Chapter Fifty-Three

Syaoran ended up sleeping on the couch for most of that first week, a compromise he'd made with himself in order to reduce the amount of running back and forth between rooms for the others while sacrificing a bit of his privacy. Not that he needed much privacy at this point. Most of those first few days he spent reading books from the library. He'd acquired a substantial stack of them before he'd been captured, all of which would be due back soon.

Three days after returning from the hospital, he stopped taking the painkillers Doctor Yamura had prescribed.

Kurogane did not approve, though it took Syaoran two days to realize the ninja was slipping the medicine into his meals without telling him. It was when he overheard the ninja muttering to Fai about dinner that Syaoran first suspected something was amiss, though he tasted nothing in his leftover soup that night that indicated there was medicine inside. Truthfully, he'd half-expected this to happen, though he'd pegged Fai as the one who would suggest sneaking crushed up pain pills into his dinner. But as he pretended to nap one evening, he eavesdropped on a conversation between the two as they hovered over a pot of spaghetti sauce.

"Should we start cutting down the dosage?" Fai whispered, as Syaoran strained to hear. Part of him wondered if either of them realized how much time he spent eavesdropping now that the conversations weren't muffled by the walls of his bedroom.

"Not yet," Kurogane said, keeping his voice just as low. "Maybe in a few days. Broken bones tend to hurt a lot longer than other kinds of injuries."

"Yes, but if he doesn't want pain relief, aren't we obligated to at least consider his wishes?"

"I considered them. He's going to take them whether he wants to or not."

Fai sighed and opened the refrigerator to retrieve something. Syaoran waited, listening. When the wizard spoke again, his voice was even softer. "I'm not sure it's the physical pain we should be worried about. What happened to him . . . it's not something that goes away. You drag the weight of that trauma wherever you go. Even if you forget it's there sometimes, it's always waiting, ready to grow heavy again."

His throat tightened, memories flickering through his mind. Blood and screams and pain, playing over and over again like a movie, except he couldn't leave the theater because he was strapped to his chair, unable to turn his face away from the screen. Fai was right—it wouldn't just go away. Not this.

His body felt heavier, as if the mention of dragging that weight with him had made those memories a physical presence.

"The kid's tough. He'll bounce back."

"A lot of people wouldn't."

"But he will."

He grimaced. Kurogane sounded so certain, as if his recovery was inevitable. Syaoran only wished he could feel so confident. Even though the fracture had been relatively minor, it would still take months for his knee to heal completely. Months he'd spend stuck in bed, unable to do even rudimentary tasks. Months of physical therapy to keep his joints from growing too stiff, and to keep his muscles from atrophying. And all that time, he'd be helpless.

Bare feet padded from the kitchen to the living room, and he forced his body to relax. He'd been feigning sleep, after all—breaking cover now would only upset the others. After a few seconds, cold fingers nudged his arm. His eyelids flashed open to reveal Fai standing over the couch, a plate of spaghetti in hand. "Dinner's ready."

"Thank you," he murmured, shoulders slumping. They'd probably slipped his painkillers into the sauce so he wouldn't notice the bitter taste. Or perhaps, he reflected, they'd slipped them into the glass of orange juice Fai set on the coffee table. Either way, guilt kept him from rejecting the food. The others had still gone out of their way to take care of him. Throwing those efforts back at them would be wrong. Maybe I should just mention it to Kurogane when Fai goes to bed, he thought, twirling his fork so the noodles wrapped around the end. When he took his first bite, he tasted a faint, medicinal bitterness. Definitely in the spaghetti, then. Resigned, he ate until his stomach swelled and set his plate on the coffee table. Without a word, Mokona hopped over and took the plate to the sink.

They were all taking care of him, but while he might've once appreciated it, now the attention felt stifling. They weren't helping him because they wanted to, they were helping him because he couldn't do anything to help himself. That had been part of the reason why he'd stopped taking the painkillers—they'd left him drowsy and muddled, further crippling his ability to take care of himself. He couldn't even read with the medicine scrambling his thoughts.

"How are you feeling?" Fai asked, leaning over the arm of the couch.

Syaoran looked away, trying not to show anyone how miserable he felt. "Fine. Thanks for making dinner." Again.

"Sure." The magician smiled, patted his head, and headed into the bedroom he shared with Kurogane. Syaoran laid back, closing his eyes as he waited for the painkillers to take effect and rob him of his wits. While he waited, the aches of his body became more pronounced. The cuts on his chest, though mostly healed, felt like they were burning, and his broken knee throbbed with every heartbeat. He was almost relieved when the pain started to ebb, despite the medicine's side-effects. As the soreness abated, so too did his worries, and he slipped into a shallow sleep.

Kurogane wandered around the apartment, alternating between staring at the muted TV and reorganizing cabinets he'd already sorted a dozen times since he'd found the kid. Sleep had grown rare for him, worry churning away in his gut as if he'd swallowed a bag of marbles, and despite years of frequent all-nighters, the weariness had started to weigh on him.

