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Rhiannon yawned, her roller boots slung over her shoulder as she strolled up the front path towards the house. She pulled out her keys, finding the right one and used it, turning the key and pushing the door open.
'Mum?' she called, listening, her ears flickering as she listened. Shutting the door she walked into the hallway, then picked up the letters that were discarded on the floor. She sniffed the air, the scent of alcohol hung heavily around her. She sighed. Her mother was home, or had come home recently. Laying the letters on a table, she stashed her boots away underneath it, then hung her coat up. Keys went on the key hook, and she headed into the living room.
Her mother was lying on the sofa, a glass and an empty bottle on the table at the end of the sofa. Rhiannon shook her head, walking over to her mother and kneeling down. She blinked a moment...something wasnt right, her mother didnt seem to have just passed out, her skin was too pale and cold, her breathing irregular and her eyes were rolled up when Rhiannon gently pried back one lid. She shook her mother's shoulders, anxiety gnawing at her now.
'Mum! Mum!' she yelled, shaking her, trying to evoke a reaction. Sayuri just lolled back when she let her go, one arm falling to the side, the hand hitting the floor. Rhiannon pressed hands against her mouth for a moment, then she gnawed hard at her lip, drawing blood then lunged for the phone on the table at the middle of the living room. With shaking fingers she dialled the emergency services, her legs giving out and she sat in a trembling heap as the operator finally answered.
'Please...' she stumbled out.
'My mother, she's collapsed, and and drink..she's been drinking and she's not waking up..' Rhiannon shook her head as the woman calmly spoke to her.
'No..there's a pulse..she's breathing but - wrong ..address,' she haltingly gave out her address, and was told an ambulance was being dispatched. She clung onto the phone as the operator spoke and then hung up, getting to her feet and going to open the front door, pacing between it and back into the living room. As she was walking back down the hallway for what seemed like the millionth time she heard sirens, the noise making her jump. Two ambulance men hurried down the path, and she took them to Sayuri. They attended to her, preparing her to be moved, and putting her on oxygen. Rhiannon grabbed her front door keys, and followed, completely on autopilot, as they put her mother in the back of the ambulance. She got in as well, the doors were shut and they were off, heading for the hospital.

Rhiannon hugged herself, rubbing her arms under the thin jacket she was wearing. It was the first thing she'd grabbed on leaving the house, and as evening was drawing in the temperature had plummeted. She shivered, her mind numb though as she walked on. She looked around; where the hell was she? The surroundings looked a little familiar, and she sniffed the air, trying to make herself think, and work out where she was. There was a scent she recognised, and she finally worked out that she was close to Damien's home.
She had a purpose now, and her slowing steps took her by degrees closer. Finally she was staggering down the path to the imposing estate, and she folded up on the porch, physically and emotionally too tired to get to the door...

Rhiannon's eyes had closed, the cold of the porch step pressing against her cheek. She just wanted everything to stop; if it wasnt for Damien she wasnt sure what she would do...Damien. Did she just hear his voice? Why was Damien at her house?.. then her confused mind managed to process the thought that she'd found her way to Damien's and had dropped down exhausted on the step. She pushed herself up, mortified to be found in this state, especially by Damien.
'I didnt...know where else to go,' she explained, her face hidden by her hair, not wanting to look at him for fear of breaking down again.

Rhiannon let Damien carry her, the feeling of being in his arms more of a comfort then he would realise. She relaxed on the couch, pulling the robe around her, teeth chattering a little still. She nodded, covering the silly uniform with his robe and leaned back a little, shutting her eyes a moment.
When her shivers were less, she looked at Damien, shifting so that her back was supported by the couch back.
'I came from the hospital,' she said slowly, her fingers twisting into the material of his robe as she spoke.
'My mother was rushed there this afternoon with alcohol poisoning.' she bit her trembling bottom lip, trying not to cry.
'I got home from work and found her passed out.'

Rhiannon glanced at Lenore, scenting something in her emotions but as she left again she just shrugged inwardly. Rhiannon watched as the tea poured itself, the magic show a welcome distraction.
'I'm worried if I start I won't stop,' she said shakily.
'The doctor said..' she swallowed thickly before carrying on.
'She would sleep until tomorrow after the stomach pump, and she was hooked up to an IV. I saw her.' she looked straight at Damien.
'She was so..small, and - and..' her head went down again, her shoulders shaking.

