AN: So I've been working on this chapter off and on for the past few weeks, I didn't forget, promise! My time has been cut shorter thanks to general life stuff, I've been so busy lately. But I finally cracked down and finished this yesterday. xD
There's alot I have to say when I get to this point, yet I always forget
Oh yeah I went back and re-read the previous chapters, and I'm sorry they're so awful, it's abit embarrassing. xD I hope I've improved since then Though I'm too lazy to re-write anything right now, so I guess I'll continue to move forward. Thanks to those who are keeping up with this story, I'm writing this for you!
But I have a feeling it's going to get pretty long. We're on the fifth chapter and there hasn't been any real romance yet. This fic is gonna devour me yet.
Enjoy!
Chapter Five - Your Fate in My Hands
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"You're back!"
Shizuru pulled Keiko into a tight hug. Botan skipped over to them, her blue ponytail bobbing in excitement as she tried to fight back the tears that threatened to overflow onto her cheeks. "Keiko, you're getting so dangerous these days..." she laughed meekly. "What're we gonna do with you?"
Keiko sniffled, giving into the overpowering urge to cry. "I didn't think. I don't know, it was daylight, they usually wait until dark to come out, so I just thought..." She buried her head in Shizuru's shoulder, the touch vaguely reminding her of her parents when they were alive and able to console her. Memories of her mother's hugs dragged more sobs to the surface of her throat. "It was a mistake, I'm sorry."
Botan patted her on the back in an attempt to soothe the girl, her lips drawn downwards into a firm line. "It's alright." she whispered, her own voice slipping on a higher note. "We're just glad you're safe."
"Welcome back." Shiori said suddenly, looking at them with deep sincere eyes, the kind that could penetrate even the toughest of shells and mend the hurt beneath, no matter what the injuries.
Keiko wiped her slick lashes with the back of her index finger. "Thanks." she said, sending Shiori a grateful, if not slightly wilted smile. Her nerves were beyond shot and the only cure that could quell her fried emotions was a thick book of her favorite stories, which she had hidden under her pillow at home. If only they could return to the village soon and get out of this creaking cave...and go somewhere truly safe. But that was out of the question.
Yukina stood on the sidelines, breathing a sigh of relief. "I'm happy Keiko-san is unharmed."
Kuwabara, the appointed protector of the flock of women, released the the tension out of his shoulders. He had grown up with the little brunette, and losing her would shove a hole right through his heart, like a pain he couldn't get out of his senses. He knew that feeling all to well, he'd already lost most of his family over the years. "Me too, I was getting really worried there for a while." Stray pieces of hair hung over his forehead and took on a deeper tone in the dull light.
Shuichi sauntered over to him, his previous footsteps unheard and undetected, appearing at the taller boys side like a crimson ghost. "Kuwabara, I need to speak with you."
He snapped his head to the right in surprise, letting out a startled cough and nearly jumping backwards into a puzzled Yukina. "Whoa man, don't sneak up on me like that!"
Shuichi flashed him an amused smile, his serious mood temporarily broken by his friends antics. "Sorry."
Kuwabara quickly apologized to the ice maiden. He swung around to scowl at Shuichi, no doubt embarrassed at being caught off guard. He hoped he would forget about it later. "What?" he mumbled. He didn't mean to be so pissy, but it was a long morning, and he had an inkling that it would just get worse as the hours dragged on.
"We ran into the demon."
"You did?" Kuwabara's eyes widened, his tired appearance suddenly perking up in interest. "Did you fight him?"
"Almost, but no. He had big black markings all over, and he acted...strange. He's not your typical youkai, that's for sure." Shuichi posed a finger at his chin, his eyes sharp and focused on distant, tangled thoughts. "He was hunting for someone..."
Kuwabara went silent and looked down at the ground. His sister had already filled him in on the adventure he missed out on when he had slept. He knew that Yukina had some sort of bounty placed on her pretty head. Thugs chased after her in the dead of night, just a petrified, innocent girl getting dragged down into their filth. They stole everything from her, even her tears. The mere thought of it made him sick.
And now they had found her. The threat was spreading to the village, like a violent epidemic unable to be contained. But what was he supposed to do? Protect her or the village? Surely there was someway to do both, right?
"It's me."
Both boys turned to the ice maiden, who was looking patiently up at them, her hands clasped together under her long kimono sleeves. "I told Keiko-san and Botan-san to leave me be, but they refused. They're incredibly kind, and I do appreciate the help, I just don't want their bravery to be rewarded with murder. All on my account."
