They didn't wait until after dinner this night. The sun was level with the windows and the bell had yet to toll when Zoro heard the footsteps, many pairs, slow as funeral bearers.

He wasn't sure when Sanji had slipped from that half-waking nightmare into restless slumber, hadn't moved for a long time after the rise and fall of his crewmate's chest had slowed and steadied, the blond head a heavy weight against his shoulder. It was too warm, that close, but the way Sanji shivered sporadically even asleep and in his jacket, he needed it. No strength in him left to burn for heat.

Aware that it wasn't over yet, Zoro eventually extricated himself, careful not to disturb his crewmate or knock him off the couch. Sanji's hands were fisted around his shirt and Zoro had to pry those long fingers free; they locked over the pillow instead, and Sanji mumbled something, but didn't rouse any further when Zoro dropped the couple blankets on top of him.

After collecting his swords from where he had thrown them, Zoro took a seat on the rug in front of the silk screen, crossed his legs and rested his chin on his fist and watched Sanji sleep. His repose was troubled for a while, as he rolled back and forth, twisting himself up in the blankets and muttering unintelligibly, before settling into a deeper sleep, so still he made Zoro uneasy. Past a certain point, a man cannot be awoken, but he didn't know how one could tell. Chopper would know for sure; without their doctor's knowledge Zoro could only guess, and while usually he trusted his instincts, there was already so damn much wrong here that he found himself atypically questioning his course. Twice he began to call Sanji awake, and stopped himself; he was standing to go examine him more closely when he heard the priests on the stairs.

With a glance over his shoulder to make sure his crewmate was still out, Zoro slid open the screen, stepped into the corridor and shut it again. By the time the first man mounted the final step, he had drawn his white katana.

The high priest stopped, raised his broad arms to halt his retinue behind him. His gray eyes met Zoro's across the short passage. "It's time," he said.

"For the last death."

The bearded man nodded.

"He might be surprised to hear that," Zoro said. "He didn't believe sixth death actually happened, before. He thought it was real."

The high priest said nothing, but the couple lesser priests on the stairs behind him dropped their heads, remorsefully.

Zoro hadn't realized how angry he truly was; the effort to keep his voice steady and low enough not to disturb his sleeping crewmate was almost too much. "You bastards, you and your damn ceremonies, you could've told him--"

"The deaths of the goddess are hers to mete out," said the high priest. "We know nothing of them, can tell nothing of what may happen."

"You could've at least reminded him that it wasn't real!"

"Real?" the high priest asked, his dark brows rising up to his cap. "The goddess is real; what the goddess does--"

"Is a fucking lie, and you know it. You were there, weren't you, watching. You damn well know none of them were really there--none of our crewmates were killed. She wouldn't, would she, your goddess, she's not into arbitrary murder--she likes the time to play with her victims, really gets into their pain. All these ceremonies--"

"It's not like that!" Even if he hadn't recognized that high soprano, he would have known it was the priestess from the way the priests on the stairs deferentially shied back. The high priest himself stepped aside to let her pass, though his beard did little to hide his dismayed expression. The little girl marched by him into the corridor, only to halt abruptly when she saw Zoro's drawn sword, her eyes going round. "The goddess--" she stammered, timidly, "the goddess isn't like that..."

She had been there this morning; Sanji had mentioned her, and she had said herself that the priestess must be there for the goddess's deaths. She had been watching with the rest of the audience, however many it had been. Zoro ignored her, looking over her head to her father. "How'd you do it?" he demanded. "How'd you make him see it, how'd you get him to believe it?"

He endured the high priest's study for a long moment before the man said, quietly, and without the weight of rhetoric that usually resounded in his baritone, "A man two days without water will see things that aren't there. And more, if it's what the goddess wishes."

"So it was just a hallucination?" Zoro frowned, thinking of Sanji's bloodstained shoes. Couldn't have been entirely a delusion; hallucinations don't bleed...

