Nanao made a face at herself in the mirror as she stared at the maid's handwork. She had to admit they knew what they were doing as she hadn't seen herself look this feminine in, well, ever. It was unfortunate that it was only to fill her sadistic adoptive father's sense of style. The dress clung in all the right places, and with her glasses gone, her hair styled in an intricate updo, and makeup applied she looked like another person. She was sure a lot of girls would be thrilled with the royal treatment, but the glinting gemstones at her throat served to break the illusion and remind her she was nothing more than a prettily dressed prisoner.
A knock came from the door and Nanao called for them to enter. A giggling Mori came through, smiling back at one of the door guards who sent the maid a wink as the door shut.
"Tanaka-dono is ready for dinner now, Ise-sama," the girl said blushing slightly.
"Thank you, Mori-san," Nanao replied, smiling at the girl kindly. She could tell easily enough when she saw a girl in love. She wondered absently how long Mori and the guard had been seeing each other. "I suppose I'm as ready as I'll ever be. Lead the way."
Mori led her through the winding hallways and down several flights of stairs, the two guards from her door following closely behind. Nanao recalled some parts of the house, but made no attempt to remember where they were going. She had no doubt she'd have someone with her at all times. They stopped before two big double doors, and Nanao took a deep breath as Mori announced their presence. Moving into the room, Mori and her winking guard excused themselves to dinner while her other door guard took up a place standing attentively by the wall.
"Nao-chan," Tanaka said looking up from some paperwork he had with him at the table. "Don't be shy, have a seat."
Nanao moved stiffly to the opposing seat at the end of the long table and sat down when one of the servants pulled out the chair for her. She nodded at the servant curtly, but made no movement to do anything else even when the first course was set before her.
"Not hungry?" Tanaka asked lifting an eyebrow.
"I sat down and suddenly started feeling rather ill," she said with a shrug. "Must have something to do with the company."
"Mature," he said with a lazy drawl.
Nanao stole her Taicho's best tactic and simply smiled at him blandly. "I'm sure I'd be able to eat if I were allowed to return to my room."
"You eat here tonight or you do without," Tanaka said simply, starting to eat. "Not that it really matters without your reiatsu. Don't be such a child. Sit there and sulk if you like, either way you will accompany me through my dinner."
She stuck her tongue out at him and was rewarded by his irritated look. Perhaps she shouldn't have been so hard on her Taicho over the years. Being immature and driving everyone around you nuts had its upsides. Anything to disrupt this disgustingly false picture that Tanaka was trying to produce. She finally sighed and reached for a fork still confident starving herself would do her no good, and not wanting to spend the evening simply staring at Tanaka.
They were into the second course, without another word being exchanged, by the time another knock came from the dining rooms door. Tanaka nodded his head to one of the servants who let in a rather greasy looking fat man. Nanao recognized him instantly as one of Tanaka's business partners who had been around often when she was a child. She and her brother had never liked him, and to be honest she had always been a bit afraid of him. There had been something in the way his eyes would sweep over her greedily that always made her feel a little queasy. He'd reached out to touch her hair once when she was a child, commenting on how pretty it was, and Mamoru had smacked his hand away from her before he could make contact. The man had laughed it off and continued on his way, but Mamoru had said he didn't like him and made her promise to stay away from him whenever he came around. It had not been a particularly difficult promise to keep.
"Tanaka-dono," the man said bowing disgracefully low before him. The man stood up and glanced at her, but obviously didn't recognize her as the child who used to roam this house. His gaze didn't stay on her for more than a second and Nanao breathed her own quiet breath of relief. All these years later and he still gave her the creeps. Honestly just being back in this house was like walking into her own personal nightmare. "I'm so sorry for interrupting your dinner. They showed me in so I assumed it was fine."
"More than fine," her adoptive father said pleasantly. "Nao-chan, this is my business associate Goto-san. Goto-san I'm sure you remember my lovely daughter."
The greasy man's eyes widened as he turned to look at her again and then he chuckled. "I didn't recognize the little girl all grown up," he admitted. "She did grow up to be a fine filly, didn't she? Well, then again I suppose that's all to one's tastes. I think I quite preferred her as a child. Older women hold very little appeal to me. All the same behind their masks of makeup, and so demanding."
"Mmm," Tanaka allowed not indicating whether he agreed or disagreed. "I assume you brought me some new merchandise."
"Yes, yes, of course," Goto said, his eyes lighting up greedily, and shifting away from Nanao. "This lot will fetch a pretty penny if I may say so myself."
