It was a beautiful autumn in Senkai.
It was always beautiful in Senkai. The seasons had nothing to do with it. The seasons weren't even allowed in here. The shimmering orange, white and black carp made their lazy circles in the ornamental ponds, the trees spread their green canopy over smooth rocks carved just enough to look like they weren't trying too hard to be ornate, and gentle sunlight shone down over it even with no sun in the sky.
Frankly, Tojiko was sick of it all. The place felt less alive than her, some days.
She closed her book, and put it at her side on the balcony, next to a piece of blank paper. She fell back on reading when trying to remember her poetry lessons from earlier in life, as usual, fell apart. It wasn't that she forgot the lessons; she just realised, time and again, that she wasn't especially poetic, nor did she want to be, outside of the occasional nagging sense that she should give it another go. It was harder to claim the soul of a romantic hid inside her when she was just a soul, anyway.
So, uncrossing her legs, letting them meld together into the usual wisp, she floated off from the balcony. She needed a change of pace, that was it. Somewhere away from all this. She made her way across the grounds, briefly rousing Miko from her meditation, along the way. The prince looked at her, a little surprised, and glanced at the gates.
"Ah? Going somewhere?"
"Hakugyokurou," Tojiko answered, clipped and terse as ever. "Seeing a friend. Back later."
Miko blinked a few times, obviously surprised. "I hadn't realised you knew anyone there."
Tojiko looked her dead in the eye, smiled just a little, and gave the answer to so many questions that she'd learned to enjoy so much.
"Fourteen hundred years." She let that hang in the air, and drifted off in the awkward, sheepish silence that followed. It probably wasn't very fair, she thought to herself, especially as often as she milked that answer for the reactions it got. She didn't have it in her to be a vengeful spirit, not with all the effort that kind of hate took, but she liked to think she made a decent spiteful spirit.
It wasn't even true. She got to know Yuyuko a year or so ago. The fourteen hundred years following her poisoning, she'd spent cooped up (trapped, really) in the mausoleum. She was almost impressed by herself for coming out of it entirely sane. After what was already a marriage of convenience between two strangers, though... Well, between being asked to die as a proof of concept, then being poisoned and hung out to dry for over a thousand years, she was quite convinced that a downgrade to somewhere around 'acquaintance' was very generous.
Besides, the look on Miko and Futo's faces when she brought it up? Priceless. She'd learned to enjoy the little things. That was one of quite a few things she'd learned from Yuyuko; the same ghost who claimed she'd learned just as much from Tojiko (who didn't believe it for a moment).
Yuyuko was often strange, and tiring, and different. The last one, she couldn't get from anyone in Senkai, and it was enough of a reason to go all by itself.
Convincing Youmu that she should be allowed through on a surprise visit wasn't too hard. There was, she reasoned to the overeager would-be bodyguard, absolutely no chance that Yuyuko hadn't somehow realised Tojiko was on her way.
"She would've said something if I wasn't supposed to come in, right? Unless she wants me to show up-"
"With respect, Lady Soga, I'm sure she would have told me to-"
"Not if she thinks it's funnier."
Youmu thought about it, and waved her through, suddenly looking very tired. Not for the first time, Tojiko mused to herself that she had never seen a pair less suited for each other. She made her way through the gates and... and visited the Netherworld. The irony, as a ghost, still hadn't quite stopped making her smirk. No, she wasn't quite like the prince's band of Samsara-dodgers (she caught herself using the Buddhist term once, and stuck with it out of a feeling of amused spite), but she was still around all the same, and only in the afterlife as a guest.
It was a beautiful autumn in the Netherworld.
It was always beautiful in the Netherworld. Everything from the gently falling snow, to the flawlessly tended gravel and grass, to the blooming cherry trees and distant floating wisps was perfect. It was, she thought to herself, the sort of smooth perfection you got from dressing a body in their best clothes before burying them, on the fair assumption that they weren't about to crease it any time soon.
It wasn't as much of a change of scenery as she would have liked. She glanced down at her own dress, and saw she'd rumpled it quite thoroughly on the way. Oh well.
"Ah, Tojiko, dear! So good to see you!" Yuyuko suddenly threw her arms around Tojiko, nearly knocking her to the ground. Sneaking up on her like that was one thing; the total lack of personal space, on the other hand, was a little hard to get used to after Senkai. ...Seiga didn't count. She just did her best not to think about Seiga, in general.
