Identity, by Muphrid. A tribe of Chinese sorcerers captures Ranma to purge emotions from the hearts of men. A continuation story, set after the end of the manga.

What's going on here? Shampoo, Ukyō, and Akane left Jusenkyō in defeat, knowing only that the Sorcerers sought Saffron but little else. Now, as they try to convince the Phoenix to accept their aid, it will take no small dose of magic to get the truth out and earn a bit of reconciliation between two people—and two tribes—that have wronged each other so.


The Message

Chapter Five, Act Two

"And so, this entirely inexperienced, green lieutenant from the PLA, fresh off his first appointment to the military, rides into the village with the next batch of trainees to 'learn the secrets of the mystical River people,' and what does he do just five minutes after arriving?" Elder Surma tapped her chopsticks on the edge of her bowl. "He propositions my daughter!"

Sipping soup from a spoon, Cologne cracked an amused grin. "As I recall, he propositioned my granddaughter first!"

Around low dinner table in Shampoo's childhood home, the Nerima party helped themselves to rice noodles and chicken broth. The journey back to the Amazon village had been tiresome indeed, and it was long past time that they had a decent meal.

"Yes, well, that one was quite a character," said Surma, pouring herself another cup of tea. "No one was safe from his advances. I dare say I wondered if he meant to proposition me as well!"

"You'd have liked that," said Cologne. "Young blood always suited you."

"Teacher, please. It was 1952. I wasn't nearly so wrinkled then."

"Not on your face, perhaps."

Surma wisely ignored this remark. "At any rate, we had the PLA lieutenant bouncing about the village in no time, for as soon as one girl catapulted him to the sky with a Heaven Blast, he just came back down looking for more. I can't help but wonder if he enjoyed that punishment."

"There are people like that, you know," said Cologne.

"You would know."

The two elders erupted in laughter. The other guests in attendance, all two or three generations removed from the pair, exchanged awkward glances. Even so, the mood was light in the house that day. Ryōga and Mousse talked over hidden weapons and ki techniques. Shampoo lent Ukyō a sample of freshly-made nail polish, glossing over how the Amazons used egg whites and beeswax to make the cosmetic. For a group of exhausted warriors, this respite was well-deserved, but to one of their number, this casual chatter faded into the background, until there was only her heartbeat left.

Ranma…

Akane glanced to her bowl of soup. Spots of oil swirled on the surface. Ripples of broth lapped at the bowl's edge, and on occasion, a loose droplet would spill over the side.

The bowl was full. She hadn't touched it. Everyone else was so jovial. Not all smiled and laughed the way Cologne and Surma did, but whatever burdens they carried disappeared along with the empty space in their stomachs. Food cured all ills that day—at least, for Shampoo and Ukyō, but not for her.

They'd left Ranma to the Sorcerers.

And so had she.

It was on the way back to the Amazon village that the story finally filtered down to her.

"How could you do that?" she'd cried, looking to Cologne, Shampoo, and Ukyō. "You had him and let him go? You let him sacrifice his own freedom so you could all escape?"

A scoff. At the head of the Amazon caravan back to their village, Cologne marched forward, her unwavering eye fixed on the terrain. "Please, Tendō. Do not accuse me of cowardice. Stronger, braver warriors have condemned me for worse. Son-in-law is capable of his own decisions. That he managed to hold out as long as he did is a testament to his quick wits, but I can think of nothing that would've dissuaded him from the course he chose. To him, fighting the Sorcerer Guard was more important than his own escape. Were it not for his cunning, were it not for our retreat, you would be alone on this path. Ranma surrendered his freedom for us."

She looked back, meeting Akane's gaze.

"He surrendered his freedom for you, too."

That was the truth, and the truth stung her. Ranma was willing to sacrifice. Ranma was willing to be brave. What had Akane done?

She took a deal. The Sorcerers offered her a way out, and she grabbed it by the horns. Ranma would want her to leave? Really? When did she ever know anything about what he wanted?

