Disclaimer: I own nothing within Sengoku Basara, any characters seen in the anime or games are clearly not my property or else I would not be writing this, original creations however are indeed my own.
Chosokabe Motochika was not as young as he used to be, he hated to admit this fact of life but it was the truth. His one good eye was not as sharp as it once was, the distant edge of the horizon now blurred when in his youth the sky was as clear and sharp as a pane of glass. While he had not lost any of the strength he was renown for sometimes the pain in his joints caused him to take rest more often than he used to. This especially hurt when he was forced to climb uphill for a particularly long time, such as the tall hill he forced himself to ascend today.
It was the highest peak in all of Shikoku, overlooking the sparkling blue waters of the Seto Inland Sea and the green expanse of the island below. The view was matched only by that which could be seen from the towering height of the Fugaku, but for its' purpose he would not have chosen any other place. Two days out of the year he climbed the mount, alone, taking with him only some incense and a large jug of sake. For three years he had done this, never missing a single trip, beginning his ascent at sunrise and not returning until the following dawn. He was close now, the well marked path was making it's final bend to the top of the hill.
There stood a small stone gate, it's slanted roof adorned with mythical sea creatures, the pillars carved from a gleaming white stone that shone in the early morning sun. A cobbled path lead through the gate into a circular glen surrounded on three sides by a thick line of flowering trees that were just past their prime, sending a mist of pastel petals covering the ground. In the center of the little glen sat a square of tiles, just enough to allow a single person to sit or kneel upon. And there, in the center of the square, nestled amongst an arch of flowering branches was a single marker made of stone. Made to resemble a four tiered pagoda, the grave was decorated with ribbons and surrounded by offerings made by the people of the island for their lost lady.
Here marked the final resting place of Chosokabe Nana of the Saito Clan, wife to the daimyo of Shikoku, mother to his sons, leader and defender of her people. Or at least those were the words carved into the gravestone, dry, formal and devoid of the brilliance that she brought into every day she walked this earth. He hated that epitaph, always had and always would. Because even if he had all the stone and all the carvers in the world laboring day and night to write out the words to describe his wife the work would never be done to his satisfaction. There were not words enough to encompass all that she was, how she fought, how she laughed, raged and loved. No amount of simple words could bring that brilliance back to the land of the living, back to him.
With more grace than a man of his size should ever posses he knelt before the grave, setting his satchel to the side and running his fingers over the characters that made up her name. The cold rock was a poor substitute for her warm skin, the polished surface a pale imitation of her sparking eyes. Three years after her death and still the wound left by her loss remained as fresh as the day he felt her last breath leave her body. With slightly shaking hands he pulled out the incense, her favorite scent of spicy cinnamon, and lit it. Next out came the jug, he wasted no time uncorking the large and heavy bottle to take a long drought and relish the solace it promised. Today was the anniversary of the day they married, one of the happiest days of his long life and so he could not stay away from her on this of all days. The only other time he came to this place was the complete opposite, the lowest point he had ever fallen to and he drug himself to this place in her honor lest he allow her memory to fade with time. Either way he always did the same thing each time he came to this dually cursed and beloved place, gave his offering, drank away the pain and lost himself to happier times long since past.
"You would scold me for this, tell me I'm wallowing in my misery and to man up," he said to the stone as he left all formality behind and sat sprawled out on the ground. "You would probably screech and yell every time I did this," taking another deep drink from the jug, "and say I'm being a pansy for hiding behind the bottle. But you're not and so I'll drink until I damn well please."
Every time he made a promise to himself that he would only cease his ritual when the sun rose on the next day, forcing him to return to his life or he found himself dead from drink and face the consequences from his irate wife on the other side. How he yearned for the later, having to see her in his dreams every night only to awake alone was more torture than even the loss of his eye had been. But he had four sons to think of, four grown sons who could not stand to be in the same room as one another let alone rule a province from one.
"They need you here to slam their hard heads together like you used to, they'd listen to you," he took another drink. "Do they hear their old man when he breaks up their petty brawls, never! But they would quake in their boots if you so much as looked sideways at them!" another gulp went down. "And now we have three grandsons, so it's a battle field every day and all of them are Morichika's. All his and he's our youngest, figure that."
