Chapter Twenty Three

Misty Dreams

Card Captor Sakura

starjade

A Burning

Her fingers bled. She knew it too and she didn't care. She had just finished the last shirt and she was starting the last one.

The last shirt. The last starwort shirt. Her mind thought of Yamazaki...her beautiful brother, so soulful and bright...his care for others stretching beyond rivalry and race...

The pain dulled from the memories of her brothers, she let her head fall back against the stone cold walls of her prison.

He kept visiting. It was unnerving. Every day, the Duke would walk in and laugh at her, taunt her, insult her...He was high on his triumph and on her upcoming death. He told her that Oribia had told him if he could not send Sakura back to her, to at least have her killed.

And that was exactly what he was doing.

It was sickening.

She always blanked out during these sessions. Tomoyo came down to visit a lot too and she loved her visits. She kept her sane. Tomoyo would always grow teary and Sakura hated that. She wasn't going to go down by giving up.

She would make sure her brothers lived. She didn't care what she would have to do. Her brothers would live.

Another surprise visitor was Lady Rita. She came down everyday. She shouted at Sakura, yelled at her and almost always broke into sobs. Sakura now was beginning to understand why Lady Rita came down here. It wasn't only because Lady Rita was wondering why Syaoran married Sakura or why he would choose her, scrawny and swollen hands, dirty and filthy with strange features and even stranger habits...over Lady Rita, who was gorgeous and perfect in every way. Infact, Lady Rita did indeed have a heart...Sakura was not to be fed more then bread and water, but Lady Rita brought down rice, meat and other food that Sakura was eternally grateful for.

Lady Rita was defying the orders of her father in her own way.

Sakura flinched as a particular painful thorn dug its way underneath the sensitive part of her hand and she had to bite down on her lip to keep herself from making any sound.

She tried not to think of Syaoran. She tried not thinking of him, the fact that she was utterly, deeply, hopelessly...

in love...

Death day was coming. And she had to finish the shirt before that day came.

She had to.

They glared at him, hard, their eyes black with anger and their brown skin glistening with sweat. Their muscles twitched and Eriol swallowed hard as he gripped onto the hilt of his sword as steadfastly as possible.

Then Eriol shouted to Meiling, " Tell them, Meiling. Tell them we're your family! Tell them!"

Meiling nodded and began shouting in a strange language. They jerked but one of them kept their eyes trained on Eriol, watching his every move.

A man walked out of the group and began to shout at Meiling in which Meiling stubbornly shook her head. And then she began to plead, and Eriol felt his heart reach out to her. She had lived with these people for who knows how long...

Then a man launched out at Eriol suddenly and his weapon struck down at Eriol with intent to kill. Eriol reflexively held his sword up and with all his strength, pushed back against the man. His sword was weak, and he grabbed onto the other end, gripping hard and feeling the blood pour from his hands and down the sword.

" Let her go," He gritted out through clenched teeth.

The man stared at Eriol, and then stood up, dropping his weapon. Then, shockingly, he began to laugh. Eriol stared at the man in absolute bewilderment and turned to Meiling. Meiling smiled at them, nodding slowly.

" It's ok. They want me to come back, but they said I could go. Let's leave quickly before they change their mind," Meiling said, hurrying over to Eriol and helping him carry Syaoran out of the clearing.

Then the same man who was shouting at Meiling came over and said something in that strange language of theirs. Meiling turned around and then ran to the man, and to Eriol's shock, kissed him.

Then she came back and picked up Syaoran's arm, helping Eriol carry him back to the horses.

Eriol stared at Meiling and Meiling smiled softly at Eriol. " You understand why I can't fight them? They're like my family." She stared at Eriol meaningfully and Eriol shook his head slowly, his eyes wide.

" You've got a little bit of Syaoran in you, Meiling," He laughed, and grabbed Meiling, holding her tightly. " I missed you...god, I missed you. I was so scared..." He muttered, and Meiling smiled, tears springing to her ruby red eyes.

