Makato stared at him for a long moment. "I can't give you a good reason to trust me. And you may not believe this, but I feel compelled to protect you." He rested his hand on his chest. "You can push me away, but I will defend you and Suzume with my life."
Kaito snorted, this man must think he was an idiot. "You're right, I don't believe you and I don't trust you."
"Well I trust him," Suzume said, lifting her chin in her haughty way. "You can't lock me away in a temple and seal my powers. I refuse."
"I make the decisions here."
"Not anymore," Akira said, coming to stand behind Suzume. She rested a hand on her shoulder, as did Noaki and Makato. The only one left standing between them was Rin who was torn between the two sides. He narrowed his eyes at her, threatening her with his eyes before she joined his side.
"Are you all fools? She'll lead us to our destruction." Kaito gestured toward Suzume.
"Why should we follow someone as weak as you." Suzume nodded her head toward him. She looked down like a queen on her throne. She thought she had won, but she would learn quickly enough that without real loyalty, she could never control this group.
"Fine, you take charge. We'll see where that gets us."
He glared at her. Suzume looked back at him, with a smug, self-satisfied smile. He would only have to keep up this charade just a little longer, then he would return to normal and none of this would matter. Just as long as nothing provoked Suzume's temper they would be safe for now. Which was much easier said than done.
Kaito stalked away from the group as well, a swirl of emotions churning in his head. Rin hesitated but she eventually followed after the dragon.
She touched his shoulder lightly. "We need to talk," she said.
He shoved aside her touch; he wasn't in the mood. He kept on walking, out of their camp and into the forest beyond. He needed space and time to think. That woman was driving him insane. Couldn't she just trust him to do what was best for him? Even Kazue had not fought him, she understood. Suzume's life had been put at risk time and again and she still insisted on clinging to her damn pride.
Rin chased after him. "You shouldn't be out here, who knows what might be drawn by the power Suzume unleashed just now."
He spun around to face her. "I told you to watch over Suzume."
Rin did not hesitate. "Makato is with her. You need someone to knock some sense into that thick head of yours."
He gripped his hands into fists. Rin had never spoken to him like this before. Was this just a further sign of his crumbling control? She knew how weak he was.
"You forget who you're talking to, kitsune," he said, his voice a low growl.
"You haven't been my master for a long time," she replied, hands on hips as she met his gaze, not as a servant but as an equal. Under different circumstances, he might have been glad to see she had grown stronger, proud even. But right now it only made him angrier.
"Will you betray me next?"
"I've only ever been loyal to you."
"Don't pretend with me. I've seen how you watch that priest. I know where your real loyalty lies."
He swung a fist at her head, which missed when she darted out of the way, his hand collided with the tree behind her. Pain shot up his arm and blood dripped down his knuckles. Another wound to add to his collection. Kaito leaned his head against the rough bark.
"I'll leave you then."
He pulled back and punched the tree several more times, heedless of the injuries he was inflicting on himself. He kept it up until his arm was shaking with the effort, and only then did he lean against the tree, sliding down to the ground with his head bowed forward and buried in his knees.
27
"Tell me again why Kaito isn't out gathering wood?" Suzume asked Rin for what must have been the hundredth time.
"Because the dragon is still healing," Rin replied without looking back at Suzume, suppressing the urge to sigh in the dramatic way the priestess often did.
Suzume scoffed. "How much more time are we going to waste waiting on him?"
"Don't you think you're being a little hard on him? He nearly died," Rin snapped her patience worn thin by the callous way Suzume talked about the dragon. But also by the dragon who continued to push her and everyone else away. She knew Kaito was worried about his weakness and Suzume's sudden rise to power didn't help things either. Rin could see it even if Kaito wouldn't admit it.
Rin glared over her shoulder in Suzume's direction. She understood Kaito wanting to protect Suzume, because she felt the same way about Makato, but couldn't Suzume at least acknowledge Kaito's efforts?
