The light eventually woke Kenshin; the sun had been up for a few hours. He blinked his eyes open when a woman called his name. The woman sounded worried and he heard quick light steps. Why was he on a strange roof in a sleeping yukata and where were his clothes? A katana was not far from his right hand, but this was not his sword. He did not recognize the scabbard or the hilt. Something was at odds here. If he had inadvertently landed himself in danger and was now a hostage for the enemy, why had he passed out during his escape? Why had they made him a hostage instead of killing him? Where was his sword? How did he get this one? Drawing the blade he discovered it was a sakabato, a reversed blade, he studied its weight and found it more comfortable in the palm that his own katana. His shorter blade was gone leaving him with an incomplete daisho, not that men generally got close enough for him to need the wakizashi.
Someone with a strong chi was almost directly below. The sooner he attacked the better - the element of surprise would be on his side. Had they thought he would be unable to kill with a mere sakabato? Retying his hair in a high tail, and creeping carefully to the edge, he frowned at the sight below him. There was no imminent danger here. There was an unarmed man, that looked a few years older than him, and a woman with her back turned to him. The man was tall, built, but a bit on a lanky side; however, he could tell that his lack of muscular bulk betrayed his actual strength. His ki was much stronger than the woman's and his brown hair was spiked up in all directions. Hands were shoved in pockets as he chewed on a fish bone. With a deft movement Kenshin landed in front of the man.
"Why were you on the roof?"
The man made no move to attack, but he kept his hand on the hilt. He understood the man not wanting to fight him – very few ever did, but he didn't defend himself either. Although it was futile every other man had made some effort instead of slouching against a porch rail with hands in their pockets.
The woman spun around and stormed at him, "I've been looking everywhere for you! What happened? One odd noise in the middle of the night, and you're gone until breakfast?" then began checking him for injuries. She smacked the side of his head with her palm as soon as she was satisfied. Was she an enemy? Large blue eyes that almost matched the ribbon in her long black tail glared at him as she waited for an answer. Her appearance was irrelevant; she moved like a swordsman and the man was probably a street-brawler who may very well be the reason he's here instead of at headquarters.
"You've been acting real weird since those politicians left yesterday. Did Saito come back last night?"
"You know him?" How did he know the third captain of the Shinsengumi? The Wolf of Mibu wasn't known to tolerate men this undisciplined.
"Yeah" The man motioned to his bandaged ribs "We've met."
Was he being sarcastic? Why did Saito break his ribs instead of making short work of him? Kenshin loosened his grip on the hilt of his katana. Having a common enemy was close enough to an ally.
"You should get dressed, Kenshin." She gestured toward the covered porch.
Since she knew his real name he headed for the steps, yet he grasped the hilt of his sword again and stretched out his chi to sense anyone else who may be lurking inside.
The kitchen was a comfortable size with the usual wood stove, raised washtub and a cupboard for food storage. The dishes were neatly stacked on a shelf and a second, smaller cabinet held a broom and other cleaning supplies. He opened the other door which led to a short hallway that didn't indicate where a change of clothes might be.
"Are you feeling alright?" The woman looked at him strangely from the doorway "You're still acting like the fight isn't over. Okubo Toshimichi gave you until May 14th to answer him; can't you relax until then?"
"It's the beginning of May?" He turned to study her. "How long have I been…what is this place?"
He read her chi more thoroughly and was a bit surprised at the strength and honesty he found. So she could probably take care of herself, and if he judged correctly, she was pretty much incapable of lying.
She was studying him just as carefully. It was strange to have a woman, who he could take out in a heartbeat, size him up like they were equal. Did she possibly think she was a match for him or was she looking for an ally against Saito? No, that look had nothing to do with battle; sometimes Tomoe looked at him the same way.
"You don't remember me." Kaoru lowered her eyes "Who are you, then?"
"You called me Kenshin so you must know I'm hitokiri Battosai."
"Battosai? Why in the world would you call yourself…you were a member of the Ishin Shishi in Kyoto."
"I still am." Now she gets scared?
"Your room is this way." She led him down the short hall opening the door at the end.
A futon and blankets were spread out on the floor next to an old trunk. Other than that the room was bare.
Sano leaned in the open doorway behind Kaoru. "It's been ten years since the Bakumatsu ended."
Kenshin looked at Kaoru for confirmation.
"Kenshin, it's 1878." She looked in his eyes like it was painful. To her amber with gold flecks were beautiful, yet she preferred them to be violet speckled with purple. "Sano, go get Dr. Gensai."
