Mikari's POV

Walking down the old street once more, I made sure no one else was there and sat down on the grass, looking up at our new house. Had my brother made love to Keiryi up on that bed, or had he kissed her senseless in that bedroom of his? Somehow, even though they were happy, I had a bad feeling about their relationship, and where it was going. Ever since we were kids, I'd known that Hiro felt as if he was especially close to Keiryi. Not until a few years ago, though, had I found out that the two of them were dating.

The last few years had been spent finding out who I really was, and who I was meant to be. At first, I didn't know where I was going, but then I realized that I needed space. I needed some time to think things through, and I couldn't do it at home. Not with the distraction of Hiro and Keiryi. Even though i wanted to see my brother happy, something told me that being in love with Keiryi would only break his heart. At such a young age, he'd said he loved her, and that love had held. Somehow, though, that love had been unable to keep me home.

First, I'd gone to my uncle Hiei, who was hanging around in a local forest. "What do you want?" he asked testily, his lean, wiry muscles tensing. "You shouldn't be here." Ever since Mother's death, Hiei and myself had only become closer because we both missed her that badly. He could be as mean to me as he liked, but I was kin, and somewhere deep inside, that meant something to him. Also, it might have been the fact that I looked completely like my mother.

"I saw what happened to Mother," I said. "I-I don't want that to happen to me too. Please, train me." He quirked an eyebrow as if I was crazy, and then laughed darkly.

"You don't want me to train you," he scoffed. "You'd die halfway through." That was Hiei. Brutally blunt, but one hundred per cent honest.

"Is there a way I can defend against it?" I asked. "Something to build an immunity to it...anything." He shot me a look that was telling me to go away and stop wasting his time. I stared up at him with her eyes, my mother's eyes.

For a moment, Hiei looked down, unsure of what to do. Then he looked straight up, and a third eye opened on his forehead, a vivid blue as opposed to his natural crimson eyes. "What on earth is that?" I asked, part curious and part afraid.

"It's called a Jagan," he stated flatly. "An eye that sees more than the surface." I suddenly had the feeling that I was being watched as that third eye stared at me hideously. "You don't have it," he said, "the disease. I'd know that anywhere after all the nights I felt it." I gazed in awe at his Jagan, and then he laughed haughtily. Even though we were at eye level, Hiei had this way of standing that made me feel extremely...inferior.

"Fine," I said calmly, "so you won't teach me. I still feel something coming, though. Very soon, dark times will come, and I want to be prepared. I'll find a way if you won't give me one."

"Wait up," Hiei called acidly. "If you want to be my apprentice so bad, then I'll do it. But don't say I didn't warn you." For a split second, I almost felt like hugging him, but I realized that would probably only worsen my situation.

"Thank you...sensei," I said with a smile. Even if I wasn't gifted with spirit powers like my father, I could still learn something.

The first day was probably the hardest of all. A short, skinny teenage girl, I barely had the strength to swing a sword. At one point I almost hacked off my high ponytail. "If you can't use the sword right away, then I guess we'll do some training," Hiei said coldly. One thing I learned quickly about him was that he didn't feel very much for the suffering of others. Only the night after Mother died had I seen him show any emotion. That was it...one single tear that turned into a glossy black stone.

"Okay," I said, and he came at me, going easy at first. For a whole hour, I parried his punches and did my best to run where I could. Hiei was shockingly quick though. Even if I trained for months, I wouldn't be able to beat him.

"Don't use your eyes," Hiei lectured, jumping up to knock me down again. "Use your hearing, your smell...use your eyes as little as possible." Groping for some sort of advantage, I jumped backward into an awkward somersault that left me feeling sore.

"It's shocking you even have any demon blood in you," he taunted. "You can do better."

It went on for a whole half-hour more before I slumped against a tree. Hiei decided to rest beside me, and I felt that creepy eye of his peering into my thoughts. There was only thing to find in my head, though...shards of what had once been. A long time ago, I had been telepathically bonded to my mother. When she died, though, that bond was broken into a thousand tiny pieces, and that was all that remained of me. All my memories were of her, and somehow I could feel that she haunted his memories too.

Finally, after five minutes of complete silence, I worked up the courage to ask him something I'd been wondering about since day one. "How did you get your Jagan?" I asked.

"Don't ask what's none of your business," Hiei said acidly, glaring at me with all three eyes.

"But...it doesn't look natural. Were you...were you born with it?"

"Hn." Whenever he started making noises like that, it was usually my cue to shut up and let him be. Sadly, I didn't feel like being the good pupil that day.

"C'mon," I said irritably. "I'm just about the only family you have left. You're not going to confide the family secrets in my dad. I know that much from what my mom told me."

"It was an implant for...personal reasons," he finished, and left me alone to go get our dinner. So that was it. That was all he was going to tell me, even though I was his favorite? For the rest of the time that I waited, it haunted me, and eventually I found myself in a very foul mood because of Hiei's secrecy.

"Quit being an impatient brat," he said dryly. "You'll learn what you need to, when you need to. There's a big battle coming, and I just met with Keiryi.

"Is she alright?" I asked immediately upon hearing Keiryi's name. Though I resented her relationship with Hiro, I didn't hate Keiryi. We'd always been very good friends. "Where is she now? Is she off fighting another battle?"