The priestess just rolled her eyes. "If our positions were reversed, and I was mortally wounded then he would have had me marching down the road in the middle of the night. We shouldn't be wasting time here, who knows when Hisato will return."
Rin took a deep breath. She knew this was just Suzume's way of hiding her feelings. In fact when they'd gone off to collect firewood, she caught Suzume looking around for Kaito.
Calm once more, Rin said, "He isn't like that. When you were unconscious after finding Kazue's heart, he snapped at everyone and couldn't sit still for more than a few seconds. He wouldn't say it out loud but he was worried sick about you."
Suzume laughed insincerely. "He just wants to use me as a proxy for Kazue, that's who he really cares about."
"You can try and deny the truth, but he cares about you. Just like I know that you're trying to pretend like you aren't worried about him when I saw you check on him before we left." Rin gave her a sly smile.
Suzume huffed again and shuffled off a few more feet to pick up a bundle of sticks rather than acknowledge her comments. Rin smirked, the priestess' silence was as good as a confirmation as she would get. And so she persisted.
"If you need help finding time to be alone I can arrange something." The kitsune waggled her eyebrows. Maybe if the two of them could talk it would improve the dragon's mood.
Suzume sputtered. "I don't want to be alone with him!"
"How long are you going to deny your feelings? You're destined to be together."
"Just because I have Kazue's soul inside me doesn't mean I am destined to be with Kaito. Do you think Makato is destined to be with you just because he's your husband's reincarnation?" Suzume shot back.
The kitsune's vulpine ears flattened against her skull. The comment had caught her off guard. "I had hoped..." she trailed off.
Suzume shook her head in disgust. "Have you even asked him what he wants? Or are you just assuming he'll want to pick up right where his last life left off?"
The twitch of Rin's fox tail was the only indication of her agitation. "I've been waiting to talk to him. A lot has happened." The kitsune turned to Suzume, a question in her golden eyes. Suzume could give her the insight she needed to approach such a subject with Makato.
"No kidding," Suzume mumbled under her breath.
Rin picked up a few sticks to avoid asking straight away. But the more time that passed the harder it was to ask her question. What if Suzume said she should give up on her hope of reuniting with her husband? Makato, though he looked like her husband, had a manner that was so different from Hikaru's it was difficult to see her husband inside him. What if everything she had held onto all these years had been for nothing? Her thoughts took a similar path as she wandered farther from Suzume. Maybe now wasn't the time to bring up the subject to Suzume either.
As she added sticks to her bundle, the bushes to her right rustled. Rin's ears swiveled and her head snapped up. A few yards away from her, Suzume was frozen in place, her entire body on alert. She was much closer to the bush and whatever was behind it. A yokai could tear her apart before Rin could ever reach her. After Suzume's fight with the centipede, the dragon had asked the kitsune to watch the priestess and Rin had been so lost in her own thoughts she'd let Suzume wander away. Suzume reached slowly for the staff on her back, which was tied next to the bundle she carried. The leaves on the bush started to tremble
and Rin shifted into her kitsune form, preparing to lunge and protect her.
The bush burst apart, and Suzume knocked her entire bundle of wood apart as she drew her staff. She held the staff in front of her, ready to defend. Rin launched herself into the air, landing between Suzume and the thing coming from the bush. She came nose to nose with Makato, who looked up at her bared teeth with wide, terrified eyes.
From the corner of her eye, she saw the deer he'd been hunting bounding away through the underbrush.
Suzume, who had fallen onto her rear, was shouting expletives.
"Are we in danger?" Makato said as he turned in place looking for an attack.
"You scared me! Why did you sneak up on me like that!" Suzume snapped at the priest.
He looked at the ground sheepishly and then grinned up at Suzume. "I scared you?" He laughed a short bark.
It was a painful echo of Hikaru, down to the coy smile and the sound of his laughter. Rin transformed back into her humanoid form, but she might as well have been invisible. His attention was wholly focused on Suzume, who glared at him with arms crossed over her chest. Rin was searching for connections because he looked so much like him, but any connections she found were more like ghosts of the man she remembered.
