For War is Kind ~ Chapter 3
Consciousness came again, sudden as a slap to the face. In the first moment when he awoke and tasted blood, Sagara was certain he actually had been slapped. He raised a hand, reaching for his injured cheek, but a fiery pain in his arm arrested him. The world tilted sideways, and Sagara's vision bled red.
A thin, strangled cry seeped from his chest, and his hand fell to his shoulder, growing tight around bloodstained fabric. His clothing was soaked trough, making him shiver, leaving him numb. It was probably for the best, Sagara realized. Whatever was happening to him, he didn't want to feel it. Though he could no longer hear footfalls, shouting or gunfire from the woods behind him, he knew it was no miracle.
He was dying.
The snow around him was crystallized with blood. It was hard to draw breath. Weakly, he struggled, digging his heels into frozen earth as though to root himself to the spot, bind himself to what was solid and what was real. He gasped, small and straining like a sob, and his eyelids fluttered before widening once more.
He had memories like fragments; he couldn't quite give meaning to them, place his torn body and the smell of slaughter in any kind of timeline. All he knew was that he hadn't meant for this to happen. It was never supposed to end this way.
Pale silver filtered through the cedar trees; the pine bows sliced it to ribbons and abstract geometries, painting the forest floor in dark-bright patterns of light and shadow. The moon hung low in the sky tonight, impossibly low and heavy and luminous, and distantly Sagara wondered why he hadn't noticed it before.
And he thought that if he could only stretch out his hand just right, his fingertips would brush against a silk-smooth surface. Perhaps he would be free then. He lifted his hand from his shoulder, and abruptly a jet of blood from the bullet wound there soaked into his collar, spilled the taste of copper over his lips. He cringed away from it, head spinning and breath coming in sharp gasps.
His lips parted around a faint sob… abruptly choked off.
"Tell me your name and your affiliation."
Someone was speaking to him. It took Sagara a moment to realize it, over the rush of blood in his ears, that he wasn't alone here anymore. His eyes snapped open, but he could make out little more than the paper silhouette of a man crouching above him, severing the silvery columns of moonlight.
And though it sent another slick wave of blood coursing over his throat, into his hair, Sagara lifted his hand, seizing the collar of the stranger's uniform with more strength than he'd thought he had left.
"Don't hurt the boy," he gasped. "If you so much as touch him…" But that was all he could manage, and he broke off abruptly, shuddering and gulping deep breaths of cold night air.
The stranger recoiled slightly at the assault, but he recovered a moment later. "There's no boy here," he said. "And don't die before you tell me what happened."
Sagara felt his hand brushed away, and abruptly he grew very still, as if ashamed. He probably wouldn't last much longer, and this man certainly hadn't come here for this. Not to watch him shiver and writhe, not to see his eyes as he breathed his last.
The press of something soft against his injured shoulder made Sagara gasp, tug sharply away. "What are you doing?"
"Trying to stop the bleeding," the stranger said. He wrapped a length of cloth, cut from the long sash around his waist, around Sagara's wound. "There's still some life left in you, isn't there?"
As he leaned closer, his features came slowly into focus. He was familiar, somehow, though it was nothing Sagara could place immediately. Those cold blue eyes, porcelain lips, the upward tilt of his nose…
A shudder ran through him, raising a stinging pain in his shoulder. "You…"
He had been right after all, the boy really had been a ghost. A phantom, all along. Or perhaps an angel. Sagara felt his eyes cloud inexplicably with tears "It's so good you're here again."
Aoshi glanced up from his work and laid a blood-streaked hand on Sagara's brow, brushing a few dark locks from his eyes. "Be still," he ordered, and clamped his teeth around the end of the bandages so he could tie them off around the last deep wound in Sagara's thigh. "What happened to you?"
Sagara shifted faintly beneath Aoshi's fingertips. "I don't remember what happened," he managed. "I don't know…"
His eyes glazed. "The Sekihoutai…"
Aoshi leaned back, looking down at Sagara critically. "Why would a faction of the new government be…?"
And then he stopped, because he already knew the answer. "You were wiped out," he said softly. "And you're a fugitive. Just like us."
"I'm dead," he said, letting his head fall back. "Better leave this place, before they find you." If he could get out of here, tell the story of what had happened… He felt a weak spark in his chest, and he knew it was hope. "They'll be back this way soon. Just go."
"I'm not going to die tonight," Aoshi replied crisply. He hesitated a moment before adding, "And neither will you, if I have any say in the matter."
He tightened the bandages once more, and Sagara managed to not scream.
"Can you walk?" Aoshi asked.
"But…" Sagara protested weakly, even laying a bloodstained hand over Aoshi's and pushing it away. But when the time came to release the boy once more, he didn't dare let go. He couldn't, not when he had sounded so sure, so certain that he could get them both out of here alive.
"With your help," he conceded quietly. He swallowed hard, tasted salt. "Can you help me stand?"
Aoshi reached to tug one of Sagara's arms over his shoulders. He pushed them both to their feet, and kept very still as he waited for Sagara to regain his breath and balance.
"Hold onto me." He tugged Sagara close and dragged him back into the cover of the trees, trying to move slowly, though he walked with such purpose that Sagara stumbled with nearly every step.
