Pouring.
When you can't hear the birds singing, nor the animals cheering. In their daily fraught, most sit within cavernous dwellings or subject themselves to the warm breath of togetherness—in speechless, communicative support of each other and oneself. Down a muddied road, hidden beyond leaves and stumps, a river exclaimed its energetic prowess; and up on a hill, where the ground just barely plateaued and began a concave descent, a puddle of water formed and grew itself into a vaster pool; and with the erosion of the mountainside, slow and in descent, and the seeping of liquid down into the earth, it would fester as a muddied lake; albeit, one that would disappear within a day, or even a few days' time, as the animal and plant life made use of its temporary sustenance.
Where the water fell with such vigor, seeing beyond the tree line was at times impossible. The haze mist of the morning found itself incomparable to the delusions of the rain's reflecting imagery. Beyond translucency in greys and blues, or whatever was left of the sky above, there might be some green, or even some brown and white. Somewhere, near a field, there were yellows and reds, too; but not here, not secluded within the forest, where even the occasional purple of a flower couldn't be seen from any direction quite so clearly.
Three sat on the porch of a wooden shelter. It was of fine quality and protected those who sat under it from the harshness of a furious and cold battlefront of sickness and woe. The one in the middle brandished a particular blue robe that desired to blend with the hue of rainwater and sat cross legged with his left arm rested on his leg and his head nestled in his hand; and to his left, a bright white and red standing out against the greyed light in front of her leaning with her weight on her arms and her head tilted up into the sky; and on the right side, a particular lightness of feathered brown patterned in red and a softly waving set of ahoge that moved with every passing of a breeze sitting with her legs pushed up to her chest and her arms furled around them. Behind them, a pair of doors slid open to either side; and beneath them, a step that could lead them into the trenches of a miniscule flood trailing downwards.
Two. "I'm bored."
One. "The rain's pretty today."
Two. "I wish it'd have waited a 'till tomorrow. At least then, we'd be off of the mountain and with the main camp."
Three. "Just be thankful we found a village, if we were all out there with the horses and little tents we might just slide right down the hillside. Besides, it's a pretty view, and we had an opportunity to take a somewhat proper bath. It's not that bad."
Two. "Sure, but I bet the guys are all over there at the main quarters drinkin' 'till they drop. Bastards just had to hog it for themselves. And what do we have?"
Three. "If you want, I could teach you how to play xiangqi."
Two. "What's that?"
Three. "A game. Then again, Kyou Kai might be more suited for it than you."
Two. "In other words, it's boring."
Splashing.
The middle man glanced to his left and right, "By the way, do we have any food?"
Kyou Kai fell backwards on her head making with a loud thud sound reverberating throughout the wooden house.
Shin sighed and looked at Karyou Ten giving him a half-smile, "Figured."
"Shin, go get some," Kyou Kai whined.
"I'll get wet, and then the food'll get wet. And then I'll have wasted perfectly good food."
Karyou Ten leaned over to him, "So, why didn't you get any?"
"I got distracted by the barrels bein' hauled away."
"And that's why Kyou Kai had to drag you away from barking at a Wu captain who laughed when you tripped on a rock?"
They heard footsteps hastily walking towards them through the mud and water. Two people approached from behind a watered mist. When they came into view, one was holding a tarp over both himself and the other, who was carrying something.
"You forgot to take a meal, didn't you?" It was En. With food. "I'm going to be soaking wet by the time I get back," as he got to the base of the house, he held up a basket of potatoes and freshly cut and salted pork. Shin got up and received En's gifted offerings.
"En," Kyou Kai called out to her fellow lieutenant and grasped his hand with both of hers, "you're a true hero." Although he felt mysteriously gratified by the sudden praise, he was unsure of how to respond.
"Stay in this downpour any longer and we'll be buryin' you in the next two days, but thanks."
En shyly laughed, "That wouldn't be a very heroic story to tell my children, so I'll take your word on it." He turned to head back.
"And"
En stood frozen and creepily laughed to himself, "Well..." He knew Shin was referring to the alcohol.
"I'm gonna kick them in the ass!" Shin yelled with En teetering off. He yelled out to the lieutenant through the rain, "By the way, there's more than enough stories of your heroism to make 'em proud!" He quieted down, "Even if you died now, it wouldn't be a waste. I can promise that." Shin knew En couldn't hear him as he trailed away and nearly mumbled the last part of his declaration, but the two who were situated on his right side now could certainly hear his words. Kyou Kai stood up and put her hands out inferring that she would take the food into their temporary abode, which Shin obliged as he delicately placed it in her hands, all the while entranced by the little necklace with the green stone that hung from her neck. When it was firmly within her grasp, she swept her feet away from him and inside the house's middle parting where the opened sliding doors were and disappeared into its darkness. Shin watched, and when she was gone from his view, turned his head back to the rain, and then down to Karyou Ten who hadn't moved throughout their ordeal. She sat with her eyes closed and a content partial smile on her face. Her ahoge waved in the wind.
"Say, are you staring at me?"
He looked back at the rain, "No."
She opened up her left eye and peered up, "You sure?"
He looked more towards the left, "Pretty sure."
She smiled a little harder. Kyou Kai walked back out to the porch and stood behind Shin's left shoulder for a moment. A breeze swept by with a chill to forsake flesh down to the bone.
Kyou Kai wrapped her long-sleeved arms around herself, "Doesn't look like it's going to let up anytime soon, I'm going inside." She moved behind them and entered the house, shutting the sliders behind her.
"It's not like I'm sad and need to be spoiled... guess I'm just itchin' to keep movin'," he tried explaining to the leftover.
Karyou Ten stood herself up and looked up to his face with her everlasting half-smile and slightly cocked head. She held both of her hands behind her back, with her right hand grasping only the thumb of the other for a second; but then proceeded to let go as she moved to raise her left hand over and onto Shin's shoulder. She grabbed the sleeve of his shirt and pulled on it; and though she pulled, instead of pulling him closer, she simply pulled herself closer to him. With her head now resting on him and the gentle breeze continuing to blow her hair and ahoge back and forth. Her eyes were closed, and she simply stayed leaning into him. As though he was unsure of how to respond or reciprocate the action, he stayed frozen in silence. She lifted her head up and stared at his profile. "Shin," she whispered just loud enough for him to hear; and when he turned his head to hers, he looked at her gaze, blinked, looked away, looked again, and then moved his head slightly in the other direction. Some air was pushed out of her nostrils in reaction, though she knew it wasn't a particularly laughing matter. She knew that as straightforward and strong of mind that he was, Shin still felt fear over the three's current relationship.
Whether it was because he couldn't gauge what they felt, or because he was afraid of saying something that would hurt them, or that he simply was unable to decide how to move forward. In reality none of them did. Each who grew as a child away from the ordinary life of a commoner. One an indentured orphan; and another who lived amongst wolves; and the one whom gave her life for a cult and revenge.
But those matters were influences upon them. They were impressions in the sand. Without wind or water, or the movement of the earth and the animals, they would stay the way they were forever; but like the world around them, they changed. The unknown did not call to them lightly. It was a more buckling fear to lose each other's trust than to lose each other's lives, in a way.
Karyou Ten let go of his sleeve and took a step back, "Might as well warm up."
The commander heard the slider open and close as he continued staring out into the wilderness of the mountain. "Yeah." He looked down and he some of the water rushing down the mountain closer to the far-off trees, like a harbinger of an oncoming mudslide. Not that it was, they were at least situated on some manner of a plateau upon the hill; and the dense, compacted rocks above them were unlikely to fall as easily as moistened dirt or limestone. But the thought was there. The general was the legend of battlefields—but that's all they were, isn't it? A legend of the battlefield, not a god of the mountain, nor of the rivers and sea, or of the sky above. Even the so-called God of War was just a man of some sort. Against the nature of a true god, they were all powerless. He could hear the rain loudly dripping from the roof of the house and into the oceanic puddles around the house. He could hear all of the splashes and the harshness of the texture of the streams that flew off of the crevices down the wooden slopes.
