by Raye
Johnsen
***********
Fushigi Yuugi is copyright Watase Yuu, Flower
Comics, Studio Perriot, Viz Communications and Pioneer Entertainment.
This fanfiction is written
to entertain, not make money. If it did, the Mt. Leikaku bandits would
undoubtedly (and gleefully) practice their craft and take all the profits.
This chapter is dedicated, with much thanks, to Odysseii, a native Chinese speaker who very kindly sent me information on the Chinese writing system with its many complexities. Any mistakes that I've made are my own fault!
***********
Chapter Nine: Misted Truth
***********
Yui ran her hand through her short hair, ruffling it. Sighing, she turned back to puzzling out the odd, not-Chinese writing patiently inscribing itself on the page before her.
At first she had thought the writing to be Chinese, of Hainan or some other dialect she didn't know, but then she had remembered that in the first lecture of the semester, the teacher had told them how the Chin Emperors had standardized the Chinese writing system, three thousand years before. So now in all of China, no matter which dialect was spoken, people could understand the written language. "Which is why all Chinese movies and television shows are subtitled!" the teacher had laughed. "So that, no matter if one speaks Hong Kong's Cantonese, Beijing's Hanyu, or Hainan dialect, one can read the dialogue and understand what's going on!"
Yui had privately decided that China must be a nation of speed readers.
Then she had thought that the jie must be the ancient Chinese versions. Over six thousand years, the characters had changed, especially in the wake of the People's Revolution, when many jie had been altered. But the teacher had shown them a few of the 'old' characters, that were still used in Hong Kong and Taiwan, and these were not they. Also, there were a few characters that hadn't changed that much over sixty centuries, and she had seen characters inscribe themselves on the page that definitely meant the same thing as those unchanging jie - and yet looked absolutely nothing like them.
She shook her head. Now was not the time to be worrying about how she could read the language. She had to read and follow the story.
'And so the four did journey on, though misgiving did assail them. And yet, though they couldst not stop, they dids't journey into the deepest of dangers. For, though they knew it not, they were travelling e'er deeper into the hands of the Lady of Mirrors.'
Yui frowned as the story spun on, around her.
**********
Gyoukouran frowned as she artfully mussed Lady Houki's bed.
Lady Kourin was in her rooms next door, and Yuiren was with her. She could hear them singing, a rather naughty song in Gyoukouran's opinion.
"No, no," Lady Kourin's voice came. "Those lines go like this: 'Mm-hm, I'll monopolise all the guys' attention / Ah! I ought to feel guilty about it...'"
Yes, you ought, Gyoukouran thought grimly. Except that girls like that never do. As she knew well. There had been a boy in her village, and a girl....
Well, that was all behind her now, anyway.
She couldn't quite work out why this was necessary. Lady Kourin had been very vague about it all - something about secrets that needed to be kept and faces and suchlike. After listening to the Lady, Gyoukouran had been perfectly happy - for about half an hour. Then she had started to think again, and Kourin's lulling words had proven pitifully inadequate against even a thirteen-year-old's logic.
When Lady Houki came back, she would be Lady Houki's maid. But nobody could know Lady Houki was gone. Even Yuiren didn't know. Lady Kourin would dress up as Lady Houki when Lady Houki had to appear, but that didn't change the fact that she wasn't Lady Houki. There was a Lady Houki, though; her suite was very thoroughly lived-in, and the air was definitely not Lady Kourin's. But why did there have to be such secrecy?
From the spicy, woody perfume that clung to the garments in the wardrobe (Lady Kourin wore a peach-and-musk scent that was very nice, but nothing like Lady Houki's scent) to the colour scheme (Lady Houki apparently favoured blues, purples and maroons, while Lady Kourin liked yellows, reds and greens) to their taste in clothing and furnishings (Lady Kourin favoured the modern and avant-garde, while Lady Houki's taste ran to classic styles and modest displays), it seemed there was absolutely nothing similar between the sisters. So why did people need to think, sometimes, that Lady Kourin was Lady Houki?
At first she had thought that Lady Kourin was fooling her and the reason for so many differences was that there was no real difference at all. But Lady Kourin had torn the two dresses that she had borrowed from Lady Houki's wardrobe, straining seams across the bust and trying to tighten the waist lacings (that actually had been cunningly designed to give slack, not tighten up. Lady Houki was apparently not interested in having a fashionably tiny waist, nor in padding her chest. One might almost think she wanted a boyish figure), and that wouldn't have happened if they'd really been hers.
She wouldn't mention any of this to Yuiren - her younger sister simply adored Lady Kourin, and Lady Kourin simply adored her back. Also, at nine, Yuiren was a bit young to try to work out what she wasn't being told. Gyoukouran was on her own. She'd have to snoop... just a little bit. Only to find out what was really going on, she promised herself. She'd stop then. Really.
