Author's notes: There should be less typos in this chapter than there has been. I keep noticing them when I come back to read the chapters that I've already posted over.
Well, I got all excited when my first two reviews for chapter 13 came in, and I immediately created a forum. So, I have a forum. Yay. We can discuss my story now!
Thanks to my reviewers of chapter 13, youkaigirl64, Chibi Ame, caliecookie1991, and KawaiiQuerida-chan!
Chapter 14"If you're doing this just to prove to us that you're not afraid, you've done it already. We can go home now."
The young man sighed and gave a short laugh. "I don't need to prove anything to you two. Do you even have any idea where I'm taking you?" He smirked at them, his composure still strong.
"This is the way to school, isn't it? I still think that we shouldn't be out in the middle of the woods in broad daylight," the woman said to him as she nearly tripped over a root. The young man continued gracefully through the trees, his royal walk keeping up a quick pace.
"So now you've had a change of heart?" he asked flippantly. "Now you're the one thinking that we should stay near-invisible?"
"She's right, you know," the small, dark, catlike creature said from the sickeningly pink bad at the woman's hip. "You should take caution."
"I know that I have to be careful. In fact, I recall telling you two that you had to be more careful," he told them irritably, throwing them a glare over his shoulder but still managing to dodge outstretched branches that seemed to be consciously attempting to scratch his perfect, pale visage.
"Well we worry about you!" the woman told him, almost pleading now. "I was so scared… You were so cold," she shivered and rubbed her arms, as if she had also experienced the icy feeling.
"That's precisely why we have come here, isn't it?" the young man stated, his composed and respectable exterior starting to wear down. Taking in a deep breath, he quickly regained it and stopped walking. They could now see a building through the trees, and all three of them knew it as a school, an important school, though only one had ever attended.
"What are we doing here?" the small creature said in a bored tone. "What do you plan to do?"
The two watched him as he just stared at the school, and suddenly his hole being seemed to pulsate once, and then he let out a sigh. The woman resisted the urge to cry out, biting her lip until it went numb with pain. The young man turned around with his regular triumphant smirk returning to his face and simply started walking back the way that they had come.
"What do you think you're doing?" the woman finally hissed, after dismissing everything else she had wanted to say to him, the boy who had just performed an act of sheer idiocy and ultimate hypocrisy in her eyes.
"I need to catch Sakura-san's attention, and her attention only. Making a physical appearance without anyone else noticing my presence would be much too difficult," he replied calmly. There was an underlying tension in his voice; he knew what he had done. He had radiated his own magical aura, so that anyone who could sense it would. But anyone who had not sensed it before would not recognize it, and there were very few who had. "Sakura-san" was one of these few. The misfortune of making himself known this way was that he had taken a huge risk. Someone was searching him out, and he didn't know who they were, where they were, or if they could even sense magic, but he was putting his faith in "Sakura-san". He needed her to find him before it was too late.
His very soul was in danger.
/MoOn/
/AnD/
/StArS/
Math class was the worst time of the day for Sakura. It was just too confusing. To make matters worse, Tomoyo didn't share that particular class with her, so she felt very alone as she tried to understand the complex equations and formulas. And just to put several cherries on top of that horrible cake of algebra, trigonometry and several different uses for the number ten, math reminded her of Syaoran. He had always been so natural at math, and he had helped her on one or two occasions. So, math class was just the worst time of the day.
Suddenly, she sensed something, and the gloom of math class seemed to be shocked out of her system. She thought she recognized it, but she couldn't be sure, it had only lasted for a moment. Her first instinct told her something that she thought that she would be completely confident in knowing, but upon a second glance, everything was now filled with uncertainty.
But upon a third look… Sakura had known that her first instinct was usually the right one, and that all doubt about it had always been completely misplaced. Doubt belonged somewhere else.
Sakura decided that she would tell Tomoyo about this small magical aura sensation that she had experienced in math class.
