34. Chocolate
"Will you teach me how to make those?"
Fai held up the cookie sheet. "These?"
"I wanted . . . to do something nice for Syaoran." Her eyes drifted to the corner. Syaoran shouldn't be forced to help a total stranger, regardless of her rank.
Fai smiled. "Sure."
An hour later, she was drizzling melted fudge over chocolate truffles. She let the last few drops fall onto the plate, then walked to Syaoran's door. Even if I'm a burden to him, I want to make him smile, she thought.
"Come in," Syaoran called.
Sakura opened the door and stepped inside.
35. Music
As her fingers brushed against the strings of the koto, the room fell silent.
When Ashura-O had asked Sakura to play, Syaoran had worried that she wouldn't remember how. As the first notes drifted through Shura's palace, he realized his fear was unfounded.
Distantly, Syaoran was aware of Ashura-O's dancing. But the majority of his attention remained on Sakura. As she played, her features overflowed with vitality, just as they had before she'd lost her memories. She was, in the moments when her fingers pulled music from that delicate instrument, the princess he had fallen in love with so long ago.
36. Wings
Until that moment, Syaoran had only feared for Sakura's life in his nightmares. As the ruins glowed beneath her hands, his heart kicked into overdrive. No, no, no . . .
"Sakura!" he yelled, hand closing around thin air as she rose into the air. A pair of ribbon-like wings spread from her back, magnificent extensions of her body. But her face remained vacant.
As if she could no longer hear him.
The wings warped and shimmered, unfolding. "Sakura!"
Fissures formed in the wings in triangular patterns. They broke apart, shattering like fragments of a mirror. And then she fell.