Yugure's Goddess
10-08-2006, 05:04 AM
Alright so here... I made meself an original fiction which I plan on drawing (or getting some one else to draw since I have no amount of patience...) Anyway you'll have to bear with me... and the incredible length of this freakin' thing. I tend to overdescribe many things and I just can't stop myself and I go back and try to shorten it but can't do it and/or often find myself lengthening it instead. *sob* ....anyway. Please read and tell me what you think and give me advise and stuff. And if you really like it(that's a bit presumptuous, isn't it?), don't wait too impatiently, as it takes me a while to write this stuff usually. (This one just took about 8-10 hours to complete... other chapters will usually take that long stretched over about a month of time so... yeah.) And forgive me if it gets bad near the end... I'm tired...
ok... I'll just shutup and let you read...Hope you like reading cause you're about to do a lot of it! X3
A Cursed Blessing
Part 1
Chapter 1:
Arrival
In the fields, bathed in the light of the shining moon, stood vague figures of the night; two beings conversing of some sinister exploit at the very edge of a dense forest. A peccant deed they were to perform that night; a deed that breathed death onto the silent mountain that stood to the East of where the scheming pair had positioned themselves as they conversed of their final orders and preparations for everything to transpire that night.
Kneeling before his master, a man in dark, almost colorless Gi pants and a torn, ragged and dirtied white shirt gave his regards of protest to some order given.
“…you will not assist us, malady?” He said quietly, both worried and curious.
“No,” The other replied. Her voice was cool silky articulate, and had a very subtly seductive hint to it. “I have matters to attend to in Edo. You will have to be diligent and patient in your duties tonight.”
The figure before him turned from the forest and faced the servant that belonged to her. She sighed drawing her narrow blue eye to the man’s bowing head and stared at his stooping form with an odd and somewhat frightening combination of sympathy and superiority. As she turned from the awe-inspiring darkness of the trees the moonlight flashed a glimpse of this sturdy woman whose strength shown through the dark blue, stretchy material that conformed almost perfectly to her near-perfectly sculpted form. Around her neck hung a strap of clothing that stretched over and about her chest tightly, in a crossed shape in both front and back, tied at the nape of her neck. Aside from her suit, her other garments were and had oddities quite their own. Around her waist was an incredibly thick leather looking belt and from it hung a free-flowing chain-link skirt. Her boots looked rubber with the top of both the backs and fronts of each, were what appeared to be pieces of copper in the shape of bolts of lightening. And in the space between her neck and thighs, levitating and spinning around her were two gold rings, held to her by some unseen force. Her hair was short, dark, sleek, straight and hung, barely an inch from her shoulders. Except for two locks that dangled in front down to her collar bone with whitened tips.
The woman turned again and gazed into and through the forest before her. She spoke in transparent and lilted notes that were distant and almost inaudible. “I know how difficult it is with Kozuka’s age and both yours and his great sympathy, however this time, there can be no exceptions. No sympathy. No hesitation. Our targets, your targets should – no – must die… forgive me, but I will neither forgive nor forget for the inability to complete this mission as I have commanded and punishment for such an offense will be severe.”
The man sighed and bowed even deeper than before staring hard at the dirt, burning a hole in the ground with his intensifying dislike of the current mission. Everything about this made him uneasy. He wondered what this woman was not telling him and what he must do… 16 years… only 16 years.
The woman turned back as the man stood, his head still bowed respectfully. She made a gesture that caused the man to lift his head and look directly at her. She pointed to a small hut on the side of the mountain behind him. His eyes, colorless, caught the light of the moon and absorbed it as they climbed the mountain and examined that quiet, peaceful residence of which he had no disapproval of before. There was no reflection from his eyes. There was no emotion and no color. The closest color to what those inhuman slits were was grey and that did not describe the intensity of emotion that shone through his orbs of abstracted desolation.
He blinked turning and waiting patiently and the woman spoke again, while giving her own small bow to the man before her “Good luck.” There was a burst of light and she was no longer there and what remained was a series of electrical sparks that passed between the trees of the forest as dancing lights that teased the man’s emotions.
He sighed, turning back to the mountainside. He took his time almost painfully drawing with his eyes the path up the side of the mountain that he was to take. How he wished he was somewhere else as he began his ascension of the mountain visually. His eyes crawled as slugs up that steep slope and dreaded every inch. He paused in thought upon the still restful lights of the small hut. He took a moment to sigh away his emotions and took a single step then more and followed the path he had traced with his eyes previously.
