A/N: First off, I don't own SC or any of the characters. Link is most
definitely NOT paired up with Cassandra. And the reason Link felt bad
about killing Ivy is because although he's killed before he normally kills
innately evil beings, but it's harder to kill someone that could have been
redeemed bc they weren't completely bad. Hope that clears stuff up!
~Belle
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Maxi and Seung Mina first ran into Xianghua. The Chinese woman eyed the two curiously. She shot Maxi a dirty look at first before realizing that Seung Mina most likely possessed pieces of Soul Edge.
"Xianghua, this is Seung Mina. She's looking for Yunsung." Maxi explained, introducing the two female warriors. Xianghua now felt jealousy's ugly head. Not only was this red haired, staff toting woman walking with her Maxi, but she also was looking for Yunsung! Life simply wasn't fair!
"Hey! Took you guys long enough." Kilik shouted out to the trio as he ran over to catch up. He had no luck finding any other warriors with shards until he had sensed the return of Maxi with someone who had a shard. He stopped beside the group and noticed the annoyed expression upon Xianghua's face. Then he noticed the beautiful red head. "Hello. I'm Kilik." He introduced with a courteous bow.
Seung Mina smiled at him before returning his bow with one of her own. "I am Seung Mina." She pointed to the staff he had leaning across his shoulder. "You study the staff?" She inquired.
Kilik nodded and then gave Maxi a look asking him to explain.
Maxi grinned at everyone. "Seung Mina here is in search of our friend Yunsung. She agreed to accompany us back to the ship where we might sort out all our goals and priorities regarding the quest."
"Okay." Kilik answered, suddenly realizing the reason for Xianghua's discomfort being how close Maxi was standing to Seung Mina. He himself was starting to feel a little unnerved. As soon as he mentioned to have studied the staff she had started to lean a bit closer to him. He cleared his throat and grabbed hold of Xianghua's hand. "Let's go meet the others then." He decided, taking off at a brisk pace with his friend in tow.
Once out of ear range of the other two he turned to question Xianghua. "What is the matter?" He demanded.
"Nothing. I'm fine. I think there are too many women in our group now is all." She told him.
Kilik couldn't suppress his laugh. After he calmed a bit and hit himself in the chest to stop the assault of chuckles he addressed her again. "You are over reacting. Besides Talim is the only other girl in our group besides yourself."
"We did just fine last time we fought for Soul Edge with only the three of us. I don't understand why we keep allowing others to join us. First the little girl, then the elf, then that boy who must be blind, and now this hussy from Korea." Xianghua was red in the face expressing her frustration.
Kilik stopped walking and placed a hand on each of her shoulders. "Look, I don't understand why you have such a poor attitude. We all want to destroy the evil of Soul Edge. It's destruction should be all that matters. By the way, Talim is NOT a little girl and Link is a formidable fighter, as is Yunsung. I don't know about Seung Mina, but since she seeks Yunsung I see no harm in allowing her to find him. Just because you are upset about Maxi does not mean you can try placing the blame on others." Kilik told her getting angry himself.
"You're just defending them because they are your little girl's friends." Xianghua replied defiantly.
Kilik quickly released his hands from her shoulders. "You need to get over yourself. Do not talk about any of my friends in such negative ways again or else you can forget about calling me a friend." Kilik warned.
"Fine with me." Xianghua replied, crossing her arms over her chest and pointedly looking away.
"So be it." Kilik answered walking further ahead of the others, ready to return to the ship.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
"So, why do we need to go to Greece?" Yunsung asked Cassandra after the four had reached the dock where the ship was located.
Cassandra smiled at her fellow warrior. "No, Yunsung, I said that I must go to Greece."
"Let us wait until the others arrive to discuss Greece." Talim suggested, after taking note on the brief look of hurt that flashed through her Korean friend's eyes at the last comment. Link adamantly nodded his head agreeing with Talim.
The four sat upon the wooden dock, with legs dangling towards the water. Link sat closest to the ship with Talim beside him. Cassandra and Yunsung sat on the other side of Talim. Link took out his Ocarina to entertain the other three while they played the waiting game.
The melody was quite soothing. Talim could feel herself falling asleep. She began to lean closer and closer to the water. Naturally her balance was quickly lost and she began to topple over.
With incredibly fast reflexes Link, instinctively reached out towards Talim to prevent her fall.
