Authoress' notes: I still don't own Inuyasha or anything in the Inuyasha universe!
Thanks to everyone again who is reading and reviewing!
Wayward Ransom, chapter 23.
The craggy remains of Mount Hakurei looked like a web made of light and deep shadow in the late morning sunlight. Above the rugged surface, a raven was soaring high in the air, circling around and around, eventually perching on a dead tree nearby. It sqawked obnoxiously, then fluttered its wings.
On the very edge of the distressed ground, a group of six people stood on the sunbathed, soft, grass-covered earth. Raidonichi stood with his ever-present shadow, Kanaye, next to him. Four monk-type men, one of whom was Masakisho, were chanting something, the words incomprehensible to Bankotsu, who had only learned of the mountain's total destruction two days ago.
Bankotsu's jacket, part of the outfit given too-graciously to him by Masakisho, blew slightly in the gentle, warm afternoon breeze. He looked down often at some of the red characters he had just noticed on his new, entirely pure white clothes, trying to decode their meaning. They were scattered here and there; on his sleeves, on the bottom hems of his pants, on either side of the bottom edges of his jacket. It was, admittedly, sheer frustration for him to not know what they meant, but the characters weren't his priority right now.
The light armor between the jacket and his inner white shirt wan't anything fancy, but it would be enough to do what he needed to do, and soon, it would come off. Besides the plain armor, it was a pretty expensive-looking outfit, and that's all that mattered. And when he got compensated for killing off Yukio, he'd buy whatever the hell he'd want.
The young warrior sat alone, on the edge of a long, wide, flat boulder. Unlike the raven he had been watching, Bankotsu was completely disinterested in the whole process of getting his favored weapon recovered from its burial place deep within the overturned ground. He tuned out the droning prayers of the monks, and his thoughts turned back to two days ago, when he had been scraped off the ground by an old woman with four daughters and, afterwards, taken in by Masakisho.
He had spent the afternoon resting, then had taken up Masakisho on his offer of a relaxing hot spring bath later on that evening. Sure enough, after he had limped there, he met Raidonichi, who was just finishing up his own bath.
Raidonichi proved to be a rather strange person. Rather than discussing Yukio and his pet bird, Raidonichi had quickly brought up the subject of women, detailing his constant travails with his present girlfriend, who was also his ward, Kanaye's, mother. Raidonichi tried many ways to pull information out of Bankotsu about his experience, but the younger man wasn't interested in small talk, or better yet, having a philosophical conversation about women. Hearing Raidonichi's list of complaints about Kanaye's mother only reinforced his reluctance to discuss relationships with him.
The only experience Bankotsu had with them, he told Raidonichi, was knowing when it was either too awkward or too fleeting, much to his own chagrin. To attempt to quell Raidonichi's annoying curiosity, Bankotsu recalled that he tried something once with a girl, and simply said that it didn't work out. He mentioned to Raidonichi that the girl was too fixated on business to begin anything. And any others were temporarily amusing, but, in the long run, just...not quite right. Besides, he had been too absorbed in trying to preserve his life since the age of three to think very much about them.
On being pressed a bit, he admitted to Raidonichi that he always thought it would be amusing to have a pretty girl around to give him massages, feed him cherries and pour his wine for him, but the realities of his life left little to no time for relaxing and allowing himself to be pampered, anyway. And sometimes, his lifestyle left him in such a mess, that he often found himself wanting very badly to be pampered.
Bankotsu tired of the subject of conversation, so he tried to get information from Raidonichi about his targets. Raidonichi said he himself had tried to infiltrate Yukio's place before, but found the security to be too ever-present, and had to abort his mission, to Kanaye's crushing disappointment. He had also tried once to gather villagers together, thinking that strength would be in numbers. That proved ineffective, also, because he found that they were more content to sit at the gate of Yukio's castle, complaining about the awful things he did, rather than helping themselves by just storming the castle and killing the hated man.
Bankotsu's thoughts were interrupted by sensing someone's approach. He could tell, even without looking up, that it was Masakisho standing before him.
When Bankotsu bothered to look up at him, he noted the pleased expression on Masakisho's face. "This is going better than we had all hoped," Masakisho said. "Usually, the souls of the dead aren't too willing to do this, so it takes much, much more prayer and supplication for them to act. We were unusually fortunate this time." He looked back at the group of monks, who were finished chanting and were now discussing something amongst themselves. "It would have taken months to dig through the rubble to find your weapon. It would also take an inordinate amount of time to create a weapon to your specifications, considering what you told me about the Banryuu." He sighed sadly and rubbed his hands together in contemplation. "Maybe even the dead realize that sometimes, doing a thing like this is necessary."
