"But to you in your little dream world
You're still the queen of the butterfly collectors"
Garbage, "Butterfly Collector"
2
"Oh…it's good to see you…" Meiling lamely attempted to ward off the awkwardness of the situation, failing miserably.
Daidouji, eyeing Sasaki-san, spoke up. "Maybe we should discuss this somewhere else-"
She was interrupted by a professor, the very one that Meiling wanted to see the least at the moment.
"Li-san! Sasaki-san!" Hiiragizawa had finally found them; Meiling had expected him to discover them sooner. "If you do not offer an explanation for your behavior in the next ten seconds, both of you will be receiving detention!"
Only detention?
"For a week!"
Never mind.
"Ah…" Meiling searched her brain for an excuse, coming up with none. From the expression on his face, Sasaki-san didn't have a decent excuse either.
Hello, week of torture. With Hiiragizawa. Oh, joy.
"Detention? You go to school here?" Kinomoto-san looked puzzled.
It seemed as if Hiiragizawa had only just noticed Kinomoto-san and Daidouji, for his eyes widened after she spoke. "I hadn't realized you were here. I'm going to have to obliviate you two."
"Obliviate? What are you going to do to them, Hiiragizawa?" Meiling briefly regretted not taking a look at her textbooks before she came to school. There was no Kinomoto-san to compete with, and no Syaoran to impress.
Kinomoto-san laughed, although it wasn't a kind laugh. "Even I know that, and you're the one who's supposed to be studying western magic. To obliviate someone is to wipe her memory. It's usually performed on muggles who have seen too much magic. They can't be trusted to keep a secret."
"Maybe not then," Hiiragizawa muttered. "Is that you, Sakura-san?"
"It depends," was her cryptic reply. "If you mean happy, bubbly, cheerful Sakura-san, she died two years ago."
There was an awkward silence after her depressing statement.
"Everyone? Maybe we should talk in a less public area?" Daidouji suggested once more.
Looking around, Meiling did not see anyone who could have eavesdropped on them. None of the others did either, so they left.
Moonscape Cottage. Hesperian Institute. Tomoeda, Japan. August 2002.
After little debate, the group of five headed to Hesperian Institute. Eriol-kun sent off an owl the moment they arrived at his cottage, presumably to inform the headmistress of Meiling-chan and her friend's whereabouts, and offered them tea.
Meiling-chan declined, as did as her friend; but she and Tomoyo-chan accepted his offer.
"I'll be back in a moment. Conjured tea never tastes the same as real tea." Eriol-kun left, leaving the four teenagers to themselves in his living room.
"So Meiling-chan," began Sakura, "you go to school here now?"
"Yeah, I got my acceptance letter earlier this summer. How do you know so much about it?" asked Meiling-chan.
Sakura shrugged complacently. "There were some books on western magic in the basement, near where I found The Clow."
"The Clow? Then you're the Clow Mistress!" Apparently, Meiling-chan's friend knew something about the Clow Cards.
Sakura blinked. "Yes," she nodded slightly, "I am."
He looked absolutely mortified. "And I spilled ice cream on you!"
She glanced at her shoulder, where the ice cream had landed. It seemed to have mostly disappeared, for there was only a green stain on her otherwise clean white blouse. Perhaps it had fallen off? He had spilled a lot of ice cream on her.
"And I'm sure you didn't know who she was," Tomoyo-chan reassured him.
It was at this moment that Eriol-kun chose to enter with the tea.
"Sakura-san, Daidouji-san, I hope the two of you don't mind raspberry tea; it was the only kind I had today," he said apologetically, carrying in a silver tray with a porcelain tea set. It was extremely fancy for someone working for a teacher's salary. The tea set must have been brought from England.
"It's fine," Tomoyo-chan answered for the two of them. "We don't mind."
Eriol-kun sat down in a chair next to the group, setting the tray on the table beside them. "Li-san, Sasaki-san, you two won't be getting away with sneaking off just yet."
Sakura heard identical, audible groans from the two of them.
He fixed the pair with a stern glance. "Both of you will be serving detention with me, for a week—starting the first day of school next week. I have already informed Headmistress Haramoto of your whereabouts, and she is most displeased. Neither of you will be going on the next trip into town. I hope you are both properly remorseful."
