(Art credit- Daishar) 

Chihiro opened her eyes. The ceiling sparkled, making her remember where she was. The room was round, like a bubble in the rock, except for the flat floor. A green glow permeated the white linen drapes, luxurious rugs covered the floor. There was a huge dark lacquered wardrobe across from her and a polished copper mirror next to it.

The bed she was in was huge and comfortable but quite low to the ground. The blankets she suspected were cashmere or the spirit world equivalent. Again it struck her that Haku must have a lot of money stashed somewhere. She tried to sit up, wanting to see more of the room. 

"Please," said a crisp voice. "Don't get up, you are ill. My master will attend to you once he has recovered from your rescue." Chihiro saw a small furry spirit at her bedside. It looked like a cat had decided to walk upright. She had ginger fur, almond-shaped yellow eyes with a slash of black for the pupil and triangular ears on top of her head. Her hands were furry too with sharp nails. She was wearing a serviceable kimono made of a cotton-like fabric. The rest of her looked relatively human.

"Satisfied your curiosity?" said the spirit woman coldly.

"I'm... sorry," she stammered. "I meant no offence."

"No humans never do, but they always end up hurting us." Chihiro was shocked by the open hostility. Haku had told her of the prejudice against Humans, but she had never thought to experience it while in his care.

"I'm sorry." Was all she could think of saying, after all, she was on the verge of septicaemia. Not the best condition to be in to think of a cutting rejoinder.

"It's all very well being sorry," spat the cat. "You have no idea what we suffer at human hands! Look at what happened to my master. He lost nearly all his power and had to suffer the pain of separation for years. No mortal can understand such things! Why he takes care of you now I don't know. In my opinion, you should go back to where you came from. Stop burdening him with your selfish demands. He has nearly drained himself completely for your benefit! If your cruel human heart had any regard for him at all, you would leave."

Chihiro decided she was not sick enough to take comments like that without saying something. She felt bad about what humans did to the spirit world, but she had had enough bad experiences in her life to recognise when she was being bullied. The bile rose in her throat. She would never be told what to think or feel again, NEVER!

"You are here no doubt by Haku's kindness also. How do you think he would react to having you talk like this to a guest in his household?" Meeka's ears flattened in anger. She narrowed her eyes and hissed exposing some vicious looking fangs. Chihiro ignored her and continued.

"I suggest you keep your opinions to yourself before they get you into trouble." Chihiro smiled sweetly. "I may be human and you may hate me, but I'm sure you can be civil to me if you care to try. I gave your master back his name and his life; we humans are not all bad. If you get to know me a bit better maybe I can prove it to you. But whether you hate me or not, I'm here to stay so I suggest you get used to it."

"Quite a good put down for someone feeling like death warmed up," Chihiro thought. The spirit gave another hiss and swept out of the room.

Chihiro knew he was in the hallway before she saw him melt out of the shadows. He still looked a bit grey and his eyes had lost some of their lustre. As he approached the bed she noticed his movements were slow and deliberate.

"So you are here to stay are you?" he teased.

"Don't you ever knock?" She retorted, sitting up. He grinned.

"This is my house why should I?" He chuckled, then his face turned serious.

"I apologise on Meeka's behalf. I employed her after her woods were destroyed. She has a good heart and is a hard worker but she hates humans."

"I know, we are all scum, we can't help it." She grimaced as he sat her forward and plumped up her pillows so she could sit in comfort. Chihiro was glad that she had been changed. The nurse's uniform was now a linen nightgown. Meeka had at least had been professional enough to clean her up a bit, despite how she felt about humans. Or maybe it was Haku. She paled at the thought and then dismissed it.

"Don't be stupid Chihiro!" she told herself.

He manipulated her arm.

"You are not scum, there is just a lot of you," He mumbled. He ran a finger over the wound, causing a spurt of pus to ooze from it.

"Ow!" Yelled Chihiro and snatched her arm away from him.

"Sorry," he apologised. "I had to check the level of infection." Then he perched beside her on the bed. "How are you feeling?" He asked. Chihiro thought for a moment. She ran a hand through her hair and then stopped, it was a tattered mess.

"I feel like I've been hit on the head by a sledgehammer... repeatedly. Then run over by 200 head of cattle, then half-drowned by a very inconsiderate river spirit." He laughed, it was a pleasant sound.

"I'm sorry I had to rescue you by drowning you, but I thought the first place they would look for you was the woodlands near the border. They would never expect you to head out into the countryside and jump down a hole." Then he gave a mischievous smirk. "Besides, my form of escape had its other benefits..." Chihiro had to restrain herself from pinching him.

"What happened?" he asked gently, abruptly changing the subject. Chihiro sighed, and told him, prudently omitting what Scott had said to her. That was private, Scott was a good person and she would not dishonour him in that way. She expected to see more of the anger Haku had demonstrated to her bedside in the hospital. Instead, he looked sad.

