Chapter 17 – Vengeance
Keiko looked down at the leaf resting on the ground at Shizuru's side, still piled high with food, and she found herself feeling a tad guilty for having eaten her own meal so greedily. Adrenaline had carried her through the altercation with Iruka, through Oyama's funeral and through a brisk walk along the demon road; but when it had come to her turn to take watch on Puu, the resting of her physical self had finally made her realise just how tired and famished she felt.
"Hey Shizuru?" she said. "Are you okay?"
Shizuru turned her head, looking down first at the slightly ugly fish decorated with berries and nuts at her side before moving her eyes to the leaf that Keiko had, rather shamelessly, licked clean.
"Don't mind me, sweetheart," she said gently. "I'm just not really a fan of demon world cuisine."
Keiko pouted, finding her response unsatisfactory: ever since Puu had brought her back down from her watch shift, Shizuru had been wearing that distinctly concerned look she always wore when she sensed something terrible was afoot.
"I came to demon world, Shizuru," Keiko said sternly. "I didn't do that lightly. If you know something, you have to tell me what it is!"
"I don't wanna worry you, it's probably nothing," Shizuru replied.
"You were right about Koenma hiding things, you were right about Yasashi trying to stop us following her and how she did it, so whatever it is this time, you're probably right again!" Keiko insisted. "So tell me! Please?"
"I'm hoping I'm not right this time."
"Tell me what it is!"
"We're out-numbered by more than thirty to one."
Keiko gasped, turning to look up at Yukina, who was suddenly standing at her side.
"And some of them are almost as powerful as Iruka was," she added.
Standing at the edge of the road dressed in mud stained jeans, an over-sized sweater that had seen better days and a luridly pink bandana tied around her head, the wind lifting the ends of her hair, Yukina oddly reminded Keiko of someone else entirely.
"Hey "snowflake"," Shizuru said with a smirk. "I think you're taking your role as New Hiei too seriously: you're starting to sound as cheerful as he usually does."
"A-and you're starting to look like him too!" Keiko blurted out as her mind finally made the connection.
Yukina turned her head, her red eyes wide as she looked down at Keiko.
"Maybe it's the jagan eye…" she said, her voice softer and sounding more like herself once more.
"Are there really that many of the loyalists?" Keiko asked her.
"I think so," Yukina replied. "Before she died, Yasashi told me there were more than three hundred cat demons living in the hinterlands."
Keiko froze and Yukina looked slightly panicked.
"Oh but don't worry!" the ice maiden quickly added. "Some of them are women and children and some of them are quite weak – not all of them are warriors. Not all of them will fight."
"But the ones that will fight still out number us significantly, right?" Shizuru asked.
Keiko saw Yukina falter, a look of guilt passing over her face.
"How soon are we likely to have to confront them?" Keiko asked quietly. "Because I'm quite tired and I was hoping I wouldn't have to see any more blood before I've had a decent sleep."
"Yasashi expects us to reach the farm by nightfall," Yukina replied.
"And we can get some sleep there and carry on in the morning, right?" Keiko said.
"Well, the farm is in the hinterlands, so I think the loyalists might have something to say about us moving in there."
Keiko nodded and sighed in resignation.
"I guess I'll just have to enjoy the walk there as best I can," she said.
"Or not."
Keiko turned to Shizuru to ask what she meant, but Shizuru was already on her feet. Keiko quickly stood up, looking up as both Shizuru and Yukina already were, finding Puu diving down from the sky. Yasashi was on his back making strange signals in the air with her arms. Keiko wondered what she meant, but when she lowered her head she saw that the rebels apparently understood their leader's sign language, as they were all clearing away the evidence that they had been fishing at the riverside and they were pairing off as they had on the road. Tora ran over to Shizuru and Keiko and Yukina turned to her too.
"The border patrol are on their way," she explained. "Do you girls still want to attempt negotiating with them or do you want to hide with us?"
"What do you think we should do, Shizuru?" Keiko asked her friend.
"I'm gonna let Yukina make this call," Shizuru replied, turning to the ice maiden. "Negotiating with these guys was your idea Yukina: do you still think we should do this?"
Yukina looked up and down the road, her brow furrowing as though she felt conflicted.
"You've got about twenty seconds to decide, snowflake," Tora warned her.
