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Kon twitched, the slightest movement that the human eye could not catch, barely more than a shift of wind.
The hands pressing into his shoulder pause in their inspection, regardless.
Silence stretches throughout the dim room, and he feels calculating eyes roaming his face. He keeps his eyes trained ahead. Keeps his face neutral. Incense smoke wafts around the room like a cloud, drenching the room in a thick perfume-like scent that covers the smell of copper and rust.
Nails akin to claws continue their inspection, lightly dancing over the edge of the gash that split the skin from his shoulder to his ribs.
Below him, the arm of his Kimono rest curled around his folded legs. The sleeve is nearly shredded to pieces, bits of green, purple, red, black turned to strips of cloth that hung limply from his torn shoulder.
He rests his hands in this lap, hands curled just so to allow his shoulder to remain relaxed while the other continued his examination.
It ached.
Throbbed and spasmed occasionally.
He held his composure.
He brought a fang forward to chew thoughtfully at the corner of his lip.
The Mononoke had caught him off guard.
Its anger and despair had been swelling like a wave until its weight had nearly crushed the humans in its severity.
Try as he might, he could not determine its reason.
Its form: that of a nekomata, was a once loved and cherished companion.
One that faithfully followed its master.
Hunted, protected, treasured.
Until it had been killed by the partner of its master.
A young woman disgusted by the creature.
The cat, once cherished, was disposed of as it was bound and thrown into a raging river below.
Kon had felt its last moments.
Felt its fight, it desperate fearful struggle. Until it all went quiet again.
Its master had, in a moment of grief, taken his own life as compensation.
Their emotions had toiled and grew and twisted into hate until it overflowed into the human realm.
It had twisted into something that rained blood and fire onto the descendants of the woman.
It had wanted something the woman had loved too.
The daughter of a daughter.
Blood for blood.
The woman’s granddaughter.
The old woman had been killed, water poured and poured into her lungs until it ruptured from her throat and eyes in a red stream.
He had found its reason, perhaps just a bit too late.
It lunged at the child with claws and fangs.
It had moved with ferocious speed, vile anger spewing from its throat, and Kon had acted too slow.
Kon had been pinned, deep claws dug, dug, dug into his flesh. Tearing and ripping as black saliva rained over him.
Kun rattled in his box, everything was on fire.
Human screams echoed around the clearing.
He breathed and fire filled his lungs.
He’s pulled from his thoughts suddenly by a sharp blinding pain in his arm.
Mind white he turns, fangs exposed, claws raised as he turned to the source with a snarl.
Blue eyes meet his with a neutral expression. They do not flinch at his sudden outburst, instead they meet his amber gaze with careful disregard. The hand that had been pressing an alcohol-soaked cloth into the wound pauses and pulls back, only slightly.
One hand is wrapped around his bicep, firmly holding his arm in place. Their grip looks deceptively loose, as though one firm tug would pull his injured arm out, but he isn’t foolish enough to believe he could get away that easily.
Likely the action would just cause him to be quickly scolded instead.
The pairs eyes meet, angry amber meeting the even blue like a clashing storm. A feral, impudent part of him swells to snarl his dominance and enforce that action with teeth and claws but he stamps down the instincts and quells the pained beast within.
“Sorry.” He rasps, turning away. The words scrape like sandpaper through his ravaged throat.
Ri does not respond, instead he silently continues his work while Kon tries to quell the raging instincts that tells him to pull away from his master and lick his wounds in private.
He relaxes again, forcing tight wound muscles to ease the torn skin to make patching it easier on his fellow Kusuriuri.
Silence rings once again between them.
He expects Ri to continue disinfecting the wound without further correspondence but instead the older Kusuriuri seems to watching him. Kon keeps his eyes trained ahead, eyeing the shoji art covering the walls around them.
He meets the gaze of the ferocious tiger that glares at him from across the room. Its amber eyes lit with hunger and rage. It still cannot distract him from his masters piercing gaze, digging deeper and deeper into his skin.
His ear twitches.
He turns and once again meets his masters eyes. Defiance meets cool reflection.
Ri eyes him cooly, not even a hint of the emotion toiling away beneath his apathetic gaze.
“Master?” Kon questions, voice hoarse but no less clear as he struggles to reign in the mounting annoyance in his voice. Again, he briefly considers pulling his arm from the others grasp, if only to annoy the other, but clears the thought away. He would only succeed in agitating his own injuries more than his master.
Ri must have foresaw the action, his mouth twitches just so before his expression smooths just as fast. Kon waits.
“You were foolish.”
“Oh?” Kon responds, voice strained and just as patronizing as though he were conversing with the humans of the Ooku.
Nails dig just slightly into his bicep from where they hold him in place as a wave of anger washes over Kon, a force so potent it almost has him keeling from the weight of it, before its quelled just as fast. He squashes the growl growing in his throat at the threatening display. His chin dips, forcefully deferring to the elder in submission.
