Yahiko and Kaoru both debated on whether or not to go to school the following day. Kenshin wanted them to stay home so he could keep an eye on him, and both Kamiya siblings ignored his thoughts on the subject. Staying home was an acceptable idea, especially since it postponed the wagging tongues at both schools, but that was the problem. It was a postponement. Plus Kaoru had a literature test and Yahiko had a math test, both wanted desperately to go to kendo club that afternoon and vent some frustrations (even if Kaoru couldn't hold a bokken), and other responsibilities. Still, the idea that of Shishio having such a strong reaction on them at school, well, they didn't want to discuss that.

In the end, they decided to see what the morning would bring. The alarm went off and they did their morning routine as normal. Neither stuck in bed to stay home. They both decided for themselves to face school again. The walk to school was blissfully uneventful, as was the day at school. However, Kaoru couldn't help but feel that she had eyes glued to her back the entire day. It felt like someone was watching her, but she couldn't find the culprit. The same thing happened during kendo club, though Yahiko didn't seem to feel anything. She was certain it was her imagination except for the sheer strength behind it.

Irritated beyond measure by the eyes on her back, Kaoru ignored Raijuta-sensei and picked up a bokken to pound out some frustration, enjoying the twinges of pain that her burned hands produced. It was a welcomed distraction. Kenshin asked her if she was alright, but given the crowded gym, she merely nodded and ignored him.

When the club ended for the day it was already dark out.

"Busu, you okay?" Yahiko voiced his own concerns.

"Fine," Kaoru replied. "I just feel like I'm being watched." That put Kenshin on alert, or rather, more alert than he'd been on. "Mou," she muttered. "It's probably nothing, my hyper-active imagination playing tricks on me after all that's happened."

"A little paranoia can be a good thing, it can."

Kaoru just shook her head, put on her backpack, and took Yahiko's as well, so it wouldn't aggravate the wounds on his back.

Together the three of them began the trek home. She still felt eyes on her back.

Until they came to an intersection. Then she saw the source of her stalker. He started walking beside them as they passed and kept in stride with them.

"Saitou-san," Kaoru greeted. Now that the eyes were off her back she felt, she wasn't sure what. She was still tense, but it was a different kind of tension than before. "It's a pleasure to see you again."

"Like getting whacked on the head with a bokken," Yahiko grumbled.

"I have some questions regarding yesterday," he stated, ignoring her brother's jibe.

"Yahiko, why don't you go ahead," Kaoru turned to her brother. "You've been complaining about the homework you have, so why don't you get it done while I talk with Saitou-san."

"I'm not five anymore, busu, why should I go?"

Kaoru leveled one of her glares at him. What she was going to mention to Saitou would probably involve what she had overheard the previous afternoon, and she was not going to have Yahiko going gung ho on searching for a sword. "Because I'm bigger than you."

Yahiko growled something, ready to fight.

Ignoring Saitou's presence, Kaoru turned to Kenshin. "Take him home," she said, swiftly taking off Yahiko's backpack and handing it to him. "Make sure he stays there."

"This one would rather you two together."

"He's worried about you," Yahiko added.

"Both of you can worry at home. I'll be safe with Saitou-san."

"But he can't see," Yahiko growled. "He can't protect you."

Kaoru hid a smile. Her dear, sweet, rude little brother wanted her safe as much as she wanted him safe, even if he couldn't do anything.

A stubborn clash of three wills gathered. Kenshin and Yahiko wouldn't leave Kaoru, and she wouldn't discuss things with Yahiko there.

Saitou merely watched the squabble without saying a word.

She turned to the translucent, threadbare rurouni. "Take him home. He needs you more than I do at the moment."

"Kaoru-dono..."

"It was you staying with me that got this started. Stay with him now." All three parties involved flinched. Yahiko at his guilt for opening the shrine, Kenshin's guilt for not realizing what he was meant to protect, and Kaoru's guilt at having to use it to get them to back off.

"Very well, Kaoru-dono."

"No!" Yahiko cried out, feeling Kenshin relenting. "I'm not going! I'm not leaving her alone!"

"She won't be alone," Saitou finally stepped forward. "And she won't be far behind. Now beat it."

