The room was cool, dark and soothing. Yukina strained her eyes to see through the dimmed lights, the soft deep purple shades along the walls. Curiosity enveloped her, her nervous feet taking her further and further into this vision. This was no memory of her own, nor a prophecy of what would be. She knew this enchantment was a reflection of someone else's life that she was seeing by looking into the deep rippling pools of clarity.

"You are sure you want this done?" the creature hovering over the young man lying on the table. His hands and feet were shackled with thick purple ooze, his bare chest bathed in the lurid pale light.

"Just do it," he said with impatience. Yukina stood in the background, the shadows forming a smoke screen that shielded them from seeing her. Yet she could hear everything, even if she could not see their faces so well.

"You are too young to handle this delicate procedure," warned the one hovering over the strapped down boy. "Those older than you have screamed. The Jagan likes to strangle upon command. You will writhe, cringe, scream, and thrash in pain. You will be left between life and death," he said.

Yukina held her breath in awe and shock. Who would go through such torture for magic, and why would he risk so much to do it? But the young man lying on the table kept his face cool and unflinching, he hardly looked upset. Yet there were a few beads of sweat on his temple, the flickering in his eyes meant he knew something was going to happen.

"If it hates you, you will be sucked of all your strength. The Jagan will turn you into a corpse within a short time. If it likes you, it will turn your body into a fighting machine better than you can ever imagine," the other one promised.

"Better." The boy licked his lips in satisfaction.

"One condition that I ask: The Jagan will be your crystal ball and no more. You cannot tell her who you are."

The young man's mouth curled into a bitter smile. "I won't say a word," he muttered.

The advisor nodded and reaching a long hand, grabbed onto a lever. "When it hurts, you are free to scream."

There was a sudden menacing crackling sound of electric power and a large drill began to descend onto the young strapping person. The sound began to grow, the blade twirling with delight and pinchers clicking like spiders. His face turned sheet white, his eyes opened with a crackling yellow madness. "How could he withstand such pain and affliction?" she thought to herself. Then the drill began its torture and had his body not been strapped down, it would have hit the ceiling with a cracking smack of agony.

"AGGGGGGGGGGGGGGUGHHHHHHHH!" The piercing scream of torture made Yukina felt that she would perish from hearing the cruel cry of hellish pain coming from him, if he would not die from doing this. She could feel the suffering slicing into herself, the nausea and sickness from the machine as it began to slice away at his body, filling him with powerful magic and deadly enchantments.

"I must stop. You are too young for this," the one carrying out the procedure said. He reached a lever to stop the machine from its drilling obligation.

"DON"T!!" the young man roared from the table. He began to let out shrill gasps of pain and moaning, but forced himself to speak. "I will kill you myself if you do not continue," he warned in a harsh voice.

"Why do you need the Jagan anyway?" he was asked. There was no answer from him, but somehow, Yukina was able to draw closer to his tortured face and gaze into his being. Because in the back of his mind was a little girl, sitting among the soft snow covered mountains and gentle trees of the forest, a small bird cupped in her little hands.

He sees me. Why does he need to find me? Would be so daring to do that?

A cry of shock escaped her lips when she saw the person in front of her: the black haired boy now a tall young man with eyes of a crimson gaze that matched the depth of only person of such a hard cold pallor. "HIEI!!" she screamed.

A-A-A

Yukina bolted herself up from the soft bed of silky grass. Awake. No more laboratory, no more haunting lights, no more screams. Now in the spring all the ningen were out enjoying the ever-growing rows of bushes, gardens, and vines and she too was partaking of the beauty of another season, the one of rebirth.

Yukina realized that the air was full of tiny cherry blossom petals that were falling to the ground like drops of pink rain. She must have fallen asleep under the tree a while ago. . oh there was Onisan, her ever faithful little kitten batting at the daisies with one swift eager paw. She took a deep breath and tried to pull her thought together. The dream had just shattered like splintered glass, but slowly her mind was putting it all back together, trying to put all the pieces into order. Onisan began to rub against her knee with a purring sound. Yukina stroked the cat with one hand, the other hand to her mouth in deep thought.

The winter had come and gone, and all the more days gone by she would try to recreate her dream from Christmas in her mind when slumber came upon Yukina's weary eyes. But the more she tried to vision her brother, the darker the uneasiness became. All this time, and no truth!! No, there was truth but it was hidden as a deadly secret, something forbidden to her-the Secret of her brother. Hiei had kept his identity from her all this time.

