A/N: EDIT: Not a lot of feedback for this chapter compared to the last; I suppose that's what I get for posting while sick...T_T
Sorry for the delay, not feeling well.
But an update was promised this week, and now given.
Here we go~! Looking forward to your feedback! Do let me know if you want weekly updates to return for this story! I'll try to be better about that, despite life's distractions:
As ever, I own no references, quotes, themes or memes. They're tributes to legends far greater than little 'ol me.
I'm just a humble author trying to make his way in this wild world, one word at a time.
Time and feedback will determine if this remains a story. Simple as that.
In other words...its up to YOU, the reader. Do let me know~!
"To know kindness is to know naivete.
To know naivete is to know folly.
To know folly is to know Gold."
~?
A Golden Touch
Her guest would not awaken.
Nearly a week had passed since Marika first found him in that crater; since she carried him back to her humble home in the Shaman Village. At the time, she had hoped he would recover quickly; that he would soon open his eyes and tell her so many wondrous things.
Who was he? Where was he from? Why did he have such power?
Countless questions abounded in her mind. Yet as the days passed, her hopes waned and his health didn't improve. No, nay, not a jot, since she first laid him on her cot.
Marika fussed over him for some time, doing what she could as she tended to his needs; cooling cloths were pressed against his forehead to help with his fever, she changed his bloody bandages every day and tended to his wounds to prevent infection, salving them desperately with what meager care her unskilled hands could muster. She even laid next to him during the cold nights to warm him, lest he get chilled and his condition worsen.
Mother had tutted and called that last bit indecent. Bah! What did she know?! Old hag. She was too worried about propriety to realize this was the beginning of something grand.
At least Grandma understood her plight in this matter. Let the lass be. We are only young once, are we not?
Indeed they were!
Sometimes, when she slept next to him, she dreamed of that strange golden fox again.
How very odd.
In time, Marika even began speaking to him, this man who may or may not be a corpse, in the hopes that her voice would rouse him from his slumber.
Maybe she was lonely. Perhaps she just wanted someone to talk to. Mayhaps it was neither.
Regardless, she spoke to him still.
"Good morrow once again, kind sir." She stroked his brow with pale fingers, coaxing him through word and deed. "Thou art safe here. Will thou not awaken?"
He groaned in his sleep. That was something, she supposed. Progress!
"My name is Marika." She laid a hand on his chest, tracing the outline of his grave, grievous, wound. "Please open thine eyes so that we might speak."
He muttered something incomprehensible and thrashed a little in his sleep.
"Shhh." she laid her hand on his head again. "Danger only lurks in your dreams. There's nothing to fear here."
He subsided a little at that, but not without a pained noise.
Truly, her heart went out to him.
The pale, horned ones, those who had wounded him, they sounded like the Hornsent she knew and yet they sounded different. Were they not one and the same? Hrmmm...too confusing. She chose to continue attending him and focus on other things instead.
"Shall I sing to you?" she asked the question despite knowing she wouldn't receive an answer. "Grandmother says Ihave a lovely voice. Would you like to hear it?"
Mother chuckled softly behind her as she stirred the pot, focused on preparing tonight's supper. "Grandmother also wants to fuse with that tree on the hill, so take her words with a grain of salt."
Marika huffed. "Mother!
She laughed.
What did she know? Surely it was no sin to cling to happiness before the Hornsent ripped it away. Thankfully they weren't due back for some time. Besides, this was something she enjoyed.
Pitching her voice low, then high, she began to sing him a lullaby; a soft nameless tune that had been passed down to her by mother, and Grandmother before her. She wasn't quite sure who created it-only that it brought her comfort during her most anxious moments. Perhaps it would yet help this wounded young man.
Time passed as she sang. She wasn't sure how long; it might've been moments, its could've been minutes for all she knew but-
Her patient twitched below her, and she cut off with a yelp. Was it her imagination, or had he moved just now?
There! Rapid movement beneath his eyelids. That meant he was either dreaming or about to wake...
.
..
...uh-oh.
He awoke in a rush, far faster than she feared; in an instant he surged upright atop her cot, seized her right wrist, gripped it and all but dragged her into his lap to snarl at her. Such strength ! She could feel her bones grinding together, her nerves pinching painfully, her heart pounding as those baleful blue orbs glared her down. A single word escaped his lips, spoken with such fury that her heat momentarily skipped a beat.
"Kaguya!"
