Shards III

Disclaimer: Neverwinter Nights 2 belongs to Obsidian Entertainment, and Tsubasa Chronicle belongs to CLAMP. I make no money from this work of fanfiction at all.

Pairings: Hints of Sakura/Syaoran, Kurogane/Fai, and eventual odd couple.

Summary: In the world of Aber-Toril, on the continent of Faerun, Sakura begins a journey to gather silver shards that hold the key to her destiny. On the way she gathers companions and knowledge, but there are some things that she may not be able to handle.

A/N: I chose to make Fai a bard, as we rarely ever see his raw magical ability. He fights as well as charms and beguiles, which are bard traits. It is also hard to try to keep these characters recognizably IC, as they have all lived very different lives when compared to their Tsubasa counterparts. Sakura, obviously, was brought up in a place where she was expected to be tough. Kurogane has no princess and Fai has no curse (yet). I usually enjoy Tsubasa AU's but one of the hardest things in them is to keep the characters recognizable. Please, if I stray, let me know?

"Ah, fresh materials to work with," the black robed figure purred, looking at Sakura and her companions. "Excellent."

Sakura blinked, shocked still as the worm eaten corpses were tugged upwards, shambling towards them without mind or will. They had fought through zombies and skeletons… but to see the actual act of animation, watching the maggots drop and bits of flesh crackle and snap with the forces goading it to move caused bile to rise in her throat. As one who dealt with spirits, with souls, to see flesh move without heart or soul to guide them made her flesh crawl.

Behind the man in black robes (she wondered if he was some kind of priest) was the one they had been looking for.

Upon arriving at Fort Locke, they had discovered that several patrols had gone missing with the new Fort Commander. Because of this, there were no more patrols along the roads. No patrols into the Mere. No one to protect West Harbor as it recovered. Sakura could not allow that to happen.

"Attack, my children," the priest hissed, and Sakura gagged at the sweet clinging stench that filled the room. "Let us add their-"

"If I might get a word in," Fai interrupted, stepping out from behind the stupefied girl. "Surely you can think of a better line? If I'm going to record your last words, perhaps you can come up with something more creative. Less clichéd, perhaps?"

Silence descended, the zombies halted briefly at the surprised pause from their master.

"Idiot," Kurogane growled before charging forward. Fai, in the background, just laughed before humming a tune.

Sakura had to stop herself from staring at her companions- and that hesitation cost her. One of the zombies swung out, making her shriek in dismay as it hit her- barely hard enough for her to feel it, but the touch left her feeling unclean. Her bow worked well as a club, but it was more useful aimed at the priest.

The priest, as it turned out, didn't get time to reword himself as his body was quickly peppered with arrows and crossbow bolts. Kurogane, in the background, was grunting and hissing as he took out the zombies which kept on twitching and flopping as he cleaved their limbs from their bodies.

Sakura quickly covered her mouth and looked away- and found that she had a much easier time dealing with pulling her arrows out of the body in front of her than she would have thought. The living man in the corner approached her hesitantly… and Sakura nearly sagged in relief. At least some of the patrol had survived.

"You would be..?" she asked, barely noticing the cold sweat that popped out on her skin.

"Commander Tam of Fort Locke," the man began, and Sakura did her best to hear him. Even the globe of light she had summoned seemed to be getting pale and she pulled her cloak a little closer. Swallowing hard, she wove towards the wall.

"Are you all right?" she heard herself ask, looking at the previous Fort Commander… just in time to feel her knees collide with the floor cobbles.

"I should be asking…"

It felt like suddenly being covered in water- sound and light receded as her chest clenched.

"Sakura?"

"My men-"

More words were spoken, but she couldn't make them all out.

"Miss-"

"Sakura!"

Sand crunched and shifted under her slippers as she made her way over the dunes to the ruins that arched overhead. Her arms and feet moved stiffly, shuffling as the night wind bit through her thin garb. Starlight and moonlight lit the way; there were no trees or clouds to hide them from view. Parched, cold air swirled around her, but it was blocked by the massive stone walls as she finally arrived…

She could make out the moon.

