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Return to the Labyrinth	By : Capitalist Category: +. to F > Card Captor Sakura Views: 8619 -:- Recommendations : 1 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I do not own Card Captor Sakura, nor any of the characters from it, nor do I own Labyrinth. I do not make any money from the writing of this story.

Chapter List
- 4
- 5
- 6
Chapter 5

‘past unlocked’

Their powerful, meaty hands wrapped around his arms and yanked, again. Li was jerked right off his feet, the stones scraping along underneath him as the trolls dragged him into the city. He fought, but their grip was too strong. They were too heavy, too many to fight off. He couldn’t even remember what he’d done, but he knew what was coming. He struggled, but he couldn’t ever fight hard enough to get free. Thatched huts and the jeering, pointing city folk passed in a blur. They knew what was coming too.

The whipping post loomed, its heavy manacles dangling, and for a split second they readjusted their grip to force his wrists into them. Now! He twisted and jabbed his knee into the gut of the one on his right, jamming his foot behind the knee of the other in almost the same breath. They barked with surprise and pain and he bolted, sprinting back to the spread of huts and obscurity of the crowd. Maybe this time he would make it; he was running so fast and escape was so close.

No, not this time, not ever. Just a step away from a shadowy alley his body froze, again, and he was trapped. They came for him, cuffed him on the head for trying to escape, and dragged him back to the post for his punishment. Like a statue of living ice Yue stood on the steps of his castle, arms crossed, eyes smug.

“Did you really think you could escape me, Little Wolf?”

“Why are you doing this?” Li begged, but Yue did not answer. They threw him against the post and locked his wrists in the dangling manacles, snickering when they ripped off his shirt. “This is a dream,” he whispered, curling his grip around the chains in preparation. “This is a dream, I’ve already been through this, why do you keep making me go through it again?”

The whip bit into his back and Li recoiled, fighting to keep the scream inside. Yue’s eyes flashed silver.

“Li Syaoran, do not think you will ever escape me. You still belong to me. I have a task for you.”

Again the whip struck, and Li gritted his teeth.

“He hunts the princess. You must protect her. I will send you to her world, and you will find her and bring her back here.”

Again. Li gasped for air, his back on fire with pain. “I know! I did, I already did that!”

“You will hide her in the labyrinth, you will guard her. You will give your life if you have to. You will do whatever you must to keep her safe.”

“I know!” Li screamed, his breath coming in ragged pants now. “I will! I already told you I would! Let me go!”

“You will not touch her. She is the princess. You are nothing. You are nothing. You are nothing.”

Over and over again the whip bit into him, flaying his skin, spilling his blood. Li screamed from both pain and frustration.

“I did everything you ordered! Why do you keep forcing me through this, don’t you ever get tired of torturing me? I hate you, Yue! I hate you!”

“Fail, and I will kill you myself. Remember your king, Little Wolf. Remember your task. Do not fail me.”

“Let me go!” Li screamed, and woke. Only an entire lifetime of concealing his presence from Yue’s trolls kept his mouth clamped shut, his clawed hands digging at the grass around him while he struggled to get control over his breathing. To his unadjusted vision, the night was pitch black and pressed in on him, thick with Yue’s unseen stare. Was he watching, somewhere? Spying on his favorite slave to make sure he was doing the job he swore he’d do, forcing nightmares on him for fun?

“Just leave me alone,” Li whispered, and buried his face in his hands. They were not the only part of his body trembling.

Eventually he came back to reality, just like always. The imagined pain, so real in his dreams, faded away to a distant memory. His eyesight adapted, and the shapes and motion of his surroundings came into focus. He was in the woods, the stream flowing quietly beside him, Kero flat on his back and snoring nearby. The princess was asleep too, by the tree, her still form mostly visible because of the little white dress she wore. For five years he’d gone to sleep dreaming of her face, and still she managed to be even more beautiful than he remembered.

You are nothing.

Li rolled to his feet and put several steps between them, keeping his back turned to her. In the east the sky was paling, what could be seen of it anyway, and dawn was not far off. They could eat breakfast here in the woods, and then move on ready for a full day’s walking in the labyrinth. At least they no longer had to worry about heading to the castle to rescue her annoying brother.

