Chapter Thirty-Five

"You must be thirsty," Seishirou said at a break in the conversation. At the mention of his newfound thirst, Syaoran's curiosity quailed. Suddenly, the rich, metallic scent he'd caught before was overpowering. More attuned to his new senses now, he was able to pinpoint the source: Fuuma. He could almost see the blood vessels pulsing with every heartbeat, could almost see the red fluid moving under the man's pallid skin. His mouth started to water.

"No," Seishirou said. Syaoran glanced back, instantly regretting his lack of self-control. He had gone hungry in his life, before Fujitaka had found him, but he had never stooped to stealing food. As the memory occurred to him, he realized that was exactly what he'd have to do to survive. He shivered.

"Am I going to be like this forever? This . . . out of control?"

His teacher rested one hand on his head, in a gesture of comfort. "It'll get easier, but right now, we need to hunt."

Hunt. We're going to go out there and rip someone's throat out and . . . He shuddered again. "Are we going to leave Fuuma?"

Seishirou nodded. It must be important then, Syaoran thought, eyes sliding over to the unconscious man. Maybe I'll die if I don't get blood soon.

He followed the dark-haired man through the jungle, moving easily through the thick undergrowth. He supposed he'd been aware becoming a vampire made one more graceful, having seen Fai move with such ease after his transformation, but he hadn't thought the difference would be this pronounced. It was just like walking across flat land. His body moved automatically, and after a while, he no longer felt the need to look down to watch for obstacles. His feet recognized where it was safe to walk and where it wasn't.

After a while, Syaoran became aware of the fatigue in his muscles. It was a familiar feeling, after weeks of doing drills with Kurogane, but it seemed out of place. Maybe it's from the transformation. It hurt so much in the beginning, maybe I'm just sore now.

The feeling persisted, until walking became an effort again. Twice, Seishirou's arm shot out to keep him from falling. "Don't worry, Little Wolf. We're getting close."

Close, he thought, clinging to the word, knowing it promised relief from the deep ache in his muscles, the painful void in his stomach.

New smells leaked in through his nose. He identified the smoke of a campfire, and the scent of stagnant water. A few steps more, and he heard the shuffle of bare feet against the dirt, of subdued murmurs around a crackling fire. "Stay here," Seishirou told him, lifting his arm to block his passage. Syaoran glanced up, confused. "I'll bring something back for you. You can't walk into a village with claws like that."

Seishirou left him there, looking at the elongated claws that had sprouted from his fingertips. They didn't look like claws, at least not what he would've identified as claws before now. They looked like deformed fingernails, too long to make sense on his short fingers. He closed his eyes so he wouldn't have to look at them.

It took Seishirou almost twenty minutes to come back, twenty minutes in which Syaoran endured the growing ache in his muscles. Even the realization that there were two sets of footsteps returning instead of just one couldn't distract him from the pain.

"My friend is right this way," Seishirou was saying. "I don't know if his ankle is just sprained, or broken, but I didn't want to make him walk on it."

"That's fine," a woman's voice replied. The sound of voice was familiar, but he wasn't sure why. He laid down, pretending to nurse an injured leg.

The footsteps were closer. He could pick out differences between them. Seishirou moved in almost total silence, every bit the natural predator. The woman's footsteps were much louder, unaccountably clumsy given how much practice she must've had walking through this jungle. Syaoran focused on the sounds of their passage, trying to push the pain out of his mind.

"Ah, there he is," Seishirou said as they arrived. The woman gasped.

"What is he?" she demanded. Syaoran glanced up, realizing how his new claws must have horrified her. Before he could apologize, he realized why her voice had sounded so familiar.

"Souma-san?"

With blood-spattered clothes, walking through the streets of Infinity had been awkward enough. But now, they faced an even more awkward situation.

Kurogane stood in front of their apartment door, waiting for the mage to regain his composure. "I can't," Fai eventually whispered. "I can't tell her."

"Get over it," he said, biting back the fury threatening to break through his control. His apprentice was dead, their enemy had escaped, and now they had to go in and tell the princess everything that had happened in the past hour.

"She'll hate me."

"Yeah, probably."

The mage glanced up, looking like he was in physical pain. Even in the short period of time it had taken them to walk from Seishirou's apartment back to this one, the vampire's injuries had started healing. The swelling was going down, and the bones were realigning, becoming more like their original shape every minute.

The ninja didn't feel guilty in the least. Not about that, anyway.

The mage had regained control of himself. Kurogane pushed the door open and walked inside.

The princess shot out of her seat at their entrance, a look of alarm on her face. "What happened? Is Syaoran—"

He lifted a hand, palm facing out, to stop her. "Sit down."

The panic in her eyes intensified. "He's okay, isn't he?" When she saw the look on his face, the blood drained out of her face. "Is he . . . Is he at the hospital? Is he going to be okay?"

The magician slipped in through the door, moving like a ghost. Sakura noticed the discolorations on his face and gasped. "What happened to you?"

Fai gave her a broken smile, which promptly died on his lips. "It's nothing."

Kurogane turned to the mage. "Tell her."

The vampire walked over to the dinner table and took the princess's hand. His claws had retracted a long time ago, making him look less of a monster, but Kurogane noticed he offered up his left hand, instead of his right. The one that's not spattered with blood, he thought.

"We found Seishirou's apartment," the mage began, hesitating over every word. "Syaoran-kun was there."

The princess's fingers tightened around the magician's hand.

"It was . . . bad. Kurogane took on Seishirou. It seemed like a relatively even fight . . ."

"Just say it already," Kurogane hissed, crossing his arms in front of him. Waiting to hear the words again plucked at his already stressed nerves.

The vampire hesitated again. His breath shook over the next few words. "Syaoran-kun was in one of the bedrooms. He had your feather. I think he was trying to get it away from Seishirou long enough to bring it back here."

Kurogane focused on the princess's reactions in an attempt not to listen to the mage. Her face was almost as pale now as Fai's usually was, and the hand that wasn't being held was clenched into a tight fist on the table.

"I never told you this," Fai went on, his voice less controlled than a moment ago. "When I was very young, someone placed a curse on me. The curse required me to kill the first person I came across who had greater magical power than I did."

Kurogane could see the gears turning in the girl's head as she grasped the ramifications of this. "No . . ." she whispered, shaking her head.

"My magic power was halved when I lost one of my eyes, but I didn't think the change would be so drastic that I'd have to worry about the curse, at least not yet. I wasn't expecting Syaoran-kun to have the feather, to be so much more powerful than he normally was . . ."

She was still shaking her head in disbelief. "No . . ."

"I wasn't in control of myself! I never . . . No matter what, I never meant to hurt him."

She stood up and tried to pull her hand away from the magician's. Tears flowed down her face in rivers. "Let go!" she yelled, her voice shooting up an octave. Kurogane realized how tightly Fai was holding onto her wrist and brought his hand down, jabbing a pressure point in Fai's hand. The vampire let go, seeming stunned by his own strength.

The princess had lost every semblance of composure. When she reached her bedroom, she slammed the door hard enough to make the hinges vibrate.