Bankotsu chuckled softly. "Or maybe they just wanna drag me back to where they are," he said.
Masakisho's face fell for an instant. Recovering his pleased expression, he continued. "Well, anyway, we don't do this often at all."
A long pause began, and the monk looked at the young man often with honest concern. He had often thought Bankotsu to be too entirely young for his skills and reputation. And even in their brief conversations, it was obvious that there was a lot of boyishness remaining in the young man's heart.
Masakisho now felt driven to know more about Bankotsu. His curious gaze was answered silently with cold cobalt eyes. "I remember you saying," began Masakisho, "that your men were at peace now. So tell me...if there is a way to put your own soul to rest...what would it be? What could anyone possibly do for you?"
Bankotsu's face contorted into a completely confused look.
Masakisho noted the disarming innocence in the young man's face. "If there is anything I can do..." he said quietly, trailing off into silence.
Bankotsu humphed, and scratched his head thoughtfully. "Rest. For me? Huh. Never thought about that too much." After a few short moments of searching for an answer, he placed one hand on a hip, and rested the other forearm on a thigh, regaining his too-casual smirk. "Can't answer that. But I know I'll be able to count on you if I ever come up with something."
Masakisho groaned to himself. He thought the solution would be something simple. However, the young man's answer gave Masakisho the impression that Bankotsu had in fact never quite figured out what he wanted out of life...or even unlife. No one had ever asked him the important questions. Perhaps, thought the monk, part of getting rid of the curse of the Band of Seven had something to do more with asking the right questions rather than providing him with wealth and other physical comforts; but it wasn't like he wouldn't be given enough of those anyway after killing the daimyo in power. He almost pitied the young man. Masakisho had a rather blessed past, and it seemed that under his steely demeanor, the young man sitting near him was, strangely, quite used to having nothing.
Masakisho turned back briefly toward the gathering of men at the bottom of the gentle slope. "I have something unfortunate to tell you. I had to tell the rest of the men here about your identity and objective. They should on the most part be silent about it, but you see that one in the white and red down there?" said Masakisho, pointing. "That's Jiro. He likes to run his mouth off. However, I needed him to be here. I don't plan-"
"I don't really care who knows about me," said Bankotsu flatly, cocking an eyebrow and shaking his head slightly. "The faster the word gets around to Yukio that I'm here, the faster he can get to a hot spring and wash his neck before I get to him," he said, one corner of his mouth pulled up in a smirk.
Masakisho flinched. The young man's boyishness seemed to be coexisting with this cold mercenary temperament. Masakisho wondered if this coexistence was, in fact, a peaceful one.
Looking downhill, Bankotsu noticed something odd was going on with Masakisho's friends. The cocky smirk disappeared from his face, as he noticed Raidonichi looking around nervously, his sai-like weapons at an attack-ready position. He was shielding Kanaye, who hid behind him. Two of the monks were on the ground, rubbing their heads in confusion, the other just getting back up to his feet.
Masakisho himself was almost knocked to his feet by a massive tremor in the ground. The only thing that saved him from falling to the ground was sprinting unsteadily over to the rock on which Bankotsu sat, and supporting himself on it. Bankotsu sat on the rock, indifferent to the way the earth shook.
When the tremors stopped, a long, thin crack in the earth was seen a short way from where Bankotsu's left foot rested on the ground. The earth split apart, and when the dust cleared, Bankotsu's eyes went wide open, and he grinned in amusement as his Banryuu was held up from the ground, its shaft gripped by a hand that seemed to be composed entirely of fine soil.
Masakisho clapped his hands together twice, and looked up to the blue sky. "Thank goodness! The spirits have recognized that we needed their aid!"
No sooner had he said this, when the earth quaked again. Another hand came out of the ground. Masakisho and Bankotsu looked on silently.
The hands worked together to raise a complete body out of the earth. The limbs of the body were reproduced in soil, but the fine details remained hauntingly shrouded.
Soil continued to fall from the specter as it awkwardly brandished the Banryuu, and the dust-figure silently brought the weapon horizontally in front of itself.
The point rested an inch away from Bankotsu's neck. The young man didn't even bat an eye.
Masakisho, on the other hand, knew his supplications to the dead had backfired. "Your mercenary past...it has come back to haunt you! No wonder the spirits were so cooperative..." he said quietly, terrified out of his mind.
Bankotsu chuckled, the point of his own weapon still at his neck. "Seems 'the spirits' have recognized me, too," he said sarcastically, looking down the broad blade, right into the formless face of what was now his new opponent.