Waters Under Earth

A Ranma 1/2 Fanfic by Alan Harnum - harnums@hotmail.com

All Ranma characters are the property of Rumiko Takahashi, first
published by Shogakugan in Japan and brought over to North
America by Viz Communications.

Homepage at:  http://www.geocities.com/Tokyo/Bay/9758

Chapter 13 : Hunt's End

Then everything includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;
And appetite, a universal wolf,
So doubly seconded with will and power,
Must make perforce a universal prey,
And last eat up himself.
-William Shakespeare

     The man was lean and grey of hair, the dark skin of his face 
crossed with elaborate lines and whirls of scar tissue that 
seemed to be markings as much as the remnants of wounds.  He 
walked with an easy, absolute grace that was utterly silent, 
along the trail leading between the mountains.  He moved like a 
great cat stalking prey, or like a hound pacing a rabbit.  Every 
movement was necessary, no more and no less than what was needed 
to accomplish his desire.

     His eyes were golden, shining, metallic twins to the sickly 
yellow eyes of the crows watching him from perches in the trees 
along the sides of the mountains or upon the mountain crags.  The 
black birds watched him, dirty feathers shifting with a sound 
like parchment rustling as they turned their heads to see him 
walking.  When he passed out of their sight, the flock wheeled 
into the air and began to fly away towards the mountains.

     The man walked on, vaguely noting the crows as they soared
away.  They were too high anyway for him to catch, and they were 
ugly, filthy birds, barely worth paying attention to at all, and 
certainly not worth hunting.  He had more worthy prey awaiting 
him not far from here.

   A quick motion of his hand fanned out the four white feathers,
longer than his outstretched hand and fingers.  He caressed them,
lifted them to his face and inhaled the scent of the prey, 
brushed them with his lips and tasted them.  He had travelled
farther then ever before to come to the end of this hunt, and he
felt, as he always did near the end, a calm patience.  The hunt
was more complicated this time, the instructions simple enough,
but still more complicated than what he was used to.  But he knew
the end, as he'd known it hundreds of times before.  The prey
would die.  It was a different sort of prey, this time, something
he had not seen since he'd been bound long ago.  It had been a
long time since he'd hunted something truly new.

     Off to the north, the crows soared towards the mountain 
peaks, a dark cape thrown upward, as if by a dark god's hand.

**********

     Koruma and Masara were very, very bored.
     
     It is a difficult time, to be an adolescent in Phoenix 
Mountain.  The genetic differences between the natural form of 
the inhabitants and a normal human were not simply a matter of 
wings, and taloned hands and feet; the natural forms also tended 
to age physically rather more quickly at first then the average 
human for the first fifteen years or so.  The difficulty was, 
the speed of mental maturation didn't change at all.  The two 
boys, in their natural forms, were a pair of fourteen year old 
minds in bodies that were essentially adult.

     There are some fourteen year old boys who are very mature
for their age.  Koruma and Masara were not among them.  By virtue
of the convoluted system of competition among the noble families
in Phoenix Mountain, however, they had ended up being assigned to
serve as Kima's assistants.  

     It was an arrangement that did not particularly suit any of 
the three.  Kima treated them, with some justification, as a pair 
of obnoxious children one is required to babysit.  They regarded 
her, also with some justification, as a harsh, unyielding 
taskmistress who worked them like slaves.

     Currently, they were serving as the guardians of the 
immortal god-king of Phoenix Mountain, the Prince of Phoenix,
Bearer of the Kinjakan, Ruler of Jusenkyou, Lord Saffron.

     Lord Saffron happened to be, at the time, a small infant who
was peacefully napping in a stone cradle in the large, 
low ceilinged nursery where the noble children were raised for 
the first six years of their life.  They were then taken and
raised by their own families individually, so that truly lasting
friendships among children of opposing families would not be 
allowed to form.  The nursery was filled with the sound of 
children laughing and playing, with the clack of the sewing 
needles and conversation of their mothers.  

     "He's a lot more peaceful when he's a baby," Koruma said,
indicating Saffron with a gesture of his finger.  Like the rest
of his family, he was dark-complexioned and black-winged,
wearing the black breastplate and sash of his family over a 
white, high collared shirt and pants, with a short sword 
sheathed at his side.  

     "Yeah.  He doesn't yell nearly as much, except when he wakes
up," Masara agreed, leaning back against the wall.  His wings 
were white speckled with brown, his breasplate and sash a mottled
green.  His bow was slung over his back, a quiver beside it.  

     The families of the two boys were traditional allies in the
power structure, both high-ranking.  The two of them got along
wonderfully, each usually managing to equal the other in 
obnoxiousness.  They were currently serving as the guardians of
Saffron for one reason, which was because Kima had ordered them
to.  Otherwise, they would have been off getting into some kind
of trouble.  Unfortunately, when Kima said jump, Koruma and
Masara jumped.  They'd learned after the first few days of 
working under her that it was not a good idea to defy Kima in any 
way.

     "I can't believe he's actually Lord Saffron," Koruma said, 
looking at the baby again.

     "Shh... Kima said to keep quiet about that," Masara said,
glancing around the nursery.  There was a large group of children
in a circle, listening to Lady Fanael of the royal family reading
to them; she saw Masara looking around and raised her head from
the book to smile in greeting to him, which made him blush and
look away.

     Saffron was not a particularly attractive baby.  He had a
somewhat fiendish appearance, with pointed ears, big eyes and
small fangs.  The diamond-cut jewel dangling from the plumes of
white hair on his brow sparkled in the light of the lamps.  The
best thing that could be said about him was that he didn't cry as
much as a lot of babies.

     He also, as Koruma and Masara had discovered, had a tendency
to bite anyone who put their fingers near his mouth.  The two 
boys each bore a few bandages due to this habit.

     "I wish Kima would get someone else to do this," Masara said
with a sigh.

     "Why can't she look after him?" Koruma muttered.  "I hate
babysitting."

