Chapter 39

The earth was shaking violently. Cracks in the ground started to form in the ground. A high pitched sound that sounded almost like a scream pierced the sky. It was such an offensive sound that Sai and Kaze both had to flatten their ears to block it out. Kirara was also obviously in pain, but the only other person that even seemed to notice was Akage. Nami and Umi were completely unaffected by the noise. The sorceress in the middle of the field below them began to laugh hysterically. Red energy began to surround and give her a very threatening and ominous appearance. As if her evil aura wasn't bad enough.

"What the hell is going on?" Kaze spat.

"She's building up a ton of magic!" Sai warned her friends, "Not sure what kind of attack she's building up for, but whatever it is, it's gonna be big!"

"Well then, we're just gonna have to stop her before she fires it off." Akage called back. Sai nodded her agreement. She was racking her brain for something to do when it suddenly came to her. Tainted magic could be purified just like anything else. Sai would just have to purify the girl's aura and her magic would temporarily be useless. The only problem was that she couldn't get close to the girl without her releasing the energy that she'd already built up. Then an idea entered her mind.

Sai immediately summoned Shinseina Yumi and several arrows to her hands. She may not have been able to get close to the sorceress to purify her aura, but she sure as hell could fire a few sacred arrows at it. The others noticed what she was doing and immediately gave her space, especially the ones with demon blood. They knew exactly how much spiritual energy Sai could put into each shot and they didn't want to get caught in any of it. The girl in the field, however, seemed to be too preoccupied with laughing maniacally to know that her precious little spell was in danger. Sai knocked an arrow and took aim. She pointed the arrow straight at the vortex of her magical energy, which happened to be her heart, and charged it. Once the air around the arrow started to spark from the energy that it was in direct contact with, Sai knew the arrow was ready. She released it with the signature twang of a bow string snapping back to place.

"Hit the mark." She muttered to herself, adopting her mother's phrase when firing off an arrow. The saying held true. The arrow slammed into the girl's aura, however it did not pierce it. Instead, the powerful blue aura of the arrow was held off by the massive red aura that was being produced by the girl. After a few moments of struggle, during which the girl never stopped laughing, the arrow began burn and was soon turned to ashes and blown away by the wind. That was a massive surprise to Sai. No one had ever resisted her sacred arrow.

"What the hell?" Sai demanded from the air. The sorceress seemed to hear her and responded by intensifying her laughter. This made Sai scowl and start to growl menacingly. She knocked another arrow and charged it to twice the power of the last. The arrow left the bow with a spark of energy and slammed into the girl's aura. A massive explosion that kicked a cloud of dust was the result. Sai smirked, confident in her victory.

"Ha! Bitch never had a chance." She spat. However, her words were soon proved wrong when the dust cleared. The girl still stood, unscathed, aura still growing. The only thing different was that her annoying laughter had been replaced by a scowl.

"You did NOT just call me a bitch!" The young sorceress screamed. Sai bared her fangs.

"Damn right I did bitch!" Sai retorted.

"Shut up half-breed!" The girl screamed back.

"Bitch now you are really gonna die!" Sai threatened. Her friends looked from Sai to the sorceress and back. Kaze scratched his head.

"Looks like the two most powerful girls in the world are having a catfight..." He commented.

"This is ridiculous." Umi agreed.

"Gotta admit." Akage began, "It's kinda hot..." Nami's face twisted into one of jealousy and rage.

"WHAT?!" She screamed. Akage's fear was clear as he put his hands up.

"Not as much as you babe! I swear! But you gotta admit that this is a little bit of a turn on." He insisted. Nami narrowed her eyes at him.

"Fine. I'll give you that. But we will talk about this later..." She said threateningly. Then she turned to Sai, "Sai! Kill this bitch quick and let's get outta here." Sai smirked.

"Gladly." She said dismissing her priestess bow and drawing her demon blades and focusing her attention back on the seething sorceress, "Time to die!"

Sai sprinted forward faster than anyone could register. The girl let loose an attack at the area that Sai had been standing, but the red magic slammed into empty ground. Sai reappeared a few feet to the left of the girl with her swords raised in an X.

"DRAGON RIFT!" She roared as the beams of light rushed from the swords and slammed into the sorceress. Sai didn't have time to celebrate. She knew by the scent in the air that the girl had dodged the attack, so she began to search the area with her eyes to find her.

