Waters Under Earth

A Ranma 1/2 Fanfic by Alan Harnum 
-harnums@thekeep.org
-harnums@hotmail.com (old/backup)

All Ranma characters are the property of Rumiko Takahashi, first
published by Shogakukan in Japan and brought over to North
America by Viz Communications.

Waters Under Earth at Transpacific Fanfiction:  
http://www.humbug.org.au/~wendigo/transp.html
http://users.ev1.net/~adina/shrines2/fanfics.html

Chapter 13 : Hunt's End

Then everything includes itself in power,
Power into will, will into appetite;
And appetite, a universal wolf,
So doubly seconded with will and power,
Must make perforce a universal prey,
And last eat up himself.
-William Shakespeare

     The man was lean and grey of hair, the dark skin of his face 
crossed with elaborate lines and whirls of scar tissue that were 
markings as much as the remnants of wounds.  He walked with an 
easy, absolute grace that was utterly silent, along the trail 
leading between the mountains.  He moved like a great cat 
stalking prey, or like a hound pacing a rabbit.  Every movement 
was necessary, no more and no less than what was needed to 
accomplish his desire.

     His eyes were golden, shining, metallic twins to the sickly 
yellow eyes of the crows watching him from perches in the sickly
trees growing along the sides of the mountains or upon the 
mountain crags.  The black birds watched him, dirty feathers 
shifting with a sound like parchment rustling as they turned 
their heads to see him walking.  When he passed out of their 
sight, the flock wheeled into the air and began to fly away 
towards the mountains.

     The man walked on, vaguely noting the crows as they soared
away.  They were too high anyway for him to catch, and they were 
ugly, filthy birds, barely worth paying attention to at all, and 
certainly not worth hunting.  He had more worthy prey awaiting 
him not far from here.

   A quick motion of his hand fanned out the four white feathers,
longer than his outstretched hand and fingers.  He caressed them,
lifted them to his face and inhaled the scent of the prey, 
brushed them with his lips and tasted them.  He had travelled
farther then ever before to come to the end of this hunt, and he
felt, as he always did near the end, a calm patience.  The hunt
was more complicated this time, the instructions simple enough,
but still more complicated than what he was used to.  But he knew
the end, as he'd known it hundreds of times before.  The prey
would die.  It was a different sort of prey, this time, something
he had not seen since he'd been bound long ago.  It had been a
long time since he'd hunted something truly new.

     Off to the north, the crows soared towards the mountain 
peaks, a dark cape thrown upward, as if by a dark god's hand.

**********

     Koruma and Masara were very, very bored.
     
     It is a difficult time, to be an adolescent in Phoenix 
Mountain.  The genetic differences between the natural form of 
the inhabitants and a normal human were not simply a matter of 
wings, and taloned hands and feet; the natural forms also tended 
to age physically rather more quickly at first then the average 
human for the first fifteen years or so.  The difficulty was, 
the speed of mental maturation didn't change at all.  The two 
boys, in their natural forms, were a pair of fourteen year old 
minds in bodies that were essentially adult.

     There are some fourteen year old boys who are very mature
for their age.  Koruma and Masara were not among them.  By virtue
of the convoluted system of competition among the noble families
in Phoenix Mountain, however, they had ended up being assigned to
serve as Kima's assistants.  

     It was an arrangement that did not particularly suit any of 
the three.  Kima treated them, with some justification, as a pair 
of obnoxious children one is required to babysit.  They regarded 
her, also with some justification, as a harsh, unyielding 
taskmistress who worked them like slaves.

     Currently, they were serving as the guardians of the 
immortal god-king of Phoenix Mountain, the Prince of Phoenix,
Bearer of the Kinjakan, Ruler of Jusenkyou, Lord Saffron.

     Lord Saffron happened to be, at the time, a small infant who
was peacefully napping in a stone cradle in the large, 
low ceilinged nursery where the noble children were raised for 
the first six years of their life.  They were then taken and
raised by their own families individually, so that truly lasting
friendships among children of opposing families would not be 
allowed to form.  The nursery was filled with the sound of 
children laughing and playing, with the clack of the sewing 
needles and conversation of their mothers.  

     "He's a lot more peaceful when he's a baby," Koruma said,
indicating Saffron with a gesture of his finger.  Like the rest
of his family, he was dark-complexioned and black-winged,
wearing the black breastplate and sash of his family over a 
white, high collared shirt and pants, with a short sword 
sheathed at his side.  

     "Yeah.  He doesn't yell nearly as much, except when he wakes
up," Masara agreed, leaning back against the wall.  His wings 
were white speckled with brown, his breasplate and sash a mottled
green.  His bow was slung over his back, a quiver beside it.  

     The families of the two boys were traditional allies in the
power structure, both high-ranking.  The two of them got along
wonderfully, each usually managing to equal the other in 
obnoxiousness.  They were currently serving as the guardians of
Saffron for one reason, which was because Kima had ordered them
to.  Otherwise, they would have been off getting into some kind
of trouble.  Unfortunately, when Kima said jump, Koruma and
Masara jumped.  They'd learned after the first few days of 
working under her that it was not a good idea to defy Kima in any 
way.  The difficulty was, when Kima said jump, they generally 
jumped in the wrong direction.

     "I can't believe he's actually Lord Saffron," Koruma said, 
looking at the baby again.

     "Shh... Kima said to keep quiet about that," Masara said,
glancing around the nursery.  There was a large group of children
in a circle, listening to Lady Fanael of the royal family reading
to them; she saw Masara looking around and raised her head from
the book to smile in greeting to him, which made him blush and
look away.

     Saffron was not a particularly attractive baby.  He had a
somewhat fiendish appearance, with pointed ears, big eyes and
small fangs.  The diamond-cut jewel dangling from the plumes of
white hair on his brow sparkled in the light of the lamps.  The
best thing that could be said about him was that he didn't cry as
much as a lot of babies.

     He also, as Koruma and Masara had discovered, had a tendency
to bite anyone who put their fingers near his mouth.  The two 
boys each bore a few bandages due to this habit.

     "I wish Kima would get someone else to do this," Masara said
with a sigh.

     "Why can't she look after him?" Koruma muttered.  "I hate
babysitting."

     "My father says she should get married," Masara said after a
moment.  "He says it's not right that a woman should be 
seneschal."
     
     Koruma shrugged.  "He's probably just mad because he didn't
get to be seneschal.  Everyone expected her to step down after
what happened."

     Masara punched his friend on the arm and scowled.  "What
does your father say?"

     "Lots of things.  I usually don't listen to him.  He keeps
on asking me if I've ever seen her with other men."

     "Huh?" 
     
     "You know what I mean."
     
     "We see her with other men lots of times.  She's always
yelling at us, and she's always talking to Xande, and..."

     "Not like that."
     
     "You mean like..."
     
     "Yeah."
     
     "Eww."
     
     "You've got that right."
     
     "But she's so..."
     
     "Middle-aged?"
     
     Before either could say anything more, they both received a
hard slap across the back of their heads.  "When are you little
fools going to stop calling me that?"

     "Kima," Masara said as he turned around, rubbing the back of
his head.  "We were just talking about you."

     "I hadn't noticed," Kima said, frowning as she stepped by
them to peer into Saffron's cradle.  "Hello, Saffron."

     "Careful if you pick him up," Koruma cautioned.  "He bites."
     
     "I don't think he'll bite me," Kima said.  "You just have to
know how to handle him."

     "He bit Lord Helubor yesterday," Masara said.
     
     "Did he now?" Kima said, a faint smile tugging at her lips.
     
     "Yeah," Koruma said.  "Really hard.  He yelled a lot, and
then Lady Fanael told him to leave because he was scaring the
children, and then Lord Helubor..."

     "Tell me later," Kima said.  "Has he been in to see him a
lot?"

     Masara shook his head.  "Just yesterday."
     
     "Hmm..." Kima said.  She reached down into the cradle and
carefully picked up the infant Saffron, who stirred slightly in
his sleep but did not wake.  "You two can take a break for ten
minutes.  Be back here on the dot."

     "Thank you, Kima," Masara enthused.  
     
     "It's very kind of you," Koruma said.
     
     The two boys promptly dashed off to get some food, having 
the appetites of adolescent boys combined with the sizes of adult
bodies.  They left Kima by the cradle, speaking in soft tones to
the child who was her king.

**********

     Ranma was so engrossed in his own thoughts and the feel of
Shiso's feathers under his fingers that he didn't notice the
cloaked man approaching until he was only a dozen feet away.

     "I thought you went back home like a good little girl," the
man said.  His voice was far too familiar for Ranma's liking.  As
soon as he heard it he was rising to his feet, tensing and
loosening his muscles in preparation to fight.

     "What the hell are you doing here?" he said.
     
     The cloaked man tugged his hood down and smirked in the same
unpleasant manner he'd had since Ranma had met him.  He was a few
years older than Ranma, his face sharply featured and slightly
effeminate, his hair a dark bluish-black, each ear pierced with a
small ring.

     "I could ask the same of you," Pantyhose Tarou said.  "I 
hear you were responsible for what happened to Jusenkyou, huh?"

     "Not really," Ranma said.  "I hear you tried to conquer the
world with magnetic back plasters.  Didn't work out too well, 
huh?"

     The smirk lessened slightly.  "Shut up, you female 
impersonator."
     
     "What's the problem, Pantyhose?" Ranma taunted.  There were
few people he truly and genuinely disliked in the world; Tarou
was right at the top of them.

     Tarou's smirk turned into a scowl.  His eyes narrowed.  "I'd
say the problem is yours, fem-boy.  First of all, you managed to
get rid of the Spring of the Drowned Virtuous Man when you and 
the formerly legendary king of a bunch of formerly legendary 
winged people decided to have a nice big fight and blow up some 
of Jusendo."

     "How'd you know about that?"
     
     "I asked the little girl at the Jusenkyou Guide's house."
     
     "Did you beat her up first?"
     
     "I don't hit little kids."
     
     "Funny, you seemed like the type."
     
     "Go to hell, Saotome," Tarou growled.  "Second, you called
me something I don't like to be called."

     "Hmm... what would that be?" Ranma said, tapping his finger
to his chin.  "Wait... I know, was it..."

     "Pantyhose?" Shiso said from where he was sitting on the
ground, looking up at Tarou with one dark eye.

     "Shut up, bird, or I'll make a sandwich out of you," Tarou
said, jabbing his finger through the air at the raven as he
pulled off his cloak and tossed it to the ground.  The metallic
scales of his vest and bracers glittered in the sun.

     "Why don't you just go away, Tarou?" Ranma said.  "I'm not
in the mood to play with you."

     "Fine," Tarou said.  "Maybe I'll just fly to Japan and have
a little talk with your fiancee, see why you're still here.  
Maybe she'd be interested to know where you are.  What happen,
you finally get sick of stringing all those girls along?"

     And it hit Ranma then that Tarou could ruin everything.  He 
could put Akane and his mother and father, Ryoga and Ukyou, 
everyone he cared about, in danger.  And he would do it as well, 
in a second.  There was very little that Ranma wouldn't put it 
past Tarou to do, if he thought it would gain him an advantage 
in some way, no matter how small.  

     "Don't you dare," Ranma said, feeling a slow, familiar
coldness start to slide over him.  "Don't you dare, Tarou, or I
swear I'll..."

     "What's wrong?" Tarou said with mock concern.  "Have I upset
you somehow?  I'm so sorry.  I'll just be going then."

     He made as if to turn, then stopped.  "Almost forgot.  I 
have to beat the crap out of you first.  Then maybe I'll fly you
back to Japan, put some nice lingerie on you and give you to the
old man.  That might get me a new name."

     "Tarou," Ranma said slowly.  "Please.  Don't tell Akane that
I'm here.  Don't tell anyone.  Just go.  Pretend we never met."

     "What's wrong, Saotome?" Tarou said.  "Worried they might
find out where you skipped off to?  Are you trying to start up
another harem?  Who's the first lucky lady?"

     "That would be me."
     
     Tarou turned around just in time to flop bonelessly to the
ground, after Cologne touched a certain number of strategic
pressure points on his shoulder and neck.  Neither of them had
even been aware of her approach.

     Cologne turned to regard Ranma.  "You always seem to mess
things up while I'm gone, don't you Ranma?"

     "It must be a talent of mine," he said with a sigh.  He
glanced to Tarou, who seemed to be in the process of a very
peaceful nap.  "Well, now what do we do?"

     "Pantyhose, Pantyhose, Pantyhose," Shiso chanted in a
cheerful, sing-song voice as he strutted up and down upon the 
ground.  "And what's in a name, anyway?"