Shin moved back and put his hands on the middle of the sliding door, one per frame; and when he suggested them open and, behind him, closed; and then noticed a particular lack of Kyou Kai and Karyou Ten present in the room. No cooking. No tea. No boiling. Not even a fire. With two of the fenced windows at the room's front, therefore his back, there was barely even enough light to illuminate the details of the mostly empty room. The light itself shaped and lit only specific areas as vertical posts littering the window interrupted and divided them into smaller segments. He saw En's delivery to his left along with some pots that they themselves; and around the center of the room, where an open floor could allow for a fire to be birthed, covered straw mats set perpendicular and perfectly assumedly left behind by the former occupants. He couldn't hear any water or noises coming from the other connected rooms, especially from his right side, where the bath was located; so, he assumed that the two girls were likely in the room straight ahead of him. He scratched the back of his head and approached, "I thought you two came in here to warm up. Kinda hard to do that without a fire, don't ya' think?" Even with his calling out, there was no response, nor sound at all aside from the weather's happenings.
Shin stood in front of the forward doors and slowly held his hand up. He placed it flatly and firmly along the middle surface of one side and lightly let his forehead drop onto the division between the sides. His head lifted back, and just as gently found itself back in its prior position. He took a step back and, with his hand still flat against the board, pushed the one side of the door open. His eyes lifted and he looked up and up and up and up—or so it seemed, but it was simply dark in the room. A window shutter was left open on the right side which allowed for a warped square to penetrate the room and radiate its grey-blue coldness on the black nothingness that otherwise presided atop of the floor; but besides that, it was too dark to see the space inside. Instead, the void had consumed its contents.
Nothing here.
He sighed and started to close the door.
A hand grabbed his wrist.
It didn't force itself.
It didn't force itself, but it lightly tugged and beckoned him.
It was slender and small.
He didn't have the power to say no. It let go and placed itself beneath his limp hand and held grabbed once more. His person was fully enveloped by that darkness, and the door closed shut. In his hand was another; and in front of him, or to the sides of him, he couldn't begin to guess what was where, or who. That wasn't true, he did know. From its more petite feeling, he could tell that this hand was Karyou Ten's.
"Hey, Shin... how does it feel?"
A vague question.
The hand moved and rotated itself along his until it had aligned their fingers parallel to one another; and though the size difference had become a little more noticeable, the hand moved slightly to one side and slipped through the cracks in Shin's fingers and held it tightly. Shin's hand naturally inclined and curled slightly, though he eventually put in the effort to reciprocate the action. She shook.
He took a breath, "Warm, I guess."
Kyou Kai's voice came from just behind Karyou Ten, "How?"
Inarguably, "It's hard to put into words."
Karyou Ten pulled his hand and himself closer to her and embraced him, "Then don't." From her right side, and Shin's left, she pulled Kyou Kai over into the embrace as well.
"What're you doing?"
Karyou Ten whined, "Being needy."
"That something you're supposed to be honest about?"
"It's an exaggeration. It's more dishonest, if anything."
"So?"
One, Kyou Kai interrupted, "I want to... I'd like to, if I could, touch you and... know about that warmth."
The lightness of a distant thunder's footsteps echoing.
Two, "In what way?"
Three, "There isn't much to misinterpret."
Gently beating heart. "There is."
Louder. "Remember when I was first assigned to the Hi Shin?"
"It'd been a while since we saw each other, 'course I'd remember that?"
"Then you remember what you did?"
She felt him contort, "Ah... about that..."
"Back then you'd do things. without bothering to asking if it was okay, you wouldn't keep your mouth shut, and you wouldn't let yourself be swayed by someone you didn't trust. Sometimes that worked out and sometimes it didn't." She sighed with open breath, "What I'm trying to say is you—or, we—don't have to hide behind uncertainty. If you don't get something, you can just ask... we've grown a little more mature since then, haven't we?"
The Qiang girl reached around and grabbed Shin by his shoulder, with her palm pressing against his back softly like an awkward hug. "I'm not against wha we have. I'm not dissatisfied, I mean, it's more like... we're kept at a distance from each other. I'm happy, but I don't really know what 'love' and 'intimacy' are. I'd like to... to figure it out." It was said with a smile that no one could see.
"Not like I had an old man or mom to tell me either, it was just me and Hyou livin' our lives for our dreams without ever thinkin' about any of that stuff. For a while, I thought I was just admirin' the two of you, but it became somethin' else. I think this feelin' is real, like a churning pit of mud, but the mud is made out of gold," he heard the two girls try not to laugh, "that sounded stupid but it's... I've never really been more scared than that time Kyou Kai's wounded unit was targeted. I didn't get it at the time, but I felt sick; and if I think about that happenin' to either of you now, I feel the same way. Not like I'm about to collapse, but like I need to keep pushin' forward to stop it from happening. I wonder if that's insulting to everyone else, though."
He felt Karyou Ten's grip intensify a little, "Neither of us would be here without you and your strength, and your moving words, and your unwavering righteousness. If you felt that way about every single person, even you'd break. Life is invaluable, so we should remember them., but we only have so much control over any of this. And... I admit I was jealous of Kyou Kai, just a little bit. She didn't have to rely on strength given to her, and she naturally exceled at things I needed to be taught. She's cute, and more than anyone else seemed to understand you," she shifted her weight, and the sound of slight wood creaks could be heard, "and it was a little later on when I realized why."
Kyou Kai teasingly laughed.
"What're you laughing at?" The other girl asked.
"When I returned to the Hi Shin, I was surprised to see that overgrown bird I had once met was the only person who Shin listened to; but I was also surprised to see how pretty you were. It was hard for me to be jealous."
Karyou Ten let out a light, dramatic gasp and moved her face to where she thought Kyou Kai's head was, "Hey, are you trying to say I'm vainer than you?"
A sudden draft of air beyond her cheek startled Kyou Kai, but with its voice she was able to halt herself from wiggling away as a reaction. She could feel the other's light breaths briskly clashing against the inner ear. Kyou Kai tilted her head up, but she did not move in any direction. "Not in particular. You were always kind to me, I appreciated that. You'd be kind to anyone, just like Shin. You might even say you have the qualities of a 'princess.'"
"If you're trying to flatter me, it might be working a little bit; but that's an unrealistic image, even for the Hi Shin. We aren't so benevolent."
Shin interrupted reaching his arm to hold Kyou Kai and Karyou Ten together, "Who cares about any of that. Title and image only matter for formal stuff... what's a princess compared to either of you anyway."
Of course they were embarrassed, that didn't need to be said. It was more surprising, though. "Hah, w-well—and now you're... who do you think you are!?" Karyou Ten stuttered over herself a little bit as she engaged with her surprised state.
"...are you still 'scared'?" Kyou Kai asked.
"'Course I am. Scared to hold on n' scared to let go."
Kyou Kai pushed herself away from the two and let go of Shin's shoulder; and from there, she grabbed Karyou Ten's free hand and started pulling her. "Come here," she told the both of them to follow through the dark. They made their way over to the single, distorting rectangle of light that was present in the room. Kyou Kai's lower half in its white and red-patterned glory made an appearance in a room of otherwise seeming emptiness, and then she stepped into it. Her entire form could not be fully contained within the sliver of light that was present, which barely seemed to light a third of her at any given time. She let go of Karyou Ten's hand and shifted herself around the light, so she was on the other side of it, and then held out her hand, which looked like just a piece of her arm that extended and floated in the air. "Shin, find my hand."
He did so and reached out in front of where he saw the arm, itself draped in her usual outfit, until he made contact with it. From there, she pulled him in a little bit and then adjusted her position so that she was facing the light right where the end of its hard edge met the floor. He could hear ruffling and movement, steps and fabrics rubbing against each other. She appeared within the light. Her bare foot, leg, knee, thigh, the side of her waist where fabric wrapped around her front and over her hip above her butt, and up the side of her abdomen, wrapped breast, and collar bone were exposed, alongside the various small scars that made their "discolored" appearances; and then all the way up a portion of her face with one of her eyes showing, one of the horns on her headband exposed, and her short hair swaying with her small movements.
