Prologue

Kuchiki Kenji looked down at the picture in his open wallet and wondered, not for the first time, how his father had even managed to find a woman like his mother. She was a simple woman, with rather large lavender eyes and charcoal black hair that elegantly touched her cheeks and shoulders. If he had ever been asked to give his own opinion he would have said she looked more like a Chinese porcelain doll than a human being- her neat features eternally captured in ceramic.

His memory of her from when she had been alive was still intact and she had been quite the same as she appeared in the photograph - serene, traditionally clad and always smiling. He had never actually seen his mother in western clothing as she had always chosen to wear the traditional Japanese kimonos. His father had always seemed pleased by this and as a result had always regarded her with an air of pride. He had once been told by his older brother though that there were rumours of his mother being deeply respected throughout their family and that was why their father had been so proud of her. Kenji had subsequently asked his brother the reason for that respect to only be given a careless shrug. "Beats me."

Raising his eyes from the photograph, the youngest Kuchiki son sighed and casually rested his gaze on the patch of peonies growing beside the garden bench where he sat. It was quiet in the family garden and had always been even when a new year's celebration was in full swing in the manor. The peonies accentuated the silence with their vibrant colours, the brilliant reds and pinks contrasting nicely against the otherwise green garden. He rather enjoyed the silence and was probably similar to his father in that regard.

"Kenji…?"

Speak of the devil.

Kenji smiled as he observed the form of his father clad in a black suit moving towards him. For an old man he had a surprising amount of vigour.

"Hey dad."

The older man carefully seated himself next to his son and quietly removed his black Homburg hat to reveal a thick, long mane of decidedly silver hair. Kenji smiled at the spectacle.

"You should cut your hair. No one wears their hair that long these days."

His father gave him a cursory glance and leaned back against the bench. "Your mother liked my hair like this."

"Ah, I should have guessed that."

His father chuckled.

Kuchiki Byakuya was a quiet man as well and if there had ever been reason for him to express his emotions he would. If he saw no merit it reacting then he simply would not. Kenji was surprised that he had laughed at his casual comment.

"So why aren't you inside, they're starting the prayers." His father asked.

"I needed some time to think, it's been too noisy in there with Akira's kids."

"They're your brother's children, you should have tolerated the pandemonium and played with them."

"I think I'm too old for that now dad." Kenji pointedly stated.

The older gentleman smiled. "Perhaps you have a point. Is that your mother?" He gestured towards the open wallet in Kenji's hands.

"Yeah I was just remembering…"

Kenji was surprised his father had even noticed it.

"Remembering? What on earth were you remembering?"

"How things were when she was alive."

"Yes well now she's gone…" There was a hint of melancholy in the old man's words but it was brief and well concealed. Kenji cocked an eyebrow at his father's superb ability to mask his emotions.

"Don't you miss her?"

There was a prolonged silence after the question before his father leaned forward and clasped his hands between his parted knees. In that position he looked significantly older than his sixty three.

"Yes…"

"She would have been happy to see Akira's kids."

"And she would have also wanted to know why you haven't had any of your own as yet…"

Kenji frowned at his father's subtle insinuation.

"Aren't you obviously wondering the same thing old man?"

"I'm not the only one."

"Who else is?"

"For one, your other family members are." He had said that as if it were the most apparent thing in the universe.

Kenji sighed. "Point taken dad but that's not what I was aiming at. What I want to know is how I'm supposed to find a good woman after taking into consideration our family's line of uh- business."

"I can always arrange a marriage for you. Are you willing to meet any young women?"

"I don't want an arranged marriage!"

"But your mother and I had an arranged marriage."

"Is that how you two really met?" Kenji curiously asked. He had been wondering about it for a while maybe because of his own failure to find a suitable bride.

"I knew a little of her before."

"So it wasn't really an arranged marriage then?"

"Well it was arranged…more like agreed on but then our circumstances were…peculiar."

"Peculiar? In what way?"

"It's a long story…"

"But I'd like to know if that's okay with you, sounds interesting enough."

"Didn't your mother tell you?" The elder Kuchiki's voice had become sterner.

Kenji scratched his long black hair at the tone. "Not really, more giggles than words and besides that was way back when I was around thirteen…"

His father leaned back in his seat once more, a pensive look flashing across his face. He seemed unsure so Kenji was taken aback when he softly murmured after a prolonged minute of quiet, "It was a simple first meeting you know…"

Kenji grinned and perked up in interest.

"Well how did it happen?"

The old man turned his face to regard his son and smiled a sad smile before trailing his gaze to the azure blue of the sky. He brushed a strand of his grey hair behind his shoulders and sighed before quietly beginning his tale.

"It was the evening of the September the 10th 1975…"