Disclaimer: I don't own Fushigi Yuugi.

Chapter One

A New Friend

Chichiri sat on the bank of a river, he was fishing for food while the others made camp. He always loved fishing, it was so calming and it gave him time to think. He was wondering what the others were up to when he heard Miaka,

"Chichiri do you have ANY food yet?" Chichiri shook his head and yelled back,

"It won't come if I just snap my fingers. No da." Chichiri looked back at the river it was flowing rapidly towards the south or towards his left.

"But I'm so hungry." Complained Miaka. Chichiri igorned her and kept on fishing. While he was fishing he noticed he was all alone and he removed his mask so that he could think better.

Half an hour later with a small basket full of fish Chichiri packed up his fishing gear. He was about to head back towards camp when he heard something.

"Get away from me!" Shouted a female voice that wasn't Miaka or Nuriko's. To the north of Chichiri on his right he saw a young woman walk backwards out of the woods and towards the river.

Two men came out of the trees after her, it looked like they were slave traders. The young woman glanced behind her and spotted the river, she turned back towards the men and shouted once more,

"I'm warning you. GET AWAY FROM ME!" The men took another couple of steps towards her. The young woman took a step back and her heel got caught on a root, she stumbled and fell backwards into the river.

"Hold on!" Chichiri dropped his stuff and he jumped into the river to get the girl who was struggling to stay up above the current.

Chichiri grabbed the girl's hand just as Miaka and the others showed up to see what was going on. Seeing the danger that Chichiri and the girl were in Nuriko grabbed a rope from Chichiri's stuff and tossed towards the two of them. Chichiri grabbed the woman around the waist and then grabbed the rope.

While Nuriko was pulling the two of them in Tasuki ran over to the two men. Even though the two slave traders were across the river they looked really nervous at the sight of his anger and then ran. Tasuki turned around towards Chichiri and the young woman,

"I can't beleive some people." he said.

The young woman was barely concious but was begining to open her eyes and look around. Miaka noticed that when her eyes began to open Chichiri started looking frantically around the clearing for his mask. Moments later Chichiri found his mask and he was about to put it on when the girl saw him her eyes not quite focused except for a moment, her eyes slid out of focus again and she passed out entirely.

Chichiri stopped, he had seen somthing, disregarding his mask entirely he picked the woman up again. On the right side of her neck was a great scar that ran just past her shoulder. On her right shoulder was part of a scar that continued on the girl's back.

"What a terrible scar." Said Chichiri. The others looked as Chichiri ran his index finger along the scar on the woman's neck.

"I wonder what the one on her back looks like." Nuriko said noticing the part of another scar on the woman's shoulder. Miaka walked up to the woman and proped her up then she carefully found a way to slip the back of the woman's outfit down without showing anything but the scar on the woman's back

Everyone gasped there was a great slash that ran across the woman's back and onto her right shoulder. Nuriko put his hand over his mouth,

"Who could have done such a thing to her?" He asked as Miaka fixed the woman's outfit so that she was covered up again and laid her on the ground. Chichiri had put his mask back on but he was unusually quiet.

"What a great scar. I agree with Nuriko who could have done somthing like that to her?" Said Tasuki.

"It was an angry villager from the town I used to live in." Everyone jumped the woman was awake. She did not get up but coninuted her story her back to them, "My name is Elenya I am a preistess from a town not far from here. One day when I was out complaining to the lord over the village that we needed new medicines a man came up to me and said that his son was desprately ill. I ran over to his house but unfortunately due to our village's lack of medicines there was nothing I could do for the boy and he died." Elenya sighed and then continued,

"I was walking home later that night when he and a group of men attacked me. They did this to me," She touched the scar on her neck and back. "but that wasn't all they did, they began to beat me terribly and then..." Elenya hand tightened on her robes. "In their anger they broke my back. Right between my shoulder blades." Elenya's voice began to shake. "They would have killed me if young man hadn't saved my life and taken me to Tai Yi-Jun. I never did learn the young man's name but Tai Yi-Jun healed my broken back and then she helped me learn how to use my spiritual powers. I asked her not to heal the scar so that I would always remember my failure and try harder."

"That's terrible, I'm so sorry." Said Miaka. Elenya reached up and pulled the chop stick that was holding her black hair up, out but she didn't let her hair fall, instead she just tightened it and put the chopsick back. Then she turned around and faced the others, she had bright green eyes that were shining with friendliness.

"Thanks for helping me." She said standing up and turning to go.

"Wait!" Miaka called. Elenya turned around, "Come and stay with us for a while." Elenya smiled,

"Thank you I could use some friends." She said with a smile.