But, Link is a very light elf and he toppled towards the water right along with the girl in his arms. Cassandra was next to react, but she is very light herself and naturally began to fall in as well. Yunsung, much stronger than the other three, reached for Cassandra and stopped her fall.
Cassandra's arms were wrapped around a very wet Link, who had his arms wrapped around a very wet Talim. Yunsung pulled the three back onto the wooden dock and started to laugh. Or at least he laughed until Link stood next to him and shook himself much like a wet dog, and he found himself wet.
That's when Kilik caught sight of the four. He couldn't help but laugh at the sight of the sopping wet quartet. Wait a second? Where did the blond girl come from? "Talim!" He called. Talim's ears perked up and Link leaned over to whisper something in her ear and her chocolate eyes took on a mischievous gleam.
Talim ran towards Kilik at top speed, hoping that he would forget her state of dryness. Fortunately, he was so happy to see her that he did, or at least he did until after she collided with him. He shook his head once he realized he had been the target of a Talim/Link trick. He wrapped his arms around the wet girl anyway. "Miss me?"
Talim smiled up at him, before rubbing her wet hair across his chest, effectively getting him more wet. "You missed all the fun!" She exclaimed with a wry grin upon her face. When she saw Kilik smile she noticed that it failed to reach his eyes. "What is wrong?"
"Nothing. Well something. But, perhaps we can talk about it later." Kilik answered. Talim reached up to tuck a piece of his hair behind his ear and nodded before extracting herself from his grasp to watch the approach of three others.
"YUNSUNG!" The red headed woman yelled once her eyes caught sight of a certain Korean swordsman.
Yunsung swallowed thickly and his breathing became more shallow. Cassandra eyed him curiously. Link smiled and whispered to him, "Friend of yours?"
"YUNSUNG do you have any idea how hard I have been trying to find you? You MUST return home this instant. You are needed in the fighting." Seung Mina continued ranting as she approached the young man whose face was draining of all color.
"But Seung Mina, what about Soul Edge?" Yunsung asked quietly, having lost his voice somehow. Xianghua was watching the exchange with only mild interest, her attention mostly focused on Maxi who seemed to be eyeing the other woman too much for her taste and her clenched fists were a good indication of that.
"Let older people take care of it. You are but a child." Seung Mina scowled him. "If father found out I let something happen to you he'd disown me! I don't know why I gave you that sword you carry if you are only going to use it for selfish gains."
"That's not true." Cassandra interjected.
"Who are you?" Xianghua demanded finally noticing another female. She cast Kilik a dirty look of I-told-you-so.
"She is Cassandra. She also possessed a shard of Soul Edge. We watched her defeat a great foe whom we refer to as Charade." Talim answered.
"She says we need to go to Greece." Yunsung added.
"You need to go home!" Seung Mina immediately retorted.
"Seung Mina, why do you not join in our quest to destroy Soul Edge. I am sure that with your help we shall be able to defeat the evil much quicker. The quicker we destroy it, the quicker Yunsung may return home having fulfilled his part in this battle." Kilik played the peacemaker, his favorite role.
Seung Mina looked at him skeptically, then back towards Yunsung. Then she walked towards Kilik and placed a hand upon his forearm and smiled endearingly at him. "I would love to fight beside you Kilik."
Kilik shifted uncomfortably when he felt the unhappy stares of Talim, Link, and Maxi.
"I'm sorry to interrupt, but I really must go to Greece. My Athenian gods have spoken with me and revealed that to be my next destination if I wish to aid in the destruction of Soul Edge." Cassandra spoke, gaining everyone's attention.
"We should go to Greece." Yunsung announced.
"No! Must go to France!" Link cried, unhappy with all the turn of events.
"But we must go to Greece." Yunsung argued with him.
"Perhaps we should go to both." Maxi replied, looking thoughtful. "I will continue on to France with Link and Xianghua. The rest of you should go to Greece."
"Talim goes with Link." Link informed the group.
Kilik narrowed his eyes at Link, unsure of the elf's motives. Just when you think you can trust an elf he goes and demands your girl travel with him. "I go with Talim." Kilik replied and was pleased when Link looked at him and shrugged noncommittally.
"All three of us can't go to France." Maxi countered, referring to the original warriors from four years prior.
"Link must go to France. Talim and Kilik come to France with Link." Link replied, making the decision for them all, as if it should have been the obvious solution.
