Ess faltered between rage, determination and an underlying hint of guilt. The night before, she had spent uncontrollably crying and eating ice cream straight from the tub while lamenting her existence... Her very long and foreseeably lonely existence. Sure, there was Darling to think about, but what of San, Er and Yi?! They had been one of the few constants throughout her life and now they were just... Gone. Off who knew where doing who knew what. Well, that wasn't entirely true. After nearly tearing up one of the refugee camps the day before alongside a human boy, Ess now had a rough idea of what the rabbits were up to. Apparently, they had decided to involve themselves with the cult that Di was investigating. It wasn't an exact location, but it was a start.

Ess had woken up in yesterday's clothes, with her hair tangled in her horns and dark bags under her eyes. The dragon princess was very unaccustomed to taking care of herself. All her life - a thousand years or so of it - she had had someone to do it for her. Some in the human world would call that being spoiled, but at the Lunar Palace, doing things herself would have been an insult to her station and her very family, which for centuries had presided over the moon and its people. If they saw her now in her pathetic state, what would her siblings say? What would her parents say?! She could picture her mother roaring at her for an entire day without letting up. And her father's disappointed glare... Oh gods. She let out a whine as she looked at herself in the mirror through puffy eyes.

Clumsily, Ess combed her hair as best she could, but several strands still remained tangled on her horns. She fixed her wrinkled clothes and set off, leaving behind the grandiose tent the rabbits had pitched up when they all arrived at Sunagakure. While it still looked lovely as ever from the outside, it had suffered a little neglect indoors. Dirty clothes and empty tubs of ice cream lay scattered through the floor. Some of the finer decorations had been toppled over as well. Several wooden crates - sealed and brand new - were pushed to a corner, clashing with the rest of the decor.

Still, the young dragon knew that she had to do something. She had to find her servants, figure out what she had done wrong, swallow her pride and apologise. And it all started with intercepting correspondence from Kumogakure. From what she had gathered in her brief time here, it seemed like said village was responsible for the current cultist activity in the area - or at the very least, had served to agitate it.

Standing in front of her temporary abode, Ess waited for Di, figuring that it was best to havearger numbers when dealing with the unknown.

[488]

The letter was a study in contradictions. On one hand the penmanship in some parts had been of the highest quality and in others it more closely resembled the rushed scrawling of a child. More curious still was the fine stationary it was printed on which had been smudged and warped horribly by what appeared to be tears. It would seem that Ess's companions the treacherous rabbits three had gone missing leaving the princess in quite a dejected state.

Well Di had become something of an expert in missing persons (or in this case largomorphs) so he was exactly the right person to contact in such an emergency. Ess's messenger hawk had found him in the early morning around three quarters of an hour after he had risen for the day. While the bird swooped down he had been at work writing something for the aforementioned princess. It was a song. Something written in the new style that Ess tended to favour. Loud and full of energy. To be entirely truthful it wasn't very good at all. The lyrics were overly verbose and some of the metaphors stretched the boundaries of linguistic sense.

Compared to Di's other truly abysmal attempts at composition however this was a timeless classic and he was rather proud of it. So folding his sheets up in a cote pocket he set off to meet up with Ess and possibly cheer her up either through his detective skills or the gift of music. Suna was much the same as it had been for the first few days of his work here - crowded , dirty and depressing in equal measure. Add to that the unsettling presence of the golden masked priests. It seemed they were everywhere an immutable constant of the territory.

He was very close to Ess's current residence when Di began to suspect that he was being followed by three specific cultists. The realisation came somewhat too late as the first had already slipped a dagger out from the sleeve of his yellow robe and plunged it into Di's shoulder with the swiftness of a mad hare. Adrenaline now pulsing through his system Di lashed out with a kick to the mans stomach dropping him to the ground.

