A/N: Has anyone else noticed that you can't breath and take a drink at the same time? I guess I never knew that the esophagus was used for breathing and eating/drinking. ...Remember what I said last time? It's true, I'm weird...maybe I should stop typing late at night... Anywho, like I said, chapters will come out when I finish them and this one is the same. I haven't been in front of the computer in a couple of days so this one wasn't out as punctually as the others have been.

O/C4: Misaki meets Nicolai, who makes up one team in the tournament with Ike and Soren. She also meets Dartanianne and Facelle, two members of another team. Facelle has a mysterious power which almost forces Misaki to tell him who she really it, though he figures it out anyway. Kurama saves her and later they go and get Hiei, leaving the banquet (since it is almost over anyway). Genkai is back at their rooms, and Yusuke and Kuwabara are passed out on the floor, drunk. Kurama gets them into their room. Misaki forces all of her weariness onto the two youkai, causing them to go to sleep. Then she settles down on the couch to wait for morning.

--

The arena was set up in a similar fashion to the first rounds of the Dark Tournament, though this tournament's coliseum had a roof. The Tournament of Threes predated the Dark Tournament by numerous years and had been calling for the best in the land for a long time. This year, Misaki was disappointed.

While it took her complete attention, Misaki could keep tabs on all four matches at once. This was one instance in which she desperately wished she couldn't. Never had she seen so much wasted space in all of her life.

"Not much of a spectacle, huh?"

Misaki looked over to see Ike standing over her with his hands in his pockets, watching the fights. He wore jeans and a blue and white striped, long-sleeved shirt with a round collar. He looked quite human.

"I'll say." Misaki said disgustingly. She had decided last night that Ike wasn't so bad. He had certainly gotten her with the whole escort thing and she held a good deal of respect for someone who could do that.

He sat down by her on the huge concrete stairs that made up the coliseum's seating.

"You know, for a youkai, you look very human."

He looked at her funny, "What makes you say that?"

"Well most youkai are pretty...odd in appearance. You know, like green skin or something."

He laughed, "Really. I suppose I'll take it as a compliment them." He looked her up and down, "You don't look youkai to me either."

"Because I'm not." She cut in.

"Well you certainly aren't human. Though I'll admit I didn't recognize you last night, Misaki."

She stared at him and he chuckled.

"I guess those eyes should have tipped me off, but I knew you for sure as soon as I saw your hair." He reached over and tugged playfully at it.

Misaki grimaced, though not because of him pulling it. When she had reverted to her normal form last night, she had forgotten to leave her hair fully black; the silver-highlights were shining through. Misaki glanced around, thankful that there wasn't anyone sitting nearby, and filled in the highlights. She didn't want the whole world knowing she was in the tournament. That could create problems.

Ike understood this and didn't say anything when her hair was suddenly all-black again.

"Hi Misaki, what's up?" Soren sat down on her other side. He had changed clothes, sporting an outfit almost identical to Ike's save that the shirt was green and black striped. His just-past shoulder length hair was held in place with a dark ribbon at the base of his neck.

"Apparently the whole world knows I'm here anyway." Misaki said crossly.

"Apparently." Ike grinned.

"What? What did I do?" Soren was confused.

"Out little Miss Misaki here thought she was fooling everyone with her 'weak and frail' act."

"Oh." Soren nodded.

"Hey! I am not little!" Misaki protested.

"Are too, squirt." Ike patted her head. She ducked away and Soren started to laugh.

"Look, just because you're unbelievably tall doesn't mean the rest of us have to be."

"Ooo," Soren kept laughing, "She got you!"

Misaki poked a finger into Soren's chest, "And you, mister smarty-pants, have no right to be laughing when the statement applies to you too!"

It was Ike's turn to laugh at Soren's dumbfounded face, "She's feisty isn't she?" He talked over her head.

"Hey! Stop that!"

"Yeah, kind of makes you wonder how anyone puts up with her." Soren teased.

Misaki folded her arms over one another and ignored them for a minute, resuming her monitor of the matches.

Soren and Ike held in their laughter, masking their smiles with a hand.

"I could easily blow the two of you into oblivion."

"I wouldn't doubt it." Ike managed, stifling another laugh.

Without taking her gaze from the arena, Misaki grabbed Ike's chin in one hand, forcing his face down to her level and gathering energy into that hand.

Soren scooted away, wide-eyed, but Ike's expression didn't change.

"You're still making fun of me!" Misaki glared over at him.

