It's an old story. One everyone thinks they know. But stories tie themselves in knots and loops as the years go ever on, ever changing and impossible to untangle. The teller changes each time, each retelling uncovering a new truth and inventing a new lie. And so this story is not like all those that came before it, nor will it be like any that come after. Stories are always this way. But we endeavor to tell the truest version of the story we know.
And that story begins on the edge of a town on the edge of a county in a cold, grey, stone building that declared itself "Mother Mary's Home for Orphan Souls," but wore the harsh manner of a prison more comfortably than that of a home. Huddled together under a thin grey blanket, near a barred window, sat two young girls, one tall and spindly, and the other small and delicate of feature. What had brought them together, one could not say- fate draws who it will together, unconcerned for the logic of men. But together the grimy blondes had suffered this fortress of children, and together they sat on this cold and rainy night, struggling to keep warm.
"Someday I'm going to sleep in one of those huge down beds. With thick, dark wood posts, and plush velvet curtains, and there'll be a roaring fire, and the blankets are going to be so warm and soft-"
"Well, right now we're sleeping on a damp floor, Duchess." The tiny one adjusted her ill-fitting dress. "But it's not all hopeless! Look!" She drew two small cookies out of seemingly nowhere. "From our benevolent Lord's private reserve. No wonder we only get gruel, in the flavor, 'not enough'."
"Mina, how did you..?"
"I'm small, Ruka, nobody sees me."
Whatever had compelled Haruka, on a night not unlike this one, to take the small, scared, lonely little girl Mina had been under her wing, it had been worth it. Maybe it was just what the kitchen maid had said, before killing the dormouse she had taken as a pet- She was desperate for something to love. Whatever the reason had been, in the three years they had stuck it out here, Mina had proven herself to be one of the lightest fingers Ruka had ever seen. She could steal a ring off of your own finger, and you'd never know. And so, they ate a little better than the other girls at Mother Mary's.
Ruka took the cookie appreciatively. "Someday, we'll eat like this all the time." She nodded, with all a child's assurance. "And we'll have meat, and there'll be so much that sometimes we'll be forced to leave it at the table."
Mina nibbled on her cookie and laughed. "While you're building castles in the air, I'd like a horse. A white one. With ribbons in his hair." She was cynical for all of what she figured were her seven years, but then again, life had given her few reasons not to be.
"You'll have it. I'll buy one for you."
She shook her head. "Okay, Ruka."
The older girl peered out the window, hearing the clunking of hooves and a call for the horses to stop. The sisters flung the door open wide- more tiny children peering out. The plague that had covered the land was starting to wane, finally, but it had left so many like her, without family or home. They were, as the headmaster liked to remind them, a burden to their king and country, and, indeed, God himself. Well, they couldn't be too much of a burden, stuffed together and barely fed as they were, but in any case, only about half of them survived anyway. Even Mina had almost been lost last year to a fever, and Haruka had to trade the little stash of trinkets they had laid away in preparation for their grand escape, for some broth and a warmer blanket. She didn't regret it, to be sure. As Mina had observed, she;d obtained most of the treasures anyhow. And Ruka cherished the one friend she had. But still, it had set them back on their master plan quite a bit.
She considered all of this, and the question of who in this group might live and who might die, when one girl in particular caught her eye. She was beautiful, and moved with a grace so unlike the others here. She was not crying, nor had her head hung low, but her chin was firm, eyes forward and proud as she prepared to walk into the stone edifice.
Mina poked her head around Ruka's shoulder and looked out the window. "What are you looking at?" She looked out the window and shrugged. "Eh. Just fresh meat for this place to chew up."
But Ruka's gaze did not waver, staring at the girl who refused to look at the muddy ground as the headmaster barked the long litany of rules at the new inmates.
Mina smacked her on the arm. "What are you so fixated on? This happens once a week. It's how I keep track of the months."
