So it has been a looooong while hasn't it? So very sorry. Time kinda slipped away from me while I was writing Phoenix Rising. Seeing how this is my first story—typos, bad grammar, even worse writing—though, I'm not gonna abandon it.

But you can image my surprise at the anount of so many reviews saying how much you guys all liked it.

Maybe...Maybe it it isn't that bad. I mean I was trying to write something good and all. Thanks. Really, thanks. You guys are the stuff authors dream of really, you are.

So here you go~

Chapter 15

[Shura]

Shura was flipping pissed. No even more then that she was cranky and PMS'ing too. 'When I get my hands on that little…'

It hadn't taken Kirigakure-sensei long to get worked up into a frenzy. It had been nearly an hour since Rin had last come down to take their orders for dinner and during that hour the exwire's and herself had worked through grumbling stomachs and all. The only one who seemed to be having a good old time was Leiko. But she had run off sometime earlier making the excuse that she had to tend to her sister.

Shura had been a bit suspicious but when she said that her grandmother would be down to help, she had perked up hoping to grill the leader of the Benzaiten sect.

That, of course, had been a good twenty minutes ago.

And Shura didn't like how things were panning out.

The exwire's themselves were hard at work making sure all the wards and barriers were up and running. Not that anything had disturbed them. It was boring as hell work but it had to be done.

What bothered Shura the most was that she hadn't gotten anything to eat! So excusing herself from her work—not that she was doing anything anyway—she made her way up the long, winding staircase and to the kitchen.

To chew Rin out for dawdling, and hopefully sneaking some extra food~ What? She was a growing girl too!

She hadn't made it two steps into the door-way of the kitchen when the ground shook and the ceiling rained dirt and rock on her. Shit, this ain't good!

[Amaimon]

He had just been minding his own business eating his twenty-third bag of "Hot' n Spicy" chips when he smelt something burning. Sniffing the air the Demon King got off the pile of futon's he had rearranged into a gigantic nest-like bed inside the linen closet.

The scent smelt tangy and metallic like someone was burning meat and hair. Wrinkling his noise in disgust, the green-haired male made his way to the door to see if it was coming from somewhere outside. 'That smell is like when Aniue accidently burns himself while cooking… And that one time when he set his goatee on fire.'

Shuddering, the Earth King made a face when he remembered the taste of his older brothers cooking. After that thought he became curious as to what could be making that acrid smell and opened the door to investigate.

He had been sitting bored in that cupboard for days amusing himself with little trips out to get food and see what his lovely sibling was up to. Ever since he that food run a few days ago up-top the Earth King had been pouting at the stern report his Aniue had given upon learning he had demolished part of the Shinkansen.

It wasn't long before he got side-tracked by another odor—this one delicious—and stumbled upon the kitchen. In hamster form, the shiny magenta eyes of Amaimon searched the room and landed upon boxes and boxes of bento just waiting to be devoured.

Mouth watering, he scampered up the counter by virtue of a cloth hanging down from it and sat in front of the mountains of food before him.

With a "poof" he sat in all his humanoid glory on the counter top and clapped his hands together. A wide grin adorned his face as he sang, "Itadakimasu~"

He completely forgot about the smell from earlier.

After stuffing his face, the gluttonous, verdant-haired son of Satan looked around the kitchen and not seeing anything else to eat hopped off the counter and made to saunter his way out until he caught a small whiff of demon in the air. It smelled like stagnant water mixed with rotted blood.

He stopped for a second trying to understand what could have possibly made the stench when he found a bit of a spiced and ashy aroma right under his nose. He glanced about and saw that there was liquid on the floor and broken shards of ceramic littered all over the place.

He raised his eyes from their usual half-mast position when he recognized the scent as the one belonging to his little Imouto.

It was soon after that he realized that the two smells intersected and that the rancid one completely subdued Rin's.

He stilled, tilting his head and his eyes found the tiny puddle of blood that had seeped onto the ground. Unbeknownst to the younger that had fainted there early and cut her hand, the older was seeing the consequence of it.

