A Lifetime Forgiven
Chapter One: Meetings
She watched him from the shade of the trees like she had been since he'd come to Kyoto. Her long auburn curls falling gracefully around her shoulders as she jumped to another tree that would keep her well hidden from sight of this redheaded man. He kept looking up to the trees she hid in as if sensing her presence, but never said a word that he knew she was following him.
The day he had saved that toddler she had been watching as well, listened as the bystanders, that turned out to be his friends in the end, told of his history and what his presence now stood for. How very like herself, she thought with a knowing smirk, which vanished by the time she'd leapt into another tree. She'd been following him for a full week since then, and he'd just killed his master! Strangely, his killing hadn't been in a barbaric way, but in a self-preserved, and she had listened, however strained, to the words he cried before dealing the final blow. She'd also listened to the words his fallen master uttered, and how this 'Kenshin' had made a vow never to kill again, that this shouldn't count against it.
Right now this human 'Kenshin' is setting up camp to soon fall asleep under the stars, but better yet under the shade of a large Sakura Tree. She sits in a high branch two trees away from his temporary resting place, her sapphire-silver eyes glowing malevolently in the crescent moonlight. If the man did have any suspicion of her presence before, it is long since forgotten since his run-in with his old swordsman master. Oh the irony. Yet she sympathizes for him, because of the tears he shed after his master had gasped his last breath and the dirt he buried his master deep under, and the prayers he said asking for forgiveness and that his friend and master have a wonderful afterlife. She wondered when she'd finally talk to this stranger, when suddenly the redheaded man stood up and stared directly at her hiding place.
"If you wish to taste dirt then attack me, but know that I will not loose." She smirked and jumped down from her hiding place, but did not take a battle stance as the redheaded man had done, but rather smiled at him rather kindly.
"I'm not looking for a battle, so don't bother drawing your reverse-blade, not that it would do any good against me." The redheaded man stared at something atop her head and she frowned ever so slightly. He seemed lost to whatever was atop her head, not listening to her words, or rather half-listening, as he no longer took a battle stance, but looked like he wanted to touch what he was staring at atop her head. He took a step towards her, his eyes glazed over with interest.
With speed she thought only she could reach, the redhead was in front of her and had a hand reached up to grasp the something atop her head. She growled as he squeezed down gently on one fox ear, and then repeated the same with the other. After a moment of this he stopped and seemed to realize what he was doing, and to whom to, and so quickly leapt away from her like the auburn colored fox ears had bitten him.
"Fox ears?" He asked looking the girl up and down without thinking about his actions. She looked beautiful, to say the least. She wore nothing but a sapphire blue yukata that brought out the matching sapphire blue in her eyes, yet somehow made the silver there stand out more so. Her blue yukata was short, like she fought a lot, much like Misaou's, but Misaou actually wore a kimono, this girl only wore a yukata draped around her curvaceous body, yet she still looked slim and petite. Her height couldn't be more then 5'2"! Her hair looked auburn, dominated mostly by a dark brown, but hinted crimson red, yet fell in lovely curls around her shoulders and past to her waist. However her bangs looked perfectly straight and cut unevenly to shadow her eyes if not parted looking allot like his own but a different color.
"If you must know, I'm a half-demon. Half fox demon, half human." She sounded quite annoyed at having to state this so openly. Suddenly Kenshin appeared to regain his composure and asked in a deep threatening voice.
"What do you want half demon?" Was he so disgusted by this fact?
"I've been following you for five days, and I've come to the conclusion I only would like to assist you in your mission." He looked quite surprised at this, once again forgetting his trained composure. A half-demon wanting to assist him! But why would she want to do this?
"Who are you?" He asked a moment later, having the time needed to regain his composure once more.
"I'm Arami." She stated with a careless air about her.
"I do not trust you Arami." He stated still in his threateningly deep voice. "How do I know you're not a spy?" Arami gave him a bemused gaze.
"Have I not already stated I've been following you for five days? Besides that, you don't know and I can't make you believe me. If you don't want my help then just say so, but you won't succeed on your own. And if this is about my being a half-demon, then never mind and I'll just be on my way." With that said she turned and leapt into the tree's shade ready to go off because of his insults.
"Wait!" He calls to the tree she's leapt into. She pokes her head out of the bush and gives him a questioning glance. "You may join me for dinner, by the night's end I will have made a decision." He stated and waited. She leapt down easily, landing right in front of him with grace, and staring him right in the eye. His sapphire-violet gaze never breaking away from her sapphire-silvers
"Fine." She ended up muttering and turning her back on the man she knew the name of being Kenshin. He smiled warmly before beginning to gather sticks for a fire. She got a glimpse from over her shoulder at his doing and shook her head sighing before beginning to help. By the time the moon had risen up the highest in the night sky above the horizon Kenshin and Arami sat in front of a roaring fire, Kenshin's eyes closed as if he were relaxing.
"So you're a half-demon?" Kenshin broke the sweltering silence. Arami looked over at him from his left side before nodding. "I thought demons died out with the Sengoku era?" Kenshin pressed on.
"I've lived for centuries, and not just in name. Demons didn't die out, they just began to understand things." She sounded uninterested. Kenshin gave her a quizzical stare.
"Understand what sort of things?" He asked after he had noticed she wasn't going to continue.
"Understand humans stupidity." He nearly face faulted with this bit of information, but regained composure instantly and gave this half-demon a glare.
"Humans aren't stupid." He pouted.
"No? Is it their wisdom that leads them to wars and famine? Dishonesty and mistrust?" She retorted.
