"C'mon, Kira-chan," Haku murmured gently, his hand squeezing mine reassuringly, "We should go back to the tent. Eirin-san said that Asahi wanted to meet you."

He tried pulling me in the direction of the tent, but I stayed where I was, my entire body frozen.

My mouth was dry, my tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth. My legs were immobile, refusing to move, as if they were melted into the very snow itself.

Somehow, I forced myself to speak, practically spitting the words from my lips as if they were a curse: "They know, Haku. They know."

I saw confusion spark in his eyes for a moment, before dissolving away to understanding. He understood what I was voicing, didn't even have to look into my own eyes to know.

His hand left mine, and then he draped his entire arm over my shoulders, pulling me flush against his side. There was barely a height difference between us- he was only an inch taller than I was, but I attributed that to the fact that he was older than I was.

"No, Kira-chan," my brother murmured, his arm tightening protectively around me, "They don't."

While I knew that Haku spoke only the truth to me- he never lied to me, I knew that well- it still wasn't enough to placate me, and I was a bundle of nerves all the way back to the tent.

Haku helped me to get back into the futon, before lying right beside me. I shifted closer to him, my hand finding his, our fingers lacing together.

His other hand found its way to my hair, and I smiled at him sleepily as he brushed my bangs from my face.

I dozed off for a while, but I was woken up to something gently shaking my shoulder.

"Ugh," I mumbled, forcing my eyes to open and blinking away the bright light that shown straight into my vision, "Wha'?"

It was the girl from before- Eirin- and she smiled at me kindly.

"I'm sorry to wake you up, but Asahi wants to meet you," she said apologetically, "And since you were raging with fever not last night, she couldn't really see you then."

"'Kay," I murmured, resisting the urge to just close my eyes again and roll over and be dead to the world, "Jus' give a second."

I shakily pulled myself up, yawning widely as I did so. Then, I pierced Eirin with an unfathomable glance. "Okay then," I said, "Lead the way."

Haku was gone, I dimly noticed, but that didn't bother me as much as it should.

I followed Eirin out of the tent, and we made our way to a much larger one, and I deftly ignored the stares that came my way.

Eirin pulled the flap of the tent back before waving me inside. I ducked my head, though it shouldn't have mattered considering how short I was.

Haku was already in there, a neutral expression on his face, but when he saw me, his face lit up and a smile replaced the frown.

"Kira-chan," he said, pointing to the spot beside him, "Sit here."

And I did. But I completely disregarded the cushion and curled up against him, my side flush against his. But he didn't mind. He simply flashed me a smile as I clung to his arm, my grip no doubt bruising.

The clearing of a throat had me looking up, and I almost recoiled at the sight of a woman gazing at us intently.

She was very pretty, and very young, about twenty or so, with long dark hair and equally dark eyes.

It must be Asahi, the lady who wanted to meet me.

"You must be Kira," she said, her voice smooth as silk.

"Y-Yes," I stammered, pressing myself further into Haku's side.

"I already met your brother, Kira-chan," she hummed, "He was lovely. Shy, but lovely."

I nodded in confusion. If she already met Haku, then what did she want with me?

"I must say," she murmured, "When Yori-kun had informed me he had found two children in dire need for shelter, I hadn't expected you to be so grievously injured. Tell me, Kira-chan, just how did you receive those injuries?"

I swallowed hard. She won't believe me, she will not believe me-

"Papa," Haku said so softly that he could barely be heard, "It was our Papa."

Asahi looked curious. "Is that so?" she responded. "And, Haku-chan, why would your own father try to kill you? Did he abuse you constantly?"

No, but he wanted to kill us all the same. He would have killed us. It didn't matter whether we were his family or not, when he found out he still would have killed us.

"No," I snapped, "He didn't hurt us-"

"The wounds that you have acquired speak otherwise, Kira-chan," Asahi said dryly.

I only glowered up at her. What business was it of hers to pry into my private life? So, Papa tried to kill me? That part was over and done. I would forget about him, forget his face and name until it only remained a black stain in my heart.

Papa didn't deserve my love.

But Asahi merely raised an eyebrow, and I hated her in that moment, wanted to wrap my fingers around her throat and squeeze-

"He thought we were abominations!" I snapped acidly, "Happy to finally know, Asahi-san?"

To my surprise, Asahi simply laughed. It was a pleasant, tinkling laugh that grated on me, and I simply wanted it to stop.

"You look like a perfectly normal little girl to me, Kira-chan," she said gently, and the gentleness of her voice irritated me further.

I wasn't a child to be coddled, not after what I'd failed to prevent. I wasn't even a child in the first place!

Yes, I may be five physically, but that was it. I had the mind of a young woman, and not a little girl.

Asahi seemed to be waiting for a response, but when I only continued to glare up at her acidly, she sighed.

"Very well," she murmured. She then smiled. "You may stay with us as long as you wish. You have nowhere else to go anyway, and we could use the extra hands."

"Fine," I said venomously.

Well, it wasn't as if we had anywhere else to go, right? Ninja villages were out of the question, and, the only village to go to would be Kirigakure anyway, since we were in the Land of Water.

I didn't want to become a ninja, plain and simple.