"Oi, what're you—"
"Look," she said as she held up her arm to the light. It was the same arm that had been torn through before, and she had exposed herself for the purpose of showing the scar from her wound. It was like it had been struck by lightning and traveled the length of her arm to the shoulder. "What do you think?"
He sighed, as if he was being pushed to apologize once more, "Kyou Kai, I'm—"
"I'm not asking you to apologize, Shin," she walked forward a little bit and reached where she thought his hand might be to silence his recently picked up habit of over apologizing. She didn't find it, and instead ended up reaching into his abdomen, but she adjusted herself and found his arm, then pulled it out and forward into the light where a part of her body was. She held it in place for a moment, and then let go; and he understood that he was meant to, therefore, keep it where he had left it. She raised her arm again and put her hand below his. "Does a scar like this change what you think about me?"
He ran his hand, slowly, up along the snake's trail, "No, 'course not. Your body isn't definin' you."
Karyou Ten reached her hand through the darkness and glazed over Kyou Kai's forehand, "As if that'd ever happen."
Kyou Kai shifted her weight and put a little more of her body into the center of the light with her head tilted down looking at the two hands gliding atop of her arm with a noticeable smile pasted on her face, "I'm glad." She still had her necklace on which gently swung around with her small movements. Though Shin intended to only look at it and smile that she, and Karyou Ten, liked his gift, he couldn't help his eyes from wandering down her chest where bandages wrapped themselves around. Aside from the various other scars embedded into and protruding from her body, he could see the slightest bumps of her ribs and various muscles that moved with her light breaths.
"Say, think you could put your clothes back on now? I feel like I might be gettin' close to starin' too much..."
Kyou Kai quickly lowered her hand and took a few steps back as the other two hands retreated into the unseeable cave of the dark; however, the former assassin did not completely fade away from the attention of the window's grace and had only removed from above her chin from view. "I don't mind that much," she trailed off.
Shin turned his head probably towards where Karyou Ten was and trailed in "I do," he said as Kyou Kai fidgeted with her arm, "it's distracting."
Almost spiteful confidence, "Really?" She took a step forward and exposed a tense lip.
The head strategist unexpectedly poked her head into the light from the other side of the room and let her hair hang down from her unnatural posture, "I think you should give a cute girl a compliment in situations like these."
"Hauh!?" He exclaimed, "All she was doin' was showing her scar, I'm not lookin' to be a pervert."
She grinned at Kyou Kai causing the other to shuffle her feet inwards, "Isn't the real pervert the one who took off her pants to show expose her arm? Hey, Kyou Kai, what do you think, it's not like you had to untie them from your waist to show your scar, right?" She swung her head back into the dark and the light steps crawled from across Shin to behind Kyou Kai, who reacted with silence and waited in anticipation. Despite the fact that Kyou Kai could hear Karyou Ten's breath and the even quieter wood creaks that the average person might not, the sudden advancement of two hands extending themselves outwards from behind and below her line of sight made her jump slightly as she felt the contact between her hands furled together and those of Karyou Ten's. She was unable to make a noise of surprise or inquiry into the happenings, so she simply let the girl with skinnier arms hold her in the moment. She looked down to see the other girl's slightly bruised hands covering her paler digits.
Karyou Ten had been undergoing basic sword training (although, she instead kept a dagger on her person) as she was insistent on ever since the incident with the assassins. Although Shin felt somewhat of a guilty conscience at first for feeling as though he had failed in keeping her safe, the strategist reassured him that her main purpose in learning any amount of swordsmanship was purely for the sake of not burdening others so much and hopefully being more useful in situations in which such close combat might arise. Although the blow dart she had kept for so long proved its worth, its use was limited to scenarios that were not uncomfortably close. But she trained. She did her best. She swung, and she got hit. And then she got up and did it all over again. Those efforts were plainly visible. All of their efforts were, in a way.
"Even though you had such a difficult exterior, and even with the strength to become an army of men's admiration, you're still soft—especially around here," Karyou Ten's left hand reached up and placed itself around Kyou Kai's chin and warming cheek.
She was in a struggle, "You're a little close..."
"Isn't that the point?"
Shin exploded his voice, "Ten, just what do you think you're doing to our poor lieutenant!?"
The slimmer girl let go and receded away from the light's visibility only to reappear in her initial position; though, in this instance, she postured herself directly in its path and restricted that which illuminated Kyou Kai, who was left with bits and pieces of her skin and face and body refracting from its reach. Before her—before them—was an individual as loosely dressed as the initially scantily clad woman. Though she faced towards Shin, and thus only the part of her body facing the open window made itself known to the world, there was clarity in the fact that she wore a standard tied cloth around her waist that hung over her pelvic region; and yet, with an unwavering confidence, she stood in this stance that made no compromise otherwise. The small humps in skin, fat, and muscle that were created by the wrapped bandages around her thighs were entirely exposed; but unlike the other girl, she did not have a dedicated band around her breasts. Rather, she had detached her waist sitao from the rest of her outfit and simply let its length hang over her chest using her neck as leverage.
"It's not like I've thought much about things like this," Karyou Ten raised her hands together and touched the tips of all of her fingers together, "and it's not the most appropriate way to approach the situation," she seemed to cringe at herself, "but—I might be getting a little ahead of myself, I know, but... it's not like I don't want to know what it's like to be touched too, or what it'd be like to hear your voices close to my ears, or going over your scars with my fingers."
"Sorry, you lost me, I think you've thought about this a lot.
Karyou Ten looked lost and turned to Kyou Kai for affirmation, "Right, Kyou Kai!? I'm not that strange am I? This is—you've had some thoughts too, right!?"
Kyou Kai did not respond for what felt like a prolonged amount of time, but in total amounted to barely less than 3 seconds; and her response was not vocal, but rather a violent nodding of her head.
An unnatural quiet lingered in the air of a thundered and rained day. In the moment of deliverance of admission, the outpour of the sky's wishes lightened and broke into a somber, falling mist. Still did the droplets fall, but no longer in an aggressive race towards their demise and absorption into the earth itself.
"In tryin' to be conscious of not oversteppin' myself, I got too self-conscious in not bein' assertive at all. In thinkin' too much about you, I didn't think about you at all," Shin pushed his face into the light with his head turned slightly away from the other two. He opened his eyes and looked at the two of them. Although Kyou Kai was, by now, mostly obscured by the fact that he and Karyou Ten were in the light's path aside from the porous holes in their figures silhouetting and allowing for bits of information to pass through and glimmer off of the girl's skin, he could clearly see the expression on her face from the portion of her eyes and mouth that were, at the very least, visible. Likewise, Karyou Ten kept to her side profile in spite of keeping her eyes tied to Shin and fidgeting with her hands behind her back. His lips parted and half-mouthed something as he thought to himself and then proceeded, "ya' know, you two are pretty beautiful when you smile," he gave them a smile. They smiled. It was hard to tell, but they were sure he had at least some tinge of pink or red on his face or ears. He closed his eyes and started to back out of the light, "I feel like I'm starin' too much, like I shouldn't be starin', or that I shouldn't... think of 'that'."
As he did so, Karyou Ten stepped forward, reached out, and grabbed his collar. "If that was a problem, I wouldn't be standing like this."
Kyou Kai stepped forward with her right hand pressed up in the middle of her chest holding her necklace with her index finger and thumb, "Say—Ten, Shin—would it be alright if I asked you to just call me Kai when we're like this..?"
Ten let go and placed herself back so that the two of them were both held by a piece of the spotlight; and Shin kept his hand in the light on its lonesome for a moment after Ten had let go as he resolved to stand with them partially engulfed by the light. This time he didn't consciously make the decision to look away, though his subconscious mind found itself in a battle of wits.
Shin raised his left hand and placed it over Kyou Kai's where it gently grazed the soft side of a breast and delicately held her hand, "I'm glad we happened to meet, Kai."
"Kai, you have pretty black hair."
She smiled and grabbed Kyou Kai's empty hand with hers.
Kai's stomach growled. A roaring monster.
"There goes that..." Ten sighed.