But it wasn't her moon. The asteroids that trailed the moon, its tears, were absent. She had never seen sand, outside of dreams. Dreams. This had to be a dream.

Yet no dream had ever left her feeling tired, her feet sore from the sheer distance she was walking on a treacherous surface with thin soled shoes. The smell was dusty, none of the rich humid rot that was a swamp. It was wrong, it wasn't right- and why couldn't make herself stop?

All she could do was watch. The body felt strange, weak, young, soft and completely different from the girl of the Mere. She tried to look around, see anything besides sand, sand, sand and stone before her, or hear the aching sob of the wind. Nothing. No spirit guide followed her, no spirits flitted through the night. The stone got closer… and Sakura got angrier. Whatever was going on- she had to fight it somehow-

He was calling her name. Someone she was waiting for, someone she knew. Not her father, not Fai or Kurogane. It was… His name was on the tip of her tongue, even though she had never spoken it before.

She rolled her head, feeling her lips gape open in a tipsy smile as her eyes lit upon brown on brown. Still, whoever was controlling the body didn't think it mattered much. Her stomach fluttered with urgency as she had something else to look at, something else important to-

-to-

Her knees buckled, and her knuckles met the strange design that swept around in a circle- and the room shivered and shrieked as it split apart.

She knew that this wasn't how this was supposed to be. She was Sakura- Sakura of West Harbor, dammit, and like hell she was going to ride behind someone's eyes like a ghost!

As the stone parted, she paused mid-air like she was held by spider silk and she fought to get her hands open, to grab something- anything- lashing out against what held her against her will-

White cold pain split her hand as the bone was pierced, metal glittering through the blood of her wound and she felt satisfaction.

Through her palm was a silver shard.

As long as she could hold on to that, if it was part of her… then…

It wasn't the cemetery.

It lacked the scent of rotten flesh that accompanied the ghasts and zombies, and the empty rustle that followed the walking skeletons. Instead there was a scent of horse, burnt food and sweat. Voices, human voices out under the sky were all around. And there were spirits, slipping quietly and unseen by the material as they went about their business of being. Cut wood still dressed in bark came into view as she struggled to open gummy eyes.

So, she was in Fort Locke.

Their first arrival had caused its own frustrations, as well as surprises, she recalled. They had gotten there, and found out that the new Commander was afraid to look for his own missing patrols. In fact, he refused to send out anyone else for fear of losing them. She had offered to go and find them, and…

"Ah, the princess has awakened," a silvery voice chimed in, and a weight she had not noticed was taken off her forehead. Blue eyes and a bland smile appeared before her: Fai. Dry eyes blinked, getting the gunk out as she ran her tongue over cracked lips. She took a breath, coughed, and coughed again when her voice wouldn't come out.

"Kuro-tail, could you get our leader here some water like a good imp?"

"That is not my name you-"

Sakura choked, and coughed again. The light abruptly hid as another body squatted beside her. A thick rope of flesh flicked across her gaze and it took her a moment to remember what it was- Kurogane's tail. Her head was lifted and a cup put to her lips. Forcing herself to swallow, she coughed and choked, then swallowed again as water ran down her chin.

They all seemed so tall; that was when Sakura realized she was actually lying on the ground, outside, on a bedroll.

"The priest of Ilmater here was able to remove the disease," Fai said quietly, and the hand tilting her up moved down to wrap around her shoulders, helping her sit up. She felt weak as water. "You'll be fine with some rest and as strong as ever. You missed quite a fight, but you wouldn't let us leave until we had finally gotten the rest of Tam's patrol. After that you were… mostly… incoherent." His eyes cut back towards the large figure propping her up. Sakura blamed it on her foggy head, but only now did she notice that the arm propping her up belonged to Kurogane. Her eyes dropped.

His arms were covered in cloth- for the time being, he was not in armor. Neither was Fai. Strangely enough, she was that he was tattooed with a holy symbol on the inside of his arm; a open gauntlet set with an eye. It took her a moment to process, but she recognized it. It was the symbol of Helm.

