Strays: A Romantic Fantasy Adventure

Sakura’s ears twitched in the direction of the soft click of the closing door and the fading footsteps beyond the walls of the cottage. She counted.

One.

Two.

Three.

That was long enough.

“Get up, Ren!” the girl urged as she bolted up in bed, her voice low in case Raz was still close by. “We have to hurry!”

The boy groaned, barely squinting one eye at the girl who was leaning over him and shaking him furiously, noticing that the room hardly had the slightest hint of light. He turned away and swatted at her. “Go back to sleep. The sun hasn’t even risen yet.”

“I know!” She shook him harder. “We gotta go now!” He ignored her and the fox rolled out of bed, annoyed. “Fine!” she huffed. “I’ll go by myself!”

The boy sighed, knowing she would, and rolled over after her. His breath hitched in his throat as he gawked at her, eyes going wide as his mind raced before quickly pulling the blanket over his head to shield him from the unexpected sight. “Damn it, Sakura! Change somewhere else!”

She rolled her eyes, not nearly as concerned as the boy was. “Not like it’s anything you’ve never seen before.” The girl looked down and observed herself before pulling on one of Ren’s shirts, tying it in a knot in the back so it didn’t hang so low, and sighed. She was already twelve. The other village girls had started to develop and mature, even some of the ones who were younger than her, but Sakura still resembled a doll made of wire, nothing more than shapeless skin and pointy bone. “Not like there’s anything to see, anyways.” She sulked as she smoothed the shirt over her chest, not even the slightest hint of swelling under her hands.

Ren stayed hidden under the blanket until he was sure she was done, and then he waited some more. It was true that he was no stranger to the girl’s body, having seen it plenty of times throughout the years. Sakura had never been one to be shy about her body, and it wasn’t something that the boy gave much consideration to in his earlier years.

But that wasn’t the case now and hadn’t been for a while.

Raz had warned him about this. Told him that things would change, become… difficult and awkward. Things that once didn’t matter now plagued his mind like a disease, nibbling away at his sanity. It had started small, only an inkling, a whisper. But it had grown, gotten louder with every passing day and the boy felt like it was a constant struggle trying to navigate it all. Especially since the girl never gave him a moment to even breathe without her presence lingering near.

The blanket was ripped from his body and the fox demon stood above him impatiently. “Let’s go!” she demanded. “We’re gonna miss it.”

With plenty of grumbling and cursing, he got himself ready while Sakura grabbed food and whatever else she found necessary and stuffed it into her bag. They were out the door just as the first rays of light came up over the mountains. The two made their way towards the trees as the girl held the bag out to him.

The angel glanced at it, tired and grumpy. “You carry it. You brought it.”

“But you’re bigger,” she argued. “It’s easier for you.”

“So? You carry it.”

“Please Ren?” She gazed up at him, emeralds bright and pleading.

Every damn time.

The boy accepted the bag and flung it over his shoulder without a word while the girl bounded ahead, satisfied with her successful manipulation. They passed through the trees and then through the still sleeping village, continuing on the road until they reached the bridge to cross the river and followed it downstream.

“Will you carry me?” Sakura asked.

Ren looked down at her, ready to fling the girl into the river. But instead, he handed her the bag and crouched down so she could climb onto his back before setting off again. By the time the sun was comfortably in the sky, the demon was asleep, and the angel was debating the pros and cons of jumping in the river and drowning them both.

“Get up,” he grumbled, not having come to a decision before reaching their destination. He jiggled her legs and her eyes snapped open.

“We’re here!” she cheered as she dropped off of the angel’s back and ran to the bank of the river. She turned and looked at him, excitement dancing across her face. “It's surfaced!”

Ren wasn’t nearly as impressed. He stared at the giant flatfish that took up a quarter of the large river, it’s pale brown scales like dirt, long spikes along its spine, and five dopey eyes blinking at different intervals. It floated on the surface of the water a short ways out, its giant, toothless mouth opening and closing, eating everything that entered.