"That remains to be seen," Tanaka said a bit coldly, and Nanao watched Goto seem to physically shrink into himself at the words. "The last batch you brought me was rather sub par. A few of the items expired before I even had a chance to make returns on them. The few I could sell had to be priced extremely below cost to even get them off my hands. As a whole I took a rather large loss on that batch. I presume this group is up to standards, or I shall be severely displeased."
"Ah, yes, of course, Tanaka-dono," Goto said bowing several times. "I sincerely apologize for the mistakes and have hand picked the ones for this group. The person that made the last acquisitions has been properly dealt with I assure you."
"I applaud your thoroughness," Tanaka said with a condescending air. Nanao got the feeling she very much so didn't want to know what they were talking about. "Hurry now, you're interrupting my first dinner with my daughter in a very long time." At this he shot her a smile down the table and she glared back at him.
Goto hurried out of the room and quickly returned with two men holding ropes and urging dirty, tired looking children into the room. All of their wrists were bound to one another and they shuffled into the room in a rather miserable looking line. Nanao's eyes widened in horror as she realized what was going on, and glanced around the room to see the servants and bodyguards pretending not to notice. So these were some of the ones well aware of her father's dealings. She looked back to the children and gripped the sides of her chair to keep from acting rashly. If only she had her reiatsu she would burn this whole house down around Tanaka's head.
Tanaka smiled benignly and rose from his chair inspecting the children one by one, using a napkin as a cover whenever he felt the need to touch one of them. The children stood stoically looking rather beaten down. The only child that could muster any sort of defense stood angrily at the end of the line, the left side of his face swollen where he had presumably been hit.
"Careful of that last one Tanaka-dono, has a bit of reiatsu he does," Goto said calmly reaching up to lazily pick at his teeth. Nanao clenched her own jaw and tried not to react. She was sure most of this show was being put on for her behalf. What better way to make her lose all hope than to show her how hopeless the situation really was? She couldn't even help some defenseless children.
"Well, come on then, boy," Tanaka said grinning a shark's grin at the defiant child at the end. "Show me what you've got."
The boy gave a scream of rage and threw a red reiatsu burst at Tanaka. Even Nanao, who could no longer sense reiatsu levels, could tell it was weak at best. The burst hit Tanaka's chest and barely even singed the cloth. Her adoptive father let out a rumbling chuckle and patted the boy on the head, making the child jerk away with anger and drag the children tied closest to him in line with him.
"Not even worth collaring," Tanaka declared moving back to the table before using his own kido to burn the napkin he'd been using to ash. "What do you think Nao-chan? Has Goto-san given us an inferior batch?"
"You're a sick bastard," she said not bothering to hide her rage anymore. "They're only children."
"Children that would have more than likely died on the streets of Rukongai with no impact on the world at all," Tanaka said calmly moving behind her to place his hands on her shoulders. She stiffened and contemplated stabbing him with her fork. Lowing his head down to her level he said, "I see no problem with making a profit from items that would have otherwise gone to waste."
"They're children, not items," she growled.
He laughed lightly by her ear and said, "It's all in how you look at it little princess. You're brother would have come to understand that eventually had you not been in the way, and besides, look at how right I was. Look at you now, compared to how I found you just a few short weeks ago. The Gotei 13 most certainly did allow your finer aspects go to waste."
"I'm a fukutaicho," she countered. "I'd hardly call that a waste."
"You were the secretary to a incompetent man whore," Tanaka replied calmly. "More like a librarian than a soldier. I did my research when I discovered you, and I've known you since you were small. Where did that emotionally volatile child go? You were always at your most beautiful when you were in an indignant rage. Always so sure your brother would be there to back you. Just waiting for someone to put you in your place." He brushed his lips lightly over the top of her ear and Nanao jerked away hastily.
Tanaka laughed and moved to the other side of the table. "This batch is fine," he said waving a smirking Goto away. The greasy man winked at her and gave the signal for his two men to herd the children out of the room. "Storage B should be open," Tanaka said nodding to one of the servants who moved to show the men out.
Nanao glared at him and watched the children leave from the corner of her eye. The defiant child had drawn into himself, and Nanao knew as well as her father did, that Tanaka's laughter had wounded the child's pride more than any hit could have.
"I like that face, Nao-chan," Tanaka said simply. "You are going to fetch me a rather spectacular price from the men who like that sort of thing." Then he went back to eating his dinner and glancing at paperwork. "You may be excused whenever you like."