"Up here half-breed!" Her venomous voice shouted from above. By virtue of her magic, she was floating in the sky above where Sai was standing. She chuckled, "My turn." With that she flicked her wrist and sent down a shower of spears made of her red magic. They pierced the ground and exploded on impact. Sai had an incredibly difficult time dodging all of them and was ultimately unsuccessful. She landed just as one struck beside her. Without any time for her to jump away, the bolt of energy exploded and sent Sai flying across the field. She slammed into the ground hard, leaving a small crater where she hit.

"Dammit." She cursed as she spat out the blood that had risen to her mouth. The sorceress was laughing hysterically again as she lowered herself to the ground and began walking casually towards where Sai was struggling to get up.

"You've been outclassed, bitch." She said, dragging out the last word. Sai jammed one of her swords into the ground and used it to pry herself up from the ground. Once up, she spat blood once again and stared the girl straight in the eyes. Then she laughed wickedly.

"I'm in a class of my own." She growled. The change was almost instantaneous. Sai's fangs and claws grew, while purple demon markings streaked her cheeks and her eyes turned blood red with her gold irises in the middle. The sorceress was not impressed.

"Oh, so the girl has let the dog out of its cage. I guess you really are a bitch now." She said dryly, "But my dear Saiai, do you really think that you can stop me with that? The great Akai Majutsu-shi, Haruka?" Sai began to chuckled wickedly.

"Oh hell yeah." She said, her eyes becoming completely red. A look of fear crossed Haruka's face. Sai noticed and smirked over her growl, "Scared now, huh?" Haruka scowled and entered into a fighting stance, summoning two blades of her red magic to her hands.

"Not a chance." She shot back.

"We'll see..." With that, Sai shot forward, her swords leading the way. Haruka barely had time to block the attack. Sai's swords rung off of hers. However, Haruka did not have time to recover. Sai was relentless in her attack. Each movement of Sai's blades was expertly timed and masterfully carried out. The sorceress simply couldn't keep up and she knew it. Knowing that she wouldn't last much longer in a direct sword confrontation, Haruka stomped her foot into the ground causing it explode with the blast directed at Sai. Sai immediately disengaged and jumped high into the air and backflipped gracefully away from the ruined ground.

Haruka was panting heavily from the short engagement. She was obviously not used to having to exert physical force in a fight. Sai, however, was perfected fine and hadn't even broken a sweat. It wasn't hard for Sai to figure out that Haruka wouldn't keep fighting like this for long. She would soon abandon close quarters combat and retreat to use her magic to finish Sai off. The only thing that was keeping her there now was pride and Sai could tell that this girl valued her own life over her pride. Sai knew that she would have to finish the girl off before she retreated.

In the midst of these thoughts, Haruka lept forward to attack Sai. Sai quickly snapped back to reality and easily parried the attack. She then took advantage of the opening she had created and pressed the attack. Sai knocked one of the red blades from Haruka's hands and thrust the other deep into the girl's stomach. The sorceress grunted in pain, but quickly responded by kicking Sai away from her causing the sword to slide out. Blood spurted from the wound and stained the ground a dark red. Haruka clutched the wound and her hand glowed red. When she removed her hand, the would-be fatal wound was healed, but Haruka was a great deal paler than before. Sai smirked. The girl wasn't invincible. She was running out of power and healing that wound had put a huge drain on her magic reserves.

"So," Sai growled, "before I kill you, you want to tell me why you killed all of those people?" Haruka laughed weakly.

"For the hell of it." She answered casually. Normally, this answer would have made Sai's stomach churn, but in her current full demon state, it didn't bother her in the slightest. It actually sounded somewhat appealing, except for the small voice in her head that told her it was wrong. She quickly shut the voice down and returned to her conversation with the sorceress.

"Sounds like fun." Sai said, bloodlust obvious.

"Figured you would say that, mutt. We're not so different, you and I." She commented.

"Oh yeah? How so?" Sai asked, curious as to the witch's point.

"Our instincts both tell us to kill anything and everything. They tell us to rip the throats out of every living thing around us and drink its blood just because we can. Because we're better than them." Haruka explained.

"True enough." Sai laughed.

"I mean, just look at your so-called "friends" over there." She said, pointing at the five figures on the nearby hill, "Don't they just look appetizing? Can't you smell their fear? I can feel it radiating off of them. It's like a wave of pleasure to me. Turns me on, to be honest." Sai smirked as Haruka licked her lips at the depraved thoughts running through mind.