**********

     The two guards were hardened veterans of more than ten years
in the small force of Phoenix Mountain that served as the 
defenders of the home.  They simply happened to be getting ready
to fly out of one of the lower entrances and do a small scouting
run when they were shocked to see a powerful hand grip the edge
of the ledge, and the owner of that hand haul himself up.  

     Galm had climbed the sides of the mountain easily, a great
grey spider, finding cracks no one else could have, climbing
near-vertical peaks to reach this entrance.

     The guards were veterans.  They stood no more chance against
Galm than they had against the last outsiders to invade the
mountain a short time ago.  In their favour, it could be said
they responded as quickly as they could, but as soon as the first
of the winged men brought up his spear to block Galm's path, it 
ceased to matter.  They died quickly; he was saving his desire to 
play until the true prey was revealed.  He killed them silently, 
opening their throats with his blade and dropping their bodies 
off the side of the mountain.

     Then he slipped inside, like a shadow, and like a shadow he
moved through Phoenix Mountain.  He knew that killing too many
would bring too much attention; it might warn the prey to flee
from him again.  He blended into the grey stone of the walls like
a chameleon, form smoky, shadowy, the golden glow of his eyes the
only thing that might betray him, but any who saw those 
shimmering orbs looked away, and when they looked back moments
later they were gone.

     Slowly, slowly, finding the long-unused staircases, at other
times clambering up the walls when needed, he wondered at this
place.  It was unlike any he had seen before.  He liked the birds 
flying around most of all; it was pleasant to have a snack now 
and again.

     Slowly, slowly, the first part of the hunt began to draw to 
a close, as up the airy mountain Galm went.

**********

     The figure stared down at the broken bodies of the two 
guards where they'd landed a few hundred feet below the entrance
they'd been killed at, each about a dozen feet apart.  It was
unlikely they would be spotted, but he couldn't take the chance.

     The signs were falling into place, as he'd dreamed them long
ago.  The first thing to do was dispose of the bodies, that the
servant who'd been sent for him would be unimpeded in his duty.

     He raised his hand over the body of the first guard, the
wings broken, the eyes blankly staring up at the sky that would
never again embrace the dead man, never again lift him from the
ground upon his feathers.  

     There was power in that hand, in the bloodline, bound up in 
his very being.  It gathered through his bones like molten lead,
swelled within his chest and stabbed through him in time to the 
pounding beats of his heart.

     "Burn for me," he whispered, and caressed the air like a 
lover.  A thin trail of greasy smoke rose into the air for a few 
dozen feet before the wind dispersed it.  A moment later, another 
followed.  When that was done and even the ashes were gone, he 
spread his wings and took off into the air.

     Above his head, the cloud of black birds circled, yellow 
eyes agleam with feverish intensity.

**********

     "The dragon bowed low to the priest and the goddess and to
Monkey.  'Forgive me for devouring your horse, good priest,' he
said.  'Had I but known you were a pilgrim to the Western Lands, 
I would not have done so.  I shall serve as the priest's mount,
for I have transgressed against my father, and would repudiate my
sins.'"

     Kima leaned back against the wall of the nursery, holding
the infant Saffron in her arms and listening to Fanael's voice, 
as the youngest member of the royal family read to the small 
children gathered in a circle around her.  Fanael loved children;
it was a tragedy that she would never have any of her own.  
Females of Saffron's lineage were born barren nine times out of
ten.  Fanael hadn't beaten the odds.  

     Strange to think that the baby she held was far older than
her, older than she could ever live to be.  How much did he
remember, she wondered, of what lives he had led before?  

     The baby yawned and snuggled against her shoulder.  He would
be ready for his next transformation in a decade or so, ready
again to bathe in the waters of Jusendo and emerge full-grown, to
shed his heat and light throughout the mountain, to make winter
warm as summer and night bright as day.  For now, though, he
would at least have the closest thing he could be given to a
happy childhood.

     "So the goddess of mercy stepped forward and took the pearl
that was the dragon's power from beneath his chin, and he became
a beautiful white horse, to carry the priest to the Western Lands
and bring the scriptures back to the East."

     Children's stories, fairy tales, mere fancies.  She held 
the legendary Lord Saffron, the Phoenix Prince, in her arms, and
found herself wondering just how much truth there is to all these
tales.  As time flowed on, did history become legend, did belief
become mythology?

     "So Monkey and the priest continued their journey to the
west, and of what happened to them next I shall tell you another
day."

     There was the sound of the book closing, and the slight,
disappointed sighs of the children before they began to disperse,
to play games or sit at the feet of their mothers.  The 
noblewomen sat in small groups, chatting and gossiping amongst
themselves, filling the air with the sound of sewing needles
hitting against each other.

     There were perhaps twenty children at the most in the 
nursery at any time; the noble population was about a fifth of 
the mountain's people, perhaps a little over two hundred.  
Tradition held that they were the descendants of those who had 
been Saffron's most loyal retainers, in a time before the 
recorded history of the mountain had begun.  

     Fanael approached, the heavy book tucked under one arm, pale
grey wings shifting slightly, the long black hair, braided 
loosely with silver chains so fine they were like thread, 
spilling down her back.  "Hello, Kima.  How is Saffron?"

     "He's fine," Kima said, patting the tiny form of the ruler
of the mountain on the back.  "I think it was right to put him in
here.  It might be good for him to have some friends while he's
growing up."

     "I think so too," Fanael said.  "It might make him a better
king, when the time comes."

     Kima nodded and shifted her hold on the baby slightly.  
"It's hard to believe he's the same Saffron who was fighting at
Jusendo a little while ago.  He doesn't look as if he could hurt
a fly right now."

     "The phoenix burns itself out at last, and then rises from
the ashes," Fanael said.  "It is the way it has always been.  
May I hold him for a while?"

     "Certainly," Kima said.  Fanael put the book she was holding
on the edge of Saffron's cradle and took the baby with gentle 
care into her arms.  

     "Hello, great-grandfather," she said, and giggled slightly.
Kima smiled softly; she really did like the other woman.  It was
hard not to.

     "We're back, Kima!" 
     
     "Early, too!"
     
     Kima sighed and turned to look at Koruma and Masara.
     
     The two boys stood in the entrance to the nursery a dozen
feet away, each carrying wooden trays covered in bowls and plates
of food, and cups with steam rising from them like tendrils.  

     "We brought lunch!" Masara declared.
     
     "I can see that," Kima said.  "I am hungry, myself.  
Fanael?"

     "I would not be adverse to eating," Fanael said.
     
     "But we only brought enough for..." Koruma began.
     
     Masara elbowed him.  "It's okay.  We can share, Lady 
Fanael."

     "How gentlemanly," Fanael said, putting Saffron down in his
cradle.  "Did you bring Lord Saffron a bottle?"

     "Sure did," Masara said, indicating it with a nod of his
head where it lay on the tray he held.     
     
     "Thank you," Fanael said.  "Good job."
     
     The two boys beamed as they laid the trays down on the stone
floor near Saffron's cradle and sat down cross-legged.  Fanael
sat down after giving the bottle to Saffron, smoothing the blue 
cloth of her rich dress to kneel on the floor

     Kima followed a moment later, carefully tucking her wings
behind her as she knelt.  "We will take lunch together, then, I
suppose."

     It was more pleasant than she thought it would be, mostly
because Koruma and Masara kept their mouths shut most of the 
meal.  Masara had always been very quiet in Fanael's presence
anyway, and when Masara was quiet, Koruma often followed.  The
food was good, and it had been a long time since she had eaten
last.  She made conversation with Fanael, and was almost, for a
little while, able to imagine that things were back to normal,
and that the one who'd defeated her king, who she'd helped to
bring back here, was not only a few miles to the north.

     The meal eventually finished, and by the end she felt more
relaxed than she had been in some time.  Koruma and Masara were
stacking the dishes in preparation to take them back to the
kitchens when she felt the first chill running down her spine.

     And she turned her head to see a lean grey figure standing
in the entrance of the nursery.  His arms were folded across his
chest.  The blue light of the lamps on the walls to the sides of
the large square-cut entrance shone across the dark hue of his 
skin, the iron grey of his hair, the white loops and lines of 
scar tissue on his face.  But nothing could shine in those golden
eyes but their own awful colour.

     She remembered the vague dreams of the last few nights,
since before they'd gone to Ryugenzawa.  Fleeing from the vast
golden-eyed shape behind her.  The howling, echoing hunting cry 
of the beast.

     The eyes seemed to engulf her, draw her gaze into them like
whirlpools.  Not just her gaze; the entirety of her, her soul,
her very being.  Time seemed to slow down, become frozen, 
brittle.

     And after that, there came the fear.  She wasn't Kima any
more as she was now, wasn't Kima as she'd been ten years ago when
she'd taken her father's position after his death, wasn't any of
that.  She was a child, a tiny child, in darkness, and there was
no escape, no escape-

     There was a curving knife in his right hand, and four white 
feathers.  She knew them to be hers, not knowing how she knew.

     The knife slashed across his left wrist, opening it.  He
clamped the feathers to his wrist like a compress; scarlet blood
flowed, slowly, like tar dripping across snow, a red stain 
across the white of her feathers.

     He opened his mouth, and spoke, like a deathsong, like a 
skin drum pounded by a hammer made of bone.

     *First blood given*
     *Blood for prey*
     *When chains are riven*
     *I shall slay*
     
     He brought the feathers up to his mouth and licked his blood
from them.  His teeth were very, very white.  

     *Hunt unending*
     *Bonds unbending*
     *Wounds unmending*
     *Grey death sending*
     
     But his wound was mending, she saw.  The slash on his wrist
was closing.  In his hand, the feathers burst into flame, 
white-hot, consumed to ash in seconds, ash falling to the stone
floor in a tiny pile, falling down from his fingers.  He tucked 
the knife back into his pale leather belt, and began to walk 
forward.

     "Who are you?" she forced herself to say, forced her hand
somewhere amidst the fear to find the handle of her sword.  

     "Where is Ranma Saotome?" the man said, taking careful,
measured strides across the stone floor towards her.  Behind her,
she heard Fanael softly draw a breath, heard the knitting needles
stop clacking, heard the children stop playing and laughing.

     "Groundling, you answer Lady Kima's question," Koruma said, 
stepping forward and into the man's path.  "Who-"

     The man continued to walk.  Koruma reached out and grabbed
his shoulder with one taloned hand.  "Hey-"

     The man reached up and broke the boy's arm at the elbow with
the same ease a normal man breaks a twig.  Koruma's dark face 
went ashen at the sound of the bone snapping, and his mouth 
opened in a wail of pain before the man clamped his other hand 
over it and stifled it.

     "Koruma!" Masara cried, starting forward.
     
     "Masara, no!" Kima shouted, drawing her sword and stepping
past the younger boy, shoving him out of the way, as the grey man
turned and flung Koruma into the wall with bone-crushing force.
The boy crumpled to the ground, one wing canted at an unnatural
angle, utterly still.

     There was no room in here to get into the air, not enough 
room to use her wings to shape the air into blades.  Behind her,
there was utter silence, an aura of fear that was almost palpable 
from the children.

     She lunged forward, striking for his belly, the steel of her
sword flashing in the light.  He stepped aside with ease, grabbed
her wrist and pulled her to him, wrapping his forearm around her
throat as he spun behind her, forcing her to drop her sword
clattering to the floor.  He wanted to hurt her, everything about 
him said that, the way he moved, the tenseness of his muscles.  
But for some reason, he didn't.  She was held helpless as a 
child; he was impossibly strong.

     "Get back," she said to Masara, trying to remain calm.  Her
shove had knocked the boy aside, but he was advancing now.  "Get
back.  Check on Koruma.  He needs help.  Fanael, keep everyone
back."

     "Oh, no," the man whispered into her ear from behind.  "Keep
them coming.  Keep them coming.  Let them try to stop me, like
the boy did.  Let them."

     "What do you want?" she said, seeing Masara moving to 
Koruma's side, seeing Fanael standing in front of Saffron's 
cradle protectively, seeing the women and children in the nursery
all watching with terrified expressions on their faces.

     "I want to know where Ranma Saotome is," the man said.  
     
     "I don't know," she lied.
     
     "Your scent says differently," the man said.  His tongue
reached out and touched the pointed tip of her ear; her flesh 
crawled at the feel of it.  "I am called Galm.  Take me to Ranma 
Saotome."

     "I don't know where he is," Kima said.  "And if I did, I
would not take you."