No, that was wrong. There was no smart reason to stay with those people, to let them pry information from her about the Amazons, about the people in the best position to help Ranma. Ranma could take care of himself. If anyone could withstand being the Sorcerers' prisoner, he could. What comfort could she offer him if she'd stayed in their custody? Would they have let her see him at all?

Not if they were smart. No, there were many reasons—good reasons, at that—for Akane to do what she did. Free from the Sorcerers, she could help Ranma. It was logical, sound thinking.

But it did nothing to quell her emotions or the temptation she felt. At least Ukyō and Shampoo had seen Ranma. At least they could tell he was all right. Truly it would've served no purpose if she'd stayed behind, but to see Ranma safe and alive…

"Akane no like Great-grandmother's cooking?"

She jolted, waking from her reverie. "Pardon?"

Shampoo cleared the full bowl from the table. The others had risen, stretching their legs, and filed through the front door.

"Akane eat nothing," she said. "Food no good?"

Shampoo was close—too close to her. Even unarmed, she was capable of too much to ignore. A martial artist can make weapons from anything: a pair of chopsticks, a porcelain spoon…

Akane scooted away a step, just enough to put some distance between them. "I'm sure it's wonderful," she said. "I just…can't bring myself to eat today. I meant no disrespect."

"None was taken." Shampoo held the bowl over her shoulder like a waitress, walking it to the sink. "But Akane do no good for Ranma if she mope while we rest."

"And why's that? Why should I stuff myself full and act like nothing's happened?"

"When war come to village, Amazons fight when they must. When break in war comes, Amazons celebrate and forget the battles that came before. We eat and dance and make sweet, sweet love to adoring husbands—"

"Don't you think you're getting a little carried away?"

Shampoo shot her a look but let the remark pass. "We partake of life because next day, war come to us again." She rested a bowl on the counter, covering it in a thin square of cloth. "If we no celebrate days without fighting, then each day is same. Each day is death."

A wise sentiment, but Akane could muster no happy feelings on this day. To celebrate, one must have something to cherish, but everything Akane could think of was far away.

No, that was wrong. Everything she could think of she'd willingly left behind. An ocean she'd put between herself and home. Miles of desolate plateau she'd trudged across to leave Ranma where he was.

Happiness was for people who had those comforts, not for her.

#

When the battle is over yet the war must go on, the weary soldiers who live recount their best days of glory, the moments of heroism that give them pride. The generals with men still left to fight plot with one another, drawing up plans and strategies. Ambassadors from foreign parties visit to discuss the effect of war on their states. There is talk and negotiation, struggle and discord, and all of it for nothing. All of it just for man to revel in the sound of his own voice—to take comfort in it but say nothing.

By noon of the third day since Akane had left Jusenkyō, there was much of this pompous, empty talk. On the Elders' Rise, the cliff above the village where the Council met, Shampoo recounted her party's skirmishes with the Sorcerers and told of how her men worked through a sleepless night, dredging up debris to cross the flooded springs. When Shampoo's turn finished, Cologne stepped forward, flames of the bonfire at her back. She spoke of Ranma and his gallant rescue of an Amazon warrior from the depths of Mount Kensei. With awe and regret, she condemned Ranma for his foolishness yet praised his bravery. He faced an army alone, after all. Without his efforts, none would've escaped to tell the tale.

And last of those present at Jusenkyō, Akane came forth, but unlike the others, she recalled nothing so glamorous or bold. She spoke of nights spent with the enemy, of a girl who naïvely tried to escape by her lonesome but awakened instead among tile and porcelain, hours after the battle had been lost. Everyone else, it seemed, had had their share of something important that day—if not victory, then a reasonable, if bittersweet, retreat—but Akane wasn't among them. When Ranma needed her most, she'd lain unconscious amid the rubble of the Guide's home, and though no one would voice their disapproval of her, she sensed it all the same. She sensed it from the shaded faces of the Silent Nine, who, though forbidden to speak, watched her incessantly, staring at her. She sensed it from the trio of Speakers before her, from the friends and comrades who stood at her back. The Sorcerers had sent her, a beaten puppy, back to the bigger dogs with but one purpose left: the message they'd given her, like a note tied to a bright red collar.