"I'm not-ah!" She gasped as he squeezed her arm. "I don't know who that is!"
"Liar!" His eyes were wild and unseeing, a waking dream. "You already tricked me once! Don't try to fool me again!"
Mother had gone terribly still beside the cauldron, not daring to budge an inch. Marika blew out a breathy sigh. It fell to her to act.
She knew he wasn't a threat. He was wounded, frightened, and afraid; of course he would lash out. Marika was many things, but above all else, she was kind. Though she knew this stranger could probably snap her right in half with little effort, she never once felt afraidof him.
"I am not Kaguya." In a burst of boldness, she reached out and touched his face, cupping a whiskered cheek in her palm as she pitched her voice to soothe. "That is not my name. No one is attacking you, here."
Hazy blue eyes blinked and slowly, gradually, his body relaxed. "Then who..?
She tossed her head, flicking her golden braid back over one shoulder. "You look upon Marika. First of her name."
A soup ladle bounced off her head, ruining her little display. "About to be last of her name if she keeps talking like that...
"Mother!"
The battered blond man blinked at her owlishly, the haze leaving his eyes. It looked like he wanted to speak more, but he coughed and his voice failed him. With the danger past, Marika took an earthen cup from a nearby table by the bed, filled it with water and pressed it to his lips.
"Drink," she instructed. "It will do you a world of good."
Reluctantly, he complied, though his eyes never left hers. He had a right to be suspicious, she supposed.
When it became clear she hadn't poisoned him, Mother came around with a bowl of stew.
"Best grt some food in your belly, boy." she cast a glare Marika's way. "Make sure he finishes every bit of it or we'll be havin' words."
"Naruto," the young man muttered under his breath, still somewhat dazed. "M'name isn't boy, its Naruto...
Marika rolled her eyes. "Naruto, then. Eat."
No need to tell him twice; he tipped the bow back and practically drank the stew down, chewing only where strictly necessary. In a matter of moments, he'd all but polished it off. She wasn't surprised when he held it out to her and asked for seconds.
Mother smiled softly, sadly. "There are none, lad. We have precious little food as it is."
His face fell, head drooping as his chin tucked into his chest. "Sorry...
Marika looked back to her Mother. "Surely we could scrounge up something-
The soft sound of snoring drew her ear; to her dismay, when she looked back, Naruto was already sprawled out on the cot, sound asleep once more. Stranger still he seemed to be snoring. Was that an improvement? He'd seldom made any noises during his rest before, but if he was healthy enough to snore...
"He cannot stay here, dear."
Marika clicked her tongue. Blast it all, she thought they were past this. "Just a little while longer; until he heals."
"And how long will that be?" the matriarch turned her back on her and went about cleaning the soup pot with a rag, "Weeks? Months? Whomever or whatever injured him so may well come back to finish the job. No," she shook her head, graying hair swaying as she worked, "The next time he awakens, you must send him on his way."
She firmed her lip and tore her gaze away. "But that would be cruel...
"'Tis a cruel world we live in, girl. We've humored him enough."
"You only gave him food and drink!"
"And now he clearly won't die," Mother countered calmly. "There are few enough of us as it is. We cannot afford another mouth to feed. Do you have any idea what will happen if the Hornsent find him here? They will be no kinder than whatever wounded him. Better he take his leave while he can.
Marika opened her mouth to argue further-
"Take Naruto and run away."
Pain spiked in her head, and she touched a hand to her temple. "Did you hear that just now?"
Mother frowned. "Don't try to change the subject on me, girl."
"I'm not!" she protested, "I just-
"You both need to run."
Marika winced.
"NOW!"
A sudden clamor outside claimed her attention; not a moment later, a hand parted the curtain-door of their humble home as someone forced their way inside. Grandmother? Marika perked up, made curious by the sudden intruder, only for someone to yank grandma back and enter in her stead.
"You'll be hidin' no one in here, woman!"
Marika balked as she recognized the intruder.
Hornsent?! But they were early! They shouldn't have been back for another week or so at the earliest. So why...?
Realization dawned with dread as another slipped in after him. The explosion. The crater. Of course they had come to investigate. it wasn't such a stretch of the imagination to believe they might have tracked him here. They probably followed her tracks at that. Just her luck.
Of course, they saw Naruto at once, sprawled out on the cot. "What's all this, then?"
"Its nothing at all, just a stranger we found-ack!"
