Past and Present (Brigits Flame Week 2 Comp)
Title: Past and Present
Author: Aquarius Galuxy
Fiction type: Prose, original fiction (Novel idea #2)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Suspense (I guess?)
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: slight mentions of gore
Word count: 1,850
Summary: Ito's history, and how it relates to her brother's capture.
Author's Notes: Written for brigits_flame's December Week 2 contest, topic being "Hustler".
Sorry for the length, I really couldn't cut any of it out without leaving gaping holes in how the story goes. Hope it isn't too boring. This is actually kinda a side plot to the novel idea, I haven't actually thought about the main idea yet. The pace is also uneven, but I don't know how else to get everything explained without confusing readers, and gaining the maximum impact at the same time. Feel free to point out loopholes, and maybe suggest ideas on how I can fix them?
It took me a while to write this piece too. Mainly because it's a history thing, plus action/suspense. My main genre is romance/erotica, so writing about things not quite including that is kinda draining for me. =p I don't really expect this piece to make it past Week 2, as it isn't the strongest piece that I can think of for the week's theme, but I'm staying by my resolve to concentrate on my novel ideas for the December competition.
***This piece is some sort of a continuation of my Week 1 Entry, if it helps.***
Okay, sorry for the long author's notes.
They were a family of two, a brother and sister who had lost their parents in their childhood.
The girl, Hanae, was senior to her brother by two years. At ten and eight respectively, all semblance of their rivalry plummeted the day the blaze struck their house. It had been a quiet night, whispers skittering to and fro between the siblings long after bedtime. Their father had burst into the room suddenly. Both children ducked beneath the covers, pretending to ignore his urgent footsteps, till he was right beside them, roughly shaking them from presumed sleep.
Go to your Mother, he had told them in a taut voice. Hurry, and be silent. We are in danger.
They obeyed him immediately, and that was the last they saw of their father. Mother had taken them in her arms, even as strange cracks sounded from outside, and eerie yellow light glowed through the paper windows. She held them close, told them to leave the town alone. She told them that they would not be safe here, told them never to return. Do not trust anyone, not even the servants, she whispered in the darkened room. Her son uttered a small cry and clung to her waist. She removed him gently. Then she made Hanae promise to take care of her brother no matter what happened.
The haunted look in her eyes had been missed by both children as they ran out of the house, looking back at her periodically; so was her lingering gaze.
An explosion lit up the far walls of the compounds when they had pattered a small distance away, hand in hand, feet bare. Servants dashed about, fleeing. Hanae grabbed her brother the moment he made to dash back. Long seconds dragged by before his kicks and punches stopped. Brother and sister alike watched as a ferocious blaze consumed the Nishihara household, taking all they had ever known.
Someone headed for them, and almost too late, Hanae pulled her brother away, scrambling out by a side door and hiding amongst the bushes, swallowing her tears. They crawled through bushes, and then ran out of the town, hearts pounding in fear.
They travelled for days, driven along by the ghosts of theft that lurked whenever they pilfered food to keep hunger at bay. Being younger, and far clumsier than his sister, Izumo was often the reason they had been spotted, and subsequently chased. Their frames thinned, and their clothes (their only possessions) grew worn and filthy with time.
It was, perhaps, by a stroke of luck that they found an old shed at the outskirts of a town. The siblings avoided the old lady who lived in the cottage nearby. This went on for a week, after which the old woman bore down on them one evening, and trapped them when they tried to escape. She asked for their names - Izumo answered her with stark honesty - and why they had taken residence on her property. Before Hanae could remind him of their mother's wishes, Izumo had let slip their circumstances. She waited on the woman's words, dreading their return to a home that ceased to exist.
Instead, the aged female proposed a deal. If they did what she said, she would feed them, clothe them, and put a roof over their heads. They accepted with a glance at the other.
Years passed. The woman - she bade them to address her as Mai - trained them in the art of thievery, though it became apparent that Izumo did not possess a knack for it. She offered him the position of a craftsman's apprentice. After refusing to separate from his sister for a period of time, Hanae managed to convince him that stealing would not have been within their late parents' wishes. She would be starting work at a wine house across town herself, and it was a legal job. He finally agreed to move into the wood craftsman's workshop with the promise of a weekly visit.
In truth, Mai had been guiding Hanae along the path of an assassin. Having used to be one in the past, she had forged a number of connections and skills that Hanae was to inherit. Thus, the daughter of the Nishihara family adopted her trade name, Ito.
Ito used the wine house as a base for her dealings. With each successful job, the commission was split between mentor and pupil. Izumo was never told about what his sister's occupation truly entailed; Hanae made sure that their meetings were held far away from the wine house to ensure his safety.
