Kaoru stared at him opened mouthed, but she could feel the drum of his Ki around her and she gulped. It was ready to go out and feed. Kaoru wondered if his gift feed off the deaths around him and she suddenly remembered Sano mentioning him getting stronger by feeding off the death of the Bakumatsu. She could feel the linger blood on the ground here…it had only been ten years and she could still feel it. Kaoru raised her eyes to his face, confused. "What happened here?"
He looked slightly startled before his eyes flicked around and a smile tugged at the corner of his mouth. "The fifth division of the Shinsengumi died here." His tone was amused. "They got in my way."
Kaoru hesitated and then licked her lips. "I never understood why you choose to fight for the Ishinshishi."
Kenshin gave her a sharp glance and then the corner of his mouth curled up. "It's simple really. They were the underdog, and while I could have cared less who would have won, the Shogun's targets were hardly out in the open. With them I could slaughter at will and once I had built up the reputation I wanted; they wanted me to slaughter." A dangerous smile curved along his mouth. "If the Shogun could have offered me more death or the single rights to kill that the Ishinshishi did, I would have fought for them just as easily. There was an added benefit I hadn't expected. With all this talk of "peace" and "no swords" in a few years Japan will be helpless against our kind. No more samurai's with there ability to sense Ki. I am sure some will keep up the old traditions but most of the population will be mine for the taking." His voice was dark with shadow and amused satisfaction and Kaoru shivered.
"You have half a candle mark to pick a target." Kenshin informed her, turning to look at her with all the shadow in his eyes. "I already have mine picked out and marked. That is your last warning."
Kaoru licked her lips and turned to the crowd, her heart hammering in her ears. Her teeth were biting down hard on her bottom lip and it took her long deep breathes to ignore the blessed stillness behind her. She wanted to go and crawl into his chest and irked her. Badly. What she really should want to be doing was taking a stake and driving it into his heart for making her do this. She didn't know how long she stood there, her eyes flicking back and forth, side to side, before she finally found something that might work. She knew, without knowing, that if she picked something horrendous then Kenshin was going to hand her the body of a fresh young girl. She was going to have to eat something…healthy; like a child drank milk. That sent a shudder down her spine. It was a girl, and that ate at her stomach, but she was depressed and dangerously so. Her bearing suggested that she was going to take her own life within a matter of hours, and while Kaoru couldn't say how she knew this, she did know that that girl would die a lot less painfully at her fangs than by ramming herself with her father's katana. Or however she planned on killing herself.
"Good choice." His breath feathered in her ear. "She is strong and healthy. You need all the energy you can get after last week."
Kaoru turned and glared up at him. "She is going to kill herself anyway." Kaoru couldn't stop the twinge of pain in her voice and he gave her a look.
"You're going to have to learn to move without being scene." There was an edge of disgust in his voice. "Move through their blind spots, use your gift to manipulate how they see you. You control their emotions. Make them believe that you are unimportant."
Kaoru licked her lips. "That's impossible."
He gave her a hard glance. "I mean it. Imagine what it would be like if all those people were under you, couldn't see you, and for damn sure couldn't touch you." He waited until she looked like she was complying before pressing a hand to the small of her back and shoving her forward. "If you want to eat, little bird, you will manipulate your gift to cover a broad space. Through the shields, and if you don't, you will not eat until you figure it out." His tone was flat and hard. "Go get your dinner."
Kaoru stumbled into the crowd after his hand settled into the small of her back and then shoved her into the walking people. As she stumbled she reached for both the instincts she had learned as a human and the gift that writhed under her skin. It danced up and she struggled to make it understand what she wanted, what she needed.
It twisted out of her like ribbons of fire, the dancing of colorful fabric in a summer's sweet wind. However, as she struggled, beads of sweat falling down her forehead in small droplet of water, she was ignored by the people around her.
