Chapter 7

Before

The Brotherhood's latest raid had been the most successful in Hiei's memory.

When they returned to camp, his belts hung heavy with coins and precious stones, and his katana shone like fresh polished steel, its thirst sated with the blood of a half dozen souls laid to rest. It came as no surprise to him (riding high on the day's glory, as he was) that even the fireside bets played to his favor. A hand of cards won him a fat purse of gold. A well-tossed roll of the dice nabbed him a fat, glistening ruby. It was as near to perfect as any evening spent amongst his brothers could hope to be.

It was good.

So very good.

But he grew sloppy. Careless.

As midnight bled toward dawn, the leather cord his Hiruseki stone hung from slipped free of his collar, and he was too oblivious to notice. Already he was dreaming of one too many glasses of shochu in the crossroads inn, of a long soak in the steaming bathhouse, of a night in Nozumi's arms, and he ignored the telltale thud of the stone as it slipped from his tunic and settled against his chest, bared for all his brethren to see.

The crowds around the firepits thinned, clansmen drifting to their bedrolls as the day's adrenaline gave way to the tug of alcohol induced sleep, but the demons that remained awake watched Hiei with new focus. He mistook their interest for admiration or jealousy. (He didn't care which.) He thought nothing of it when he at last gathered up his winnings and trudged toward the tree line, planning to sleep amongst the roots of a sprawling tree.

He nicked a quilt off a snoring behemoth as he went, and he nestled it in a nook of the tree, then curled up in its folds. His riches clinked with his every movement, heavy against his hips, but he wouldn't untie his coin purses from his belts. Not here, where so many greedy hands lurked in every shadow.

A yawn wrenched through him, and despite a lifetime of diligence, he allowed both eyes to fall shut. Just for a moment. Just for a precious instant of rest.

A mistake.

A foolish, idiotic, reckless mistake.

He heard the singing of the blade, felt the breeze that ripped from its sharpened edge—and it was only the preternatural speed of his reflexes that saved his life. His shoulder slammed into a root as he threw himself sideways, his limbs tangling in his stolen blanket. He snapped his eyes open in time to see a knife embed itself in the tree trunk, and then there were hands at his throat, clamping about his windpipe, closing off his airways.

He thrashed, but the quilt trapped him, restricting his movement down to useless fumbling. A massive thumb pressed beneath his jaw, smothering his pulse as the hands clenched tighter. His snarls and grunts choked against the palms smothering him, not that anyone would arrive to save him were he to manage a scream.

Hiei could rely on no one but himself.

Ever.

He grew lightheaded, his thoughts scattering, but a pressure at the small of his back called to him, and he snaked an arm backward, beneath himself, stretching until his palm curled around a worn leather hilt. He jerked it free, slicing a cut across his own back in the process, then slashed it through the quilt, freeing himself enough to stab upward. The blade scored a shallow divot into his attacker's arm, a meaningless cut in proper fight but enough to startled the brute into slackening his grip.

Just for an instant.

But an instant was all Hiei needed.

He drove an elbow upward, smashing aside the arms that held him down, then scrambled to his feet. With one hand, he secured the dagger in his belt, and with the other, he drew his katana, sinking into a fighting stance as naturally as breathing. (Or at least, as breathing had once been—before an idiot had crushed his airway.)

Perhaps that could have been the end of it. If his attacker (Ichiro, he recognized now) had possessed a lick of self-preservation, Hiei could've left the Brotherhood then, disappearing into the forest for a week or a month, however long it might take for their greed to abate. But it appeared Ichiro wasn't content. Not yet.

The giant demon was nearly triple Hiei's side, all thick bones and bulging muscles. Slow but strong. The axe he drew might've weighed as much as Hiei himself. Pale moonlight revealed its pocked, dull edge. Those who met their end upon its blade died slow, cruel deaths, nothing like those Hiei meted out with his katana. They'd be an uneven match—Hiei quicker, Ichiro stronger—but he'd beaten far worse odds before, and he'd do so again a hundred times over.

He would not die here.

"Give me the stone," Ichiro demanded, "and I'll let you walk, you useless wretch."

A smirk quirked Hiei's lips. As if he feared this fool. How laughable.

A breath later, his katana shrieked against Ichiro's dull blade. Leveraging his superior speed, Hiei spun left, ducking away from the falling axe and slashed inward, beneath Ichiro's clumsy guard. His sword bit into tender flesh, but Hiei had underestimated how little oxygen had returned to his lungs, and before he could deepen the strike, Ichior drove an elbow between his shoulder blades, sending Hiei collapsing into the dirt.

Hiei rolled, finding his feet and raising his katana to block Ichiro's next strike. His knees wobbled beneath him, unsteady, and pain screeched down his back, bruises already coalescing along his spine. Anger scorched in his blood, heat seething down the hilt of his sword, and when his next attack found flesh, steam rose from the wound, cauterizing it instantly.