She lowered her head in shame.
"So you do know these youkai?" Shuichi asked after a moment, his voice heavy and serious, letting her know that he didn't have time for games.
She took no offense to the warnings that lurked behind his tone, her figure stood still as a statue, only wisps of her blue hair quivering under the shadow of the cave. "No, but I positive I'm the one they're looking for. The men that held me captive surely noticed my absence by now and probably sent someone to find me."
Kuwabara's frown deepened as that sinking feeling returned to the pit of his stomach. "Well hold on, you can't go back, even if they are looking for you! That's not what you're thinking right?"
"Why should an entire village suffer because I'm being selfish?" she argued, clutching a fist to her chest. "I can go back and I can take it. The guilt from the loss of life would be worse than any physical pain they could give me."
Shuichi smiled at her. Of course he knew that not all youkai were corrupt, and this girl was living proof. But it still didn't mean they could trust her. "That's awfully noble of you." he said.
"You're not really gonna send her back?" Kuwabara pleaded, his hands groping for the right words in the air as he stared at Shuichi. "You can't be serious."
The redhead's expression didn't change. He looked out of the corners of his eyes at Yukina, who's ruby colored orbs were wide with questions that needed to be answered. Her fate rested in his hands. He could save her life or crush it with one decision.
Behind her carefully guarded expression lived the fear of being sent back into a world of torture and misery, loneliness. He could see it, he couldn't ignore the quiet trembling of her hands under that kimono, and it sent a wave of disgust through his body, causing his heart to sink in his chest. She was only a girl, she had the same the innocent face of the ones he was supposed to protect.
But that un-natural hair color and eyes the shade of a deep red wine reminded him that she wasn't human. Deception at it's best. He moved his gaze to the ground.
"What's with the grim looks?"
Shiori touched her son's arm, pressing her fingers against his skin to jar him from his thoughts. Mother's intuition naturally told her that something was wrong. He was a distant, complicated boy, but he always had a sense of lightness about him that was now gone. "Is something the matter?" she piqued, small eyes blinking in concern, her presence snapping him from his deep reverie. "Shuichi you look pale."
He turned to her and smiled, but the gesture was done half-heartedly and his lips lost their usual luster. "I'm fine mother, don't worry. Just tired."
She accepted his answer with an air of defeated concern. A pang of guilt resonated through him at disappointing her.
When he returned with the battered Keiko, Shiori had welcomed him back with open arms, no doubt caught in a spell of unease at the idea of him clashing weapons with some vicious youkai. It was his duty to fight any threat, but she continued to fret over the dangers he willingly threw himself into.
She did that all his life, and it was something he would never forget. It was...kindness, a virtue he learned only from her.
His shoulders slumped into a posture of defeat as he faced the calm Yukina, who was busy reassuring Kuwabara that she would be alright. "Listen." Shuichi said, catching their attention. They both peered at him with apprehensive eyes.
He cleared his throat. "You can stay, no use sending you out to the wolves. Just keep close to us and don't wander off like Keiko did today. We might've led them to our hiding place already, and we can't afford to make any more mistakes."
She tried to hide her relief by stopping herself from smiling, but her lips turned upwards anyway, and she ended up beaming at him in gratitude. "Thank you." she said in that same cheerfulness, with words as light as a hummingbirds wing.
But the cold creeped back into her expression. She reminded herself of why she was there in the first place, and what would happen if she stayed. She felt like she had some sort of curse stamped on her back that relentlessly followed her everywhere. "I can't though." She turned away. "I don't want to hurt anyone here. They're after me, not any of you."
"Don't be silly." Shiori fussed, catching onto the meaning of the conversation. "You can't go back there."
Kuwabara patted Yukina on the back with a grin plastered on his face, as if he was the only one let in on some joke or secret. Shuichi, the usually rigid guardian over the village rules, had just accepted her into the group, sealing her safety for the future. "You're not going anywhere, I'm not gonna let you."
Her eyes widened in a questioning stare and she took a step back. "You're all being foolish." she whispered.
Kuwabara shook his head, wondering where the girl connected her logic together, she was so damn determined to throw herself into the hands of the enemy, even after finally gaining freedom. How long had she been locked up in that place anyway? "Maybe," he chuckled, "but you're foolish for turning down someones offer to protect your life!"
