Disclaimer: Tamora Pierce owns the Tortal crew is, but my characters I do control.

A/N: Well, here's the third chapter like I promise. Read it and review please. I would really enjoy.

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Chapter 3: Confusion

I silently tag along behind Sosonokatsu and glare daggers into the back of his head. Every time he looked back, I was all happy and smiles, but as soon as he looked away, he was my living practice board again.

How dare he. First he picks me up and carries me off! Then he grabs me around my waist and pulls me into an embrace, close into his nice, warm body- no! I will not think that! But- no, that's not all. Ohhh, no. That's not all. He had to KISS ME! Well at least it was on my neck. Maybe if he- NO! Stop thinking those things. Hey, you! Voice in my head, yeah, you. Get the hell out!

"We're here."

His silky voice breaks my train of thoughts and mental ranting. I look up, only to be surrounded by beautiful paintings. There is a mixture of landscaping, skyscraping, still art, live art, animals, people and immortals. All are done by professionals. Unlike the artists at my lands, these people were better than I, and most likely human.

"It's beautiful! Thank you."

I glance at him and I see an emotion I haven't seen on anybody's face in a while. I rake my brain for a few seconds for the answer.

Is it... pride I see in his eyes?

I believed it was my imagination because it was gone so suddenly.

"I knew you would love it."

That startled me a little. "Have you been stalking me?"

That seemed to hurt his feelings a little, although I know not why. It could've just been my stupid imagination again; as was the pride. His face was like a mask again; no emotion at all, not even in his eyes.

He whirled on his heels and stormed out of the room and back out into the hallway. Suddenly I am angry. Nobody, I repeat, nooobody, walks out on me without finishing a conversation, walking out in the middle of it. Who does he think he is!? King of the world? Just because he was a prince gave him no right to treat me like this. I'm getting tired of it. I stomp out after him.

"Why did you just leave like that? You could've said something ya know?"

He just walked on, as silent as ever. His attitude was lighting my fuse. First he's kind shows me the pictures. Then he whirls out of there like I slapped him in the face. Now he's giving me the could shoulder.

"Hey! I'm talking to you!" I grab his arm and twirl him around until he's facing my direction. He glared down at me. "I don't know what your problem is bub, but I don't like your attitude. Are you listening to me?"

"My problem is my problem."

"Your acting like a woman on her moon cycle. Stop it and answer me correctly!"

This seems to piss him off. To my surprise, he grips my arms, just below my shoulders, hard, then slams me against a door to an unused room and shakes me once... firmly, that left me quivering inside.

"Now listen here wench. Just stop talking. You're starting to get on my nerves and hurt my ears. All you've done so far is insult me. Don't push me over the edge."

"YOU OVER THE EDGE!? YOU OVER THE EDGE!? YOU'RE THE ONE WHO TOOK ME TO MY ROOM WITHOUT TELLING ME WHO YOU WERE! YOU'RE THE ONE WHO PULLED ME INTO YOUR ARMS! YOU'RE THE ONE THAT KISSED ME, even if it was on my neck! THEN YOU JUST GO AND DISAPPEARED. YOU, YOU... UGH!"

He was as calm as ever. "You were in danger because I was there, so I left."

"IN DANGER! IN DANGER! YOU SAY I WAS I DANGER!? HE SAYS I WAS IN DANGER! LIS-"

"Shut up."

My eyes just about fell out of my head. BOOM, there went the gunpowder barrel. "SHUT UP!? SHUT UP!? YOU JUST TOLD ME TO SHUT UP!? I'LL SHOW YOU TO TELL ME TO SHUT UP YOU COLD, UNFEELING BASTARD!"

"I am not unfeeling."

"SO YOU ADMIT TO BEING A COLD BASTARD!"

He caught my flying fist around my wrist. With his other hand, he caught my counter fist. He brought both into my chest, and then held them with one hand. His grip was strong. I tried to struggle out, but it was firm. He opened the door behind me. It was dark. There's furniture in there, but I could tell nobody used it, nor entered this room entered this room in quite a while. The scents within here were decades old.

