Chapter Twenty-Five

Tohru tip-toed down the steps, praying that the old floors wouldn't creak beneath her weight and give her away. This can't wait until morning. She'd decided as much while pacing her room, thinking of how best to broach the subject of Kyo's confinement, and after more than an hour of mapping out potential dialogues in her head, she finally knew what it was she was going to say to Akito.

But again, it couldn't wait. No, she had to talk to him now, while the words were still fresh. She'd considered writing them down, but had opted for memorization instead. In the end, it wasn't difficult. After all, she'd repeated each line enough times that she was half-convinced they were permanently branded into her brain. Now I just have to get to Akito.

Of course, remaining hidden would be crucial to her plan's success. Showing up at someone's door late at night was generally frowned upon, and the Main House attendants were sure to raise the alarm if they saw her. Akito himself would probably have her thrown out once she made herself known to him. But Tohru was determined to stand her ground even if such a thing occurred. He'll never hurt me again.

Isuzu would have called her a fool for thinking such a thing. But Tohru had seen a marked change in Akito, and whether or not the others were willing to acknowledge this fact was beside the point. Tohru saw it, and she knew it was real.

Once downstairs, she slipped on a pair of shoes and reached for the door, though before she could turn the knob, doubt started creeping in. What am I even doing? Sneaking around in the dark was usually something only done by people who were up to no good, and Tohru didn't like to think of herself as such a person. What would happen if someone saw her before she could reach Akito's rooms? How would she explain herself if-

Stop. She shook her head. Now you're just making excuses. Be brave, like Mom would've been.

Sighing, she allowed her body to slump, until her forehead rested heavily against the door. "Mom," she whispered. "I don't know if what I'm about to do is the right thing. I wonder, if you could see me right now, would you be proud?"

Her mother's airy laugh answered right away, and though Tohru knew it was only in her head, she smiled all the same. "Oh Tohru, quit worrying so much! Just be yourself. Listen to what your heart is telling you. You'll be fine."

Those were things that Kyoko had said at some point or another, and reflecting on them made Tohru realize how silly her question was. All Mom ever wanted was for me to be myself. And these last few weeks, Tohru had felt more like herself than she ever had in her life. Go on, then. You can do this.

She took a deep breath before pushing the door open and stepping out into the night.

Why does this seem familiar? Even as Ren pressed her knife into the tender flesh of his neck, Akito couldn't shake the nagging feeling that something like this had happened before. Once, a very, very long time ago.

"Surprised?"

The sound of his mother's voice drew a startled gasp from Akito, and she laughed, as though his misery was something to be enjoyed. "Yes, I'm sure you thought I would target her instead. She is far less secure in that isolated little house, after all." Ren lowered her lips to his ear, and Akito recoiled at the feeling of her breath on his skin. "Imagine, for a moment, how easy it would be for someone to slip through the door and creep up the stairs to her room- "

"You wouldn't dare do such a thing," Akito ground out, and Ren gave the knife a twist, as if to remind her son that she had the upper hand.

"Wouldn't I, though?" she said when he fell silent. "The girl has caused so much trouble, say nothing of the fact that she's come closer than anyone to ruining my plans."

"What plans?"

With reluctance, Ren lessened the pressure of her knife, until it was only pointing at him and no longer biting into his neck. Though his heart still raced, Akito released an audible sigh of relief. "I'll tell you," she answered finally, "if you promise to be a good boy and do as I say."

Her patronizing tone infuriated Akito. At the same time, there was something about the way she spoke that evoked that feeling of familiarity from earlier.

Ren…a knife…

A memory from long ago leapt to the forefront of his mind.

Akito was sprinting through the gardens at Sohma House, his sandalled feet a soft whisper in the damp grass. After running for some time, he dove behind a thicket, willing his heavy breathing to quiet so that the woman chasing him wouldn't hear.

"Ren!" a distant male voice called out. "Ren, stop! No good will come from this!"

The memory was sporadic, but Akito recalled peering around the brush after several minutes, curiosity momentarily overtaking his fear.

