Vaster Than Empires

by Ayezur

AU. Early summer, 1601. The Western Army is defeated; the country stands, uneasy, under the hand of the Tokugawa. Kaoru Kamiya, whose family was on the losing side, has been sold into marriage for the sake of peace. Her new husband is a legend, a demon bound in human form, marked by his blood-lust and his bright red hair. However, legends have a way of being not exactly... true.

10. the thing with feathers

A/n: This sumbitch is 15k long - almost twice my usual length. You will enjoy. I promise.

All biographical details contained herein are basically accurate. I've taken some liberty in the description and in guessing how Ieyasu felt about them - although we have some evidence that he really did feel bad about the whole thing with his son - but the facts themselves are completely true.

Have fu~un

also, this chapter is rated M because of reasons.

---

"My lord." The priest bowed low, forehead touching the matting where he knelt. "This lowly self is honored by this audience."

"It's no trouble, that it's not," Kenshin said mildly. "Since you came this far…"

Though it had been a surprise to see the young priest at his doorstep. One of the two who had accompanied the foreigner, back in Hito; this was the younger one, the farmer's son. Ma-te-o, as he'd been renamed. Another strange point of similarity between himself and the youngster. Taken from his home and renamed, for the sake of talent he had not asked for…

"How can one assist you?" Kenshin folded his arms inside his sleeves. The priest's arrival, though unexpected, was not an unwelcome distraction, given the business he was putting off dealing with. The men who'd guarded Lady Kaoru – and his heart clenched a little, to think of what had happened and what might have been – had failed in their charge. It was his duty to punish them.

He was starting to hate his duties.

They were under house arrest, pending his decision. Several had already petitioned him for the right to suicide for their honor's sake. It was either grant their request and order the rest to follow or turn them out, leaving them dishonored and their families without income. Perhaps another lord might take them on, perhaps they could find other work somewhere, but…

Kenshin stifled a sigh. The priest lowered his head.

"Truthfully, my lord, it is this I who must ask how this lowly self might serve you. My superior, noting your interest in the Christian religion, thought to send me to offer myself into your service."

It was a clear, lovely day, the first one in ages, and the outer doors stood open to admit the warm, rain-washed air. A shriek of laughter pierced the still summer air; one of the girls, on the other side of the house. A break in their lessons, perhaps.

"Forgive my confusion, but why would one need the services of a priest?" Kenshin's brows drew down as he searched the youngster's face, looking for the agenda. Everyone had one, as the incident with Black Hat had so painfully reminded him. And he could no longer afford to hold himself above politics.

"It is a tenant of the Christian faith, my lord, that all men have need of a priest's services – whether they know it or not." There was a strange look in the priest's eye, too urgent for the light tone in his voice. "The previous lord occasionally found it useful to consider foreign perspectives on certain issues or events. Although this lowly self was born Japanese, I have spent some years among the foreigners; I speak their language and understand their customs."

The priest paused, then, tension lining his face.

"Priests learn much, my lord – and it is the utmost and sincere desire of my superior that the knowledge we have gathered be placed at my lord's disposal. Should you wish it to be so."

"One… takes your meaning," Kenshin said slowly, still not entirely sure that he did – but there was certainly some kind of hidden message here. "That I do."

Was he suggesting that the foreign priests had an intelligence network? Well, they probably did, it only made sense… so given that, was he then insinuating that Kenshin was being offered access to it?

It couldn't be that simple.

"For example," the priest continued, a light flush suffusing his face. "Forgive this lowly one's forwardness, but word of the incident with the Black Hat has spread throughout the city. This is an example of an incident where the previous lord might have sought counsel with my superior."

"In what sense?" Keep asking questions, that was the trick. Kenshin had seen Lord Tokugawa do it a hundred times; the more you forced someone to explain, the more flustered they'd get, and eventually they would brush too close to the truth and reveal the shape of it.

"Well…" The flush had not faded, although the priest didn't seem to be embarrassed, precisely. More determined than anything else; his spirit fairly crackled with it. "My superior might have begged the previous lord to consider the fates of the families of those guards who failed in their charge. He might have counseled mercy – that, for the sake of their wives and children, they be neither expelled from the clan nor ordered to suicide, but given some other punishment and a second chance."

