Disclaimer: Natsuki Takaya owns FB, I don't. I also don't own anything else you recognize. Please R&R if you have the time :)
Oh, and a new cameo in this chapter. Kazuma is Khazuma (not much change there, hm?). "Shoma-mharu" is an honorific for a master of martial arts. You can tell I'm heavily influenced by what I see in manga...Also, later I accidentally wrote another scene where Asheno dared Lhado to beat Huki, forgetting what I'd already written in this chapter. I'd appreciate any feedback on which version you prefer after I get that chapter up in the future.
Chapter 15
Three days crawled by. Upon their return to school, Haku and Hatsuharu set themselves to the task of simultaneously catching up and preparing for the high school entrance exams, which were in two weeks. The purpose of these tests was not to determine who would enter which school; they only served as class placement exams. Long ago Asheno had decided that Haku, Hatsuharu and all the other Dzuni would attend Karori. Still, teachers and family pressed students to perform as well as possible on the tests. Hence the intense studying. Haku spent many hours late at night trying to bulk up in math and science, his worst subjects. History wasn't far behind, and language was no problem for him. The tests weren't an issue for Hatsuharu; he performed consistently well in all of his classes.
The visions had settled into more or less of a routine for Haku. The last few nights, after he fell asleep at his desk, visions stole into his dreams. Like before, sometimes Haku inhabited the body of one of the characters; other times he watched as an impersonal observer, separate from everyone else. However, it seemed that the wolf made Haku see the vision from another character's perspective more often, especially when Asheno was involved.
Haku had watched Lhoru adjust to life at Shoma Shehure's house. She gradually grew accustomed to Huki and Lhadoman's constant bickering and martial arts sparring, and Shehure's somewhat off-color comments continued to stymie her. For now, Lhoru kept her new residence a secret from her best friends, Zhula and Hanadzima. Two visions, in particular, left deep impressions in Haku's memory.
At the start of the first one, Haku was transported to Karori again. Huki and Lhoru were alone in a hallway, Huki looking very serious and Lhoru more than a little worried. After some furtive glances to make sure no one was around, Huki spoke in a low voice.
"You didn't tell your friends about us? About the curse?" he asked.
"Oh no! I would not do something like that!" Lhoru shook her head vigorously.
Huki sighed. "Your memory may be erased. We say erased, but it's more like hypnosis. The last time someone found out my secret…" he gulped.
A high-pitched child's voice spoke, "I didn't want to lose my friends." The voice had come from Huki's inner consciousness. The scene blackened as though a switch had been flipped, and a small, evanescent lavender circle appeared at a distance from Haku. A wind yanked Haku off his feet and sucked him into the softly pulsing circle.
He stood in Asheno's parlor, the same one where he'd had his disastrous audience with Asheno only the week before. It was nighttime, and no lights had been lit. Somehow, the room seemed much bigger than before. Haku realized he was in the body of Huki as a small boy, when he was no more than eight or nine.
Haku sensed the boy's considerable fright, both mentally and physically. His knees shook under the white and light blue hekasho, and his lungs tightened, an asthma attack threatening. Tears burned his eyes. In front of him, only the silhouette of Asheno lying on the chaise could be seen. In Huki's mind, Haku saw the image of a group of children playing, rolling in the grass, yelling with delight. Then a girl started running towards him, her arms outspread. Haku felt Huki's body tighten in the memory, as the girl hugged him and the now-familiar "pop" echoed like a death knell. All the children stood around the tiny rat perched atop the clothes Huki had been wearing, staring at him.
The flashback over, Haku heard little Huki's voice address the nearly invisible Asheno, with only the slightest quiver on the first word.
"Asheno, am I so strange that my friends' memories had to be erased?"
The smooth voice loathed by so many replied, "Of course. Is it not normal for a little boy to turn into a rat?"
"But I didn't want their memories to be erased."
"Huki, if people knew what you were, they would be disgusted. They would avoid you, make you a social outcast. Do you want that?"
"N-no."
"Then you will not play with your friends again." The sickly scent of dying flowers in the garden wafted through the air. Huki's suffocating sobs broke the silence.
Haku returned to the previous scene, where Huki and Lhoru still stood quietly in an empty hallway at Karori. Now Haku watched on his own again.
Finally Huki asked, "Do I…sicken you, Lhoru?"
"No, I feel fine today! So much better!" exclaimed Lhoru, smiling. Evidently she'd misunderstood the question.
"That wasn't…" Huki paused, then returned her smile. "Never mind, I'm glad you're feeling better."
"Why does Asheno want to see me?" Haku, inside a little boy's body, heard the young Lhadoman think as the seven-year-old cat crouched under the oldest, largest flame tree on the Shoma compound. "Old Blood," as the family called this tree, towered over northwest corner of the compound's main garden, its tortuous branches jealously guarding the terrace. Hardy vines crawled over the ancient stone walls, and feral flowers bloomed during the spring and summer months. The shaggy grass added a final touch to the corner's wild look. Lhadoman had always liked this part of the family garden best because it defied the orderly trimness of the rest of the gardens. Its wildness reflected his tumultuous relationship with the Shomas well. Whenever he came to the family estate, which wasn't often, he could always find comfort in the northwest corner, chasing a butterfly or exploring the windy, overgrown footpaths.
