Notes: I'm positive Kekkaishi won't end this way anymore, but most of this was written before certain manga revelations, so I can live with this the way it is.

Summary: Yoshimori gives his life to finally seal Karasumori. Here are ten lives touched by his sacrifice.

Ten Secrets of the Sealed Karasumori

A Kekkaishi Oneshot by

Nate Grey (xman0123-at-aol-dot-com)

1 - Sumimura Yoshimori

In the end, it was an easy choice. Yoshimori had been working towards that goal for most of his life, whether he realized it or not, and he could not ignore a friend in pain.

Chushinmaru's pain was a little more difficult to spot, as he tended to hide it between claims of boredom and demands for entertainment, but it was there. He was a lord, but he was also an extremely lonely child in desperate need of a true friend.

The thought of leaving his family and friends behind, and especially Tokine, weighed heavily on Yoshimori. But they were strong, and all things considered, half of them had been convinced all along that he would get himself killed one day. Him having a say in it was a better option, or at least he told himself it was.

It wasn't really so much like death. Yoshimori still felt alive. The only real sacrifice had been his human body. He still had a body, so to speak, but it felt less solid, and didn't have as many restraints. Walking through walls was pretty neat, he never had to worry about going to the bathroom anymore, and most ayakashi simply ran away screaming the moment they sensed his presence. The braver ones usually died once they were in his presence, and very rarely did he have to do anything to them. His will itself destroyed them without conscious thought, and Yoshimori understood why.

No ayakashi would harm a human again on his land. That was his solemn vow, and it was bound to his very soul.

2 - Sumimura Masamori

The truth was that despite any initial problems, any of the three Sumimura brothers could have served as the human sacrifice to seal the power of Karasumori.

The truth was that Masamori almost did.

But he had hesitated. There was so much he still needed to do. He had promised himself that he would either set the Shadow Organization back on the right path, or destroy it completely, whichever would serve the world best. Ironically enough, merging with Karasumori would have put him in an excellent position to do either one.

And while Masamori was still debating, Yoshimori had stepped forward and been accepted.

Masamori honestly did try to stop his brother. He could have tried harder. He could even have forced Yoshimori to step down, leaving Karasumori with no other choice but to select the oldest brother, despite it's preference.

But that was not what happened.

Instead, Masamori watched his little brother sacrifice everything to save the world, again. It was the one lesson that Masamori hadn't wanted to teach Yoshimori, so of course it was the only one that seemed to stick.

The hardest part after that was not facing his family, but facing his subordinates. They took the news even harder than they had the loss of Gen, if only because they had thought Yoshimori would be just as invincible as his older brother. It had never occurred to any of them that he could die, or that he would choose to.

For a time, Masamori questioned if he had any right to remain part of the Sumimura family. He questioned it when he took over the Shadow Organization, he questioned it when he finally stopped fighting his feelings and married Kasuga Yomi, and he especially questioned it when Toshimori came to him for kekkaishi training.

In fact, Masamori only stopped questioning it when his son was born with the Houin Mark. If Yoshimori had forgiven him, then perhaps he could one day forgive himself.

3 - Sumimura Toshimori

He was careful to keep the similarities between himself and Yoshimori to a minimum. Partially to spare Tokine from pain, but mostly for his own sanity.

Toshimori's kekkaishi powers had awoken the moment he sensed Yoshimori's death. No one could explain it: the techniques came easy to him without practice, and while his power was less than either of his brothers', he'd already had the accuracy that Tokine had worked for years to obtain. Yet there were times when, for no clear reason, his powers simply shut down for days at a time. Far from being problematic, these down times allowed Toshimori to have something of a normal life. He firmly believed it was Yoshimori's final gift to him, and he treasured those peaceful days.

He had insisted that there be no grave or memorial built for Yoshimori. Such things implied that his brother was dead, and Toshimori was convinced that Yoshimori was alive somewhere, even if it was in a dimension that none of them could reach. Besides, he preferred that people remembered his brother in their hearts.

In his own heart, Toshimori had made a choice: he would never call the land Karasumori again.

To him, the land was Yoshimori, now and forever. That was what his brother had given his all for, and that was the way it would be.

4 - Sumimura Shigemori

He chose to remember his idiot grandson in his own way.

Every year on Yoshimori's birthday, Shigemori ate nothing but cake and coffee milk. At every meal.

Everyone else in the house quickly joined in the tradition, and then so did Tokine and the Yukimura family, and before Shigemori realized it, Yoshimori's birthday celebration had become a local holiday. Cakes were sold at half price, families with three or more children ate free at restaurants, and chefs came from miles around to present cakes to the Sumimura family.

None of this was ever really explained in a satisfactory matter, but it didn't have to be.