"Why?"

"Because humanity is sinful by nature, my lord." The priest bowed again. "Forgive this unworthy one, but this is a tenant of the Christian faith with which my superior has ordered me to counsel my lord. All human beings born to this earth are flawed and made distant from God by our imperfections. Yet God is merciful, and through His love even the greatest sinner might be redeemed and stand, whole and worthy, in His light."

The priest took a deep breath and raised his head a little. His words sounded rehearsed, like something he had read and memorized long ago.

"Therefore, it is right and good to be merciful, as God Himself is merciful: to practice here on earth the mercy and compassion that is the spark of the Divine within our breasts, our sole connection to the God whom we are so cruelly severed from."

He looked up a bit further, and his eyes were fierce.

"There is no sin, no crime, no evil so great that it cannot be forgiven, if the sinner repents with a sincere heart."

There was a second meaning here, too – a significance to the priest's sudden speech that Kenshin couldn't quite grasp. Yet the words struck a chord in him, beyond the anxious snap in the priest's spirit that warned him that his words were more than they appeared. A slow note, regal and serene, like a morning glory unfurling in the low dawn light.

"If only it were that easy," Kenshin murmured, and didn't realize that he'd spoken aloud.

"It can be, my lord." The priest sat up fully, resting his hands on his thighs. "Others may say otherwise – others may demand blood for blood, and life for life. And yes, penance must be paid. But it need not be death or disgrace, my lord." Again, his face was peculiarly intense, too intense even for proselytization. He was trying to say something without saying it, and Kenshin could not for the life of him figure out what it was.

The Lady Kaoru's voice rang out, calling in sudden urgency: then there was a scuffling crash and a high-pitched wail, soon calmed. He wanted her with him, suddenly, with her fierce blue eyes and her proud chin, her keen and fearless mind. It was a physical ache, like hunger or thirst.

"It is my superior's belief, my lord," the priest said again, speaking very carefully, "that no man should live without mercy."

---

The priest's audience ended shortly after that. He'd delivered whatever message it was that he'd come to deliver, and the rest of the conversation had been mild pleasantries winding down to an uncertain finish. Kenshin had offered the priest hospitality, as a courtesy; he'd accepted gratefully, and Kenshin had seen him tucked safely in a corner of the entirely-too-large manor.

Then he'd gone in search of Lady Kaoru.

She was with her sisters, watching them play marbles from the porch in the small courtyard at the center of the private quarters. Suzume was winning, by the look on Ayame's face. He wasn't completely sure, never having played the game himself; only the older children had played marbles in his village, and he'd been apprenticed before they allowed him to join them. Afterwards, of course, he hadn't had the time – or anyone to play with.

The girls were absorbed in their game and didn't notice him padding softly onto the porch. Lady Kaoru did, though, turning and beginning to stand as he approached.

"Honored husband."

"One doesn't mean to disturb you," he said quickly, his heart clenching at the sight of her. She was wearing her hair in the simple tail that she preferred, held in place by a bright blue ribbon. Her kimono was a deep red with a subtle, golden pattern around the hem, vaguely familiar. Dragons, he realized, with a jolt: the same abstracted beasts that adorned his own crest. The exact same – and his head got a little light at that, as he understood why he recognized her kimono.

He'd sent it to her as a bridal gift, once the engagement was announced. Because it was custom. Or, well, someone else had sent it, and he'd given his approval. He'd barely glanced at it, certain in the knowledge that no garment could soften the impact of what was happening to her…

He hadn't thought that it would hurt so much to see her freely wearing his colors and his sigil. It did, though; hurt so wonderfully that he didn't dare breathe, in case it stopped.

"It's not a disturbance," Lady Kaoru said quietly, pausing halfway to her feet. "We're having a little break right now – Ayame hates mathematics, so it helps if she can do something fun afterwards." She smiled at her sisters, small and indulgent, and Kenshin swallowed against his suddenly dry throat. "It's Suzume's best subject, even though she's young, but she always copies Ayame. So if Ayame doesn't like math, then…" She shrugged, rueful.

