Author's Note: While writing this the other day I noticed that I had set Yuzuki's age at an impossibly low age for what I wanted to happen in the story so I have gone back to the prologue and changed her age.

So that you all know, she is now 21. A little younger than what I'm comfortable with with what I want to happen further down but not as ridiculous at 16 so this is much better.

Now please enjoy the next chapter of my updated Memories of the Past!

-Kittie

Chapter 12: Family Feud

"Again." Hiei's stern voice cut through the training area that had been built near my house as he barked orders at me.

Sweat dripping down my back as I swung my sword at the training dummy I stood in front of. It had been several weeks since the incident in the woods and I was well enough to train; which was exactly what I was doing.

"Slave driver." I mumbled darkly under my breath as I backed up to strike the dummy again. The last few days had been this same motion over and over again, me striking the dummy, Hiei making a face of disgust and telling me to hit it again, repeat; it was enough to make one go a little insane.

"Again." Hiei barked ignoring what I said as I'm sure he could hear it.

"Enough!" I shouted as I chucked my sword at Hiei instead of the dummy. The sword flew straight at him grazing his cheek as it went by and sunk into the trunk of a nearby tree. "For the last five days from sun up to long past sun down you have been making me hit this dummy, I have had it!"

He wiped the blood that seeped from the tiny cut on his face from where my sword had passed. "Did you intentionally miss or was your aim just that terrible?" His condescending voice questioned as he glared at me.

"I missed." I snapped. "You weren't going to dodge and had I really wanted to hit you I would have aimed for center of mass and not a small target like the head. Not that your head is small by any means, your ego seems to inflate it beyond recognition."

His mouth twitched. I wasn't quite sure if it was in disdain or some type of smile, but it was gone before I could distinguish the two. "Again."

I ground my teeth. "No! I'm not doing this again. I get that this is making me a better swordsman, but that was not the issue I'm concerned with. How is this supposed to help, in anyway, with my accidentally melting shit?!" I waved my hand at the tree that I had melted during the first day of training and the three melted dummies.

"You're angry correct?" He asked in a blasé voice.

"Fuming." I muttered darkly.

"And have you melted anything?"

"What?" I looked around me and noticed that there was no laser like streams of plasma spewing forth from my hand. Everything was perfectly intact. "No…" I answered weakly.

"So even though you're angry and that is usually when you lose control of the abilities you possess you have yet to melt anything or uproot normal gravity from any particular point, is that correct?"

"Yes…"

"And yet you don't see what the sword training is doing for your control…" He stated snidely.

"I hate you." I answered as snarky as I could while I walked past him and yanked the sword from the tree before returning to the practice dummy and swinging at it again.

Hours went by with me doing nothing but swinging a sword at a dummy in different ways over and over and over again. The sun had set and the evening chilled quickly with the wind whistling through the trees. I had brought my sword back up for another swing at the dummy when something felt wrong.

"You feel it too then." Hiei's gruff voice came from closer to me than usual causing me to glance over at him.

"How long have you felt it?"

"Not much longer than you, you're getting better I guess."

"Gee, thanks for the backhanded compliment there."

Hiei shot me a look that, in other times, would have sent a chill down my spine, but the constant churning in my stomach and the alarm bells in the back of my head made it hard to be afraid of him at the moment.

"I can't quite figure out which direction it's coming from…" I mutter as I look into the trees as if willing them to show me what's hidden inside them.

"Stay here."

"I am not a dog." I answered before I took off into the trees. Running through the trees, I followed my instincts to take me to the location that I kept getting the weird feeling from. Edging around a boulder I came face to face with a child.

"What?" I skidded to a halt in front of the now very scared child and stared at her confused. What would a child be doing here of all places?

Hiei jumped from a tree intent on attacking the thing that had put us on edge.

"Wait!" I yelled as I hopped in front of his oncoming sword. "It's just a child!"

He stopped, the point of his sword centimeters from my heart, I could take a deep breath and pierce myself on it. After a moment he withdrew it and took notice of the small child behind me.

"What is a child doing here?"

"That's what I would like to know." I said as I turned around and knelt in front of the kid.

"Hello," I said with a smile and I took in her appearance. She was small, three or four maybe, she had big eyes and dark hair that was tangled with leaves. Her legs and feet were dirty which made me wonder if she was homeless, but the dress she wore was good quality and appeared to be new. "Did you get lost?"

She stared at me, eyes wide in freight, and nodded slowly.

"Do you know where your parents are?"

She shook her head.

I pursed my lips as I looked at her. Did we take her home and keep her there until we found a way of returning her or did we try to find a way back to where she came from now while her parents were nearby?

