pensively the guards waited, hands locked on swords, beads of sweet pooled foreheads and feet dug in mud looking as they were no more or less than statues.
She knew better than swinging fists against an army and so she relinquished her knife to the side and sagely held her hands up. "Happy?"
The guards raptly exchanged glances and turned to their chief who started toward Yuki. He sped up the stairs, sword pointed to her belt. "Are you responsible for this?" He gestured to the courtyard sprawled with dead guards.
If they were to play that game, Yuki cocked her head at the shed. "Are you responsible for that?"
His impeccable face strained. "Those humans submitted their lives willingly to the purebloods. Before you get ahead of yourself, show me your identification badge."
As she shuffled to retrieve the article from her bodice, the guards rigidly twitched on feet. Her eyes lit vindictively upon the men and she held out a leather badge in air. The chief ascended where she stood and reached for it. She slammed it against his face. He was taken back and slashed his sword.
Inches from contact, Yuki dropped flat on the ground, grappling for her knife as she did so in a flash. Simultaneously they launched on her and she was all too grateful for the years of dexterity fleeing from her father's irascibility. The assailing men gaped at her plunder with smacking, elbowing, kicking and slamming bodies in what was a proficient display of expert maneuvering. She cut through the courtyard from the unconscious men and hopped on the brick wall. The second army waited on the other side.
"Give up." Sneered the chief. "It's no use fighting us."
Sheathing her blade carefully as she sighed over her shoulder, Yuki said, "Maybe you haven't met a lot of vigilantes in your years or you'd stop talking," Skipping over the bricks, she slipped over the bending aperture and grinned back. "And apprehend me instead." A slinging blade stripped through the air in her direction. She leapt off on the opposite side, missing it by an inch.
"Get her!" Roared the chief. "Stop her now. Lock the entrance to the palace!"
A fool would walk through the main entrance. She would've if she wanted to nurture her gluttonous side by drinking leftovers from the shed during her imprisonment. She had finally arrived at the apex of her plan after months of studying the layout of the palace, better known as the 'place of answers' that comprised the veil of her reality.
Maneuvering the hidden strip behind the palace was expectedly simple. She was partly shocked it was precisely as she had imagined. From crumbling rocks to elegant gardens and pagodas containing royal statues, Yuki refrained from standing aloft in admiration of the beauteous milieu of the thousand-year-old building.
Like a nimble creature she climbed the walls, agile and soundless with only the brief swift of leaves falling to the ground. She crawled over a vulnerable and dingy old roof before she started in a run to the transversal side and swung into another crib of roof tiles. While her trained breathing was seamless upon her upper lip, her heart pounded from unreasonable anxiousness. Jumping over a smoking chimney, she would've retracted and steered clear, if she had noticed the creaking tile plummeting under her heel. As if the land beneath her feet were yanked off, the entire roof collapsed suddenly.
Seven feet in a dusty, solemn dark room, Yuki landed in the shamble of tiles and wood. She wheezed in pain only for a moment before straining her head up for an inspection of her surroundings. Falling through an old roof hadn't been part of the plan obviously. Despite her fastidious study of the palace blue-prints, she was unable to decipher where the filthy building was on the map. Her only clue were aisles of books, flasks, tubes, and liquid bubbling in the background. Something about the tubes and flasks made her stomach clench in perturbation.
Moving a leg, a groan that resembled a stubborn camel hollered out of her mouth. She opted to roll on broken wood instead. Gripping her head and propelling her weight sideways, she stopped until she passed the rubble and collided with the clearer and smoother floor. After checking for broken bones, she made an attempt to stand. Her eyes, ears and nose transfixed by the swallowing darkness of the silent the room. She was readily scanning for movement or furtive guards, knife in hand out of habit.
Crinkle
Her knife seared through air at the moving shadow against the post. It retreated back in the darkness like an insect shriveling from sunlight.
She glided cautiously toward the post that held walls of tattered and disorganized books, hinting frequent usage. She pulled her knife from the wood and blew on the tip.
The gun settled against her temple and moved ever so softly to the back of her head. His predatory steps traceable by the creaking floorboards. "I also have tricks up my sleeve like your knife."
Yuki smirked, "First of all, do you know how to use a gun?"
