Next chapter should be on the 11th of November.
"Is Sakura-chan still sleeping upstairs?" He asks, gaze not shifting.
There's a pause- or at least it feels like one to Fai as he feels his stomach drop before she says anything and he knows already but what if he's wrong- they wouldn't have just let her leave in her condition, would they? They aren't stupid-
"No." Yuuko says evenly, gaze cool.
Fai looks up, single eye blown wide as the shock registers and he knew, he knew but!
"She's out there." She says and Fai could throw up. His hands make to tear Mokona from his lap but he can't wake the small creature so he just wraps his fingers into his flesh and feels his claws bite at his skin, threatening to rip through his arms as he tries to hold it together.
"They sent her with someone. The real Syaoran went with her." He states the questions, horror crawling through every inch of him.
"No. She went alone. That was the price." The witch says neutrally.
Fai can't hold it together. Without words he places Mokona on the bed beside him and leaves instantly, running from the room. Rage fuels him as he tugs the cape around his shoulders, feeling a spiraling nausea at the pure wrongness of a feeling past the bottom of his spine where he shouldn't feel.
He doesn't care though.
He doesn't care if it hurts him or makes him sick or kills him. He deserves all that.
He wants all that.
But Sakura-
The princess.
His Princess.
She doesn't deserve any of that.
He has to do something to save her- has to protect her, his daughter.
He can hear somehow where Syaoran is- the real Syaoran, not the fake who he can feel through the tendril of magic caught between them- and tell through some strange pull where Kurogane is and he bursts between them with all the fire he has held inside, spitting and snarling and breaking its teeth against his self-control which is wavering like steam from a kettle.
"Where is Sakura?" He growls out, finally feeling like the monster he's always been.
Syaoran looks guilty, sadly staring at Fai in a way which won't earn him half the sympathy it would have from the old one when everything was new and bright.
The ninja has the gall to look calm, dismissive even.
Before that would have merited a little teasing or maybe even a brief, hidden piece of honesty tied up in ambiguity and humour.
Now Fai is even more broken apart than before- (We all are- screams a distant part of his mind, crying out for him to stop) now it only makes his claws extend from his fingers, deadly sharp and looking close enough to his- to that man's- that Fai knows that he truly is his son in every meaningful way, even down to his demonic nature.
"It's what the princess wanted." Kurogane says, voice even, eyes fixed steadily, unchallenging on Fai's.
He thinks he's right.
"And you didn't stop her." He gets out through gritted teeth, addressing the man completely now because he is the only one who could have and he did nothing- no one else knew her well enough. Syaoran would always do what his childhood friend had wished and this Syaoran would never dare to command his own mother.
"No." The warrior says, "I didn't."