Puu landed and Yasashi leapt down to the road, ushering Tora over the edge of the road, urging her to hide herself, before rejoining Keiko, Shizuru and Yukina.
"You don't have to do this, girls," she said.
"I'm certain Mister Hiei would help us in any way he could," Yukina said. "He might even be able to take us part of the way on his vehicle."
Yasashi tilted her head and scrunched up her nose.
"In my experience, Hiei doesn't do anything to help unless there's something in it for him in return," she said. "Everything Kuwabara said back on Ping Island was right: Maze Castle, the dark tournament, Genkai's ordeal, even Sensui: Hiei only got involved after excessive bribing."
"How hard did you have to bribe him to take out Tarukane and the Toguros?" Shizuru asked.
"Not at all," Yasashi immediately replied. "In fact, he volunteered to help and joined that little mission all on his own… Accord… When… Ah, I see!"
Keiko did not share Yasashi's epiphany – which appeared to happen when Shizuru began pointing purposefully at Yukina – rather she only felt more confused than ever.
"Thanks girls," Yasashi said, before leaping off the road and vanishing from sight.
Looking back along the road in the direction they had come from, Keiko could see a dust cloud rising in the air and the liquefying distortion of a heat haze that indicated the patrol vehicle's approach.
"Yukina, are you happy to take the lead here?" Shizuru asked as the roof of the vehicle began to appear.
Yukina nodded and Shizuru turned to Keiko, who looked up at her expectantly.
"We should have a back-up plan, just in case this doesn't go as expected," Shizuru whispered. "If things start to go south, we get on Puu and we retreat."
"What about the others?" Keiko asked.
"They're well-hidden," Shizuru replied. "And I don't think fighting what is basically the police of this world is a good idea. I think we've got enough enemies here as it is."
Keiko nodded, lifting her kendo stick over her shoulder and sliding it down diagonally between her back and her backpack; if she did not need to use it, she preferred to have her hands free to help her escape quicker if need be.
Turning her attention back to the road, the patrol vehicle had reached the top of the slope in the road that it had been climbing, bringing it level and revealing the entirety of it to Keiko's line of sight. It was bigger than even the largest of tanks she had ever seen in the living world – in museums or on television news reports – and it looked and moved as though it was heavier than a human tank too. In fact, Keiko thought with a nervous gulp, the patrol vehicle looked and moved as though it could squash them all – including Puu – without hesitation or interruption of its forward journey. She briefly entertained the idea that just that might happen – the patrol might think a few minor bodies in their way was a major inconvenience and they might not stop – but her fear was quickly allayed when the vehicle began to slow down long before it reached them, eventually drawing to a halt a good thirty feet away from them. A lean-bodied demon that looked a little like a golden-skinned humanoid anteater leapt down to the ground and started to walk towards them, regarding them through thin, scrutinising eyes.
"Good afternoon Sir," Yukina greeted him, bowing her head politely in greeting.
The patrol officer stopped in front of Yukina, his eyes thinning further as he studied her for a moment.
"I'm terribly sorry to bother you, but my friends and I are looking for one of your colleagues," Yukina continued, apparently undaunted by the increasingly irritated look the long-snouted demon was giving her. "Is Mister Hiei with your company today?"
There was a long pause before Yukina received a response, and when the reply finally did come, Keiko almost wanted to laugh at the irony of it.
"Actually sweetheart, I'm a woman."
Yukina gasped and hurriedly bowed her head.
"My deepest apologies, Ma'am!" she said.
"It's fine," the patrol officer replied. "Hiei isn't with this convoy, but we didn't just stop to make idle conversation with you: we stopped because you have two humans with you here, and it's our duty to send them back to their own world."
"It's okay, these humans are with me," Yukina said.
The patrol officer slowly shook her head.
"I'm not sure you wanted to admit to that," she said. "Keeping humans as slaves is a crime nowadays and it's another thing I'm duty-bound to respond to."
"Oh no, they're not my slaves, they're my friends!" Yukina hurriedly corrected her.
The patrol officer looked carefully at Keiko and then Shizuru.
"Honey, do I look like I'm enslaved over here?" Shizuru asked her.
