A/N: This chapter is brought to you by Bowfinger Productions.

This is a chapter of a lot of dialogue, for some obvious reasons. The not-so-obvious reasons are that I wanted to have Yukina fill in a few of the blanks and retell a few of the events that weren't "shown" as they happened earlier in this fic. Also I felt I needed to reiterate a few points raised earlier in the fic.

Chapter 32: Treaties Negated

"So wait, let me get this straight: the whole time you were running around dressing up as soldiers, men with cleavage and ninjas, Yukina – little, quiet, inoffensive and unassuming Yukina – actually successfully dressed up as a man and joined the fight?"

Botan pouted dejectedly.

"Wow," Keiko whispered.

"You make it sound like I didn't know what I was doing!" Botan complained.

"You didn't!" Shizuru scoffed. "Yukina got it right first time and she's never worked as closely with the boys as you have during a fight. Maybe Yukina should be the "mission manager"."

Botan gasped in horror.

"Wow," Keiko whispered.

"I'm the mission manager!" Botan said. "Nobody else is as qualified as I am to be the mission manager!"

"Why? Because you're the only one who owns enough dumb outfits for the job?" Shizuru asked. "I think Yukina is better qualified than you. She can pick a convincing disguise – unlike you – she's a better healer than you, so therefore she's more useful than you, and she apparently can hold her own in a fight."

"Wow," Keiko whispered.

"Yukina cheated!" Botan said.

"You're just bitter," Shizuru replied.

"Wow," Keiko whispered.

A short way behind where the three girls were standing, Yukina was loitering in the doorway of the temple, watching them carefully. Apart from Rui, who had helped her clean her hair and subtly disposed of the clothing she had worn to disguise herself as Hiei, nobody had spoken to Yukina since she had returned from spirit world. And, even with Rui's diligent help, she had not managed to entirely remove the staining from her hair – most of it had come out with the application of a stringent detergent, but her hair was still a shade darker than it usually was, and she still had several slightly lighter streaks where she had stained her hair white to simulate the starburst of white in Hiei's hair. She hated how she looked and had struggled to smile when Rui had made her study her reflection – but more than that she hated how she felt and how she was going to even begin explaining herself to the others. She had hoped to start with the girls as they were her closest friends and therefore ought to be the most likely to understand; but Keiko looked shocked to the point of physical sickness, Shizuru was being far too flippant about it and Botan was both angry that she had missed her chance to be a part of an "adventure" and embarrassed and awkward about the realisation that she had been inadvertently flirting with Yukina instead of Hiei.

"Has anyone even seen Yukina this morning?" Shizuru asked.

Botan shook her head and Keiko continued to stare blankly at nothing in particular.

"She's still here though, right?" Shizuru pressed. "She hasn't found herself a new disguise out of that spirit world spell-book and taken off someplace else, has she?"

"She went to bed early last night, and she was still asleep when I got up this morning," Botan replied.

"Well no wonder," Shizuru said. "Poor little thing must be exhausted. Can you imagine spending eleven days on the road with those three?"

"Wow," Keiko whispered.

"What she did was totally reckless!" Botan insisted. "She ruined her hair! She could have been killed! And Yusuke, Kuwabara and Kurama all assumed that she was Hiei – they were all assuming they had someone as powerful as Hiei there helping them! It was an incredibly stupid and dangerous thing to do!"

"More stupid than pretending to be in the SDF?" Shizuru asked, eying Botan critically. "More stupid than trying to join the SDF so that you could fight alongside them after their own captain had been overpowered and abducted, having them believe that you were as strong as they are?"

Yukina turned away from the girls and started to slink quietly back into the temple, only to gasp in alarm as a figure suddenly stepped out of the shadows, blocking her path back to her room.

"I think they both make a good point," a voice greeted her. "Yusuke, Kuwabara and Kurama were all relying on you as though you were a part of their team, as though you were an equal part of their team. You put more than your own life in danger. And this was, by far, the most dangerous, naïve and stupid thing that you did."

