Title: Exit to Eden

Author: Tiamat's Child

E-Mail: tiamats_child@yahoo.com

Rating: PG-13

Characters: Kotori/Kamui/Fumma

Summary: The Three are waiting for the world to be ready for them…

Notes: For Aishuu's A Change in the Tapestry challenge. *hides face in hands* Okay, so it's a one shot, and yeah, it doesn't feature the whole cast… I tried. That just is not my style. Ummm…As to what I changed, well, I basically played with the nature of the whole 'twin star', tied to the Earth thing. It still makes good archetypal sense, it's just different. And, in my personal opinion, rather creepier. Of course, that may be because I think that Clamp has rigged the whole concept that they've set up, but hey, there you go. On with the fic.

Exit to Eden

The shrine on the hill has rumors flying about it like the swallows that nest in its trees. They never seem to leave, those swallows, even in the deepest winter. And the people know why. It's the girl, they say, the shrine maiden that sees the future, though she won't tell it to you for money. The birds stay for her, because she speaks to them. The people have seen her standing in the courtyard in early morning dimness, covered in living feathers, till she looks like a seraph, outlined in rosy grey by the dawn. The birds will startle then, and she will stand in the middle of them, laughing and laughing and laughing. And they fly about her, their wings sounding just like her laugh.

But that's just one tale. There are others.

Like the one that says as how there's only one big bed in that whole house, as the girl and the boys she lives with don't like to sleep apart. There's those who shake their heads at that and try hide the illness on their faces, for it isn't right, it's not, to live that way. And then there's those who shake their heads and try to hide their smiles, for they're good children, all of them, and they've had such a hard life, to lose all their family so young. But the three don't care at all what the others say, for they've learned it doesn't matter a pinch of salt so long as they're happy.

And they are happy. How could they not be? There's kisses and laughter all the day, with hard work and the results of it to let them feel earned. There's little Fumma finds more welcome than the feel of a days hard work over, especially when he can come back into the house, and find the two he loves more than life there, tossing tales back and forth as Kamui cleans up for dinner and Kotori cooks. All is brightness and warmth and love so strong it's almost tangible, almost there to taste or touch.

The neighbors notice too. The shrine feels so alive, they'll say to each other. It's so happy, so different from the way it used to be! Can you remember when it didn't feel melancholy? The spirits must be smiling. It's good luck to have a shrine so warm and light. Surely no ghosts will take to haunting it now.

Kamui knows things that he didn't once upon a time, like the exact curve of Kotori's neck. He can close his eyes and feel the line of it, and taste the scent, sun-ripened raspberries and something entirely female and entirely her. And he knows the soft flutter of Fumma's eyelashes on his cheek, or high on the curve of his own throat. He could almost tell you just how many Fumma has, simply from shutting his eyes shut and remembering, and counting.

And those who live nearby notice that too. They see the way they stand together, too close, too easy. And they see the way they touch each other, too causal, too knowing. It's clear that they know each other in ways gleaned from more than simple life in the same small place. And it's plain that that knowledge wasn't taken for a lark, a game. They needed it terribly, and to them that makes it all right. What others think matters little, at least as far as they are concerned.

Kotori sees the future every night as she dreams, and sometimes it makes her wake up shaking and terrified, her hands quivering as tautly as a too tightly strung bow. Than the boys will hold her, and wipe away her frightened tears with gentle fingers, and press soft kisses into her hair. Hush. It's all right. We've made it past. And sometimes Kotori manages to sleep again, falling into a vast, dark goosedown, and sometimes she is not, and lays awake the entire night, huddled between her boys, until the grey of morning makes its way up over the lip of the eastern rim of the world.

Kotori will not tell the future for money. She will not tell it at all. It is a hard thing, to know the future, and not a burden she would wish on any other. Sometimes she reaches out to change it. Move. She tells a young woman one day, Go visit your family for the weekend. Don't stay in your apartment alone this time. And because everyone knows Kotori, and knows that she knows things she shouldn't be able to, the young woman does as she is told, and the pool of spreading blood soaking into long hair stays in Kotori's mind's eye, kept from escaping into the world of waking. And Kotori is grateful.

Kamui has taken to gardening. There's something about the secrecy of living things growing in the dark, damp earth, curled close and warm where none can watch, that appeals to him. It reminds him of them, and what they've become and are becoming. He loves to coax life upwards out of the earth to sway in the sweet, green laden air, gleaming and young. He's getting rather good. Fumma says that it's hardly unsurprising that plants should like him. You're going to be the one to save them, after all. He says. It's not so very long now. Kotori laughs and hugs him when he shows her the first sprouts of sage. Soon the whole world will be your garden, she says, just you wait. You'll see.

Kamui is looking forward to the world being his to replant and rebuild. He knows just what he'll do too. He isn't going to kill the people, not at all. He loves people, for his beloveds' sakes. But they will have to learn to share. The plants will twine hugely up the sides of the skyscrapers; the concrete will shatter and fall to bits. The oil reserves will be locked to deep for humans to tap. If they need cars that badly they can certainly find alternatives. Some dams will crumple, and some bridges fall. Nothing more than what is needful, of course, and nothing that would hurt Kotori or Fumma. No, he will change things wisely, carefully, and hurt as few as possible.

Fumma is the one meant to guard them both, he knows it. A seer, a creator, and dark god to guard, that's what every tale needs to be complete. He means to keep them safe, both of them, and he can hardly bear to wait until the task for which Kamui was born has begun. To remake the world is such a brave and noble thing. There will be those who will try to stop it, there are always are, and he must keep them from succeeding. They will die by his hand if they threaten any of the three. The world must be allowed to recreate itself in its own image, the image it has placed into the deep places of the three's knowing. He is not afraid. He loves Kamui and Kotori, and trusts them. And he trusts himself.

Kotori fears nothing while she wakes, for she can see no future where she does not wake in the morning, go out to call her birds and greet the sun, and then come back in for two good morning kisses. This new world will be good. She knows it. While she wakes she knows it.

The garden clings closely to its secrets, but already you can see the change. The plants are larger, healthier, *more*. Kamui is changing them without even trying. The world is growing nearer the time, and so are the children. They will be ready to take their thrones soon

There will come a day when flowers spring up beneath Kamui's feet, leap to crown Kotori of their own accord, and ripen and wither where Fumma passes. Livegiver, Seer, Deathbringer. The Three will rule then, and the world shall be at their feet as a great and glorious orchard.

Eden is waiting. The Three are waiting. And the shrine still bears rumors heavy upon it, like apple blossoms in the spring.

Hush. Listen. Do you hear the plants growing?