I don't own Rurouni Kenshin.
Beware kiddies, there's a little bit of Kenshin feeling sorry for himself in this chap. He'll snap out of it soon, though, so don't worry.
BLADE OF THE PAST
Chapter Fifteen
"Stay away from her," the boy very nearly growled, pushing against Yahiko's restraining arm. "You are not my father, and you are not going to hurt my mother!"
Sano sat in a seemingly careless position between father and son. He smoked his pipe and watched the proceedings.
"I never meant to hurt her," Kenshin answered, his head hanging down and for all appearances looking like he was the errant child in this relationship.
"But you did! You hurt her! Look at her now – you did that!!"
Kenshin kept his eyes closed. He couldn't look back to where Shinta was pointing. He couldn't look at Isa's small body on the floor and too pale. Like the snow. Kenshin remembered the snow too well. Blood on the snow. He'd first met her when he was knee-deep in it…
"YOU DID THAT TO HER!"
Thankfully, Kaoru was there, and she was in a motherly mood. "Now, Shinta, you can't blame Kenshin for your mother's injuries. Someone else poisoned those darts."
Shinta stood quiet, the tension easing from his body, and he now slumped rather than strained against Yahiko. "I know that Master Saku sent those men." Shinta looked up, the glare and fire returning to his eyes as he stared at Kenshin. "But he didn't save her."
Kenshin flinched. The words hit him harder than a physical blow, and he staggered a step back. "I'm sorry," he managed to whisper.
But no one noticed. Kaoru was hugging Shinta tightly, telling Yahiko to fetch some tea and bring it to Kenshin's room. They'd put Isa in there, at his insistence. She was still sleeping due to the original poison's effects as well as the side effects of Dr. Gensai's anti-drug. Kaoru pulled Shinta down the hallway, away from Kenshin.
"Come now," she was soothing, "why don't you stay with your mother until she wakes up. I'm sure she would rather see your face when she wakes rather than anyone else's in the world…"
Sano got up lanky legs, swaying a bit from the sake he'd wrestled away from Kaoru earlier. After events like these, how could she expect him to seriously stay sober? For that exact reason, he thought it best to return to his own home for tonight. Besides, with a sick woman from Kenshin's past asleep in his bedroom, Kenshin needed the porch for his own bed tonight.
"Well, Kenshin," Sano said, clapping a hand on the small samurai's shoulder. "I'm off home now. See to it that the Missy doesn't stay up all night worrying about everything."
"That I will, Sanosuke," Kenshin mumbled, his head still down.
"Aw, cheer up, Kenshin. Everything isn't that bad."
"My own son hates me. How can that not be bad?" Kenshin stepped away from the paw of Sano's hand and walked halfway across the room. Yahiko bustled through with the tray of tea and cups in his hands. The kid didn't pay any attention to the two friends in the main room.
"Kenshin."
The red-haired man looked up, the sadness of his violet eyes not lost on Sano. "What has happened has happened. There isn't anything you can do to change it now. You can only change the future – not the past." And with that strange advice, Sano lumbered out the door and away from the dojo.
"He's right, you know."
Kenshin turned around to see Kaoru in the hallway.
"Shinta doesn't hate you, Kenshin. He just doesn't know the truth. And he won't know the truth until you tell him." Kaoru blew out the lanterns in the main room and started back to her bedroom. "And you really can't do anything to change the past, Kenshin. You can only hope to be forgiven."
Kaoru disappeared down the blackened hallway. Kenshin heard her soft voice converse with Yahiko's for a moment before two separate doors slid shut.
Forgiven.
It was an easy concept for Kenshin to grasp. He forgave readily. Yahiko stole his sword that time and nearly got himself killed for his efforts to be a bigger man. Kenshin wasn't angry. Sano tried to kill him after they first met, when he was Zanza. There were no grudges now. Kaoru beat him over the head repeatedly on many occasions. Kenshin didn't let that stand in the way of his friendship with her. Forgiveness was natural.
But Himura Kenshin has done many things in his life that should never be forgiven, when he was the hitokiri Battousai. He could fill a small ocean with the blood he's spilt during the Revolution. He killed his dear wife. He nearly killed his lover after that. Kenshin was one of the last to deserve forgiveness.