     "My father says she should get married," Masara said after a
moment.  "He says it's not right that a woman should be 
seneschal."
     
     Koruma shrugged.  "He's probably just mad because he didn't
get to be seneschal.  Everyone expected her to step down after
what happened."

     Masara punched his friend on the arm and scowled.  "What
does your father say?"

     "Lots of things.  I usually don't listen to him.  He keeps
on asking me if I've ever seen her with other men."

     "Huh?" 
     
     "You know what I mean."
     
     "We see her with other men lots of times.  She's always
yelling at us, and she's always talking to Xande, and..."

     "Not like that."
     
     "You mean like..."
     
     "Yeah."
     
     "Eww."
     
     "You've got that right."
     
     "But she's so..."
     
     "Middle-aged?"
     
     Before either could say anything more, they both received a
hard slap across the back of their heads.  "When are you little
fools going to stop calling me that?"

     "Kima," Masara said as he turned around, rubbing the back of
his head.  "We were just talking about you."

     "I hadn't noticed," Kima said, frowning as she stepped by
them to peer into Saffron's cradle.  "Hello, Saffron."

     "Careful if you pick him up," Koruma cautioned.  "He bites."
     
     "I don't think he'll bite me," Kima said.  "You just have to
know how to handle him."

     "He bit Lord Helubor yesterday," Masara said.
     
     "Did he now?" Kima said, a faint smile tugging at her lips.
     
     "Yeah," Koruma said.  "Really hard.  He yelled a lot, and
then Lady Fanael told him to leave because he was scaring the
children, and then Lord Helubor..."

     "Tell me later," Kima said.  "Has he been in to see him a
lot?"

     Masara shook his head.  "Just yesterday."
     
     "Hmm..." Kima said.  She reached down into the cradle and
carefully picked up the infant Saffron, who stirred slightly in
his sleep but did not wake.  "You two can take a break for ten
minutes.  Be back here on the dot."

     "Thank you, Kima," Masara enthused.  
     
     "It's very kind of you," Koruma said.
     
     The two boys promptly dashed off to get some food, having 
the appetites of adolescent boys combined with the sizes of adult
bodies.  They left Kima by the cradle, speaking in soft tones to
the child who was her king.

**********

     Ranma was so engrossed in his own thoughts and the feel of
Shiso's feathers under his fingers that he didn't notice the
cloaked man approaching until he was only a dozen feet away.

     "I thought you went back home like a good little girl," the
man said.  His voice was far too familiar for Ranma's liking.  As
soon as he heard it he was rising to his feet, tensing and
loosening his muscles in preparation to fight.

     "What the hell are you doing here?" he said.
     
     The cloaked man tugged his hood down and smirked in the same
unpleasant manner he'd had since Ranma had met him.  He was a few
years older than Ranma, his face sharply featured and slightly
effeminate, his hair a dark bluish-black, each ear pierced with a
small ring.

     "I could ask the same of you," Pantyhose Tarou said.  "I 
hear you were responsible for what happened at Jusenkyou, yes?"

     "Not really," Ranma said.  "I hear you tried to conquer the
world with magnetic back plasters.  Didn't work out too well, 
huh?"

     The smirk lessened slightly.  "Shut up, you female 
impersonator."
     
     "What's the problem, Pantyhose?" Ranma taunted.  There were
few people he truly and genuinely disliked in the world; Tarou
was right at the top of them.

     Tarou's smirk turned into a scowl.  His eyes narrowed.  "I'd
say the problem is yours, girlie.  First of all, you managed to
get rid of the Spring of the Drowned Virtuous Man when you and 
the formerly legendary king of a bunch of formerly legendary 
winged people decided to have a nice big fight and blow up some 
of Jusendo."

     "How'd you know about that?"
     
     "I asked the little girl at the Jusenkyou Guide's house."
     
     "Did you beat her up first?"
     
     "I don't hit little kids."
     
     "Funny, you seemed like the type."
     
     "Go to hell, Saotome," Tarou growled.  "Second, you called
me something I don't like to be called."

     "Hmm... what would that be?" Ranma said, tapping his finger
to his chin.  "Wait... I know, was it..."

     "Pantyhose?" Shiso said from where he was sitting on the
ground, looking up at Tarou with one dark eye.

     "Shut up, bird, or I'll make a sandwich out of you," Tarou
said, jabbing his finger through the air at the raven as he
pulled off his cloak and tossed it to the ground.  The metallic
scales of his vest and bracers glittered in the sun.

     "Why don't you just go away, Tarou?" Ranma said.  "I'm not
in the mood to play with you."

     "Fine," Tarou said.  "Maybe I'll just fly to Japan and have
a little talk with your fiancee, see why you're still here.  
Maybe she'd be interested to know where you are.  What happen,
you finally get sick of stringing all those girls along?"

     And it hit Ranma then.
     
     Tarou could ruin everything.  He could put Akane and his
mother and father, Ryoga and Ukyou, everyone he cared about, in
danger.  And he would do it as well, in a second.  There was very
little that Ranma wouldn't put it past Tarou to do, if he thought
it would gain him an advantage in some way, no matter how small.  

     "Don't you dare," Ranma said, feeling a slow, familiar
coldness start to slide over him.  "Don't you dare, Tarou, or I
swear I'll..."

     "What's wrong?" Tarou said with mock concern.  "Have I upset
you somehow?  I'm so sorry.  I'll just be going then."

     He made as if to turn, then stopped.  "Almost forgot.  I 
have to beat the crap out of you first.  Then maybe I'll fly you
back to Japan, put some nice lingerie on you and give you to the
old man.  That might get me a new name."

     "Tarou," Ranma said slowly.  "Please.  Don't tell Akane that
I'm here.  Don't tell anyone.  Just go.  Pretend we never met."

     "What's wrong, Saotome?" Tarou said.  "Worried they might
find out where you skipped off to?  Are you trying to start up
another harem?  Who's the first lucky lady?"

     "That would be me."
     
