They sat down and ate in silence. Minamino knew she would ask her questions after about five minutes and so he prepared answers that wouldn't give too much away. He couldn't risk Hina coming back. He had a promise to keep. He looked up at the black night sky, where he could see thousands of little stars trying outshine each other. He looked down over the still bustling town below and could faintly hear the sound of traffic and the music and crowd from a concert being played there that night. He looked down at his hands; they were even more covered in blood. He stood up and walked into the woods, following the sound of the stream. He dipped his hands into the water and rubbed them together to get rid of the blood. He looked up at the sky again and stood for a moment, just listening to the stream and the wind in the trees. He sighed and walked back to camp and Hinata walked out into the woods to wash their bowls, and her hands, in the stream. There was an easy silence for about five minutes after she returned. Minamino had given up trying to think of answers and decided just to take the questions as they came. He wasn't going to make this easy for her, that was certain. Hinata finally decided on a question but prolonged the silence by two more minutes before plucking up the courage to ask it. She still wasn't sure if she wanted to know the answer.
"Who are you?" Hinata said and there was another silence before he answered.
"Me." He replied with a sly tinge to his voice. Hinata rolled her eyes.
"This is going to be a long night." She looked at him with a slight smile in her eyes and he knew she wasn't going to give in until she got the answers she wanted. She was right, it was going to be a very long night. There was a silence until she repeated her question.
"Who are you?" he looked at her.
"You've known me for five years. You know who I am." He stressed the last word slightly to try to give her a hint at the question she should ask. She'd probably miss it, as usual. He was kind of hoping that to be the case but, unfortunately, this was not a usual situation.
"Fine then, who were you?" She asked with an exasperated sigh and he smiled slightly.
"Someone else." She 'harumphed' and he laughed. This definately wasn't going to be easy for her. She sighed and looked up at the stars as if they had all the answers.
"Who am I?" She asked dazedly and Minamino swallowed nervously. That had to be the worst question so far, even if she was only asking herself. She looked at him and he tried to seem normal.
"I'm not who I think I am, right? It's all to do with the fact I can't remember, right?" She looked at him with a determined shine in her eyes. She wasn't letting this one go. He sighed and looked away. Memories came flooding back to him, memories of the old days. Those days had been good and he wouldn't mind returning to them but, he had made a promise.
"She must never remember. You know the consequences." Her voice echoed in his mind. He never did care enough at the time to remember her name. Right now, he wished had. He knew she would reappear as soon as she noticed Hina was being remembered.
"Who am I?" She half whispered to him and stared at the patch of muddy grass by her feet. He looked over at her, his eyes sad, but she didn't look up. He looked away again before she did. Maybe not as long a night as they'd imagined.
"I'm going to bed." She whispered after a long silence and slunk off into the tent.
"I'll keep watch. The wolves may come back." He replied just as she was about to zip up the tent. She smiled slightly.
"Night." Was all she said, closing the zip.
"Goodnight." He replied quietly. He sat there for a further half and hour until he sensed her presence and stood up, changing into his true form; it was the best way to talk to her.
"You have broken your promise." She said emerging from the woods. Her appearance was that of a traditional Japanese princess. She had long black hair tied up on top of her head elegantly and her green eyes shone with a regal light. She walked like royalty and she could easily be mistaken for a real princess. She wasn't of course. She just liked feeling as if she was better than everyone else. Many people would just take her as obnoxious and spiteful but Minamino knew the reason for her being so harsh. It wasn't very pleasant.
"I think you'll find that I haven't done anything to tell her who she is." His silver eyes remained cold and dark. "It seems she managed to half remember herself." She raised her eyebrows, her cold eyes matching his.
"That is a suprise. You mean to tell me you didn't do anything which could have aided this?" They both wore the same cold expression and were having a perfectly balanced conversation. They matched each other exactly and most people would have found it funny to watch and made some joke out of it. Hinata, on the other hand, was intrigued. She wanted to know what was going on. She wanted to know who she was. Both of them knew. She wanted to know. She wanted to know! A tingling excitement ran through her body like electricity, this feeling was completely different to the one before, she had felt despairing then, but this time she felt excited. She had to find out. She had to know. She listened and watched their conversation intently trying to catch anything that would give her a clue as to who she was.
"I did what I had to." Minamino replied to her last comment. She 'humph'ed but said nothing else about that.
"I suppose I'll be going then." She said coolly. "Kurama," she added as he turned to walk back and he turned to look at her again. "She must never remember. You know why." He nodded once and she left. He turned back to his human form, Minamino Shuuichi, and sighed. She was going to remember and there was nothing he could do about it.
'Kurama' Hinata played the word over in her mind. That was his name. She remembered her old name too. She knew slightly more. Memories that never happened to her. She smiled to herself but frowned at the girl's last words.
"She must never remember. You know why." What was wrong with her remembering? Who was that girl? Was the girl actually royalty or was she just pretending? Hinata sighed and the electricity died down slightly. She decided to think about it in the morning and drifted off into an easy sleep. Kurama, on the other hand, had decided not to sleep. He sat outside the tent looking up at the stars his eyes vacant and cold. He was thinking about what he would do when she remembered. He hoped it wouldn't be for a while but there was every possibility that she had heard that conversation and that would help her remember. Especially seeing as his real name had been mentioned.
"Never come back here!"
"I want it this way! It will be easier won't it?"
"If you break this promise you know the consequences."
Memories came back to him all at once and swirled through his mind, making his already grim mood even worse. Images flickered past his eyes and he pictured every scene clearly and felt the exact same feelings that he had at that point. He inhaled sharply and shook his head to clear this barrage of thoughts. The pain of the last image was unbearable and, even though the thought has been pushed back as far as he could possibly get it, a dull ache still remained. He changed the course of his thoughts to the tournament and smiled. He only had to make it through the rest of this week until he could forget about everything and lose himself in the tournament. With all the worries he had on his mind, he couldn't wait.