Lost and Found

It was a breezy afternoon in the Land of Grass, and a young kitsune boy by the name of Yuuhei could be found walking along a well trodden path, humming a whimsical tune and swiping a stick across the tall blades of grass that grew abundantly on either side of the trail. This land was his home, at least the only one he'd ever known, and by now he knew these roads like the back of his own hand.

Yuuhei often walked the trails this way, on the lookout for anything valuable that might have been dropped by a passerby and lost to the dense thicket. He'd found all sorts of treasures this way, sometimes it was coins or jewelry, other times he might find tools or salvageable weapons. 'A weird amount of weapons,' he often thought, as if the place had once been the site of some kind of battle. For all he knew, maybe it had.

Today though, it seemed he would come across a different kind of treasure entirely. As the grass parted around his stick, he suddenly caught sight of bright blue ribbon. Curious, the boy knelt down, crawling through the grass and pulling up a wide piece of blue paper stretched across a wooden frame, painted with an impressive golden dragon. He looked at it in awe, lifting it into the sunlight and watching the scales glimmer. 'A kite...?' It had been a long time since he'd seen one of these. A vague memory flashed in his mind, of a man lifting up a simple red kite while a young Yuuhei chased the wind. His father, he thought.

Yuuhei's fingers traced the golden dragon, noticing that the kite string had been snapped short. Pursing his lips, he reached into his kimono and pulled out a spool of black thread he kept for mending his clothes, unraveling a length of it and bowing his head as he carefully attached it to the remaining string. 'Passable,' he thought, smiling as he stood up and took the kite into the field. The breeze blew at the grass, making it ripple and dance. The perfect kind of day for a kite. Lifting it high, he ran against the wind, whooping excitedly when it caught the breeze and started to soar. He tugged carefully on the string as he goaded it higher, smiling happily as the golden dragon danced in the sky.

He passed the day like this for some time, surprised at how durable his thread had turned out to be. As the sun began to set in the sky, a small family passed by on a caravan, and a little girl gasped when she looked up and saw the flying dragon. "Look up there, mama! It's so pretty!" Yuuhei heard her and gave them a quick glance, looking back up to how the dragon swooped and swirled in the golden light. It really was magnificent... but he would have a hard time carrying it around in his travels. Chewing his lip, the kitsune starts to carefully reel it in, until it loses the breeze and drops into his hands. Coiling up the string, he jogs after the caravan, stopping when the adults start eyeing him suspiciously. Glancing down at the marvelous blue kite in his hands, he slowly holds it out to the girl, who gasps before taking it and squealing happily. "It's really for me? Thank you, thank you, thank you!!" Smiling quietly, Yuuhei nods and backs away slowly, letting the family know that he was no threat as they carried on. Part of him wished he would have kept it, but he'd long known that he didn't have a place for such belongings without a home to call his own. And seeing the girl's happiness was enough to lift his spirits some. Yuuhei turns, whistling quietly to himself as he made his way to the stream. His belly was telling him it was time for fish.

[Exit]