Akane passed on that message, and there were more than just the Elders to listen to her, for the Council entertained guests that day. Two envoys of the Phoenix tribe, summoned by short-wave radio, circled the campfire and swooped in to land.

"So it's Keema's lackeys, is it?" said Mousse. "Korma and Masala? Can't say I thought I'd see you two again."

Masala scoffed. "I didn't think the blind duck saw us in the first place."

All pleasantries aside, the representatives of the Phoenix, once briefed on the affair at the spring ground, had little of use to say.

"You say the Sorcerers want Lord Saffron, but why would they?" asked Korma. "We know you people hate the Sorcerers, but what do we have to do with it?"

Thus, Korma denied the Amazons access Mount Phoenix, even as emissaries, even while the Chinese Army confirmed the Sorcerers power.

"Our reconnaissance satellites have verified it," said a general from the People's Liberation Army, handing out photographic evidence of the illusory forest where the pools should be. "This 'distortion' about the spring ground extends four kilometers in every direction."

"So we can count on the People's Republic to lend us aid in this matter?" asked Surma. "I can't imagine how letting the Sorcerers overtake your sovereign territory is in the Party's interests."

"On the contrary, the Chairman has no desire to interfere in tribal affairs," said the general. "You will be allowed to settle your conflict as you please."

Cologne muttered to herself. "That means they'll let us destroy each other and pick up the scattered remnants when we're done."

"There is, however, some arrangement we could consider," said the general.

"Oh?" said Surma. "Do tell."

"If you have a granddaughter who is young and unwed, then perhaps we could—"

Then perhaps Elder Surma would chase off the libidinous general with a swinging, flaming torch.

It was stupidity. Stupidity and stubbornness all around. No one would Akane blame for their fiercely protective self-interest, but that didn't make them any less idiotic. That didn't make them any less wrong. Maybe they wouldn't trust Ranma, but she did. If he said the Sorcerers were after Saffron, doubtless he meant it. If no one else would listen, that wasn't just their loss. Only a leap of faith would rescue Ranma now. Without someone to heed his words, his sacrifice would mean nothing.

And yet it was cruelly fitting. So often Akane had given him no chance to defend himself, no time to explain his actions. She'd disbelieved Ranma that day, the day the cold rain fell, and now, no one would heed him at all.

The Council wanted time—time to reason out the puzzle before them, to deliberate. And so the party from Nerima returned to Shampoo's home. They ate. They sparred before the front steps, and the sun continued its inexorable journey through the sky. Daylight turned to dusk and then night.

They slept.

They dreamed.

In her dreams, Akane saw the world with eyes that weren't her own. She watched her own face—a doppelganger's face—twist with rage on the sidewalk outside Ukyō's shop. She fled through forest and brush from the Sorcerer captain, and when a rockslide buried her, she burst from the rubble and blasted herself free, yet her own foolish compassion earned her naught but a slash on the thigh. By a river foreign to her, Kohl led the way to an imposing, black stone tower. There, she bore witness to a battle of the ancients, where Amazon and Sorcerer crumbled to dust before a single spell, but her journey here was yet unfinished. From a pallid young boy, she learned to fear the emotions that could be stirred in her heart. From an innocent babe, she grew to hate the Sorcerers for what they were. And though she tried to escape, the captain was there. The Lady was there. And they would hold her as long as it took to take their goal:

Saffron. The person meant to be their Sieve. Akane knew because she saw these things, heard the words of the Sorcerers, but not her own. As she trained the Sorcerers in how to beat the Phoenix, the voice that spoke with her mouth was familiar. As she struggled against dehydration among the tunnels of Kensei, she spied her own reflection in puddles of tainted water: a face, boy or girl, that she knew all too well.

Ranma?

"Wake up, Akane."

Blackness, night. Woolen blankets trapped the heat against her body, her only insulation against the cold.

It was Shampoo's house, and Akane lay on a twin bed, with Ukyō snoozing just a few feet away.

