In the end, Kuwabara dug a pair of fuzzy, girly gloves out of a hall closet, then scooped a battered candlestick from a shelf and weighed it one hand. "Will this thing do?"

Biting her lip, she took it from him. Instantly, her demon energy crackled beneath her skin. It was still distant, trapped beneath the cuffs, but the candlestick would be enough. For now. "Thanks."

"Sure thing." Stuffing his hands in his pockets, he rocked back on his heels. "That all you need?"

"Yes." Her gaze skittered to the distant door. The barrier might keep her trapped in the shrine's vicinity, but at least in the woods she wouldn't feel like such a caged animal. "I'm free to go outside, right?"

"Don't see why not. But maybe don't go near the encampment, yeah?"

She dipped her chin in acceptance, muttered another thanks, and hurried for the door. The kitchen flashed by on her left, a knot of her captors congregated around its table. Yusuke. Kurama. Botan and Keiko. As she stepped onto the porch, she heard Kuwabara join them, his boisterous voice booming.

The candlestick tucked in the crook of her arm, she tugged on the gloves and set her sights on the treeline. The branches closed overhead in a matter of steps, shadows dappling her shoulders.

Trekking to the barrier took longer than she'd anticipated. When Kuwabara and Kurama hauled her in, the trip had blurred into a snarl of pleading and bargaining, the exact duration lost behind the creeping certainty that she'd failed Nomi forever. Now, walking at her own pace, she'd guess the shield lay at least two miles south of the temple. If the shrine sat at the dome's center, the land the ex-detectives had claimed was larger than she might have guessed—though not by much.

"You can stop following me," she said as the barrier's blue light appeared between the trees ahead. "You heard the psychic. I can't escape."

In a streak of black, the Jaganshi appeared before her, his hands shoved deep in the pockets of his cloak. "When did it start?"

She shouldered past him, striding straight to the barrier and leaning her forehead against it. Somewhere out there, the meeting point waited. Fifty miles at least. If she wanted to be truly ready, she'd need at least a day to get there—to assess the location, make sure it wasn't a trap.

Sighing, she turned back to the Jaganshi. "What are you on about?"

"When did Project Shell start?" His voice was flat and even, devoid of the raging anger he'd aimed her way up to now. "You say its public knowledge. So tell me, when did it start?"

Why did he care? When it started wasn't nearly as important as what it had done. Besides, there were no second chances, no opportunity to press undo and set the worlds back as they'd once been.

"Answer the question."

"I don't know. I became… entangled in it six years ago." She crossed her arms. Her throat had grown tight, but she batted that away. Project Shell's origins weren't secrets. Not as far as she was concerned. "But it had started long before then."

"Hn."

And she saw it then. Why he'd cared. Six years ago, he'd been a low-class demon. Not the heir to Alaric. "This was far greater than you," she said. "Maybe Mukuro should have seen it. Alaric was her land. I'd have thought she knew it better. None of us expected that of you."

Power snapped across his skin in answer, but she didn't back down or take it back.

No sense lying about the truth.

The barrier crackled behind her. It was the only sound for a long time. A minute. Five. All the while, the fire demon watched her. His gaze never left hers, but if she were to guess, she'd think he wasn't seeing her, not properly. He was trying to find her mind—or so the fluttering of his Jagan led her to believe.

The crunch of nearby footsteps disturbed him, and he blurred out of existence just as a short, blue-haired apparition emerged from a thicket of bushes. "There you are," she said softly. "I'm Yukina."

Kalanie bit down the urge to say she'd already known as much. Instead, she plucked at her yukata's sleeve. "Thank you for lending me this."

"Oh. Of course." The apparition stepped closer. In her hands, she cradled a wicker basket, steam rising between the cracks in its lid. "I thought you might be hungry."

The mere thought of food hot enough to steam sent a pang rolling through Kalanie's stomach. "You thought right."

With a pleased smile, Yukina reached within her basket and produced a small blanket. She spread it across the underbrush and fallen leaves, then settled atop it. "Come sit."

All too aware the Jaganshi must not have run far, Kalanie sat. She curled her legs beneath her, as mindful of not damaging the yukata as she could be. For a time, they sat in quiet, Yukina producing canisters of noodles and fresh bread from the basket. She waited wordlessly as Kalanie ate, her gaze flitting about the trees, though more often than not, Kalanie felt it settle on her.

"Thank you," she murmured as she set aside her empty canister. "It was delicious."

"You think so?"

The glimmer of surprised pride in the apparition's voice nearly brought a smile to Kalanie's lips. "I do."

After a beat, Yukina murmured, "I hope our treatment of you hasn't been too horrible. I… I was a prisoner once. To a cruel man. I would not wish that on anyone."

Kalanie gripped her candlestick between vice-like fingers. "If anything, you've been too accepting. I'm not safe. I'm not trustworthy."

"Because of the Sovereign Binds?"

"Yes."

"But they are not you, and the man who gave them to you isn't here."

Kalanie laughed hollowly. "That doesn't matter, yet only the Jaganshi seems to realize it."

