The Twelve Kingdoms: The Shore in Twilight

by a thread. She'd only survived because the Royal Kei had saved her.
    Risai could not help but close her eyes. So this surely must be what I am fated to do.

Interlude
    S anshi took a deep breath. The murky, golden gloom surrounded her. She was inside a narrow, endless "somewhere."
    I made it in time.
    She had broken through without breaking free. She'd held on. A vague twinge of unease passed through her. She let the air out of her lungs, almost startled by her profound sense of relief.
    A voice suddenly echoing from somewhere out of the amber darkness brought her back to herself.
    "This is--"
    The surprised tone of the voice made her to take hold of her senses.
    "--a cell."
    "Gouran."
    Had he accompanied her? Amidst all the confusion? "A cell?" Sanshi was about to challenge him, half in startled wonder, when she realized this as well. They were within the familiar confines of Taiki's shadow.
    In truth, Sanshi had no idea where they were. Wherever the murky, golden darkness had descended. No earth and no sky, no beginning and no end.
    Sanshi and the other magical you -beings did not sleep as did animals or people. There was thus no way of them to imagine such an analogy, but "sleep" was to them like a waking dream. She vaguely understood she was "somewhere." But not what kind of place this was or its location. Whether the muddy, saffron mist was falling on them or whether the weak, golden light was radiating around them.
    Not even that distinction.
    Wherever they were was narrow and confining. It plainly felt so. And something firm and strong seemed to be holding them here. And that wasn't simply because, compared to its normal strength, the "golden" hue of the light was so terribly dim.
    They were definitely enclosed in a kind of cell.
    "This is--" she said, but she sensed no air passing through her throat. Only the thought. Perhaps only the intent to speak.
    "What is this shell?" asked Gouran. But that equally may have been nothing more than the intimations of his voice. The confusion enveloped her.
    "A shell--"
    Her intuition told her this was Taiki. The thing surrounding them gave her every impression that this was Taiki. Testing this hypothesis, Sanshi tried pushing her consciousness beyond their confines. Normally she should come into contact with psychic streams entwining Taiki. But a viscous resistance blocked her.
    "We can't escape his shadow!"
    No, it was not impossible. Concentrating with all her might she somehow might be able to rupture these restraints. But she sensed that the effort would exhaust her. It would take an extraordinary amount of energy and no little pain.
    And yet Sanshi had possessed every intent of surveying her surroundings.
    The dim light. Taiki's weak ki. Its bright source hidden from them, the frighteningly thin psychic streams descended on them as if through a heavy downpour.
    "We are closed in--"
    Gouran's voice sent a chill down Sanshi's back. A kirin was one species of you -being. The energy required by these magical beings to surmount the boundaries between human and beast was bestowed upon them by Heaven. The thread of that spiritual energy infusing them was thin indeed.
    The shirei lived off that energy. And so their efforts were in vain.
    The opening through which that energy trickled was thin as well. More critical than the weakness of the psychic streams around Taiki was that he could not draw them in. He lacked his horn.
    They were consuming themselves. The more of Taiki's energy Sanshi and Gouran consumed, the less was left to Taiki. Not enough energy was trickling through to them to keep their threads of life alive.
    Even though his enemies were about.
    Enemies who'd attacked him. The sudden transformation to kirin. And the shoku rising out of his scream. Taiki could not have known how to create such a shoku. The power was given to Kirin by Heaven, but Taiki didn't understand the powers of a kirin very well. The shoku he produced was purely instinctual. The severe wound he had taken to his horn must be related to it. That something so dreadful could have happened while Sanshi and Gouran were journeying to Gyousou, of all times, was undoubtedly part of the same devious plot.
    Some person or persons unknown had made sure that Sanshi and Gouran would not be at Taiki's side. And then took advantage of their absence to attack him. If the kirin died, so would the king.
    This is an insurrection, Sanshi muttered to herself. But by whom?
    In the midst of the shoku, Sanshi was