Yukina looked down at the bandana in Koenma's hands – it was ingrained with dirt and yellowed with sweat, but she could still make out the browned stains of her own blood, in the distinctive shape of the talisman she had used to confuse anyone checking for a Jagan eye on her forehead.

"I read the entire book, from cover to cover," she said quietly.

"I don't care," Koenma replied, tightening his grip on the bandana. "That book was from spirit world. I'm angry that Botan took it here, but she at least had the presence of mind not to dabble with the contents after reading the warning in the preface."

"I read the warning in the preface," Yukina replied, daring to meet his eyes.

"You may have read it, but clearly you didn't understand it," Koenma snapped back. "Which makes it all the worse that you continued to use the spells in that book! If you can't even understand a warning, how can you understand the danger?"

"I'm very sorry Sir. I never intended to use the book. I read it because it was interesting. But then nobody would tell me what had happened to Hiei, and I became worried. When I saw how worried Kurama was that Hiei was missing, I knew something bad must have happened. And then when I overheard you talking to Kurama, Yusuke and Kazuma about the virus in demon world, I knew I could help. I also knew that nobody would listen to me or take me seriously if I asked to go along on the mission to get to Hiei. I thought if everyone thought I was Hiei they would respect me enough to let me go to demon world. I never intended for things to get so complicated. After we found the breach to spirit world, I tried to get to Hiei. I was going to tell the truth once I got to him and managed to help him get better. But… But then, on the way there, we found Rikka, and she led us to the auction in Illyria, and…"

"And you further abused your disguise to recruit Yusuke, Kuwabara and Kurama into helping you cause political unrest in demon world?"

"I never intended to cause political unrest Sir, I just wanted to save my friends from being tortured."

"A demon using forbidden spells from a banned book normally kept hidden in spirit world is a serious crime, Yukina."

Yukina stiffened, her eyes growing large as the stern look on Koenma's face suddenly started to seem to be more an expression of carefully controlled anger than the side-effect of his sometimes childish nature that she had initially assumed it to be.

"I should arrest you for this, you understand," he added, his voice barely above a whisper.

Yukina took a moment to find her voice, her mouth moving soundlessly as she tried to answer him.

"W-will you arrest me?" she eventually managed to ask.

"I should," Koenma replied. "But I'm not going to. You've shown no signs of this sort of behaviour before, and I think that, after the amount of trouble you've caused for yourself this time around, you won't be in any hurry to repeat your actions."

"I have no intention of repeating my actions Sir, I promise," Yukina insisted, bowing her head politely.

"Well the chances of Hiei becoming so incapacitated that you have such an opportunity again are negligible, to say the least," Koenma said, his expression softening slightly. "I need to know that you understand that what you did was dangerous, stupid and illegal. That book was banned for a reason, and you are not to tamper with spirit world materials again – and I don't care if Botan gives them to you or not, you should still know better than to mess with them."

Yukina hurriedly nodded.

"And don't worry," Koenma added. "You're not the only one I'm reproaching. Botan is in trouble for taking the book from the spirit world library, and Yusuke is in serious trouble for breaking his Psychic Spyglass!"

Yukina tried to hide her initial twitch of horror behind a nervous laugh as her mind replayed the image of her own booted heel crushing Yusuke's Psychic Spyglass into oblivion in the cockpit of one of the military vehicles the team had travelled around demon world in. She had been forced into it at the time – had Yusuke decided to turn the item on her, he would have seen the talismans she was hiding behind, not to mention a few other things that would clearly have revealed that she was not Hiei.

"Yes, well, I'm glad we had this talk," Koenma said, eying Yukina over suspiciously. "Try to keep out of trouble from now on."

Yukina sighed in relief as he stormed past her – presumably on his way to locate Yusuke – and she then tried to continue on her way back to her room, only to be forced to a halt a few steps later as a hand grabbed her elbow.

"Hey, where do you think you're going, Little Miss?"

Yukina contained a groan and turned around to see Shizuru grinning down at her.

"So I just have two questions, really," Shizuru said as their eyes met. "First of all, why didn't you take me, Keiko and Botan with you on your little adventure? And second, you have to at least tell us what those boys really get up to when they're on the road together."