Her head pounded. If night could shimmer and swirl, it would make her dizzy. She sat upright, hugging her knees.

"It was all…just a dream?"

"Not quite."

The voice that answered her came from the doorway, from a figure enshrined in a soft, supernatural glow. He stepped forward and crouched beside Akane's bed, bearing a warm smile.

"Hey there, tomboy," he said. "You don't look too bad."

"Ran—"

"Shh!" He put a finger to his lips. "We don't need to wake Ucchan."

Akane lowered her voice to a whisper, but her tone was incredulous. "Don't need to wake her? Ranma, you—you're here! You've escaped, haven't you?"

His smile turned wistful and sad. "Sorry. It's just a touch of Sorcerer magic I picked up. I ain't really here at all."

Not really here?

Then this person who kneeled beside her, whose breath tingled her skin—he was only an image? An illusion?

Akane trembled. "Still!" she said. "Ukyō would want to see you. Everyone should!"

"Dummy," he said, laughing to himself. "It's just you and me here. Truthfully, I don't know I could reach more than one person. I'm still new to this vision thing."

"Vision?"

"It's a long story. Look, I don't know how much time we have, and that's a shame, really. There's a lot I'd want to say."

"Ranma—"

This time, he put a finger over her lips and cracked a grin. "Maybe it doesn't work this way in the real world, but hear me out for a minute, will you?"

Akane nodded, taking hold of his finger and lowering it to her lap. "All right," she said. "I'll listen. I promise."

Ranma eyed their intertwined hands. "Akane…"

"Go on. You should hurry, right?"

"Oh, yeah. It's, well…" He pulled back, but Akane held his hand in place. "That is, um—"

"Holding a girl's hand makes you nervous?"

"Say what?"

Akane snickered.

"Oh, come on, this ain't no time for jokes!"

"Then tell me—whatever it is you came to say, I'm here to listen. I can take it. I'll believe you." She squeezed his hand. "I want to save you, Ranma. I want you back home with me. I've already told everyone. I finally managed to tell myself. I—"

"Akane, don't. Save it."

"But Ranma!"

"Save it for when we see each other face-to-face," he said. "For real. Not this vision where I'm not really here. Save for when I've had a chance…" He fingered a shirt-button in the middle of his chest. "…a chance to earn it."

Akane shook her head. "You've already done so much. Don't think you haven't earned what I want to give you. What I choose to give you."

His eyes widened; he blinked in faint surprise, but soon enough he nodded, a warm smile coming to his lips. "I guess we've got a lot to talk about when all this is over."

"I want to have that conversation, Ranma. When we're home together, I want that very much."

"I think I'd like that, too." His gaze hardened. "But there's a lot that needs to happen right now; a lot we need to do to get there. I've tried to show you all I can. If that ain't good enough for Keema to listen, I don't know what is. I've lied to the Sorcerers, Akane. I've told them things that are wrong about the Phoenix and what they can do. I hope that'll be enough, but if it isn't, there's going to be a fight. Know this when I say it: these Sorcerers have to be stopped. They're twisted. They're wrong. What they're doing is nothing short of evil, and if Shampoo and Ucchan can come meet them at Mount Phoenix and kick their sorry asses, so much the better."

"But Ranma—"

"Sindoor's the real problem, though. If anyone needs to be sent straight to hell for what she's done, it's her. It won't be easy, but—"

"Ranma!"

He stopped. "What is it?"

"What about me?" asked Akane. "You mentioned Shampoo and Ukyō. Why do you talk like you don't expect me to be there?"

"Come on now—"

"Answer me. Please."

He grimaced. "Now don't get me wrong here."

"I'll try not to."

"I'm really, um, glad you came to help find me and all, but you've got to think for a minute, okay? You were almost trapped at Jusenkyō, am I right?"

Akane bowed her head. What was she going to do? Admit that her freedom was only Kohl's prerogative?

"You've done enough," said Ranma. "Ryōga, Mousse, Shampoo, Ucchan—they're capable. They're good people…most of the time. You can trust them to go to Mount Phoenix and do things right. You don't need to be there."