Kaoru slid the door closed behind her while he looked at his unmade futon on the floor.
He was twenty-eight years old? There was no mirror to check his appearance. He looked at his rough, scarred hands and saw another one of his fingers had broken at some point, but not set correctly before it healed. They began to shake as he realized he'd lost twelve years of his life. Kenshin curled them into fists to steady himself and sat on the unmade futon until he noticed a red hair in the folds of the blanket. He didn't sleep on a futon, not since he left his training master Hiko Seijuro.
The old trunk in the corner held a change of clothes and his travel pack. Kenshin changed into the patched magenta gi and worn white hakama while Kaoru began talking to him through the rice paper door giving him a brief description of his best friend Sagara Sanosuke.
"He constantly chews on fish bones and the 'Bad' symbol on his back is in memory of being a cadet in the Sekiho Army."
If the man used to be Sekihoutai then he ought to hate me, not be a friend. Wait, Sagara Sanosuke…he might be a relative of Captain Sagara, maybe his son. The man's spiky brown hair and habit of chewing on fish bones reminded Kenshin of Harada from the Shinsengumi. Well, Harada chewed on grass stems, but either way he wasn't about to trust Sanosuke any time soon.
"We rescued Myojin Yahiko from the Yakuza and Takani Megumi works with Dr. Gensai because she knows how to make a variety of medicines." Her tone of voice told him that she cared for Sanosuke and Yahiko much more than Megumi.
"I'm Kamiya Kaoru and you've been living in my dojo for almost six months." The woman who carefully checked him for injuries then smacked his head for worrying her didn't have anything else to say about herself or why he was in her dojo?
He opened the door. "That's it?"
She nodded and looked at her feet. "Unless you want to know how the Bakumatsu ended or about the Boshin and Seinan Wars…"
The woman doctor asked if he had a headache, if he was dizzy, could he stand on one foot without falling… The two women began whispering in disagreement about something he couldn't follow. A boy with short messy hair came in looking for Kaoru and was quickly pulled aside by Sano trying to explain Kenshin's memory loss. The boy's dark eyes quickly moved to the man in question standing by the stove. Kenshin figured the boy was Yahiko and feeling a bit on edge surrounded by strangers who knew him well slipped out of the kitchen. He leaned against the wall next to the doorway to listen to their conversation without being under their scrutiny.
"Hey Ugly, did you see his eyes?" Yahiko sounded excited.
"Of course."
"If Ken-san thinks that he's sixteen years old and still fighting in the Bakumatsu you know what that means." Megumi's tone was a little condescending.
'Ken-san? That's a bit too intimate.'
"We get it, he's Battosai." Sano folded his arms.
"His memory loss could stem from head trauma."
"See! You hit him too hard this time, Old Hag!" Yahiko laughed.
'Who is he referring to?'
"You loud-mouthed Brat!"
'I think that's Kaoru.'
"Little Missy, you sure Saito didn't come back last night?"
"Nah, he came straight through the door before. Last night was probably some stupid burglar."
"Yahiko, you know an ordinary man can't hurt Kenshin. It must have been someone like Udo Jin-E, but stronger or more devious."
'Udo Jin-E…Jin-E…Oh, Kurogasa, the Shinsengumi traitor.'
"How much has he been told about his past?"
"I told him who we are and how long he's been here."
"You'll confuse Ken-san if you tell him anything else, just act normal and maybe something will trigger his memory."
'Why doesn't Megumi want Kaoru talking to me?'
"We don't have to do anything to fix him?" Yahiko stepped toward Megumi.
She shook her head "It's not like a broken arm or Cholera."
"Hey, Little Missy, you want me to stick around?" Sano stepped away from the wall.
"No, I know you'd rather be gambling with your friends."
"Right now he's not the wandering rurouni…you've seen hitokiri Battosai."
Kaoru had a soft, pleasant laugh. "He's still Kenshin. I'll see you guys later."
'Why is Sano trying to protect her from me?'
Kenshin heard the door to the yard creak open but it didn't close right away.
"Kaoru, I don't think you're strong enough to handle this situation; at least try to smile or he may leave."