Yukina searched Shizuru's eyes for any sign of jest, but found none. She moved her eyes to Shizuru's side, where Keiko was standing a step back, still looking pale and bewildered. Botan was nowhere to be seen, which meant that at least she would not have to deal with quite so many questions before she managed to escape back to her room again.

"Well," she began, turning her attention back to Shizuru. "Neither you nor Keiko could survive in demon world. Few humans who accidentally land in demon world survive if they are not found and returned home swiftly. The air is toxic, and Keiko would quickly perish breathing it, and the general dark energy of demon world would overwhelm a psychic as sensitive as you, Shizuru."

"Are you saying we're not as tough as you are?" Shizuru asked.

"No, but you are both human and I am demon," Yukina reminded her. "Demon world was my birthplace, and, for many years, it was my home."

"Fair enough," Shizuru conceded. "Now answer my next question: what was it like being that close to the action?"

Yukina sighed, rolling her eyes towards the ceiling as she tried to think of an appropriate response.

"Well, it wasn't at all how I imagined it might be," she eventually answered, lowering her eyes to Shizuru again. "They curse, expel gas through various orifices and talk about matters of a sexual nature a lot more than they do around us."

"What?" Keiko said, stepping forwards, her eyes suddenly finding focus.

"And they spend an inordinate amount of time naked," Yukina added.

"Naked?" Keiko repeated, leaning closer still.

Shizuru snorted and waved a dismissive hand in the air.

"Oh come on, Yukina!" she said. "You're not seriously trying to say you've seen all three of them naked just because they thought you were Hiei?"

Yukina nodded, trying to ignore the way Keiko's jaw fell away from her face and Shizuru's eyebrows twisted over her suddenly wide eyes.

"You mean they never suspected that you weren't Hiei, not even for a minute?" Keiko asked.

Yukina shook her head.

"So… Huh…" Shizuru muttered.

"Is it really true that you discovered during a trial in spirit world that Yusuke is a virgin?" Keiko asked.

Yukina nodded.

"Seriously?" Shizuru asked.

Yukina nodded again.

"I was there when it happened," she said.

"I had no idea!" Keiko whispered.

"Well, have you ever slept with him?" Shizuru asked her.

"Well no, but I assumed he'd been with other girls!" Keiko replied. "He lived in demon world for three years, for crying out loud! I didn't honestly expect him to remain faithful to me during that time!"

"It was lucky that he was," Yukina added. "Because if he hadn't been, I would have been forced to open the gate and then explain myself. I was just about to do that, but Yusuke thought I was accusing him of holding back when he knew he was able to help us, and he opened the gate before I got the chance to finish explaining myself."

"Wait, what do you mean by that?" Shizuru asked. "Couldn't my brother have opened the gate?"

Yukina slowly shook her head, gulping as she saw the angered look brewing in Shizuru's eyes.

"I didn't know my brother had got past first base with you," she said in a dangerously low voice. "In fact, I didn't even know he'd gotten to first base with you."

"But I just told you I could have opened the gate," Yukina hurriedly pointed out.

"But you didn't," Shizuru said. "I don't mind if you've always liked Kurama, but if you've been leading my brother on, that's another matter entirely…"

"Oh, no, Kuwabara hasn't ever so much as kissed Yukina!" Keiko interjected, bringing a quiet sigh of relief from Yukina. "He dated a girl called Ayame for a while, and I think there were maybe one or two others, too."

"What?" Shizuru echoed, rounding on Keiko.

"I guess he didn't tell you, huh?" Keiko asked.

"You guess right! Why wouldn't he tell his own sister he had a girlfriend?"

"Maybe because you might yell at him?"

"I wouldn't yell at him!"

"You always yell at him. And you're yelling at me right now for telling you this."

