Authors Note:

Wow. First time back in a long while, isn't it? This is my first YYH fanfic, so judge easily. Thanks enjoy!

PS: R and R, almost forgot!

Chapter one Circle

Life is a circle, with no beginning or end.

A young woman, barely more than a girl at fourteen, hummed tunelessly as she straightened the white cloth that served as her garments. Some knew her as Skye, but only those who would get past that ridiculous title of honor Lady. Yes, My Lady, right away, My Lady. Ugh.

But she did not let her revulsion for the meaningless word show. She let nothing show, and that served as her protection from life's thorns. She knew that she herself seemed to those around her to have a barrier around her, one that could not be passed. It made her mysterious to them, causing her to have a need of watchfulness alone in the night.

She had only herself to trust, and only her soul to guide her. In the end, what else was there? Gold? It was just metal, and meant nothing to her survival, and her spirit's preservation.

Skye's ears perked up, just as a wolf's would, for there was some embodiment of the animal in her. She was one of those strange beings content just to be. One of the creatures called WolfSister and WolfBrother. Odd that one of her kind would become a Miko, but no odder than a Fox Demon bandit to choose to become Ningen, human.

A sound nearby came to her attention, echoing in her sensitive ears, and bringing an instant reaction. She stood, and whirled to face the sounds of sticks cracking and bushes being pushed aside. It was a man, panting in his hurry to get somewhere. No, not a man….a human not much older than herself.

"Hey, lady!" he called as soon as she came into view. Skye raised an eyebrow delicately, sensing that this way he used The Word was not a title of respect, simply a statement that he did not know her name. Fine, it was almost refreshing in a way. She might live on her own, but the Miko in the village nearby was almost useless. She was sure this boy, so little older than her, wanted healing.

"What the heck is that, some kind of nightgown?" he asked this skeptically, and she could hear his mind wondering whether he really had felt a strong spirit energy, one that might mean help.

"What help do you need?"

Sharp as a needle, and her voice is the same. She wasn't quite sure what he meant, but yes, she knew her voice was sharp, yet serene, the same as it always was. The thought she had picked up this time was so tangled with strange meanings, that she gave up trying to decipher it.

"I have never heard myself compared to a needle, boy. You are odd, do you even know who I am?" Now her curiosity was piqued, who was this boy? Where did he come from, and what on earth was that he was wearing? If she didn't know better, she'd swear he was from Ningenkai.

"No. Ask me if I care."

She decided not to.

"I'm Skye. Skye Wingthorn. And no need to tell me who you are, your name is Yusuke Urameshi, and your friend is sick, yet trying to keep fighting anyway." Yusuke stopped in his tracks, eyes unconsciously wide with shock. "I advise you ignore it." she advised serenely.

He closed his eyes, and took a deep breath, then moved toward the direction he had come from, muttering something that sounded like an 'I don't want to know.'

Skye wasn't running though, and he looked over his shoulder impatiently. His glare told her without words to hurry up, or she would not remain unharmed. He looked about to strange her.

"Time and distance are irrelevant in a world where nothing exists the way it seems, and your senses cannot be trusted." Skye told him over her shoulder, ever serene, ever calm. Yusuke decided right there and then that this was some odd dream. Where else could a wolf demon be a Miko, and suddenly go from way behind him to right in front of him in the blink of an eye.

"I'm not a wolf demon. I'm not a demon at all. I'm a WolfSister." Her yellow eyes flashed with amusement, and her ears, so white on top of her head, flicked.

"Any point in asking what that is?" Yusuke's words came out in puffs as the jolting run forced air from his lungs. He didn't feel tired, so he couldn't be panting. Just the jolting, then. Wait, what? She stopped running.

"You don't know what a WolfSister is?"

"No. Keep moving."

Skye sighed, shaking her head in disbelief. "It used to be our race was revered." she noted regretfully while running with the graceful, long striding run of a wolf basking in the glee of running. She heard Yusuke's mind seeing that, and flicked her tail in amusement.

"Now our numbers have dwindled so much that the ka'anuuk is the only clan left. I wonder, are you the only one who has forgotten?" She skidded to a stop, and felt sickness, poison, in a man ahead.

He was resting, it seemed, but she could feel that the poison in him would be ignored. He wasn't going to stop for this illness, or any other that left him standing, an admirable if dangerous quality.

"So. You are Kurama, correct?" It was more a statement than a question to the one who had learned his name already from Yusuke's mind, and already she was prodding his mind for the toxin.

"Yes. How is it that you know my name?" Kurama stood, and she saw, more like felt, even, the muscles in his abdomen clench in pain he would not show. Without answering, she gently, yet firmly, forced him to sit again.

"Sit. Do not get back up." She told him sharply. Perhaps the name she had chosen, Wingthorn, was appropriate after all, she thought as she almost winced from the sharpness in her voice. Yet Skye noticed that even as her voice was as sharp thorns when it came to another's safety and health, it still held a measure of that unshakable serenity, an attitude as serene as the sky itself.

"Why…?" Kurama wanted to know. The question was finished in his mind. Why am I being made to sit? I'm only a little ill, and why should that slow us down?

"A little ill? The toxin in your system would have killed a normal human hours ago. It should have given up and been gone, but this one is holding to you. Don't try to fool me, I can feel the fever, and see the muscles clenching in pain. I'm going to help you, alright? If you do not see a well trained healer soon, you'll be hallucinating next. Fever is not something to mess with."

"Is there a Miko nearby, Lady….?" He waited patiently for her name, but she could feel the fever getting worse steadily. If left unchecked, it could dry him out and leave him crippled for life, if he even survived.

"Skye Wingthorn. Just Skye, if you please. As for a Miko, she's trying to help you, if you'll let her." Kurama's eyes closed a little at the mistake he had made, and she raised an eyebrow delicately, urging him to hurry.

"Can you help me?"