"And if I want to be there?"

He raised his eyebrows. "Why would you want—"

"You're going to be there, aren't you?" she said.

"I'm going to try to make them take me, but I don't know if—"

"Then I want to be there, too."

"Akane, really, think for a minute. This could break down into all-out war. It's dangerous!"

"You think I don't understand that?"

"I think you're being too stubborn to think things through!"

"You can't tell me that! You don't know what I've thought through or not!"

She took a breath, squeezing his hand again.

"You don't know how much it hurts, knowing what I said…"

"I'm sorry, Akane."

"For what?" she cried, head down. "What are you sorry for?"

"I think I have to go."

With a sorrowful expression, Ranma met her gaze.

He was fading out.

"No!" she said. "Don't go!"

"The vision dust's wearing off," he said. "I'm sorry; I have to. This was all I had." He looked down. "I meant what I said, though. If the others go to Mount Phoenix, I want you to stay here."

"Don't say that!"

"I mean it!" he said. "If you go there, you're just going to get hurt."

"I'm prepared for that."

"Well I ain't!"

She recoiled. The force of his words pushed her back. Even Ranma seemed to realize it. He lowered his voice again, speaking barely above a whisper.

"Just…take care of yourself, tomboy." He brushed a lock of her hair back, over her ear. "And do something about this hair of yours when you wake up, all right? It's a mess."

"Why you—" She flinched. " 'Wake up'?"

"Yeah, Akane," he said, fading out. "It's time to wake up."

Light. Chirping. Wood and plaster and woolen blankets.

"What's the matter, Akane-chan?" asked Ukyō, wrapping her bindings around her chest. "Something wrong?"

#

Convincing the Amazons was easy enough. That morning, Akane relayed the substance of her vision to Cologne, who, though dismissive at first, heard her out to the fullest detail.

"A 'sieve,' you say, to 'contain their magic'?" Cologne shook her head, hunched over her walking stick. "I find this most peculiar. In truth, I have a hard time believing Ranma could send you such a specific account."

Akane nodded. It was hard for her to believe herself, but that was the choice: either it was fantasy or reality, and Akane chose reality. Though his touch might've been mere illusion, Ranma's warmth stayed with her, for that was as real as could be.

She tucked a stray lock of hair behind her ear and met Cologne's gaze. "When you thought Shampoo was coming back to Jusenkyō, you told Ranma that your blood was in danger."

Cologne raised an eyebrow. "As I remember it, that isn't all I said."

With that knowing glance, Cologne accepted Akane's tale. Together, the two of them went to the Phoenix emissaries. Korma and Masala were skeptical (and, as it happened, somewhat unfamiliar with the meaning of the word sieve), the two representatives of the Phoenix agreed that the matter would be best handled by Keema herself.

"Are you sure it means a strainer, though?" said Korma. "I could swear, written that way, that means underbrush."

"How could you think it makes sense for the Sorcerers to turn Saffron into 'underbrush'?" said Ryōga.

Masala frowned. "How does it make sense that they'd use him to strain noodles?"

"Yeah," said Korma. "Lord Saffron's power would make it easy to cook noodles, not strain them. It's much more reasonable to think he could use his fire to clear away weeds and shrubs."

After a long and heated debate over the best practical uses of Saffron's powers, the party had prepared to set out. Even the Council wouldn't withhold its assent in this matter, opting to dispatch them at once while preparing a main force to follow. Indeed, the matter had passed without resistance. It seemed the only true dismay among the party was with Akane herself.

You are worried for me, aren't you, Ranma?

Crinkle. A clod of dirt disintegrated under her heel. For three days the group had hiked south and west. At last, a tall, narrow crag poked over the horizon, the only landmark in a wasteland of open desert plain.

A voice in Akane's mind answered her. "Of course I'm worried," said a vision of a pigtailed girl, who walked in Akane's imagination, treading behind her. "Whether I say it or not, I'm worried. I'd be a fool not to be. So are you if you don't give it a thought."

Akane tightened the straps on her pack. I know this is dangerous. If the Sorcerers come, there'll be fighting.