Once Yukina was sure that Shizuru and Keiko were suitably distracted arguing between themselves she hurriedly fled from them, gladly taking herself back the welcome solitude of her room. She pulled the door closed and took a few calming deep breaths before starting towards her bed – only to scream in alarm, stumble over her own feet and almost crack her head on a bed-post as she fell awkwardly onto her bed. She quickly righted herself, scrambling backwards to press her back against her headboard, eying the unwelcome intruder in her room with wide eyes.

"There, you see? You're not the only one who can play clever tricks. You didn't even know I was in here."

Yukina shook her head.

"You've caused me quite a lot of trouble and embarrassment, Missy."

"I never meant to do that," Yukina replied, still shaking her head.

"Really?"

Yukina faltered slightly.

"Well, I…" she began awkwardly.

"Lord Koenma is furious that I let that book land in your hands, Yukina," Botan said, before sitting down hard onto the edge of Yukina's bed.

"I'm so sorry Botan," Yukina insisted. "I didn't mean to get you in any trouble."

"And you almost came between me and Hiei," Botan added.

"…Um… How so?"

"Well, all those times I thought you were him… He's very offended that I couldn't tell the difference…"

"Oh. Well… Hiei is a reasonable… I mean Hiei is… Um… I'm sure he won't blame you for this forever."

"Worse than that Yukina, you came between Hiei and Kurama."

"Oh, no, I never did that! Wait… Did I?"

"Yes, you did."

"You mean… Kurama really was attracted to Hiei?"

"What? No! I mean you have ruined their friendship because of what you did. Hiei is angry that Kurama kissed you all the while thinking that you were him."

"Ah. I see."

Botan nodded.

"I never meant to cause them so many problems," Yukina said. "Please, Botan, you have to understand – maybe you understand more than anyone else – I just felt so useless sitting in this temple all alone while my brother was suffering. I had to do something, and with that book, I had the means to intervene!"

"What did you just say?" Botan asked, eying Yukina warily.

"I said with that book, I had the means to intervene," Yukina repeated.

"No, no, before that," Botan said, waving a hand about irritably. "You just mentioned your brother. I thought you said you hadn't managed to find him?"

Yukina held back the urge to call Botan out on her near-flawless act of ignorance.

"I know that Hiei is my brother, Botan," she said instead.

Botan gasped, her hands flying to her mouth and again Yukina resisted the urge to tell her to stop feigning ignorance.

"I didn't tell you that!" Botan said. "Did I? Oh dear, I did, didn't I? When I thought you were Hiei, I referred to Yukina as your sister! Oh my, Hiei will be furious!"

"Yes, Botan, you did say it, but you weren't the first," Yukina assured her. "Kurama was the first to mention it."

"Kurama?" Botan echoed. "How unlike him, he's normally so secretive!"

"He thought I was Hiei, remember? He referred to me as Hiei's sister, and he talked about Hiei coming from the ice village, and then I knew for sure."

"Oh, well, I'm so glad it wasn't me who squealed."

"Yes, well, on that subject, you, better than anyone, knew how much it pained me that I could never find my brother, that I never knew if he had survived or perished. I thought you were my friend, Botan, but all this time you knew and you never told me."

Botan shook her head and waved her hands in the air, but the look of guilt on her face was still obvious.

"It wasn't that simple!" she defended herself. "Hiei threatened to kill me if I told you! And it wasn't my place to tell you, it was up to him to tell you! I thought it was very mean of him not to tell you the day you gave him your hirui stone and asked him to find the fire demon carrying the matching one, but you know Hiei, he won't be told!"

"If you had told me, I wouldn't have told Hiei that I knew," Yukina replied. "I would have respected you as a friend and not revealed to him that you had told me the truth. I never would have admitted it to him, even if he ever found the courage to admit it to me himself. I just would have liked to have known, for my own peace of mind. You could see that I was suffering, why didn't you tell me in confidence?"

"It wasn't my place to tell you, and Hiei told me not to!" Botan insisted. "But now that you do know, you must understand how bad the situation between Hiei and Kurama now is! Hiei could barely tolerate it when Kuwabara was singing love songs at you, he's furious that Kurama, his supposed best friend, actually put his hands on you!"

"I don't see why what happened has to stop Hiei and Kurama from being friends any more."