"I didn't say a word!" His eyes had laughter in them.

Misaki released him, got up, and moved a ways over and down before sitting again. She didn't look behind her and began watching the fights again, not noticing them sit on either side of her at first.

"Don't you two have a match to get ready for or something?" She sounded annoyed.

"Nope. We're one of the seeded teams. Youself?" Ike asked.

"What rank?"

"We...hey you didn't answer my question!"

"Yeah yeah we're seeded too." She waved a hand at him which he swatted away, "What rank?"

"Uh...second I think. Is that right?" He looked over her head at Soren who was stretched out, his body easily spanning two of the giant seats—his legs resting on the step below them—with his arms spread out to either side, one behind Misaki.

"Yup." was the answer from Soren.

"Not bad." Misaki nodded approval, "Of course my team is ranked first. It's a common practice though. If any person on the team is a returning combatant, the team is automatically ranked first. Doesn't happen often." "In fact, it's only happened once before." Misaki thought to herself.

"Of course." Ike's grin came back.

"You're making fun of me again." She warned.

"I am not! Soren did I say anything that made fun of her?"

Soren looked seriously at them both, "No. I didn't hear anything." But the way his eyes seemed to dance with mirth gave him away.

Misaki scoffed and got up again. This time Ike and Soren each grabbed an arm, stopping her.

"Don't move again," Ike pleaded.

"We're just going to keep following you around anyway." Soren added.

Misaki rolled her eyes and sat back down. They still didn't let go of her arms.

"I'm staying, okay?"

They slowly let go as if a sudden move would invoke her to further wrath. She kept a good poker face but accidentally let a hint of a smile raise the corner of her mouth. She was sure neither of them had caught it; she was half-right.

"You led us on!" Soren exclaimed indignantly.

Misaki acted as though he hadn't said a word, her gaze fixed intently on the arena below them.

"What do you mean?" Ike wanted to know.

"She wasn't mad! And she knew exactly what we would do!"

"Oh really?" Ike's eyes narrowed.

A sudden realization hit Soren and he leaned away from Misaki, "You...you're a telepath, aren't you?"

Ike's eyes widened and he waited for a yay or nay from her.

"-sigh- I've been found out." Her words echoed within their heads.

"I'd heard rumors that you were, but never took the time to believe them." Soren was amazed. He leaned closer, "So how strong are you? Can you just read emotions? Or what is at the front of the mind? Or can you actually read thoughts?" He couldn't help but be inquisitive about the prospects.

"Slow down." Misaki smiled at him, "I can basically do all of what you said. And by examining your thought processes, I am able to foresee what you will do next. For example, as soon as Ike realizes what all of that means, he's going to blush. Deeply."

Soren watched as Ike's face began to turn a brick red color.

"Wow! That is cool."

"That's what you think." Ike mumbled. "I could have gone without knowing that she could read my mind."

"Oh relax Ike," Misaki consoled him, "You're male. You and Soren can't really help it."

Soren blushed deeper than Ike had.

She grinned, "If you trained, both of you could easily put up barriers to prevent weaker attempts."

"Could you train us?" Ike wanted to know.

"Depends on how good a student you are."

"Me? What about him?"

"He's smart enough to do fine. It's you I'm worried about." Misaki saw that Soren was moping. "Aw Soren." She gave him a hug that he half-heartedly returned, "I'm sorry. There aren't many true full-blown telepaths who could keep up continuous mental barriers all of the time. So it means I'm walking around catching glimpses of people's minds all the time."

"Can't you block it out?" His thirst for knowledge outranked his embarrassment.

"Never completely. I've gotten to where I hardly notice most things. But some emotions and thoughts are so strong that I can't help but feel them." Misaki grimaced as she went back to watching the matches. "Well that solves that problem."

"What problem is solved?" Ike asked her.

"I came here wanted to know who my team was going to fight tomorrow and I just found out."

"The match isn't over..." He and Soren looked at the part of the arena she pointed at.

"It's as good as over. The little yellow guy is tired and his attacks are getting sloppier."

"So the chick he's facing is going to win." Soren finished for her.

"Actually, no. He's hiding a dagger up his sleeve. He's planning on stabbing her arm but she's going to punch his face with that arm. He'll be put off balance and accidentally stab her leg, probably tearing a lot of important stuff. Stuff she needs to be able to walk. She won't be able to recover fast enough and he'll finish her off."

All of them watched as events began to unfold far beneath their feet.

