by C. J. Anaya
Angie was totally rambling now.
This. Was. Awesome.
My gaze swiveled to Bishu and my eyes nearly popped out of their sockets when he took a step forward and transformed into a muscled Asian warrior. His long hair was jet-black and pulled back into a ponytail. His chest was bare except for the leather straps criss-crossing it. He still wore the same black leather pants as before. His jaw was long and defined and his cheekbones high and chiseled, a bit unorthodox for Japanese features, but I had a strange feeling this particular identity was a special one.
“I’m assuming you didn’t kill this person either,” she said, as she took him in from head to toe.
He shook his head no and took another step forward. The massive swirls of emotion from each of them solidified within my mind and became visible to me. There was a lot of bright pink and light, along with a smattering of muddy blue, especially on Angie’s side. Geez she was absolutely freaking out right now.
“I can change forms at will without killing anyone, but it is difficult to maintain any form for long. This form is especially difficult to maintain and is one I haven’t tried in a long time.” He flickered for a moment, but took in a deep breath and his form solidified again.
“Why? What is so special about this form?” she asked.
He reached his hand out and lightly ran a finger down her bare shoulder. She noticeably shivered and his full lips lifted into a pleased grin.
“This is me. This is who I used to be and who I hope to become again once we reach Kagami. I know I may look like a monster, but that isn’t who I really am, Angela. I may be a war god, but I only seek out justice. You will never have reason to fear me.”
Shut the front door! This god of fortune didn’t hold anything back. He thought showing her his true physical form might engender some trust. I fanned myself as steam from the shower heightened the sizzle between those two. The tension was yummy. Better than a rom-com by far. I needed popcorn and chocolate, and I needed it fast.
I saw her swallow a couple of times and couldn’t blame her. Bishu in his true form was not only daunting, but pretty much every girl’s warrior god fantasy come to life.
He’d played his cards well. He figured if Victor wasn’t truly a contender yet, then he needed to get Angie’s attention in a big way.
Mission accomplished.
Bishu: 1
Victor: 0
“That’s good to know. Next time I come to the conclusion that you’re a psychotic killer, I’ll just come right out and say it. Save us some time.”
Bishu let out a chuckle and allowed his finger to drift from her shoulder to her elbow and then to her wrist where he took her hand in his and gave it a squeeze.
“Yes. I find your direct approach to everything quite refreshing.” He lifted her hand and gave her a low bow, maintaining eye-contact.
She nodded, mouth hanging open as he kissed her knuckle and slowly rose to his full height, which was considerable. Then his form flickered once, twice, and he was back to being an over-sized beast from hell. Sadness swept through him and his shoulders hunched forward in defeat. His self-loathing caused him to think that his monstrous form was something Angie wouldn’t be able to look past, but he was about to find out that my best friend had one of the biggest hearts ever created by our First Parents. Offering up unconditional love was what Angie did best.
“You know what, Bishu? Whenever Hope and I have a misunderstanding we always hug it out.”
“Hug it out?”
She didn’t give him a chance to process that one before she stepped forward and wrapped her arms around his hairy torso, startling him in the process. Their colors solidified into unified pinks and golds. Signs of love, passion, confidence, and tranquility.
Very interesting. What was even more interesting was that I could actually see their colors. I tried to see how their auras bounced off the veil, but that aspect of the process still remained a mystery to me. Still, seeing their auras at all was encouraging. I’d take what I could get.
She leaned her head against his chest and said, “How long has it been since someone gave you a hug, hellcat?”
He rested his chin on top of her head and swallowed back the lump in his throat, her kind gesture overwhelming his normally stoic façade.
“We do not do much hugging in the Underworld,” he stated.
She chuckled and looked up at him.
“Well, I’m a hugger, so you better get used to it.”
He lifted a paw and gently smoothed back her hair.
“I shall look forward to every hug you offer me.”
Another significant look passed between them before poor Angie could no longer handle the heavy atmosphere.
This was Angie after all.
She blinked and stepped out of his embrace, giving him a saucy grin.
“Always so polite, Bishu. Don’t think for one second those princely manners will prevent me from kicking your hairy rump while we’re training on the beach tomorrow.”
Bishu gave her a delighted grin full of teeth I’d never want to face-off with on my own.
“I hear you are out of practice, Angela. Do not be overconfident.”
“Says the guy who got his butt handed to him during our first encounter. You do recall the moment I pinned you to the ground, right?”
“Of course,” Bishu said as he walked toward the door and then turned back to look at her. “It was one of the best moments of my life.” Then he sauntered out of the room like a satisfied predator who’d just managed to catch his prey. I didn’t need to see Angie’s face to know her mouth hung wide open.
Never thought I’d live to see the day when a beast managed to get the best of this particular beauty.
Sleep proved elusive. Probably because I panicked at the thought of connecting with Amatsu in some nightmarish dimension warp. I drifted in and out of consciousness, but never really slept deep enough to get the rest my weary mind and body craved.
Training today was gonna stink.
Kirby was the first person I helped in unearthing specific memories involving his fighting skills. I really didn’t want to give him too much to process, and this time I made sure that nothing interrupted the procedure so I could monitor every memory from previous to present.