"You don't? Really? Maybe there's no problem from Kurama's perspective, but what about Hiei? He's so confused, wondering if Kurama always wanted to kiss him all this time, and knowing that Kurama was attracted to you and knowing what fox demons like doing to ice maidens like you!"

"Kurama isn't like that."

"No, I know that, and you know that, but Hiei's anger is making him so irrational he doesn't know that!"

Yukina lowered her head to avoid having to look at Botan any longer, mostly because she was starting to feel guilty that maybe her ruse had destroyed the trust between Kurama and Hiei.

"And it's true that I kept a secret from you," Botan continued. "But you kept one from me too: you never told me you liked Kurama."

"And you only found that out because you and Keiko went snooping around in my private quarters during my absence," Yukina bit back, finding the courage to look directly at Botan again.

"It's not the same thing, Yukina," Botan argued.

"It absolutely is. You violated my trust in you."

"That's not the same thing as going around pretending to be a man who can fight as well as Hiei!"

"You don't take me or my feelings seriously. You think I'm just a child."

"Well you are!"

Yukina scowled at Botan, but the ferry girl remained unaffected.

"Look at what you're wearing!" Botan said, waving a hand at Yukina.

Yukina looked down at herself and her heart sank. After spending most of the evening before enduring Rui scrubbing at her hair and then enduring a difficult night's sleep that was fraught with nightmares, Yukina had not given much thought to her choice of clothing that morning: she had simply opened her wardrobe and pulled out the first garment she had laid her hands on. Which, unfortunately, was the pink dress that came to halfway down her calves and buttoned all the way up to the neck. Keiko had taken her shopping for it some time ago, and it had, Yukina remember bitterly, come from a child's clothing store.

"The adult clothes are too long for me because I'm not very tall," she said meekly.

"Because you're a little girl!" Botan replied.

"I'm not a little girl!" Yukina argued.

"You're dressed like one and, until recently, you've always acted like one!"

Yukina gasped.

"You think I'm immature?" she asked.

"No, just childish," Botan replied.

"That's worse!"

"No, I meant to say "childlike"."

"That's still bad!"

"No it's not! We all love how sweet and innocent you are! You're adorable! You're like a little kitten!"

"I am not a child! Stop patronising me!"

Botan sobered then and reached a hand over towards Yukina, patting one of her bent knees gently.

"I'm sorry Yukina," she said. "But as your friend, I have to make you understand this: Kurama is a man. As a demon and as a human. He may seem very kind and gentle to you, but he's not like Kuwabara. He won't be contented with picnics and getting to sit beside you on the couch when we play cards."

"What are you trying to say?" Yukina pressed.

"Kuwabara was a unique case. Kurama won't be content to worship a woman from afar. If he wants someone that way, he would act, rather than hesitate like Kuwabara has done these last thirty-seven years."

"I haven't known Kuwabara for anything close to thirty-seven years."

"Really? I suppose sometimes it just feels like it's been that long…"

"Botan, stop trying to be diplomatic and just tell me directly what you mean."

Botan retracted her hand from Yukina's knee and shuffled herself around to sit at the foot of the bed, facing up the length of it towards Yukina.

"In normal serious romantic relationships between adults, more things happen than just the girl cooking for the boy and the boy singing glam rock songs quite badly at her in return," she began.

It was clear that Botan was trying to be polite, but Yukina was growing angered, and Botan's tone and mannerisms were starting to seem insultingly condescending to her.

"They want physical intimacy," Botan continued. "Do you understand what that means?"

"Are you talking about sex?" Yukina asked, inwardly hating herself as her voice wavered on her last word, a tell that Botan did not fail to pick up on, her head tilting and her expression becoming sympathetic.

"Yes, and do you really understand what that means?" Botan asked.

Botan started talking again, but at the sight of her pushing her index finger on one hand through a circle formed by the thumb and fingers on her opposite hand Yukina threw her pillow at Botan, who fell silent as it clipped her forehead.

"Just stop!" Yukina began as she scrambled to stand from her bed. "Just stop fussing over me and treating me like a child all the time!"