" I missed all of you too...but let's get back. I heard the princess is in trouble," Meiling spoke.

Eriol nodded. Then as they were just about to gallop off, Eriol froze and reviewed Meiling's words in his mind.

Princess?

" Get out. Right now."

Sakura's head jerked up and she stared at the man in surprise. It was a guard of the Duke's and he was staring down at her nastily.

" It's time for you to burn, witch," He growled and motioned for another man, who entered Sakura's cramped cell and grabbed her arm, pullingher to her feet. Sakura, in shock, complied with the man but then she felt an icy cold feeling rush through her body, as she comprehended his words.

Time for her to burn? But...it was too early! Her execution wasn't for another few days and she wasn't finished Yamazaki's shirt!

With almost unearthly force, she pulled away from the man grabbing her and starting to smack them as hard as possible, pushing them out of her cell. Not now, not now, not now, was the only thing that went through her head as they pushed her against the wall and grabbed her arms, forcing it up her back, making her gasp with pain.

" Bitch!" He swore. " You lucky your gonna die today, because if you weren't going to, I'd kill you myself!" He let go of his hold and she dropped to the ground, breathing heavily in pain.

"Stop fooling around," The guard at the door of the prison barked. " Grab her and let's go. There's a big crowd outside waiting for the Kinomoto witch to get burned. We can't keep them waiting can we?"

Sakura, in her last desperate attempt, grabbed the basket full of the shirts as they grabbed her arm and pulled her along with them. She followed them up the stairs and down the hallway and as they walked, she heard a roar that nearly scared her out of her skin.

The roar of the crowd got louder and louder as they came closer to the doorway.

" This is your end," A familiar voice said behind her and she shuddered. Turning around, she glared with hatred at the red eyed man who stood behind her, smirking.

" Finally...you, wench, are going to die...and Oribia will reign supreme...and then once she kills off your dear little Xiao-Lang, whose going to stop me from being King of the Li Kingdom?" the Duke whispered. " Absolutely nobody."

He then grinned horridly at her, tucking a strand of dirty auburn hair behind Sakura's ear. " You have such beautiful eyes, you know that?" The duke whispered sinisterly. " If Syaoran hadn't claimed you, I would've loved to have an exotic little Kinomoto in my bed every night. Until I tired of you...those gruesome paws of yours isn't quite appealing, dear."

Sakura didn't care anymore. She felt her body stiffen at his words and when he mentioned killing Syaoran, her body seemed to pulsate with anger.

She drew her head back and spit in the Duke's face, her eyes glaring at him with anger. The Duke reared up to his full height and drew his hand back to slap her and she steeled herself for the blow but he didn't touch her.

He just smiled and laughed. " You're going to die anyways...that's enough reward for me," He whispered and then cried out in a loud voice. " Take her in!"

The guards yanked on her arms and brought her outside the doorways. Sakura's eyes automatically closed and she flinched at the light that she hadn't seen for days. The roar of the crowd grew deafening and when she opened her eyes, her jaw dropped in shock.

It seemed as if the entire kingdom had come to see her death. They jeered and booed at her, hatred clear in all of their faces. Sakura felt herself tremble and she tried to keep herself strong, but when anyone stared at you with such an expression on their face...

It made her weak inside and she felt her confidence slip away from her.

She then took in the rest of her surroundings. The executioner stood at a pile of straw that was ontop of a bunch of pieces of wood and a cross smack in the middle of it that was held up by two strings that were connected to the ground. A wooden plank led to her death.

The Duke shouted to the crowd, " Today is a monumental day! Keili, the woman who Prince Xiao-Lang blindly married under a temptress spell has committed the worst of sins! Betraying her husband with another man, performing witchcraft and not to mention, she is of Kinomoto heritage!"

The crowd was growing wild with anger now. Sakura trembled as she felt the wind blow strong against her and she closed her eyes against the eyes of the crowd.

" What should be her punishment?"

