Chapter Fifty-Seven

"What are you doing?"

The words sliced through Syaoran's heart like a sword, plunging him into frigid reality. His head snapped up, eyes flying open as Kurogane jerked back, yanking his hand away from Syaoran's thigh.

Silence pressed on his eardrums like lead, interrupted only by the tick of the clock. Syaoran looked over to see Fai standing at the edge of the living room, his single eye wide. That eye flickered between him and the ninja towering over him, as if Fai couldn't comprehend what he'd just seen.

A curious numbness spread through his mind, heavier than the pain medications the doctors had prescribed him. He sank into the cushions, body detaching from his brain. His thoughts spun in lazy circles, the horror of getting caught not quite piercing the veil of shock. Only when Fai repeated his query did Syaoran start to surface. "What are you two doing? What . . . are you . . ." The magician's voice trembled, mouth opening and closing as he tried to form a coherent sentence.

"Don't—" Kurogane began, but then Fai started shouting over him.

"Explain! What is this? What have you been doing to him? How could you . . ." He faltered, staggering forward, then leaning against the side of the couch for support. "What is wrong with you?"

Kurogane stiffened, fists shaking. "Keep your voice down. We can explain everything."

"He's what?" Fai pointed, and Syaoran flinched from his finger as if he'd been stabbed. "Fourteen? Fifteen? And you? Twenty-seven, twenty-eight? How could you possibly explain this?"

"Mage—"

"Get out."

Kurogane blinked, as if he hadn't understood the command. Or as if didn't think Fai could use that tone, Syaoran thought numbly, watching as the ninja rocked back on his heels. His expression shifted to disbelief. "What?"

Fai stepped forward, claws sliding out as his eye yellowed. "You heard me. Get out. Get away from him."

"Like hell I will!"

"Now."

Fai's earlier words started to sink in. "He's what? Fourteen? Fifteen? And you?" Cold and unforgiving, like a glacier crushing everything in its path and molding the earth itself into new shapes. Horror slid down Syaoran's spine as the implication of those questions hit him. For so long, he'd been justifying the age difference because of his time trapped in Fei-Wang's prison. It had become a non-issue.

But Fai didn't know that. He only knew what this looked like, and it looked pretty awful. He started to stand, then realized his cast wouldn't allow him to. Instead, he leaned forward, sitting up tall, until his lower back started to ache. "Fai-san, wait. You don't understand. He's not—"

"You don't have to defend him, Syaoran-kun." Fai took another step forward, until he was only a foot away from Kurogane. The ninja held his ground, raising his chin half an inch. Fai's arm whipped out, catching the red-eyed man in the ribs. Kurogane doubled over, eyes going wide. "Get out," the vampire said, blood running down his nails. Syaoran looked down to see the splotch of red blossoming on Kurogane's shirt.

"No, don't!" Syaoran reached out, trying to put himself between the pair. Kurogane's eyes flashed down to his arm.

"Kid—"

"Both of you, stop," he begged. "Let's just sit down and discuss this."

"And then what?" Kurogane demanded.

Syaoran hesitated, thrown off-balance by the question. The others waited for his answer, fuming; he looked away. "The truth."

The ninja's fists tightened, knuckles turning white, and Syaoran sensed the older man was dreading this conversation just as much as he was. But after a moment, his fists loosened and he stepped back. "What are we going to do about the princess? I can't imagine you want her to hear this."

"No, but . . . No, you're right."

Fai interrupted. "I want to talk to each of you alone first. No arguments." His golden eye flickered to Kurogane, narrowing. If looks could kill . . . Syaoran thought, fidgeting.

"I'll be on the roof," Kurogane said after a moment. "Kid, you okay with talking to him first?"

Syaoran nodded. Better to get it over with before Sakura woke and started poking around the kitchen looking for breakfast.

A moment later, he heard a rustling by the door as Kurogane pulled on his coat and slipped into his shoes. Fai stood rigid until the front door closed, then relaxed, taking a spot on the couch beside Syaoran. Silence hummed in the space between them as Fai rested his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands.

How can I even explain this without sounding crazy?

"Syaoran-kun, I've never wished you any harm. Not even in Tokyo. You know that, don't you?"

A lump rose in his throat. "I know."

"So you can tell me the truth, no matter what it is. You don't have to be ashamed of anything. I just need to know how long he's been using you like this."

He shook his head. "It's not like that. He's not abusing me, he . . . We came to an agreement."

"An agreement."

"Yes." His cheeks warmed. "This may sound strange to you, but I'm the one who approached him."

Fai's head snapped up, as if he'd been jolted with an electric current.