*********
"Sir, when are we going to stop?"
Lieutenant Youji turned from the window, careful not to jostle his broken arm too much, and bent over the bed that held the wreck that had been his first sergeant.
He frowned as he looked at the opposite wall. He was now the only mobile member left of the squad.
"I don't know, Mero," he sighed. "I want to, Seiryuu knows I want to - but we were given this mission by Lord Tomo. I could face going back if it were any other commander. But Lord Tomo -"
Sergeant Mero frowned at his commanding officer. The captain was pretty young, only been out of the Academy a year, but he had his head screwed on right. He'd listened to the sergeant, asked his advice from time to time, and he never let his book-learning get between him and common sense. A couple more years, and the captain might turn out to be a decent commander.
And one thing a commander never did was hesitate.
"The rumours about Lord Tomo are just rumours, sir," he said quietly.
"Rumours start somewhere, Mero," Youji replied distantly, "and nobody has seen the Second Division recently...."
Mero shivered. "The Emperor wouldn't condone it."
"Does the Emperor know?" Youji asked quietly. "And - and I don't think he would care, even if he did know. Lord Tomo is untouchable."
Mero looked away.
Youji sighed. "We stay. We'll wait until we heal, and then we'll see what we can do." He looked down. "And we'll avoid bringing Lord Tomo an excuse."
**********
Nuriko had reined Chika to a walk. This strange swirling mist unnerved her.
Why had everyone been so snappish earlier? She'd been scared and seeking reassurance. So it didn't happen often. But she was entitled to be scared too! She'd been stabbed and hit and hit on and pinched! Her bottom still hurt!
Then a soft voice, that was apparently singing to itself, came from the gloom ahead.
"In heaven, the stars are sparkling, / On earth, the flowers are blooming, / And within my universe, / My love for you is shining. / It won't stop and I can't stop it, / For my love is my life itself, / Irreplaceable..."
Hotohori has a nice singing voice, she thought vaguely, and then thought, Hotohori, singing?
It would probably have been better to worry about the direction the singing was coming from. The last time she had seen Hotohori, before the mist cut her off, he'd been riding behind her and pointedly chatting to Miaka.
Riding Chika in this mist was an invitation to break the poor mare's leg, so Nuriko dismounted and walked forward. The mist cleared and she found herself standing in an unfamiliar room.
"There you are," Hotohori said. He pulled on a fine cambric tunic, unconcerned. "I thought you were going to get dressed?"
Nuriko glanced down at herself. White shirt, maroon surcoat, white trews, brown boots - "I am dressed," she pointed out.
"You're going to be witnessing my marriage dressed like that?" he asked ironically.
"Uh..." Nuriko stuttered. Because treacherous memory was flowing back. Yes, today, the Emperor was marrying Suzaku no Miko, for Konan had been saved....
How? she asked herself, then dismissed the thought. It was in the past, it didn't matter, and today was more important.
She doesn't love him, Nuriko thought desperately. She doesn't, and I.... "Excuse me," she gasped, and ran blindly out of the room.
Mist....
Mist?
Nuriko fell to her knees on the damp grass. "A dream?" she whispered.
"I... wish it... were," a gasping voice grated. "Where were you?"
She lifted her head and reeled back. The flagstones she was kneeling on were damp and sticky with blood. Tamahome lay before her - they had left his handsome face intact. But that was about it. His strong arms had been sliced away from his body, while his entrails wound in viscous patterns from his torn-open belly.
Miaka lay in gross parody of a sacrifice before the main altar. Her chest had been torn open and her heart and lungs ripped from her desecrated corpse.
As for Hotohori - at first she couldn't see his body, and then she wished she hadn't. Because she couldn't help but see it; a hand here, a leg there, a ragged piece of flesh that might have been his neck....
Nuriko clamped one hand over her mouth in an effort to stop herself throwing up.
"You traitor..." the voice grated again, and she found herself staring straight at Tamahome.
"Where the hell were you when we needed you, you selfish little girl?" the wreck of a Shichiseishi hissed. "Call yourself a Shichiseishi?"
She gritted her teeth. "I am a Shichiseishi," she promised, "and I will avenge you. I swear I will," she took a deep breath, "because I'm a Shichiseishi!"
She snapped up to her feet, slipped on the dew-wet grass, and fell onto her butt.
Panting, Nuriko stared at nothing while she tried to come to grips with what she'd just seen.
Hotohori about to enter a disastrous marriage, and an attack in the Temple that she had apparently not been present for that had killed everyone.
"What on earth?" she breathed. "What am I facing? Hotohori marrying? Everybody dying? But I know these could happen...."
"Poor little girl, who understands nothing...."
The voice was old. Old and grating, full of grit and ache.
"Who's there?" Nuriko demanded. Her voice hadn't wavered at all, she was pleased to note.
"That's for me to know...."
