Because these two really shouldn't have been separated, you all get two updates in one week. Next update will be Monday (my time, so Sunday for almost everyone else) so watch out for it.

Administrative stuff

Summary: Li Syaoran must return to Kinomoto Kingdom with the remains of his fiancée after her tragic demise. But a marriage is still required to unite the two families, and now Syaoran has his pick of the six remaining daughters of Kinomoto Fujitaka for the sake of both their kingdoms. Romance/Mystery

Ages:
Kinomoto Touya: 27yrs
Li Syaoran: 22 yrs (almost 23)
Kinomoto Sakura: 21 yrs
Kinomoto Tomoyo: 20 yrs
Kinomoto Ayame: 18 yrs (dec)
Kinomoto Meilin: 18 yrs
Kinomoto Chiharu: 17 yrs
Kinomoto Naoko: 16 yrs
Kinomoto Rika: 15 yrs

Disclaimer: I do not own Card Captor Sakura.

It's Only Love – Love Today: Part II

From that first sighting, Syaoran spent the next six days falling in love with everything there was to fall in love with about Kinomoto Sakura. Her laugh, her smile, her irrepressible cheer. Everything about her enchanted him, and even her most unattractive personality traits made him love her more.

On the second day he fell in love with her silliness. Nakuru and Sakura (both grown women – Nakuru was even older than Syaoran) were playing a game of tag around the castle and the latter almost knocked the wind out of him as he was coming around a corner. Not that he minded too much – how could he with Sakura fussing over him to make sure he was alright?

She apologised profusely, trying to explain how their strange game had started in a very long tale that for some strange reason seemed to start at Sakura's tenth birthday and finish at some point in the distant future. He absorbed every word, listening ever so intently until she was done.

"So what you're saying is all this started because there was a bee in your hair?" he questioned, quite certain that he had captured the gist of her story.

Sakura nodded sheepishly, giving him an apologetic look. Syaoran couldn't resist smiling at her when she was looking at him so sweetly.

"I'll forgive you, Sakura-chan," he told her with a smirk forming on his lips and a plan in his mind, "but on one condition."

"Ne, you can't do that," Sakura protested, pouting as she crossed her slim arms petulantly over chest. The apologetic demeanour was all gone, and replaced with a slight air of haughtiness. It was almost as though she'd never had someone accept her apology in such a manner.

"It was a genuine accident and I only apologised out of courteousness," she added, looking fiery and challenging once again. "Forgiveness is an act of charity, Syaoran-kun, and not subject to conditions."

He knew when she said his name that she was not genuinely angry with him, and so felt safe to continue riling her up ever so slightly. "But you haven't even heard my condition, Sakura-chan," he argued with a teasing smirk. "You might like it."

Sakura blushed genuinely as she feigned outrage at the salacious under tone. "I assure you that I will not enjoy any condition you impose upon me, Syaoran-kun," she told him in an affronted tone holding a hand to her breast, "but I will comply regardless. I am, after all, a woman of honour."

"Good," Syaoran agreed, "so you'll meet at the stables on Saturday at nine and I'll explain the rest of my condition from there."

"If I must," she replied reluctantly, giving him a conspiratory wink before turning on her heel and leading Nakuru away with her.

As they left, he heard Nakuru whisper something along the lines of "I think my dear little cousin has a crush on you, imouto-chan" with a happy sigh. Sakura made no reply, but glanced back over her shoulder for one last look at Syaoran, a blush streaking over her features as she met his eye and hurried away.

And although it was her silliness that he fell in love with in that moment, perhaps it was really the fact that with Sakura, he could be a little silly too.

The majority of his days were taken up with talking strategy with the other men. Kero was surprisingly very good at this, not that Syaoran would admit this. Like he and Touya, Syaoran and Kero had been instant enemies.

Despite having his time monopolized, Syaoran still found the opportunity to find loveliness in Sakura. On his third day it was her clumsiness, if for no other reason than it gave him the perfect excuse for staying close to her and holding her like the delicate thing that she was. When he caught her helping out in the kitchen on the fourth day (he'd heard her voice and gone to investigate, only to find her covered in flour and laughing at herself) it was her down-to-earth nature. When he saw her in the garden on the fifth day making daisy chains with Yue's son, it was her sweetness (although at the time he had been a little put out by the ten-year-old's insistence that he would marry Sakura when he was big enough). When, in a brief moment of rest on his sixth day, he had accompanied her and Kero to do some fishing, it was her determination, along with the fact that she wasn't just a prim little princess.

By the time Saturday morning rolled around, he was surprised there was anything else to fall in love with, but as he entered the stable, he caught a glimpse of her bathed in the morning sun, and was struck entirely. She was a vision. She was a creature of dreams. She was everything.

Sakura caught him staring, smiling a little to herself as she hoped that his expression meant what she thought it meant. She pouted asking, "why are you looking at me so intently?" as she crossed her arms protectively over her figure.

"I suppose I'm just a little surprised," Syaoran answered with surprising cool, recovering himself with a white lie, "after all, my cousins told me you were notorious for your sleep ins."

"Not when it's this important," she whispered lowly to herself, but Syaoran did not catch her heartfelt words. Instead she covered it with her own white lie. "I was up anyways with Nakuru-chan," she explained, blushing a little as she spoke. "She's been having terrible morning sickness. The doctor thinks she needs some country air until she's back to her senses."

"She's pregnant?" Syaoran asked, the news surprising him. "In her condition . . . should she really be . . . well . . ." he struggled to find the words, and with a happy laugh, Sakura kindly finished the thought for him.

