LADY AOKI || JUJUTSU KAISEN

四十三

Inumaki woke to snow falling. 

Tiny snowflakes landed icy kisses on his cheek, waking him gently as he peeked through the rim of his eyelashes. A wave of icy breath blew another gust of snow into his face and he instinctively winced, but when he came to once more, he found himself faced with the most beautiful pair of eyes he'd ever seen. 

He never really understood the significance behind "the eyes are the window to the soul", but as he found himself pinned beneath the gaze of the aquamarine dragon, it marked one of the only times in his life he felt as though he didn't need to say anything to be heard.

The dragon's head was easily the length of his entire body, with a long elegant snout dotted with glittering white scales and slender horns the exact shade of the sky on a sunny day. As he quietly looked upon the white-haired boy's face, he felt something stir deep inside of his soul. 

His entire body, the length of a blue whale, flickered once, twice, and began to melt, shrinking and condensing into the form of a young man wearing a light blue hakama. His face was startlingly lovely, with skin pale as snow and lips that looked like they smiled easily.

By his side was a sword, one marked with a sigil that was all too familiar.

"You saved my life. Thank you." 

It was the first time Mizuchi spoke in nearly two hundred years, and his voice was thin, like an autumn leaf still clinging to its branch, but steady enough considering his injuries. 

Inumaki could only stare, wide-eyed with a seized throat, as his memory began to jog. 

When he woke up the first time, Anzu was the first thing that filled his vision. Her sitting cross-legged on a tree root as she cleaned her sword with the end of her jacket. Her expression was peaceful and deep in thought, he knew by the way her eyes narrowed and her lips curved in a small frown.

She really did look like she belonged to the forest, not as a cursed spirit, but something brighter, more lovely, like a nature sprite who made flowers bloom wherever she stepped.

"T-"

Anzu suddenly pressed her fingers to her lips, and every muscle in his body seized up. Her gaze swept the treeline, tracking a rapidly-moving shadow, and her grip tightened on her sword. From the looks of it, she had been keeping the curse at bay for a while.

"Don't." Her voice was dangerously soft. "Even. Blink."

Smooth as a prowling cat, she rose soundlessly to her feet and crouched low. Her chest moved as she inhaled, exhaled, and stilled.

Inumaki only saw a flash of it. The curse had been creeping over him apparently, a mere stone's throw away, with peeling gray flesh and an eerily human likeness. Anzu moved the same time as it, hurtling the katana like a javelin straight into the curse's head and pinning it back into the dirt. A chilling-childlike scream ripped into the silence.

The forest came alive all at once, a mass of moving shadows, rustling leaves, and claws on bark. Anzu threw out her hand, and the trees braced against the weight of her cursed energy blasting the spirits back.

"GO GO GO GO GO!" She screamed, snatching up their backpacks and her sword as Inumaki scrambled to his feet, his panic driven by hers, and the two of them bolted through the trees without a second glance over their shoulders.

Out the corner of his eye, he saw the swarm surge on the injured curse, a black cloud of snapping teeth and rendering claws. A chill ran down his spine as Anzu grabbed his arm and pulled him into a small clearing.