“Wow.” The boy yawned, ready to go back to bed. “Best day of my life. We should go home before I can’t contain my excitement anymore.”

Sakura ignored him while digging through the bag frantically. “Look at it! It’s so big!”

“What are we doing here, Sakura? It’s a fish. A not tasty fish. Who cares?”

The girl pulled her hand from the bag, brandishing three daggers in between her fingers. “I’m going to kill it!” she exclaimed with a wild grin.

Of course she was. It was all she ever wanted to do.

“You’re gonna piss Raz off again. How many times has he told you to stop trying to kill the large pests without his permission?”

“I don’t try,” she shot back. “I do. And it hasn’t been enough times to get me to stop, obviously. I don’t know why he always acts like that. I’m better at it than you are.”

The girl really was. Ren always hesitated, unsure of himself, nervous of what could happen. He was always toeing a fine line, and he never knew when he would cross it, or if he’d be able to come back once he did. But not Sakura. She never thought twice, she just did it. There were times the boy would gripe and complain about having to join her, but he always went. Not because she needed him to, but because he needed to.

He needed her.

And the mayhem that came along with her that subdued his own.

However, he knew his uncle was going to be angry if he found out, and that was something else that he wanted to avoid.

“It’s not hurting anything,” the angel told her, a halfhearted attempt to do what was expected of him. “Let’s just go before Raz gets back.”

The fox stared at the fish with a brutal gleam in her eyes. “Okag said that they just keep growing until they take over the whole river. Soon it’ll block the flow of water, flooding up here and downstream will go dry. So, I’m going to kill it.”

“With three daggers?”

“Well, I can’t exactly use your sword, and Raz won’t get me one of my own. I’m stuck with these.” Sakura pouted, feeling sorry for herself. Raz was so unfair.

“Even those are too much. You’re a threat to yourself and everyone around you.”

A dagger zipped through the air and stuck into the ground at Ren’s feet. He tapped it with the toe of his boot, uninterested with the girl’s threat. “Looks like you’re killing it with two.”

Sakura glared at the angel, realizing too late that she had made a mistake, but too proud to admit it. “Doesn’t matter! I don’t even need the other one.” She discarded the second dagger, sending it sailing into the ground next to the first.

“Alright.” The boy yawned, cracking his neck. “Well, don’t get eaten.”

“I won’t!” she barked as she leapt stone to stone until pouncing on the giant fish. The scales were slick with a thin, runny goo under her feet, and she struggled to keep her balance as she slipped and slid to the fish’s head. She fell to her knees, and looked into one of its large eyeballs, concluding it as the best way to its brain as she poked it with an exploratory finger. The demon raised the dagger above her head, preparing to strike, just as her legs slipped apart and she fell face first into the eye.

Ren’s uncontrollable laughter from the bank turned the fox’s face a burning scarlet, her embarrassment growing with every gasp as he doubled over, struggling to inhale.

This was not going as Sakura had planned. She wanted the boy’s attention, but this wasn’t exactly what she had in mind.

Her humiliation quickly turned to rage as the girl haphazardly pushed herself back up, covered in the pest’s slime, over doing her attempt to redeem herself. She couldn’t stop her body from slipping aimlessly just as the fish blinked. The demon was pushed away, her arms and legs flailing to grip at anything around her, and she slipped from the pest’s head into the water before disappearing into its gaping mouth.

The boy quieted and straightened as the girl disappeared. “Oh,” he said aloud to himself, unconcerned. “She’s gone.”

He watched the pest float, its mouth opening and closing, and waited. He looked to see how far the sun had made it across the sky, wondering if he could get both a nap and his chores done before Raz returned. A loud groan escaped as the boy leaned over to pick up the daggers at his feet and tucked them into his belt.

This was taking too long.

Ren was going to miss out on a nap.

The muffled sounds of gurgling and bubbles popping rose from the fish’s belly just before the scales melted like hot wax and the bones crumbled away like dried mud into the river to be washed away.