"I'm the one with the ship!" Maxi complained. "I'm the captain, I make the decisions." Link gave Maxi a dangerous look and the pirate backed down a bit.
"Exactly, you have the ship and Greece is further." Kilik answered wisely.
"Perhaps I too should go to France." Seung Mina replied, keeping her eyes on Kilik.
Maxi looked at her confused. "But I thought you wanted to stay around Yunsung?"
"He's a big boy. I'm sure he'll be fine." Seung Mina replied, not moving her eyes from Kilik's tone physique.
Link pulled out his boomerang and hit the woman upside the head with it. It didn't hurt, he practiced the trick plenty on Yunsung and it only stung a little. "No. Link, Talim, and Kilik go to France. Not you."
"Why should the elf get to decide?" Seung Mina pouted, rubbing her sore head.
"Perhaps the elf knows more about what we are dealing with in France than you do. Therefor, I intend on trusting his judgement." Talim replied, doing her best to sound cool, calm, and collected. First off, no one is allowed to flirt with her Kilik. Second, when did he become her Kilik? Third, obviously because of the fact that Link is an elf he knows more than they would, right?
Seung Mina finally looked closer at the girl that was speaking to her. Then everything seemed to click in her head and she realized that Kilik seemed to belong to Talim. She smiled at the young woman after realizing this and moved further away from Kilik.
"My apologies, master elf, if you feel my services to be better served in Greece I will heed the advice." Seung Mina replied before marching over towards Yunsung and grabbing him roughly by the ear. "You have a lot of explaining to do young man." She told him yanking the appendage hard.
"So, let me get this straight. We are dividing into two groups, again? One headed for France and the other to Greece." Maxi clarified. "My ship is to head for Greece."
"I will make sure our mission in France follows precisely as we had planned." Kilik reassured his friend. "We will simply need to purchase passage by some other means."
"Do we have the resources for such a division?" Talim asked, remembering how important money seemed to be in this society.
Kilik lifted his coin purse from his belt and lifted it. "Maybe." He replied.
Link started laughing and opened his own purse revealing many rubies. "Link have resources."
"Okay, fine. When do we meet back up? In three weeks perhaps?" Maxi asked, making sure that they would be organized.
"In three weeks we can not possibly reach both France and Greece." Kilik replied thinking through several mathematical equations in his head to reassure himself that the timetable was indeed impossible.
"Egypt then? In three weeks time?" Maxi supplied.
"Egypt it is, in three weeks. It was nice meeting you Seung Mina and Cassandra." Kilik addressed the two new females. "We will collect our belongings and find our next means of travel." Kilik informed Maxi, before he followed Talim and Link back on board the ship.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Spawn was unsure of why he was still following this group. But now he had a decision to make. Should he follow the group to Greece? He shook his head. No, France promised more action. For some reason he preferred the trio that would be heading to France.
They would soon be seeking another means of traveling. He looked down at the enchanted mask within his hands. He had scavenged the caves of Voldo and found this magical item. If he placed it over his face, he would appear as a normal human.
With this mask, Al Simmons was once again as those who knew him in his life would remember. Of course, he was cursed to this sixteenth century until he provided the demon in charge of him with Soul Edge.
It would be wise to become closer with these three. He noticed a man with horse and wagon a few miles away. He had seen that man murder three people the day before. Perhaps he would do the world a favor and rid humanity of his existence. Besides if he could take the wagon and use the mask, conveniently, he would be the transportation of those three warriors.
He also had to deal with the winds giving him away. He knew that the young woman could read it's messages. He could easily take care of that little problem as well. But, he needed to deal with one problem at a time.
He began his predatory walk towards the murdering merchant.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Kilik was walking side-by-side with Talim. Link was leading the pair towards the outskirts of town. Kilik reflected on his last conversation with Xianghua. She had pulled him aside right before he was about to leave the ship.
Xianghua had apologized for her earlier behavior. He merely smiled at her and told her that all was forgiven. Was forgiveness truly so easy to grant? He had to wonder. Maxi and he had discovered clues that Nightmare was alive in France.
He had to question whether Nightmare was worthy of forgiveness. But, then, he too was guilty of numerous murders thanks to the evil seed of Soul Edge that had rained down upon his home many years ago. His shoulders slumped at the implications. Who was Kilik to judge Nightmare?
