I own nothing.

Usagi gently knelt down on the other side of the panda cub and looked up into Tomoe Ame's face. She was still staring out the entrance of the cave. Her eyes were wide with fear. He looked back down at the youth she held tightly against her.

He gently and slowly lifted his hand and even more gently and slowly laid it down upon Noriyuki's shoulder. The panda stiffened slightly beneath his touch. Usagi pulled his hand away. Then, though it seemed impossible, he reached up and traced the top of the panda cub's head even more gently. If anything, the stiff form of the Daimyo relaxed.

Usagi's brow furrowed. He glanced down to the pair of black furred feet nearly touching the side of the cave wall, but not quite. As he reached for them, he heard a hiss. He looked back to Tomoe Ame. She was glaring at him with her teeth clenched.

A voice came from above their heads. Both samurai's chins jerked up as they looked its direction. A wrinkled face with two, large, triangular ears protruding from it peered at them from out of a large hole in the ceiling. "If your young daimyo had the courage to jump back down the way I'd carried him up, to get away from his captors and would be captors, after removing smoke pellets from my unconscious ninja's clothing and using them more or less correctly, I thought he 'might' have the ability to keep silent as the dead for a time as well."

Usagi looked grimly back at the Kashira. "Necko have good ears."

"Not as great as ours." Kurokaze twitched his own.

"Now what?"

"The prize has hurt his feet. No great loss in the eyes of Hebi. He enjoys strangling his foes in his coils. Noriyuki does not have to stand for him to do that."

Usagi's eyes widened. Of all their laws, silence was the greatest among the ninja. Of all their laws on silence, never revealing the names of those they worked for was the highest. Kurokaze's upside down face wrinkled into a grin at the look on Usagi's. "As you may have surmised, my alliances have shifted. Hekiji and Hebi are hard, ruthless, and powerful, but a cub with guards like you, has thus far avoided being taken to them and now by his own wits and courage as well as yours. He may have made a good ninja."

Usagi glanced worriedly as Tomoe. She continued to remain silent, but her mouth had dropped open and eyes bulged a bit as this compliment to her lord that was anything but in her sight. The old ninja continued, and Usagi shifted his gaze back to the Komori Kashira.

"Hebi alone should have come directly to us, and only to us with this task, but he did not. He let messages be sent to all the ninja clans. He made certain his benefactor's name was included hoping the added authority would add to his request's prestige. This started a war among the ninja clans competing for their prize. Instead of overwhelming you and whittling your forces down as they hoped, it has caused my clan and the necko's to collide with each other like deafened and fevered Komori in a dark, clouded, and rain-filled sky."

Usagi flinched then stilled again as Kurokaze continued. "A secret is hard kept by so many. If Hebi is willing to let his 'and' Hekiji's names be mentioned to so many in their plans to gain other clans' lands for themselves, at some point the Shogun will learn of it. He will not take kindly to those he proclaimed daimyos, and thus supported, being assassinated by others as the latter lie to him about it. If your youth outlives their short time in the sun, then I am playing the long game by siding with him." The Kashira grinned again. "Others have not."

Noriyuki finally turned a pain-contorted face away from Tomoe Ame and whispered through clenched teeth, "Thank you Kurokaze."

"Thank me by surviving cub even as Hebi and Hekiji fall under the weight of their own plans. And you, retainer and ronin, continue to protect him till he does."

Tomoe Ame answered with the tone of a outrage and rebuke, even if she attempted to keep her voice quiet. "Of course, I will!"

An expression of satisfaction carved itself into Kurokaze's face before it fell away as he looked back to Usagi. "You are an embarrassment to Hekiji, Ronin. Only by learning the location of your lord's head before you die at his hands or by his orders, and then finding it and a way to display it, so it is still identifiable, will wash away his embarrassment fully. Yet, you are dangerous to transport alive to his torture masters to gain this truth. It is not worth it. But, be wary. If you fall, I will reconsider my alliances again. You are a part of the reason this cub has remained alive thus far."

"If I fall, I hope it is after Hekiji is no longer a threat to anyone including Tomoe Ame and her lord."

"After the necko attempt to assure Hebi of their part in Noriyuki's 'delivery' to them neither Hebi nor Hekiji will forgive me. My clan's future also is linked to yours."

Tomoe Ame spat words at the Komori. "Then what will you do with us? We are now surrounded by many of your warriors here!"

"The necko may grow suspicious if we do not leave soon. Your lord must also be carried with his injured feet."

Usagi broke in. "Gennesuke can carry him."

"Perhaps, but I assume you want Noriyuki at his palace as swiftly as possible."

Tomoe Ame's face contorted in a mixture of surprise and rage. "Am I to assume, you wish us to trust you to carry us all there after the lies you have just told both the necko 'and' us?"

The ninja master turned narrowed eyes upon Tomoe Ame. "I have not lied to you Samurai. I lie to competitors, not allies."

Usagi spoke up then. "Swear on your daughter's memory, whom I carried, fevered, indoors out of the rain and nursed back to health, you will deliver Lord Noriyuki, Tomoe Ame, and Gennesuke safely back to Lord Noriyuki's palace and far from Hebi, Hekiji, and those who serve them."

"I so swear to you, young ronin. I so swear."

What do you think?

God Bless

ScribeofHeroes