     Tarou turned around just in time to flop bonelessly to the
ground, after Cologne touched a certain number of strategic
pressure points on his shoulder and neck.  Neither of them had
even been aware of her approach.

     Cologne turned to regard Ranma.  "You always seem to screw
things up while I'm gone, don't you Ranma?"

     "It must be a talent of mine," he said with a sigh.  He
glanced to Tarou, who seemed to be in the process of a very
peaceful nap.  "Well, now what do we do?"

     "Pantyhose, Pantyhose, Pantyhose," Shiso chanted in a
cheerful, sing-song voice as he strutted up and down upon the 
ground.  "And what's in a name, anyway?"

**********

     The two guards were hardened veterans of more than ten years
in the small force of Phoenix Mountain that served as the 
defenders of the home.  They simply happened to be getting ready
to fly out of one of the lower entrances and do a small scouting
run when they were shocked to see a powerful hand grip the edge
of the ledge, and the owner of that hand haul himself up.  

     Galm had climbed the sides of the mountain easily, a great
grey spider, finding cracks no one else could have, climbing
near-vertical peaks to reach this entrance.

     The guards were veterans.  They stood no more chance against
Galm than they had against the last outsiders to invade the
mountain a short time ago.  In their favour, it could be said
they responded as quickly as they could, but as soon as the first
of the winged men brought up his spear to block Galm's path, it 
ceased to matter.  They died quickly; he was saving his desire to 
play until the true prey was revealed.  He killed them silently, 
opening their throats with his blade and dropping their bodies 
off the side of the mountain.

     Then he slipped inside, like a shadow, and like a shadow he
moved through Phoenix Mountain.  He knew that killing too many
would bring too much attention; it might warn the prey to flee
from him again.  He blended into the grey stone of the walls like
a chameleon, form smoky, shadowy, the golden glow of his eyes the
only thing that might betray him, but any who saw those 
shimmering orbs looked away, and when they looked back moments
later they were gone.

     Slowly, slowly, finding the long-unused staircases, at other
times clambering up the walls when needed, he wondered at this
place.  It was unlike any he had seen before.  He liked the birds 
flying around most of all; it was pleasant to have a snack now 
and again.

     Slowly, slowly, the first part of the hunt began to draw to 
a close, as up the airy mountain Galm went.

**********

     The figure stared down at the broken bodies of the two 
guards where they'd landed a few hundred feet below the entrance
they'd been killed at, each about a dozen feet apart.  It was
unlikely they would be spotted, but he couldn't take the chance.

     The signs were falling into place, as he'd dreamed them long
ago.  The first thing to do was dispose of the bodies, that the
servant who'd been sent for him would be unimpeded in his duty.

     He raised his hand over the body of the first guard, the
wings broken, the eyes blankly staring up at the sky that would
never again embrace the dead man, never again lift him from the
ground upon his feathers.  

     There was power in that hand, in the bloodline, bound up in 
his very being.  

     "Burn for me," he whispered, and caressed the air like a 
lover.  A thin trail of greasy smoke rose into the air for a few 
dozen feet before the wind dispersed it.  A moment later, another 
followed.  When that was done and even the ashes were gone, he 
spread his wings and took off into the air.

     Above his head, the cloud of black birds circled, yellow 
eyes agleam with feverish intensity.

**********

     "The dragon bowed low to the priest and the goddess and to
Monkey.  'Forgive me for devouring your horse, good priest,' he
said.  'Had I but known you were a pilgrim to the Western Lands, 
I would not have done so.  I shall serve as the priest's mount,
for I have transgressed against my father, and would repudiate my
sins.'"

     Kima leaned back against the wall of the nursery, holding
the infant Saffron in her arms and listening to Fanael's voice, 
as the youngest member of the royal family read to the small 
children gathered in a circle around her.  Fanael loved children;
it was a tragedy that she would never have any of her own.  
Females of Saffron's lineage were born barren nine times out of
ten.  Fanael hadn't beaten the odds.  

     Strange to think that the baby she held was far older than
her, older than she could ever live to be.  How much did he
remember, she wondered, of what lives he had led before?  

     The baby yawned and snuggled against her shoulder.  He would
be ready for his next transformation in a decade or so, ready
again to bathe in the waters of Jusendo and emerge full-grown, to
shed his heat and light throughout the mountain, to make winter
warm as summer and night bright as day.  For now, though, he
would at least have the closest thing he could be given to a
happy childhood.

     "So the goddess of mercy stepped forward and took the pearl
that was the dragon's power from beneath his chin, and he became
a beautiful white horse, to carry the priest to the Western Lands
and bring the scriptures back to the East."

     Children's stories, fairy tales, mere fancies.  She held 
the legendary Lord Saffron, the Phoenix Prince, in her arms, and
found herself wondering just how much truth there is to all these
tales.  As time flowed on, did history become legend, did belief
become mythology?

     "So Monkey and the priest continued their journey to the
west, and of what happened to them next I shall tell you another
day."

     There was the sound of the book closing, and the slight,
disappointed sighs of the children before they began to disperse,
to play games or sit at the feet of their mothers.  The 
noblewomen sat in small groups, chatting and gossiping amongst
themselves, filling the air with the sound of sewing needles
hitting against each other.

     There were perhaps twenty children at the most in the 
nursery at any time; the noble population was about a fifth of 
the mountain's people, perhaps a little over two hundred.  
Tradition held that they were the descendants of those who had 
been Saffron's most loyal retainers, in a time before the 
recorded history of the mountain had begun.  

     Fanael approached, the heavy book tucked under one arm, pale
grey wings shifting slightly, the long black hair, braided 
loosely with silver chains so fine they were like thread, 
spilling down her back.  "Hello, Kima.  How is Saffron?"

     "He's fine," Kima said, patting the tiny form of the ruler
of the mountain on the back.  "I think it was right to put him in
here.  It might be good for him to have some friends while he's
growing up."

     "I think so too," Fanael said.  "It might make him a better
king, when the time comes."