Kaoru stared at the girl who was glaring at the flower stand. How on earth was she supposed to do this? She didn't understand this whole mind control concept and she didn't understand, Kaoru paused mid thought. Chewing on her bottom lip for a moment she sent out a tentative trailer and attempted to remember how Enishi had entered her mind. He didn't use the same approach Kenshin did, but he had used something that was a cold echo of her gift; so if hers was an emotional level of Enishi's.
Kaoru was sweating profusely by the time the girl moved and seemed to drift into the alley, her expression blank and cold. Kaoru licked her lip before following. Kaoru felt something sick lurch in her stomach and Kenshin’s words only made it worse.
“Good. That was unexpected, but I will teach you a few different ways next time.” Something in his tone told her he was satisfied by something. “However, you’re going to have to kill her. Here is how it works. You will drink until you feel the slight change in blood, it becomes sweeter, and then you will be able to feel her life-force snap. I promise, no matter what the gift, all vampires feel it. Some, more than others.” There was a hint of satisfaction in his voice. “Let me know how you do absorbing her death.”
Kaoru gave him a horrified look, and he smirked at her before slashing open the girls neck so she could smell the blood her body had been starving for. Kaoru gave him a furious glance but walked over and bit down and drank deeply. She didn’t know how long she drank but Kenshin was right the blood did start to taste richer and then…
Kaoru dropped the girl like a sack of rice and stumbled backwards. If she hadn’t crashed into Kenshin she would have landed hard. His hands caught her arms firmly and he whipped her around to glare at her. Kaoru gave a gasp struggled to breath past the sensation of her own lungs and heart shutting down. Struggling past the feeling she barely recognized the feel of his wrist against her lips but she bit down on reflex, and most likely an impulse sent by Kenshin. As soon as the warm blood touched her tongue it was immediately easier to breath and the feeling of suffocating and struggling through the ink ended. It took another warm mouthful to make herself let go and then she stumbled into the wall and slid down it while he stared at her with a cold expression on his face. Kaoru ignored him and tucked her knees to her chest and fought against the tears that were gathering behind her eyes.
He said nothing, and for that Kaoru was thankful. The girl was on the ground gasping for air, and Kaoru knew, her stomach churning, that she was struggling to breathe as well. There was the sound of a katana unsheathing and then the girl was quite. Kaoru was also thankful he was strong enough not to cause the thud that happened with steel hit bone. She was suddenly dragged upwards and a pair of hands were grasping her forearms and steadying her as she looked upwards.
“Pull yourself together.” He ordered quietly. “I am shielding you again. Next time we will see if that happens when I shield you from her death. You will learn to hunt on your own. I cannot, will not, continuously hunt for you.”
Kaoru swallowed hard, the rush of his blood in her mouth so much more addicting than the taste of the girl. She nodded slowly, attempting to bring up her hands to wipe at her cheeks. He didn’t wipe her tears away from her face, but he did hand her a piece of cloth. “Clean yourself up.” He ordered quietly before turning away from her. “I killed the girl, so I won’t need to feed. Were heading back. I will deal with this when we get back.”
Kaoru stared his back helplessly for a moment before she followed, attempting to figure out what the cause of the steady pulse of whatever it was burning in him from the inside was.
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Megumi quietly went over all the herbs and bandages that she had on stock in the Aoiya. Her hands moved with practiced ease as her mind drifted to other places. Batts was back in town. She had felt the change in the air two days ago when he stepped back on the soil. After healing him for the ten years she had been attuned to his presence. She had felt the moment that he began to absorb darkness echoing along lines of power that criss-crossed along Kyoto that always held an echo of him. She doubted that there was a dark alley that he hadn’t used his dark gift, taught it to kill; taught himself control.
“Collecting herbs?” Sano’s mocking drawl echoed in the almost empty room. Megumi allowed her eyes to slid shut and taped down on the rising emotion in her. Part of her wanted her to be furious at him, wanted to give a scathing remark; she had gotten good at those. Another part rippled in hurt and frustration and that was the part she attempted to mentally destroy.