"It looks to me like a demon with a jagan eye has hypnotised two humans and is parading them around like trophies," the patrol officer flatly replied. "And as if that ain't bad enough, you're travelling with a giant peacock and you're in a strangely remote region: the only thing this road leads to and from is the hinterlands of Alaric, and that's not a place anybody goes to unless they're collecting a bounty. So really, this looks to me like this little girl is taking two human slaves and the main dish for a banquet off to market to collect the best price she can get for them."
"Puu's not a peacock, he's a swan," Yukina said quietly.
"I thought he was a goose," Shizuru said.
"I think he's supposed to be an egret, or some sort of heron," Keiko added.
"I don't care what it is," the patrol officer said. "And I don't care what excuses you all have: humans are not allowed to run around in demon world like this. I gotta take these two to the nearest portal, wipe their memories of this place, and send them home."
"No, please, wait!" Yukina said, holding up her hands. "We're friends of Mister Hiei!"
"I don't think so," the officer replied. "I know Hiei, and he doesn't mix with low level demons or humans."
"Pfft, obviously you don't know Hiei very well…" Keiko muttered.
The patrol officer turned her head, fixing her thin eyes onto Keiko, who grinned nervously.
"I don't have time for this," the patrol officer said. "The humans are coming with me, you are under arrest for hypnotising them and attempting to collude with an officer of the border patrol and the blue ostrich can either get off the road or become a stain on the underside of our vehicle."
"But Mister Hiei would attest to our innocence!" Yukina insisted.
"Listen sister, I'm getting tired of the sound of your voice," the patrol officer bluntly replied. "So save it for the jury."
She started to reach a hand towards Yukina but stopped short of her goal as a vine snapped around her wrist, halting her actions. She slowly ran her eyes along the length of the plant until she found the wielder of it.
"I'm sorry, but I can't let you arrest or deport anybody here today."
Keiko was not sure that Yasashi's interference had been a wise decision, as her appearance had caused three more bodies to disembark the patrol vehicle and start towards them.
"Well, now I understand why she's going to the hinterlands," the patrol officer said. "I did think it was odd she was going such a long way just to sell off a couple of humans and a giant turkey."
"Puu's not a turkey," Yasashi corrected her. "He's a noble eagle – apparently…"
The patrol officer narrowed her already narrowed eyes and clenched her hand into a fist, the vine around her wrist snapping and disintegrating. Her other officers joined her as the vine wilted to the ground, the remains still hanging from Yasashi's hand. The rebel leader shrugged and flicked something casually onto the road before dropping and pressing her free hand to the ground. A tree shot up out of the road – despite the dry, hard surface not being the type of earth that anything would grow from – but as soon as the tree had reached its fullest height one of the officers produced a sword and leapt up, slicing the tree in half vertically.
"That was helpful," Yasashi casually commented.
The officer with the sword gave her a hard look but she returned it with a smile that did not falter even when the two halves of the tree fell in a V-shape across the whole width of the road. She then turned to Yukina, Keiko and Shizuru, who were on one side of the fallen tree.
"You might want to distance yourself for this next part," she advised them.
Yukina nodded and started towards Puu. Keiko and Shizuru quickly followed her lead, Puu lifting them from the road as the patrol officers leapt onto the road between the two halves of the fallen tree. Keiko watched on curiously as the officers became stuck in the previously concealed pool of sap the tree had leaked onto the road. Yasashi threw a handful of petals at the patrol officers and they collapsed into the sticky mess, looking strangely peaceful as they fell asleep.
"I hate to do this," Yasashi said with a sigh. "But they're clearly not on our side and we can't afford to have them coming after us again."
Keiko wondered what she meant, leaning forwards to afford herself a better view as Yasashi slid three small yellow and orange flowers from one sleeve, each flower resting between her fingers. She hopped up onto the base of the fallen tree and drew back her hand and then swung it forwards, launching the three flowers stem-first towards the patrol vehicle. The sharp stalks barely punctured the surface of the vehicle, tentatively hanging as though they would fall out at any moment: but after a wave of Yasashi's hand, Keiko remembered where she had seen the flowers before.
Yasashi dived off the road, disappearing from sight, and Puu backed away and upwards as the flowers ignited and the patrol vehicle began to quiver. A few seconds of stillness passed before the patrol vehicle burst apart, a dark liquid spilling from it and catching alight, leaving behind a mess of warped metal and a river of flames.
Puu, without instruction, slowly landed on the road again, and the cat demons all gradually emerged, stepping back up onto the road.
