Scars
Normally, it would be a female bodyguard or something to help Haruhi in the shower. However, sense the two queens of the families had passed away five years before, there were no women in the main household and they had no need for female bodyguards. If Haruhi was just a friend as she'd been just two months before, then perhaps a woman would have been hired from the hospital to come and help her. However, now that they knew who exactly she was… they were far too paranoid to trust someone that they hadn't been training and observing for a lifetime.
When Mori walked into the room, Haruhi was already undressed and under the spray of the shower, doing everything on her own. It was obvious that she was in pain. She was alone so she wasn't wasting her energy on pretending she didn't feel pain. And because she was alone, his calling her name startled her no matter how quiet it had been.
"You're safe here, Haruhi." He told her for maybe the thousandth time sense she'd started to stay with them that morning. Because her condition wouldn't get any worse if they sent her home, they did so even though they knew that her father worked long hours and wouldn't be able to take care of her. When they asked Ranka if he would mind if they kept her at their mansion while she healed, though, Ranka's only concern was weather or no Haruhi would be alright in a house surrounded by men, apparently having been told after all that the boys who hurt her intended to rape her.
"I hardly count as enough to scare her, you see." Ranka pointed out. "I'm her father."
"I'm her uncle." Yorihisa countered.
Ranka paused before sighing. "So you know about that. I'm sorry about your sister."
Yorihisa nodded. "I failed to protect her. I intend to at least compensate for that failure by protecting her child." Then he sighed. "You lost Haruhi for three years. Do you know where she was?"
"When her mother was raped, she got pregnant. I couldn't afford two children on my income and I didn't want her to be raised in a situation that everyone looked down on her. I don't know how she did it, but I know that Haruhi found her sister in that time and has been raising her behind my back. Haruhi probably thinks my reasons for giving her sister up were… different."
"So I have two nieces. Haruhi has just been raising her sister in secret."
"Yes. Hopefully, you don't make the same mistake I did."
Haruhi did everything on her own. She basically took over the role as 'woman of the house' when her mother passed away. She cooked, cleaned, and took care of raising herself while her father worked long hours to support their lifestyle. At the same time, she managed to keep up with her studies, a feat that normally took up every waking moment of a girl's time considering her perfect grades. However, she had something else she did on her own – raise her sister, Naomi, who her father put into an orphanage.
"Let me help you." He called as he walked further into the room. So she'd stop using both of her arms to try to cover herself, he carefully wrapped a towel around her thin body to protect her modesty. "You're my cousin, Haruhi. It's alright."
Haruhi's face was so red that it was nearly glowing. Her entire body was red, honestly. "It-It's really alright. I'm sure you have better things to do. I'm fine on my own."
Carefully, he reached out and put a hand on her head before pulling her slightly to lean against him. "I want to help you. It doesn't seem fair that I've been serving your cousins all their lives yet I've only been your friend for a little over a year."
"I'm getting you wet…" Haruhi complained.
"I'll change later. Don't worry about it." He told her. Careful of moving too quickly, he grabbed onto a bottle of shampoo. "May I?"
He'd helped Honey bathe several times before, even a few times because he was injured while training. This, however, was still very different. Though he'd always been drawn to the girl, he'd never helped her in such a way. He'd never seen her body so exposed before and he'd never before seen her injured, much less had to handle her injured body. Now, she was in his arms. It was his responsibility to care for her.
He had the honor of being the first Morinozuka to serve her, a huge deal because, by birthright, she should have been taken care of the second she was born. Normally, it'd be his father's responsibility to correct the wrong. However, he was given the honor because he was closer to her, more likely to be trusted.
Once the shower was over, he brought her out of the area and carefully dried her, very aware that she was getting chilled rather quickly. He helped her dress, though she put her own bottom-clothes on along with slipping on a bra while he wasn't looking.
"I'm broken, not useless." Haruhi pointed out when Mori stated that he was supposed to be helping her.
"Just because you're not useless doesn't mean you need to go out of your way to move your injured shoulder." Mori pointed out. Carefully, he slipped her into s sun-dress with such a low slit in the back that she barely had to move her shoulder to slip the arms in.
Mori stopped his task of buttoning the dress, though, distracted by a mark on her back. It was just barely sticking out from the back-strap of her bra. It was a deep indent, a scar that looked years old. He'd seen scars like that on fighters and knew the nature of the wound. That was more than enough to make him worry. However, the age of the scar scared the hell out of him. It looked more than three years old.
Haruhi was barely 16 years old.
"Haruhi." He called. Carefully, he placed a hand on her back. He concentrated on his voice, not wanting to scare her by sounding angry when she was in such a vulnerable position. "What is this?"
