FicWad

Confusion, Tohru mused, was not a pleasant state to be in for long periods of time, and at the rate surprises were being flung at her, she was likely going to stay confused forever. "How strange," she muttered. "The girl in black said the same thing, but how can any of this be 'meant to be'?"

Haru, Momiji and Uo-chan drew closer, waiting intently for Shigure's answer. He sighed. "I'm saying you've always been meant to go to Ryuukama, and that everything that's happening now is just a way of-of pointing you in the right direction. Fate, destiny, the manipulations of some other intelligence I have yet to uncover, call it what you want, but the circumstances are too convenient to be mere coincidence. Someone intended for you to go to Ryuukama, Tohru-kun."

"But why?" she asked, bewildered.

"There's a little girl in Ryuukama who's suffering from a fever no one's found a cure for yet. She needs your help. She's been asking for you, actually."

"What?!" four voices chorused. "You know anyone in Ryuukama, Tohru?" Arisa demanded.

Tohru shook her head, looking dazed. "No, no one. Poor little girl. Is she a villager?"

Instead of replying, Shigure reached into his pocket for Kana's letter and handed it to her. She read it carefully, and her perplexed frown deepened. "Kisa...chan?"

"Hatori-san's daughter?" Haru asked in surprise.

Shigure nodded. "Kisa Sohma, only child and heir of Lord Hatori Sohma, Duke of Ryuukama. The Duchess requests that you come, Tohru-kun, as she believes your presence would help comfort her daughter. She assures you that you'll be treated as a member of the family and an honored guest."

"D-Duke? Duchess?" she sputtered. "Y-You mean-"

"Oh, don't worry," he added, smiling. "Ha-san may be a bit on the serious side but he's a good man, and his wife Kana is one of the nicest people I know. I haven't met Kisa in person yet, but Kana-san tells me she's quiet and shy, which means she takes more after Ha-san, the poor mite."

"But I can't-I mean, I-" Tohru waved her hands frantically in the air. "I wouldn't know what to do! They're nobility, and I'm just a waitress in a café. I don't deserve to be around such important people. I'll do things wrong and offend them and embarrass you-"

Shigure's smile widened. "But Tohru-kun, you're doing just fine around the Duke of Mizaka."

"What? But I've never-" /Kisa Sohma/. Her voice died as the realization left her staggering. "Sohma..." she breathed.

"You mean, you are the Duke of Mizaka?" Arisa snorted. "Good one, Shigure-san. Everyone knows there aren't any dukes or lords in Mizaka. They all got run out of town or something after the Shattering two hundred years ago."

He tilted his head agreeably. "True, many of the families left after the city was ravaged, but not all. Our family remained, on the condition that we renounce the title and give up rulership of Mizaka. You remember your history lessons, ne? Lord Kunihiro was ruler of Old Mizaka until he died defending the city, but because he was closely related to the king, the people blamed him too for the mess. So his son, Lord Ryujin, voluntarily relinquished the title to keep the peace."

"Our family never forgot, though," Momiji said softly. "We don't call ourselves by the old titles, but we still follow the hierarchy, and Shi-chan is the direct descendant of Lord Kunihiro."

"Who used to be called-" Shigure winked at Tohru "-the Black Wolf of Mizaka."

"Oukami." Whom she used to call 'Pochie' so carelessly. It all became so clear. No wonder the family treated him with so much respect. If things had turned out differently, Shigure would have been ruler of the entire city. All the times she'd treated him casually, even laughed at him, flashed through her mind, and she wilted in utter mortification. And if Shigure was a duke, did that mean Momiji and Haru were nobility as well? Mother, have I been living with blue bloods all this time? "B-but how could Kisa-san have known to ask for me? And what could I possibly do to help her? I don't know the first thing about curing fevers."

"That's what I want to know," Haru cut in. "What good would Tohru be to Kisa? Or is there some other reason Kana-san's asking for her?"

"I don't know," Shigure answered honestly. "Kisa-chan's fever is...unusual. During her delirious spells, she calls out Tohru-kun's name again and again. Kana believes Tohru-kun might somehow give her daughter the strength to fight off the fever."