     Galm made a sound deep in his throat behind her, something
mixed between a growl and a whine.  "Take me."

     "You cannot force me to."
     
     "TAKE ME!" he shouted, the frustration raw in his voice, so
loud and so close to her ear that it seemed he might deafen her.
"TAKE ME, DAMN YOU!  THE HUNT'S NOT ENDED TILL THE PREY IS DEAD!
I CAN'T KILL THE PREY TILL I FIND RANMA SAOTOME!  TAKE ME!"

     His voice was savage, inhuman, growling.  "Take me."
     
     "If I do not, what will you do?"
     
     The man seemed to have no response to that.  His voice rose,
wordlessly, a whining sound of baffled disappointment.  

     "Kima," Masara said, tears in his voice from where he sat by
his friend.  "Koruma's hurt really bad.  We need to get someone
who knows medicine."

     A thin wail rose, from the stone cradle that held Saffron.
It grew in pitch and volume.  Saffron had awoken.  Behind her,
she heard Galm take a deep inhalation of breath.

     "I know you," he said after a moment, a wondering tone in
his voice.  "I know your scent.  But how..."

     He stepped forward, forcing her to walk with him or be
dragged by the throat.  Fanael was still in front of the cradle 
that Saffron lay in.  

     "Fanael, move," Kima said, finding it hard to speak with his
arm across her throat.  "Get out of his way."

     Fanael did so, moving to the side, her eyes wide with fear.
Kima could already see the noblewomen leaving with their 
children, heading for the other entrance to the nursery.  The 
news would be all over the mountain in minutes.

     "I know you," Galm said, looking down into the cradle at the
crying child.  "But nothing human can..."

     Then he began to laugh, a terrible sound.  His free arm
reached down and plucked Saffron up into the crook of his elbow.
"Take me to Ranma Saotome, or I'll tear the child's throat open."

     Kima felt herself go cold.  The breath seemed to tear itself
from her body.     
     
     "Please." she said.  "Not that."
     
     "Will you take me?" 
     
     She slowly nodded.  "I will.  He is nearby."
     
     "Kima," Fanael said from where she stood a few feet away.
"What... what does he mean?  You don't... I thought the outsider
went back to Japan."

     Kima was silent for a moment.  "Lady Fanael, I want you to 
go and get Xande.  Tell him what's happened here.  Tell him I 
have gone to the north.  If I am not back in an hour, he is to
send the troops after me.  Get help for Koruma.  Tell Xande to 
try and contain the news; the fewer people that know about this, 
the easier it will be."

     "Kima-"
     
     "Lady Fanael, please."
     
     The small woman nodded, and then walked quickly away.  Kima
glanced at Galm; he was smiling broadly.  Saffron had ceased to
cry; Galm held him cradled against his grey-vested chest, even as
he held her by the back of the neck with the vise-grip of his
hand.

     "We'll go, then?" he said from behind her.  His breath 
smelled like cold blood and rotting meat.

     "Yes," Kima said softly.  "We'll go."
     
     He let her go then, and she stumbled a few steps away from
him, taking easier breaths.  She turned to see him staring
intently at Saffron's face.  

     "I know you..." he whispered softly, white teeth flashing.
     
     "This way," Kima said, turning and starting to walk.  She
couldn't hear his footsteps as he followed, but each time she
glanced back he was there, holding Saffron, golden eyes gleaming.

     Once they were outside, she would have been able to flee.
In the air, he couldn't catch her.  But he had Saffron, and he
held the heart and soul of Phoenix Mountain in his hand.  She did
not know what would happen to Saffron if he were injured in his
infant form.  She could not risk that.  Not for her own life, not
for anything.  

     And this was what she had brought upon them, when she went
that first time to Japan in pursuit of the girl who'd stolen the 
map.  How she'd gotten it in the first place they still didn't
know.  But there was another passage she remembered, from The
Book of Fire and Earth:

     *The Phoenix fallen, and the hound walks the halls of the 
mountain.  Blood is on his jaws, blood on the face of the sun, 
blood on the hands of the ones who brought him, by the flight 
taken across the ocean, by the foulness hiding in dotage, by 
the madness hiding in arrogance, and by the hand of a child.*
     
     They came to a doorway soon enough that led out of one of
the palace buildings, out onto the mountainside and the short
flight of steps terminating in a long drop into thousands of feet
of empty air.  Below her, the sharp peaks of Phoenix Mountain
rose out of the mist, and everywhere the landscape of mountains
pierced the clouds.  The wind was cold up here, blowing through 
her short hair.  Behind her, she heard Galm take a long 
inhalation of breath.  

     "So what do you do now, groundling?" she said, glancing back
at him.  "Can you fly?  It's a long climb down."

     "I don't need to fly," the man said, and shrugged as he 
stepped by her, Saffron clutched tightly under one arm.

     Then he leapt off the edge of the stairs.  He plummeted like 
a stone through the tendrils of mountain mist, then landed 
lightly on his toes a hundred feet below, catlike and with utter 
ease, on the sharp top of a stone spire less than a foot wide.

     Kima's eyes widened, and then she saw him leap again, down
what must have been a two hundred foot drop this time before he
contacted the edge of a rock wall and sprang off, continuing down 
like that until he was almost out of her sight, before she spread 
her wings and leapt off, a terrible fear rising in her as she saw 
him bound easily down the mountainside, Saffron clutched in his 
arms.  He could not be human, not with those eyes, not with the 
way he moved.  Nothing could move like that.

     When she reached the bottom of the mountain, he was standing
there, sniffing at Saffron and frowning in what looked like
confusion.  He looked up when he saw her, and the frown became a
smile.  "Take me to him.  You can fly if you want, but don't go
out of my sight, or the child dies."

     Kima wondered if that was possible, as she began to lead
Galm to the north.  Towards Ranma Saotome, towards Cologne,
towards where Samofere had gone, towards a destiny whose outcome 
was not yet certain.

     Overhead, the crows watched them go from their perches in 
the crags of the mountain, eyes cold and hard, their pupils like
legless black beetles trapped in the yellow amber of their gaze.

**********

     "So what do we do with him?" Ranma said, glancing at the
still form of Tarou.  Cologne stood next to him, also looking
down.  Shiso was fluttering around in the air overhead, seemingly 
rather bored with the whole thing.
     
     "I don't know," Cologne said, shaking her head.  "He would
destroy everything I worked so hard to build up.  If he goes back
to Japan and says anything to your family or to Akane, it will
get back to the Circle Eternal somehow.  They'll take your mother
and father, or Akane, and..."

     "I know, I know," Ranma snapped.  "But what's the easiest
way to stop him?"

     "Kill him," Cologne said bluntly.  "That would be easiest."
     
     "WHAT?"
     
     "Calm down, boy.  I'm not suggesting for a moment we 
actually do it.  But it would be easiest."

     "It doesn't matter," Ranma said.  "I'm not doing that.  Not
ever.  Not even to Tarou.  Not after..."

     "If it were the only way to save another's life?"
     
     Ranma shuddered.  "That's different, Cologne.  This isn't
the same.  Do you know that Xi Fa Xiang Gao thing that Shampoo
used on Akane, back when she first came?  That memory eraser
shampoo?"

     "It doesn't last forever," Cologne said.  "And I... learned
long ago that trying to change someone's mind through that kind
of magic is an act almost always doomed to failure in the end, or
to consequences you cannot foresee."

     "So what do we do?" Ranma said.  "It's not like we can just
ask him to keep quiet, is it?"

     "Why not?" Cologne said, glancing down at Tarou.
     
     "But... he's..." Ranma said, trying to find the words to
explain it.  "He's... he's Tarou, Cologne."

     "That's hardly much of an argument," Cologne said as she
bent down and looked at Tarou.  "He seemed like a smart one, at
least, from what I saw of him.  We can try explaining things to 
him."

     "He won't care," Ranma said, shaking his head.  "All he
cares about is getting his name changed."

     "Let me handle him, Ranma.  Try to keep your brain in charge
of your mouth for once."

     "This ain't gonna work."
     
     Cologne ignored him and pressed a point on Tarou's neck.
The young man's eyes fluttered open; they were filled with rage.  

     "Tarou, I will take the paralysis off you under one 
condition," she said.  "You are not to attack Ranma or I.  You
are to listen to what we have to say calmly.  Blink if you
agree."

     Tarou glared at the two of them, eyes barely more than
slits.  Then, at last, he blinked.

     Cologne pressed a few more points on his neck and shoulders,
and the slender boy slowly got up from the ground, rising to sit
with one knee curled up to his chest and the other stretched out
across the thin grass of the ground without saying anything.  His 
expression was one of carefully calculated nonchalance.

     "So," he said finally, breaking his silence and looking up
at Ranma.  "Who's the girl?"

     "The girl is capable of answering that herself," Cologne
said icily.

     "So who are you?" Tarou said.
     
     "We've met before," Cologne said.  "At the Nekohanten, when
you first came to Japan."

     "Don't remember you," Tarou said with a shrug.  
     
     "I looked rather different," Cologne said.
     
     "That's an understatement," Ranma interjected.  Cologne
whacked him in the back of the head, and he went back to his
former occupation of glaring at Tarou.

     "My name is Cologne," Cologne said.
     
     Tarou laughed.  "Right.  The old sack of bones that looked
like Happosai's sister.  What'd you do, find the fountain of 
youth?"

     "Smart boy," Cologne said.  "You got it first try."
     
     "Sure," Tarou said.  "You're crazy as the hermaphrodite
here."

     "Were you born this obnoxious or did you achieve it after
long years of practice?" Cologne asked.

     "I'd say a combination of both," Ranma said.  
     
     "I liked it better when you were keeping your mouth shut,"
Tarou said, tilting his head back to look at Ranma from where he
sat on the ground.  

     "Idiot children," Cologne muttered.  "I should just let the
two of you beat each other up and then pick up the pieces."

     "I'd like to see you try and stop us," Tarou said as he 
stood with lazy grace to his feet.  "I don't make the same
mistake twice, and I know how to defend against those pressure
point strikes-"
     
     His next words were swallowed in a choking wheeze as Cologne
punched him in the stomach with a fist, the knuckles of her index
and middle fingers extended.  It had been hard to even see her 
move.  Tarou doubled over, face going slightly green.
     
     "Bitch..." Tarou gasped.
     
     "Yes, that's right," Cologne said.  "I'm a bitch, and if you
think that you're going to go running back to Japan and put my
great-grandaughter in danger, if I think there's even a chance of
that, you'll discover just how much of a bitch I can be."

     "You're really her, aren't you?" Tarou said as he 
straightened up.  "The old woman from the Nekohanten."

     "Tarou," Ranma said slowly, trying to put as much calm into
the words as he could.  "If you go back and tell people where I
am, that'll put Akane, Akane's family, everyone, in real danger.
There's people after me, people who would really hurt them if
they thought it would help them get to me."

     He saw Tarou's face soften slightly, just for a moment, a
very rare thing.  Then he returned to his normal expression of
smirking superiority.  "So what's it worth to you?  More to the
point, what does it get me?"

     "Do you feel nothing for anyone beyond yourself?" Cologne
said.  "Have you never wished to do something simply because it
would help another?"

     "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you?" Tarou
said.

     "Yes," Cologne said.
     
     He snorted.  "That's a load of crap.  Do unto others before
they do unto you.  Everyone's gotta look out for themselves.  
Once that's done, you can start caring about other people."

     "I would like to hope you do not believe that," Cologne said
softly.  "It is a poor way to look at life in one so young."

     "Don't you judge me," Tarou said.  "I don't care if you're
the old woman or not.  No one judges me but myself."

     "And do you like what you see?" Cologne said, as a light
wind passed through the clearing where they sat, stirred the
remnant ashes of the campfire nearby and sent her hair blowing in
dark strands.

     Tarou was silent for a fraction of a second longer than he
had been before.  "Yeah," he said at last.  "I like it just 
fine."

     "This isn't getting us anywhere," Ranma said shortly.  
"Tarou, what do you want?"

     "You know what I want," Tarou said.  "Can the two of you
help me get my new name out of that old man?"

     "In the future, perhaps," Cologne said.  "Not now.  Not any
time soon."

     "We can't return to Japan right now," Ranma said.  "But..."
     
     "Then what good are the two of you to me?" Tarou said.
     
     "What good is a name?" someone called from above, the voice
from the formerly silent, soaring form of the raven.  Shiso
banked in the air above their heads and spiralled down to land on
Ranma's shoulder, cocking his head to look at Tarou.  "A man is
not defined by his name, nor is a name defined by a man."