"More than that," the priest told him. "What happens is not a lie--it is true, as true to them as whatever we witnessed--"

"I don't care about truth," Zoro said, "but it wasn't real. It didn't actually happen. --most of it, anyway," and he looked past the high priest at the men crowded behind him. "So how many of you did he kill?"

"None," the high priest said. "All three will live, our healers assure us."

Zoro smiled, must have been grimly by the way the other priests shrank back. The little priestess ducked behind her father's robes. "Weren't expecting that much fight left in him, were you?"

"We were to blame," the priest accepted. He didn't twitch, even under the full force of Zoro's narrow-eyed glare. "There should have been more of us ready to restrain him. We knew he's a warrior, but we weren't prepared for that violence."

"You just expected him to do nothing, showing him something like that--"

"We didn't know would happen," the high priest spoke over him. "The deaths of man are the same for all, determined only by the sinner's endurance; but the deaths of the goddess are different for every man. Death of blood, death of the past, that can be guessed. But the death of the future, there's no way to tell. An artist might go blind, a father lose his children...we had no way of telling he would strike at us...or anyone. But we still should have been ready." He subjected Zoro to another examination, sharp gray eyes passing him up and down. "And you, you're uninjured? It's not unheard of for the attendant to be attacked...or worse."

Zoro snorted. "That damn cook couldn't take me out even when he's in top condition." If Sanji had attacked him for real, not just trying to goad him, if maybe Sanji had blamed him...if he had seriously had to defend himself... "If he'd tried, he'd have been in more trouble than me."

The high priest only nodded. "Neither is that unknown."

Zoro had lowered the sword, though not sheathed it; now his fist clenched around the hilt. "What do you mean?"

"My daughter told you, didn't she," and the priest down glanced at the girl, unable to help his forbidding countenance from softening a little, though it hardened to stone again when his gaze returned to Zoro. "The final ceremonies are rarely survived."

"Rarely," Zoro repeated, harshly. "You mean, never. Right?" The knot of anger in his belly tightened until he felt ill. "And you thought I might do your work for you, this time around. That I'd believe what he saw, you were hoping I'd kill--"

"No." The flicker of those gray eyes away might count as a flinch from this man. "I never feared such. You're a warrior, a pirate, and violence is your way, but what I have seen of you--even knowing what he would tell you, I didn't doubt that he would live for this ceremony."

"He didn't live for that," Zoro said flatly. "That was it. You're done with him."

"The sooner the seventh ceremony is completed, the sooner--"

"There's not going to be any seventh death," Zoro replied, and raised his sword. "You've all done your thing, the goddess had her chance at him. It's enough. This is over."

"Not yet," said the high priest. "I'm sorry. There's yet the final ceremony."

"Forget it."

"I am sorry," the priest repeated, and then he bowed, so low he almost bent double. "Please let us pass. There's not much time before nightfall--"

"No," Zoro said. "He's done enough for you already; he won't make it through another one. Not now. He agreed to do this, I know. And what he let you do to him, what the goddess did, it doesn't have anything to do with me. But you're the one who asked me to be attendant. And the truth is--truth is, if you knew our captain, you'd know we can't afford to lose our cook."

He brought his sword up to his mouth, clamped his teeth around the rough wrap and smooth metal of the hilt while he drew the other two katana and raised them, deadly blades crossed before him. "You are not touching him."

The passage was narrow, stone walls close enough that extending his arms he might brush both sides with his fingertips. There wouldn't be room for anyone to slip past his swords, even if the whole temple charged at once. He set himself, blades tilted outward, the metal gleaming crimson through the red haze over his eyes. The cursed katana was singing up and down its steel length, almost shaking in his hand in time with the pounding of his heart. He'd sat and done nothing for too damn long.

But they didn't charge him, not all at once, or any of them. Only the high priest moved at all, and that was to advance with deliberate, unguarded steps, until he was just within the blades' range. He had no weapon, his hands empty as he raised them, fingers spread, palms out. "I am sorry," he said a third time. "There's no choice. Let us pass. Or stop me now."