"No, not this. This doesn't happen every time." She could not explain the feeling, no exactly. It was unlike anything she'd ever felt. She understood some now of what Rei emant when she spoke of feeling the grace of God- Quick as Mina'd been to say that if God were to grace them with anything, it should be bread, Ruka had envied the peace it seemed to give Rei. She felt that peace now, the overwhelming feeling that she was exactly where she was meant to be. Everything was right, but suddenly everything was different.
"Ruka, we can't afford for you to get sick."
"I'm not sick. I'm just-" She stared, mouth open.
"Looney. Excellent." She pulled her away from the window. "Go to sleep. We'll see them all in the morning."
They curled up together as they had so many nights before, but Haruka's lack of sleep was due to neither the cold of the stone nor the wet of the rain, but the girl with the faraway eyes.
"En garde!" Haruka swung wide her stick, Mina ducking under the too-high stroke and jabbing toward Ruka's stomach, nearly getting her. She jumped back and brought her stick down hard on Mina's, stopping the thrust.
Mina backed up quickly and whirled around Ruka's back. "Have at you, blaggard!" But Haruka was too quick, and blocked her on the left.
She pursued Mina behind a tree. "I shall feast upon your innards tonight, devil!"
Mina jumped up on a stump, almost eye level with Haruka. "I promise it shall be a far richer fare than you're used to, Ruka Hood!"
And then Haruka saw, out of the corner of her eye, the girl sitting there on a rock, eyes closed in the sunshine. She was peaceful, unbothered by the girls playing their loud games around her. Ruka wanted to reach out and touch her, but she was so beautiful, even in the rough grey woolen dress and long plain plaint all of them wore. She seemed to transcend it somehow, the small smile crossing her lips, so like the Mary she had half-heartedly venerated in the chapel, but now wanting to give all of her worship to this radiant-
Mina struck her across the face with the rough stick, and her cheek began to bleed.
"Ow! MINA! " she held her hand there a moment, and pulled it away, running the smear of blood on her dress.
Mina buried the point of the stick in her chest."You think when you fight Prince John, he's going to pause so you can make eyes at some girl?"
Ruka heard a faint giggle, and looked over at the girl to discover, to her great joy, that she was favoring Ruka with a smile.
"She's laughing! "
"Of course she's laughing, I hit you in the face with a stick, that's something everyone can enjoy "
Haruka ignored Mina and walked toward the girl who sat so gracefully among the rabble that surrounded her. She was aware of every sensation: The beat of her heart, the way the rough woolen dress pulled at every inch of her skin, the fall of the braid down the middle of her back, even the very air that entered her lungs seemed to flow like silk. Caught up in the grand scope of her feeling, Ruka suddenly realized she was standing in front of the girl, who was staring right at her. No, not at her. Through her, indexing her, burying her eyes into her like she were looking at a painting she might never see again. It was intoxicating and off-putting, all at once.
She rubbed her hands together, took a deep breath, and scratched behind her ear. The words had to be perfect. "Good morrow."
Mina sighed from the stump where she sat cross-legged, watching. "Aye, poetry, Ruka. I can't watch this." She hopped off the stump and quietly slid toward the gate.
The graceful girl smiled beatifically. "Good morrow, brave swordsman." Her voice was like the sound of church bells, each word its own note, together in musical perfection.
Ruka blushed, and suddenly any command she had of the English language was destroyed in the moment it took the girl to toy with the end of her braid. She touched the cut on Ruka's cheek.
"Oh, but I see you were wounded in the pursuit of good." Her eyes just kept moving along Ruka's person, as she stood and stammered. "Does this brave warrior have a name?"
She stood tall, looking the girl in the eye. "Ruka-uh- I am Haruka Hood."
"Brave knight Haruka Hood, called Ruka. I am Maid Michiru, of Fitzwalter."
"Michiru." The name could not have been more beautiful if it had been sung by a nightingale. It was all at once unexpected and perfection, and Ruka found it within herself to smile back, emboldened by the idea that the subject of all her veneration had a name she could invoke in her own personal heart's prayer. Thinking as quickly as she could, she picked a violet from the ground next to the rock where she sat. "For you, Maid Michiru. As your knight."
