A/N: Herro! I'm still alive and kicking; don't worry. :) NaNoWriMo ate my writing career, and when I finally got it to spit it out, it was so scrunched up I decided to let it dry off first. So then I waited until the middle of December and that's when I started Chrys 4. X3 Enjoy~

Bloodstained Chrysanthemums/沾染着血的菊花

Chapter 4: Ceremony /第四章：典礼

For a short while, there was silence between the brothers. The tea was cold and neither one had taken a sip for quite some time. The lanterns glowed warmly, in contrast with the moon's frigid luminescence, as if patiently waiting for either to speak after Yao's unbelievable tale. A drop of scarlet blood slipped from one of the cuts on his cheek and dripped onto the table quietly. Finally, Kiku spoke.

"You have just added more questions than you have answered."

His older brother sighed, dabbing the blood off his cheek with a long sleeve and breaking away from his brother's stony gaze. Of course he wouldn't believe it! Who believes such a tale so easily? "You asked, aru," he pointed out with a slight hint of annoyance.

"Why would Chun-Yan do something like that? What purpose would it serve? How did she haul you off here in the first place?" Kiku pressed without much conviction. It was answers he needed, but Yao's expression told him that he would reveal no more. Besides, he did not entirely believe Yao's explanation. It was just so…surreal.

"I think I've told you too much already, aru," scowled Yao, fiddling with his long, dark hair consciously. "I'm not even supp—"

He halted in his speech abruptly, head suddenly jerking up; eyes wide, as if an epiphany had just struck him like a brick. Kiku cocked his head curiously. Perhaps he would spill more?

"Do you hear that?" whispered Yao, closing his eyes contemplatively.

Kiku paused and listened, but he heard nothing at all. "Not quite…"

"Listen, aru," insisted the Chinese, holding a finger up for silence.

Again Kiku strained his ears to hear, and again he heard nothing. "Yao," he prodded anxiously, watching worriedly as his brother began to smile ever so faintly. "Are you alright?"

"What are you talking about aru? Of course I'm alright." The light smile was quickly replaced by an annoyed frown. "Can't you hear it aru?"

Kiku decided to be blunt, because pretending to hear nonexistent music did not seem like a very good strategy at the moment. After all, Yao had just relayed to him a fable of something incredibly unlikely, if not downright impossible. "No, Yao. I'm sorry; I hear nothing."

"Nonsense aru!" Yao persisted, slamming his hands onto the table and pushing himself off the ground, head turned to the window. His brows were furrowed together, his expression pensive. "It's very clear…Now, why would there be music aru…" Another revelation struck him, and he snapped his fingers in understanding. "Of course! The ceremony. This is something I have to see aru!"

And with that, he appeared to completely forget about his visitor as he scrambled out the door in a huge rush to see this amazing "ceremony" from which inaudible music played.

Kiku, of course, allowed his curiosity to get the better of him. He struggled to his feet at once, dashing after his unusually quick brother, who had already gone out the double doors of his Oriental mansion, left hanging off their hinges in his rush. "Wait…" coughed Kiku after Yao, watching as the very tip of his ponytail disappeared into the shadows in between the trees. Why was he so fast? "Yao, I'm coming…"

Yao left his view uncannily easily, considering how infuriatingly slow his pace was years ago, the last time they had seen each other, when Yao was waltzing up the steep slope that would become the setting of his terrible misfortune with a smile on his face and a spring to his step. What in the world was happening? Kiku's mind could not catch up. Yao may have been going insane, fabricating stories of dragons and listening to music that simply did not exist, but that would not account for his boosted alacrity and the slices on his face. Perhaps it was Kiku who was going insane.

Looking for Yao was not easy once he had left Kiku's sight. The Chinese had received a huge head start, and Kiku could not even hear his footfalls anymore. He was forced to squint in the nighttime gloom to spot any broken twig or disturbed pile of leaves in order to discern Yao's route from the mansion. It took Kiku over fifteen minutes to find his adoptive brother.

The trail led up a slope, to a cliff not unlike the one Yao had fallen off all those years ago. The clearing was washed out in the moonlight, like it had been painted expertly in watercolor. Yao was perched daintily on top of the boulder at the center, his dark locks blowing behind him as he raised his eyes to the starry sky in awe. All above him were scattered golden stars, more than Kiku had ever seen in one place.