In a motion as old and familiar as breathing, Li activated his sword and drew it in a lazy, comfortable horizontal slash. Then a step back and a downward strike, forward and thrust, spin and slash again. He repeated the motions until the dream had been pushed back into the farthest corner of his mind, mixing in new attacks and whatever else struck his fancy, designing a routine only he would know. Then he happened to turn back in the direction of the others and saw she was awake, sitting up and watching him.

He stopped. “Your highness. Did I wake you?”

“Mm, I’m not sure.” They both spoke softly, more out of deference to the stillness around them than to the still-snoring Kero. “I woke up for some reason, maybe it was you moving. It’s okay, I don’t mind.”

“You can go back to sleep. I’ll wake you when I’ve caught some fish.”

She grimaced and tried to comb her fingers through tangled hair. “I don’t think I could, now that I’m awake. That ground isn’t very comfortable to sleep on. How do you live without a bed?”

Li, of course, had only the vaguest idea of what a bed was and therefore wasn’t sure how to answer. She looked embarrassed when she realized what she’d said and quickly changed the subject.

“That was really pretty, the drill with your sword. Did your mother teach you that too?”

Li almost smiled at the thought. “Not a chance. I found this a long time after she died.”

“But then who taught you?”

“Taught me?” Again Li was mystified the girl’s constant assumptions that one had to be taught something. What kind of world did she live in? “What is there to teach? It’s sharp, you hit the enemy with it.”

She folded her arms over her knees and rested her chin on them. “Where I come from, people train at special schools to learn how to fight like you do. It takes them years; my brother studied karate for four years and I still don’t think he could fight like you.”

“Your brother’s fighting ability is not worth mentioning.”

“Still, you’re so fast, and you move like an expert. You fought better than those king’s soldiers.”

“I grew up getting bullied by a king’s soldiers. I watched the way they moved, and copied them. I should say, copied them better. Anyone could do it.”

Sakura did not seem satisfied, but she dismissed the issue with a shrug. “Well, it’s still nice to watch you. It makes me feel safe.”

She stood up, brushing off grass and moss and dirt, and moved to the stream, while Li tried to thwart the furious blush that had spread across his face. Luckily she wasn’t looking at him.

“Where will we go today?” she asked, splashing cold water on herself. “Since we don’t have to go to the castle anymore.”

“We’ll keep to the northeast, I think. There are better hunting and fishing grounds that way.”

“Sounds good.” For all her complaints of discomfort and obvious dislike of dirt, she hadn’t lost her smile, and now she was directing it at him again. “It seems you know the prettiest parts of the labyrinth. I can’t wait to see what’s next.”

It was all he could do not to smile back at her like a dumbstruck idiot, fiercely digging his palm into the hilt of his sword to keep himself grounded. A roll of thunder startled them and they both glanced skyward.

“Oh no, do you think it might rain?”

“I don’t know. Maybe.” Actually it was the first time, in a month of living under this sooty-colored sky, that Li had heard it produce thunder. The clouds were curdling as he watched, thickening and darkening in a way he’d never seen them do. He didn’t like it.

“Your highness, I think we should -” Another peal of thunder cut him off, rolling around them for such a long time before it finally faded away. It was not until it did so that Li realized the purpose behind it.

The thunder covered the noise of the approaching gargoyles.

At least a dozen could be seen against the sky, not on any meandering patrol but headed straight for them at top speed. They didn’t have a hope of outrunning them. Sakura saw them too, and he heard her breath hitch with quiet fear.

“Li-kun, can we -”

“No time to run. And they know we’re here.” He readjusted the grip on his sword and raised it, preparing himself. “Get Kero, and get yourselves under that boulder. Tell him I’ll try to hold them off until dawn.”

“What happens at dawn?” she asked, but he was already moving closer to the stream, putting himself directly in between the overhanging boulder and the coming gargoyles. It wasn’t much, but the giant rock had fallen against the wall in such a way that it created a small crevasse underneath, something no attacker could get to from above. Obediently Sakura squeezed herself into it with Kero in her arms.

The closest of them screeched a challenge, and Li snarled in reply.

