A.N.:This is the worst chapter I've wrote so far….it's a bit chaotic…mainly because it's written from so many different point of views… sorry about that…
Disclaimer: Do not own anything, but plot, places and characters of Emi, Ranmaru, Akamaru and Mimi (who is a new character modelled after my dear lil sis.)
I want to thank all those brave people who have enough courage to write me some feedback…it's always nice to know what other people think….THANK YOU!
-The blessings and the curses of blood-
Onikage stepped into the dark mausoleum above his dungeon. He wasn't alone in the moist stone room, built for some unknown Gohda's memory. There were spirits everywhere; tens of them hissing and lurking around him. Eyes glowing in the darkness they climbed on to the statues and walls, anywhere to get better view of him.
Onikage had known that the spirits weren't the nicest smelling creatures, but the reek of the decaying corpses, made him gag. The jerky movements of the spirits hurt his eyes, they seemed to skip trough the space they moved, just appearing to the other position without going trough the whole movement. Slowly the spirits crawled closer… cautiously, without sudden movements or will to attack, efficiently blocking his way out.
It started to seem that it wasn't going to be as easy as he had thought. Their presence explained the girl's injuries though. "It was fucking impressive that she had managed to run from them. She would indeed be a fitting meal."
"Weird." He wondered walking closer to the spirits... "Usually spirits avoid me, by all costs…what has changed…?"Spirits hissed, but didn't let him pass. Onikage stopped, standing there unmoving as the spirits got slowly closer and closer, sniffing the air.
"…It's the smell!" Onikage figured "The smell of the girl's blood… smell of a prey."
One of the spirits had climbed on the great marble coffin, and now tried to claw the girl hanging from his shoulder. He kicked the hungry opportunist to the near by stone wall. The spirit slid effortlessly trough it, not gaining any harm in the progress
"Sorry, this is my meal. Go hunt your own." Onikage suggested, to the bunch of hungry spirits.
He really wasn't expecting it to work, so he wasn't greatly surprised to see them attacking towards him, their white eyes were glowing in the dark, and their clawed hands reaching for the girl in his back. He kicked the first two away with ease, and made a clear opening in the middle of the room, with his trademark three kick combo, just for fun. His powers were almost returned, but there were more and more spirits compensating their fallen comrades. To him the situation started to look like a promising fight, something to ease his growing frustration.
"It'd be fun to kill all of those death reeking creatures… and then torture Mitsuomi… to drink his blood and slowly peel of his skin… But unfortunately I don't really have time for it…yet." Onikage thought sending one spirit flying with especially mean shoulder trust.
The girl was getting weaker with every spent moment, and he was feeling it as a pain, that tried to split his head in two, and the fighting was much more challenging when he had to dodge the attacks meant for the girl. Now he was stuck on protecting her, until he figured out how to break the Mitsuomi Gohda's curse.
He needed to get her to someone fast, and he couldn't really run when the girl was hanging from his shoulder like this. He repositioned girl, so that she was in his arms as small as possible. Bending protectively over her he dashed trough the wall of spirits, out to the front yard, leaving a trail of injured and vanishing spirits behind him, like a wind of destruction.
There were hundreds more of them out side, but that wasn't the thing that made him froze to his place. It was the familiar voice that echoed from the house: "Akamaru, give me my Izayoi."
"Old man, Shiunsai! But … master Mei-Oh killed him…I saw it my self… …it must be the son, …Tatsumaru ." The thought wasn't exactly encouraging.
He had fought the Tatsumaru brat before, and he had been problematic then… Now with a few hundred years more training Tatsumaru was a real threat…and what was worse Onikage hadn't fully recovered yet…
Rikimaru stepped to the nightly yard watching the swarm of spirits gathering around something in front of the mausoleum, built from the memory of Mitsuomi Gohda, Matsunoshin's grand father. It was past midnight and he could barely see the jerkily moving mass, but he could easily smell them. The strong stench of rotting flesh seemed to be everywhere around him. Rikimaru took a deep breath, battling with the nauseous feeling. He would have to cut trough them to see what they were after.
"Akamaru, give me my Izayoi." Rikimaru grunted to the young soldier behind him. The soldier beside him chanted something and pulled the sword from the thin air. He was a gifted fellow.
