Kaoru awoke to the knowledge that some had happened, and that it involved Kenshin. It wasn’t the warm, fluttery feeling she had gotten as a child. Instead it was the dark and twisted emotions that she had been discovering since this entire ordeal with Kenshin had started. It felt like the rasp of his tongue on a raw cut; the quicksilver movement of his fingers. Whatever he had done, the side of her that was rapidly growing, the dark side, had enjoyed it. She was receiving the bloody backwash of something she couldn’t understand, and from the way her body was shivering, she was enjoying it too.
Sitting up, her fingers brushed absently against the healed skin of her torn shoulder, and she frowned. There was nothing to show that the marks had ever been there. Kaoru angled her hands into the moonlight and stared at the skin. They was more supple that she remembered them being as a human, and even the calluses had lost a bit of their rough edge. Her nails were strong, and longer than she generally allowed. However, if the swords clashing today had said anything, they were difficult to break. She knew without tracing a hand down the skin of her arm or shoulder that her skin was softer; as if she could afford the expensive lotions they sold at the market to sooth her skin.
She hadn’t really examined her new self, partly for fear of what it would be like when she looked. Everything had been affected by Kenshin’s blood. Her allergy to wood, her body’s minor alterations. Even her ability to see in the dark of the room; the moonlight gave her enough light to see perfectly. Her sudden attraction to gore, blood and darkness; Kaoru shivered slightly. He had been so perfect tonight. The way his darkness clung to him, only highlighting the fury of his eyes, the perfect way he moved.
The interference in his gaze as he stared at the men before him; the bloodlust that had seeped from him to her as her gift absorbed what she watched; even now she could sense it. The whispering flood of heady black need that would slosh through her veins in dark harmony with his. It was becoming harder to keep this absent part away from the part of her she wished to cherish. She was learning that it was patient, and something was building in the darkness. She could sense it, at times like this. A low twisting of heat that was slowly building in part of her that she didn’t know had existed until Kenshin had walked into her life. It had something to do with her gift and the hazed line that connected them that her gift kept attempting to show her. As if something was not quite right about it.
Misao stirred next to her, and Kaoru looked at her friend. There were old scars in her Ki, twisted markings that had her automatically running ‘hands’ over them to test the depth. Kaoru paused in mid-brush and jerked back. She didn’t even have to call it anymore. Did something like this just become instinctive? There had to be a way to protect herself from it. It was like being pounded with the emotions of hundreds of things at once, and some of it fed her while other parts of it had her recoiling. Whatever it was, it hid itself from Kenshin, as if it was afraid of something in him; but when it hid itself, something else rushed forward. She was beginning to wonder if that was the instinctive part of her Kenshin had whispered about. Her eyes slide shut at the memory of his hot mouth and his wicked fingers. If she had been human she might have cried.
It was not something she was proud of. This sudden knowledge of an attraction to this dark vampire who had changed her; wrenched her from the life she had loved. She had barely seen Yahiko and Sano in the past days. She couldn’t even remember how many days had been between her and Kenshin. A week? More, perhaps? Brining her knees to her chest she thought about her current predicament.
Okay…she had fangs. She drank human blood to survive. To be more accurate, she drank Kenshin’s blood, and he drank human blood. He enjoyed killing. She hated it; but part of her was beginning to relish it. She was stuck between two very different natures, and she was going to have to learn to balance them. Kaoru flopped backwards and stared at the ceiling. This was getting a bit more complicated than she had first thought it was going to be. If she was completely honest, she would admit that she hadn’t thought past anything, not since she was changed. She had the sudden urge to go and spar, but the door was warded…
Sitting up, she noted the room Kenshin had brought her to. Sighing, because she really wanted something to drink, she headed for the door. Shifting forward she brushed her fingers down the door and felt the slight surge of power. It didn’t burn per-se, but it flickered a warning. Kaoru took a deep breath and reached for the part of her that was practically crawling under her skin. Thick cords of black and red were twisted around the screen, and when her fingers brushed close, it was the black that twisted towards her skin.