On this occasion, however, Lhadoman picked nervously at grass stalks. Asheno had not requested an audience with him since that time three years ago…when he ripped off Lhadoman's bracelet. The memory still stung. Lhadoman had seen the horror his true form inspired for the first time, that he could recall. His true form…automatically, Lhadoman checked to make sure the blood-and-bone bracelet was safely on his wrist.
Besides picking up Lhadoman's anxiety, Haku fought his own mental battle against an instinct to run away from the northwest corner, to elude the shadow that lay in wait for him behind Old Blood. Whenever he had come near the northwest corner, Haku sensed the stirrings of a dark revelation. The feeling had been vague, but potent and deeply frightening. The first time Haku had approached the northwest corner, when he was a year old and on a walk with Rhena and Hatsuharu, he began crying uncontrollably and didn't stop until Rhena rushed him back to the house. Since then, Asheno had told him severely on several occasions that he shouldn't be silly, that it was only his imagination, there was no monster in the northwest corner. To Haku one thing was certain: that feeling truly existed as a palpable entity.
So the vision proceeded, Haku desperately wishing it would end as soon as possible, trying not to look at Old Blood. Mercifully, Lhadoman trotted away from it in pursuit of a bird. A hidden root caught the boy's foot and he stumbled to the ground. When he looked up, he saw the bottom of a purple hekasho.
"Lying with his face in the dirt before the family head," observed a very young Asheno. Haku had never seen Asheno as a little child, even in family photographs. Here, he could not be more than twelve. Short, perfectly black hair framed the pallid, sharp lines of a beautiful face racked by recent illness. "How appropriate for the outcast cat."
Asheno's eyes looked down contemptuously.
"What do you want?" demanded Lhadoman, determined not to let his fear show.
"Uncouth as ever. I've recently heard that you want to join the Dzuni as an official member."
"Yeah." Lhadoman sat up, uncertain what direction this conversation was heading towards.
"Why should I let you join?"
"Because I'm a Dzuni, too. I should be in the Dzuni!"
"How dare you say that, after your mother started going crazy after seeing your true form when you were born! It's because of you that she killed herself and embarrassed the family!"
"It wasn't my fault!"
"You inconvenience everyone. Your precious Shoma-mharu takes you in as a favor, and you repay him by causing trouble at school. You pester me, your god, who has more important things to do! The cat join the Dzuni? It'll never happen." The last words pronounced in a staccato.
"But—" Lhadoman cut himself off, squirming and looking at the ground.
Asheno smiled. The smile that meant he knew he had power over his precious Dzuni. Haku and Hatsuharu had not seen the insidious smile often, but Haku recognized it. The smile had appeared more often in the past few days.
"If you want to join so badly, I'll make a deal with you," Asheno spoke softly, bending down and tipping Lhadoman's chin upwards to face him. Inwardly, Haku grimaced at the repulsion from such close face-to-face with Asheno. Judging from the boy's mental reaction, Lhadoman felt the same.
"The day you defeat Huki in a martial arts battle," whispered Asheno, "is the day you join the Dzuni. As your god," emphasizing the "your", "I promise to stand by this if you miraculously defeat Huki. After all, it was the rat who prevented the cat from going to the banquet. It is only right that you should have to prove your worthiness by avenging yourself on the rat before you are allowed to join the Dzuni." He released Lhadoman's chin with a final superior sneer, and walked away without another word.
Momentarily confused, Lhadoman continued to sit. As the boy's mind seethed in turmoil, Haku overheard bits and snatches of overheard conversations:
"The rat is special, isn't he?"
"Oh, yes, the rat is beautiful and intelligent. Not like that cat."
"Poor Shoma-mharu Khazuma. Throwing away his life on that thing."
"What is it? It's so ugly, and it stinks!"
"Yes, Khazuma's too young…"
"Lhadoman, come and have tea with me." A kitchen table in a sunlit room materialized, with cups and a china teapot set out. Haku saw an emaciated blonde woman, Lhadoman's mother, he assumed, sit in one of the chairs, and a pistol slowly rising towards her head…
"I will defeat Huki! I will!" screamed Lhadoman, fat tears rolling down his round cheeks. "I will become a real Dzuni!"
That vision stood out in Haku's memory with disturbing clarity. It had been the first time Faran-Zhuku had shown him a vision both emotionally and visually disturbing on so many different levels. Not only had he felt Lhadoman's intense fear, there was his own fear of the northwest corner and Asheno, then that last sight of Lhadoman's mother and the pistol.
Yes, thought Haku as he stopped by his school locker at the end of the day. The wonder was that he hadn't gone mad.