"Very," she heard Meiling-chan mutter under her breath.
Sakura decided to not-so-subtly change the subject. "Eriol-kun, why do you look so different? You look as if you were twenty."
"That's because I am," he answered. "I was eighteen when you saw me last."
"But you looked our age," Tomoyo-chan interjected.
"I was twelve when I created Spinel Sun and Ruby Moon; after that I stopped growing. I remained the same for six years. When the sealed card was captured, I had what seems to be best described as a massive growth spurt. About eight years' worth of growth was crammed into a span of two years."
Sakura winced. That sounded painful.
"It wasn't that bad, actually," Eriol-kun reassured them after seeing the identical expressions on all their faces (excluding Meiling-chan, who for some reason had glee written all over her face), "I didn't feel it much. I only saw the changes taking place." (At this, Meiling-chan's expression of glee morphed into one of disappointment.)
Apparently Sasaki-san had noticed her facial expression as well. "Don't look so disappointed, Li, what did he ever do to you except give you detention for a week?"
"Not to me," she replied evasively. "And it was technically his fault that it happened."
"Technically my fault?" Eriol-kun looked mildly irritated, which meant that in fact he was extremely irritated. He was very good at hiding his emotions when he chose to. "You do realize that we are different people and that I had no influence over his actions, correct? And it was for a good cause!"
Suddenly, Sakura had a very good idea of what he and Meiling-chan were talking about.
Meiling-chan laughed harshly. "I thought he was able to see the future. Does Kinomoto-san look as if you've done her a great favor? I know that Syaoran doesn't."
That did it. Sakura stood up abruptly, having heard enough. "Would you stop talking about it as if I weren't here? The past is the past. I'm leaving now."
She made her way to the door, opening it long enough for Tomoyo-chan to utter a rushed, "Thanks for the tea, Hiiragizawa-kun!" before leaving (she was polite to the last) and to hear Sasaki-san ask,
"Would anyone please explain to me what's going on?"
Kinomoto Residence. Tomoeda, Japan. August 2002.
What am I wearing?
It certainly wasn't one of Tomoyo-chan's creations. Sakura appeared to be wearing western-style powder blue wizarding robes, lined with delicate white lace that looked as if it would break under the slightest bit of pressure. Her robes looked exactly like an illustration of 18th century wear she had seen in Ye Olde Wizarding Guide to Fashion, except the illustration hadn't been nearly so pretty as the real thing.
She seemed to be standing in an English garden, but it was obviously cultivated with magic. A light layer of snow blanketed the ground, and more was falling, but it seemed to evaporate the instant it met a flower. Some of them, such as the starflowers or the gladioli, clearly could not grow in England's cold and rainy climate. Other plants were so obviously magical that she wondered what would happen if a muggle stumbled upon the garden. She might rush out of the garden in fright at the sight of the gigantic umbrella-sized flora or the quivering Flutterbye Bushes.
Sakura sat down on a snow-free stone bench, shivering and wishing for a jacket.
"Are you cold?"
She stopped shivering for a moment, looking up into the face of Clow Reed. Or is it Eriol-kun? He looks so young.
"Here, take my cloak." He unclasped his cloak and handed it to her, who accepted it gratefully.
"But won't you be cold then?" she asked.
Clow Reed/Eriol-kun smiled. "No."
They sat there, silent, for what seemed like an hour. Apparently, he was perfectly content to stare into space for a long period of time.
Sakura broke the silence. "Reed-san, why have you brought me here?"
He appeared to be genuinely puzzled. "But I haven't, Lightner."
Thud.
"Ouch!" Sakura woke to find herself entangled in her light blanket on the floor, the alarm clock ringing loudly next to her. She never woke up feeling peaceful or content, especially after a prophetic dream.
Prophetic dream?
"Kero-chan?"
The guardian beast didn't look up from his video game. "What is it, Sakura? Can't you see I'm busy right now?"
"Did Clow Reed ever know anyone named Lightner? Who looked a bit like me?" She asked loudly over the blaring volume.
"I don't know," Kero-chan replied, distracted by the flashing lights and sounds of his video game.
Sakura scowled, an expression that looked out of place on her face. Keroberos, Guardian Beast of the Seal, liked only two things in life—food, and video games. Ever since all the cards had been captured and converted, he had provided her with little help on anything. She'd have to ask Eriol-kun about it, then.