“Come on, you ugly bats.” They folded their wings and dove, crashing upon the peaceful little copse like a tidal wave of fury. Li’s sword met them head-on, slashing through one’s arm and then reversing to slice through its neck before it had even landed – it fell to the ground dead. In the next second he’d cut off another’s wing and was away before its brothers could retaliate. Another tried to rip open his face with its claws and he snatched the wrist, twisting and pushing it against its fellow attacker and skewering them both. They were everywhere, the noisy, vicious creatures, but their broad wingspans made it too easy to get in each other’s way and their thick brains kept them from figuring that out and attacking in fewer numbers. In the first five minutes of the battle, he’d dispatched half their force.

Claws shot toward his eyes and Li knocked the arm aside with his own, swiveling into the motion and cracking his heel against its head. It grunted and fell against its brother, then both screamed when Li slashed his sword through both of them.

“Oh, you are good.”

Li didn’t have a chance to do more than turn and see the backfist before it connected with his face and sent him sprawling to the ground. Head spinning, he picked himself up and saw his majesty Rai, idly flexing his fingers. “But I’m better after all.”

He raised a hand to his remaining soldiers, silently forestalling them from attacking, and drew his own sword. Cold and calculating eyes fixed on him, and above them lightning flashed between clouds.

“Come then, Little Wolf. I’m curious.”

Li had no business going up against a king, didn’t have a hope of winning, but he curled his grip around his sword and lunged forward. Rai blocked and parried his strike and sent him stumbling; Li whipped around and barely managed to guard himself against getting cut in half by Rai’s follow-through strike. Rai didn’t even give him a chance to push his sword off before he was slashing again at Li’s face, and Li scrambled to block that too, twisting away from the force of the blow and trying to nail him with a back kick. Rai avoided him easily and nearly took his head off. Li ducked and slashed upwards, the sword almost jarred out of his hands by the impact when Rai blocked him.

They were so close, and Li threw a punch at his jaw. But Rai stopped that too, catching his fist neatly and closing his own hand around it with a pressure that made Li writhe.

“Such a dirty trick,” he chided. “Only a lowly street rat fights like that.”

“What do you think I am?” Li growled, and pushed himself away so hard he fell back on the ground. Hastily he thrust out his sword in defense, but Rai stayed where he was.

“I think you’re about to be dead, along with that little princess over there you’re so desperately trying to protect. Keep fighting if you like, but surrender and I promise your deaths will be quick.”

“Not a chance.”

“Suit yourself.”

Overhead the thunder rumbled again, and out of the skies fell a light rain. Not dropping his guard for an instant, Li scooted back a few inches and jumped to his feet, trying to blink the water out of his eyes. Rai was just so damned fast, fast like lightning – how was he supposed to win? Or even survive?

Rai was not bothered by the rain. This time he attacked, driving Li back with a series of short, sharp strikes, his blade flashing silver through the droplets. Frantically Li deflected them, knowing he was being forced back, further away from Sakura and Kero.

“At least kill me first, before you go for her,” Li panted, when he’d parried Rai’s latest attack. “Can’t you wait that long, at least?”

“Do you think this is some kind of game, Little Wolf? This is war.”

A scream punctuated his words, but it wasn’t Sakura’s. Li glanced aside just briefly enough to confirm that it was a gargoyle writhing in pain, clutching its charred hand to its chest. Good. If Kero could just manage to stay dry then he could hold them off; Sakura was still safe.

Rai grunted thoughtfully as he watched his minion whimper. “You’re better prepared than I thought. I’d better get on with killing you.”

He attacked with a ferocity that Li almost buckled under, slashing and thrusting at a speed beyond human. Six times in as many seconds Li nearly died, each time pushing himself out of the blade’s path with only a heartbeat to spare. Rai was not only faster than he was but stronger, and Li felt his sword twist and bend around his own with a helpless dread. He had no time to wrest free before Rai flicked his wrist and sent Li’s sword flying.

It landed ten steps away, or maybe a million, it made no difference. Too far. With a triumphant smirk Rai pulled his arm back and swept his sword toward Li’s head. Instinctively Li hit the ground just under the swipe, his palms slapping against the earth, grabbed a fistful of mud and flung it frantically at Rai’s face. The king was so startled he yelped, and Li bolted.

“Little brat,” Rai swore under his breath, clawing the last of the stuff out of his eyes, and tore off his right glove. Time to give this upstart renegade what was coming to him.