     Kima nodded and shifted her hold on the baby slightly.  
"It's hard to believe he's the same Saffron who was fighting at
Jusendo a little while ago.  He doesn't look as if he could hurt
a fly right now."

     "The phoenix burns itself out at last, and then rises from
the ashes," Fanael said.  "It is the way it has always been.  
May I hold him for a while?"

     "Certainly," Kima said.  Fanael put the book she was holding
on the edge of Saffron's cradle and took the baby with gentle 
care into her arms.  

     "Hello, great-grandfather," she said, and giggled slightly.
Kima smiled softly; she really did like the other woman.  It was
hard not to.

     "We're back, Kima!" 
     
     "Early, too!"
     
     Kima sighed and turned to look at Koruma and Masara.
     
     The two boys stood in the entrance to the nursery a dozen
feet away, each carrying wooden trays covered in bowls and plates
of food, and cups with steam rising from them like tendrils.  

     "We brought lunch!" Masara declared.
     
     "I can see that," Kima said.  "I am hungry, myself.  
Fanael?"

     "I would not be adverse to eating," Fanael said.
     
     "But we only brought enough for..." Koruma began.
     
     Masara elbowed him.  "It's okay.  We can share, Lady 
Fanael."

     "How gentlemanly," Fanael said, putting Saffron down in his
cradle.  "Did you bring Lord Saffron a bottle?"

     "Sure did," Masara said, indicating it with a nod of his
head where it lay on the tray he held.     
     
     "Thank you," Fanael said.  "Good job."
     
     The two boys beamed as they laid the trays down on the stone
floor near Saffron's cradle and sat down cross-legged.  Fanael
sat down after giving the bottle to Saffron, smoothing the blue 
cloth of her rich dress to kneel on the floor

     Kima followed a moment later, carefully tucking her wings
behind her as she knelt.  "We will take lunch together, then, I
suppose."

     It was more pleasant than she thought it would be, mostly
because Koruma and Masara kept their mouths shut most of the 
meal.  Masara had always been very quiet in Fanael's presence
anyway, and when Masara was quiet, Koruma often followed.  The
food was good, and it had been a long time since she had eaten
last.  She made conversation with Fanael, and was almost, for a
little while, able to imagine that things were back to normal,
and that the one who'd defeated her king, who she'd helped to
bring back here, was not only a few miles to the north.

     The meal eventually finished, and by the end she felt more
relaxed than she had been in some time.  Koruma and Masara were
stacking the dishes in preparation to take them back to the
kitchens when she felt the first chill running down her spine.

     And she turned her head to see a lean grey figure standing
in the entrance of the nursery.  His arms were folded across his
chest.  The blue light of the lamps on the walls to the sides of
the large square-cut entrance shone across the dark hue of his 
skin, the iron grey of his hair, the white loops and lines of 
scar tissue on his face.  But nothing could shine in those golden
eyes but their own awful colour.

     She remembered the vague dreams of the last few nights,
since before they'd gone to Ryugenzawa.  Fleeing from the vast
golden-eyed shape behind her.  The howling, echoing hunting cry 
of the beast.

     The eyes seemed to engulf her, draw her gaze into them like
whirlpools.  Not just her gaze; the entirety of her, her soul,
her very being.  Time seemed to slow down, become frozen, 
brittle.

     And after that, there came the fear.  She wasn't Kima any
more as she was now, wasn't Kima as she'd been ten years ago when
she'd taken her father's position after his death, wasn't any of
that.  She was a child, a tiny child, in darkness, and there was
no escape, no escape-

     There was a curving knife in his right hand, and four white 
feathers.  She knew them to be hers.  

     The knife slashed across his left wrist, opening it.  He
clamped the feathers to his wrist like a compress; scarlet blood
flowed, slowly, like tar dripping across snow, a red stain 
across the white of her feathers.

     He opened his mouth, and spoke, like a deathsong, like a 
skin drum pounded by a hammer made of bone.

     *First blood given*
     *Blood for prey*
     *When chains are riven*
     *I shall slay*
     
     He brought the feathers up to his mouth and licked his blood
from them.  His teeth were very, very white.  

     *Hunt unending*
     *Bonds unbending*
     *Wounds unmending*
     *Grey death sending*
     
     But his wound was mending, she saw.  The slash on his wrist
was closing, even as he tucked the feathers into the pale leather
of his belt and reversed the knife in his hands to put it there
as well, without a sheath to hold it.

     "Who are you?" she forced herself to say, forced her hand
somewhere amidst the fear to find the handle of her sword.  

     "Where is Ranma Saotome?" the man said, taking careful,
measured strides across the stone floor towards her.  Behind her,
she heard Fanael softly draw a breath, heard the knitting needles
stop clacking, heard the children stop playing and laughing.

     "Groundling, you answer Lady Kima's question," Koruma said, 
stepping forward and into the man's path.  "Who-"

     The man continued to walk.  Koruma reached out and grabbed
his shoulder with one taloned hand.  "Hey-"

     The man reached up and broke the boy's arm at the elbow with
the same ease a normal man breaks a twig.  Koruma's dark face 
went ashen at the sound of the bone snapping, and his mouth 
opened in a wail of pain before the man clamped his other hand 
over it and stifled it.

     "Koruma!" Masara said, starting forward.
     
     "Masara, no!" Kima shouted, drawing her sword and stepping
past the younger boy, shoving him out of the way, as the grey man
turned and flung Koruma into the wall with bone-crushing force.
The boy crumpled to the ground, one wing canted at an unnatural
angle, utterly still.

     There was no room in here to get into the air, not enough 
room to use her wings to shape the air into blades.  Behind her,
there was utter silence, an aura of fear that was almost palpable 
from the children.

     She lunged forward, striking for his belly, the steel of her
sword flashing in the light.  He stepped aside with ease, grabbed
her wrist and pulled her to him, wrapping his forearm around her
throat as he spun behind her, forcing her to drop her sword
clattering to the floor.  He wanted to hurt her, everything about 
him said that, the way he moved, the tenseness of his muscles.  
But for some reason, he didn't.  She was held helpless as a 
child; he was impossibly strong.