"May one join you?" He kept his arms tucked inside his sleeves, his fingers gripping hard at his elbows. "If it's not an imposition, that is."

"Sure." Lady Kaoru sank back down on the porch, moving over a little to make space for him and patting the porch beside her. A small, careless gesture – yet she had never yielded ground to him, not once. Never invited him.

Kenshin lowered himself gingerly down and they watched the girls play, wrapped in a companionable silence. Suzume made a very clever throw – knocking several marbles out of the ring at once – and Ayame flounced back on her heels, crossing her arms with an irritated moue. Lady Kaoru giggled.

He was so close to her, close enough that her hand, braced against the porch, was almost touching his side. Close enough that he could feel her warmth, that she was alive and here, and even a full week after the horror of the duel and the moment when he'd looked past Jinei to see her fighting for air it still struck him as a miracle.

I am not afraid of you, and I don't hate you! Not even a little!

He'd held her hands in his, and she'd wiped the blood from his face – just like after the bandits, her touch searing and absolving him. Her hands were so small, and so strong. Not as rough as his, perhaps, but she'd used a sword all her life and it showed in her hands' confidence, in the tough callouses that arced across her palms and the joints of her fingers. Good hands.

There had been a part of him that had wanted to sleep at her feet like a dog keeping watch; he'd settled for sitting in the hall outside her door, barely dozing and snapping awake at the slightest sound, not caring how little sleep he was getting or that the doctor had told him to rest himself. Not when she had come so close – when he had nearly failed her, when he had almost – again – been too slow, too stupid to protect the one person who most needed protecting.

He'd made sure to be gone long before she woke up.

There had been a great deal of explanations and paperwork to get through, afterwards, and Kenshin rather suspected that if Lady Kaoru hadn't been there to help him he would still be dealing with it. Now, though, the only remaining fallout was the fate of the guards who'd allowed her to be captured, and that was a subject he hadn't dared broach. They had been her father's men, people she had known from childhood. And she was samurai, and she knew what the penalty was – but that didn't give him the right to ask her approval to condemn men who had served her father faithfully. That was his burden.

She hadn't been troubled by Jinei's fate, but… that was different. As much as he might want her to give him permission, to tell him that it was all right, that she understood – he couldn't ask that of her, not in this.

"Did your audience with Brother Mateo go well?"

He started a little when Lady Kaoru spoke, wrenching his thoughts out of the gloom. She had turned to face him, not quite leaning back against the porch pillar, and her steadfast eyes were curious.

"One is… not entirely sure, that I'm not," he admitted, trying not to squirm in remembered discomfort. "He was somewhat cryptic, that he was."

"Oh?" She blinked, turning to look out across the courtyard. It was a small space, holding only a half-grown lilac tree and a shallow pool of water lined with stones, too shallow for more than frogs to live in it. One little green fellow hopped up on a rock and croaked as he settled down to bask in the sun. "Father did always say you had to be careful with them…"

Her hands fidgeted in her lap, and he wanted very badly to hold them again, to clasp them to his heart and raise them to his lips, to kiss each delicate tip of her fingers.

"One has no real experience with foreigners." He hoped that he didn't sound as embarrassed as he felt. "It seems, though, that your father spoke with them often?"

"He did." She smiled a little, soft and sad. "He always said that there wasn't any harm in them, so long as you keep them in line. Give them a little land to build their temples on and freedom to practice that religion of theirs and they're more useful than not."

"Keep them in line?"

She nodded. "They think they're subtle, see?" she explained, and that glow began to suffuse her features, the one that lit her face whenever she was instructing and made him feel like a child again, dreaming in a sunbeam. "Like children. If you let them think they're stealing a march on you, they'll be perfectly content to spin out little intrigues and leave the rest alone."

"Oh." Kenshin ducked his head, face heating. "One does not have much of a head for intrigue. Or politics. That I don't."

"Well, what did the priest say?"

