My Gift to You *Revised* by Ishtar

Great Lord, Lonely Heart

My Gift To You

By Ishtar Sugishita

Chapter 1: Great Lord, Lonely Heart

The Summer was a stiffling one. Not that it much mattered. Temperatures never really affected youkai, considering they were usually able to stand whatever, burning hot or freezing cold. But, the comment was simply a notation of his observation as he watched the little ningen stop benieth the shade of a large maple tree, catching her rugged breath and wiping off beads of sweat rolling down her face with the sleeve of her kimono.

He idly reminded himself that she would be needing a new wardrobe soon. The kimono she was currently in was perminately stained by todays odds and ends such as muds, grasses, juices, and various dyes from her laying amongst the wildflowers in the small meadow, as well as stains from prespiration on her sleeves. Here and there a small rip showed itself on the plain orange and green cotton material. Much like all her other ones.

A small unnoticeable sigh passed his lips, and his shoulders slightly slumped, although that couldn't be noticed either. His golden gaze rose slightly, taking in the sight of the maple leaves, full and green, blossomed across the ancient tree. The wind picked up at that moment, rusling the leaves, a few unable to remain attached as they fell down towards the ground, thickly and widely covered with wild grass. The little girl undernieth the tree reaching up to catch her 'prize' as the leaves fell into her chubby adolecent hands.

The winds swept passed the tree and the girl, and blew over towards and then past him. The quick gust ruffling mostly his long silver tresses and emptly left kimono sleeve. He grimaced at the rememberance, but it soon passed as the silk of his hair, and the silk of his sleeve settled back to its original postition, looking as if it had never been disturbed.

The sun was directly overhead, signalling it was now mid-day, but what did time really matter to him. He wasn't expecting anyone, or anything, he had no appointments to make, no business to handle. And his lifespan spun out to an estimated umpteenth amount of decades so he never really needed to be in a rush to do anything. Somehow he felt depleated and old, like his time had already came and past. In some way he felt he had served a perpose and would never have a perpose again. It was odd for him to wonder so much about his self perpose or meaning of existance, but he supposed it was merely bordom getting to him.

He opened his eyes, never really remembering himself actually closing them, and lifted up his last remaining hand so he could view it. Under the suns rays his elongated nails glisened slightly. Then down to his fingertips and long thin fingers, until he reached the palm of his hand.

'Empty', was the simple word that his mind registered when he gazed on at the part of his appendage. Truth was however, that it was empty. The pale immaculate skin had not a thing thought precious to hold in his hand that he could be sure of to last, not a thing he could keep without it someday having to slip away or die. His eyes focused more accutely on the hand as a whole. It was interesting indeed. So many times he has looked at this very same hand before, and it would be covered in the blood of his enemies or random innocent victims, yet, as he looked at it now, not a trace of any if it could be seen. After all the battles and wars he had fought in he had never recieved a true wound that would last him as long as he lived. Even his missing left arm, where nothing but a small stump of a bicep lay, would grow back within time.

A hand that holds nothing has nothing to give, that was one of the many things his mother used to say to him, yet, she would go on, we have a heart and thats the one thing we all have so you can never truely say you have nothing to give. He pondered on that for a few momets, the fact that all he truely had was his heart, which was a part of every beings body that was somehow connected to love, but who would want his heart, his love? It was a chunk of ice chipped off from his frozen being, a love that could provide no warmth or compassion, even if it was a gift it was a useless gift nonetheless . Yet, the factor that he was unable to love shouldn't have ever bothered him, he was lord of his lands, he was without a mate, he was the strongest and most feared youkai, and thats the way he was going to live, and the same way he was going to die.

His mind faultered for a moment on concluding the thought, and for a second had to convince itself that that was the truth. A picture painted across his mind, of his mother and father, true form and nuzzling eachother, the warm moment being shattered as his persona froze it over. The truth was what he had first and always intended it to be. Love should not have been an existing emotion among youkai, it was for petty humans. Even his parents relationship proved that, for it didn't even last long itself before it died out. It died in the form of his mother after she became heartbroken upon hearing of an affair, her own mates affair.

The child inside him, the one that he had built so many walls around to keep him from uprising to the surface, pulled against his retraints as he let out a pained cry. The lords ears rung as the piercing sound echoed throughout him, reminding him how much the past events really had affected him. How much he hurt, still to this day, only now he knew how to drown those past memories out, with blood. But as he flexed his claws in his controlled rage, he realized that he didn't really feel like going out for a kill. No, he just felt like he needed some silence in the dark, so he could build more walls. He never wanted to face his past again, his innocence demented by the petty thing called love. Perhaps he did have a lasting wound after all.

His arm dropped, taking down his hand from his view, and in frustration he clenched his hand into a fist, his nails digging into the palm of his hands. The pressure broke through the skin soon enough leaving crecent moon puncture marks as droplets of blood penetrated the torn berrier. He didn't feel so much as a sting, and soon the crimson liquid receeded and the skin healed, leaving not a mark. The youkai blood in him leaving himself practically indectructable.

He would forever remain, while everything else faded away.