The larger of the two cast aside his robes revealing a heavily muscled torso covered In tattoos. His golden mask showed no expression but what was on his belt certainly caught Di's attention. It looked to be skulls belonging to large lupine beasts. What were these ? Di's conclusion to this was trophies and if he wasn't very off the mark they belonged to the wolf like creatures they had encountered the other night. In one hand the man summoned forth a scythe and his companion beside him seeing his or her chance decided to strike.

Dodging to the right Di narrowly avoided what thought to be a small sickle lashing out at him. Blood was already leaking out of his shoulder wound and soaking the paper he had kept the song lyrics on ….. damn it all!

Welling up chakra in his hands Di unleashed a ball of pure energy to the attacker with the chi throwing him against a side of a building and leaving his unconscious form prone. Di barely had time to react when the weapon swept in to disembowel him. Not waiting for another strike Di reached over and grabbed the scythe . The cultist to no one's surprise didn’t take this very well and soon they were both rolling on the ground wrestling for control of the weapon. Neither of the pair noticed when the fighting pair tumbled onto the street of the shanytown that Ess was currently occupying.

(619 words)

As Di crashed through the alley with his assailant, emotional wailing filled the crooked and narrow streets of the shantytown. Really, Ess's day - week, more like it - was only getting worse by the minute. What had she done to deserve such ill fate? She had been nothing but nice to the gods of luck and misfortune the last time they had visited the Lunar Palace. Sure, she may have bribed a servant to do a few unruly things to make things awkward between the two, but she had made sure to appear just as appalled as everyone else. Had they caught on anyways? Well, that was hardly the point. Desperate crying aside, some wretched cultist was atop her future husband, brandishing a scythe and threatening to gut her Darling.

How dare he. The sheer gaul gall the man had to even try to attack Tianlan Se. The sounds of sobs soon turned into a hiccuping roar. Laced with chakra, the noise targeted the attacker's very core. One Last Trip to Flavortown - a technique who's naming source Ess really couldn't remember for the life of her. Echoing screams resounded in the man's head, catching him off guard. Pain racked his body as his eyes and ears began to bleed profusely. Coughing, he hacked up blood. Surely, that was enough for Di to finish off that wretched child of man. Monkeys, all of them. SHe ignored the cowering civilians and curious onlookers. Right now, she had trouble seeing them as little more than vermin.

Promptly, Ess resumed her wailing for another minute or so before calming herself down. If Di had already finished off the man or gotten rid of him in any way, Ess would wipe her tears on her sleeve. Her face was red, puffy and sleep deprived. Her hair was still tangled haphazardly on her antlers and the kimono had seen better days. Honestly, it was a miracle that she wasn't exposing her entire chest to the whole crowd.

"Oh thank goodness you came," Ess began, throwing herself at Di. For once, she wanted genuine comfort rather than to make him squirm. Bonus points if she got both, though. "They're gone! They left me and they're gone forever!" She practically screamed, trying her hardest not to start crying again.

It had taken this even of all things for her to realize how much her rabbits really meant to her - not just as servants, but as companions and even friends. "I've looked everywhere! They joined that cult because I didn't take care of them and they hate me and they don't ever want to see me again and I miss them," she rambled, holding back a sob. She took a shaky deep breath. "I have to at least find them and apologize. You'll help me, right, Darling?" She asked, her tone genuinely hopeful, her lower lip quivering. If Di suddenly decided to refuse, she didn't know what she would do.

Most likely, the dragon princess would crawl back to her parents and cry for the next two months. Moreover, she would actively work against the arranged marriage for at least three years.

[535]

Even in such a distraught state Ess proved to be deadly. Blood then greymatter began to leak from the cultists nose and ears and as Di broke his neck he felt a twinge of sorrow for the poor bastard. This evaporated almost immediately as he recalled that the zealot had just tried to murder him. Coming to his feet and wrapping his arms around Ess he embraced the young princess. Her body was wracked with sobs as she relaid what had transpired with her servants.