Nuriko ran towards the voice, not seeing the glaze across the air....
"... and you not to guess!" the voice finished, taunting.
She found herself in a small room. It was carpeted, with velvet chairs and a small table, which was loaded with food. "Don't worry," the voice said. "Make yourself comfortable. It's not like you're leaving any time soon."
***********
Tamahome sighed and let Hikaru move slowly forward. It's not like we're getting very far in this mist anyway, he thought. I bet I'd go faster if I got off this horse and walked. Not that I could see where I was going if I did.
He couldn't help but think over the past few days. He'd found his Priestess, had a girl declare love to him, had someone he thought was a boy turn out to be a girl, and been accosted by bandits. And the week wasn't over yet.
Now I know why 'May you live in interesting times' is such a terrible curse.
He dismounted, for no particular reason, and began to wander forwards, letting go of the horse's reins. He was busily thinking about his Priestess.
I like her. She's clumsy and a little silly, but she's sweet. And... and she's the only girl who's ever wanted to be with me. I've always been 'Little Monster' and 'So-Who-Never-Has-Time-To-Stop'. None of the girls who didn't remember 'Little Monster' have ever wanted to find out why I had no time. The fact that I didn't was enough to put them off.
He shook his head. Nuriko wants us to be together. That much is obvious. He - she keeps throwing us together.
Tamahome stopped dead. Is it because she likes Hotohori?
The purple-haired Shichiseishi probably thought she was being subtle. It was true that Hotohori seemed to have no notion of her feelings. But she was always around him, and she always seemed to anticipate him.
It was well-known that Suzaku's Shichiseishi Nuriko had been found and joined the Imperial Court two years ago. The Emperor had commissioned a special play that had travelled all over Konan, telling the story of the Shichiseishi of Byakko, and mentioning that the time of Suzaku's Shichiseishi was imminent, as shown by Nuriko's appearance.
There was something in that play, too, now that he remembered.... The whole centre framework of it had been a love story between the Priestess of Byakko and her First Shichiseishi. Their love had guided them and their fellow Shichiseishi, uniting them and leading them to victory. And there had been a romance between the Second and the Third Shichiseishi, too. Of course, everybody had thought it was just them, the Third Shichiseishi of Suzaku was a man... except now Tamahome knew she was a girl....
"Is it all foreordained?" he asked aloud, stopping dead in the swirling mists. "Am I liking Miaka because I like her, or because I'm the First Shichiseishi and it is decreed that the Priestess and the First Shichiseishi should love? Is Nuriko putting us together because she thinks we'd be good together, or because something else is moving her?"
"Because she likes you and you like her, you IDIOT!" a girl's voice snapped.
Tamahome's head jerked up. "... Nuriko?" he asked blankly. He couldn't see a thing in this fog.
"I'm over here. Where are you?"
"I'm here."
"I'm here, too. So where is 'here'?"
"Over by the twisted tree."
"Ah. I know where you are now. I'm to your left."
In a room far, far away, or closer than a breath (depending on your point of view,) Yui read 'The First Shichiseishi did not realize that it was not the Lady Nuriko with whom he was speaking. The Lady Nuriko, having ignored the repast that would have put the Priestess of Suzaku into raptures, was watching her fellow Shichiseishi and screaming a desperate warning to him, while trying to use one of the red velvet chairs in the room to break out of it. Neither effort was successful, and she felt most poorly after straining her shoulder and screaming herself hoarse.'
"Shall I come over to you or you come to me?" Tamahome, who apparently had no self-preservation instincts, asked.
"Come over here. I'm over by the red apple tree."
The mist miraculously cleared up enough for him to see the tree. It was heavy with bright red apples, and Nuriko stood beneath it, smiling. Tamahome did not notice the shine to the air between himself and the tree, or how the smile on Nuriko's lips did not reach her eyes. He started forward, then stopped.
"Hang on," he said. "This is spring. Apple trees don't fruit till autumn...."
Unfortunately he'd passed the glaze in the air. The colours of the world spun, and then reformed. Tamahome found himself standing in a red room. The carpet was red. The velvet chairs were red. The walls were painted dark red, and the tablecloth on the heavily-laden table was red.
He was also standing on the remains of a smashed-up chair. He quickly leapt sideways to stop himself from falling over.
His movement attracted attention. "Hullo," a soft, hoarse voice said. "She got you, too."
Tamahome turned and saw a very different Nuriko. She was sitting on one of the chairs, rubbing her shoulder. Her eyes were red and she seemed somehow - diminished. Her personality, always so bright and expansive, was depressed and somehow much smaller.
"What happened to you?" Tamahome demanded.
She shook her head. "You couldn't hear me. Guess she's right," Nuriko murmured. "I don't understand anything."
"You're not the only one," Tamahome told her. "I think this fog has gotten into our brains! I couldn't make head or tail of M- what I was thinking of-"
"Miaka."
