CH10: The Truth Will Set You Free

Sakura pranced around her room uncomfortably. "Li-kun!" she begged. The door to her room was locked, and Li had the key. She could have used the jump card to escape through the window, but the groundskeepers were out caring for the lawn and she didn't want to be seen using her magic. She banged on the bathroom door. "Please let me in!" Sakura was getting antsy; she was unsure of how much longer she could hold it in.

"I am almost finished." He replied calmly from the other side of the bathroom door, "I will only be another fifteen or twenty minutes." Sakura, as usual, had to be woken by Li that morning. It was a much shorter trip for him since he had slept on the floor by her door for the past couple days. Neither of them appreciated the arrangement. Li wanted her to tell the elders about her abilities so he could stop babysitting her, but Sakura insisted that it was best that as few people as possible know. The fact that his family already knew, or at least suspected, had not loosened her lips about her secret at all. Li saw this situation as unjustly punishing him for Sakura's mistakes and was determined to make life as hard as possible on her until she did what he wanted. It didn't help that they were both too stubborn to consider relenting.

"I'll do anything!" She cried, fearing her bladder would burst. Behind the door, Li smiled. These were exactly the words he had been waiting for.

"You will tell the Elders the truth this morning?"

"Yes, just let me in!" The lock on the bathroom door clicked and Li emerged holding a half read, dusty, old book labelled 'The Sorcerer's Almanac: A Guide to All Things Magic'.

"It is all yours." He smiled, giving a mock bow and gesturing into the bathroom. Sakura did not see it though as she just shoved him out of the way and slammed the bathroom door. He heard a sigh of relief as Sakura barely made it in time. "I am sure the elders will be most interested in what you have to say in the lessons this morning, Kinomoto. You may want to hurry up though, they start in three minutes." Li called through the door, gloating over his victory.

"NANI?!" Sakura worried over how she would ever make it to the lessons in time, until she spotted an object glinting on the top of the sink, "If I'm late, you're late." She called back, "Not only must you escort me, but you left the key in here!" Li cursed and waited… and waited… and waited… They were almost fifteen minutes late before they even got out of the room.

"Gomennasai, Li-sama," Sakura belted out as they arrived late to the lessons, "I did not mean to be late. Li-kun has insisted that I tell you the truth, so here it is;" Sakura glanced towards Syaoran and grinned maliciously, "We were late because Li-kun spent an hour and a half in the bathroom this morning."

"NANI?" Syaoran's face turned red. Sakura was unsure of whether this was from rage, or from embarrassment as he heard stifled giggles coming from the two elders who had been waiting for them.

"I believe that it is time that we get started." One of the elders said, "Perhaps today we shall talk about the proper nutrition for a fighter… And of the importance of fibre in one's diet." Li glared at Sakura for the rest of the lesson time.

Later, all Li could think about the event was, 'Thank God it was not a martial arts day, or else Touya would never let me hear the end of it.' When Touya had learned about the current arrangements for Sakura's restriction of mobility, he would have gone after Li with the kendo training-sword he had be using to spar, had Yukito not restrained him. Even though the initial attack had been prevented, Li had found himself the victim of several 'accidents' over the last two days. Li was sure that if things came to blows, he would be the victor, but he did not look forward to the fight. Touya was at least a head taller than him and had been training for most of his life, though not nearly as vigorously as Syaoran had. Syaoran's fighting skills were better than Touya's, but Touya had a much longer reach and was not unskilled at fighting, so it would certainly be a painful victory. As much as Li enjoyed a challenge, he would prefer if he could avoid this one by forcing her to confess.

On his way to school, Li pondered the possibilities. He couldn't physically torture her. His mother and the elders frowned at that practice. It had only been used twice in the past hundred years, but not for anything as trivial as this. A shining, silver ray of hope entered his sight as he saw Clow's magic circle engraved on an innocent looking item in the window of an antique store.

"I hope you are ready Sakura," Li smiled as he gladly overpaid what it would have been worth had it not been magical, leaving the shopkeeper very happy and with a business card with his number on the back should the owner find any other items that might be of interest. "This will be a day you truly won't expect."

"Sakura-chan!" Tomoyo waved as her friend roller-bladed towards her. "Did you sleep well?"

"No." Sakura replied, "I had to sleep with Li again and he snores horribly." She clamped her hands over her mouth in shock. She had not meant to say that much.

"You mean… You and Li…" Tomoyo was looking rather shocked, but that did not stop her from having her camera out to record the rest of this conversation.

"HOE!" Sakura waved her arms and shook her head in defiance of the allegation, "We have been sleeping in the same room because the elders don't trust me to be alone in the Li complex since I knew stuff I shouldn't have because I released the Clow Cards and haven't told them about it." Li smiled as he watched Sakura try to contain herself from a position hidden in a tree on the other side of a wall between a property and the street. He held a silver set of scales that tilted when Sakura tried to speak.

