Bubble: I have loads of ideas now :D Thank you all very much for reading!
Ilumi: This chapter is about-
Natsumi: I GOT HIT BY A TRUCKKK GODDAMIITTTTT- *Bubble clamps hand over her mouth*
Bubble: ...about Illumi's love life! xD
Hisoka: Well this will be intriguing...
Saki: (T.T) Love lives... *faints*
Illumi: Fridgethatbubblegum does NOT own HunterxHunter...
Bubble: Please R&R! Thank you so much for reading :D
*flashback*
I fainted again, but this time, I had a nice dream of when Saki and I were little, playing in sand on the shore of a beach.
*end flashback*
Chapter 7. Love for Illumi
He had no way of knowing this would have happened.
Sure, he had an idea, but he thought it wouldn't be so severe. It couldn't be so severe.
Is it true that you have a double?
Illumi didn't think so.
Beautiful blue eyes that sparkled like the sea, soft and silky grey hair that the sun seemed to love.
He didn't think it was possible, that the world wanted to haunt him once again, with a copy of Saki Suzumia.
He remembered little, but he knew he had loved her.
"...Illumi, look at her! She's going to be your bride!"
His mother was calling him, he felt like he was surrounded in a golden light, soft and warm. He was happy.
"Her name is Suzumia Saki, be nice!" He remembered nodding.
A small girl poked her head from behind the cupboard.
How did she fit in there? He thought to himself as she inched out from behind the massive wooden box to meet his eyes.
Her eyes were a beautiful blue, he swore he saw some emerald in it too.
Her silver hair came to her shoulders and she had a swept fringe, a little cherry-shaped pinned to the side as well.
Illumi had felt like he had just met a goddess. She didn't have parents, so the family took her in.
"I-Iwumi?" She said quietly, her voice sounded like tinkling from a soft bell, quiet as a stream, and as lively as birds in the morning.
He remembered nodding, lost in her gaze. He was seven, and she was four years old.
Now thinking about it, he didn't remember how it came about, but Saki was definitely chosen to be his bride, to take on the assassin legacy by his side.
He didn't want that, for her, for both of them. She didn't deserve to be treated and hated like a killer. He knew it may be too late for him, but it wasn't for her.
"Iwumi!" She still couldn't say it right after a year, they were holding hands and sitting in the sandpit, making a sand castle.
"This is Saki and Iwumi's castle! We're going to live happily ever after here!" She said cheerfully, placing a shell on the side for a window.
Illumi nodded, and she smiled a smile that could make angels faint. He was never one for words, but Saki liked him just the way he was.
Thinking they could never go back to those times again made him want to cry, but after what had happened, it was as if he wasn't able to even cry anymore.
"Illumi!" three years had passed, he was 11 years old, Saki was 8.
He would never be able to forget what had happened that night. It scarred him to the core.
His parents and everybody around him were sure that the marriage would work out perfectly fine.
Illumi had never said his intentions out loud. He wanted to get Saki out of the vile mansion, as far as she could go before the marriage took place.
They were too young to be engaged, but they were, nonetheless. After all, rules didn't matter to the Zoldyck family.
Saki was a bit slow when she was younger, she didn't know Illumi was trying to get her out of the marriage.
"One hour till the big event!" His mother said smiling, his father was nowhere to be seen.
Saki looked amazing in her white frilly bride's dress. It had light pink roses that dotted her neckline and the base of her dress, she looked stunning.
Everybody had always been kind to her because she was cute, and now, Illumi had to see behind the laughs and encouraged smiles, as fate revealed its ugly head.
If he said there is nothing to regret, then he is wrong, but sometimes he is glad she never had to face the anguish of living as a killer.
He held his hand out to her, Saki beamed and took it in her small white gloved hand.
"Illumi, you're hair is like seaweed! It's so cute! I want it to be longer!" She said giggling.
He didn't say anything, but considered the idea reasonable, if his bride wanted it, then so be it.
He kissed her hand and walked up to his grandfather, the 'priest' for the marriage.
"I announce you husband and wife." His grandfather said, smiling down at them,
"Illumi, do you swear to protect your wife, and to love her, and together take on the Zoldyck legacy?"