Tojiko half-grumbled something that might've been a 'you too' and followed over to the porch of the manor, once Yuyuko let go. "Knew I was coming, huh?" She asked, and Yuyuko beamed at her, while taking a seat.
"Of course not! Why would I spoil a surprise visit by finding out?" Of course, of course. Why do something like that? Tojiko just smiled and nodded along. Simpler, really. Paying a visit to Yuyuko was a little like- she wasn't completely sure what it was like, actually, but she made a habit of visiting without any plans and letting Yuyuko carry her wherever the princess's mood ended up that day. Some days it was just idle chit-chat, and other times, it was conversation that she was sure meant something else completely. She would figure it out one of these days. Probably.
Youmu came by again, after a bit, bringing a tray and a confused expression. Tojiko decided to herself that the poor girl's face would probably be stuck that way for good, inside of a few more years. She set the tray down and hurried off, leaving Tojiko looking down at two empty cups, and a teapot full of-
Tojiko put her face in her hands, and groaned.
"What's the matter?" Yuyuko asked, looking and sounding perfectly innocent, with a confused smile she probably borrowed straight from Youmu. Yuyuko always looked and sounded perfectly innocent. Nearly, anyway. Tojiko had seen her acting obviously mischievous a few times, when she hadn't done a thing.
"It's not tea. You put water in it. You're up to something."
"Water and sweets," Yuyuko corrected her, index finger held up, nodding towards a couple of rice cakes on the tray.
"Oh, hey, I missed those. Thanks." Tojiko picked one up, biting into it and, on second thought, tossing the whole thing in her mouth. They were on the small side anyway, and she wasn't in the mood to be dainty. Good, though.
"You're right, though. I do have a question, though. I've been taking to some reading recently, I'm sure you know how it is-"
Tojiko snorted, and shook her head. "I run out of things to do. You don't. I'm not sure I believe any of this." She wasn't annoyed, really. Yuyuko went through points and conversations like she was making a joke. Meandering points and setup whether any of it really happened or not, to get to her punchline. The punchline usually being a few layers away from what she was getting at didn't make it any easier to keep up.
"I've been studying some Taoist works, the things the prince so likes to go on about," Not her prince. Tojiko had to smile; it was a nice little touch. "I wanted your opinion on-"
"Nope. Not happening. Don't know a single thing," Tojiko answered hurriedly. "Ask the prince, she'll talk your ear off about it. Not a preacher, not a philosopher. Not me."
"Exactly! I know what they'll say." And if she knew that, what could Tojiko- oh. Oh.
"My answer, right or wrong. That's what you're going to tell me, but what you mean is 'Tojiko, I thought it would be funny to make you think about something'. Is that it?"
She hadn't seen Yuyuko grin often. Tojiko heaved an exaggerated sigh, smiled in a slightly tired way, and leaned back against one of the sliding doors. Waiting. That was Yuyuko, through and through; just let her strange ideas carry you, and learn to enjoy the ride. She was never boring, or predictable. ...For all that, Tojiko had never been surprised by her, past the first few meetings. The trick was in not expecting anything to begin with. It was, she was almost certain, cheating, and probably didn't count.
"Would you like to guess?" Tojiko stared at the tray, the little puzzle laid out for her, and frowned. She knew a little more than she let on, in the same way that a person picked up anything over time when surrounded by enthusiasts. She still shook her head.
"Nope, but I gave it a shot. Water...? They go on about water a lot. It's probably something about that, right?" She shrugged. That was all Yuyuko was getting out of her. Eventually, Yuyuko caved to her expectant look, and carried on.
"Action without action. Like water. I see that again and again. 'Be effortless,' they all say. Be where you belong, do what you're meant for. Or... something like that. I'm sure you would explain it better."
Tojiko very much doubted that Yuyuko was the playful amateur she acted like. No harm in playing along, though. "Right, uh... tip of my tongue. Wu wei, unless I misremembered. The point is... the point is, basically, you should be doing what you're meant for, like you said. Your natural place in the world, like Earth around the sun, that kind of thing. The water comes into it when- you already know this, don't you? Be honest."