Lady Kaoru pulled her legs up onto the porch, kneeling to face him at right angles, and her voice took on a teacherly tone. It was beautiful to see, the unconscious shift in her demeanor, how she sharpened and sat taller. Her brittle pride, her grief, her wary rage all burned away like rice paper before her absolute certainty. This was, he thought, the way that she should always be: a votive flame, dancing bright against the dark.

He repeated their conversation to her, as fully as he could. She listened intently, biting at her lower lip until it reddened.

"I see," she murmured to herself when he was finished. "You invited him to stay?"

Kenshin nodded, uncertain. "Was that wrong?"

There was a certain shade in her eyes when she answered.

"No… though you really should be careful. He was offering to share information with you, but the foreigners have their own ideas, and anything he gives you should be checked against your own sources. Leads, rather than absolute truth. You know?"

Her eyes searched his, still a little shadowed. Still not quite certain that she was welcome.

Kenshin nodded again, more firmly this time, and wished that he could convince her. But he didn't have the right – he could only show her that he wanted her guidance, and hope that she would come to trust him.

He'd been right in one thing, then. And it would naturally follow, wouldn't it, that the priests might try to control him through information. Not something he would have concluded on his own, not right away, but it was simple enough once she pointed it out.

"Thank you, honored wife," he murmured. "It – one is always glad to have your counsel, that I am," he fumbled, unable to stop himself from smiling. "There is much that one does not know – and one wishes, very much, to do no harm to Hito." Or to you, he added silently, because to hurt one was to hurt the other; she was tied to the land in her blood and bone.

"About that…" Lady Kaoru's eyes slide away, and the shadow in them deepened. "I… heard that the men who were guarding me that day are still under house arrest."

"Ah. Yes." He swallowed, gut tightening. "So they are."

"Have you made a decision?"

"Not… yet, honored wife." He didn't want to make a decision, even though there was only one that he could make: whether to spare their lives and destroy their honor, or grant them death and redeem it.

"It was my fault," she said quietly, head bowed. "I'm more to blame than they are. If I hadn't ordered them to stay so far away, they would have seen… and I know they should have ignored my order!" she nearly cried, responding to an objection that he hadn't made. "But they didn't, and I gave it, so it's my responsibility."

Kenshin held himself very still, to avoid leaping to any conclusions.

"Do you have counsel in this matter, also?"

She flushed.

"I know it's not – done – but my father – well, my father always said that if a man fails once, he should be given a second chance. People don't forget that, when you lift them up instead of casting them down. It makes them loyal. I know it sounds odd, weak even, but it works and – and it's what Hito's used to. It's not like with the bandits, or Black Hat." She seemed to be speaking mostly to herself, now. "Those crimes were too severe, they had to be punished with death. It's not that you should just forgive them," she added, too quickly. "But you don't have to – you can cut their salaries and demote them. You don't have to order their suicides. You can show mercy." Her throat worked. "If you want."

Penance must be paid. The priest's words echoed, queerly mirrored in Lady Kaoru's faltering plea. But it need not be death or disgrace.

No man should live without mercy.

"If this is your will," he said carefully, his voice faint and distant through the buzzing in his ears. "One would – truthfully – prefer such a solution. That I would."

Not for the practical reasons that she'd offered, the ones that barely hid the disquiet written in her soul. For what he thought, perhaps, might be her true reasons – that there had been enough death for the Black Hat's sake, enough lives destroyed to secure his precious legend. And she did not wish to add to that man's retinue.

Neither did he.

"Very much so," he murmured, and couldn't help leaning a little towards her, any more than a blossom could help growing towards the sun.

"Good." She wrapped her arms around herself, holding herself a little too tightly. "I'm glad."

Suzume shrieked in victory. Ayame glared at the empty ring as if she could somehow will things to be otherwise, rolling her shooter between her fingers and pouting.

"Anyway, um…" Lady Kaoru cleared her throat. "Did you know, there's going to be a festival tonight? Here on the grounds. For Tanabata."

"Tanabata?" Kenshin blinked. "Oh – that." He'd heard chatter about it, and dimly recalled signing some kind of form giving most of the servants leave to attend.

She nodded. "I thought that, perhaps, if you're not occupied – the girls really want to go, you see, and they'd love it if you came. They're very fond of you."