"Shut up and let me finish," Hiei commanded, and I stopped talking immediately. The one thing I had learned, if nothing else, was to always listen to Hiei when he took that tone of voice. It meant he was angry about something, and pushing his anger could have dire consequences.

"I met with Keiryi and her father in Makai," he began, squatting down next to our fire.

"But I thought Kurama was..."

"Circumstances have changed," Hiei continued, and fanned the fire before speaking again. "Kaiina is mortally ill, and we all know who caused it. Fehreil is striking yet again, and this time he plans to take her so Keiryi will be his. However, Keiryi and her father have gone into the forest to try and stop Fehreil in order to heal Kaiina. I am only restrained from helping by you. Hopefully you'll be little less ungrateful."

Rather than charging him, I kept my anger inside, where it was still totally visible. The void that had been left by my mother's death began to ache more than usual at the lack of compassionate company. Hiei had been a great training master, but a terrible uncle, one who made me feel guilty if I shed a single tear. It wasn't his problem, after all, to deal with "useless, human emotions". Nothing was his problem, and it was getting quite frustrating.

Dinner was silent and tense, and I left to find some peace elsewhere. In the midst of the forest, there was a small grove that I decided to stop in, and I tried to use my spirit energy to see again. What was going to happen? How was Keiryi involved? These were the questions I asked, and then the world became white with only seven figures. When those seven figures became clear, I gasped, and scrambled to go find Hiei.

"Hiei!" I shouted, hoping he'd hear me and come. Before I could even make it to our little campfire, he ran right into me, glaring down at me as I went crashing backward.

"What is it, Mikari?" he demanded coldly. "What on earth has made you panic this time?" He seemed genuinely angry at me and me alone.

"It was a vision!" I screamed. "Keiryi's going to die!"

"Shut up. How do you even know it's true."

"None of my visions have been wrong before!" I shouted at him, acting like a spoiled child. "If you don't want to believe them, then I'll go find someone who does!"

Without another word, I went dashing home, and Hiei let me go. He was following a couple hundred feet behind me, but I didn't care. It was time to go home, where I knew I would be loved. Then, I wouldn't have to deal with Hiei and his fierce temper. Dad and Hiro would be happy to have me back where I had always belonged.

Once I got to the walkway up to the front door, I saw a dark man standing there, waiting for me. His eyes were darker than anything I'd ever seen, and his hair was a rich, dark brown. "Who are you?" I asked, breathless. Though absolutely frightening, he was awesomely powerful the way he carried himself.

"Does it really matter, Mikari?" he said with a smirk. "Soon, I will have taken care of you, and you will get to be with your family in the underworld!"

My mind was scrambling for what to do, but my body reacted effortlessly. Every step he took, I was able to judge easily. Hiei was much faster and a lot trickier. I laughed softly and a streak of blue light shot out toward him. "Silly girl," he said, and drew a saber that was about four feet long. Almost twice my height, he loomed over me ominously.

"You never could keep yourself quite together," he said. "I've watched all of you, and you seem like the one who would crumble if left alone. Sadly, the weakest pawns must be removed first. Your mother was so trusting, and so deliciously afraid when we took her."

Eyes open wide, I stared at him in terror. This was the man who had killed my mother. This was the heartless murderer who had ripped apart my father's soul by eliminating his one true love. "She wasn't weak," I said darkly, "and neither am I..." Ice-blue lines blurred my vision, and ice covered the earth, lashed out at him. Everything was poured into my last ditch effort, and yet he kept walking.

"Looks like you just weren't strong enough," he said with a menacing laugh. "If you had been, you wouldn't be so ready to die."

On the edge of my little storm, Hiei stood helplessly. "You don't have me yet," I told the man before me. "I'm not dead." In my mind, I realized just how foolish I'd been to leave Hiei, who was willing to protect me, when we both knew a crisis was coming.

"Give up, little ice maiden," he said. "I am Fehreil, the rightful king of Makai. No one will challenge me once I have eliminated you and your friends!" He took me and touched my heart, tracing the outline of my breast, and then resting his hand in the small of my back. Everywhere his hand went, I felt dirty, as though the plague was sprouting up in those places.

"You can live if you come to my castle," he said with a seductive tone to his voice. "Then I will have the pleasure of seeing your beauty in full."

"Shut up!" I screamed in agony, and I felt my own power tearing me apart. Drunk on it, I took more, and then my body grew weaker, and I collapsed. Everything was fading, and he was gone.

Before my last few minutes were up, I saw Hiro and Dad standing there in shock. "I'm so sorry for leaving," I choked out, blood drizzling down my chin. "I love you...all of you."

"Don't be sorry, Mika," Hiro said, letting me rest against him. "It was all my fault. Please find it in your heart to forgive me for all I've done."

"I'll always love you, Mikari," Dad finished off. "My only regret will have been that I didn't get to see you grow up all the way."

A tiny, black-haired girl was there before me, smiling cordially with her celery-colored eyes. "It's time to go, Mikari," she said softly. "It's time to go home."

A/N-Hi, all of you who are still reading my story. Sorry it's been a long time. I went on retreat for a while, and then I went to DC and the Outer Banks for vacation. Sadly, there's only two+ more weeks until I have to go back to school and probably write less. So, love to those who have reviewed recently, and I hope you enjoyed this chapter. I know it was kind of an aside, but I would've wanted to know what happened to Mikari in the end.

Peace, Love, and Peace Out,

Miari