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Long after Kurama has fallen asleep, Hiei is awake.
Hiei walks with featherlight footsteps against the floorboards and down the staircase, winding his way through the shadows and silhouettes cast by the furniture illuminated by light from the windows and the glass sliding door leading to the backyard. A faint silvery hue covering the furniture and tendrils of houseplants along the walls, on the tables, and on several of the shelves.
If it wasn’t for his mother’s influence, Hiei was sure that their home would be a veritable forest by now. Though there was enough tasteful furniture and personal effects of Minamino Shiori to make it less of a youko’s den and more of a human home. Glancing up the staircase, Hiei tucked his hands in his pockets to ease his fidgeting. His energy lashed at the air and he drew it back to him, careful of where his body warmed, unsure whether the picture frames and the paint on the walls could stand overbearing heat.
Gaze flicking to one of the pictures, Hiei’s eyebrows knitted together as he stepped closer to observe it. A little boy with dark red hair and bright green eyes smiled at the camera as a woman with darker hair and softer eyes looked down at him fondly. Her hands set upon his shoulders and one of his own resting on top of one of her’s. They seemed happy, much like the pair that sat at the kitchen table, talking about their day and laughing while teasing one another.
He wasn’t sure what to think of the boy in the picture or the one upstairs. While Kurama played the part of a dutiful son, it didn’t seem like an act. Not on most days. Especially not when he went out of his way to secure Shiori’s comfort or played into her desires, his energy calmed when she smiled. Hiei thought to call him out on it. Docile, nurturing, kind — those weren’t things that the Legendary Bandit were known for. Not the things that Youko Kurama did.
But what did he have to go off of aside from stories?
If Kurama was right, and he was the Youko, one and the same — then wasn’t it just as likely that he had changed?
Hiei swallows the lump building in his throat and looks away sharply, padding across the cool wooden floor to the backdoor. It would be easy to open it, lock it behind him and just go. Even if Kurama thought to come and find him or kill him on sight, he wouldn’t leave his precious mother.
The scent of the flowers on the wall beside him were intoxicating and Hiei tilted his head away from them, trying to ignore the calming smell. His arrangement with Kurama was longstanding, he told himself. With Yukina’s life in the balance and information about the Jagan at hand, sticking with Kurama would have been his best option.
And while he loathed it, what else could he do?
The energy building beneath his skin itched and pulsed, clawing at his insides and burning him from within, cooled by the ice in his blood. His stomach turned and he clenched his fists, lowering his chin as the Jagan opened beneath his bandana. Even though Kurama had given him “normal” clothes to sleep in, he refused to part with the strip of cloth even to sleep.
He couldn’t risk the Jagan opening and something occurring because he didn’t have control. A slight, even mistaken, was a slight nonetheless. And he didn’t have the strength to fight Kurama properly. Not the leverage either.
“Because you’re weak,” a voice in his mind traitorously whispered, and Hiei jerked his head aside. He closed his eyes tightly and breathed in harshly. Letting the Jagan close and his mind ease as he tried to find a calm in the storm of his mind.
Why couldn’t he sleep?
He certainly tried but he hadn’t exhausted himself, those pitiful excuses for demons weren’t enough of a challenge for him, and Kurama was too tired from school to spar with him. There was nothing stopping him from taking his sword and leaving for the night, finding somewhere to calm his energy, then passing out until the morning.
Nothing aside from the sound of soft footsteps descending the staircase and a gentle whispering voice.
“Hiei?”
Hiei lifts his head and all thoughts of running, of hiding, of leaving are left behind. He turned to look up at Minamino Shiori as she stood on the last step with her hand on the banister, looking into the living room confusedly. Her eyes were still half-lidded, glazed with sleep, and hair loose around her shoulders. She scanned the living room before her gaze settled on him.
“Couldn’t sleep?”
Hiei glances down then looks up at her. Enough of an answer as she nods and descends from the last step, gesturing toward the kitchen.
“Why don’t we have some tea?” Shiori asks, keeping her voice low as to not wake Kurama no doubt.
Hiei looks toward the sliding door and imagines his escape before turning and following her into the kitchen. The preparation are a silent affair, a comfortable silence between them that reminds him of Kurama. As if she’s busying herself and thinking of the task while waiting for him to say something, not pushing or pressing when he doesn’t — only staying.
It’s a common trait that they have. This patience.
Glancing at her from the corner of his eye, seeing her soft smile and gaze flicking from the kettle to the cups that she set aside to the list of tasks she had prepared for later on in the day. Just like her son, she tended to plan ahead and he rarely saw her idling.
“Is something wrong?” Shiori murmurs, writing down another line on the paper before glancing up at him.
Hiei realizes that he was staring and pointedly looks away. Their eyes are different colors but the knowing look is overwhelming. As if they could glean his secrets simply by looking at him. But with Shiori, it’s different.
She looks at him and his heart stammers in his chest, threatening to break free when she comes closer. He represses the urge to reach out when she wraps her arms around him, pillowing her cheek against his head and flattening his hair when she hugs him. There’s no repulsion, no disgust, and she is warm and solid. Unafraid of him and allowing him to stay as long as he likes.
Hiei rests his chin in hand as he listens to the kettle’s whistle, Shiori pouring their tea as he waits. He’s almost certain that if he asked her to hug him that she would. If he asked her to hold him to keep the nightmares at bay, she might.
But why would he?
She wasn’t his mother. And he wasn’t her burden.
