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Part One: Chapter 12


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#1 Guest_The Blue Sorceress_*

Posted 10 October 2007 - 03:31 AM

Chapter 12


On his fifteenth day as part of Miyazaki's household, Yoshimo found a letter stuck under one of the shoji panels that opened out onto the verandah from his room. He unfolded it, and his heart nearly stopped when he caught sight of Hiruma's distinctive handwriting. The kanji stood out on the paper, bold, but crude as a child's scrawling.



Yoshimo,

I don't know what you've been doing with your damn time, but you've wasted enough of it. I want you to be back here in one week, or I'll come and get you and the papers myself.




Yoshimo folded the letter and hid it in his clothes, reminding himself to put it in the fire when he got a chance. One week was hardly enough time to get back to the city, and that was if he rode his horse to exhaustion. He didn't dare wait though, Hiruma no doubt intended to follow through on his threat to come after him, and though Yoshimo had made sure that Hiruma wouldn't kill him there were lots of things that man could do that stopped short of killing, but would still be intensely unpleasant.

"Tonight then," Yoshimo said under his breath, feeling rushed. He could manage it, of course, truth be told he could have been done with it five days after he arrived, but he delayed first to wait for Tamoko, and then to wait until he told her his plan to take her with him. He had to tell her afternoon, and then get her on his way out. He'd have to steal another horse for her; it would be too much to ask one horse to carry the both of them and still cover enough ground.

The thought crossed his mind that he could easily just stay in Kiyama's employ, happy, safe and secure, and just tell Hiruma to go screw himself if he showed up. Hiruma would kill him, naturally, no matter what consequences awaited him back home, and that was why the thought only crossed Yoshimo's mind rather than staying for tea. As much as he had begun to like Kiyama and his family he couldn't take the risk. Besides, if Kiyama found out what had really happened would he be so forgiving? Probably not, and even if he was, Touga would find some way to do away with him. Doing the right thing intrigued him, it held an air of romanticism that he tried to keep at an arm's reach, and at the same time sometimes wanted to embrace, but when it came down to the right thing or his life he was going to choose his life.

Yoshimo spent the rest of the day trying to contain his nervous excitement. Logically, he knew that it might very well be the death of him for anyone to get suspicious of him now, but logic wasn't enough to keep his palms from getting a little sweaty when Touga, fresh from practicing with a band of his students in the dojo, rounded a corner and glared at him with eyes that might well have seen into his soul for the knowing look they held. Fifteen days, and the older man's animosity had cooled not a whit, if anything, actually, it had grown. Yoshimo stepped nimbly aside, avoiding confrontation as much as possible, but he still felt Touga's eyes on him, waiting for him to slip up. Touga was waiting for something that wouldn't happen, though, since Yoshimo was quite confident that he wouldn't make a mistake.

"You look on edge," Touga commented coolly as he passed. "If you kept your nose out of trouble I guarantee you would find it easier to relax." He was going before Yoshimo got a chance to answer back, which was probably, in the end, a good thing.

He poked around the house looking for his sister, and eventually found her sitting with Megumi on the verandah and enjoying the morning light. Megumi had been pestering her since she arrived to take advantage of the outdoors, since a little fresh air and sunshine were good for pregnant women. Tamoko had apparently given into the other girl's wishes and joined her for a late breakfast. It irritated Yoshimo a little to see the two of them together, since he had to get Tamoko alone to tell her what he had to tell her, but Megumi's cheerfulness seemed to lighten her mood a little, and he thought that perhaps Megumi was a good influence on her.

"Yoshimo-san!" Megumi exclaimed, gesturing for him to come sit with them. "Did you sleep well?"

Yoshimo nodded. "I did. And you two?"

"Oh I slept fine," Megumi said, her louder, more vivid voice overpowering Tamoko's quieter affirmation.

"I was going to show Tamoko-san my collection of dolls this afternoon, would you like to join us?"

Yoshimo quailed. Wasn't Megumi a bit, well, old for dolls? She was Tamoko's age after all. "Ah... well..."

"Please, Yoshimo-kun?" Tamoko asked.
Despite his lack of interest, Yoshimo folded, and the three of them spent a quiet afternoon sitting in a quiet room while special house servants brought out and displayed Megumi's entire doll collection for them while Megumi discussed, with a surprising amount of intelligence and savvy, the various dolls. Lunch was brought in halfway through, but that was the only break from the tedium. Still, it seemed to please Tamoko, who reminisced with Megumi about being a little girl. The difference, Yoshimo noted a little bitterly, was that Megumi had a chance to finish growing up on her own before being shoved into it.
By the time the whole show was over it was nearly time for dinner. Yoshimo never thought he'd be glad to see Touga, but he was very glad indeed when the kensai interrupted Megumi's explanation of the last doll and ushered the three of them out.

When dinner was done with it was time for the girls to bathe, and after that Kiyama invited his guests and his family into the main hall for something of an impromptu poetry contest. Yoshimo was invited too, since Tamoko was his sister, and he played the part of a good, well brought up samurai and wrote a little haiku:


Endless summer days
I would love to be alone
with only the breeze



He also penned a follow up:

Moving so slowly
sun inches across blue sky
Oh when will it end?