"Can you blame me for not wanting you in the middle of that?"

Can you blame me for going forward, knowing the risk?

"You're as stubborn as ever."

She smiled. Yeah. I guess so. All I know is I'd rather find you here, angry with me for being so stubborn, than have to sit and worry on my own.

"That's not a good reason."

Then let's meet face-to-face this time, Ranma, so I can tell you what I came here to say.

As the mountain in the distance loomed higher on the horizon, the shadows of Phoenix patrols swept over the party, long and distorted by the setting sun. The shapes they outlined were sinister, and so were the attitudes of the Phoenix guards who greeted the party at the base of the mountain. Gruff and militant, they said little, merely pointing the way up the grand stair.

"I expected as much," said Cologne, leading the pack. "Ranma's battle with Saffron may have restored water to the central well, but Saffron still lives as a child, unable to bathe the people in heat and light. Such misfortune must still grate on them."

Shampoo exchanged a glare with one of the Phoenix warrior. "Feeling mutual," she said. "Phoenix no forgive for Saffron; Shampoo no forgive for what they do to her, either."

"There will be other times to heal damaged pride, child."

"Is no time like present." Shampoo folded her arms, marching on.

Midway up the mountain, the group's escort led them to a guest house, a structure built seamlessly into the sheer mountain face—one step through the doorway, and natural rock gave way to modern plaster and brickwork, with shining murals of the phoenix adorning the walls.

"It's incredible," said Akane, setting her pack down to peer through the windows. "Hey, where does this door go?"

"Ah!" Ryōga flinched. "Akane-san, I wouldn't do that!"

Akane pushed through a pair of double doors, taking a step.

And two steps further, there was nothing but air.

Akane froze, eyes wide like saucers. "It's—it's…"

"A straight drop." Masala grabbed her by the wrist and yanked her from the precipice. "It works if you can fly. Not so much for a landling like you."

"You might've told us first!" said Ukyō.

"We would've caught her if she fell." Korma frowned, reconsidering. "Well, we might've."

Were it not for such a long way down, Akane could've held this place in wonder and awe. Indeed, to see the Phoenix people fly about the mountain, swooping between platforms carved wholly from the near-vertical spire of rock—it entranced her. Mousse and Ryōga and Shampoo had come to this place before, but she hadn't. She knew the people, yes, for they'd held her within Mount Kensei. She knew their tactics, for they pelted her with arrows and spears as she made her escape.

And she knew their leader, the woman who took her to Jusenkyō, the creature with pure white hair and and alabaster wings.

Their belongings secure, the party moved on again, climbing the stone stairs up the mountain. Their destination: the court of the Phoenix Lord, in which the servants of Saffron saw to the daily business of their tribe…

And where the leader of the tribe in Saffron's stead sat upon the winged throne, bathed in torchlight as dusk settled over the mountain.

"So," she said, rising, spreading her wings to full breadth. "The emissaries of the Amazons have arrived."

Akane stiffened, a chill tingling the back of her neck. This person had used her, after all. She taunted Akane about her relationship with Ranma. She captured her and brought her back to China, and all for what? To use as a tool against Ranma? To serve the transformation of Saffron?

And now they were supposed to be allies, yet Akane's heart couldn't help but beat a little faster, keeping her on edge.

"I must say, I found the explanation for the Sorcerers' awakening most intriguing," said Keema, who stepped forward lightly, as if to walk on air itself. "The Sorcerers have long kept to themselves, as have we. It is curious to think they would make us their enemy as well as you, isn't it?"

"Perhaps it is," said Cologne, leaning forward on her walking stick, "but facts are facts. The Sorcerers believe Saffron's rebirth to be the cause of their Sieve's failure and demand that the perpetrator also be the replacement. It is a sensible system, if strange to the likes of us."

Keema nodded. "Whatever the reasons, my priority is the protection of Lord Saffron. I know well the history between your people and the Sorcerers. I am not interested in your war. You are the people who've come offering aid; for me to accept it, I must be convinced it is necessary."

