Chapter Sixty
Kurogane watched Seishirou drag the boy out of the park. The kid looked back at him for several seconds before finally turning his head away, but his expression was unforgettable. It was as if he'd narrowly avoided getting hit by a truck, and was still recovering from the shock.
Behind him, Kurogane could hear the princess calling the boy's name. A few feet in front of him, the mage sat up and blinked. Kurogane didn't have to ask if he was okay. There would've been no point to the boy's mercy if Fai had been seriously hurt.
"Are we going after him?" Fai asked. Not a suggestion or an accusation of heartlessness, but a request for orders.
"When the hell did I become the leader?" Kurogane demanded, more out of habit than malice. "Do whatever you want." He turned, sheathing Souhi. The kid's long gone by now, anyway, he thought.
The princess sat beside the scarred swath of grass, pieces of metal scattered all around her. It took him a moment to recognize the pieces of her broken leg brace. Cheap steel, like the sword in her hands.
She could've been killed by that blast, he realized. When he'd seen the flash of lightning, exploding so close to where he and the dark-haired bastard were fighting, he'd assumed the spell had been aimed for their fight. The fact that the blast had come so close to striking the princess threw him for a moment. Surely, the boy hadn't been aiming for her. Of all of them, the princess was both the least threatening in a fight and the most likely to stir some kind of sympathy in the kid. It didn't make sense for him to attack her, especially when there were better targets so close at hand. So what was he doing?
He walked over to the burnt patch of grass. Fai followed, then split off to comfort Sakura. Kurogane continued to the edge of the blackened grass, kneeling down to touch the ashes. Most of the embers had died out, but the ground was still warm. It's too close to be a wild shot, the ninja thought, though he'd doubted the kid would ever let loose such a weapon if he had no time to aim it. A few feet in any direction, and someone would've gotten fried. If anything, it would've been easier to hit someone than it would be to miss. No, it's too perfectly placed. He meant to miss.
His gaze traced the swath of damage, examining the perimeter. From tip to tip, the destruction reached over twenty feet. But even at its widest point, the scorched area was no more than two feet across. Highly controlled. Too controlled to be an accident. He was trying to create a wall. His eyes slid between the princess, struggling to compose herself, and the spot where he'd fought Seishirou. Between them was the spot the lightning had struck.
Fai looked on, perhaps making the same connections as he was. As silly and stupid as Fai sometimes acted, Kurogane knew they'd have to discuss this later. The mage knows more about magic. He might know something I don't. Or that he might draw a different conclusion altogether. And with the boy turning into a vampire . . . Kurogane frowned, replaying the day's events in his mind. The carefully-placed bolt, the brief scuffle between the boy and the mage, both vampires now, the moment when the boy had brought his sword down and frozen without piercing flesh . . . Mercy. Why would he show mercy unless he intended to come back later?
The princess's emotions had overpowered her desire to stay in control. She sobbed hysterically into the magician's shirt, her leg hanging at an awkward angle over the ground.
The ninja rose from his crouching position and looked over to the others. He considered sharing his theories with them. There was not a doubt in his mind that the placement of the lightning spell, at least, had been deliberate. But with the princess in hysterics, perhaps it wasn't the best time to try to explain. "Let's get back to the hotel," he said. "We should pack before we move on from here."
"We're going?" the magician asked.
He nodded. "We'd spend too long looking for Seishirou. We're better off in a new dimension, trying to get feathers that way."
"We'll have to go after Seishirou at some point."
And not just because of the feathers, the ninja thought. "Not now."
For once, the magician chose not to be his normal, annoying self. Instead, he just bowed his head and said, "Okay."
"We need to reset the bone."
Syaoran looked up from his swollen wrist. "Reset the bone?" he echoed uneasily.
Seishirou nodded. "If it heals wrong, it'll be painful later. It's better to reset it now."
He glanced around, as if searching for something to alleviate the pain of his throbbing wrist. In the toy-filled living room of Miss Adele's house, painkillers were the last thing one would expect to find.
"I've made tea," the woman said, strolling in from the kitchen. In her hands was a plastic platter with three plastic cups. She set it down on the edge of the couch and handed one to each of them, being careful of his broken hand.
"Thank you," he said quietly.
"It's just what you need," Adele responded. It seemed like a strange way to answer a thanks, but Syaoran was too preoccupied to think about it.
