Demon Stories

Saya: White Rice Powder, 1620, Japan

Saya

White Rice Powder

1620, Japan

"You would make a pretty girl."

He was smiling at me. His long white, red lined kimono was loose about him, and he was sitting on the wood floor in front of me, his legs curled up under him messily. On his face and neck were all kinds of womanly paints, causing him to have that look of a woman which had drawn me to him in the first place. He looked exactly as a woman looks. No. He looked even better than any woman ever could look. Somehow. 

"I want to paint you, my Saya."

He smiled innocently, and drew closer to me, crawling gently, slowly. 

"I am a man," I told him plainly, refusing.

"I am a man, too," he whispered, still smiling, but I could see I had said the wrong thing, in his eyes.

I cupped his painted face in both of my hands, in love. 

"You are so beautiful," I told him, softly. "Do not be sad."

Then I kissed him slowly, our lips lingering on eachother's, and with a quick outward breath my body suddenly flared in demonish want for him. But something small in my heart, like a pin inside, stabbed and made the guilt flow freely like blood and I could not think. 

"Seiya, your heart is beating so fast," he whispered, his voice going higher like sweet girl, and this caused me to breathe even more. Seeing my weakness, his lips curled into a gentle smile and he pushed on my chest ever so lightly with his small hand. 

As I laid on the floor, my black hair pooling in strange swirls about my face, he crawled on top of me and leaned over. He studied my face. I studied his deep green eyes. 

"It is a curious mystery," he whispered like a cat, "how your dark brown eyes turned royal blue when you became demon. Like a deep blue sea."

While saying this, he had dipped his brush into a small, black lacquered bowl full of white rice powder. Not wanting to see, I closed my eyes and felt the strange fibers fly about my face in a surprising way by his experienced hand. His loving, beautiful hand. And I began to cry.

The brush stopped then, and unwillingly, my hands rose to my face and I covered my eyes. Sobbing quietly, I did not want him to see. But there was no way he could not see these red tears. The blood mixing with the rice powder and making an odd paste. 

"If you do not want to look like a girl so much, I will stop." I could hear the sad concern in his voice. The guilt and regret in his voice. This stabbed my heart all the way to my back, sending small twinges of shivers up my spine, for this was not at all what I had intended. It caused my guilt to fold over on itself and compound. Which caused me to cry even more. 

"Seiya-a," he whined a little, and hugged my body with all of himself.