A tall woman stood beneath the wrought-iron archway leading into the gardens. The wind blew, dark strands of hair floating behind her as she sauntered into the sacred space. She was gripping something in her hands, and though Akito couldn't identify the object, whatever it was, it glinted against the mid-morning sun.

Certainly, it was not uncommon for Ren to use intimidation tactics on her son, but that time had been different from the others, and Akito no longer wondered why his brain had chosen this particular moment to recall it. That was a knife she held in her hands that day. I was hiding from her because I knew she intended to truly hurt me. Someone had stopped her, though. Akito didn't know who, but he vowed that he would learn the man's identity if it was the last thing he ever did. Which, by the way things are going, he thought grimly, it might very well be.

He forced himself to look at the knife hovering mere inches from his face. "I wonder," he said, "are you hoping to succeed where you once failed, Mother?"

He thought the question might catch her off guard, but Ren appeared unaffected. "You remember that, do you?" She snorted, and Akito couldn't tell whether she was more amused or annoyed. "To be entirely truthful, I'm not sure I would have had the courage to follow through, even if your precious dragon hadn't interfered."

Hatori. Of course. At this point, Akito could lay his life at the doctor's feet, and it still wouldn't be enough. I can never hope to repay him for all that he's done for me. Never.

"A mother can never truly despise her child, after all," Ren continued. "At least, not enough to do the unthinkable." Her lips twisted into a wicked smirk. "Or can she?"

Before Akito could react, she struck him with the blade. Pain sliced down one side of his neck, and he yelled wordlessly. How bad is it? I can't tell! Blindly, he probed the area with his fingertips. They came away stained with red.

Somewhere in the midst of his frantic movements, he heard Ren scoff. "Relax, child," she lulled, sounding bored. "It isn't fatal."

Not fatal. Not fatal. Not fatal.

Dazedly, Akito let his hand fall back down to its side. No doubt, his clothing would be bloodied, ruined. But that hardly mattered. It's all right. I'm not going to die.

For a moment, he'd thought he was, that a flick of Ren's wrist had brought his already overextended life to an abrupt end. Akito wasn't sure he had the words to describe how it had felt to be hit with that sudden, jarring rush of finality, to know that his fate had been sealed by a single act and couldn't be altered.

Then again, he supposed that wasn't true. After all, had he not lived more than half his life knowing he would die sooner than most? Yes.

But that. That had been another thing entirely. Spending hours moping about his room over the imminence of his death was one thing. But the panic that had risen in his chest just now…that feeling was unparalleled, enough that his hands still trembled in the aftermath.

His relief was short-lived, however, for in the next instant, Ren reached out and grabbed him by the head. Akito fought back, shoving his body against hers with all his might. A hissing noise escaped Ren's throat, and within seconds, she had her knife out again. This time, she pressed the point of it into his back. "You will stay right here," she told him, "or else I will kill you where you stand. And," she added slyly, "your precious Tohru Honda will be next."

Rage tore through Akito. He hated that Ren had compromised him again. But more than that, he hated the way she talked about Tohru, like the girl was nothing more than a means to an end. "Dead or not, you won't touch her," he said. "Not ever again. I'll make sure of it."

"Oh?" Laughing, Ren ran the knife up and down his spine, as if daring him to try to fight himself free again. "Does that mean you'll send the spirit of the zodiac god to haunt me?" She shook her head, laughter slowly receding. "No, child. You have lost. Though I regret it has come to this, your actions have left me with no other choice."

Hearing this, Akito's blood turned to ice. Loathe as he was to admit it, Ren was the strongest of the two of them, and if her intent truly was to kill, then there wasn't a lot he could do to stop her. Oh, he could fight, and he would, if it came down to it. But in the end, she had a weapon, and if she decided to use it in earnest, his chances of survival were slim.

"The curse is deteriorating," she said. "I didn't want to believe it at first, but it's a fact I can no longer afford to deny, seeing as I am the only one who intends to stop it."

"Stop it?" Akito repeated irritably. "And how are you going to do that, Mother? By killing me?"

Now he understood. Or at least, he thought he did.