Tomoyo already looked suspicious and glanced towards Li's hiding place without Sakura seeing her nod and smile towards an otherwise normal tree. Li almost let himself fall out of the tree when he noticed her do this. He replaced the scales into his backpack and hurried away.

Every time Sakura spoke, she found herself saying more than she had intended to. She was in constant fear that someone would ask a question that would cause her to say something really compromising. Her friends quickly caught on to her inability to lie and were taking advantage of it for their own entertainment.

"So, who do you think is the hottest guy in school?" Chiharu asked as they waited for class to start after lunch.

"Li, of course." She replied before she could stop herself. A loud thud was heard behind her as a surprised Syaoran tripped over his own feet and slammed his face into a desk. "Too bad he is so cold, self-centered and mean. He is such a baka." Syaoran scowled as he stood himself up again. He was actually quite irritated with himself. He had known already that he was considered the most attractive guy in the school by all the single girls and most of the ones who weren't. He wondered why what Sakura had said surprised him so much. "Li? Are you okay?" Sakura asked. She pulled a handkerchief from her bag and held it over his face. He realized quickly that his nose was bleeding. Actually it was bleeding a lot. The front of his shirt was actually soaked with blood. He didn't think he had hit the desk that hard. "Li?" Others were gathering around him now.

"Maybe we should get him to the nurse's office." Naoko suggested, as he just stood there staring into space as Sakura tried to stop his bleeding. He seemed to come back to life suddenly and grabbed the, now red, handkerchief from Sakura.

"I am fine." He stated resolutely. This became even more of an obvious lie as he collapsed unconscious on top of Yamazaki as he tried to escape the circle of concerned students.

Li was carried by Sakura, Takashi and Tomoyo to the nurse's office. The nurse had insisted on calling Li's mother who in turn called Doctor Ling and they both arrived at the school minutes later. Sakura was waiting with the nurse and Syaoran when they arrived. She was soaked with almost as much blood as Syaoran.

"He tripped and hit his face on a desk." Sakura said immediately as they entered the office. The doctor nodded in acknowledgement. Syaoran was lying in the bed with cotton stuffed into his nose and the bleeding stopped by the cauterizing agents that the nurse had soaked the cotton in. Doctor Ling inspected Syaoran for a few moments, humming to himself.

"He definitely has a concussion. It is a fairly major one." The doctor said, "He does not have a broken nose, but he has a severe gash that has severed an artery in his nose. If it starts bleeding again, he may need to have it surgically closed. He will need rest for at least a day, but should avoid strenuous activity for the rest of the week. He may feel dizzy or disoriented after he wakes up. If this lasts for more than a day, he has trouble sleeping, or any other symptoms occur, please call me." Hi Ling whispered something to Yelan, then left.

Yelan picked up her son with surprising ease. "Get his school bag, and yours as well. He cannot stay here in this condition, and you cannot stay in those clothes." Sakura did as she was told and headed back towards the classroom.

Sakura picked up her own bag and then Li's bag. It was heavy. She tried to heft it into a position with better grip. The zipper got caught on a desk, opened a bit, and she saw a silver engraved magic circle. She got out into the hall and took the object out of his bag. She could feel its aura now. She knew that this was a Clow Card. She didn't know where Li had gotten it, but she was fairly certain that it was what had caused her so many problems today. She knew Li had only been trying to help her by trying to force her to reveal her secret, and now, because she hadn't he had been hurt. "This is all my fault." She said to herself. "I opened the book that he was supposed to open and took his birthright away, and then I lied about it which took his freedom away, and now this." A tear rolled down her cheek as she thought of how much she had ruined his life. She swore to herself that she would tell the elders about the Clow Cards as soon as Li awoke. She also decided that she would at least try to be his friend, if he'd let her. Sakura glanced around to make sure no one was watching and quickly sealed the card and signed it with Syaoran's name before putting it back into his backpack.

Li awoke late that night lying in his own bed. His head hurt and his face hurt and he could not remember precisely why, only that Sakura had something to do with it. She was curled up asleep in one of the armchairs and one of the elders was watching over him.

"You are awake. How are you feeling?" The elder asked.

"Like someone was using my face instead of a punching bag." He replied, "Sakura didn't beat me in a fight did she?" Syaoran asked, extremely relieved when he learned it was not so and that he had in fact tripped and hit his face on a desk.

"Gomenasai, Li-kun." Sakura said, opening her eyes, "Please forgive me. If I hadn't been so stubborn, this never would have happened."

Syaoran remembered what he had done earlier with The Libra. "It's not your fault." He said as he noticed that her cheeks were wet.

"It is my fault, and I can't fix it, but I can do the next best thing. I can make sure it doesn't ever happen again." She turned to the elder, who by some coincidence was the same one who had taught that family history class that had cause Li to be stuck babysitting her. "Li-sama… I knew about Clow Reed because I was able to open The Clow and Keroberos. the guardian beast of the seal, told me about him when he made me a card captor." The elder nodded and left the room without saying anything.