Math class. Sakura suddenly slumped disappointedly in her chair. Math class was the worst time of the day for Sakura.
/MoOn/
/AnD/
/StArS/
"Good to see you back in school, Usagi-chan!" Naru said, taking a seat beside Usagi at lunchtime.
Usagi smiled and straightened to look at her friend, almost as if testing her abdominal muscles for the millionth time since Saturday. As had been the result for the last nine hundred, ninety nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety nine times, they worked perfectly. "Thank you, Naru-chan. I had time to recover over the weekend."
"What did you have?" Naru asked, tilting her head in curiosity.
Usagi opened her mouth to speak, but found herself pausing to actually come up with something. "Just a flu," she said.
"It must have been a bad flu," Naru said, but she waved it off. "There must be a bug going around, Hisano-san had that as well."
Naru's eyes sparkled when she talked of Yojiro. Similar to all of the girls in the school, Naru had become instantly infatuated with either one or both of the twins when they had first come. Yasuto was off the market – for now – so all of the girls thought that it was only a matter of time before Yojiro found a girlfriend as well. He seemed to receive many letters of confession, but Usagi had never seen them and Yojiro himself seemed quite unaffected. He never showed interest in any of the girls; he was more intent on making sure that his brother didn't get into any trouble.
"Yes, that must be it," Usagi said. "Naru-chan, have you ever sent Yojiro-san a love letter? I'm sure there are a lot of girls who do."
"Oh no, of course not!" Naru replied, in a rather annoyed tone. "Hisano-san will never look at one of those desperate little…" Naru trailed off, mumbling a few rude words to herself.
"Sorry, Naru-chan," Usagi said, hoping that she hadn't offended her friend.
Naru laughed good-heartedly. "Oh don't worry about it Usagi-chan. Have you written to him?"
Usagi blinked in surprise before laughing and shaking her head. "No! I don't like him like that! Besides, I've only talked to him a couple of times," she said nervously. She had never even thought of Yojiro or Yasuto in that way. She had never thought of anyone in that way since Mamoru. Mamoru. She hoped that she would free him soon.
"Well, at least there's someone that's not in love with one of the Hisanos," Naru said, staring off into space. "I just can't resist their charm!"
Usagi giggled. Yasuto's boyish charm matched with Yojiro's gentlemanly charm was certainly a force to be reckoned with.
"So, Usagi-chan, I heard that there's a new movie coming out this Friday…"
/MoOn/
/AnD/
/StArS/
"So, you think that Hiiragizawa-san is back?" Yukito asked from his place on the couch next to Touya. His face held a slightly pained expression; it was hard to determine what Yue was thinking behind Yukito's eyes.
Sakura nodded. "It was only for a second, but I swear that it was his aura."
Touya looked very skeptical of the idea. "If he's back, then why hasn't the little troublemaker made his appearance yet?" he said, clearly annoyed.
"He's been concealing his aura this whole time, maybe he's hiding," Sakura suggested.
"But why do you think that he'd be hiding?" Tomoyo asked, sounding worried. Touya glanced at her out of the corner of his eye, his annoyed expression remaining.
"Everyone who hides has something to hide from," Yukito said cryptically, his eyes slightly out of focus.
"You think it has anything to do with…" Touya said as his eyes slipped from Yukito's distant look to his sister's worried face.
"It could be," Tomoyo said. "But why?" she asked, elegantly and honestly concerned. Her eyes held an innocence, but she held herself regally, as always.
The fours sat in silence, thinking of possibilities. Their quiet pondering was cut short when a loud yawn made its way down the staircase, followed by the small golden form of Kero, sleepily peering at them.
"What's everyone so serious about?" he asked, not really caring what the answer would be.
There was a moment of silence before someone did actually answer. "Sakura-chan thinks that Hiiragizawa-san may be back," Tomoyo said. "It seems as though he's hiding."
Even though the news did hit the very-tired Kero – and it did so very slowly – he still had only one thing on his mind.
"Let's have pudding."
