"O flames that glowed! O heart that yearned!
They were indeed too much akin,
To the drift-wood fire without that burned,
The thoughts that burned and glowed within."

-Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, "The Fire of Driftwood"

The fire could be seen from a mile away- its iridescent flames reaching out into the sky like a crackling spire. As the wood and chunks of debris soared flaming into the afternoon air, the streets around them blackened, casting a hazy shadow over the village. Outside around it people screamed, grabbing their children and putting their hands over their eyes, for on this particular afternoon, the dead were more than few.

Mugen stood idly in front of the flaming building, his ronin rival beside him, both watching in silence as the decorated walls crumbled and fell. The former Shinto temple had been the most renowned in the area, older than memory itself, and many stood and mourned as its bright red pillars collapsed into the ground.

They heard a wail beside them, where an old woman had fallen to her knees. Her head was wrapped in a pale linen cloth, and she was clutching herself to a man on the ground, lines of her face etching deeper within like an old, frozen tree. She sobbed and shook as she clutched at his face, shouting curses and pleas that the man would never hear. His blood ran like oil against the soot-colored ground, and she pressed a shivering kiss on his temple.

"Who the hell did this?" Kazuo said behind them. There was rage building in his voice. "WHO THE HELL DID SOMETHING LIKE THIS?"

Still watching the woman as she wept, Jin walked over to her swiftly and put a hand on her shoulder. Mugen raised an eyebrow as he heard him say,

"Excuse me, but did you see the person who did this?"

The woman looked up; eyes wrinkled and small as she opened her mouth to speak, but no sound came out, instead just a long string of quivering saliva.

"I know..." said a voice, and another woman stood before them, younger and bolder- her mouth pressed into a grim line as she pointed away towards the fire.

Ignoring the crowd's gasps, Mugen looked over at the object in question. Nailed across from the building was a tall wooden cross, a symbol unmistakable to him now after all these years. Its long, painted arms seemed to wave at them in the blistering heat.

"Those bastards!" someone shouted. "They've gone too far!"

"What're we going to do?!"

"But mamma!" a little boy cried. His face shone red in the blowing ash. "Grandpa's in there!"

"Shiro!" his mother scolded him. "Come over here this instant!" Though she gathered him close

as her eyes welled with tears.

"That's it, Goro..." Kazuo said. is"It's time to end this! Get Yamagata and tell him that we're here!" He grit his teeth. "I'll send word to all the local lords, that anyone caught having anything to do with these nut jobs... will be sentenced to death!"

Ichikawa took a deep breath, his throat tightening plainly in an inward struggle, and nodded his head.

"Yes sir. I'll be back within an hour." He shot a meaningful glance at the pair before turning around, out towards the edge of the village, where Mugen's keen eyes saw him break into a run.

"You two!" Kazuo barked. "Ask around and find out who did this! Chances are they're part of the hidden village, and I wanna know which direction they went!" A young man ran by with a sword in his hand, eyes wild. "You there!" the roju called. "Get word out! I want stepping-stone tests started in every area of town!" The young man stood staring. "I mean now!"

The young man nodded, tripping over his own foot as he ran off towards a large cluster of villagers, who were shouting and gathering weapons.

"This isn't good." Jin said quietly during Kazuo's diversion. "They're going to start a riot."

"Yeah well I'm startin' ta get the feeling that's the point'a this." Mugen grumbled. He felt a tumultuous anger burning up inside of him and his finger twitched. It was time for some bastards to die.

"We know they didn't do this." Jin went on. "And the chances of another hidden Christian clan underneath Kenshin's nose are little to none." He pushed up his glasses, and Mugen didn't have to see his expression to know what he was thinking. He could hear it in his voice. "So that must mean..."

Mugen gnashed his teeth, and his mind flashed back to an unexpected time.

"Hatred and rage swirl within you...so powerful that I can't tell whether or not it's actually...it's as if...it's as if you're like me..."

He sucked in a breath, remembering those last words- that woman's last admission before someone so like him was gone from this shitty world.

"I just realized...that my son's been dead for a long time now."

"HEY!" shouted a voice. "Quick! Over here!" Mugen only glanced up at the large fat man, waving frantically in the distance. "I think we've got one of 'em...no, two of 'em! Everybody, come quick!"

Jin looked at over Mugen and he looked back. The roju and his men stared too, examining their faces which shared a silent question - until they heard the voice.

"HELP! Wait, please! Somebody help us!"

Jin's voice pitched like a string pulled too taut. "That soundslike Fuu."