"Hiei?" Yukina turned to face her, her crimson eyes wide and uncertain. "Kazuma had mentioned Hiei does not trust you, and last night… I have never seen him so riled outside of a fight. He is usually so restrained."

Running a nail across the candlestick's grooves, Kalanie looked to the trees. Sure enough, she spotted the fire demon crouched upon a branch, his katana in hand, as if ready to attack at a moment's notice.

"I get it," she said, her gaze locked with his. No doubt he could hear their every word. "His Jagan lets him sense minds. Read them if he pleases. How long has he lived that way, able to see the thoughts of anyone nearby? But he can't do that with me. My mind is not just shielded against him; rather it doesn't exist at all."

She shoved to her feet. "You all should remember that. My mind does not exist. Not like all of yours. I control it now, but I may not forever. If he finds me…" She shook her head and started walking, trailing a hand along the barrier, feeling its buzzing energy through her glove. "Thank you again, Yukina. You're too kind.

By her third night, she gave up on the mattress.

After so long sleeping in protected hollows or curled between the roots of sprawling trees, the bed was too unfamiliar. Worse, it reminded her of before. Of the nights she'd spent on the cot at the end of his bed.

The night before, Botan had realized she hadn't given Kalanie anything to sleep in, and she burst into the bedroom, a bundle of pajamas in her arms, only to find Kalanie curled in the corner, a pillow behind her head and the sheets wound around her body. Startled, Botan lay the pajamas on the bed—beside the yukata Kalanie had already shed—and retreated with a mumbled goodnight.

This night, there were no interruptions. Just the moonlight slanting through the curtains, painting her silver as she threw her energy against the spirit cuffs. She couldn't sleep until she'd worn them down. Piece by piece, night by night, she'd claw against their hold—whatever it took until she was free. And so, her candlestick clutched in her hands, rust flaking from its shaft, she tore at the cuffs' strength until her eyelids drooped.

When sleep came, she slept without dreams.

Yusuke asked a million questions.

"Did you try to kill him? I mean, that's what I'd do first, if someone tried to turn me into their mindless slave."

Kalanie frowned into the mug of mud-brown liquid they'd given her. Coffee, Kurama had said. She'd never smelled anything so bitter. "That's always his first compulsion. No killing him. No maiming. No hiring someone else to do it instead."

"Okay, fine, but then you must have torn him a new one? Verbally. Cursed him out? Hiei knows some brutal Demon World swears. You must have—"

"Forbidden."

She refused to meet his eyes, nor those of the audience she'd garnered . All she'd wanted was breakfast, something to quiet her stomach while she walked the barrier, looking for weakness—for anything that would get her free of this place. Instead, she'd become their morning entertainment. The ex-detectives. Their women. The boy demon Rinku.

He was worst of all.

He reminded her too strongly of Nomi.

Rocking back in his chair, Yusuke drummed his fingers on the table. "So what? You had no free will? Not a stitch?"

"Not if it didn't please him."

"That's screwed up."

She rolled a shoulder in a half-shrug.

"What's the deal with this?"

He'd picked up her candlestick. Six days in her hands and it was already covered in rust. If he applied too much pressure, the shaft would crack in half.

She picked at the core of the apple Yukina had offered as food. The weight of so many eyes made her skin crawl. "I can control metal—iron, specifically. But I also need it. To channel my energy. Keep it contained. If I go too long without contact with iron…" The beast comes.

That's what Nomi had always called it.

He was so much stronger than her, his energy nearly boundless. But with that great strength came great weakness. His need for iron always outweighed her own. The candlestick wouldn't have lasted a day in his hands.

Yusuke snapped his fingers in front her face. "Hey, Earth to slave-girl. If you don't have iron, what?"

"I lose my mind."

He snorted. "Thought you'd already lost that."

"It's different."

As Yusuke's mouth opened, some new question or insult ready to roll off his tongue, Kurama stepped forward, casting the half-breed a sharp look. "I've heard of your kind. Your power levels are dependent on the resources available to you, correct?"

She sensed a trap. "Yes."

"So the power Kuwabara and I felt in you before the cuffs—that wouldn't be your full strength?"

"No."

He sighed. His eyes were kind, even as his words cut her to the bone. "You see, then, why we can't remove the cuffs? I know you want us to. But until we can be sure it's safe for you to be here—"

"It isn't," she said. The room shifted instantly, as if not a soul dared breathe. She soldiered on. "It won't ever be. So don't keep me here. I've answered what I can. There's nothing more I can do for you. Take off these cuffs, drag me into the mountains, and set me free. I swear, you'll never see me again."

"And what happens if Masaru finds you? You've been within our walls. You know too many of our secrets."

It was her turn to snort. "They already know all this. You have no secrets."

Kurama's brow creased. "Explain."

"They've studied you. All of you. For years. It's why I knew you all already." She grabbed her candlestick from Yusuke's hands and clutched it close, swallowing down the compulsion rising to clog her throat. "They know everything about you. Your allies. Your powers. Did you know the Dark Tournament was filmed? Every fight. Every technique. I've watched it all. Twice. And every demon in this forsaken world knows where this temple is. If Masaru wanted to take this place, he'd have marched on it already. So set me free. I've no secrets of yours to keep anyway."