~*~*~*~*~
Kiseki sighed staring in awe as the older woman finished her story on an incredible inflection. The younger woman gave a huge smile and clapped a few times leaning forward on her seat. “That was fantastic! Did he really, Mother?” She said with great volume and enthusiasm.
Her long brown hair draped down to and flowed over her shoulders then down to the small of her back and her bright green eyes gave her an air of an ignorant though innocent and enviable child. She wore pink garments that seemed old as if she had worn them all her life. Her top was a loose silky garment that fluttered easily in the wind and at her waist she wore a thick silk skirt with many tediously woven layers stitched almost exclusively for this young girl. Around her neck was a dark tinted and also dirtied pink bow tightened to almost painful intensity.
Her Mother smiled broadly and nodded. She looked deep into her daughter’s sparkling eyes saying with intensity as the younger girl’s excitement grew “He most definitely did do that, my dear. And he regretted none of his actions!”
Kiseki gasped, clasping her hands to her chest and closing her eyes, almost sarcastically, as she imagined the actions of the young man. Things many young girls dream of.
The older woman continued to smile as her roughly chiseled features shown the delicate bone structure of her face that mirrored almost perfectly that of her daughter’s. Her seemingly frail form was covered in a thick, brilliantly colored kimono fit for an empress. However, years of wear and tear left the garment’s once radiant and vibrant colors dulled and the edges frayed. Her hair had been pulled back into a tight bun and was held by finely painted though also worn chopsticks. And her old icy blue eyes coupled with her withering features seemed to give an age that far exceeded the one that was her own.
When Kiseki opened her eyes her mother was still smiling though in her eyes it seemed her mohter's thoughts had strayed elsewhere. These stories often seemed to have an effect on her mother, almost as much of an effect as they had on Kiseki.
But the younger one chose to ignore it for now. She’d ask her mother sometime later.
As they sat, absorbing this moment of bliss, something in the mother’s eyes changed profoundly. She seemed to become shocked desperate and confused all at once. Kiseki blinked and eyed her questioningly but did not ask those questions until her mother finally leapt from her seat and raced to peer through the window behind where she sat. She glanced around outside a bit then backed away from the opening. Her features gave no hint to her emotions, however Kiseki could see in her eyes that something was wrong… something was very wrong.
She stood. “What is it, Mother? Is something wrong?” She took a step, then retreated as her mother stormed past in a flurry of agitation. She dropped to her hands and knees and began to feel around the wood planks on the floor, knocking on them occasionally. Kiseki was honestly beginning to think that her mother had gone mad when one of the planks she knocked on flew up and she pulled something from beneath it. The older woman stood without replacing the plank, brandishing a masterpiece of sword-smithing. A katana whose sheath was decorated finely with priceless metals that caught the dim lighting of the room and refracted it wonderfully nearly doubling the rooms overall luminosity. She turned to Kiseki and moved to the back room of the hut while making a motion for the younger one to follow.
The Mother tore down the bamboo flap separating to the two rooms. Kiseki asked those questions once more, but received no answer again. They walked quickly until reaching a small, unused doorway at the back of the hut but stopped behind the flap that covered the opening. Her mother paused and turned toward the young girl who was on the verge of shaking from confusion and fear. Mother took a deep breath and a chain from around her neck which was draped kindly over the shoulders of her child, while smiling a smile that tried to calm the confused and, now, inconsolable child before her. She placed a hand on her child’s head and rubbed her palm softly on her scalp, ruffling her hair and smiled sympathetically.
Then she began to speak and as she spoke she fastened the katana around her child, weaving the strap over her left shoulder and below her right. “Now Kiseki I want you to do something for me.”
“What? What’s going on, Mother? I don’t understand…”
“It’s alright. You don’t have to, my child. All you have to do is promise me…” She gazed intensely into her daughter’s eyes as she tightened the straps.
“Promise you what?” The stress she was sifting through was causing her eyes to water from anxiety and her chest was caving in from the weight of her worry. Her breath rate increased but her mother put a hand on her shoulder to calm her.
“Promise me that no matter what happens you will run. Run as fast as you can. No matter what happens, no matter what you hear, what you see. Just keep running and don’t stop no matter how tired you may get. And when you run out of stamina and can go on no longer, keep running. Don’t ever stop running.”