"Sonofabitch." Mugen moaned. That damn broad.

Jin glanced over at Kazuo. "I think we should-"

"Yeah yeah." Mugen said. He drew his sword.

"I just realized that all of this time... they have only been using me."

Kazuo ordered them to follow as he and his men ran off into the crowd. Mugen tensed for a moment, eyes far away as though drifting out to sea, and Jin looked at him questioningly.

"You know," the pirate said, suddenly grinning. "I was just gettin' real tired of this shit anyway."

Fuu trodded past the brightly-colored shops in a daze, ignoring the sights and sounds of the famous Edo province as her mind wandered. Normally, she would have been thrilled to be out of the hidden village, delighted to stretch her restless legs and seek out the tastiest foods... but today was different, she thought. Today, she utterly despised herself.

"My! Will you watch where you're going?"

Fuu looked up, taking in the frustrated glance of Aiko, Ichikawa's full-grown daughter and her shopping companion for the day. Fuu mumbled a half-hearted apology before stumbling back into her thoughts.

"Stupid! Stupid!" she groaned internally. She struggled not to pull at her hair. "What the heck was I thinking?"

So for the fortieth time since it'd happened, Fuu replayed last night's events in her mind, reliving the horror of what she'd originally thought would be an honest expression of gratitude. First, there had been her- finishing her daily task of taking care of the horses and giving them their feed. Then there was the unusually loud crack of thunder, causing her to start and fall off the ladder on which she'd been standing. It tumbled underneath her as she clung to the rafters for support, leaving her to hang helplessly a good twenty feet from the ground. But before she'd even had time to cry out, Mugen was there, all haughty steps and dark eyes, shaking his head at her idiocy before leaping up to grab her. She'd wondered as he'd carried her down how long he had been outside, or if he had just been walking by and happened to hear the noise.

He had put her down as she shook off her fright, mumbling something about "stupid broad" and "clumsy"...and that's when it 'd smiled at him, thinking she liked the way he puffed out his lips when he was angry, or awkwardly scratched at his head, and after saying a quick thank you, proceeded to reach up and kiss him full on the cheek.

Fuu moaned out loud, causing Aiko to stare. She still couldn't believe it. She had kissed him. She had kissed. Mugen.

She tried shaking her head of the rest of it. Her stifling embarrassment after realizing what she'd done, the way her lips had lingered for a moment or two longer than expected. She blushed at the memory of the contact, his cheek an unexpected plane of smoldering heat, but what she couldn't forget most was the look of shock on his face.

Fuu cursed again.

"I can see that you're in the middle of some sort of inner turmoil..." Aiko said dryly. Her two-year old son clung to her shoulder, whining and fussing as she bounced his body up and down. "But from the look of things here, we won't be getting any shopping done."

"Huh?" said Fuu, looking up for the first time since they'd arrived. The busy town of Edo was in fact completely empty, its long lines of shouting customers absent from storefronts. Fuu peered into the windows for signs of life, but no one was around.

Aiko's son cried out, pulling at a chunk of his mother's hair. She calmly pulled him off.

"That's weird." Fuu said. "Where do you think everyone is?"

"I don't know." The older girl shrugged. "But to be honest, I'm fine with it." She pulled a small, silver bottle from her knapsack, giving it to the boy. "I don't feel like hearing it from my father that I was out here today. The less people there are to see us, the better."

Fuu suddenly remembered what Ichikawa had told her- something about his daughter not being included in their weekly trips to the market. "Well how come?" she asked. "Why doesn't he let you leave the village?" Then it hit her. "Are you in trouble with someone?"

Aiko frowned, her small eyes going narrowing, and Fuu immediately regretted her words. For some reasons unknown, Aiko had never seemed to like her.

"Let's just get this over with." the girl sighed. "We'll take what we need. Now Renishi's list says one quart of saki, three yards of linen, a pound of rice and..."

But Fuu wasn't listening; instead she was watching a man run quickly past them. She could hear his hard, ragged breath from where they stood, and he looked to be in a panic.

"Excuse me!" she yelled. "Um, sir! Could you tell us where everyone is?"

He stopped, leaning over, large dark hands grasping at his knees for air. Once he'd regained it, he let out an exasperated sigh.

"Damn women! Can't you see? Haven't you heard?" He pointed in the distance, where a large cloud of smoke billowed slowly into the air. "The Shinto shrine has been burned down! All of the priests are dead!"