Yusuke's chair thunked back onto all four legs. "Not happening. Nice try though. You're great at the spooky stories."

He shoved to his feet and strolled from the kitchen, his hands laced behind his head. Nonchalant, for all intents and purposes. But she saw straight through it to the unease beneath. The same anxiety rippled through the room, a nervous fearful energy. One by one, her audience filed into the hall, subdued, the laughter that had followed them in an hour before long gone.

In the end, only the Jaganshi remained.

As he had every day, he followed her out to the yard, into the trees, all the way to the barrier. Then he trailed her. For hours. From sunup to sundown. Watching her with his true eyes since he could not with his Jagan.

She needed him to slip up. To grow distracted. If she were to find a means of escape, she'd need a moment to herself, some time to think, but he was always there, like a shadow stitched to her heels.

After the first day, he never spoke again. She tried to engage him once, prattling about the dinner Yukina had cooked the shrine's occupants the night before, hoping she might annoy him, drive him away somehow.

It hadn't worked.

It seemed nothing would.

On her tenth night, she made a breakthrough.

It was as her eyes fluttered shut, sleep coming to claim her at last, that she felt the flicker. Her last wild assault against the cuffs sent a fissure through them, cracking their hold upon her energy. In her next breath, she was wide awake, stamping her power down into the deepest crevices of her soul.

The cuffs remained intact, still circling her wrists, gleaming atop the ridiculous gloves Kuwabara had given her, but one push and they would give out. Which meant her time had come. She had to make a move. Now. Before the cuffs died entirely or she slipped up and revealed the return of her power.

Padding to the door, she pressed an ear against the wood. No one moved outside.

The night had been a quiet one. When she'd come in at sundown, the ex-detectives had been huddled together in the kitchen, muttering over some matter she knew better than to interfere with. Not long after, Kurama and the Jaganshi had disappeared. Where to, she had no idea.

If they were still gone, now was her chance to test the barrier. Snap her cuffs and throw her will against it. Or better yet, check the ground beneath it. When they'd trapped her in their prison pit, the barrier had extended on all six sides, covering not just the walls but also the floor and ceiling. Though the greater barrier arced high into the sky overhead, she'd never sensed anything beneath her feet. If she'd had a moment alone, she would have tested it before, but with the Jaganshi trailing her every step, she'd had no chance.

Now she did.

She left the bedroom in her pajamas, padding down the hall as if headed for the bathroom. The flannel pants clung to her legs and the shirt was too big, nearly cumbersome, but both were better than the confines of the yukata. If she were to succeed, she'd need speed on her side.

Nothing stirred in the hall nor the meeting room beyond it, and she crossed to the door without incident. Barefoot but for a set of stockings, she eased open the door and stepped onto the porch.

The night was nearly silent. Only an owl hooting in the distance disturbed the stillness. Hardly daring to breathe, she leapt down the steps and slunk to the trees. The branches closed around her, blotting out the moon, and her eyes adjusted slowly.

It was only then, as the darkness threatened to swallow her, that she sensed it. The soft murmur of voices off to her left followed by a surge of power. An orange sword burst to life, flaring between the tree trunks, and a moment later, Kuwabara's hazy silhouette cleaved a hole between worlds.

Kalanie didn't wait to watch who emerged. She burst into a sprint, hurling her energy against the spirit cuffs and shattering their last tenuous hold on her. Instantly her power returned, her senses sharpening. Energy signals snapped into focus around her, and she recognized strength that could only belong to Kurama and the Jaganshi emerging from the portal.

But more energies followed. Warped. Broken. Bound.

Her heart churned into overdrive as she skidded to a halt before the barrier. She dropped to her knees, scrabbling at the earth, scooping dirt away from the shield wall. As she clawed a rock loose, her hopes were confirmed. Mere inches beneath the surface the barrier terminated. She could dig beneath it.

And she would. Before Masaru's puppets found her.

Seizing a tendril of her power, she plunged her hands into the soil and called for the iron that dwelled deep beneath the earth, but just as metal answered, the ground trembling beneath her touch, a scream shattered the night. High-pitched and clear as a tolling bell. Immediately recognizable.

Kalanie faltered.

Yukina.

AN: Dun dun dun!

Okay, so some answers here at last. A bit of an explanation about Kalanie's need for iron. She depends on it to channel her power.

And now some housekeeping: you might have noticed that I've changed my chapter titles. This story has basically become a landing point for all my various obsessions at the moment, including YYH, Jessica Jones (if Masaru's powers sound familiar, you can look to Jessica Jones for as to why!), and now the Broadway musical Hamilton. Nothing of Hamilton will make it into the story (because um, how would I possible mash together a play about one of America's founding fathers with YYH?), but I'm going to be using a lot of my favorite lines as chapters titles. The connections may not be obvious, and that's fine! I just wanted to do something a little fun for me :)

Thank you so much to everyone who has reviewed or favorited or added this story to their alerts. I love hearing from you all! I hope you enjoy this chapter, too. The story is about to really start getting into motion!