The evening offered its prayers with a light sprinkle and drizzle flowing through the mountain and its various crevices and ravines like tears of the face. Albeit the cold of the wind had conceived its final gusts by evening time, the chillèd frosts of a sky that knew neither sun nor moon rattled wood and bone alike. Windows and shutters were closed, and soft fabrics and clothes laid bare on the ground for those inside to sit upon; and although it was of a cold night, the light of fire and its cackling breaths served as primary precaution against its potentially insidious desire to consume that which lived of heat, for none took attempt to redress in packed layers and only took time to drape a robe over shoulders.
They cooked and they ate. They spoke of memories. They spoke of dreams past. It was not for the sake of holding unto anchors of self and ideas of old, but in reminiscence of stories that now belonged to history itself, as though they were the mere tools of construction which built the cornerstones of life lived present but had worn themselves far too outdated to continue the journey as originally smithed and armored together.
Grown, dim embers who had aged into reddened wood softly spoke their secrets, though none were too keen in listening closely. With finished meals and an afterwards light divulgence into a leafy tea, the man in blue sprawled his arms out on the floor with legs still crossed and back rested against the floor. He was neither interested in sleeping nor the sight of the ceiling but stared into it anyway. "Ten."
"What?"
"I'm surprised you don't wear somethin' across like Kai."
"Well," she looked down, "not like there's any reason to." The other girl was covering her face with crossed legs angled upwards and her hands holding the sides of her hair over her mouth as she took a peek. And peeked. And peeked. "...if you stare that intently, I'll get self-conscious, you know," Ten remarked.
Shin hummed, "I see, that makes sense."
"Now you're getting too comfortable—you've got something interesting on your mind, huh?"
"Can ya' blame me?"
"I guess it's only fair considering how often we see you half-naked," she crossed her arms up and held her head high as though she had made a profoundly intelligent statement.
Ah. "That ain't the same."
"Who're you to tell me that?"
"I'm a guy, and the situation is completely different."
She grinned a little, "Just because you're not so conscious about it doesn't mean other people aren't, and just because Kai is a respectful girl doesn't mean she was intently looking chi by chi and cun by cun entirely innocently."
With an explosive force, he pushed himself up. His body slowly rose to an arch where the power he had put into his rise could no longer traverse upwards; but rather than fall down, his core activated, and he finished the journey to completion himself. Shin's head flopped forward, and his hair moved itself over his eyes causing him to tilt his head slightly to one side so that he could peer through his slightly overgrown bangs. Focus was initially given to Ten, but in haste it was switched to Kai. She noticed this change and directed her attention to the ceiling as one of her hands let go of her hair and she sunk deeper into her knees. Her finger lightly tapped against the wood below and made a little circling motion.
"It's not like I had any particular intentions before or in the moment, but it's different when it's said and done."
"Ten was onto somethin' earlier..."
Kai's eyes locked back onto him, though her finger kept twirling against the wooden floor, "She's only able to talk because she's the same."
Shin's head whipped to Ten where he held to her the expression of an ogre in disappointment.
Ten held her ground, "I'm not going to apologize for having wants..."
"And you're tellin' me about gettin' too comfortable? Where's your modesty?" He joked.
Kai interrupted, "You once walked out of a lake bare naked intent on sparring with me, I wasn't aware 'modesty' was a word you knew about."
Ten raised a brow, "That means..."
Kai stopped her, "It was years ago."
Ten continued, "I doubt it's changed much since then."
Shin's ogre face returned, "What's this about? Why's it feel like I'm suddenly gettin' the short end of the stick again?"
"Those are your words, not ours."
He snickered and leaned forward to rest his face on his fist with his elbow planted just before the knee of his crossed legs.
"Are you sure you want to be saying that with your chest, Ten?" Kai attacked for fun too.
With a slightly smushed face, Shin closed his eyes and gave a toothless smile.
Ten's voice growled as though she was imitating Shin retorting, "What's that s'posed to mean? You saying it's not enough?" Even her manner of speech was reminiscent.
Warm and calm.
Kai's naturally lower voice replied, "I would never insult a beautiful woman in any way."
As if to fall asleep.
Ten's tone changed, "Oh, well... that's okay, then."
They had flopped back and forth in tone enough to give an amount of whiplash.
"You're surprisingly docile at times."
"That kind of comment isn't something I can just respond to—am I supposed to say 'You too, Kai', or what? Is it an insult? A compliment?"
"I was pointing out something cute."
Ten scrunched her temple, "Seems kind of backwards. 'Docile', like an animal?" She lifted her feet off of the ground and put her weight entirely on her rear as she balanced herself and slowly laid herself down on the wood with her wingspan stretched. The robe she had draped over her shoulders sprawled out with her, no longer covering any amount of her besides acting as a cover between her back and the floor; and just as she had allowed for her sitao to lightly suspend itself over her chest, the had now drifted off just below her armpit and down her upper ribcage where they, too, met the ground. Rested were that which had been kept barely hidden.
Kai looked as the fire spun around in her eyes but then looked away. "Ten, you're exposed."
"Yeah."
"'Yeah?' Aren't you going to do something about it?"
Ten raised an arm in the air and did a shrugging motion, "It's not a bother, the fire's warm enough. Besides," she lowered her hand down to her chest and placed it off-centered next to her left breast, "you were going to see anyway." Her fingers sank into her skin as though she intended to grip her heart and still it.
Kai stood and moved next to Ten, robe and all. She put her legs up and hugged them in a position similar to but different from the one she was in earlier. "You sure?"
"Are you really asking that after your stunt?"
Kai looked down to Ten, peeking through her now-raised arms, and Ten stared back at her. "I don't know how to... it's—"
The girl on the floor pushed herself, "Close your eyes."
"For what?"
"Just do it."
Kai kept still and did as she was told.
...
..
.
Suddenly, she felt arms wrapping around from behind her and lightly holding across her, and then a body envelop her from her back and a head that had found a placement in the bridge between her neck and right shoulder. With the slight force pulling on her and melted back into the embrace.
"I don't know much about what to do either, but the solution is something like this. Forcing yourself to be forward won't go anywhere if you've got a heart and head thinking differently; and rushing into things might as well be a suicide charge. All I can do is what feels right, but not just for me. It's whatever you say too. And Shin. As long as we're honest and thinking things through, we can do anything," she held a little tighter, "doesn't matter if we're protectin' the middle kingdoms, fightin' them, or... this... whatever we are. I won't compromise on that."
Kai closed her eyes and let her muscles limp, "If you're going to try speaking like him, be careful not to start acting like him at least."
Ten gave a hushed laugh. "I'm not crazy enough to try fighting a 'War God', even less more than once, or win."
The two paused and looked at Shin. He was still seated in his spot with his head resting on his fist and eyes closed. His breaths were visible from the lifting and lowering of his chest. Ten silently laughed to herself while Kai smiled and reclosed her eyes. Ten's hands unlatched themselves from around Kai's collar and shoulder and hovered over to her ribs where her fingertips lightly pressed onto the barely protruding bone and then down the sides.
"...can I?"
"Yeah..."
Ten's hands moved across the ridges on Kai's stomach until her own fingers had met with each other. The sensations caused Kai's muscles to twitch in reaction and her upper half pushed itself backwards into Ten a little bit more. Unmoving as a fortress wall, Ten stood her ground and pushed back with an equal force as she started to touch individual muscle that poked from the skin. Her thumbs swept from the outer regions and then inwards and upwards in an arc and down between the abdominal muscles that were certainly far more defined on Kai's body than Ten's. With her hands slowly sliding down the slope, they passed over the girl's belly button causing her to involuntarily react again.
Kai's hand skittishly made its way from her side and grabbed one of Ten's hands to pull it away; however, the response she received was instead that the hand she had grabbed had snaked its way into locking with hers while the other hand carefully spread itself across the upper half. "Even with a hundred scars here," she moved up, "I think you'd be as pretty as the day before." Ten found herself at the edge of the wrapping Kai had around her breast and lightly tugged on a piece of it by slipping some of her thumb underneath it and grabbing the other side with her index finger. Though it was wrapped in such a way that tugging at it like this would not unravel its contents, her intentions and closeness to something that was regarded as a most sacred aspect of femininity, something she generally did not think about nor attempt to interact with. It was beyond her, yet she was always conscious of it in her journey as a lonesome traveler.