The red acted almost indifferently, so she reached for it and yanked. She thought she felt something, surprise or annoyance; perhaps both, and then both fell away. Kaoru frowned. That was entirely too easy. If the swearing from Misao earlier had said anything, then that should have taken a whole lot more work than it did. There was something missing. Kaoru watched as what it was slowly dissolved, and she frowned at it. When she let go she felt a slight drain in her power, but that was all. Shrugging to herself, she opened the door and looked around. The halls were still empty. She listened for the sounds of Soujiro and frowned when she couldn’t hear anything. One of the things she had started to take for granted was the whispers of others, the sounds of breathing, and the smell of everything living. It was almost comforting; or at least, it was the most comforting part of being what she now was.
Moving down the hall, she walked silently over the wooden boards, her tabi protecting her bare feet. She had never thought about the possibly of getting a splinter from the wooden paneling, but now her mind sprung to the possibility as she walked. It hurt, she decided, that something that had been so innocent in her childhood was now so dangerous in her youth. She felt like she was 17 going on fifty-something. Bitterly, she reminded herself that she would be there one day. Looking as young as she did now, pushing a hundred. She didn’t want to examine that aspect, but it seemed there was going to be no escape from Kenshin in the form of a mortal death. Was it only four weeks ago she had been lamenting that Yahiko was going to give her premature gray-hair? Yahiko had no way of knowing it at the time, but she had always looked forward to it. Perhaps if her hair was something besides ink-black, then people would take her seriously. Who took youth without questions, the proverbial grain of salt?
Moving into the kitchen she paused when she saw Soujiro outside. Kaoru paused, the cup she had secured to take to the well halfway off the shelf. She didn’t know Soujiro had any friends in this area. She couldn’t quite clearly see the man’s features or his coloring, but there was something odd about him. For instance, the way that Soujiro was standing, almost like a limp doll that had its strings pulled taunt. Putting her cup carefully on the shelf, she eased back into the shadows of the hall. There was something off about that man, and she had the sudden urge to stay away from him. Slipping down the hall she sighed at her parched throat and was about to open the door and slip back inside when she heard a board creak.
Kaoru turned with a wary expression, but couldn’t find anything. However, the hairs on the back of her neck were standing in definite warning, and she allowed the sheen of power to flicker over her eyes. The hall became almost pitch in color, since there was no Ki to lighten the gloom, and she frowned as she searched for whatever had left. Sighing when she couldn’t find anything, she slipped back inside her room and shut the door. Perhaps it was just the house settling…
Kaoru was settling the blanket around her naked legs when she heard something like a hiss and this time she kicked Misao as she looked around. Misao mumbled something under her breath, and rolled over, her expression smoothing out in sleep again. What a great watch-dog she was. There was another noise, and her breath hitched in her throat. The same feeling of unease and danger raced through her senses and she stiffened. What looked like a shadow flickered across the floor and headed towards her, and then there was a snarl.
Kaoru felt her chest heave in short little pants as she felt the air clear of the danger. Something had been in the room. Something dangerous, evil, and hungry, and dammitt she wasn’t talking about her absent mate. There she went again. Referring to Kenshin as…that. Which she knew to be true, but something inside her seemed to shimmer with resentment. As if she had done something wrong or he had failed to complete something which should have been done. Kaoru shivered slightly at the thought of something running around only half-complete between them.
She had almost managed to get her breathing back to its normal patterns when the shoji door slammed open, bouncing back again at the force. Kaoru jumped slightly, wondering how she had missed his re-entrance into her home, and felt a surge of adrenaline race in her veins. Misao sat up with an incoherent yelp and glared at the door. The smaller woman swore like a sailor, and Kaoru wondered if she had managed to get herself onto a boat to avoid Aoshi. Her thoughts had little time to arrange themselves as Kenshin glided into the room, his expression darkened by the shadows.
“Megumi has an extra futon in her room.” Kenshin ordered Misao. “Go.” Misao’s eyes widened in outrage but Kenshin flashed several inches of bone-white fang and glared. Misao snapped her own teeth and picked up and left. The idea of being with a changed vampire was clearly one of great irritation for her.
