A/N: A multi-chaptered short series to keep some friends of mine from going insane. Natsuki/Nao, and Mai/Shizuru… Don't like it? Run, hide, flee!

Footnotes: This takes place in the Edo era (1600's, or for historical reference: when Tokugawa Leyasu was the most powerful man alive after Hideyoshi died.)

The Pebbles Underfoot
Chapter 1
(A preamble)

I was born and raised a villager's daughter. We were one of the more prominent families, but, we were not rich enough to find value in the city. My father spent his time in the fields, my mother dyed thread, and I spent my days by her side, learning to keep a house.

Like all who lived in the village, who were not of warrior class, we lived in modest housing. Even though we had more money, it was against the law to have a house grander than any warrior, especially if the man of the house was a farmer.

Unlike most women in the village, I was a schooled child, educated by my father himself. I was one of the few able to read and write beyond very basic literacy. This was due in part to my strict upbringing, and because my parents wanted me to be aware of the world in which I lived. I was taught to be more than merely a good wife and a wise mother. Although, it was impressed upon me that those thing always came first and foremost.

We were a traditional family, who unfortunately, lived near some very untraditional neighbors. They were nice enough people, surely, but I'd always been warned to stay away from them. We lived up on the grassy knoll, and they lived just at the bottom, nearest the well where we gathered our water.

Every morning when I was young, my father fetched the water. I'd follow him, and when I did, I'd see a little girl. One not too much younger than me. She also had a bucket in hand every morning, and, my father would help her to gather the cool liquid from deep within. As we grew older, we were firmly aware of each other.

I hadn't a clue as to her name. We walked not side by side, or hand in hand, but on the opposite sides of the pebble laden path. I'd see her every day. I watched her grow. As I got older, I began to understand what everyone meant.

She was a strange girl, so unlike the other young women of the village. Most women kept their hair long and straight, and I, myself was also one of the flock. This woman was different though; her hair cropped short, hardly shoulder length. That was improper, to speak the least. It was not the only oddity, though.

She was an unmarried woman, clearly. A married woman was expected to shave her eyebrows and wear her hair in an up-do more befitting her stature. This girl did nothing of the sort, and I never saw a man, save for her brother, around at all. She seemed to tend her home, mind the chores, mostly by herself.

I once inquired about the matter, and my father's response was to laugh. He's pat me on the shoulder, praised me for my kindness, and told me not to concern myself with such trivial matters. I was soon to be a married woman after all, and as such my mind was to be focused on the duties that would rest before me.

So, being the dutiful daughter, I nodded quietly and went to wash the linens. I had my place, and she had hers. My father was right, whatever was going on in her life most certainly wasn't my problem.

A woman's rights, her stature, was always less than that of a man. It didn't matter her breeding, well or not, my father would say. A woman was defined by her gender, and even the lowest man would always be higher than the highest woman. It was a matter of birthright, so my father would prattle distastefully.

In this, he was happy to be a villager, happy to not have any deeper responsibilities than to this tiny community. So long as the bull would lay with the cows in spring, and the rice grew plentiful, that was all my father worried about. There were three provisions my father kept above all else, and he made it loud and clear to any who would dare listen to his bluster.

A driven man of this village, he said, needed only three things to be truly happy.

A dry roof.
A goal in life.
A woman to warm his bed.

All other things, both good and bad, would come in time.

He didn't fully believe in mindset that women were lesser than men. Though he saw the logic in it, I knew he ignored most of it. He highly regarded my mother, and he educated me avidly when he didn't have to do either of those things.

Yet, he felt it was his responsibility. They never produced a son to take over the farm, and my father worried, seeking to marry me off as soon as possible.

Thankfully, my father received no few requests when it came to me, and his troubles came with selecting the best one. There were a few men that sat high on his list, but it was out of my hands. I'd known this since birth.

Because I had no agency, no sense of self other than to be strictly what I was. A woman, a wife, a mother, a caretaker to the home. I was raised to be alright with that, but some part of me felt uneased as well.

It was a truth that sat ill with me, I wanted to defy it so profusely, turning my back on even that privilege. I envied her, that strange woman with short cropped hair. She had to have more freedom than me, or so I thought…