Kai's interaction with these elements was limited to the gossip of men and people she had come across in her travels, and that ambitious woman she called sister who would tease her otherwise pure mind. Between these thoughts and conversations, there was hardly any consideration of its occurrence in her own life. Of those who were brave enough to mention such matters publicly, it was always the most shameless of the bunch, or those simply cracking jokes, she thought. It was not a negative influence on her comprehension of a situation should it arise, per se; but rather, with no other experiences to learn from, she was limited in her understanding of and mindfulness.
No better were any of the others, though. Although strengthened by the confidence of a wave that wished to continue on and on, Ten's own experience with the matter was just as limited. The frustration of living with a man who didn't even recognize her as a feminine figure coupled with her younger experience living in the slums with some of the kingdom's most bald-facedly brutish were not much better. Although she had the time to organize her thoughts in some ways or another, uncharted territory is as it is described. In some way, she had internalized a form of an inferiority complex with her so-called lack of femininity—again emphasized by some lack of physical traits that seemingly led to good health in childbearing as was in discussion here and there, as well as the hurt she felt in not being acknowledged by Shin for a moment in time. Those feelings subsided in part, both due to the moment of confidence, as well as the fact that Shin, and Kyou Kai, were of comfort. Neither was berating, and though they made fun of one another, they could each see the color of one another's eyes and stare into the night as though there never was a Kingdom of Qin to begin with.
In this moment, they steadily made an approach to these ideas. Femininity and masculinity were parts to an equation that made up the whole of one individual and the next, and questions of how one such person interacted with another existed, especially amongst women. It was not uncommon to hear rumors of a man courting another man in private, yet there were few, if any, whispers amongst women in the courts, in the cities, or elsewhere. Certainly, they must have existed in some degree; but these difference off personality, of tradition, could exasperate more fear; but woman or man, it was of no relative importance. It was a detail, an aspect of the formula that could be changed, because it wasn't of any matter which of them was male or female or a combination of the two. Love did not bind itself to a curse of words and strict concept, love itself was many things, and so it could be many more things.
Kai pushed herself up and away from Ten. She didn't move away from where Ten was seated, but simply unstuck her back from Ten's front; and as she did so, slowly unwrapped herself. Layer after layer, and piece by piece, skin was revealed. It was left with a slightly pinkish imprint that Ten couldn't help but run a finger over from the top of her spinal line and over the hump of a shoulder blade. Eventually the movements of her arms came to a stop, and she held herself at the front with her arms pressing inwards and slowly subsided. Ten invited herself back to physically embracing the other, but she made careful movement in order to not disturb the harmonic safety each of them felt. Again, she placed her hands gently upon Kai's stomach to garner her reaction, and as she received no ill response started her ascent.
Over many minor mounds and shallow crevices, she found herself at the peak of the ribcage that flared out slightly. The quickened breaths of the other girl fueled her nerves, but also her confidence as her own breath shook and she took conscious care to not whimper. And then she rose up and over the hill and felt its softness and firmness.
In the endless annals of history where mirrors reflected each and every moment for an everlasting, intangible, infinite number of "now's" and "then's", this moment reflected itself just as non-finitely. The soft shapes hunched over one another across a scattering of blued, purpled glass. Every moment was then. She was careful with her touch, both across its soft areas and across the small areas of slightly dried skin on one of them.
"Forgotten already, huh?" Shin's eyes were still closed, and his head still rested on his arm, but he extended his somewhat puckered lips out slightly and spoke as though he was pouting. "When put up against a lustful woman, I s'pose I don't stand a chance."
Ten disengaged herself from fondling Kai and placed her arms beneath Kai's armpits, reaching over to her shoulders and grabbing them, and pulling her close for a moment. The two stood up, "We're this far, have some confidence," Ten whispered into her ear. Kai swallowed some of her own accumulating saliva before jumping up a little when she felt a nibble on her ear. Her foot moved forward instinctively in an attempt to remove the rest of her body from the newfound stimulus, though it was this moment that gave Ten the opportunity to gently shove her towards Shin. A highly trained warrior, perhaps; but still a virgin of emotional intimacy. She made an attempt at stumbling herself out of his path for fear of colliding directly with him, but as her ankle twisted ever so slightly, it became apparent that she'd instead just fall.
Unwilling to let this happen, Shin opened his eyes and readied himself to catch the flying girl, which he succeeded in doing so at the cost of his balance being tipped over and finding his back and head on the floor. He had caught her below the armpits, but his primary response in the moment was to analyze Kai's arm. It was healed. He knew that. They knew that. She didn't need anyone's supervision.
The general let out a single chuckle, "This's the second time I've caught you." He was smiling while he made contact with her eyes. That was it. That burst of a bewildering kindness and love of life. Those eyes had changed throughout the years. They had grown a little wiser, but they had also grown to look at her and Ten with an incomprehensible zeal and admiration. Her necklace twirled in front of him, and as his eyes were caught by it, he looked straight at her chest. His mouth flew agape, but he quickly regained his composure and looked away as he had been; though with her hands free, she moved her hands forwards and onto the sides of his head and directed it back to her. Her cheeks swelled slightly, and her eyes almost closed to a squint, and a small smile stretched from one side of her face to the other that just barely showed her teeth. Her thumb ran itself down the side of his nose and curved around the bottom of his cheek where his eye cheek dipped to eye. Her thumb moved back to just before the bridge of the nose and traced his face again.
Helpless, like a stray kitten. "If you look at me with that expression for too long, even I won't be able to hold back from your cuteness," she smiled through her words.
The world's only red kitten. "Shin, you better not be thinking about rejecting either of us." It might've been more than a threat, but it felt warm. The master tactician employing her master manipulation tactics—that wasn't true, she was just giving him a kick.
Kai grabbed his head and pulled herself closer to his. Shin didn't bother trying to push back and let her gently fall, like a feather, on top of him, so that she could engage in a kiss. His hands had let go of her and, though stiffened with the shock of emotions he had some trouble with fully processing, kept at bay; and while she made her lips known to his, she let her hands circle around and rub around his arms and chest just as she had done his cheek. A most gentle, loving caress. She didn't know what to do, or how to do it; and neither of them quite knew how to make the kiss work, but she remembered the feeling and touch of Kyou Shou gently touching her hair and caressing her cheek from time to time. It was a different kind of love, but it was that love that allowed for her to express herself in this situation.
As a man, he couldn't help having such a reaction, could he? As a man, it was only natural that a woman of this magnitude would have some sort of effect on him, wasn't it? But knowing that she was there, where it was, he felt vulnerable and embarrassed and found himself shifting herself and him to the side so that she was no longer fully on top of him.
But it didn't matter. She gave him the same eyes that he was sure he had.
Ten squatted next to the, behind Shin, and gave her usual smirk. "Hey, Shin—"
He didn't give her time to respond either as he pushed himself into a sitting position and lightly grabbed her by the sitao she still had hanging from her neck so he could give her a kiss.
She was surprised but not opposed; but in that surprise, she lost her balance and fell forward as well. Kai had gotten up and caught her from following forward; and the three of them, almost as if they were trying to tie themselves together into a knot like a bundle of picked reeds and straw looked at each other for a moment.
"You're full of confidence all of a sudden," she teased and raised her hand to tug on his robe which pulled the collar away from his neck and exposed more of his shoulder.
"Just a little nudge sometimes, ain't that it?"
"...'a little.'"
"A bit."
"Say, would'ya mind if I—"
In unison, "No."
In unison, eyes with intent.
In unison,
He lowered the rest of his robe down to his torso on his own in slowed but powerful sways of movement. Albeit respectful in their observance, their gaze was unable to hide shadowy figures of two women ready to drool on themselves as self-control evaporated into a quietly whispered suggestion. Outside, the rain, which had dimmed into a light mist over the course of the evening, began to sprinkle again.