"Did it get away?" Tsuki asked, emerging from around a nearby bush.
Makato looked back at Tsuki and his smile fell flat. "It did." His response was terse and quick.
Rin who had basked in his brief smiles, saw the shutters close on his expression and could see the way he hid his feelings behind an unfeeling mask.
"What are you doing out here?" Suzume asked Makato, arms still crossed over her chest.
"Tsuki and I were hunting: the dragon's orders." A small smirk pulled at the corner of his lip.
Suzume shook her head, a similar smile echoed on her face. Rin's head swiveled between the two of them. Perhaps she was imagining it but she felt like there was something going on between them. Don't be ridiculous, of course they understand one another, they both have Kazue's soul inside them.
"Did you think we were yokai?" Tsuki asked, looking at the scattered remains of what had previously been Suzume's wood bundle.
Suzume looked down at the mess she had made. "Even if you were I could have taken you on." She held up her staff in a defensive pose.
Perhaps it was meant to be a powerful gesture but to Rin she looked like a child who was playing pretend. Makato looked her up and down, a quick glance which Rin caught. He saw her looking and blushed, turning away from her as he cleared his throat. "Have you fought a lot of yokai?" he asked her.
"Let's just say our Suzume is a bit of a magnet for yokai," Tsuki said before coming over to ruffle Suzume's hair.
She slipped out from beneath his grasp and swung at him, but the strike missed and Tsuki danced out of her reach.
While Suzume chased Tsuki, trying to get revenge for him tousling her hair, Makato was staring at the ground with his brows furrowed together. Unnoticed from the sidelines, Rin scrutinized his expression, looking for further hints of Hikaru or memories of his long past life with her. Was he trying to recall his own past?
"I guess you'd know about that seeing as you have Kazue's soul in you too," Rin said as she approached him from the side.
Makato did not lift his head, and instead knelt down to pick up the sticks Suzume had dropped. Rin squatted down to join him, and they reached for the same stick at the same time, their hands brushing against one another. As soon as their hands touched, he jerked his hand away and stood up abruptly. Rin felt as if someone punched her in the gut.
"Excuse me—" he started to say, pivoting to turn and walk away.
She couldn't let him go, not yet. "I wanted to talk to you — if you have the time," Rin said in a rush.
He turned just enough so she could see the silhouette of his face. More than anything she wanted him to recognize her. The longing that she'd kept at bay for so long threatened to overwhelm her and she fought the urge to reach out and take his hand. It was too soon to put any expectation upon him. She knew that much from watching Suzume and Kaito.
"I've been wanting to talk to you too," he said, a small frown furrowing his brow.
Rin stood up, not sure where to begin.
"Should we walk?" he asked, gesturing to the forest at large.
"Would that be okay? Isn't Tsuki watching you?"
"Are you afraid you can't trust me?"
Rin shook her head as she walked over to him. I can't trust myself with you. Memories of long gone days flooded through her mind, of similar walks in easy silence, assured in the affection of her life mate. She had known from the start that Hikaru's life would be limited and she had been prepared for his eventual death. But his death had come suddenly and without warning and though she told herself she could be patient and wait for his rebirth it had been a long couple of decades. The only sound that passed between them was the crunching of the leaves that carpeted the forest floor under their feet.
It was Makato who broke the silence. "You said in my past life I was someone named... Hikaru?" His mouth fumbled over the word as if it was unfamiliar to him. Another blow to her hope that he'd remember her from his old life.
Rin nodded, she couldn't get words past her tongue. It felt as if it was filling up her mouth.
"And you knew that I could heal the dragon, before I did," he added.
She nodded again. Words caught in her throat.
There was a long pause and then he said, "My memory isn't very good. I know some things without knowing where I learned them, like my spiritual powers. Memories filter in and out. If I concentrate, I can remember where I grew up, but I cannot remember my mother's face or whether or not I had siblings..."
