Inertia
Moonlight in the temple gardens, waxing bright, stains his hair and cheeks with its colors.
A spirit solidifies before him, decked in the regal robes of a king. Such decadent things are remnants of the past, preserved forever in the lingering memory of a man whose soul could not move on. It is projected to the living world, made flesh once more, only by the sheer force of will of that same stubborn soul.
The king smiles indulgently and lifts one hand to run his fingers through black hair. The color is just right. The way it shines in the moonlight is just right, but the texture is slightly coarser than it should be. The length is too short; it curls at the ends where it should lay flat.
He knows that, in this ungainly teenage body, he isn't nearly as graceful or beautiful as he once was. Aren't they but minute differences, though, when the soul is the same? He balks at that thought and pins the ethereal man with a steely gaze.
"You cursed my soul with the gift of remembrance."
"Then do you wish to forget?" And there's that damnable smirk tagging along with the teasing response. It's the exact same one that haunts him in vague dreams of a world long gone.
"Not particularly, no. I suppose some of my past selves were rather bitter about it – about having to remember all the consequences of mistakes they didn't even commit in their own lifetime. But now there have been so many experiences that I find it hard to recall specific events from specific lives unless there's a catalyst to jog my memory. In a way, isn't this a form of forgetting?"
A hot breath whispers into his ear, "You remember this, though? Do you remember us, my sweet sage?"
Of course he does. This question is stupid and unnecessary, he thinks, because it's not as if he even has the power to forget. He keeps all the passionate nights locked in his mind not because they were so grand that he can't let go, but because they are seared into him with magic. Knowing this, however, doesn't stop the images from flashing forth.
I love you.
You're beautiful.
We'll send Lawrence to secure the southern border.
Come sit by me.
What are you reading?
Your strategy was brilliant.
Let's pull back here and attack their left flank.
There are bandits in this area.
I'll protect you.
Stay by my side.
Stay with me tonight.
Stay with me when the war is over.
"Stay with me."
The spirit quietly pleads, wraps large arms around him and asks to be his lover again with hooded eyes and pride lowered as much as someone with such arrogance can stand to do. He stares straight into the broad chest with his mouth set, hoping that the trembling in his limbs won't be noticed, and so won't decrease the force of what he's about to say.
"No," he hisses out painfully, "I can't be your lover unless you move on with me. I won't stay here just for you when I've got my own life to live."
That's the truth of the matter, isn't it? This ghost is not the king of anything anymore, and has not been since his death thousands of years ago. The lover whom the dead king pines for has been dead just as long. It makes no sense that the ghost of the Sage would reach up from within him, intangible hand stretched out in equal longing, but it does. He chooses not to acknowledge that dull ache.
"You've changed."
"And you haven't."
"Why does it have to be this way?"
There was no pride in their devastated whispering. Because, he wants to respond, there are things even a god cannot control. My mind is my own, and none of your meddling could predict or prevent this outcome.
In the end, he swallows it down because the loneliness in that simple question struck a chord deep inside him, and he can feel an echoing sympathy tugging at him from somewhere in the vast recesses within. It makes him falter for a moment. Perhaps his mind and heart and soul are not entirely his own.
Why not take the offer? Shinou is, or was, a great man, and he could definitely learn to love a man like that. Once upon a time, he had loved that man. He's close enough to the original, isn't he? He can pretend to be Daikenja, can't he? Aren't their souls still the same?
Even after four thousand years?
Even now?
The same?
No.
This is the inescapable truth: his name is Murata Ken.
It is Murata Ken's eyes that close in sorrow; it is Murata Ken's voice that comes out at a carefully measured pace, soft and strong.
"You'll never find him again, you know. No matter how long you wait here, he'll never come back to you, and the longer you wait, the farther he'll go. Perhaps if you had called out for Christine, I might have decided to take the offer. I am much more Christine than I am your Daikenja, but you didn't know Christine, and you don't know me."
Murata pulls away from the spirit to gaze up with a rueful smile. "She's always in motion, always different every night, and always leaving the night behind. The moon is a cruel mistress, don't you think?"
The only way Shinou can catch his Daikenja is if he wakes from this unnatural stillness and gives chase, but Murata leaves this hope unsaid.
It rings through the silence anyway.