In Ren's mind, killing Akito was the perfect solution. If she succeeded, he would die, but God's spirit would live on, wandering for some time before eventually choosing a new host. A new zodiac god meant that more cursed individuals would follow, thereby, fulfilling Ren's goal of keeping the curse intact. It was a full-proof plan, really. But what Akito still failed to grasp was why all of this was so critical to her.

"Why are you obsessed with the zodiac curse?" he asked. "You aren't even a Sohma, at least not by blood. So why should any of this matter to you?"

The threat of violence hung in the air like an ominous fog, but Ren remained still and quiet, enough that Akito almost could have forgotten she was there. "It isn't fair," she said finally, and Akito was surprised to find that her tone had changed. Gone was the sharp, commanding voice he was used to, the one he'd found himself mimicking over the years in order to get what he wanted. "It isn't fair that you lived and he didn't."

The words were spoken in a gentle undertone, and this was more than enough to clue Akito in on whom she was talking about. Akira. Naturally, as everything Ren ever did and said seemed to come back to Akito's father, the man whose death had destroyed her.

"Akira and I were supposed to live out the rest of our lives together. But then you came along, and everything changed." Her soft voice took on a sharp edge. "Don't you see? It was you! You ruined our happiness! And as if that weren't bad enough, then you went and got Akira sick-"

Akito shoved Ren away from him, the action sudden enough to shock her. She nearly fell before regaining her footing and taking an swipe at him with the knife, but by then he'd put enough distance between them that he was able to easily dodge. "I did not make Father sick," he told her through gritted teeth. "That is an alternate version of the story you invented in order to give yourself further justification for hating me."

He was more certain of this than he'd been of anything in his life. And yet still Ren had the audacity to shake her head at him. "You became deathly ill just days after Akira's passing. Do you not remember?"

How could I forget? That had been the day Akito learned the truth from the housing staff, when they told him that his life was destined to be short and plagued by illness. When he learned that being zodiac god did not, in fact, make him special. That illusion died with Akira, and Akito would never forget how difficult it had been for his younger self to come to terms with the reality of things. It had been the worst time of Akito's life, and for Ren to add insult to injury by suggesting he was responsible for passing on the sickness that killed Akira…

"I remember everything," he said evenly. "If you recall, it took several days for me to show signs of illness, which would indicate that he is most likely the one who passed it on to me, not the other way around."

But Ren shook her head again. "No," she insisted. "Akira never got sick! He was healthy! Then you came along and contaminated our house with disease!"

Akito thought back to the times he'd punished his zodiac for minor offenses, things that weren't their fault, all the times he'd scorned them simply for existing. I treated them exactly the way Ren is treating me now. It had been his way of exercising what truly little power he had in the world, and he'd lapped up every last bit of it so that he could feel bigger and more important than he knew he was in actuality. Is that also why Ren does it? he wondered. Did scapegoating Akito give her a sense of satisfaction? Did blaming him for Akira's death help her better cope with the tragedy? He supposed he would never truly know.

"You can point the finger at me all you want," he said, "but the fact remains that Akira is dead. He is dead, Mother, and there is nothing you, or I, or anyone else can do to bring him back."

He expected Ren to be upset by this, that hearing the truth spoken so plainly might cause her veneer to crack. But instead, she threw her head back in a laugh. "Oh, my dear child, that is where you're very, very wrong." She lifted one arm, and it was only then that Akito noticed a thin cloth bag hanging from her shoulder. "Akira has been with me this whole time. He's always with me." She bent slightly at the knees as she set the bag on the ground and reached inside. "You wonder how I could know that you were the one who contracted the illness first. Well, I know because Akira told me. You were the one who was meant to die all those years ago, not him! And tonight, I'm going to right that most egregious wrong."

Then she pulled a familiar black box out of the bag and held it between them.

It wasn't regular for Yuki to come to his cousin's door late at night. Actually, it wasn't regular for him to come near Kyo's room at all. But tonight he had no choice. The things he said to Tohru…the way he handled that…

It was unforgivable, and Yuki refused to let the incident go unaddressed.