I was about to start yelling again, but his mouth crashed onto mine in a heated kiss. All of the fight just went out of me, along with the tension and self control. My tail uncurled and my hybrid form came out. My hair turned into a silky, silver shade and my ears became pointed and furry. He put one hand on the nape of my neck and pulled me closer to him while wrapping his other arm around my waist.

Just as he started to take my kimono top off, he stopped. He breaks away and leaves the room. I stare at the door, totally dumbfounded. I regain my senses and my anger comes back ten fold.

He's seducing me to gain his way!? Oh, ho, ho. Now he's in for it. Two can play that game.

I hear a commotion on the other side of the door. At first I was confused. There was only a huge hallway on the other side of the door. I shake my head when I hear the shing of a sword being unsheathed. I rushed over to the door and crouched down, looking through the keyhole. (A/N: "Curiosity killed the cat.")

There were youkai with jet black hair attacking Sosonokatsu. All he had were claws and fangs to attack with while they had long katanas. They all kept at a patterned attack; one after another, the five would-be assassins attacked. All of a sudden, one of the assassins dashed up from somewhere behind and ran his sword through the stomach of Sosonokatsu.

"NO!"

I didn't know that the scream came from me until I rushed out of the room. I stood over Katsu's unconscious body; withdrawing and flipping open my fan. I bared my fangs and leapt at the ninja who's sword went through Katsu, and slit his throat with my kobudou sensu. I caught his katana before it fell and put my folded fan back into my obi all in one fluid moment.

I was back over Katsu within seconds. I then cock an eyebrow at the ninjas, which is a difficult feat when you're scowling at them. One ran at me. My mock worked on the baka. It was fighting with anger now, which was her fatal mistake. I inch to the side a little and she ran right past me. My sword went down through its heart as it went flying past and was instantly dead.

The other three ninja leapt through the portal I just noticed, which would count on how they got in here without alerting the guards. I heard the guards coming and surprisingly, my whole body became human at will; I wasn't able to do that earlier. Meaning that my paws were human feet now and hurting while in the boots made for paws. Claws, fangs, and cat-slit eyes I would normally had, weren't there anymore. Usually if I didn't try to hide my eyes, they would be a dark amethyst, but now they were dark green.

Shaking my head out of my brief glee, I throw the katana back onto it's original owner. I then put my feet under me while putting Sosonokatsu's head in my lap. I gentle play with his hair as I set my healing magic into him to slow his bleeding; that was the only thing with in healing I knew.

"Don't die on me now. You baka, you owe me a tour of the castle still, to get to know the place!"

The guards took their sweet ass time getting here. I believed that they were being slow, even for human standards. I think bribery was taken place. Surely if I hadn't been here, Katsu would've died because he was stabbed by a youkai poison sword. They looked surprised to see me there; which made me believe the bribery even more. The moaning of Sosonokatsu in my lap seems to have awaken them from their stupor.

I clear my throat and look at them. "I need a healer right away. Send your fastest runner. He's dying here!"

The boy took off at full speed. He was pretty fast, for a human. A few minutes later, he returned with six healers; two carrying a stretcher. They put Sosonokatsu on it and hurry away. I then notice a pile of ashes as some guards were sweeping it away I wanted to follow after them, but the guards held me back for "questioning" they say.

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Translations:

Baka: idiot, fool, or stupid

Haku: white

Hanyou: half-breed

Inu: dog

Katana: a type of curved sword that Japanese samurai use, or in this case, Yamani samurai

Kimono: a Japanese out fit that girls mostly wear

Kobudou: fighting in close combat with weapons

Obi: the tie around the middle of a kimono

Sakura: the blossoms of a tree

Sensu: a flip fan used in Japan

Youkai: demon

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A/N: Hello again. I hoped you like this chapter. I had great fun writing it and a greater time typing it up while changing some of it at the same time. Always I do that. I type it up and change something in every chapter. And trust me, the type up is ten times better than the written.

Anyhoo, please review. I got a lot more chapters to write so I gotta go. Hope you've enjoyed this one. It might be a while for the other chapters to update. You can't carry a computer in your backpack now can you? ; Anyways, please, please, please review. Oh and did I mention REVIEW.