Botan grabbed her arm and Yukina paused long enough to look back over her shoulder at the ferry girl and hear what she had to say.

"I just need to know that you understand," she insisted. "The first time can be very stressful and, in some cases, painful. I just don't want you to get hurt or be afraid."

Yukina tugged her arm out of Botan's grip.

"I've seen and endured much scarier and much more painful things than love," she said.

"But–"

"And you already know that. You saw the scars I had after being Tarukane's prisoner. Now leave me alone, please."

Yukina marched briskly from the room, half expecting Botan to call her back or come running after her, and only feeling a little surprised when neither happened. She kept going at the same pace, around the back of the temple, altering her path a few times as she found herself approaching the sound of voices, determined to take herself somewhere private. When she failed to find anywhere within the temple that she could be alone, she eventually resigned to leave the temple altogether and start towards the hollow tree where she had buried the tools she had used to turn herself into Hiei.

"Returning to the scene of the crime?"

Yukina stumbled to a halt, clenching her fists at her sides as she fought back tears of sheer frustration.

"I saw it all, you know. I saw everything."

"Why?" Yukina snapped before she could stop herself. "Because you watch me all the time with your Jagan eye? Because if that's true, did you also see all those nights I prayed for you and cried myself to sleep worrying over you?"

Hiei broke eye contact with Yukina in a brief moment of apparent guilt, but quickly recovered his composure.

"I thought you were at least a sensible girl," he began. "But what you did here was stupid beyond–"

"I'm not a girl, I'm a woman!" Yukina corrected him.

"No, you are a girl," Hiei calmly replied.

"If that's true, then you are just a boy," Yukina retaliated.

Hiei tensed.

"You don't like that?" she asked.

"You've lived most of your life in the ice village," he carefully responded. "I know what goes on up there, I know how those women live. I know what they taught you, how they raised you. There are so many things you don't yet understand about life outside of the ice village."

"It's true that there are many things I've encountered since leaving the ice village that have shocked me," Yukina admitted.

"And there are many more things you will encounter yet that will shock you more. I think you encountered a few shocking things when you pretended to be me."

"Yes…"

"A premeditated act that makes me wonder just how naïve you really are."

"It wasn't premeditated. I heard you were sick and I thought I could cure you, so I made my disguise."

"You read the book long before that happened."

"Yes, but the two incidents are unrelated. I read the book because I'm trying to learn more about different ways I could use my powers, and I thought a book about ancient spells might teach me something useful."

"And you made appropriate replications of my clothing to disguise yourself."

"Yes."

"You made them by hand, and even bought footwear like mine in a size that fitted you. You did those things weeks before I fell ill. Explain that."

"I can't."

"Can't or won't? You did those things after reading the book of spells. You knew I was the one person you could most easily disguise yourself as – we're both the same height, we have similar features and you thought that because I'm often quiet, you wouldn't even need to think of appropriate things to say if you were pretending to be me. You planned this weeks ago, you were just waiting for the right opportunity. It came quicker than you expected. You wish you'd had more time to work on your skills with a sword – something else you started studying intensely when you began reading that book."

"You read my thoughts."

"When I saw you being used as a chew toy by a wood nymph, I felt justified in doing so. You were in danger, and I had to know why you were in that situation. I had to know if you had chosen to do it or been forced to."

"You had no right to invade my privacy like that. You're just as bad as Botan! You think you have the right to rummage through my personal thoughts and feelings and then cast judgement on me and tell me what to do!"

Yukina sighed and turned her back on Hiei, finding a little relief from removing the sight of him glaring at her from her vision.

"You did something incredibly reckless, you could have hurt others as well as yourself," Hiei said. "I don't believe that's something the Yukina I know would want to do."

"Maybe it's a family trait," Yukina quietly replied. "Look at all the reckless things you've done that endangered more lives than just your own."

"And you may have made an effort to alter your personality, but you made no effort to alter your gender-ingrained habits," Hiei responded.

"Wh-what do you mean?"

