The Dragon Saga Box Set

by Nicolette Andrews

  "If you want, I can carry you. It's only going to get more treacherous the higher up we go." He held his hand out for her, but Suzume ignored it and climbed to her feet.

  "I don't need your help. I can climb on my own." She held her head up high, like the princess she was.

  He smiled but made no comment. He hurried back up the hill to a waiting Rin. Rin took Kaito's hand as he approached and he didn't shake her off. I'd like to see her smile when I rip her hair out, Suzume thought. What does she want with him anyway? I cannot believe he just lets her hang onto him. Didn't he say he loved Kazue? He must have been unfaithful and that's why she sealed him away.

  Suzume liked this idea and it helped her climb the remainder of the hill. By the time she reached the top, the forest had begun to thin and she could see the mountains in the distance and specifically the mountain where their journey had started. She couldn't see the temple from this distance, but she could imagine it sitting against the backdrop of the blue-gray mountains, clouds swirling around it. I thought we had gotten farther away than this. She sighed. Are we ever going to reach the palace at this rate? With everything else that had happened as of late, she had almost forgotten her original motives. I don't even know what I'll do once I get there anymore.

  She could not chase this thought further because the forest had grown silent. She could not hear the birds nor the wind in the trees. She glanced around for her companions, but they were nowhere to be seen. Not this again.

  "You know, I'm really starting to get tired of these hide-and-seek games," Suzume shouted.

  "Tired of the games?" a voice echoed back at her.

  Suzume spun around, looking for the source. Nothing was there. "This isn't funny!"

  "Not funny!" The voice cackled. It sounded like it was right by her shoulder. She arched her head in that direction.

  There was nothing there but a slow-rolling fog.

  "Kaito, Rin? Where are you?"

  "All gone, they left the priestess alone."

  A chill ran up Suzume's spine. She didn't like this, not even a little bit. She stepped forward. The fog swirled around her ankles like a veil and it obscured the forest floor.

  Something brushed against her leg inside the fog and Suzume shrieked and backed away. She ran into something solid. She felt up and down and realized she had been backed into a tree.

  "Tasty, pretty, tasty," something hissed inside the mist.

  Why is this always happening to me?

  Whatever it was drew closer. She could smell the decay hanging from it like a cloud. Her heart hammered in her chest and she felt the tingle on her skin, the fire under her skin coming to her rescue. Her power burned her fingertips. Suzume concentrated and listened for the sound of the creature. A twig cracked nearby and she focused on the spot where the sound came from. She pointed her hand in that direction. Flickering flames burst from her fingertips in the direction of the sound. It burned through the mist, and for a moment she saw a hint of mottled skin before it disappeared.

  Heart pounding in her chest, she strained her ears, listening for the creature. Then she felt something like a beacon in her head, telling her to shoot to the left. She aimed both hands in that direction. The creature hissed and squealed in pain before everything went silent. Frozen in place, she could only hear her blood thundering in her ears. Then slowly, very slowly, the fog began to dissipate.

  Suzume stayed with her back against the tree for a few moments, letting her heart slow down. She could hardly believe she had reacted that quickly. Once she regained her composure, she went over to look at the creature. It looked like a hunched-over old man, with a sparse covering of hair on its head and long pointed teeth in its mouth. In the middle of its chest was a burn mark where her power had hit it dead on.

  Well, at least my powers came to my rescue when I needed them.

  Footsteps fell on the soft ground covering and Suzume jerked her head up, hands at the ready to shoot fire at whoever approached her. A very short bald man with a round belly stood at the edge of the clearing.

  "You! You're the idol from the shrine." She pointed at the bald man. Her voice seemed to echo back at her in the empty silence of the forest.

  The short man gave her a serene smile. "That I am, and I've been looking for you."

  "For me?" Suzume asked and pressed her hand to her chest. Why me?

  "I owe you one more wish."

  "What are you doing here, Rin?" Kaito said, breaking the silence.

  She smiled to herself. She had been having so much fun teasing the human, she had forgotten the Dragon would be expecting answers. Slipping into the role of the trickster and flirt had been a good disguise to find out the priestess' intentions. She was surprised to find the Dragon traveling with a human, and one he seemed fond of. The look he gave the priestess was the same he had given Kazue all those years ago. I've been quite nostalgic lately. Of course, for the Dragon, it would not seem nearly as long. When Rin and the Dragon had parted ways, she did not think they would see one another again. But here she was by his side once more, and again he was in love with a human. It seemed history really did repeat itself.

  "I thought you would need my help," she replied with a wink.

  "You're not acting like yourself."

  She laughed. "I'm just having some fun with the priestess. She's easy to tease. I could see she has a temper right away." She looked at him from the corner of her eye with a smirk. "And she's rather jealous."

  He frowned. "She's different from Kazue in that way. But then Kazue knew I had eyes for no one but her."

  Rin hesitated to ask. Everyone knew Kazue had been the only human to win the Dragon's heart, but she had betrayed him in the end. I'm surprised he's willing to open his heart to another human. But perhaps that wasn't quite right, they didn't seem like lovers. Maybe he had not accepted his own feelings yet. He had been hurt before. It's a good thing I am here, maybe I can help him heal by finding happiness with another. It would be a distraction while she waited for her own happily ever after. Is this our fate? To keep falling in love with mortals only to have our hearts broken over and over again.