     Ranma saw something light in Tarou's eyes, something 
deep-hidden, covered soon by surprise, anger.  "What did you 
say, bird?"

     "The road is long," the raven said.  "The road is dark."
     
     "Shut up," Tarou said, taking a step forward, raising a 
fist.  Cologne stepped into his path.

     "The bird does not know what he talks of," she said.  "He
tends to repeat things he has heard before."

     Something seemed to go out of Tarou.  "Whatever."
     
     He looked up at the sky.  Ranma and Cologne did too.  The
white clouds of the morning had been replaced by a bank of grey
shapes, drifting cumuli laden with the promise of rain.  "So, you
two want to tell me what's going on, maybe give me the reason why
telling people where you are could put them in danger?"

     Ranma and Cologne were silent for a few moments as Tarou
looked at them.  Shiso cocked his head back to stare at the 
clouds, as a few drifted in front of the sun and cast a shadow
across where they stood.  "Storm's coming," he said.
     
**********
     
     Kima flew low to the ground, along the twisting trail that 
led between the mountains of the Bayankala range, constantly 
aware of the golden eyes watching her from behind, the lean 
figure pacing the ground below her.  And most of all, aware of 
the child clutched in his arms.

     This was her fault.  All of this was her fault.  She had
brought Ranma Saotome back to Jusenkyou because of what she'd
seen in the books, what she'd seen below Jusendo, and she'd
brought back this as well.

     She wasn't sure what it was.  It had dodged her sword like
she was moving in slow motion, it had broken Koruma's arm like a
twig, and it had dropped two hundred feet and landed on a nearly
vertical stone wall as easily as another man might have walked a
few feet.  There was a terrible sense of simplistic power to the 
thing that looked like a man, the thing that called itself Galm.  
He was like a sword with the edge of a razor, unadorned and 
plain, made only for killing.

     The consequence of this could be dealt with later.  She
would lose her position, most likely.  Her family's name would be
stricken from the record of the nobles.  But none of that
mattered now; ensuring Saffron's safety was the only thing that
mattered.

     On the ground below, a child began to cry.  Saffron.  She
slowed in her flight, let herself glide for a few moments.

     "Shut up," she heard Galm say.  "Shut up, you little beast."

     The baby only began to cry louder, his wail rising into the
air, echoing off the mountain walls.  

     "Shut up, I said," Galm's brutal, savage voice snarled from
the ground below.  "Shut up or I'll rip your tongue out."

     She landed on the ground in front of the striding 
grey-haired man, who was currently holding Saffron at arm's 
length, his powerful hands wrapped around the child's midsection.  
He looked as if he were about to begin shaking him.  The child 
was crying, a thin sound of fear and pain.

     "You said you would not hurt him," Kima said.  "You said if
I took you, you would not hurt him."

     "I hate when things cry for no reason," Galm said, spitting
onto the ground.  "Children are the most useless creatures.  
Utterly helpless.  I will give him something to cry about, if he
wishes."

     "Everyone was a child once," Kima said.
     
     "Not me," Galm said with utter conviction.  He smiled, the
savage, snow-white ivory of his teeth showing from beneath the
cruel curve of his lips.  She found her eyes drawn to the 
patterns of scars upon his face, vertical and horizontal slashes,
curved lines, spiralling weals upon the darkness of his skin.  
Terrifying as his face was, there was nothing to compare to those
golden eyes, that regarded everything without the slightest sense
of emotion or empathy.  

     "I can make him stop crying," Kima said gently.  "Just give
him to me.  I'll stay right here.  I won't try to run."

     She stretched out her arms to Galm, trying not to let any
hope show on her face.

     Galm looked at the sobbing infant in his arms, then 
half-tossed him to Kima with a disgusted snort.  "Don't even
think of trying to flee.  I can have your wings off you before 
you can get a foot off the ground."

     He smiled again.  "I can't kill you yet, but I can hurt you 
very badly.  I haven't yet.  I like to save the hurting till the
end."

     Kima nodded and turned her back to him, forcing down the 
fear, cradling Saffron against her shoulder.  His tears were hot
against her bare skin.  

     "Shh... Shh... It's alright," she soothed.  "It's alright."
     
     Saffron sobbed slower, but he did not stop crying.  She
could feel Galm's golden eyes burning into her back.  "It will be
alright, my king.  I will not let him harm you."

     Faintly, far away, she heard a voice lifting in a song,
sometimes high-pitched, sometimes so low it almost could not be
heard.

     "What is that?" Galm said behind her.  "Who's there?"
     
     "FLY!" someone screamed from nearby in an old, strong
voice.  She took to the air instinctively, hearing Galm howl
behind her, feeling the brush of his fingers against the heel of
one boot as he leapt.

     And then, turning her head, she saw dozens of tons of earth
and stone descend like an oceanic wave upon the grey-haired shape
of Galm from behind, solidifying as it fell, a massive 
half-melted shape like a stubby candle of rock, a hand and 
fingers emerging from it, clenching at the air.

     Samofere was on the trail behind them, to the south, 
kneeling on the ground, sweat beading his wrinkled face as he
touched his fingers to the edges of the pit the earth had
formerly occupied.  "Go, Kima!  I can't hold him long!  Go to
Cologne!"

     She saw the fingers of the hand protruding from the rock 
flex, and cracks begin to appear around it.  

     "Samofere!" she called.  "He's not what he seems.  You have
to get away."

     "I know what he is," Samofere shouted back.  The cracks
spread further around the hand; other cracks began to emerge on
the rock.  "He can find you wherever you go!  Go to Cologne, to
Ranma!  Make ready to fight!  I can't hold him forever."

     He screamed then, as if in agony.  She saw his hand tighten
on his plain wooden walking stick.  Or not so plain now, she saw;
there was a triangular prism of green crystal atop it, blazing
with emerald light.  "GO!"

     A second hand smashed out of the rock, splitting open a
circle of cracks.  The two hands wrapped around the edges of the
splits where they emerged from the rock column and began to push.

     Saffron began to cry louder, and that galvanized her to
action.  She took off to the north, as behind her she heard
Samofere scream again, and heard the sound of stone splitting
apart.

     Overhead, the storm clouds began to gather tighter together.
          
**********

     Howling with rage, Galm tore the stone prison in half and
stepped out amidst the shattered chunks, powdered rock clinging
to his clothing and skin.  The white-winged shape of the prey was
nearly a hundred feet away, high into the sky, going higher with
each passing second.

     No matter.  He drew a knife and threw in one quick motion,
an eye sharper than any human's picking out the spot perfectly.
He heard a high scream of agony and saw her flutter to one side
in the air; the knife dropped, glittering in the sunlight and
trailing blood, to the ground.  It wouldn't kill her, but it 
would slow her down.

     The sound of stone crumbling behind him alerted him, and he
hurled himself to the side as a dozen jagged spikes fell from the
remains of what had imprisoned him.  
     
     "Hold, beast," the brown-robed old man said from where he
stood, black wings folded over his back.  "You will harm no one 
of my people while I still stand."

     Galm took a deep inhalation of the air.  "I know your 
scent."

     "And I know yours, hound of hell," the old man said.  He 
held his walking stick in front of him horizontally with both 
hands like a staff; the green light shining from the crystal atop 
it hurt Galm's eyes.  "I know your name and your shape and your
binding."

     "They live long in these parts, don't they?" Galm said.  "Or
perhaps much less time has passed than I thought.  But he was not
a child when I was born into this place, and you were not an old 
man."

     "It matters not," the old man said in a weary voice.  "What 
is past is past."
     
     "And what is to be is to be," Galm said.  "There is only the
present for now.  Soon you will be dead."     
     
     And then he moved.  Before he got a dozen feet, the ground
erupted in a fountain of earth and stone beneath him, hurling him
into the air.  He spun and landed on his feet, closing more
distance between him and the old man, who slowly retreated before
him, voice rising in a complex song, green light shining from his 
cane.

     The earth humped beneath his feet, burst into spikes of
stone that pierced his legs and arms and chest.  He drew a
gasping breath as he broke them off and staggered away.  

     "You have no idea how much that stings," he snarled, as he
ripped one out and flung it at the old man.  It dissolved to mud
in the air a yard before it would have hit.

     And then Galm changed, bounding forward on four legs across
the ground, wide jaws opening, red-tinged saliva dripping across
the earth in his passage.  The earth shook; a chasm opened under 
his feet, but he leapt aside.  To the left and right the earth 
exploded in columns of jagged stone, but he dodged and wove 
between the eruptions, coming ever closer.

     And then he was leaping, form flowing in mid-air to human,
catching the old man by the throat and wrenching the stick from
his hands, hurling it aside, the green crystal dimming to
darkness at it clattered across the ground.

     The old man brought up a hand as if to ward off a blow, and
Galm punched him in the face, then again.  He moaned and sagged
in the hunter's grip, as Galm drove blow after blow into his
stomach and face, the sensitive spots of his arms, the delicate
bones of his wings.  Blood ran across the grey-haired man's fist, 
as he dropped the old man to the ground like a toy.  The old man 
was covered in his own blood, from his white hair to his brown 
robes to his black wings.  Galm guessed most of his ribs were
broken, as were his arms.  He'd snapped the long bones of the 
wings as well, and broken the old man's hip.  The old man was 
making a low sound of agony from where he lay on the ground.

     "I'd play longer," Galm growled, the edges of his lips
curved in a feral snarl.  "But I've got better things to do than 
amuse myself with old men, no matter how old they are.  Die 
slow."

     He brought his heel down on the old man's windpipe, hard 
enough to crush it, not hard enough to break the neck.  He heard
the old man gasping his last slow, agonized breaths on the
ground as he turned and ran to the north, following the trail of
the prey.  She was going towards Ranma Saotome, the old man had
said.  

     He would have more killing to do soon.  Galm threw back his 
grey-haired head and howled, like a hound upon the chase.  Hunt's
end was coming.

**********

     Kima felt something impossibly sharp slash through her right 
shoulder and wing as she flew.  She screamed in agony, feeling
blood flow across her back, as each movement of her right wing
began to drive a knife of fire into her back.  The pain of
flapping was unbearable, but she kept it up as long as she 
could, driven on by Saffron's now-silent presence in her arms.  
They were not far from where she'd left Ranma and Cologne.  

     Her eyes welled with tears as she flew, from the pain of the
wound, from knowing that Samofere had been left behind to face
something he could not possibly defeat.  She was feeling faint
now from loss of blood, as the mountain walls soared by to her
sides, the rough earth below her, the blue sky overhead.  The
ground was coming so close, now, how had she gotten to flying so
low-

     She managed to roll as she hit the ground, tucking her wings
and falling on her uninjured side, keeping Saffron safe as she
slammed into the earth.  She could barely feel her right wing;
agony was her world, a throbbing pain whirlpooling out from the
wound on her shoulder.

     She looked up from the ground.  She was so close, right next
to the trail that led off into the recess in the mountains where
Cologne had made camp.  It was less than two hundred feet across
rolling, hilly ground to there.  It might as well have been two
hundred miles.  She couldn't move.  

     In her arms, Saffron began to cry again.  Somehow, somehow,
she staggered to her feet.  She could no longer fly, but she
could run, and she did, smoothing the infant's hair as she
half-staggered along the trail.

     Far behind her, but closing quickly, she heard something
howling triumphantly.     

**********

     "Bird speaks Japanese pretty well," Tarou said, glancing
down at Shiso and then up at the clouds.  "So, you two were about 
to tell me everything that's going on?"

     Suddenly, the raven gave a great cry, a sound with sorrow
running through it, and took to the air, wings beating 
frantically as he flew to the south, over the scraggily trees of
the forest.

     "Huh?" Ranma said, watching the dark shape speed away.  
"What's gotten into him?"

     From far to the south there came a monstrous howl, bouncing
and echoing off the mountain walls, a sound that chilled him to
the bone.  
     
     He heard Cologne softly gasp.
     
     Turning to look where she was, he saw a white-winged figure
staggering from the east, fifty feet away.  She was holding a
small, cloth-wrapped shape in her arms; even from here, he could
see the blood staining the feathers of the drooping right-hand
wing, running down the side of her body.  
     
     "Kima!" he shouted, running to her side, Cologne and Tarou
behind him.  She almost collapsed into him as he grabbed her by
the shoulders; he could now see what she held in her arms was a
familiar baby.  Saffron.

     "Kima, what happened?" he said.  
     
     Her face was almost white, her eyes clouded by pain.  "He's
coming..."