Rikimaru, himself couldn't touch the spirits. Only those who were already dead and those few rare ones with remarkable powers could harm them with bare hands. No normal weapon would hurt them either; Izayoi however was no ordinary sword.
Soundlessly Rikimaru attacked, cutting trough the spirits, like they would be nothing. Their blood stained the blade shimmering in the moonlight, as they fell to the ground disappearing to dust. He could see their prey. It was the human girl, Ayame, lying on her back, looking pale and bloody. "She must have lost the medallion." He cursed, mentally.
Suddenly he noted something rather odd; the spirits weren't attacking her straight away. Something was keeping them away, a small black figure that had curled on top of her hissing to spirits. It was a black cat, with glowing red eyes.
"Another one of the witches' pets?" He sighed deeply; he had never got along with cats. Rikimaru bent closer to examine their victim, just to see her chest rising, she was breathing.
"The girl is still alive!" He thought surprised. He moved his hand to check her pulse, but the black cat hissed a warning and bared it's claws.
"Ok, no touching…he mumbled to the cat and then stood up. "Akamaru! Get Tesshu, immediately!" he shouted, and the soldier vanished from behind him.
Rikimaru bent over Ayame again for a moment to pour a healing potion down her throat. He had stolen it from Tesshu's chambers, when the healer had tended master Gohda. The cat however didn't appreciate his actions as it attacked his hand with all might a beast that small could muster, scratching it with all four little pawns.
For a moment Rikimaru was tempted by thought to sent the little, furry bastard flying towards the spirits, but decided otherwise as he remembered that the appearance was deceiving when it came to Emi's and Mimi's pets….The cat might even survive….
There were more spirits gathering to the yard. Something seemed to have driven them crazy; they wouldn't dare to come here otherwise. Not with this many demons out here. Rikimaru raised Izayoi and took a defend stance. He would have attacked them, but he wouldn't let Ayame's side before Healer Tesshu would arrive. He had never trust cats; they were too self-righteous for his liking.
It took full ten minutes before Tesshu arrived to the scene in his human form with Mimi. Mimi was Emi's sister…or so she claimed. She was small and delicate, pale little blonde, with the most disturbing sense of humour. She looked angelic in her long white dress as she floated next to Ayame.
Rikimaru could see a flash of recognition pass her blue eyes as she saw the little furry bastard…
"Is the cat yours?" He asked trying to keep his voice unemotional.
"No, but it once belonged to my sister Emi…then it escaped one day, without any warning…" Mimi said looking the cat that had suddenly gone very quiet and unmoving. "It did upset my sister greatly, so we should keep it out of her sight for some time…"The cat actually shivered hearing these words.
A devilish smirk was born to Rikimaru's lips …maybe he would pay a visit to Emi later this evening…
"It seems to share some sort of bond with the girl." Mimi continued pulling Rikimaru from his thoughts. "We should probably keep it with her." She chirped to Tesshu and smiled in a girlish manner.
"If you say so, then I guess it's fine." Tesshu answered, raising the limb girl, with the cat, from the ground and carrying them back to the mansion. Mimi had obviously curled the man around her little finger.
"Oh, and Rikimaru…" Mimi chirped suddenly remembering something "you should probably get rid of these spirits soon. Our young master has awakened and coming to see what the fuss is all about." She smiled innocently "He is such a sweet kid… pity that he is always rushing straight to trouble…" with that she turned around following Tesshu away from the darkness of the yard, leaving Rikimaru alone to his bloodshed.
Gohda walked trough the hallways his cheerful mood forgotten. He had popped his head outside just to see that Rikimaru had already dealt with the problem. Sent Ranmaru and Akamaru to assist the stubborn silver haired ninja in the aftermath and returned back inside. He was feeling a bit tired for the show he had put up earlier…Ranmaru wouldn't challenge his words anytime soon…but now his side was hurting again.
"The damned weak blood." He cursed mentally; he didn't need slow healing as one extra trouble. Jyuuzou of the South wanted war, and Mei-Oh of the West refused to meet him. Twins of East hadn't answered any of his messages, and now the lost souls of the forest had decided to rebel. Sometimes he wished that he could order everyone just to sit and listen for a moment, just like he could in this mansion.