"I-"
"You were asking why I was putting you and she together. I heard you. I can answer you that, at least. It's because she likes you, and you like her. So I thought that you should be together. Or at least see if you can be together. Being a Shichiseishi is tough. Somebody should get a happy ending." Nuriko's voice was flat.
"Like you won't get, with Hotohori?" Tamahome, the King of Tact, commented.
Nuriko gave a short laugh. "I just saw Lord Hotohori marrying Miaka, and it horrified me. And I have no idea why." She shook her head. "The vision of everybody dead in the temple, that one I can understand why I was horrified. But Lord Hotohori will marry one day, some fine highborn Court Princess, and I will be there as his Second, because I am his best friend. I know that. I've always known that."
"You saw everybody dead?"
Nuriko lifted lilac eyes to him, and Tamahome was startled to see them shining with tears. Somehow, he'd never thought of Nuriko crying.
"Miaka - Miaka was o-on the altar and she'd had her heart ripped out, and you - you were-" she broke off, burying her face in her hands.
Tamahome knelt down beside Nuriko's chair. He reached one hand behind her, to pat her gently on the back. "There, there," he soothed. This wasn't like one of Yuiren's nightmares. "It's all right." He gently pulled one of her hands from her face, and pressed it, palm down, over his chest, where she could feel the rise and fall of his breath and the steady thrum of his heartbeat. "See? I'm alive. It wasn't real. I'm all right."
Nuriko lifted her face out of her other hand. She smiled tremulously at him. "You're really nice," she whispered, and there was a note of wonder in her voice. "I thought you were just a jerk who was picked by Suzaku at random, but you can be nice."
He smiled. "And I thought you were a crazy boy who just did whatever struck him as interesting at the time and never cared about what other people thought."
Nuriko grinned suddenly. "I like being thought of that way! Nobody stings me for loans, then!"
Tamahome smiled back. "Too bad, I know your secret! Hey, now we're talking, I need to borrow-"
"No way, I'm broke!"
They both laughed.
"You know," Tamahome said, "I think that I smelled honey from this food. It might just be a honey sauce for some pork, but I bet it would help your throat...."
***********
"The two Shichiseishi spoke gently to each other, discovering friendship and care, as Tamahome found the foods that would soothe Nuriko's wound," Yui read.
Her skin felt odd - tingly and sensitive. Every time she touched the page it seemed to wriggle under her fingers, and the room was growing closer and drier as she sat there. It was silent, too silent; and as she brushed her fingers over the paper she was reminded that most paper these days was made of wood pulp.
There was something both exalted and repulsive about the thought; that these desecrated corpses of the mighty forests even now surrounded her, and that she was making use of their sacrifice, rendering it meaningful.
************
Hotohori sighed as he watched the mist swirling around Takehito's hocks.
I really ought to say something to Nuriko, he thought. I guess I'm not used to hi-her being vulnerable.
Which brought another, far less palatable thought.
I let her down.
This morning, before they had left the bandits' stronghold, he had found his sai in his clothing packs and belted them to his waist. Nuriko's use of the name her brother had given him reminded him of the promise he'd made when he'd been given these sai.
'Guard my sister.'
I knew at the time that Chou wasn't talking about Lady Kourin. He was talking about Nuriko. And I didn't do it. I broke my word.
He sighed again, threading his fingers through his ponytail nervously. Miaka - oh, she's pretty enough, but she's a child. If Tamahome isn't looking after her, Nuriko is. He shook his head, barely noticing that Takehito had come to a stop. Lord Suzaku, why did You pick her? I always thought Your Priestess would be - intelligent and mature. Certainly more graceful.
Unthinkingly he dismounted. "I can't fault her nature. She's certainly open and loving enough. My friend. But..." he sighed. "I wanted more. I dreamed...." He began to braid some parts of his ponytail. "She isn't the girl I dreamed of. Nuriko is closer to my dream than she'll ever be."
"Such a shame you've lost her then, isn't it?"
Hotohori spun on his heel. The mist was chokingly thick, and he literally couldn't see anything in the swirling, choking mist. "Who are you?! Show yourself!" he demanded.
"You're such a pretty boy. Are you sure you're old enough to be an Emperor?" the achingly gritty voice asked lazily.
"I am Saiheitei, Suzaku Shichiseishi Hotohori and Emperor of Kounan. And if you know where Nuriko is, TELL ME NOW!"
"My, my! Are we jealous? Well, you've reason to be."
The mist in front of him cleared, and he was looking into a prison cell. Nuriko sat on a dank, mildewed bench. Tamahome was kneeling beside her on the grey stone floor, with an arm around her shoulders. As Hotohori watched, Nuriko buried her face in her hands. Tamahome looked distressed, and pulled one of her hands away from her face, pressing it to his chest. They stayed there in that three-quarter embrace, her face turned up to his, for several seconds, before the scene spun itself back into mist.
