Realized I made a mistake so I replaced this document, haha. Now it's better. READ ADND REVIEW!

Hikaru watched her lover suspiciously as they made their way through the narrow hallways and passages of the fortress. Where they were going she did not know, she followed him in all things now. She only wanted to please him, to make sure that he would have her, when no one else would have. She had told herself in Tokyo that she had stayed true to Lantis out of pure love for him, and that was partly true. But as she got older and grew a little farther away from Cephiro and those who lived there – she realized now – that she might have entered into a relationship, if any had been offered. The lack of interest in her as a girlfriend had made it easier to stay committed to the man she had left in Cephiro. And belatedly she realized that part of the reason she had been so mad at Umi was that she just didn't want to acknowledge that same longing in herself; the longing to move on, to have a life on Earth. But now that she was here, in the place she had dreamed of for seven years, she was even more unsure of what she wanted.

She gazed up at him. No, she knew she wanted him. He was everything to her now. Yet he was subdued. "Lantis," she asked cautiously as they tread the hallways, "Where are we going."

He stopped abruptly, "I don't know. I was just … I was distracted."

"Something's wrong," not a question.

He looked away, down the passage where they had come from.

"What is it?" she prodded.

He looked down on her, "I told you that I was glad it was not you that was singled out of the three this time around."

"Yes?" she stared back at him hard. He was not touching her. He usually took her hands or caressed her cheek when they spoke face to face. He was distant and unsure, not like himself.

"I said that and I meant it. Because … Clef told me he hated me because I was strong enough."

He backed away from her now. There was pain in his eyes and his stance. She tried to get closer to him, but he kept backing away.

"But what if I hadn't been? What if it was me instead of him?"

She was so confused, "Lantis, you're scaring me. What are talking about? What did he mean by 'strong enough?"

There was a long pause before he spoke, "Strong enough to wait so long. For Umi, for you."

With an intake of breath, she stopped moving toward him. They both stood completely still, facing each other in the dim hallway. Hikaru inhaled deeply, taking what he had said in with the air. It was too much. They stood silent for too long. She didn't know what to say except, "It isn't you."

"Yes, but …"

"You were strong enough."

"But I wouldn't have been without …"

Almost anticipating what he was going to say, she paced the distance that divided them and caught his face between her hands, "I'm here now. Nothing else matters."

Ren leaned against the wall in the second room allotted to Kakeru and Umi. He watched his new companion and Fuu, each sitting on either side of the unconscious blue-haired woman in the bed. Kakeru leaned in close to his fiancée's quiet face, sitting on the edge of his chair he was too tense, still angry. "It's going to be fine, Kakeru," Ren said softly.

"You don't know that," he answered quickly and harshly, ready to lash out at anything.

"That doesn't matter," Fuu interjected, "What all of us keep forgetting is that Cephiro is the land of the will. If you want something to happen enough, it just might. We can't let fear or depression or worry overwhelm our goals here."

Kakeru straightened in his chair; his hard gaze fixed on his sister's friend, a woman he had obviously known for a long time. "And what are our goals here, Fuu? What exactly are we going to do? Become Magic Knights? Then what?" Ren wondered at the relationship between the two, of the three girls Fuu was the only one who was not intimately connected with Kakeru.

"We confront Clef and discover what's been happening in the palace. And go home, if we can."

"If we can?" Ren was startled by this possibility. "I thought this was a set thing. We do what we have to and go back when we're done."

Fuu answered with the worry she had warned against in her gaze, "We don't know who brought us here."

Kakeru was more alert to the conversation now, his brow furrowed in consternation, "So?"

"No one in the fortress wished for our help, let alone new Magic Knights," Fuu got up and started pacing, "Umi was right in the beginning. What use are Magic Knights to a Cephiro without a pillar? Why bring me, Hikaru, and Umi here, if there have to be new Knights? Nothing makes sense. And no one is sure whether it's only Clef who's behind all this."