A sneer came to his face when he finally became aware that there had been a struggle. Inhaling deeply, he took off like a shot out the door intent on finding his missing sibling and the owner of that putrid odor that had attacked her.

All he had to was follow the scent, and skulking through the halls intent on keeping his presence invisible, hid from a certain red-haired woman when she rounded the corner.

Waiting till she stomped past Amaimon crept out of the hallway she had passed by and continued on.

It wasn't long till he felt a surge of demonic force coming from a dark shadowed corridor. When it led to a dead end he tilted his head and looked around confused.

'I know that she is here, but where?' The Demon King scrunched his noise, and started feeling the walls. 'Maybe…a secret passage?'

It wasn't till he stepped into a puddle of water that came from the old, ratty tapestry on the end wall that he found it.

He touched the fabric and was surprised when he nearly fell flat on his face when he pushed on it. Tumbling through the not-so-secret entrance he pin-wheeled his arms to keep his balance.

When he no longer felt like he was going to lose his balance, he noticed the puddle of water was more like a miniature lake covering the entire room. There was a serious depression in the middle of the floor with rock strewn around like someone had decided to redecorate. With TNT.

Looking around some more the teal-eyed man caught the sight of a sword peeking out of the rubble and stepping forward heard a light groan. Eye wide, the demon scurried to the noise picking up the katana along the way once he realized that it was his little siblings'.

Tied to the ceiling with thick, gelatinous tendrils his Imouto shuddered and moaned again as if she knew he was in the room.

Walking closer, the Demon King was suddenly hit in the back with something wet and hard causing him to hit the floor face first and roll till he came to a hard stop on his back. Blinking in surprise, he narrowed his eyes and jack-knifed back up from the floor. Whipping around with rage in his eyes at being attacked so cowardly, he bared his fangs.

A young figure stood by the tapestry that the entrance way was hidden by and her eyes glinted in malice. "What is a man doing HERE?! A demon by the looks of it too. How dare you…"

Unworried, the Earth King frowned slightly eyes narrowing in distaste. The rancid odor seeping from the female in front of him caused his nose to crinkle up in distaste. "Did you touch Imouto?"

The other figure sneered nastily, pointy fangs peeking out past her lip. "Imouto? Your related to that thing? No, wait. That would mean… Well, well, well it would seem as if I will have a feast quite soon… You are a target too, I suppose. I don't have to hesitate then. Now die!"

Amaimon growled, hearing all he wanted to before he pounced. He reached for her neck with his claws landing in a puddle instead. Suddenly the sword was yanked from his grasp by a whip of water. Twirling around to dodge the second one he jumped across the room, back to the door, facing the girl that had dissolved into liquid only to reappear next to Rin with the stolen blade held to her throat.

Eyes wider than normal, Amaimon snarled not pleased at all. "Don't you touch her!"

The ground shook when he stomped the rubble-strewed floor causing a miniature earthquake in the confines of the room. Dust and dirt flew everywhere when he disappeared and reappeared right behind the young female. The sword was yanked out of her surprised grasp as Amaimon kicked her in the spine, sending her tumbling much like the Earth king had before.

She screamed in rage but when she twisted around landing onto her sandaled feet she seemed to freeze. Suddenly her rage filled features vanished and she straightened up sneering, "So sorry, but I have to go. Not that it much matters, you'll be back. After all, I bet your little sibling," her words dripped with venom. "Will come crying begging me to spare her little twin."

A grotesque laugh later, the girl dissolved into water, vanishing without a trace.

Sensing that the attacker was truly gone, Amaimon un-crouched from his battle position and came to stand in front of his little sister.

Who, when waking up in the aftermath of the battle she mumbled something intelligible and Amaimon eyed the rope—if it could be called that—then the Koumaken in his hand.

Before he came to the conclusion to cut the tendrils with the weapon, Rin's eyes fluttered open, staring at the floor hazily.

It didn't take long for her to start coming around—albeit slowly—and lay her eyes on him.