Kenshin reached out to pull Yahiko along, before stopping and withdrawing. Yahiko growled something unrepeatable and took off running. Watching him go, Kaoru let out a cross between a sigh and a sob. She would have to do major damage control when she got home. She didn't need this! She just wanted to be with the remaining family she had, put him into college, watch over his happy life, hell, even have a happy life for herself! But since releasing Shishio, all her hopes and aspirations were being torn apart and crumbled into itty bitty pieces.

Not now! she scolded herself. Deep breath. Straight back. "So, Saitou-san, what do you want to know?"

"Who was the ghost you were just talking to?"

No sign of unbelieving in his voice. Saitou was not showing any signs that he didn't believe in ghosts any more than if he did.

"Meiji rurouni," she replied, uncomfortable with giving out names. "He has it in his head that it's his job to protect us."

"And the shrine."

Kaoru glared.

"'It was you staying with me that got this started.' He was with you when the shrine was opened." Saitou offered a wolfish grin. "That also implies his responsibility was to keep people such as yourselves from opening the shrine."

Kaoru flushed, uncomfortable with his deducing things she'd rather kept to herself.

Saitou left the subject alone and moved on. "I understand your burns were smoking yesterday."

The kendo practitioner said nothing. She merely removed a bandage from one of her hands, showing him the wounded skin. He pulled out a small flashlight and inspected the charring. It was no different than the last time he'd seen it when he first arrived at Sanosuke's house, no sign of the heat it radiated the previous day.

"The nurse's records indicated that they were bleeding yesterday. There are no signs of that."

"We didn't exactly walk into another black cloud," she growled, pulling her hand from his inspection and rewrapping it.

"Then what did cause it? This Shishio demon?"

Kaoru's anger flared. "He evidently saw it fit to kill someone yesterday," she bit out. "And lucky us, we were on the receiving end thanks to his marking us."

He didn't ask what "marking" was. Instead, he inquired about what she had learned about Shishio since then. Kaoru sighed. This was the part she didn't want the other two knowing about. That she had eavesdropped about the Mugenjin and during her free time in the library today, tried to find information about the sword.

"So Shishio is after either the sword or his whore."

Kaoru automatically bristled. "That's what I said! He's probably after the sword, since she's dead by now!"

"I thank you for the information." Saitou leaned back, his face becoming obscured in the nighttime shadows. "I'll stay in touch."

He left her alone on the street, spirits already starting to gather to pester her about this or that.

Sighing, Kaoru started back on the long walk home.

When she got home, the house was silent. Yahiko was no doubt hiding in his room from the cruel thing she said to get him to leave, Kenshin had probably vanished once Yahiko was safely in the house. And why? Just so Kaoru could tell information to Saitou, who she wasn't even sure she could trust, on the off-off-off chance that he might be able to help. She was an idiot sometimes. Quietly shutting the door behind her, she sat down on the step to take off her shoes.

Tears were prickling at her eyes. Her hands still faintly burned. It was just too much. She curled up on the step, not even having the strength to take off her other shoe. She was just so tired of it all. Of spirits pestering her to help them. Of the strange looks the people at school would give her. Of dealing with Saitou and his lack of anything to put her at ease. Of Shishio's constant burning in her hands. Of everything.

On some level, she resisted just laying there, silent tears slipping out of her eyes. She had a paper due the following day, a kendo meet was coming up in a week or so that she wanted to practice for. Yahiko probably hadn't had dinner, so she should whip up a sandwich for him or something. But instead she just lay there.

What on earth has possessed her to make such a rude remark? It was nobody's fault that Shishio had escaped his prison, and she had said something in a manner that had hurt everyone involved. Forget damage control, would she even have anything to repair? She'd never say anything like that normally! Tease and insult, yes, but that was cruelly slicing away at the precious bond she had with her only living family left and erecting a wall with the one spirit that didn't pester or irritate her, but instead wanted to protect her.

She was an idiot.

Kaoru didn't know how long she lay there, wallowing in the pain and tearing into herself for saying such a hurtful thing. Without Saitou's eyes boring into her back, she'd had a moment's clarity. She hadn't wanted Yahiko there because she didn't want him involved. But, dammit, he was already involved, and marked worse than she was. She couldn't not involve him. He deserved every scrap of information he could get just as much as she did. And she just shut him out. Of all the stupid--

A small hand touched her shoulder, rolling her onto her back.

"Kaoru?"