And their elder sister? he didn't ask. He wasn't sure, still, if he had the right to know. The right to even hope…

But here she was, wearing his bridal gift, counseling him – so maybe…

"One would be honored," he said softly.

---

"Hurry, hurry!" Ayame tugged on Kaoru's hand, straining towards the brightly-colored booth and the crowd of children in front of it. "I wanna catch a fish!"

"Shouldn't we wait until it's time to go home?" Kaoru laughed, digging in her heels. "Do you really want to carry a fish all evening?"

"But if we wait they'll all be gone!" Ayame fairly wailed.

"All gone, gone!" Suzume joined in, clenching her fists and stomping her feet in time with her older sister.

"I'm sure that won't happen," Kaoru said, glancing over at Kenshin for confirmation. He gave her a startled look, lips parted slightly as if he'd been about to say something. Then he seemed to reconsider.

"It's true," he said to the girls. "One is quite sure that they've brought more than enough fish to last out the evening, that I am."

"But…"

"Look, Ayame," Kaoru chimed in, pointing. "Fire jugglers!"

Ayame gasped and took off, Suzume toddling behind. Kaoru and Kenshin followed, careful to keep the girls in sight.

"Ayame would have forgotten the poor thing somewhere, or broken the bag," Kaoru explained to him, quietly. "We'll come back after she's calmed down a bit."

"Ah." Kenshin nodded his understanding. His eyes were bright, and a small smile played across his face as he watched Ayame help her sister through the crowd in front of the juggler's platform. "They're very lively, that they are."

"…it's been a while since they could just have fun," Kaoru said quietly. "I know they seem carefree but… it's been a while."

The last time they gone to a festival had been before the war, when Father was still alive. It had been proper festival, not this palace affair: the shōgun's festival was more a party than anything else, with hired entertainers and the food and game stalls run by servants, and no charge for any of it. There were a few, carefully-vetted merchants selling goods of far better quality than would normally be at this kind of thing, and the evening was slated to end with a special event: a fire-flower display imported from China.

And no one had whispered, when they walked with Father. There had been no sideways glances or quick steps aside, no inexplicable bubble surrounding their little family as everyone tried too hard not to meet their eyes. Respect, yes: he had been the lord, after all. But no one had feared him, not the way the festival-goers feared Kenshin – even though they were, technically, his peers.

She raised her chin a little, feeling their stares. Let them stare. It was their own fault if they couldn't see what was right in front of their eyes.

"One is glad to see them happy, that I am." Kenshin asked, with that strange note in his voice. His throat worked slightly, and he looked away. "And – are you, as well? Enjoying the festival, that is." He reddened a little as he said it, glancing back at her.

She thought, for a moment, about telling him the whole truth. How different it was, and how strange. How much she missed her father, her home, and how the festival – bright and loud and not quite right, not quite what she remembered – made her wish, almost, that things weren't what they were. That she had met him in some other way, some better way: that there wasn't the terrible gulf of her father's death and her uncle's betrayal between them.

But he was looking at her with such shy hope that the words died in her throat, unspoken. Instead, she smiled.

"I am, honored husband," she told him, fingering the sleeve of her scarlet robe. His colors, and his crest: she'd received the gift with all due courtesy and sworn never to let it touch her skin.

She'd sworn a lot of things, before she'd met him.

"Come on." Kaoru tugged once at his sleeve, catching the fabric between her ring and forefinger. "Hurry up, or we'll lose track of the girls."

---

The juggler kept her sisters enthralled for a good quarter hour before they darted off to the next colorful distraction. His act was half-acrobatic, the performer dancing and leaping among the flames as if they were no more than colorful streamers, once passing the comet-trail of his baton so close over his head that Kaoru gasped and shrunk back towards Kenshin, certain that the man was going to set himself on fire. Kenshin started, and she could swear that she felt his heart beat faster: then he leaned in and murmured to her, touching two fingers lightly to her clothed elbow. His touch sent a jolt through her – a nice jolt, like rounding the corner to see an old friend come for an unexpected visit – and she wanted, suddenly, to lean against him.