And still, people had found it in their great hearts to somehow forgive him. Tomoe had forgiven him for killing her beloved fiancé. She had forgiven him so completely that she ended up falling in love with and marrying him. Isabelle had forgiven him for killing Tomoe, Isa's dear friend whom she loved like a sister. Her heart, too, had found the room to not only forgive his horrid deeds but to love him as well. Kaoru never once considered Kenshin as anything other than Himura Kenshin, the wanderer who walked into Tokyo one day and never found the urge to leave. She never held his sins committed as the Battousai against him. She loved him too, in her own way.
Kenshin's head drooped, and he unconsciously brought one hand up to fist in his bangs. He tugged on his hair, squeezing his eyes tight. He did not deserve to be forgiven a second time. Isa had done it once, and he would not ask her to do it again. After all, how could Kenshin expect forgiveness when he had yet to forgive himself.
Small sounds of whimpering carried through the thin walls. Kenshin's hand dropped back from his hair and down to his hilt, ready for the most unexpected creatures to leap out of the shadows at him. Cautiously, he stole down the hallway and to the source of the sounds. His own room.
As silent as a ghost, Kenshin slid his door along its tracks, peering inside for the sound. He expected demons and shadows, wraiths and ninjas – he didn't expect…this.
Shinta was curled in a fetal position on Kenshin's bedding. The young boy was crying in his sleep, or crying himself to sleep. His quiet sobs and eerily heavy breathing made Kenshin believe it was the former, rather than the latter. Shinta was on top of the blanket that had been used to keep Isa warm. Isabelle was wrapped around her son, lying on her side with her chin resting at the top of Shitna's head. She had one arm casually over Shinta's shoulders. Kenshin could see nothing more of her than the long dark braid of her hair, her face and the olive-complexion of her arm. The rest of her was covered by the blanket.
Common sense told him to leave. From the stories he's heard from Sano, Shinta and Isa were kept apart. Shinta was beaten and basically held captive as an incentive for Isa to carry out Saku's dirty work. It made Kenshin shiver in barely-contained anger just to think about that. But something more magnetic than common sense made him step into the room, closing the door behind him.
He had failed as a father. He had failed as a husband and lover to Isa. Kenshin swore to not make those mistakes again. Shinta may hate him. Isa may never forgive him for leaving her to die all those years ago. None of that mattered. Kenshin would make up for his past mistakes starting now.
And he'd be damned if he left them both in here unprotected while some criminal boss wanted to recapture them or kill them.
Kenshin's socked feet made no sound as he padded across the room, sitting on the wall where he could face the door and also keep himself roughly between the sleeping pair at the back of the room and any enemies who might come in through that door. It reminded him too much of his time as a samurai, as the Battousai. He sat leaning against the wall, his sword pulled from his belt and leaning on one shoulder. His senses were hypersensitive, straining to hear the slightest sound of warning or feel the tiniest brush of air.
***Flashback/Dream***
His cheek still burned dully from the knife she'd used. Blood from it still dripped down the side of his face, adding to that of the blood from the head wound as it soaked the collar of his gi. More blood stained the pristine white of the new-fallen snow. But not all that blood was his.
Tomoe's eyes were closed now, her last breath gone and the warmth of her body rapidly fading into the chilling winter air and cold wet snow. Kenshin clutched her tight, willing her to keep breathing.
The snow crunched off to his left. He should have turned to see who it was. He should have assessed the danger. But with Tomoe dead, he just didn't care anymore.
"You should leave," the young voice said, high-pitched and choked with a mix of emotions that bordered along grief, anger, and sadness all in one.
"Leave me," Kenshin growled, keeping his head bowed over Tomoe's beautiful face and refusing to let go of his hold on her.
"Samurai of the shogunate will show up soon. You, Imperialist, should leave."
Kenshin tore his eyes away from Tomoe's blue-tinted skin long enough to glare vilely at the newcomer. His breath caught short at seeing a young swordsman standing there. Further scrutiny proved this person, a couple of years younger than Kenshin, to be female and foreign.
"Leave me," he said again.
"Tomoe tried to save you. Will you throw her life away so easily?"
Kenshin leapt to his feet, leaving Tomoe to rest in the snow behind him. His sword was drawn and his jaw set firm. "This is not easy," he ground out.
"But you're ready to remain here, to die at the hands of the people she tried to save you from?" The girl cocked her head to the side, letting silvery tears fall like ice to the snow as she watched him.
"Who are you?"
"Someone who loved her like a sister," she said, nodding at Tomoe's body. "And someone who would rather carry out Tomoe's last wishes to see you safe, rather than leave you here to be murdered."
The white of the snow crept in on his vision, swirling and blotting out colors. Kenshin blinked, shaking his head of the fog and trying to focus enough to fight. If she knew Tomoe, then she must be on the side of the Shogun, too.
