Broken Cage

Part 10

Brittle was the only word for the body of the boy as he walked in the fury of the sands and gale of winds around his tiny form. Robes now worn to rags by the claws and teeth of the gale over the days or weeks his feet had carried him away from the ashen palace once his gilded cage. Every step had been one more string cut from those who had torn his mind to nothing and reshape it to their wants and need of the young man.

He was free from them all.

Now he went from a gilded cage to place of white hell in this land of the living devils that tortured man of flesh and soul alike. Yet where would he go from this point? He could only walk and push his body and mind with one more step to leave the long shadow of that place far behind. Even now after the weeks of walking, no more could the teal eyes see the tops of the towers of the palace of his keepers. Having traveled long enough to lose sight of it all in the horizons of scarred moons pale light on the nights the dead world was calm. Yet one thing lingered on this lost one's mind.

Now what?

Only the name he knew and given to him by Momo was that of Shiro. The only world he had known was of darkness and pained flesh that ached now scarred on his skin. Serving only her wants and needs and that was all he lived for so long. Shiro knew not of a world outside the ashen walls or away from the calm gaze of Lord Aizen. Shuddering a bit in his rags of that man who was like a living god of that world he had left behind. No one had come looking for him at all, so would they look now? Would they think him dead and gone from the world? Did he mean nothing to them at all? Even to Momo?

Shiro could only keep pressing on with his steps on the sands to be lost in the winds. Strangely he found himself clinging to the blade that now had fallen silent in voice and mind to him. His only comfort in this bleak world and friend. Yet he felt a gentle hum deep in the core of it, letting him know he was not alone even if no voice came from the ragged hilt of the thing at all in the following days. After some time, Shiro had pulled it from the sheath to see the thing was cracked and brittle but still shone brightly in the light of the moon as if glowing just for him like a light of hope.

Over the days, his teal eyes noted something strange of this blade and the passage of time.

It was healing!

Every day, the cracks were going away from the surface of the sword little by little in his hands.

Why?

This left him wanting more answers for seeking questions of all this happening. Shiro tried to think of theories of why while he walked every day and hid from hollows now and then that popped up in the sands. Thankfully they were as dull as a dead pig and easy to run from or duck away in time. It left him feeling something know to his mind.

Pride

He could take care of himself out in this harsh world without anyone at all. Shiro was also feeling stronger know that he had left that ashen cage. The flesh was healing of old wounds left and toughening in the wind, muscle reform and shaped on his bones from walking so much and swinging the blade day in and out for hours. His body was feeling like his own for the first time, it was a joy to him and he loved it more as he grew stronger in his own strength.

There was no real to keep track of the time as he moved along but only sleeping when needed or eating when he came for food in the forest under the sands. Shiro found himself one-day calm day feeling calmer from overthinking a dream he had just waking up of that woman, those cornflower colored eyes begging for him to return, a touch of soft lips on his cheek and a cheer filled smile that could outshine the sun. His heart beat a bit stronger and that painful longing for this person would echo deep in the heart. It was that memory that had kept him alive in the darker moments of his time under Momo and Aizen. Shiro no longer thought of him as his Lord or a god these last few days. One more nagging dream often popped up, of a world with a blue sky and of a moon that waxed and waned. A place with a true sun and living things and people in black with swords like his.

People who called him Taicho

People who called Hitsuyaga

She called him both but his name was softer on her lips.

He wanted to know the truth to all this, so only to keep pushing on the ward would he find these things maybe? Feeling something for a moment that seemed out of place, blinking in the surprise of this sense; energy.

Pulsing and beating in the air around him for a moment.

Grabbing the blade in moments, he lept to his feet in a mad man's dash to the trail of this energy that seemed to beckon him all the more. Heart racing for the moment of and not knowing why he was driven to it. Only to stop at a point as the black sky was ripped open in front of his widen orbs. Lost to words of what this might be, gripping the hilt of his sword in fear of what might come out of this tunnel of light in the dark world he called his own.

A form of some kind stepped out in the light to fall softly on the silver sands. Female in form of soft curves and tall in height of honey-colored locks that fell in waves about her shoulders. Lips full and lush and meant to speak softly of night times passing of heated flesh and healing. Eyes the shade of a cornflower but so much livid and bright in the cast of the eyes.

It was her!

She looked at him, eyes wide in shock and a ripple of sorrow to pure joy on that face of a living goddess. Speaking so softly of that name she had called in his dreams so many times.

"Hitsugaya..."