Of course both poems were roundly misinterpreted, and though Yoshimo was more than willing to admit that they lacked both creativity and actually merit and meaning, the last one won a little prize from Kiyama, a prettily folded origami crane made by Kiyama himself from delicate lavender rice paper painted with tiny irises. Yoshimo thought he caught the older man winking at him from across the room in silent sympathy for him, but he might have been imagining it. Anything to relieve the boredom.

When the poetry contest was over it was close to the middle of the night and it was time for everyone to go to sleep. It was then that Yoshimo realized the entire day had been wasted, and he had to get to work as soon as the house was asleep or lose his chance. He hadn't been able to speak to Tamoko all day, so he would have to just surprise her after he'd snatched the papers. She surprised well though, as he remembered, and she probably wouldn't get upset with him.

He went to his room, ostensibly to go to sleep, but in reality he lay awake on his futon, drumming his fingers on his thighs restlessly while he waited for the sounds in the house to cease. Finally, all was quiet, and he crept out of his room, silent as an owl on the wing. He knew the path to Kiyama's study by heart, and could have found his way there with his eyes closed, which was a good thing since there was no moon, making the night as black as pitch.

The door to the study slid aside smoothly and quietly, and he slipped in, closing the door behind him again just in case someone were to stroll by. Carefully he made his way to the locked chest and took out his tools. He didn't need to see the lock to pick it any more than he needed to see his way to the study to get there. He picked the lock by feel alone and felt decidedly satisfied when it snicked almost inaudibly. The chest was full of neatly rolled scrolls, each tied off with ribbon, though what color he couldn't tell by feel. Not knowing which scrolls Kiyama really wanted, he took them all, though there was an armful.

He closed the chest and left, moving back to his own room just as quietly but not quite as nimbly as before. He deposited the papers on his futon and began to wrap them in some of his clothes, which he then tied into a bundle and slung over his shoulder. Then he went to find Tamoko.

She was lodged with Misao's other servants in rooms just off Misao's own. Thankfully, Tamoko was a light sleeper, and though she didn't wake when he came into the room she was easy to rouse. He had to clamp a hand over her mouth to keep her from shouting, but as soon as she realized it was him her fear eased away.

"Why are you here?" She whispered.

"I'm leaving," Yoshimo replied, thinking to keep things simple.

"But... why?"

"Because I have to. Listen, Tamoko-chan, I'll explain things on the road, we need to leave now."

"On the road? What are you talking about?"

"You have to come with me, I'm not going to leave you behind again."

Yoshimo wondered if Tamoko was frowning, because she certainly spoke to him in the voice that she had always used before when he said something stupid. "I can't do that," she protested. "I can barely walk around on my own! Where are you going? Why are you leaving in the first place?"

"You can ride," Yoshimo explained. "It's not that far, only a week..."

"A week?" Tamoko whispered, shocked. "I can't ride for a week! Where are you going? The capital? Yoshimo-san, I can't do that, it could hurt my child."

"You can have other children!" Yoshimo said, trying desperately to convince her. "If you don't come with me now I may never see you again."

Tamoko's voice went very, very cold, and Yoshimo got the distinct feeling that he'd said something wrong. "I don't want to have other children," she told him with a firmness he hadn't heard from her ever before. "I want to have this child. He's my child. Mine, and he's the only good thing in my life."

"There's me."

"You're not my son."

She had a point there. "Don't you want to come with me?"

"Yes," Tamoko said, her voice tiny again. "Yes, of course I do, but I won't let my baby get hurt. Can't you tell me where you're going? I don't care what you did, but I want to know where you're going. Maybe I can get away and I can find you later."

Yoshimo sighed, feeling sick to his stomach that he had to leave her behind again. He gave her directions to Hiruma's house in the capital and had her repeat them back to him just to make sure she had them. "Come as soon as you can."

"I promise I will."

Yoshimo squeezed her shoulder gently and left her room via the verandah. He circled around the house, and out into the front courtyard. From there it was a simple thing to get out the gate and...

Suddenly a lantern was lit in the center of the courtyard not more than ten yards from where Yoshimo stood.

Miyazaki Touga set the lantern down on the paving stones and said in a quiet, dangerous voice, "You should have listened to my warning, boy." In a heartbeat the kensai had his sword drawn and he charged. Yoshimo fumbled for his katana, trying desperately to draw it in time, but the catch that prevented the sword from slipping free of it's sheath wouldn't release. Touga swung, and at the last second, the katana slipped free. Like the waters of a geyser, the katana shot out of the scabbard and the hilt struck Touga under the chin, snapping his jaw shut mid-battle cry with a resounding crack.

Touga lost some of his momentum and all of his balance, and his blade only nicked Yoshimo just above the left eyebrow. While Touga groaned and clutched his jaw, Yoshimo took the chance that fate had provided him and booted the downed kensai firmly in the head, knocking the older man unconscious.

By now the whole household was awake, and so Yoshimo grabbed up his katana from the ground, sheathed it and bolted. He threw open the gate, abandoning all hopes of recovering his horse from the stable, and ran, ducking off the road and into the forest where he would be harder to pursue in the dark. The household would probably be in chaos, since undoubtedly no one would have ever suspected that a mere boy could defeat a grown man, not to mention the leader of the house guards and their lord's son, and so they would be a little slower to mobilize after him, but that didn't mean much of a head start, and it certainly wasn't what he had planned. Only pure dumb luck had saved him from lying in pieces on the paving stones, and it would take all his skill to make sure that he wouldn't end up in pieces in the forest, since he didn't trust his luck to get him home.




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