The First Installment of Card Captor: New Beginnings

Episode Three- The Judging of the Keeper

Li Keitaro sighed, remembering the stories his grandparents had told him about his great-grandparents, who had been the authors of the NeoClow deck. It had all seemed so farfetched, so interesting, to him then, but now that he was actually facing the real thing, he was beginning to have second thoughts. The three Guardians were all so different from what he had expected… the girl, Spark, was about as unprofessional as you could get; she was his age and quite childish. She was often answering pertly back at Neptune, whom she seemed to like, and always teased Darkyce rather impertinently. Neptune was another matter; he was cool. He was always calm and collected, businesslike, and he was used to authority. Every servant in the house immediately jumped to do his bidding. They also kept well out of Monsieur Darkyce's way, because he often brooded and would look fit to kill whenever someone threw him out of his reverie.

And they expected so much of him!

Just how much, he realized quite soon. Neptune had gone out of the room, but now returned, bearing a large, ornate tome and what seemed to be a pendant. Both book and pendant had the symbols of the moon, the sun, a star, and the earth on them.

"Is… is this the Clow Book and the Key?"

"No and yes," replied Neptune smoothly. "It isn't the Clow Book; it's the NeoClow Book. The Sakura Book was pink, the Clow Book black; this one, in case you haven't noticed, goes from dark purple to dark blue, and then to dark green. But you're right, this pendant is the Key."

Keitaro made a grab for it, but was stopped by Neptune's upraised hand.

"Not yet," he said.

"There are five tests. You passed the first one when you answered the call. The next test will be one for speed. You will fight the fastest Guardian--- Fire. Then the test of strength shall follow: you shall undergo my challenge. The fourth is the test of wisdom, and you shall face the oldest and wisest of the Three."

He made as if to leave. "You ought to get ready. Aurora is already waiting for you outside."

"Wait." Keitaro raised a detaining hand and grabbed Neptune's sleeve. The older boy stopped and gazed coolly at him, calmly smoothing the rumples in his sleeve. Keitaro found himself stammering awkwardly. "Um… you… er, you said there were five tests… Right?"

"Ah, yes," replied Neptune vaguely with a small, distant smile as he turned away once more to step out of the door. "You will know when the time comes."

"Oh, and by the way," he added as he disappeared into the shadowy hall with the smallest of waves, "there are some bittersweet chocolate-covered peppermint cakes in the next room… pick the ones with lots of foil."

'That was helpful,' thought Keitaro as he hurried along the hallway outside into the wide, immaculate garden of Crystal Mansion. 'What am I supposed to be doing with these? I don't like dark chocolate…' Coming out of the room Neptune had pointed out with three sweets in his pocket--- he had taken some time picking out the three with the most foil wrappings, although to what purpose he didn't know--- he glimpsed Spark outside through a large, tinted window, and he stopped a moment to watch. She was so fast! How was he supposed to compete with her speed? In fact, how could he not have noticed it? She moved--- well, she moved like light, fluid and fast. But if he really was the Captor…

She raised her head and beheld him at the window. She smiled brilliantly, waving him over. Cupping her hands to her mouth, she shouted, "Come on down!" Keitaro nodded silently. He turned and ran the rest of the way into the garden.

She smiled impishly at him, pretty and vibrant, as she explained his next task. "There are five flowers in the garden: a lily, a rose, a dahlia, an amaryllis, and a lotus. Of course there are more, but only those five among the others are special--- each holds a jewel inside it. You need to find your way through the maze---" Keitaro noticed, for the first time, that indeed there was a maze of tall hedges in the garden, and thought disconcertedly, 'I must be going blind,'--- "find the said flowers, and pick out the one with the blood ruby inside it according to clues you will find along the maze before I do. This is a test for both your mental and physical speed; I will give you five minutes' head start. The catch is this--- I know the quickest way through the maze, I know exactly which flower has the ruby, and, as you probably noticed, I am very, very fast."

Keitaro stared dumbly at her, blinking blankly.

"Fun, isn't it?" she giggled. "Your five minutes starts… now."

The would-be-Captor turned wordlessly and ran for the hedges.