But him, of all demons!! Hiei, the Black Shadow of the Makai. Hiei, whose katana had devoured flesh and soul. Hiei, his gaze alone drove terror into mortal and demon alive. Quiet, sulky, reserved, and mysterious. "My past was dark and bitter", he had told her.

She had heard the rumors about the woman on the Island of the Koorine. Sometimes when her own mind would strain to search into this shrouded past, Yukina would find herself looking into a memory like a deep rippling pool, a memory that was not hers. The woman held a bundle to her chest, a bundle with parchment strapped all over it to contain the churning madness of the bundle. Yukina would watch a single tear gem on a strand of silver tucked into the bundle, and a few whispering pleas were said, praying that the "bastard" child would be able to endure the harsh frostbitten world. Then, with a heavy heart, the woman cast off the precious bundle into the unknown hostile wilderness, to be forgotten for all of time. Her heart seemed to jump into her throat as the realization struck her like rays of hot sun striking through the trees: the child did not die.

Regardless of whatever she thought of him, Yukina knew he was the unwanted one. "You will not be unwanted any longer," she said aloud. Onisan only mewed in reply.

Was she scared of him? Perhaps she was. But if Yukina was related to Hiei, then she must also have some of his own iron-like strength to pursue the needed path, didn't she? Did she have the courage to go looking for this spitfire demon and accept him? He had saved her life, and that alone was great enough to make him worthy. And he was true to his word in the dream: always there for her. Always watching her with those eyes of ever burning red flame.

Yukina let out a shudder when she remembered the cruel torture that Tarukane had inflicted upon her, the weary hours in the towers as a prisoner. She remembered the miserable agony of seeing people and animals killed, just to see her weep for those wretched stones. But as soon as Hiei had come to her rescue, she had felt the safety of his presence envelope her like the protective wings of an eagle. He beat up her captor; he stopped when she begged him to, and asked for nothing in return.

And the searching. . .the screaming winds of winter. . .the Jagan's azure dance of death. . the crimson coal of a despised son. . . the memories hitting on time's windowpanes. . . time sliding back and forth like beads on an abacus...

"Oh, Onisan," Yukina gasped. Without even realizing the cat had run off, she gathered up the skirts of her kimono and began to run as fast as she could. "Will I ever be able to find you, Hiei?" she thought.

A-A-A

"Dang it, not again!" grumbled the brunette. Makoto put her hands on her hips and just pursed up her lips at the sight of the slightly lopsided and rather battered looking tulips.

"It always happens this time of year. No matter how hard we try to plant a decent arrangement, the flowers get trampled on," she shook her head to Kurama.

"The students cannot stop being happy from being around the blossoms now, I suppose," he suggested with a cool voice.

"Happiness? To stomp on daisies and forget-me-nots?" Makoto threw up her hands in frustration. "I'm going to wash my hands of gardening from now on."

"Don't give up your passion. It would make your efforts futile," Kurama said, bending down next to a bush. He touched a delicate petal carefully. "If you want to make things grow, then continue to sow and wait for what will reap."

Makoto ran a hand through her dark brown hair and sighed. "Well, at least the roses are still in good shape," she said surveying the budding flowers. "It's those thorns, really. No one will jump on a flower that's protected so well."

No sooner had Makoto left, then Kurama heard the breathing of a female coming from behind him. The sense was urgent, shocking and a bit scared.

"Kurama!!" Yukina ran up to him, breathing with low gasps as she tried to contain herself. His eyes were calm and deep like the waters of the sea at night. One look and she knew there was no need to explain, because he knew the Secret. "Where is my brother?" she begged him. "My brother, the one with midnight hair and eyes of garnet. The one minna-chan calls him Hiei", Yukina insisted.

Kurama managed a weak smile. "She sounds like one in love," he thought to himself. "Now you know," Kurama spoke finally, his fingers smoothing out the soil.

"Why? Why all of this secrecy?" she insisted. "Why didn't anyone tell me?" Yukina suddenly felt bitterly unhappy that Kurama and the others had kept this from her.

"We would if we could, but Hiei didn't want us to. Had we opened our mouths, it would have been our last word." Yes, that did sound like him to be so secretive.

"Does he hate me?" Yukina begged.

"He hates himself. Beyond all his success in battle and pride of a fearless name, he does not think himself worthy as being called your brother. Even if he did, he knows nothing of family."

Kurama's words brought despair to her, but only for a moment. She knew three words could help, words that she himself had told him in the bleak coldness of wintertime: **Take my love**

"I can make him understand," she said softly.

