Twelve Lords

by Max Jager

  "I know that." Turning she buried her face into his chest. "But you know that I can't help it. Those mikos keep sprouting up even more as of late and in the South too. The constant threat of Kenji and Shinra. Not to mention Yori and Motoichi no one knows where they are." Taking a deep breath she looked up at him with a pleading in her eyes. Hoping that he would change his mind. "I don't care how big he is he is always going to be my little pup."

  Wiping the tears from her eyes Kurosai sighed. "He can always be your pup. But he is not little anymore. He is nearly grown. He is right. IN twenty years' time he can take a mate and have a pup of his own here. Or leave and be gone for another hundred years and there is nothing we can do. You don't have to turn your back on your son. But he needs to grow up."

  With a sob lodging in her throat, Sorae's grip on his clothes tightened. He was right and she knew it. She always knew this day would come. But secretly hoped it never would. When his hold around her waist tightened she went limp in his arms. "I know that. It is just so hard. He has been such a grown up since he was ten years old that I guess I still hold out hope of seeing that pup he was before that will come back out and be my little boy again."

  Kissing the top of her head, Kurosai let out a sigh of his own as he laid his forehead on her head. "Sorae he will always be your little boy in a sense. But right now it is time to just let him go off on his own and see what life brings him. It's time to let him grow up."

  "But….." Taking a few deep breaths Sorae still clung to him. "But when you leave you can be gone for a full month sometimes."

  Laughing as he made her look back up at him, Kurosai lifted her around her waist and headed for the bed. "Before you were here I would spend six months at a time or more doing the rounds. I know it is hard but it is time to let your pup go and grow up." Sitting on the bed with her he smiled into her eyes. "Just think you have another one that not only likes to learn to fight from her father, but the girly stuff from you. She will be able to keep your mind from straying too much to your son."

  Smiling as she tried to stop the tears Sorae nodded. "I know you are right just going to take me some time to get used to it. I am going ot lie down for a while though. I feel a headache coming on and I really don't want to suffer through another day with one. Or deal with you because of it."

  Kissing her gently Kurosai stood. "That would be a good idea. I need to go and tell our son he can go. Then train the princess some more."

  "Right."

  Once he was out the door and it closed behind him Sorae stood and went to the window as silent tears fell from her eyes when she landed on her son. Taking a deep breath she sighed. "I have all the faith in the world in you Kiyoshi. I know you are strong and wise and more than capable. But you are always going to be my pup and I will only ever want what is best for you. I do hope you will be careful while you are out there."

  X

  Going to where his son stood watching Yukani, Kurosai sighed as he crossed his arms. "Kiyoshi."

  "Father?"

  Turning a glare to meet his son's iced blue eyes he sighed. "If you come back with so much as a scratch on your body and cause your mother to have a fit over it. You will not go again until the day I step down and make you Lord. Have I made myself clear on that?"

  Though his eyes nor his face showed it, Kiyoshi was relieved that they didn't probe any further. "Understood Father." He was finally going to get to go out and do what he has wanted to do since Yukani was born and he heard Torakus talk about that miko. Nothing was going to stop him now from finding out everything he could about the mikos that lived the south. And unlike his father, he was going to find a way to eradicate them once and for all.

  Even though Kiyoshi's eyes never left his sister, Kurosai's eyes never left his son. There was something about all of this that seemed fishy to him. But there was no way of knowing what it was without calling his son a liar. Something that he had never done and didn't have the proof to do it now. 'I do wonder if it is all the talk about the mikos he hears when he sits in with me in court. I guess we will never know though with this one.'

  Stopping her drills, Yukani pushed her hair behind her shoulders as she turned and went up to stand before her father and brother. "Papa can I ask you something?"

  Turning a smile down to his daughter Kurosai laughed. "Anything princess."

  "Since he is strong do you think that I could go on the rounds with brother? He will keep me safe and bring me home."

  Answering his sister, with one of the rare smiles he had Kiyoshi looked down at her as he turned to face her. "You know very well mother will not be pleased if I did take you with me. Digging her heals in even more than she has with me."

  Her amber eyes pleading, Yukani kept her eyes up at him. She didn't want to get left behind! "But I want to go with you big brother! You tell me all the time that I am doing better and better. I know I can take care of myself out there." Stepping closer to him she turned on her best pitiful look, the one that typically worked with her father. Hoping that just this once it would work on her brother as well.

  Turning and going to pull a practice blade for him, and the practice spear that she used, Kiyoshi turned back to his sister and held it out for her. "I tell you what. I will propose it to mother. Only if you can get through and touch my shoulder with your spear. And you only have three chances."

  Catching the spear as he tossed it to her, Yukani gave him an odd look. "But why do I only get three chances to touch you?"

  With a laugh Kiyoshi took up a stance. "I will tell you that after you have touched me or not. It has meaning."