"I do" Illumi said, probably the first time Saki had heard him talk. Her eyes widened at his voice, and she beamed, it was just making her love him more.
"And do you, Saki, swear that you will walk with Illumi through thick and thin to love him forever and stand beside him as he continues the legacy?"
Saki looked up, the golden light shining through the window making her eyes dance.
"I-"
She stopped. Illumi's blood ran cold. The whole room had suddenly become engulfed by an unknown evil.
Only when he dared to look, he realized that Saki's eyes were wide, staring at nothing in particular, and she fell to her knees, coughing up blood.
His father had stabbed her.
He couldn't express the emotions that raged through his body, like a tornado they tore his heart into pieces.
"You must learn to mask your emotions, Illumi. Look at your expression, you are hardly my son if you cannot make a straight face just because somebody was killed."
His father said, appearing behind him, sliding the knife out of Saki's now motionless body. Illumi couldn't think straight, blood clouded his eyes, his breaths came out in gasps, the taste of iron on his lips.
He fled, stumbling over and over as he tried to calm his shaking knees.
He fell to the ground once more as he burst through the doors of his mansion and into the garden.
He remembered trying to shout, but his habit of being silent had taken its toll, he felt like he had forgotten how to speak.
He ran past the orchards, the vines, the trees. He came to a clearing and fell to his knees in front of the large pond in the middle of the garden.
He peered at his reflection in the water. His face was unrecognizable, twisted, anguished.
It was only then he realized he had been crying. He howled a cry and clutched his hair. I'll grow it, he thought viciously. I'll grow it for Saki.
After he had regained his composure, Illumi trotted back to the family mansion. The traces of tears long gone.
"I only did it because you need to become stronger." His father announced when he had returned. "I arranged for you to witness your first love to die in front of your eyes."
Illumi only stared out to him with blank eyes, completely stripped of emotion. His once shining purple eyes were a dull navy-black.
The light had gone, and he looked like walking dead.
"I want you to promise me..." His grandfather had said, he didn't hear the rest as he fainted on the cold stone floor.
"We got you a little brother!" His mothers' high voice tore through his head,
"A little brother?" Illumi asked, not bothering to ask where the brother had actually come from. His mother tugged a 2 year old child from behind her.
Illumi's eyes widened. He looked... just like Saki.
His hair was a little lighter, as Saki's hair had looked like a storm forming, his hair was whiter than grey, but his eyes, they were identical to hers.
On second thought, not the spitting image, because Saki's eyes were livelier than his.
"Help me name him!" His mother pranced around the room as the little brother looked around with wide eyes.
"Killua" Illumi breathed, "His name can be Killua."
Illumi thought of the connection between him and his little brother a fragile sort.
The crooked relationship may have been formed through Saki's resemblance, the horrible events that had twisted Illumi to the core,
and the need to protect someone from harm, no matter how he had to do it.
"I-I love you!" Illumi snapped out of his thoughts as a girl walked up to him and said those three words he wanted to hear so many times.
He wanted to cry, he wanted to laugh, but all he could do was stare. It was Saki Suzumia. His bride's doppelganger.
It took all of his might to try not to gasp.
The quiet man he was, he still had something missing since Saki had died. He knew what it was now, but he refused to accept it.
He couldn't accept it.
"Illumi when I first saw you, you were like... I don't know, like someone who had come up in my dream somewhere, I remember seaweed hair, sandcastles..." She continued, carefully stepping up to him.
Saki wasn't one to blush, but something told her Illumi had seen her blush before.
"I-" She started again, but Illumi stopped her with a blank expression.
"I don't know what dream you were talking about but I barely know you so sorry." He said it so fast, he wanted to cry, Saki looked like she was going to too.
"Please can we just even try to talk a little?" Saki pleaded,
"I know it's sudden but-"
"I have this promise, so sorry no." He said bluntly, putting his hand on her shoulder and pushing her away. Saki looked like she wanted to say something, but closed her mouth tightly and looked down.
When she looked up, Illumi was gone.
Saki ran. She didn't think about much, just getting home. I'll go and see Natsumi. She thought bravely. We can help each other out.