"Papa!" wailed the priestess.

The bitter determination in those stone-gray eyes was enough to cool Zoro's rage, but ice could damage as much as fire, and the frozen knot in his gut was so tight it was hard to breathe around it. He stayed still, braced with the swords ready. If the high priest took one more step...

"Papa, please," the priestess sniffled.

"Lonlin, stay back," the high priest said sharply, his composure cracking a hair, though he didn't look back.

"But..." and she shuffled forward in her robes. Her eyes were wide and glistening with tears, welling up and catching in her lashes. "Do we have to, Papa? He's--he did all this already, and now, this time..."

"Have faith in the goddess," the high priest said.

"But she hurt him already. This morning," and she shivered, "he was hurting so much, I thought he'd...even when he was fighting Berski and the others, he wasn't trying to hurt them, really, he was just..."

"Lonlin," the high priest said, "there's no other way--"

"No," Zoro said. "There is."

Before the priest could move, he had flipped the cursed katana around, punched his fist curled around the hilt into the large man's jaw, knocking him to the floor. In the same motion, rather than pulling back, Zoro continued twisting into the blow, sweeping low the other katana as he rocked forward into a crouch. The blade stopped a finger's breadth from the little priestess's chest.

It took every ounce of restraint he possessed to keep that point steady, locking his muscles to unmovable rock. The priestess was just as motionless, but her eyes raised to his, and he was startled to see no new tears flowing, her little mouth set too firm for a pout.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw the high priest pick himself up off the floor. "One other way, right?" Zoro asked him, or thought he did; it didn't quite sound like his own voice speaking. "You told me so when it started. Any ceremony for this? Or can I just do it?"

The priest's mouth was moving but nothing was coming out. "How about it?" Zoro demanded. "You can call this off. Or I'll end it the other way."

"You--you cannot. Please." The man clasped his hands, bowed his head over them as he knelt before Zoro. "Please, do not--"

Zoro's katana moved in his hand, and only his iron control kept his reflexes in check. The priestess had stepped forward, until the tip of the sword pressed to her chest, slanting down toward her heart, scraping against the beads and creasing the white and blue robes. Her arms at her side, she raised her chin to look up at him, all trembling bravery. "It's all right."

"Wha--"

"Lonlin!"

"Papa," she said, still staring up at Zoro, "I don't want to kill anybody. It would be my fault, and I don't want him to die. So this is all right."

Zoro drew back his sword slightly, so the blade's point was only brushing her robes. "Yeah," he said. "It'll be all right. Just let me take him back to our ship, we'll leave and we'll never come back to this island. Your goddess doesn't have to know--"

"We can't do that," the high priest said, quietly, remorsefully.

"Then what are you going to do?" Zoro growled. "You think I'm not serious? I'll do what I have to if you don't give me a choice. I'm a pirate, after all. Don't think I'll hesitate."

"None of us have a choice," the high priest murmured, and the priestess shook her head.

"She sees. She knows," the girl whispered. "So there's only this way." She closed her eyes, inhaled so her chest swelled toward the sword.

Zoro stared. The corridor wasn't nearly as warm as the room, but he could feel sweat trailing down his back. His fingers gripped the hilts so tightly they were cramping, as if each blade weighed more than a boulder. "How crazy are you? Just forget the damn goddess, that's all you have to do."

"To forget our gods would be to forsake all the people of Satva," the high priest told him. "The pirates of the Grand Line, the storms of this region--this city didn't exist before their protection. We owe the safety and prosperity of this island all to them."

"So that protection's worth a couple sacrifices. A little blood, for the good of everyone. And he isn't even one of you."

"No. He is not." How could the man sound so calm, with his daughter's life balanced on the point of Zoro's sword? Not angry, not even afraid, just sad, regret heavy in his tone. The priestess wasn't trying to get away--she couldn't have possibly been fast enough to escape, but her slippers might as well have been glued to the floor. And the high priest was doing nothing to save her, however useless the attempt might have been, just saying, quietly, "But he is your crewmate, and you will do what you must."

