Chapter Text
Sakura held her cards tightly to her chest. Then, she turned toward Eriol and his guardians.
"Eriol-kun, wait!" she called after him, just as he had turned to walk away. "I um. C-can I talk to you for a moment? Alone?"
Eriol blinked, a small hint of confusion shimmering in his bright blue eyes for a moment.
"Yes, yes of course, Sakura-san."
The two young magicians walked a fair distance away from their guardians and friends to talk in private.
Once they were out of earshot, Eriol was the first to speak.
"So, what did you wish to speak with me about?" the blue haired sorcerer asked, turning to stare at Sakura with a concerned gaze. "Is everything alright, Sakura-san?"
Sakura fidgeted nervously under Eriol's piercing blue gaze.
"Sakura-san?"
Sakura still said nothing. But, then, Eriol's eyes grew wide upon spoting tears begining to form in the young girl's emerald green orbs.
"Sakura-san?" Eriol called once more. "What's wrong? Why are you crying?"
Sakura's gaze lowered from Eriol's sapphire blue one, and her emerald green eyes shifted down to her shoes at hearing the concerned edge to his voice.
"Saku, please talk to me!" Eriol pleaded, sounding almost scared, as he placed both hands on her shoulders. "Please, Saku. You're really beginning to scare me."
Upon hearing her nickname being spoken aloud by the bespectacled sorcerer, her head shot up, and she met his worried gaze head on.
"I um. Eriol-kun, there's something very important I need to discuss with you. It's about Clow Reed."
At hearing the name of his past self, Eriol's curiosity was now clearly written on his face.
"What about Clow Reed?" he quietly asked her.
Sakura's emerald eyes shined with an emotion he couldn't quite pick up on, and her face grew suddenly very serious.
She looked straight at him, and calmly said, "Were you ever made aware that Clow Reed had had a child?" she softly asked, eyes darkening some upon seeing his face grow pale, and how his sapphire eyes looked about ready to pop out of his head.
"Saku? What? How is-" Eriol tried to form a coherent string of words together, but his mouth just wasn't on track with his brain at the moment.
Saku took his reaction to mean that he was never made aware of this fact. Clow, her father, had kept the knowledge of the young sorceress and her true origins to Clow Reed a secret from his reincarnation.
Sighing heavily: Saku decided to just get straight to the point. No games. Eriol deserved to know the truth.
"You weren't the only one reincarnated, Eriol-kun." She began slowly, leting her words rejister before beginning again. "I, too, was reincarnated. I, Sakura Kinomoto, am the reincarnation of Clow Reed's daughter." She paused to take a breath, then began again.
"I am the full reincarnation of Sakura Reed, the only daughter of Clow Reed himself."
Eriol just stood there, frozen to the spot, and as white as a bed sheet. In all honesty: He looked like he might faint from the shock of it all.
"Saku, I...I...I..." he stammered over his words, right before his eyes closed, and he fell forward toward Saku.
"Eriol! Eriol! Eriol, wake up!" she cried, sounding panicked, as she looked down at the unconcious boy in her arms. "Please wake up!"
Eriol's sapphire blue eyes remained closed, and his black and gold mage robes layed pooled beneath him like a large dark cloak.
"Eriol-kun?"
This time, when Saku called his name, the dark mage's eyes slowly began to flutter open.
"S-Sakura-san?" Eriol whispered her name so quietly that she almost missed it entirely. "W-what happened?"
But, before Saku could say so much as a word: The realization seemed to dawn on him, and much to Saku's growing horror, she saw tears spring up in the dark mage's sapphire blue eyes.
"Dear God, Saku. I-I-I attacked you! I put you in life-threatening danger! Y-you're m-my dauter, and it's my job to protect you from harm. Not to cause you harm!" he choaked on a sudden sob, and threw himself into her arms. "I'm s-so sorry, Saku. If I had known of this beforehand: I never would've attacked you like that! I-I would've protected you-" he broke off mid-sentence, just as another sob tore itself from his throat.
Sakura pulled the sobbing mage into a tight hug, corsing her fingers through his midnight blue hair, and whispering comforting words into his ear.
"Shh, Eriol. Eriol, it's okay. Everything's alright now." She hugged him even tighter to her chest when he made a low, high-pitched whimpering sound like that of a wounded animal. "Please don't cry, Eriol-kun. It's ok. I'm ok. You attacked me, yes, but you were only doing it to test me. And, for that, I don't fault you for one little bit."
"B-but, but Saku-" he tried to speak, but wound up breaking off once again in tears. He buried his face into his daughter's white and yellow cloak, and cried even harder. "I-I'm s-so s-sorry. I never intended to hurt you as i I did. Please forgive me, Saku."
Saku smiled warmly down at the young blue haired mage, burying her face in his soft hair as she felt tears of her own start to roll down her face.
Father and daughter stayed like that for several long moments. Eriol's anguished cries eventually were reduced to quiet sniffles, and then silence.
"Eriol-kun?"
There was no answer, and Saku glanced down to see that the young dark mage had fallen asleep. She smiled lovingly down at her father, er, his reincarnation, and gently wiped the tears away with the pads of her thumbs.
She kissed his forehead, and quietly whispered, "I love you, Dad." She carefully moved a few strands of his midnight blue locks out of his face, before humming softly and resting her chin on the crown of his head.