     "Who?" Cologne said.  "Who's coming?"
     
     The howl echoed again, closer, monstrous.  There was fury in 
it, bloodlust, an ancient hunger so deep-running and 
all-encompassing it was terrifying.

     "Galm," Kima whispered in a choked voice.
     
     "Who?" Ranma asked, confused, but hearing the fear in her
voice.     
     
     "Give her to me, Ranma," Cologne said, plucking Kima from 
his arms.  She carefully took the child from the other woman's
grip and handed him to Ranma.  "Hold that."

     "Hey, I didn't ever wanna see him again-" Ranma said, but he
shut up and took the baby at the force of Cologne's glare.  
"Geez, you're an ugly kid."

     Cologne laid Kima down on the ground and turned her over 
onto her stomach; the right side of her back was covered in 
blood, still slowly flowing.

     "I think whoever cut her shall be here soon," Cologne said.
"Tarou, go and get my bag from by the fire."

     Tarou opened his mouth as if to say something.  There was
rare confusion on his face.

     "Now," Cologne snapped.  "Before she bleeds to death."
     
     Tarou nodded and turned to run.
     
     Ranma sat down on the grass.  Kima's head was turned to look
at him.  Her eyes were wide, pain in them, as Cologne tore a
sleeve of her shirt off with a ripping sound and pressed it
against the wound.

     "Who did this?" Ranma said, shock and rage in his voice.
     
     "Galm," Kima gasped, and then moaned as Cologne shifted the
compress.  "He's coming..."
     
     "Who's Galm?"
     
     For a third time that howl sounded, rising through the air
like a daemonic bell.  "That's him, isn't it?"

     "Yes," Kima said.  "You have to protect Saffron.  He's after 
you too, I'm not sure why."

     "Don't talk," Cologne said shortly.  "It will only make it
worse.  Try to relax."

     Tarou ran up, lugging the dark bag that Cologne had carried.
He put it down next to Cologne, then crouched by her.  "Who is
she?"

     "Kima," Ranma said.  "She's from Phoenix Mountain."
     
     "Well, that's obvious," Tarou said.  "There aren't many 
other winged people running around.  Who's the kid?"

     "That would be Saffron," Ranma said.
     
     "Doesn't anyone stay the same age around here?" Tarou said,
shaking his head.

     "Would you two shut up?" Cologne snarled.  "Tarou, there's
bandages in there.  There's also a glass jar of greenish-white 
unguent in there, without a label on it.  Get those out for me."

     Ranma looked down at Saffron as Tarou began to rummage
through Cologne's bag.  The infant was quiet, scarlet eyes wide
and staring up at the sky.

     "Samofere..." Kima murmured, eyes closing.  Ranma saw
Cologne stiffen.

     "What about Samofere?" she said softly.
     
     "Left him," Kima said.  "He fought with Galm.  I don't know 
if he's still alive."

     Cologne's face went slightly pale, and only Ranma saw it.
Tarou handed her the bandages and a small jar of greenish-white
paste.  Hands shaking slightly, Cologne opened the jar and
scooped out a handful of the unguent, pulling away the 
blood-soaked sleeve of her shirt and flinging it to the grass.

     "It's a clean wound, at least," Ranma heard her say.  "The
edges aren't ragged."

     She began to rub the cream into the wound.  Kima gave a soft
sound of pain from on the ground, and her eyes closed for a 
moment before snapping abruptly open again.

     "Saffron?" she said.
     
     "It's okay," Ranma said, reaching down with his hand and
lightly touching the rough-skinned, slender talons of her left
hand with his.  "He's with me."

     Cologne was bandaging the wound now.  "That will numb the
pain and help to close the wound."

     "Good," Kima muttered.  "I need to be able to fight.  He's
almost here."

     "You're lucky to be alive, fool," Cologne said.  "I don't
see why you're even still conscious."
     
     And then again, there came the howl, from so close it seemed
to drown out all other senses.  Ranma looked up to see a man of
medium height standing two dozen feet away.  He had a young face,
darkly complexioned and covered in scars, but his hair was a grey
like the steel of a blade.  He wore a vest the same colour as his
hair, and black pants.  His clothing was spattered with blood, 
and Ranma didn't think that it was his own.

     "Ranma Saotome," he called.  
     
     "You're Galm, then?" Ranma said as he rose to his feet.
     
     "I am," the man said.  He looked utterly and completely
relaxed.  "It's time to go now, Ranma."

     "I'm not going anywhere with you," Ranma said slowly.  
     
     "Then I will have to force you," Galm replied, and shrugged.
     
     "Who is this guy?" Tarou said, stepping up beside Ranma.
     
     "Beats me," Ranma said.  
     
     "Careful," Kima said, pushing aside Cologne's staying hand
as she sat up.  "I don't think he can hurt you unless you try to
fight him."
     
     "But he hurt you, right?" Ranma said.
     
     "He's following me somehow," Kima said.  "He's not human."
     
     "Certainly not," Galm said, as if offended.
     
     "So what are you, then?" Ranma asked.
     
     "Lots of things," Galm said.  "Right now, I'm to take you to
Jusenkyou.  At that point, I can proceed to play with the prey a
little."

     "Play?" Tarou said, frowning and looked down at the 
bloodstains on the ground where Kima had lain.  "This your idea
of playing?"

     "Oh, no," Galm said.  "That just the beginning.  Have you
ever seen a cat play with a bird?"

     Ranma shuddered slightly at the mention of cats.  "Can't say 
I have."
     
     "Oh, it's delightful," Galm said with a smile.  "First it
tears off one wing, then it tears off the other and then it bats
the thing around for a while.  I've always wanted to try that
with something that could really scream."

     Ranma looked at the thing that seemed a man, into those
glowing golden eyes.  There was fire pounding deep inside his
head, but it felt as if it were held back, within a fist of his
mind, controlled, just barely, but ready to be unleashed.  

     And behind it, oh, deep, deep behind it, the killing fury of
the ice, and inside that there was only the nothingness, the
blackness.  And he did not know that if he let it engulf him if
he could come back.

     He turned around, slowly, and bent down, handing the quiet
form of Saffron to Kima.  Her face was still pale, and her side
was still streaked with blood.  Cologne was carefully bandaging
her wound, face hard and intent.  She seemed to be deliberately
ignoring Galm, ignoring everything but tending to the wound.

     Kima took the child from him and cradled it against her
shoulder with a soft, sighing sound.  She looked very young, very
vulnerable.  He hadn't realized how young she was before; she 
couldn't be more than ten years older than him.

     Ranma stood up and turned back to look at Galm, who hadn't
moved from his position.  He still stood, relaxed, nonchalant,
arms crossed over his chest.  He smiled at them.  His eyes
gleamed.

     Overhead, the storm clouds gathered in looping spirals of
grey.  The fire was lapping at the edges of his senses, begging
for release after such a long confinement.  Behind it, the ice 
loomed like an arctic claw.

     He started to step forward, and then Tarou passed him, 
moving swiftly and easily, dropping into a loose combat stance,
the metallic scales of his vest and bracers gleaming in the sun.

     "Okay," Tarou said, something cold in his voice, something
very angry.  "You want to play, pal?  Let's play."

     "Yeah," Ranma said as he came to stand beside older boy,
staring at Galm, caressing the fire inside of his head.  He knew
beneath his shirt the dragon was moving; he could feel it, like
the caress of electricity.  "Let's play."

     There was a tiny shift in Galm's body, almost imperceptible.
     
     Then he was moving, and Ranma and Tarou moved together to
meet him.  Not, perhaps, for reasons entirely the same, but it
was together they went to face the hound of hell.

**********

     Two voices, speaking, in a room of stone.
     
     "It is begun," said the first, a voice ancient and cracked,
an edge of cruelty to it.  It lacked all the trembling senility 
the speaker usually adopted.  "As it was foretold."

     "Finally," said the second, a young voice, deep and 
powerful, the words elegantly formed.  "We have waited.  We have
done as was asked.  Now we are given what was promised."

     "The master works slowly," the first said.  "But his works
are always achieved."

     The second laughed.  "You sound like the fools who speak of
Saffron as our god."     

     "Our lord is all he is said to be and far, far more," the
first said, and there was cold anger in it this time.  "Speak
carefully of him, little one.  He is not some child whining in
his cradle.  You do not wish to rouse his wrath."

     "Speak carefully to me, old one," the second said.  "You
don't wish to rouse mine either."
     
     The second raised his hand, and there was a crackling, as
flame burst into being from nothingness.     
     
     "And your fire will not save you if you rouse the master's,"
the first said, and laughed, an aged cackle that grated on the
ears.  "Nor will it save you if you rouse mine."

     The hand was lowered, slowly.  The flame winked out.
     
     "You need me," the second said almost petulantly.  "I don't 
need you."
     
     "Fool," the first said scornfully.  "You need me.  You don't
have the brains or the patience to pull this off."

     There was angry silence for a moment from the second, and
then he spoke.  "You say some truth.  I know my limitations."

     "And I know mine," the first said.  "The people need a 
king."

     "And a king needs an advisor," said the second.  "Someone to
take care of the little things."

     "And that is why our lord needs us," said the first.  "To
take care of the little things."

     "I see him in my dreams, you know," the second said with a
wistful tone to his voice.  "His wings are bigger than oceans.
His fire is black beyond midnight.  His eyes are the pits left 
when stars burn out.  His beak could cleft a mountain in twain."

     "It is well, then," said the first.  "Let it come.  Let the
flames burn out at last, and the King of Ashes rule in Phoenix
Mountain."

     And he laughed, like a rusting blade scraped across stone, 
and he was joined moments later by the young, strong voice of the
second.

**********

     Tarou and Ranma struck at Galm almost simultaneously, Ranma
with a leaping aerial kick, Tarou with a combination of low,
quick fist strikes.  Galm ducked under the kick, caught Tarou's
blows on his crossed forearms and moved back a few steps as the
other two advanced on him again.

     "Try not to get in my way," Tarou said.  "Maybe you should
just go sit down."

     Ranma didn't even respond.  There was no room for taunts, or
response to taunts.  He was fire, cold ice-fire, pure distilled
rage.  His face and hands were pins and needles, and he could 
feel his heart thudding inside his chest, and he was just barely
maintaining the edge of control.  Cologne was standing near Kima, 
stance ready to receive Galm if he made it by Ranma and Tarou.  
Kima held Saffron, her face deathly pale, the injured wing 
drooped to the side on the ground where she sat, looking as if 
she were barely able to manage even that.

     He snapped a kick at the side of Galm's head, and the 
golden-eyed man caught it and spun through with the movement,
dodging past Tarou's attack and pulling Ranma off balance to
send him crashing into Tarou's side.  The two of them stumbled,
nearly falling.

     "I said not to get in my way," Tarou snarled, and then they 
were parted as Galm slammed into Tarou from the side and bore him 
tumbling across the ground in a rolling tackle.  They landed with 
Tarou on his back and Galm atop him, his hand raised to the air.  
There was a knife in it, long and curving, the inner edge of the 
blade saw-toothed and brutal.  

     Ranma was running, but the knife was already stabbing down.
Tarou caught Galm's wrist with both his hands, grunting with
effort of stopping the blow; Galm smashed him across the face
with his free hand, as Tarou heaved and swung the man off him,
slamming Galm into the ground as he rose up, his face bloody.

     Galm was on his feet an instant later, and then Ranma was 
upon him, kicking for the hand that held the blade and sending it
spinning into the air.  His other foot came around and struck the
man across the face; he pivoted, foot still in the air, and then
snapped back, striking him again from the other side.  

     Galm took the blows like they were from a child, lunged
forward with a snarl and grabbed Ranma by the collar of his
shirt.  He dragged him forward, slammed his forehead into 
Ranma's, then yanked him back and hurled him at Tarou as the man
approached.  Tarou ducked and shot forward like a bullet, driving
hard blows into Galm's sternum and chest, then finishing up with
a palm heel that smashed Galm's nose flat against his face.  The
grey-haired man never made a sound to indicate any pain.

     Head aching from Galm's blow, Ranma looked up from where 
he'd landed on the ground to see Galm grip Tarou by the arms and
wrench them out to the sides as he drove a vicious knee into the
young man's stomach.  Tarou doubled over slightly, but blocked
the next blow by twisting his body to side and taking it on his
hip.  Galm still had him by the arms, though, and he raised Tarou
overhead, squeezing the held man's arms against his sides.  Tarou
kneed him in the face once, further damaging the ruin of the 
man's broken nose, but then Galm whirled and drove Tarou at the
ground headfirst.  Tarou twisted at the next second, taking the 
impact with his shoulder, and avoiding having his neck broken by
scant inches.
     