"Well, maybe I'll just have to have a snack." Sai growled, "After I tear out your heart." Haruka scowled.

"Just try it bi-" But before she could finish her sentence, Sai had abandoned her swords and had stabbed her claws into Haruka's chest. The sorceress' eyes were wide with shock as blood trickled from her mouth.

"I wasn't kidding." Sai whispered menacingly. Then she clenched her clawed hands, causing Haruka to wince, and ripped her still beating heart from her chest. Haruka's body dropped first to it's knees, then completely to the ground. Sai dropped the heart on top of it.

"Bitch." Sai spat as she walked over to retrieve her swords from their place stuck in the ground. Then she turned to stare at the people on the hill and sniffed the air. She laughed as the one scent that she still remembered and loved filled her lungs alongside four other appetizing scents nearby, "Let's go see if my mate wants lunch."

Kaze looked on as the woman that was his wife and mate walked towards him and his friends. He should have been happy since she had just won a major battle. The problem was that she wasn't herself. Her scent had changed along with her appearance. She was in her full demon state. Her demon blood had overpowered her during the fight and now she was subject to its will. Kaze knew that she wouldn't hurt him since he was her mate. However, he also knew that his friends didn't have the same luxury and that they were now in danger. The only thing he didn't know was what he could do about it.

"Guys, you're gonna need to run now." Kaze said bluntly.

"What?" Nami asked confused, "Sai just won. Why should we run?"

"Because Sai isn't herself right now." Akage answered, "Her demon blood took over her mind. Now the only person she know up here would probably be Kaze. We just look like a nice meal for them to share."

"Well we can't just leave her then!" Umi insisted, "She needs our help!"

"Yeah and I'll give it to her! But you have to get out of here now. Keeping from eating you would be impossible!" Kaze yelled. Hesitantly, the two girls agreed before escaping with Kirara and Akage. Kaze turned around to face his mate. She was much closer now at the base of the hill. He knew that she wouldn't be happy that he let their food run away.

Sai walked towards her mate in her demon blood induced haze. This haze was only intensified by what she saw when she got to the bottom of the hill. Her mate was shooing their food away. He was telling them to run away when she had just finished a battle. There was even a cat demon among those that he had chased away, one that would have been very tasty. She sprinted at superhuman speed the rest of the way up the hill and stared daggers at her mate.

"What the hell was that?" Sai growled, "Now we have to go catch the food again!" Her mate stared back at her dumbly. His eyes were almost sad.

As soon as this thought ran through her mind, her mate mark began to burn. All her mate's emotions began to flood into her. Among them were sadness, worry, and fear... for her. Sai couldn't rationalize all of these in her clouded mind. They hurt her and confused her. She looked to her mate desperately trying to figure out what was making him feel this way. Then he began to approach her with tear beginning to stain his face. He stopped in front of Sai and lifted his hand to her face to brush away the loose hair from her face.

"Sai..." He whispered softly. Then, without warning, he took her into his tight embrace. Sai couldn't process what was happening. It didn't make sense and she couldn't shake the burning of her mate mark on her right shoulder.

"Sai... Sai please come back to me..." He whispered into her ear as his tears wet her neck and shoulder.

"But... I am..." Sai said confused.

"No." He said firmly, "I want the woman I love back. I want my Saiai."

"But..." She began. Kaze didn't let her finish. He pressed his lips against hers. The burning in Sai's mate mark intensified. Suddenly, all of his thoughts and memories began to rush into her mind. Her human blood cried out at the entry of them into her. Her humanity demanded its place back and Kaze's mind was helping it. The demon blood coursing through her fought back hard against the intrusion, but it couldn't last and was slowly pushed back. Sai's claws and fangs began to return to normal. The demon markings on her face began to fade as the red in her eyes began to recede to reveal her golden irises. It only took one last push for Sai to return to herself. With Kaze so close to her, she could make out each individual piece of his scent. She could smell his sweat. She could smell his hair. She could even smell his demon blood. But most of all, she could smell his humanity that burned with love for her.

Sai went limp in Kaze's arms and dropped to the ground. Kaze caught her before she could fully hit the ground. She had fainted from it all, but she had returned. He could tell by her scent. She had come back to him and he couldn't have been more grateful. His woman, his wife, his mate, had chosen him once again.