“You broke the ward.” Kenshin softly spoke into the night and Kaoru went to stand to meet him on equal footing when he was suddenly inches from her and snarling. Kaoru felt something snake in her blood at the expression on his face and she glared back.
“You shouldn’t have caged me like a child.” Kaoru started, but her words were stolen as his nose was suddenly behind her ear, his breath hot on her skin. Her hands automatically went to his forearms to steady herself as he breathed, and she frowned.
Anger. Anticipation. The slightest tang of fear. Kenshin let his eyes droop at the smell of her skin and emotions. Something had startled her, and her scent proved that it hadn’t been him. Her fear smelled good, almost as good as her little temper. Unable to help himself, he let his tongue snake out and taste the slight perspiration on her skin, and he caught the faintest trace of her blood from earlier on her skin where it had splattered. Dropping his head, he kissed the skin for a heartbeat before he allowed the taste of her blood to soothe the taste of black-blood away from where it lingered on his mouth.
Kaoru gasped in surprise at the feel of his tongue, and then in the next instant she was pressed flush against him and he was…her body melted against him even before she could rebuke it, and something like a purr was crawling from her throat without her permission. This…feeding was almost comforting, for reasons she couldn’t explain. Every muscle in her body relaxed at being so close to him, with his strong teeth buried in her throat. Sighing, her eyes began to feel rather heavy, and the stroke of his tongue lulled her into half consciousness as he pulled back. There was a rumble of sound from his chest and she mental berated herself as her body snuggled forward so her nose as against his collarbone, since he had raised his head. She thought she caught a flash of impatience from him, but she allowed the calm feel of the night to flicker through her and fell back into the darkness.
Kenshin stared down at the now sleeping woman in his arms and couldn’t decide between bemusement or anger at her. She was curled against him like a cat, her warm breath flickering over his skin. He could still remember the warmth of her on his fingers and his frown darkened. He caught another nuance of her scent and sighed. She had been neglecting to feed herself. Again. Placing her form back onto the futon, and fighting the urge to push her off him, as well as the urge to curl her closer to him, he settled her back into the blankets and leaned against the wall to fall into a half doze and keep an eye on her warm little body.
She was becoming a distraction again. Every time her little body came in contact with his, and her Ki attempted to work between the cracks of his own, he felt the need to finish the bond. To invite her feminine fangs to bury themselves in his neck and tighten the bond already between them. His mouth twisted into a frown. It was one thing for her to need him; but he could find no need for him to desire her. She was a complication he was sure he didn’t want. It was one thing to use her as a means to his ends, to have the knowledge that even if he decided he didn’t want her, no one else could have her. It was a completely different idea if his body wanted her more than it did. He had admitted to himself that part of him wanted her, fine. He had her.
He should have been able to curb that part of him now. He knew her mentality wasn’t that of a vampire, probably twisted with some strange notion of love. Vampires didn’t feel love; they didn’t even generally acknowledge its existence. They didn’t understand humans and their need to apply words to the base emotions. He had no need to whisper love-sweet nothing in her ears, nor did the part of him that craved her every movement. However, he couldn’t deny the fact that his body stirred with a need to take her past her own control and to deliver her into his hands. He was a man of patience. A smile curving his lips, he let the sound of her breathing lull him into a half-sleep, shifting until he was comfortable.
It was only a matter of time until she came to him to fulfill her needs. Then he would judge her and see where it led him. His little pet was his to have now. Beyond her control, beyond her reasoning, her instincts craved what only he could give her, and he would delight in it.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
She writhed against the chains, her naked body crashing again and again against the clamps that held her, her underfed, starved body at the beginnings stages of turning in on itself, her eyes pale yellow around the dark black of her pupil as disease set in. The smell of blood, stagnant and fresh, fell in a putrid aroma of stink around her body. The irises of her eyes were white with age, and the walls were littered with the markings of her nails gouging the walls, the same marks her own body bore. “She is lasting much longer than we thought she would. It would seem that the heart of that delightfully vibrant young man was the key.” His body never fully entered the light, if the light could be called such. “Tell me, where did you find him again?”
