Disclaimer: I do not own X. Clamp does. I do not own Onmyoji. Yojiro Takita does.
Many thanks to my beta, Cait-hime-sama-dono.
From the Past
It wasn't often that Subaru'd return to his family's estate in Kyoto and choose to stay in the city beyond the necessary updating conversation with his grandmother.
Kyoto was far too filled with mystically charged places that reminded him of his own power and abilities; those he had wished to cast away from the first moment his mind fully comprehended that there was no way out of his duties.
As he passed them, each torii seemed to loom over him, its very form seeming to frown at him, to threaten to topple onto his head and bury him underground; to seal him like an evil spirit.
The former clan head was, too, something Subaru seemed to feel uncomfortable around as of late. His emotions towards his grandmother had been intensifying and changing since Hokuto's death; like colors in a rainbow.
First he felt cold towards her; knowing she had abandoned him to his miserable fate seven years ago. Then he'd look at her once so proud form, sitting inert in a wheelchair and the guilt would crush him.
For a while, during the second year of mourning over his sister, Subaru would be compelled towards such warm love and need for his sole surviving blood relative that he'd visit Kyoto often. His grandmother's constant frown, her slow way of talking, her reluctance to drop the mannered speech in favor of a more family-like, closer form of conversation and her constant searching gaze whenever Subaru'd get close enough for her to smell the cigarette smoke on his clothes, soon wore off those warm feelings. Chilled and disappointed, Subaru came to realize that his sudden domestic need was merely the backlash of the unexpected void of loneliness his sister's death and Seishiro's disappearance left him with.
He has been formal and cold towards his grandmother ever since.
The updating conversation that 1998 autumn was no different than any other conversation, for the most part, anyway. Subaru was staring out the opening between the sliding doors; the garden outside offered him both a beautiful view of the weeping willows in full fall foliage and something to focus his eyes on while pondering.
Next year around this time he'll have his hands full with the second purpose of his life; fighting for humanity as a Dragon of Heaven, one of the Seven Seals. Subaru hoped that by October of next year he'll be over and done with this duty in which he had no interest.
"Are you listening, Subaru-san?"
"Yes, grandmother. I was thinking about next year and my duties then."
A glimpse of a smile stretched the corners of the old woman's lips.
She did not have wrinkles there; she had wrinkles on her forehead, at the juncture of her brows and above the center of her lips, but not at their corners.
She was glad to see her grandson daydreaming about his duty for once in his life. Usually she'd wake him from reveries he would not dare to share with her.
She decided Subaru earned a bit of light conversation.
"Mitsumushi-san paid me a visit today."
Subaru remembered the girl, he and Hokuto had played with her in their childhood. An energetic, happy girl prone to giggling fits, who loved flowers and would always drag them away from the estates and into open fields and dim forests like she was an animal wishing to return to nature.
Subaru presumed that by now the girl had become a fine young woman and must have married; an arranged marriage, to judge by how traditional her family is.
"Ah, Mitsumushi-chan, that brings back memories. How is she?"
"Her shrine is open again after the renovations it has been going through. The landslide's damage was completely repaired and now the shrine is once again open to visitors. Perhaps you would like to go there, Subaru-san, and see the archive?"
"Archive? I never knew the Seimei shrine had an archive."
"It is where they keep Abe no Seimei's notes and belongings. No one but the monks and us Sumeragi know of this part of the shrine."
Subaru's head felt like it had been caught in a tornado. Unknowingly, he tilted his weight forward a bit, leaning towards his grandmother as if to hear better. This talk of an archive in the Seimei shrine made Subaru as excited as a small boy.
"D-does the fact that only the shrine workers and us Sumeragi are allowed to know of the archive's existence mean that us Sumeragi are also allowed in the archive?"
Lady Sumeragi cast her eyes away from her grandson and bowed her head, running her wrinkled fingers on the smooth floorboards in an attempt to hide her happiness from the man.
For the past seven years the most unnerving notion has been pestering her and would not let go; her grandchild was losing interest in his duties, was becoming more and more engulfed by rage and the need to avenge his sister's death.
Subaru's placid behavior and silence, his tendency to daydream more often these days even worried her enough to consider that he has turned to narcotics to sate his stormy emotions. For so long Lady Sumeragi wringed her hands in the dark seclusion of her room, anxious for her grandson's well-being.
He was so out of reach for her, so different and detached that she often felt like there was a wall of glass between them. She'd speak to him in the warmest way she knows, would offer him all she could give him and he'd return her a puzzled frown as if she was speaking an entirely different language than his.
