Etched In Black Ink
Sequel to The Devil's Workshop
MysticShadowWanderer

Disclaimer: Don't sue. You'll get nothing, anyhow. I don't even have a job.

A/N: w00t! Here it is, the much-anticipated (or at least not entirely forgotten) sequel to The Devil's Workshop. Please excuse any typographical errors, as I have had some brandy ice thing, and my head's not entirely on straight, and I know I'm not going to want to go back later and fix what I missed. Enjoy!

Chapter One: To Begin Again

"Don't let your son do that!"

"My son?"

"He's yours when he acts like that, do something about it!"

"What's so wrong that he's doing?"

Kaoru threw up her hands in exasperation; the man would never change. But at least he was at home now, and safe, relatively. As for his son, the child seemed, at times, hopeless. With a sigh, she hauled herself up from her seat on the porch and started across the yard to stop Kenji, who was hiding behind the slightly-opened gate, throwing stones at anyone who happened to pass by. Ignoring the squeak that he let out when she grabbed him by the arm, she fairly dragged him back toward the house.

"Momma, don't!" he pleaded. "I'll be good, I promise!"

Kaoru gave him a withering glance, as if she hadn't heard that charade too many times to count. Kenji tried to further coax her with his best possible puppy dog face, and when that failed miserably, he turned a defiant glare at her. The look was unmistakable; the child had inherited his father's deadly eyes, though without that chilling amber color, which she was thankful for; the color was more like her own but slightly darker. Still, she simply gazed back, trying her best to look irrevocably unyielding. After a few moments, Kenji grew tired of trying to stare her down and sank his teeth into the tender part of her hand. Kaoru let go with a yelp, and Kenji took the opportunity to run; he was out the gate and down the road almost before she realized what was going on.

Helplessly, she turned to her husband, who had watched the entire interaction from where he leaned against one of the beams of the porch, his face unreadable.

"Well?" she said hotly. "Go get him! It's all your fault, anyhow."

"Yes dear," he replied docilely. "I expect I'll be repaid for my efforts?"

"Of course," she purred. "I suppose I will spare you from being viciously beaten by the majority of the city when they found out that the 'freak child' is at it again."

Blinking once, Battousai smiled at her and then ambled down the road after his strayed son. Kaoru sat down heavily, pressing a hand to her head. She was very much afraid of the potential that her child had. Hopefully now that his father was home, he would be taught some manners.

How long had it been? Battousai had come home three weeks ago from Europe, where he'd been hiding since he left America shortly after Kenji was born. Kaoru and the baby had been left to fend for themselves in the outskirts of New York City for nearly five years. It was understandable, she knew that they had been in danger when they were together, but it hadn't made the separation any less painful. Not to mention the fact that Kenji had spent the first five years of his life fatherless, and was more like his father than she could handle.

The child was quick, and had a temper that Kaoru was loath to put up with. There were several places that they were no longer allowed to enter because of the boy's horrific behavior that, no matter what method she used, she just couldn't seem to control.

It wasn't that he didn't love his mother, because she could tell that he did, but the fact seemed to be that he couldn't tell right from wrong, and didn't terribly care to learn. That scared Kaoru, because it was so like Battousai that she began to worry that the boy would turn out a killer. Not only that, she would be helpless to stop him. It was his father that would have to deal with him now, because she was at her wits' end as it was, and Kenji was growing worse by the day.

"Got him," she heard, and looked up to see Battousai pushing open the gate, Kenji tossed over his shoulder easily. The child was beating his father's back with his little fists, but the man seemed to take no notice.

The sight was enough to make Kaoru smile, even after the harrowing day she'd had. This was how life was supposed to be. All three of them. Battousai set Kenji down at his mother's feet, and kept him from running off again by taking hold of the child's ear.

"Now listen, son," he began patiently. "Running away is going to do nothing but make your mother angry. And when she's angry with you, she's angry with me, too. And she's scary when she's mad." He made a face and Kenji giggled.

Kaoru lifted an eyebrow, but said nothing.

"No more escape attempts?" Battousai questioned.

"No, father," Kenji chirped earnestly. "No more. I promise."

"Good. Now, go along and go to your room. You're not going to get off that easily."

The boy scampered up the porch and into the house. Kaoru could hear him thundering down the hall into his room. She stared at Battousai in amazement.

"In five years I haven't been able to teach him to respect me, and you've been here all of three weeks, and you're already getting sincere promises out of him." She flopped down on her back in defeat.

Battousai sat at her side, shifting to brace his body over hers, rubbing his nose against hers affectionately. "Don't worry, as soon as the novelty wears off, I'm sure he'll disregard me too."

"I hope not," Kaoru sighed, reaching up to tug at Battousai's hair. "What I would do without your help, I don't know. He's out of control."

"He needs discipline in his life," Battousai countered. "He's too smart for his own good, but I can see a lot of potential in him."

That was the problem, Kaoru thought with a frown. "What do you plan to do?"

"I plan to teach him Hiten Mitsurugi."

"Do you think that's wise?"

"It will teach him self control."

"It will also teach him to kill."

"What if that's what he was meant to do?"

Kaoru closed her eyes and refused to answer. She'd killed before, because of Battousai, and she'd killed again (Battousai didn't know yet, and she was almost afraid to tell him), but only because she'd had to. Did she want her son to be a murderer? Did she have a choice? His father was still a hitokiri, of course, but he was a rather special case.

"I shouldn't have left you for so long," Battousai whispered, his lips brushing against her cheek.