Exhausted, he stacked the final few cans of tomato sauce in the cupboard and walked over to the couch where the kid lay sleeping. He kept quiet, drawing on all his stealth skills to creep up to where Syaoran slept without waking the boy. In some ways, the kid's sleep cycles mirrored his own—fitful, uneasy periods of rest, interrupted by the softest disturbances. Not a healthy sleep cycle, perhaps, but he had to admire the constant alertness. Silent as a shadow, he took a seat at the edge of the couch, listening to the kid's breathing, reminding himself that as long as the boy still breathed, everything was fine.

Kurogane closed his own eyes, relaxing. The near-constant stress of the past few days slipped to the back of his mind, fatigue catching up to him at last as the apartment grew so quiet, he could hear his own heartbeat pulsing in his ears.

Time slipped away from him, and he fell into the most restful sleep he'd managed in days. Yet part of his mind remained alert, attuned to the sounds of the outside world. A whisper of sound yanked him from his sleep, and his hand wrapped around Souhi's hilt before his mind could catch up to his instincts. When nothing attacked after a few seconds, he relaxed and took stock of his surroundings. Everything seemed to be in its proper place, and the kid remained sleeping.

But not peacefully. Syaoran shifted in unconsciousness, hands tightening into fists as his eyebrows slanted downward. His head lolled to one side, blood seeping away from his face, leaving it pallid. A soft mewl escaped his throat as his features twisted in anguish.

"Kid?" Kurogane nudged the boy's shoulder, then jerked his hand back when Syaoran recoiled, lifting one arm to protect his face.

Anger surged through his body, spreading like poison through his bloodstream. Damn it, he thought, forcing himself to take a breath. I should've killed those bastards for what they did to him.

On the couch, Syaoran's nightmare continued, his quiet moans increasing in frequency and volume. A pair of tears slipped down his tanned cheeks, his cast scraping against the edge of the couch as he curled up. Pain shot across his face, his breath coming faster. His fists trembled.

Kurogane leaned over the edge of the couch, shaking the kid's shoulder. "Wake up. Come on." Wake up. Just wake up. That's the only way to stop the nightmares. His hands tensed. After his parents had been killed, Kurogane had spent months avoiding sleep as much as possible, just to keep the nightmares at bay. It had been cowardly, stupid, the sort of thing only an idiot or a kid would do. Sleep deprivation only lowered your ability to fight off real danger. But back then, it hadn't seemed weak, it had seemed necessary.

Abruptly, Syaoran's body went still, eyes flashing open. Lines of red criss-crossed the sclera of both eyes, and a thin film of tears magnified each burst blood vessel. The kid stared at him for a long moment, too stunned to say a word, then turned his face away, wiping his eyes with the back of his hand. "Sorry."

A wrinkle formed between his eyebrows. "What the hell for?"

Syaoran didn't meet his gaze. "I woke you up."

"You were having a nightmare."

"Even so—"

"Don't. You don't have to apologize for something out of your control."

The kid's body sagged, falling limp over the couch cushions as his eyes glazed over. "Kurogane-san . . . Can I ask you something?"

He braced himself—things seldom turned out well when a conversation opened with that question. "What?"

"Have you and Fai-san been slipping my painkillers into my meals?"

The question derailed him for a moment—he'd expected something related to their previous relationship, or something morbid—so it took him a moment to answer. "Yeah, we have. You need to take your medicine."

"I'd rather have the pain."

"That's stupid."

Syaoran's eyes darted to the cast on his leg. "I know. Of course I know that, but . . . I don't know how to describe it. I don't feel real when I take the medicine. It's like my mind is slipping away, and I can't think."

"It's only temporary. And you're going to take those pills even if I have to shove them down your throat."

Syaoran shuddered, looking away. "I miss you."

Wow, maybe the pills really are screwing with his head. He sighed. "You don't have to say it."

"I have to say something. The others are sleeping now. They haven't really left the apartment since . . ." He trailed off, anxiety shooting across his face. "They haven't left me alone for days. I haven't had much of a chance to talk to you alone."

This conversation can't end well. "All right, spit it out. What do you need to say?"

"I trust you."

"Okay. And?"

"I'm not strong," Syaoran whispered, so quietly that Kurogane strained to hear it. "I used to think I was, that I could endure anything, but . . ." His breath quaked, and he shuddered. "I feel like I'm drowning, or falling, and I won't be able to pull through this. And I'm scared." His eyes budded with tears, and Kurogane realized just how much it was costing the kid to even admit to that fear.

With a sigh, he stood up and lifted the kid into a sitting position, moving between him and the edge of the couch. From there, he pulled the boy onto his lap. Syaoran froze, looking up at him with wide, shocked eyes.

"Go to sleep," Kurogane said shortly. "I'll kill anything that tries to hurt you."

The strangest look crossed the kid's face, but after a moment, he relaxed, rolling onto his side so his cheek rested just above Kurogane's knee. He ran his fingers through the kid's hair, letting his hand rest there as Syaoran went limp. "Thanks."

"Yeah," the ninja murmured, closing his eyes. "No problem."