"You have no authority to order around here." A voice reminded him of the back of his mind. "You are a just substitute…nothing more. You should be more grateful, more respectful towards the pure-blooded…You should give the thrown to Sekiya, and retrieve now…he might even spare you." it advised.
"I'm here to give her a peaceful kingdom. To take care of her land until she is ready." He mentally countered the voice. "Sekiya himself gave me the order."
"It doesn't matter. No matter how hard you train yourself, no matter how many enemies you kill, no matter how powerful you are; you can't change the blood that flows in your veins." The voice taunted "And by that blood you'll be judged. And already has…"
Sighing deep Gohda suppressed the voice, which once again was right. He needed guidance, but he couldn't run to Sekiya. Not in the middle of the crisis, it would put her in danger, and putting a true heir of Gohda clan in danger was not an option. He needed to discuss with Emi. The witch was wise, and she would probably understand him and his reasoning the most.
It didn't take him long to, find Emi's rooms. Their doors were made from black iron, with stylish bronze cat decorations, with green eyes. One of the bronze decorations blinked at him as he got closer and before he could knock the door was opened.
"Come on in." Emi greeted from somewhere inside.
Emi's rooms were almost as big as Gohda's own, but unlike Gohda Emi had filled every wall and other place imaginable with most peculiar things.
The whole room had been currently decorated with black, white and orange...except the sofa that was invisible-ish …closer to transparent ….popping in and out of sight…Emi was sitting on it at the moment a little grey white cat curled into her lap. Cat theme was the dominating theme in her room, which fit her fine since she was a real cat lover.
Only decorations that didn't fit the cat-theme were the painting of a pale, black haired man with glowing red eyes and three bronze heads, chatting with each other. Each of the statues represented different stage of stopped time. The head of girl symbolized the past; the head of middle aged woman symbolized the present and the head of old, wrinkly woman represented the future. The heads were currently talking about the newcomer servant, Ayame…
"The human girl has suffered a lot; don't be so harsh on her…." The bronze girl pleaded as Gohda stepped in.
"Shush…we continue this later…we have a visitor…." The oldest warned glancing meaningfully at Gohda. The youngest head glared him a moment and then went completely still, playing a good little statue.
"What is it, master Gohda?" Emi asked raising her stern green eyes to meet his. Gesturing him to sit down to a black leather armchair, that had suddenly appeared from thin air.
"I need you to read the cards…"Gohda sighed, sitting down. "I need to know how much time I have left."
"The cards won't tell the future, you know this... They don't work like that. They don't tell you what you want them to tell…they tell you, what you need to know…nothing more …nothing less…" Emi said smiling a little mysterious smile.
Ayame woke up, regretting the whole procedure as her sense of feeling crashed on her. The pain in her right wrist was almost enough to drop back unconscious, and she was feeling so weak. It was unfamiliar feeling to a girl who had always had more energy than she needed. She opened her eyes, there was a bald man standing near the bed talking to someone she couldn't see. She was in her own ice coloured room, lying on her bed under the thick blankets.
"…Yes, but she is mortal, so I'm not sure how that would affect her." She heard a voice from say somewhere far away.
"Very well then…we do it your way…" Other voice said with voice filled with irritation.
"What are they talking about?" She wondered groggily, but her concentration to listen this conversation any further broke, as something warm and furry touched the base of her neck. She glanced to her side to see black fur ball, snuggling closer to her.
"What are you?" Ayame wondered trying to sift to a better position. The fur ball sensed her movement and raised it's glowing red eyes to stare her, like she would be the one to intruding it's personal space.
It took a moment for her sleepy mind to register the creature as a small black cat.
"Sorry kitten…didn't mean to spoil your nap…" She croaked in a raspy voice, she barely recognized as her own. The cat twitched it's small ears and hopped to sit on her stomach, like it would want a better view of her face.
Ayame stared to delicate creature…something in the cat's eyes seemed familiar, but before she could grasp the memory, it was gone.
She struggled her left hand free from the blankets and petted the cat. First it looked her hand like she'd try to attack, and curled smaller, closing it's eyes. It was actually shivering as Ayame ran her finger along it's silky, soft fur. She let out a small chuckle as the cat opened it's eyes to look the hand that petted it. She ran her hand along it's back and the little creature started to relax. She could feel how the tension it's muscles lessened under the silky fur and the cat sifted in to a better position. Now it laid on it's back, on her stomach looking relaxed and purring softly.
