Here's a little fic offering. It's just a prologue for what could be
a much longer story, but whether or not I continue will depend
on whether or not you like it. ^_^ And though this is just the
prologue, future chapters (if there are any) will contain spoilers
for... well, pretty much darn near everything. ^_^;
C&C is welcome.
Standard disclaimers apply.
Kokoro no Nozomi (Desires of the Heart)
by Kitsune
Prologue
It had been a mistake to chase the tengu, Nozomi realized
belatedly, as she struggled to free herself from the writhing
branches of the winter-bare shrub that had ensnared her. Even
though the trickster spirit had led her on a merry chase that had
*should* have ended when she had plunged through the thin ice on
the frozen river, she had continued to pursue the tengu, in spite
of her sopping wet fur, with gleeful temerity.
And now, because she could not bear to give up the thrill of
the chase; because she reveled far too much in the wild, glorious
sensations of the fox form she wore... she was trapped in yet
another of the tengu's traps. The unnaturally long thorns on the
shrub's branches grew even longer, snagging her red pelt and
digging painfully into her flanks. She squirmed futilely against
her entanglement, yipping in protest as the old bird spirit
looked down at her from the branches of the tree where it had
taken refuge.
Hm, she thought, if that old bird thinks he can trap me in a
silly bush, he is sadly mistaken. And with that thought, she
summoned the foxfire within her to burn away the branches...
Nothing happened. She blinked. Her magic...
*What's the matter?* the tengu asked, its beak open in a
silent laugh. *Caught, are you? Can't use your magic?*
*Release me,* Nozomi demanded angrily, in an effort to
disguise her sudden fear at being so thoroughly trapped.
The tengu blinked at her, malevolent humor flickering in its
bird-black eyes. *And have you nipping at my heels again, kit?*
the tengu replied. *I think not. This should teach you to
respect your betters.* And with that, the thorns underwent yet
another growth spurt, drawing blood, and the fox yelped,
thrashing helplessly within her painful prison. Laughing, the
tengu took to the air in a flurry of long-dead leaves and icy
wind, and disappeared over the forest into the twilight sky.
Nozomi ceased her struggles almost immediately. It was
futile, she knew, to try and get out of a tengu snare without
some serious counter magic. She tried once again to summon up a
spark of foxfire... and sighed. The tengu had planned his trap
well. The only thing she could do now was wait until one of her
elder sisters found her... at which point, she thought with a
groan, she would be chastised and humiliated for once again
stumbling so foolishly into trouble.
So she waited. And waited. The shadows lengthened, and the
first evening stars began to glimmer above the eastern horizon.
But her sisters did not come.
The winter chill deepened with the darkening of the sky,
seeming to penetrate every fiber of her wet pelt, seeping into
her body and settling into her bones until not even shivering
kept her warm. The thorns pierced the flesh of her fox body, but
no amount of gnawing with her sharp teeth could destroy them, nor
loosen their hold on her.
Night fell, and, with the rising of the full moon, Nozomi
could see that her drenched, blood-matted pelt was covered in
thin layer of glistening frost.
*Sisters,* she called out, as panic began to grip her heart.
*Sisters, please! Please, help me!*
She was answered with silence. And she suspected, with a
growing despair, that her sisters were going to be strong in the
promise that they had made the *last* time -- that they would no
longer rescue her from every little self-inflicted predicament.
But... she was freezing to death. And if her body died
while she was still trapped within the borrowed fox flesh, it
would be the end of her.
Surely her sisters would not let her perish alone in the
middle of the forest, all for the sake of an oath...
The moon traced an agonizingly slow path across the sky,
tracking the minutes and hours as they slipped by without anyone
coming to her aid. Gradually, as her eyes began to drift close
under the onset of a frozen, lethargic weariness, Nozomi began to
be very afraid that her sisters had indeed left her alone to
die...
She was aroused from a deep, numbing sleep by the sound of
voices.
At first, she thought her sisters had come to her rescue at
last. But no... The voices were not the sweet music that
resonated within her mind... but were, instead, actual vocal
intonations. Distant shouts, calls, mumbles, grunts...
Human voices, she realized. Near. And coming closer.
She would have panicked, were she not already resigned to
her imminent death. With what seemed like a momentous effort,
she opened her frost-caked eyelids slightly, and saw, with some
surprise, that she had lived through the night at least. The
forest ground was swathed in the pale gray mist of a bleak winter
dawn.
And, less than a tail-span from the tip of her nose, she
could see small, bare, human feet, caked with mud.
A spark of amazement burned through the frozen numbness that
engulfed her, borne from surprise that a human could get so close
to her without her senses giving her warning... and it gave her
the strength to wearily lift her gaze to see the owner of the
dirty feet.
Her first thought, as she looked into the child's face, was
that she was mistaken; that the boy was not human at all, but her
kindred. Why else would he have such large eyes, the color of
amethysts, and hair as red as her own pelt, tied up high on the
back of his head like a small fox tail?
But no, he was human after all. Dressed in little more than
rags, clutching a bundle of dry sticks to his chest with thin
arms that spoke of knowing both hunger and hard work, the boy
stared at her with a mixture of sadness and pity, but no
recognition. And as she lifted her gaze to look at him, he took
a sharp intake of breath.
"You're alive," he said softly.
Perhaps, she thought in silent weariness. But not for much
longer. Go away, little human child. My dignity has already
been tattered beyond repair, and if I am to die, I would prefer
it be in private, and not with some filthy human child staring at
me, no matter how beautiful his eyes.