" DEATH!"

" How?"

" BURN! BURN, WITCH BURN!" The crowd chanted and Sakura was pushed down the wooden plank until she was standing precariously on the balls of straw and wood. She clutched onto her basket and nearly screamed when the executioner tried to take it away from her.

The Duke laughed hilariously at her desperate expression. " Let her have it. It doesn't matter anyways! Pathetic little Kinomoto peasant...where's your husband now?

Sakura threw him a hate filled glare but fear was now thumping through her heart. She didn't expect to be killed so soon. She knew that Eriol would not be back in time, if Meiling was indeed captured by the Wilds and who knew if they survived or not? The Wild's were dangerous and uncivilized...Syaoran, Meiling and Eriol could be dead...

And her brothers...her poor brothers..

Gripping onto her last chance, she felt her feet being tied to the bottom of the cross so she would not escape.

She felt the executioner light the torch and the crowd began to hoot and holler.

She closed her eyes.

No...

Looking up, her eyes pleaded with the sky. Please...she chanted. Please...brothers...come now...please, come! Yukito! Please come now! It is your younger sister...Princess Sakura Kinomoto of the Kinomoto Kingdom...she calls for you! Come! Before it is too late...

But no bird flew through the sky. No swan in sight. Tears began to streak down her cheeks as the executioner raised the torch in the sky, the crowd going wild as he brought it down and lit the haystack on fire.

Come...Come...Come...she repeated desperately. Please! For mother's sake...for father's sake...for our half brother, for our people! For you! Come now!

The fire licked all around her feet and she could feel the heat and she knew in no time, it would be burning the soles of her feet...and she would be a pile of ashes, her vow to save her brothers burned away..

NO! she screamed in her head. NO!

Then, in the corner of her eye...she saw...

" Bitch!" She heard the Duke swear in absolute glee. " Die the way you're supposed to! Die as a witch!"

" NOO!" She heard a woman's scream in the crowd and tears spilled past Sakura's eyes. Tomoyo...God, Tomoyo had been so good to her...she didn't deserve this...Tomoyo did not deserve this at all..

Then once again, a flash of white at the corner of her eye and she looked up. Far off in the sky, a swan.

A swan.

A swan...

Brother...She thought, and then, the fire licking burning at her feet, she reached deep into her basket as the swan began to sweep downwards, downwards...

Screams of shock rippled across the crowd as the swan swooped over the heads of the crowd and Sakura, with every fibre of her being, shouted within herself TOUYA! And with that, she swung the shirt around his neck and then the rest of the swans began to fly down, their large wings flapping above the crowd, white feathers raining down on them like snow.

" What is the meaning of this?" She heard the duke scream.

KOSUMO! The next swan, the next shirt.

" Swans! Their swans! She's performing a spell to save herself!" Cries spilled across the crowd.

HIRO! Another shirt.

EDEN! Another swan.

" STOP HER!" The duke cried.

YUKITO! Another white swan, another starwort shirt.

But then, no other swan came swooping down. She looked around herself, searching the sky hopelessly. Yamazaki...Come please! Yamazaki!

The last shirt lay in her basket. The shirt without a sleeve.

Then, she heard a familiar cry in the crowd. " KEILI!" Her eyes opened and she looked into the crowd, her heart beating fast against her chest and she could hardly think. Then her eyes grew wide with shock.

Amber eyes...

Chestnut hair...

His cry resonated through her heart and she nearly fainted at the sight of him..

Syaoran...He had come...

He was pushing through the crowd, his amber eyes wild with fear and fury. His eyes trained on Sakura, he pushed frantically through the crowd trying to reach her. Behind her, Sakura felt her smoke filled eyes spot a black haired girl and a navy blue haired man who looked just as scared as Syaoran and she felt herself relax a bit.

They were alright...

" KEILI!" He was shouting over and over and she coughed as the smoke rose and rose, soot covering her face and her feet burning. She tried to raise her feet from the fire that licked the bottoms of her soles but since her ankles were tied to the cross, she could do no such thing.