Lightning sizzled past Li’s head with a searing heat that made him flinch, and hit a tree with enough firepower to turn it to splinters. Again Rai fired, this time just missing his feet, and the grass blackened and burst into flames. Li pushed himself to run faster, but he had no way to hide and Rai was too close to miss a third time.

And he didn’t.

The bolt of lightning hit him squarely in the back, the sheer force of it throwing him into the air. Li smelled the nasty burned air, saw the ground rushing up to meet him, heard Sakura’s distant and terrified scream. He did all these things, and hit the dirt hard enough to knock the wind out of him, but he did not die.

Even he wasn’t quite sure about it, at first. Shaken, he pressed himself up from the ground and tried to breathe, bewildered but very much alive. He didn’t even hurt. But Rai couldn’t have missed – he’d felt the bolt connect with his body.

He looked back, one shocked stare to meet another’s. Rai stood stock still, astonished and gaping, and it seemed like forever that the two of them just looked at one another while the rain fell all around them.

It was the first ray of dawn that broke the spell, for Li. It was faint and weak, barely noticeable between the earth and the heavy clouds, but it penetrated the gloom and snapped his mind back to where it belonged.

Get out. Run!

He snatched his sword amulet and sprinted for the boulder, and at his movement Rai seemed to come back to earth too.

“Get him!” Li heard him shout to his soldiers. “Get him, get him now! Bring him back to me!”

Sakura shrieked with surprise somewhere ahead of him, confronted with a suddenly giant and lethally dangerous Keroberos, but it was the closest gargoyle that had more reason to scream. One clawed swipe took him out, and then Kero ordered Sakura to climb onto his back.

“Don’t let him escape!” Rai thundered somewhere behind him, and Li pushed himself faster. Sakura was holding out her hand, Kero already airborne, and he leapt and grabbed it just before Kero was flying higher than any human could have jumped. She really was strong, for a girl, and helped him up onto Kero’s back behind her.

“Get down!” he ordered her, and pushed her down until her arms were wrapped around Kero’s thick neck. “Kero, go lower! You have to lose them!”

“How many?”

Li checked over his shoulder. “Four!”

“Hang on!”

Kero dove back down into the labyrinth, hurtling through the corridors at a dangerous speed. At least one was keeping up, Li could hear it screeching somewhere behind them. Coming up was a thin arbor arch, what once would have been heavy with ivy vines but was now wearing a single brown vine. “Slow down!”

“But -”

“Do it!”

Kero slowed down, just enough for Li to reach up and grab the arch without losing his arms in the process. Kero and Sakura shot ahead without him and he swung overhead, his feet connecting solidly with the unprepared gargoyle’s chest. Li landed on top of it when they hit the ground, and by jamming his boot against its jaw he easily broke the neck. Another one saw him and swooped down, straight into his sword.

Li turned on his heels and dashed back the way Kero had been going. It took a few minutes, but he finally found him dispatching the last of their attackers. By the time the flames died down, those gargoyles would be nothing but piles of ash.

“Come on, kid, quick. Time to ditch this joint.”

Li climbed back on behind Sakura and Kero withdrew his wings, loping along the maze’s passages with a fluidity and speed Li was very grateful for, at the moment.

One more step, he was pretty sure, and he would have collapsed.

- - - - - -

Touya almost jumped out of his skin when he woke, his heart hammering fast and hard in his chest and his lungs gasping for air. A cry of alarm formed on his lips, but what it was or who it was for he didn’t know. Uncomprehendingly he looked at the walls around him and tried to remember where he was.

“You alright, mate?”

“Huh?”

Blankly he looked at the rust-colored worm, relaxing between bricks in the stone wall behind him. It looked a trifle concerned.

“Twitching and moaning in your sleep, you were. Bad dream?”

“Not exactly.” Touya pushed himself upright into a sitting position, so stiff and sore he could barely move. “I just… get these feelings sometimes; I can tell when my sister’s in danger. I’ve gotten much better at it since the last time I was here.”

Here being the Labyrinth, in which his sister might very well be fighting for her life this instant. Finally he woke up completely, remembered everything that happened the day before, and saw with despair his surroundings in the morning light.