And now, as she mentions the great Abe no Seimei shrine her grandson comes to life. There is not one onmyouji in the whole of Japan who would not lose his composure at the offer to come and see the very things Seimei wrote, the artifacts Seimei touched, the rooms where Seimei roamed. Her grandson, who she thought had lost most of his care for his family and their tradition, was no different, despite all her worries.
"Would you like to go and see the archive, Subaru-san?"
"I-I would very much like to, yes." Subaru choked on his words, his throat unused to expressing the high octaves of exhilaration.
"Well, the shrine is still open; perhaps you can go there right now."
Subaru climbed to his feet quickly, walking to the door then turning around quickly, "Grandmother, did you want to speak to me about anything else?"
"No, Subaru-san, you may go."
Mitsumushi had indeed grown into a young woman, younger than she aught to be, but a woman nonetheless. She had not grown any less giggly or happy however, much to Subaru's content. She waited for him at the entrance to the shrine, under the torii, smiling and bowing politely.
For the first time in seven years Subaru did not feel awkward under the shadow of a torii. The air in the shrine seemed lighter, sweeter; the upcoming winter chill warming up for him. This was the domain of onmyouji and friendly territory for Subaru's clan members. Here is where he belongs; here is where his kind lives.
As exciting as observing Abe No Seimei's shikifuku or his painting brush for ofuda making and star charts, it was the mysterious journal written by Seimei himself which interested Subaru the most.
In lack of true guidance from his ancestors, Subaru had always felt somewhat alone. The only scriptures former Sumeragi heads ever left behind were strictly business and contained only reports of spells, of training for younger generations and chartings of the Sumeragi family tree.
Subaru wished for a more human text, something with opinions, something with feelings, something to prove to him that ancient onmyouji had emotions and needs and problems the like of his.
He did not expect to find the answer to his current problems and did not delude himself with the notion that he might find advice from the wise long departed for his situation, but anything that was not the frosty mannered demeanor he received from his grandmother and relative underlings would suffice for him.
He just wanted to know that he is not the only onmyouji in history to ponder against his duty because of his personal feelings, to find it troublesome and restricting.
Abe no Seimei, the legends say, had a humorous, brave personality which often bordered the defying and was wise enough to often frighten and upset those around him with lesser power than his; traits only tolerated by the emperor's court men and other onmyoujis of the time due to Seimei's great and far superior power.
Perhaps this ancient man, who by now had become a myth no less admired than the western Merlin, will reach out to him through the rice paper of the scrolls to place a comforting warm hand on his shoulder.
But Subaru's mind was wandering again and here he was, all alone in the archive's broad and silent room with the box of scrolls before him.
The room was softly illuminated; enough light coming through the door's paper, as well as light coming from the fully open northern window, Genbu's window. Perhaps this means his wishes will be answered, that his plea for a cry from the past will be heard.
His fingers trembling, Subaru reached out to the box's lock. The wood and metal must be so ancient and Subaru's hands so young and modern; what if it breaks under his touch? The feeling of unworthiness washed over Subaru and he recoiled.
The scrolls inside, at least nine hundred years old, how will he touch them without crumbling them? They say there's a spell cast on Seimei's belongings, keeping them as fresh as the day they were made, but is it only a legend or is it real?
No, nonsense, he has been said to have been the strongest onmyouji the clan ever had in all its years. Still, these are the writings of the great Abe no Seimei…
Before he can shy away from the honor any more, Subaru reached out and carefully but swiftly opened the box, pulling out the scrolls one after another.
Outside, a wind was blowing, tearing off a single fiery orange leaf from a weeping willow and placing it gently at the edge of the smooth surfaced lake outside. The water moved at the wind's whim and the leaf was dragged away from the white pebbled shore onto the middle of the pond.
Nothing.
Subaru found absolutely nothing that would be of use to him. The scrolls contained nothing but records of Seimei's predictions for the emperors, of small meaningless countryside exorcisms and dull challenges from a jealous competitor named Ashiya Doman. Subaru had known all this since he was eight and was given a copy of the Konjaku Monogatarishu.
The scrolls rolled out of his palms like fleeing field creatures as Subaru's back slumped and his palms landed on the floor, open, beaten. His head bowed, Subaru shut his eyes tight and tried not to think too much about the sign this whole affair might be to him.
A single black ribbon hanging loose from one of the scrolls lay on the tip of Subaru's fingers and tickled his senses, but Subaru pushed the sensation out of his mind.
The window of Byakko was now open. Was he destined to fight demons and protect the spirits of the dead from the modern world like the legendary tiger? Is he not allowed to breath, to move, to live beyond his status and duty?