Talim noticed the change in Kilik's posture. She placed a concerned hand upon his bicep. "Kilk, what troubles you?"
Kilik couldn't look at her. He couldn't look into chocolate eyes still full of innocence. He shrugged off her hand. "Nothing. I am just thinking."
Talim moved her hand away quickly as if it was burned. "I was just concerned." She whispered looking away.
Kilik stopped to consider his behavior. "Thank you for your concern, it is appreciated Talim." He told her sincerely. She nodded her head, but remained silent.
"Up there." Link pointed towards a tall man who was feeding his mighty horses.
"Good sir, might we offer you a proposition?" Kilik called, gaining the man's attention.
"Sure that you might, but I might not take it." The man replied in a cheerful voice, that completely put the trio at ease.
Link held up a ruby towards the man. "I think that I may be interested." The man replied with a greedy smile. He gave a great sweeping bow to the three. "My name is Al and I am an English merchant on a lonely trip to France. How may I serve thee?" Inwardly Spawn was smiling, incredibly proud of his acting skills.
Talim merely stared at the man. He was an unusual skin color. He was much darker than any other person she had seen. She glanced over towards Link and reprimanded herself. She had never seen an elf before Link either and look how well that turned out.
"As fate would have it, we are also headed towards France." Kilik replied.
"Well one of you can ride up front with me and the other two can ride in the covered portion of the wagon. You can rotate if you want. I was actually about to head out after I fed my horses and allowed them to rest a little while." Al told them, smiling, his green eyes seemed to emit an unusual energy.
Talim suddenly felt a little uneasy. Why was she not sensing any winds? It was as if something was preventing the winds from speaking to her. Kilik appeared to notice her unease and draped his arm comfortably across her seemingly frail shoulders.
He smiled down at her and then at Link who nodded his approval. "Talim and I will enjoy the comforts of the covered cart first.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Hehehe...I love the Talim/Kilik fluff and the jealousy in this fiction! It's too fun! Sorry Seung Mina fans, I mostly used her to increase the jealousy factor. Spawn sure is a shady character. I don't think I would want to travel all the way to France with him! He's so easy to "piss off" as he says in the game. Since I'm splitting the groups ¾ att of each chapter will go with wherever Talim and Kilik are, the other ¼ keeps up with the other heroes. Thanks for reading! ~Belle
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Maxi and Seung Mina first ran into Xianghua. The Chinese woman eyed the two curiously. She shot Maxi a dirty look at first before realizing that Seung Mina most likely possessed pieces of Soul Edge.
"Xianghua, this is Seung Mina. She's looking for Yunsung." Maxi explained, introducing the two female warriors. Xianghua now felt jealousy's ugly head. Not only was this red haired, staff toting woman walking with her Maxi, but she also was looking for Yunsung! Life simply wasn't fair!
"Hey! Took you guys long enough." Kilik shouted out to the trio as he ran over to catch up. He had no luck finding any other warriors with shards until he had sensed the return of Maxi with someone who had a shard. He stopped beside the group and noticed the annoyed expression upon Xianghua's face. Then he noticed the beautiful red head. "Hello. I'm Kilik." He introduced with a courteous bow.
Seung Mina smiled at him before returning his bow with one of her own. "I am Seung Mina." She pointed to the staff he had leaning across his shoulder. "You study the staff?" She inquired.
Kilik nodded and then gave Maxi a look asking him to explain.
Maxi grinned at everyone. "Seung Mina here is in search of our friend Yunsung. She agreed to accompany us back to the ship where we might sort out all our goals and priorities regarding the quest."
"Okay." Kilik answered, suddenly realizing the reason for Xianghua's discomfort being how close Maxi was standing to Seung Mina. He himself was starting to feel a little unnerved. As soon as he mentioned to have studied the staff she had started to lean a bit closer to him. He cleared his throat and grabbed hold of Xianghua's hand. "Let's go meet the others then." He decided, taking off at a brisk pace with his friend in tow.
Once out of ear range of the other two he turned to question Xianghua. "What is the matter?" He demanded.
"Nothing. I'm fine. I think there are too many women in our group now is all." She told him.
Kilik couldn't suppress his laugh. After he calmed a bit and hit himself in the chest to stop the assault of chuckles he addressed her again. "You are over reacting. Besides Talim is the only other girl in our group besides yourself."