It was beautiful, but the star-adorned sky must have been a usual sight in a remote island like Yao's. What made tonight so special that he had to cut short their important conversation in order to stargaze?

"Yao?" Kiku took a feeble step into the clearing. The waterfall of moonlight immediately washed down his hair and face, highlighting him as he entered.

"Kiku-di!" Yao turned for a very brief moment to show off the shining grin on his face and wave at his little brother to come over. "Come on over here, aru! Let's watch the ceremony."

Presuming he had meant the stars all along, Kiku took his brother's side on the luscious grass, and gazed upwards into the enthralling sky. The sparkling expanse hanging delicately above the two of them brought forth a slight chill of nostalgia. Yao as a child had loved the stars; at every chance he could get, he would spend the night stargazing. Oftentimes he would bring Kiku with him as well, and they would stare into the sky together, like they were doing now. Of course, the inky city sky was nothing compared to the amazing glittering lightshow they gazed into at the moment.

After a while, though, Kiku's attention shifted to his brother instead. They had been watching the stars for quite a while now, but Yao did not show the slightest sign of tiring. In fact, he would occasionally clap or whoop or even laugh as he stared up into the sky.

And the sky, as it had always been, was occupied only by the myriad stars and the solemn moon.

Kiku could stand it no longer. "Yao?" he ventured. "Shouldn't we be heading back now?"

"Back aru?" Yao sent him a questioning look, the sparkle in his eyes similar to that of a child waiting for Santa on Christmas Eve. "Why? The ceremony isn't over yet aru. That was only the traditional dance number by the Apprentice; the coronation has just begun aru."

He should have known something was wrong.

"I apologize, Yao, but I don't see anything but the stars."

Yao's childish glance turned into a stunned stare, and Kiku almost regretted being so frank. But what else could he do? Pretend to see dragons looping through the sky? Cheer at the nothingness spiraling above them? Lie to Yao that he believed every single detail of his far-fetched story?

If he did that, he would be going crazy, as well.

"You don't?"

"No. I'm sorry." The lack of Yao's verbal tic in the question was more unnerving than his unrevealing stare. Had he really taken this all seriously?

Yao's expression turned from completely blank to unbearably disappointed, and Kiku was forced to look away. This was all real to him, apparently, this tall tale of his. The urgent need to bring him home after all struck Kiku for a split second. If he was going mad, he would need to return to civilization as quickly as possible. Then, again, there was no one else on this island, and aside from his cuts, he seemed perfectly fine all by himself, so perhaps…

"Okay…Okay, it's okay. It's almost over anyway. I don't need to see it…Come on, Di-di. I'll bring you home." Yao got up from his seat, turning away from the cliff side, although his eyes still wandered to the sky above them, an upset look on his face. Before his eyes, dragons still danced. Kiku almost felt guilty, but one with hallucinations as complex as Yao's was bound to be disappointed in one circumstance or another.

The elder's pace on the way back was deliberately slower, and he often stopped to kick a rock or simply to stare up into the sky for minutes more before finally shaking his head and continuing his excruciatingly slow saunter. He had really wanted to see that ceremony, it appeared. Kiku would not allow himself to be blamed for it, however. Yao's behavior had been much too strange for the past night, and if he refused to tell the whole truth, this would be the consequence.

Yao stood in front of the house now, eyes forlornly fixed to the sky, but, finding it now empty, sighed and entered the mansion without a single hint of acknowledgement to his little brother, who watched him trod away as the lanterns down the path to the front door lit one by one as Yao passed each. Soon Kiku was alone under the bleached moonlight, the unblinking stars, and perhaps even the dragons of Yao's fervent imagination. If it was imagination.

Truth. What was it? The most obvious "truth" would be that Yao was going mad, that everything he spoke of was illusion-based and could not be trusted. But then, how would one explain his vanishing act and reappearance on a deserted island, or the way the lanterns lighted themselves as he passed; his sudden speed and the way his eyes were eerily backlit?

Kiku watched the lanterns black out, and deep inside of him he realized that signing Yao's tales off as delusionary was his own wishful thinking.

Something sinister was in the making, and Kiku had walked straight into it.