Then Sakura saw something that froze her blood to the core. An archer, wearing the Kinomoto crest was poised at the top of the pillar on the castle, his bow and arrow aimed straight at Syaoran's heart.

Sakura's heart thumped with fear.

Syaoran didn't notice

He would die.

No. No. NO! The wind whipped around her, the flames licking higher and her soles burning, she felt her heart burst with fear and desperation as the last shirt was ripped from her hands, into the empty sky and she felt her throat burn as she screamed at the top of her lungs, with a voice scratchy from months of not using it...

" SYAORAN! WATCH OUT!"

Syaoran glanced up at her in shock and then turned to where her finger was pointing, not a second too late. The arrow took him in the shoulder with a sickening thud and the crowd was going crazy around him, absolute chaos. But Sakura could not think.

Her brothers...

Yamazaki hadn't come..

The shirt was gone..

She had spoken..the curse..

Her brothers...they would remain swans...

Syaoran had pulled the arrow out of his shoulder with a roar and leapt through the crowd, racing up the wooden plank and to Sakura. Punching his way past the guards,he grabbed her shoulders and slashed through the ropes binding her feet and pulled her from the fire, his strong arms gripping her tight against his chest, almost as if he was afraid she would disappear.

" Keili...don't worry...I'm here, I'm here, I'm so sorry, I'm so sorry..." He was chanting under his breath, holding her tight as he pulled her away from the fire but she could not comprehend his words. His fingers stroked her hair as he attempted to calm her but she would not listen.

My brothers...she cried hard, her voice finally being put to use as she sobbed and screamed and cried, her fingers clenching onto his shirt as she cried into his shoulder, banging her fists against him in pain.

No...no...

No...

a/n: well, climaxy here i gues. lol. anyways yea tell me wut u guys think of it alright? Was it feelingish enough? Lol, weird word I know. anyways yea, tell me wut u guys think andd ill attempt to update faster...

and yea now Sakura can speak lol. And if Syoaran knows she'z a princess yet...i dunno we have to wait to see...he was still calling her Keili wasn't he? Hmm.. .And if your wondering how Meiling knows that Keili is Sakura and all that, well, you'll see in the next chappie.

lol and i guess i should answer some questions. As the story progresses, u understand some of the stuff I'm writing but I guess I should explain now since I'm getting a lottaaa repeats of questions.

Why can't Sakura just write her thoughts since she can't speak?

Well in the beginning of the story, you find out that Sakura can only speak Chinese and this is because of Yamazaki and Yukito, who were taught Chinese to interrogate Li prisoners. They never learned how to write Chinese because who could teach them in the Kinomoto lands? Remember these two lands are at war and they do speak different languages. I also mentioned it once more when they were married. . "Sakura didn't know how to write the Li language, so Syaoran had to write her name for her and she copied it from him." Hope this clears it up for you.

Isn't this story too alike to Daughters of the Forest?

Yeah, it's alike but in many ways its different. I took all the twists from the story while adding twists of my own and new characters and situations. I've only read the book once so I'm doing this off of memory. There are many things I didn't include and many things I included. If you guys read the book, you would notice the differences.

When Sakura gasps, doesn't that go against her "no speaking" thing?

No, because you can gasp without sound. It's just an intake of breath. Maybe I should have been clearer..scratches head

Isn't the S/S getting a bit too stretched out?

Not really, because I'm not the one to have Syoaran and Sakura making out by the third chapter. First, you've got to realize their personalites, secondly, their heritages and their situation. This story is based on EMOTION not lust, which is also why I'm not making Sakura drop dead beuatiful.

I cant remember any other questions...and yeaaahh I also made a couple of mistakes with Tomoyo calling Sakura by her real name instead of Keili and Sakura speaking to the dog and all that stuff...sooo sorry! cowers Loll...

Lolll see ya latez,

starjade