“But, why-?!”
She was cut off abruptly “Promise me.” Her tone and features were dead-serious.
Kiseki hesitated but answered, “…uh-y-yes..”
Her mother nodded and continued, pushing her a bit toward the doorway “Also, don’t run in a straight line for longer than five steps. Weave around the trees while keeping a set direction. And for now that direction should be north, after you hit the edge of the forest. Get to the trees first, then turn north, alright?”
The child was still hesitant but nodded. “And Kiseki, if you must, use those weapons that blade and the magic of that pendant.” The turquoise gem glinted a bit as if it knew it was being spoken of. The woman stepped closer to her child and draped her arms around young lady's shoulders. She sighed as Kiseki returned her embrace with conviction as if in desperate need for her mother’s arms. When she released her and pushed her toward the opening. “Go my child. I’ll see you once more in this lifetime… in one way or another, I promise. I'll see this through and find you, ok?” And with that she ushered for her child to flee and Kiseki took off into the night.
The old woman turned from the opening and returned from the front of the hut taking in a breath of anticipation as her will wavered. She could feel him approaching. She could feel his power. This would be the last night she was destined to see. The mother knew this and braced herself.
“Forgive my lie, Kiseki, my child.” She whispered sadly, smiling in irony at the path before her.
And now the man stood before the hut. The hut he dreaded to enter but knew he must. The woman within seemed to stare through the bamboo flap that covered the doorframe and in her hand she grasped her only weapon. Her magic circled her right wrist and in her hand formed a double pointed ice pike and her breath became visible. With another bit of her magic, in her left hand which she held, upturned, before her, she created many needles of ice which levitated above her palm then shot through the bamboo.
The man outside had already dodged them before they could even be thrown and crawled onto the roof of the hut. There he stood silent and waiting, waiting for nothing. The woman within slid her left foot before her, and smoothly fell into an experienced martial arts stance and brought her left had up before her in a guarding gesture. The man on top of the hut took a breath and with a great bit of force used his strength to crash through the roof of the building causing the it to cave in around him. Before there was time to think the woman had thrust her old form into the onslaught of dust and debris pulling her pike into a strong attack. He was already on his feet catching her pike in his right hand and twisting it over his shoulder using it to propel her over his shoulder with it. But the woman released her weapon and allowed him to do his useless maneuver and used this opening to plant a palm into his ribs with an echoing crack. He crumpled from the impact and stepped back, releasing the woman’s freezing weapon, flinging it in the air. She caught and spun it then drew it to her side and charged toward her enemy.
But the man had recovered from her attack and jumped back as the woman used well-placed swings to dismantle his defenses as all he could do is dodge for that brief moment. This continued for a bit before he finally found an opening as the woman foolishly lifted her pike too far; he caught it and gave his own blow to her ribcage. A bone broke and she stumbled backward, trying to recover but it was too late. He brought his other fist up, releasing her pike and it connected to the right side of her jaw with crushing force. She slid back but managed to keep her balance, wiping some crimson droplets from her chin.
For a moment both warriors paused, sizing each other up and catching their breath. After that brief second the male warrior charged and now the female was on the defensive dodging his attacks but all the while, she mumbled some incantation under her breath. The man jumped back and caught the full force of a devastating wind that distracted him long enough for her to come in for a deep cut with her pike. She carved a long slash into his right shoulder and shallowly across his chest. And with the power of the gale she had created with her magic, from that wound sprung a brilliant cluster of ice crystals that temporarily froze that side of his body. It wasn’t meant to be fatal just to cause much damage and subdue an enemy. It was a weak spell after all but a spell that drained quite a bit of the old woman’s power. She staggered back, weakened by her efforts.
She breathed in heavily. She needed to stall and weaken him for as much and as long as possible, but this… She was not capable of keeping this up for very long. This man was very fast and far better than she. She swayed a bit in her weakness. For whatever she had hoped, it was nil for that second that she took to catch her breath and recover was the second the man had attacked, grabbing a knife from his waist and while knocking her against a wall, drove that blade through her. He glared at the woman keeping what intensity he had not lost in his emotions and this battle.