He blasted Kyo's door open with a single, swift kick. Because that idiot didn't deserve the courtesy of a knock. The doorknob slammed into the wall with an ear-splitting crack, and a fleeting image of Shigure passed through Yuki's mind. No doubt, the dog was downstairs wailing about how the world was hell-bent on destroying his home. But the thought lasted only a brief moment, overshadowed at once by the very real scene playing out before Yuki.

It was difficult to surprise Kyo. Almost impossible, really. But judging by the way the cat shot straight up in the air, every hair on his body on end, Yuki could only surmise that, for once, he'd succeeded. Tremendously. Under any other circumstances, he might've laughed. But there wasn't the slightest glint of humor in his eyes as he stared his cousin down from across the room.

"What the hell is wrong with you?" Kyo exclaimed, kicking to his feet. He'd been sitting on the bed when Yuki burst in, likely sulking after his fight with Tohru. Not, of course, that he had anyone to blame but himself for the way things had gone. "You don't just go barging into somebody's room like that! Have you completely lost it?"

Instead of answering, Yuki stood motionlessly, his searing gaze never once leaving Kyo's.

"Hey," the cat said, his voice suddenly wary. "What is this? Why are you-"

"Shut up."

Kyo closed his mouth. There was yet another thing Yuki rarely saw his cousin outwardly display: fear. Again, the rat was too angry to feel triumphant. "What the hell is wrong with me? I think a better question might be: What the hell is wrong with you?" He crossed the room in three long strides, bending so that he could grab Kyo by the front of his shirt. "Your behavior earlier was inexcusable. I've never wanted to hit you so hard in all my life! In fact, the only reason I didn't was because Tohru was in the room, and I didn't want to upset her any more than she already was!"

The cat's eyes grew wide. "I…I did what I had to!" he sputtered. "She was talking crazy-"

"Enough with the bullshit!" Yuki yelled, shaking him. "You might have everyone else fooled, but you don't fool me. Tohru loves you, and you love her. I know you do!" he roared when Kyo opened his mouth to protest. "So why? Why are you doing this? You have everything, don't you see?"

He broke off, eyes flashing with horror at the realization that he'd revealed more than he intended. What the hell? Why did I say that? He released Kyo and averted his gaze, making a show of straightening his collar in order to hide his embarrassment.

"I have everything?" Kyo's voice was incredulous. "What kind of sick joke is that? I'm the most hated person in this entire family. Everyone knows I'm a monster, and they're sure to remind me of it every chance they get. So don't tell me I have everything, when the only thing I've ever wanted was to be accepted, like you!"

And all I've ever wanted was to fit in with regular people, people other than the Sohmas, Yuki thought, though he refrained from saying as much out loud. "Why?" he asked instead. "Why do you want to fit in with the Sohmas so badly? The rat is beloved among the zodiac, and I've been miserable my entire life."

He was speaking from the heart, but Kyo rolled his eyes at the confession. "Oh yeah, it must be so awful being the rat. Look at you." He nodded at Yuki, his expression one of pure and utter disgust. "Always so prim and polished and neatly dressed. Good at everything you ever touch, including martial arts. Next in line for student council president, and let's not forget that pretty much every girl in the school has a crush on you-"

Yuki punched him square in the jaw. "And do you ever stop to think for five seconds about everything you have?" he shouted as Kyo hissed in pain. "Everyone outside our family—everyone who doesn't know you're the cat—likes you! You have a magnetic personality, and whether you mean it to happen or not, people are drawn to you. Including Tohru." Yuki's hands clenched into fists. "She loves you, Kyo. Don't you understand? She chose you over me! It took a while to come to terms with that, but I've finally accepted that I don't stand a chance. And now? I just want her to be happy. But you're ruining that by being a stubborn asshole."

Kyo blinked, wincing, as if Yuki had struck him again.

"For once in your life, just listen to me, you stupid cat: Get over yourself. Yes, all the Sohmas hate you, but so what? You're not really going to write yourself off as worthless and unlovable just because of the opinions of a few stupid people, are you?" He shook his head. "You're smarter than that. Or at least, I thought you were."

He turned to leave, though he paused one last time at the threshold, one hand resting against the doorframe. "Don't screw this up," he muttered. "If you do, you're going to regret it forever. You know I'm right."