     Ranma came at Galm, and the man dropped Tarou where he lay
and hit him across the face with crushing force.  He followed up,
moving with blinding speed, grabbing Ranma by the shoulder and
slamming him again in the jaw, then again.  Ranma's teeth clicked
together at the impact, and he saw with horror that Galm's nose
was no longer broken, blood no longer splashed his face.  His
golden eyes gleamed.  

     The man fought with no recognizable style Ranma had ever
seen.  He was horribly fast and immensely strong, but he seemed
to have no technique beyond sheer viciousness.  
     
     But that, Ranma admitted, was serving well enough.
     
     Ranma sagged in his grip, saw Tarou rise from the ground and 
come at Galm from behind.  Galm ducked under the blow and raised 
Ranma into it, and he felt Tarou's fist crash into his cheekbone 
before Galm hurled him away and spun, rising from the crouch he'd 
gone into and hitting Tarou in the stomach.  He grabbed him by 
the throat as he doubled over, wrapping his hands around the 
other man's neck and beginning to apply pressure.  Tarou's eyes 
bulged slightly, and his hands came up to claw at Galm's eyes.  
The man moved his head out of range and lifted Tarou from the 
ground with a savage snarl of pleasure.  

     And then Cologne was there, descending from a great height
to crash atop Galm's back, one small foot on each shoulder.  The
long rake swept down, slashed once across his face, once across
his hands, and then she leapt into the air, somersaulting 
backwards as Galm threw Tarou aside and turned to her.

     "What did you do to Samofere?" she said, holding her weapon
like a staff, crosswise from her body.     
     
     "The old man?  I broke his throat and left him to choke to
death on his own blood," Galm said with the same emotion he might
have used to describe slaughtering a chicken.  The wounds Cologne 
had done were already closing.

     Ranma saw Cologne's face go utterly, utterly white, like a
statue carved from bone.

     "Liar," she said, grief so raw in her voice it was almost 
visible.  Ranma tried to rise, saw Tarou trying to do the same.

     "It's very difficult for me to lie," Galm said sincerely.
"Though I can, I'm not very good at it.  But I'm telling the
truth.  I broke his wings, his ribs, and then I stepped on his 
throat.  He was old and weak anyway.  He deserved death."

     Cologne gave a scream of rage and ran forward, sweeping the
rake back.  Ranma saw tears in her eyes, sorrow scrawled across
her face.  She was moving so fast she was little more than a 
blur; crimson light rushed up her arms, blindingly bright.  It 
rimmed the handle and head of her rake, flowed off the blades and
trailed behind her like liquefied fire.   Her hair streamed back 
in the speed of her passage.  Galm tried to dodge, but Cologne 
was too fast, too fast even for him.  

     She brought the weapon around in a wide sweep, a blade of 
fiery energy thinner than paper and sharper than a razor forming 
at the end.  It hit Galm in the shoulder, tore down through his 
body, and sliced him in half at the hip.

     There was no blood; the heat of the blade had cauterized
everything, and Galm did not bleed much anyway.  The upper part
of his body fell to the grass, golden eyes closing, shock on his
face.  The legs folded at the knees and then collapsed, the arm
still attached to the thin remains of the torso and shoulder
clutching spasmodically at the ground.

     Weeping, Cologne dropped the rake to the grass, red aura
vanishing.  She fell to her knees and sobbed as if her heart
would tear in two, as she buried her face in her hands.

     Ranma finally got to his feet, staggered to where Tarou sat,
gasping and rubbing his throat.

     "You okay?" he asked wearily, looking at where Kima sat with
Saffron, looking at where Cologne wept into her hands, looking to
the halved body of the thing called Galm.

     Tarou slowly nodded, turned his head to regard the body of
Galm.  There was blood on his face, from where one of Galm's 
punches had split his lip.  His throat bore the mark of the
golden-eyed man's powerful fingers.  Ranma saw his eyes widen
suddenly.
     
     "Oh crap," Tarou said, and pointed.
     
     The upper half of Galm's body, the head and one arm and half
the torso, was dragging itself towards the lower half.  The eyes
were open, golden-bright and awful.  The teeth as he smiled were
very, very white.

     "Cologne!" Ranma called, but the dark-haired woman only
continued to sob.  He saw Kima beginning to stand to her feet.
He saw the hand on Galm's upper body reach out and grab hold of
the hand on the lower body.  The fingers wrapped around each
other.  A miasma of warping, a sense of air being twisted and
bent out of shape, occupied the space where the two parts of the
body lay for the next few seconds.

     Grey clothing, black clothing, dark scarred skin, all those
flowed across each other for a moment, and then a grey shape 
stood on four legs, the head rising taller than Ranma's waist,
nearly to his shoulder.  It was neither hound nor wolf nor great 
cat, but somehow had the character of all those things.  The coat 
was sleek and grey over a body thick with muscle and weight, the 
short mane below the jaws a darker grey, wild and bristly.

     Its head was vastly disproportionate, more than twice the
size it should have been, the eyes golden and as large as man's
open hand, the jaws big enough to bite cleanly through the trunk
of a great tree and have room left over.  Red-tinged foam dripped 
from the jaws and dropped upon the ground at the beast's feet, 
hissing as it fell and bubbling on the earth like acid.

     The monstrous thing opened its jaws and howled.  A triple 
row of razor-edged triangular teeth were exposed, with longer,
curving sabretooth fangs for the upper canines.  The howl they'd
heard before was the mewling of a kitten to this.  Burning saliva
the colour of blood sprayed through the air as the beast threw
back its head and screamed in rage at the sky.  The light of the
sun itself seemed to dim beneath the force of that ancient voice,
that savage cry of furious, unending hunger as old as the
beginning of the world.

     "Oh crap," Tarou repeated, and Ranma had to agree with the
other boy for once, because that just about summed it up.     
     
**********

     The raven landed beside the broken, blood-stained body of
Samofere of Phoenix Mountain.  The old man was still drawing
gasping, heaving breaths through the shattered remains of his
throat.

     "Hello, Shiso," he said in a whisper of a voice.  "She made
it to them, then?"

     "Yes," the raven said.

     "Good," Samofere said, half-choking as he did so.  
     
     "Duty not done," the raven said.  "Not yet done."
     
     "I know," Samofere murmured.  "I know.  But wait a moment,
friend.  Give me rest a while.  I am not what I once was."

     "None are," the raven said.  "They are not what they have
been or what they will be.  They are what they are now."     
     
     "Very well," Samofere said, and he rolled over, driving his
body to motion through the pain of all the broken bones, through
the agony of his shattered windpipe.

     He dug his hands into the earth, spread his wings out as
much he could with so many bones broken in them and draped them
around his body and across the earth, brushing the ground with 
their feathers.

     And then he called, with his mind, with his voice, with his
body and soul, down into the earth, down past the earth to the
stone below, to bedrock, to the roots of mountains.  Down past
the rock to the water flowing below the earth, from the tiniest
trickling stream to the greatest underground river, deep he
called, so far, oh so far, and there was so much pain, so much
memory of what his power had wrought once before, so much 
between.

     And then, back, from the earth and the water under earth, 
there came a voice, rising, a tremolo voice so deep it was felt 
as much as it was heard.  The raising of mountains, the sliding 
of continents, if they had been given voice, it would sound as 
this did.  Behind it came the voice of rivers, of the waters
flowing beneath.

     *Duty not done,* the earth whispered.  
     
     *Not done...* the waters echoed, tides in the voice, waves
breaking upon a beach.     
     
     "I know," Samofere gasped.  "I know.  But I must have aid."
     
     *Duty not done,* the earth said.
     
     *Not done, not done...* the waters repeated, rain falling on
mountains.     
     
     "Cologne needs me," Samofere said.  "My brother needs me.
Others do as well.  Give me help, please.  It has been so long
since I used my power.  I feared to."

     *Sin forgiven,* the earth called, mournfully.
     
     *Forgiven, forgiven, forgiven..." the waters said with
sadness.     
     
     "I know," Samofere said.  "But how could I forgive myself?"
     
     But to that, the earth and the water could give no answer
that could be put into words.     
     
     On the earth he lay upon, cracks were beginning to form, 
minute at first, tiny, then opening wider.  From the earth below,
there came the sound of something vast rising, a great rumbling
liquid sound.  

     The stone shifted beneath his body like a lover, and he
pressed his blood-stained lips to her and kissed her, inhaling 
the scent of stone and earth, breathing it in like a fine wine. 

     "Thank you," he said.  "Thank you."

     *Duty not done,* the earth said.
     
     *Not done, not done, not done...* the waters said.
     
     And then, in a hundred tiny geysers first of all that arced
high into the air and fell down in one great shower, the waters
came from under earth.  Arctic-cold, chilling him to the bone,
washing the pain away from him, as bones began to straighten and
knit together, as flesh and muscle formed anew from nothing, as
the waters showered down upon him.

     And when the last of the waters drained away, down through
the cracks in the earth, down to join again with the great 
underground river that flowed from beneath Jusendo to Phoenix
Mountain, from whence it had come, he was healed and transformed.

     Samofere stood up, human now, wings gone.  He brushed back
the long, unbound length of his rich brown hair with an unlined,
dark-skinned, youthful hand.  Waters droplets sprayed across the 
earth, and the earth drank of them hungrily.

     Shiso came down from where he'd been soaring in the air,
landed upon Samofere's broad young shoulder.  

     "Duty not done," the raven said.  
     
     "I know, I know," Samofere said, reaching up and gently
stroking the bird's broad black side.  "It never is, is it?"

     "Not yet," the raven said.  
     
     "So long," Samofere murmured.
     
     "Long and more to come," the bird said.
     
     The bird cocked its head and looked up at the sky, and when
it spoke next the voice was different, deeper, more powerful.
"Once, in a time so long past it has become less than legend, 
there were two brothers, the kings of their people, just and 
wise.  One was golden and fair as sunrise, the other dark but no 
less fair, fair as the night sky filled with stars.  They ruled 
with kindness, and the lives of their subjects were joyous."

     "And then the forbidden conjunction came to be," Samofere
completed.  "And of the purest love was born a child of hate, to 
tear down all that was beautiful, to take the life of the fairest 
land upon all the earth, to shatter kingdoms beneath his feet and
scatter the dust of nations from his hands.  And so cursed became
his name that it was never spoken, and they called him only the 
Ravager."

     "And no one could stand before his power," Shiso said.  "And
the two brothers went below the earth, and they found a power
there, and a promise was made.  And they raised in a mountain two 
statues, two taps to bring the power from the earth below, and one 
was called the Phoenix, and one was called the Dragon."

     "And for three days and three nights, the two brothers 
bathed in the waters called from below the earth, the waters that 
are given the power of She Who Must Not Wake," Samofere said.  
"And they went out to make war upon the Ravager, that the Dark 
should not rule over the heavens or the earth or the waters under 
earth."

     "And one was called the Phoenix," Shiso said, spreading his
wings to the side.  "Power of the air and fire, of light and wind 
and heat, thrown back to the very edge of creation, to die again
and again, and be reborn again and again."

     "And one was called the Dragon," Samofere said, and he 
had his wings again now, as they grew from his back, 
black-feathered and vast, casting a shadow across the ground 
before him.  "Power of the earth and water, of ice and cold and 
stone, thrown to the edge of annihilation, to dance upon it but 
never to cross, to live forever and to never die."

     And then, the Dragon spread his wings, and the clouds moved
away from the face of the sun for a moment, and the light shone
upon them in the glorious highlights of purple and deep blue that
rimmed the feathers.  The raven leapt from his shoulder and 
soared to the north, and the Dragon followed him, flying above 
the cracked earth and below the stormcloud-laden sky.

     From the north there came the sound of something ancient and
primal howling, mad with the desire to kill.

**********

     Before Tarou and Ranma could even begin to move, the huge
creature that Galm had become was leaping forward across the
ground, to where Cologne crouched on her knees, weeping into her
hands, seemingly unaware of anything beyond her own grief.

     "COLOGNE!" Ranma screamed as he began to run.  One of the
huge front paws of the beast lashed out, as large as a man's
head, tipped with brutally hooked, finger-length claws.  It 
caught Cologne, tossed her into the air like a rag doll as the
claws slashed open cloth and the flesh beneath.  The other paw
came up, slamming her body into the earth from mid-air and 
pinning it.  The vast jaws opened, and Ranma knew, knew that he
would not make it in time, and his heart went sick with grief.