Hill. Tomoeda, Japan. August 2002.
Sakura was very grateful that school had not yet started. Using only her memory, she had found her way to the hill, but upon reaching it, she saw no steps, nor any cream colored mansions on top of it. She had circled around it about ten times before she remembered that she had her cards with her. It had been a long time since she had needed (or wanted) to use them. They brought back…memories.
Using a combination of Fly and Illusion (which left her feeling mildly drained), she made her way up the hill, but when she reached the top she saw nothing but dead grass and dirt. Hoping to not land top of some sort of building, Sakura landed at the very edge of the hill and pulled out Through. She had gotten through the magical barrier, only to face a large black iron fence. At this point, she was beginning to feel more than just a little tired, but she used Jump to make her way over the fence.
"Hey you! Girl wearing black!" called out a masculine voice that sounded as if it were from a high altitude. Sakura looked up wearily, to see a boy in cream colored quidditch robes flying on a broomstick. To her, he looked like an ant. "Watch out for that bludger!"
Bludger?
She heard a whistling sound behind her.
Oh.
Despite her already exhausted magical powers, she did not have a death wish. "Shield! Block that bludger!"
The bludger bounced off the pink, transparent shield (which appeared to be wavering a bit) with a loud clank! Looking up, Sakura saw the boy (or was it an ant?) gaping at her. But she ignored him, and decided to continue on to Eriol-kun's cottage before she collapsed. She had a terrible headache.
Moonscape Cottage. Hesperian Institute. Tomoeda, Japan. August 2002.
"That wasn't very wise of you, Sakura-san," Eriol-kun admonished her.
Sakura shrugged. "I didn't know how to talk to you otherwise. Do you have a phone here?"
He shook his head. "We communicate by owl."
"Then there was no other way I could have talked to you, right?"
"What amazes me is that you used," he thought for a moment, "five cards to get here, when you could have only used one—Mirror. You could have sent your mirror self to tell me to owl you."
"Mirror wouldn't have been able to see the school either," she objected.
"Remember, Mirror is a Clow Card—not a magical human such as yourself. You may lack western magic, but to a magical object—no matter how humanoid—magic is just magic. It would have been able to find me just fine," Eriol-kun explained.
"And you tell me now," Sakura grumbled.
"Sorry, but you did leave rather abruptly yesterday. But it doesn't matter now. What urgent thing have you come to say?"
"I had some sort of prophetic dream," she began, "but it wasn't of the future. I'm sure it was the past."
His curiosity was blatant on his face. "And what happened? Do you know what time period it was?"
"Nothing really happened. I was in this garden, it looked English—but it was definitely magical. And your former self—he looked really young though—was the only other person there. He called me Lightner."
Eriol-kun, despite being a very pale person, seemed to go even paler. "Are you sure he called you Lightner?"
She nodded. "Yes, pretty sure. Is something the matter?"
"Probably not. Hopefully not." He tried to sound reassuring, and normally he was very persuasive, but his face was still ashen.
Sakura frowned. Her dream, apparently, wasn't a very good omen. "Who was Lightner then?"
Here Eriol-kun smiled, though still he lacked color in his face. "One of Clow's closest childhood friends, whose real name was Hero Lightner. She looked very much like you do today."
"And what happened to her?"
He said, unflinchingly, "She died."
Author's Note:
Sorry, but I took a bit longer than I expected to writing this chapter. It's not as good as I would have liked it to be, but it'll do. Next chapter will be more interesting, I promise. Syaoran will probably make his appearance in this fic next chapter or the chapter after next.
On Names:
Depending on the POV of the scene, the characters are named differently. Sakura thinks of Meiling and Meiling-chan, Meiling thinks of Sakura as Kinomoto-san, and so on. I tried to keep it as accurate to the anime series as possible, but I did make a few mistakes, and for others I just made it up. So you can usually tell whose POV a scene is in by what the characters are referred to as.
On the Harry Potter References:
After I changed the summary a bit, it does say that this fic crosses over to Harry Potter as well. But Sakura is not going to Hogwarts. I originally had Meiling doing so, then realized another important aspect of the plot would not work if she did. So I created Hesperian Institute for her to attend, and situated it in Tomoeda.