"At least your mother tried to understand." He mumbled.

"But my Father he..." she protested feeling angry herself now. How could he be so calm in the face of this injustice? She felt cheated. He stopped the angry comment by putting his finger to her lips.

"Do you hate them Chihiro?" he asked his green eyes holding her hazel ones.

"NO!" She protested, taking his hand from her mouth. "I think they are fools but..."

"So you have lost respect for them?" He interrupted again. Chihiro knew he was guiding the conversation but her head hurt too much for her to care.

"No I still respect them, they are my parents! But they have been such..."

"Let me put it this way..." he said interrupting yet again but keeping his tone light. He leant forward so his face was inches from hers and she could feel his breath on her face. "I could kidnap them, bring them here, and show them what they refuse to believe. Then I could stand them before you, they could apologise and then I could rip out both their throats or maybe just your fathers. Is that what you want? Because if that was your wish, I would do it in a heartbeat."

Chihiro pressed herself back into her pillows to get a little more distance from those hungry eyes. She had to force herself not to put her hands over her ears, his coaxing, honey sweet words rattled around her brain after he had stopped speaking. Despite her horror, she was tempted, but only for the briefest moment.

"No," she whispered, "I don't want that." He nodded, seemingly satisfied and sat back again. Chihiro swallowed her pulse started to slow now she was not pinned under those fey eyes. She then realised what he had done.

"You did that on purpose; you made me angry and then offered me the revenge the darkest part of me wanted... why?" He smiled all ease and friendliness now, not a trace of bloodlust remained in his gaze.

"For someone who has no family, parents seem a precious gift. I would hate to see you throw yours away. You must admit they are not malicious; they only ever wanted what's best for you. Also, if you truly did not care about them you would not have been appalled by my offer." She frowned at him.

"You are far too clever, it will get you into trouble one day." She murmured. He raised an eyebrow and said nothing. "You could have just said "you are being unreasonable Chihiro," and left it at that."

"You would not have listened." He retorted, then he stood. "I still need time to gain my power back before I heal your arm." Chihiro looked at the weeping sore.

"Won't it heal on its own?" She asked.

"I contacted Linca; she says you need a thing called antibiotics to heal on your own." Chihiro nodded, she had thought as much. "In the meantime, you should rest. I should be ready to try this afternoon to make you more comfortable." Then a conspiratorial look crossed his face. "I almost forgot."

All of a sudden Chihiro's lap was filled with three bottles of vodka, 10 boxes of coffee, 20 slabs of chocolate and 10 cans of chocolate pudding. Chihiro was delighted and her eyes widened in wonder.

"How did you...?" She looked up, he was gone.

As promised, that afternoon he came back. He looked better, the colour was back in his eyes and his complexion was less lifeless. She thanked him profusely for his gifts. She also demanded to know how he had done it, she then berated him for drawing on his depleted resources for something so trivial. He gave her a huge wink.

"What's the point of being an all-powerful river God if you can't bend the rules from time to time?"

He inspected her arm and sighed.

"Stabilisation spell is wearing off." His hand hovered over the wound. Green light glowed on her arm. She felt cold and shivered. He placed a hand on her forehead and looked into her eyes.

"This is going to hurt I'm afraid," he said. Then the small piece of needle in her arm started to move. She shouted but fought to remain still for him. His cool hand did not leave her forehead, but his eyes concentrated on the wound. Slowly the needle eased from the puncture hole. Once it left the hole it floated into the air and melted to nothing.

Puss seeped from the wound. Chihiro thought it hurt more now than it had before. Bandages etc appeared and Haku cleaned and dressed her arm and then a final wave of healing magic swept through her body, dissipating the poisons in her blood.

"It's done," He said weakly. He was sweating and looking even worse than when he had collapsed; even his eyes had dulled in colour. He turned to try and walk from the room, desperate for rest. Chihiro caught his arm.

"Stay," she said quietly. Haku blinked, thinking he had not heard her correctly. She shifted up the bed to allow room for him, Haku's eyebrows shot up.

"It would not be proper," he mumbled. Chihiro's face clouded.

"I don't know much about the etiquette in this world that's true. However, as far as I am concerned we are friends and you are ready to drop. If you try and make it to your room your pet cat will probably have to scrape you off the floor again. I'll be blamed for it; she will see it as my fault. Now stop being so stubborn and get some rest." He wavered; she had a point, but...

"Besides you're far too tired to take advantage of the situation." She teased. He smiled then and pulled back the sheets and lay down with his back to her.

"This may be a bad idea but it feels so good right now." He thought as muscles turned to water and he began to drift off.

"Who would have thought you were such a prude?" Chihiro yawned.

"I'm just protecting your honour." He murmured into the pillow. She yawned again and turned her back to him, not touching him.

