The nights at Rukongai are so cold that I usually don't sleep during the night, but during mornings. You might think it is a strange habit for a prince, but I have my personal motives. And did I just mention the cold? Good, I don't like repeating myself. I also don't like cold although I'm used to it. You have to be when your kingdom is always covered with a glacier coat. This cold I can handle. It is even desirable. What I couldn't handle was the coldness sting delivered by that poison yesterday. Memories. It's all that's left of my sunny and rainy past. I had shut them away from thoughts, locked my heart for good, put it in a cage of ice so I wouldn't feel the frozen kiss of memories anymore. But that man...that poison...it melted the cage, it busted open all the locks and I could feel again the sting of lost, sorrow, guilt, regret...I can't handle that. He would have killed me with my own memories. But instead he just gave me the cure to my heartache and now I'm only able to remember the warm memories, the ones that speak of the happiness I once felt, the ones that make me want to feel this warm in my chest and make the cold outside even more unbearable. What man holds such power? What kind of black arts does this man know? I've spent the night wondering. Why do I feel this way? Why those names on the bottles? I was too confident about my capacities to deflate sorcery. I put my life at risk and to what purpose? I'm their only hope. Nobody will come to rule this forsaken land. There's no money in the chests. I can't complain, I still have a home, what to eat, what to dress, some luxuries like reading and have attendants and a guard at my service. What can I actually do for them? Sometimes I think they are happier than myself and they would be just fine if left alone. But then I remember the face of this stranger, which speaks of health, warm, joy, happiness and I can't help thinking that they all miss the sun, they all miss smiles in their faces.
Not of course the type of smile the blacksmith of the Real Guard is doing right now as he crosses the inner yard of the palace towards the blacksmithery. He's drunk once again, but no one seems to care. At least today he didn't get another strange tattoo. He's probably trying to forget a certain blonde that is now working for the red haired wizard. The problem is that he is always trying to forget her being with another man. One different man (or several) every night. Hisana was never a lady to give me such trouble. I think about my heart once again before leaving the balcony to go sleep. There's a memory lingering there that I can't quite reach. I frown. What have I done?
****
"Oh shit, shit, shit.", I curse as I prepare breakfast for me and Zabimaru. Well, I don't really "curse", not really or you would see something sparkle, anyway I'm really not that good with curses and spells, and they tend to sparkle in my own face. Not that I care, the staff helps me focus and I'm a magical potion type of wizard anyway. It's like cooking and making tea. I like that. No, I don't have a cauldron, you freaks! I have a tiny boiler which is enough. So...right....I curse. Zabimaru is giving me those cold "I don't know you" stares. I'm lucky it's cold outside or by this time she would have leave me here alone and go as far as she could from me just to make me suffer. I know she doesn't approve.
"Hell, I don't approve either, but what should I've done? He still has three more days! You know I never used it, not even that time", I yell at her. She turns her back towards me. She's pissed at me for using "second love" and she is right. You all must be wondering why I possess a poison originally called with the meaning of my name. Well, Kisuke likes to name things, even if not his creations. I just called it " the poison that it's gonna get me famous", but then it was not a very commercial name. Anyway, five years ago Kisuke was one of the teachers at the magical arts academy "Soul Society". Kisuke was more a man of knowledge than an actual mystic man. His times as a shopkeeper at Rukongai were far behind him. He was fascinated about the transformation of metals and simple materials into noble ones. Yes, he was conducting alchemic experiments. His pursues were good, to get the philosopher stone, end the poverty in the world and maybe have enough money to have more two kids with Yourichi. But he was being watched. By that time I became his assistant. I was good at what he called the lab, but my job was to keep it clean and secured for his own experiments. He repaid me by letting me do my own recherché on potions there. He would say that the search of an alchemist is always a lonely one.
Things that we manage to do in three years:
1. Fire
2. A lot of burn stuff
3. Tea
4. the hougyoku
5. First and second love
Why did I do these potions? I still ask myself. I was looking for my philosopher stone I guess. I was looking of a way to reach the heart of men, to bring mankind happiness and love. I used some old passion potions, happiness potions and a mixture of ingredients that resulted in something that can open your heart for good or evil. Somehow my own findings helped Kisuke focus on the essence of what he planned to achieve, the stone able to make you gain access to your inner soul without getting separated from it.
I was just a poor kid that had managed to pass the admission tests. A kid who lived practically in the building and was set to all kind of tasks, like wash the floors and dump out the garbage. So no one was really paying attention on me. But like I said Kisuke was being watched. Aizen, one of the directors of "Soul Society" wanted hougyoku for himself. When hougyoku was almost finish it disappeared. Neither I nor Kisuke had doubts about who had stolen it. Ah, needless to say that I was the may suspect. When I was held prisoner by the council of souls, Kisuke tried to help me, but Aizen was pulling the right strings and deluding everyone with is charm spells.
So when a false hougyoku was found at my chambers I had to face one of the death penalty we wizards sometimes face: the walking soul. You may say that I'm still alive, but I'm I really? I feel disconnected, incomplete. I had to face what I am and I can't hide, can't wear masks. I can't pretend I can't walk away. My soul is heavy, she's a mortal like me, when I die she dies for good. I feel this weight on my chest, this materialization of something that should be as light as a snow flake. She walks beside me and she is me, she feels the same, we both share a heart and yet we are two strangers walking side by side.
My only hope
The real hougyoku
Kisuke says it's not completed yet. It can make you communicate to you soul but you cannot separate from her.
"I'm already separated from my soul", I told him back them, but he just got all mysterious to me and said he can help me to become once again one with my soul. I just need to find the final ingredient to the core of hougyoku: a scale of a white dragon. So here I am in a ball freezing town and I've already got five propositions of sex, made a blacksmith very pissed and drunk by the looks he gave me this morning and already poisoned the prince. Sweet.
"So what I'm I going to do about it?" I continue talking to Zabimaru's butt, "the ball is tomorrow so no warm done don't you think? If he is sleeping the night after tomorrow nothing really bad will happen", I reassure her.
"Are you stupid or what? We still have to guarantee he is sleeping and he was pretty much awake when he spoke with us".
Huh, bet your soul don't call you stupid.
"Who are you talking to Renjjjjjjiiiiiii? "Matsumoto burst in." Ah, never mind boss, I won't tell them you speak to your pet over there. Anyway, I'm late cause that Hisagi gave me another jealous scene this moooorning. Stupid blacksmith can't take his eyes of my boobs. You don't stare at my boobs, ei, wait, why don't you stare at my boobs, its something wrong with then? Maybe you are like the moon!"
I blush hard, and then I catch what she said.
"Like the moon? What do you mean?"
" Dahh, the Prince Byakuya, he doesn't like boobs. Oh, how did it go the interview last evening?"
"What do you mean he doesn't like...huh... boobs?" what the hell is this woman babbling about?
"Oh it's what we say because he just won't marry anyone else and we have to wait to have a king. He doesn't even have an heir, not even a bastard. He doesn't ask for women at the palace....real strange that man if you ask me...but then again you are behaving just like him".
I smile.
"Well I don't like boobs", I tease her.
"I knew it!" she says smiling and we both start to laugh.
I know he loved a woman so what they say can't be true. But he knows what people say about him; this is what he was talking about. I don't know why he is throwing this ball, maybe he still believes he can find someone at these meetings and make the people shut up. He seems a person who believes in true feelings, that will not lightly indulge himself in mere carnal pleasures as most of his subedits would. But I might be wrong. The tales about his deceased wife disturbs the image I made of him wile speaking to him. Is he truly an assassin? If so whose fate did I join with his? Three days...what have I done?