"We did just fine last time we fought for Soul Edge with only the three of us. I don't understand why we keep allowing others to join us. First the little girl, then the elf, then that boy who must be blind, and now this hussy from Korea." Xianghua was red in the face expressing her frustration.
Kilik stopped walking and placed a hand on each of her shoulders. "Look, I don't understand why you have such a poor attitude. We all want to destroy the evil of Soul Edge. It's destruction should be all that matters. By the way, Talim is NOT a little girl and Link is a formidable fighter, as is Yunsung. I don't know about Seung Mina, but since she seeks Yunsung I see no harm in allowing her to find him. Just because you are upset about Maxi does not mean you can try placing the blame on others." Kilik told her getting angry himself.
"You're just defending them because they are your little girl's friends." Xianghua replied defiantly.
Kilik quickly released his hands from her shoulders. "You need to get over yourself. Do not talk about any of my friends in such negative ways again or else you can forget about calling me a friend." Kilik warned.
"Fine with me." Xianghua replied, crossing her arms over her chest and pointedly looking away.
"So be it." Kilik answered walking further ahead of the others, ready to return to the ship.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
"So, why do we need to go to Greece?" Yunsung asked Cassandra after the four had reached the dock where the ship was located.
Cassandra smiled at her fellow warrior. "No, Yunsung, I said that I must go to Greece."
"Let us wait until the others arrive to discuss Greece." Talim suggested, after taking note on the brief look of hurt that flashed through her Korean friend's eyes at the last comment. Link adamantly nodded his head agreeing with Talim.
The four sat upon the wooden dock, with legs dangling towards the water. Link sat closest to the ship with Talim beside him. Cassandra and Yunsung sat on the other side of Talim. Link took out his Ocarina to entertain the other three while they played the waiting game.
The melody was quite soothing. Talim could feel herself falling asleep. She began to lean closer and closer to the water. Naturally her balance was quickly lost and she began to topple over.
With incredibly fast reflexes Link, instinctively reached out towards Talim to prevent her fall.
But, Link is a very light elf and he toppled towards the water right along with the girl in his arms. Cassandra was next to react, but she is very light herself and naturally began to fall in as well. Yunsung, much stronger than the other three, reached for Cassandra and stopped her fall.
Cassandra's arms were wrapped around a very wet Link, who had his arms wrapped around a very wet Talim. Yunsung pulled the three back onto the wooden dock and started to laugh. Or at least he laughed until Link stood next to him and shook himself much like a wet dog, and he found himself wet.
That's when Kilik caught sight of the four. He couldn't help but laugh at the sight of the sopping wet quartet. Wait a second? Where did the blond girl come from? "Talim!" He called. Talim's ears perked up and Link leaned over to whisper something in her ear and her chocolate eyes took on a mischievous gleam.
Talim ran towards Kilik at top speed, hoping that he would forget her state of dryness. Fortunately, he was so happy to see her that he did, or at least he did until after she collided with him. He shook his head once he realized he had been the target of a Talim/Link trick. He wrapped his arms around the wet girl anyway. "Miss me?"
Talim smiled up at him, before rubbing her wet hair across his chest, effectively getting him more wet. "You missed all the fun!" She exclaimed with a wry grin upon her face. When she saw Kilik smile she noticed that it failed to reach his eyes. "What is wrong?"
"Nothing. Well something. But, perhaps we can talk about it later." Kilik answered. Talim reached up to tuck a piece of his hair behind his ear and nodded before extracting herself from his grasp to watch the approach of three others.
"YUNSUNG!" The red headed woman yelled once her eyes caught sight of a certain Korean swordsman.
Yunsung swallowed thickly and his breathing became more shallow. Cassandra eyed him curiously. Link smiled and whispered to him, "Friend of yours?"
"YUNSUNG do you have any idea how hard I have been trying to find you? You MUST return home this instant. You are needed in the fighting." Seung Mina continued ranting as she approached the young man whose face was draining of all color.
"But Seung Mina, what about Soul Edge?" Yunsung asked quietly, having lost his voice somehow. Xianghua was watching the exchange with only mild interest, her attention mostly focused on Maxi who seemed to be eyeing the other woman too much for her taste and her clenched fists were a good indication of that.
"Let older people take care of it. You are but a child." Seung Mina scowled him. "If father found out I let something happen to you he'd disown me! I don't know why I gave you that sword you carry if you are only going to use it for selfish gains."