"Let me take you from here," she offered. Never once had her hand drifted to the two swords at her side.
Kenshin wavered, his body refusing to stand still. The world pitched and turned under him, making his vision falter again and his stomach scream. "I won't leave her," he managed to say without falling over.
"Her family will be here soon. Reinforcements have seen the explosions. Everyone will be here soon. All the more reason for you to be gone."
"I can't see," Kenshin told her.
"You've lost a lot of blood."
"I can't leave her."
The warm hand of the girl clasped his elbow, startling Kenshin. It unnerved him to think that she had gotten so close without him noticing. He was in no condition to fight 'reinforcements.' Kenshin had to admit defeat.
He never said he would go with her, but the slumping of his shoulders and the katana falling from his grip spoke for him. Kenshin barely registered the fact that the girl bent down, picking Kenshin's blood-stained sword from the snow and wiping it clean before she pushed it back into the sheath at his belt.
"Come with me," she said, pulling on his arm again.
***end***
He must have dozed. At first, his senses were muffled and sluggish, but within a second, they were sharp and feeding him unerring information. The room was shallowly illuminated by dull gray light, suggesting that it was close to dawn outside. Shadows still hung heavy in the air and covered most of the surfaces in Kenshin's room. He sought out the reason as to why he was woken from his dozing.
She was lying on her back. Shinta had rolled over during the night, and his head was buried in the side of her ribs, his face hidden. Isa had an arm curled protectively and warmly around Shinta's shoulders, holding him close to her side. But her head was facing the other direction. She was looking at Kenshin.
The change in her breathing had woken him. It wasn't soft and slow like before, when she had been drugged and asleep. Now it was stronger, quicker, and just a bit on the side of panicked.
Until she met eyes with Kenshin. A small smile broke out onto her face, making her seem like she was sixteen again. Her eyes sparkled with something Kenshin hadn't seen in years. Love.
Was it possible? Did she actually forgive him for trying to kill her? For leaving her there to die later?
He didn't have too much time to ponder. Movement from her stole his thoughts away, and he watched as her other arm appeared from under the blanket. Her hand reached toward him, the fingers flexing clumsily. Her arm shook with effort, the muscles still weak from the poison. With a loud thunk, her arm fell to the floor.
It was only a soft sound. Not enough to even wake Shinta. But to Kenshin, it echoed like thunder and made his skin jump.
She wasn't smiling any more. Kenshin slid away from the wall, setting his sword down and moving closer to her. Her eyes were closed, robbing him of that sparkle he'd seen earlier.
"Isa," he whispered. "I'm sorry, Isa." Kenshin put his palms flat on the floor, bending down to touch his forehead to the floor as well.
He heard her hand slide across the wooden planks of the floor, scraping like sandpaper in his ears. He felt her clumsily reach for his head, her fingers tangling in his hair. Kenshin felt the tension seep out of him. It was forgiveness. Forgiveness and love were laced in that gesture.
Kenshin couldn't help but raise his head to look at her, only to find that her eyes had reopened and she was staring at him. The crimson eyes were clouded – whether from sleep or the drugs, Kenshin didn't know.
Her mouth moved. No sound issued forth. Kenshin's eyes flicked down to look at her throat, seeing the harsh scar near her trachea. He closed his eyes, feeling deflated. He'd done this. With one stab through her throat in an effort to kill her, he'd robbed her of her voice, that beautiful voice that she'd used to sing to him.
The hand in his hair tugged lightly, making him look up at her.
"No," she mouthed. He could understand the movement of her lips.
"But I did this…" he tried to tell her.
Another sharp tug in his hair.
"You gave me everything," her lips said. She looked pointedly down at the sleeping Shinta on her side.
Kenshin shivered. She was wrong. He'd abandoned them both, and he knew it.
She tugged his hair again before letting go.
"Food," she mouthed, closing her eyes and falling back asleep.
Kenshin couldn't help but smile. He rushed off to cook something for her, something that she'd taught him how to cook.
_____
*whew* Hopefully that's a little bit longer of a chapter and you guys won't yell at me for my short updates (at least for a while anyway). Like I said before, I write what comes to me and post it right away. If you'd rather I hang on to that and post less frequently but with longer chapters, you guys let me know. I don't know what readers' preferences are…besides Calger459 and Pearl who both say my chaps are too short. But it's a give-and-take kind of thing: either frequent updates with short chapters or occasional updates with longer chapters.