  "Who is she?" Rin asked.

  He looked at her sidelong. "She's the one who broke the seal."

  "Really? An untrained priestess?" Her raw power was evident. It radiated off of her like a beacon. She was not surprised they had run into trouble thus far.

  He nodded his head. "She's Kazue's reincarnation."

  Rin stopped in her tracks. He forgave Kazue after she betrayed him? "How can you be sure it's her? How can you tell someone has been reborn?" Her chest constricted, thinking of her own lost love, maybe out there somewhere.

  "The Hanyou, he's gone?" he asked.

  Rin looked at the ground. "Hikaru died twenty years ago. I've been living at the shrine we built together. I thought I would know when his soul returned, that I would feel it…" Rin pressed her hand to her heart. "But I've felt nothing. Perhaps he'll never come back."

  They walked in silence for a moment. "We both knew the price of loving a mortal."

  She nodded. "Knowing doesn't make the pain less."

  Kaito did not answer and she left him with his thoughts. Her own had turned introspective. She had found him to forget the past, she did not want to waste any more time waiting on Hikaru's rebirth. She would find him, one way or another. But in the meantime she could support the Dragon, as she had done long ago. She could help him in the new world.

  "The priestess must have broken the seal on the Kami in the idol. It's the only explanation. Is that why you want to find him so badly?"

  "No, I want to know who sealed him."

  "What good will that do?"

  "Because if he is powerful, as I suspect, that means there is only one who could have sealed him."

  "Kazue."

  He did not answer.

  "So you are not positive Suzume is Kazue's reincarnation, then?" Rin asked.

  Birds called to one another overhead. The Dragon's gaze f
ocused ahead, scanning the horizon, searching for the missing Kami. Or was he in search of answers? She did not expect him to speak; he did not owe her any explanations. But when he spoke, his tone was low as if pitched for her not to hear. "I want to hate her, but each time I try, she makes me laugh or yells at me. She's nothing like Kazue, which makes it harder to think of her as the same woman." He smiled to himself.

  Rin could not help but feel as if she had invaded his private thoughts. The Dragon she had known would never show this vulnerable side before. His imprisonment did change him. She had to ask, however, "Have you forgiven Kazue, then?"

  He responded with a frozen silence. They continued their climb, jumping over boulders and around thick groupings of trees and bushes. The only sound was the crunch of debris and the priestess' heaving breathing behind them.

  "Why did Kazue do it? I never knew why. I thought she loved you, I thought you loved her."

  "So did I."

  They ducked beneath low-hanging branches, and down below, the priestess in question huffed and complained. It was true this woman had none of the power and grace Kazue exuded. Will I recognize Hikaru in his new form? If Kazue's reincarnation is so different from her, perhaps Hikaru will be a stranger to me. She had assumed that when he was reborn, it would be the same man she had known. Now she was not so certain.

  "I thought you were out for vengeance. What changed?"

  He paused and looked over his shoulder at Suzume struggling up the hill after them. Her hakama had gotten tangled in a low-hanging branch and she was tearing at the fabric as she tried to break free, distracted and beyond hearing distance.

  The Dragon said to Rin, "The priestess, Kazue's reincarnation, was trapped by a spider. I had a chance to walk away and let her die. All the evidence indicated she was Kazue's reincarnation. Originally, I had planned to draw out my vengeance, mete it out in small doses. I wanted to destroy her life before killing her. I thought that was the only way to fill this hole inside me that Kazue's betrayal left behind. But perhaps I've grown soft during my imprisonment. I decided on the coward's path, and I left her behind."

  He looked away from Rin, across the forest and at the fractured light falling onto the forest floor. The sun was high in the sky, their shadows looked like dwarfed miniatures of them. The Dragon sighed and then said, "I kept thinking about her after I left. I couldn't get her out of my head. I had to know for certain she was Kazue, or else I would keep hunting down her reincarnations for all of eternity. So I rescued her, but I'm still not sure. I don't know what to do with her now. She thinks I'm under a spell, so I'm playing at being in love just to lower her defenses." He ran his hand along the top of his head and then held it there. "I want to believe she is Kazue, but she can't be."

  Rin sighed. She wished she knew how to advise him. Once upon a time they had been close, if only for a short while.

  The Dragon would not meet her gaze. He looked back again to the priestess. She had been unusually quiet for some time. But when they looked, she had disappeared.

  Kaito swore. "I shouldn't let my eyes off her for a moment." He balled his hand into a fist. His eyes clouded over, and she felt the moisture gathering in the air around him. He wants her to be Kazue because he loved her, but he's afraid of getting hurt again.

  "She seems like an awful lot of trouble. What will you do if she is Kazue?" she asked.

  He looked at her, a complicated series of emotions on his face. "I want to start over. She is not her predecessor. Maybe we can heal the wounds of the past together."

  28

  Suzume's mind spun for a moment before the words could come out properly. This has to be a trick or a dream or a hallucination.

