[FFML] [FFML][Ranma][violence content] Tokens(A tale of Ranma & Akane in the desrt)

Note: Hi, I just joined this list. I hope I did this right. This is my first Ranma fanfic. So, please C&C it. I would appreciate it very much. Thanks. None of these characters are mine.

Prologue

The kingdoms of Jin and Jiya on the continent of Sidon had been at war for seven generations when King Genma assumed the throne of Jiya. He was a cruel and merciless prince, already acknowledged as a ruthless warrior on the battlefield when the old king, his father, took ill and faded from life until he lay still and wraithlike in death.

Genma was skilled with the sword and in kenpo, though it was the pursuit of the latter that consumed much of his time. The Saotome kings of Jiya and the Tendo kings of Jin had fought side by side long ago, and together had created the Anything Goes style of kenpo. Now being bitter enemies, they practiced their craft separately.

At any rate, being fair of face and strong of arm, and above all being the King, Genma did not find it too hard to find a bride as his councilors advised.

The lady Nodoka caught his eye at a ball. As her tall, slim form swayed in the dance of the Jinian court, her hair a halo of flame around her head, Genma followed her movements with his eyes and imagined her in his bed.

�She�s already engaged, Majesty,� said Kalamari, Genma�s chief councilor. �Andrei Mori and she have been betrothed for years.�

The next day, young Count Mori was escorted by an armed guard to the palace in chains, charged with treason, and beheaded that very night. His head adorned the palace gates the next morning.

Genma and Nodoka were married with great pomp and ceremony the following week.

The beautiful King and the young Queen lived well enough in the palace, and if Nodoka�s form seemed frailer, and her dark eyes sometimes haunted, none dared to voice their opinions on why that might be.

Eventually, Nodoka grew heavy with child. Genma was jubilant.

�An heir! I shall have a son to carry on the Saotome style of fighting,� he crowed.

One late evening, Nodoka gave birth to a girl.

Genma screamed when he heard the news. He strode up the stairs to the birthing chamber and dragged his bloody, exhausted wife from bed in his rage. She fell moaning to the ground, her hands clawing at the rich Aubusson carpet until she fainted from sheer exhaustion and terror.

The king would have dragged her down the stairs if he hadn�t been stopped by his councilors.

�I shall drown your brat myself!� he promised her. But the councilors came from old families, and believed it was bad luck to kill the royal firstborn child.

�Leave the Queen, your Majesty,� they pleaded. �The child is valuable. It will gain you lands and armies if you sell it to an ally. It will only strengthen your bonds with them.�

The councilors did not dare to refer to the child by its sex.

�Bah! Take it from my sight then. I don�t want to see it until it is grown and can be sold!�

So the babe was named Kasumi and taken away to be cared for by the queen�s handmaidens. For the Queen ventured only to nurse her child herself and left it to the handmaidens at all other times.

Almost before Nodoka was recovered from her labor, Genma proceeded to frequent her bed until she had conceived again. This took a year, because to the west of Jiya, Jin and the other civilized countries, news came of the Arun, a horde of nomads led by a charismatic and unstoppable leader named Happosai. Genma was kept busy defending his territories in the far west.

In the meantime, the old king of Jiya died as well, and left the kingdom to his son, Soun. Soun took a wife to him and proceeded to continue the war with Happosai and the six tribes of Arun.

The following year, another daughter was born to the Queen and Genma�s rage could not be contained. He hung his wife from her wrists in the Great Hall and whipped her till the blood from her back pooled at her feet.

Hatred for her husband coiled like a cold black snake in the queen�s breast as she hung from the chains. The councilors again begged for the King to spare the child and he thundered at them, �If she bears me another girl child, I shall kill her and burn all her babes before her dying eyes.�

The councilors shuddered and retreated and worked all their arts, and every day a potion was sent to the queen, so that she might bear a boy child, but another year passed before the queen grew heavy with child again.

Around this time, spies brought the news to Genma that Soun�s wife was pregnant as well. A month before the queen was due, Genma received news that his enemy�s wife had delivered a healthy son.

