A/N: The takes place after the episode "Wielder of the Dragon" in the Dark Tournament saga. I own none of the characters. Kurama's POV, contains mild slash, nothing graphic.

I was ever in awe of the power Hiei could harness when his mind was put to a task. Team Urameshi sat in the locker room, some of us preparing, others healing. I sat with my back against a wall, listening to Yusuke and Kuwabara bicker like the school children one could occasionally forget they were. Each was trying to hide the weakness they perceived in themselves with threats and violence. I shook my head. One day, I hoped, they would learn that their emotions could be their strength, if they allowed.

After the last match, the ring lay in ruins and the committee had had to call an intermission while it was replaced. And so here we sat, each in varying degree of disarray. I was nursing the wounds that had so nearly taken my life during my match with Karasu, Kuwabara was attempting to convince himself and all the rest of us that he did not fear his upcoming clash with the smaller of the Toguros, Yusuke was pretending he wasn't in an emotional shambles so soon after Genkai's death, and Koenma was staring out the window in a feigned show of nonchalance. And then there was Hiei.

The fight with Bui had taken so much of Hiei's strength that he now lay unconscious on a bench, having been carried in by Kuwabara and Yusuke. I wondered at his request, to find a quiet corner in which to tuck his body away until he awoke. It seemed simple enough, but the trust implied bespoke the changes he had experienced over the last few months. Hiei was beginning to trust his team, his friends. I thought back for a moment to the Hiei I had first met, virtually identical and yet unrecognizable as the demon who now lay before me.

As Yusuke and Kuwabara continued to prepare for their coming fights, I looked across the room at Hiei, the corners of my mouth turning up. He seemed to be so at peace, lying there, and the thought of it stirred something deep in my memory.

For all of my human childhood, while my young peers had played at "hide and seek" or toiled away in their boxes of sand, I had listened to the mothers' chatter. Invariably, one or the other of them, occasionally even my own, would begin to fawn over how adorable the children were when they slept. I remember this topic in particular because it was one of the few, among them party clowns and mobiles, that I had never fully understood. To my mind, the only difference between a sleeping child and one awake was that the sleeper would be less apt to speak. This would unquestionably qualify as an improvement in a 4-year-old human, but I was still unable to see the constant conversational draw.

Watching now over Hiei, I decided to cross this item off my list of human idiosyncrasies I had accepted that I would never truly comprehend. The habitual scowl, without which I had rarely seen him, had been completely smoothed away, as though time itself had been reversed and taken him back to an age when he had been happy, an age which, sadly, I had long ago begun to suspect had never existed. The tension which held the muscles throughout his body rigid had been sapped away. Even the determined set of his jaw, which I had mistaken for his natural bearing, had altered. His eyes, though closed, seemed larger somehow, and on the whole he seemed younger, and I wondered if he would have any trouble at all blending in with the students at the school I occasionally attended. 'Adorable' seemed an eminently appropriate description.

But it was not merely a physical change. This was the first time in our association that I had seen Hiei so utterly vulnerable. If some ill meaning demon were to come across him, there would be nothing he could do. It seemed odd, but there was something about this moment of intense defenselessness that I found strangely endearing. There was an inherent trust to the situation, a deep bond. It was as though Hiei was a child placed in my care, and I was, if not his parent, his keeper. When waking, Hiei was rather like a human 4-year-old, brash and unpredictable, and I often felt it was my responsibility to protect him from the consequences of his actions. I wrapped his wounds, I protected him from challenges he wasn't ready to face, I walked at his side into the dangers of the unknown.

I felt a deep stirring of emotion, and not for the first time, I was glad for the duality of my nature. I had never, in all my hundreds of years, cared for another the way I cared for Hiei. Were I still the clever, detached Yoko, I would have ignored the warmth of the sentiment outright. Were I merely the young, innocent Suichi Minamoto, I would fear the depth of the feelings I had for him. But together they recognized and embraced the undeniable truth that I loved this ruthless, angry, brilliant demon. Someday, perhaps, together they would find the courage to tell him.

Hiei's shoulder twitched and, despite my wounds, I was at his side in an instant. I put my hand to his arm and he calmed once more, falling back into the sleep so deep one might wonder if he would ever wake. I heard a short laugh from behind me, and I looked just in time to see the smile on Koenma's face as he turned away, chuckling and shaking his head.

Soon after, Yusuke and Kuwabara returned to the main area of the locker room, having argued all they felt that they could, and they carried Hiei back out to the stadium between them. I followed along, keeping a watchful eye on him, determined to keep him safe as we charged, once more, into the dangerous unknown.

I don't know what to tell you, except that these two just speak to me. Let me know what you think.