"That's not true." Cassandra interjected.
"Who are you?" Xianghua demanded finally noticing another female. She cast Kilik a dirty look of I-told-you-so.
"She is Cassandra. She also possessed a shard of Soul Edge. We watched her defeat a great foe whom we refer to as Charade." Talim answered.
"She says we need to go to Greece." Yunsung added.
"You need to go home!" Seung Mina immediately retorted.
"Seung Mina, why do you not join in our quest to destroy Soul Edge. I am sure that with your help we shall be able to defeat the evil much quicker. The quicker we destroy it, the quicker Yunsung may return home having fulfilled his part in this battle." Kilik played the peacemaker, his favorite role.
Seung Mina looked at him skeptically, then back towards Yunsung. Then she walked towards Kilik and placed a hand upon his forearm and smiled endearingly at him. "I would love to fight beside you Kilik."
Kilik shifted uncomfortably when he felt the unhappy stares of Talim, Link, and Maxi.
"I'm sorry to interrupt, but I really must go to Greece. My Athenian gods have spoken with me and revealed that to be my next destination if I wish to aid in the destruction of Soul Edge." Cassandra spoke, gaining everyone's attention.
"We should go to Greece." Yunsung announced.
"No! Must go to France!" Link cried, unhappy with all the turn of events.
"But we must go to Greece." Yunsung argued with him.
"Perhaps we should go to both." Maxi replied, looking thoughtful. "I will continue on to France with Link and Xianghua. The rest of you should go to Greece."
"Talim goes with Link." Link informed the group.
Kilik narrowed his eyes at Link, unsure of the elf's motives. Just when you think you can trust an elf he goes and demands your girl travel with him. "I go with Talim." Kilik replied and was pleased when Link looked at him and shrugged noncommittally.
"All three of us can't go to France." Maxi countered, referring to the original warriors from four years prior.
"Link must go to France. Talim and Kilik come to France with Link." Link replied, making the decision for them all, as if it should have been the obvious solution.
"I'm the one with the ship!" Maxi complained. "I'm the captain, I make the decisions." Link gave Maxi a dangerous look and the pirate backed down a bit.
"Exactly, you have the ship and Greece is further." Kilik answered wisely.
"Perhaps I too should go to France." Seung Mina replied, keeping her eyes on Kilik.
Maxi looked at her confused. "But I thought you wanted to stay around Yunsung?"
"He's a big boy. I'm sure he'll be fine." Seung Mina replied, not moving her eyes from Kilik's tone physique.
Link pulled out his boomerang and hit the woman upside the head with it. It didn't hurt, he practiced the trick plenty on Yunsung and it only stung a little. "No. Link, Talim, and Kilik go to France. Not you."
"Why should the elf get to decide?" Seung Mina pouted, rubbing her sore head.
"Perhaps the elf knows more about what we are dealing with in France than you do. Therefor, I intend on trusting his judgement." Talim replied, doing her best to sound cool, calm, and collected. First off, no one is allowed to flirt with her Kilik. Second, when did he become her Kilik? Third, obviously because of the fact that Link is an elf he knows more than they would, right?
Seung Mina finally looked closer at the girl that was speaking to her. Then everything seemed to click in her head and she realized that Kilik seemed to belong to Talim. She smiled at the young woman after realizing this and moved further away from Kilik.
"My apologies, master elf, if you feel my services to be better served in Greece I will heed the advice." Seung Mina replied before marching over towards Yunsung and grabbing him roughly by the ear. "You have a lot of explaining to do young man." She told him yanking the appendage hard.
"So, let me get this straight. We are dividing into two groups, again? One headed for France and the other to Greece." Maxi clarified. "My ship is to head for Greece."
"I will make sure our mission in France follows precisely as we had planned." Kilik reassured his friend. "We will simply need to purchase passage by some other means."
"Do we have the resources for such a division?" Talim asked, remembering how important money seemed to be in this society.
Kilik lifted his coin purse from his belt and lifted it. "Maybe." He replied.
Link started laughing and opened his own purse revealing many rubies. "Link have resources."
"Okay, fine. When do we meet back up? In three weeks perhaps?" Maxi asked, making sure that they would be organized.
"In three weeks we can not possibly reach both France and Greece." Kilik replied thinking through several mathematical equations in his head to reassure himself that the timetable was indeed impossible.