The hand releases his arm and Kon rests it lightly against his side. From the corner of his eye he sees the bloodied rag being dropped to the side of Ri’s medicine box. A few scales rest atop the box, sitting in even and precise positions above them. Kon watches them, wishing he could summon one to rest atop his fingertip to at least entertain himself through the scolding.
“It was foolish.” Ri begins again and this time Kon does not impudently respond. He listens to Ri rummage through his box, setting various balms and salves to the side. His master does not inspect the bottles too closely, confident as he expertly gathers the material to rest next to his folded legs.
Kun whines its distaste with the reprimand before Li chimes over it with a heated growl. Kons’ ear twitches from the sounds while Ri continues his assessment without so much as a flick of his ear.
Finally Ri turns, a handful of herbs and salves surrounding him as he added each to the mortar resting by his legs. He begins grinding the concoction together with swift, concise flicks of his wrist. The pestle grinds into the mortar roughly, scraping against the stone with more force necessary to efficiently mix the herbs. “You allowed the mononoke to fully form.” Ri continues through his work. “Through your unnecessary interactions with the humans responsible for its creation.”
Kon bites his tongue even as Kun whines through their bond before Li silences him.
“Allowed the destruction of the holy property surrounding the area, and furthermore.” The mortar is set down with a harsh clatter. “Almost allowed your life to be stolen to defend those same humans.”
Kon does not respond.
“You pity the Mononoke. You pity the humans who allowed for its rage to seep into the world. When will you learn your pity will only lead to your own end?”
Nails curl into his momohiki.
“Kon.” The young Kusuriuri turns and again meets his masters eyes. Cold blue anger meets bright amber defiance. They hold each other like that for a moment, tension leaking from the walls as the Kusuriuri gauge each other dangerously.
“I could not let them die.” He responds simply. “Not if I could save them.”
Ri’s mouth twists ever so slightly, the corner dipping deeper as his nose wrinkled just slightly. “Tch.” He hisses, jerking his gaze away to glare at the mortar below. His expression smooths as he eyes the salve gathered at the edges of the bowl. Its scent was sharp, nearly choking Kon as it wafted around the two like a serpent, coiling tighter and tighter around them.
Kon watches his master gather the ointment onto his fingers before he turns back to his student. His hand again comes up to grip onto Kons bicep to hold him still as he slathers the thick ointment into the wound. The young Kusuriuri does not flinch from the sting as it settles into the torn flesh, but his mouth tightens ever so slightly.
“Your job is to slay the Mononoke, not to needlessly endanger your own life for those who would rather turn on you at the slightest chance of their own survival.”
“What would you have had me do, master?” Kon snaps, fangs exposed as he glares. Ri does not respond, he meets his students eyes emotionlessly. His silence was answer enough and Kon snorts, disgusted, and sharply turns away.
“You can think me cruel all you want.” Ri continues. He had finished applying the salve into the wound and was now threading a needle with careful precision. “There are so few of us and an abundance of humans, humans who are the very reason for our strife with the Mononoke.”
“So we should just allow the Mononoke to kill them?” he turns back, glaring down his nose at his mentor. “I should have allowed the nekomata to slay the child? Allowed it to rend her to pieces simply because of the choices her grandmother made?”
“You must do what is necessary to complete your mission.” Ri tells him, ignoring the youngers impudence. He lines the needle up with the edge of his ravaged flesh.
It enters near painlessly, the end so sharp it punctures his torn flesh with little resistance.
“I did complete my mission.” Kon bites back.
“At the cost of your own body.” Ri responds just as quickly.
“It does not change the fact I slew the Mononoke.” Kon inhaled sharply through his nose as the needle poked a particularly tender spot on the wound. Ri paused, only momentarily to allow Kon to gather his senses again before continuing. “I completed the mission, protected the humans.” Most of the humans a voice hisses and he swipes the thought away mentally. The mother of the girl had died before he could find the form. The grandmother before he found the truth. He had done everything in his power to protect the girl from meeting the same fate. “The only mistake I seemed to have made was crawling here afterwards.” He snarked, eyes trained away from his master to instead eye the bluebird shogi across the room. It eyes seemed to plead with him, large black and almost weeping eyes meet his and he’s reminded of the young girl, weeping over his crumpled form as the Mononoke towered over them.
It had been almost a relief to give up his conscience to Kun then. The fight had not lasted nearly long enough before he was suddenly flung forcefully back into his body. Kun, sheathed, had tumbled onto his chest when Kon fell instead of back to his box. The girl cowered between the gnarled roots of a nearby tree, eyes large and fearful as she stared at him. He lifted a hand then, a whisper of comfort on his lips, but she stumbled back, tears slipping from her lashes as she curled away from him, a striking contrast to her earlier laughter as he hefted a scale up on the end of his fingernail for her to paw at playfully. Blood pooled from the side of her head as she held a single shaking hand up to the wound.