"And the demon attacks?" Haru continued.

"Demon attacks?" the others cried in unison and in varying degrees of astonishment.

Shigure winced. "Mou, Ha-kun, I wish you wouldn't spring those things on people like that. Yes, like our own city, Ryuukama's been, er, experiencing some problems. Magic is strong there, and Ha-san told me the barriers between dimensions sometimes grow thin. I think Kana-san suspects a connection between Kisa-chan's fever and the rise in demon attacks. Ha-san's daughter inherited more than just his gregarious personality; she's highly gifted in magic as well, and her visions could very well contain a clue about the attacks. As for ensuring Tohru-kun's safety, Kana assures me that she has assigned her best agents to see to her protection."

Dukes and sorcerers. Magic and strange fevers, death sentences and demon attacks. A distant city she'd only heard of and a little girl she'd never met who knew her by name. Tohru felt as if she were stuck in a dream that wouldn't end. It occurred to her that if her intention was to clear her name from the charges of magic, then going to Ryuukama, where people lived and breathed magic, was not the smartest way to go about it. On the other hand, there was no other place for her to go, and sorcerer-duke or not, Hatori and Kana were part of Shigure's family just as much as Haru and Momiji were. Shigure trusted them implicitly, and she, Tohru, trusted Shigure.

Besides, Kisa-san needed her.

The thought rang strong and clear throughout the whole jumbled mess. Even if nothing else came out of this crazy adventure, even if everything turned out to be a horrible mistake and she would never, ever be able to go back home again, she could at least help save a little girl's life. /Hold on, Kisa-san/, she vowed silently, /I'm coming/.

"Well, that's all fine and dandy, but how's she going to get there?" Arisa said, interrupting Tohru's thoughts. "All the ships've been docked, and the pier's probably crawling with-"

"Guards," Shigure murmured to Tohru's knees, before turning to Haru. "A search party, going just past the bridge. They'll be here in fifteen minutes."

Haru frowned. "If not the pier, then where do we go?"

"We'll leave through the back and head toward west market," Shigure answered, after a pause. "Hopefully, they haven't barred the way to the caravans yet. It'll take longer to reach Ryuukama by caravan than by ship, but that's all we've got."

Tohru and Arisa stared at him. Noticing this, he shook his head as if to say 'I'll explain later'. "There's one more thing before we go," he said instead, drawing an object out from his pocket, sparking collective gasps of astonishment. A pendant swung on its gold chain from his fingers, sending shards of light bouncing off the exquisitely cut gemstone, which was clear at the edges but shaded into a deep blue at the core. The stone hung from a gold disk shaped like the sun, with its rays twined around the stone's upper half. Dazzled, Tohru stared at the gem. "It's beautiful."

He glanced around, but everyone's gazes were all similarly riveted to the stone. Haru's face had gone completely blank but not without effort, if the way he was clenching and unclenching his fists were anything to go by, while Momiji's breathing grew shallower. "You feel it, too, don't you?" he asked his cousins. "It's calling to you, too."

Momiji touched the gem then pulled his hand back. "What the hell is that?" Haru asked hoarsely.

"It's the Sun Stone," Shigure answered. "An artifact that's probably more than a thousand years old. It was once fixed on the King's Staff and believed to have been lost. How it managed to wind up here as a necklace, I have no idea. Probably someone managed to rescue the staff and break the stone off to make it easier to hide, and two hundred years later, someone else packed this thing in a box and sent it to me."

Haru cupped his hands around the stone, and everyone gasped when his hands glowed white. Startled, Haru jerked away and shoved his hands into his pockets. "That thing feels like I just shoved my body into a waterfall. Momiji, you all right?"

The smaller boy passed a hand over his eyes. "Yes, but my head hurts."

Tohru was unable to take her eyes off the stone. It looked so beautiful, the way she imagined a star would look if one fell from the sky. She reached out and gingerly touched it. "It's warm," she said wonderingly. "Shigure-san, may I try it on?"