Shigemori aged rapidly in the wake of Yoshimori's passing. He grew increasingly bad-tempered, and was unusually strict with litterbugs, often trapping them within kekkai for hours and then dumping them in rivers. He was perfectly friendly whenever his great-grandson and Tokine took him for walks in the afternoon, but only when Tokiko didn't accompany them.

5 - Yukimura Tokiko

Nearly everything planted in those days grew wild and rapidly.

Tokiko's garden was no exception: she had fresh fruits and vegetables coming in nearly every week, regardless of season, weather, or if she had actually forgotten to plant anything in the first place.

Shigemori was firmly of the impression that she should be offering prayers and giving thanks that his idiot grandson was such a generous provider.

Tokiko, being who she was, was not about to pray to a teenager, dead or otherwise. She always managed to remember Yoshimori in her prayers, though these were less to him, and more about him, and the peaceful sleep she wished for his weary but foolish soul, than anything else.

Yoshimori, being who he was, often thanked her in person by whispering directly in her ear, especially when her back was turned, because he had always enjoyed nearly giving her a heart attack.

6 - Madarao

Toshimori's first act upon taking up his brother's duties was to break the seal on Madarao. No one told him to do it (quite the opposite, actually), and Toshimori himself would not provide a solid reason behind it when asked. But he was the only one completely unsurprised when Madarao didn't immediately run away.

Madarao certainly enjoyed having his freedom back, and strongly suspected that even if he did run away, Toshimori either wouldn't pursue him at all, or would take his time in doing so. In the end, that was what convinced Madarao to stay. Toshimori had respected Madarao even when there had only been a rock in a doghouse for him to pay respect to. Now that they were partners, that respect had only deepened and grown.

It wasn't guilt that made Madarao stay. It was gratitude. Toshimori actually valued his opinion, and relied on him far more than Yoshimori ever had. Of course, with Madarao in his natural state, the land firmly on their side, and Toshimori's powers being inconsistent at best, it was much easier to rely on Madarao, but that wasn't the point.

There was a bond between them, and somehow Yoshimori's absence only made it stronger.

7 - Yukimura Tokine

The first night that Yoshimori came to her after his death, Tokine honestly thought that she was dreaming. So she had behaved as people do in dreams: with no fear of consequences, giving in to the desires that she always locked away when awake.

In her dreams, Yoshimori was all too real. He smiled at her, told her that he would always protect her, and kissed away her tears. Then they would make love until Tokine fell asleep in his arms, spent but satisfied.

This went on for some time, and at no point did it ever occur to Tokine that she might not be dreaming. After all, Yoshimori was dead, and she had certainly never behaved this way with him while he was alive.

The dream ended one day when her grandmother kicked in the bathroom door, dragged Tokine away from the toilet, and pointedly told her that she knew morning sickness when she saw it.

Tokine dreamed of Yoshimori that same night, and they did not make love. Instead, she yelled at him and hit him on the head until he admitted that yes, taking physical form was within his power, and that he definitely should have mentioned it at some point, especially since all of his reproductive parts still worked.

Oddly enough, once they got past the yelling and the hitting, Tokine found that she was not really mad anymore.

In fact, the only real problem that occurred during her pregnancy was convincing everyone that Toshimori was not the father. For months, however, Toshimori went red in the face every time he saw her, and could barely string two words together around her until her son was born.

Tokine thought her son was perfect, but her grandmother never really got over the fact that the baby's Houin Mark was situated firmly on his palm.

8 - Ougi Shichirou

So many things had improved after Mahora was properly installed at Arashizaki Shrine. Others had not.

The old cherry blossom tree had withered, but never quite died, and remained there, the rotting husk a permanent eyesore on the land. Shichirou was certain that Mahora could have removed it. He was equally certain that Mahora never would.

Perhaps gods had their own honor codes. Perhaps this was Mahora's way of remembering her, or simply his creepy companion's way of torturing Shichirou.

He did not regret the actual murder, only the cowardly way in which he had done it. Surely Mayuka would have refused if he'd given her a choice, even fought back. But her power had been nothing compared to his own, and he could have simply defeated her in combat. Instead, he had killed her while her guard was down, and she had died with his betrayal in her eyes. It was not a death worthy of his reputation, and he had taken no pride in it.

For all his talk of personal honor and pride, in the end Shichirou had been unable to escape the path of blood. It hadn't surprised him: he was an Ougi, after all, born to snatch away life as easily as he drew breath.

Every meeting with Yoshimori had only served to reinforce that despite their similarities, their intended roles were mirror opposites: Yoshimori was meant to walk proudly in the light, and Shichirou would always dwell in the dark. To this day, Yoshimori insisted that Shichirou was a hero, but he was the only one who thought so. Mayuka's death had been uncomfortable for Shichirou's own subordinates, to say the least: if he could so easily turn on someone who had been so important to him, there was no reason to think anyone else in his camp would be safe.

