Chapter 10
Story by: Cessy Angel
Still, footsteps. Always, only footsteps. When will the footsteps stop? When will they come save her? He seemed to close, yet they would walk in circles, as it seemed. Never did they go too far away, and never did they come close.
Misao's throat ached, and how badly she wanted to cry out to Aoshi. She tried for the sixth time, and still no sound came out, only a short rasping. Tears swelled in her eyes, never had she felt to desperate, so helpless.
In a fit of despair, and longing, she gave one last cry. One last try.
"Aoshi!"
One single cry. It seemed to small, so exhausted. Pain shot through his heart as well as a faint moment of happiness, knowing his Misao was alive. My Misao? She never belonged to me.
Aoshi took quick note of where the faint cry came from. He walked quickly, almost running. Now, and only now did he see a door hidden behind a large red drape, almost completely hidden, only the frame of the door showing on the upper left side.
The door handle was cold, and the thought of a shivering Misao came to his mind, ever enveloping his fears of her in pain. Why did he let this happen? He could have come sooner, spare her from the supposed pain of being with Kanryu, and the other.
His hands grasped harder on the handle, and then swung the door open. Dark, damp, cold, he wasn't able to see anything. Only a small candle beside him he took and descended the stairs slowly, yet he managed to stumble few times because of his pressured mind.
A low, rasping breathing came to his ears. When he reached the last steps, he pulled the candle towards the torch, a bright fire igniting and illuminating the room. A gasp was heard, both from his own mouth and from the other.
"M-Misao..." His lower lip trembled. His eyes began to have a light film of water over them, he restrained them from coming. Before him, Misao had both arms and legs in shackles, her feet not touching the ground. Her whole body covered in red dried blood, even her delicate face was mudded in the layer of crimson. The beautiful kimono she had wore that day now was shredded above her knees, and her hair, loose, and, crumpled with dirt.
Netherless, her eyes looked at him in such sorrow, and in such hope. How could he have been more wrong, thinking that she would be alright. He despised himself, letting such innocence being put throughout such suffering. He couldn't even move, frozen, even though he so badly wanted to take her in his arms and get her away from this hell.
Again, he whispered in the cold of the basement, "Misao..."
In all of her life, never had she been so happy to see Aoshi. She felt happiness when she was with him, true, but this happiness was beyond recognition, beyond words. It was as if he had saved her from death itself, which was partly in truth.
She whispered his name twice, so soft and low that even she barely even heard it. Aoshi, standing at most several feet from where she was, his face masked in despair. It hurt her heart seeing him this way, and it was at the same time she saw him like this, so saddened. Could it be that his sadness is... because... of me?
She closed her eyes
and treasured the moment. She would be free. "Aoshi-sama..."
Aoshi tried forming a smile on his lips, yet it would not come, and he didn't know why. His feet were frozen to the floor, yet he could already feel her hair in his fingers, her soft skin enveloped in his arms, he would save her from the torture.
Misao gave him a smile, showing how much she had been longing for him to come save her, and she didn't need to say any words before he began walking towards her, slowly, his hands almost losing their grips on the kodachi.
As he walked, something caught his foot, he didn't want to look down, he only wanted to look at her. Yet as he lowered his head, and Misao did the same, they both gasped at the pool of blood forming around the floor.
"Kanryu..." Aoshi looked down, seeing the man's face in a blur of bloodied pieces of skin that once looked like his stomac as his legs and arms. Who would do such a thing?
His long enemy, now dead. And even he had not succeeded in doing this. What monster could possibly have done this? Even he, once known as a demon towards the soldiers which defied him at the Edo castle, could not stand the look of it. Only a pure monstrosity could have had pleasure in doing so. But the questions kept roaming in his mind, only two simple questions. Who? Why?
"Aoshi..." Misao whispered, her face shocked in horror at the sight laying very near her feet. She saw how he looked at the corpse, the pain of an enemy killed by another, a warrior thought of this as defeat. But she knew who did it, and her eyes searched desperately to look at his face, wanting to stay here no longer.
Aoshi lifted his head again at her, understanding that she did not want to stay there any longer. He began again walking towards her, but only heard the gasp of the helpless ninja, and then seeing another, holding onto her mouth, his hand clamped over her face.
"Beautiful, isn't she?" The man mused, his green eyes piercing at him, mocking him. His black hair covering most of his pale face, yet even as he seemed to innocent, as if a young child, his menacing smile shook him in anger.
"Who are you?" Aoshi hissed, his concern towards Misao, her head violently trashing side to side, trying without any luck to get away from the man's grip. The grip on his kodachi tightened again, and his body tensed.
"Maybe you've heard of me before. Maybe not. My name is Kimweri Meshika." His grin widened.
Aoshi's eyes widened, just like Kimweri's grin, and he took several seconds before he replied, his voice shaken and confused. "N-no! You can't be the same as my brother's..."
Kimweri gently let go of Misao's face, her eyes and face showing how confused she was. His eyes still rested on Aoshi's face. "Oh, but I am."
Author's Notes: I was pretty close to continuing this chapter, ah, but I felt like leaving you guys on a little cliffhanger. Anyways, I don't know if any of you noticed, but my writing style changed, just a little bit. (I gotta stop reading those Ann Rice books!) Anyways, the next chapter will explain most of Kimweri's connection with Aoshi and Yushiro, Aoshi's brother. So, I better leave it like that. Please review!