He was sick and dizzy with blood loss, but Sagara was finding it much easier to drag himself back to the desire to live than to resign himself to die, and he felt impossibly alert. Aware of every sound, every whisper of foliage and ever shadow cast by the pale moon
Beside him, Aoshi shifted a little, as though suddenly uncomfortable. "I'm saving your life, you know. So I'm going to expect some answers."
"Oh." Sagara lifted his head weakly. "Maybe later."
"No," Aoshi said. "Now. We don't have far to go, but if you lose consciousness, you'll never make it. So you can start with your name."
"Sagara Souzou," he said. His voice was weak, but even, and a moment later, he spoke again, softly, "How am I? Where are you taking me?"
"Kyoto. And you'll last until we get there, at least." He was silent for a moment, thoughtful. "Sagara. I see."
There was a hint of recognition in Aoshi's voice, followed by an abrupt dismissal that made Sagara want to shrink from him. "What about you?" he asked. "Are you going to give me a name to go with the thanks for saving my life?"
Aoshi's eyes narrowed. "You don't need to know that yet."
After that, they both concentrated on moving forward. Aoshi's pulse and breath, though muted by layers of clothing, were steady, and Sagara felt oddly subdued by them. Soon, the walls of Kyoto appeared through the trees.
Aoshi dodged around the gate that led into the city. "Don't worry. I don't want to risk a trip through the streets just yet," he explained, though Sagara was hardly in any shape to have noticed. Aoshi took them instead around the western edge of the walls to a small hut just inside the treeline.
Upon seeing their approach, an elderly women lit a lamp in one of the dwelling's small windows and rushed out to meet them.
"Summon a doctor," Aoshi instructed. "A loyal one."
Clasping Sagara more firmly against him, he continued inside.
A bed lay prepared against the back wall, and Aoshi left Sagara there. "Try not to move too much," he said, and then was gone.
Sagara watched the boy depart as though through a tunnel, until he receded into the hazy pinpoint of light at its end. He sank back to the mattress, boneless and weary. The bandages Aoshi had wrapped around him were soaked through with blood by now, and he glided a hand over his chest to see if he could determine where he had been hit.
The entire front of his uniform was slick and cold, a thin sheet of crimson ice, and the ends of his hair were saturated with blood, stiff and wiry as an old paintbrush. His hand fell weakly away, curled around the edge of the mattress. He didn't feel much pain, not yet. It was the helplessness that ached the most.
With a quiet sigh, Sagara pressed his eyes shut. He kept them closed, even when Aoshi returned a moment later and pressed a ladle of water to his lips. "Drink this, if you're still awake."
Sagara did as he had been instructed, though the icy water stung his throat. Aoshi was patient, keeping a steady hand behind his neck until Sagara had finished and tilted his head back, coughing weakly.
"You shouldn't have done this…" he murmured, when the fit had passed.
Aoshi's eyes narrowed as he lowered him carefully back to the mattress. "Maybe not," he said. "But regardless, it's done."
"This is all my fault," Sagara continued, as though having not heard. "If I hadn't…"
But his voice was failing, and the rest was lost in a breathless sob.
"Stop it," Aoshi ordered, laying a hand against the side of Sagara's face. "There will be time for that later."
"Will there?"
"You might yet live. There's something strong in you. Something that struggles, even now."
Aoshi drew his short sword and began to cut Sagara's uniform away from his body. He undressed him, and threw the ruined clothes into the corner. "You won't need them anymore."
"I know," Sagara said. It shouldn't have bothered him, but still, to hear the words spoken so calmly in that boy's voice, so coldly, made him shiver His hands curled tightly into fists at his sides, and he closed his eyes, silently resigning himself to Aoshi's care.
It wasn't so bad. There were worse ways to die than this - than warm and safe with a beautiful boy watching over him. Sagara smiled, just faintly, but it was enough to make Aoshi pause.
"What is it?" he asked quietly.
"Nothing. I just…" His eyes grew distant again, unfocused and dim. "I never knew ghosts were so considerate."
Aoshi tilted his head slightly, gazing down at the man as though seeing him for the first time. He measured fresh bandages, cutting them precisely, but when he leaned over Sagara, he seemed to hang back a moment.
You've lost a lot of blood," he said. "And you came close to freezing out in the forest. But you'll survive this."
He began to bind Sagara's wounds, starting with his shoulder and working down. "So much for a peaceful future."
Sagara's face twisted, thought not with pain. His eyes fell closed. "So much for it."
Aoshi seemed surprised by the sudden change in his tone. "You're in shock," he said, as he began to bandage the glancing wound on Sagara's hip. "It may not hurt much now, but you're going to be in a lot of pain, soon. You should rest while you can."
"All right." Sagara swallowed hard, collecting his emotions. Having Aoshi's hands on him like this, it wasn't so bad. He was grateful for it, and he would have liked to stay awake a moment more, just to see what the boy would do next. But he was weary. His eyes stinging for want of sleep, his body sore and unwilling to move. Exhaustion tugged at him, an insistent hand pressing against his chest, forcing the air from his lungs. Slowly, his body relaxed, fingers uncurling at his sides.
"So much for…" he whispered vaguely, but the words trailed off into a soft senseless murmur, and Sagara slept.