Even before the act, he had understood, or at least suspected that killing a god would come with a heavy price. Shichirou was not surprised that Tokine seemed to have escaped such a fate unscathed. Yes, she had been imprisoned, but only briefly, and Yoshimori had rescued her. No one was going to save Shichirou. No one would or could. If it had been a matter of defeating an opponent, he could have easily saved himself.

But he had no idea how to defeat the curious rash that bloomed on his cheeks, the very image of the circular patterns on a moth's wing.

Nor could he challenge the dusty cough that grew worse with every passing year.

On his twenty-sixth birthday, he began to see Mayuka's face in virtually every mirrored surface. He could have banned all mirrors from the mansion, but knew there was little point.

On his twenty-eighth birthday, Mayuka began appearing in his dreams again. She was not angry, oddly enough, but reserved and surprisingly patient. It wasn't hard for him to guess why.

On his twenty-ninth birthday, they met again in his dreams. This time, however, Shichirou reached for her hand, and she grasped his own in return, gently but firmly.

"I will follow where you lead, Mayuka-sama," he promised. "I am yours, now and forever."

"My silly Shichirou," she cooed, stroking his cheek, "you always were."

When the servants came to wake him, all they found was a lone cherry blossom on his pillow.

9 - Kanda Yurina

Yoshimori only visited her once after his death, and from that, Yurina understood his feelings perfectly.

Rather, there were none, or at least none for her. At most, he still thought of her as an informant, an early warning system against ayakashi.

They were not even friends. She had never been to his home, and he had turned down any invitations to hers.

But he didn't want her to be hurt, if only because he couldn't stand watching anyone get hurt. So he gave her a gift.

It was a shikigami dog: all round and pudgy and white all over, void of any other features, save for the black design on its back. It was slightly different from the one Yurina remembered: his shikigami had always bore a black diamond. Now there was a large, black circle inside of a rectangle (she almost had no choice but to call him "Spot"), and she had no idea what it meant, save that it felt more like Yoshimori than the previous one had. The dog was friendly, and often licked her face with a tongue that felt as soft as tissue paper. She would have preferred a cat, all things considered, but she loved Spot and would never dream of replacing him.

Yurina was never lonely despite living alone. She made a comfortable living as a fortune teller, and had dinner with the Yukimuras twice a week at Tokine's insistence. Toshimori had extended the same offer, but Yurina found being around him far too painful. He was too attentive, too kind, too much like the Yoshimori that she had fantasized about.

10 - Sumimura Sumiko

She hadn't left her family for love, ambition, or any vague, noble reason like that.

She did it for her own sanity.

Masamori understood.

Far too much importance was placed upon the Houin Mark. But really, it was just a symbol.

Chushinmaru was a child. What did he care for symbols? If he wanted you, he told you so, mark or no mark. Certainly it was easier for him to communicate with the marked ones, but what did a child who could end the world have to fear from a little effort?

He had called to her, night and day, demanding to be set free, pleading for new playmates.

Sumiko had never told a soul. Even if they had believed in him, they would not have believed her. And why would they?

She didn't have the mark.

She left because she had to. The distance was nothing to him, but eventually, Chushinmaru lost interest in her, and focused on the ones that remained directly above his sphere of influence. Just as she'd hoped. The thought of sacrificing her sons to him did not sit well with her, but she had always intended to return, once she found a more permanent solution.

Yoshimori had been up to the task, as she'd always known he would be. But the end result was not quite what she'd prepared for.

Their respective duties kept them apart most of the time, but Sumiko found it was now necessary to avoid him even more.

Sometimes when Yoshimori looked at her now, she felt eight years old again, and she could still hear Chushinmaru's whispered voice in her ears, pleading, insistent, and slowly driving her mad. Sumiko wanted to hate them both, for that would have been easier. But she loved Yoshimori, and that was more than a little dangerous now. Chushinmaru had not so much stopped existing as he had been sealed within Yoshimori. If there was ever a moment when Sumiko allowed her guard to weaken, she had to believe that he would act on his old desires and claim her. Anything less was too risky.

Certainly this hurt Yoshimori, but it was necessary. Yoshimori had become so much more powerful after the sealing. Already, he could destroy Karasumori with a mere thought. The idea of what he'd be capable if Sumiko's own power were added to his was beyond even her imagination.

Tokimori had warned her that it might be this way. She'd ignored the warnings, and now she wished she hadn't. Sumimura kekkaishi were natural powerhouses, and with the right techniques, Sumiko could have sealed Chushinmaru within herself. The only reason she hadn't was because an insane god was infinitely worse than one that was merely upset at times.

The only comfort was that Sumiko could live with having sacrificed her family to save the world. After all, it was nothing she hadn't done before.

The End.

Endnotes: Obviously, some of this no longer applies (particularly the part about either sealing Chushinmaru within a person or sacrificing a person to him, though it seemed to be vaguely implied as a potential answer at a few points). Questions and comments (and even complaints, I suppose) welcome, since this made far more sense in my head.