"Demons are like that too undoubtedly." He shot back.
"Yes, but watching humans repeat our mistakes is where humans gain stupidity." She retorted carelessly. Kenshin considered this a moment.
"Then why did you just watch?" He asked with a quieted tone.
"I didn't just watch. I'm a half-breed; I have no place among either side. So I killed for both. Unknowingly to humans, demons have always had a rivalry with them. No matter how much demons killed humans offspring, you people managed to keep popping up and overpopulating. Mating doesn't come as easily to demons as it does humans. So it isn't that demons died out, just that they've kept their population at a minimum and at some point decided better of the killing as humans were already taking each other's lives, some humans even took their own lives out of grief or fear. It was a bloodbath over the centuries, and in the end demons just decided to sit back and watch, becoming lazy." Kenshin listened intently, drinking in every drop of information and not missing the emotions hidden in her tone as she explained them.
"I see." He uttered once she had finished and fallen to silence once more. "But what do you mean by you killed for both?" He caught the flash of sadness in her eyes, and saw as she held out her hand in front of her, palms up and glared at the claws found there like they were the most awful sight in Japan.
"My mother died when I could barely walk, and my father couldn't bare the shame his offspring were a half-breed. My father was a great fox demon lord, but when demons began to disappear, so did he and I lose his trail. So without any means for control, I lost control. I grew up alone, surviving anything, by killing whatever stood in my way." Kenshin stared at her claws, not knowing why she glared at them so. Hadn't she used a weapon?
"But how were you able to defeat anything standing in your way?" He asked once she had paused and thought not to continue.
"Demons need no need for weapons, they have certain abilities to serve as such. Some are bodily weapons such as a claw of steel which cuts through any object such as I have, others are spells and wards and mischief, which I also sport used mostly for defense." Kenshin gave her another quizzical expression. She sighed and looked at a boulder not too far from where she sat. She stood and walked over to it. "Observe. Claws of Blade!" She growled before bringing her left hand down onto the stone, and slicing right through it like a wet tissue. Kenshin stared amazed at what he'd just witnessed. "You see. Also I can disguise myself as a human or whatever my imagination creates. It is a form of mischief also to be used as a ward for reasons I'm sure you would not like to experience." She sat back down by the fire and sighed lightly again then looked over at him. "Why are you so curious?" She watched his stunned face turn into a light shameful blush as he looked away.
"Just am I guessing?" His shoulders shrugged. Arami rolled her eyes before her fox ears atop her head twitched and she began to growl lucidly. Kenshin looked over at her confused once more. "What is it?" He asked as Arami stood and got into a battle stance.
"The smell of human blood is growing stronger. Someone is drawing near, and I don't think they want to play nice." She murmured through her growls while staring at a bush, before whispering something under her breath Kenshin just caught. "Human Female Disguise." Her fox ears atop her head faded into invisibility while her claws shrunk to look like a feminine human girl's. Without her demonic features Arami actually looked even more beautiful, to put it plainly, and looked around nineteen. Kenshin noticed the changes in her and stared disbelievingly when suddenly he felt it. The ki of a Battousai! He too stood and brought upon a battle stance, his right hand hovering above the hilt of his new reverse-blade sword.
"Come out!" He called to the bush Arami had so intently fixed her gaze on. It took only a second before a man appeared now in front of the bush, clad in many so many yukatas' it was hard to tell where one stopped and another started.
"My name is Gahnite." The muscular man stated pulling a sword from his waist. Arami's growl worsened and Gahnite smirked at her antics. "I was uninformed a woman would be traveling with you? Perhaps before I kill her, we can play." He made a sickening action with his tongue directed at her that made Arami want to pounce and rip the tounge out.
"You won't bring her into this." Kenshin had drawn his sword and now stood at the ready for any attack that was to come.
"Wrong." Surprisingly Arami was the one to speak. If Kenshin was surprised he didn't show it, but kept his battle stance. "Don't waste your time with this piece of shit." She spat at the muscular man that easily towered over her. Gahnite's smirk turned into an angered frown and he readied his right hand to slap her. Without warning Arami allowed her illusion to drop, meaning her fox ears reappeared atop her head and her claws grew back to their normal sharp selves.
"Why you little bitch- what in the hell?" Were Gahnite's last words as Arami pounced and sliced through his shoulder? Kenshin watched in horror as Gahnite fell, the large man's eyes closed his body having gone limp. As Arami landed gracefully where he would have stood, Gahnite made a crash to the hearth. Kenshin sent a glare her way and she gazed back at him with a knowing sparkle in her now pure silver eyes.
(AUTHOR'S NOTE: I'm not really into the whole Rurouni Kenshin thing, mostly because I've got other fan fiction stories to finish first hand. Depending on how everyone likes this is how fast I finish this story. I only need three reviews that say one of two things. You liked it or you hated it. Constructive criticism is appreciated, but plain old flames aren't. Yeah I know this sounds like a crossover with Inuyasha™ but it's not, or at least I'm not planning on it being. Whatever, just read and review this chapter, and if you don't like this'll be the last story I finish, as I've others to work on, and I'm planning a Yu Yu Hakusho one, but the idea just hasn't struck me yet for a plot. Thanks for reading anyways!)
Disclaimer: I don't own Rurouni Kenshin™. I do own any of my original characters. (And I don't see who would want to sue me, as all you'd get is a stick of Bubblegum and some loose change. (I'm broke until I win the lottery, keep your fingers crossed))