"Oh, not like you do. Please, go on!" Yuyuko listened attentively, leaning forward with each hand pressed against one cheek, squashing it a bit. Tojiko realised, days later, that no one knew anything quite the same way someone else did. That was the trouble with Yuyuko, she had far too much fun with this.
"...Right. Well, the water, right? Whatever you pour it into – teapot, cup, pond – that's the shape it turns into. Flexible, or always doing what's expected from it, or whatever. There's some other stuff about wearing mountains down that I heard once or twice too, but I wasn't listening too closely. Like I said, a lot about water. ...Something like that, anyway, that's just the bits I picked up," she finished, deflating a little.
"Better question," she perked up right away, looking at the rice cake left on the tray. "You having that?" Yuyuko smiled and shook her head, and the little sweet disappeared in a flash. Tojiko chewed it for a while, then gulped it down. Still good.
"And what do you think about all that?" Yuyuko asked, and Tojiko opened her mouth to answer that she'd never given it much thought. She would be lying, she realised, to her surprise. She thought about it quite often, just never quite so mystical about it.
"I think," she said slowly, deliberately, "I think... I've done it a fair bit better than anyone who takes one look at death and decides to con it. I mean... don't look at me, right? I didn't mean to end up this way," she added, a little defensively.
"So, let's see... Obedient daughter, check. Political capital? Oh, was I ever. Loyal wife, sure, but I'm not sure anyone really noticed. When I was supposed to be an experiment? When that was where I belonged?" She made a little barking sound that wasn't quite a laugh, but tried to pretend. It tried very hard, but Yuyuko's hand ended up on her shoulder all the same. She was never a very good liar.
Tojiko looked down at her cup. At the pond, a little way ahead of them. Water. A perfect, snug fit wherever you put it, as long as it was penned in on every side, and never thought of moving past the walls put around it. She took a long, long breath. She needed one, dead or not.
"Sure, I guess I've been pretty much a model. More or less. You still want my answer? I'm warning you, I'm not much for metaphors like you." Yuyuko nodded, all the same. She didn't want an answer, Tojiko knew that much. It was a question for her to ask herself, right from the start. Yuyuko would sit by the sidelines, listening for the answer that Tojiko gave herself.
Slowly, Tojiko stood- floated slightly higher up, holding the little clay cup in a white-knuckled grip. She threw the cup as hard as she could, and watched it speed along the garden, spilling droplets as it went. The porcelain shattered against the first tree trunk in its way, breaking nearly into dust. The water splashed everywhere, scattering into tiny little droplets. An enormous, damp mess, going nowhere in particular.
Free.
"Aw, would you look at that? Caught me being poetic for once." Tojiko turned her head, and grinned like a shark. Yuyuko was staring, shocked, and Tojiko was almost as surprised to see her react like that. It made her laugh, and laugh, and laugh, until she collapsed against Yuyuko, one hand beating against the floor, teary-eyed and wheezing. Minutes later, when the princess had calmed down much faster than her, she looked up, gasping, and shook her head, wiping at reddened eyes and brushing matted hair away.
"I wasted a lot of time, huh?"
Yuyuko looked her dead in the eye, and put on her best grave voice. "Fourteen hundred years."
"...Nah. The rest, I mean." Yuyuko just smiled at her, and shrugged.
"But there's a long while to go, isn't there?" There were perks to being a ghost. There wasn't a lot of dying or clock-ticking in the plans, for one. Fourty years, fourteen hundred- she had plenty more time, and she wasn't about to waste it. ...Not unless she found a fun way to waste it, anyway. She put an arm around Yuyuko, and felt something slip off her shoulders.
Metaphorically, anyway. This might get to be a habit if she wasn't careful. At this rate, she would be writing about cherry blossoms before the week was out.
"Tea, dear?" Tojiko nodded, then looked up, a bit sheepish.
"Oh, uh... Yuyuko?"
"Yes?"
"Might need a new cup."
"Figuratively?" Tojiko put a hand to her face, and sighed softly.
"Alright, alright, I shouldn't have chucked it like that. I'm still not drinking from a teapot." Yuyuko laughed, and called for Youmu.
It was all a big mistake, a waste of time, all of it. Water. Hah! Not a chance, never again. She'd wasted her years with expectations, and ended up dead for it. The nice thing about mistakes, though, she realised... was that they had a way of canceling each other out, sometimes. She had all the time she wanted, now.
She thought she might try living, this time around. It would be something new.