Both women gasped and before she even realized, Fuu was instinctively running towards the scene.

"Stop!" she heard Aiko's panicked voice behind her. "What d you think you're doing?!"

Several yards from the flaming building, Fuu was forced to a halt. All around her people were pushing, panicking, screaming... and she had to duck her head just to avoid a man's elbow.

"What happened?" She heard them chant. "What's happened?"

"The Christians!" someone yelled. "It was them! They did this!"

Fuu gasped, covering her mouth. She turned to Aiko, who was shielding her son's head with her hands, face as white as camphor.

Desperate to get a closer look, Fuu shoveled her way through the crowd, all elbows and gnashing teeth. Aiko shouted for her to stay but instead latched on, her cool hand painfully pinching the skin underneath Fuu's shoulder. But Fuu pushed on, making her way all the way to the front of the swarming mob just as someone's leg caused her to trip and fall.

"Eek!" she cried, tumbling face-first into the ashen ground. Aiko, still holding on, fell on top of her, her young son wailing like a battle horn as they struggled to regain balance.

Fuu rubbed her smarting face- there was a trickle of blood there. "Are you okay?"

"Yes." Aiko got up from the ground, examining her child with a look of worry. "But that was very foolish!"

Fuu got up, examining the burning building up close with a look of shock and wonder... when someone's shout changed everything.

"Hey! What's that down there?!"

Somewhere near the edge of the crowd a man stood staring, his hand pointing furiously at an object on the ground.

"That! That there! What type of book is that?"

Fuu looked down at the book in question, its smooth leathery surface glimmering in the afternoon blaze. She felt the empty space near her breast where it had been, and her blood ran cold as marble.

"SHE'S ONE OF THEM!" a woman screamed.

"Aiko! Run!"

But it was too late. Three men had grabbed her and Aiko too, forcing them on their knees as they kicked and stomped to subdue them. Through the shouts and angry yells Fuu could hear Aiko's pleas, and she forced herself to look over. She could just barely see her, only a few feet away, using her own body to cover her son's as a flock of hands rained down upon them.

"Let them go!" Fuu yelled. "You're gonna hurt her!"

No one listened and a woman stepped up, twisting her hand into Fuu's hair and pulling hard as she screamed.

"HELP! Wait, please! Somebody help us!"

One man in particular had focused on Fuu, his sweaty, bearded face hovering over hers as he pounded her with his fists. She tuned out then, vision tunneling in a pain-induced haze, and she could see him so much more clearly than the others. She saw the look in his eyes, wild and glazed over, and she realized then that it was not a look of hatred...but of fear.

It only lasted for a second though because in the next- a long, familiar sword was bleeding through his gut.

"Mugen!"

The man groaned and fell at her feet, and Fuu fought hard to stay conscious as she watched her former companion slice through the crowd. In the afternoon heat he was like a god of death, sharp and keen and blazing before the fire. His eyes flashed, body snapping and thrashing like an unstuck coil as he brought down anyone who reached for him. Fuu forced herself to sit up, using her sleeve to wipe the blood from her brow as it dripped into her eyes. With a pounding head she searched desperately for Aiko and her son, and almost collapsed with relief when she found her, held protectively in Jin's arms as he too destroyed their assailants with a string of precise blows.

There was an older man shouting at them, strong and broad with graying hair and a slightly crooked nose. He yelled at them to stop, calling them traitors and other strange names, and Jin had to hold him off as he tried grabbing for Aiko.

"Time to go, girly." Mugen said, lifting Fuu off the ground in one clean sweep. He threw her over his shoulder, though not as roughly as she'd expected, and stabbed one last man in the stomach as they made their way for the forest.

"No, wait!" Fuu cried. She pointed back behind them.

"Your friend'll be fine." he snapped. "Fishface's got her." But Fuu shook her head.

"No, I mean the book! I have to go back!"

She saw Mugen shoot her an odd look but then it was gone, replaced by annoyance. He turned and ran back so fast that Fuu thought she would faint from the movement, but in moments time he'd grabbed the small leather book and was speeding back away from the scene. He said nothing to her as his geta'd feet paddled across the ground, but Fuu paid little attention. Instead, she lost herself in the feeling of his hand against her back, balmy and broad, holding her in place and spanning across her back with bits of warm pressure. Though every inch of her body was smarting and sore, she closed her eyes and sighed against his, tucking her face deeper into the salty crevice of his neck. She felt him tense, and his hand tightened against her.