“He was a swordmaster’s son.” The sibilant hiss replied. “I had hoped that the heart of a man witha Ki worthy of our kind would revive her.” The second shadow was bent over, as if afraid for his life. They watched as they woman writhed and stretched and bled. It slid in soft, careful drops down her body to the drain, which ran into a bowel. From there, it would go through a purification process, and then be ready for indigestion.
“She may live long enough for us to find what she hid from us.” He replied as he walked over, softly tracing the blind woman’s face, watching as she jerked around helplessly, her teeth snapping as broken fangs ground against her teeth. “What her family will be more than happy to track down for us.”
Both men left the screaming creature to her own devices and with the shutting of the door so did the sounds quiet. “Tell me, how fairs the child?”
Both men straightened in the darkness and walked at a more even pace now that they were not bombarded by a insane woman’s driveling screams and the bombardment of a slowly leaking Ki that tore at their own desperately. The blood of her family had been engrained into his veins for years, and Empaths could not kill one of there own. Supposedly it was a genetic fault. That was more myth than truth. He had learned, through all of his experimentations, that it was actually that an Empath would not survive the absorption of a death-Ki so close to their own. If they managed to just once, however; then they could slaughter without reprisal. The first kill of a vampire at their hands, and the first kill of their family, were the two most likely things to kill a young Empath.
“She is responding well to the treatment. Her skills are improving, and in about another month we will be able to move her to the cutting chamber. They’re predicting that she will last longer than the other one, but she isn’t as strong.” The second man returned his voice regretful. “However…we have gotten information back from our spies.”
This peeked his interest. Ever since her escape so long ago, he had wondered if she had managed to produce offspring. Not a week ago he had felt the burning of another Empath being awoken in his power, and he had known she had. Then she had disappeared, and darkness had threatened his ability to trace her until it was gone. A smile bloomed on his face, hard and edged against an elegant face. “Is that so? Tell me about her…this escaped rabbit of mine.”
The man’s eyes lit up with greed. “She is strong. Stronger than Mio, and young,” he whispered, his eyes practically fluttering with the impact of his words. He listened to the description of her youthful body and great power; how she had recently been changed.
“How soon until she is here,” he softly asked, delight dripping from his worlds. He watched curiously as the man shifted from foot to foot, as if nervous. “What?”
He licked his lips. “She has a mate.”
The man raised a brow. “With the amount of power I lend you fools it shouldn’t be a problem. You have the stolen life of an Empath racing in your veins. What more do you need?” There was a growing edge to his voice.
“She is the Battousai’s mate.” He tried again.
It stopped him cold. Hitokiri Battousai… “He will be arrogant and lax. When that happens, bring her here. His hold on her will be easy to break. Do I make myself clear?”?
His lips pursed. It might take a while, but he would teach her daughter why his slaves didn’t escape him, especially why blood-slaves lost there souls.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
“She is surprisingly adept with that sword.” Megumi commented as she sat down besides Misao, who weighed the options of ignoring her, or lunging for the jugular, and instead watched where the woman was correcting Yahiko with his movements. Yahiko still held the Bokken, but Battousai had been out early and calmly snapped Kaoru’s shinai, then handed her the sword with a look that held a world of meaning. Misao wondered if it meant he was starting to care for Kaoru, or if it was just self-preservation on his part. She knewthat the pair would, supposedly, share each major wound in hopes that both would live. If Kaoru infected herself with wood poisoning again, then Kenshin would be forced to shoulder half the pain. “She has spent most of her life with them. By the time she fully matures, she will be quite good.”
“You find that surprising?” Megumi asked, a bite in her voice that Misao ignored in favor of imagining the fox with several Kunai buried in her throat. The mental image cheered her greatly, and she offered a full fanged smile to the older woman.
“You managed to control you gift.” Misao quietly pointed out. “I am sure she will be fine.” She watched in satisfaction as the woman paled slightly, her face darkening soon after. Misao watched as Kenshin moved and adjusted Kaoru’s hold on the hilt and her placement of her feet, his face expressionless. It wasn’t a stance she recognized, but she watched as Yahiko watched and mimicked. He too would be good with a sword. “He works to increase her speed.” Misao absently commented, frowning when she recognized the Ki at her back.