It didn't take a detective to piece together how much this had hurt her. In dragon society the bond between master and servant was something that was sacrosanct. To enter into service with a dragon was to literally dedicate your life to a being that in time would become a literal divinity. There was something religious to the experience - it was not something to be taken lightly. Ess would put implicit trust in her companions to lose them was a transgression against the natural order of being. It was like waking up and finding ones very legs had detached and walked away.

That said there was something definitely 'off' about the rabbits. The entities had an almost fatalistic air about them possibly even categorized as misanthropic. Initially Di had taken the suicides that they had performed as a form of clowning for Ess's amusement. Many Yokai were playful by nature and thus it didn't seem too strange that such creatures would be tasked with making sure Ess did not succumb to boredom. However if the death wish was a sincere desire then it could change the situation immensely.

Voicing this wouldn't help draw Ess from her melancholy he needed to reassure her and raise her spirits.

“Ess It's not your fault. San , Er and Yi don't hate you they are just confused at the moment. The rabbits were seduced by a human cult. From my readings and what I have seen they can be very persuasive and often use brainwashing techniques to turn people against those who they love the most. If the rabbits have run away it means that the cult feared that your influence could save them. We can go stop the cult together and get the rabbits back. Soon they will be back and thanking you for rescuing them for this unpleasant incident.”

Di wasn't sure exactly how much of this was 'true' per say but it was what Ess needed to hear and he wouldn't let his darling be wounded by the little largomorph terrors. Di had a pretty good idea of some of the locations where the cultists had made their headquarters in the ruins of Suna. The Jashinite cultists had earned this reckoning. They might be servants of a dark god but gods were no strangers to Di and Ess. Both had seen major divinities bow to their parents in supplication. Di and Ess were still young but with time even Jashin himself would fear their power.

Ess calmed her sobbing. She stepped back from the short embrace and nodded at Di’s words. “You really think so?” She asked. “I… I just hope they’re not mad at me,” she added in a low voice. She took a deep breath and with it, inhaled the scent of blood.

“Are you…” she sniffed again. “Are you bleeding?” She asked. Ess eyed the body, lying dead on the ground, neck bent in an unnatural angle. She huffed indignantly. “Now that’s just rude,” she said. Of course, it was more than rude - it was an assassination attempt. And had it been carried out by another dragon, she would have been much more distressed and worried. A war would likely break out if the offended side wasn’t properly appeased. It had happened more than once before. In the case of humans, though, it was laughable to think that one of them might actually kill a dragon. The possibility, at least to Ess, was nonexistent. “Come on, let me bandage the wound before we leave. I’ll tell you what I know and we can come up with a plan,” Ess instructed, going back into her tent. She was more calm than she had been initially, but her voice sounded tired.

Inside, Di would be able to see the full glory of the young dragon’s downward spiral. Empty pints of ice cream littered the floor alongside different garments that looked like they had tried to be folded but failed halfway through. The futon on the ground resembled a mess of fabrics piled on top of each other instead. Behind the mess was a perfect coordination of bright colors and soft lighting that could have made for a very welcoming abode otherwise. “Sorry about the mess,” Ess said, choking back a sob. “Feel free to sit… somewhere,” she said, unsure of where Di could possibly make himself comfortable. The seating cushions were buried somewhere in the messy floor.

She rummaged through her belongings, trying to remember where she had put her medical supplies. While the dragon princess mostly used her knowledge of anatomy to perfect her illusions or play pranks on people - sometimes both - she did know how to clean and heal wounds. “No… no… that’s not it either…” she said, discarding the items that weren’t what she was looking for. She tossed them aside in a small pile - an assortment of tea containers, jewelry, hair accessories and the dragon equivalent of young adult novels. “Here, finally,” she said, digging out the leather satchel where she kept her medical salves and bandages. She had decide to bring them in case Di was injured when she found him. She stared at the supplies for a moment. Same purpose, slightly different circumstances.