He went to the Queen�s chamber and told her the news.

�Do you remember my vow last year, my dear?� he asked maliciously.

�I had fainted from your beating, my lord,� Nodoka reminded him tonelessly.

�Well, I feel free to repeat it. If this third child is a girl, I will rip open your belly so that no more such spawn will leave your womb.� With that, he left her.

A month passed slowly, and as the date of the birth grew nearer, Genma�s councilors grew more and more terrified.

�If Nodoka births a girl child this time, the King will kill us all along with the Queen in his rage,� said Lord Tofu. �I have a young son myself, and I would like to live to see him grow up.�

�There�s a solution,� mused Kalamari. �It�s a slim chance, but Genma might agree to it.�

The advisors put their heads together but could not find a way to improve on Kalamari�s plan. They went to seek an audience with Genma.

�You know that the Arun are massing on the plains, majesty,� they said.

Genma glanced at them. �Aren�t we even now waiting for a reply from Cantos to join with us?� Cantos was Jiya�s greatest ally, though not nearly as powerful.

�Uhm,� Kalamari coughed. �Yes, Majesty. We received a reply today. They have seen the strength of the hordes of Arun and don�t think that allying with us will save them. They want us to have a third ally.�

�What?� barked Genma. He rose from his throne and strode to where Kalamari knelt, offering up a scroll. He snatched it and peered at it, but he was not very good at reading, and finally he glared at them.

�Who do they want us to ally with?� he asked.

Kalamari did not want to see his King�s face when he replied, but he stayed looking up so as to avoid the foot that doubtless would be coming his way.
�Jin, Majesty.�

There was a long silence. Kalamari had to skip nimbly to avoid the foot that nevertheless managed a painful kick to his ribs.

�What filth are you spouting, you fool of a camel?� Genma roared. �Why would I EVER want to..?�

�There are advantages, majesty,� ventured Kalamari.

Genma�s cold eyes lit on his advisor.

�Interrupt me again and I shall have your tongue sliced from you with a blunt blade.� The councilors quaked on their knees. �What advantages?�

Tofu looked up at this point.

�When old enemies become allies, it is customary to give each other a token of their good will. Usually, that token is a son or a daughter. Each king will foster the child of the other as his own. The child is a surety against betrayal.�

�What is so wonderful about sending off three girl brats? I will give them away freely to any beggar that asks,� said Genma.

No one questioned that the third child would be a girl child.

�Ah, but if you give them to Soun, Majesty, in return you will get a son,� Kalamari said craftily. �His son. To raise as your own.�

Genma paused, the words reverberating in his mind. A son. To raise as his own. To train as he wished.

�But why would he take three daughters for one son? Everyone knows a son outweighs any number of daughters in value.�

�Ah, you will only offer him your youngest daughter, majesty,� said Kalamari. �The more daughters you give him, the less he will value them.�

�What will make him value your youngest will be that you will engage your daughter to him,� Tofu continued hastily. The King was clever, and if he decided that they were deceiving him in any manner, their bones would soon adorn the palace walls. �The king won�t believe that you, a warrior, would break that oath.�

�This war with the Aruns is likely to be a long war,� Genma mused. �I would have the boy for many years. And betrothed to my daughter he would be bound in a double bond to me and Jiya. And he will rule after me. Let Soun have another son to rule after him.�

He looked down at his cowering councilors. �Very well. You may contact Soun of Jin.�

When the third daughter was born, no one was really surprised. The Queen looked up with tired terror in her eyes as Genma entered the room.

He will kill me this time, she thought.

But he only smiled a strange smile at her and took the baby away. She dared not ask where.

The arrangements had been made. The two kings sent each other documents with their seals pledging their children Ranma and Akane to each other.Genma was afire with eagerness. The only reason he waited till his daughter was weaned was that he did not want her to die on the way to Jin, thus stealing him of his new son.

One cool summer morning, a procession of slaves, servants, and courtiers, Kalamari at its head, left the city of Jiya with the baby princess Akane. Across the desert, a similar procession carrying the little prince, Ranma, began the same journey to Jiya.

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