I wasn't going to go out of my way to change things, and what right did I have? They were all going to get a happy ending anyway, so why interfere?

The only thing I would change would be Haku's death. He's not going to die, and that was all there was to it.

. . .

The next few weeks passed in a blur, and my arms were soon healed enough to remove the bandages.

I stared down at my arms as Eirin removed the bandages that were tinged brown from lying on them all night,

Thankfully, the wounds had stopped opening weeks ago.

"There you go, Kira-chan," Eirin said when she had finished, "You're as good as new."

I looked down at my arms, experimentally moving them. They were a bit stiff, but nothing that constant exercising would change.

My right arm, the one where I had tried to do… I wasn't going to think about it. It was thick with scar tissue, and the scars were huge and terrible, thick and ropey and bright red from being newly healed.

I hated them.

My hand, the one that Papa had stabbed, had a thick white scar on the palm, and I found that it was difficult to move it at all.

I could barely move the fingers, and my entire hand was numb, stiff, and dull.

The nerves were shot.

I realised, very bitterly, that I would never be able to use it again properly. I would be a pretty crappy ninja if I would become one- not that I would, of course- for the simple fact that I wouldn't be able to do those hand signs or even wield a weapon.

Well, at least it was only my left hand. I was right-handed in this life- thank God- wherein in my last I was left-handed.

Let's just say that it came to a severe shock when I first tried to draw something into the snow.

"How are they, Kira-chan?" Haku asked, peering down at them. "They look very-"

"I can't move my hand," I said blankly.

I held up my left arm and let Haku see my hand. He prodded it experimentally, and all I did was shrug.

"I can't feel anything, Haku," I said in response to his inquiring gaze, "It just feels numb."

"Oh," he said, as if that one word explained everything. But I knew that he was just confused, and maybe even bothered what Papa had done to me, done to us.

I perked up when I heard voices at the tent, and I noticed that Eirin was gone.

"You can't come in here," Eirin was saying.

"Why not?" a familiar voice whined, "I'm her friend, too. Even Chiaki here agrees with me."

"Idiot," Chiaki scolded, "You're too old to be her friend."

"I'm only fourteen," Yori protested, "And you're supposed to agree with me, Chiaki. How else are we going to get in there and see them?"

"We could wait for them outside," Chiaki suggested.

"Let them in, Eirin-san," I said.

I saw Eirin turn to me, saw her eyes flick worriedly to my exposed arms, but all I did was cover them with the blanket of the futon.

"There," I said, "Problem solved. Now, let them in."

"Alright," the girl sighed, "But only for a few minutes. Do you understand, Yori-kun? She's only five, and she doesn't need-"

"-someone like me to ruin her childhood. Blah, blah, blah. Now, can we come in?"

He didn't even wait for an answer before he barged inside.

He visibly lit up when he saw me and Haku.

"Hey, Haku," he said, grinning hugely, "And Kira. How've you both been?"

"Fine," Haku said.

Chiaki walked in behind him, still looking as he had the last time I'd seen him, which was weeks ago really.

His face looked bored, but his dark eyes were glittering with something as they landed on me. "Glad to know that you haven't died yet."

Yori instantly turned to the younger boy. "Chiaki!" he scolded, "Stop being so blunt!"

"It's okay," I found myself saying, and he turned surprised eyes onto me, "I don't mind."

"Just because Chiaki's a brat shouldn't make it okay," Yori said sulkily.

"No, really," I interjected, "It's fine. I'm used to Haku, so I'll get used to Chiaki in time, right?"

"You know, Kira," Yori said, resuming his previous grin, "You're very cute when you're not all covered in blood.

And then he yelped, because Chiaki had smacked him.

"Idiot! And you call me blunt?"

"You didn't have to hit me, Chiaki!"

Eirin rolled her eyes from her spot behind them. "Don't worry," she said, looking amused, "They always do this."

It seemed that they did.

. . .

The days blended into weeks, and then months, and before I knew it, an entire year had passed, and I was now six.

It was surprisingly easy to go into everyone else's routine. All we did was stop, sleep, eat, and sell wares at every village we passed by.

I always stayed with Haku, and even went with him to the villages whenever Yori and Chiaki roped him into going.

My brother was eight years old now, but he didn't seem to grow at all.

Maybe it was because I spent every waking hour with him?

He looked the same to me, anyway.

Sometimes, I could forget what had led us to this caravan, but whenever I looked at my arms, I'd be reminded, and so I'd taken to wearing long sleeves wherever I went, instead of some of the more casual clothes I'd seen a few of the other children wear.

They weren't very many children here, only two others besides me, Chiaki, and Haku.

Chiaki didn't act like a kid, even though he was nine. He acted more like a teenager, and was very mature.

He was still a brat, though.

Our life was better than ever. Nobody knew about Haku's Kekkei Genkai, and the only people that knew about our family situation (the fact that Haku had killed Papa and all of those villagers to keep us safe) was Yori, Chiaki, Eirin, and Asahi.

They were the only ones, and would be the only ones.

I didn't want our life to go down into another downward spiral. I didn't want it to be ruined.

Hopefully, our makeshift peace would last.