Word came one day from an uncle they had long since lost contact with. It had been ten years after the fire. The messenger who bore the news expressed Nishihara Eizo's solemn regret that he had not been around to rescue them from the blaze. It had taken a long while to find them due to their obscurity, as well as a lack of funding. Eizo then extended a request for the siblings to join him at his residence, where he could make up for the lost years of caring for them. He had also mentioned the inheritance his older brother, father to Hanae and Izumo, had left to his nephew and niece. Hanae would receive her portion upon her marriage; Izumo could lay claim on his once he turned twenty.
It would have been severely rude to reject such an offer. Despite their misgivings, the siblings returned to their home village, each receiving their private quarters in Eizo's large mansion. Such opulence was alien to Izumo, though not quite so for Ito, who had infiltrated countless other luxurious abodes.
Their uncle was genial and goal-oriented, a merchant who dealt with goods around the region. He had come into possession of his older brother's business after the latter's demise, and had combined it with his own to form a formidable force in the market. Nishihara Eizo was a caring man, one Hanae and Izumo grew to respect despite their initial reservations. Izumo had started his own wood-crafting shop in the duration of their stay. Hanae was, however, bidden to stay home, being an unmarried woman without a chaperone. That failed to prevent her from slipping out of her uncle's compounds at night to complete missions Mai assigned her to by post.
The latest mission was no business of Mai's. Izumo had been kidnapped during an assignment that had taken her out of town. Eizo was pacing worriedly when she found him in the large hall, minutes after she had returned home. He mentioned a ransom, and the location where it was to be placed, casting doubt on a derelict area of the town. She decided to investigate the compound that very night.
It came as a shock to Ito when she fell through the ceiling of the building they were holding Izumo, right into a ring of a dozen armed guards.
Their sharpened spears pointed towards her throat; some of the gleaming, metallic tips pressed into her skin through her black clothes, drawing blood, threatening to create a passage right through her neck. Her breath caught. Her eyes darted to the wall of guards around her, desperately searching for a viable escape as she took stock of her available weapons.
Two of the spears were lowered to her palms, pinning her hands to the floor when she tried to reach for her dagger. Smoke bombs would not work now, not when the guards could well puncture her body if she tried to move. She thought of Izumo squirming in his chair. He was probably straining for a glimpse of her, the intruder. Her insides tightened. The mission was a failure. Even she could admit to that.
The hairs at the back of her neck prickled when the door creaked open. For all she knew, it was the person responsible for Izumo's capture, and-
"Ito. I see that you're finally here." A masculine voice wove its way through the room. It was so painfully familiar that her blood turned solid in her veins. Her heart slammed into her ribcage. It couldn't be.
The guards closer to the door parted, keeping their weapons trained on her throat. She blinked multiple times, straining her eyes in the lamplight to make sure that she hadn't imagined the man standing in front of her.
"I couldn't thank you enough for making your way here so quickly, Ito. Or should I say, Hanae?" The rounded form of Nishihara Eizo smiled down at her, hands clasped behind his back. "This makes my work here so much simpler."
"Sister?" Izumo croaked somewhere behind the guards, his voice laced with confusion. "Sister, why are you here?"
She did not trust herself to speak at first. Betrayal coalesced into coiled anger in her middle, that she was loathe to act upon because she did not have the upper hand. What did Eizo want from them? "What is the meaning of this?"
"I have been hunting you both down for the longest time." Her uncle stroked his trimmed beard, coolly observing her. His eyes flickered over to Izumo, and for a moment, she feared that one of the guards might well round on him for a fatal blow. "Never did I count on his two children running away from home all those years ago!"
All those years ago? A flicker of bright orange surfaced in her memory, followed by the moving image of an explosion without sound. And then the puzzle began to click into place. She kept her voice as steady as she could. "The fire, you mean?"
"Why, yes! I'm surprised you remember!" Eizo gave a short laugh. He bared his teeth.
"Why?" Ito did not trust herself to speak further. White-blue fury wound through her insides and tensed her muscles. The ache from losing her parents never quite vanished. To learn that a trusted family member had orchestrated it was akin to having an old wound sliced anew and spread open.
"Damned bastard!" Izumo yelled from his corner, his efforts to free himself audible by the clatter of the chair he was bound to. A dull thud silenced him.
"It was always about the inheritance." Her uncle shrugged carelessly, beady eyes sweeping over her trapped form. "The two of you have put a dent in my plans for long enough. By sunrise, you will be long departed from this world, and I will finally be in possession of that gold you've denied me all these years. Do thank my brother on my behalf when you see him in your afterlife."
Ito glared at her uncle so hard her eyes felt like they might burst. Murderous intent seared through her body like none she had experienced before. It was all she could do to keep her wrath in check as she watched Eizo turn and leave the room, her fingers twitching with sheer bloodlust.
She would kill him tonight. But first, she had to rescue Izumo. Then she would track the traitor down and rip him to bloody shreds with her dagger.