"Egypt then? In three weeks time?" Maxi supplied.
"Egypt it is, in three weeks. It was nice meeting you Seung Mina and Cassandra." Kilik addressed the two new females. "We will collect our belongings and find our next means of travel." Kilik informed Maxi, before he followed Talim and Link back on board the ship.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Spawn was unsure of why he was still following this group. But now he had a decision to make. Should he follow the group to Greece? He shook his head. No, France promised more action. For some reason he preferred the trio that would be heading to France.
They would soon be seeking another means of traveling. He looked down at the enchanted mask within his hands. He had scavenged the caves of Voldo and found this magical item. If he placed it over his face, he would appear as a normal human.
With this mask, Al Simmons was once again as those who knew him in his life would remember. Of course, he was cursed to this sixteenth century until he provided the demon in charge of him with Soul Edge.
It would be wise to become closer with these three. He noticed a man with horse and wagon a few miles away. He had seen that man murder three people the day before. Perhaps he would do the world a favor and rid humanity of his existence. Besides if he could take the wagon and use the mask, conveniently, he would be the transportation of those three warriors.
He also had to deal with the winds giving him away. He knew that the young woman could read it's messages. He could easily take care of that little problem as well. But, he needed to deal with one problem at a time.
He began his predatory walk towards the murdering merchant.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Kilik was walking side-by-side with Talim. Link was leading the pair towards the outskirts of town. Kilik reflected on his last conversation with Xianghua. She had pulled him aside right before he was about to leave the ship.
Xianghua had apologized for her earlier behavior. He merely smiled at her and told her that all was forgiven. Was forgiveness truly so easy to grant? He had to wonder. Maxi and he had discovered clues that Nightmare was alive in France.
He had to question whether Nightmare was worthy of forgiveness. But, then, he too was guilty of numerous murders thanks to the evil seed of Soul Edge that had rained down upon his home many years ago. His shoulders slumped at the implications. Who was Kilik to judge Nightmare?
Talim noticed the change in Kilik's posture. She placed a concerned hand upon his bicep. "Kilk, what troubles you?"
Kilik couldn't look at her. He couldn't look into chocolate eyes still full of innocence. He shrugged off her hand. "Nothing. I am just thinking."
Talim moved her hand away quickly as if it was burned. "I was just concerned." She whispered looking away.
Kilik stopped to consider his behavior. "Thank you for your concern, it is appreciated Talim." He told her sincerely. She nodded her head, but remained silent.
"Up there." Link pointed towards a tall man who was feeding his mighty horses.
"Good sir, might we offer you a proposition?" Kilik called, gaining the man's attention.
"Sure that you might, but I might not take it." The man replied in a cheerful voice, that completely put the trio at ease.
Link held up a ruby towards the man. "I think that I may be interested." The man replied with a greedy smile. He gave a great sweeping bow to the three. "My name is Al and I am an English merchant on a lonely trip to France. How may I serve thee?" Inwardly Spawn was smiling, incredibly proud of his acting skills.
Talim merely stared at the man. He was an unusual skin color. He was much darker than any other person she had seen. She glanced over towards Link and reprimanded herself. She had never seen an elf before Link either and look how well that turned out.
"As fate would have it, we are also headed towards France." Kilik replied.
"Well one of you can ride up front with me and the other two can ride in the covered portion of the wagon. You can rotate if you want. I was actually about to head out after I fed my horses and allowed them to rest a little while." Al told them, smiling, his green eyes seemed to emit an unusual energy.
Talim suddenly felt a little uneasy. Why was she not sensing any winds? It was as if something was preventing the winds from speaking to her. Kilik appeared to notice her unease and draped his arm comfortably across her seemingly frail shoulders.
He smiled down at her and then at Link who nodded his approval. "Talim and I will enjoy the comforts of the covered cart first.
~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~
Hehehe...I love the Talim/Kilik fluff and the jealousy in this fiction! It's too fun! Sorry Seung Mina fans, I mostly used her to increase the jealousy factor. Spawn sure is a shady character. I don't think I would want to travel all the way to France with him! He's so easy to "piss off" as he says in the game. Since I'm splitting the groups ¾ att of each chapter will go with wherever Talim and Kilik are, the other ¼ keeps up with the other heroes. Thanks for reading! ~Belle