'How can Kaoru contain so much rage? …oh, she doesn't…'
Kaoru admired how well he was adjusting to his amnesia; there was no doubt she'd have been venting her anger over twelve lost years in no uncertain terms. Battosai had to have heard Megumi's parting comment, just as he had to have heard the sound of her bokken hitting the closed door. She felt like she was on the losing end of another Megumi set-up and decided to treat Kenshin no different than she always had and hope he'd get his memory back soon. What else could she do? Sit around and wait for him to leave? Yeah, like she hadn't been doing that since the day after he moved in…
"Thank you for the food." He spoke with a quiet baritone that unsettled her a little.
"You're welcome. Sorry we missed breakfast." She poured tea for him as he dug into the leftovers from yesterday's dinner Kenshin made.
Eating with Kaoru was a little awkward; it was almost like eating with Tomoe. His late wife spent more time writing in her diary than speaking to him. What do you say to someone that you apparently live with, but don't know? At least during the stilted meals in the dining hall of the Ishin Shishi headquarters he was able to eat quickly and leave.
"I have an outside training session at the Jouetsukan dojo today with young children. I'd rather skip it to show you around the dojo and neighborhood, but we need the money. Do you want to come with me?"
He looked at her with a blank expression not sure how to respond to a woman training master.
It took a moment for Kaoru to realize hitokiri Battosai probably needed some time alone and watching her show young children how to hold a training sword will bore him to tears.
"Yahiko and Sano share the room next to yours although Sano still sort of has a long house on Ruffian Row; that's on the other side of the market. He's usually here for dinner even when I cook." Kaoru gave him some more rice and refilled his cup automatically "Yahiko works at the Akabeko 'til closing four nights a week so he trains in the morning. Megumi works with Dr. Gensai and she watches his granddaughters if they don't have a lot of patients." Kaoru gave him the last pieces of tofu. "He brings Ayame and Suzume by once or twice a week on days when he makes house calls; they call you 'big-brother Kenny.' I can tell him not to bring them next time if you…"
"No." Eating with Kaoru was nothing like eating with Tomoe. It was a good thing Megumi told her not to talk. Recalling her tone of voice when he was getting dressed and Megumi's parting comment, perhaps Kaoru's monologue was retaliation against the doctor.
"You don't mind playing with little kids?"
He shook his head slightly "Why do you volunteer so much information?"
"We know you, but you don't know us yet." She gave him quick directions around the dojo and bathhouse; letting him know he'd be alone until evening.
Kenshin smirked at the way the woman with impeccable table manners got up and ran out of the room so she wouldn't be late. Megumi was irrelevant, Kaoru was only trying to level the playing field; that display of loyalty unsettled him. Kaoru's mention of Ayame and Suzume reminded him of the children he played with in Otsu; the boys used sticks to play swords with him while the girls played with a ball.
Everything Kenshin had seen about the dojo reflected a lack of money; the rooms were neat, clean and sparsely furnished with only what was absolutely necessary. The storage shed and gate needed some repair work. He wandered into the dojo noticing the miss-matched doors, sword marks on the patched walls and a thick book on a low table against the back wall. He read the plaques on the wall listing the names of the two students, Myojin Yahiko and Tsukayama Yutaro, then the plaques for Dojo Master Kamiya Koshijiro and Assistant Instructor Kamiya Kaoru. He met Kaoru, where was Koshijiro?
Koshijiro turned out to be the author of the book describing the family's sword style, Kamiya-Kasshin-Ryu, giving careful instruction for each kata. He imagined the sword moves as he flipped through a few pages. The passages on battle strategies were more dog-eared than the rest of the book. A piece of paper with much better handwriting was tucked in the back. 'Hide your strength as much as possible until it is truly needed.' 'The winner of a legitimate match cannot be blamed for being too strong; the loser will not be avenged' 'When facing multiple opponents try to create a situation to fight them one-on-one.'
The faint scent of blood lingering on the floor and back wall was too reminiscent of his recent deadly encounter with Captain Kondo and his 2nd Unit of the Shinsengumi making his hands feel sticky; this training hall had seen a lot of action for an unknown style with only two students.
Needing a bath to get rid of the feel of blood, Kenshin carried buckets of water from the well to the bathhouse, stoked the fire and went to find another change of clothes from his room glad that Kaoru had given him an afternoon alone. He didn't want to explain bathing in the middle of the day. Kenshin grabbed a rag and chunk of soap off the shelf and washed himself quickly with an extra bucket of water before stepping into the cypress soaking tub. This tub was large, deep and very comfortable. He sunk in further letting his hair float around his shoulders, even though it looked like blood in the water the scent was replaced by the aroma of the cypress bath.