The fox’s head bobbed up and down as she swam her way back to shore. She reached dry land and flopped over onto her back, hair a sopping mess sticking to her entire body, and smiled successfully. “I told you I only needed one dagger,” she bragged.

“You sure did. I’ve never been more impressed.” The lie was obvious in his exhausted tone. “Let’s go.” The boy started back as the demon rolled over and onto her feet, grabbing the bag and jogging after him. As soon as she overcame him, her body spun around to face him while walking backwards.

“Ren?” she asked, her eyes pleading.

“No. You’re wet.”

“Please, Ren! I saved the village!”

Ren sighed and allowed the girl to climb onto his back once again. He took the path towards home, listening to Sakura snore against his ear the entire way. It was still early. A nap was now out of the question, but he could hopefully still get his chores done before Raz returned.

But as the boy broke through the trees, his uncle was already there, coming in and out of the shed carrying tools and other odds and ends out into the yard. The older angel stopped as Ren came up to him, the girl still sleeping on his back. The man looked between the young angel and demon, shaking his head.

“That damn fish?” he asked, already knowing the answer.

Ren nodded, his eyes averted.

“Put her to bed. She can do your chores as well when she gets up. I need your help today.” Raz scoffed and went back to cleaning.

The boy took the girl inside and laid her in her bed still wet. He quickly changed out of his damp clothes and went to help his uncle pull the rest of the items from the shed. Raz instructed him to remove the planks from the frame, separating the good wood from the rotten ones, before doing the same with the frame.

Sakura emerged from the cottage not long after the two angels had finished constructing a new frame. She had changed out of Ren’s clothes and into a mint green sundress and made an attempt to silently sneak around in order to avoid the older angel’s wrath.

“You’re doing Ren’s chores as well,” Raz commanded, not even bothering to look back at her.

She froze, her tail bristling. “That’s not fair!”

“And cleaning the chicken coop.”

“But…”

“Compost.”

“Fine!” the girl shrieked and stomped off, furious that her whole day would be filled with chores after having done the villages and neighboring town a favor by exterminating the pest.

The man shook his head and turned his attention towards Ren, watching the boy as he watched Sakura, eyes soft and a small upturn to his lips.

That damn look again.

“You love her don’t you, boy.” It was a statement rather than a question considering there was no question about it.

Ren snapped back, pulling a nail from his mouth and pounded it through a plank into the frame. He repeated with the remaining nails before shyly going for more in the bag by his uncle’s feet, his head down to avoid making eye contact.

Raz sighed. “You really know how to pick ‘em. It’s been obvious since the beginning, so don’t act like you don’t. You look at her the same way Ben used to look at Celeste, and we know how that turned out. You two are lucky, though. You’re not stuck in the same situation they were. Things will work out a lot better for you.”

“Oh.” It wasn’t often that his uncle spoke about his mother and father, but when he did, Ren kept quiet, having learned young that Raz would only divulge what he wanted and pressing for more would get him nothing in return.

“I’ve told Sakura that she should stop sleeping in your bed.”

The boy nodded. Sakura had whispered to him every night about Raz’s lectures as she curled up next to him, ignoring the man’s warnings and doing as she pleased.

“We both know she’s not going to listen to me. Even if I make you tell her yourself, I’m sure she’ll sweet talk her way back into your bed that night. And I understand. It’s the way it’s always been, all you two have ever known, so I’m not going to make you do that. But you’re going to have to learn how to say no to her. You’re going to be in a world of hurt if you don’t figure it out and figure it out quick. You two are getting older, things are going to change and get more complicated. That girl is a long way off from thinking before acting, but you’re not that way. You’re not reckless, you think things through. You’re going to have to be the one to use the brain in your head and make the right choices. If anyone can put Sakura in her place, it’ll be you, but you have to actually do it. Can you do that, boy?” Raz looked at his nephew, the boy listening carefully.

Ren stood, sticking the first nail into his mouth. “I can.”