So convince her they did. Or tried to, at least, over the finest feast the Phoenix could spare. With naught but dusky horizon around, the party dined in open air, bracing against the drafty winds of the upper mountain. To see the her guests scramble for overcoats and mittens accused Keema to no end. "You landlings get cold so easily," she said.

"Alas, we possess not a bird's high metabolism to keep ourselves so warm," said Cologne.

Keema sneered. "Perhaps you should eat, then, and warm yourselves from the inside." She looked to Mousse. "Or perhaps you find our meal unappealing?"

Mousse pushed away his plate of roast duck, glazed in a syrup of milk sugar. "How can you people do this? Isn't it like cannibalism or something?"

"That we have wings to fly with doesn't make us treat birds as our kin," said Keema, slicing her duck with her bare finger claws. "We respect them as partners, but in the end, a partner that has served long and well, who can fly no more, can only do us one last service." She gestured toward the plate. "They give back to us, to those who raised them from hatching. Make no mistake: we are all alone on this mountain here, as we have been for decades, centuries. All of us who die must eventually give back. Only Lord Saffron does not, for he cannot die. He is the heart of our people, and that is why, even as I can hardly believe your tale of the Sorcerers' goals, I must consider any threat to him and thwart it."

"You sure take protecting this Saffron of yours seriously," said Ukyō.

Keema raised an eyebrow. "I don't know you. Are you truly ignorant of the role Lord Saffron plays for our people?"

"Save your breath," said Ryōga. "Ukyō might not have heard it, but we've all endured the spiel."

"Lord Saffron's adult form provides constant heat and light for our people. At these heights, the night can be frigid and cold even in summer. Our Lord takes the chill from the dark."

"Ah, the joys of a human radiator," said Mousse.

Keema glared. "It is not only that. Over the railing, you may see the fields below, where we grow many crops to last us through the winter. Sweet potato, rhubarb—I could go on. It is difficult work, even for us. You needn't dig deep to find earth that is frozen year-round. When Lord Saffron is at the height of his power, the fields bask in his radiance at night. Anywhere else, crops must lie dormant at sunset and go without light until morning. Here, even the short, rough growing season on the Plateau is doubled by Lord Saffron's power. Once, when I was a child no taller than a rod, I helped my father take in the harvest. That was when Lord Saffron was on his last days of that incarnation. His flame was weak, and yet, every sweet potato we pulled from the ground was taller and heaver than I. We ate well that winter. I even had the childish complacency to tell my parents I didn't think we should plant sweet potatoes the next year.

"But Lord Saffron was reborn that spring, and without his fire, the harvest was small. I didn't have the luxury to grow weary of sweet potatoes that year. We had hardly enough to eat that winter, certainly not for myself, my father, my mother who broke a wing…."

The table was quiet.

"It's been many years since we had a harvest like that one," said Keema. "With Lord Saffron an infant now, it'll be many more before those times return. We may have water, and that is good, but water is merely a scarcity here. Water alone can't make the fields productive, the crops good. So if you think the importance of Lord Saffron is a spiel we use to intimidate outsiders, you're mistaken. I, for one, would very much like to be sick of sweet potatoes again."

The guests at the table eyed their meals. "Wait a minute," said Ryōga. "Isn't this…" He picked apart a tuberous root with his chopsticks. "This is sweet potato, isn't it?"

"Yes. It is."

Mousse cleared his throat. "It's your own fault, you know."

Ukyō gaped. "Are you serious? You really just said that after the speech she just gave?"

"Don't be a fool. If Keema has anyone to blame for Saffron lying in a crib right now, it's herself. That's right, Keema: you kidnapped Shampoo, you brainwashed her, you caused no end of trouble for all of us. You should just be glad you came out of the deal with water back in your mountain. You can't blame any of us for doing what we had to for Shampoo, for our cures."

"You care nothing for my people," said Keema. "You care nothing for the safety of Lord Saffron, am I right? It is only fortunate for you that the Sorcerers, the very Sorcerers your people hate so much, have made us their enemy?"