“Very good.” Aoshi’s voice purred near her, and she ignored the heat that rolled through her stomach at the movement. It was almost a purely domestic scene that had something rotten rolling into the back of Misao’s tongue. She wished she had met Kaoru before she had been changed, because she would have been fun to drag around Japan on endless bloodbaths and hunts.
“Have you decided what you are going to do?” Misao asked her tone bored. Watching Kaoru beat Yahiko to death with a sword was fun, but only if Kenshin would stop correcting or altering her form. From here she could catch the look of disapproval on Kaoru’s face, and she smirked. Kenshin wouldn’t be able to knock her around much longer, she was getting much more assured of herself, and there were times when Misao had seen the dark part of Kaoru’s nature peeking at her from behind her eyes. One of these days the barrier Kaoru wasn’t aware she was holding up was going to crack and then she would learn to live with her dark nature. When that happened she knew that Kenshin would have his mate.
Kaoru mentally scowled as she was corrected yet again in her stance and reminded herself that learning was something you never stopped doing. He was better than she was. Which meant he had the right to instruct her; but that didn’t mean she had to like it! When he stepped back she took a deep breath, gritted her teeth, and quietly demanded the moves she wanted from Yahiko, and began again.
There was something that was bothering her. She couldn’t put her finger on it, but there was something about today that was off. She hadn’t seen Soujiro since last night, and while part of her demanded that she tell Kenshin about her fears, another part of her suggested that she wait. Kaoru sighed and quietly debated as she went through another set of drills, mentally implementing the changes that Kenshin had been giving her all morning. It took some work, because her muscle memory kept attempting to alter back, but repetition was something she was good at.
This was probably the reason her brain kept going over and over what had happened the night before; which unfortunately wasn’t allowing her the peace of mind of only going over Soujiro. Instead, it also went over the relaxing contentedness of being used as Kenshin’s snack in the bedroom. It also wanted to point out that that situation was completely improper and that she should be furious with herself; but she was tired and couldn’t find the energy. Strong fingers wrapped around her wrist between sets, and she looked upwards to find a sight she was slowly growing used to.
“You’re distracted.” Kenshin informed her quietly, disapproval radiating from his body. Kaoru frowned up at him, a spurt of anger she couldn’t control echoing through her. Something flickered in his eyes, and then he stepped back. “You need to feed.” His voice held that same tone of disapproval and something else. Something definitely darker and less manageable.
Kaoru frowned at him, but her eyes flickered to where Soujiro was walking over, and a bite of apprehension ate at her stomach lining. There was something odd about the way he was moving again. Kaoru walked over to Yahiko, who was standing a few feet away, her eyes never quite leaving where her mate was standing. She kept getting distracted by the pulse that was beating steadily in her eardrums, she wasn’t sure if it was her own, or someone else’s. There was a snarl from Kenshin as he turned to speak to Soujiro, and Kaoru felt it before she saw it.
Wrongness. Something was terribly wrong, and she turned to yank Yahiko away from the entrance, when she saw it. The same whispering darkness she had heard last night, coming at her hard. Kaoru jerked the same time she heard someone snarl, and then she saw him. Hair the color of white, white clouds and eyes dipped in a color somewhere between emerald and blue. It didn’t matter what color eyes they were because it echoed a state of mind she had seen once before. Whoever this man was, he wasn’t sane.
Kaoru attempted to stumble backwards, to break out of the darkening colors, but they seemed determined to yank her in. Mentally screaming, she found herself shoved forward by the will-power of her own feet, something she suddenly didn’t have control of. Kaoru couldn’t struggle against him as he calmly picked her up and walked away. Could hardly find the ability to breath past the twisting, darkening echoes of power in her blood. Foreign power, darkness that she couldn’t crawl out of. Where Kenshin was hot and fire and deceptively dark, this was cold. Cold ice twisting into her veins that only slowed when her world went black.
Home FanFiction Ravyn Amber Linings