Sakura tilted her head to the side curiously, as if to say "why". Because of this, Kero had to think of an excuse, but he was very tired, and Kero's thoughts were not processing very well.
"To…um…celebrate," he finally said. Sakura gave him a reprimanding look and Touya rolled his eyes, but Tomoyo giggled.
"I think it might do us good to clear our heads so that we can figure this out," she said, smiling her sweet smile.
Touya sighed and got up. "Fine. Let's have pudding."
/MoOn/
/AnD/
/StArS/
"Yin, wha-."
"Sh…" Yin smiled down at Yang as he ran his hand over her currently auburn hair. Yang closed her mouth and closed her eyes, soothed by Yin's gentle hand. Although Aiko was a few rooms away, the slightest creak could break her concentration, and she would be angry if that happened.
Yang sighed and tried again in a whisper. "Yin, what happened in England?"
Yin smirked. "He was not there," he said, "the house was abandoned."
Yang nodded, understanding a little more why Aiko had been so enraged when she had returned, and why she had been meditating so often.
Aiko was not in fact meditating. She was communicating with spirits, trying to convince them to listen to her and only her. She would not stand for another incident similar to the one that had cost her Mamoru's crystal. However, not many spirits were willing to comply. Clow Reed had been the greatest sorcerer in the world, and only one currently had the potential to rival his legacy, so it was both out of fear and respect that spirits would listen to his every command. If that meant betraying the woman who had them bound to her to supply her power, than so be it.
"What will happen to us?" Yang asked, a worried expression entering her face.
Yin gave her a confused look, and she elaborated. "What will happen if she fails? What will become of us? Will we be…" her last word came out as a barely audible whisper. "Free?"
Yin opened his mouth to speak, but shut it as he realized that he could not answer. Instead he settled for taking Yang's hand and smiling down at her, but inside, his mind was a flurry of questions.
/MoOn/
/AnD/
/StArS/
The refrigerator door opened, and Michiru looked up from her place on the couch to study Haruka as the other woman peered down at her own arm. The refrigerator door closed and opened again, and Michiru let out a small laugh.
"Do you ever break a habit?" she asked, getting up and taking a can of soda from the fridge as Haruka reached in to get one as well.
Haruka completely ignored her question as the can in her hand exhaled sharply at her when she opened it. "Know who I really don't get?"
Michiru sighed. She supposed that Haruka's habit of continually testing her arm would last another day or so. "Who?" she asked, already knowing the answer.
"That Kinomoto-san guy. I just don't understand him," Haruka said. Michiru carefully opened her can of soda and looked up at Haruka, her eyes asking her roommate to continue.
"He so protective of his little sister, when it's obvious that she's a lot more powerful than him," Haruka ranted. Michiru giggled softly, but Haruka took no notice.
"Maybe he has different motives for protecting her. She seems like such an innocent girl, Kinomoto Sakura. She doesn't seem to have knowledge of the tragedies that life can bring," Michiru said, turning to gaze out the window with a strange smile on her face. If not for the distant look in her beautiful aquamarine eyes, she would have appeared perfectly content.
"That's the reason why you backed me up…" Haruka said, not sounding surprised. "When I didn't want her to join us, that's why you supported me; to protect her, an innocent child, from everything we've been through."
She studied Michiru's face with a sad smile, until the other woman finally parted her lips to speak. "I believe that you wanted to protect her on some level as well, and you were angry because Kinomoto Touya was preventing you from keeping them all out of harm's way," she said solemnly. "But it is too late now, and we can all see that despite her innocence, she is strong, and we need her help."
Haruka frowned and furrowed her brow slightly, Michiru always knew her better than she knew herself. Taking a sip from her soda can, she turned away and followed Michiru's gaze out the window. The sun was casting long shadows across everything it could not touch; it would set within an hour.
"Yes," she said, "we need her help."
/MoOn/
/AnD/
/StArS/
And the plot thickens…
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Word Count: 2,322