He would always talk to her like this, as if she were sitting beside him, catching her up with the goings on of their family in the time between his visits. In the thirty-seven years they were married Nana had given him four boys and he had been more than proud of her and their children, showing off his family whenever he could. Motochika would never let it show for fear of loosing face and worsening the family feud but it broke his heart to watch the men Nana's boys had become fight one another over the rule of Shikoku. There had always been sibling rivalry but her death had hit them harder than they wanted to admit, without their mother to ease their growing tensions the dispute had only become worse. And the sad true fact was that he had not been very helpful in the last three years. For months after loosing his beloved wife he had locked himself away in his castle on the Fugaku. Nobuchika, his first born, would try and persuade him out but he was lost to his sorrow. More than a few drunken incidents involving fists were the highlight of these visits. Chikakazu and Chikatada, the second and third of his sons, would even try appearing together but that did not end well either with the bickering always going on between them. He only came out of his cups when Morichika brought the first of his grandsons to see him, the baby was less than a year old at the time and looked up innocently at him with Nana's violet eyes. From then on he limited his drinking to just two days out of the year for the sake of trying to mend their warring family.
"You would have known what to do, you always knew what to do," he took a sip from the jug then set it down, looking over the clear blue of the sea stretched out before him. They had done this very thing so often, watched the waves together, laying back and enjoying the salty breeze as it caught their hair, cooling the heat of the day. So many memories, so many little things that he had take for granted. It wasn't even until recently that he was shocked to realize he did not even have a picture of her, never being one of the lords who took the time to sit for portraits or waste time on painters. Now the only image he had of her was in his mind's eye and he was terrified without her here he might start to forget the fall of her hair or the way her lips would smile. It was only in his memories that he could see her clear as day, so he forced his mind not to forget, refused to let himself loose even one part of her. She had become the best part of him, for all her fierceness in battle or the razor sharp edge of her wit she had been all that was good in his world. He had adored her, had fought for her as he never fought for anything before. The days he spent with her were the best days of his life because every morning he woke up to her precious face and went to sleep with her in his arms. To watch her succumb to the disease that would eventually steal her from him was the hardest battle he ever had to fight. She was not young anymore, her body unable to fight back agasint the infection that raged within her. But she tried, oh how she stried, her warrior spirit refusing to give in even as her body withered away. Doctors were brought in from far and wide, each one promised far more than their asking price to heal the Lady of Shikoku, each one left empty handed. Weeks passed and she began to loose her strength, the blood from her ceaseless coughing staining his clothes when he held her weakening body close against the warnings of the useless physicians.
They said such closeness would allow the disease to spread, that he would surely die as well if he continued to refuse leaving his place at her bedside. He thinking at the time if only that were true.
Tears streamed down his cheek unchecked, the sobs caught in his throat and he bit into his lip until little rivers of blood rolled down his chin. He missed her so much it physically hurt, it hurt so much worse than a sword or arrow ever could. The breeze blew the incense smoke towards him, the familiar scent of cinnamon that used to hang in every room of their home brought so many bittersweet recollections. She loved the spicy scent, he used to bark his disapproval every time she went to light another stick but she would burn the scent anyway just to irritate him. Motochika took another long drought of sake, ignoring how blood and tears stained the back of his hand as he wiped his lips.
"Nana, do you see what you do to this old sea dog, woman?" he ground out. "The Ogre of the Western Sea turned into a sniveling mess, I just bet you're laughing your pretty ass off somewhere at the sight of me."
The wind blew through his spiky white hair, gently, as though long fingers were brushing through the unruly mane, just as she used to do. Between that and the smell of cinnamon wafting through the air he imagined she was nearby, perhaps hiding just behind him or peaking around the trunk of a tree ready to jump out. Some said the spirits of the dead watched over their loved ones left on earth, he was never a man to believe in such stories but he'd like to be if it meant the love of his life might be with him once more for even a moment. For now though all he had were the plights of the present, the solace of a bottle and the memories he held within him of the woman who tamed the heart of a pirate. So he sat back against the cold stone of her grave marker, gazing out towards the horizon and lost himself to his memories of his beloved, his mermaid…
Author's Note: Thanks for reading! What did you think? I've been a fan for quite some time but never got around to actually diving into the realm of fics for Sengoku Basara, here's hoping it's not a total disaster. So this can remain a oneshot or there is the possibility for telling the story of how these two met and came together. What will it be?