Nanao shoved her seat back from the table and stormed out of the room noting offhandedly as her guard peeled away from the wall and followed her. She stormed out into the hallway not caring that Tanaka could see how much he'd gotten to her. She really wanted to strangle him in his sleep. It had been a long time since she'd been this angry and she was almost grateful for the reiatsu blocking collar in that she was pretty sure if it wasn't there her reiatsu would be raging wildly and she had no inclination to keep it in check.
Storming up the stairs, Nanao whirled around on the guard who stopped one step below her. "Get away from me," she demanded. The last thing she wanted was someone near her at the moment. She hated the whole situation, but currently the thing she hated the most was herself for being unable to do anything at all to help those children or defend herself.
"I'm to stay at your side at all times Ise-sama," the man said unemotionally. "I'll escort you back to the room." He reached for her arm and she jerked back away from him.
"Don't touch me," she growled and then acted on impulse, moving forward and shoving the man hard on the chest. On even footing the act would have meant very little as it would have probably not even forced him back one step. In this situation, however, the shove threw the man off balance on the step, and sent him toppling backwards head over heels down the stairs. The guard lay unmoving at the base of the stairs, and Nanao couldn't even bring herself to care whether he was alive of not.
Not hesitating, she moved down the hall more calmly and looked for a wandering servant. A maid was cleaning some tables at the end of the corridor and Nanao moved up to her taking a chance. "Excuse me, do you know where storage B is?"
"Ise-sama?" the girl questioned obviously not knowing who she was, but taking an educated guess. Nanao nodded and held her breath slightly, hoping the maid was not one that knew about her father's profession. "Is storage B where the broken furniture is stored?"
"Yes, that's the one," Nanao said trying to appear like she knew what she was talking about. "I believe there is an old rocking chair in there I was fond of as a child. I wanted to have a look and see if it could be refurbished."
The maid willingly gave her directions after her little lie, and Nanao crossed her fingers that the maid was mistaken about there being just broken furniture in storage B. Moving through the house quickly, Nanao tried her best to act like she should be there whenever she passed servants or guards. For the most part she tried to avoid them all together as she could never tell when one would know that she wasn't allowed to go anywhere without a keeper.
Rounding the last corner the maid had told her about, Nanao moved out through a dingy looking door into the night air. She glanced out over the land Tanaka owned and maintained, where she had been allowed to play as a child, and then walked the other direction to the rows of storage sheds that she had always been kept far away from. Moving down the quiet rows she wondered how long it would be until someone raised the warning that she was missing. She counted down five sheds like the maid had told her to, and hoped that the rest of the storage really did contain old items from the mansion.
She found storage B without a guard and an old padlock on the door. It probably didn't take much to keep a group of frightened children locked away, and Tanaka more than likely didn't see the point in wasting funds posting a guard outside. Nanao fingered the lock and once again mourned the loss of her kido. Looking around she bent down in the dirt taking an odd sort of satisfaction in feeling the grime work its way into her pretty dress at the knees. Digging down she dislodged a large rock and pulled herself back to her feet.
Nanao slammed the rock down hard on the padlock to no effect. She winced at the noise it made but hoped no one was near enough to hear it. Slamming the rock down a few more times she realized she was making more progress on the metal latches the lock was attached to than the lock itself. Altering her direction she pounded on the latches until they started to pull lose of the wood. Nanao glanced back at the house once again, noticing a commotion starting up and assuming they'd discovered the fact that she was missing. With one last hit the metal gave a groan and fell down off the door, latch and all.
Nanao pushed the door open to find a bunch of frightened faces and the one defiant boy standing in front of them, a weak kido building between his hands. She gave the kid points for courage, but that level of power wasn't going to do much beyond make amusing parlor tricks. Stepping into the shed she carefully shut the door behind her. With any luck the house would be so busy looking for her that it'd be easy to help the kids escape.
A/N: *hangs head in shame* Sorry this took so long, it's been a rough week, and my roommate's boyfriend snores like a gorilla, so it's been a rough week with little sleep. Also I've had slight writer's block on the part I'm on :( Hopefully you are all still reading, though!
Thanks so much for all the reviews of the last chapter! I'm glad you guys liked it, and it was wonderful hearing everyone's take on the situation. I've always wondered how Shunsui made the transition from seeing Nanao as a cute little girl and seeing her as a woman and no one really talks about it so I thought I'd explore it a bit :)
Ok hopefully I'll have another chapter up soon, but I'm taking my computer for repairs tomorrow and I'm desperately hoping they can do it all in one day!