Interlude IV

Festivals have always been an integral part of Meiji's culture. The chief festival of any given year is Feast Day, the celebration of the day Meiji finally succeeded in parting from the control of the empire to the east. It should come as no surprise; the tenacity with which the people of this nation hold to their freedom and independence almost makes it a foregone conclusion.

Generally, Feast Day is seen to be the day in which the king must thank his citizens for their part in keeping the country free. On this day, most kings have chosen to spent the daylight hours in their receiving halls, listening to the worries of anyone who wishes to enter. At night, a grand feast is served in the square of the capitol, and inns are paid by the crown to serve any who need a meal. This tradition often extends to other nobles, who hold similar gatherings for their own people. In every town, it is the responsibility of the highest crown agent to do the same.

In the capitol, Feast Day is ended with a display of firecrackers, made exhaustively all year by the finest pyrotechnic artisans in the country. It is truly a day of celebration, one looked forward to no less by parents than their children.

This was getting ridiculous. Kaoru sighed, groaning inwardly. It had been several days since they had taken Enishi to Saito and had him locked up somewhere Shishio's goons couldn't free him. He'd have a trial as soon as Katsura was back on the throne where he belonged. No, her problem had nothing to do with Enishi, not really. It had everything to do with Kenshin, and the fact that he had spoken scarcely two words to her since.

It hadn't been the cold shoulder, precisely; she hadn't exactly approached him and struck up a conversation, either, but… sometimes, she could tell he was watching her, and when she looked up, sure as anything, the golden eyes would bore into hers for a moment, and she would read something in them that she didn't quite know how to place. Invariably, she would smile shakily, and he would seem to realize himself and look away. She hated it, every part of it, especially the thrill that look sent through her stomach. It was as if there were a swarm of moths in there, and they all went into a tizzy at nothing but a look. It was rather unnerving, and only served to confuse her further.

She wasn't completely without self-awareness, though- she knew why she felt this way, she just didn't know how. Or when, for that matter. It was not difficult to admit that Kenshin was… an attractive man, or that she was drawn to him on some level. He challenged her, forced her to stand up for her views, and though that infuriated her sometimes, she could appreciate it. It meant he was treating her as an equal, and he was willing to hear her out. She truly enjoyed his company, sullen and quiet as he could be sometimes, and she was wholeheartedly behind what he was trying to do.

Perhaps, with time, she would have been able to admit to herself that she was falling for him. She'd been among his group for about a year now, all told, and in that time had come to appreciate who he was and how he got there. But then… he had… no, we did. I was just as much a participant as he was, and I can't blame him for this.

Now, she was simply confused. In all the time she had been slowly figuring out how she had felt about him, she had never once entertained the notion that he thought of her as anything more than an ally, maybe someone who might be a friend someday. Yet… his kiss had been impassioned, demanding, his hands… she shuddered involuntarily and blushed, even though there wasn't really anyone else around to see. Megumi had caught her daydreaming about it once, and immediately known something was afoot. Kaoru had only barely managed to avoid telling her everything like some overexcited girl with her first crush.

Really, she'd kept quiet for his sake. He seemed to regret it now, if his recent behavior was anything to go by. The problem was, despite the obvious issues with them ever repeating the episode (his station, the mission, the fact that either of them might die at any moment), she did not regret it in the slightest. If her body's reactions to the simple memory were anything to go by, she'd be blissfully happy to repeat it until the day she really did die. Oh no… don't tell me I'm already- she shook her head sharply, banishing the thought before it could form completely. There was one mess she wanted to stay well away from.

Best to just ignore it for now, and hope that everything went back to normal soon. It wasn't exactly what she wanted, but… it would surely be better than this.

Kenshin cursed under his breath. She'd looked up, and it had only been then that he realized he'd been staring in the first place. Again. His eyes seemed to drift towards Kaoru at every possible opportunity and his own inability to recognize when this was happening irritated him to no end.

What had happened… he knew he should feel guilty about it. He'd taken blatant advantage of the trust she had in him, and doubtless had caused her no small amount of confusion. He could read it in her too-familiar face when she smiled now, that note of uncertainty that had never been there before. She had been perfect, and he'd ruined it.

Yet… he'd felt nothing but gratified when she'd responded to his attentions, and the fact that he wanted that sensation again- her warm, pliant lips moving with his- that was the sole and crushing reason for his guilt. If his influence ruined her, he wanted her to be ruined, and the pure selfishness of such a thought shamed him.

