A Fox's Whisper

30: |几卂尺|

I opened my eyes slowly, the pale light of morning splintering in shards through the curtain of ivy shielding the cavern from outside.
The cold stone floor bit into my legs, although the rest of me felt warm. I yawned, tendrils of sleep still clinging to me, cajoling me back into its clutches. I couldn't deny that going back to sleep would be preferable from what awaited me that day. But when I tried to sit up, something tightened around my body, and suddenly I was no longer sluggish and addled. 

I blinked rapidly, turning my head. Kazuha was still sound asleep, and I was cradled against him in his arms--which explained the warmth and why I wasn't able to properly move. Heat immediately rushed to my cheeks, even though I wasn't sure why I should feel flustered. I certainly hadn't stopped him the night before when he'd kissed me.

Tentatively, I reached up and pressed the tips of my fingers to my lips, wondering if perhaps it all had been a dream. Which of course was ridiculous, because even though it hardly seemed real, I knew it was. I was by no means imaginative enough to come up with something so vivid. I could still feel his lips against mine, his breath on my face, his hand tracing poetry across my back. Remembering it had me giddy all over again.

I'm in love with you. And I have been for a while now.

That was what he'd said to me the night of the festival. That was the part that was the most surreal to me. For how could someone like Kazuha say he loved someone like me? Never in my life had I ever considered someone loving me, much less admitting it. It hadn't once crossed my mind that I would part with my heart like that either. Any stories I'd heard mentioning lovesick girls and their soul mates simply made me roll my eyes. They were foolish. Harebrained.

Yet now I wondered if I was no better than them, if perhaps I'd joined their foolish ranks without so much as a second thought. Because as I looked at Kazuha, his relaxed, peaceful face, as I remembered how I'd dissolved beneath his touch...well...the possibility of me falling in love seemed a little less out of the ordinary; less absurd. I'd wanted to kiss him. I'd wanted to be held by him, touched by him. I wanted to know what it was like, if being kissed till you were dizzy and breathless was something that could happen. Clearly it could.

But where did that leave me--us? I admit that after hearing of Tomo most likely being killed so easily, I was struck with how badly I didn't wish Kazuha to come to harm because of me. If I let him stay with me, if I let him continue seeking out Dorobo with me, then what would become of him? Dorobo never made idle threats, and I felt ill at what he would do to Kazuha if we found him together. To make matters worse, there was this: this hesitant, uncertain, wishful tie between Kazuha and me. This tightrope both of us walked blindfolded. This ridiculously saccharine thing called love could only serve to break my heart rather than heal it, should I let it fester like an untreated wound. 

Because that was what had happened wasn't it? Kazuha and I had fallen hopelessly in love, and he was the only one who'd felt the need to admit it. I should've been angry, I thought. Things were fine between us the way they were. We'd gotten along well enough, and I would've been just fine without his profession of love to me, thank you very much. We'd reached some sort of understanding with each other. But whatever shaky ledge we'd been standing on had completely given way, and we were plummeting blindly to who knew where, and it was all because--

No. Try as I might, I couldn't stir up any vehemence in my character toward Kazuha. I didn't want to. I rested my head against his chest, feeling the slow rise and fall of it, listening to the steady thudding of his heartbeat.

This isn't going to work, you know. You and him. You know this won't last.
Yes...yes, I did know that. However things played out between Yamabiko Dorobo and me, and the Raiden Shogun dueling Kazuha's friend, the bottom line was...Kazuha was Kazuha. And I was myself. The two simply couldn't mix, and at any given moment I could be killed by Dorobo, or he could, or we both could, and then whatever this was between us would be the least of our worries.