Hotohori did not blink or shift his body for several seconds, the curling of his hands into fists and uncurling them that he might clench them again his only movement.
"Did that amuse us?" The bodiless voice certainly was amused.
"... give her back now," Hotohori whispered.
"Couldn't quite hear you," the voice singsonged.
"You - you... You give them back!"
"Why should I?"
"What did they ever do to you?"
"This is my place. You do not have my permission to be here. I can do whatever I want to you." The voice was chilling in its indifference.
"We're escorting the Priestess of Suzaku to the home of Lady Taiitsukun!" Hotohori shouted. "We didn't mean to trespass! We'll pay compensation, whatever you want, just let them go!"
There was a pause. However, Hotohori could still feel the weight of the mysterious woman's attention.
"I think," her voice rang clearly, "that you should ask your Priestess about that."
The mist parted to reveal Miaka standing directly behind him. But before he could even speak, Hotohori found the ground he was standing on had suddenly sprouted what felt like several roots. Unbalanced, he fell over.
"I told you we should have cleaned that up."
"Were we expecting any more visitors?"
"Ah, you're getting sarky again."
"Don't sound so happy about it, Mister I-Forgot-It-Was-Spring."
"Keep that up and I'll forget about your shoulder. And your arm. Besides, you broke it."
"Trying to get your attention so you wouldn't get trapped in here, if I may remind you-"
"Nuriko? Tamahome?" Hotohori interrupted the bickering.
"Lord Hotohori!" "Hotohori!" they greeted him. He looked around at what appeared to be a rather comfortable room.
"I thought you were in a prison cell," he said wonderingly.
Tamahome nodded. "It is a prison cell," he replied. "We may as well eat while we're here," he continued, flapping his hand on the side away from Nuriko. "Look at this!"
Hotohori glanced at Nuriko. She was cradling her shoulder and looking away from both of them. Following Tamahome over to the food table, he asked, "What-"
"Shhh!" Tamahome hissed, glancing at Nuriko. She was still pointedly ignoring them. "Keep it down! Forget this thing between you and me for the minute and listen, alright? This is about Nuriko. I don't know what you were shown to get you off your guard long enough to get grabbed, but she saw us all murdered."
Hotohori felt his eyes widen. "I saw you hugging Nuriko. She saw us dead?"
Tamahome nodded. "Well, I did do that. She was devastated. Apparently we weren't just dead - we'd been butchered."
Hotohori turned to look behind him and saw how... small... Nuriko was, huddled in her chair.
"It's really rocked her. I don't know how you and her are, but we've got to reassure her or something. I mean, look at her. I think a part of her thinks we're ghosts." He shook his head. "That's why I hugged her. How many ghosts hug people?"
"Not many," Hotohori conceded.
"So... I don't know. We can't be different because she needs us to be normal, but, she's been the one who's been strong for us and I don't think she can be strong for anybody except herself right now."
Picking up a plate, Hotohori asked, "What has she eaten?"
"Not much. I got her to eat some honey pork because she shouted herself hoarse yelling to us when she first got here, but what she mainly ate was the sauce. Are you going to try to feed her?"
Thoughtfully, Hotohori selected three wontons. "Some of our first arguments were over food. And about food. It took a battle in itself to convince her to take her meals with me. It is improper for a commoner to see the Emperor eat."
"You've eaten with us, all through this journey."
"You are not a commoner." With that, Hotohori took his loaded plate over to sit beside Nuriko, on the side she was facing. Balancing the plate on his knees, he began to eat.
Nuriko had been watching Miaka through the clear side of the room. She seemed to be having an extended conversation, probably with the one who had lured them all in here. Be wise, Miaka, she willed. Don't be deceived by illusions. Be careful, Miaka... and then Hotohori plunked himself down right beside her.
She'd heard Tamahome and Hotohori whispering to each other over the food. But they hadn't been loud enough for her to hear any words without trying, and she had not wanted to try. Probably talking about me. Stupid Nuriko who was silly enough to cry....
The plate was full of delicious things. Roast duck and sharp wontons, steamed rice and water chestnuts, with spiced sweet-potato patties, all her favourites. She breathed in the scents and her stomach gave her a pointed and audible reminder that it had been a long time since breakfast, and Hotohori was acting as if everything was cooked perfectly.
He glanced over at her when her tummy rumbled, and pushed the plate closer to her, in unspoken invitation. And he smiled.
For some reason, that made her angry. "What do you think you're doing, Lord Hotohori?"
Hotohori took a bite of the duck. "Eating," he replied mildly. "Want some?"
"It could be anything!" she snapped. "It could be mildewed turnips!"
"But my tongue says it's roast duck. In tangy sauce," Hotohori replied mendaciously. "Are you sure you don't want any?"
