Disclaimer: Even though I wish I did, I don't own any of the Fushigi Yugi characters, but Tara is my character.
The Mountain city
The next morning, they readied themselves for their trip to the city at the bottom of the mountain. The little boy Tamahome had been helping out the day before waved and yelled to them.
"I promise I'll learn to ride a horse, then I'll ride it to your country!"
"I'll be looking forward to it!" Tamahome replied, smiling at the little boy.
"Good-bye Mr. Scary face!" The boy said to Tasuki. At least the slightest bit of anger was in Tasuki's voice as he grumbled and mumbled to himself about hitting the kid upside the head.
Bye everybody, thank you for all your help!" Miaka called back to the villagers in the distance. The group of 9 began to make their way down a long path that apparently lead to the city at the bottom of the mountain.
"Are we there yet?" Tara asked, slumping on the saddle of her horse.
"Not yet, we still have a couple hours longer to go. No da." Chichiri said, pointing in the direction of the city. Tara groaned and stopped her horse.
"We'll get there faster if we walk, how about I meet you guys there, I don't like horses." Tara said, hopping off of hers.
"If you were going to go, you couldn't go alone anyway, you always get inta trouble." Tasuki said, hopping off of his horse too.
"I'll go with you." He stated flatly.
"Then we'll meet you there, then figure out a plan." Tamahome replied.
"Yay! If we get there early, we're not in the cold anymore!" Tara felt something small land on her hand and looked down to see a not so small spider looking her straight in the eye. Her face was as pale as the snow on the ground. Tasuki had continued walking when he turned around and saw the spider, looked at her face, back at the spider, then pulled out his harisen. He got in position to fry the spider and grinned.
"LEKKA...SHIN'EN!" Fire burst from the fan and fried the spider... and Tara with it. Her face was still a little in shock and Tasuki just looked at her, her clothes just singed. Tara's eye twitched and she shook the spider corpse off of her hand. She walked over to the bandit, grabbed the harisen and smacked him on the head a couple times.
"Ow! The hell was that for?"
"You shot those flames at me!"
"No, I didn't, I was aimin' for the spider, stupid!" Anger was written all over her face and she punched him in the side of the face.
"I'll get there by myself, I don't need any help from you!" Tara yelled. She turned around and stomped off in the direction of the city.
Not long after, Tasuki had backtracked his way back to the others, royaly pissed. Nuriko looked at the bandit.
"Where's Tara?"
"She said she could get there herself, so I let her go by herself." He grumbled, rubbing his cheek where she had punched really hard.
"Hey, how'd you get so beat up? No da." Chichiri asked, tapping one of the many bumps on the bandits head.
"Hey, Ow! Stop that... Tara punched me, and smacked me on the head with my own harisen." Tasuki said it both angrily and in a bit of a whiney tone.
"Wow, so the "brave" bandit got beaten up by a girl." Tamahome teased.
"Hey, she's stronger than she looks, she was trained at Mt. Reikaku along side us other bandits!" Tasuki retorted. There was silence, Miaka was the one to break it.
"So she grew up with bandits?" Miaka asked, looking a little weirded out.
"Yep. Plain and simple, Nakago killed her family, friends and other people of her village and burnt it to the ground. Ask Kouji, he knows it better then I do, he was actually there, I just heard it from him." Tasuki replied, hopping back on the horse that he had been riding earlier.
"Either way, we have to find her before the Seiryuu warriors notice she's alone." Nuriko said, getting them back on track.
Tara continued to walk, and walk, and walk. She sighed.
"Maybe I shouldn't have been so mean to him, but when I get pissed off, I get pissed off... Nah, that's no excuse, well, when we all meet up at the city I'll apologize to him." Tara heard a sound in the bushes near her. Her eyes darted to where she heard the noise, nothing. She turned around and saw a weapon of sorts fly at her. She barely had any time to dodge it, and when she did, her back smacked into a tree.
"Who's there?" She asked, a bit of fear in her voice which she tried to hide... Silence.