“You shouldn’t bite the hand that heals you.” She returned carelessly. She kept her expression carefully neutral and she turned and looked at him. “I don’t have any oath that says I must put you back together when Battousai leaves you in small bite sized pieces.”
Sano’s mouth curled into a mocking smile. “Because I insulted his pretty little play thing.”
That hurt. Megumi took a deep breath and laughed her voice harsh. “You know nothing of it; and I think it’s time you leave.”
He stepped closer. “Why,” he demanded his tone careless and frosty. “Soujiro is back on his feet, completely healed. You don’t seem to be doing anything important. Why should I leave?”
Megumi pushed everything back into its compartment carelessly, promising herself she would be back to organize it later. Instead she went to move around him. His hand snapped out and caught her wrist. It wasn’t a painful hold and it scent little sparks of need flaring down her wrist at the contact. His brown eyes were moody at they met her startled ruby eyes. “So you know to.”
Megumi jerked out of his hand and left as dignified as her retreat could give her and locked herself in her room. She clamped her hands over her ears so she wouldn’t have to listen to his footsteps walk away or possibly; his voice telling her to let him in. He was almost her enemy. His animosity towards Batts was noticeable enough to her and she had no formal training. Now that…Kaoru was here, he would probably be dragging her around the corners of Japan. This was a relief, but he would demand her where he could keep in contact with her and there was no way she was going to escape him.
Sano….Sano was the opposite of the nightmare she had learned to live with. He was passionate, hot-headed, reckless, and just a notch distracting. Kenshin’s passion was a cold passion, his movements deliberate to extract that most pain possible from his victims, and she feared him more than she did anything. She had seen the way Kaoru fought against him, both tooth and nail and gift and fang; had seen the way he watched her from his lashes. He had never offered to take her battles, never taught her to fight, and only kept her alive because she was necessary to him.
Now Sano had come along and he…
Megumi pressed her lips together. It wasn’t going to happen and she wasn’t going to think about it. Sanosuke Sagara would never see her as more than Kenshin’s “plaything” and she would never attempt to make him see otherwise. Soujiro had headed out that morning to start tracking down Enishi, after Aoshi has reinforced the mental blocks that Enishi had torn though like butter. Aoshi was the oldest Vampire Megumi knew, and while Kenshin was death and dangerous; there was little Aoshi didn’t know something about. He and Misao would make a good couple; as good as there kind could be. She didn’t hate Misao, even for the scares she still bore, but she would never feel anything towards her besides cold anger.
Megumi opened the door and went back to her herbs. If Kenshin was as determined to kill Enishi and anyone he was connected with; as he had been to destroy Shishio, then there was going to be a lot of dead bodies.
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Kaoru had followed Kenshin back to their house. She was quite on the way back, careful to shield her thoughts in that curious shadow that was in her mind. Part of her feared that the shadow had something to do with Kenshin and his endless darkness, but he never turned, never wavered; and Kenshin would never offer her the comfort of her thoughts deep in himself.
It had to be something else. She just didn’t know what it was. Just that it was quite and safe from the tremulous backlash of her own emotions. That was worth more than anything else that anyone could give her, and since she had found it during the agonizing moments of feeling the girls death pool in her own lungs, she hid there.
He said not a word as he led them to the bedroom. He didn’t pause or say a single world to the woman who opened the door and who closed it behind them. Instead he moved to the window and uttered a word that seemed to echo and bit and the room seemed a bit darker as the shades fell into place. He still didn’t look at her as he calmly turned to her. Only once he had pinned her under those moon-glow eyes did he say anything.
“Tell me what happened.”
Kaoru stared at him for long moments before she took strength from that quiet shadow. “I do not want to talk about it.” Her voice was quite in the room. Quiet because she didn’t fill the room with her words the way he did. Quite because there was a deathly silence after her spoke declaration.
“Don’t want to talk about it,” his voice was low with temper and he moved forward, a whisper soft glow of predator silk. “I don’t remember giving you a choice about it.”
Kaoru’s chin rose. “You will not bully me.”