For herself, she was marked by Selune, goddess of the moon. Darkness hid from her, and it gave Sakura the promise of bringing light in the deepest of night. Helm… god of protectors; all protectors, be they guards or mercenaries.

Fai, she absently noted, had no such symbol.

"You got the worst of the disease, once we ran out of potions and kits," a voice interrupted, and Commander Tam looked down at her. "You did your best, but you were out of it. Fortunately, your two bodyguards were more than a match for that stupid…" The tall man furrowed his brow, as his jaw trembled. "Patrols will resume into the Mere after this. I can't believe that security became this lax. We owe you our thanks, young lady."

Sakura's eyebrows went up. "Bodyguards?"

"Well, considering how these two young men," and here Fai tittered while Kurogane snorted, "followed you, I made an assumption. The part celestial here called you their leader." The Commander carried himself with the ease of someone associated with command, and his bearing was one of someone higher born than your common country soldier. Yet he squatted beside her comfortably, tilting his head. "Interesting folk, these two. If you aren't their leader, how did you all meet? Men of demon blood and angel blood don't usually run in the same circles."

"I'm going to Neverwinter on a task," Sakura managed to say, but her voice was rasping. "We just… sort of met…"

Three men were looking at her, in her underwear. This has to be a nightmare. One of her hands flopped forwards, trying to find a blanket. None of her effects were near.

None.

No one but Kurogane would have noticed her muscles clench, because she simply didn't have the strength to stiffen much. He certainly had to have noticed the way she went completely limp against him when he dragged her back into view.

"It's fairly rare for Harbormen to leave the Mere, and when they do, they tend to have a good reason," Tam went on, looking at her. "Fai, your celestial, mentioned that you had said West Harbor came under attack. I'm sorry… well, I'm more sorry for the idiots who took you all on. Your people have that reputation for a reason."

"Will the roads be safer now?"

"With the patrols, maybe. While you were out more refugees made it here for protection." The barely visible lines on Tam's face got deeper as he exhaled. "There are still bandits, and the animals of this area have been acting stranger and stranger. Until some of that is cleared up, I'm afraid I can't say how safe the Mere can be."

Sakura closed her eyes.

"You probably need your sleep. I'll leave you alone for now."

She heard Tam's mail jingle as he stood and walk away. The arm holding her up let her lay back against the pallet, before pulling her green cloak over her for her modesty's sake.

"Well, I'm going to see if I can talk to some of the people here… if we're going to get to Neverwinter, all the information we can muster will be useful," Fai responded. "You just sit here and rest, and let us take care of you."

"Since when am I the leader?" she asked softly, grateful that she wasn't having to sit up anymore. The ground had started to tilt sideways.

"My dear, haven't you realized that strays will always follow you if you feed them?" Fai laughed easily, and she could hear his light footfalls as he stepped away. "Rest well."

There was a soft swish next to her hear, and an even softer growl. "Your pack is here."

If she had the strength, she would have winced.

"You mentioned a shard when I was carrying you back." Another would be wince. "It is still there, in your pack. You repeated something about it, several times." There was a pause. "I can smell traces of the lower plains on it. Do you know what it is?"

Sakura would have pressed her lips together, but she was too tired. "No. My father… thinks that was the reason my village was attacked. I'm taking it to Neverwinter to see if I can find a mage to inspect it. It's the closest place that might have someone strong enough to know."

"And those things we fought, at the Inn, were what came after your village?"

"Uh-huh."

She felt sleep calling her, calling her back to wherever she had been earlier, in her dreams. A dream that hadn't been her own.

"Then we're going to Neverwinter," Kurogane said quietly, as sleep drew her back.

In another world, on another pallet, lay another Sakura. Opening her eyes, she absently noted that nothing was familiar.

That was okay; she wasn't too familiar with herself.

Her hand ached. Something besides the heavy numbness that filled her world caught her attention, and she drew her left hand out from under the covers. White bandages covered it, but underneath she knew there would be a scar. Images of fighting, of struggle, of confidence in herself echoed, focusing on the scar and what was inside it echoed through her empty mind.

Somehow, the realization was comforting.

It also reminded her… that she had to look for something…

To be continued.