Author's note: Sorry it's late. I kind of lost track of what day it was.
Chapter 14: Departure
The small group left the cave base at dawn.
It would take them several days to reach the border, without even accounting for the time it would take to get to the place where the scales were being auctioned off, so they packed light and moved fast. The weather was nice, though, so the trip was quite pleasant.
At one point, Hina found herself walking next to the man with the topknot—Soukan—so she asked him about dragon scales.
"It's not a metaphor," he said in response to her first question. "They really are the scales of dragons. They are rare, true, but dragons still exist in the wild places of the Makai, if you care to look for them."
Hina considered.
"And other creatures considered mythical?"
"Most are real. I saw a kirin, once." The man paused, lost in the memory.
"What was it like?" asked Hina.
"It was many times my size, though so gentle that it didn't bend a single blade of grass. It had the scaled back and tail of a dragon, but the feet of a deer, a single winding horn in the center of its forehead, with a mane of fire."
Soukan smiled slightly at the memory. "It looked straight at me. I was mesmerized, and followed it for quite a ways. I was so focused on it that I missed my footing and took a bad fall."
"I rather thought the kirin was supposed to bring good fortune."
Soukan bowed his head.
"It did."
He considered his words for a moment, and then said, "At that point, my situation could not have gotten worse…and after I saw it, I gained the chance to make it better."
Hina nodded slightly, and, remembering Aijou's words, did not press for details.
She spent the rest of the day walking in a companionable silence with the others, until it was time to make camp.
Camp on this small mission was nowhere near as elaborate as the one they'd had set up outside Mashou City. Indeed, since it was right in the middle of the dry season, they didn't even have tents, just a small fire to sleep around.
They all helped gather the firewood, and Kirin started the fire with a touch of his hand.
"All right," said Kirin as they gathered around the fire to eat the stew that Zougeiro—the man with the blank white eyes—had prepared for them. "Hina, you'll take the first watch—just stay awake for the first two hours and wake us if anything goes wrong. I'll take second watch, Shizuku, third; Anei, fourth." Though Hina hadn't caught that last name before, the only one left whose name she didn't know was the shadowy man with the pitch black skin and the stark white markings.
Night watch was boring.
There really wasn't any getting around that.
Hina was already tired, and sitting staring at the hypnotic forms in the fire while trying to stay aware of her surroundings wasn't helping. So she turned away from the fire, instead spending the time recreating the ice-plants of her homeland in miniature. She built their familiar forms, sweeping out the sharp curves that felt so much more natural than the hard lines of knives and swords, dividing each leafblade into smaller leaflets, and then dividing them again until they disappeared into edges that were deceptively feathery.
The task helped the time pass easily enough that she didn't even realize her two hours had passed until she heard Kirin stir and rise behind her.
When he came up to relieve her, he saw the sculpture of the chimi plant she'd just finished, so much more elaborate than the one she'd shown Juhi.
"It's the fruit you tried," she said, feeling the need to say something. It was a strange thing, really, that had been growing on her as she grew more accustomed to outsider patterns of speech. Most of them seemed uncomfortable with long periods of silence.
Kirin studied it. "I didn't realize you could form something so elaborate."
"Only if I have the time."
"Still, it's quite impressive."
"Thank you," said Hina, rising to let him take her place.
He took her place, but as she turned to head back towards her place by the fire, she paused.
"Have you ever seen a kirin?"
Kirin raised his head, looking surprised.
"I'm…not sure. I might have caught a glimpse of one once. Soukan claims that's what it was."
It was Hina's turn to be surprised. "You were his...opportunity?" she asked. "You brought him into the group after he saw it?"
Kirin looked down. "There…wasn't a group before him. Just me and my sister."
Hina's lips parted, though she wasn't quite sure what she wanted to ask, but he spoke again.
"Perhaps I'll tell you about it someday," he said with a slight smile.
It was clearly a dismissal, as well as a warning that she was edging in on personal territory.
"Sorry."
"Quite all right."
Hina lay down, further away from the fire than the others, not bothering to wrap up in a blanket, and tried not to be curious about a story that really wasn't any of her business.
The next morning found Hina a little more drained than usual, with less than six hours sleep under her belt. She was starting to think that maybe it hadn't been a very good idea to waste her energy on sculpture. Perhaps she ought to take up a hobby that that didn't involve youki.
In any case, she was not called upon to fight either that day or the next, and she wasn't on the watch the next night, so she had a chance to catch up on her sleep.
The trip was mostly quiet, broken by occasional conversation or laughter. On the morning of the fourth day, the monotony was broken by a small city that they passed through, and barely had time to get reestablished before they finally started to approach the borders of Tourin that afternoon. She had learned by then that Tourin was the country ruled by the rather idiosyncratic figure of Raizen the Mazoku, though most of the orders nowadays come from his second, Hokushin.
Hina wondered as she walked if the concept of being part of a group of smugglers bothered her.
After all, they were breaking the law, or about to, and she had always been the sort to stay well within the bounds of legality.
Well, with one exception, though leaving Koorime had never technically been outlawed.
She finally decided, though, that it didn't bother her. After all, she had a rather long view of outside politics, dating back many thousands of years. She could only see the struggles out here as part of history, which was somehow different from whatever conception of "real life" she had. From that perspective, what one particular ruler wanted at one particular time didn't really matter that much, as long as she could get away with it.
She didn't think that particular thought would come back to haunt her.
They had just crossed into Tourin when they came across a group of border guards. Kirin greeted them, unworried. After all, they weren't doing anything illegal yet. The border guards, after giving them a once-over, let them go untouched.
They got their bearings, and turned toward the city the farseer had indicated. The wind had picked up, and they were walking straight into it, which kept getting into their eyes.
"Have you ever seen a phoenix?" Hina asked Soukan, still curious about the creatures she'd thought were purely mythical.
"There was…" he started, but trailed off when Shizuku stopped, sniffing the air suspiciously.
"What is it?" asked Kirin.
"They're…getting closer again," she said, puzzled.
"What?" said Kirin, wheeling around.
"Your fox must be more useful under better circumstances, like a complete lack of wind, and maybe nothing stronger-smelling than a couple of oak trees."
The leader of the border guards stepped up from behind them, wearing the grey uniform and shaved head that marked him as a servant of Raizen.
Shizuku growled, though Hina wasn't sure if it was the insult to her sense of smell, the possessive pronoun, or just the threatening air the man gave off.
The guard didn't wait for a more articulate response, turning instead directly to Kirin.
"You know, I didn't recognize you at first, Kirin of Tenkashi." Kirin's lips twisted, revealing his teeth. "It's been a while—your picture is a bit out of date. But you're definitely the same person."
He straightened up, feeling important. "There is a warrant out for your arrest, and that of anyone travelling with you. So would you like to come quietly, or shall we do this the hard way?"
Kirin's eyes flicked to Shizuku. She inhaled and grimaced, twitching her shoulder in a tiny shrug.
Realizing what he wanted, Hina let her senses wash over the area, picking out the energy signatures of the enemy guards, spending an ounce of concentration wondering at the apparent fact that no one else could do so.
"Twelve."
Kirin's eyes widened fractionally, but he nodded.
"I'm afraid we're going to have to take the second option."