The duty that took up all his time in his youth until his civil education was denied of him, the duty that forced him out of his house on days when he only wished to stay in bed and sink into his misery. The duty that sent him into the company of society when all he wanted to do was to be alone so no one would see him cry, no one would see his face twisted in pain, longing, anger and infinite sadness.
The status which defined him as the arch enemy of the man he wished to see the most. The status which encouraged him to hunt down that man until his love filled him with disgust at his own traitorous heart and body.
Subaru's fists were clenched now as he leaned on them and his arms shook. His back trembled with every sob he tried to choke.
Was it even proper to cry in such a place, and for such a lowly reason?
Who is he to protest, even in thought only, about his function? Had there not been many clan heads before him? Had they no emotions to deal with? No personal affairs which distracted their minds as well? How had they coped with those then? Who is he to complain so much, and even be as daring and unruly as to seek a proof against his clan's traditions in the house of Abe no Seimei!
With his head bowed so, Subaru suddenly noticed, as he opened his eyes again when he was sure he had held back his tears, another scroll at his knees.
This one, a smaller scroll, the ribbon tying it a greenish bluish hue, must have rolled there when Subaru first scooped the scrolls out of the box and had been left there out of his sight while his frantic eyes focused on the bigger scrolls before him.
Blinking away the few tears he couldn't hold back, Subaru straightened his back and reached for the scroll.
His hands trembled again as he loosened the ribbon and unfurled the delicate paper.
His eyes consuming the text were at first filled with disappointment mixed with awe and a sense of honor. These were short inscriptions describing Seimei's day to day life within his house, mundane things like the shiki he used to help bring water and food, the spells he practiced during his free time and the people who visited him.
On one hand this was all so mundane Subaru might as well have read the protocols in the other scrolls, but on the other hand these were small snippets of Seimei's sanctuary; his own home.
Subaru's breath hitched as he came across his family name's kanji on the scroll and for a moment he was caught by awe's dizziness. The great Abe no Seimei himself had mentioned his family name in his personal scrolls. It was as if he could hear the magician's voice and see his face, looking into his eyes, speaking to him.
An overwhelming sensation of belonging filled Subaru with warmth and suddenly he realized that he actually felt like he belonged to the Sumeragi in a sense. His feeling of alienation from the rest of the clan, he understood, were merely the result of his depression and his emotional detachment from his grandmother. He has a home, after all, and a place to run away to. He belongs, even when his heart pounds in his chest with acid, hot traitorous love for the wrong person. Will this understanding last during long bitter fits of drowning, blinding depression? Subaru didn't know.
Calming himself from the excitement, Subaru focused on the text before him.
'Sumeragi Goshuu-san came before me this morning and brought along with him his twelve year old daughter. Merely introducing me to her, he pretends he is showing his young girl the great Abe no Seimei with whom he works in the palace, as if to brag about his familiarity with me.
'I can see what he's plotting.
'Next his wife will come, along with Goshuu-san and that shy frightened little twelve year old thing of theirs, and they'll start saying how nicely she behaves and how well she can already cook.
'They wish to arrange a marriage which will unite my powers with their family members' powers and create a generation of able onmyouji for the emperor's service. Or maybe they wish to tie me to their family for honor's sake.
'At first I consider inviting the girl to a small interview with me, or rather, a shiki in my form, to see her true colors. I cannot avoid tradition, I think at first, and a man my age aught to marry and start a family, never mind how much the thought bothers him.
'What good will come to me from a wife? She will not be able to live in the same house as mine or her life will be an endless mass of messengers from His Highness for help, frightened villagers and noblemen calling to my aid. There is no hope in thinking she might help me with welcoming and entertaining those who come to visit me; she will not have time to raise the children. And children will be expected of us once we're married. Another thought to disgust me.
'The girl is not at all bad; her powers may be weak and underdeveloped, but they are distinctly there. The Sumeragi, quite like my father's family, seem to be given an unquestionable ability to dabble with onmyodo in every generation. No doubt that when I will no longer be here they will succeed me, but must it be set in stone in the shape of marriage? Goshuu-san trusts me so little?
'And besides, she seems more interested in Mitsumushi than in me; always looking at her with big awe filled strangely green eyes. It's dear Mitsumushi's inhumanity that attracts the girl's attention. I highly doubt any oni or shiki pay visits to the Sumeragi's estate; they are wiser than me when they make sure to keep business away from their homes.
'Disaster strikes suddenly. Hiromasa enters while the Sumeragi delegation is still here. He might be naive and trustful, but one look from Goshuu-san and another look at the girl and he realizes the subtext of Goshuu-san's visit.