"It would be fair," said Cologne, "considering we had a hand in putting Saffron in his current state to assist you."

"Yes. We all know who killed Lord Saffron, don't we. We all know who and why."

Akane gulped.

"How ironic that I must now aid, however indirectly, the person who slew my lord," said Keema. "But this I will do, should it serve Lord Saffron and his people. I will help Saotome Ranma, as you all so much seem to want, but I will take no pleasure in it. I will enjoy it not. You care nothing for my people; I care nothing for your Ranma. He bested the Lord in battle, and for that, he has my respect, nothing more. If I could meet him alone, face-to-face, if the information he bears about the Sorcerers and their threat held no meaning to my people…"

Keema's talons sank into the table.

"I would like nothing more than that," she finished. "Nothing more. But for now, I do my duty. You say the Sorcerers are a threat to us. You say they come to face us in battle, and you have faced them yourself. Tell me, then: how do they fight? What magics do they wield? I want to know how to beat them. I want to know how to kill them. If the Sorcerers truly mean to take Lord Saffron from us, I want to know how to make them run, so that in their retreat, we can fly after them and slice them from shoulder to hip."

And so, over a tense dinner, Shampoo and Cologne recounted their clashes with the Sorcerers, from battles recent to those of decades past. The Amazon contingent stayed longest, while the others, like Ryōga and Ukyō, headed to bed early, content to sleep off the fatigue of the hike. Akane, too, took to her sleeping bag in the cold, black guest house that fused with the side of the mountain.

Keema was right, after all. Without Saffron, pitch darkness blanketed the room.

But I'm not fooled. I knew Saffron, too. I heard him—how he taunted Ranma. He was as much his own undoing as Ranma was. He pushed Ranma. He egged him on.

Akane rolled over, staring at the ceiling.

He made Ranma kill him.

Maybe that was why Ranma didn't want her to come. For Akane, talk of Saffron brought back memories of that duel: of being small and unable to speak, of unbearable heat that scorched her until she could be dried no further. In one sense, it was ironic. At the time she most needed Ranma, at the time she was weakest, she'd saved him, too. Had she flung herself into Saffron's fireball as a living, breathing human being, made of flesh and bone and blood, it would've incinerated her insides.

She would've just died.

When the choice came between Ranma risking his life for her and her dying, she knew what she'd do. She'd already done it before.

That was why he didn't want her to go. Even if he thought she didn't remember that decision, he knew what she would choose. He knew what she'd chosen the last time.

Is it so hard to understand, Ranma? You always think you have to protect someone, but I can do that, too. I can protect you, in my own way. I want to. Why don't you understand that? Why do you tell me to stay away? Because you don't want to see me hurt? It's not like it's easy the other way around. You get hurt. You take more damage than you care to admit. I know I'm not as good as you. Not many people are, but you've trusted them before. You trusted Mousse and Ryōga-kun to go to China with you.

She rolled to her side, staring out a formless window, into the black.

Can't you trust me this one time?

A spark. Flames and beacons, tiny spots of light, streaked in the distance.

What's that?

Akane slipped out of her sleeping bag, feeling her way through the dark. She crept to the window, and outside, more and more beacons came to life, like fireflies flaring to a brilliant glow.

But these fireflies had wings of feathers, not gossamer.

"Ukyō, Ryōga-kun, wake up! Something's happening!"

A torch flickered over the room. Shampoo ducked through the doorway, fiery club in one hand, steel ball and handle in the other.

"All wake quickly," she said. "Get weapons. Be ready to fight."

"Ready for what?" asked Akane.

"Keema's patrols see them," said Shampoo. "Sorcerer scouts. They come to find Saffron. They come before the invasion force."


Next: Ranma goes before Sindoor's court, making the case to go with the invasion force and, so he hopes, find an opportunity to escape, but the Sorcerer captain is suspicious. The Lady may dislike reliance on magic, but Kohl isn't afraid to use an ancient spell…and test Ranma's truthfulness once and for all. The Sorcerers start to unravel Ranma's web of lies in "Ashes" Part III - "Riddles" - Coming August 27, 2010.

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