Kakeru looked down and away, "Yeah, Lantis was telling me after the attack …"

"… He's had no direction. Nothing he attempts seems to have any kind of purpose, except misery to those who left the palace. He doesn't target any villages unless there's someone he wants there." Umi woke to Kakeru's voice, hushed yet angry. He was pissed off, she knew. Not at her, but at Clef. Yet it had been her fault, she had gotten hurt because she had been careless. She shouldn't have let her guard down.

"It's like he's trying to get revenge for something that never happened," Ren's quiet observation from the opposite wall. She couldn't see him. She knew if she moved her head would pound with the effects of Clef's blow. She had been hit with that kind of force before. She had fought Alcione more than once, who had used some of the same power as her former teacher. She let them continue, not wanting to halt a discussion on this subject that was actually going somewhere.

Fuu's voice came from her left. "Ren," she breathed, "you're right. He's obviously mad. What if he believes something happened that didn't."

Then Umi realized something, "We don't even know what really happened that day. No one told us why they left, how it happened." She sat up quickly, instantly regretting it, as she knew she would, especially when all three faces turned back to her in surprised concern. Her hand to her head she nodded and smiled and reassured everyone. Kakeru kissed her repeatedly and Fuu asked what happened.

"I was napping, and when I woke up he was here. He was holding my hand. He said he wanted to leave with me and I asked him if we could stay here instead. I begged him to stay. I thought if he would stay we could help him. But he went crazy. He said every one here were his betrayers and I believed their lies. When I told him I thought they must be telling the truth he hit me. I didn't see it coming at all." She grabbed Kakeru's hand and apologized, "I never would have tried it if I thought that he would hit me. He was always talking about protecting me. I thought even if he was mad his madness wouldn't allow him to hurt me, if it was centered around me. I was wrong. I should never have …"

Kakeru held her again, "It's okay. You didn't do anything wrong."

Fuu put a hand on her friend's shoulder, "The important thing is that you thought it through. That he doesn't have some sort of power over you. He hasn't tried any kind of magic to gain influence over you."

Umi jerked away from Kakeru, she felt the fear wrench through her body and settle in her chest. "C-could he do that?"

Ren stepped away from the wall and stood leaning against the baseboard of the bed. He and Fuu exchanged quick glances, "Liesse talked with all of us while you were unconscious." Kakeru watched his companion closely as Ren continued, "It is a possibility. None of us want that to happen."

Fuu took up the explanation, "So we're all going to help look out for you." She stroked Umi's back comfortingly, "But you have to be more careful as well. None of us know what Clef is capable of now. He's proving that more and more."

Umi breathed in deeply, steeling herself to yet another threat on her life as she knew it. Why was this happening to her?

Caldina came in to help Umi to the bath, so that she could wash herself and help and soak her aching body, for Fuu's wind could only heal the sores. His fiancée reached for his hand to steady her, but Kakeru held back and said, "Ren, why don't you go with them. I'll be down in a second," he kissed her on the cheek saying afterward, "I swear, I'm not going anywhere." Ren crinkled his forehead at him, but helped her out the door anyway, with Caldina holding her on the other side.

Fuu stayed back, anticipating his desire. "I thought we agreed not to tell her. You understood as well as I did what the consequences would be. I saw that look between you two, but Ren doesn't understand her the way we do," he watched her as she smoothed the bedding absently.

She looked up, "I think Ren understands more than any of us would expect. And he came up with a perfect solution; if she thinks that this attention has to do with only her and not the whole of Cephiro, she can't feel that guilt." Fuu cocked her head, challengingly, "I thought you trusted him."

Kakeru glared at her, "I do. But I'm not so sure about you."

"When are you going to forgive me for him? Now you know why it happened."

"What are you talking about? I never knew why? He loved you Fuu, there was no reason …"

She broke of his outburst coldly, "If you don't realize now you will soon. You're smarter than you let on Kakeru." She stared proudly at him for a few more moments before turning and leaving him in the abandoned room, wondering how Cephiro had anything to with Seiho Harada.