Vision Of Escaflowne Fan Fiction ❯ Refugees and Kings ❯ Home ( Prologue )

His last straggling students finally gone, Myoujin Daisuke locked the dojo entrance behind him. He rolled his sore shoulder with a grunt then stepped onto the dirt path leading to the shrine on the nearby hill. There, he could forget how much his aging bones ached after the longer sessions with his students.

 

That evening a warm breeze flowed from the south, tugging at his loose hakama and blowing freshly fallen leaves across his path. This was one of the few places left in that part of the city that still had trees, a kind of park under Myoujin's protection from any developer that might show too much interest in the area. As such, he made sure to enjoy the setting as often as possible and run his students up and down some of the steeper paths even more frequently.

 

Despite the ever-present glow from the city, the moon dominated the sky. Myoujin paused a moment on the path to gaze upwards, wondering how it could be so bright.

 

A shift in the wind pulled his thoughts from the moon, carrying with it a scent at first so faint he couldn't be sure what he smelled then growing stronger. Out of some instinct Myoujin turned into the wind.

 

“Ugh,” he nearly gagged on the mingling scent of burning flesh and wood before he could clamp his sleeve over his mouth and nose. “What is-“

 

The air exploded, nearly knocking him to the ground.

 

A lifetime of training driving him, Myoujin dropped into a crouch, his hand ready to free his sword from its scabbard at the first need. The moon began to weep and flow the path with blinding tears. He squinted into the silver light cut into long arcing shafts by the trees. His hand faltered as his vision cleared.

 

A young woman knelt among the star fall in the middle of the path. The air calmed in her presence and with it returned his sense of hearing. The bundle she held in her arms screamed with the fury of a terrified child. Judging by her flowing dress, Myoujin might have wondered if she was from one of the fantasy stories his students always brought into the dojo were it not for the very real looking dark stain spreading down from her shoulder across her abdomen.

 

The realization that the woman was wounded pushed Myoujin through his shock. Still working off reflex, he rushed to her side. “What- what happened?!

 

To his surprise, she hardly seemed to recognize his existence. Her expression collapsed into panic. Stunned tears ran from her emerald eyes as she stared through Myoujin, capturing the glow of the moon to her cheeks. She cast about desperately with her free arm to search the empty ground for something precious.

 

“Val,” she gasped, fighting back sobs, “Val! Where are you?!”

 

“Hold still!” Myoujin barked, trying to get at her shoulder, “You're losing too much blood!”

 

She thrust his hands away with more strength than he would have thought her capable of with her slender frame. She tilted her face to the stars to glare at them in accusation. Her scream turned to words only at its most piercing, “VAL!”

 

With that cry, she set the air around them ablaze once more.

 

Guessing what to expect this time, Myoujin threw up his arm to shield his eyes. He willed the lady to disappear again with the light, to slip back into his imagination like a strange dream so he could wake up the next morning and wonder where such ideas came from.

 

The light faded. The child the woman held stilled wailed.

 

Damn it! This can't be happening. I'm old but I can't be loosing my mind yet!

 

Instead, when he lowered his arm, a new shadow stood not far off the path among the oak trees. Myoujin felt his hand move once more to his sword, wondering what else the night would bring.

 

Apparently unaware of the threat of Myoujin's sword, the shadow stepped onto the path, the remaining moonlight revealing him to be a young boy. He also held a child in his trembling small arms. He could not have been even seven years old yet he sported a gash across his forehead that would have suited a grown warrior. Blood dribbled across the left half of his face, his lips set in a line of grim satisfaction.

 

“Val!” the young woman cried when she saw what he held, sounding as surprised to see him as Myoujin was.

 

The sound of the woman's voice pushed the boy forward, even though he was already swaying on his feet. He struggled through the few steps towards the lady and collapsed onto his knees at her side. “I have her,” he breathed, “She's here.”

 

Taking both children in her arms, the woman was no longer able to hold back her sobs. These two were no threat to Myoujin. His sword forgotten, he approached the boy to inspect the cut on the boy's forehead. Myoujin needed something concrete he could do; something tangible to help these people. He couldn't just let them sit helpless in the moonlight, even if they were sake induced figments of the imagination.

 

“It's not too deep,” he said when the boy jerked under his touch. “You'll be all right Kid.”

 

“All right...” the boy repeated, mumbling. Myoujin watched in shock as he touched another stain on his sleeve as though in disagreement. His legs crumpled from beneath him and he collapsed against Myoujin.

