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"Sakura Fall"

The wind rustled through the trees in the enchanted sakura forest and a shallow wave of blushing flower petals came down a moment later, tickling the pointed ears at the crown of her head. Tynkana's ears and white brow whiskers twitched. Her body ached, weighted down by unseen wounds and strain as she struggled vaguely to breathe. Her purse, hidden carefully inside her coat, was weighted down in a different way. The sun was sinking low upon the horizon, threatening to sink with a weight of its own. She was safe, for now, and her grim job was done. No one had followed her here. She slid down the side of a wide and gnarled old trunk, yellowy-green eyes narrowing wearily as she looked upward to the bottoms of the flowers above. The wind picked up multi-hued, long brown strands of hair and twirled them around lazily. They defied gravity as they danced away from their bonds in the single braid that began at the nape of her neck and marched, along with a multitude of goosebumps, down her spine. A storm was coming, but she still had a bit of time before rainfall. The petals drifted down, down... and she drifted along with them.

CROWS.

Tynkana awoke suddenly to the squawking of crows. She jumped to her feet and almost out of her pelt. She looked up but of course could see nothing past the tree's pink cotton-puff blanket. That had been the whole point of hiding here, after all. No one would see her, though she couldn't see them, either. So she listened as the flock continued right along past her. When nothing else could be heard, or felt on the breeze, as every hair stood on end, she gradually relaxed. Grumbling softly to herself, she sat back down. Now her seat was cold again, she thought with a half-smirk.

Then she heard the wingbeats of something heavier. Much bigger. Stronger.

With a mighty CRACK that echoed sharply through the wood, she felt a violent vibration that shot down through the tree trunk and into the ground through the its very roots. She was completely stunned, unable to process the sudden attack. She looked up again, eyes wide with terror, and with a sharp tearing sound, something dark fell down through the branches as the heavy wingbeats fled the scene. She gathered just enough control to open her arms to catch a bundle about the size and weight of a sack of potatoes.

She stared down at the darkly colored bundle. It was no sack. It was an infant wrapped in a blanket but holding onto a large torn piece of some other cloth. Shock was mirrored in their faces as they stared at each other for an interminable moment. Then the child screamed.

The sound jumped from its dark little beak then bore through her ears and into her brain. The endless, depthless soft pinks bled eerily away from the sakura trees until all she could see was bright, glaring white. Then the light faded to darkness and the world became long and angled as if she was falling over. And finally it zig-zagged, jagged like serrated blades. She turned to the side and vomited.

By the time she was done, the baby's voice had faded away but Tynkana noticed that the face was still contorted and crying. No voice issued from its beak, just a soft hiss-like sound. Big alligator tears gathered and trailed down its face. She held the wrapped bundle-with-child against her chest. She had younger siblings; she knew how to hold a baby. For now, the baby still cried. Gradually, very gradually, the voice began to return, as if it had momentarily lost its voice from its scream. She could then identify that voice, even though it was that of a tiny bird: it was a cry of pain.

She looked up into the trees and cried: "Hey, you dropped your baby! Hello!?"

Stumbling around, she called out again and again. Finally, hoarse, she looked down at the child's face. "Don't you... care?"

The baby's eyes had dried. Those eyes were very unusual. They were red and blue: heterochromia caused the red above to fade slightly into the blue below, and both colors were jewel-deep. Fascinated, Tynkana found herself staring. She shook herself free of the weight of those eyes and looked at the rest of the baby's face. It was covered in soft down, black as night. In the fading light she fancied that she could see the faint iridescence that crow feathers have, but that was ridiculous, baby feathers don't shine. The baby's feet were probably literal crow's feet, and it probably had tiny featherless baby wings on its back. This was clearly a baby tengu.

"Care to join me for... dinner?" the catgirl asked with a fake-ominous voice.

The baby giggled.

She smirked. Oh, was it cute. Very cute.

"I guess it's time to go."

She had a place in mind and she knew the way from here. It was an ageless orphanage on the way to Barton that everyone knew about but stayed away from. Or, at least, people her age avoided it like the plague. After all, she was only seventeen, she was practically a child, herself. Not that she had been a child for a very long time.

Making her way through the forest, she came upon a lantern in the fog. Then another. And another. The road they were on began to bend in a curious, almost impossible way. Then, finally, it was there before them, surrounded by lanterns and wrought iron. The Lost Lantern Orphanage was a beacon on the edge of reality. She had never been this close before and approached as if in a dream. She stopped at the front gate and noticed the light flicker. Had a stray wind caught the flames inside?