The woman appeared to be in deep pain as she stared down at the dark red liquid that poured from her abdomen, dripping from the edge of the silver blade, the warrior had chosen to conceal until now. She coughed, spurting blood across the floor and the man’s hand. He withdrew his blade, stepping from her form as it keeled over. She wished to scream but did not, knowing that such a cry would distract and slow Kiseki. And that was something she wanted less than to meet her demise at that moment. But, now the latter was now inescapable. Her vision became unclear but she groped from the man’s ankle as she collapsed into a dieing heap on the floor. Her blind grasps were easily avoided by the skilled and relatively unharmed warrior. He stared sentimentally down at the pathetic woman, grasping desperately for the one who had ended her. It wrenched his insides to watch something so terrible and he fled out the back of the hut as fast as possible wincing and holding his wounded shoulder.
~*~*~*~*~
Kiseki ran toward the sanctity of the forest. Was that some one in the trees? Or just a gust of wind? She forced herself to look straight and charged headlong into the line of concealing trees. She ran as fast she could, forcing herself to not look back. She ran straight for a bit before she remember her mother’s words and wove in-between and around the trees as she sprinted north.
It was a while before she was sure of an odd feeling she had acquired. She could not hear anything other than her footsteps and panting but she could feel the presence of some one else nearby. She just knew some one was following her. Behind her she heard an incredible crash that resounded throughout the entire valley. She wanted to stop but she heard her mothers words before she could and ducked her head to enshadow her eyes and ran on, barely keeping track of where she was in the forest. Desperate and short of breath, worried and ashamed, she ran faster.
Now she could hear it, they were light though fast footsteps that tapped lightly from tree to tree, right over her. Wherever she went, they followed. For several minutes she ran, she wove through the trees, faster and faster, all the time aware of that second presence. Finally the feet leapt from the branches of the trees and connected with a soft thud and crunch to the dried, crackling leaves on the floor of the forest and pursued her from their. The pace quickened. It was fast, too fast. She could hear him as he drew some kind of blade. She tried her hardest to run faster, but it was no use. And before she knew it a hand had grabbed the back of her shirt and jerked her backward but she pulled away just in time to dodge a stabbing motion from his wakizashi. She swung around and looked back at him. A stupid mistake. Disregarding his previous error he took a slash aimed for her throat. She pulled back but the blade caught her across the chest and in doing so severed the chain around her throat, which the girl was oblivious to. It was a shallow cut compared to what it could have been but still did quite a bit of damage. She staggered back into a tree and as she sunk to the floor, gasping and wide-eyed, another slash came toward her face but… for some reason the warrior hesitated.
She was puzzled but realized, panting desperately, that she had an opportunity and scrambled, stumbling, to her feet and took off again, a stream of blood blowing past her shoulders, making a line that tailed a few inches behind her, through the trees. She coughed, her eyes watering from the pain of panic and guilt coupled with the pain from her mew wound. In her blind and furious desperation she tripped over a vine and fell, catching a deep gash across her right cheek from a sharp, low-hanging branch. Her breath stuttered in whimpers of pain but she stood again and did her best to run again, now with the following foot steps behind her again.
She became a bit light-headed. Too much blood loss. This time the pursuer shoved a fore-arm into her back, pushing her down. He pinned her, face down and raised his sword to strike, but she drew her own weapon and in a desperate and blind movement, swiped at her attacker with that sword which found nothing as the warrior leapt from his victim’s back. He cursed and raced at her again as she stood and turned toward him. He took another strike but the girl pulled up her sword to defend herself and their blades crossed. For a moment in that struggle, she caught a glimpse of the boys face but it would be a while before she registered what she had seen. Still, the boy was much stronger than her and he managed to shove her sword aside with his and in doing so slice into her right cheek so that a cross-shaped cut formed from that slash and the cut from the branch.
Kiseki moaned in agony. She brought her blade up again, though, as the warrior came in for a low cut. She closed her eyes, afraid to see what was to come and emitted a shrill and desperate scream as if her call would summon some other person to her aid but there was no one, there never was. But as her scream subsided another call, some one else's seared through her ears and when she opened her eyes again, the warrior was before her, moaning and covering his eyes as if he had lost all sight. She blinked and turned to run off into the forest, though by now she was so exhausted, she would not get far and yet somehow she did. Her pace was far slower than before but was enough to carry her far away from where she had been. Many hours passed before she finally gave up. The forest was endless, her endeavors were hopeless and pointless.