Zoro looked from his set expression, to the little priestess with her eyes squeezed shut. All three katana were drawn and ready and yet he felt exposed; that deadly sharp steel might as well have been painted wood, just blunt, useless stage props.

Losing, as he had sworn to Luffy he would never again, but he recognized the bitter taste of it in the back of his throat, almost gagged.

In less than a second, with hardly an effort at all, he could finish this; he could win with just one quick and simple stab. He was a pirate, a wanted man, and they had to guess how much blood was on his hands already. And yet she didn't move, and the priest just watched him, mute and passive, and neither of them answered when he cried, "What the hell is wrong with you!?"

Instead, an unexpected voice behind him said, "What the hell is wrong with you?" and before Zoro could turn, a hard shoe slammed into his stomach with enough force to drive the air from his lungs and knock him back a step.

He hadn't even heard the screen slide open, much less his crewmate wake up; his own fault, for not paying closer attention, and that kick hadn't been powerful enough to actually hurt. "Sanji, you--shit!"

Sanji's knees were buckling, his face bloodless white. Zoro dropped his swords and lunged, caught him before his head cracked against the stone wall behind him. "Idiot," he said, pulling the cook upright and looping an arm around his back to hold him there, "watch it!"

"You stupid swordsman," Sanji rasped, his breath short and his head down, so that Zoro could only see a circle of blond hair. "What the hell do you think you're doing?"

The high priest had taken his daughter's shoulder, drawn her back and moved in front of her, watching them with his face as inscrutable as ever. "You know what I was doing," Zoro said.

Sanji forced up his head, shrugged off Zoro's arm and leaned his shoulder against the wall to support himself instead. One hand came up to absently rub his temples as he looked across the hall at the high priest. "Sorry," he said. "I'm sorry about that. Forget him. I'm ready now."

The large man nodded, advancing a step and extending a hand toward Sanji. "If you'll come--"

"He won't," Zoro said flatly, and pushed between them, crouching to retrieve his white katana as he moved.

"Get out of my way," Sanji snapped. "I'm going."

"We're going," Zoro told him, not glancing back. "We're getting the hell out of here." Hooking his boot under his second katana, he kicked it up into his hand and crossed the blades, the steel ringing. "Screw the goddess, screw the ceremony, screw this whole damn island--"

"No." And now Zoro did look at him, because he didn't recognize that tone, not anger and not pride, not anything he was used to hearing from Sanji. The cook had pulled himself upright, lifted his chin, only his hand splayed against the wall betraying his dizziness. "I'm going with them. Alone. Like I said I would." His gaze went straight past Zoro to meet the high priest's eyes. "I'm ready to get this over with."

He started forward, relying on the wall's stability while he concentrated on putting one foot after another, and Zoro wouldn't have needed any swords to stop that slow progress; he could have knocked Sanji over with one finger, but he didn't. Instead he took his crewmate's arm, muttering, "Idiot," and wondering which one of them he actually meant.

"You don't think I'm strong enough?" Sanji said, with sarcasm so thick it could smother, but though he stumbled even with Zoro's support, the resolution in his narrowed eyes was unwavering. He had made his choice, and once made, that decision, the decisions of any of his crewmates, were as indissoluble as Zoro's own.

No point to fight it, so he didn't. But Zoro was careful in his reply. "No. I don't. Why else would I need to save your ass?" And was rewarded by the anger that flared in Sanji's eyes, a little color flushing back into his face. His crewmate shoved him away, teetered and found his equilibrium, covering the last couple strides alone, and then the high priest steadied him with an impartial grip on his arm.

"Just forget it," Sanji said over his shoulder as he started down the stairs, the little priestess hurrying at his side, as if there were anything she might do to help him. "Just go. I told you before, this has nothing to do with you. It was my fault."

