Chapter Text
The girl standing in front of him is a little scrap of a thing.
Dark hair curls around her shoulders, her blue eyes glaring up at him. She's too thin, dirt encrusted on her hands and kimono. Her dark blue haori is much too big, the wave patterns a stark white contrast. She's nothing but a ball of rage and spite.
Kyoujurou immediately likes her.
However, he can see why Tomioka had refused her as an apprentice. She was much too volatile, not really possessing any real drive of her own. He can see that she's holding onto the dredges of her brother. They are strong hands, however, and behind that blazing gaze lies the heart of a warrior.
Don't get him wrong! He doesn't think Breath of Flame will suit this fiery girl. She has fire, but she also has the malleability of water. He actually thinks she could have made a fine tsuguko for Tomioka. There is something in the way she moves that he sees in Tomioka. (Kyoujurou doesn't know it, but what he sees is them carrying the same grief of having lost an older sibling to an oni.)
So! Kyoujurou will mould her potential so she can be a good Demon Slayer. He will help her find a path in the Kisatsutai for herself, instead of being bolstered by the dreams of one long gone.
"You should be my apprentice," he says in a booming voice. His cape flutters in a distant wind, which his new apprentice-hopeful eyes dubiously.
Ah. A girl with sharp eyes. How delightful!
Her shoulders hunched, hands fisting in the oversized haori. "You… you'll train me?"
Such a small voice! He had to struggle to hear, his hearing still damaged from his fight with the Gun Oni.
"Yes! Come, we shall have a test!"
He turned towards the nearby mountain, keeping a steady pace that the girl could keep up with. Her footsteps join his not long after, pitter-pattering like the scurrying of a mouse.
Oh dear, oh dear. She is very small, isn't she? She isn't like Kanroji, who was already half-grown when she came under his tutelage and is now well on her way to creating her own Breathing Style. While this girl still has some growing to do, it did mean that she was currently much smaller than he's used to.
It could be training! Yes, training for when he eventually teaches Senjurou in all the things Chichiue had taught him, before his venerable Chichi succumbed to (drowning in a sake jug, forgetting the things that really matter) his… illness!
Senjurou was even smaller than this girl, yes. She would be a good starting point for all the things he would eventually need to teach his little brother.
The wooden sword he passes her is too long, but not too heavy. She holds it like she doesn't know how – which is fair, since Kyoujurou has yet to teach her anything. She still holds it aloft, doing her best to cover her vital spots. A quick study!
He holds his wooden sword in front of himself, watching the way she readjusts her grip. A quick study, indeed.
"You have to last one minute in a spar with me," says Kyoujurou. "Just one minute. Sixty seconds."
"I know how to count," she snaps.
Very fiery! If he can channel that anger, she will make a brilliant swordsman. Her eyes are sharp, tracking his every movement even when they hadn't started. He can already tell her eyes will be her greatest asset.
"Begin!"
The timer starts and Kyoujurou flies.
He aims for her head, just to see what she does. Her arms, unused to the strain of the quite heavy katana replica, struggles to lift in time. As his wooden blade nears, she ducks under it. A good reaction time, all things considered!
She scrambles to the side, waving the wooden sword inefficiently. Kyoujurou drives his blade down, aiming to deflect her haphazard blows and send the blade flying out of her hands. Her hand shudders from the impact, but her white-knuckled grip ensures the sword doesn't do more than swing to the side too far.
The girl rolls with the movement. She has good instincts, considering this is likely her first spar. She doesn't yelp or drop her sword, doesn't scream even if her fall is rough. She stands back up, eyes blazing with blue fire hotter than red flames.
Her jaw clenches and she flies at him.
There is nothing elegant about the way she hacks at him. Kyoujurou dodges, because he wants to see how long she can keep it up. Frustration makes her lip curl as she fails to make contact, but she doesn't stop. Not when her limbs tremble from exertion and the too-long hem of her haori trips her up several times.
She is a wild thing, an animal that just wants to see blood. That won't do at all.
Her wooden sword catches his knee with a sharp thwack!