She dropped to her knees then crumpled to the floor of the forest and stared, crying as puddles formed around her. It had begun to rain, as if in response and understanding of Kiseki’s own tears that night and she spoke. Her voice was soft and somehow undisturbed by the events. He words were a lulling emotionless drum. “Mother… I’m sorry… I deserve to die… … … Father…How I wish you were here…”
The rain drummed on pooling with her blood and everything in the forest, churning, blurred together before it all went black and Kiseki rested…
~End Chapter 1~
-----------------------
So freakin' tell me what you think... *dies from lack of sleep* (XD)
love
dani
dude
ok... I'll just shutup and let you read...Hope you like reading cause you're about to do a lot of it! X3
A Cursed Blessing
Part 1
Chapter 1:
Arrival
In the fields, bathed in the light of the shining moon, stood vague figures of the night; two beings conversing of some sinister exploit at the very edge of a dense forest. A peccant deed they were to perform that night; a deed that breathed death onto the silent mountain that stood to the East of where the scheming pair had positioned themselves as they conversed of their final orders and preparations for everything to transpire that night.
Kneeling before his master, a man in dark, almost colorless Gi pants and a torn, ragged and dirtied white shirt gave his regards of protest to some order given.
“…you will not assist us, malady?” He said quietly, both worried and curious.
“No,” The other replied. Her voice was cool silky articulate, and had a very subtly seductive hint to it. “I have matters to attend to in Edo. You will have to be diligent and patient in your duties tonight.”
The figure before him turned from the forest and faced the servant that belonged to her. She sighed drawing her narrow blue eye to the man’s bowing head and stared at his stooping form with an odd and somewhat frightening combination of sympathy and superiority. As she turned from the awe-inspiring darkness of the trees the moonlight flashed a glimpse of this sturdy woman whose strength shown through the dark blue, stretchy material that conformed almost perfectly to her near-perfectly sculpted form. Around her neck hung a strap of clothing that stretched over and about her chest tightly, in a crossed shape in both front and back, tied at the nape of her neck. Aside from her suit, her other garments were and had oddities quite their own. Around her waist was an incredibly thick leather looking belt and from it hung a free-flowing chain-link skirt. Her boots looked rubber with the top of both the backs and fronts of each, were what appeared to be pieces of copper in the shape of bolts of lightening. And in the space between her neck and thighs, levitating and spinning around her were two gold rings, held to her by some unseen force. Her hair was short, dark, sleek, straight and hung, barely an inch from her shoulders. Except for two locks that dangled in front down to her collar bone with whitened tips.
The woman turned again and gazed into and through the forest before her. She spoke in transparent and lilted notes that were distant and almost inaudible. “I know how difficult it is with Kozuka’s age and both yours and his great sympathy, however this time, there can be no exceptions. No sympathy. No hesitation. Our targets, your targets should – no – must die… forgive me, but I will neither forgive nor forget for the inability to complete this mission as I have commanded and punishment for such an offense will be severe.”
The man sighed and bowed even deeper than before staring hard at the dirt, burning a hole in the ground with his intensifying dislike of the current mission. Everything about this made him uneasy. He wondered what this woman was not telling him and what he must do… 16 years… only 16 years.
The woman turned back as the man stood, his head still bowed respectfully. She made a gesture that caused the man to lift his head and look directly at her. She pointed to a small hut on the side of the mountain behind him. His eyes, colorless, caught the light of the moon and absorbed it as they climbed the mountain and examined that quiet, peaceful residence of which he had no disapproval of before. There was no reflection from his eyes. There was no emotion and no color. The closest color to what those inhuman slits were was grey and that did not describe the intensity of emotion that shone through his orbs of abstracted desolation.
He blinked turning and waiting patiently and the woman spoke again, while giving her own small bow to the man before her “Good luck.” There was a burst of light and she was no longer there and what remained was a series of electrical sparks that passed between the trees of the forest as dancing lights that teased the man’s emotions.
He sighed, turning back to the mountainside. He took his time almost painfully drawing with his eyes the path up the side of the mountain that he was to take. How he wished he was somewhere else as he began his ascension of the mountain visually. His eyes crawled as slugs up that steep slope and dreaded every inch. He paused in thought upon the still restful lights of the small hut. He took a moment to sigh away his emotions and took a single step then more and followed the path he had traced with his eyes previously.
~*~*~*~*~
Kiseki sighed staring in awe as the older woman finished her story on an incredible inflection. The younger woman gave a huge smile and clapped a few times leaning forward on her seat. “That was fantastic! Did he really, Mother?” She said with great volume and enthusiasm.