"I - I-" She glanced at the plate and then back at his face, finally spotting the gleam of humour in his golden-brown eyes. "What are you trying to make me do?"
"Do? Nothing. Nothing at aaall," Hotohori drawled. "But if you keep drooling over my duck, I may be forced to feed it to you."
"I can still feed mysel-MMMPH!"
"So I see," said Hotohori thoughtfully, tapping his chopsticks together. "That's why I could just stick that wonton in your mouth like that."
Nuriko glared at him balefully over her bulging cheeks. Swallowing hastily, she told him, "That wasn't fair."
"Of course not. Now eat. That isn't a request, Lady Houki," he added sharply.
Nuriko blinked at that, but accepted the chopsticks and plate. She had taken a bite from a strip of the duck before she saw the wash of slow-but-fierce colour creeping up Hotohori's neck. Glancing down, she realized that the meat between her chopsticks was the same piece he had taken a bite from. Blushing herself, she let the strip fall from between the chopsticks, and applied herself to the rice.
Tamahome watched, thoughtful himself.
************
Miaka breathed in a lungful of the cold, chilling mist.
She knew Hotohori had been trying to catch up to her; and the sudden mist that had separated them all was all that had stopped him. She was suddenly grateful to it.
Hotohori was nice. He was calm and sweet and gentle and nice....
Last night, she'd said that to Nuriko as they lay in their small chamber. That Hotohori was nice. Nuriko had rolled over to face her and said "Nice? Him?"
"Don't you like him?" Miaka had asked.
"Of course."
"But you don't think he's nice?"
"Lord Hotohori is a lot of things, but no, I don't think he's 'nice'. 'Nice' is mild. And he isn't."
Miaka had thought about it. Mild? Love wasn't supposed to be mild, it was supposed to pick you up and shake you, restructure all your priorities and make you change your world. No, love wasn't 'nice', not at all.
But Hotohori was nice. He wasn't a bad guy, he wasn't nasty, he wasn't... passionate.
Miaka sighed. She was almost certain that Nuriko would disagree with all of these points. Well, not the bits about Hotohori not being a bad guy.
Tamahome, on the other hand, was passionate. He was charming and honest and sincerely kind. But he most definitely wasn't nice.
Yui and she had once been talking about boys, and Yui had said something that Miaka had remembered, mainly because she didn't really get it. "The boy you like won't be nice, and that's how you can tell you like him," Yui had said.
She thought Hotohori was nice, but Nuriko didn't, and Nuriko liked Hotohori. Miaka was pretty sure of that. Nuriko had been friends with Hotohori a long time though, so she thought she liked him the way she always had. Miaka was pretty sure of that, too.
Nuriko, on the other hand, thought Tamahome was nice. And Miaka knew he wasn't. Gallant and cool, the way he had ripped into those slavers - but he wasn't nice. He was too cool, too kind, too strong, too sexy, too wonderful, to be 'nice'.
Was this what Yui had meant?
"I'm sorry, Hotohori," she said softly.
Suddenly, as if summoned by her words, Miaka heard Hotohori's voice. "Just let them go!" he pleaded.
Just let who go? thought Miaka, in sudden panic. Where are Tamahome and Nuriko?
A gritty, elderly woman's voice answered him. "I think," it echoed, "that you should ask your Priestess about that." The mist before Miaka parted and let her see Hotohori... and see him vanish.
"What did you do to him?" Miaka demanded of the air. "Where are they? Where's Tamahome?"
"Who are you?" asked the woman's voice.
"I am Yuuki Miaka, a third-year junior high school student and currently the Priestess of Suzaku. Who are you?"
"I am... the Lady of the Mirrors."
"Wow! Do you know the way to Lady Taiitsukun's?"
The voice paused, and when it spoke, it seemed a bit nonplussed. "Yes, I do... why do you ask?"
"Well," and Miaka flapped one hand in dismissal, "I haven't been very well lately, so the Shichiseishi want to ask Taiitsukun to send me home so I can get better and then come back."
"Konan is in danger."
"I know!" Miaka said impatiently. "That's why we have to get to Taiitsukun's as soon as possible. I won't be any good to anybody if I collapse, so the sooner I get home and get better, the sooner I can get back and save Tamahome and Nuriko and Hotohori."
"They're not in any danger."
Miaka gave the empty air a very flat look. "Look, I am fifteen. I do know some things. I know they'll fight. I mean, if you can see the enemy from Tamahome's house, they don't have much choice. And if you fight, you're going to get hurt."
"You are committed." The voice had regained its composure.
"Yes, so where are they?" Miaka demanded.
"Miaka?" Tamahome's voice came from beside her.
"You're all right here." The voice sounded smug. The landscape changed swiftly, melting into a long marble hall. Miaka looked up to see her three Shichiseishi standing beside her. Or rather, two of them. Nuriko had been sitting on a chair which seemed to have suddenly collapsed, spilling a plate of food all over herself. "That's for smashing My chair," the no-longer-disembodied voice commented.