Momentarily regaining a sense of awareness and wiping her mouth with the back of her wrist, Ten interrupted their proceedings, "What if someone..?"
"Then I'll put 'em in a headlock and make sure they forget."
"Your plan is to knock the memory out of them?"
"There ain't nothin' to worry about right now."
Ten softly gulped and lowered her chin looked to Kai as if to ask for mutual approval. Still hesitant. Of course they were. Talk and talk as one might, the unknown was still a step ahead.
They moved forward together and placed their hands on his chest and pushed him down with firm palms. He was unsure of what to do being on the defense and relinquished his thoughts of tactics as he felt one of his legs straddled and a mouth traversing up his bicep and diagonally over his pectoral on the opposite side. In between, the two girls who held hands and glanced at one another in attempts to communicate their next actions or understand what they were supposed to do next, but they received no support besides each other's presences. They let go.
Shin kept his eyes away in embarrassment of what the two were doing and planning to do with him, but with his left arm, the side in which Ten was holding his leg, he raised his hand over and covered her shoulder with it and softly rubbed from it to her collar and then her neck, which caused her to shiver as she, too, took an effort to trace over and feel the various muscles that erupted from and scars that interrupted his skin; while on the opposite side, Shin felt goosebumps as Kai hastened her approach to his own neck with little pecks from her lips and a trail of saliva in her tongue's wake. His neck turned away from her which he understood was because he didn't want to face her directly yet, but all this action gave to Kai was full access to the rest of his neck.
Ten unlocked herself and sat up and then sat on top of his abdomen; and while she moved into this position, his hand drifted down her neck and over her chest as he gave light tugs to her breast and experienced its softness for the first time. Kai pushed herself up too and Shin moved his arm to her thigh and felt its firmness and strength and caused her to press her knees together and lean towards him as though a shock of lightning was continuously sparking itself from their moment of contact.
"Shin," Ten said.
He opened his eyes and squinted at her above him.
"You don't need to—"
He pressed her small breast again and traveled down to her ribcage and held her while he freed his other hand and pushed himself up with Ten still on top of him. "You gonna say somethin' like, 'I might as well be a man? Why bother?' Is that it?"
She frowned her lips and stared off to the side, "You made it worse."
"I hope you can look back on it and laugh a little," Kai poked his leg, he got the cue, "what I'm meanin' to say is: I was bein' a kid and spoke my mind a little much. I guess what I did is a bit more than 'speakin', but I made that mistake," he shifted his weight so that his left arm was now holding himself up and he placed his other hand over Ten's heart above her breast, "and I happen to like what's here," he took his hand off and raised it up to her forehead and uncovered the bangs that hung over her brows, "and here. I almost feel bad for you wantin' to keep my eyes on 'em."
Ten tried to hide a smile from showing up on her face, and her cheeks reddened; and her mouth morphed into a crooked line trying its best to frown, but her eyes pierced a softness into him that had him smile back, and her chin moved forward just a little bit. "I—Kai, hold," she said as she pushed her hands onto his chest and used her weight to push him back a bit, though his own strength held up until Kai grabbed him from behind much like how Ten was holding her earlier. He was relatively bigger than her, though she had no trouble in pressing up against him and holding his head next to hers and boldly pecked his ear and the cheek of his face. She closed her eyes and collapsed her chin on the gap between his neck and shoulder.
Shin subtly leaned his head and body a little more into Kai's embrace as he felt Ten's hands drift down his torso and begin unwrapping the sitao around his waist.
Her outward advances and the attacks he was dealing with on two fronts couldn't keep his voice entirely in check.
Kai's mouth formed an "o" as she heard the noise that he had produced which very quickly turned into a smile with closed lips and light bites on his neck. Primitive as it seemed to be a natural instinct, her nibbles elicited further contortions of his voice. He had enough of it, though, and with his hand free, he pushed his thumb up onto Kai's chin and raised it upwards while he angled his neck. She may have been pushed away from the interest of her neck, but she was clearly satisfied with what she had done and made no attempts to hide it; though, it wasn't like Shin was displeased with the rare happy-go-lucky grin she had on her face, but rather that he knew that she was trying to extort him for the new sounds, previously unknown even to him, that he had made.
Ten stopped as she was in the process of un-robing Shin. Clearly red in the face, even still, just as they all were to some extent, she opined—or rather, emboldened to herself—that she should turn off the light. Let the fires rest and be put away. Let its onlooking be silenced.
Again, in the dark, but not alone nor cold; and in the midst of night, as the audience of rain was swept into an abyss of irrelevancy, the shuffling sounds of performers and lovers settling themselves back into their positions holding one another and listening—with bated breaths—for trembling breaths and the squeak of surprise or that of 'a feeling' that had no descriptor in the moment. Absent-minded of even their goals in the worlds, the three of them could only do as much as to prioritize each other. Presided with a portion of submissive femininity as he allowed for the smaller-breasted woman to take control of him as she pleased, so that she may feel at ease, so that she may ease herself to her pace; but in the portion of aggressive masculinity, he took hold of the other and felt her in ways that he previously could not, with more details to be explored and uncovered than naught. As gentle as the snow could fall upon a face.
From where he was, he could smell her skin. Her hair. Her.
From where she was, she could feel his embrace, and his breaths, and the beating pulse of his heart in his body.
And on top of him, the one who exposed him most of all to the darkness of nothing, but the warmth of her grasp.
Even though she had made such a joke earlier, he could not be bothered with self-consciousness.
Even though she had made such a joke earlier, she didn't care what it really was, so long as it was him.
In that moment, the three of them could only afford to care and to love.
When she let go, and she scooted herself forward bit by bit and then pushed herself up using his chest and her arms; and when he took one of his hands and touched her arm and crept to her ribs to hold in that position; and when the other bent herself over further to kiss him; and as the first took one hand and moved it down to align herself; and when he pulled the other closer to him; and when she grabbed the other girl's hand resting on his chest.
She felt the pain of being pierced. It was not a pain like that of a knife, but it was unexpected for a moment. Perhaps she meant to cease the subconscious complaints that she held, or perhaps it was only natural as her mind and body both were unable to think about anything besides those two, she wondered about the pain of Kai's arm. She wondered what it was like to have been cut through. She wondered what it was like for Shin to have been cut as many times as he had. To be stabbed through as she did another. It was not that kind of pain, it was a pain she could deal with, and also not necessarily a pain at all as she felt herself contorting slightly from another feeling entirely. It was morbid. She didn't like it, the ideas in her head as she continued. She pushed herself up with her other hand and sat where she was for a moment and decided to traverse herself and march her way closer and closer. She glided over valleys of bones pushing over skin and little bits of fat that presented themselves around her stomach.
She let out the smallest whimper of Kai's name and remained unmoving in the moment. The other girl slowly made her way up from Shin's face and lowered him to the floor so that she could find her way over to Ten; and in the meanwhile, Shin calmed himself from simply taking over. He didn't want to do that, even if it was the response his body desired. He took the hand on her side and moved it down along her hip and onto her thigh where he gripped and massaged starting from top and intending to end at the bottom near the knee.
Kai felt along Ten's shoulders and found and held her face.
A soft call of name. Almost pleading. Ten raised her hands and found Kai's face as well. She shook some and circled around the hair over her ears.
She brought Kai up to her face and lightly allowed for their lips to meet. It was bittersweet in the moment. Maybe she felt a wave of guilty rush over her, or maybe not; but as she moved her face away, she let out a few tears, some of which found themselves traversing Kai's wrist, and some of which dropped directly onto Shin. The male of the group eased himself up and put his forehead on Ten's. He moved back slightly and knocked his temple straight into hers. He heard her make an 'ow' sound, and before she was able to complain he moved his hips forwards slightly and caused her to retract down and grip his arms from the sides.