Kyoujurou leaps back, rubbing at the blow. That will likely bruise! What a strong blow for one so small! Perhaps she is more like Kanroji than he thought. Dense muscles packed into a small body. How invigorating!
He changes his stance, going from defense to offense. The girl's eyes widen, her leaden arms refusing to raise her blade in time to counter. Although it pains him, he swings his sword and it makes contact with her cheek.
She goes flying.
Sixty seconds on the dot. She certainly knows how to count!
He crosses the distance between them when the girl doesn't move. Oh dear, he must have knocked her out. He'd made sure to pull back his swing too.
Perhaps it is for the best. She is too young to be a trainee, not yet experienced her first menstruation, likely. That was fine; he wouldn't know the first thing about a lady's hardships! (Hahaue left far too soon. She would have liked a daughter, he's sure. A daughter with Chichiue's hair and her eyes.)
He crouches, reaching for her shoulder. He's not too sure who's more surprised when she slaps his hand away – the girl, or Kyoujurou himself.
"I'm fine," she mutters, gazing down at her hands in her lap. "Don't pity me."
Oh. Her hands.
They are not the dainty, delicate hands he expected. The palms are rough with callouses, healing nicks decorating her fingers. They must be rough to the touch, with healed over scars and burns. A worker's hands.
Well! She has lasted a minute in a spar and she has hard-working hands.
Kyoujurou laughs.
"Very well," he booms. The girl flinches, pupils dilating. "You shall be my apprentice!"
"You – You'll take me?" she blurts out, getting to her knees. "Me? Really?"
He doesn't mention her hands. He doesn't mention the bruise blooming on her cheekbone that she hasn’t noticed yet. Instead, he says, "I like your fire! I think you can go far as a swordsman." His voice softens as it hardens. "Tell me, Shoujo. Why do you want to become a Demon Slayer?"
Her hands clench. She worries her lip, then releases it.
"Oniichan wanted to be a Hashira," she says quietly. "I'm gonna be one. To finish his dream. Then he can rest."
"What weak conviction," he says bluntly. She will not go very far like that. "I will not make you my tsuguko. The title of Flame Hashira is one that runs solely within the Rengoku family."
“I don’t care,” she screams. Her eyes glisten with tears. “I’ll find a way! I’ll be a Hashira, no matter what! Just… please. Please, train me, Rengoku-san. No one… there’s no one else. No one else will take me.”
He can see why Tomioka didn’t want to take her. At the rate she’s going, she will burn out long before she reaches Kinoe, let alone Hashira. She doesn’t fight for herself. She doesn’t fight at all. She doesn’t know what it takes to be a Demon Slayer, let alone possess it.
But maybe… maybe if he can teach her well. Show her that there are other reasons to be a Demon Slayer than those she has chosen for herself. If she can never become Hashira, will she still fight?
He wants to find out.
“I will take you. Are you willing to accept my apprenticeship, knowing your brother’s dream may very well die with you?”
He expects her to run away. Maybe she will cry and Kyoujurou will feel better knowing he isn’t throwing a child to her death.
Instead, the young girl clenches her jaw and curls her hands into fists.
“Even if it dies with me,” she says. “I have to try. No matter what.”
He can see conviction in her. He knows it’s there; something real that will make her worthy of being an apprentice. He just has to bring it out. It might be a long road, but he doesn’t think so. She’s a quick study, after all.
She will never be his tsuguko, but she could be his legacy. She could make a fine senpai for Senjurou, if nothing else. He could be nothing more than a stepping stone to finding her a way to becoming a Hashira, but that isn’t so bad.
Kyoujurou stands to his full height and offers a hand to her. The girl stares at it, then slides her small, rough hand in his.
“Then I shall name you my apprentice! What is your name?”
She stands on shaking knees, head held high.
“It’s Higuchi Ayame, Rengoku-san.”
“Higuchi Shoujo! Let’s head to the Butterfly Estate to get your cheek checked! That was quite a blow you took, you know?”
