One Thousand Cranes

The door to the room that Corey shares with Karasu is closed, but as he approaches it, he can hear the sounds of a conversation inside. Caution slows a little, and he hears Karasu talking to Wuya. "I tell you, it is a perfect plan. He will not expect a gift fully four months before the occasion."

"There is a reason for that." Wuya responds saucily. "You are meant to give it on-time."

Karasu makes a small amused noise. "I want it to be a surprise birthday gift Wuya. That is the point." There's a sound of shifting and then Wuya making a semi-distressed sigh.

"You never listen to me." The common complaint of familiars everywhere.

Corey has stilled entirely when he hears Wuya and Karasu talking, and the discussion of a birthday gift is a pang in the paladin's heart. He remembers well that Karasu didn't understand the notion of a birthday celebration until he came into the human assassin's life. He remembers surprising Karasu with a birthday gift and explaining the concept to him. And...

He has to ruin everything.

The paladin takes a deep breath and raps on the door. "Karasu?" He tries to hide the pain in his voice. "It's me, Cor'ethil."

There's a soft noise from inside and then a worried warble from Wuya before Karasu pops the door open and there's a lightly surprised look on the one-time assassin's face. "Cor'ethil! I was not expecting you back from your walk so soon." His slightly flushed face gives this away and he finally backs away from the door, opening it to allow the other man inside.

It's immediately clear that Karasu had made an attempt to decorate. There are snow-white paper flowers made from origami and cut-out leaves made of a less expensive sort of paper which gives them a soft petable look and a small amount of ivory color. They've been pinned to the wall with glue which has left a small scent in the room, but a slightly cracked window makes the scent not as remarkable. "I ah.... Happy Birthday?"

There's even a picnic laid out on the bed, a blanket they usually use when they're out in the forest and foods that Karasu has seen him choose for those outings that have become a pleasure to them both. Wuya shifts nervously from foot to foot, looking at Cor'ethil hopefully.

Meanwhile, Karasu has spotted the bag in the other man's hand. "A snack? I am sure that it will make a fine addition to the meal... If... you will join me that is." Karasu seems almost unnaturally nervous.

Cor'ethil's heart swells and breaks all at once. Why a birthday present for him so early? Unless Karasu doesn't plan to be around for his birthday. Unless Karasu is... pure and earnest in wanting it to be a total surprise. Which could be the case.

His eyes fill with tears. "I love it, Karasu," he says. "But..."

Corey closes the door behind him. "This bag is from Sori. He wanted me to abandon you. I... I can't. You know I can't." Already he's breaking down, the tears spilling down his face. Some paladin he is, falling apart like this so quickly in private quarters, and in the face of something so lovely and wonderful. How horrible, for Karasu's efforts to be met with such news and such a face full of anguish. "I'm sorry."

The length of time between the but and the next words that Corey says feel like the longest moment to Karasu. Then Cor'ethil says that word. 'Sori'. His face shuts down entirely, and even Wuya grows suspiciously still. Karasu's eyes drop to the bag and he blinks slowly. It's a tell that Corey has grown to know. He does it to give himself time to think before he acts.

His hands lift to Corey's face, tilting it to his own. "He did not hurt you." It's not a question. Karasu would have seen the tear, smelled the blood. He pauses a moment, and then speaks again. "What did he say? Did he give you a reason for... him wanting that?"

This is Karasu who is always trying to prepare for what needs preparing for. Trying to understand so that he can plan the next twenty steps ahead. "Come my kokoro, I can not have you so sad, we are not parted." Not yet.

There's a litany of dark little whispers in Corey's head. How is it that he's the one who's falling apart and Karasu's so strong? Isn't he supposed to be the paladin here? Maybe Sori was right and he is just a child having a tantrum. But there's Karasu's comfort, and Corey feels it at least. "Sori... He wanted to have me abandon you, so that you were all alone and not gathering allies. He said he could guarantee that you would continue to remain alive, and that his plans require you to be alone."

He shakes his head gently. "He said the bag contains gifts that you gave him, willingly over time, and... I told him no. I wouldn't abandon you. I _can't_ abandon you. I saw and felt his aura, Karasu. He's as evil as a human can get; I might have destroyed him myself if he didn't have numerous agents waiting in the area. I can't trust someone who would promise that you would be alive, but has historically demonstrated no care at all for your happiness and wellbeing."

The words send a flicker of surprise through Karasu. "He must be planning something that I would want to move against; to want me unaided. Perhaps some move involving my brother." Worry pulls his lips into a thin line and he shakes his head, and his eyes flicker to the bag once before dismissing it entirely. "Logic dictates that we do not give him what he wants. I can not see evil as you can my kokoro, and I would not hasten to call him evil. Practical yes. Evil..."

Karasu shrugs here. "Only Vardama knows the true weight of our souls. Yet your eyes are the truest scale I could find outside Her halls." His fingers trace Cor'ethil's face more surely. "I do not doubt his words, if he were to act outside of honor then those that follow him so blindly would abandon him; so he will not lie. Yet like those you know of; he may make the sky seem green with his words if he can. Did the contents upset you this much Cor'ethil?" This is asked more softly.

