"Lord Tokutomi, there are visitors here for you," Tsuna began in a weak whisper as she stared at her lord's sickly pale face. Just days ago he had been a picture of perfect health but now, he looked ready to keel over and die. "My lord are you feeling alright?" the words fell sloppily from her trembling lips.

Tokutomi glared at her with dark glazed over eyes. "I'm fine," he hissed, but he didn't sound it, the bass in his voice had all but gone and his body rattled loudly with each word he spoke, but he pretended not to notice. Running a shaky pale hand through his dark hair, pushing his messy sweat soaked locks out of his face. His eyes were puffy and rimmed with bloody purple colored bags as though he had spent days rubbing them, over, and over, and over again. Pounding his fists into his eye sockets until the skin was inflamed and raw and bruised.

He cleared his throat, breaking Tsuna's gaze off of him. "These guests...what do they want?" he asked taking pauses between words to breathe.

Tsuna only shook her head. "They're here about Ariwa, they want to save him."

"What about the demon?" Tokutomi hissed quickly, perhaps too quickly; Tsuna took several nervous steps back gripping her arms hard holding herself in place as best she could, there was something off about her master, it was as though he didn't want his brother to be found at all, it was almost as though he just wanted the demon, but for what Tsuna couldn't even begin to imagine, what use after all could a demon be? She bit at the inside of her cheek and and huffed out a deep breath before answering with a very quiet, very nervous, very shaky, "no." Tokutomi snorted loudly, rolling his eyes with such vigor, Tsuna thought it might have hurt.

"Do you want me to send them in? They're waiting to speak with you," Tsuna continued. Tokutomi made a face nodding his head.

Tsuna didn't waste time, scrambling for the door, soon as Tokutomi had answered her, she wanted nothing more than to be as far away from him as possible.

The silence Tsuna left him in was almost calming, almost, lately Tokutomi had been having trouble clearing his head, all he could think about was the demon, and getting more blood, and how brittle his body was starting to feel, as though he were made out of slowly cracking glass.

The group that walked in was small, two women, one man, and two very tiny demons, Tokutomi felt his blood boil over with a terrifying sort of excitement as he began to ask himself if their blood would do just as well as as the she-beast that ran off with his brother.

He frowned, no, he didn't want there blood, even if their blood worked better than hers, he still wanted her blood, only that demon would do.

One of the girls cleared her throat loud as she could to catch his attention.

"We heard your brother was taken by a demon?" the first girl said with a kind sort of sadness that on a different and better day, might have tugged at Tokutomi's heart strings, but today he only stared.

"Yes," was the answer that crept from between Tokutomi's trembling lips.

The group exchanged looks. "Right well, we heard about your brother and we want to help you find them and take down the demon that took him from you," the girl with the sadness in her voice seemed all too proud of herself.

"Take down?" he stumbled over the words. His eyes filled with fire and brimstone at the very notion of the words, he licked his lips and grunted something inaudible that made the girls shrink in their skin.

"I...think I'm going to see where Inuyasha went off to," said the oddly dressed girl, her dark hair slung over her shoulder as she quickly made her way out of the large room, Tokutomi had been making her uncomfortable, she couldn't place it but there was a strange demonic presence lingering over him, something foul was in the air she could sense it, she wasn't sure what it was, but it was their a faint feeling of unease, something horrible was going to happen soon. She wondered if it had anything at all to do with what Inuyasha had said earlier...she paused in her thoughts shaking her head. Kagome, you need to get a grip, she thought, giving herself a good mental kick.

The monk was speaking now, his voice treading on nervous caution, "So," he began probing his mind for the right questions. "The demon that took your brother what did it look like?"

"What did it look like?" Tokutomi was breathing the words, his lips hanging onto each syllable.

"She had horns and her skin...it was purple...like lavender never seen skin that color before...never seen hair that color before..." he trailed off and the monk had to bring him back on track.

"Her hair was also purple?"

Tokutomi choked out a laugh, "don't be ridiculous," he said in that breathy whisper again. "Her hair was like fire...wild and red-I think it might have been brighter than fire...so bright," he trailed off again, his eyes more glazed than they had ever been. The small Fox demon crawled up the solemn woman's leg, and onto her shoulder, trembling.

"Well Tokutomi...Sir, I'm sure you'll be able to sleep well at night knowing you're brother will be brought back to you soon, we'll do everything in our power to get him back home!" she added.

"What about the demon?" Tokutomi was barely listening to the girl, she wasn't saying anything he cared about, he only cared about the demon.

"The...demon?" asked the monk clearly confused.

"Yes...what are you going to do to the demon?"

"Kill it of course...unless you had other plans in mind for the creature," Tokutomi only smiled, yes he had other plans for the demon, so many plans, he smiled a little wider as he watched as the group or what was left of it with a slight incline of their heads, left him to stew in the silence, Tokutomi liked the silence.