She tucked it into her braid. "My knight." And the sun dappled through the trees as she smiled, painting them both with spots of sunlight in the dark.
It is a wonder, how quickly children bond, in a way adults can only hope to know. Michiru and Haruka quickly became inseparable, always playing at knight and lady, Ruka bringing her violets for her hair, admiring the tiny purple adornments in the sunlight, knowing they marked Michiru as her lady, her thing worth fighting for.
Mina, for her part, wondered of what use Michiru could possibly be to them. It was not that Mina was particularly opposed to more girls joining them- indeed, she and Ruka had discussed it before, but it had always been a question of someone's usefulness, rather than the way the summer sun touched someone's hair.
But in time, she came to accept it as just another one of Ruka's many strange fixations, and in any case, Michiru was not half useless. She knew how to tell the glass from the gem when Mina picked pockets, and for that Mina was grateful enough to let her stay. Mina still slipped through the bars of the gate, as she had for years, and still brought back treasures and sometimes, the greatest treasure of all, food. They had to go a little farther, now, and Ruka rarely snuck out with her anymore, preferring to stay by Michiru's side. It didn't matter much to Mina. Ruka was a bit of a bull in a china shop anyhow, and without her the picking was easier, but it was more the principle of the thing.
No, what truly worried Mina was Haruka's lack of discernment when it came to the question of Michiru. Not that she hadn't shown her willingness to be a fool before- she had taken more than a handful of beatings that should have gone to Mina. But Michiru had awakened a new level of self-sacrifice in her, and it was one that Mina generally disapproved of. She gave Michiru part of her dinner when the pickings got scarce, she put her blanket over her when it got cold, and just last week she had found herself caned for speaking out of turn to the headmaster, who had dared to to shove by Michiru at the dinner line and caused her to spill a bit of her treasured ration of stew. It was all well and good to be in love, Mina thought, but it was at least slightly important to remain alive while doing so. Ruka was getting somewhat over-familiar with the business end of the cane.
Ruka didn't seem to care. She said girls liked scars, and smiled at Michiru while saying so.
Well, girls liked a martyr even better.
As Mina carefully considered the problem in front of her, Michiru and Ruka sat in their quiet copse of trees where they spent so much time, sheltered from the rest of the world and wrapped up in the joy of each other. Ruka tenderly braided her violets into Michiru's hair, enjoying every moment her young fingers were caught up in the brilliant silk of Michiru's mane. She was struck at how the violets seemed to adorn Michiru like tiny jewels, looking more beautiful than any princess Ruka could imagine, clothed in the lace of the dappled sunlight like a bride before her.
Michiru gazed over her shoulder and back to Ruka, the soft smile she had come to worship gracing Michiru's lips. "I had thought, you know, that my coming here was the day of my greatest tragedy."
Ruka tied the braid at the end and shrugged. "I think most of us think that."
Michiru turned completely to face Ruka, her face so few inches from hers. "For my part, I was wrong. I have had a thousand tragedies, and yet I cannot truly call my arrival here one of them anymore."
For a moment, Haruka forgot how to breathe. Michiru had never been so close to her, not really. Some nights, when it had been particularly cold, she had snuggled into Ruka. But it had been cold. And Mina did the same thing. Nothing was meant by it. Nothing would ever be meant by it, because Michiru was above her, to think that Michiru ever thought of her as a lover would be foolishness. The knight pours their affection into their queen, knowing that all they can ever hope for is the chance to serve her, the chance to worship her. To ever hope that she could return the affection was almost a betrayal of duty.
In another time, she might have remembered the story of Lancelot and Guinevere.
But, as it was, all she could do was stutter. "O-oh?"
Michiru smiled again, but it was different now, and a slight rosy blush came to her cheeks. "I could never bring myself to declare meeting you a tragedy."
They kissed, then, with all the sweet and innocent love of the very young, and for the first time she could remember, Ruka heard the birds sing inside the iron gates.