  Looking at her spear then a glance to her father who stood with Umarus she settled on her brother's iced blue eyes. "So let me get this straight brother. If in three tries or less I can touch your shoulder with the blade of this practice spear, you will talk Mama into letting me go with you on the rounds?"

  "That is the agreement."

  Watching as he sighed and crossed his arms, Kurosai was impressed with his daughter. She circled with her brother as her eyes were intense and focused on her target. She was doing it all right. And after this he had a feeling that the second she was mature, she would flee the Southern Shores and be right back here. He would have to step up her training in the mean time.

  Watching his sister as she focused, Kiyoshi didn't think about the fact that his father and Umarus were standing there watching as he smiled a true smile. When she charged at him, he was really pleased that when one attack toward his shoulder didn't work, she turned to something else. Then a third one. Though none of them touched him, she didn't use the same attack which was what he wanted to know if she would. When she dropped to her knees and dropped her spear he sighed. 'She will be formidable when she becomes sound. Even after she is grown and comes back here, she will have to keep it up.'

  Looking up at her brother as tears streamed from her eyes she crossed her arms. "I really wanted to go with you brother. I really tried but I guess I am just not good enough and I doubt that I will ever be."

  Kneeling down next to her, Kiyoshi reached out and pushed on her head to make her look up at him with his smile still in place. "Yukani you are still young. You do not have the strength that I do. By the time you are my age you will be much stronger and would be allowed to go with me. But you are still growing in your skill sis all."

  Her eyes turning into a glare, Yukani kept her eyes locked with her brother. "How do you figure that? You didn't move anything but your arm and I couldn't touch you anywhere."

  Standing up he crossed his own arms. "I told you that you only had three chances for two reasons. One, if you had used the same attack, I would have lectured you about being predictable. If you use the same attack too many times they learn it. You won't be able to get them with it no matter what you do. But you didn't do that. You were smart enough and sound enough in what you know to use three different attacks on me without stopping. That speaks volumes on how much you have learned."

  Blinking then smiling
as she stood up Yukani giggled. "Well then I will have to double up on my training with Father and Master Umarus while you are gone. After all he can use the time he would have spent training you to do more with me. Right? That way I can be as good as you are when you get back."

  "I am sure Father would love too."

  Hearing the growl come from his father, Kiyoshi turned to him with his mask back in place. "After all you would be training me at those times so it isn't like you wouldn't be doing anything you wouldn't normally do Father."

  Running to her father with that pleading look, Yukani folded her hands before her. "Oh please Papa?"

  Looking from his daughter's pleading eyes to see the gleam that was in his son's eyes, Kurosai growled. He was stuck. With a sigh as he put his hand on her head he shook his head. "Sure I would love to Yukani."

  "Thank you Papa!"

  X

  Walking in the room to see Sorae sitting at the table by the window, Kurosai sighed. "What happened to laying down?"

  "I couldn't lay down right now. So I had some tea brought to me and was watching Kiyoshi and Yukani." That was when she noticed that there was a mixture of annoyance and pride that was coming from him. With hope in her heart but knowing it wouldn't happen she looked over at him. "What is going on? Are you having second thoughts of letting him go?"

  Bending over and kissing her nose, Kurosai shook his head. "It isn't about that he is going. I just wish that I could say the annoyance is cause of second thoughts but I can't. That pup of yours has a way with his sister I am telling you. He gets through to her when I can't."

  Laughing Sorae watched as he went to the bed and fell back on it. "I know that much. He has for me as well many times."

  "I know. But it is good to know that he does have some emotions under that ice sculpted mask he has all the time."

  Moving to sit next to him, Sorae was confused. "What happened?"

  Standing he sighed as he started to take off his armor. "Just humor me and let me get it all out before you jump to conclusions okay." When she nodded he stretched with a smile. "Yukani asked me and Kiyoshi outside if she could go with him. I didn't even get to tell her it wasn't happening when Kiyoshi made a deal with her. She had three tries to touch him on the shoulder and he would talk you into letting her go with him."

  Sorae started work herself up as she opened her mouth but then growled when his hand went up stopping her. 'Oh he better not think that he can get that to fly it won't.'

  Going to the closet, Kiyoshi kept his smile. "When she asked him why three he told her he would tell her when it was done. Well she has great promise as a fighter when her skills are honed. But as you would expect she couldn't touch him. Even using three different attacks. Kiyoshi then explained why using the same one more than once lets your enemy learn it. Then he somehow got me suckered into spending the extra training time I would spend with him each day, with her. Not that it is a problem. But she didn't even try to argue the point with him. Not one whine at all. And top it all off he smiled the entire time he was talking with her."

  Standing and going to look out the window Sorae smiled as she watched her children sparring with each other under Umarus's watch. "So he can show his emotions then huh. I have never really seen him interact with Yukani like that before. I do hope I get to one day."