Amaimon himself crept up to his tied-up sibling and placed his clawed hand onto her cheek surveying the sleep-hazed blue eyes of his sibling. Hearing the quiet mumbles coming out of her mouth he tilted his head quizzically Now Amaimon wasn't too sure what his little sibling was going on about but he knew he couldn't just leave her tied up. It sounded a bit like she was out of it so he figured there wouldn't be a big struggle when he took her back to the closet to rest. Till she started to become more lucid and question him.

Fixing to untie her so she could see he wasn't a threat he noticed a small trail of blood leaking down her leg. Anger rising, he glanced up and down her form again looking for more injuries and noticed the two reddened puncture marks on her upper and inner right thigh. Peeking closely at it while holding the then thrashing child in hand he rubbed the perforated holes and a bit curious, licked them. It held a terrible taste that made him wrinkle his nose.

The inquiry into the wound caused another round of wiggling and groggy protest from the younger. So making an executive decision that she didn't necessarily need to be awake any longer he knocked her out with a quick chop to the back of her neck. That and he rather not have deal with the no-doubt drugged sibling.

He then cut the glue-like substance that held her to the ceiling and caught the smaller in his arms.

'Now what to do… I bet that it won't be long till the Exorcist's come since I made a lot of noise… Maybe… No, Aniue might get mad at me.'

Deciding to make a quick get-away Amaimon hugged the child in his arms a little more closely and made to snap his fingers.

But when he had tightened his grip on the child-like teen he looked down again quickly scanning the body of his Imouto. 'That…is not good.'

[Rin]

A light shined in Rin's face. She moaned in agony feeling her muscles stretch unnaturally from the tight hold her bonds held her in.

The sounds of a battle were echoing around her and the loud crash of rubble and someone screaming in rage reached her ears. Slowly, she opened her eyes which were bleary from the venom that had been inflicted upon her from the snake earlier.

The wound itself ached and spit fire through her veins. A bad taste lingered in her mouth and she saw the smoke and fire that lit the room with a hazy quality. She blinked trying to stay awake and adjust to the bright flashes of light and every other stimulus that bombarded her.

'Damn… why is it so hard to concentrate? What was I doing again? I can't… I don't remember.'

Rin's eyes slid shut and she almost fell asleep again when the noise stopped. Everything was quiet except the "clack" and "drip" of stone and water as it rained down from the ceiling. 'Why? Why did the sound stop? Was someone fighting? It sounded like it… What were they fighting over…I wonder…'

A cold hand suddenly touched her cheek and she felt nails scrape across the flesh there. Placing more force into staying awake she trained her opened eyes on the man before her.

'Who? Their face is all blurry…' She gulped and tried to speak, "W-are… Who are y- Who-?"

A finger laid itself over her mouth telling her to be silent. "Naughty little sibling. Forgetting me…"

A kiss was laid on her lips and she squirmed when the person's tongue licked them. 'Gross… What are they doing?'

The raven-haired exwire tried to concentrate on the wavy outline of the guy in front of her and only managed to see muted green and the sharp leer of teal eyes slitted like a reptilian's.

This jolted her awake and quickened her breath. She squeaked out breathlessly, "Na- no! Let go of…me! I won't taste good!"

They didn't listen and the eyes disappeared from her line of sight. Seconds later hands poked the skin that had been bitten. She let out a harsh hiss of pain and then jerked when she felt a hot and wet tongue drag itself across her sensitive skin on her thigh.

She tried to move away from the attacker but couldn't due to her arms being pinned above he shoulders by something she could not see. 'I have to- I have to do something! I don't want to die!'

Her struggles became even fiercer until she heard a grunt and the felt something blunt hit the back of her head. The dark instantly consumed her mind while she slumped forward.

I know, not another cliff hanger.

That being said there will probably only be two more chapters left. Once I get the lemon (malexmale) written for the next chapter—the long awaited, the very, very long awaited lemon—I'll end the story in the 17 and probably do an epilogue, so 18 will wrap everything up. I don't think there will be a sequel. After all I really can't seem to write in whatever P.O.V this is anymore. (I don't even know what to call it.) First person for me from now on.

So thanks for the patronage and all.

Tarry a while. Thou art so fair. ~ Wild-Tama