"You made me seem like a woman. Even Yusuke, at one point on the mission, thought that I had somehow turned into a woman because of your behaviour."

Yukina looked back over her shoulder at her brother.

"What's wrong with being a woman?" she asked quietly.

"If I had been born a woman, I would be an ice maiden, and I would lived in that place with those women, and now I would be just like them," he coldly replied. "It's a fate I am grateful everyday to have escaped."

"If you had been born a woman, you would be me," Yukina pointed out. "We were born on the same day, from the same mother."

Hiei tensed slightly, but said nothing.

"I don't understand why you didn't ever tell me," Yukina said softly, turning from him again to avoid having to see how little his emotions were affected by their conversation. "I was so lonely. Our mother was an orphan when she gave birth to us, she was the only family I had, and after she died, I felt such hope, such joy, when Miss Rui told me that I had a brother. I just wanted to have a family. Everyone else in the village had a family except me. Even Miss Rui had her mother and grandmother, but all I had was a dream about a brother I thought I might never find."

When Hiei did not respond, Yukina looked back over her shoulder in the hope of gauging his response by his appearance; but apparently he had fled, because, despite turning on the spot twice, she could not find any visual trace of her ever-elusive brother.

She wondered if he would ever admit that he was her brother, or if he would even ever talk to her about it.

With a sigh Yukina picked her way over to the temple steps and started down them, only to stop short as she noticed someone sitting on the steps some way below her. She hesitated on the spot for an uncomfortable length of time as she dithered about what to do next – should she turn back and sneak away, or confront him, she wondered?

"Hey, Yukina."

Yukina started down the steps, her mind going blank as the decision was taken from her hands: apparently she had already been spotted. She took a seat next to the slightly sullen redhead, smiling up at him nervously.

"Your friend Rui seems like a nice lady," Kuwabara said, keeping his eyes forward, leaving Yukina watching his profile intently. "She made some little sweet cakes last night after you went to bed. I think I ate about seven of them."

Yukina smiled.

"I learnt how to cook and bake from Miss Rui," she said. "When I was a child, Miss Rui took on the role of my late mother, and as I grew up, she became my friend. She's going to stay here at the temple with me from now on."

"That's nice."

"You'll still visit us, won't you?"

Kuwabara picked up a loose pebble by the side of the steps and threw it down, watching it bounce down several steps before disappearing from sight.

"I'm sorry I farted in your face that one time," he said quietly.

Yukina made to answer him, but words failed her.

"And I'm sorry I, um, y'know, made number one in front of you," he continued. "And I'm sorry I dropped you that time I carried you on my back. But, hey, I thought you were Hiei when I did those things."

"Hiei is my brother," Yukina pointed out.

"Yeah, I know that now," Kuwabara replied.

"Well maybe if you think that's the wrong way to treat me, then it's the wrong way for you to treat my brother," Yukina said.

"But… He's Hiei. And he makes my life so difficult – and on purpose too!"

Yukina nodded and turned to look forwards, partly hoping to see something that Kuwabara might be looking at – even though she already knew that he was simply avoiding looking directly at her.

"So Hiei's your twin brother?" Kuwabara asked after a short silence had passed between them.

Yukina nodded, and although neither of them turned towards the other, Kuwabara seemed to notice her action.

"So does that mean you can feel each other's pain and stuff?" he asked.

"No," she replied.

"So Hiei didn't feel anything that happened to you when you came to demon world with us, right?"

"No."

"Good."

"But he did see everything."

"What?"

"He said he was watching me with his Jagan eye the whole time."

"Oh…"

Yukina turned to look at Kuwabara again, but still he did not turn to her.

"I'm very sorry if I hurt your feelings at all, Kazuma," she said gently. "I know I insulted you when we were in demon world – and probably when we were in spirit world too – but I had to. I had to behave just like Hiei, or you would have suspected me."

"You didn't hurt my feelings when I thought you were Hiei," Kuwabara replied. "You didn't say or do anything that was any meaner than anything Hiei's ever said or done to me. But it did kinda hurt when I found out you've had a crush on Kurama all this time."