In the yellow guy's hand appeared a knife. Trying to mask his difficulty with breathing, he shifted its weight in his hand, and then dashed forward, holding it in a position from where he could easily sink the knife into the female youkai's arm. He hoped that it would paralyze her long enough that he would be able to think of some way of winning.

They both ran for each other, but as the female came closer, she pulled back her fist; the fist from the arm he planned on stabbing. They were too close for him to change anything and he barely had time to dodge to the right. The female stepped on his foot, meaning to stop him in his tracks so that she could land her punch. But he pulled his foot out from under hers, tripping forward and making her fall to the side. He put his hands underneath him to catch the impact of the ground. The hand holding the knife slid into the female's thigh as he came down and stuck in her leg. He could feel the skin, muscles, and tendons, tearing under his weight. Then the knife stopped, the point digging slightly into the bone.

He rolled away, relinquishing his grip on the weapon, and stood up, ready just in case she was able to retaliate. But she only held her leg, fingers embracing the knife between them. Heaving a thankful breath, he quickly fished another dagger from his boot and made his way over to her. She rolled into a ball, a scream threatening to rip from her mouth. He held the dagger at a point in her neck that if he chose to penetrate, would instantaneously kill her. The ref, standing at the edge of the roped in fighting area, blew his whistle, announcing the battle over and the yellow fighter the winner.

"Round rule, no killing." Misaki provided.

The yellow youkai stumbled off the fighting arena, holding his side where the female injured him earlier in the match.

"Remind me to consult you the next time I need to place a bet on anything." Ike's eyebrows were raised as he nodded approvingly.

"So...you can...see the future?" Soren frowned.

"Ha! By the Oracle, no. Thankfully. There is a tendency that the bad outweighs the good where I am concerned. All I simply analyze both fighters and what they planned and from there I can come up with a fairly close ending."

All three of them watched to battles for a while longer.

"Soren have you heard anything about the other two teams that are seeded?" Misaki suddenly spoke up.

"Hm. I can tell you what I know. Ranked fourth is a team of ningens. There's a whisper of a specialty team with the third ranking. They say the team has a chanter but I've never heard of such a thing. At least, only stories that I would hardly deem as truthful."

"If there is a chanter, that'll be deadly against any youkai." Misaki immediately thought of Facelle and Dartanianne.

"What's a chanter?" Ike asked them.

"One of the three ancient winged races of youkai. There are herons, hawks and ravens. Hawks are the strongest and usually have hair some shade of brown and their wings are brown. Ravens are the quickest and most crafty, usually have black hair and their wings are black. The herons are the ones who all look the same, blonde hair, white heron wings with no variation in color at all. They are known as the light-chanters or just chanters and are the leaders of the three races because of their inborn ability to chant. There are several different kinds of chants supposedly, chants for growing things and the like. But there are also chants of life...and more importantly chants of death. The herons rule over the other two races because of these chants and though the hawks and ravens don't like the arrangement, there isn't anything they can do about it. They tried to wrest power from the herons but they wised up when the herons began to chant and their opponents began dropping like flies."

"For someone who calls them 'stories' you know quite a bit about the winged ones, Soren." Misaki teased.

"So what about them makes them deadly against youkai?" Ike thought that they seemed deadly against pretty much anything.

"Well..." Soren blinked. "I don't know."

"Holy cow somebody take this down!!" Ike exclaimed, "Soren doesn't know! What day is this?! I'm going to write this somewhere!"

Misaki elbowed him, "It probably has something to do with the fact that they are youkai themselves, so they know exactly what do chant to make another youkai meet his doom."

"Oh." Ike said shortly. "That would make sense."

Soren and Ike's stomachs growled at the same time and they all laughed.

"I'm guessing you didn't eat breakfast either?" Soren said.

"Nope!" Ike replied as they both stood.

"Well I'm starving. Come on Misaki, let's go find something to eat."

"No that's okay. I'm not hungry."

The look on Ike's face was one of astonishment. How could anyone ever possibly not be hunger? Soren shrugged at Ike's silent question.

"Want us to bring you anything?" He asked.

"Nah. Don't worry about it."

Soren shrugged again and the two guys left in search of food.

Misaki wanted to keep an eye on the round, however disappointing it was. She sat criss-cross, attempting to get more comfortable on the hard seat.

The second set of matches didn't prove anymore fruitful than the first. Misaki's dissatisfaction sunk to a new low with the condition of the participants.

-lotsm