Author: Aquarius Galuxy
Fiction type: Prose, original fiction (Novel idea #2)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Suspense (I guess?)
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: slight mentions of gore
Word count: 1,850
Summary: Ito's history, and how it relates to her brother's capture.
Author's Notes: Written for brigits_flame's December Week 2 contest, topic being "Hustler".
Sorry for the length, I really couldn't cut any of it out without leaving gaping holes in how the story goes. Hope it isn't too boring. This is actually kinda a side plot to the novel idea, I haven't actually thought about the main idea yet. The pace is also uneven, but I don't know how else to get everything explained without confusing readers, and gaining the maximum impact at the same time. Feel free to point out loopholes, and maybe suggest ideas on how I can fix them?
It took me a while to write this piece too. Mainly because it's a history thing, plus action/suspense. My main genre is romance/erotica, so writing about things not quite including that is kinda draining for me. =p I don't really expect this piece to make it past Week 2, as it isn't the strongest piece that I can think of for the week's theme, but I'm staying by my resolve to concentrate on my novel ideas for the December competition.
***This piece is some sort of a continuation of my Week 1 Entry, if it helps.***
Okay, sorry for the long author's notes.
They were a family of two, a brother and sister who had lost their parents in their childhood.
The girl, Hanae, was senior to her brother by two years. At ten and eight respectively, all semblance of their rivalry plummeted the day the blaze struck their house. It had been a quiet night, whispers skittering to and fro between the siblings long after bedtime. Their father had burst into the room suddenly. Both children ducked beneath the covers, pretending to ignore his urgent footsteps, till he was right beside them, roughly shaking them from presumed sleep.
Go to your Mother, he had told them in a taut voice. Hurry, and be silent. We are in danger.
They obeyed him immediately, and that was the last they saw of their father. Mother had taken them in her arms, even as strange cracks sounded from outside, and eerie yellow light glowed through the paper windows. She held them close, told them to leave the town alone. She told them that they would not be safe here, told them never to return. Do not trust anyone, not even the servants, she whispered in the darkened room. Her son uttered a small cry and clung to her waist. She removed him gently. Then she made Hanae promise to take care of her brother no matter what happened.
The haunted look in her eyes had been missed by both children as they ran out of the house, looking back at her periodically; so was her lingering gaze.
An explosion lit up the far walls of the compounds when they had pattered a small distance away, hand in hand, feet bare. Servants dashed about, fleeing. Hanae grabbed her brother the moment he made to dash back. Long seconds dragged by before his kicks and punches stopped. Brother and sister alike watched as a ferocious blaze consumed the Nishihara household, taking all they had ever known.
Someone headed for them, and almost too late, Hanae pulled her brother away, scrambling out by a side door and hiding amongst the bushes, swallowing her tears. They crawled through bushes, and then ran out of the town, hearts pounding in fear.
They travelled for days, driven along by the ghosts of theft that lurked whenever they pilfered food to keep hunger at bay. Being younger, and far clumsier than his sister, Izumo was often the reason they had been spotted, and subsequently chased. Their frames thinned, and their clothes (their only possessions) grew worn and filthy with time.
It was, perhaps, by a stroke of luck that they found an old shed at the outskirts of a town. The siblings avoided the old lady who lived in the cottage nearby. This went on for a week, after which the old woman bore down on them one evening, and trapped them when they tried to escape. She asked for their names - Izumo answered her with stark honesty - and why they had taken residence on her property. Before Hanae could remind him of their mother's wishes, Izumo had let slip their circumstances. She waited on the woman's words, dreading their return to a home that ceased to exist.
Instead, the aged female proposed a deal. If they did what she said, she would feed them, clothe them, and put a roof over their heads. They accepted with a glance at the other.
Years passed. The woman - she bade them to address her as Mai - trained them in the art of thievery, though it became apparent that Izumo did not possess a knack for it. She offered him the position of a craftsman's apprentice. After refusing to separate from his sister for a period of time, Hanae managed to convince him that stealing would not have been within their late parents' wishes. She would be starting work at a wine house across town herself, and it was a legal job. He finally agreed to move into the wood craftsman's workshop with the promise of a weekly visit.
In truth, Mai had been guiding Hanae along the path of an assassin. Having used to be one in the past, she had forged a number of connections and skills that Hanae was to inherit. Thus, the daughter of the Nishihara family adopted her trade name, Ito.
Ito used the wine house as a base for her dealings. With each successful job, the commission was split between mentor and pupil. Izumo was never told about what his sister's occupation truly entailed; Hanae made sure that their meetings were held far away from the wine house to ensure his safety.