Rhiannon let Damien hold her, and as soon as his fingers started to stroke though her hair she couldnt hold her tears back and she cried into him, her whole body trembling. She clung to him, her fingers gripping tightly to his clothes;
'Don't leave me,' she cried.
'Everyone leaves me...please don't..' she shook her head, her whole posture abject in her misery.

Rhiannon mumbled a little, eyes heavy as Damien gently rocked her.
'Love you..' she shaped the words, her fingers stilling as everything caught up with her. She just felt so .. tired, beyond tired really. Her tail curled up, resting on the curve of her hip and she snuggled into him.
'Tired..' she managed.

'Mother..' Rhiannon had a hand on the door of the hospital room, half in and not sure if she could bring herself to walk right in. Sayuri looked up from packing her stuff into the overnight bag that Lenore had kindly brought her. Her thin face paled a little at the sight of her daughter; Rhiannon had not come to see her before now, not that she could blame her, and she was a little frightened of this confrontation to come. She zipped the bag closed.
'You're looking well Rhiannon,' Sayuri commented gently.
'You look like crap,' retorted Rhiannon sharply, seeming to wince at the sound of her words.
'Well yes, I imagine I do, and that I deserved that.' her mother said. Rhiannon looked Sayuri over, taking in the frail form under the baggy clothes that were meant to hide it, the streak of grey that had sprung up in Sayuri's once glossy hair and her pale features.
'How could you..why?' Rhiannon blurted out, bottom lip trembling as she sought not to cry. She came into the room finally, shutting the door behind her. Sayuri lowered herself back onto the bed, pushing the bag aside and patting the sheets. Rhiannon gingerly sat.
'My beautiful daughter,' Sayuri spoke gently, reaching out and touching Rhiannon's cheek. Rhi flinched a little, her mother's fingers were a touch cold, the skin worn from the woman's nervous biting of it. Sayuri moved the hand, running a length of Rhiannon's hair through her fingers instead. Rhi closed her eyes, listening as her mother spoke.
'I'll tell you something I've never told you before. My youth wasnt like yours, I grew up in Japan, daughter of a scholar who had fallen from favour. I was sold, as girls sometimes are to the Mama-san of a okiya when I was only 9.'
Rhiannon opened her eyes, looking at her mother, who was staring into space, back where her words were taking her.
'It was unimaginable. Torn from the only place I knew and told I was to work here until such time as I had payed my debt back to the Mama-san. I was bought because I was destined to become a Maiko, then a Geisha, picked because even at a young age I had a natural grace. That wasnt to say I did not play, but I could become serious, and then my movements become lyrical..so I was told.' she sighed a little, looking briefly at her daughter before carrying on.
'I tried to escape, but eventually gave in to my new life, I had no choice after all, to return to my family would have caused them much distress, and I had no doubt my father would have already spent the money he was given for me. My mother..she had died a year after my birth.'
'That's why I've never met my grandparents then?' Rhi asked.
Sayuri nodded;
'I could never forgive my father for selling me, and a few months ago I was sent news that he too had died.'
Rhiannon said nothing, but wondered if that too had contributed towards her mother's drinking problem, despite her claiming to hate her father.
'When I was old enough for mizauge..a practice that despite being outdated, was something my mama-san could not pass over selling, there was a bid from the patron of a Geisha who had never liked me. Hated me I believe. By this time I had become popular, I was a fair dancer, but my proficiency lay in the shamisen, and I was often called upon to play at teahouse events. My rival was also a shamisen player, and when I was chosen instead of her for a role in one of the more prominent performances of the area, her bitter jealousy grew into a rage. She attacked me on the night of my mizuage, leaving me badly scarred on my back. This is also why you'll have never seen me bare my back..not even when we went swimming.'
'I wondered,' Rhiannon said gently.
'Yes...I have always had a paranoia since I met David that somewhere was another assassin hiding in the shadows to wreck my life. When he left me again...and never came back I wanted to drown myself in alcohol, and not confront the tatters of my life. If I was gone...you would mourn, but it would pass and I couldnt infect you with my failings.'
'Mother..' Rhiannon said, her voice pained.
'I wouldnt get over losing you and .. dad,' she forced herself to say the word.
'I know that now, I know it was selfish of me to just want to slip away. It's harder to live then go, but I'm going to try. If you'll give me the second chance to be your mother.' Sayuri looked at Rhiannon who was by now crying.
'I dont want anyone else to leave me,' she cried, wrapping her arms around Sayuri.
'And I promise I wont try to leave you before my proper time.' Sayuri replied, hugging her daughter tightly, stroking her hair.