And now he did recognize that strange flat note in Sanji's voice, obscured by his misleading calm. Zoro pounded down the stairs, shoved in front of them and spread his arms to bar their way. The priests around them scrambled back with such alacrity that they tripped down several steps to avoid his swords, though their high priest didn't balk.

"Tell him," Zoro commanded, glaring up at the man. "That last ceremony, tell him it wasn't real."

Sanji flinched, looked away. "It didn't happen," Zoro growled. "They're all alive--tell him!"

"I cannot."

"You son of a bitch--"

"Leave him alone, Zoro. It was the goddess. It was me. Not any of them." Sanji continued descending, sliding his hand down the stone, passing Zoro without a glance.

Zoro turned with him, sheathed his katana and dropped a hand on his shoulder to stop him. "Sanji, listen to me. This bastard told me himself, it was just a damn trick--"

"Or he was lying to you." Sanji's whole frame was wired so taut his shoulders trembled under his jacket. "You didn't see it. You don't understand. Let me go, Zoro." He pulled away.

"Sanji!" Zoro followed him down the stairs to the next landing, ignoring the priests falling back from them as if their touch might be poisonous. "Dammit, Sanji, it was just one of the ceremonies--if it wasn't, then what are you doing now? If they didn't finish the sixth, why is this one the last one--Sanji, listen--"

"Please."

A sharp tug on his haramaki brought him to a halt. The little priestess had taken hold of his sash, her fingers curled into the folds of green fabric as she rocked back on her heels. Her small weight was hardly enough for him to notice, and the empty hall afforded her no purchase, no doorway for her to brace herself against, but she clung anyway. "Please, don't," she whispered. "He can't hear you, the goddess won't let him. He has to do this, so it will be over, and she won't hurt him anymore. He's strong, right? You p-promised he was strong..."

Sanji was far enough down the next flight that he was passing around the curve of the tower, out of sight. "You can't do this to him, there's got to be another way--"

"There is," she said, tremulously.

Zoro exhaled, feeling like all his strength was rushing out with the air, as if this girl's little hands really were enough to hold him here. "No," he said. "That doesn't count. It's not a choice." His ribs weren't even sore; the bastard cook had known he couldn't do it, or he would have really meant that kick.

"Then this is the only way." The high priest loomed before him. Silver gleamed in his hand--the cursed katana, but before Zoro could draw the other two, the man extended the sword toward him, hilt first. "Trust your friend," he said.

"It's your damn goddess I don't trust." Zoro closed his hand around the hilt. "So where are we going for this?"

"Not you," the high priest said. "As before, you cannot come--the goddess wouldn't allow the ceremony if you accompanied us, and if it isn't accomplished tonight, we would have to wait for the next sunset."

"Tomorrow?" Another twenty-four hours, and Zoro froze. Even if the crew didn't come looking for them by then--and how powerful was this damn goddess, really?--another day without water...

"There's little enough time left now," the high priest murmured. "There's no other way," and then he had moved, faster than a man his size should be able, quick enough that Zoro didn't have time to do more than bring up his sword. But the priest wasn't going for him, but the wall behind him.

He pressed his hand to the carved stone, gliding his fingers down the grooves of a narrow oval symbol, and there was a low grinding noise, rock scraping rock. Part of the wall slid away, a dark, rectangular gap in the hall's smooth curve. Zoro half-turned toward it, readying himself for whatever might emerge from that gloom.

What he wasn't prepared for was the priest's massive fist driving into his chin, a refund for his punch before and then some, which knocked him back, stumbling, into the hole.

He made out the outlines of a broad chamber around him, tiled floor under his feet and the ceiling lost in shadow overhead, and then the stone dropped down again over that portal, only just missing his toes. He had one glimpse of the little priestess's white, shocked face, and then he stood in pitch blackness.

to be continued...

Whoops, thunderstorm - must post and run, as always, thanks for reading, and reviewing!