Right… right… left… right… another left…

"Great, just great," Keitaro mumbled angrily a few moments later, yanking his pant leg free of the clinging hedge. As he bent to unstick it from the few unyielding thorns still fastened to it, he noticed a small slip of paper hanging on to a thorn at his eye level. Picking it out of the hedge ("Ouch!"), he read:

A multitude of skirts

Dress this pretty princess

In rainbow hues and shades…

A multitude of skirts… 'That must mean petals… it has many of them… and it must be colorful…' Well, that removed the lily. Lilies only had six petals, usually; and besides most lilies were white. Usually. And most. He went back to guessing his way out of the maze.

As the seconds ticked by, he found himself wondering what the peppermint chocolates were for. He'd heard of sugar highs, but surely that wasn't what Neptune meant? Was he supposed to get hyper on a sugar overdose? But how would that help him? Besides, he disliked dark chocolate, and had only a passing preference for peppermint. An ego-booster? It didn't seem like Neptune to be so impractical…

Keitaro walked right smack into the hedge and fell down. As he shook his head free of the jarring impact, he saw a small scrap of paper float down from he knew not where. He caught it, hoping it was another clue. It was.

If leaves were all you'd look at,

Mine would not be geometric in design,

In short they do not run in parallel lines.

Not parallel lines? The flower wasn't a monocot, then. Goodbye, lily. Goodbye, amaryllis. That left only three choices, and Keitaro quickened his pace. Four minutes gone…

Wait a minute. Was that a clearing ahead?

It was. And in the hedge, artfully spelled out with flowers, was another clue.

This is the last clue you will find,

The rest you must figure out with only your mind.

Fragrance is held in as high regard as art,

Yet I hold no fragrance in my heart.

"That's it? Just three clues?" exclaimed Keitaro, dismayed. "I don't think that's fair." And he still did not know what the candy was for. Was it supposed to make him faster?

Spark suddenly sped into view. Keitaro was taken aback at her speed; she was gaining on him, and fast. Maybe he should eat the candy… oh, why did Neptune have to make him choose those with a lot of foil? Unwrapping them would take a lot of time…

Suddenly, in a flash of insight, he understood. The sweets weren't for him to speed up; they were for her to slow down. Drawing one out of his pocket, he dropped it discreetly where she was sure to find it.

She picked it up, hardly breaking her stride, and slipped it into her own pocket. Keitaro drew another from his pocket and threw it some distance away. Brimstone faltered, and swerved to get the sweet. She hesitated briefly before putting it, too, into her pocket.

The flowers were in sight; Keitaro felt sure it wouldn't be the rose, for roses were fragrant. And he was right; Spark was making a beeline for the dahlia, just beyond the pond where the lotus lay. Keitaro now knew his goal; he removed the last peppermint from his pocket and threw it as hard as he could in the opposite direction. As he hoped, she backtracked and went to catch it.

"Well, you won," she said later as he handed her the ruby. "Although how you knew…" Her eyes narrowed into slits at the "innocent" smile the master of the house gave her, and the just-as-"innocent" lopsided grin Keitaro blessed her with. "He told you, didn't you?"

A guilty smile. "Have you never heard the tale of Atalanta and the Golden Apples, Aurora?" said Neptune softly. "It is a Greek myth…"

Keitaro's eyes narrowed. "You knew I'd think of that, didn't you?" he wondered suspiciously. Neptune nodded. "I had hoped so," he replied.

"But who was Atalanta?" pressed Aurora, her mouth full of candy. Her eyes were full of childish query; she was truly curious.

"Atalanta was a girl who was so good in sports that she could beat any man," said Keitaro. "She boasted that she would marry any man who could beat her in a footrace. Many tried… all failed. Until finally (…) asked help from Aphrodite, the goddess of love, who gave him 3 golden apples. Nobody could resist them. During the race (…) threw the first apple close by, the second further, and the third as far away as he could. Atalanta went to pick them up and lost the race. She married him, but she didn't mind because he was smart and fast."

Aurora nodded. "Ah, well, I don't mind, either," she replied carelessly, ever the optimistic child. "Not at all. Neptune would have never given me any of his precious chocolates otherwise, and I do so adore them! Peppermint cakes!" She munched contentedly on a peppermint, and sent an angelic smile to Neptune, who grinned back.

"You passed my test, by the way," she said softly to Keitaro. "The time is coming for you to face the next."

"No, not yet," replied Neptune. "Go home, child."

"We will await your return," grunted Darkyce, the only words he had spoken during the duration of Keitaro's knowing him, except for introducing himself.

"But when?"

"You will know… when the time comes."