Word came one day from an uncle they had long since lost contact with. It had been ten years after the fire. The messenger who bore the news expressed Nishihara Eizo's solemn regret that he had not been around to rescue them from the blaze. It had taken a long while to find them due to their obscurity, as well as a lack of funding. Eizo then extended a request for the siblings to join him at his residence, where he could make up for the lost years of caring for them. He had also mentioned the inheritance his older brother, father to Hanae and Izumo, had left to his nephew and niece. Hanae would receive her portion upon her marriage; Izumo could lay claim on his once he turned twenty.
It would have been severely rude to reject such an offer. Despite their misgivings, the siblings returned to their home village, each receiving their private quarters in Eizo's large mansion. Such opulence was alien to Izumo, though not quite so for Ito, who had infiltrated countless other luxurious abodes.
Their uncle was genial and goal-oriented, a merchant who dealt with goods around the region. He had come into possession of his older brother's business after the latter's demise, and had combined it with his own to form a formidable force in the market. Nishihara Eizo was a caring man, one Hanae and Izumo grew to respect despite their initial reservations. Izumo had started his own wood-crafting shop in the duration of their stay. Hanae was, however, bidden to stay home, being an unmarried woman without a chaperone. That failed to prevent her from slipping out of her uncle's compounds at night to complete missions Mai assigned her to by post.
The latest mission was no business of Mai's. Izumo had been kidnapped during an assignment that had taken her out of town. Eizo was pacing worriedly when she found him in the large hall, minutes after she had returned home. He mentioned a ransom, and the location where it was to be placed, casting doubt on a derelict area of the town. She decided to investigate the compound that very night.
It came as a shock to Ito when she fell through the ceiling of the building they were holding Izumo, right into a ring of a dozen armed guards.
Their sharpened spears pointed towards her throat; some of the gleaming, metallic tips pressed into her skin through her black clothes, drawing blood, threatening to create a passage right through her neck. Her breath caught. Her eyes darted to the wall of guards around her, desperately searching for a viable escape as she took stock of her available weapons.
Two of the spears were lowered to her palms, pinning her hands to the floor when she tried to reach for her dagger. Smoke bombs would not work now, not when the guards could well puncture her body if she tried to move. She thought of Izumo squirming in his chair. He was probably straining for a glimpse of her, the intruder. Her insides tightened. The mission was a failure. Even she could admit to that.
The hairs at the back of her neck prickled when the door creaked open. For all she knew, it was the person responsible for Izumo's capture, and-
"Ito. I see that you're finally here." A masculine voice wove its way through the room. It was so painfully familiar that her blood turned solid in her veins. Her heart slammed into her ribcage. It couldn't be.
The guards closer to the door parted, keeping their weapons trained on her throat. She blinked multiple times, straining her eyes in the lamplight to make sure that she hadn't imagined the man standing in front of her.
"I couldn't thank you enough for making your way here so quickly, Ito. Or should I say, Hanae?" The rounded form of Nishihara Eizo smiled down at her, hands clasped behind his back. "This makes my work here so much simpler."
"Sister?" Izumo croaked somewhere behind the guards, his voice laced with confusion. "Sister, why are you here?"
She did not trust herself to speak at first. Betrayal coalesced into coiled anger in her middle, that she was loathe to act upon because she did not have the upper hand. What did Eizo want from them? "What is the meaning of this?"
"I have been hunting you both down for the longest time." Her uncle stroked his trimmed beard, coolly observing her. His eyes flickered over to Izumo, and for a moment, she feared that one of the guards might well round on him for a fatal blow. "Never did I count on his two children running away from home all those years ago!"
All those years ago? A flicker of bright orange surfaced in her memory, followed by the moving image of an explosion without sound. And then the puzzle began to click into place. She kept her voice as steady as she could. "The fire, you mean?"
"Why, yes! I'm surprised you remember!" Eizo gave a short laugh. He bared his teeth.
"Why?" Ito did not trust herself to speak further. White-blue fury wound through her insides and tensed her muscles. The ache from losing her parents never quite vanished. To learn that a trusted family member had orchestrated it was akin to having an old wound sliced anew and spread open.
"Damned bastard!" Izumo yelled from his corner, his efforts to free himself audible by the clatter of the chair he was bound to. A dull thud silenced him.
"It was always about the inheritance." Her uncle shrugged carelessly, beady eyes sweeping over her trapped form. "The two of you have put a dent in my plans for long enough. By sunrise, you will be long departed from this world, and I will finally be in possession of that gold you've denied me all these years. Do thank my brother on my behalf when you see him in your afterlife."
Ito glared at her uncle so hard her eyes felt like they might burst. Murderous intent seared through her body like none she had experienced before. It was all she could do to keep her wrath in check as she watched Eizo turn and leave the room, her fingers twitching with sheer bloodlust.
She would kill him tonight. But first, she had to rescue Izumo. Then she would track the traitor down and rip him to bloody shreds with her dagger.