Beauty and the Beast (DRAMAtical Murder fanfic) (Boyxboy)

Chapter 20

"My hair used to be grey."

The statement is random and out of place, so I can't help but look over at Hikaru with a confused expression. We were currently distracting Alluka in the small garden area, so the Fox- so Kyor could get some more rest. His eyes hadn't returned yet, and the little fox boy had been getting a little too rambunctious to keep cooped up in the room any longer. Hikaru had appeared shortly after I arrived here, alongside the two cat boys who immediately began to play with Alluka.

We'd been sitting together on a stone bench in relative silence until now.

Hikaru doesn't even seem to acknowledge me having turned to look at him. He continues to stare evenly at whatever point of space across the garden he'd been staring at for awhile. But he only continues after a short pause.

"I haven't changed much since I was a human. I was never very strong, and I have a cowardly disposition. A habit of smiling and laughing even when I know I don't have to. I wasn't very well liked in my village, see. My mother was beautiful, had a lot of husbands, and a lot of nightly visits by men. Other women hated her for distracting their husbands, so a lot of the children didn't like me. Neither did any of the men, temporary or permanent. My mother had black hair, all wavy and beautiful, but mine turned grey very early on. I wasn't the cutest child either. Too clumsy, too dim-witted to be good at much of anything."

Something tells me he doesn't expect a response even when he pauses, so I keep quiet. His voice is slightly detached, as remembering something very painful, but too far back to still feel that pain. The way he speaks of his home gives the sense he's from an older period of time.

"My father died in some battle before I was born. He was a wanderer, and good enough with a blade to be picked up by some merchant who got on the wrong side with some armed folk, I guess. Not good enough to survive, though. I was very used to men hating me. I was naive though, so I never hated them back. I always though I must have done something to make them angry. That's probably why... I met Taiko."

His tone is softer at the end. The detachedness is faded, replacing with something closer to fondness. But there's also something in his voice, in the very eerily still way he sits and stares off into the distance, that says he has hard time speaking of it.

"I found Taiko. He was injured, and wearing armor, so I thought he might be a soldier left behind in a nearby battle. There were a couple lords fighting back then, and sometimes soldiers would pass through the village. He stayed in our home while he healed. My mother knew a bit about patching up wounds after caring for me, and I was older. Sixteen, maybe? Men were trying to push her to make me leave around that time... they said I was old enough to go. She never let them, so I was around to help her. To help some wounded soldier."

Another pause, but it's much shorter this time.

"He was very polite, and thankful for our sheltering him. A little too much so, for the me back then. So I asked him one day if he thought my mother was beautiful. He told me he didn't like black hair. It was such a difference from all the men I'd met before who'd thought she was so magnificent. I grew to like him a little after that. He was the only man I'd met who didn't immediately hate me. But that didn't stop the village. My mother had somehow managed to get the village head's son to turn his head, and he had enough power to do something about what he saw was in the way. Looking back on it now, I think that was probably why Taiko insisted so strongly that I take him to see the festival. We rarely had them, but I was never a fan of crowds, especially crowds of people who disliked me. I'd thought I was just indulging in some whim of a nameless soldier, wandering through the festival like a fool. Taiko loved watching the children play little games."

A ghost of a smile rises to his lips.

"Did you know I have a mask? Usually kitsune make them themselves, but Taiko had insisted on buying me a white fox mask that day. I couldn't really part with it, so I kept it. It was probably just meant to hide my face, and he probably thought it was funny to put a human in a fox mask as a fox in human form. I think in truth he spent that night protecting me more than actually enjoying the festival. Always looking around, tying the ends of a cloth around each of our wrists so we wouldn't get separated. It wasn't until we went to return home that I had any idea of the village's intent. I was attacked outside my home by a group of men. Taiko led me through the forest as we tried to run, but he was still injured and I was never fast to begin with. They caught up with us in the clearing, and then... I learned the truth."