     "Get back," she said to Masara, trying to remain calm.  Her
shove had knocked the boy aside, but he was advancing now.  "Get
back.  Check on Koruma.  He needs help.  Fanael, keep everyone
back."

     "Oh, no," the man whispered into her ear from behind.  "Keep
them coming.  Keep them coming.  Let them try to stop me, like
the boy did.  Let them."

     "What do you want?" she said, seeing Masara moving to 
Koruma's side, seeing Fanael standing in front of Saffron's 
cradle protectively, seeing the women and children in the nursery
all watching with terrified expressions on their faces.

     "I want to know where Ranma Saotome is," the man said.  
     
     "I don't know," she lied.
     
     "Your scent says differently," the man said.  His tongue
reached out and touched the pointed tip of her ear; her flesh 
crawled at the feel of it.  "I am called Galm.  Take me to Ranma 
Saotome."

     "I don't know where he is," Kima said.  "And if I did, I
would not take you."

     Galm made a sound deep in his throat behind her, something
mixed between a growl and a whine.  "Take me."

     "You cannot force me to."
     
     "TAKE ME!" he shouted, the frustration raw in his voice.  
"TAKE ME, DAMN YOU!  THE HUNT'S NOT ENDED TILL THE PREY IS DEAD!
I CAN'T KILL THE PREY TILL I FIND RANMA SAOTOME!  TAKE ME!"

     His voice was savage, inhuman, growling.  "Take me."
     
     "If I do not, what will you do?"
     
     The man seemed to have no response to that.  His voice rose,
wordlessly, a whining sound of baffled disappointment.  

     "Kima," Masara said, tears in his voice from where he sat by
his friend.  "Koruma's hurt really bad.  We need to get someone
who knows medicine."

     A thin wail rose, from the stone cradle that held Saffron.
It grew in pitch and volume.  Saffron had awoken.  Behind her,
she heard Galm take a deep inhalation of breath.

     "I know you," he said after a moment, a wondering tone in
his voice.  "I know your scent.  But how..."

     He stepped forward, forcing her to walk with him or be
dragged by the throat.  Fanael was still in front of the cradle 
that Saffron lay in.  

     "Fanael, move," Kima said, finding it hard to speak with his
arm across her throat.  "Get out of his way."

     Fanael did so, moving to the side, her eyes wide with fear.
Kima could already see the noblewomen leaving with their 
children, heading for the other entrance to the nursery.  The 
news would be all over the mountain in minutes.

     "I know you," Galm said, looking down into the cradle at the
crying child.  "But nothing human can..."

     Then he began to laugh, a terrible sound.  His free arm
reached down and plucked Saffron up into the crook of his elbow.
"Take me to Ranma Saotome, or I'll tear the child's throat open."

     Kima felt herself go cold.  The breath seemed to tear itself
from her body.     
     
     "Please." she said.  "Not that."
     
     "Will you take me?" 
     
     She slowly nodded.  "I will.  He is nearby."
     
     "Kima," Fanael said from where she stood a few feet away.
"What... what does he mean?  You don't... I thought the outsider
went back to Japan."

     Kima was silent for a moment.  "Lady Fanael, I want you to 
go and get Xande.  Tell him what's happened here.  Tell him I 
have gone to the north.  If I am not back in an hour, he is to
send the troops after me.  Get help for Koruma.  Tell Xande to 
try and contain the news; the fewer people that know about this, 
the easier it will be."

     "Kima-"
     
     "Lady Fanael, please."
     
     The small woman nodded, and then walked quickly away.  Kima
glanced at Galm; he was smiling broadly.  Saffron had ceased to
cry; Galm held him cradled against his grey-vested chest, even as
he gripped her by the back of the neck with the vise-grip of his
hand.

     "We'll go, then?" he said from behind her.  His breath 
smelled like cold blood and rotting meat.

     "Yes," Kima said softly.  "We'll go."
     
     He let her go then, and she stumbled a few steps away from
him, taking easier breaths.  She turned to see him staring
intently at Saffron's face.  

     "I know you..." he whispered softly, white teeth flashing.
     
     "This way," Kima said, turning and starting to walk.  She
couldn't hear his footsteps as he followed, but each time she
glanced back he was there, holding Saffron, golden eyes gleaming.

     Once they were outside, she would have been able to flee.
In the air, he couldn't catch her.  But he had Saffron, and he
held the heart and soul of Phoenix Mountain in his hand.  She did
not know what would happen to Saffron if he were injured in his
infant form.  She could not risk that.  Not for her own life, not
for anything.  

     And this was what she had brought upon them, when she went
that first time to Japan in pursuit of the girl who'd stolen the 
map.  How she'd gotten it in the first place they still didn't
know.  But there was another passage she remembered, from The
Book of Fire and Earth:

     *The Phoenix fallen, and the hound walks the halls of the 
mountain.  Blood is on his jaws, blood on the face of the sun, 
blood on the hands of the ones who brought him, by the flight 
taken across the ocean, by the foulness hiding in dotage, by 
the madness hiding in arrogance, and by the hand of a child.*
     
     They came to a doorway soon enough that led out of one of
the palace buildings, out onto the mountainside and the short
flight of steps terminating in a long drop into thousands of feet
of empty air.  Below her, the sharp peaks of Phoenix Mountain
rose out of the mist, and everywhere the landscape of mountains
pierced the clouds.  The wind was cold up here, blowing through 
her short hair.  Behind her, she heard Galm take a long 
inhalation of breath.  

     "So what do you do now, groundling?" she said, glancing back
at him.  "Can you fly?  It's a long climb down."

     "I don't need to," the man said, and shrugged as he stepped 
by her, Saffron clutched tightly under one arm.  