Ichiro bellowed. A swing of his meaty fist caught Hiei across the jaw, and as Hiei staggered, the axe arced toward him. Its pockmarked edge found Hiei's ribs, rending his flesh asunder, tearing muscle and shattering bone.

To Hiei's utter indignation, a scream tore from his ragged throat.

His world narrowed to the pain in his side and the rage in his heart. Flames wreathed his hands, and he hurled fire into Ichiro's face, scalding his flesh, burning his eyes. A slice of Hiei's katana found the tendons in Ichiro's knee. The giant collapsed, legs giving out. Hiei's next swing tore across the bastard's throat.

One burbling, blood-soaked breath later, Ichiro lay face down in the dirt.

At Hiei's back, voices rose, the encampment stirring as the echoes of their fight rippled off the trees. Hiei didn't look back as he stumbled into the forest, not at the corpse he left in his wake nor at his brothers as they shouted and hollered.

The Woods of Wayward Wanderers closed in around him. Branches stretched like clawed arms overhead, blotting out the weak moonlight, and nettles caught at his cloak and tore at his trousers. The throbbing pain in his side slowed him, but he forced his legs to churn faster and faster, staggering into a clumsy, meandering trot and then a stubborn, beleaguered run. His thoughts grew foggy, his mind weakened by blood loss, and he couldn't put a name to his destination, but he knew it lay north. Where the Riverlands and the Woods met.

Where the scent of sandalwood clung to soft, clean sheets.

Where she would be.

It was not yet dawn when Hiei's body gave out on him.

He grunted, throwing out his arms (no—just one arm; the other wouldn't answer his summons) as he careened toward the dirt. Pain screeched in his wrist, but he managed to save himself from a proper faceplant. Obstinate and determined, he struggled onward on his hands and knees.

A hundred meters more.

That was all that remained between him and the buttery light of the crossroads inn.

Loose stones in the road scraped his knees and cut into his palm. More than once, he sagged into the dirt, panting, mustering all his might to carry onward. He'd left his dignity leagues back in the Woods, abandoning ego in favor of a sheer desire to survive

At last (at long, painful last), he reached the inn's threshold. The door was closed, perhaps barred for the night, and Hiei sagged against the wood, pressing his forehead to the chipped paint. He had to suck down a steadying breath before he could manage to rap his knuckles against the planks. Once. Twice. He tried for a third, but he couldn't manage it, and his arm fell limp to his lap.

The world was dark. Darker than it had ever been.

He couldn't keep his eyelids open, couldn't keep his head upright.

He had made it to the inn, but it wasn't enough. He'd bleed out here, upon the doorstep of the one place he'd thought he might be safe. Hn. What a fool he was. To think anywhere (or anyone) could protect him. To think he might've—

Hinges creaked.

The door pushed outward only an inch or so, blocked by his collapsed frame. He tipped himself sideways, making enough space for a cautious head to peer past the doorjamb. A familiar face angled down at him, bereft of the scowl he'd grown accustomed to.

At the sight of him, brown eyes widened, soft lips parted.

Sueko.

Not Nozumi.

"You," she breathed.

He could only grunt, pressing his good arm against the wound still seeping blood down his side.

"Fuck. What happened—" She shook her head, cutting herself off.

Shimmying through the crack in the doorway, she knelt beside him and scooped an arm around him. It was lucky for them both that he was smaller than her, that her lithe frame still dwarfed his. "Come on," she murmured, straining to leverage him onto his feet. "There you go."

Step by brutal step, she got him inside. They stumbled past the empty tables and deserted bar, headed for the stairwell. It felt as though a lifetime crawled past as they worked their way upward. Her breathing grew labored, and she kept up a constant mutter. "Keep going, you bastard. You can't stop here. Just two more steps. You can do it." When at least they reached the landing, the hallway stretched endlessly before them, but now that they were on level ground, she could do more of the work, and she dragged his listless feet the last stretch to the door he'd come to know so well.

She turned the knob, but the lock clinked, still latched into place. "Damn it."

"Key," Hiei said.

Sueko snorted. "I don't have one."

A wretched moan burbled past his lips, and the last of his strength left him. He slumped into her. His sudden weight was too much. Her grip gave out, and he lurched to the floor, pain smarting across his side, his shattered rib searing his mind to blinded white.

Then there was a sharp thud. Then another. Followed by the splintering of wood.

Through his eyelashes, he saw the door swing inward.

Sandalwood washed over him.

Then darkness.

The hours that followed were blurred.

It felt as though Hiei's memories were a hundred pieces of a puzzle that wouldn't fit together, a dozen sensations and moments scattered like stars against a black night.