  Pulling a shocked gasp from his mate, Kurosai walked up behind her and scooped her up in his arms as he turned and headed for the bed. "You will see glimpses of the pup he once was sometimes if you watch. I bet we all see it more often though when he takes a mate and has a daughter of his own one day."

  Glaring at him, Sorae growled. "I don't even wanna think about that right now. Don't you even."

  Laying his mate on the bed, Kurosai followed her down with a smile of his own. "You will have to face the fact sooner than you think for your son and daughter. But for right now. No more talk about the pups that we have. Let us see if we can't possibly have another one?"

  With a gasp as she let her eyes roll back in her head when he dipped his head and kissed her neck Sorae twined her arms around his neck. "I think I can agree with that for now." Giving into the bliss as his hand found its way inside her kimono to her bare breast all the worries of the world melted away. The only think that she could think of, that she wanted right now was him.

  Making of a Lord Chapter 32

  A few weeks have passed and now it was time for Kiyoshi to leave and go on the rounds. Standing at the gate with his parents and his sister. He could see the clear warning from his father not to come back with a single hair out of place from his father. And the worry that was not only in his mother's eyes but all over her face as well. He knew that she hated letting him walk through that gate. But she would one day understand that this is something that would benefit the South more than she could ever imagine right now.

  Fighting the urge to cry, and forcing herself not to throw her arms around him in a blubbering fit Sorae stood next to her mate. She knew this was going to happen one day and she wasn't going to be able to stop it. Right now she just really hoped that it would go off without incident and he would be home soon. Taking a deep breath she looked up into his eyes. "Promise me that you will be careful. And come back as soon as you can do you understand?"

  With a nod for his mother, Kiyoshi just wanted to get out the gate and never look back for a while. He had a job that he wanted to do. "Yes mother. I will only be gone for as long as the job calls for. No longer."

  "Good." Sorae took another deep breath then once again found herself forcing tears to stay at bay as she watched her daughter rush to her brother hugging him. But it was the smile on his face that was her downfall as a few tears fell. It was unmistakable. 'He can show his feelings. That is amazing.'

  Letting tears rush from her eyes, Yukani threw her arms around Kiyoshi's waist. "Please come home soon as you can brother. It won't be the same without you here."

  Laying his hand on her head Kiyoshi nodded as he smiled. "As soon as I can sister." Then with a nod for his parents he turned and walked through the open gate without another word. His mind focused on the one thing that he wanted to do right now. The only thing. Getting the troubled spots taken care of so that he could then focus on finding a miko and learning all he could about them. And why they are such a threat not only to the demons of the south, but everywhere. He just couldn't fathom how a weak human could have such power as to kill a demon with a single arrow.

  A glance over his shoulder at the palace as the gate closed he sighed as he turned and relaxed and kept walking. In his mind going over the secret messages and codes that he has shared with Sanzo, Shone, and soichiro. Not only about the mikos but also about the movements of dragons in each land.

  Though it did take him longer to get out on his own unlike Shone and Sanzo who had shared the biggest bulk of information that had been found out. He and Soichiro were not so lucky to get out to get much. Chirio was even more protective of him than his mother was of him. But he was able to get something in with the few times that his father let him go with Hiro and some guards.

  Kiyoshi on the other had had not been able to contribute until now. Up to this point, the information gathered suggested that there were only a few that had any power that posed a threat to a higher level demon like themselves. The low level peons were a different story. The ones that could actualy pose threats to them were few and far between.

  All of them knew how to do two things in a fight. Shoot arrows and use barriers. This being his first time out, he wanted to push it as long as he could and figure out the threat level of the mikos in the south. But not long enough to where it would upset his mother and he not be able to do it again for another twenty years.

  X

  Just as the sun started to set behind the mountains, Sorae once again that day found herself standing at their window, watching the way her son left. Not smelling him in his room or anywhere on the grounds was something that would take her forever to get used too. She didn't know wh
y he wanted to do this so badly. She hoped it wasn't because of the mikos but he swore it wasn't. But she knew in her heart that there was something else as to why he was so adamant about it. "I just hope you don't get yourself into trouble Kiyoshi."

  "Do you still doubt what your son is capable of?"

  Turning a glare on her mate as he walked toward her, Sorae crossed her arms. "I have never doubted his abilities. I know he is capable. But I am going to worry about him none the less. Even when we aren't living here anymore. Yukani for that matter too. Until the day I die."

  Reaching her as she turned back to the window, Kurosai laughed as he rubbed her upper arms. "I know how you feel on that one. I am going to worry about him too. And the both of them when it is just us at the Southern Shores. But I also know that the sooner you stop getting stressed out over it, the easier it will get. And besides. The more I think about it today, this will be a good lesson for him also."