“Alright, shirt off,” she instructed, sitting so that she could get a clear view of the injury. If he struggled to move his shoulder, she would help him. “This might sting,” she would say if he consented to her tending his wound. She would rub a solution on the wound to clean it and prevent infection, one to seal the wound and prevent bleeding, another to help the healing process and one more to dull the pain. All the while, she explained what she knew of the cult and her servants’ whereabouts. “We already knew they were operating in cells around the area. Most of them are hiding either in the surrounding caves or in the village ruins. I managed to track where they were taking crates of carrots and narrowed it down to a location. I’m not sure how many of them there are, but that shouldn’t be a problem,” she explained. What Ess didn’t say was that she had stolen those tubs of ice cream from the same convoy she had interrogated. She would now move to wrap Di’s shoulder in a bandage, her fingers moving carefully to avoid causing him any added pain. “They’re closing a deal tonight for weapons, which will draw them out of their hiding place. All we need to do is intercept it.” With that said, she finished tying the bandage. “You should be fine for now.”

The young princess got up to her feet again and tucked her supplies back where she found them. She left the pile of assorted things where it was, though. For a moment, she wondered if she should spend more time learning how to heal. Draconic medicine was effective, but healing with the use of ki was more efficient. Maybe she could teach herself how in the near future and maybe she could help her Darling with the knowledge.

[855]

For Di things had taken a slightly surreal edge. The fact that he had just taken a life was beginning to sink in. Surely he should feel more from the act? The act of extinguishing ones life flame and driving them into the merciless wheel of rebirth was not something that should be taken lightly. And it had been so quick. What's more Di found that he didn't regret the action. The man – if the killer could still be called that had attacked him with the express purpose of sacrificing him to Jashin. Even worse after the thug had finished with Di Ess was likely on their list of targets. That elicited a visceral almost alien response in the young prince.

Fury born of a primordial storm – the sort of emotion that could only be described as 'odium' for to strike at Ess was profane. Were this to happen the world would burn.... best not to contemplate that sort of fate, the princess had displayed that she was capable of handling herself and was just as instrumental to the assassins demise if not more so.

His thoughts returning to the present Di surveyed the scene of Ess's tent. It resembled nothing less than the aftermath of an exceedingly distraught typhoon. Kumogakure lacking the delicate Imagawayaki ,Doriyaki and Sakura Mochi that would be served as a traditional fare at Ess's palace had forced the princess to turn to a much more available form of conciliatory sustenance. As Ess bade Di sit the young detective pushed aside some of the impeding cartons only slightly staining his trousers with vanilla flavoured goodness.

Removing his now bloodstained shirt Di felt the cool touch of Ess's hands as she began to bandage him up. While he was still in no way happy that he had been stabbed having Ess work on his injury felt pleasant in a way that few things had up to now. It also had a clear effect on the princess too – being able to achieve something productive under her own power without the need for her rabbit retainers was good for her confidence.

Listening intently to Ess's information regarding the erstwhile rabbits Di knodded.

“Thanks for the patch up there Ess – my shoulder is already feeling a lot better. I have to say I'm surprised you are so familiar with medical anatomy. Did you spend a few decades reading up on it? I should be a-ok to bust this deal with you tonight. The longer we leave the rabbits in the hands of the cult the harder it will be to make them see the light of reason again. I think perhaps we should assume our true states when we do it however – the scales certainly help when it comes to turning away all manner of unwelcome blades.”

On top of this they could attack from the air giving them an advantage over the human cultists. The rabbits of course knew that the dragons could fly but Di wasn't even sure the little devils could even communicate with the cultists in any meaningful form. They had shown no sign of being able to speak and it was doubtful that the moon dragons had taught their servants how to read and write unless they also took the role as scribes to Ess. Given how much time Ess's parents had no doubt invested into her calligraphy lessons and classes on classical poetry Di assumed that the rabbits were illiterate.