He was cognizant of a soft mattress beneath his back. Of gentle hands stripping his torn tunic from his chest. Of two voices, one feminine and terrified, the other deep and forcibly calm. There were smatterings of pain. Fingers prodding his inflamed side. Wet cloth against sticky flesh. Dry bandages wound tight across his middle. At some point, his boots were shucked from his feet. A coverlet was tucked up to his chin. Water dripped past his lips, soothing down his ragged, bruised throat.

Sleep ebbed and flowed. Sometimes it welcomed him with open arms. Other times it drowned him in smothering darkness.

Through it all, he never sensed her. Never heard her voice. Never felt the cool press of her fingers.

She wasn't here.

When he'd needed her most, she wasn't here.

He ached for her, and she wasn't here.

He did not cry. He was too weak for even that. But he thought, perhaps, this deep, endless pain beneath his breastbone was what made lesser souls part with their tears. (And for once, just this once, he understood it.)

The door creaked. Swung inward.

Hiei groaned, turning his face deeper into the pillow.

"Are you awake?"

He grunted.

Footsteps padded into the room. "You've slept for a whole day. Uncle says you should eat. Drink, too. I've not been able to get much down your throat." Sueko sighed. "You're bruised something awful."

The edge of the bed dipped, and he realized she'd sat down. Grimacing, he forced his eyes open, then pushed himself upright with his good arm. She watched, appraising the bandages wrapped about his ribs. Apparently satisfied, she held out a tray. A bowl of steaming broth sat atop it, accompanied by a tankard. Suddenly acutely aware of the rumbling in his guts, he accepted it, reaching for the stein. It wasn't shochu, but he'd accept ale—

Water.

It was only water.

"Drink," Sueko commanded when he hesitated.

Irritated, he obliged.

The moment the water hit his lips, he realized how parched he was, how desperate his body had become. He drained the tankard in two long gulps, then grabbed the spoon and tucked into the broth. With a roll of her eyes, Sueko snatched the cup and disappeared, returning a few minutes later for a fresh pour.

She didn't sit down this time, instead standing over him as he slurped down spoonful after spoonful of the soup. "What happened to you?" she asked at last.

He didn't answer.

She huffed, crossing her arms across her narrow chest. "Did the assholes you run with do this to you?"

Stubbornly, he ignored her.

She laughed, bitter and irate. "Of course, they did. The Swords. The Brotherhood. You're all the same."

Hiei tensed, the wooden spoon biting into his fingers as his grip tightened. She thought him a Bloodied Sword, just as Nozumi did. But unlike her sister, Sueko hated him all the same, regardless of which clan he lived amongst. (Was she wrong to? He'd nearly died at his brother's hands. Not that he'd admit it. Ever.)

"Why do you come here?" she asked, no longer looking at him. She glared at the sloped ceiling with a ferocity he'd not expected of her. "Do you get some kind of sick pleasure from it? From manipulating her? It's been six months. Aren't you tired of her yet?"

Manipulating Nozumi?

Hn.

He would have laughed if his throat did not pain him with every breath and swallow.

She was the one who'd wormed her way beneath his skin like an addiction. She was the one whose scent was intoxicating. She was the one who'd asked his name and granted him hers.

The one who'd let him keep her dagger. The same dagger that had saved his life from Ichiro.

"Hello?" Sueko swiped hand in front of his face. "Answer me, damn it."

He turned away, pushing the tray and its empty soup bowl toward her. The tankard he kept, cradling it in his lap. She scoffed, tossing a dozen nasty names his way as she snatched up the tray and stormed from the room. The door thudded closed behind her.

In her wake, Hiei slumped into the bed. His body ached in protest, but already, he could feel how much he'd healed. His rib throbbed as if it were bruised, not shattered, and he was no longer weak with blood loss. In another day or two, he'd be recovered enough to head out on his own, back into the demon plane that hungered for his death.

He wouldn't give the world that satisfaction.

Not now.

Not ever.

Sueko didn't return with food. Not that evening, as the sky darkened beyond the lone window of Nozumi's room, nor in the morning as it lightened once more. And so, as the sun reached its zenith, Hiei at last left his quiet sanctuary, lugging along the chamber pot they'd granted him.

He trudged down the back staircase, one arm around the chamber pot, the other clutching the railing. In the bathhouse, he emptied the pot and set it aside amongst others of its ilk, then he stripped off pants, shed the too large tunic they'd provided for him, and unwound his bandages. The skin beneath was raw, covered in angry, vicious scabbing, but it was healed enough that he dared to bathe. Not for long enough that his skin softened and pruned, but long enough to wash the vestiges of dried blood from his flesh.

Once dry and clothed, he headed for the tavern, not the room upstairs.