     Scarlet foam sprayed from Galm's jaws as he howled, and 
Cologne screamed in agony and writhed under the paw that held her
to the ground like a cat holds a mouse.

     He saw Kima was on her feet, staggering, clutching Saffron
to her.  One wing came up, the uninjured one, and whatever she
yelled was lost amidst the fury of Galm's howling voice.  The
wing came down, a blur, and the winged woman staggered to the
side, thrown off balance by her attack, falling to one knee.  
There was a screaming sound so high-pitched it was almost beyond 
hearing, and the air between Kima and Cologne seemed to peel back 
in the passage of the whipping blades the Mizuchousenzanyoku 
formed.

     They hit Galm like a razored hurricane, slashing deep wounds
into flanks and chest that did not seem to bleed.  He turned from
Cologne, panting like the bellows of a god, red-dripping jaws
open wide, the lacerations of his flesh already beginning to
close.

     A burst of red light blossomed in Cologne's hands, swelled
into a ball and blasted out from her.  Galm was flung away from
her, tumbling across the ground for a dozen feet before getting
to his feet.  There were claw marks down Cologne's side through
the rags of her shirt, deep wounds that seeped blood slowly as
she turned to Galm.  Her face was a struggle between fury and
sorrow and pain.

     "Stay dead, damn you!" he heard her scream.  She raised her
hand and the red energy exploded again, crackling like lightning
as is lashed through the space between them and struck Galm.  
The beast howled and writhed in pain beneath the blast.

     And then he changed, so quickly it barely registered.  There
was a sense of flowing, of the air rippling around him like a
heatwave, and then a man stood where a beast had been.  The 
scarlet power of Cologne's attack lashed around his limbs and
body, but he stepped forward, pulled his arm back and threw,
blindingly quick.

     Ranma saw the thrown blade strike Cologne in the chest, near 
the heart.  She fell backwards, the power of her aura dying 
around her, hair covering her face as she slowly crumpled to the 
ground, bonelessly, eyes wide with shock and pain.

     "NO!" Ranma yelled as he charged Galm.  He lifted his hand,
uncaring of Cologne's warnings from before about using his ki, 
uncaring of control, uncaring of anything.  He felt tears in his 
eyes.  He felt cold, so cold.

     Blue fire exploded from his hand, fury of his soul made
material, grief and rage manifested in power.  The blast struck
Galm like a hammer, flung him backwards to crash into the edge of
the forest.  Ranma heard trees snapping, saw them falling, as the
grey-haired man was slammed into them hard enough to break 
through them.

     "He won't stay down," Tarou said from behind him.  "I need 
cold water.  I can take him easy then."

     Ranma closed his eyes in frustration.  There was water in
their bags, nearly a hundred feet away.  It had always seemed
whenever he needed it the most, water hot or cold would always
elude him.  

     There wasn't time.  Cologne was dying, or already dead.
They were fighting something that had pulled itself back together
after being torn in half.  He could see Kima had collapsed to the
ground, the effort of her attack having drained much from her.
Saffron's wail was rising high into the air, where he lay next to
the one who guarded him so vigilantly.

     And a massive, four-legged grey shape was climbing from the 
wreckage of the edge of the forest, golden eyes like 
searchlights, jaws flecked with scarlet foam, absolutely and
totally uninjured.

     It threw back its great head and howled again, unstoppable,
unconquerable, challenging.  It was a predator and killer of
impossible power, an inhuman force of pure brutal strength.  
What answer had he, or Tarou, or even Cologne, what answer had 
they given to this thing but their own human weakness?  

     And then, as if in answer to the howl, as if answering for
them, a voice of thunder rolled in the sky, deep and booming like
a great drum, and he felt the first drops of rain upon his skin, 
before the torrential fury of the storm that had been gathering 
for the last few hours unleashed itself into the wind and the 
driving rain, pelting down upon the earth, changing the shape of 
his body.

     Water dripping down from her bangs into her eyes, Ranma saw
Galm's rushing charge, accelerating with each step, the bloody
saliva streaming from his jaws and marking the path behind him.
The howl split the air, cleaved apart the silence and rendered it
to nothing.

     And she saw, with earth-shaking steps, the monstrous shape
of tentacles and horns and shaggy hair that was Tarou's cursed 
form step forth to meet it, giving an answering bellow that was 
almost as loud as the thunder, almost as loud as Galm's howl.  
The two beasts met in battle, as Ranma turned to go to Cologne.
     
     Ranma hurried to where Cologne had fallen, as behind her she
heard what was probably the closest thing to immovable force
meeting irresistible object that was possible in the physical 
world take place; she was almost sure she felt the earth shake 
with the collision of the two great bodies.  She knelt down by 
the fallen woman.  Blood was mixing with rain water and flowing 
down onto the ground.  The rain was soaking Ranma's clothing to 
her skin, but she didn't care, because she was so cold inside it 
didn't matter.

     "Cologne," Ranma said, staring sickly at the bone handle of
the knife and the exposed length of the blade, straight and
double-edged, not the curving blade Galm had used before.  It had 
hit Cologne on the left side of her chest, driving through the 
black silk of her shirt and into the breast beneath, over the 
heart.  The shirt was sticky with blood.  Cologne was pale as 
snow, her breathing not even noticeable until Ranma touched her 
fingers to the other woman's neck.  The pulse was fluttering and 
weak.

     Her lips were moving, though her eyes were closed.  Ranma
leaned down and put her ear to Cologne's lips.

     "The knife..."
     
     "What?"
     
     "You have to take the knife out.  Do it straight and clean,
one pull.  I don't think it touched the heart.  It's close,
though."

     "Cologne, I don't know anything about-"
     
     "You're the best I've got right know. Put one hand on my
sternum, right between my breasts.  Yank it out as straight as
you can with the other hand."

     "Cologne, I can't touch you there-"
     
     "Ranma," Cologne whispered.  "This is not the time to get
bashful, please.  Now will you pull this damned knife out of my 
chest, or do I have to do it myself?"

     Ranma could hear Tarou and Galm fighting behind her and
Cologne, the bellowing roar of Tarou nearly as awful to hear as
Galm's howls.  Gulping, feeling the tears running down her face,
she put her left hand on Cologne's chest where the other woman 
had said.  There was the slightest feel of soft curves beneath 
her hand, and she tried desperately to ignore them.  She 
concentrated on the clammy coldness of the skin, the weak breath.  

     She wrapped her other hand tightly around the bone handle of 
the knife; the slight shift made Cologne moan in agony, and her 
eyes snapped open for a minute before closing.

     "Do it," she hissed.  
     
     Ranma did it.  
     
     The knife came out with a sound worse than anything Ranma 
had heard in her life.  Metal scraping on bone, the wet sound of
torn flesh.  The blade was straight, thankfully, such a small
thing to be thankful for.  She heard, vaguely, a bellow of pain
from nearby, the sound of something vastly heavy falling to the
ground.

     Cologne screamed, and then that was cut off in a spasm of
choking coughs.  Blood ran from her mouth as Ranma flung the 
knife aside and pressed her hands desperately over the pumping 
wound.  It did no good, none at all.  She could feel the heart 
beginning to slow, feel Cologne begin to stop breathing.

     "No..." she whispered, tears falling as the rain fell about
them.  

     There was a howl, the sound of wood splintering, another 
bellow, pain in it this time.  He heard the howl again, then it
was abruptly cut off as the sound of something snapping echoed
through the air.

     "GODDAMMIT, NO!"     

     The rain fell down her face, mingled with her tears, and
those fell upon Cologne's body.  She couldn't even feel the
heartbeat anymore.  The blood was flowing so slowly now.  Her 
hands were covered in it, and so was Cologne's chest and shirt 
and the ground.  It was everywhere.

     "No..."
     
     A soft sound rose from nearby, in a moment of silence
between the sound of the combat between Tarou and Galm.  It was
wordless, inquisitive.

     Ranma turned her head, vision half-obscured by the bangs
slicked across her eyes, the red of her hair turned almost black 
by the soaking of the rain.

     The infant that was Saffron lay on the grass nearby, flat on
his stomach.  He must have crawled from where Kima lay 
unconscious, now with Akane's form upon her from the rain.  His 
scarlet eyes were devoid of anything beyond a simple, childish 
curiosity.

     And when Ranma looked into those eyes, just for a moment, 
she saw something staring back at her.  Something hidden, behind 
barriers so vast it could never hope to escape.  But there was a
flicker, a thin flicker, a golden mote dancing in the red of the 
infant's eyes.
     
     There was no way to describe it.  She felt the grief and 
sorrow, the helplessness, melt away.  There was a fire lit inside
her head, not the hot rage, nor the icy burning.  It was a thing
made of gentle sunlight, fire that warmed but did not burn, ice
that cooled but did not freeze.  The rain had soaked the tiny
king's rich clothing to his small body.  Drops of rain shone in
the golden hair, drops of rain glittered on the jewel that hung
in the middle of his forehead, from amidst those odd plumes of 
white hair.

     And Ranma realized, in that moment, what Saffron's fate had
been.  To die again and again, to be reborn again and again, to
be a child forever, to heat and light the mountain home.  That
was his purpose, his only real purpose.  He was a king, and yet 
he was in truth little more than a slave.  A well-treated slave, 
but a slave all the same.

     And she felt in that moment something she never would have
expected to ever feel for the king of Phoenix Mountain, the one
who had come so close to ending Akane's life, to ending her life.

     Rising in her heart, from the furthest depths of her being, 
she felt a pity so great, so absolute, that there were no words
with which to render it.  How long, she wondered, how long had
this gone on?  How many years, centuries, millennia, had this 
cycle of death and rebirth taken place?  

     And somewhere, deep, deep, so far back in those red eyes, 
she saw something looking back, that understood, that was 
grateful, in this one moment, for her pity, for her 
understanding.

     There was light inside her, everywhere, spreading through 
her body like water flows to fill the shape that holds it.  She 
felt it, spreading from somewhere deep inside her, some hidden 
place.  She felt it go from her fingers, lain over Cologne's 
still body, over the terrible wound.  She felt a moment of
connection more intimate than anything she had ever felt as it
began to spread through Cologne's body.  She heard the rattling 
gasp of breath, felt the wound begin to knit, felt cold skin 
begin to grow warm, felt the beat of the heart begin again.

     And then she heard a triumphant howl behind her, and turned
to see Galm leap from the weakly-struggling, bloody and torn body 
of Tarou's beast form and come bounding towards her.  The beast 
lowered its head and simply rammed her; it felt like being hit by 
a small train.  Black stars burst in front of her eyes, and she 
felt herself flying through the air, through the torrential rain 
which was already lessening, and then the ground rose like a 
hammer to meet her.  The air exploded from her lungs, and every 
bone, every inch of skin, sung with agony.  

     She raised her head weakly from the ground to see the 
grey-haired man standing over the unmoving Cologne and the tiny
form of Saffron.  There was a blade in his hands, a feral smile
on his face, and a killing light in his eyes, and then there was
only the darkness.

**********
     
     The rain was fading away to a light shower, there on the
hilly clearing near the forest, standing in the shadow of the
tall mountains, as Galm looked around.  The great beast the boy
had become was still alive, but he had injured it so badly it
would not be moving for a while.  The girl Ranma Saotome had
become was lying a dozen feet away, unable to rise.  The woman
he'd hit with his throwing knife seemed to have recovered
somehow.  Farther away than the rest, the short-haired young
woman that wore the same clothing as the prey and carried the
same scent was stirring slightly, but that did not matter.

     None of it mattered except the tiny child, the infant at his
feet.  Perhaps it was the rain, washing away the other scents.
Perhaps it was the battle, sharpening his senses to an even
greater height than usual.  But he remembered, now, remembered 
who this child had been, and what the great voice had called in 
his head as his old chains were broken and new chains given, as 
he was thrown out from the vast darkness of his prison to this 
other prison, this bondage to those who could call him, the words 
of that mad, vast, beautiful, infinite voice:

     *Freedom, freedom, freedom, when the child of light is slain.*
     
     But he felt the scent, felt the form, and knew this was no
ordinary child.  He knew what the child was.  That was a part of 
him.  He had the knowledge of what he scented, of some of the 
deeper truths of it.  The child could not be slain easily, but he 
could be slain, by one who knew what he was doing, as he did.

     He bent down and seized the child with one hand, plucking
him up off the ground.  He took a few steps away and sat down,
ignoring how the baby wept.  It was no more and no less a
distraction than the soft sound of the few raindrops still 
falling from the sky upon the ground.  