"She loves me!" Ruka scooped Mina off her feet and spun her around.
"Of course she does. Am I the only one who pays attention around here? You two have been dancing around trying to catch each others' fancy like a pair of field grouse." She squirmed out of Ruka's grip. "Leaving me, might I add, to handle the burden of our work myself."
Ruka frowned, realizing, in that moment, that she may been a little neglectful of her friend. She touched Mina's shoulder. "Ah Mina, I'm sorry, I-"
"Don't be sorry, be useful." She smuggled something into Haruka's hand. "Hide this."
She glanced into her hand, and then looked back up. "Honey candy! How did you get this?"
Mina looked up at her and slyly smiled. "I found a way into the palace. The kitchen, at least, I've yet to mine the true riches there." She nodded fiercely. "We need to save it. We can buy favors with it, maybe even from the sisters."
Ruka looked at it sadly. "We can't have any?"
Mina unpacked something from her pocket. "I've something better." She unwrapped a small piece of stewed meat and gave it Ruka.
Her eyes grew wide as she chewed a corner of it. "God in heaven, Mina, this is delicious." She felt Michiru's hand on her shoulder, and turned around excitedly. "Michiru, we have meat!" She extended it toward her small mouth. "Here, have some! I've more than enough for me."
Michiru sadly shook her head, her eyes downcast. "You must keep it for yourself." She sighed and took Ruka's hand. "My love, I need to speak with you."
Mina bowed slightly. "I know when I'm not needed." She took the honey candy from Ruka's grasp. "I'll take care of this." She skipped off into the cold stone building, stealing one glance back at the pair before disappearing.
Michiru did not look back at Haruka, but led her by the hand into the small grove where they had passed so many sweet hours together, like Orpheus leading Eurydice out of Hell. Even when they reached the quiet safety of their little nest, Michiru held her hand, but looked away into the distance, into a future that she had already seen and Ruka could not imagine.
They stood there for a few moments before Michiru's voice broke the quiet. "I am going away."
Ruka started, and shook her head fiercely. "Where? There's no where to go." She considered for a moment, her face growing panicked. "I'll come along with you, Mina and I have some valuables saved away, Mina can come with us, can't she? I'll follow you. Let me follow you."
Michiru looked back at her, her eyes filled with tears. "Once there was a girl. And she lived in a great hall, and had the finest teachers, wore the finest clothing. She was the only child of her loving parents, and all was well for her in this world." She dropped Ruka's hand and wandered off a few steps. "And then the plague came. The plague cared not for rich or poor, good or evil, it took saint and sinner the same. It took the girl's parents from her, stolen away in the night like so many servants had been, so many other nobles. The girl sickened. She sickened but she did not die, no matter how desperately she wished it. So many had died. There was such a panic and a clamor. She was mistaken for a servant's child, you see, and no amount of her protests convinced anyone otherwise." She laughed coldly. "There were so convinced of their own ideas that it did not occur to them that a child might know who she is, above all else. And they sent her away, like they did all children who were inconvenient and orphaned, those too foolish to die with their families. The girl determined she would simply bear her cross and never again know happiness, and perhaps God would grant her the release of death." Tears streamed down her face. "But she met a girl,no, a noble knight, who was good and kind to her. Who saved her in every way it was possible to be saved. The girl found happiness again, even in such a dark place. She found love. Before that, love had been a word she only knew from books and stories." Her voice darkened. "But she was not allowed to keep even that. Just as she had come to love the knight and know the knight's love for her, she was discovered. Suddenly the disposable child was a precious doll to be protected, and the king announced his intention to raise her himself as his ward." She looked up at Haruka. "I am to go with Prince John."
Haruka's breath quickened, as if there was not enough air in all the world to aid her, these words drowning her, her body crying out for any relief. The words came broken to her lips. "Why didn't you tell me?"
"I told you on the day we met. I am Maid Michiru, of Fitzwalter."
Tears filled her eyes. "I thought we were playing a game! I'm orphan Ruka, of nothing." Her shoulders slumped and she sat on the ground.