So he'd avoided her altogether, as much as one could in such close quarters. At meals, he made sure there was always one person between them, and he spent much of the time between these alone or with Hiko, practicing. He had finally mastered the succession technique, or at least as much as he could without being willing to use it on his master. It was designed to kill one man as it was passed to the next, but he absolutely refused to do that. Maybe once, he would have been able to understand and accept the practical necessity of it, but not so any longer. Shishio would have to be the test case.

But now they were here, in the middle of camp, and he had no excuse to leave. They had inevitably made eye contact again, and she was beginning to look… irritated? Maybe that was it. He supposed he could understand that; he was not unaware that his behavior had been rather boorish, but he saw no other way to handle it. Damn it all; he had to get away from that stare, and now.

He was leaving- yet again. Kaoru was most displeased with this, and her breath left her in a huff. Things would just go back to normal… right. As if that was going to happen. She'd quite nearly forgotten how insufferable he could be when he set his mind to it.

"You gonna let that slide?" Sano's voice sounded from somewhere behind her, and she rounded on him, intent on telling him to mind his own business, because she really needed to get this out of her system, but the look on his face was completely serious, and she was so unused to seeing it that she stopped before saying anything and actually thought about it.

"…No. No, I'm not," she replied, almost as though coming to the realization herself, and she nodded firmly, not noticing the grin that had split her friend's face as she departed after Kenshin.

"You look like the cat that ate the canary," Megumi commented to Sano, raising a brow. She suspected it had something to do with the determined flash that had just lit Kaoru's eyes, but she had not heard the exchange of words, so she could not be sure.

"Do I?" He replied with a smirk, advancing the distance between them and planting a bold kiss on her lips. "Well, maybe I just set the raccoon loose."

Megumi took a second to recover her breath before speaking again. "Sano, that made no sense."

"Didn't it? Oh well." The man shrugged as if he didn't really care, and just gave her that half-wild, lopsided grin again, the one that sent shivers from her head to her toes.

Oh well, indeed.

Kaoru crashed through the underbrush, not even bothering to be stealthy. He'd know she was coming, anyway, because she was tracking him with her ki sense. He wasn't moving, though, and she considered that a good thing. Even if you had run, I would have followed you.

She wasn't sure exactly how she felt about that revelation, but right now, she didn't really care. She felt so much that it was making her sick to her stomach, and she needed to get some answers before she burst.

She found him in a clearing, facing away from her, seated, apparently staring off into space. Her stomps faded to the whispers of sound she usually made, and she ghosted to his side, fixing him with a measured look before dropping gracefully to the ground beside him.

It was a long moment before she spoke, and she held out hope that he would in that time instigate the conversation, or at the very least look at her. He did neither, and she made a small tsk-ing noise in the back of her throat before breaking into the silence with more completeness. "We need to discuss this."

"Discuss what?" She rolled her eyes.

"You know exactly what I'm talking about, Kenshin. We need to discuss why we aren't talking to each other, why you can't so much look at me without leaving camp, why I-"

He interrupted her with a sigh. "Fine. I'm sorry; I shouldn't have. Is this sufficient?" His tone was abrupt, and he still refused to look at her. Kaoru couldn't decide if she was more angry or hurt by this; whatever it was, it manifested in a clipped, sharp tone.

"No it isn't!" she practically shouted, and she felt a bit gratified when he flicked his eyes in her direction at last. "I don't want you to apologize, I want… I want…" Kaoru hesitated, groaning inwardly. What did she really want? She had thought a reversion to what had been before would be enough, but now she was sure that it couldn't be. She didn't want to be kind-of friends with Kenshin anymore.

"Be careful how you finish that statement," he warned her in a low voice, and she was startled to discover that his eyes had gone a shade darker, the expression in them unreadable but sending some unnamed thrill though her nerve endings.

"I want you to kiss me again." The words were out of her mouth before she realized it, and her eyes betrayed her shock at the admission, spoken aloud before she'd even truly admitted it to herself in the right amount of words.

She didn't really have time to think about it though, because a low growl issued from the back of Kenshin's throat, and it wasn't half a second more before she was on her back in the grass, looking directly into those darkened irises. Kenshin was supporting himself with a hand on either side of her, and Kaoru sucked in a shaky breath, willing herself to have the courage to follow through on her proclamation.

He descended, lips brushing hers in the lightest of chaste kisses once, twice. She sighed softly, nipping his lower lip and looping her arms about his neck. She felt him smile against her mouth, before diverting his attentions to her jawline, tracing a path to her earlobe and down her neck, twisting one long-fingered hand into the hair at the nape of her neck, the contact causing her to shiver.