"Who didn't know that was gonna happen?" Tora asked.
"I'm sure it would have gone differently if Mister Hiei had been with them," Yukina replied.
"Oh, sure it would have, snowflake," Tora said.
"We could have negotiated with the officers," Yukina added.
"Yeah, you were making a fantastic job of negotiating your way straight into prison," Tora responded.
"That was pretty close, Yukina," Keiko admitted. "I guess we really don't have any allies here."
"Let's keep moving," Yasashi said. "It's only a matter of time before someone realises what we did here, so let's get as far away from the scene of the crime as we can before that happens."
Yukina and Keiko jumped down from Puu's back and Tora jumped up to join Shizuru on watch duty again. As Puu took off, Keiko noticed that Yukina looked paler than usual.
"Are you okay Yukina?" she asked.
Yukina forced a smile.
"I thought I might get arrested," she admitted. "I thought the only way we would get to speak with Hiei was if I let them arrest me, but I didn't want them to do anything bad to you or Shizuru. Or Puu."
"Well, we're okay now," Keiko assured her.
Yukina nodded, but Keiko thought that she still looked a little apprehensive.
Kuwabara groaned, his hands clenching into fists at his sides. He was sure he could feel a draft, and he could only assume that he had accidentally left his bedroom window open. It was not that the breeze on his skin was unpleasant – in fact, it was quite soothing – but the wind was carrying a horrid, sickeningly sweet smell with it. He pushed himself up with his fists before awkwardly rising to his feet and fumbling about blindly for the window. When his fingers collided with glass he felt for a handle and then tugged at it, pulling until the sound of bird calls and the wind stopped.
Kuwabara opened his eyes to thin slits, squinting against the glaring sunlight.
He wondered why he had fallen asleep by the patio doors.
Kuwabara opened his eyes wide, ignoring the pain of the glaring light he was subjected to: he was overlooking his back garden, and it was awash with sparkling pink and cream flowers that were both far too vibrant and far too beautiful to be of living world origin. He turned on the spot and hurried towards the front door. He was almost certain the flowers that had taken over the garden were of the demon variety, but the only way to be sure was to ask an expert, and so he set out to find Kurama.
Walking out onto the street in only his red boxer shorts was surprisingly refreshing: it was such a nice day outside after all. Walking down the middle of the road was a little uncomfortable with bare feet, but, as he stepped over the hood of a car that had barely avoided colliding with him, Kuwabara decided that it was not so bad, and Kurama's house was quite close.
One screaming old lady, three giggling little girls and two near misses with traffic later, Kuwabara found himself at Kurama's front door. He knocked on the door and waited for a reply, his eyes wandering upwards and his head tilting in silent fascination as he noticed Kurama's step-brother, one leg out of his bedroom window, the other still inside, his body slumped in the window-frame and apparently asleep; he always had been a strange boy though.
When nobody answered the door after what Kurama thought was a reasonable length of time, he tried to open the door himself. It was locked, but he found a key under a plant pot on the porch that opened it, and so he continued inside. He wandered around the house a little before moving upstairs, where he found Kurama's mother asleep in her bed, Kurama's step-father asleep in the doorway of Kokoda's bedroom and Kurama asleep in his own bed.
"Hey, Kurama?" Kuwabara said, pushing a hand at the dozing fox demon's shoulder. "Kurama? Kurama! Kurama!"
When yelling his name several times failed to waken Kurama, Kuwabara tried leaning over him and yelling in his face. When that strategy also failed, Kuwabara shuffled through to the bathroom, filled a cup with water and brought it back to Kurama's room, throwing the water a little clumsily over Kurama's face.
"Whoa…" Kuwabara muttered as he dropped the cup. "He didn't even flinch!"
As he looked down at Kurama's serene – if now also drenched – face, a thought occurred to Kuwabara. He stepped up onto Kurama's bed and opened the curtains, looking out onto the back garden. It was filled with the same unusual flowers Kuwabara had observed in his own garden, and he began to wonder if there was a reason for that. He opened the window and knelt down, barely squeezing himself between Kurama and the window, before peering outside.
He drew in two deep breaths before slumping back into the bed.
Shizuru put her hands out, grabbing Keiko's shoulder in one and Yukina's shoulder in the other. Both girls stopped and turned to her expectantly.