"Can you really?" Kurama shook his head slowly. "But you must, because only you can help Hiei. You are his relative, you are full proof that he goodness within himself."

"I know he does," she nodded with a small smile. "I've felt it before." Kurama rubbed his forehead and closed his eyes against the harsh sunlight.

"He is a difficult one to understand. I'm not even sure that you, the closest he has to kin, will be able to find the key to open him up." Yukina felt a shiver go down her spine. Yes, he was a fierce person and though they were siblings-did she dare to go after him?

As if to clarify his answer, Kurama looked at her with wisdom in his eyes of imperial jade. "Tell him the truth that you know, and you may succeed."

She nodded in agreement. "Hai, I will succeed," she said. "Arigatou, Kurama- san", she thanked him with a bow. Yukina looked off into the sun where blades of grass waved back and forth in a cascading green carpet, rippling its lush vibrant color. She took a deep breath and began to walk off bravely into that green path, the wind rustling at the bottom of her silken garment. Kurama watched the feminine figure slowly get smaller, until she broke out into a feverish run and disappeared.

"You said you will succeed, not that you would try to succeed," he thought in hope. Kurama knelt again beside the bush and brought his face close to the flowers in careful concern. The rose petals were already increasing in number and color.

A-A-A

She knew.

What a fool, he told himself leaping from tree to tree without stopping. He could feel her presence coming closer and closer and it only forced his legs to sprint faster beyond the branches until all was a whirl of brown and green to him. It was only a matter of time before they encountered each other, and yet he kept running to take his anger out on himself.

What did he know about the Ningenkai? The unwanted ones were kept in large buildings called orphanages but others had to fight on their own, much like him. She'd hate him, of course. Once she knew that her brother (her half brother really) was him, she'd let go of him. Girls were bizarre and mysterious. They could start out so innocent and grow to be such deceitful, backstabbing creatures. He had watched her through the whistling winds and beating rain, the angelic little girl who sat in the forest and played with rabbits and birds. But daises grow brown and brittle over time, ice spreads a bitter freeze over a living pond, and all of earth is sealed with deathly winter.

"You are growing up now, sister", he thought to himself bitterly. "You will become even prettier and less naïve."

He had a vision of her, grown to full womanhood: A tall icy woman with a stern face of perfectly carved beauty and porcelain texture. Her pale green hair now had silver streaks of elegance as it streamed down to her ankles like a majestic cape, shielding her from all that she deemed unworthy. Her skin was white as snow itself, her lips full pouting into a smile that curled up with haughtiness. And her eyes had become two frozen red stones of harsh winking power, two ruby gems and no more. Perhaps that is what his mother looked like, before she abandoned him. Before all the others had forsaken him and hurled the bundle of a baby off the island to fend for itself.

"And she will be the same way, no doubt", Hiei told himself. A frigid female queen with a frozen heart to match herself would wash her hands of him, renounce all claims of knowing or having anything to do with him and walk out of his life with a stiff neck and head lifted high in pride. You had the Jagan eye, you did all you could to get that blasted thing for power and protection and it hurt. It felt like a holocaust in your head and nearly killed you, but you got the Jagan eye to protect her. Now what?

"Master," came a small clear voice. Hiei looked at the branch ahead of him. Onisan was there in his true form; a two legged creature with small ears on top of his face, still eyes of olive green, and a chocker of brown shells around his neck.

"Master, she is coming after you. Why do you flee as one runs from the enemy?" the cat asked, swishing his tale. "I do not run from my enemies like a coward," Hiei lashed out at the creature. "Now get out of my way or- "

"-Or you'll what?" Onisan demanded abruptly. He stood up, no more than two feet high but with a face of youthful determination. "Master, she names me after you. I follow her as you wish me to." Hiei unsheathed his weapon and slashed away at a dead branch.

"Then take care of her, for she does not want me," he growled.

Onisan stood up and timidly but bravely looked at his master. "I shall not flee from my own task, Hiei-sama. But do not shirk from your own task." The cat creature leapt out of the tree and landed on the ground carefully. "I shall return to my own form. The rest lies within your own hands, master." Onisan's body shrank until he was back into complete animal form before scampering away.

Hiei continued to tear into the trees, thicker and thicker into the world of nature and further and further away from civilization. He could already hear her footsteps coming closer and closer. Her breath getting more and more agitated as she forced herself to go after him. He could sense her like the scent of a rose slowly spreading out. He was no coward-he was never afraid of fighting anyone or anything no matter how high the stakes grew. Then why did this incident seem to disrupt the very walls of pride and anger that he had been building up all his life? He would simply have to force down the feelings, like forcing down agony and pain within the heat of a battle. Of course he would handle this sufficiently, he was the Black Shadow. He would not fall nor succumb to weakness in any case.