"Gilead has given me the gift to see the auras of evil, as I am sworn to defend all of the good and twilight against evil," Cor'ethil gently replies. He closes his eyes, taking a soft breath. "I mean it when I say that man is evil. His aura is only slightly better than that of a fiend walking forth from the Hells. Were he to go to Vardama now as he is, I am convinced that the Gray Harpist would have no sweet song to sing for him, although I am not one of her own and cannot speak for her."

His eyes open again. "I just... I cannot allow a world in which you are to die so young. I cannot allow a world where you are to die so soon. I won't permit it. I won't allow it. There are so many people who want to _take you_ from me."

There, that's the unpaladin-ly bit. It troubles him. But it is his struggle. "I don't want you apart from me. Not for all the days that are in your natural lifespan. I don't want you robbed from me before your coil must return. I... I am a poor paladin." Yet Gilead is with him. Yet his powers have not fled from him.

Karasu is at a loss for words for a moment, trying to find the words to address that which concerns his heart. "I was never meant to live until an old age my kokoro. Perhaps that is why Vardama placed my heart inside this strong body of yours; so that it might live so many years beyond what I endure. I can not say when time will take me, but it is not likely that you will watch me age... If I could give you those years; I would, but they are not mine to offer."

His finger soothe the vessel that carries his heart, this beloved Cor'ethil whom has begun to soften him in ways that he at times finds frightening. "You are a poor nothing, come... set aside this bag; whatever it may be, and celebrate with me. We give nothing to those that threaten us."

It's unfair, and part of what Cor'ethil struggles with is that he has lived a life where good effort was rewarded--he did his diligent training, and good things happened to him because he worked hard for it. He had a good home. He had a good family. He can return to Llyranost at any time to them. And yet there is Karasu--whose life is categorically what Cor'ethil can consider 'unfair' almost from the time that Karasu had left the cradle to grow into adulthood--and Cor'ethil simply cannot comprehend why. "I wish I could be content with just your heart," he murmurs, not for the first time nor the last.

The remark about the bag, however, makes Corey's silver eyes blink. "Sori said the bag was filled with gifts that you gave him," he says. "I haven't checked it yet, nor its contents. Do you know what they are?" He doesn't trust Sori at all.

Karasu looks at the bag. "Not with certainty." Which is as good as saying that he has no idea. "Is it ensorcelled?" Best to be cautious when dealing with Sori.

The question is a good one. Corey regards the bag for a moment. "Let me check?" While all llyranesi have arcane connection, Corey has not honed his beyond the simple casting of cantrips, and he focuses on detecting magic. It's usually Karasu's job to detect, but at this moment... Corey desperately needs to feel like the protector he wants to be.

His eyes briefly glow blue, and then he shakes his head. "No magic," he says.

Karasu nods and then looks at Corey. "If you are not willing to look, I will do it. I doubt that is anything that I have not seen. Though I can not remember any gifts that I gave to him." He shakes his head. "Akimitsu Sōri... I wish that I knew what he was up to. It has been too long since I was in xian."

As Karasu speaks, naming the man who had raised him as an assassin, Corey opens the bag. He stares for a long moment at its contents. Bones. Bones that, at first, he does not recognize. They confuse him. Why bones? Why would Karasu have given... Sori... bones?

A light dawns in his head. It's blood-red.

"Karasu," he says in a voice that's thick with horror, "why are there finger bones in this bag?" Silver eyes look up at Karasu, horrified of the answer that's to come.

Again that thinking blink. Yet when Karasu speaks, gently taking the bag from Cor'ethil's fingers. "When I was young, if I made an error, he would remove one of my fingers. So that the lesson would be a painful reminder that I had errored." He takes Cor'ethil's hand in his own. "Then he would tell the priest that worked for him, to regrow the fingers, so that I could do what was necessary. I am sorry that you had to see this my kokoro."

His eyes are dark with the echo of regret. "You would not like his teaching methods; none of them were kind Cor'ethil; but they were effective."

Karasu's right; Corey doesn't like the methods. He's shaking his head, tears welling up in his eyes again. How many fingers has the hand holding his lost? How many times has Karasu been so cruelly mistreated by this 'teacher' of his? "I don't care how effective it was," Corey says in reply. "You should never have been treated like this. He needs to be brought to justice. His evil must be removed from the world. Or other people will be raised and taught in this manner."

He looks at Karasu, squeezing the other man's hand gently. "I love you, Karasu," he says. "Nobody... Nobody ever stood up for you growing up. That's plainly evident to me now. But that doesn't have to keep being the case. _I_ can. I _will_. That's why I'm being so stubborn and bullish about everything. Because I love you, and... Even if me being here doesn't fix what happened, because I can't go back in time... it means someone cares. I care." Corey's not articulating himself very well, but he's emotional. It's to be expected.