"I gotta bad feeling," she warned them.
They had not long left the dusty road the border patrol guarded, starting along a flat piece of land carpeted by dry, spiky grass: but ahead of them the land sloped steeply down into a valley between two large mountains. The valley itself was mostly taken up by a wide, angry river: but despite the roaring of the water and the general stench of demon world, Shizuru could still distinctly feel the approach of something nefarious.
"Everything alright, Shizuru?" Yasashi asked, stopping alongside her.
Shizuru shook her head.
"I'm not a gambling girl, but I'd bet you my next month's wage that the bad guys are waiting for us down there," she said.
Yasashi looked out across the valley and nodded.
"I don't doubt your suspicions," she said. "On the other side of the valley, the river flows out to the west and the area on the other side of the water is what's known as the hinterlands."
"We're there already?" Keiko asked, looking up at the sky. "I thought we wouldn't get there before nightfall?"
Yasashi shook her head.
"It's still another two miles over difficult terrain," she explained. "It would probably take at least another hour to reach the farm."
"I don't think we'll make it that far alone," Shizuru said. "I think there's a great big welcoming party waiting for us down in that valley."
"We can't continue then," Yukina offered. "The mountains are too steep and the river is too wild: we'd be trapped."
"I agree with Yukina," Keiko said. "The passage through the valley looks too narrow: if they ambush us – and if they outnumber us so greatly – we'd be in big trouble."
"So what now, fearless leader?" Shizuru asked, turning to Yasashi.
"Everybody stay with your partner," Yasashi announced, looking around the others. "I'll investigate alone. If you lose sight of me, take cover. If you see the signal, take cover."
She waved at the two cat demons in the air on Puu's back and the spirit beast obediently began to descend.
"This is a waste of time!" Tora said.
Yasashi turned to her curiously.
"You've been out of this fight for too long, Yasashi," she continued. "We've come this far, we know they're waiting for us, we're not gonna be able to draw them out and if we hide back here, they'll just call in all their bounty hunting friends to charge us from the rear and herd us into the valley anyway."
Yasashi turned to Shizuru.
"Change of plan," she said. "Shizuru, stay with Keiko and Yukina. Tora, you're with me now."
"I don't need to be paired with anyone!" Tora replied.
"Easy tiger, I think your boss is probably right this time around," Shizuru advised.
"How can you say that?" Tora snapped at her. "Your two weak little friends killed Iruka! If we all go into this the same way they did – without hesitation – we can take down all the loyalists: even Jagasame!"
"Tora, this isn't the time for bravado!" Yasashi admonished. "We need to proceed with caution. Before we can advance, we must understand what the loyalists have planned, what traps they may have laid for us–"
"You're starting to sound just like Kurama."
Yasashi and Tora both went very still and silent, staring at each other with an intensity that made Shizuru almost feel queasy just to stand next to.
"Get on the bird and keep your mouth shut," Yasashi eventually said.
Tora's lip twitched and her eyes thinned, but she did as she was asked.
"Everybody else hold your position here unless you lose sight of us or you see the signal," Yasashi told the others.
"Signal?" Keiko asked.
"It's okay, we'll let you know if it happens," Chita called over to her.
Yasashi joined Tora on Puu's back and he spread his wings, taking a few strides forward before launching himself into the air. Shizuru felt a flicker of something unusual as Puu flew over her head. She looked down at the ground, expecting to see a snake or some sort of lizard, but there was nothing unusual to be seen. She kept her eyes down a little longer, finally noticing a slight quiver of movement in the grass halfway down the slope they were standing on. When a mound of grass began to grow in size a sickening realisation hit her and she began frantically waving her arms above her head.
"Hey!" she screamed, her voice breaking from the force of her cry. "Look out!"
Yasashi glanced back at Shizuru, but in doing so she failed to notice the black root shooting out of the ground towards her. The root caught one of Puu's feet and yanked downwards. Puu cried out as he was jerked through the air, the combination of the root's attack and his response throwing both Yasashi and Tora from his back. The fall was quite a significant one, but both cat demons were quickly obscured from sight as a mass of black roots shot up.
"They just took our two top fighters!" Chita cried.