"You had no choice," she murmured.

"I missed you too much." He bent his head down to nip at her earlobe and then, finally, pressed his lips to hers. She returned his kiss eagerly, but when his hands began to roam, she shoved him away.

"Not out here," she admonished.

Battousai gave her a pathetic look. "You've made me wait for so long."

"Not out here," she repeated. "And Kenji likes to come in my... our... room without knocking."

"Then lock the damn door!"

Kaoru smiled at him and took his hand in hers. "Tomorrow we will find someone to care for him, and you can do whatever you want with me for the entire day."

Battousai's eyes lit up, and Kaoru laughed. He was like a child on Christmas morning.

"Go find something to keep you occupied," she said.

"Tonight, then," he replied, "I am going to start training our son."

Kaoru watched as Battousai showed Kenji how to hold the sword; the man refused to let his son learn with a bokken or anything less than a katana. That put Kaoru on edge, because the child was not much more than five years old, and could hardly be expected to be able to handle the weight and length of a katana without some sort of mishap. At this rate, she would die of heart complications before she had her thirtieth birthday.

Surprisingly, Kenji was doing just fine, if not better than that. For being little more than an infant, Kaoru could see from across the yard his intense concentration and desire for perfection. She wasn't sure how to react to that, whether to be pleased or frightened. As for Battousai, he was clearly pleased.

Somehow Kaoru suspected that Battousai had hardly anticipated coming home at long last to a half-wild five year old that was far too wise and mature for his young age. She had always supposed, and it was no different now, that he acted older than he was because of what he was. Exactly he was, of course, she wasn't entirely sure. If she used mathematical terms, it made sense that he was three-fourths mortal. But when she stopped to think about it, Battousai was semi-mortal, not half-mortal, and that made a difference. She dropped her head in her hands with a moan; all this thinking was giving her a headache. It wasn't always this hard for her to think about things; indeed, she used to contemplate many deep and meaningful issues, especially after she'd met Battousai, but Kenji had worn her down, and she often got little sleep during the nights. Maybe with Battousai home, that would change.

"Good!" Battousai's words drifted to her ears, and she smiled in spite of herself. "I think that's enough for today. Now go on, get to bed."

Kenji followed his father's every instruction, pausing to jump on his mother and hug her tightly. Kaoru winced at first due to the pain the jolt caused her head, but wrapped her arms around her son and kissed him on the cheek. She pulled away and rumpled his hair affectionately.

"You heard your father, it's bedtime." She smiled at him as he shuffled into the house and toward his room, reluctant to be sentenced to sleep after such an exciting day. Kaoru wasn't sure whom it had been more exciting for, the child or his parents, at least one of which would love to sleep at that moment.

"You look tired, love," Battousai said as he settled himself next to her. "Too tired. Are you coming down with something?"

"I don't know, maybe," Kaoru admitted. "I'm not as young as I used to be," she added.

Battousai scoffed, though she thought he had no right to, being what he was. "Twenty-three is not very old, darling." He looked at her with a completely serious expression. "I'd say you have at least another year before your hair starts greying and you begin to get wrinkles."

They stared at each other for a moment before Kaoru began to laugh. His sense of humor had matured since she'd first met him, mostly in the fact that he actually had one. After spending two years with her, she'd practically forced him to see some of the light in life and that not all humor had to be cynical.

"Why don't you get to bed, too?" Battousai commanded more than asked.

"But there's still so much to do," she argued.

"I'll take care of it."

"But-"

"I'll take care of it," he reiterated. "You need to sleep. After all, tomorrow's a big day." He grinned at her, his eyes glinting dangerously. "Now go, before I change my mind and decide to take you here and now."

That was enough to motivate Kaoru to get up and go into the house. Battousai sat staring out at the setting sun, thinking about the life that he had now. He quickly concluded that life had been far too kind to him, but that he missed the year he'd spent with Kaoru, running around Japan and then America. The sense of irresponsibility and the lack of need to change that was sorely missed by the side of him that was reckless. Yes, he loved Kaoru, and loved his son, but part of him wanted to be out traveling again. He was a wanderer, pure and simple. The boy would grow up fast, though, perhaps too fast, and he would then have his chance to be free again. Kaoru, of course, would come with him, and he could go back to his life of careless freedom.

Then there was the fact that it was much harder to find anyone here to employ him. He had bought Kaoru a nice house in a nice neighborhood, which made it difficult for him to find the type of people he typically dealt with. It was a good distance from the shadier parts of town, and he was beginning to think that perhaps they would have to move.

Everything would have to take place in its due time, though. For the moment, he had tomorrow to look forward to, and he could spend the entire night with his lover tucked in his embrace. Life was too kind to him, he decided. Something had to go wrong, and soon, because things did not work like this for him.

A/N: Yay. We have started another fun-filled odyssey with my mentally fucked up characters. I'm excited. I don't have any clue where I want to go with this story, but I guess I'll figure it out. Much thanks to bloodofinnocence, who hounded me until I actually started writing this fic. Unfortunately, I've become extremely lazy and tired this summer, more so than usual, though I'm not sure why (it may be the short hours of sleep I get because I go to bed at four in the morning...), so I don't know how often updates will be coming. I'm not feeling very inspired to do anything besides watch reruns of old sitcoms lately. It's pathetic really... I sit around and eat, watch TV, and every so often go out and party, and that's about it. Summer school just completely sucked me dry, I am dead tired. Don't expect frequent updates, though I'll try my best. Ja ne!