-Ronin's pov-

I threw Konosuke on his couch and went to see Toklata. She was still hiding out in the bath, right where I had left her, humming lightly to herself. I opened the bath curtain, and she gave me a weak smile.

"You didn't kill him, did you?"

"Of course not," I replied, sitting myself next to the tub. "I knew you didn't want me to."

"That's good," she said, playing with a stray lock of hair like a kitten. "Anyway, I had a question. My hands were really hurting while you were gone, and I was really tired. And I've got these funny scratches on my fingertips. Do you know why?"

She looked at me with those eyes; those horrible puppy-dog eyes. She could probably get anything she ever wanted out of me just by batting those things a few times, honestly. I would really have to work at that so I wasn't just a pushover of a mentor.

"Toklata," I sighed, not knowing how to begin. I struggled in my mind with a few ways to break it to her gently, finally deciding to just answer her question. "I do know why you're in so much pain. Are you sure you want to know why?"

She gave a small, quick nod, and I sighed.

"You were going to die, because you had lost a lot of blood. So I put some of my blood into you. See those scars on your fingertips? That's where I pumped the blood into you. And now…now…"

"What?" she pushed in a curious voice. I couldn't stand to look at her. She was giving me what was possibly the most adorable smile I had ever seen in my two-hundred and thirty-one years, sitting at attention with her hands folded neatly in her lap, and a few stray locks of toasted-brown hair falling over her doggish nose. She concentrated on these for a few seconds, before blowing them out of her face.

"Because I put my vampire blood into you…you're now something called a half-vampire," I finally managed to stutter out. It broke my heart to see her smile falter the way it did, the corners of her mouth slowly pulling down, her bottom lip dropping slightly.

"Um…so…" She tried to figure out just what to ask; like whether I was kidding, or what exactly this meant for her.

"I'm so sorry, Toklata. But it was either this or death. This means that you will have to give up your family and friends to be my assistant—you'll have to travel with me."

"What's there to give up?" she asked dejectedly. I guess that was sort of lucky, the fact that she didn't have much of a family or any close friends. "Still…I don't think I'll make a very good vampire. I think blood tastes like tinfoil, and I kind of like the sun."

"Well, that's one of the perks of only being a half-vampire. You can be in the sun all day if you like. And I'm going to get this out of the way now, so forgive me if I sound a little bitter—you don't have a choice in this, Toklata. There's no going back to being perfectly human. It's just not possible. If you refuse to come with me, then you'll be a danger, mostly to yourself, and I'll…I'll have to kill you right here. Which was what I was trying to prevent—your death."

I would never really be able to kill her, so I just had to pray that she'd come along with me and try to make the best of life.

Just as she opened her mouth to reply, Leigh opened the door, breathless. "Konosuke is waking up," she informed us in a worried voice. "What now?"

"Toklata, you wanted him alive," I sighed, exasperated. "And I promised him you'd give him some reason to live. You feeling up to giving a mushy speech? Because I think he may just kill himself if you don't."

Now it was Toklata's turn to give a troubled sigh. "I don't want him to die"

"All right. But don't tell him you're a half-vampire. I don't know how he'll react."

She nodded and stepped shakily out of the tub, leading the way down the hallway that led through the kitchen and into the living room, where Konosuke hadn't made any move to pull himself off of the couch.

Toklata walked fearlessly up to him, with a rather defiant look on her face.

--

-Leigh's pov-

Konosuke managed to sit up against the yellow couch's arm as Toklata approached him.

"I'm glad you're okay," he mumbled, reaching out to gently touch just below Toklata's right shoulder.

She pulled away softly, but it clearly wasn't from fear. "You stuck a sword through me," she said, her voice clearly showing that she was hurt (both emotionally and physically). "And now I hear you want to kill yourself."

"What else am I supposed to do?" he asked dejectedly, sticking his hands out for her to see.

I gasped lightly at the sight of them. The fingers were a sickening blackish-purple color, a few of them twisted at hideous angles.

"Thanks to your buddy Takoda over there, I'll never be able to touch a sword…or a wooden stake…again."

"So?" she replied simply, but with a slight edge to her soft voice. "Why does that make you want to die? It's not even the age of swords and Dracula horror movies anymore!"