     Then he leapt off the edge of the stairs.  He plummeted like 
a stone through the tendrils of mountain mist, then landed 
lightly on his toes a hundred feet below, catlike and with utter 
ease, on the sharp top of a stone spire less than a foot wide.

     Kima's eyes widened, and then she saw him leap again, down
what must have been a two hundred foot drop this time before he
contacted the edge of a rock wall and sprang off, continuing down 
like that until he was almost out of her sight, before she spread 
her wings and leapt off, a terrible fear rising in her as she saw 
him bound easily down the mountainside, Saffron clutched in his 
arms.  He could not be human, not with those eyes, not with the 
way he moved.  Nothing could move like that.

     When she reached the bottom of the mountain, he was standing
there, sniffing at Saffron and frowning in what looked like
confusion.  He looked up when he saw her, and the frown became a
smile.  "Take me to him.  You can fly if you want, but don't go
out of my sight, or the child dies."

     Kima wondered if that was possible, as she began to lead
Galm to the north.  Towards Ranma Saotome, towards Cologne,
towards where Samofere had gone, towards a destiny whose outcome 
was not yet certain.

     Overhead, the crows watched them go from their perches in 
the crags of the mountain, eyes cold and hard, their pupils like
legless black beetles trapped in the yellow amber of their gaze.

**********

     "So what do we do with him?" Ranma said, glancing at the
still form of Tarou.  Cologne stood next to him, also looking
down.  Shiso was fluttering around in the air overhead, seemingly 
rather bored with the whole thing.
     
     "I don't know," Cologne said, shaking her head.  "He would
destroy everything I worked so hard to build up.  If he goes back
to Japan and says anything to your family or to Akane, it will
get back to the Circle Eternal somehow.  They'll take your mother
and father, or Akane, and..."

     "I know, I know," Ranma snapped.  "But what are we supposed
to do to stop him?"

     "Kill him," Cologne said bluntly.  "That would be easiest."
     
     "WHAT?"
     
     "Calm down, boy.  I'm not suggesting for a moment we 
actually do it.  But it would be easiest."

     "It doesn't matter," Ranma said.  "I'm not doing that.  Not
ever.  Not even to Tarou.  Not after..."

     "If it were the only way to save another's life?"
     
     Ranma shuddered.  "That's different, Cologne.  This isn't
the same.  Do you know that Xi Fa Xiang Gao thing that Shampoo
used on Akane, back when she first came?  That memory eraser
shampoo?"

     "It doesn't last forever," Cologne said.  "And I... learned
long ago that trying to change someone's mind through that kind
of magic is an act almost always doomed to failure in the end, or
to consequences you cannot foresee."

     "So what do we do?" Ranma said.  "It's not like we can just
ask him to keep quiet, is it?"

     "Why not?" Cologne said, glancing down at Tarou.
     
     "But... he's..." Ranma said, trying to find the words to
explain it.  "He's... he's Tarou, Cologne."

     "That's hardly much of an argument," Cologne said as she
bent down and looked at Tarou.  "He seemed like a smart one, at
least, from what I saw of him.  We can try explaining things to 
him."

     "He won't care," Ranma said, shaking his head.  "All he
cares about is getting his name changed."

     "Let me handle him, Ranma.  Try to keep your brain in charge
of your mouth for once."

     "This ain't gonna work."
     
     Cologne ignored him and pressed a point on Tarou's neck.
The man's eyes fluttered open; they were filled with rage.  

     "Tarou, I will take the paralysis off you under one 
condition," she said.  "You are not to attack Ranma or I.  You
are to listen to what we have to say calmly.  Blink if you
agree."

     Tarou glared at the two of them, eyes barely more than
slits.  Then, at last, he blinked.

     Cologne pressed a few more points on his neck and shoulders,
and the slender boy slowly got up from the ground, rising to sit
with one knee curled up to his chest and the other stretched out
across the thin grass of the ground without saying anything.  His 
expression was one of carefully calculated nonchalance.

     "So," he said finally, breaking his silence and looking up
at Ranma.  "Who's the girl?"

     "The girl is capable of answering that herself," Cologne
said icily.

     "So who are you?" Tarou said.
     
     "We've met before," Cologne said.  "At the Nekohanten, when
you first came to Japan."

     "Don't remember you," Tarou said with a shrug.  
     
     "I looked rather different," Cologne said.
     
     "That's an understatement," Ranma interjected.  Cologne
whacked him in the back of the head, and he went back to his
former occupation of glaring at Tarou.

     "My name is Cologne," Cologne said.
     
     Tarou laughed.  "Right.  The old sack of bones that looked
like Happosai's sister.  What'd you do, find the fountain of 
youth?"

     "Smart boy," Cologne said.  "You got it first try."
     
     "Sure," Tarou said.  "You're crazy as the hermaphrodite
here."

     "Were you born this obnoxious or did you achieve it after
long years of practice?" Cologne asked.

     "I'd say a combination of both," Ranma said.  
     
     "I liked it better when you were keeping your mouth shut,"
Tarou said, tilting his head back to look at Ranma from where he
sat on the ground.  

     "Idiot children," Cologne muttered.  "I should just let the
two of you beat each other up and then pick up the pieces."

     "I'd like to see you try and stop us," Tarou said as he 
stood with lazy grace to his feet.  "I don't make the same
mistake twice, and I know how to defend against those pressure
point strikes-"
     
     His next words were swallowed in a choking wheeze as Cologne
punched him in the stomach with a fist, the knuckles of her index
and middle fingers extended.  It had been hard to even see her 
move.  Tarou doubled over, face going slightly green.
     
     "Bitch..." Tarou gasped.
     
     "Yes, that's right," Cologne said.  "I'm a bitch, and if you
think that you're going to go running back to Japan and put my
great-grandaughter in danger, if I think there's even a chance of
that, you'll discover just how much of a bitch I can be."

     "You're really her, aren't you?" Tarou said as he 
straightened up.  "The old woman from the Nekohanten."