Nozumi's uncle was behind the bar, as he nearly always was. Hiei claimed one of the dozen empty stools, bracing his elbows atop the polished wood.

"Let me guess," the demon said as he dried a glass with a rag. "Shochu?"

Hiei huffed a grudging laugh. His first in days. "Water."

The bartender raised his brows in mock shock. "How wise of you." A moment later, he deposited a tankard before Hiei with a clatter. Water slopped over its lip. "Asahi," he said by way of introduction.

Hiei gulped down one mouthful, then another. "Hiei."

"I must say, you're lucky to still be with us, Hiei."

He did not meet Asahi's eyes as he drained the rest of his water. "I'll pay you. For saving me."

"No need. We don't let demons die on our doorstop. Inn policy." Asahi drifted away, returning with a pitcher of water and refilling Hiei's tankard. "I imagine you'd hoped for Nozumi to find you, not Sueko."

Hiei hummed a wordless answer.

"She's not here, as I'm sure you gathered," Asahi continued without pause, as if he'd not needed Hiei's confirmation. "She'll return tomorrow, though, if you'd like to wait for her."

Hiei said nothing, but within the hollow of his chest, his heart sputtered. He clenched his eyes shut against a sudden prickle of relief.

Asahi lingered a moment longer, but then the tavern door opened, and a customer wandered in off the crossroads. Lofting a hand in welcome, Asahi bid the demon to find a seat where he'd like, and with that, Hiei was left to nurse his water alone.

Tomorrow.

Nozumi would return tomorrow.

He could wait that long.

He slept restlessly that night, Nozumi's narrow bed too big for him without her in it too. He gave up eventually and cracked open her window, leaning out to discover eaves directly below. Mindful of his healing ribs, he eased himself outside, stepping onto the shingles, then turned and lifted himself atop the inn's proper roof. It was an old, weathered building, and it creaked and groaned as he made his way across it, until he settled on the eaves that looked out toward the crossroads.

He did no idea where Nozumi might return from. The Riverlands to the north? Somewhere from the east or west? All he knew was that he'd bet the entirety of his overflowing coin purses that she wouldn't come from the south. No one with a wick of sense would travel the Woods of Wayward Wanderers alone. Nozumi was not that kind of fool.

From his seat, he watched the sun rise. Its rays painted the lands in pinks and golds, gilding this dusty stretch of road like a fine jewel. This was why he loved to sleep in trees, to see the world this way. (The way it could be if one could drag themselves high enough above the dirt and blood and death of Demon World.)

When dust clouds began to drift down the road from the north, he was surprised. He'd expected Nozumi to travel alone, but quickly he realized what an absurd notion that was. In all their time together, he'd sensed little of her energy. If he were a forest fire, she was no more than a candle already blown out. Of course, she wasn't stupid enough to travel without companions.

But even with that realization under his belt, he didn't expect the full-fledged caravan that trundled down the road.

It stopped at the crossroads, and a tall, slender figure hopped from a cart in its midst, waving to the driver who held the reins of the stag that drew it onward. A haversack hung from the figure's back, clearly stuffed to its seams even at this distance.

Creaking hinges below him announced the inn's front door opening. Then voices bubbled forth. Sueko, cheerful and bright. Asahi, relieved and warm. Down the road, the figure turned, saw the two that had emerged from the inn, and burst into a run. They all met at the rock wall that ringed the inn's property. Nozumi and Sueko came together in a tangle of limbs and chiming laughter, squeezing one another tight. Asahi swept them both into a hug.

The sight of it all was like ice water down Hiei's spine. He hardly dared breathe as he observed.

Nozumi was clothed not in a tunic like he was used to, but in a pressed, bright blue shirt. She wore a hunter green sash across her chest, looped over one shoulder and tied at her hip. Her hair was swept back, not into a messy knot but in a neat plait. None of it was right. None of it was the girl he knew.

And her tumbling, chiming laughter. Her fierce, unguarded smile.

He'd never heard or seen those either.

Silent as a shadow, he found his feet and crept back along the rooftop, dropped down to the eaves, and slunk into her room. Working quickly, he gathered his things. He stuffed his ruined shirt into his pack (though he kept the too big tunic they'd given him; Asahi's, he assumed), tugged on his boots, and tossed a handful of gold onto the bedside table. Then he stepped back out the window, jerked it closed behind him, and dropped into the wild garden below.

In moments, he was gone, streaking into the forest. Headed west. Away from that beautiful sunrise. Away from that family. Away from that girl he did not know.

Away, away, away.

AN: I'm sorry this chapter is a day late! Yesterday was a wee bit busy. My fiancé and I introduced our parents for the first time, and I bought a wedding dress! A very big day, which unfortunately didn't leave time to get a chapter up. Alas. That said, I hope you enjoy this one! Thank you to those I heard from last chapter!