"This is why you are my heart, as well as the one I love." Karasu says. "That you feel that which is beyond me." His hands capture more tears and he carelessly tucks the bag of bones into his belt so that he can do so. "Please. No more tears. I have a gift to give you, one I think that you will like, and I have a meal to share. Let me make my kokoro smile."

Wuya croaks. "Let him cry if he wants to Karasu. The gift can wait."

Karasu chuckles lightly here and nods once. "My familiar is right. I forget that emotions need time." He leans down then and kisses Cor'ethil gently. "I am here." He folds himself against the other man then, offering a place of safety for the paladin's tears.

It's an odd thing. Corey just wants to take Karasu's hands--which have lost so many fingers, precious for all of the fingers that he has now--and hold them forever in his hands, as though that might protect them forever. As though holding Karasu might protect him forever.

So he gives in. The paladin just yearns to protect his Karasu, his beloved. He leans in and embraces Karasu, putting his lips to Karasu's skin and kissing the man in random places on the man's head. "I love you," he says softly. "I love you." More kisses, given at wild abandon, given for the man who is, as far as he's concerned...

"You are my gift." Corey whispers that gently. "Your very presence is a gift to me. That's why I cry at the thought of losing you."

Karasu chuckles. "Come now, you will make nothing of the gift I've to give to you?" He offers that small secretive smile of his and starts to lead Cor'ethil to the bed. "I think you will indeed like it. I was going to keep it a secret until the end of our meal... But I think now that you should have it first." He pats the bed, encouraging the other man to take a set there and pulling out a box from under the bed for Cor'ethil. It's a moderately sized box.

Finally, Corey gives a little laugh, a joyful little thing, teased out of him by Karasu's words and smile. He takes a seat and takes the box. "I just mean that... I could be happy if all I ever had was you. Anything else is a wonderful extra joy." Yet he doesn't dismiss this gift.

"Wuya... Would you like to help me open it?" Corey hasn't forgotten his favorite best-buddy. "I know you like opening presents."

Wuya does a happy little tail bob and hops over to the bed. He eyes Karasu a moment. "Maybe just a little?" Cautious bird, but to his surprise, Karasu relents and nods. The bird chirps happily and hops over to tug-tug on the ribbon holding the box shut. Two tugs and the ribbon falls apart and he hops back. "There! I helped!" He sounds entirely too pleased with himself.

"You certainly did!" Corey compliments Wuya, leaning down to kiss the bird on the head and pet his feathers. The bird-boy gets love, too, especially where Karasu's a bit more reserved in his displays. "I couldn't have done it without you."

It's a little Corey-lie, because physically, he could have... But would he have wanted to? No. So he's grinning from ear to ear as he opens up the box. That grin disappears as he sees what's inside.

Hundreds of little folded paper cranes, with folds in their backs that resemble the shape of roses. All in different sizes and different colors. Absolutely beautiful in shape and form, and absolutely beautiful to Corey in their meaning. He looks up at Karasu and his eyes water again. "For me?" he asks. "You made these all for me? Oh, Karasu!"

Karasu flushes a little. "It is simply... I know that your people create a grand Curuchuil when they wed." His dark eyes meet Corey's. "I am not capable of gardening real flowers. Nor of carving stone. Nor any other work of art save..."

He motions to the paper cranes. "In my lands we have a belief that if you fold a thousand of these that your wish might come true. I am hoping then, that you might grant that wish."

Corey flushes in kind. It's true; his family has a curuchuil. He could even add himself and Karasu to it if they so wanted. Yet... Karasu had never indicated marriage to him before? He didn't want to pressure Karasu into such a thing, but... Mother would certainly permit Karasu and himself being in the curuchuil without such a formal bond. "Are you asking what I think you're asking?" he asks, his silver eyes alight in pure surprise and anticipatory joy.

The flush deepens just a little on Karasu’s cheeks. "I believe so. I would like if we could marry, if you would spend the rest of my life at my side... however much time I have left Cor'ethil... I offer it to you."

The anticipatory joy transforms into overflowing joy, moving Corey to tears once again as he immediately reaches out to embrace Karasu again. He has his beloved in his arms. Always and forever, bound at the heart, forever immortalized in the Cari'thana curuchuil garden: his love for Karasu, and Karasu's love for him. "Yes," Cor'ethil murmurs before planting many, many kisses onto Karasu's cheeks and lips: little things that are no less a measure of his love for the other man for their size, but many because it is all that Cor'ethil can think of for his beloved.

Finally, Corey allows himself to exist in the moment, as it's finally sunk in what Karasu means when he says that he is not dead yet. He is alive. They are alive. They exist together. Why spend time crying and lamenting what is to come ahead?

_I must write to my mother and tell her what's happening._ Corey vows this. There will be a proper curuchuil. There will be a wedding in some fashion. Whatever Karasu wants, he gets.

A thousand cranes will see their wish come true.

-End