Rin turned to face him, and he looked up at her with eyes so much like Hikaru's it made her chest hurt.
How desperately she wanted to touch his face, to lay her head against his chest and listen to his heartbeat to convince herself that this wasn't all a dream.
"Hikaru and I..." she hesitated. What if she was wrong? Or what if he rejected the idea the way Suzume so adamantly denied any connection to Kazue?
"I don't want to raise your expectations about me..." he said looking directly at her.
"Go on," she managed to choke out.
He laid his hand over his chest — the shape of his splayed fingers, his tanned skin and calloused hands, they all reminded her of Hikaru. Maybe she was looking for connections that weren't there but she could have sworn his hands were scarred in the same way Hikaru's were. "I've been searching for something for a very long time. And I hoped it was you, and I'm sorry to say this but I just don't remember you."
Tears threatened the back of her lids as she shook her head to dispel his protests. "I don't expect you to remember me."
"That's just it. I do remember the dragon, I can see Kazue's memories so clear." He hesitated.
Something felt like it had a hold of Rin's lungs and was limiting her ability to breathe. "Oh."
"What I am trying to say is, I don't think I'm Hikaru's reincarnation."
Rin forced a laugh. "Oh, is that all?" She lightly slapped him on the shoulder, in the same way she would have with Hikaru. But even as she did, it felt wrong. She had no right to touch this man. "Well I am glad you brought it up, because I wanted to say I don't feel burdened just because you're similar to him. That's all in the past after all."
He was looking into her eyes, searching perhaps for some sliver of memory that linked him to her.
"I am sorry," he said
She shook her head. "Don't be."
Just then Tsuki and Suzume rejoined them, coming back in their direction. Suzume was scolding Tsuki for some prank he had played. Makato turned immediately to look at Suzume and his entire face lit up. Rin could see it on his face, she was nothing to him. She took advantage of his distraction to slip away, retreating into the forest to be alone. And it wasn't until then that she allowed herself the luxury to cry.
As t
he tears streamed down her face, Rin slid to her knees, her hand covering her mouth to stifle her sobs. Behind her she could hear Makato calling out to Suzume and laughing. There was no place for her in his new life it seemed.
"You're much too beautiful to be crying."
Rin's entire body froze as she looked up at Hisato's smiling face, his hand outstretched to her. "What if I could fix this problem of yours?"
Rin growled at him, seconds away from transforming into her kitsune form.
Hisato held up a finger and as if by some spell of his she was frozen in place, unable to move. "Makato is Hikaru. All that he needs is to remember. Help me and I can return him to you."
"At what price?" she snarled.
"Straight to the point. I like that." He grinned.
Rin, still frozen in place, could not look away. She glared at him, willing him to answer.
"Kill the dragon for me and I will return your husband to you."
She laughed, mockingly. "I wouldn't betray Kaito, no matter the price."
"Is that so? Are you certain that the dragon feels the same?"
Rin bared her teeth at him in response.
Hisato laughed, his maniacal smile off kilter on his face. "Consider it. When you are ready, I will be there for you."
He bowed before stepping through a portal and leaving Rin who, once free from his spell stared at the place he had been.
28
"Where are we going exactly?" Kaito asked for what may have been the third time in the past fifteen minutes.
Suzume tried her best to ignore his question and pushed a branch out of her way, which whipped backward toward the annoying dragon behind her.
Kaito combated her cold shoulder by complaining in a whining voice, "Why aren't you telling me anything? I deserve to know where we're going."
Holding her head up in the most regal pose she knew, Suzume forged forward ignoring him. As the new leader of the group, Suzume had decided they'd wasted enough time at the dilapidated shrine. She was anxious to start the hunt for the missing eight gods and the other pieces of Kazue's soul. If she could find anything related to Kazue it would prove to Kaito that she was not only a good leader, but a better leader than him. She could just imagine the look on his face when she presented him with an artifact, or better yet, if she freed one of the missing Kami.
The Sea Stone Page 20