Chapter 16

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Enishi took Kaoru back to the hotel, cleaned her up and left before she had woken up. Yahiko greatly resented Enishi for just about everything at this point, but knew he really couldn’t do anything about it. Everything about the man from his actions to his attitude to the very way he walked annoyed Yahiko to no end. He was relieved when he left, but didn’t like not knowing when he’d return.

Kaoru didn’t wake up until late that afternoon, and as soon as she sat up, she brought her hand to her face and winced as she touched the small but angry looking cut on her left cheek. She stood and groggily made her way to the mirror, feeling slightly disoriented. She peered into her reflection and gasped at what she saw. A thin line running from an inch under her eye, to just above the bottom of her ear stood out, stark red on her face. She fingered it, wincing at the sharp pain she felt. Someone had stitched it up with tiny precise little stitches. If she were lucky it wouldn’t scar.

She looked down, sobered by the thought that she would forever have a reminder that Kenshin had tried to kill her. Perhaps this was how Kenshin felt about the scar on his face. A constant reminder of destroying the happiness of the one he loved, and the other side a reminder that he also destroyed her life. She looked down at her hands remembering how small they were compared to Kenshin’s thin sword callused ones.

She leaned forward and sobbed into the wall beneath the mirror, feeling like the sensation of crying was quickly loosing it’s meaning, as she had done it so often now.

Yahiko watched as Kaoru fell into a deep depression. She wandered about her room aimlessly, pausing to stare in mirror every once and a while, and often sitting down to brush her hair for hours. After a day or two of this she stopped wandering aimlessly and lay down in her bed all day. Yahiko hopped this change meant the end of it, but the next day things got worse.

Upon entering her room the next day Yahiko gasped in surprise. Everything in the room was a wreck, and the mirror was shattered. He looked around for Kaoru, worried that something had happened to her. When he found her he almost wished he hadn’t. She had a wild look in her eye and a heavy looking object in the other. She threw it at him violently and he barely dodged it, only to find something else being thrown at him that grazed his arm. He winced and ran out of the room. She obviously didn’t want company now.

Kaoru sat in her room after she had driven Yahiko out and sighed. She had tried to pull her hair over her scar but it kept falling away. That’s when she’d broken the mirror. She looked down at her hand, which was covered in blood. Is this what Sano always had to go through? She thought to herself, ripping a piece of clothing up and wrapping it around her hand. The blood bled through, spreading slightly to a point then stopping.

Kaoru put a hand to her head. The headache just wouldn’t go away. And neither would the scar. She frowned as someone slid food into the door and fearfully ran away. Must be one of the servant girls, she thought as she picked up the tray and leaned against the far wall. She stared blankly down at the food for a minute before picking up a pair of chopsticks and slowly picking at it.

She had to get herself together. The scar wasn’t important, and her life didn’t revolve around Kenshin. She hissed in pain as her injured hand brushed against the edge of a tray. Or at least it shouldn’t have. He had told her himself that she shouldn’t take people in so carelessly. She should have listened.

Yahiko watched her from a tree outside her room. He hated to resort to this but he was worried. He sighed in relief as she sat down and started eating the food he had told someone to bring up. Well at least she wasn’t being self-destructive. He smiled painfully; maybe he should be spying on Kenshin instead. Why had Kenshin attacked her? He wondered. It didn’t make much sense. If he weren’t so sure it was Kenshin they saw, he would think that they’d approached someone else who just had the same appearance. But the way he’d talk and the way he’d moved had proven it beyond a doubt. Not to mention he still had that cross shaped scar.

Yahiko wished Enishi would come back and do something about Kaoru. He had a feeling Enishi might be the only person she’d listen to now for some reason. He glared into the room. She’d become quite cozy with Kenshin’s enemy. Maybe Kenshin knew that and that’s why he attacked. Yahiko shook his head. That would be just as out of character as this situation seemed.

Enishi wouldn’t come anyhow, he knew. He was likely off doing something sinister. Kaoru was just a tool to him, Yahiko told himself.

“But if that was the case, why did he carry her back to the hotel and stitch her up instead of just waiting for me to realize she wasn’t fatally wounded” Yahiko blushed at the reminder of his stupidity. He didn’t know why he’d overreacted. Everything was just too much he supposed. He sighed and hopped down the tree, heading back into the hotel and up to his room. He peaked into Kaoru’s room on the way only to get hit in the face by a tray.

Kaoru seemed to stop moping about after that day, taking up her boken and practicing in her room, She didn’t seem to care that she was also wrecking the room further in the process. Yahiko tried to approach her again only to have something thrown his way. He sighed and finally got the point. He went downstairs and helped in the inn, hoping the time would fly by faster, and also feeling guilty at the trouble Kaoru was causing for them.

Enishi finally returned a month after they had arrived, exactly when he said he would. He knew that Yahiko suspected he had been around the whole time but the boy didn’t say anything. He was wrong anyhow though, he did have things to take care of, he had just wanted to see what happened when Kenshin and Kaoru met up again. He hadn’t expected such a violent response, and for a moment he did have the overwhelming urge to push her out of the way, but she avoided it on her own, and the cut was a small price to pay. Although it was a shame to mar that face, his mind droned sarcastically, knowing that was something he didn’t want to admit he was thinking.

He walked upstairs and headed up to her room, raising his eyebrow as he saw the tattered state of the room. He walked in and grabbed her boken mid-swing. She looked up at him with fire in her eyes and said one word.

“Revenge” She said looking at him strait “Will you help me get it” Enishi said nothing and just looked down at he, so she continued “If he’s thrown away everything he believed in before, he has no right to live. He’s too dangerous” Enishi drew a line down the side of his face, mirroring where her scar was, indicating that he didn’t believe that was the only reason she wanted revenge. She turned bright red, but didn’t look away from him.

He grabbed her by the arm and headed down the stairs, throwing a bag full of money at the innkeeper for the damage. He stopped in front of Yahiko.

“The ship leaves in two weeks.” He said handing some papers and a pouch of money to him “Be on it or not, it’s no concern to me.”

Kaoru glanced back at Yahiko as they went out the door, but she quickly looked away, not liking the expression she saw on his face.