Yukina blinked and titled her head to the side, perplexed and regarding his words. It was her turn to shrink in defeat, her lips poking outwards into something that resembled a pout. "Alright, you win, I guess." she said simply.
Shiori smiled, pleased at the outcome of the situation, while Shuichi leaned against the stone wall, green eyes staring holes into some distant corner of the cave.
He prayed he wasn't making a huge mistake.
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"Didn't find her, did you?"
Hiei's eyes flashed with vehemence at his question.
Yusuke leaned against the trunk of a tree, standing with the ease and grace. Rays of sunlight crept in between the canopy of leaves, sending dapples of light across his skin, contrasting with the grey shadow from the branches overhead. The tree's silhouette seemed to give him even more patterns, even more bizarre markings.
Hiei could tell that the Mazoku had been waiting awhile; that impatient scowl reflected the string of insults floating around in his head, ready to lash out at anyone in verbal injury. Yusuke hated waiting. He didn't have the attention span for it and he bored easily, like a bratty little kid.
Hiei's lips quirked into a sneer. "Do you see anyone with me?"
Yusuke's muscles tensed for half a second. He was already caught in a foul mood and ached to go off on the first person who decided to bitch at him. He had been chasing 'invisible', maybe even imaginary ice maidens all morning and was sick of it.
But he dodged Hiei's sarcasm. The fire demon was cranky, as always, but the longer he picked at him the more the fire demon's tension built up. Eventually it would explode like an angry volcano and they'd have a vicious brawl on their hands. Yusuke had to remind him that even though they were partners on this wild goose chase, he wasn't one of Hiei's little minions. His Mazoku blood couldn't stand to be insubordinate to anyone. Especially someone half his size.
Yusuke fixed a concentrated stare on the youkai, putting total scrutiny on him as if he'd never seen him before.
His lips spread open into a devious grin. "Hey is your girlfriend taller than you?" he blurted, without thinking better of it, deliberately enticing the blunt end of Hiei's wrath. "I mean any shorter and she'd be a midget right?"
Hiei's expression switched from hostility to annoyance. "What?"
"Well it's just, y'know...I guess she'd have to like pint sized men, because.."
He visibly bristled. "Shut up you moron. She's not my girlfriend. She's my sister."
"Huh?" Yusuke blinked.
Hiei scoffed and turned his head away, facing the distant mountains. The sun finally rose out from the corner of the sky and dyed the clouds a deep maroon color, signaling the shift from morning to noon. The chirping cicadas sang their last goodbyes to the sunrise.
He hated that sound. Years before when he was alone, consumed by his back breaking training schedule, he was forced to listen to that horrible chirping the first few hours of the day. It broke the consistent quiet of the forest, usually interrupted only by deer or the occasional howling wind. But that chirping, that fast tick tick ticking sound reminded him of the constant drilling in his own heart. He was losing time.
But when the cicadas can't be heard and when the sun sinks down and changes the sky to a horizon of violet, he would move on. She had to be in the next village. He would find her. So Yusuke might as well know. "You heard me."
Yusuke's eyebrows shot halfway up his forehead. He watched the demon with a mix of caution and curiosity, wondering if this was some kind of test. "You serious?"
"We're going in tomorrow." Hiei said sharply, his back still turned to the confused Mazoku. "So call the demons out of the forest and get them ready so we can invade the closest village tonight. Did you find anything of interest?"
His question jerked at Yusuke's conscience like a invisible hand. Plundering a village never used to bother him, so what the hell? In the beginning they only raided a village when they were desperate. But somehow, over the months he'd traveled with Hiei, the attacks turned into weekly crimes, their demon underlings rushing in a killing whole towns in one swipe, staining the ground red. The corpses of their victims were starting to pile up on his mind, pulling it down.
But it wasn't like they were the only ones who did it. Youkai were growing desperate from the shortage of food, shortage of homes, and shortage of sane leaders. War after war had given death more numbers than him and Hiei ever could. It wasn't their fault! The humans were just an easy source of survival.
Yusuke rubbed his dirty cheek with the back of his hand. He frowned when he noticed the clean bandage wound carefully up his side.
His guilt seemed to reach a crescendo.
But his words moved against it, though he nearly choked trying to get them out. "Yeah, I did, actually."
To his surprise, Hiei didn't bombard him with a million questions. Instead, he simply shrugged and repeated his orders. "Good."
The Mazoku didn't follow anyone. But today was different. Hiei's tone was unusually shaky, as if he were too furious to speak and attempting to try would shatter the last control he had on himself. Yusuke was not filled with boundless intuition by any means, but he could sense the unbalanced, almost sad aura around his friend.