They shuffled around with Shin at lead until she was laying on the floor that he matted with the articles of clothing that were laying around. He held one of her hands in his left and one of her thighs in the other and slowly pushed. Kai lay on her side next to her and rubbed her hand across Ten's stomach and up her breasts, occasionally stopping to lightly prance about with only her fingertips. Whenever she did this, Ten faintly groaned; and after the third time, she took her free hand and reached out to her side and found the back of Kai's hip, effectively her butt, and pressed her fingers together in a grabbing motion. Kai's back arched a bit, and she pressed her chest towards Ten; of course, no one could see any of this occurring in the dark, though they could feel their bodies drifting. Meaning to get back, Kai quickly ran her hand from Ten's ribs and down to the middle of her navel and over her hypogastric region until her down-facing fingers pushed through the hairs sprouted like reeds from the middle of Ten's mons. She could feel Shin's own beat and a relentless pulse from Ten. But even so, she moved her fingers more as Ten flailed like she was trying to stop Kai; though, she was unable to do anything as Kai reached her goal. Ten, unable to resist the strength of two direct attacks found herself pushing her legs inwards to Shin as if to try and crush him. Even her voice let out a little more and she lightly shook.
"Hey... was that—"
"Shut up," Ten silenced Shin in a strained, quieter voice than she had used.
In reality, he wasn't sure and wanted to ask, but he never found the opportunity to following his shutdown. Though, he eventually figured it out in the moment as he moved his hand around her thigh and got a strangely strong reaction and a refusal to speak otherwise. He was careful not to lose himself, otherwise fear that he may become a father too quickly and lose the resource of one of his finest for some months—the reality was that the former bothered him more than the latter, though more because of the circumstances that he had grown up with and not wanting to pass it on as some sort of family trait.
Even quieter than before, "Go give Kai attention."
Kai reached her hand away from Ten and touched the tip of her middle finger with her thumb as though she was intrigued by the particular texture of moisture it had somehow (though, she knew how) accumulated. As her mind frenzied about, she pulled her hand closer to her face and stuck her tongue out, but her unashamedly perverse nature was stopped from reaching finality by the sudden thud next to her, which she figured was Shin moving over and moving his hand around to bring himself over. He felt around for her until he found her arm and was able to move up to her face. She couldn't see, but with her superior natural abilities, she could tell exactly where he was by his breathing; and in return, she took one of her fingers and poked him in the forehead.
He lowered himself, with her finger still on him, until she felt like she should release and lay her arm lay flat next to her head. Shin found a piece of her body, right above her breast, and kissed it, and then tried to do what Kai had done to him and bite it, though there wasn't enough to grab onto with her skin stretched in the position that she was in. Nonetheless, she found the thought to be attractive and let out a small moan. Discouraged wasn't the correct word, but a brand-new form of embarrassment attached itself to her memory of the moment as her head steamed red knowing she had let out the sound that she did—perhaps it was a karmic response for what she did to Ten. On the other hand, Shin was more than encouraged and put his hand on her waistline as a guiding line so that he could find where her hip was; and as he found it and the bit of fabric still covering her and was able to find where it was tied and release its hold. Gently, he pulled it off and put it aside so that he could place the base of his thumb on the barely protruding bone of her hip. With his wrapped digits on her hip, he followed the curves and contours around her small hip dip and up and across her thigh. He moved her leg slightly aside and put his hand atop of her mons with his thumb sticking down and over her unseen cleft. Since he had no idea what he was doing besides what he had just done, he simply pushed his hand back and forth on her while trying to be attentive to her reactions to certain parts and movements. He had intended to do so with Ten as well if not for her swiftness in leading and getting to the main course.
Having experimented some and understood part of the situation, as well as feeling the warmth and slick all over his thumb, he was intent on moving forward and trying to do both at once.
"What are you doing?" She stopped him. She wasn't as commanding as Ten, in a strange sense of irony; though it was clear to him that she didn't intend to let him do anything more, yet.
"There somethin' else..?"
She pushed herself up, "You're not the only one here."
He was confused, "I'm tryin' to figure it out for—"
"I want to too."
Despite the fact that Ten had already been the one to touch him how he was expecting, there was still something embarrassing about it being said out loud, even indirectly. To think he was a grown man and they grown women. It was a thought he chose to ignore
"Fine." He was pouting. She thought it was cute, so it wasn't a problem.
"...can you stand up?"
Shin's face pushed together into a central point on his face, "If that's what ya' want..."
She knelt on her knees and reached out to his thigh. It was as muscular as it looked, much more than her own; but in her eyes, or sense of appeal, no less erotic than he thought of hers. Like he had done to her, she also traced her way up and around him. She had already felt his abdomen and other parts of him a myriad of times in the past, but it was different now. She wasn't focused on alleviating his pain or injuries, and she could focus on satisfying whatever it was that she was interested in and mapping him in her head (albeit subconsciously). When she was content with her general exploration, she placed one of her hands along the particular group of muscles that were in question. Or rather, she grabbed it.
"Any harder and you'll start hurtin' me."
"Hm. maybe Ten was right."
"I—"
She pushed her hand to his mons and held with her thumb and first two fingers and gave him a kiss. Or rather, it.
She continued, "I'm kidding, not that it'd matter one way or another."
A strong pulse and a separate move.
Goosebumps sparked up his legs.
She noticed it had a dryness on the skin in little places and figured it was probably rom Ten earlier and put her face back up to it. She blew on it to gauge another reaction, but he kept melting in her hands. There was a particular scent that made its way into her nose, which she figured was a mix of himself and where it had been, which is to say again: Ten. Nonetheless, like she had earlier, she stuck out her tongue and pushed herself closer. This time, she was able to have some finality to her actions as her tongue made contact and moved up and off. Surprised, Shin now couldn't help himself in making a noise. It wasn't an especially intense feeling but knowing what she was up to and the abrupt slippery feeling he felt was enough to challenge his restraint of voice. Moving even further, she moved her tongue across the port side which induced a particular flavor, most likely that of Ten; though, as she moved closer to the base, it became more of a sweat-like salt, which did not especially bother her. She moved her head back and opened her mouth and received it in small bits, though it was more like an open-ended kiss, and she didn't quite understand what she was supposed to do at that point besides settle her lips and attempt to encroach further.
Her chamber of a mouth was capable or indulging in an incredible amount of food, but she found herself struggling to take this with all of her habited eating experience and found herself letting go as her esophagus made its uncomfortability in the moment known. She stopped and took a few breaths while rubbing her hand across Shin's hip.
Suddenly, Kai was again ensnared from behind by none other than a partially reinvigorated Ten whose left arm wrapped around below Kai's arm and cupped one of her breasts with the other pushing to the same place Kai had touched on her moments earlier. She teased, "Why'd you stop?" as her hand made contact. Kai's fingers impressed into Shin's body, and she made an effort to continue with her attempts to please him. Ten's fingers pushed their way through the entanglement of Kai's comparatively wider region of hair and found their target with ease. Kai didn't express herself as vocally as the other two, but every so often, with one kind of movement or another, Ten was able to get a peep of a moan.
Ten moved out of the way and pushed Kai onto the layers of fabric she slid over and pushed her face into each other to give her another kiss.
"You're starting to smell like him."
An absurd statement, but Kai couldn't find a response in time.
Shin got to his knees and lifted Kai's legs up and pulled her closer to him.
As he took the lead and pushed himself into her, Kai pushed herself deeper into a trance with Ten's lips and breaths to distract from the bit of pain that she encountered with his entrance. While being rocked back and forth, she pulled her face to Ten's ear and whispered, "Can I try... you... too."
"Uh, h-how would you—" Ten's strong offense was of no help in the defense; but it's not like she was against the idea, it was the fact that she had no idea how to or where to position herself to do something like that, as well as her self-consciousness about putting that part of her in Kai's face, "it's, well... okay."
Kai whispered again, "It's not like I couldn't taste it anyway."
The former assassin had an overwhelmingly blatant eroticism in her words and desires—the things people do for love, such and such. "Shut up, I don't need to hear about that or what it feels like or what it sm—I don't need any of that!" She complained while pushing herself up to straddle Kai's upper chest. Shin moved his thumb down and replicated what he had been doing earlier in combination with his continuing thrusts in a desperate attempt to finish things as he found himself closer to breaking the dam.