Shigure slipped the necklace over her head, letting the stone rest between her breasts. "This stone belonged to the last king, Senmaru," he told them. "He was a powerful sorcerer, as were most of the kings, and they used this stone to amplify their power, although nobody knows how to use it now. It was believed that the Sun Stone would always find its way to its rightful master."

Tohru's eyes widened. "Then it belongs to you, Shigure-san. You're the-ara?" She'd started to pull the necklace off to give it back, but her fingers only managed to close around thin air. She squinted down and tried to grasp the stone, but the crystal felt as solid as a puff of cloud. It also seemed to be shrinking...she cried out, her hands beating frantically at her breast as the stone continued to sink into her chest. "Shigure-san, help!"

"Tohru-kun!" Shigure tried to pull the stone away, but his hands merely streaked blue lights in the air. Terrified, Tohru clapped both hands over her chest and bent double. Brilliant white rays exploded between her fingers as the stone vanished completely into her body. When the light faded, she straightened slowly while the others crowded around her. She took a shaky breath and patted her chest. "I'm all right. It doesn't hurt. It just feels warm." A thought occurred to her, and she undid the top buttons of her dress and opened it a little. Sure enough, the outline of the Sun Stone was etched in thin blue lines on the skin between her breasts, right above her heart.

"The Sun Stone's inside her?" Momiji looked up fearfully. "How did that happen? How are we going to get it out?"

"Hmm." Shigure frowned, then reached a finger up to trace the outline on Tohru's chest but got his hand slapped away by a scowling Arisa. "Ite! I wasn't going to try anything," he complained. "Miyamoto-ojiichan never mentioned anything about the stone merging with human bodies. If I may, Tohru-kun?" he asked, shooting a wary glance at Arisa. When Tohru nodded, he placed all five fingers over the mark but only succeeded in making the blue lines glow gold, then white, before fading back to blue again. "Well, that didn't work. There's got to be some sort of spell for this. A king would know what to do."

Haru gave him a flat look. "We don't have any kings handy, Sensei. The closest to royalty would be you and Hatori-san."

Shigure shook his head. "The stone isn't meant for me. It belongs to Ha-san, and if anyone knows how to get the stone out from Tohru's body and use it, it'd be him." He watched resignedly as Tohru redid her buttons. "Here's yet another reason why Tohru-kun should go to Ryuukama. At least with the Sun Stone inside her, she'll probably have some sort of protec-" He stopped. "The guards are here. We have to go /now/."

With no time to worry about the stone inside her, Tohru followed the others out through the back and into an alley. Arisa crept toward the street and peered out. "It's clear. No guards in sight."

"Better to keep to the back street," Haru said, and she nodded.

"No." They turned to Momiji, who was standing ramrod straight, his golden eyes blank. "Guards. Too many of them. They'll catch us. They'll hurt Tohru. The shadows are moving, and someone is screaming, screaming-" His voice grew increasingly louder and Tohru hastily covered his mouth. His eyes cleared and he sagged against her. "Not west market," he muttered.

"Momiji-kun." Tohru stared at him, unnerved by his display. He gave her a weak smile.

"A troop's been alerted. Somebody's seen us." Haru swore softly. "What now? Momiji's never been wrong before."

Shigure raked a hand through his hair. "We don't have a choice. We'll have to run for it, and hope the others can hold the guards off."

'The others?' Tohru thought, but there was no more time, because suddenly they were running through the narrow street behind the buildings, past broken crates and garbage heaps and filthy piles of rags that occasionally moved and reached out grubby hands to them. She soon became thoroughly disoriented as alley after alley flew past. Faint, shadowy figures seemed to be running alongside them while more followed from up on the rooftops, and light footsteps seemed to dog them, but when she turned to look over her shoulder, there was no one there. She tripped on a plank of wood and crashed against a garbage can. Shigure grabbed her arm, and they froze when voices drifted toward them over the street noises: "This way! I heard something!" At the other end of the alley, a few guards skidded to a stop, pointed, and sprinted toward them.

Shigure narrowed his eyes. "Now!" A split-second later, just as the guards were about to run past, a door flew open and slammed right into their faces. A large man leaned heavily against the doorway, apparently too drunk to notice the groaning guards piled in a heap on the other side of the door. He raised a jug and yelled something incoherent, then kicked the door again just as the guards were picking themselves up, sending them sprawling back down.