'I was probably just imagining it, there's nothing here, it's just me, and the others back there.' Tara felt something sharp sting her arm.
"What the?" She turned around to see someone run off into the woods in the opposite direction, towards the others. Tara's eyes widened.
'gotta find them, gotta warn them!' She started to run back towards them and started feeling dizzy. She looked at her surroundings, which were now blurry and swirling.
"what... what's going on? Why's everything blurry and swirly..." Tara was now slurring as she ran and she was starting to stumble. She fell to her knees gasping for breath, her face now turning red from a fever.
"What was that thing that stung me?" Tara wouldn't be able to answer that question for awhile. She collapsed onto the pathway, hoping that her friends would find her soon.
Miaka looked into the distance and saw something on the pathway, saw someone on the pathway.
"Tamahome look! I think it's Tara, she doesn't look too good." Miaka said, hopping down from her horse when Tamahome stopped it. Everyone dismounted their horses and walked or ran over to the fallen warrior. Chichiri checked for a pulse, finding one and sighing in relief.
"She's still alive. No da."
"We have to get her to a hospital right away, my healing powers can do nothing for her at this point." Mitsukake said to the group. Nuriko picked her up and mounted his horse carefully so as not to hurt the unconcious girl.
When they reached the city, they instantly started looking for an inn so Tara could rest and try to fight off the poison creeping through her veins. The Inn was very nice looking, and the beds inside seemed comfortable enough, so they put her on one of the beds in Miaka's room. Downstairs the rest of the group was discussing how they would look for the Shinzaho. In the end the groups were Chichiri and Chiriko, Tasuki and Mitsukake and Hotohori, and Tamahome, Nuriko, and Miaka.
"Here, each group take one, they're flares, set it off when you have information about the Shinzaho." Chiriko said, handing each group one of the flares and heading off in a seperate direction from the others. Tamahome and his group walked up to a huge tablet with writing on it.
"Um, excuse me, do you know how to read this?" He asked an elderly woman.
"No one uses that language anymore, maybe a scholar would be able to read it though." She replied.
"My father could read it, he's a scholar." A man said, leaning against a nearby building, grinning slightly.
"Okay, take me to your father." Tamahome said, stepping forward.
"Wait Tamahome, we'll go too!" Miaka said, putting a hand on his shoulder.
"No, you and Nuriko stay here, only I have to go." He replied, giving her hand a reassuring squeeze. Tamahome followed the man to a bar where it smelled of alcohol, and drunk people, laughing their hangovers away.
"you told me your father was here, you liar."
"Oh, I'm not lying, he's right over there." The man pointed over to an old man, his black hair a mess.
"But we noticed you're travellers, and travellers have money, so hand it over."
"Me? Have money? Of course not, hey do you think you could lend me some?" Tamahome said, shrugging and looking at the ceiling. The man, now angry, growled a little.
"Why you... Get him boys!" The man pointed at Tamahome, sending his henchmen out to kill him. All that could be heard were punching noises in the background and the sound of people falling to the floor with a loud thud.
"What? But... How?"
"Don't mess with me." Tamahome said, picking the man up by the scruff of his neck.
"Put my son down, I believe he's learned his lesson." The old man with messy hair said, still sitting at his table.
"Alright, I got what I needed to know, now to get back to Miaka and Nuriko." Tamahome ran down the street only to run into someone.
"Are you oka... Yui? You're looking for the Shinzaho too, eh?"
"Tamahome, yes I am."
"Have you even thought of stopping being the priestess to be Miaka's friend?"
"After she betrayed me, I don't care what happens to her!" Yui yelled, running of in another direction. Tamahome was silent the rest of the way back to where Miaka and Nuriko waited.
Okay, another chapter, to everybody who's been wondering where the hell I am and not updating, It's because I was swamped with homework, and I went on a band trip, then I had to finish a picture the other day, then I had a study guide to do and an essay last night, but I'll try really really hard not to take this long to update again, and thanks for being so patient.