Kyoujurou can feel the vibrations of footsteps heading for the Estate. He knows those footsteps. He was the one that had trained those feet, after all, as well as the girl attached to them. He hurriedly pulls the kaikage out of the wok, glad that he had the foresight to start on those last. The sweet potatoes burning just won’t do, either!
(He might have eaten a couple… dozen while he was frying them. Fret not! He made sure to buy two dozen for moments like these!)
“Okaeri, young Ayame!” he booms as the shoji slides open.
There stands his apprentice, his protégé, in the doorway. She doesn’t look any worse for wear. Her hair has fallen out of its ponytail – oh! She only has half of it tied up with the ribbon he gifted her years ago. She looks… well, she’s not as tired as he had expected, considering the grueling affair of Final Selection. Then again, she likely spent the night with Urokodaki-san, as per her missive. She will have rested up there.
She looks strong and healthy. Sometimes, Kyoujurou looks at her and remembers the twelve-year-old that came to him – scrawny, weak and angry at the world. (She came back from Okutama at thirteen and somehow looked so much more broken. He remembers holding her close and wishing she would just cry. It reminded him too much of Chichiue, in the aftermath of Hahaue’s passing.)
Now, she stands before him. Behind her, he sees a crow with a silver chest settling next to Taiho, his own crow. A cloth bag filled with the Kisatsutai uniform hangs off her shoulder. She settles a hand on the hilt of her borrowed katana. In two weeks, that will be replaced with her very own Nichirin Sword.
Higuchi Ayame is fifteen years old and a Demon Slayer.
He leaps out of the kitchen and pulls her in for a hug. She stiffens for a moment, then melts into his embrace. Kyoujurou remembers when the top of her head barely reached his chest; now, she settles comfortably under his chin. How time flies so quickly!
He knows his apprentice is strong. She has sufficiently mastered eight forms of Breath of Flame. She even managed to best him while blind-fighting! While he will admit to going easy on her (it wasn’t fair to be so strict when she wasn’t even a Mizunoto yet), he certainly hadn’t made it easy. She had even managed to score a deep gouge on the wooden collar!
She is strong, but Kyoujurou can’t help but worry.
He wonders if this is how Chichiue felt when he left for his Final Selection, when he came back a Mizunoto. His apprentice has not yet left the Estate, hasn’t even gotten her Sword yet, and he already worries.
You can’t be there to save her forever, he reminds himself firmly as he rests his chin on the top of her head. She is small and she is warm and for now, she must be hungry!
“Were you worried about me?” Ayame teases.
He pulls back, a frown tugging at his lips. “Of course I was. Although I have no doubts about your capabilities, the Final Selection is not meant to be an easy exam. I’m proud of you.”
Her eyes widen. If she is surprised, then Kyoujurou has done her a disservice. Since the day she walked into his Estate, she has made him proud. She puts her all into everything he teaches her. She has learned to stand on her own two feet and he will happily send her out on her first mission, knowing that her flames will burn bright and cut down any foe in her way.
She is the apprentice of the Flame Hashira, Rengoku Kyoujurou.
Ayame’s lips twitch. “It smells really good,” she comments, sniffing at the air. “I’m starving.”
Kyoujurou laughs at her bluntness. He supposes he has done her a bigger disservice in teaching her to be so straightforward!
He claps a hand to her shoulder. “Of course you are! You’re a growing girl. Between the two of us, this feast I’ve cooked up should be easy to put away in no time!”
He shoos her off to wash up. The grime of the road can be unpleasant to sit in. She won’t take long, so he busies himself with setting the table and bringing out the food. He might have made a bit too much, but cooking had taken his mind off the hours that passed without his apprentice near.
How easily he has gotten used to his Estate turning into a home.
He will miss her when she leaves.
Ayame returns in a flower-printed yukata – a present from her parents years ago. Her hair is wet, but her eyes light up at the feast spread before him. She takes a seat and claps her hand together.
“Itadakimasu,” she calls out.
Kyoujurou echoes her and fills his plate, but waits until she takes a bite.
“It’s delicious,” she says around her chopsticks.
Kyoujurou beams. “I’m glad!”
Yes, he is very glad.