"Easy there hotshot, beneath your tough exterior, I can sense your uneasiness." He returned.
"Don't worry." She chuckled. "It's not because of your gun but your books. Sheesh, gives me shivers. They take me back to a time and place I don't want to remember."
"Hmph."
"You can calm down. I'm here on personal matters."
"Answer one question," He cut in chillingly. "You're the one the guards are hunting. The one causing all the riot. Did you come to poison our fountain?"
"Our fountain?" Yuki brushed her belt and patted her canteen appreciatively. "Actually, I delighted in it myself. Quite a system you have here, getting blood from the innocent by sticking tubes in them and draining them alive."
The barrel shoved warningly on her head as he slurred. "The guards will be here any minute."
Yuki turned slightly to peer at the motionless shadow. Before she could acquire a glimpse of his face, he clocked the gun. An amused and knowing smirk highlighted her soft mouth. "You don't plan to kill me." Yuki grinned openly now, "Not with the guards coming this way."
A chortle mingled in question. "Oh, how would you know?"
Her gaze turned somber on his shadowed profile. "What is with you Koyotans? You yap your mouths like you have all day. If you want to shoot me, then do it already."
He made a move, and she took her chance, swinging around and smiting his arm. The gun clattered somewhere in distant corners. Yuki clenched her fists in precaution just as he appeared ready to assail. Her distracting chuckle left him glowering.
"What's so amusing?" He couldn't see where the humor was.
"This is cute and all but it's a waste of my time. I'm not here to dance with you." She shifted her hands in her cloak and patted her shoulders dust-free. "Frankly, I'm running out of time. There is something perhaps you can help me with." A pearl white fang peeled through soft lips underneath her hood.
He blinked and automatically reached for the hood but she shoved a scroll in his face. "Seen her somewhere?"
"Why?" He guardedly shot back.
"I'll ask the questions." She spat. "Hurry before your wild dogs get here. I told you there isn't much time."
"That isn't my problem." He muttered.
Yuki shook the scroll impatiently. "Come on. I've lost my way."
"But what kind of business do you have with her?" He growled.
Scoffing under her breath, Yuki refolded the scroll and tied it back in her belt. "You're more stubborn than you look." She fixed her cloak as best possible in the dark and stepped out of the curb of the post. A hand tucked on her belt with eyes roaming nastily on bookshelves. "Nice library. Yours I'm assuming?" She grumbled apathetically.
He bent somewhere in the shadows for the gun. A skilled sense of seeing in the dark, he ceased his reach seconds from the glaring knife against his carotid pulse.
"I do like guys who are book-smart but common sense is also a priority, no?"
He stood back unperturbed and looked down at her evenly. "You have no idea who I am, Miss."
"Ah…" A sweeping examination of his piercing ruby eyes and defined jaw chiseled her smile into a strained grin. "Pureblood." She hissed in resentment.
His aura horrendously warped around her as intended. The enormity of his power and boundless superiority bathed his beautiful and satin-white face. As she analyzed him, Yuki grasped she was becoming inhumanely attracted to his stern passivity.
Probably his pureblood aura working on me.
"Do you always have the same appeal on people or is it just me?" She wondered loudly.
His solemn eyes narrowed, "This will be our last meeting." From his raised palm, he ambushed Yuki with a storm of hot air.
She stared undeterred. "Yea. We wouldn't have worked out anyway." Securing her knife again, she laughed and saluted. "Enjoy your books, honorable pureblood." Noticing the telepathic control he had on her now immobilized limbs, Yuki hissed in displeasure and made another attempt at moving. "What's your point? I get what you are." She snapped.
"I'm obligated to kill trespassers like you. Especially one who seeks a royal pureblood. Answer me at once," He ordered, "Why do you seek Lady Juuri?"
"Sir Bookworm, I have no desire to divulge my plans. Sucks not to have the ability to read minds, doesn't it?" She raised a brow, "What I do has nothing to with the whole royal family, only Juuri Kuran. Stay out of it, understood?" Grounding her teeth, she bit out blackly, "Release me."
He stood immobile and used his telekensis to strip her of her hood and unraveled her long brown hair. Yuki frowned as he ambled to a stop, almost touching one of her trailing tresses. He withdrew the hand with a skeptical look in his eye and turned away. "You may go."