He looks at me for a moment, disappointment in his eyes, and walks out. He says he forgot to run some errand back in the palace and walks out. Sweet man, he is such a horrible liar.
'I discharge Goshuu-san with the excuse that I have readings to perform. Goshuu-san's farewell is, "Please look kindly upon us."
Poor Hiromasa.'
Subaru lowers the scroll after his need to consume it brought him to loom over it, the page mere inches from his face.
His clan did not marry with Abe no Seimei; in fact, Seimei married no one and had no children of his own. He took Goshuu's eldest son and cousin as pupils and taught them the duties and skills required for his position, but that is all.
The honor was great, since at the time, Seimei's teacher, Kamo no Tadayuki, also proposed his son for the job and was turned down. Luckily for the Sumeragi, Tadayuki's son proved as a man with faint powers and a scatterbrained personality and it was absolutely unthinkable to make him Seimei's successor.
That is how the Sumeragi clan got to its current status; lessons in family history he received at the age of five taught him that.
Sumeragi children beginning their onmyodo training at the age of five, another connection to Abe no Seimei.
The Sumeragi tried their best to adopt as many of Seimei's small methods and behaviors to resemble him.
Now that he thought of it, Subaru had to wonder if they were trying to delude future generations who were outside the onmyouji society that Seimei did indeed marry into the Sumeragi.
Subaru had gotten what he wished for; a different angle to look at his clan from. He never heard of a thing such as a Sumeragi clan member coming to another person in a matchmaking attempt; so far people came to his clan asking to be wedded into the family. Never in his life could Subaru imagine someone from his clan in that awkward, nearly pathetic state of a man trying to wed off his daughter, though he saw many others do it while he lived in Kyoto.
And a glimpse at his clan during the Heian period, Goshuu was the son of the third Sumeragi; they weren't even clan heads then because their clan did not have a high enough status to need heads. They were merely a family, some of which performed the roles of onmyoujis in the emperor's palace amongst many others with varying levels of power. The young Sumeragi family, what a refreshing view.
But there was more to that piece of scroll: who is this Hiromasa Seimei speaks of, the man he described as 'sweet', this person who becomes upset by realizing Seimei might be married.
His mind, incapable of comprehending the thought for a moment, made Subaru dizzy. It sounds, even if he's reading things the wrong way and twists the text into the interpretation he wants to see, like Seimei's connection to Hiromasa was more than just a friendship.
His family schoolings taught him that Minamoto no Hiromasa was a friend of Seimei, an assistant at best, but nothing more.
Of course they won't tell him Hiromasa was anything more; why would the clan who tried to marry Seimei into them admit there might have been more than friendship between the two men?
But is it reality or is he just reading the wrong things here? Is it possible that Seimei faced the same problems that he does? Well, Hiromasa was a friend of Seimei, the type that did not pretend to adore him and then kill his sister and try to kill him, so his problems and Seimei's were not completely parallel.
The problem they did share was society around them, people who come with suggestions of arranged marriages and expectations from Seimei to produce an heir.
In the end, as Subaru learned, those around Seimei realized they could not bind him in chains of human society's rules. It is a legend that Seimei wasn't even completely human, to add to that, so the nature of his offspring was often a worrying thought. They honored his power and stopped pressing him, so he had his way in the world as he wished it.
Ah, if only he was as powerful as Seimei.
Realizing that his mind was wandering again and that an irritating need for a cigarette tempted him to defile this holy place with his petty habits, Subaru resumed his reading.
'Performed a reading.
My mind was most preoccupied by thoughts of the Sumergai clan as Hiromasa did not yet return and I worried. I wished to see that family's future, if only to find a small excuse to rid myself of this attempted knot. I do not know what I was looking for, perhaps it was Goshuu-san and his first born's obvious powers that intrigued me. It seems the ability to practice onmyodo is insistent in their bloodline as if preparing to serve a purpose. I suppose that with Tadayuki-sama's son turning out the way he is and the Sumeragis turning out the way they are, a successor to my position coming from a family other than the latter is unthinkable.
'What I discover in my reading I wish to share with no one, not even this paper on which I write. I find myself in need of release from this horrid secret, though, and so I will speak in codes alone, revealing not the true nature of my divination. Perhaps one day the participants in these events will read and understand; until then in codes it will remain.