Kai jolted as he did so and found herself holding Ten's hands while the latter planted herself above her face and allowed her to go about her ordeal. "It's sensitive so—", unfortunately Kai did not quite care. It did not take long for her to once more collapse to her side and lay motionless—still holding onto one of Kai's hands—as the Qiang girl's stomach vibrated softly with the contractions that were sent around her body as she, too, was made to climax; and Shin, satisfied that he had satisfied the others, suspended himself and released onto Kai where it mixed with sweat and rushed down the curves of her body and onto the floor. He hadn't thought this through, and he wouldn't think about it until later, but thankfully he did not dirty their clothes with anything particular.
The three of them lay together mostly in silence. Kyou Kai made little circles around the warm parts of her lower stomach while feeling the texture of what was on her, while Karyou Ten covered her face with one arm and cuddled herself closer to Shin laying between the two.
"We should take a bath."
"Maybe."
"It's not a suggestion, Shin."
"Go take one then, or does Kai wanna go first? After all I kind of, you know..."
Ten questioned, "It's not like we can't take a bath together, assuming we have enough water, and that thing can hold the three of us."
"I think I should wait 'till the two of you are done."
"Don't tell me you're still e—"
"Are you really gonna risk it, especially with Kyou Kai?"
Kai turned her head to the two, "Why would that be a problem?"
"Wouldn't that make the bath a waste of time?"
"Oh..."
"Why are you making cute little Kyou Kai sound like a lecher?"
"You're right, you're both perverted, since both of you knew what I was meanin'."
Ten shifted her weight and pushed Shin's arm between her small breasts, "You don't know anything yet."
"Huah?"
There was a man who dreamed he was a butterfly named 'Zhuang Zhou'.
Flirted with was the grass and kissed upon were the leaves by Zhuang Zhou.
But he was not 'Zhuang Zhou'.
The butterfly had no knowledge of Zhuang Zhou.
He awoke and once again was 'Zhuang Zhou'.
Or perhaps he was the butterfly dreaming of Zhuang Zhou.
It was unmistakable, he may have thought, "for I am 'Zhuang Zhou'."
But what was the distinction between the butterfly and Zhuang Zhou?
"Shin."
Flutter. "Hm? Kyou Kai?"
Squat. "Were you asleep?"
Sniffle. "Yeah. Where's En?"
Resting on hands. "I told him and the others to head back. We have orders to move north."
Stretching arms up. "And Ten?"
Standing. "Getting ready."
Yawning. "And everyone else?"
"Waiting. Your hair is getting a little long."
"Is it bad?"
"Different."
"D'you have a preference?"
"It's your choice."
He raised an eyebrow and smiled, "I didn't say I'd change it for you, I just wanna know if you have an opinion."
"I dunno," she hugged her legs with one arm and parsed the bangs hanging from his forehead with the other, "but it's better without the tail." She took a step back and held out her left hand which poked through her long-draping outfit, "Here."
He extended his arm out and leaned forward. She took his hand and pulled him up. He let go and grabbed his sword leaning against a tree, and they started back. "I don't mean this rudely, but is there a reason you still wear that?"
"What? The necklace?"
"No, the clothes."
"You want me out of my clothes? Right here, right now?"
He sighed, "Would you really take that risk?"
"I was making a joke."
"That's motivating."
"To answer the question, though, maybe."
"You—what I mean is: I'm surprised it doesn't bother you since it's Shiyuu. I thought you might've distanced yourself from it all."
"If not for the Shiyuu, I wouldn't have what I do and have had what I did. This," she held up her sleeves and looked at them, "isn't for them."
"Hm? What's this?" Shin kneeled down and inspected something embedded in the soil. Stuck, he decided to try digging it up with his hands and realized that it was just a fragment.
Kyou Kai looked at it with him, "Looks like pottery."
It was white and had streaks of fading, detailed blue running across one side, but there was nothing else to indicate what it may have originally been a part of.
"Can't imagine somebody'd be carryin' somethin' like this around through here," he carefully wiped more of the dirt off and decided to hold onto it while the two kept walking.
"Maybe someone was trying to escape with their valuables."
"There're no castles 'round here, so someone with this kinda stuff would be pretty out of their way. No clear paths or roads, either, so it's not like a wagon can just roll through."
Kyou Kai picked up her pace and walked in front, "Is there a reason you're interested?"
"Not really, I'd just like to know where it came from."
Reaching over a small, hill-like slope, Kyou Kai raised her right arm up and waved while she waited for Shin to catch up. The thousands-strong Hi Shin camp was gearing up to leave. Some of the men were double-checking their logistical carriages and ensuring that they had resources and an adequate number of weapons and disposables; while some of the other men sat around the stone slabs from the local ruins and wrestled or talked; and on the outskirts of their clearing were various others keeping watch of their surroundings.
"Shin!" He could hear his name being called from the one table that hadn't been put away at the center of camp.
"Yo! Ten!" He called back.
With his approach, the leaders and lieutenants of the Hi Shin gathered together to go over their route and plans with Ten's planning and tactician division. When they finished, they left to gather their units together and checklist with them, and then assemble at a small platform which Shin would use to convey their plans and give a small talk to given that they were heading closer to the border with Zhou and, at the very least, skirmishes were likely on the horizon.
Before Shin presented himself, he pulled Ten aside. "Ten, you know anything about this?" He held up the shard to her.
"Looks like pottery, why?"
"Found it in the ground, wonderin' where it came from. Wagons can't pass through here and there ain't much else around."
"Could be smugglers, but it probably came from here."
"What do you mean?"
Ten held her arms up and spread them to emphasize that she meant, quite literally, where they were, "This used to be a village, or a castle, of some sort; but by the look of it, that was probably before either of us was alive. There's not much left, but it could've been involved in a battle, or people just left. When they left, they might've taken their things and dropped stuff; or maybe it was looted. Most of the stones and bricks were probably taken by Qin or Zhou to use elsewhere and now... this is what's left. "
He stared at it in the palm of his hand, "And maybe this a memory of it."
"It might not be remembered in history for anything, but maybe someone somewhere will remember this place."
"Yeah. It's pretty even though the blue is rubbed off and it's all dirty. Here," he held it over to her, "mind keepin' it somewhere for me?"
"You sure? There's not much value to this."
"I'll keep it, the value doesn't matter, I like it, kind of like—"
"If you compare either or me or Kyou Kai to this shard, you will regret it."
Shin smiled awkwardly.
"Good, now go, you're wasting our daytime."
He dropped he piece in her hands. She looked it over herself and put it in a box she lined with cloth, and then asked for one of the soldiers to put it in one of her personal unit's carts.
The Qin army under Shin gathered in front of the platform and waited for him to climb up and speak. When they were all together, he made his way over to the base of the stage and looked at the that steps that led up. He blinked and momentarily saw the faces of old friends and foe in the steps themselves. Some were furious, some were sad, and others expressionless. Even the visions of Ou Ki and Hyou were not of a particular warmth to see. And as he blinked, the stairs disappeared and were replaced by a single mound of bodies. Shin took a glance, through the side of his eyes, to the crowd awaiting him to see both the familiar faces he was accustomed to and those he had no personal connection with. They only had the difference of what he knew about them, and who they were to them, but they were all people. They were all people like those who had fought and died before. They were all people like those he was trying to protect or guarantee the equal freedoms for, those that were not forced to fight and kill for differences between borders. When he looked back at the steps, they were just stairs and nothing more. He climbed to the top, which was not particularly high, and looked at everyone, from his right to his left. The wind swayed through his hair and robe as they lightly flailed together. He closed his eyes and focused his thoughts on two particular jade stones.
Shin took a large breath, exhaled, and opened his eyes.
There is a land that is far away. It is far, but it is not anywhere other than here, and so it is close. It is the same land, just distant. Sat comfortably on a small silk pillow of its own in an enclosed space behind glass was an old piece of pottery. Across, three were sitting together on a wooden bench overlooking the sea where a boat was slowly making its way through the bay and into the ocean.
"I guess it is kinda pretty."