Her back hit the wall with enough force to jar her as her teeth clacked together painfully. Once her body recovered from the abrupt change of direction, she had no choice but to meet the darkness in his eyes with her own fire. As always her gift sprang to her command without her thought and his eyes narrowed and she felt as he pulled away his shields, all but the last, leaving her disoriented and dizzy.
“If you wish to use your gift against me, Kaoru,” he breathed in her ear, “you’re going to have to learn to control them yourself.”
It writhed under her skin like a living thing and his grip on her arms tightened a fraction as if something surprised him.
“Now, you will tell me what happened.”
Without his control keeping her wild gift tame it reacted violently. The emotions, the sensations, of drowning in her own blood, the blackness that reached up to swallow her, flared in her blood an pressed into him from there connection. He went still, as if he was unable to move, and she struggled against the sensations of an emotional death that had started on the inside of her gut and rushed into the black-hole that was his gift.
“Stop,” he ordered her fiercely, catching her jaw and meeting her eyes with his. “Leave it.”
Kaoru felt bile rising in her throat and he shifted the palm of his hands so that they were pressed against her bare skin of her neck. The contact soothed some part of her, but her gift flared at him until she went blind with it, and then it was over. She was standing with her hands pressed into the gap of his Gi, her cheek resting against him. His hands were on her arms, but were loose now. He made no move to hold her or move her, so she stayed there for a moment, breathing against his skin and absorbing the cold feeling of silence that was so calming that came off him in waves.
“How interesting.” With her ear against his chest she could almost breathe again. Her gift was still there, still un-caged, but it seemed to be alright now and wasn’t attempting to leap from her skin like a mad, wild thing. “How very interesting. I wonder, little bird, if you’re away of what you just did.”
Kaoru raised her eyes to his face a breathed in and out. “What,” her voice was raspy. “Are you talking about?”
“You just gave me the feelings you were feeling at the time.” His voice was calm and slightly amused. “Your gift took the emotion of death, turned it into a living, breathing memory, and you shoved it into me like I was filter.” There was an edge to his voice.
Kaoru swallowed. “I…”
His fingers came to trace her jaw line and there was an edge in his eyes that could almost have been violence. But he made no move to strike her or hurt her. Instead his eyes churned, gleaming with something else instead.
“I will want to see how far this will get me.” There was an edge of thoughtfulness that edged in his voice that scared her. Her gut clenched and his mouth curved into a dark smile.
The knock on the door was her saving grace.
“Sorry, my Master. You apprentice is here.”
Kenshin moved away from her and moved downstairs. She was forced to follow.
Soujiro was waiting for them. He had bowed low to Kaoru and then given his report, maintaining his half bow. It had surprised her when they had been told they had a visitor and that she had been included in on the conversation. The wording had been clipped and she had the impression that Soujiro was recovering from sort of chest wound and decided to ask Misao about it later.
“I have a lead on Yukishiro.” Soujiro quietly informed his Master. “Shinomori-san thinks he can track him through the residue he leaves in the minds of those who he controls for even a short period of time. Accused him of being sloppy. He wished to know if you wanted us to report back what we find and come hunting with us tonight or if you would prefer to come now.”
“Meet me at the Aoiya tonight.” Kenshin said firmly. “There are things I must take care of first.” There was a note of dismissal in his voice and then Soujiro rose from his position and Kaoru caught a fluttering of pain as he straitened and then left.
He turned to her and gave her a dark look. “Go get cleaned up. You’re staying at the Aoiya tonight with Misao. I don’t have the time to teach you to keep up your shields. She is the next best to teach you. When you’re ready for me to lower the shields, I am sure you can figure out how to contact me.” There was a hard edge to his voice and Kaoru had the gut instinct that in order to contact him, in the way she thought he was suggesting, that she was going to have to give something of herself up first.
That was the way it always seemed to be with this man.
As she went to bath and change out of the bloody Kimono, she wondered if this was how the rest of her life, which was now a very long life, was going to be.
She would learn how to control her gift. Then, this would end.
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