Her long brown hair draped down to and flowed over her shoulders then down to the small of her back and her bright green eyes gave her an air of an ignorant though innocent and enviable child. She wore pink garments that seemed old as if she had worn them all her life. Her top was a loose silky garment that fluttered easily in the wind and at her waist she wore a thick silk skirt with many tediously woven layers stitched almost exclusively for this young girl. Around her neck was a dark tinted and also dirtied pink bow tightened to almost painful intensity.
Her Mother smiled broadly and nodded. She looked deep into her daughter’s sparkling eyes saying with intensity as the younger girl’s excitement grew “He most definitely did do that, my dear. And he regretted none of his actions!”
Kiseki gasped, clasping her hands to her chest and closing her eyes, almost sarcastically, as she imagined the actions of the young man. Things many young girls dream of.
The older woman continued to smile as her roughly chiseled features shown the delicate bone structure of her face that mirrored almost perfectly that of her daughter’s. Her seemingly frail form was covered in a thick, brilliantly colored kimono fit for an empress. However, years of wear and tear left the garment’s once radiant and vibrant colors dulled and the edges frayed. Her hair had been pulled back into a tight bun and was held by finely painted though also worn chopsticks. And her old icy blue eyes coupled with her withering features seemed to give an age that far exceeded the one that was her own.
When Kiseki opened her eyes her mother was still smiling though in her eyes it seemed her mohter's thoughts had strayed elsewhere. These stories often seemed to have an effect on her mother, almost as much of an effect as they had on Kiseki.
But the younger one chose to ignore it for now. She’d ask her mother sometime later.
As they sat, absorbing this moment of bliss, something in the mother’s eyes changed profoundly. She seemed to become shocked desperate and confused all at once. Kiseki blinked and eyed her questioningly but did not ask those questions until her mother finally leapt from her seat and raced to peer through the window behind where she sat. She glanced around outside a bit then backed away from the opening. Her features gave no hint to her emotions, however Kiseki could see in her eyes that something was wrong… something was very wrong.
She stood. “What is it, Mother? Is something wrong?” She took a step, then retreated as her mother stormed past in a flurry of agitation. She dropped to her hands and knees and began to feel around the wood planks on the floor, knocking on them occasionally. Kiseki was honestly beginning to think that her mother had gone mad when one of the planks she knocked on flew up and she pulled something from beneath it. The older woman stood without replacing the plank, brandishing a masterpiece of sword-smithing. A katana whose sheath was decorated finely with priceless metals that caught the dim lighting of the room and refracted it wonderfully nearly doubling the rooms overall luminosity. She turned to Kiseki and moved to the back room of the hut while making a motion for the younger one to follow.
The Mother tore down the bamboo flap separating to the two rooms. Kiseki asked those questions once more, but received no answer again. They walked quickly until reaching a small, unused doorway at the back of the hut but stopped behind the flap that covered the opening. Her mother paused and turned toward the young girl who was on the verge of shaking from confusion and fear. Mother took a deep breath and a chain from around her neck which was draped kindly over the shoulders of her child, while smiling a smile that tried to calm the confused and, now, inconsolable child before her. She placed a hand on her child’s head and rubbed her palm softly on her scalp, ruffling her hair and smiled sympathetically.
Then she began to speak and as she spoke she fastened the katana around her child, weaving the strap over her left shoulder and below her right. “Now Kiseki I want you to do something for me.”
“What? What’s going on, Mother? I don’t understand…”
“It’s alright. You don’t have to, my child. All you have to do is promise me…” She gazed intensely into her daughter’s eyes as she tightened the straps.
“Promise you what?” The stress she was sifting through was causing her eyes to water from anxiety and her chest was caving in from the weight of her worry. Her breath rate increased but her mother put a hand on her shoulder to calm her.
“Promise me that no matter what happens you will run. Run as fast as you can. No matter what happens, no matter what you hear, what you see. Just keep running and don’t stop no matter how tired you may get. And when you run out of stamina and can go on no longer, keep running. Don’t ever stop running.”
“But, why-?!”
She was cut off abruptly “Promise me.” Her tone and features were dead-serious.
Kiseki hesitated but answered, “…uh-y-yes..”
Her mother nodded and continued, pushing her a bit toward the doorway “Also, don’t run in a straight line for longer than five steps. Weave around the trees while keeping a set direction. And for now that direction should be north, after you hit the edge of the forest. Get to the trees first, then turn north, alright?”
