Title: Surety
Fandom: Magic Knight Rayearth
Rating: General
Length: 800 words
Content notes: Some background mention of violence
Author notes: A snippet of medieval!au Hikaru and Fuu, one evening
Summary: One evening, shortly after having had to separate from their friend, Fuu and Hikaru settle in for another night in the woods.

oOo


“Here,” Hikaru said, crouching down beside Fuu and holding out a hand of small twigs. “I think these are dry enough to catch.”

“Thank you.” Fuu busied herself pulling the kindling she’d been trying to light out from the small campfire she was attempting to light before it was fully dark in these woods. “This should – ah, there we go.”

A couple of little points of light finally caught and began to grow, flaring up into actual flames as they watched it intensely, until the kindling had truly caught and the larger pieces of wood were beginning to burn as well.

“We should look for some dry kindling while it remains light tomorrow,” Hikaru said, quietly. “Before we set out.”

“Yes.” Fuu hesitated, glancing at her companion. “Did you see any sign of anyone else?”

“No, though it is not easy to see such things in this light.” Hikaru waved a hand at the sky, barely visible through the branches overhead. “But I saw and heard nothing to make me think we are being pursued now. I think we may have stopped the last of them yesterday.”

Nodding slowly, Fuu sat back. They were tucked into the dry hollow where a great tree had fallen, the ripped up remains of the root-ball a massive shadow behind them, blocking the wind and hopefully also the light from their little fire from being seen at a distance. Their horses, meanwhile, were both hitched further along the bole of the tree. “I did not hear any pursuit all day. Either they are all defeated…”

“Or they have turned back to find their original target,” Hikaru finished for her, taking a breath and wrapping her arms about her legs. “If they have… did we do the right thing?”

Fuu nodded, though the question had weighed on her own mind more than once, the past few days. This was the third night since they had sent Umi off with Clef, Lord Eleru, when they were attacked; she believed that she and Hikaru had now dealt with that threat. But if they were wrong…

“We must trust in Umi to keep them safe,” she said, softly. “And this task is just as important for Cephiro. If those letters had not arrived when they did, we would already have come in this direction, looking for the Prince. The Queen needs her heir located and safeguarded.”

“I know. It is only…” Hikaru sighed, then smiled at Fuu. “I do think she will keep him safe, and they will be able to travel more quietly as two together than four may. But it is strange being apart.”

The three of them had been together since the day they were each kidnapped, taken on board the ship which got caught in a storm and blew across a very wide sea, until they crashed onto the shores of Cephiro. They had taken control of the ship just before the storm’s onslaught. It was the first time they had worked together.

Fuu hoped dearly that the fight three days ago would not be their last.

“We will find the Prince, and by the time we return with him to the Queen they may have returned as well,” she said, as she added another piece of wood to the fire.

“You do believe the injured man we met was the Prince, then?” Hikaru asked, as she set about finding their few cooking supplies.

“When we described him, the Queen agreed it matched that of her brother.”

“Yes. And he was wearing Clef’s badge.”

Fuu thought again of the man they had met, so briefly, before they had managed to find their way to the Queen and into her service. She had thought of him a lot, in the months since; she had set his broken leg and splinted it. It was merely the care she would have for anyone she treated, to wonder what had happened to them since. Particularly when one knew not the true name of the person they helped, nor what they had been doing to be alone and injured in the deep woods.

Though it seemed Ferio of Cephiro had given her his real name, after all. He had merely omitted the fact he was the Queen’s brother, heir to the throne, and engaged upon an information-gathering mission.

It certainly had nothing to do with the way his smile had warmed her from the inside out.

“We will find him,” she promised, softly. “We shall find him and bring him safe to his sister.”

Hikaru smiled at her, and together they settled down to rest for the night before picking up their quest again.