She didn't think, she just wrapped her arms around her brother and sobbed. "I'm sorry, Yahiko, I'm so sorry. I didn't mean to hurt you! I've been such a bitch...." He was the only family she had left. She'd promised herself that she would protect him from anything, selfishly, so that she wouldn't loose him. She just never thought that she'd need to protect him from herself. "'m sorry..."

Yahiko hugged her tightly as well, fighting the tears in his own eyes. "Busu! You've been the only thing to keep me sane since dad died. Don't you dare call your tanuki self a bitch."

The held each other, in the entry way, neither quite willing to let go of the other. Their burns still ached, but they didn't seem to sting quite so much. Kaoru spilled everything she'd heard from Kenshin and Aoshi the previous day and Yahiko offered what he could in information. Still in the entry way, they both planned how to spend their time at the library the following day. After all, as long as they were alive, they were going to fight back.

Unbeknownst to the two siblings, a wandering spirit watched over them, a smile lighting his lilac eyes.

Saitou sat behind his desk, eyes looking downward but unseeing. In front of him was a report of a death from Shinjuku. It was a puzzler to those investigating it. A young business man, healthy, fit, and with a wedding within a month, had just keeled over at a business meeting, dead. The coroner couldn't find any explanation of his death. There were no marks on the body, and the organs were in perfect condition.

When the Kamiya girl had said that the Shishio demon killed someone, this was the case that immediately came to mind. Normally it would be written off as "natural causes" for some sort of medical reason that was probably very, very rare. However, Saitou was looking at it again. Whether or not he believed that the Kamiya children could see or feel ghosts was still up in the air. There was no doubt that something happened to them when he arrived at the rooster's house to find them smoking with burns that looked days old.

He'd watched them, suspecting they were keeping something from him. Their odd behavior was fascinating. The Kamiya girl seemed to speak to someone who wasn't there, and the Kamiya boy seemed uncomfortable when she did. A thorough background check had revealed no history of mental illness in the family. The death of their father could attribute to some sort of mental breakdown except that the Kamiya behaviors had been around since before their mother died.

When confronted, the girl had said that their family could see or sense spirits. That the dark cloud he sensed over the city was a demon named Shishio Makoto. That this demon had just killed someone.

It made sense. But it wasn't supposed to. So Saitou reserved judgment.

So instead, he decided to look into this Shishio Makoto and the Himura Kenshin who had defeated him. They were Meiji era, so he started at the beginning of the Bakumatsu no Doran and worked his way forward. There were no records in the regular channels of either men, but Saitou had access to other channels of information. Both Shishio and Himura had been assassins. Shishio had gone insane and tried to overthrow the government while Himura helped and aided anyone who crossed his path.

A fascinating story, but it didn't seem to be pertinent to what was going on in his city. There was an underlying tension that Saitou sensed, and it was growing. Petty crimes were increasing in numbers and perpetrators were getting more hostile.

There was also the spirit that the Kamiya girl had spoken to the previous night. She didn't give his name, but he was the spirit who was supposed to "guard" the shrine that the Kamiya boy had opened. What had happened? It was an inconsistency in the Kamiya story. Why did a guardian leave his post? There were also her allusions to ghosts who seemed to know more about what was going on. Those were the spirits he wanted to talk to, if they even existed.

"A sword and a whore, huh?" he whispered to himself. If nothing else, it was fascinating to see where the Kamiya's story led him to.

Father burning in a fire...

Yahiko's eyes snapped open, every muscle tense and his breath caught in his throat. It wasn't the first time he had dreamed since receiving the mark. Insofar as he could tell, Kaoru didn't get them; he just assumed that it was yet another symptom, like the burns which currently ached along his neck and shoulders.

He ripped the comforter off, realizing belatedly his futon and his self was soaked in sweat. Frustrated, the boy tried to stay still and fall asleep again. It was to no avail; he was wide awake. Conceding the inevitable, he sat up. Moonlight was streaming through his room, three quarters full and casting everything in shades of silver.

Changing nightwear did not help him. His body was too wired, his mind recycling the horrible image of his father in a fire, skin melting, the acidy smell of smoke everywhere, and the unbearable heat.

Growling, he grabbed a shinai and padded silently down the hall and down the stairs. Maybe some practice outside would work the negative energy out.