Shigure hauled her up and ran. Panting, Tohru fought to keep up, but she couldn't stop seeing that lightning-quick moment when the man at the doorway met Shigure's gaze and gave a nearly imperceptible nod. There was no trace of drunkenness at all in his face. It was as if the two of them had somehow planned the move. But how? she wondered wildly, how was that possible?

The street spat them into another marketplace. Stalls covered every inch of the courtyard, while overhead gas lamps were strung up in rows between posts. Although there were noticeably fewer people and more vacant stalls here than in central market, there was still a sizeable crowd despite the hour and the uncomfortable clamminess in the air.

Shigure smiled in relief. "Looks like Mit-chan's pulled it off. There's the caravan. All we need to do now is hold the guards off long enough for you to make a quick getaway."

Tohru followed his gaze across the forest of stalls to the relatively empty darkness beyond, punctuated by the glow of two or three bigger lamps. They were nearly at the edge of the city. The caravan that would take her to Ryuukama-and to freedom and safety-waited there. /But my home is here/, came a plaintive wail from inside her, and tears filled her eyes, nearly blinding her.

"Do you see any guards?" Momiji asked anxiously.

"Not yet, but they're not too far behind us," Haru replied.

"Let's split up," Shigure said. "It'll be harder to pick us out in the crowd. We'll meet at the other side."

They separated, with Shigure pulling Tohru after him, his hand clamped painfully around her wrist. She glanced over her shoulder, and her stomach dropped at the sight of a veritable army of guards swarming through the marketplace, shouting and shoving people out of the way. "Shigure-san, they're following us!" she hissed.

He looked back. Two soldiers were marching in their direction, scanning the crowd intently. He cursed, glanced around, then pushed her into the shadowy space between two abandoned stalls and squeezed in after her. The guards walked past, giving only a cursory glance at the patch of darkness that hid the two, and Tohru thanked the gods that both she and Shigure were wearing dark-colored clothing. She pressed flat against the wall and held still, and only when the guards had moved away did she allow herself to breathe.

He turned to her and grinned. "Well, that was exciting. The others are almost there. We-"

"You there! What are you about?"

The light was suddenly blotted out. One of the guards loomed over them, blocking the entryway, and he gaped at the sight of her. "Hey, it's her! It's the witch, and-Akkan's blood! Sohma-san?"

Before any of them could react, a shadow dropped down right behind the guard. A blade flashed, and the guard gurgled and slumped down. Tohru felt a shriek race up her throat, and she stuffed both fists against her mouth to hold it in. Shigure thrust her behind him just as the shadow stepped into the light, becoming a young man dressed in a coarse brown cloak, his longish black hair tied back in a small ponytail. His otherwise good-looking face was marred by a scar that ran from his left cheekbone to his chin. His dark eyes glinted as he regarded them. He raised the dagger he'd used slit the guard's throat, then bowed low in a courtly gesture that was jarringly out-of-place in the middle of a marketplace and with a dead guard between them. "Greetings, Princess. The Shukari send their blessings with you on your journey to our long-lost kinsmen."

She opened her mouth, but only a faint whimper emerged. Shigure frowned. "Who are you?"

The young man met his stare. "Name's Megumi, Sohma-san. There's no need to probe me. If I seem familiar it's because you've met the Lady. My sister," he added. Shigure raised his eyebrows and nodded slowly. "You need to get away from here," Megumi went on. "The caravan's waiting. We've already cleared the road, so your escape should be easy."

"The place is crawling with guards," Shigure pointed out. "What do you plan to do about that?"

Megumi smiled serenely. "Raise a ruckus." The next moment he was gone. Tohru moved to follow, but Shigure held her back. "Not yet. We have to wait for his signal."

She was about to ask how he knew that, when a loud voice thundered from the middle of the marketplace. "Foul vultures! Cowardly curs! Isn't it enough that your despot of a governor's taken away our jobs, forcing us to scrape a living from underneath your boots? Now you come to finish us off as well?"