"So Nakuru?" she suggested.

"Precisely," Syaoran agreed. It was the only word for her stunts, and he was sure that sort of behaviour couldn't be conducive to her current condition. Between chasing her sister-in-law around the castle and attacking her husband with a bone crushing hug every time she saw him, Nakuru was constantly on her feet and racing around, which did not seem like the right sort of regime for a pregnant woman to engage in.

Sakura shrugged in response to his question. "You know she's calmed down a lot since her and 'nii-chan married," she offered. "Once she gets bigger she'll really have no choice in the matter."

He nodded thoughtfully and the two lapsed into a comfortable silence. Well, sort of. Sakura shifted uncomfortably, her eyes gazing shyly at the young king before she found the courage to break the silence. "So, what was your condition?" she asked curiously. "It better be good, or else I might decide that I don't want you to accept my apology," she added with feigned indifference.

"It's not much," he answered, feeling that irrepressible urge to tease her build up once again. He was starting to understand a little why her brother always insisted on calling her kaijuu, often to his detriment. "Only that you have to spend the whole day with me."

She considered his proposition with a sweet gesture of mock thought, her index finger tapping lazily on the corner of her mouth. "It seems an awful lot for something so small as an apology," she said, returning his tease.

"I know," he replied, breaking the jovial mood for one of total sincerity, "but it would mean so much to me, Sakura, if you would agree to do so."

She smiled gently at his confession, her cheeks not failing to turn a fetching shade of red as she replied with a quiet "I think I'd like that too" and extending her hand towards Syaoran. He took it immediately in his own, his whole body feeling warm as they shared this quasi-embrace. He began to lead her on a short walk, a picnic basket hanging from his free hand as they went.

Syaoran was always surprised by how freely he could talk to her and how much he enjoyed doing so. He was naturally a quiet young man prone to bouts of silence, but with Sakura he wanted nothing more than to narrate the world around them and watch as she attended to every word he said. She listened carefully, offering her own insights when necessary, but generally happy to simply hear him speak of everything and anything that came to mind.

"Here," he said when they stopped by a small lake. He reluctantly let go of her so he could lay down a blanket on the grass, before quickly returning to her side so that he could help her to her seat.

She gave him a mock look of admonishment, swatting away his hand as he attempted to prepare an apple for her consumption. "You know I'm not one of those delicate princesses that need everything done for them, Syaoran," she told him, half smiling as she gave him a semi-stern telling off. "I am perfectly capable of eating an apple you know, skin and all." She punctuated her point by taking an almost harsh bite into the apple.

Syaoran couldn't help but smile at her. "Forgive me," he responded, feigning a look to match hers, "I just can't help but want to do things for you, Sakura. I want to do everything in my power to make you as comfortable and happy as humanly possible."

"Stop getting mushy on me," she teased, assuming that it was part of their teasing game, and so not taking him seriously at first. "When did you turn into such a sap?"

"I'm not usually," he admitted, taking a deep breath to find his courage, "but I'm hoping you'll allow me one last sappy moment."

Sakura's eyes widened as she realised that he was being completely genuine and that whatever the words that came next out of his mouth were, they would change her life forever. She nodded cautiously, urging him to continue.

"Kinomoto Sakura," he began, his breath leaving him a ragged 'woosh', "you are . . . wonderful. I have never met anyone in my life so entrancing, so kind, so lovely, so enthusiastic . . . so wonderful.

"A-a-and," he began to stutter, losing some of his nerve after his near confession of love as he arrived at the very important question he needed to ask her, "I w-would like your permission t-to court you."

He shut his eyes tight, fearing the worst. Even he was not deaf to the rumours of Sakura and her suitors, and he expected at the very least a slap to the face; at most he expected a death warrant from Touya - one that the Crown Prince would happily mete out himself. Instead what he got was a gentle hand placed to his cheeks, forcing his eyes open in shock and disbelief.

"I would like that very much, Syaoran-kun," she told him warmly, her eyes shimmering with unshed tears.

And just when he thought there was nothing left to fall in love with about Kinomoto Sakura, that gentle look pushed him right over the edge. He loved her smile, her laugh, her sweetness, her beauty, her silliness, her stubbornness, and everything there was to love about any one person. He even loved her clumsiness. But most of all he just loved her, and everything that entailed. He loved her like he had never loved anyone before and like he would never love anyone again.

Not even Kinomoto Ayame.

'But what of Kinomoto Sakura?' you might ask. What of her feelings?

She had a whole week with Li Syaoran; a whole week to fall in love with his occasional smiles, his concerned eyes, his shyness and stoic exterior, but her feelings remained unchanged. She didn't fall in love that week, not even a little, for she was already in love with a stubborn little boy who pushed her into a lake fifteen years ago.

Only now that she thought about it, it might have been a pond.

~ to be continued ~

Another piece of the puzzle falls into place. Any guesses on the full picture?

Next chapter: The moment you've all been waiting for . . . Touya arrives at the Kinomoto palace . . .

Note: If you've read much else of what I've written, you'll probably have noticed that I have a tendency to change the order that characters fell in love/realized their feelings, but in this case, it is because of my firm belief that Yukito totally 'ankle blocked' Syaoran's mojo and had he got in first, none such blocking would have occurred. So, yeah, Sakura liked him first and has for fifteen years. Sweet, right? And the week together only confirmed her feelings for him insert collective 'awww'.

I also tried to imply the reason for Touya's absence thus far. He's in the country with Nakuru because she's pregnant again. In other words, he doesn't know that there are death threats to be issued and asses to kick, but he soon will.