But, contrary to her unspoken wish, he did not leave.
Instead, he knelt down, placed his bundle of sticks on the frozen
ground, and slowly reached out a cautious hand...
"Shinta!" The new voice caused the boy to jump, startled,
and he looked over his shoulder to see a old woman hobbling
through the grove of trees toward him. "What do you think
you're doing?" she demanded. She peered over the boy's shoulder
at the object of his interest, and grimaced in disapproval.
"You're supposed to be collecting firewood, not poking at dead
foxes." A touch of fear tainted her frown, and she stepped away.
"A dead fox is a bad omen, boy. Are you trying to bring disaster
down on us all?"
"But it's not dead," the boy protested quietly. "It looked
at me."
"Dead or alive, it doesn't matter," the old woman grunted,
her eyes shifting uneasily away from both the boy and the fox.
"You don't have time to waste, especially on a creature that's
not going to live out the day anyway, what with those wounds and
being practically frozen to the ground. Besides, if Junkei finds
out, he'll beat you again until you can't even stand up."
"No he won't," Shinta replied. "Junkei realized last time
that if I can't stand up, then I can't work."
The old woman groaned. "Like talking to a rock," she
muttered. "Fine then. Do what you like if you enjoy the sting
of the rod so much. Just don't involve any of the rest of us,
or it'll be worse for you." And with that, she stumbled off, as
if eager to disassociate herself from the child's apparent apathy
towards imminent punishment.
Nozomi listened to the exchange with surprise, then watched
as the boy... Shinta... once again reached out towards her. Her
body's instinct urged her to growl at him, or even nip at his
fingers, but she was far too weak to even act on such basic
survival urges. So instead, she watched with an almost detached
interest as he grasped the thorny branches that entangled her,
his small hands slipping easily between the long, thick thorns.
He was trying to free her, she realized suddenly, through
the frozen fog that clouded her mind. The fool child was going
to try to break the tengu's enchanted prison.
The boy leaned over as he adjusted his grip, and bent his
head towards hers. "This might hurt a bit," he whispered
apologetically.
Nozomi felt like weeping at the boy's compassion, especially
since she knew his efforts would ultimately be useless, and that
the time he wasted, trying to undo what no mortal could, might
indeed earn him a beating from whatever master kept him so thin
and ragged. How ironic, she mused bitterly, that the only one
who had the inclination to save her, was one who could not.
The boy grunted as he tried pulling at the branches, which
didn't give way in the slightest. He stopped, frowning, then sat
on his haunches and scrutinized the thorny shrub as one might
size up an adversary, his violet eyes narrowed intently. After a
few moments of examination, he stood again, pushed back one
sleeve, and carefully slipped his skinny arm in between the thick
outer thorns and branches, until his hand reached the heart of
the tangle, where the branches were less thick, but the thorns
more numerous. Grasping a branch firmly between the thorns with
his small hand, he planted his bare feet against the ground,
leaned back, and pulled with all his might.
Nozomi watched silently, not even daring to hope. She could
feel her heart slowing; a frozen lump trying to pump ice through
her veins. A thin layer of frost was slowly creeping across the
surface of her open eyes, obscuring her vision...
The boy pulled... and nothing happened.
Clenching his teeth, his eyes hard with determination, he
pulled again, groaning with exertion. He pulled until beads of
sweat stood out on his brow, in spite of the cold winter air...
*crack*
Nozomi's frost-clouded eyes widened as she heard the snap of
that small branch... and felt the tengu's enchantment shatter.
The supernatural strength fled from the shrub's branches, and the
boy fell backwards onto his rump as he unexpectedly tore the
shrub apart.
For a moment, Nozomi did nothing, too stunned with surprise
that the boy had succeeded.
Then, with a howl of euphoric delight, she leapt free of
both the thorny prison, and her frozen, dying body.
*Saved!* she called out to the sky; to her sisters, if they
were listening; to the tengu whose magic snare had been destroyed
by a mortal child. *Saved!*
She turned to look at the boy who had rescued her... and
found him kneeling next to her abandoned fox form.
His bare arm was bloody with scratches from where the thorns
had bit into his flesh when he fell backwards, but if he was in
pain, he didn't show it. His red hair hung over his eyes as he
worked swiftly and carefully to pull the thorns from the small,
frozen little fox before him.
As he gently pulled the last thorn from the frozen, matted
pelt, he rested his hand on the bloody flank. The frost melted
under the warmth of his hand as he sat there looking into clouded
golden fox eyes, feeling for a heartbeat, for a breath,
anything...
And then he bowed his head.
"Dead," he whispered, brokenly. "I'm... sorry..."
No, Nozomi wanted to tell him. No, not dead, Shinta.
Alive. Alive, because of you.
But though she was free, she was still weak and drained from
her ordeal. She didn't even have the strength to manifest
herself in a ball of foxfire.
Slowly, Shinta stood and raised his small hands in a praying
gesture for the dead. And Nozomi could see in his young face
that it was a prayer he had done many times before.
After a moment, he scrubbed at his wet eyes with the back of
his grimy, blood-streaked hand, and bent to pick up his bundle of
firewood. Quietly, he left the frozen little fox behind.
Nozomi, who knew then that she would love this human boy
forever, followed.
*****
Just the beginning. ;-) I plan to stick close to the canon in brief,
and then pick up the story in earnest after the end of the manga.
If you'd like to see more of this, that is.