Everyone, guard and vendor alike, stopped and stared. Tohru gasped. Megumi was standing on top of a stall, his cloak thrown back dramatically, his dagger and sword raised. The lamplight gave him a saintly glow, and his eyes glittered with fanatical zeal. The people watched him, spellbound. "People of the Outer City, what have you done to deserve this cruelty?" he bellowed. "You've worked your fingers to the bone for the governor, starved your children for the governor, sold your souls for the governor-and this is how he repays you? His guards have come among you now to drive you out of your homes! Where's the righteousness in this? Where's the /justice/?"

People began to mutter and shoot resentful glares at the guards, who were beginning to look ill, especially since more shadowy figures dressed as Megumi was, and just as heavily armed and deadly earnest, were appearing from out of nowhere. The shadows are moving/. Tohru remembered Momiji's words, and she shivered. But Megumi wasn't finished yet. "We, the Ashari, have suffered with you! Our people have been murdered by the Mizakan tyrant, our chieftain's son taken and tortured. We fight beside you now, people of the Outer City! Take up arms and fight! Fight to be free! /Fight to live!"

He raised his sword and a tremendous yell erupted from hundreds of lungs. The next instant people were turning on the guards, punching and kicking and hurling fruits, vegetables, meat bones and empty crates, while the cloaked warriors charged. The marketplace was in complete chaos. "Now!" Shigure hissed, and then they were fighting their way through heaving bodies, ringing blades and flying cabbages. They reached the edge of the market, and Tohru could see Momiji, Haru and Arisa waiting not far from one of the caravans. Suddenly, rough hands grabbed her around the waist and jerked her away from Shigure's hold. "Gotcha!" the guard snarled as he and two others dragged her off. "You're not getting away, you damned witch!"

Screaming, she kicked out, and her foot connected with a jaw. Somebody swore and a fist slammed into her middle, knocking the breath out of her. She fell on her knees, struggling against waves of weakness, and she raised her head to see Shigure, Haru, Arisa and Momiji attacking the guards. Swords flashed, and she could see blood flowing from her wounded companions. "No," she whispered raggedly. "No, no, no, no, NOOOOO!"

Agonizing heat exploded from her chest, flowing like liquid fire through her veins. Blue rays flared outward from the Sun Stone, becoming a rippling ribbon of blindingly white light that wrapped around her, scorching her from the inside out. The grasping hands fell away, and she felt herself rising, her body obeying another will. Her mind was flying in space far, far away, hurtling past a jumble of images and memories, past a whirlwind of stars and shimmering colors, until she came at last to a vast field of white.

She looked around, and saw that she wasn't alone. A boy was standing with his back to her, his silvery hair gently stirring in an unfelt breeze. She stepped closer to him. He turned-

-and violet eyes in a face of exquisite perfection met her own startled gaze. The eyes widened, and a question flickered in their depths. She reached out a hand to him, then suddenly the ground vanished and she plunged downward-

-into an odd sort of darkness. Her body jolted as the floor rocked beneath her. Cool hands clasped her own and brushed against her face. Voices spoke, sounding as if coming from far away. "Tohru, you're all right, oh thank the gods..." "We're on the caravan, Tohru. We've gotten away..." "We're on our way to Ryuukama. Shigure-sensei stayed behind to deal with the guards...you're safe, now..."

Her lips moved, whispering a name borne on a delicate stream of memory from a time beyond time, just before she sank into blessed unconsciousness.

"Yuki."

- - *

In a time beyond time, it waited.

In infinite darkness and absolute silence, it waited. The being circled the walls of its prison, chafing at the chains that bound it to this realm between mortality and immortality, chains that were forged by blood and power and will.

Human blood. Human power. Human will.

It raged continually at the ignominy of it all. It seethed against the presence that bound it to its will and claimed its power as its own. This parasite, this master whose iron-fisted hold upon it would soon be broken.

Soon, very soon.

And so it waited. It called upon its servants and drew strength from their offerings. Outside was a world waiting to be devoured, and its hunger had grown sharp indeed. When the time came, it would break free of its prison and feed upon that world.

And infinite torment awaited the one who dared enslave a god.

Soon. Very soon.