Her arms and legs unfroze and she sighed then glared. "Tell the guards I went in the other direction if you don't want your books burned." Yanking on her hood again Yuki twirled on her heel and briskly opened a window.
"The garden leads to a grand pagoda and connects to the avenue of lions. You will find a tower there." He touched the spine of a book and held back ponderously. "She hasn't been living in the palace for years. You won't find her here."
Yuki curled her fists. "Then where the hell is she?"
"With her relatives in the south." He replied as if it were the most obvious answer in the world and finally selected a book.
"Where in the south?" Yuki hissed.
"I can't say unless you disclose the business you have with her."
Her eyes narrowed cunningly, "Nice try."
He peeked a glance at her figure gliding through midair above the garden and avenue. Her silhouette landed precisely behind a crypt. Another proficient execution produced from strict practice or from many trespassing experience Kaname deduced. Yuki disappeared somewhere within the shadows in seconds. He stepped closer to the sill and leaned halfway to follow her beguiling shape. Even his acute night vision couldn't distinguish her amongst the buildings and shrubs.
The library doors thrust open. Guards pedaled back in perturbation as the chief hastily reached Kaname. "Ouji-sama, are you hurt?"
Kaname smirked and tossed the book to a guard. "No." Eyeing the broken roof and scattered tiles under his shoes, he remarked, "A stray bird wandered into uncharted territory, wonder how it'll return home?"
"Bird?" The perplexed chief gazed at the broken ceiling. "Did you happen to see an insect crawl this way?"
"I spoke of birds, not insects." Kaname replied.
The chief blinked uncertainly. "The palace was penetrated and if you know where the unwanted individual went, please tell us."
"I will." Kaname strode to the exit, "If I see it."
º º º
Yuki crunched the pebbles and looked up with a huff. "I'll see for myself." She decided immediately. His words echoed like the moonlit breeze, easy-going but cold.
South?
She latched onto a branch in a jump and swung herself over. With the skill of a cat, she climbed another branch and reached a brick aperture. The lining was narrow and detailed as she clung to small depressions and scaled higher to the roof. It took unnecessarily longer than she was used to before she finally reached the peak. From the top, a gallery of avenues, gardens, and shadowed pagodas stood out.
You've seen them all. She skipped over another ledge and landed on the neighboring roof. Memorized every avenue and building. You know it better than your home.
Raking into another corner, she slipped down the gate and slinked to a nearby deck. Wedging herself through the side, Yuki entered the opening without detection. The guard on the left shifted and turned around as she plummeted to the floor with expert efficiency. He looked away silently and yawned. On her elbows she crawled to the sill and pushed herself over. With a soft thud, she landed on her side and whisked herself behind a furniture. Light movement from the curtain hid her shadow in the room.
Yuki grounded her feet and listened for noises. A hand locked on her knife all the while reviewing the perimeter. When it appeared clear, she moved to the first hall. Four scones and three doors on the left led her to a winding turn and a staircase. Her sweaty hand unfastened the banister as she wheeled on the right corridor. There were five doors, each locked. Yuki passed a glance at the rounding boardroom housing elegant furniture and antique vases. She didn't waste time to marvel over the appealing atmosphere haunting envious women in the century.
She trekked further in the room and through a second door. Chatter and movement hurled from inside. Yuki froze at the sight of maids streaming in activity and dodged behind the door, waiting for them to file out.
"You didn't hear?"
"It happened the other night. I suppose they had it coming."
"How long until the wedding, do you know?"
"Not for another four months?"
"Wonder why they wait so long? Hurry up and get along. You have a whole century to fight each other."
"Leave it to them. It's their business. What do we know?"
"What do you mean? Just because we aren't married doesn't mean we can't get married later. I'm still very hopeful."
"That's the difference between a royal servant and a loyal servant." Sighed the maid and wiped her perspiring forehead. "It's not so bad to be a royal servant but sometimes I wish we had liberties in our lives."
"Shh, don't let them hear you."
Yuki dissolved in the shadow of the door as they ventured out. She found herself striding to the drawing room. Her cloak swished mutely against the tea table and wiry white fingers clenched around the cold door where she stood at last listening.