"Protect my honour," she scoffed at the ridiculous notion. "Protect me from who? You're unlikely to spread malicious gossip." She snuggled down and drifted into a deep sleep.

He waited until her breathing indicated she was asleep to answer.

"From myself." He whispered, "I'll protect you from everyone, including myself." He remembered what Linca had said about emotions creeping up on him. That hot balmy midsummer night seemed a lifetime away now. The sprite had been annoyingly accurate; he was fighting a losing battle. He had not given up yet however, a spirit and a human was unnatural, and yet...

He fell asleep thinking in circles.

He awoke in the early morning, but no sun streamed through the crystal windows, only the same uneven glow of the bioluminescent fungi in the cave outside. He blinked sleepily, trying to focus. His eyes were greeted with a shock of brown hair with red tints fanned over the snowy white pillow before him.

As he suspected might happen, he had turned instinctively towards her body heat as he slept. Now he was lying cuddled into her back, his arm around her middle. His hips were spooned around hers and their legs were hopelessly entangled. She was still fast asleep, her breathing was regular and she was occasionally snoring gently which he found terribly endearing. She was still exhausted.

Healing magic utilised the patients own energy as well as the healers to repair the damage or cure the illness. Much rest was often needed afterwards for the patient; the healer could decide how much energy to take from themselves and the patient. In Haku's case, he had used as little of Chihiro's energy as possible. However, drained as he was he still had to take some off her and had nearly brought himself to collapse again.

He closed his eyes and just for a moment enjoyed her closeness. The softness of her body against his, her scent tickled his nostrils. Not the human smell, that had already faded and was quite pungent, though he would never tell her that. This was her own smell, light and slightly spicy. He had the urge to press his nose to her pale throat and inhale it more deeply. He toyed with the idea of drifting back to sleep and letting her wake to find herself in his arms. It would be very interesting to see her reaction. He dismissed this, however, not wishing to cause her embarrassment or worry when she was recovering. She had been quite ill.

Again he had been shown how fragile she was; and yet she had also shown him how strong she could be. He had smelt the blood that was not hers on her clothes. She had obviously had to do some fighting to get away. Being virtually untrained, he was surprised she had not been more seriously injured. Humans were strange things, warlike and vicious they seemed bent on their own destruction most of the time and yet Chihiro had taught him that they could be compassionate and giving too. Haku was now of the opinion that the human race was generally good and it was but a few who created the chaos.

He held her tightly for a moment and then gently untangled his legs from hers. His bare foot brushed her unclothed lower leg, making him gasp. Her skin was achingly smooth and warm. More determined to leave now, before he changed his mind, he levitated her an inch or two and slipped away from her before replacing her on the bed. She grumbled in her sleep at the disturbance and snuggled into her pillow as if missing him holding her. Her face frowned and then cleared as she slept more deeply. Haku had had enough. Emotion running high enough to choke him, he practically ran from the room. He opened the door and closed it quietly behind him without a backward glance.

Meeka was in the hallway, mopping the highly polished stone floor. The cat-like spirit's eyes rounded to see him leaving the humans room. Haku knew what his housekeeper would be thinking. She would know he had not returned to his room last night. He gave a shallow bow and greeted her as if nothing had happened and marched down the corridor. He came to his own room and went straight to his balcony overlooking the underground lake. He stared at the black surface for some time. Linca would arrive in two days, he would have to settle things with himself by then or he really would have no peace.

Confusion clouded his mind. It was wonderful to have her back, she brightened everything, but the strength of emotion he had for her before she left seemed to have intensified in her absence. He had really missed seeing her face, hearing her voice. He had not realised how much just her company meant to him. He knew he had been attracted to her, that he could have handled. This went deeper, much deeper. He was frightened and exhilarated at the same time. In all his long life, he had never felt this way about anyone.

"I am in serious trouble." He said to the lake.

He realised now that the only reason he had changed his form was for her. As the years had gone by he had aged himself in parallel to her. The way he acted when she arrived, the anger he felt when she ran away from him, his nervousness in dancing with her and his delight when he had, the protectiveness he felt towards her when she cried and the devastating loneliness he had felt when she had left him; it all pointed to the same thing.

"I am in VERY serious trouble." He told the lake.

Relationships between humans and immortals were cursed. Everyone knew that even Chihiro would know that as a student of legend. The gulf between those who would die and those who would endure was just too wide. Yet Linca had loved a mortal, but from the way she had flared up at him, he bet that the end had been less than agreeable. He was frightened of getting hurt but most of all of hurting her. He sighed and leapt off the balcony, executing a perfect dive into the lake, he made no splash as he entered the water. Contact with his river soothed his worries but could not make him forget her scent and her warmth. Or how he wished he could wake with her in his arms that way every morning. He worked with his river and formulated a plan.

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