Too lost in thought, he jumped to the right and only succeeded in getting a severe gash as a tree branch ripped across his shoulder. Hiei let out a curse between gnashing teeth and shoved a hand against the bleeding shoulder, forcing himself on. He had gotten worse injuries anyway. But her spirit was coming even closer now, her voice calling "Onisan! Onisan!!" getting louder, LOUDER, LOUDER!!!!

"Hiei, please!!" came her young vibrant voice. "I need to talk to you!!" There she was, waving her hands in excitement below him. Hiei winced inside. There was no turning back now. Time to face the Secret. Reluctantly, he jumped from the tree and landed in front of Yukina on the ground. He gave her a reproachful glare, then got a good look at her face.

Pink. Of course she was wearing pink-this was the spring season. A wreath of pale pink cherry blossoms adorned her hair, their light texture so becoming to her pale green hair like a dainty crown. Her soft skin now had a red rosy spot on each cheek from running so much, her eyes brightened from the exercise. "How kawaii and enchanting, the very picture of loveliness", Hiei thought grimly. It was wonderful and appalling at the same time. And him? Black hair even more disheveled then usual, the bandage rather lopsided, and he had a pretty bad gash of blood running from one shoulder. A crimson stain on his skin was now even staining the blackness of his rumpled robes. There is a word for this encounter, and that is shame. Pride and shame together were simply salt in the very deep and very long wound. It made Hiei withdraw himself even more from anyone trying to talk to him, pulling away like a wounded dragon slouching back to its hideout.

"Hn. So you know," he muttered. Turning his head, Hiei began to lick his wound. He was used to the briny taste of blood in his mouth, the feeling of self-satisfaction and even more to tend to himself. "Here, let me help you," she offered as she stepped forward and stretched out a hand.

"Iie," he snapped abruptly, taking a step back. Yukina froze at once from his steel word. "I'm fine, I don't need you."

"But why? Why would you want us to be apart?" she begged. Hiei looked up, knowing that there was now blood on his lower lip. He didn't bother wiping it away. What was the point in trying to be more decent, if she'd only despise him more? "Because," he said in a voice like a shadow descending onto the night: dark and threatening. "I am dangerous."

"We are too different. I am fire as you are ice. I am night as you are day. And if I am West, then you are East," he went on.

"East just has to turn around to find West," she said timidly. "All I have to do is call, and I know you hear me."

Hiei turned around-he couldn't bare looking at her any more. "Hn. You may be my sister, but I am not your brother."

"Yes you are," her voice spoke up. Her small warm hands touched his shoulders and turned him around back to her. "I love you," Yukina announced in his face. She immediately regretted saying that, for as soon as the word left her mouth, he jerked his head with disgust and broke from her grasp.

"Baka no ningen belief," he snapped. "Love? It means broken futures. It means illusions and mirages of heady feelings before you are abandoned. What good comes out of giving to others without condition?" Yukina found herself fumbling for an explanation.

"That is what unconditional love is: to give to others regardless of unimportant things," she explained hastily. Crack. A small break in his own sanity was beginning to make Hiei feel the rage well up within himself and he forced it back down fiercely. Too late.

"UNIMPORTANT!!?" he roared. He grabbed her by the shoulders and drove Yukina against the bark of a tree. She winced in pain as the gnarled bark mashed against her back and her head ached in pain-but she also knew how to force down feelings.

"Gomen sai," she whispered. Truly he didn't mean to do that to her. But his eyes were too angry, to full of rushing blood and tormented resentfulness to stop.

"Was it unimportant to cast me out as if I was pestilence?" Hiei demanded. Yukina shook her head tearfully. "Was it unimportant to expect me to die alone and unwanted?! Why give me life, only to take it back at once? Death is just another adventure into a world of hell, and I expect it to be every bit of the hell in the Makai as well," Hiei said with a long cold laugh of contempt.

There had to be something else to scare her completely, to make her turn away in utter disgust from him. "Tell me, oh wise sister," he hissed between clenched teeth. Hiei ripped off the bandage revealing the maddening blue Jagan eye. "Is this trivial business? "If there is goodness in any realm, I know nothing of it. I have been in the dark my entire life, and will remain there."