Kaoru almost forgot to stop at the market on her way home from the Jouetsukan Dojo. She remembered that Kenshin wasn't cooking dinner as she passed the tofu vendor then bought a few vegetables. He was standing with his back to her when she came through the gate. His feet were shoulder width apart and his hands were on his hips as he inspected their small garden. Kaoru stared at his high tail as she called out "I'm home." Kenshin tied his hair at the nape of his neck with a thin leather strip and she just now realized how much she missed him. Not because he made dinner and heated her bath, but because he would've turned around and smiled as he said "welcome home." Battosai merely nodded.
He was stunned by her open, honest grin. The traditional greetings weren't used by Hiko or the Ishin Shishi and by the time he remembered he was supposed to say 'welcome home' Kaoru was already on the steps.
"You know if you spent an extra day at the Maekawa Dojo we could eat at the Akabeko. Oww! Geez Ugly, what was that for? I'm just saying…"
Kenshin quietly thanked her for the food noting that her cheeks turned pink. He wondered why his normal seat was at the head of the table; this wasn't his dojo. Why didn't Kaoru mention Kamiya Koshijiro? Where was the dojo master?
Kaoru noticed Sano's sour expression when he took a bite. "If you weren't such an ugly mooch Tae might let your tab slide and you could eat there."
"Ha! Look who's calling who ugly." Yahiko snatched a piece of tofu from Sano's bowl and got hit by a wooden spoon in the process "If that's all you think a spoon is for then-"
"You should cook with a shinai; it'd taste better." Sano finished Yahiko's jibe ducking quickly out of range.
Kenshin understood why they teased Kaoru about her cooking, yet had no idea why they stole more of it from each other. Their words were insulting, yet their tone wasn't harsh and even though Kaoru blushed she wasn't trying to hit Yahiko very hard. He watched her empty the last of the tea into his cup automatically. Tomoe asked if he wanted more during their meals and waited for his answer. Kaoru randomly gave him more and it didn't seem right to say anything when she was in the middle of serving him. How did he normally handle that?
After Kaoru washed the dishes and said good-night, Kenshin headed for the door.
"You're leaving?" Yahiko's tone made Kenshin pause.
Battosai's amber glare didn't make the boy back down. He was a kid, probably about eleven or twelve, yet he wasn't afraid of him. "You want me to stay?"
Yahiko's expression was enough of an answer.
"Let him go, kid." Sano spoke up from the doorway. "If Battosai doesn't want to live here he won't sneak out in the middle of the night."
Kenshin circled back through the empty market idly wondering if the Ishin Shishi headquarters still stood, or if the old inn had burned as so many other buildings had during the chaos. Were any of his comrades still alive? Would they recognize him? Would it make a difference? He had no attachment to any of his old comrades. Whether Kyoto had been razed or flourished he wasn't going there.
A few blocks farther led him past a cemetery, and as a matter of course, his thoughts turned to his wife. Tomoe was raised to be a traditional wife; quiet and an excellent cook. After she witnessed a man attack him he brought her to the Ishin Shishi headquarters where they shared his room as though they were brother and sister. She had eventually earned his trust and sometime later they became close friends; he didn't know of her secret plot to kill him for revenge.
His feet were on the edge of Ruffian Row, but his mind was stuck in the past. When he needed to hide-out for a few months Captain Katsura told Kenshin and Tomoe to marry and move to Otsu because a married couple moving to a remote village was more believable than if they were siblings. Kenshin told her he wanted their marriage to be real and took her gentle smile as agreement. By the end of Autumn Kenshin realized that he had fallen in love with his wife, yet she remained distant. The change in geography had no effect on her heart.
Five months after their wedding, in the heart of winter, they finally understood each other. A visit from her younger brother ultimately prompted her to speak. They sat against the wall, wrapped in a blanket talking long into the night until a brush of hands led to a brush of lips and their marriage became real at last. But when Kenshin woke the next morning Tomoe had already slipped out to meet the men she had hired to kill him.
If she changed her mind about having him killed to avenge Akito's death then why did she leave? If she forgave him for murdering her fiancé then why didn't she tell him about the plot? Why was her younger brother Enishi there scowling from behind a tree as Tomoe lay dying in his arms?
He took a deep breath and headed back to the Kamiya dojo because there just didn't seem to be anywhere else to go; nowhere to escape from old painful memories and unanswered questions.