     "Tarou," Ranma said slowly, trying to put as much calm into
the words as he could.  "If you go back and tell people where I
am, that'll put Akane, Akane's family, everyone, in real danger.
There's people after me, people who would really hurt them if
they thought it would help them get to me."

     He saw Tarou's face soften slightly, just for a moment, a
very rare thing.  Then he returned to his normal expression of
smirking superiority.  "So what's it worth to you?  More to the
point, what does it get me?"

     "Do you feel nothing for anyone beyond yourself?" Cologne
said.  "Have you never wished to do something simply because it
would help another?"

     "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you?" Tarou
said.

     "Yes," Cologne said.
     
     He snorted.  "That's a load of crap.  Do unto others before
they do unto you.  Everyone's gotta look out for themselves.  
Once that's done, you can start caring about other people."

     "I would like to hope you do not believe that," Cologne said
softly.  "It is a poor way to look at life in one so young."

     "Don't you judge me," Tarou said.  "I don't care if you're
the old woman or not.  No one judges me but myself."

     "And do you like what you see?" Cologne said, as a light
wind passed through the clearing where they sat, stirred the
remnant ashes of the campfire nearby and sent her hair blowing in
dark strands.

     Tarou was silent for a fraction of a second longer than he
had been before.  "Yeah," he said.  "I like it just fine."

     "This isn't getting us anywhere," Ranma said shortly.  
"Tarou, what do you want?"

     "You know what I want," Tarou said.  "Can the two of you
help me get my new name out of that old man?"

     "In the future, perhaps," Cologne said.  "Not now.  Not any
time soon."

     "We can't return to Japan right now," Ranma said.  "But..."
     
     "Then what good are the two of you to me?" Tarou said.
     
     "What good is a name?" someone called from above, the voice
from the formerly silent, soaring form of the raven.  Shiso
banked in the air above their heads and spiralled down to land on
Ranma's shoulder, cocking his head to look at Tarou.  "A man is
not defined by his name, nor is a name defined by a man."

     Ranma saw something light in Tarou's eyes, something 
deep-hidden, covered soon by surprise, anger.  "What did you 
say, bird?"

     "The road is long," the raven said.  "The road is dark."
     
     "Shut up," Tarou said, taking a step forward, raising a 
fist.  Cologne stepped into his path.

     "The bird does not know what he talks of," she said.  "He
tends to repeat things he has heard before."

     Something seemed to go out of Tarou.  "Whatever."
     
     He looked up at the sky.  Ranma and Cologne did too.  The
white clouds of the morning had been replaced by a bank of grey
shapes, drifting cumuli laden with the promise of rain.  "So, you
two want to tell me what's going on, maybe give me the reason why
telling people where you are could put them in danger?"

     Ranma and Cologne were silent for a few moments as Tarou
looked at them.  Shiso cocked his head back to stare at the 
clouds, as a few drifted in front of the sun and cast a shadow
across where they stood.

     "Storm's coming," he said.
     
**********
     
     Kima flew low to the ground, along the twisting trail that 
led between the mountains of the Bayakala range, constantly aware
of the golden eyes watching her from behind, the lean figure
pacing the ground below her.  And most of all, aware of the child
clutched in his arms.

     This was her fault.  All of this was her fault.  She had
brought Ranma Saotome back to Jusenkyou because of what she'd
seen in the books, what she'd seen below Jusendo, and she'd
brought back this as well.

     She wasn't sure what it was.  It had dodged her sword like
she was moving in slow motion, it had broken Koruma's arm like a
twig, and it had dropped two hundred feet and landed on a nearly
vertical stone wall like a cat.  There was a terrible sense of
simplistic power to the thing that looked like a man, the thing 
that called itself Galm.  He was like a sword with the edge of a
razor, unadorned and plain, made only for killing.

     The consequence of this could be dealt with later.  She
would lose her position, most likely.  Her family's name would be
stricken from the record of the nobles.  But none of that
mattered now; ensuring Saffron's safety was the only thing that
mattered.

     On the ground below, a child began to cry.  Saffron.  She
slowed in her flight, let herself glide for a few moments.

     "Shut up," she heard Galm say.  "Shut up, you little beast."

     The baby only began to cry louder, his wail rising into the
air, echoing off the mountain walls.  

     "Shut up, I said," that brutal, savage voice snarled from 
the ground below.  "Shut up or I'll rip your tongue out."

     She landed on the ground in front of the striding 
grey-haired man, who was currently holding Saffron at arm's 
length, his powerful hands wrapped around the child's midsection.  
He looked as if he were about to begin shaking him.  The child 
was crying, a thin sound of fear and pain.

     "You said you would not hurt him," Kima said.  "You said if
I took you, you would not hurt him."

     "I hate when things cry for no reason," Galm said, spitting
onto the ground.  "Children are the most useless creatures.  
Utterly helpless.  I will give him something to cry about, if he
wishes."

     "Everyone is a child once," Kima said.
     
     "Not me," Galm said with utter conviction.  He smiled, the
savage, snow-white ivory of his teeth showing from beneath the
cruel curve of his lips.  She found her eyes drawn to the 
patterns of scars upon his face, vertical and horizontal slashes,
curved lines, spiralling weals upon the darkness of his skin.  
Terrifying as his face was, there was nothing to compare to those
golden eyes, that regarded everything without the slightest sense
of emotion or empathy.  

     "I can make him stop crying," Kima said gently.  "Just give
him to me.  I'll stay right here.  I won't try to run."

     She stretched out her arms to Galm, trying not to let any
hope show on her face.

     Galm looked at the sobbing infant in his arms, then 
half-tossed him to Kima with a disgusted snort.  "Don't even
think of trying to flee.  I can have your wings off before you
can get a foot off the ground."

     He smiled again.  "I can't kill you yet, but I can hurt you 
very badly.  I haven't yet.  I like to save the hurting till the
end."

     Kima nodded and turned her back to him, forcing down the 
fear, cradling Saffron against her shoulder.  His tears were hot
against her bare skin.  

     "Shh... Shh... It's alright," she soothed.  "It's alright."
     