"You just don't understa—"

"I understand that you could live a happy life if you tried," she snapped. "You're not drop-dead ugly; you could find a nice wife! And take some cooking classes while you're at it! Just don't do something stupid like kill yourself, because no matter how bad your life is, there's always a chance for it to get better, as long as you're not dead!"

"Girl," he growled, "you don't understand. Now, let me finish before you go ranting off again." He paused, making sure Toklata wasn't going to blurt something out, and then continued when she remained grudgingly silent. "There is absolutely nothing left for me in this life, with my fingers shattered and my career destroyed. I'm a partial vampire, so I can't just live like any other man would. And you—you are nine years old! But you speak as if you've lived forever, and understand everything! Such arrogance in such a small girl simply amazes me! And despite your annoying pride, you've still managed to throw my entire system of justice by befriending one of my worst enemies and then turning around and acting all sweet to me!"

Toklata stuck her nose higher into the air, a sight that was starting to become comical. "Well obviously you don't understand as much as you think; if you're sitting here ready to take you life." She looked down, no longer sneering down her nose at him, and her eyes softened. "You're not as heartless as you think. You took care of me all those days. You could've killed me whenever you wanted, but you didn't."

I had to admit, he had showed a bit of morality in this aspect. And she was right, too. Such a persuasive little girl…

"Even after I stuck a sword through you, you still don't want me to die?" he asked in a horribly confused tone. "That makes no sense. It's like throwing all reasonable logic and nature into a bottomless pit to adopt some moronic 'forgiveness' lie."

"I have to forgive you," Toklata sighed, again becoming annoyed at the fact that he couldn't quite grasp her style of merciful morality. Honestly, I couldn't either. If I had been in her shoes, I would've ordered him to be killed in the most painful way possible…or worse…

It was so simple. "Forgive and forget"—what most people had given up for the theory of sweet revenge.

Toklata took a few strands of Konosuke's hair and gently fumbled with it, staring deep into his icy blue eyes (which seemed to be melting from the heat of her own warm, cheerful eyes). "You shouldn't feel like you need to give up your life. I forgive you," she repeated. "I guess I can't stop you if you really want to die, but I'd be happier if you chose life."

She held out both arms and wrapped them around his neck, being very careful around his out-of-socket shoulder blade. Very slowly, Konosuke eased and accepted the gesture, in turn throwing his arms carefully around her back.

"For you…anything," he mumbled softly. "You win. Just get the vampire and his woman out of my house as soon as possible, and I'll…I'll head to Mexico, I suppose. Do you like the sound of that?"

"It depends. Can you speak Spanish?"

"Ah. I'll learn. Now hurry up and get out." He released her and pushed her lightly towards the bathroom. She spared him an over-the-shoulder smile before disappearing down the short hallway. Ronin and I followed (only after sending Konosuke a final dirty look), not even reaching the doorway before she came back out, with her single set of clothes balled up in her arms.

"Hey, what's the hurry?" Ronin asked jokingly.

"Mister Konosuke would like us out as soon as possible," she informed us, as if we hadn't heard their entire conversation mere moments before. "Mister Konosuke, would you like your shirt back?" she called down the hall.

"Not all covered in your blood," he laughed back. "Come back here for a second."

She did without a second's hesitation, back through the kitchen and into the charming den. Ronin and I peeked our heads around the corner, still not nearly as trusting of him as Toklata was.

"You're such a kind girl."

"You aren't too bad yourself."

Surprisingly, they hugged again, and then said their final goodbyes. I still couldn't understand how warm they were with each other—perhaps it was just something beyond understanding. I made a mental note to ask Ronin about it later, just as Toklata skipped past us and out the broken back door. Ronin followed right after, but I stood, watching Konosuke as he heaved a heavy sigh and stared at his hands.

I couldn't really sympathize, no matter how hard I tried. And when he noticed that I was still there, he turned his cold glare on me.

"I don't have any qualms about killing you."

It wasn't really a threat, with his hands the way they were, but I still followed Ronin and Toklata into the cool night air, saying that we could go back to my place.

"Leigh, are you suggesting something?" Ronin whispered teasingly into my ear, before I reminded him that a child was present.

--

A/N—SORRY! Ah, there's been flooding around here, so I wasn't home too much. I didn't get flooded, but my camper did, and I've spent a lot of time at my grandma's house trying to get the river muck out of it!