"Hey. YHey. YH ou alive up there?" he asked gruffly. "You're too quiet." There was a pause, to which he added, "Usually I can't shut yer whiny ass up."

Fuu bit her lip, mind wandering as she listened to the steady beating of his heart. It was like a war drum. "I'm fine, Mugen." she said, smiling down at him as he gave her a sideways glance. "Thanks for worrying about me."

He grunted, continuing on with her clinging to his back, and Fuu realized then, as they made their way across a trickling stream, that Mugen had always been there for her. Countlessly saving her from death and worser fates, though barely complaining when it lead to his own- he really was like her protector. Fuu blushed at this sudden thought and for some reason, it caused her insides to ripple with a strange heat.

She felt Mugen twitch beneath her, and he came to a stop between a thick patch of trees. He set her down in the field of grass, awkwardly laying her body as though going to toss her and thinking better of it, and Fuu stared up in confusion as he cursed and grumbled. He leaned in over her, peering hard at her face as he took in the damage, and Fuu felt nervous as his gaze raked over. As she was wising she'd worn her nicer kimono, she realized in that moment that she must've looked bad, because his eyes above her were like muted fire.

He growled, biting down hard on his haori and ripping a piece off with his teeth, and Fuu started. In his rough, untactful way, he dipped the cloth in a nearby puddle and began bandaging it tightly around her forehead.

"Can you tell me how tha hell it is-" he grumbled. "That when there's some kinda trouble, it's always you?" He leaned in closer then, bony knees pressing against her hips, and his calloused fingers brushed roughly over her skin. She felt her stomach clench as he did this, and became very aware of his breath against her face, hot and shuddering and concentrated... it raised the little hairs at the back of her neck.

Fuu sucked in a deep breath and, against her will, her body began to shiver.

"You really that scared?" he asked after a moment. He had noticed her trembling. "I've seen ya take a whole helleva lot worse than what you got back there...especially from some weak assholes like that."

She looked up at him then, eyes burning- feeling the pit of her stomach tingle as she met his storm-gray irises and said the only words that she could think to say.

"That's not the reason..."

He froze, hand still at her bandage, staring down at her with hard, questioning eyes as she swallowed her fear.

"That's not the reason I'm shaking."

There was a brief moment of silence, in which she looked up at him meaningfully, and then his lips crashed down on hers so forcefully that she lost all of her breath. They slid violently against her own, like the sand meets the midsummer tide, and Fuu tangled her fingers into his hair as though she'd done it a hundred times before. Mind going blank, she felt an uncontrollable urge to grind and buck her body against him- however she fought the impulse. Instead, she stayed frozen in her place on the ground as he leaned in over her, letting out a soft, pitiful whimper as his tongue grazed her lips.

"Fuu?!"

There was a voice in the distance, Jin's voice, calling out for them as he made his across the path they'd made. Mugen abruptly stopped moving.

"Kasumi-san? Where are you!?"

Crouched on top of her, she heard Mugen suck in a sharp breath. Fuu's eyes snapped open, and she saw him looking down at her as though seeing her for the first time. He removed himself from his place against her chest and, leaving a cool breeze where his body had been, stood up swiftly from the ground.

"Let's go." he muttered, turning away. She watched him rub absently at the scruff near his chin. "Old four eyes is about to give himself a hernia."

Confused and stunned, Fuu stood up shakily from the ground, forcing herself to stand as her quivering limbs failed beneath her. She followed behind Mugen, who looked back once to check on her, mumbling something about walking carefully before putting his hands in his pockets as he picked up the pace. Fuu's heart was still hammering, lips still tingling where his tongue had ran across them only moments ago, and when Jin came up to greet them- it was all she could do to say hello and smile.

Author's Note: Yay! A kiss lol! But of course, Jin would interrupt it. I'm sorry if it was too brief or whatever *begs for forgiveness* But I really don't feel like these two are ready yet...at least not until I say they are! So expect some more fluff in an upcoming chapter ❣

Thanks so much for sticking with my story and reading this far. I really do love writing for this site! However I've never really been a quick updater, I take way too long to write these things, and my outlines are starting to pile up in random places (car. notebook. work...?) So I'm going to take a little bit more time getting all my plot points together, and maybe even grazing over some previous chapters (just basic editing) so that I can make them more concise. (They say that adverbs are a writer's most necessary evil!) Hshs, so bear with me while I balance this and a big research project that's coming up for school. I have so much fun writing this story, and I can't wait to get it all out!

The next chapter should be up in a few weeks :)

love CNS