"You are so cute." Ayame murmured, pressing the unaware animal against herself. The movement caused a great deal of pain in her right wrist and numerous other places on her body.
"Shit." She cursed in pain, loosening her grip of the cat.
"Ah, it seems you are awake." A voice said near her bed. Ayame looked to the direction of the voice to see a tubby, bald man, in his early forties looking back at her. "I'm healer Tesshu." He said introducing himself.
"How are you doing today?" he asked, like he hadn't heard her cursing.
"I feel like, I would have left under a collapsing building." She answered grimly. Then it hit her. She shouldn't be here. The last thing she remembered she was walking in the forest, and there was something else too…a man… an oddly moving figure in the dirt road.
"Why am I here? What happened? How long…? She asked rapidly as the wave of panic washed over her.
"You don't remember? I was kind of hoping that you'd tell me…." The man answered avoiding her question. "All I can tell you are the fact of your injuries and where you were found. Do you want to her them?" He asked like it would be a treat of some kind, but she wanted to know.
Ayame nodded under the blankets, and the black kitten came closer, curling to sleep the base of her neck, under the blankets. It seemed to be a forgiving kind of type.
"You were found in the front yard, with several broken bones, numerous cuts and you suffered from a major blood loss. You are healing remarkably fast and should be able to return to your work in a few days. There will be hardly any scar's and no permanent injuries… you are a very lucky girl." He said with an encouraging smile.
"And it's a surprise to see you awake this soon. I expected it to take more than a week." He said happily.
"A week…" Ayame repeated faintly, starting to understand the seriousness "I've bee unconscious a whole week… Has anyone contacted my school?" She asked as her rational thinking kicked in.
"I'm sorry, but it wasn't our priority…and it slipped from our minds." He said looking a little ashamed.
"Our…So there were other doctors here…." Ayame wondered aloud.
"Yes, Mimi assisted me." Tesshu said with a sheepish smile appearing in to his face. "She is Emi's sister, the main chef of the manor." He continued, seeing the silent question in Ayame's eyes.
"You should meet her soon enough. She was the one taking care of your cat. It refused to leave your side, to eat, so we had to bring the food to it. It was a bit starved, but now it's fine."
"My …cat? …But I don't have a cat." Ayame said glancing the sleeping, cat under the blankets.
"Well, you have now…it seems to have adopted you." Tesshu said smiling. "Rumour tells that it actually attacked Rikimaru, when he bent over you examining your injuries…He was the one that found you."
Ayame lifted the sleeping cat to her lap, to look it better. It didn't even bother to open it's eyes, just let out a content sigh and snuggled closer.
"You are truly brave one…I wouldn't dare to even threat Rikimaru, let alone attack him…And he is at least twenty times bigger than you…it was stupid thing to do…but thanks." Ayame thanked the cat mentally petting it.
"I better name you, if I'm going to keep you." She said aloud, even though there was no decision to make… the little kitten had already stolen her heart.
"Try using name, Oni." A petite blonde suggested stepping into the room. "…It's the cat's name." She explained in high-pitched voice.
"You know it?" Ayame asked staring, the young girl before her, she had long straight blonde hair, fair skin and ice-blue eyes. She was short and delicate, like a fairy. And was dressed in a long white dress, which was both stylish and beautiful.
"Yes, he once belonged to my sister Emi…but he left several years ago. Anyway nice to meet you I'm Mimi." She chirped, flashing her pearly white teeth as she smiled. "Nice to meet you."
"Nice to meet you too, I'm Ayame. …I though that the cat…Oni… was a kitten…" Ayame said petting the sleeping cat.
"Well, he can be deceiving…but it's nice to know that he has found a good owner. All he really needs is a little discipline." Mimi said lightly, but Ayame got the feeling that her words held several different meanings, and none of them were light. It was as if Mimi was trying to warn her somehow.
-The end of chapter four-
A.N: …I have a confession to make…. I really don't have a clear plot in my mind…I just write whatever comes to my twisted mind…. Is that a good or a bad thing I wonder…?
It also seems that my fic gets worse with each chapter…sorry about that