A Magical Princess

Chapter 1

It was not surprising that death had finally come for Hayano Hibiki. Over his long years as the Daimyo of his small but prosperous country he had accumulated a long list of enemies.

Still, he never thought it would end quite like this, with his guard dead around him, and his two small children sobbing in the mud, his form over them in a futile effort to protect them. His leg throbbed where it had taken a deep slash with a sword, and he was becoming weak with blood loss. Desperation was all that kept him conscious.

"Please," he begged in a voice made harsh with pain. "They're children - barely four years old. They don't need to die."

The shinobi surrounding them didn't say anything and he knew he had lost. They had been hired by dissidents who wanted to see his brother leading their country instead, and shinobi always followed orders.

"It's okay, my flowers," he whispered to his poor, sweet children. "It will hurt only for a moment, and then we will be together again -"

His words were cut off when one of the shinobi grabbed his hair and yanked him away. He couldn't quite stop his hoarse shout when the man dragged him across the mud, hand reaching towards the only thing in this world he loved.

"You are to know that they are dying because of your own misguided arrogance," the shinobi said in an almost-bored tone and Hibiki shuddered when he realized part of their orders was to make him watch. "Fruit Country will be taken care of in your absence."

Hibiki, who never cracked his serene expression, never raised his voice or gave anything away, choked on a sob and begged for his children's lives. The pleas fell on deaf ears and he watched, tears and snot mixing with the mud on his face, pride a long-forgotten thing, while the other black-clad man raised the sword above his son's tiny, shaking body.

The sword began to descend and a voice called out something strange and incomprehensible. A blue jet of light flashed across the clearing and hit the swordsman, who stiffened before falling. Right on the first hit's heels, another beam of light whooshed past Hibiki towards his captor, who pushed him away and jumped back into the waving grass around them.

Hibiki crawled over to his children, who grabbed his muddied and bloodied robes and pushed up against him. Unable to run, he watched while the slim figure of a woman rose from the grass, hand gripping a stick and holding it out in front of her, steps light, but obviously not shinobi trained.

The shinobi made a few hand signs and her eyes widened when small rocks propelled towards her at dizzying speeds. With a slash of the stick, a blue shield popped up in front of her, stopping the projectiles with a crackle of strange energy before she dropped forward into a roll. The battle that raged next was a strange one, and Hibiki fell in and out of consciousness despite his attempts not to.

Finally, the clearing went silent, and then green, green eyes were peering into his before the world around him went dark.