  "Then turn Kaito back to the way he was!" she shouted.

  He shook his head. "I cannot."

  She placed her hands on her hips and looked down at the small bald man. He didn't come up much higher than her hip. She gave him a scowl that turned most men into a puddle—except Kaito, but he wasn't most men. "You made him into a simpering idiot, so turn him back into the arrogant boar he was before."

  The bald man, Kami—or whatever he was—chuckled and smiled at Suzume. "It was not my power that changed the Dragon." He frowned slightly as he looked into the distance. It gave Suzume a sinking feeling. "You've been hurt before, I can see that."

  She scoffed.

  "You've been hurt many times."

  Is he insane? What is he talking about? "What do you mean? I've never been hurt, not really…" Her father's impassive face as he delivered her sentence floated to the surface of her mind, and her mother's indifference. She shoved it down where it belonged. I don't care what my father thinks or about my mother.

  "No? You've lived your entire life alone, isolated from those around you by your birth. Used by everyone trying to get closer to your father. And then because of the sins of your mother, your father disowned you and sent you into exile. Did that not hurt? What about your mother choosing her lover over her children. Did that not sting?" the Kami said with a raised eyebrow.

  Suzume shivered. It's like he can read my mind. I don't think I'll ever get the hang of these immortals. "Hey, I thought you were going to grant my wish, not analyze my personal life," she said, hoping to redirect the conversation away from painful memories.

  The god shook his head, smiling.

  What's so amusing? Suzume narrowed her eyes at him.

  Ignoring Suzume's suspicious glance, he elaborated, "Your real wish is not simple, I fear. Your life has many folds like a lily." He opened his hand and a white lily bloomed there. It unfolded its multitude of petals, revealing a pink center.

  A few weeks ago, that might have impressed Suzume. But after everything she'd gone through thus far, she was not going to be distracted by something so simple and nonthreatening.

  "How do you know what my wish is when I haven't even asked for anything yet?" she said, with her arms now crossed over her chest. He spoke in too many riddles for her liking.

  He closed his hand and the lily disappeared. He folded his hands and rested them on his belly. "It is my gift, as a creator and giver of life."

  She eyed the supposed Kami up and down. The top of his head would reach her chest and he was thick around the middle with chubby fingers and short stubby legs. This guy is a creator? I find that hard to believe.

  "Is it so hard to believe one as small as me could bring life?" His voice, though mellow, had a sharp edge to it hidden beneath his calm words. For a brief moment she felt an overwhelming pressure, enough to knock her to her knees. But it was brief and she only wobbled slightly on her feet.

  "You can read my mind? That's not fair!" She pointed an accusing finger in his direction as she took a step back. This Kami was powerful, maybe even as powerful as Kaito, which was difficult to believe. How many more scary things are out there that I don't know about?

  He laughed long and loud this time and his round body shook with the force of it. The silence absorbed the sound, leaving not even an echo. This place is bizarre—why is it so quiet here?

  He took a moment to collect his breath before looking at her. "I know what your wish is because I do not need words to grant a wish. How else did you think I granted your earlier wishes, when they were never spoken aloud?"

  "But I didn't mean to wish for anything," Suzume replied in her defense. "I was just tired and hungry and…"

  "Lonely," the god supplied.

  "No." She shook her head forcefully and her hair whipped around her face.

  He clicked his tongue. "Come with me, child." He swung around and waddled down a pathway that appeared with a wave of his hand. I'm still not sure if this is a trap or not. The body of the Yokai that had attacked her lay on the ground a few feet away. Its blank eyes stared up at the blue sky.

  "I can assure you, I am no more danger to you than that was." The Kami stopped up the path from her and motioned towards the dead creature. "If your predecessor was able to capture me at my full strength, you would have no trouble
overcoming me in a weakened state."

  "You mean Kazue? I am not her!"

  He shook his head. "In time you will have to accept the truth of your destiny, but that is a tale for another day." He shrugged before continuing up the path.

  Suzume hung behind, uncertain if she could trust him.

  "Are you coming?" he called.

  I might as well follow him, it's better than hanging around this thing. She nudged the dead Yokai with the edge of her sandal. It shifted and rolled over, making a sickening crunching noise. Suzume screeched before blushing and hurrying to follow the Kami. I hope I never have to kill another Yokai again.

  "You'll face many such creatures on your journey," the Kami said, replying to her thoughts.

  "Quit doing that," Suzume chastised. She looked down at his gleaming bald head, it looked shiny enough to reflect the light. "Why are these things after me?" she asked finally.

  "Because they desire your power. Your untapped spiritual energy is a tempting prize for those who seek it. And in these times, there are many," the god explained without looking up at her.

  "Then how do I learn to control my powers?"

  "That is not something I can answer. I can only grant your wish."

  "And telling me about the creature is part of this wish?" she asked. That's awfully convenient.

  "I am sorry, Priestess, but these are the laws for my kind." He sighed and he seemed very weary.

  "There are other wish-granting… Kamis?" Suzume asked. If I had known I had wishes, I would have asked for a handsome but stupid husband, a palace of my own and my position returned at the palace.

  "That is not your true wish; if it was, I would grant it."