"Hmm?" Haruhi hummed. "Probably a scar. Sorry, I tried to cover it."
Mori swore those words killed him. That's why she caused herself pain and put her bra on without his help. Mori calmed himself, worried that she could sense his anger as Honey could. "What happened?"
"Don't remember it, really. I was in the car when Mom and I were ran off the bridge, but I wasn't wearing a seatbelt so I went flying." Haruhi told him. "It used to be here." She reached back, tapping her shoulder blade about an inch away from her spine. "Scars move as you grow, but the bone-scars don't."
"Doctor Okazaki said that your x-ray could tell a story to fill a library." Mori muttered.
"Yep." Haruhi chirped.
Mori felt like he was being tortured. She'd not only been denied her birthright all these years, but she'd needed the protection. If she'd been protected as she should have been as the Haninozuka Princess, then none of this would have happened. Her mother wouldn't have been killed. Haruhi would have never been harmed in any way. Haruhi would be a normal girl with a mother and a normal life.
"Mori?" Haruhi called, worried as he started to shake. "You cold?" She sighed, slightly grabbing at his shirt to pull it away from his skin. "I told you that you were going to get wet."
Mori sighed, realizing that he was trembling with rage that his cousin had been harmed when she should have been protected. He was suddenly overjoyed, though, that she had thought the shaking was with cold rather than anger. She couldn't see him angry. She was too vulnerable and would fear him, returning to trying to do everything herself.
"I'll be dry soon." He told her. He finished buttoning her dress up. Carefully, he put her back on her feet and surrendered her to his father so he could excuse himself to change. Once he was in his room, he slammed his fist into the wall, putting a hole through it.
"Takashi." Honey called, apparently having been in his room. "Is it something she asked you not to talk about?"
Mori took a deep breath before removing his hand from the hole. "She put on her bra without my help, trying to make it so I wouldn't see a scar on her back." He stated as he started to change. "She didn't seem to mind talking about it at all. Such things are… normal." He suddenly hated the 6-leter word with a burning passion.
Akira sighed, walking into his son's room. "She's with Yasuchika and Satoshi." He eyed the hole in the wall before glancing back to his son and nephew. "We can't do anything about the past, Takashi. And control your anger better. You lucked out by her thinking you were cold."
Mori nodded, by that point dry and dressed for the day. "It won't happen again, Father."
"Oh, I doubt that." Akira stated. "You've never felt the pull because you were too young when the lord's bride was still with us. Your pull to take care of Mitsukuni and Yasuchika will be nothing compared to the pull to take care of Haruhi. She is a girl. Girls are meant to be cared for."
"Yet her mother wasn't on your watch." Mori bit out.
"No, she wasn't." Akira agreed.
"Notify her doctor that she has a scar on the bra-line of her back, half an inch from her spine on the left side." Mori stated.
Akira nodded. "Did it seem to be a sensitive subject for her?"
"No. She doesn't remember it clearly. It was from when her mother was murdered."
"Meaning she was likely present."
"Meaning she was present."
Akira nodded and left.
Honey sighed, grabbing onto Mori's hand. "We'll protect her from now on, Takashi." He told him. They left the room and joined the family at the breakfast table. As usual, of course, the Haninozuka family members fought upon greeting.
Haruhi glanced over to Akira while Honey and his father 'greeted' each other. "Will I still be exempt from that tradition when I'm healed?"
"Yes. Women don't fight." Yorihisa answered instead as he and Honey joined and the food started to be served.
"So why was my mother's childhood a living hell?" Haruhi asked. She then glanced down upon realizing that it was a little too soon to bring that up. "Sorry."
"No." Yorihisa stated. "That is why she hated it here. Our father was rather determined to make her strong considering she was the first female born to the family in several generations. I was to train her because my father was far too strong. She grew to associate my presence with pain and fear, hating me and our lifestyle. So she left."
"Kinda what happens when you train someone who doesn't want to learn." Haruhi mumbled. She sighed, jabbing a sausage with her fork. "It's usually only seen with yakuza kids, though."
"What, being forced to train?"
"No – being forced to become a monster." Haruhi stated. She looked the lord in the eye. "Looks like you caught it before it was too late."
"I don't see how." Yorihisa muttered. "My sister is dead."
"You can venture outside the mansion and tolerate being around people that don't automatically bend over backwards to kiss your feet." Haruhi stated bluntly. "I can make a rather long list of people who can't do that and one happens to be-" She stopped. "He's standing right behind me, isn't he?" She glanced around, seeing the servants around them bowing their heads submissively and all of the Morinozukas around the table keeping their eyes down as well.