     Saffron sobbed slower, but he did not stop crying.  She
could feel Galm's golden eyes burning into her back.  "It will be
alright, my king.  I will not let him harm you."

     Faintly, far away, she heard a voice lifting in a song,
sometimes high-pitched, sometimes so low it almost could not be
heard.

     "What is that?" Galm said behind her.  "Who's there?"
     
     "FLY!" someone screamed from nearby in an old, strong
voice.  She took to the air instinctively, hearing Galm howl
behind her, feeling the brush of his fingers against the heel of
one boot as he leapt.

     And then, turning her head, she saw dozens of tons of earth
and stone descend like an oceanic wave upon the grey-haired shape
of Galm from behind, solidifying as it fell, a massive 
half-melted shape like a stubby candle of rock, a hand and 
fingers emerging from it, clenching at the air.

     Samofere was on the trail behind them, to the south, 
kneeling on the ground, sweat beading his wrinkled face as he
touched his fingers to the edges of the pit the earth had
formerly occupied.  "Go, Kima!  I can't hold him long!  Go to
Cologne!"

     She saw the fingers of the hand protuding from the rock 
flex, and cracks begin to appear around it.  

     "Samofere!" she called.  "He's not what he seems.  You have
to get away."

     "I know what he is," Samofere shouted back.  The cracks
spread further around the hand; other cracks began to emerge on
the rock.  "He can find you wherever you go!  Go to Cologne, to
Ranma!  Make ready to fight!  I can't hold him forever."

     He screamed then, as if in agony.  She saw his hand tighten
on his plain wooden walking stick.  Or not so plain now, she saw;
there was a triangular prism of green crystal atop it, blazing
with veridian light.  "GO!"

     A second hand smashed out of the rock, splitting open a
circle of cracks.  The two hands wrapped around the edges of the
splits in the from which they emerged rock column and began to 
push.  

     Saffron began to cry louder, and that galvanized her to
action.  She took off to the north, as behind her she heard
Samofere scream again, and heard the sound of stone splitting
apart.

     Overhead, the storm clouds began to gather tighter together.
          
**********

     Howling with rage, Galm tore the stone prison in half and
stepped out amidst the shattered chunks, powdered rock clinging
to his clothing and skin.  The white-winged shape of the prey was
nearly a hundred feet away, high into the sky, going higher with
each passing second.

     No matter.  He drew a knife and threw in one quick motion,
an eye sharper than any human's picking out the spot perfectly.
He heard a high scream of agony and saw her flutter to one side
in the air; the knife dropped, glittering in the sunlight and
trailing blood, to the ground.  It wouldn't kill her, but it 
would slow her down.

     The sound of stone crumbling behind him alerted him, and he
hurled himself to the side as a dozen jagged spikes fell from the
remains of what had imprisoned him.  
     
     "Hold, beast," the brown-robed old man said from where he
stood, black wings folded over his back.  "You will harm no one 
of my people while I still stand."

     Galm took a deep inhalation of the air.  "I know your 
scent."

     "And I know yours, hound of hell," the old man said.  He 
held his walking stick in front of him horizontally with both 
hands like a staff; the green light shining from the crystal atop 
it hurt Galm's eyes.  "I know your name and your shape and your
binding."

     "They live long in these parts, don't they?" Galm said.  "Or
perhaps much less time has passed than I thought.  But he was not
a child when I was born again, and you were not an old man."

     "It matters not," the old man said in a weary voice.  "What 
is past is past."
     
     "And what is to be is to be," Galm said.  "There is only the
present for now.  Soon you will be dead."     
     
     And then he moved.  Before he got a dozen feet, the ground
erupted in a fountain of earth and stone beneath him, hurling him
into the air.  He spun and landed on his feet, closing more
distance between him and the old man, who slowly retreated before
him, voice rising in a complex song, green light shining from his 
cane.

     The earth humped beneath his feet, burst into spikes of
stone that pierced his legs and arms and chest.  He drew a
gasping breath as he broke them off and staggered away.  

     "You have no idea how much that stings," he snarled, as he
ripped one out and flung it at the old man.  It dissolved to mud
in the air a yard before it would have hit.

     And then Galm changed, bounding forward on four legs across
the ground, wide jaws opening, red-tinged saliva dripping across
the earth in his passage.  The earth shook; a chasm opened under 
his feet, but he leapt aside.  To the left and right the earth 
exploded in columns of jagged stone, but he dodged and wove 
between the eruptions, coming ever closer.

     And then he was leaping, form flowing in mid-air to human,
catching the old man by the throat and wrenching the stick from
his hands, hurling it aside, the green crystal dimming to
darkness at it clattered across the ground.

     The old man brought up a hand as if to ward off a blow, and
Galm punched him in the face, then again.  He moaned and sagged
in the hunter's grip, as Galm drove blow after blow into his
stomach and face, the sensitive spots of his arms, the delicate
bones of his wings.  Blood ran across the grey-haired man's fist, 
as he dropped the old man to the ground like a toy.  The old man 
was covered in his own blood, from his white hair to his brown 
robes to his black wings.  Galm guessed most of his ribs were
broken, as were his arms.  He'd snapped the long bones of the 
wings as well, and broken the old man's hip.  The old man was 
making a low sound of agony from where he lay on the ground.

     "I'd play longer," Galm said.  "But I've got better things 
to do than amuse myself with old men, no matter how old they are.
Die slow."

     He brought his heel down on the old man's windpipe, hard 
enough to crush it, not hard enough to break the neck.  He heard
the old man gasping his last slow, agonized breaths on the
ground as he turned and ran to the north, following the trail of
the prey.  She was going towards Ranma Saotome, the old man had
said.  

     He would have more killing to do soon.  Galm threw back his 
grey-haired head and howled, like a hound upon the chase.  Hunt's
end was coming.

Continued in [Ranma][Fanfic] Waters Under Earth - Chapter 13 (2/2)--====================987654321_0==_
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