Adele left, and Seishirou set his cup of tea aside. Syaoran finished his quickly, noting the strange taste of the herbs. He tried to identify whatever was in this tea, but it was no concoction he knew, or if he did, it wasn't something he'd ever tasted for himself. When he was done, he set the empty cup aside and held out his broken wrist. Seishirou's fingers probed around the disturbed skin, so gentle that Syaoran felt no extra pain at the pressure.
"You'll want to sit still for this," the dark-haired man said. "It's going to hurt."
Syaoran nodded, sinking into the back of the couch and bracing himself to feel the bones sliding together. His mind strayed away from the pain as his teacher manipulated his wrist. "Ready?" the man asked.
"Ready."
The pain of the bones reuniting was more sudden and shocking than Syaoran could've imagined, even worse than the initial break. A scream clawed its way up his throat, but he bit it back. This didn't surpass the agony he'd felt during his transformation, but it was closer than he'd ever wanted to come to reliving the pain. But it was the sound—the screeching and snapping of bones being realigned—that turned his stomach. He doubled over, as if to void his stomach right there, but a hand coiled around his throat and pushed him back into the sofa. Instead of bile, a whimper rose from his throat.
"There. It's over."
The words brought a torrent of relief matched only by the fast-healing ache in his wrist. He took several deep breaths.
"You'll start feeling better in a few minutes, but you shouldn't try to move for a while. You've been through a lot today."
He didn't even want to think about the screwed up circumstances he'd endured this evening. Seeing Sakura, nearly getting killed, breaking his wrist, sparing Fai . . . Why did I do that? he wondered, his attention slipping away from the pain. Back at the park, he'd had only a few seconds to process everything. A sane person would've vanquished their opponent, regardless of circumstances. An opponent he knew to be dangerous, one who had tried to kill him . . . It should've been so easy to swing his sword and end the confrontation right there. So why didn't I?
"I'm going to check on Fuuma upstairs. Stay here."
He couldn't muster up the will to respond. In fact, his whole body felt numb, as if he was drifting off to sleep. When he didn't answer, Seishirou left.
Did I spare Fai because I'm too weak to kill him? he wondered. Have I let my emotions get in the way of the more practical solution? Or is it because I know I'll need him later? Sakura would've been upset if I'd killed him, but he came after me first. He shook his head. "I can't think," he whispered to himself, too low for his teacher to hear upstairs. He hadn't been able to think since throwing the bolt between Sakura and the others. Even that, he'd done in the heat of battle, when his emotions were running high. I should've done something else, he thought. Something less dangerous, like a wind barrier. That was reckless.
Images of the battle flitted through his mind. The bolt that had separated Sakura from the others, keeping her out of the fight; the instantaneous reaction from Fai; the sound of steel crashing against steel, announcing every decisive blow between his old mentor and his new one . . . Syaoran wondered who might've triumphed, if that battle had been allowed to come to an end. With Seishirou's supernatural speed and the longer reach of his sword, the natural conclusion would've been that he would've won. But somehow, Syaoran doubted that. Seishirou was only ever serious when it came to protecting Fuuma, and even then, he usually managed to maintain his lighthearted demeanor. Where Seishirou would've treated the battle as nothing more than a casual sparring match, Kurogane would've been serious, focused.
Focused enough to kill a vampire in single combat? he wondered, remembering what he'd heard of Kamui's combat skills in Tokyo, and what he'd seen of other vampires. Logic dictated that a human shouldn't be able to kill a vampire, at least not alone, but . . .
If the fight had come to its natural conclusion, one of them would've been killed. If I hadn't thrown that bolt of lightning . . . If they hadn't been distracted by my fight with Fai . . . He took a shaky breath. Which of them would I rather have won?
His eyes flashed to the stairs. Seishirou was likely letting their newest feather rest over Fuuma's heart, slowing the disease before it could spread further. He's doing this for someone he cares about. Even if he was being playful in the fight, he wouldn't have let himself get killed. But what reason would Kurogane-san have to win the fight beyond finding one of the princess's feathers? If it came down to one feather versus his life, surely he would've chosen his life. He's too smart to throw it away when he knows there are other feathers to find. So why? Because he hated Seishirou enough to want him dead, even if he had to compromise is own survival? Because he needed me back for some reason?
Above him, he heard footsteps moving across the carpet. A moment later, Seishirou descended the stairs and reentered the living room.
I shouldn't even be thinking about this right now. I have a job to do. Seishirou-san wouldn't like it if I was thinking about the others. He'd say they betrayed me back in Infinity. He'd say I didn't need them.
But if they betrayed me, why are they so desperate to get me back?