“Here you are,” Shiori says, bringing Hiei back from his thoughts with the sweet scent of marigold tea beneath his nose. “It’s my favorite.”
Hiei wants to tell her that he knows that but immediately swallows the words as he takes the cup, leaning against the counter.
“Careful it’s hot —“
He remembers at the last second what he’s meant to do. Pretend. Blowing on the tea, the steam fills his vision and he blames it for why his sight blurs. Blames her and her smile for why he almost slipped up.
Shiori sits at the kitchen table, nursing her own cup between her hands, her elbows propped up as she blows at her own cup then takes a sip. It’s almost too easy. Sipping tea and lingering in one another’s presence with a silence so calming that it was almost disarming.
Almost.
Hiei glances down at his cup and swirls it, watching the liquid spin. He’d almost taken a sip of it not knowing what was inside. Although he watched her make the tea, he wasn’t sure what was in the blend itself. Poisons came in different kinds, some of them odorless and others tasteless. A voice in the back of his mind told him that she wouldn’t do that. Kurama’s reassurances that she was a gentle soul.
He brushed the latter aside. Kurama’s judgement was clouded and couldn’t be easily trusted. After all, she was his mother and he was pre-dispositioned to think she was good. A part of his mind chided him for thinking down upon the youko but there was so much he didn’t know. His head was spinning and he closed his eyes tightly, trying to right himself. The lack of sleep and the pressure between his ears, pounding at his skull, was growing.
Restless energy thrummed beneath his skin and he wondered if it was only him that was burning. A gentle touch to the back of his fingers, cool where his skin was heated, startled him out of the heat haze settling over his mind. He jerked upright and looked into Shiori’s darkened eyes brimmed with concern.
“You’re burning up,” Shiori whispers, gently prying his fingers from the tea cup and setting it aside. Hiei’s heart leapt into his throat and he snatched his hands away from her. Her quick thinking keeping the cup from falling and shattering on the floor. “… Hiei, are you alright?”
Alright. He wanted to laugh. In the beginning, it felt as if he were close to being better. Now, he was’t so sure. Now, he was floating somewhere in this haze of being and it felt as if he were losing his mind. And he couldn’t sleep.
Hiei pressed his lips together and glanced down. He couldn’t protect Yukina and she left the Makai, he couldn’t find her because his capabilities with the Jagan were lacking, and he was having to rely on a being of legend who took the form of a human boy — nothing was alright. Fraying at the seams, he was just fraying and everything was too much.
“It will be alright,” Shiori muttered, her hands cupping Hiei’s own. He thought to snatch his hands away from her, to tell her not to touch him, that it was beneath him but all strength to speak or admonish was a sapped from him at her touch. “Perhaps not now, and not tomorrow, but you are safe.”
Hiei shakes his head and closes his eyes tightly. Shiori’s grip on him isn’t too tight and it isn’t too loose. A gentle caress that he doesn’t deserve, something that’ll soften him from the inside out, but she doesn’t let go no matter how much he tries to will her to. And he worries. Worries of the warmth radiating from his skin, the heat that may scald her, the look on Kurama’s face to see his precious mother burned by his hands, the swift death if he lost control—
“Hiei.”
His attention snapped to Shiori, her eyes wet with tears. Why was she crying?
“I know it may not feel like it… but you are safe now.”
Safe. He wanted to yell at her. To ask her what she knew about being afraid. Of needing somewhere to be safe. The fear of living as you were. Yet with every pang of frustration at the back of his mind, the heat became overwhelming, welling up at the back of his eyes. He tried to remind himself that he was here for Yukina. That he didn’t have time to sit in a kitchen coddled by a human woman and told that he was safe. He didn’t have time to patrol a city with a demon masquerading as a human. Unlocking the Jagan’s secrets, becoming stronger, finding his sister and then —
And then what?
His gaze flicked over Shiori’s face but he wasn’t seeing her. Hiei paused and squinted his eyes, panting breaths parting his lips as he curled in on himself.
And then what, he asked himself. Then he would bring Yukina back to the Makai, he thought, but he didn’t have the courage to speak to her. To tell her that he was the one that she left Hyouga for. To see the disappointment in her eyes when she realized that her efforts were wasted.
Kurama would grow in strength and no longer need him. The well of information dried up with nothing to use as leverage, he’d be cast out into the cold. It’d be the end of dinners with him and Shiori, waking up with Kurama at the other side of the room preparing for school. Gentle smiles, snide remarks, someone at his side —
It would all be gone.
Because why would it stay?
His vision was blurry and he eased his hands from Shiori’s grasp, his fingers trembling in a way that they hadn’t since he first held a blade. Feeling the ringing as the steel connected, the sensation shooting up his arms, shaking him to the core. The smile that formed when a heavy hand settled on his head, complimenting him on a job well done. The revulsion that should have set in from seeing the corpse at his feet wasn’t there.
But now, as he stared at his hands, all he could feel was revulsion. Disgust. Pain. Compared to his enemies, his pain would be everlasting while theirs was short. It was their fault for being weak, he told himself only to bitterly remember the cruel irony.
He himself was weak.
“I’m here, Hiei,” Shiori said, her words falling on deaf ears as she gently rested her hands on Hiei’s back and held him with her elbows tucked close to her. It didn’t matter that she had to bend awkwardly, curving over him as he curled in on himself.
In her arms was a child that needed and she would give all that she could to help him find peace.