They looked up to the end of the room, to see the ugliest woman they'd ever seen sitting on a raised dais.
Miaka reacted first. She pointed a shaking figure at the old woman. "SUNAKAKE BABAA!!" she shrieked.
Tamahome backed up a step. "Who?" he asked.
Hotohori half-turned towards Nuriko and was ostentatiously helping her stand.
Nuriko stood up shakily. "Excuse me, madame," she said quietly.
"Yes?"
"Who are you, please?"
The old woman grinned. "I am Taiitsukun, the Creator of this world."
"Really?"
"Yes, really."
Hotohori glanced over his shoulder, then looked back to Nuriko and began fussing over her injured arm. "I thought She would be fairer," he murmured to his friend. "Or, at the least, presentable."
Taiitsukun had much sharper ears than anyone suspected, and a long-handled mallet came sailing down to bonk him hard on the head.
"So you wish to go home, Miaka," Taiitsukun commented.
"I will come back when I'm well again," Miaka promised.
"For this effort, we will need all three of your Shichiseishi's full attention." Taiitsukun clapped Her hands. "Nyan-Nyan!"
At the clap, what had appeared to be pink balloons floating around the room shrank in on themselves, and with a loud pop! each became a cute little girl.
"Nyan-Nyan," Taiitsukun commanded, "tend their wounds."
The little blue-haired girls, all eight of them, made a beeline for Nuriko. They hit her and she went down like a skittle - hard and with a loud clunk.
"Nuriko!" all three of her companions shouted, and waded in to rescue her from the enthusiastic overattentions of the mini-first-aiders.
Taiitsukun shook Her head as She watched Hotohori give Her a new skylight in the process of introducing a Nyan-Nyan to the pleasures of skydiving without a parachute. Tamahome was a little less enthusiastic, while Miaka just tried to push the little girls out of her way.
The Nyan-Nyan were recklessly intent on continuing their mission, though. Nuriko had been stripped to her underwear and all four of her limbs had already been bandaged to the point where they more closely resembled the legs of an albino panda.
"Next time, a double dose of common sense for all of them," Taiitsukun muttered.
************
Yui felt a sudden surge of elation.
"And so, Taiitsukun watched as her Maidens prepared the Priestess of Suzaku and her Shichiseishi for the transfer between worlds."
Yui let herself relax. Miaka was coming home. Everything would go back to normal. She'd soon let go of this Priestess thing and she'd be back to being just like Yui....
Now she could admit she'd been jealous. Lots of people paid attention to Miaka, always. Miaka had the good looks. Miaka was klutzy enough to charm. Miaka made people feel bright. Miaka's genkiness was infectious. It was all of a piece that Miaka would fall through the rabbit hole and become the queen of Wonderland....
And good ol' Yui stays behind to read of her adventures.
She did like Miaka, truly. They had been together since kindergarten. But she often felt that Miaka was like a golden sun and she was forever going to be the pale, envious moon. Miaka had a mother and brother who cared about her. Miaka was the centre of their circle of friends. The only thing Yui felt that she really had was her brain.
Part of her said she should leave Miaka - take lots of exams, then, after Miaka got her results and made her decision, claim her parents were taking an interest in her (for once) and that they were 'insisting' she go to a different school. But Yui could not bring herself to do that. She might be but the moon, but she could not abandon her sun.
But I do wish that, just once, this sort of thing would happen to me.
************
"Now," Taiitsukun began, "you must all close your eyes and concentrate. Miaka, there is a strong connection, between yourself and the world you left behind. There's something you're carrying, that has a copy in your world."
"Something I'm... carrying?" Miaka guessed. "My uniform?"
"A copy is worn by someone in your world. Someone who misses you, and wants you to go back."
"My uniform... Yui! My best friend, Yui!"
"Concentrate on your friend. Remember how good it felt to be with her, and will yourself there. You Shichiseishi, lend her your strength."
Miaka let her mind fill up with images. Yui on the first day of junior high, when the bullies tried to corner them, grabbing her hand and running away. Yui at each and every one of her birthday parties for ten years, including the dreadful one when she was eight, just after Papa had left and it had gotten out all over the school and nobody wanted to be her friend anymore. Yui had kept on being her friend though. Yui had always been there. Yui was strong and smart and always kept her promises and never let her down. Yui had promised they would go to high school together.
"Yui," she whispered.
And the red light took her.
************
Yui had her eyes closed as she whispered, "Come home, Miaka! Come home!"
The sudden scent of green moss made her open them again in surprise.
She felt the trees whisper and the scent of the forest surrounded her. Misty coolness, rich mulchy scent of fallen leaves, quiet scent of the forest's flowers, all encompassed and included by the bright blue light that sprang out of nowhere to surround her. And suddenly there was no ground, there was only the light - and the feeling of strong arms about her, carrying her away to somewhere else.