     He laid the child on his back on the grass, reversed the
knife in his hand so it pointed downward, and closed his eyes.
He let instinct take over, the core of killing that was his very
existence, the brutal, fierce strength of his nature.  He sniffed 
the colours of the child's scent burning before his senses.

     The hand that did not hold the knife came down and seized
the centre of those paired plumes of forking white hair, grabbed
hold of the jewel that hung there.  Yes.  The weak point, the
spot of vulnerability.  Hidden to any but him, but there.  

     The knife plunged down.  The child screamed.
     
     He pulled with his other hand.  It was like trying to shift 
a mountain, impossibly heavy.  He strained.  Muscles corded his 
arm and shoulder.  And slowly, slowly, he felt it begin to give.  
He twisted the knife in the child's heart, smiled, his eyes still
closed.  The child screamed again, a high wail of pain.

     And then, with the sound of air imploding, he felt it tear
free in his grip.  He opened his eyes to see what he held.  A
crown, sized for an adult.  It was a band of braided gold and
silver, with the form of a bird at the front.  The wings were
spread to the sides, and two long plumes descended from the
body, a feathered tail.  A golden chain was threaded through the 
beak, a diamond-cut jewel on the end.  
     
     And the child was gone.  In his place there was a man with
golden wings and hair.  The hair hung down to his feet, covering
his nakedness, but not the great wound over his heart from the
knife.  He was taking slow, gasping breaths, his pale scarlet
eyes half-slitted closed from pain.

     "Brother?" he whispered.  "Brother, what is it?"
     
     "No brother here," Galm said, tossing the crown aside and
raising his knife again.  "Just me.  Just me.  And I'm about as
far from a brother as you're ever likely to meet."

**********

     Ranma heard the child scream, and managed to open her eyes
again.  The rain had slowed in the time she'd been unconscious,
and was now only thin drops across her body.

     Galm was kneeling by the body of a winged man with golden
hair.  His knife dripped blood, and he held a shining object in
his other hand.  He flung it away and raised the knife again.

     There was a scream of rage and grief, in Akane's voice, and
then Kima was crashing into Galm, white uniform hanging loose
around Akane's smaller body.  The attack was useless.  Galm 
grabbed her by the throat, raised her high, brought the knife 
back-

     "CUT THE CHAINS!" a voice screamed from far away, vaguely
familiar, half-remembered.  "CUT HIS CHAINS!  IT IS THE ONLY 
WAY!"

     Ranma sprang to her feet, not even understanding.  She did
the only thing she could; dropped whatever edge of control she'd
maintained, reached back inside herself, and let pure instinct
take over.  Her eyes closed, and then she felt the power flow
through her, burning pain, dark light, icy fire.  

     Lines of light unfolded from the blackness of her vision, a 
cage of silver, twisting skeins of air and earth, dancing shapes 
of the clouds, the harsh glow of life, the flowing structures of
reality, inner forces of spirit and soul and power-

     And a thing loomed before her, a shape that was somehow more
than one shape at once, a great wolf with bloody jaws, a man who
held scales, a woman in a shroud, something that was somehow only
mouths, so many shapes that her mind could not compass them, some
so utterly alien that she could not even hope to comprehend their
meaning-

     Image overlaid image, a dozen times, a hundred times, and 
hundreds of others, hundreds upon hundreds, all at once, and they
were true, they were all true.  And there was a line, an anchor,
an aching unreality of darkness beyond black, like a slash in the
fabric of the world, stretching off from the shape across some
vast gulf, a connection, a chain, a binding.

     She stretched her hand forward and slashed through the 
black chain as easily as a knife through warm butter.  She felt
the impossible coldness of it as she did, the vast, soul-searing
hunger, for just a moment.  It snapped at her like steel jaws,
tried to drag her down, pull her within that horrible icy chill,
and she knew if she fell into this then there was no return, no
return to anything of warmth-

     And with an effort of will and a silent resistance against
the devouring of all her being, she dragged herself back from the
edge.  

     Her eyes snapped open, and she saw Galm still there, with 
Kima in Akane's body held by the throat and dangled above the 
ground.  His eyes were masses of pure gold, pupils and whites 
vanished, irises swelled to fill the entire eyesocket.  Around 
him, the air writhed as if in pain.

     "FREEEEEEEEEEE!" the grey-haired man howled joyously.
"FREE!"

     He began to bring the knife forward.  "FREEEE-"
     
     And then, he and the air around him seemed to unfold, like
the shape of an origami bird unfolds to reveal only blank paper.
For a moment, the space he had occupied seemed to be an inversion
of itself, a negative image of empty space, and then it was 
normal again, and Galm was gone, that last howl echoing in 
Ranma's ears.
     
     With the hand on her throat gone, Kima dropped to the 
ground, swaying unsteadily on Akane's feet.  The curved knife 
Galm had carried, the one with which he'd stabbed Saffron, was 
buried in the ground at her feet, point dug into the turf.

     Ranma stood up and walked over, across the rain-slick grass,
in the cold shadow of the mountain, through the soft caress of
falling rain.  Kima was shivering, hugging her arms around 
herself and weeping as she looked at the golden-haired man upon 
the ground.  It must be Saffron, Ranma realized.  It could be no 
one else.  

     Seeing Akane weep, even if it wasn't truly Akane, made 
something hurt deep inside her.  She reached out and touched that
familiar shoulder, saw Akane's familiar head turn, and the look
in the eyes was utterly alien to Akane, grief and rage, and so 
cold, so cold.

     "Don't touch me, groundling," Kima hissed.  "Have you not
done enough already?  My king is dying."

     "Kima..."
     
     A shivering sob wracked Akane's form, that familiar face
twisted into sorrow and the dark eyes closed.  "Go."

     "At least put this on," Ranma said, slipping off her blue,
wooden-tied shirt, the black undershirt beneath clinging damply 
to the curves of the female body she wore now, the false form of
Jusenkyou.  The slender neck and elegant head of the dragon on
her skin flowed around the upper curve of her right breast.  
"You'll catch pneumonia, runnin' around in that outfit in this 
weather.  It doesn't even fit you in that body."

     Kima said nothing, but she allowed Ranma at least to drape
the blue shirt around her shoulders.  Ranma knelt down by 
Saffron.  He looked much as he had as an adult the last time 
Ranma had seen him, though his hair was entirely golden now, and 
the white crest of plumes with the tiny jewel was gone from his 
brow.  And there was no rage in his eyes, as he slowly drew his 
dying breaths.

     "You showed me, didn't you?" Ranma said.  "How to heal
Cologne.  Somehow, you did.  Thank you."

     "You are welcome," Saffron whispered.
     
     "Can... can I use it to help you?" Ranma asked.
     
     "No," Saffron said.  "The wound is too great."
     
     "I'm sorry," Ranma said.  
     
     "I am the one who must beg forgiveness," Saffron said.
"Though I do not expect you to grant it.  For what I did to you
and your love in my other form."

     "It wasn't you," Ranma said.  "I know that now."
     
     "But it was," Saffron said.  "It was always me.  I could
see, but I couldn't stop it.  Oh, the Light forgive me.  Oh, 
brother, forgive me."

     "Brother?" Ranma said.
     
     "Is he here?" Saffron said.  "Brother?"
     
     His eyes half-closed, then snapped open again.
     
     "Brother?" Kima whispered in Akane's voice as she knelt.
     
     "My brother," Saffron said.  "Is he here?"
     
     "I know of no brother," Kima said.  "Lord Saffron.  Forgive
me.  I have failed you.  I am beyond forgiveness, yet I ask you
grant it anyway, that I may end my life knowing that your light
shall-"

     "Shh..." Saffron said.  He looked up at Kima, and Ranma
realized he knew it was her, that to those pale, scarlet eyes
flecked with swimming motes of gold there was no disguise 
offered by that false form.  "I could have asked for no more 
loyal a servant than you.  It is my time.  It was predicted.  It 
is done at last."

     He closed his eyes, and whispered his next words.  
"Brother?"

     "I am here," a strong young voice said from behind them.
Turning his head, Ranma saw a brown-haired man in brown robes,
with black wings turned darker by the falling of the rain.  His
green eyes were sorrowful.  There was a raven upon his shoulder.

     "Samofere?" Kima said, softly, wonderingly.
     
     The young man nodded.  "I shall explain later.  If I may 
speak with my brother?"

     "I better check on Tarou and Cologne anyway," Ranma said,
deciding everything right now was so confusing that she was just
going to try and focus on one thing at a time.

     "They will be alright," Samofere said.  "Though I fear your
bestial friend may be in some pain for a time.  The hound wounded
him gravely."

     He turned to Kima, in Akane's body.  "Kima, if you have
anything more to say to my brother, let it be done now.  I must
speak with him before the last of his strength is gone."

     Kima nodded and took one of Saffron's hands in hers.  Ranma
realized with surprise they were human, not the bird talons he 
had borne before.  She brought it up to Akane's lips and kissed
it, gently, eyes closed and tears leaking from beneath the lids.

     "Farewell, my king," she whispered, the sorrow aching in her
voice.  "Forgive me."

     She stood up.  Samofere looked at her sadly, then knelt down
by his brother.  Shiso flapped from his shoulder to land on
Ranma's, gently reaching out to run his beak through her hair.  
He made a soft croaking sound, mournful, sorrowing.

     "What I have to say is for my brother alone," Samofere said.
"If you would?"

     Ranma nodded, saw Kima nod a moment later.  He began to walk
towards where the great form of Tarou lay, hair matted with blood
and soaked with rain, flanks heaving slowly up and down, unable 
to move due to dozens of wounds.  He glanced back, saw Kima 
following behind him, walking on Akane's legs, weeping with 
Akane's eyes, and with the crystal drops of the rain shining in 
the darkness of Akane's hair.
     
     Behind them, they left two brothers, one dark and one fair,
one living and one dying, upon the rain-slick grass.  He saw,
before he turned his head away, Samofere lay Saffron's head in
his lap, and stroke his brow with his fingers, so softly and
tenderly, with such love, that it hurt to see.

     And overhead, far overhead, beyond the vision of any upon
the ground, the black cloud of crows circled for a few moments
longer, and then soared towards Phoenix Mountain, bearing the
news of what they had seen with them.

**********

     There were three who felt Galm's bindings snap, the hidden
chain of power that bound him both to his service and to this 
plane of reality broken asunder.  All of them were far across the 
ocean when they heard, in their heads, a howl brutal as murder 
that echoed through their skulls.  Then they heard it abruptly 
cut off, as he was hurled back through the walls between worlds, 
back to the place of imprisonment he'd escaped from before.  

     Two of those three scowled, knowing their plan was come to
failure.  They had some small compensation in what Galm had
found by sheer chance in Ryugenzawa.  But they were patient, and
could afford to wait.  Other opportunities would present
themselves.

     The last of the three smiled, as he packed his bags in 
preparation for a journey.  He had made a great many journeys in 
his life; he had been going to and fro in the earth, and walking 
up and down in it.  He thought that this one might be his last.  
He knew what the end of the hound of hell's binding meant.  As 
before, he walked to the balcony of his hotel room and stared out 
across the cityscape of Tokyo, out across the harbour, out across 
the ocean.  His pale blue eyes were hard, flat, glacial-cold.
     
     He gazed out for a long time, waiting, watching, listening.
There would be a sign.  There always was a sign, if he looked for
it.
     
     Finally, in the night sky above, he saw a black-feathered, 
yellow-eyed shape turn one long circle, and lift its carrion 
voice to the air in a harsh cry that was like laughter.  He 
thought about it for a moment, then decided it was a possibly a
good omen.  

     Then, slowly, he saw something darker than the air around it
falling down from the sky towards him, swaying from side to side
in the air.

     He reached up his hand to grasp it, and saw by the light
shining through the closed glass-fronted doors of the balcony
that he held a greasy black feather in his open palm.  For a
moment, some chance trick of the light made it seem golden rather
than the dank, dark colour it had been at first.

     Overhead, the crow banked to the west and soared away,
sending another cry into the night as it did.  He watched it go
for a moment, then turned back to the feather.
     
     And suddenly, he held only a stain of ashes upon his hand,
long gone cold and dead as if from a fire burned out a century
ago, in the shape of a feather.  He smiled, for he had been sent 
a sign, and one that pleased him greatly.

    The Phoenix was fallen.  And whatever new king would rise
from the ashes, he believed his lord's will would be done.  He 
threw his hand out and scattered the ashes to the wind, and 
laughed and laughed and laughed, as he watched the ashes fall
from the light to the darkened city streets below.