"No," She drew her arms around her shoulders. "You are Haruka Hood, of my heart." Michiru sat on the ground and drew Ruka's head into her lap.
"They're going to take you away."
Michiru looked off into the distance, but did not say anything for a moment, just stroked her hair quietly in the calm of the grove. She sighed, and looked down at Ruka. "They're coming for me tonight."
She sat bolt upright."That's too soon!"
"The Prince would say I have been too long in such a place. It reflects poorly on him to lose track of a niece." She gently embraced her love. "I do not wish it either, Ruka. But it is the truth of the matter."
Ruka simply sobbed in her arms.
Mina held Ruka's hand as the coach pulled up. It was bigger than either of them had ever seen, ornately decorated with delicate wood carvings covered in elegant gold leaf, polished to a shine. A footman jumped off the back and laid a red velvet carpet over the dust in the road, spilling out toward the girls lined up in front of the cold stone edifice they called home, that roll of cloth worth more than any of their lives.
"His Majesty, Prince John!" The footman bellowed.
The door, decorated with the crest of family and crown, swung open, revealing a man in plush purple robes, more gilded than even his carriage. Ruka hated him immediately. He smiled politely at the girls, and Mina pulled her to her knees alongside her and the rest of the other orphans.
She hissed into her ear. "Ruka. Do not do anything stupid. They will KILL YOU."
The doors to the home swung open, and Michiru appeared in the doorway, the same faraway and stone-faced expression she had on her face the night she arrived. They had given her a bath, probably warmer than anything any of the other children had ever felt, and was outfitted in an elegant green gown, with her own jewels at her neck, sparkling brilliantly. Her hair was intricately braided with pearls and gold, but Haruka noticed a small violet tucked in the curls. Her violets.
"Maid Michiru, Lady of Fitzwalter, niece to the King." Prince John walked toward her, each honorific sliding off his tounge. "My utmost apologies that you have languished in this common home. Of course," He nodded to the headmaster, "I know you have been in the loving care of these earthly angels. But a rose requires more than a wild violet, so they say."
Michiru's eyes were downcast, and she politely curtsied. "If this be the kindness of an earthbound heaven, I may only imagine what the real one shall be. I suppose it is true, what they say though, Sire."
Prince John snapped his fingers, and a tall, dark-haired woman stepped out of the carriage. "Setsuna, your handmaiden, will see to your care and education in the future.
Setsuna curtsied to both Prince John and Michiru.
Ruka sat, knees to the ground, choking back tears. They couldn't take her away. It would be as if someone had taken the sun and demanded she spend the rest of her life in eternal night. Mina's hand was on her leg, and she wasn't sure if it was meant to comfort her or hold her back. In any case, it mattered little when she heard the carriage door slam shut and prepare to take her Michiru, her lady for which she would fight and dare, away from her. She couldn't allow it.
"Michiru!" Mina tried to stop her, but she plowed through the row of stern adults and ran as fast as her heart would take her toward the carriage.
Michiru, in a moment of desperation, hung the entire top half of her body out of the carriage window, and held onto Ruka's hand.
"I'll never forget you, Michiru! I'll come for you! You'll see!" She cried out with a force beyond her eleven years. The coach began to pull away, and Ruka struggled to keep running alongside, holding onto Michiru's hand like a lifeline. Michiru took the violet from her hair and pressed it into Ruka's palm, their eyes still locked.
Prince John looked over at her and shook his head. "Driver!" The driver looked down at the skinny girl clinging to the future Lady, and raised his whip. Mina winced as the crack went through the air, and Haruka fell into the dust of the road, the back of her dress split open and a red line dripping down her spine.
She did not care when the headmaster grabbed her by the shoulders, screaming about penance. She did not care when they threw her into a cold, dark, lonely closet, nothing to eat, nothing to drink, only a prayerbook and a candle. She did not care about the burning in her back, the scar it would leave, or the fever it would bring.
She just kept holding that flower.
