A Visitor

I was sitting in the rain and looking up in the sky. Water is my favorite of the four elements that I command. That’s probably because it’s the one that I was actually taught to use, so I had bonded to it long before I figured the others out. I held out my hand and gathered a ball of water in my palm. With a practiced flick of my wrist the water started flowing in figure eights around my wrist as if it were a snake.

“I wish Sanzo would come out here and see this. You’re beautiful in the rain,” Goku said with wonder in his voice. I pushed the rain away so that it trickled down an invisible shield and patted my hand on the patch of roof next to me. Goku came and sat down beside me while looking up at the water in amazement.

“I gather Sanzo doesn’t like the rain,” I said gently. This guy would probably spill his guts for a Popsicle – or a simple water show.

“He never said why, but he always gets so gloomy when it rains,” the little guy said sadly.

“Does he get gloomy when he’s near rivers and lakes and stuff?” I asked, gently probing for information. “I’ll bet he looks kind of funny swimming.”

“He doesn’t like rivers,” Goku said as he watched the rain slide down my invisible barrier. “Whenever we have to cross one and there isn’t a bridge he makes us go the long way until we find one.”

“How strange,” I said. “What about Hakkai? He doesn’t like rain, either.”

“He killed a thousand demons to save his wife, and then she killed herself with his knife. If you bathe in the blood of a thousand demons you become one yourself.” As Goku spoke he seemed to notice what he was saying and his eyes widened. “I’m not supposed to tell you that!” he shrieked and backed away from me a little.

I smiled sweetly and consciously relaxed my shoulders. It sounded to me like both men had suffered severe trauma in their pasts that made them hate the rain. Hydrophobic people tended to fear water and avoid it the way Sanzo did, but they wouldn’t get into a depressive funk so long as they were inside when it was pouring.

“Oh, whatever. It’s too late now. Guess what I figured out how to do!” I said excitedly. I held out my right hand and touched a little trickle of water. Where I touched turned the little stream of water green, and in a circular pattern all of the water started turning into different bright colors. I tried to pattern the colors into interesting designs, but I didn’t yet have enough control over the spell to make it happen. A bright purple dragon would have cheered Goku right up, I figured.

We sat in silence watching the rain for a little bit. Then Gojyo came out onto the roof and told Goku that if he didn’t hurry he would miss his lunch. With a start Goku jumped up and ran through the doorway. I followed more slowly, dusting off my bottom.

“Don’t worry about what Goku told me,” I said. “I won’t tell anybody else.”

“The little monkey doesn’t know when to keep his mouth shut,” Gojyo groused. I chuckled into my hand and allowed my shield to shrink as I turned to go back inside.

“Sometimes trusting people is a good thing,” I said. “He clearly trusts you and the other two. Hell, you trust them all as well. I’d say you have a good working relationship.”

Gojyo shrugged, but didn’t say anything. I just walked down the steps into the inn and retraced my steps back to Sanzo’s room. As I reached for the doorknob Gojyo’s hand reached out and stopped mine. “What are you doing?” he asked.

“Everyone deserves to be able to dance in the rain,” I said casually as I pushed past him and opened the door. Sanzo was sitting on his bed staring out the window. His knee was pulled up to his chest and he leaned on it as he brought a cigarette up to his lips. I walked up to him and was surprised that he didn’t pull his gun on me. “Come dance with me,” I said in a soft voice.

Sanzo looked at me for a brief moment as if I had sprouted antennae on my forehead before turning back to the window with a firm, “No.”

“If I recall correctly,” I said softly, “I did not ask you a question.”

I stepped forward and Sanzo’s gun was pointed at me just as I had expected. Without missing a step I pinched the sides of the gun barrel and the metal bent easily under my touch. I deftly pulled the gun from Sanzo’s fingers with my left hand as my right hand snaked around his waist and heaved him up over my shoulder.

“What the fuck are you doing?!” Gojyo asked loudly.

Hakkai had heard our commotion from the room next door and had come to investigate. As I passed him in the hallway I grabbed his right ear with my left hand and pulled, saying, “You’re going to come with me, too.”

“What? Where? Why?” Hakkai asked.

“Water is the healing element,” I said briskly as I quick marched up the stairs and onto the roof. “It is a symbol of cleansing, purity, and femininity, although I don’t know why girls are linked to water. It probably has something to do with menstruation and our monthly cycles. Either way, it really doesn’t matter. Water is the calming element that ebbs and flows…
I’m sure you can think up better water imagery than I can, so I’ll stop it now. I hate poetry.”

“Put me down!” Sanzo groused.

“I’ll drop you face down on the stairs if you want,” I offered. “Just think of it this way: I’m a busybody who wants something. Would it kill you to indulge me just once?”

There was a gurgle that came from Hakkai’s stomach, and mine answered back. I paused on the last stair before I used my power to open the door to the roof. I shoved the rain aside again and set Sanzo down on the dry rooftop. Releasing Hakkai I reached in my back pocket for the little purple compact mirror that I carried around. I opened it and stared into the magnifying mirror, searching for something specific, before I turned it toward the ground and Called out my picnic supplies.

“Where did that shit come from?” Sanzo asked, clearly freaked out a little. Without speaking I quickly spread out the blanket and set out enough food for an army of five.

“This is amazing,” Hakkai said as he inspected the streaks of rain that were not falling on his head. “How did you ever figure out how to do it?”

I shrugged. “I read about something like this in a novel I read a few years ago and copied it, using bits and pieces of what I’d learned when I was part of the Mage’s guild of the Sea. I joined the guild on my seventh birthday, like all good little mermaid girls do.”

“You’re a mermaid?” Hakkai asked.

“Partly,” I said. “My blood is very mixed. Gojyo, could you please bring Goku up here?”

“Uh, sure.” Gojyo left us to sit in uncomfortable silence. Now that I had them, I wasn’t entirely sure which tactic I should use to loosen them up.

“I hate the cold,” I said suddenly, shocking both Hakkai and Sanzo out of their reveries. “When I was four I was chained to the wall in the dungeon at the top of a castle keep, and then shot through the palms of both of my hands. The castle was from the middle ages and had been left in ruin for a thousand years, so there was nothing in the windows to keep out the snow. I was abandoned from about nine that night until around noon the next morning when some archeologists were searching the ruins for artifacts and found me. The chains had cut off the circulation in my hands, so there was no danger of bleeding to death, but hypothermia had started to set in. Because I’m a mermaid I can’t freeze, but without enough salt surrounding me my body temperature can drop to unhealthy levels.” I removed the glove from my right hand and looked at the scar that was still there, both on the palm and the back of my hand. “I’ve hated the cold ever since.”

I turned to look at Sanzo, making sure that my brown eyes captured that violent purple gaze. “But when I see the snow I make sure to lie in it and make a snow angel. That’s why I want the two of you to dance with me in the rain.”