Syaoran went on, speaking rapidly. "It started a few months ago. I don't remember exactly when, but it was a few weeks after we arrived in this world." He paused, remembering how reluctant he'd been to approach anyone, how he'd isolated himself, only eating when the others left or were otherwise occupied. Wasting away as guilt gnawed at him for what had happened in Tokyo. "I was in a bad place. Kurogane-san was the only person here who didn't treat me like a ghost. Ah, no offense."

Fai made a dismissive gesture. "Go on."

Syaoran nodded, staring at his cast and imagining patterns in the gauze. The words flowed better if he didn't allow himself to consider his audience. "Back then, I thought there was no way to repair what went wrong in Tokyo. I thought you all hated me, so when I realized that he didn't, of course I preferred to spend time with him. And one day, I just . . . I don't know. It was an impulsive decision. I didn't think about it."

"Think about what?"

Reminded of his audience, his cheeks burned bright red. "Well, I sort of . . . I wanted to differentiate myself from the Other, so I did something he would never do, and I . . . I kissed him, but it wasn't meant to be romantic. It wasn't. But I'd been so alone for so long, and I couldn't stand the way you all looked at me." Through me. Like a ghost.

"And you two just—"

He shook his head. "It's more complicated than that." He took a deep breath to maintain control of himself. "I don't want you to think he just agreed to let things be that way. Of course not. He must've thought I was insane. That day, he was so angry, and I was so scared that I'd ruined everything. How could I ever face him again? But he was kind to me. When I broke my shoulder, he was the one who made sure I took my pain medication." He decided it would be prudent to leave out the fact that Kurogane had been the one who'd broken his shoulder in the first place. Mentioning it would only exacerbate the situation. "And that day I came back from the library with a black eye . . . He helped me through that, too."

"Anyone would have."

"But he was the one who did. And things started to look up. It was always because of him. He never abandoned me—never. So one day, I . . . I asked him if things could be that way between us. And he agreed."

The ticking clock grew louder as the room fell quiet again. Fai didn't move, his gaze unfocused, as if he was looking at something far away. When the silence grew awkward, he spoke. "And that's all the further it went?"

Syaoran froze, remembering the sizzling touch of the ninja's hands on his face, his ribs, his hips. Remembering his own responses, which had embarrassed him even at the time. His throat closed up. How am I supposed to talk about this with someone else? It's an invasion of privacy. I'd never ask him about his love life.

But this wasn't just an awkward situation, he reminded himself. Ten minutes ago, Fai had actually believed the older man had been molesting him. Fai still didn't have all the justifications, the reasoning. So tell him. Explain. And hope this doesn't go sour. "Fai-san, that's not . . . I should've explained better. You mentioned earlier that you were concerned about how young I was, compared to him."

"That's right."

"But the thing is . . . Taking into account the time I spent as Fei-Wang's prisoner, I'm actually about twenty-one."

Fai balked, mouth opening and closing. "Twenty-one?"

"It's not an exact age," Syaoran continued. "But if I'm basing it on how much time I spent watching through the Other's eyes, that's what I come up with. Now, you could argue that I wasn't actually present in Clow when my clone was, and therefore those years don't count." He paused, tilting his head up to look at the ceiling. "But I feel old. Much older than I look."

"Even stretching it, that's still a difference of at least six years."

"I know. But from a certain viewpoint, I am a consenting adult. And greater age gaps in romance were common in many countries in my home world—less than a century ago, it was acceptable in some cultures for fourteen-year-old girls to be married off to old men as their second or third wives."

"Syaoran-kun—"

"It's not ideal. I know that. But it's still my choice."

"And how does that choice affect Sakura-chan?"

The words pierced a hole the size of his head in his argument. Guilt twisted through him like a spear driven through his entrails. Sakura. He hadn't forgotten her—of course not—but he hadn't allowed her to leak into his relationship with Kurogane. He'd convinced himself it was unnecessary to worry about that detail until he could actually see her again, face-to-face.

Fai interpreted his silence as guilt and went on. "You must understand how this looks."

"Yes, but—"

The magician held up a hand to stop him. Syaoran bowed his head, eyes fixed on his broken toes. "I understand that with a great variety of worlds, you could conclude that different cultures will have vastly different societal standards. But it seems fairly universal that something like what you and Kurogane have would be . . . problematic."

"Why?" Because it makes you uncomfortable? Because you think it's wrong?

Fai sighed. "I'm not going to argue with you over this. But if you're going to do it, I have one condition."

He raised his eyebrows. "What sort of condition?"

"You have to tell Sakura."