Earth and Rain

2

San shrank back, her heart pounding irregularly in her chest. What did they mean, they wanted her? Why? What did that mean?

"You cannot be serious!" howled Mao, while Maiku growled deep in his chest, threatening each and every samurai before him.

"Brother, what can they mean? Where and why do they want to take me?" San cried desperately.

She was ignorant of men.

"San, it matters not. You are not going with them."

"Then we attack," stated Lord Asano.

"So be it!" roared Maiku. Quick as a flash of lightning, he and Mao leaped down upon the group of samurai, biting, scratching, snarling. Four or five men were already wounded sufficiently to put them out of commission.

Glaring at Lord Asano, San jumped down to do her bit, drawing the combat mask over her face again. She slashed and stabbed and wielded her dagger with every ounce of strength and agility she possessed. Lord Asano looked down at her, an unreadable expression on his face.

"Princess of Wolves, stay your hand," he said quietly, evading her attacks with infuriating ease. "Come with us quietly and we shall not bother your 'brothers' or this forest again. You shall live in my palace and partake of its luxury with me."

San did not like the way he smiled when he said, 'with me', and liked it even less when he extended a large brown hand like the head of a shovel to her.

"Princess Mononoke... San," he coaxed, "I promise I could give you more than living in this wild forest, living in that cave, could ever give you. You will learn to read and write. You will be taught the arts. You will have proper clothes and money to buy whatever you wish."

San stared up at him, incredulously. All she had was in 'that cave', was here in the Realm of the Forest Spirit with her brothers. All she had was the sapphire brightness of the sky on a clear day, in the cheeky birds that fluttered around her in flashes of feather and gleaming eye, in the cheerful rustle of the trees, and in the quiet beauty of the Forest Spirit's lake. She didn't want to learn to be a human, learn to be part of the race she despised but could not escape from. She wanted to stay a wolf and live here in peace and enjoyment with her brothers.

What could Lord Asano's palace possibly offer her that would make her want to give up this beautiful, wonderful place that had raised her as much as her mother, Moro, had done?

"Why do you want me to come with you?" she challenged, oblivious to the savagery taking place around them. It was as if they had both been transported to a separate world, and no one could touch them.

"Why you, you mean? Well," the arrogant Lord thought for a moment, "I'm not particularly sure, now that I think of it. I suppose because you would have some interesting things to say, and I want to hear them. It might be because you have lived out here for - how many years?"

San cast a swift look at him. "Seventeen years, my Lord."

"You have lived out here for seventeen years and survived so excellently. I would like you to to teach my samurai to fight the way you do," he turned his handsome head to the side and surveyed her critically. "You are quite a remarkable young girl, and I want to know you as your pets do." He jerked his head toward the snapping and snarling white blurs that were Maiku and Mao.

San felt a wave of rage pass through her. "Pets?" she cried. "They are my brothers, the only family I have left, and I am their sister! They are the only family I have ever known," she fired. "Them... and Moro, my mother."

Lord Asano looked on her, pity rampant in his coalish eyes. "You will come to know more than them."

San cast a look around her, taking everything in. It might have been the last time she saw this place.

She took a very deep breath, and wondered at the horrible nervousness in her throat.

"I wil go with you if it means saving my brothers and this forest," she said, hating every word. "But on one condition."

Lord Asano looked at her both in surprise and in enquiry.

"You will give me three days to farewell this place and everyone I love. I still do not understand why you require me in return for the abandoning of my home, but I will find out," she retorted.

To her great chagrin, Lord Asano laughed. "You are a fiery one, are you not?" he chortled. "It will be amusing to see you bow to the ways of the civilised human."

San stared helplessly at him, anger coursing through her.

"I will never," she declared.

The horrible Lord just laughed. "I agree to your condition, Princess of Wolves. Or... well, what do you prefer to be addressed as?" he asked, though his patronising tone was not lost on San.

"You will call me San," said the young wolfgirl. "That is my name, my Lord."

"Very well. San it is, then. We will return in three days, by which time I expect you to be ready to leave. Something in your eyes makes me trust your word, so I know you will not leave this forest before you are supposed to." Lord Asano cast her one last appraising look, then called a halt to the fighting.

"Mononoke San has agreed to leave with us. We need fight no more," was all he said, and the remaining living samurai ceased combat. They were gone as quickly as they had come.

San turned and ran away through the trees, feeling the leaves and branches tear at her clothing and hair. She did not stop until she came to the Forest Spirit's lake, which unlike her heart was calm and serene, bathed in the evening light. Shocked at what she had just agreed to do, she keeled over into the water, silent tears running rampant down her anguished face.

What have I done? Mother, forgive me, forgive me...

o

"How can you know she will keep her word to you, my Lord?" asked one of the samurai, on their way back to their camp at the edge of the forest.

"She is not inclined to trifle with me," Lord Asano declared. "She will come to see reason and enjoy living with me, enjoy the comforts my wealth and power may offer her. She will see," he laughed softly and stared right through the servant standing in front of him. "She will forget about her home here. And then," a smile spread over his face, "she shall become my wife and queen."