“Damn it, I fell asleep? I only meant to rest for a few minutes! Now I’ve lost so much time.” He jumped to his feet and fretted, then forced himself to take a deep breath. “No, this time around time doesn’t matter. I don’t have a deadline, it’s okay. But I still shouldn’t have fallen asleep.”

“Are you sure you’re alright, mate?”

“No, mate, I’m not alright. I’m hungry, sore, and miserable. I have no idea where my sister is, or if she’s even safe, and there’s an army of gargoyles searching for both of us.”

“Well if the Storm King found the princess, I ‘aven’t ‘eard about it,” consoled the worm. “And I would ‘ave, most certainly. Buck up.”

“Yeah, I’ll be sure and get right on that.” Wearily Touya leaned against a bubbling fountain and splashed his face. “Wait a second, how did you know who my sister is?”

“Tall, dark-haired bloke from another world bearing the royal mark on his neck? All the worms know who you are, mate. You’re the king’s lover, and your kid sis is his ‘eir.”

Touya, who had chosen that particular moment to slurp a mouthful of water, promptly spat it right back out.

“What did you call me?”

“You’re the king’s lover, and -”

“No, no, NO. Not now, not ever! I won the bet, doesn’t anyone here know that? I rejected him, I left him.”

Cautiously the worm eyed him as he gesticulated. “Whatever you say, mate.”

“You’re damn right, whatever I say. I don’t have anything to do with him anymore.”

“Then why did you come back to the Labyrinth?”

“I’m here to help my sister. And yes, I know I’m not with her,” he added forcefully, when the worm opened his mouth, “but that’s going to change. I’ll find her today, and this time I won’t let us get separated.”

The worm glanced at the courtyard around them and grimaced. “Good luck with that, mate. Pretty big place, you know.”

“I know. Believe me, I know.”

“Best be on your way then. Last I ‘eard, she and the Little Wolf were clear on the other side of the labyrinth, sleeping in the plum orchard.”

“Sleeping together?” Touya yelped, his voice going straight up one octave on the last word. The worm looked at him strangely and he cleared his throat. “I mean, how did you know about that?”

“Not much us worms don’t know, mate.”

“Oh. Well that’s good… good that you know. Just tell me the way to start walking and I’ll find her.”

“Well, you want to turn right out of that doorway and then -”

“Wait, wait! You said the worms know everything out here?”

“Sooner or later.”

“Do you know where Yue is?”

If worms had eyebrows, his would have gone right up. “I thought you didn’t want anything to do with the king?”

“I don’t,” Touya said quickly. “But finding him is the only way to get my sister out of this mess. Do you know where he is?”

“Sorry, mate. The king is the one bloke in the labyrinth we can’t seem to find. Wherever he’s lurking, it’s beyond our sight.”

“Of course.” Touya rubbed his temples, wishing he wasn’t already so exhausted after just waking up. “Of course it is. He never made anything easy for me, if he could help it.”

“D’you mean to look for him, then?”

“No. I’m looking for my sister.”

- - - - - -

Kero must have traveled for close to two hours before he finally stopped to rest, putting so many twists and turns behind him that it would be impossible for anyone to track them. When he finally did stop, it was in the shelter of a stand of browning pines. This marble bench was dry, Li absently noted as he slumped down on it. It hadn’t rained here; perhaps they had gotten far enough away. For now.

“Li-kun, oh god, are you alright? I was so scared, I was sure you were dead…” The princess was kneeling before him, examining him with her bright, concerned green eyes, tentatively reaching to touch his face. “Are you hurt anywhere? Did you get burned?”

“Eh, the kid’s tougher than he looks, Sakura. He can take a licking and keep kicking! Pretty close call, though, lucky for you two that I was there. Looks like we can afford to take a break now. Anybody else hungry for breakfast?”

Kero tried to casually saunter away, but stopped short when Li spoke.

“Kero.” The big cat flinched and froze, and Li felt his grip curl around the edge of the bench. “What happened back there?”

“Hey, you had a closer seat to the action than I did.”

“No, I know you saw. Rai hit me with that lightning, I should have died.”

“Maybe he was holding back.”