************
Miaka stirred. The red light, cinnamon and salty driftwood and bone-warming heat, was gone, and she was alone on the floor of the quiet, private room of the National Library.
"Yui?" she called softly. "Yu~ui! Where are you?"
Standing up, she decided to go and look for Yui. She did not notice the Shinjitenshisho lying open on the floor, nor the way the blank page was filling up with text.
************
He sat in the window and observed the sunset.
He supposed he ought to be practicing with his Taisuisen, but for some reason, he couldn't. It was curled up and ready by his hand, the two balls freshly polished and the hard horsehair tassels carefully combed clean. He'd been attempting to convince himself that nothing was wrong, that this unsettled feeling was nothing more anticipation of the exercise of his Shichiseishi Talent....
A clay cup picked itself up from the table. It floated over to a tall, earthenware pitcher, which tipped over gently to pour clear liquid into the cup. Gently resettling itself upright, the pitcher stood alone on the table as the cup drifted over to the boy's hand. Suboshi gripped the cup and lifted it to his lips, sipping at the cool water and feeling rather proud of himself. The water had not spilt, and the cup had not woven nor lurched, but had instead moved straight and sure. His control was improving daily.
So it wasn't anticipation, but... no. No, it was anticipation, Suboshi realized, the sort you get when the air is full of the tang of lightning as well as heat and water, brewing a thunderstorm, a bad one. The skies were clear, and everyone else was moving around, so it wasn't a storm... was it?
Suboshi was fifteen and a war orphan. Education, in his experience, was something that happened to other people. Symbolism and metaphor were no more than long words to him, and a simile would have to hit him over the head with a very large hammer before he could recognise it. Therefore, he had no way to explain exactly what he was thinking of, or why he felt so wound up. He had to... do something....
It would have been of little consolation for him to know that he was not alone. His older brother was snappish and short with the servants, Soi had locked herself in her rooms and was arcing at the copper pipes to stop herself calling down a bolt on whichever unfortunate crossed her, while Tomo was terrifying the gardeners with an assortment of illusions. He had found it tension-relieving the first time one of the gardeners had fainted dead away at the sight of one of his beloved rosebushes covered with slugs, so he was attempting to repeat the feat. The gardeners lived in horror.
But Suboshi's restlessness was not driving him to sarcasm, wanton destruction or mindless tormenting. Something was calling him. Without any real thought to the matter, he slipped down from his perch and out of the room, heading into the city and towards... something. Someone, another part of himself murmured deep in his subconscious. Whatever. He'd know when he found it. Her, that part of himself muttered again.
*********
Author's Notes:
1. Yes, Raye is finally studying Chinese, over a year after starting this story. Which means, of course, that now I know why Yui's reflections on the language of the Shijintenshisho back in Chapter Three were dead wrong.
2. I know that in canon, Yuiren is six. However,
I have chosen to revise her age upwards.
If I went by canon, Gyoukouran
would have been seven when Yuiren was born. In a family where the mother
dies in childbirth and there is a daughter of an age to tell when water's
hot and with the ability to change nappies (ie, over five), almost invariably
the daughter will become the foster mother. It is only if the daughter
is not old enough to handle those chores and there is no other female
relatives available that a male relative will take the position. Therefore,
if Tamahome did raise Yuiren, Gyoukouran would have had to be less
than five years older than her sister. I hardly think a boy of eleven would
have been dying to play house (though he may have been dying to give
up playing house after the first nappy).
3. In canon, we have no idea what So Gyoukouran was like. She exited the story before we had any chance to get to know her. So, I cheerfully admit it: I'm making most of her up out of whole cloth. Oh, and yes, I was very fond of Nancy Drew when I was thirteen.
3. The song Kourin and Yuiren are singing is "Maiden At Her Best", Nuriko's image song from episode 28 (the recap episode). The translation is from my Tomodachi fansubs, copyright Karen Duffy and Yamazaki Masatomo, and is used without permission.
4. The song Nuriko heard Hotohori singing is part of a poeticised version of his image song 'Boku No Uchyuu Ni Kimi Ga Ite' [Within My Universe, There Is You]. It is based on the Geocities translation of Hotohori's Music Crip [sic].
5. Something a lot of people forget (and the anime doesn't help) is that Seiryuu's element is not actually Water. It's really Wood (or Lightning). Water belongs to Genbu, Byakko's element is Metal, and Suzaku's attribute is Fire.
6. According to the notes provided by Tomodachi Anime for episode 7 of the TV series, Sunakake Babaa is a ghost who looks like an elderly woman. People wandering deserted city streets late at night encounter her, whereupon she throws sand in their faces. She first appeared in the popular literature of the 1800's, but also featured in a classic manga and anime of the 1960's.
*********
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