Mother tried to intervene and was summarily backhanded for her efforts. She struck the wall with an awful crack and went limp.
Marika screamed. "Mother!"
The first Horsent took a look at Naruto, looked to his companion, and grunted. "Hrrrm. He'll do. Get the knives and put him in the jar with the rest."
...by your word, brother." the second nodded, then left back the way they'd come, much to her great horror.
Panic bleed through Marika's breast, cold, and icy as winters grasp. "No, wait! Please! You can't!"
The Hornsent scoffed. "Can we not? Out the way woman, or you'll be joining him in the jar."
She tried to block him with a hand and-
Pain.
Agony seared across her chest as his blade raked across her arm, then through her neck and collarbone, opening an ugly wound there.
Her world went black and gray.
No. Not like this. Please, please, not like this. She didn't want to die to these foul creatures. Not the Hornsent. Anything but them and their jars.
She hated them with their grizzly, caterpillar, masks, and the way they acted. High and mighty, as though all the world were beneath them. They thought themselves blessed. They were not.
They were just...monsters...!
She fell, clutching her ruined throat, gasping for air that wouldn't come...
.
..
...until it did.
A tendril of golden light shot out of Naruto's stomach and slammed into her back. She never saw it, but she felt it as the voice came on again, rattling her world. Her wound sizzled-owowow!-and incredibly she found that she could breathe again, inhale even
"I've lent you some of my power! Finish him quickly and run!"
The Hornsent saw her stagger back and spat. "Ye bloody witch...
Flailing blindly, Marika grabbed the first thing within reach.
It was a hammer.
Bulky and crude with a wooden handle and a heavy iron head, meant for a little more than hammering down nails and nothing else.
Although...this bastard was looking an awful lot like a nail right about now.
"Fie, another fool?" The Hornsent sneered. "Your kind never learn."
Marika lunged at him with a feral snarl and incredulous, he stepped back, unprepared for the sheer ferocity of her assault. Up came his sword to strike but with wariness not boldness.
It would prove his doom.
Her first blow smacked his raised arm aside, breaking it at the elbow to make him yowl. The second smote the Hornsent mightily upside the head, snapping his skull to the right, with an audible crack. Horns, flew, and his caterpillar mask went askew, revealing a face not unlike of humans.
Here at last, Marika paused. They looked so very much alike. Take away the horns and what were they?
Two peas in a pod. And yet the Hornsent thought themselves blessed.
Pathetic.
Mother cried out behind her. "Marika, no! Stop this at once! You'll be a heretic!"
She paused, considering.
...what of it?
Gurgling wetly, the Hornsent lunged at her.
So slow. Had he always been this slow? Or had her perception of time simply shifted?
In the end, it didn't matter. She sidestepped and smashed her hammer into his knee. He dropped with a keening cry to clutch at his mangled limb; the moment he did she slammed her weapon into his arm again, disarming him. From she targeted his vulnerable back. Once. Twice. Thrice, until a loud popping sound filled her ears.
Success! He dropped like a sack of potatoes.
Marika watched him for a moment, making certain it wasn't a ruse.
She felt strong. Powerful. But she took no joy in it. She felt only wretched despair.
"God, faith, Bonds, vows, you hide behind them without thought. Your kind disgust me."
Her hammer swung up with intent.
"Here is your god."
The Hornsent snarled at her. "A curse upon ye-
Marika's hammer came crashing down on his horned head.
A/N: Aaaand scene.
Well? Did you like this story? Yes? No? Maybe? Would you like weekly updates? By all means, speak up! Make yourselves heard! Your voice matters~!
Silence hurts worse than any flame. Looking forward to reading your feedback when I get home from work~ If this chapter gets a ton of feedback-hopefully!-then I'll do my best to ensure another early update again. If not...I don't know. I really don't.
Once more, we're sticking with the "Embers" rule for this story.
If folks don't like this, it won't be continued. Meaning that if the story itself isn't popular? It will remain, but it won't be continued! I'm working two jobs to keep the lights on, as such I barely have time to write; as such, I cannot afford to write something folks don't enjoy. So by all means, speak up! Your voice matters! Make yourself heard! As ever, reviews are the fuel that sustain me. Without them I cannot write a single word. Simple as that.
So in the Immortal Words of Atlas...Review, Wouldst Thou Kindly?
No previews. Wouldn't do to spoil things.
Its going to be...legendary.