 

“Hey! Hey kid, wake up,” Myoujin said as he lowered the boy to the ground, patting his face hard enough to wake anyone. The boy's eyes fluttered once then closed once again. Myoujin turned to the woman. “What's wrong with him?!”

 

She returned his look helplessly, “I- I don't know!”

 

Myoujin frowned down at the child. There was no sign that he had lost that much blood. He skin wasn't even pale yet. But-

 

“What the hell?!” Myoujin touched the boy's hair just to make sure it wasn't a trick of the light. His hair seemed to be fading from auburn to gray until it started to take on a faint silver sheen.

 

“Shit,” Myoujin hissed under his breath and scooped the boy into his arms. “Miss, can you walk?”

 

The lady was already behind him, “Go.”

 

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“So much for Fanelia as it once was.”

 

Leandros tried to push them back, tried to slip away into a place where dreams were black and held no sound. But the memory of those words pinned him down, forcing him to relive them again and again. Fire surrounded him and he couldn't find any escape.

 

Perhaps after what he'd seen, he would have submitted to that. Let the fire take him and destroy the memory of his pain. He might have, had he not been responsible for another's life. He couldn't let himself fail again.

 

“Hand over the child.”

 

“I'll die first!”

 

That refusal had earned him the pain he now felt in his right arm. Once again he could only watch as the blade flashed and fell. Once again he heard the scream and wondered if it was his own. Then his dream reminded him of the blood and he knew for sure.

 

His sword arm was ruined. He shrank away from the ache that testified to that fact.

 

Father wants me to learn the sword, to become a knight. How can I face him? How can I tell him that I'll never.....

 

No. His father was dead, slaughtered by the strangers that had broken into the manor carrying fire. All to give Leandros time to hide.

 

Leandros owed it to his father to remember what he had been taught. It was his duty as a member of their family to return to the world, not matter what he wanted.

 

Even if he was going back to a world where he would never be able to see his father again.

 

Leandros opened his eyes. Somehow he had gotten into a simple room colored in earthy tones and with no kind of door he recognized. He was laid out on the floor. No, not on the floor, he soon discovered there was a kind of mattress beneath him.

 

Soft fabric rested on his forehead. Someone had bandaged his head and part of the cloth blocked his left eye. Whoever it was must have dressed his arm as well. The searing that had been there before had lessened to a dull throbbing.

 

An unfamiliar voice was speaking. “....really have to get the both of you to a doctor!”

 

Yes. They needed dozens of doctors. The manor was burning! Who knew how many people had been hurt!

 

“No,” his lady responded, “No doctors. You've done enough.”

 

Lady Hitomi… He remembered light then... then... Where were they?! Leandros attempted to sit up. His parents' screams rang in his ears, sabotaging his efforts. He choked on tears and buried his face in his arms.

 

He hadn't been able to help them. He failed them. A gentle hand pressed against his shoulder. Incapable of consoling him, it rested there simply as a sign that there was someone who shared pain as deep as his own.

 

“He will recover fully from the poison soon enough,” the stranger's voice said, intruding upon their grief, “Though his hair will stay that same shade the rest of his life.”

 

The fire these words sparked in him finally allowed him to rise. Hitomi's hand fell away as he shot up. Leandros glared furiously in the speaker's direction from red-veined eyes. What did it matter what color his hair was, for Gaea's sake? How could something like that possibly matter in that moment?

 

A man stood across the room, dressed strangely in what almost looked like robes to Leandros. His hair, still black though he was obviously reaching middle age, was pulled back into a neat pony-tail falling between his shoulders. He returned Leandros' gaze dispassionately. “What's your name Kid?”

 

Blood flecked the edges of the man's sleeves. Perhaps this was the person who had tended to his wounds? Either way, Hitomi did not appear to be in danger. There was no reason to be suspicious. Leandros responded with the pride he knew his family would have expected of him. “Leandros.”

 

“Leandros,” Hitomi murmured, recapturing his ragged attention, “I owe you my Valari's life.”

 

The baby was alive! The news made Leandros dizzy with relief and he made matters worse by shaking his head hastily, “Lady Hitomi, I-“ he saw new tears threaten at the edges of his lady's eyes and quickly fell silent.

 

“You must call me Kanzaki now, Leandros.”

 

“San,” the man clarified suddenly. “Say Kanzaki-san if you don't wish to stand out.”

 

“What? Why?” Leandros saw something new form in Hitomi's expression, something beyond her original sorrow. There was pity in her eyes and he didn't like it. “But Kanzaki... san... Aren't we going back?”

 

Hitomi said nothing. The pity in her eyes remained. Leandros gave into his tears, drowning out anything his lady or the man said afterwards.

 

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