'So..gonna tell me about the proposal then?' Sayuri asked when she was checked out of the hospital, heading back to their house in a taxi. Rhiannon rolled her eyes;
'You are feeling better ..being nosey already,' she grinned.
'Curious is all,' Sayuri replied as they pulled up outside the house.
'Well...maybe I'll tell you later,' Rhiannon opened the front door after the taxi driver had been paid and driven off again.
'Okay,' Sayuri looked around, noting the folded packing boxes and packaging material.
'Give me a few days, and we'll begin packing up okay?' she looked at her daughter.
'Okay..' Rhiannon disappeared off towards the kitchen, leaving out the back door and climbing the old tree she had used when she taught Damien how to climb trees. She clung to the trunk, pressing her cheek against the bark and cried herself out before heading back inside.

Journal Entry (Sayuri):

And so on, and so on. Life. It goes endlessly on and we are caught in the wheels, and if we are not careful, we will get crushed by the motion.

I feel that is where Rhiannon is, trampled by the loss of not one, but two important figures in her life. First her father, something which almost crippled me emotionally, led me into my drinking problem, which, whilst being something I can never be complacent about, has become part of my past. I did the steps, I went to the meetings. I can never drink again, but it's a small price to pay for being healthy and alive. She never really spoke too much about it, but I know she felt his absence, and still does.

And now her fiance, young Damien who she was so in love with, he has gone, we know not where. I don't know what to do for Rhiannon. She is spiralling into a black hole and I feel as though I cannot pull her out of it.
I hate this feeling of helplessness I have about the situation. I am her mother, and I feel useless. I see the pain etched on her face, the weight she has lost, how ragged she appears to my eyes and I weep for the bright little girl I once had.

She goes out evey night, comes back scratched and bloodied, clothes torn. I know that she is changing every night, the wounds are from claws, she is fighting, fighting others like herself. I fear that one night she won't return, I don't sleep at night now. I stay awake until I hear her heavy footsteps on the stairs, the key in the door. And then I snatch a few hours, falling into a dreamless sleep for a few hours before I wake again and start the day.
I need help, and I am not sure who to turn to for that help. I cannot burden Sati, she has her own problems, and I know she will give birth soon.

I have to help Rhiannon. I have to. I am losing her. I know it.

Kendall encounters Rhiannon at the wrong time of the lunar month

Rhiannon sat on her bed, legs folded, her body pressed up against the head board, staring at the small, shining circle of silver that lay on the quilt at the foot of her bed. It lay there, taunting her, a ring that held memories and painful recollections of when she thought that she was perfectly happy, that everything in her life had finally fallen into place. She could have sworn she'd gotten rid of the engagement ring, or lost it..or anything. But there it had been, she'd up-ended a drawer on her bed to sort out all the junk and as she'd picked up the last piece of scrap paper it had glinted at her. And ever since that moment, she'd been huddled on her bed, looking at it as if it were a species of poisonous spider.

She edged forwards, poking the quilt near to the ring, letting out a breath as the light caught the silver. She had to do something; and indeed logic was saying firmly that she should pick it up, find the nearest body of water and fling it into it. Her hand hovered over it, fingers shaking, her eyes rimmed with the tears she had thought she had shed enough of over the loss of the relationship. Rhiannon folded her hand around the band, clutching it so tightly that it was digging into her skin, but she didn't relax her grip. She slid of the bed, leaving her room, leaving her mother's house, not even pausing to put on shoes.

She barely registered the tickle of the grass under her bare feet, hadn't stopped when her mother who was out in the garden had spoken to her, and didn't even pause when she walked off the grass and onto gravel, the stones poking and cutting her feet. There was a steely determination on her face - for closure. She'd cried enough, and little surprises like this one only served to set her back.

At the bank of the river that cut through the land at the bottom of the hill down from where her mother's Japanese style house stood she stopped. She stretched out her arm, the closed fist around the ring only now relaxing and it span in the air as it dropped into the swiftly flowing water.

'I loved you Damien. I really did.' she spoke to the air, clutching her hands together as she did so.

'This is goodbye. Wherever you are. I hope. I hope you are well.'

Rhiannon turned on her heels, up towards Sayuri who had followed her down a way, letting her mother put her arm around her as they walked back to the house. There were no tears this time. She'd cried her last for him.