'I have looked into the future and have seen he who reads the stars better than me look back at me, his face darkening for the fall of a bright star. I've seen the greatest vessel of Ise shrine give away its power to love. I've seen the wolves of mount Mitsumine become domesticated and led by a ray of light to which the earth itself speaks. I've seen fire take hold of a religion from far away and wind circling it, too far to save it from a tidal wave which quenches it. I've seen people look into the future in their sleep and despair. I've seen numbers create a flesh and blood young girl and she herself creates numbers. I've seen men make a puppet which can think and speak and feel on its own. I've seen twin stars collide.
I've seen children cry for their mothers and mothers for their children. I've seen great tragedies.
What I've seen of the Sumeragi I wish not to speak of at all.
The future will be merciless to all and no one will be left untouched.'
Subaru stopped reading. A heavy load seemed to have dropped on his shoulders and the need to lie flat on the floor and pretend he did not read this became tempting. After staring at the box for a while, Subaru picked the scroll up again and resumed his reading. He will not think about it now, he'll think about it later.
'As I step out of my house and into the garden I cannot help myself from closing my eyes to inhale the sweet warm spring air and be thankful that I will not live in those times.
'A messenger came from the emperor, informing me of a matter I'd rather have handled and approved myself.
There have been far too many times as of late where the spirits of rebels against the throne and bloody criminals linger in the land of the living to become mononokes and haunt their judges, and even the emperor himself.
I am doing my best whenever and wherever I can to fight these monsters, but they keep coming like tsunami, relentless. Even I, with all my powers, cannot handle this flow. Many a councils was ended about this matter, with very few solutions to the problem.
'One onmyouji, a young man in the beginning of his career, was the only one who offered a solution which did not involve all of us working harder to chase away these troubling times.
His suggestion sounded preposterous from the beginning: That the execution of these offenders of His Highness' rule will be made so that their souls will be immediately locked away thus preventing them from lingering amongst us.
'When I asked him how we will do this he suggested the use of a mound, a burial mound where the corpses of the offenders will be kept so that their souls will be locked there as well. The mound will be kept by an onmyouji specifically trained for the keeping of the spiritual lock, a guardian of the mound.
'"And what," I asked, "will keep the souls within the mound?"
'He smiled and looked away, his eyes seemed ominous, like looking at a possessed man's eyes. A tree will be placed at the top of the mound and the tree itself, he claims, will lock the souls within it.
'"A tree that locks souls within it?" I exclaimed, "What manner of tree would that be? What will make it lock souls within it?"
'"We will feed to it the souls of the dead. And the very execution of these men will be made so that the…"
'"The tree will feed on the souls?" I stopped him before he had chance to say any more, "Will this not make the tree too powerful to be under our control after some time? Will the tree not grow hungry the moment crime rates go down?" he seemed to want to answer, but I did not allow him this, "And who do you suggest will be the onmyouji who will practice these executions? Who ever heard of a murderous onmyouji? You will need to invent a whole new branch of onmyodo for this task; it is completely out of the question."
'Now the messenger comes to tell me that despite my efforts to show the emperor some logic and common sense, Sakurai-san's suggestion has been agreed to. The mound will be built far, far away from the palace, to the southeast, near the shore, to protect the emperor.
If Goshuu-san comes to speak to me of the emperor's decision I must not let him on to my divination; this topic and what I saw are far too related to him to be told to him.'
Subaru placed the scroll down again, this time to keep his tears from dropping onto the priceless paper.
It is not as if he didn't already know all this; during his first years of seething anger and boiling need for revenge he dug around for any scrape of information regarding the beginning of the Sakurazukamori clan.
Just like the mentioning of his family's buds mentioned by the great Seimei brought about an emotional flood on Subaru, so did this mentioning of Seishiro's ancestors.
The window of Seiryu is now fully open. Subaru frowns at it as the soft light of the ripening noon lands directly upon him.
There is very little left to read on the scroll, only five more sentences left until this tiny beam of light for Subaru will come to an end.
Wiping his eyes with a handkerchief in the corner on which the letters S.H. are sown, Subaru brings the scroll up again, close to his face until he can faintly make out the changes in hue in the ink to indicate the flow and rhythm the scripture was made.
'Night time in early summer and already the cicadas interrupt my sleep. My futon feels empty and I go out in search of what's missing. The sounds of the fue coming from the backyard tell me Hiromasa's as unable to sleep as I am. Moonlight shines silver onto tiny undisturbed sweat droplets until his back becomes adorned with diamonds. His fue had taught him well of how to gently place his lips onto its body and his fingers to dance up and down to produce the most beautiful sounds.'
Subaru's smiling a sweet, happy smile. His heart, as it beats wildly in his chest, feels like it is freer to do so than ever before.
Seiryu's window remains open as he gets up to leave.
Subaru's mind is too occupied to notice Byakko's window is also open now.
(tbc)