My father was a different animal altogether because most of his life dealt with heavy training and combat, and picking out the necessary memories without forcing him to suffer through the loss of a wife he didn’t remember was tedious and exhausting. He’d already lost my mom. I wasn’t going to add a second loss like that to his plate. By the time I finished highlighting the necessary memories for both of them, I could barely hold myself upright. Kirby and my dad looked like they needed several shots of adrenaline.
I swayed on my feet and nearly fell over, but Tie’s arm around my waist prevented that disaster. I gave him a grateful smile at his worried look. He hadn’t said much to me as we’d all bunked down for the night, but he hadn’t been as distant either. I took Bishu’s advice and tried to give him the necessary space he seemed to need to forgive himself for his mistake, but it wasn’t easy. The bond with Amatsu was starting to affect me again. I wouldn’t be able to hold out much longer.
“I’m fine,” I assured him. “I just need to lie down for a little bit.”
“It looks like Kirby and Dr. Fairmont might need to as well,” Ms. Mori said. She reached for Kirby’s hand, a foreign tenderness shadowing her face. “Come, Kirby. Let’s get you some warm milk and tuck you into bed.”
My father narrowed his eyebrows at this exchange. Then he looked at me as if to say, Ms. Mori acting motherly is creeping me out.
“I can take Angie to the beach and work on some forms with her,” Bishu offered.
Victor’s irritation slammed into me, but he didn’t say a word against it or offer to join in the training.
I was beginning to think Angie was right. His guilt over their history together prevented him from pursuing her no matter what he felt f
or her.
His loss, I guess. Victor was going to have to learn his lesson someday.
“Dr. Fairmont, I will help you to your room,” Victor offered. I gave him a grateful smile, since I was obviously not physically capable of lifting a hand to help anyone. Tie lowered me to the bed and pulled the covers over me as everyone dispersed.
In truth, I was a little nervous to be left alone with him. I wanted the chance to talk about my behavior on the island and the way my bond with Amatsu had nearly taken over, but I wasn’t sure how he would respond. An emotional expanse of fear, guilt, and uncertainty had built a solid barrier between the two of us. We had to tear it down. I needed him to break through it and fight for us just a little.
“You didn’t sleep last night,” he stated.
“No.”
The creases between his brows deepened.
I sighed. “I can’t fall asleep completely. What if Amatsu sucks me in again? According to Bishu, I visit him in my sleep, but I don’t remember it when I wake up.
A muscle in Tie’s jaw ticked, but I pressed forward. He had to face this. He had to acknowledge that this was happening.
“If you hadn’t been there to strengthen our bond when Amatsu attempted to connect with me…I…” I kept my eyes glued to the white sheets covering my lap. Admitting this to Tie made me feel like such a hussy. “It’s so powerful. Those feelings were all-consuming and prevented me from remembering my point and my purpose.” I swallowed hard. “For a moment I forgot that I loved you.”
The words had to be said. He had to understand what this connection to Amatsu did to me, but handling the backlash of his emotions made me feel as if I was drowning in a sea of feelings I couldn’t surface from.
“I am going to stay here and watch you sleep this time.” He lifted my chin so my eyes were forced to meet his. They may have shown his agony, but they also held a fierce love for me that gave me hope he still felt like I was worth fighting for. “If I think that something about your ki is off, I’ll wake you up, bring you out of it. You can’t go on like this. If you don’t get some rest you’ll never be able to fight him off, and from what Bishu has told me, the bond Amatsu created with the Black Blossom is far stronger than any bond our First Parents originally created.”
His lips twisted in anger, and my cheeks pinked as I remembered the seductive pull I felt on the island, and the way the voice I heard made me want to abandon everyone and everything and simply give in at that particular moment. Instant gratification. Seemed to be the name of the game with Amatsu.
True, this bond was powerful, but it was fake.
“What we have is real, Tie. No matter what Amatsu managed to accomplish through magic, what we have is the real deal.”
“But will it be enough?”
He moved away, but I grabbed his wrist and kept him from escaping.
“Do you still love me?”
His eyes shot to me, his look incredulous.
“How can you ask me that? Of course I still love you.”
“Then why are you distancing yourself from me? It’s like you’ve given up, like you think that what we have is doomed to failure.”
He sat down next to me, pulled me up into a sitting position, and held me to him.
“All my life I have experienced only half of what I could feel, been only half of what I could be, fighting to attain the one thing that will complete me in every way imaginable.”
He gently pressed his lips to mine and seared me with a heated kiss. Then he pulled back and the pain in his eyes tore at my insides.
“Something always keeps you from me, prevents us from being together, and I’m so tired of it.” His thoughts carried him far away from me for a moment, and when he refocused it was obvious he’d come to some drastic decision. “I don’t know if we can wait for Hachiman to perform our binding ceremony. We have to do something to stop the spread of Amatsu’s influence.”