A second passed, but nothing else happened, and Kaoru opened her eyes to find that Kenshin had ceased, and was regarding her with a troubled look on his face. "Kenshin?" she questioned quietly, not really sure what was wrong.

A pained expression replaced the other one, and he moved to the side, lying on his own back beside her. "I can't do this, Kaoru. Not now."

Her eyebrows knit together, and she turned her head to the side to look at him. "Do what? Why not?"

"This," he made a vague gesture with his hand, and he seemed so completely out of his element that she swallowed back her offended remark and decided to let him finish. "Not now. Not when there are still things to be done."

"More important things." She knew it probably sounded selfish, but she could hardly help the thought all the same, and her tone was not bitter, only dejected. He had an empire to retake, a war to wage and battles to lead and hopefully win. She couldn't really blame him for that, but…

"No," Kenshin's denial was swift. "Just… more pressing. More dangerous."

"I'm not made of glass, Kenshin. I can and will be dealing with those dangerous things, too, but I'm still…" in love with you.

He shook his head. "I can't risk it. If I allowed this to continue, and then something happened, I- it's foolish to involve yourself with me."

Kaoru nearly panicked. He was beginning to close himself off again, become the hard-hearted person he thought of himself as, and she didn't like the frosty edge his last words had taken. Oh no… you're not getting out of this that easily.

Propping herself up on her elbows, Kaoru leveled a glare at him. "And what if something happens anyway, Kenshin? What if we never took this chance, and then we never get to? Would you be okay with that? I wouldn't." Her eyes flashed dangerously, and she shook her head, making to get up. "If I had known you were still such a coward, I would never have-"

She was cut off by a viselike grip on her arm, pulling her back to the ground, and a secret smile played on her lips for just an instant before she gave in to the pressure.

Sano had to resist the urge to snicker when Kaoru and Kenshin returned to camp an hour or so after they had left. Her lips were swollen, and he was sporting a red mark that was clearly a bite mark on one shoulder, which he abruptly covered by adjusting the arm of his shirt. The fist-fighter and Megumi shared a grin, and she simply rolled her eyes.

He was not one to let the matter go so easily, of course, but figured he'd give it a while to settle in with both of them before he began his ribbing in earnest. He had some mercy in him, after all.

"Well," he announced to the camp generally, "I've done most everything I can to mobilize the farmers and villagers. Thanks for letting me borrow the cloak, Kaoru; I think the Watchman legend really helped. They know when we plan to move, I think, and the rumors are moving thick and fast, but they're careful not to tip off the loyalists."

"Good," Kenshin noted, looking distinctly more uncomfortable than usually passed his stoic façade. Oh, this was too good.

An awkward silence (that Sano relished) fell over the group, at least until Aoshi chose to break it. "I take it the plan is still the same, then? Kenshin, Sano, and myself infiltrate Shishio's feast-day masquerade, while Kaoru and the others lead the peasants and what few noble allies we've managed to muster against the main force of his troops to prevent them from coming to his aid?"

"That's one hell of a plan you have there," Hiko contributed dryly. Just how long do you think a bunch of peasants and one or two battalions of soldiers can hold the capital army?"

"Not long," Kaoru replied, "but long enough." She wasn't convinced she was the best choice to lead the army, such as it was, but Aoshi had correctly pointed out that people would fight for the Watchman's justice, much more willingly than for anyone else. The Watchman's cause was their cause, after all, and she and her friends all dressed in black had been thwarting some of Shishio's most concerted oppression efforts for a while.

Hiko grunted, but turned to his apprentice. "I guess that means you'll have to be fast about it, won't you?"

Kenshin did not comment, apparently deeming it unnecessary.

"Two months," Megumi mused aloud. "That's not a lot of time to prepare."

"It will have to be enough," Kenshin replied flatly.

A/N: Hello again everyone! Let me begin by saying thank you for all the amazingly supportive reviews last chapter. I'm glad to hear that treading into unfamiliar writing territory is something I should do more often! I fully admit that I was so happy I decided to update a week early for you all.

Many of you also wished me safe travels to Japan, and I thank you for that as well. Unfortunately, my college has withdrawn financial support, so I won't be going after all. On the plus side, this means I should be able to stick to a better update schedule. :-)

Anyway, I got so many reviews last chapter that I was completely flabbergasted. This one's more of a transitional thing (I hate to say filler), and I will be getting the plot back into high gear by next time. Thanks a bunch, you guys, reading reviews really does lift my spirits.