The child was still hesitant but nodded. “And Kiseki, if you must, use those weapons that blade and the magic of that pendant.” The turquoise gem glinted a bit as if it knew it was being spoken of. The woman stepped closer to her child and draped her arms around young lady's shoulders. She sighed as Kiseki returned her embrace with conviction as if in desperate need for her mother’s arms. When she released her and pushed her toward the opening. “Go my child. I’ll see you once more in this lifetime… in one way or another, I promise. I'll see this through and find you, ok?” And with that she ushered for her child to flee and Kiseki took off into the night.
The old woman turned from the opening and returned from the front of the hut taking in a breath of anticipation as her will wavered. She could feel him approaching. She could feel his power. This would be the last night she was destined to see. The mother knew this and braced herself.
“Forgive my lie, Kiseki, my child.” She whispered sadly, smiling in irony at the path before her.
And now the man stood before the hut. The hut he dreaded to enter but knew he must. The woman within seemed to stare through the bamboo flap that covered the doorframe and in her hand she grasped her only weapon. Her magic circled her right wrist and in her hand formed a double pointed ice pike and her breath became visible. With another bit of her magic, in her left hand which she held, upturned, before her, she created many needles of ice which levitated above her palm then shot through the bamboo.
The man outside had already dodged them before they could even be thrown and crawled onto the roof of the hut. There he stood silent and waiting, waiting for nothing. The woman within slid her left foot before her, and smoothly fell into an experienced martial arts stance and brought her left had up before her in a guarding gesture. The man on top of the hut took a breath and with a great bit of force used his strength to crash through the roof of the building causing the it to cave in around him. Before there was time to think the woman had thrust her old form into the onslaught of dust and debris pulling her pike into a strong attack. He was already on his feet catching her pike in his right hand and twisting it over his shoulder using it to propel her over his shoulder with it. But the woman released her weapon and allowed him to do his useless maneuver and used this opening to plant a palm into his ribs with an echoing crack. He crumpled from the impact and stepped back, releasing the woman’s freezing weapon, flinging it in the air. She caught and spun it then drew it to her side and charged toward her enemy.
But the man had recovered from her attack and jumped back as the woman used well-placed swings to dismantle his defenses as all he could do is dodge for that brief moment. This continued for a bit before he finally found an opening as the woman foolishly lifted her pike too far; he caught it and gave his own blow to her ribcage. A bone broke and she stumbled backward, trying to recover but it was too late. He brought his other fist up, releasing her pike and it connected to the right side of her jaw with crushing force. She slid back but managed to keep her balance, wiping some crimson droplets from her chin.
For a moment both warriors paused, sizing each other up and catching their breath. After that brief second the male warrior charged and now the female was on the defensive dodging his attacks but all the while, she mumbled some incantation under her breath. The man jumped back and caught the full force of a devastating wind that distracted him long enough for her to come in for a deep cut with her pike. She carved a long slash into his right shoulder and shallowly across his chest. And with the power of the gale she had created with her magic, from that wound sprung a brilliant cluster of ice crystals that temporarily froze that side of his body. It wasn’t meant to be fatal just to cause much damage and subdue an enemy. It was a weak spell after all but a spell that drained quite a bit of the old woman’s power. She staggered back, weakened by her efforts.
She breathed in heavily. She needed to stall and weaken him for as much and as long as possible, but this… She was not capable of keeping this up for very long. This man was very fast and far better than she. She swayed a bit in her weakness. For whatever she had hoped, it was nil for that second that she took to catch her breath and recover was the second the man had attacked, grabbing a knife from his waist and while knocking her against a wall, drove that blade through her. He glared at the woman keeping what intensity he had not lost in his emotions and this battle.
The woman appeared to be in deep pain as she stared down at the dark red liquid that poured from her abdomen, dripping from the edge of the silver blade, the warrior had chosen to conceal until now. She coughed, spurting blood across the floor and the man’s hand. He withdrew his blade, stepping from her form as it keeled over. She wished to scream but did not, knowing that such a cry would distract and slow Kiseki. And that was something she wanted less than to meet her demise at that moment. But, now the latter was now inescapable. Her vision became unclear but she groped from the man’s ankle as she collapsed into a dieing heap on the floor. Her blind grasps were easily avoided by the skilled and relatively unharmed warrior. He stared sentimentally down at the pathetic woman, grasping desperately for the one who had ended her. It wrenched his insides to watch something so terrible and he fled out the back of the hut as fast as possible wincing and holding his wounded shoulder.