“No…” Li shook his head, the memories so vivid it was as if part of him were still back there, still locked in that strange stare with the king. “No, I saw his face. He was surprised, just like me. He did not expect me to survive that. And then afterwards -”

His heart thumped uneasily within his chest when he remembered how Rai screamed for his guards to catch him, to not allow him to escape. Not a word about the princess. Only him.

“He wanted me. Why?”

“What makes you think I know anything about it?” Kero whined, and Li’s impatience smoldered.

“Because if you really didn’t know anything, you’d be trying your hardest to convince me that you did. Tell me what’s going on!”

“Fine, fine,” Kero muttered, and sat his big rear down on the ground. Fastidiously he started licking at one paw. “I’ll tell you what I know, but it’s not much, okay? And don’t get mad at me. It’s not like any of this is my fault.”

“Any of what?”

“Just hang on! It happened fifteen years ago; I’d pretty much forgotten all about it.” He paused to clear his throat. “Though it was strange enough to take notice of at the time. It’s not every day that an outsider not only enters the labyrinth, but actually makes it all the way through to the city. And she was a woman, on top of that, a real pretty lady. She was practically ready to collapse when she came tottering into the castle that day.”

Kero snuck a sideways glance at Li. “And she had a baby in her arms.”

Li felt his breath catch in his throat, tight and painful. Dimly, he also noticed that Sakura had slipped her hand into his and was holding on.

“She’d come from another kingdom, and was begging Yue for the right to seek asylum here in the Labyrinth. She promised to do whatever he commanded, if he would only agree to let her stay. She was awful desperate to hide from something – or someone.”

“Then what?” he whispered.

“Well, Yue took one look at the kid in her arms and said that ‘under no circumstances’ would he allow the stolen son of the Storm King to be harbored in his kingdom. It was an act that practically invited war if they were ever discovered.”

Li’s heart just kept beating faster and harder, until any second now he was sure it would jump right out of his chest and vanish into the labyrinth.

“Well, that lady sure wasn’t good at taking ‘no’ for an answer,” Kero drawled. “Lord, she just kept begging and begging, going on and on about her cruel master and how he’d hunt her to her death but it was her baby too and she had a right… blah blah blah.”

“Then what happened?” Sakura pressed, and he shrugged.

“I dunno. I got bored and went to go find a snack in the kitchen.”

“Kero-chan!”

“I’ll kill you,” Li snarled, and both of them looked so dangerous that he actually backed up.

“Okay, okay, relax! Sheesh. I never saw her again, but I was curious enough to ask Yue what happened with her, later on. Seems they settled on some kind of deal. He agreed to let her stay within the kingdom for as long as she wished, but only on the condition that she remain in the labyrinth with her child. They were not allowed in the city, where other people could see them and talk to them. That’s the last I ever heard him mention it.”

All the rest of the air that had been burning in Li’s lungs shot out, and he gulped for fresh oxygen. Everything about his life had clicked, suddenly and horrifyingly, into place and he was unprepared for so much truth. Mystery was what he’d grown up with, mystery was what he knew. Truth was worse.

“Oh, Li-kun,” Sakura murmured, and squeezed his hand.

“You knew about this,” he growled, and turned his eyes back on Kero. “You knew! Why didn’t you ever tell me?”

“Now hang on, kid, watch what you say. I did not ‘know’. I mean, it was ten years later when I saw you again and to be frank, you looked nothing like how you did the last time. You were bigger, not to mention louder. And I’d forgotten all about that incident. It wasn’t until Rai invaded last month that I remembered, and I started to wonder if maybe you weren’t that baby. But I didn’t know. I didn’t know anything… until just now.”

But Yue must have. The thought crystallized in Li’s mind with absolute certainty, because of course Yue forgot nothing in his kingdom. All these years, smirking while his trolls beat and whipped Li like an animal, he knew.

“Li-kun?” The princess was leaning in close again, scrutinizing his expression with fresh worry. He didn’t know what his face looked like, but he guessed it wasn’t good. “Li-kun, are you okay? Say something.”

“Sorry.” He pulled his hand out of hers and stood, too overwhelmed to think straight and knowing only that he needed to get away. “Can I be alone for a while?”

He did not wait for an answer, and fled.

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Disclaimer: I do not own these characters

Oooh. Didja see that one coming?
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