Yukina turned her head from Kuwabara to hide her embarrassment.

"I really wish you'd told me sooner that you didn't like me."

Yukina gasped and spun around, finding herself face-to-face with Kuwabara; but she no longer cared that he could see the colour in her cheeks.

"I do like you Kazuma!" she protested. "Of course I like you! I've always liked you, and I always will! I just… I don't feel as strongly for you as… As you want me to."

"I thought I was doing all the right things to make you like me more," he replied, trying to smile but only succeeding in looking infinitely more miserable.

"I'm so sorry if I misled you," she said sadly. "Please know that was never my intention! But… You have had other girlfriends, and I don't know that you ever really understood me. I… I don't much care for watching wrestling, or listening to angry music, or watching the movie "Fake Purse Ninjas" over and over and over and–"

"I thought you liked "Fake Purse Ninjas"! It's the perfect movie for a guy to watch with his girlfriend! It has ninjas, which I like, and it has purses, which you like!"

"But I don't even own a purse, Kazuma."

"Do you hate it because the purses were fake?"

"No. I hate it because it's just a bad movie."

"Oh. Wow."

Yukina sighed.

"So I guess you're gonna go on a date with Kurama now, huh?" Kuwabara asked her.

Yukina's eyes doubled in size and her face at first felt cold as the colour drained from it entirely; but, mere seconds later, she began to feel her face burn as it suddenly flooded with colour again.

"I guess Kurama always was better with the ladies than I was," Kuwabara continued. "He's a not as manly as I am, but he knows a lot of stuff about flowers and all those girly things you like."

Yukina turned from Kuwabara again.

"I don't want to talk about this with you," she said quietly.

"I'm not mad at you," he assured her.

"Maybe I want you to be."

"I'm just a bit upset and maybe disappointed."

"I don't know what I need to do to make things right between us."

"Well, unless you change your mind about Kurama and decide you'd prefer someone who prefers ninjas to flowers, you don't really need to do anything, I suppose."

"You're being so reasonable. I feel worse now."

"Your friend Rui spoke to me last night. She said I had probably misunderstood you all this time and that I should go easy on you."

"You don't have to do what someone else tells you to."

"What she said made a lot of sense. She's a nice lady."

Yukina nodded.

"She said she thought "Fake Purse Ninjas" sounded like it was a fun movie."

Yukina turned back to Kuwabara to see if he was making an attempt at humour – and when she saw that he was deadly serious, she was left wondering just what Rui had been thinking when she had made such a ridiculous proclamation.

"Things might be easier from now on though if you just stayed a girl," Kuwabara said. "And don't try to be Hiei again."

Yukina nodded and touched a hand to Kuwabara's arm. He forced a tight-lipped smile and, once she was sure that he was not going to touch her hand, she stood up, bowed to him and continued down the temple steps to the forest below, feeling exhausted mentally and emotionally.

"Hey!"

Yukina yelped as something landed on the forest path ahead of her. She barely had time to register who it was before he was suddenly at her side. She flinched as he dropped a heavy arm around her shoulders and started to walk on, pulling her along with him.

"We need to talk," he explained as he caught her watching him fearfully.

"I didn't tell Keiko and Shizuru, I promise!" Yukina hurriedly answered.

"What?" Yusuke grunted, frowning down at her questioningly. "Oh, no, it's not about that. There's two really major things we need to talk about. And we need to walk this way while we talk."

"Do we need to walk this fast?" Yukina asked, stumbling awkwardly along as her shorter legs tried to keep pace with Yusuke's longer, stronger strides.

"Yeah, because the first thing we need to talk about isn't gonna take that long."

"I don't understand."

"Just keep walking. It'll make sense soon."

Next Chapter: Yusuke has a proposition that shocks Yukina, Kurama and Yukina finally get to talk to each other as themselves and then Fumio comes back (ie I get to do my typical Harumoto/Sayori scene – I've noticed I keep putting Harumoto/Sayori scenes into my fanfics ever since I read YoJinBo…) Chapter 33 – What You Will