"You had best think it thoroughly. Moving at this weather? How about a vacation?"
"Make it a life-long vacation, one that never ends. I'll agree to that."
"Oh, My lady! —Don't be so. You need to enjoy yourself."
"It's no fun living for an eternity. You lower-vampires don't understand. Our genetic material prevents us from peaceful death."
"Those words shouldn't come out of your mouth, Juuri-sama."
"Is it just me or do you exaggerate for a hobby?"
"Aheh, my apologies."
Fire glowed on the walls of the room containing dark wooden floors, crimson beddings and everything that reeked of beauty and affluence. The so-called pureblood sat at a vanity with a kneeling maid combing her long brown hair.
Unbeknownst to Yuki, her claws creased the impeccable oak door at the sight of luscious brown hair.
Sensing something outside, Juuri turned her head but thought nothing of it and peered at her maid. "Don't work too hard. Get some rest. Hurry and go."
"You're the only royal who hates having maids around," Informed the maid with a grin, "Maybe I'm lucky and I shouldn't speak freely. Sometimes I feel fortunate to work in the palace."
"Good for you. I don't hear that a lot."
"When I hear rumors like purebloods are slave-makers, it angers me. We are not slaves. We would follow you in death if demanded of us."
Juuri patted her hand. "You don't have to do none of that. Now go to sleep. I can take it from here." She drew her hair over shoulder and stole the comb away. "Vanity sure is something when you're a pureblood." Juuri inspected her reflection.
The maid laughed as she strode to the door. "Yes, Juuri-sama."
Juuri tapped under her ruby eyes and pouted. "I've looked like this since I was sixteen 5,000 years ago. I'm getting tired of looking the same."
The maid stopped, "But your beauty is unsurpassable. You are one of the most radiant creatures of society."
"Radiant?" Juuri scoffed and rose from her chair meanwhile tossing her hairbrush and stretched her arms. "Who cares about that? I'll see you tomorrow. Please, lock my door on your way out."
"Yes, Juuri-sama." The maid bowed.
A shadow fluttered across her vision and her nose wrinkled. She jumped to the door and scanned the outer room. "Is that you, Rin?" The room was darkly uninhabited and gloomier than a grave.
I must be seeing things.
º º º
Zero stared at the night emptily. His eyes light and shimmering like mercury. Stepping away from the unconscious woman on the grass, Zero pulled his cloak over his shoulder and strode toward the trees at the gates. The grass was moist and his breath pooled in white clouds in the dark. Branches swayed and leaves cluttered around his glassy hair. His eyes narrowed on the tree trunk. Flowers dribbled like white dust on his shoulders and feet. He walked over the flowers and stopped, one palm against cracked wood.
In the elevating breeze, her scent twined the flowers and wet grass. Relief abandoned him the second he registered another ambiguous smell. He leaned against the trunk and slipped his palm on the opposite side where he knew to find her warm mouth. Her quickened breathing fanned his knuckles and wrist. Finally her warm lips grazed the bone of his radius. Before his fingers reached higher, Yuki slapped his hand and clenched her tearful eyes shut.
"After scrounging for years, after waiting hopelessly," Yuki croaked between sobs, "After—after everything. Seeing her now. Her hair, eyes—all of it." Her lips continuously trembled in the streaming tears. "I chickened out, Zero." She confessed. "I got so scared. I panicked. She was inches away from me. So close that I could've touched her."
Yuki shoved her face in her palms and repented. "Can you imagine? I came so far after waiting for years and this is where I stop? All for what? Why exactly did I come here? I knew she'd be living happily. I knew she was better off than us." Peeling her hands back, she screamed indignantly at the sky. "Why aren't you saying anything?"
Zero turned in her direction.
Yuki clenched her teeth. "I wasn't planning on giving up. What did you think I was gonna do?" She bolted around to find him watching her unblinkingly. "What?"
He only looked at the falling leaves from the shivering branches above them.
Yuki curled a hand over her stinging eyes. "You knew this'd happen, didn't you?"
Of course, he did. It went without saying.
Quietly, he arranged her hood over her cold ears and forehead and strode back to the unconscious woman he had been watching over.
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