~*~*~*~*~
Kiseki ran toward the sanctity of the forest. Was that some one in the trees? Or just a gust of wind? She forced herself to look straight and charged headlong into the line of concealing trees. She ran as fast she could, forcing herself to not look back. She ran straight for a bit before she remember her mother’s words and wove in-between and around the trees as she sprinted north.
It was a while before she was sure of an odd feeling she had acquired. She could not hear anything other than her footsteps and panting but she could feel the presence of some one else nearby. She just knew some one was following her. Behind her she heard an incredible crash that resounded throughout the entire valley. She wanted to stop but she heard her mothers words before she could and ducked her head to enshadow her eyes and ran on, barely keeping track of where she was in the forest. Desperate and short of breath, worried and ashamed, she ran faster.
Now she could hear it, they were light though fast footsteps that tapped lightly from tree to tree, right over her. Wherever she went, they followed. For several minutes she ran, she wove through the trees, faster and faster, all the time aware of that second presence. Finally the feet leapt from the branches of the trees and connected with a soft thud and crunch to the dried, crackling leaves on the floor of the forest and pursued her from their. The pace quickened. It was fast, too fast. She could hear him as he drew some kind of blade. She tried her hardest to run faster, but it was no use. And before she knew it a hand had grabbed the back of her shirt and jerked her backward but she pulled away just in time to dodge a stabbing motion from his wakizashi. She swung around and looked back at him. A stupid mistake. Disregarding his previous error he took a slash aimed for her throat. She pulled back but the blade caught her across the chest and in doing so severed the chain around her throat, which the girl was oblivious to. It was a shallow cut compared to what it could have been but still did quite a bit of damage. She staggered back into a tree and as she sunk to the floor, gasping and wide-eyed, another slash came toward her face but… for some reason the warrior hesitated.
She was puzzled but realized, panting desperately, that she had an opportunity and scrambled, stumbling, to her feet and took off again, a stream of blood blowing past her shoulders, making a line that tailed a few inches behind her, through the trees. She coughed, her eyes watering from the pain of panic and guilt coupled with the pain from her mew wound. In her blind and furious desperation she tripped over a vine and fell, catching a deep gash across her right cheek from a sharp, low-hanging branch. Her breath stuttered in whimpers of pain but she stood again and did her best to run again, now with the following foot steps behind her again.
She became a bit light-headed. Too much blood loss. This time the pursuer shoved a fore-arm into her back, pushing her down. He pinned her, face down and raised his sword to strike, but she drew her own weapon and in a desperate and blind movement, swiped at her attacker with that sword which found nothing as the warrior leapt from his victim’s back. He cursed and raced at her again as she stood and turned toward him. He took another strike but the girl pulled up her sword to defend herself and their blades crossed. For a moment in that struggle, she caught a glimpse of the boys face but it would be a while before she registered what she had seen. Still, the boy was much stronger than her and he managed to shove her sword aside with his and in doing so slice into her right cheek so that a cross-shaped cut formed from that slash and the cut from the branch.
Kiseki moaned in agony. She brought her blade up again, though, as the warrior came in for a low cut. She closed her eyes, afraid to see what was to come and emitted a shrill and desperate scream as if her call would summon some other person to her aid but there was no one, there never was. But as her scream subsided another call, some one else's seared through her ears and when she opened her eyes again, the warrior was before her, moaning and covering his eyes as if he had lost all sight. She blinked and turned to run off into the forest, though by now she was so exhausted, she would not get far and yet somehow she did. Her pace was far slower than before but was enough to carry her far away from where she had been. Many hours passed before she finally gave up. The forest was endless, her endeavors were hopeless and pointless.
She dropped to her knees then crumpled to the floor of the forest and stared, crying as puddles formed around her. It had begun to rain, as if in response and understanding of Kiseki’s own tears that night and she spoke. Her voice was soft and somehow undisturbed by the events. He words were a lulling emotionless drum. “Mother… I’m sorry… I deserve to die… … … Father…How I wish you were here…”
The rain drummed on pooling with her blood and everything in the forest, churning, blurred together before it all went black and Kiseki rested…
~End Chapter 1~
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So freakin' tell me what you think... *dies from lack of sleep* (XD)
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