The Demon Within

Chapter Seven

The next morning Mei lay on her back, looking up at the ceiling. Her eyes traveled across the room until they landed on her bandaged arm and she gritted her teeth together at the sight of it. She had wrapped her arm with some bandages so she wouldn't raise any suspension from the guys, since they saw her get cut. They will kill me if they figure it out, she thought. She took her pillow and buried her face in it. Everything was going wrong. It didn't help when Mei realized her family was dead because of her. If she had just been a human, none of this would have ever happened; she wouldn't have attracted Ryou, and Hintani would've never gone off to join the samurai. Mei didn't know the exact reason why Ryou wanted her, but she figured it wasn't for anything good. 

Mei wondered how long Ryou had known about her; about her being a demon. Did he know from the start, or did he pick it up along the way? If Ryou knew from the start about her...Mei buried her face even deeper into the pillow, cursing her existence. Mei had never wanted any burdens to carry, and now she was carrying the burden of her family being mercilessly murdered because of her. Mei wondered why her family had decided to protect her instead of getting rid of her. Surely they had known she was a demon. It would have been common sense to toss a demon when someone had the chance, but for some unknown reason, her family didn't. Mei sighed angrily as she had another question she wanted an answer too. Mei still had a hard time overcoming the fact she was a demon, her thoughts returning to last night when her wound healed itself. She was no different from Ryou, in some areas. No, I'm better than him. I'm not a mass murderer like him.

Then the thought came to her mind she might become one. All the rumors she had heard about demons were that they were ruthless killers. So did that mean Mei would become a killer and kill the samurai here? Mei grunted and hit herself on the forehead, forcing herself not to think about those types of things. Thinking like that wasn't helping her present situation at the moment, so she didn't need to concern herself with something that wasn't going to happen. Mei's main concern now was to hide the condition of her wound and how it had healed. She was afraid of being sent to the infirmary to have it checked out, since Kalik seemed pretty worried about her last night. A small knock sounded at her door and she slowly sat up, her eyes slowly trailing towards the door. Soushi, the captain, entered in followed by Kalik, Takashi and Kaito, the only ones who knew she was Hintani's sister and had encountered Ryou last night. Well, not by blood, Mei thought solemnly. She watched as they sat down and Soushi turned his attention to her, his eyes flaring. Mei raised her eyebrow at him, curious to know what he wanted so early in the morning.

"First off, you are in error for not coming for help when the demon came by," Soushi said angrily. Mei was astonished. Why was he so angry? He had nothing to be angry about since he wasn't even there! "Do you think Hintani would appreciate you acting like that?" Mei immediately narrowed her eyes at him.

"Don't bring him into this," Mei hissed at him. "I didn't act out of order. I was merely taking a walk and Ryou showed up!"

"Then why didn't you come get help? Demons are the things we deal with. It is not your job to deal with them."

"His business was with me, not you! He established that fact very clearly. He has nothing to do with any of you."

"That demon could've killed you Mei," Kalik said strictly and Mei felt her heart tighten.

"You are lucky you got away with a cut to your arm," Soushi retorted as he eyed her seriously. Mei scoffed as she lowered her eyes to the floor.

"He wasn't going to hurt me," mumbled Mei. She knew the real truth and they didn't, which made this conversation very one-sided. Ryou wasn't going to hurt her because she was demon.

"You don't know that," Kaito said as he shook his head. "I think we got there just in time." Mei snorted and eyed them warily.

"So Ryou is the man you said was after you. I did not think we would be dealing with something like this. I was thinking more along the lines of human men," Soushi said rubbing his chin. "This makes things a bit more complicated."