Stepping out to the backyard, he slipped in the mud and fell back. It had been raining for three days, and only now did the boy notice that his yard was a mudball. A vicious curse escaped his lips before he bit his teeth together. Kaoru, at least, was still sleeping and he dared not wake her, make her worry more than she already was.

Exhaling through his nose he stood up and began marching towards the trees as his mind continued to darken.

It had been two weeks since they learned about the demon's sword, Mugenjin. There was nothing listed anywhere about it. Not in libraries, not in history texts, not even on the internet. Both of them spent so much time working on it that their grades started slipping - something he had already been called in by his teachers about. If he wanted to get into at good high school, he would have to start getting good grades now, of course; so please stop researching your hobby and get back to studying.

Stupid bastards, like they had a clue what was really going on. Like he could tell them what was really going on. Yahiko continued to stomp through the woods, unaware he was muttering curses under his breath.

He wondered if Kaoru even remembered that her graduation was only three weeks away. Exams were in two weeks. It was supposed to be her shining moment, when all of her efforts and achievements were celebrated in her crowning achievement. But no, it had been completely ruined because stupid Yahiko had opened the stupid shrine and was stupidly marked by that stupid demon with those stupid burns.

"STUPID!!" Yahiko blindly swung his shinai, and it cracked against something. Refocusing on the outside world, the rusty eyed boy found his feet had carried him to the shrine. The gates were still open, as it had been left. The earth under his feet was soft but not muddy, and the boulders looked almost white in the moonlight.

Father burning in a fire...

An intense, guttural cry escaped from his throat, and Yahiko beat his sword into the boulder - even now not daring to touch the shrine - thwacking and pounding and kicking and shouting.

"It's all your fault! You ruined everything! Give it back! Give it back! Give me back my life! Give me back my sister! Give me back my father!!"

It felt like all he even knew was loss; this had all started when his father passed away. Had Shishio caused that to make him open the shrine? Was Kaoru next? Was Yahiko doomed to be alone?

"I hate you! I hate you! I hate you!! Aaauugh! Bastard! Bastard!! Bastard..."

The energy finally dissipated, and Yahiko sunk to his knees, panting. Tears were streaming down his face; his body was shaking with his sobs.

The gentle smell of incense wrapped around him, the heated stones curling up into his fingers and toes before rolling up to his forehead and the small of his back.

"Kenshin..."

The feeling of the stones rubbed in small circles. Comfort.

"I hate it," he sobbed. "I hate being the only weak one! You can do things with the Oniwabanshu, that wolf Saitou can do things. Hell, Kaoru does everything, and I do nothing! God, I can't stand it!" He rammed his fist into the boulder, his skin breaking on contact. "I'm useless!"

One heated stone moved up to the already heated skin of his burned shoulder. It was harder to interpret the subtler movements like this, but Yahiko could guess what Kenshin was saying. "It's not your fault, it isn't."

"Bullshit it's not my fault," Yahiko muttered, his body sagging under its own weight. Exhaustion hit him all at once, and he curled up under the boulder by the shrine. The incense was making him sleepy; the heated stones still rolling around his back and becoming slightly heavy.

"You are very strong, you are. There are very few boys who have a heart as strong as yours, this one thinks it is so strong it's only rival is your sister's, he does. Both experience ghosts and yet they are still healthy people; they still practice kendo and love each other; they still go to school and maintain grades. This one would like to see another of your age do half as well. Yahiko-kun, you are the strongest because you are enduring the most, you are. This one is proud of you."

His voice was a soft tenor. Yahiko couldn't grasp why he could hear Kenshin, but his words warmed him considerably. He was almost asleep when arms wrapped around him, and Kaoru took him home.

Saitou stared at the schools where the Kamiya children were currently located. It had taken weeks of investigation. The Kamiya had suffered from their "markings" which had him linking deaths that normally would never be related. And yet he saw the similarities. They were definitely subtle. Anyone lesser would have missed it. But Saitou saw. And he saw the pattern.

This demon Shishio, who Saitou believed did exist and was part of the dark cloud he sensed hanging over the city, was close to two things. A sword and a whore. Saitou had finally found what he was looking for. The sword, was tricky to find. Aside from a record of its creation, no files existed on who it was given to after its owner's death.

That didn't stop Saitou. That information he was going to give to the Kamiya children and trust that they would pass it off to the ghosts in the know. That much he could leave to them.

Saitou, however, had a woman he needed to see.