"No you wont," Yukina's voice suddenly gripped. She said this fiercely, with anger not unlike his own wrath. Was that, indeed, fire in her own eyes? Was she capable of hating and loving him at the same time? She hated his fierce independence, and understood that it was part of his survival. One would, and could force a lesson when nothing else would do. The image of the bundle being lost into the wailing snow stung in her mind.

"I wont let you die in shadows, alone and forgotten. Brother, we shared the same womb and-"

"Half brother," he bit on the word sardonically. "I am a forbidden seed". Yukina balled up her fists in frustration. "Why do things have to be this way?" she begged to him. "Hn. They just are," he retorted. Yukina watched her brother stretch out his bruised hand to the ever-continuing horizon. "There is your destiny: away from me. You should forget we ever had any connections." He didn't dare even look at her anymore as he said this, but kept his eyes on the sun. "But, but," she protested.

"IIE!!" Hiei shouted at her. "Haven't you heard a word that I have said? Our relationship is over!" Twice he had yelled at her, and again the tears were starting to well up in her eyes. Anger, frustration, and turmoil were all churning in him madly. Hiei finally looked at her face, marred with pain and shock. "Now you are free to hate me."

Yukina could not have been more stunned by this remark than anything else. He wanted her to despise him? The Secret had not been understood by neither of them the same. Hate him? He had avenged her pain, brought justice to her oppressors, watched over her through tedious days and hardship, and all Yukina was asked to do was leave? The startling quivering girl felt a rush of emotions envelope her, knowing that it would never be that way.

"Hate you?" Yukina whispered in a voice that was silently screaming for attention. There was only one thing left to do, one thing that her heart was aching to do for so long. Yukina threw her arms around her brother's neck and embraced him with all the goodness of her own soul.

"How can I hate you when you nearly died trying to protect me?" she sobbed.

Unable to hold back the tears any longer, Yukina let all her feelings pour out of her eyes and cried, the tiny precious drops of water forming sparkling stones that fell onto the grass at their feet. "The Jagan could have killed you, but you did it for me. I know there was goodness in you, I know it," Yukina said over and over again.

The girl buried her face into his chest. His essence gave off a fragrance of fresh embers coming from a newly made fire, and cedar twigs crackling in the coals.

Yukina's words from her throat were pushing out against her mouth before she could contain herself. "Onisan, onisan," she begged with fervor in her voice, "Please don't hate yourself for being angry or hate me for not being strong or brave enough. You have been through so many terrible things and I cannot stand it anymore! I want to help you. Onisan, forgive me for not being there for you sooner," Yukina cried. "Please forgive me and love me," she sobbed pleadingly. "Because I love you. You mean more to me than anything at all."

She expected him to push her away again. But that moment, she had succeeded doing something that no other could do to influence Hiei: She said she loved him. Another powerful crack in the barriers and all the hidden stirrings broke through. She has finally broken down the ice caked barrier between them, the one Hiei had erected so painstakingly over the years.

Yukina had broken down the walls with the word, "Onisan": My brother. My respectable, honored brother.

It was a title, a privilege bestowed onto him that he didn't want to-that he wouldn't give up. Something about that one word coming from her voice was making Hiei shake inside. Another thin crack of doubt had split into the barriers he had erected inside himself and it was beginning to grow. But why could he not fight it?

The Black Shadow, whose name had cast fear into the hearts of many, felt something new that he had not ever felt before. The new feelings threatened him, encircled his being and yes-even scared him, because he did not know what this was. But here she was, crying for him with pity, sadness, and even happiness. She never wanted to leave him. But why? What worth was there in her weeping and affection, someone that she had never known her whole life?

A strange feeling thick as syrup, slowly flowing through his veins began to crawl like lava oozing over and hissing. A feeling that he hadn't felt before, certainly not from her. But she had never known the Secret before. Nor had she ever been this close to him. Her body was so warm and gentle . . . her essence so calm and tender. And suddenly, he understood: Onisan was himself.

A criminal and fire demon yes, but a brother as well. A test of such loyalty and courage that challenged him, no wonder Hiei knew he cherished his obligation. The only way he could stop being Onisan was if one of them was to die. And he wouldn't let that happen so easily.

The feelings flowed from her as willing as a rushing spring of bubbling water and into his own parched being. What was this power that made him feel weak-unable to run or break from her grasp-and yet strong enough to do anything he wanted?

"Have I been wrong?" he thought to himself. He looked down at the ice princess embracing him with all the strength in her being.

"You call this love? Then I must be bewitched," he thought.