Cries echoed through the dark forest.
It did not take long after that until more humans found them.
The girls father had hauled him up by the front of his kimono, anger contorting his face as he demanded what Kon had done. Where was his wife? What did he do to his daughter? It had taken two men to pry the man off.
The girl wept and reached for her father.
Human medicine peddlers loaded him into one of their carts.
Kun was quickly confiscated, though he rattled dangerously at the humans, he could do nothing more than allow himself to be placed back into the medicine box.
Kon breathed, staring at the movement outside the cart as the stars whisked by overhead. A particularly harsh bump had his breath stuttering.
He fell through the veil into Ten Wings.
“And yet, you always come here after.” Ri, finished with sewing the gash together pulls the thread taut and clips it with his fang. Kon moves to flex the skin to test its durability, but Ri stops the movement with one hand to his forearm. He gathers what’s left of the ointment to slather it over the freshly sealed gash with two fingers.
Kon had no rebuke for that. In his untethered and near crumpled state he had stumbled to the first place he could think of for help. For protection.
He had been forcefully awoken by smelling salts held under his nose, the sharp incense jerking him from his stupor violently. “I was not in my right mind.” He mutters. He respected his master greatly, but he would have preferred to skip the argument and lecture that came with getting healed by his superior.
“That applies to more than just licking your wounds.” Kon resists the urge to roll his eyes at the comment. He hears the older Kusuriuri sigh and from the corner of his eye he sees him wipe the leftover salve on the bloodied rag. He sees a roll of gauze being plucked from the medicine drawer before his master once again turns to him with a neutral expression.
They drift into silence from there. Ri carefully wraps his arm and chest, pressing folded chunks into the deepest parts of the gash to add additional pressure. Kon watches as his masters eyes flick to his other cuts, as though he were gauging the severity. Finally, he finishes, securing the end of the wrap by tucking it tightly into the end of one of the folds.
Ri considers the wraps, eyeing their tightness with a clinical eye only their kind could possess. Finally he meets Kons eye. “You did a good job, regardless of your shortcomings on the execution.” He acquiesces.
Kon blinks. Surprised as his master turns away from him to gather the leftover supplies into his medicine box. When everything had been securely packaged away he settled back into a more comfortable position on his knees. He holds his opium pipe with one had and takes a drag from the end. The drug puffs blue smoke around his masters head before dissipating. He taps the smoldering end into a porcelain bowl resting by his side before continuing. “I just pray you consider your own life before considering how quickly you can extinguish it.” He breathes another portion of the opium before he meets Kons eyes again. “How else will you be able to save more humans, otherwise?” and he smiles, the slightest crick at the edge of his mouth, before it falls again and his expression is flat again.
He turns away to blow the blue smoke overhead. “Perhaps we need more Kusuriuri like you, Kon. Too many of us are cold, calculating. More concerned with eliminating the Mononoke than upholding the lives of the innocents they afflict. Though, they are mostly responsible for their own afflictions most of the time.”
“Not always.” Kon counters, and he almost expects another wave of anger to flow over him.
“No, not always.” Ri agrees, a chuckle rumbling his throat briefly. He has a distant look in his eye and Kon wonders what humans he was remembering to create such a strong reaction from his master. “Some are merely in the way.”
Kons ear twitches, mind flickering to the abundance of humans who more succeeded in aiding the Mononoke than assisting with quelling it with their insistent secrets. “That’s true.”
“And some.” Ri taps the opium pipe against the bowl again. “Can catch you by surprise.”
Kon plucks the opium pipe from his masters fingers, Ri allows for the theft with little more than a flick of his ear. As Kon takes a drag from the pipe he blows the smoke overhead. “I know you think them cruel and mindless master.” He breathes. “But they are full of life. Potential. Should we not encourage that growth? Cultivate their potential?”
“It is not our place to do so.” Ri tells him. “But I will not prevent you from trying. Perhaps Kun was waiting for a wielder like you to appear, that may be why he waited so long to choose a new wielder. Though, I doubt even he knew you would be so willing to court with death.”
“I will do my best to prevent further incidents from happening.” He promises his master quietly.
Ri breathes out slightly. “Please do.” He glances at his student again. “Though, should you find yourself afflicted again, you do not need to hesitate to return.”
“I know.” Kon mummers, eyes half lidded as the opium dulled his senses slightly. “Thank you, Master.”
Ri does not respond. The two lapse into another silence, this time more companionable than rigid with tension. Kon lulls in the warmth of the room, wrapped in the sweet scents of incense and safe under the watchful eyes of his master.