So he didn't say anything.
And he couldn't get past his disbelief. That crazy bastard had a sister?!
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"Koenma sir, I'm telling you, she hasn't killed anybody!"
Botan crouched at the lake's edge, peering down into the clear water. She leaned over on her tip toes to get a better look, careful not to lose balance and fall, which would disturb the mirror-like surface, blue and serene as a crystal. The weeds rose up on all sides and tickled her legs. "Listen to me!" she persisted, careening her neck farther out to see better. "I know it still sounds weird, but I really don't think she's some crazy human killer."
The magic of Spirit World was what enabled Koenma's image to stare back at her from the lake. Communicating with someone so far away was difficult, his voice was fuzzy and his image was blurred despite the glass-like quality of the water. But she could still imagine the deep line that hung over his brow, a sign that he was upset.
"That doesn't make a difference!" he wailed, his voice sounding too high and too young for his teenage appearance. "She's still the cause of it! Botan you've got to do something!"
She drew back. How could he blame her for this!? "What am I supposed to do?" she said as harshly as she could while still maintaining a whisper. She didn't want any nosy passerby to overhear her and let the secret out about her double identity. Or worse, she didn't want anyone to think that she was going crazy, talking to the pond like this. Someone might think she was arguing with a fish. "I'm just following your orders! Maybe you don't know what you're doing? I think that's-"
"Well the thieves are still after her, so that makes her a threat! Isolate her from the village before a handful of lives are lost. Those demons will track her down and find her, and then-"
Botan sighed. "And then we'll see who the threat is."
"Exactly."
She knew right away that she couldn't do something like that. Koenma wasn't there beside her, he didn't talk to the girl or witness how much pain she was in. Did he see the scars that marred her skin? He wasn't around when she and Shizuru had to wrap bandages around Yukina's burn wounds, which still looked dark and raw against her silvery complexion.
Botan had never seen a burn injury like that. Certain sutra, ones that could go right through the flesh of ice youkai, had been cruelly pressed against her arms and legs. Shoving fire into a pile of snow had the same effect.
Yet Yukina treated her abuses like they were nothing to her at all.
"The marks do hurt, but at least they left my face alone. If my face became too badly scarred then I'd be unrecognizable to someone..."
It was an odd comment. But she was an odd girl.
She wasn't about to throw her out into danger. Shuichi only just decided she could stay!
"What're you doing?"
Keiko leaned over out curiosity, wondering what her slightly squirly friend was up to. Her thick chestnut colored hair was tossed up in a short, messy bun, and the strands tickled Botan's shoulder as she moved closer to get a better look.
"Oh uh hi Keiko!" Botan tapped the water quickly, dispersing the Koenma's image. "I was just...um..washing my hands and singing! It's fun, you should try it sometime, aha..."
She cocked an eyebrow. "You don't usually sing..."
The uneasy smile started to hurt her cheeks. Botan was never good at lying...or hiding things. Why did Koenma choose her for this job anyway? Maybe she should try diversion tactics. "Oh you look so lovely today Keiko, you should wear your hair like that most often!"
Keiko twirled a lock around her finger, catching the brown highlights in the sun. "Thanks, but I don't think so, I just put it up because it was driving me crazy. This weather makes it dry."
"Oh yeah, that happens to mine." Botan said, as she stood suddenly and began pushing Keiko away from the water. Koenma might return and yell at her for hanging up on their conversation. He was a nice person, but he was still the mighty lord Koenma, prince of Spirit World, and titles like that were why he had an ego bigger than his father's fat head. "But don't you worry, you're so pretty that even if all your hair fell out you'd still be gorgeous."
Keiko made a funny face. "What?"
Botan dragged the girl back to the cave as she blabbed about anything, trying to guard her secret. One hint about what was going on and the clever girl would figure it all out in no time.
Though she wished she could tell her best friend everything; Keiko would know what to do, and Botan's problems would be solved.
But that wasn't the case, and she was lost.
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"..."
Aha I love Botan. x3
Please keep in mind that I don't have a Beta reader, so even though I try to edit mistakes I'm sure there are some in there. I'm currently looking for an editor to get the problem solved soon.
I'm not terribly pleased with this chapter, but it's not too awful I hope. I'm still trying to work on my writing style, I'm a novice
You know what I'm going to say(well, if you read these notes). Thanks for reading.
:3