"You do care, don't you?" she whispered. The feelings were flowing from his chest into every vein and muscle, even his arms felt tingling with the feeling. A sudden impulse caught him-not to move quickly, but gently and carefully. Not used to being delicate, but Hiei reached up with a hand and carefully touched her cheek, smoothing away a few tears. At once they became perfect tiny gems between his fingers, but he let them fall to the ground.

The gaze was firm and clear, the vision bright and steady as he looked into her own eyes: the same deep dark ruby gaze of his own. Truth, loyalty, understanding and care were in their eyes.

"I have cared more about you than any other woman I have ever known." His voice was unsteady even if his gaze was straight. "And my life means nothing to me unless I know you are safe and happy", Hiei said.

"Oh, Onisan," Yukina began to cry again with happiness, smiling at Hiei through her tears before hugging him all over again. But this time, she felt his strong arms come around her, embracing her gently but firmly. "Outoo-chan", he said softly.

A-A-A

Whatever else went on between the siblings was unknown to the others. At least none of them had ventured out to spy on them, and Hiei was grateful that Yusuke or Kuabara hadn't been horning in on this. He made a mental note to thank Kurama, for no doubt his trustworthy friend had had something to do with this. Now the two of them were sitting on a tall strapping thick branch of one of the trees. Yukina had never been accustomed to being in such high places, but her brother had gently helped her up the tree into a safe place where only the two of them could converse and the leaves would hide them from all prowling eyes.

The sun was setting into its fireplace for the night, beyond the monstrous trees of the Makai and into the unknown. On the other end of the sky, darkness was gently covering the blue tint with a warm navy cloak.

"It is beautiful up here. No wonder they say you spend your time in trees." He folded his hands behind him, over his head with relaxed satisfaction.

"Just like a bird," he said. "That is why I wanted to get you a pet. At least a cat can defend itself." Yukina's eyes grew wide as she cuddled the cat closely.

"Really? That's why?"

Hiei shrugged. "It was the least I could do. After what Togoru had done with those birds of yours and all. . ." his voice trailed off.

"I wanted you to have something that could take care of itself. Something strong enough to fend off dangers." Onisan was also there, now back in his animal form the feisty creature was trying to chase its own tail, batting at the rustling gray tail with enthusiasm.

"Like you?" she said. "Hn," came the answer as he folded his arms behind his head. Yukina stroked the cat for a moment and listened to the crickets chirping before speaking again.

"We're not a hopeless family, are we?" she asked suddenly.

He turned his head with a look of surprise. "Hopeless? We're still here. Just you and me . . and the cat makes three." She smiled, and he noticed how pretty she looked when she smiled. It made her face look so sweet and animated, not at all like a fine painting or sculpted piece of porcelain. He suddenly wished he had other things to make her as happy as well. If so, maybe she wouldn't grow up to be the kind of person that he thought she would become after all. As if she has read his mind, Yukina edged a bit closer to her brother.

"There must be some things that you enjoy," she suggested gently.

Hiei's eyes immediately glinted with a ruby sparkle of delight. "I like ice cream." The words jumped out of his mouth and he instantly felt awkward at saying it. But her laughter was like a gentle cool fountain of bubbling water that was gentle and comforting to listen to. So he only glanced aside and added, "I also like those spicy candies that Kurama gets sometimes."

"Their called cinnamon, I think," Yukina suggested. "Anything else you like besides sweets?"

"Well, I like this little rascal," he said holding up Onisan. The cat took an excited swing at Hiei with one striped paw but missed, letting him smirk with pleasure.

"And," he lowered the cat and fixed his garnet gaze on his sister. "I like you." Yukina's skin turned a bit pink from the compliment. "I like you as well. That's four things already," she said counting on her fingers. "Do you think you like your friends?" He shrugged. "Hai, I suppose so. That brings me up to seven things I can tolerate."

"Then you are more tolerant than you think you are," Yukina said softly. "I think you will keep finding things to like, the more you look for good."

A gentle breeze carrying the cool scent of blossoms and spring water wafted through the branches, teasing their bangs: jet black and ice green.

"If I can ever learn," he muttered.

"If I teach you to look through the world as my eyes, will you teach me to be strong through yours?" Yukina asked.

Her brother looked into her sparkling vibrant gaze of red. Something different, but not completely impossible lay in her gaze. Their hearts were two mirrors, reflecting on and on but the ice and fire understood everything. Together they had the power to make great things happen, together they could give each other the strength that the other lacked, in that gaze was courage and kindness to move on. And he would find it-every day, time by time. "Forever and ever, my sister," Hiei promised.