Shizuru opened her mouth to tell the other cat demons to stay back, but before she could voice her thoughts, Yukina had already started running down the hill. The others hurried after her until only Keiko remained at Shizuru's side. Shizuru turned to her to tell her how relieved she was that she could count on her to be sensible and not go running blindly into a trap, but instead she made a small noise of alarm as she found Keiko throwing down her backpack and then grasping her kendo stick in both hands.
"I'm ready to go, we should stick together though, like Yasashi said," she said.
Shizuru tried to say something, but words failed her again.
"Come on, Yukina's already down there!" Keiko urged.
Shizuru turned to look down the hill again, if only to confirm that what Keiko had said was true. As she located Yukina's aqua hair – which looked almost luminescent under the shadow of the roots – she could see that Keiko was not only right, but that Yukina was still ahead of all the others. She kicked at a root and for a brief, incredulous moment, it seemed as though her tiny foot bouncing off of the root had been a significant attack, as the roots all dropped back down into the ground as suddenly as they had arisen. Keiko looked up at Shizuru again and Shizuru nodded at her. Together they ran down the hill, joining the group at the edge of the freshly churned earth where the roots had emerged.
"What the hell was that all about?" Shizuru asked.
"Is everybody here?" Keiko asked. "Is everybody's partner here?"
Yukina moved over to stand next to Keiko and the others all moved to stand alongside their respective counterparts. Shizuru watched Yasashi carefully as she muttered names under her breath, waving hands at each member of the group as she went.
"It looks like everyone is still here," she concluded. "Is everyone okay?"
There was a murmur of agreement, but Shizuru blocked it out.
"Everyone isn't still here, Yasashi," she said.
Yasashi looked at her in a way that suggested she had no idea what she had just said.
"Is Puu okay?" Keiko asked.
She and Yukina looked about before locating Puu some distance away. They ran over to him and Shizuru started after them, grabbing Yasashi's arm and dragging her along.
"Your angry little friend is missing!" she explained when Yasashi started protesting.
"Tora?" Yasashi echoed.
"Yeah," Shizuru confirmed. "Unless she's still with Puu then those roots took her wherever the hell they went."
Yasashi yanked her arm from Shizuru's hold and took off at a speed Shizuru had not realised she was capable of. She passed Keiko and Yukina and ran all around Puu before pushing him up to his feet to check underneath him.
"They've got Tora!" she called out.
Shizuru cursed and stopped running as she joined Keiko and Yukina, who had stopped as Yasashi reached Puu. They watched Yasashi look about herself wildly as though she expected Tora to suddenly appear somewhere nearby as the remainder of the rebels gradually joined them.
"This is terrible," Yukina said faintly.
"What do you think happened to her?" Keiko asked.
"I dunno kid," Shizuru replied. "There's just one thing that doesn't make any sense though."
Keiko and Yukina turned to her expectantly.
"If those roots were a weapon of the loyalists, why didn't–"
Shizuru's voice caught in her throat and she fell to her knees, hugging her arms around her torso as she began to struggle to breathe. She could see a monster in her mind: a tall, wide creature with enormous fangs, piercing yellow eyes and hairy hands dripping with blood. It was close and it would bring about something terrible, but it was nothing compared to the red-eyed monster that would follow.
"Shizuru, are you okay?"
Shizuru could still hear Keiko's voice with surprising clarity, but she lacked the strength to answer her. Only when her vision of the yellow-eyed beast shifted did she find the energy required to move, forcing herself to stand.
"Over there," she managed to make herself say, pointing out towards the valley. "Behind the mountain on the right."
The others all turned to look in the direction she had indicated and there followed a long moment of silent stillness before a hint of movement appeared at the location Shizuru had indicated. A handful of armoured demons appeared around the side of the mountain, looking out over at the girls.
"There's only fifteen of them," Keiko said. "That's not so bad, right?"
"But where's Tora?" Yukina asked.
As soon as Yukina had finished talking, another handful of armoured demons appeared, followed again by another two groups. Shizuru could see that Keiko was still trying to count them; and as their number had reached a staggering high she could only assume that the logical action of performing a headcount was somehow soothing to Keiko in what was doubtlessly a moment of panicked fear.
And then the yellow-eyed monster from Shizuru's vision appeared, approaching from the rear of the armoured demons.