Before I had a chance to ask him what we could possibly do, his lips took mine again in a kiss much more urgent and powerful this time. It was exquisitely beautiful and heartbreaking in its desperation. He connected with my ki and brought our colors together, building them into a powerful display that lit our cores from the inside out. I expected him to pull back at this point like he usually did, but he deepened the kiss and the connection. My core heated, sending tiny tingles of electricity through my veins and along my spine. I lifted my hand to his jaw and softly caressed the soft stubble there as his ki solidified around mine and began offering it a steady stream of energy that looked like liquid gold.
The gold rushed to the cells in my body, forming a protective shield around the cell walls and moving on to larger, and more complex parts of my anatomy. A burning sensation started from the tips of my toes through my feet and up my ankles and calf muscles. I surrendered to the fire consuming me because I trusted Tie and I absolutely had no desire to ever be released from his arms, from his kiss, again.
As the heat slowly reached my chest and entered my heart, an awful tearing sensation ripped at the center and pulled with a ferocious jerk that would have left me thrashing if my body hadn’t become immobile. The liquid fire within my chest pulled and strained as if attempting to uproot something buried deep within my chest. Tie’s arms kept me flush with his body and his soft lips consumed me. The energy from his ki poured into my heart and desperately tried to obliterate the one black spot at its center.
That was where the Black Blossom had stabbed me and where my bond with Amatsu originated. Tie’s ki used its energy to wrap around and under the black spot, attempting to pry it from its spot. The blackness within me finally sensed the attack and responded violently by sending out a burst of energy shrouded in darkness and hate. The unexpectedness of it caused Tie’s ki to lose its grip and our connection was lost.
I jerked my legs and came up for air as Tie let out a string of expletives and pulled me to his chest.
“It’s that one spot. That’s the source of the bond. Right at the center of your heart, and I can’t remove it.” He lifted his eyes to mine and tears streamed down his face.
“If you can’t remove it, then who can?” I asked.
Moisture formed in his cold, blue eyes. His despair left me in a panic. His eyes grew chilly and distant.
“No one can remove it, Hope. The best I can do is continue to keep it contained so it doesn’t consume you.”
I shook my head, refusing to believe I was going to be connected to Amatsu on some level for the rest of my life.
“There has to be something we can do. And what about my ascension? That’s what you were trying to do, wasn’t it? Even without Hachiman? Without being married?”
“At this point it won’t matter if we are married. If I can’t destroy the darkness within your heart, you’ll never ascend, and if you never ascend you won’t ever be capable of channeling all of the energy you receive from the millions of ki beyond the veil in order to heal it. Not even with the Grass Cutter Sword helping you. You won’t survive that influx of power unless you are completely immortal.”
“You’re saying it’s hopeless?”
“I’m saying I ruined it. I ruined everything. My actions have put you in the worst kind of peril and assured the demon god his victory.”
I didn’t accept the doom he spouted. We had to keep fighting.
“What are we going to do then?” I asked. I hardly noticed the tears falling down my cheeks until Tie reached over and gently wiped them away.
“We’re going to find that prophecy, figure out exactly what its stipulations are, and then pray that our First Parents will have thought up a plan B for all of this, because as it stands, Hope, you cannot heal the veil until your bond with Amatsu is severed, and the demon god knows it. He’s known it for centuries.”
I leaned back against the wall and gave him a tired look.
“What if the prophecy doesn’t give us any answers? What if there is no way to sever this bond?”
Tie opened his mouth
to speak, but closed it. There was nothing he could say to make this right.
His silence said it all.
***
I managed a few hours of sleep after that disheartening discussion, but only because I was so exhausted, not even the certainty of the world ending could keep my lids open. Tie had to interrupt my sleep a few times when my ki flickered and faded. He thought it signified some kind of pull from Amatsu, but since I never remembered any of my encounters with him when I awoke I had no way of confirming his theory.
Training on the beach was a new experience for everyone. Bishu once again volunteered to help Angie with her conditioning while Victor paired up with my father and Ms. Mori took over Kirby’s exercises. I studied her soft features whenever she looked at Kirby and nearly doubled over in surprise when I realized that I felt slightly annoyed with her for never feeling any kind of motherly affection for me.
I was happy for Kirby, but I failed to understand why she had never loved me in our first life when it was obvious she was capable of motherly affection now.
I had to shake myself from these useless musings. No matter how disappointing I had been as her daughter, that was then and this was now. Kirby was happy, glowing from the inside out with every tender gesture Ms. Mori showed him and as long as he was finally being given that nurturing love he deserved, that was all that mattered to me.
“She may not show it, but she does love you, Hope,” Tie said as he handed me a practice sword.
I inhaled deeply and took in the brightness of his blue eyes under the rays of the sun. His light hair waved slightly against the wind. He was mine and yet I wasn’t certain I would ever fully be his.
“You reading my mind now?” I asked.
“No. Just your face. It’s always been very expressive.” His light smile grew serious as he regarded me. “I’ll never condone her for her behavior. I’ll never understand why she didn’t protect you from your father, and I’ve spent centuries despising her for that, but it might be time to talk to her about it. Forgive her for being such a crappy mother, at least for your sake. It isn’t healthy for you to hurt like this.”