"Get away from her!" An unknown male voice cried out as the bushes nearby rustled and a man leapt from them.

"Bloody h-" I started as I fell back to try and get out of the way of the attack.

Hiei jumped in front of me and blocked the man with the back of his sword. Hissing issued from where the man's hand met the metal sword and I notice the metal began to warp.
"His hands are poisonous!" I exclaimed the obvious as my brain tried to catch up to the situation.

"Like I didn't notice…" Hiei muttered clearly annoyed as he pushed back against the man.

A giant shuriken ripped through the trees, forcing the two men apart and causing me to do a nose dive for the child to make sure she didn't get hit; it was quickly followed by its owner.

"What is going on here?!" Amira exclaimed as she caught her weapon. "Damien? What are you doing here?"

"Does it matter? You have not been home for some time now. You have responsibilities." The man in question answered.

"Wait a minute, wait a minute… You two know each other?" I asked as I sat back up carefully checking over the child that sat next to me.

"Emiko?" Amira questioned as she noticed the kid. "You brought Emiko here? Are you insane!? This isn't a safe place!"

"Then you shouldn't be here!"

"Um, hello? Hi… I see you two know what's going on but for the people who don't understand anything, mainly me, care to explain what's going on?" I finally said as I tried to catch their attention.

"This has nothing to do with you." The man, Damien, snapped darkly.

"Actually it has everything to do with her." Amira snarled before she turned to face me. "This is my husband Damien, the young girl you tackled, thank you by the way, is my daughter Emiko."

I felt my eyes turn into saucers as I stared at Amira. "Uh… Nice to meet you both…? I'm -"

"I know who you are. You're the reason my wife is never home but instead out here where her life is constantly at risk."

"Whoa there buddy, I'm not sure what you are so mad about, but Amira is here on her own volition and I'm certainly not forcing her to stay here."

He stepped forward, I stepped back and froze.

Probably shouldn't have done that…

He took another step forward and I resisted the need to move away again. Amira stepped in between us and I could feel the glare that wasn't directed at me.

"We are not doing this in front of Emiko…" She said quietly. "You knew from day one what my life was like, where my priorities were, what was important to me. You knew and you accepted it, do not sit here today and argue with me about things I warned you about."

With that she spun around and smiled at the little girl. "Let's go get you cleaned up."

"Okay." Was the response as Amira scooped her up and stalked off back towards my home.

I stood there for a moment and tried very hard to make my walk away from the angry man I've never met before look as calm and collected as I could while I was screaming at myself in my head.

Don't give him your back! He's just going to kill you!

I'm pretty sure that Amira wouldn't like that.

Amira can't stop him from doing it.

Hiei will.

Uh huh…

I pursed my lips at my own thoughts. It was true I wasn't sure if Hiei would really help me as what had happened between us when we had gone to that village seemed almost like a distant dream, but he was stuck helping me because he agreed to it. That meant he couldn't let me die if he could stop it, right?

"You're making a face woman." Came the oh so familiar voice of the man I was just thinking about.

"Your insults don't faze me anymore." I commented as I tried not to scratch at the spot on my back where I could feel Damien's eyes trying to bore into.

Hiei made a noise in the back of his throat as he regarded me with hard eyes. "I'm sure I can think of something."

I threw my hands up. "Oh for the love of- Is that all you can do around me? Insult me? Is this some sort of game for you? "Let's see what new insults I can come up with to use on Yuzuki." You must really enjoy trying to get under my skin."

Hiei opened his mouth to respond but I couldn't hear him as at that exact moment the sound of glass breaking and a high pitched keening filled my head. I grabbed my head and put my hand against the nearest tree and all sense of equilibrium flew right out the window when the sound started. Following the keening came the sound of laughter, the same laughter I heard anytime the voice of that monster filled my head.

"Yuzuki." Hiei's voice was harsh as he grabbed ahold of my arm roughly; the sound stopped instantly.

"Ah…" My head cleared, and my balance returned all because he touched me. "How close are we to the barrier?"

"We had been right next to it."

I nodded, that might have explained what had happened, but I didn't want to voice my concerns out loud.

Don't let go… I'm afraid...

His hand on my arm had made it stop, whatever it was, and I didn't want him to let go, but how could I tell him that? I couldn't voice the words in my head even though I desperately wanted to; instead I just smiled at him and said: "I'm fine now."

I pulled my arm free of his grasp gently and braced myself against the returning noise; it didn't come. Or, at least it wasn't as bad, just something in the back of my mind that, if I tried hard enough, I could ignore it. What I couldn't ignore was the nagging feeling I got that something was very wrong.