Prompt: A Vow & Ghost Stories
Credit for the second prompt goes to dreamsengraved! I really like the combination of these two and how the story turned out with them. If there's anything people want to see, send me a suggestion! I love hearing from you guys!
--cy.
"I swear it."
He held the sword out to the light of the moon, alone in the field. It was one of the few times that he found himself alone these days, mostly used to being bothered at the most inconvenient times by the most unlikely people. Why, just yesterday Syaoran had asked him to explain why Fai had meant by one of his jokes.
Kurogane hadn't expected to have to answer that. But, damn, the kid had just been so confused...
Okay, so maybe he wasn't completely used to them yet. He'd learn. You didn't just make good on promises in a single night, despite the fact that that was all the time it took to make them.
Tonight was different. It was a reaffirmation, tying another knot in the bound that had been forged so many years ago.
The darkness cloaked his smile. Hell, the number of times he did this, that bound must have been pretty damn huge by now.
It always seemed that he came to do this out of different reasons. Sometimes, he felt that he had to train more, that he'd let something slip by that he should have been able to block. Sometimes it was something out of the blue, like a yearly offering he felt weird without making. And other times it was ...well, for reasons that he really didn't want to admit, not yet. Now, though, it was out of a need to remind himself that she was still out there, somewhere, and not to give up the ghost.
His smile faded into something rueful.
There were stories told, he'd heard them in passing (no one really told him ghost stories; you expected to scare the listener, and Kurogane wasn't someone that people really wanted to try and scare. Somehow they were much more comfortable with him being the scary one), whispers in a hall, or hushed conversations from a doorway.
"Did you hear that sometimes, they say, when a swordsman makes a pledge and doesn't fulfill it, that his spirit is doomed to wander forever, always attached to the sword he swore on, a ghost?"
There were reasons that you didn't break oaths.
"And that, until the blade is broken, he'll never stop trying to make good on his promise, always in vain..."
He'd never heard of any spirit haunting a weapon. If there was any blade that deserved to be haunted by ghosts, it was Ginryuu, and before he'd traded it off to the witch he was pretty sure that there was nothing attached to it. Would he have even considered letting it out of his sight if, say, it had?
Maybe all swords came with their own ghosts. All the old swords had memories of battles and valor attached to them, a train of memories flowing behind them as they passed from one wielder to the next. The new swords were fresh, but always seemed to have a personality; nothing was without an attachment.
If that was true then, he glanced at Sohi, he was going to be one hell of a ghost. Probably an angry ghost, too, he judged, imagining the countless hours of fun there were to be had terrorizing young kids trying to master the art of swordplay.
But, no, that wasn't for him. It sounded pretty nice, but the whole point of him re-dedicating himself to his mission and swearing himself to her on a new sword wasn't so he could break his promises. He had things that he needed to do.
Protect her, for one thing, but first, get back to her.
And so, he made his pact, before the stars and heavens, before the wide plains, and in sight of the moon.
"I vow by this blade that I shall return. By its name, steel, and the obstacles it surpasses, I promise you this."
He held Sohi up to the night sky a moment more, lost in thought.
Kurogane kept his promises. By any means necessary, but still, the sentiment was the same.