Seeing the monster sent a series of questions and disturbing thoughts through Shizuru's mind: she wondered how it was that Jagasame was so much physically larger than all the other cat demons; she realised that the loyalist leader was incredibly powerful and that those around her would never be able to best him in battle; and she wondered exactly how the physical aspect of the relationship between Jagasame and Yasashi would have functioned, given that he was more than twice her height and arguably ten times her width.
You took one of ours.
Shizuru stiffened, looking about herself. No-one else around her appeared to have heard the loyalist leader's voice but her, and she wondered if he was addressing only her.
You took my best soldier.
Shizuru looked over at Yasashi, the look on the rebel leader's face and the slightly askew angle of Jagasame's head telling her that he was in fact addressing Yasashi, though Shizuru was somehow able to overhear what he was saying.
Now I'm going to do to your best soldier what you did to mine.
Shizuru turned back to Jagasame, gasping along with the others as he hoisted Tora up in the air, her body barely bigger than his hand. She was struggling desperately but it was obvious that she would never break free of his hold with her own strength. As he started to reach his other hand towards her Shizuru grabbed Keiko and Yukina, turning them around to face her so that they would not witness what she already knew was going to happen next.
As Jagasame pulled Tora's head from her body Yasashi let out a cry of despair that seemed to be enough to keep Keiko and Yukina turned away as they both hid their faces. Energy began swirling around Yasashi in growing waves and an air of irrationality hardened her expression. Shizuru shook her head and started to move towards her, intent on warning her that she was running into a problem far bigger than it seemed; but she stopped when Yasashi turned to glare at her with glowing eyes.
"Stay out of this," she growled. "This is my fight, and I'm ending it here and now."
"Wait!" Shizuru cried. "Something really bad is about to happen and if you go running over there, you'll be killed!"
Yasashi gave her one last glare before turning and starting down the hill. Shizuru ran after her and the others followed her lead, but they did get far before Yasashi skidded to a halt and turned on them, throwing a handful of what looked like beans at them. She ran on again as a row of trees sprouted from the ground, blocking the path for the others to follow her.
"Are those pussy willow trees?" Keiko asked. "That's kinda funny, a cat using a pussy willow tree as a weapon! What's it gonna do anyway?"
Shizuru looked over both her shoulders, seeing half of the rebels backing off fearfully and the other half staring up at the trees in a cold sweat. Yukina was the first to move again, running towards the trees. As she neared them, they began shedding their fuzzy catkins, which landed harmlessly on the ground. When nothing else happened, Shizuru, Keiko and a few of the stronger cat demons started to follow: but they all stopped again when the catkins suddenly pounced at Yukina.
"They're literally miniature wildcats," Chita offered when Keiko shot her a questioning look. "They'll tear you apart with their teeth and claws if you try to pass."
"But if we don't go on, Jagasame will kill Yasashi!" another cat demon added.
Chita and the other, braver, cat demons charged onwards, quickly becoming caught in the swarm of catkins. Keiko turned to Shizuru for guidance and Shizuru took a moment to first locate Yasashi before answering: when she saw that the rebel leader was almost at the river she reluctantly started forwards.
"We have to stop Yasashi," she explained as Keiko followed her lead. "She doesn't know what she's running into."
"Right," Keiko agreed. "Jagasame will kill her too – or worse, she'll end up like poor Oyama!"
Shizuru briefly contemplated not telling Keiko the truth, but as the ominous feeling began creeping over her again she swallowed back her reluctance and pressed on.
"It's not Jagasame she has to worry about," she said. "He won't get his hands on her today. It's what's coming that will kill her if we can't get to her in time."
"What's coming?" Keiko repeated. "What do you…"
Keiko's voice trailed off and she winced and flinched almost painfully.
"What is that noise?" she wailed. "It sounds like hundreds of people being painfully tortured and screaming for their lives! And why does it feel so dark?"
"Yeah, this is something that's gonna make you wish you'd never had training to raise your spiritual awareness…" Shizuru said.
"It's awful! What is that noise?" Keiko cried.
With her hands pressed against her ears, apparently she had not heard Shizuru's reply; but she appeared to hear Yukina's.
"That's the sound of an equaliser!"
Yukina was smiling brilliantly despite the fact that she had a catkin chewing on her right shoulder and another one clawing at her left shin, but Shizuru did not share her enthusiasm. As she turned to face the enormous red-eyed monster racing down the hill towards them she could not help but think that the cat demon situation was about to get even more complicated.