"Do you see? There, at the corner of the stage, behind that screen. There's a young man with a bucket of water back there, in case something should go wrong."

"Oh." Kaoru craned her head, feeling a bit silly, and saw what he was talking about. "I knew that."

"One has a slightly different view, that's all," he said apologetically. The warmth in his voice made her chest ache. "It's a bit difficult to notice from where you are, that it is."

"Big sister!" Ayame wove through the crowd, dragging Suzume behind her. "Suzume wants to see the puppets, let's go!"

"Puppets!" Suzume caroled, raising her arms to Kenshin. "Ride!"

"Ride?" Kenshin knelt down, bewildered, and Suzume threw her arms around his neck.

"Ride!" she insisted. He laughed and gathered her in his good arm, hoisting her up to see over the crowd.

"Is that what you wanted?" he asked, and she nodded ferociously before leaning her head on his shoulder. Ayame wormed her way between Kenshin and Kaoru, grabbing each of their hands in hers.

"Let's go!"

"Yes, yes." Kaoru spoke in unison with Kenshin, and they looked at each other in mutual surprise. Her face heated; he blushed faintly, and then Ayame was dragging them along to the puppet show and she had to watch her footing.

She was aware – too aware – that they were on display. That the shōgun's court was watching, whispering and wondering about the behavior of the shōgun's demon and his unwilling bride, what it might mean and how it could be used to advance their own agendas. The business of intrigue never stopped, not even for a festival.

That didn't mean she had to pay it any mind. Not tonight, anyway. Tonight was for her sisters, and for her, and for Kenshin. Tonight she would pretend that the world was not the way it was, and that there were no shadows between them. She had earned that much.

"Sir Ken." A cool voice, rich with amusement.

Kaoru turned her head to see Lady Takani coming towards them. She, too, traveled in a bubble: the court shied away from her as though she carried some infectious disease. Which scandal was, Kaoru supposed: they feared that her disgrace was catching.

"Lady Takani!" Kenshin sounded pleased to see her. He bowed in greeting, as much as he could with Suzume in his arm. "It's good to see you here, that it is."

"Hi, Uncle Ken," a high voice chirped. A boy not much older than Ayame poked his head out from behind Lady Takani's skirts. He was thin-faced and wary, with a full mouth that didn't quite know how to smile. And he stood at a strange angle, as though one leg was slightly shorter than the other.

"And little Katsuo, too." Kenshin's smiled deepened. "Honored wife, have you met Lady Takani's son? One believes you're acquainted with the lady already, that I do…"

"I am. It's a pleasure to see you again, Lady Takani," Kaoru said, watching the other woman's face. There was just the faintest hint of a smirk around her mouth, and a certain wry glint in her eyes.

"I'm glad to see you looking so healthy, Lady Himura. Are these your sisters?"

"Yes. Ayame, Suzume, say hello."

The girls bowed. Ayame frowned at Katsuo.

"What's wrong with your leg?" she asked, peering around Lady Takani to get a better look.

"Nothing!" Katsuo darted around to the other side of his mother. Ayame pursued. Lady Takani reached out to pull her son closer, glaring.

"Ayame!" Kaoru cried, grabbing at her collar and pulling her back. "Don't be rude – "

"But it's all twisted up funny – "

"It's always been like that," Katsuo snapped, clinging to his mother's side. Kaoru could see, now, what caused his strange stance and gait: his right foot was curled in on itself, almost rounded. "And it's not my fault!"

Ayame stopped where she was, tilting her head to one side like a puzzled sparrow.

"I didn't say it was," she said. "So you were born like that?"

Katsuo eyed her warily. Then he nodded, slowly. His grip on Lady Takani's skirts loosened.

"Oh." Ayame considered this, frowning. "Do you like puppets?"

"…ye-es…" The words came out slowly, as though he didn't quite trust himself to say them. Ayame lunged forward and grabbed his wrist, smiling.

"Come on, then! They're gonna be starting soon and if we get there late we'll never get a good spot."

"Hey – !" But she was already dragging him off, ignoring his half-voiced protest.

"Well, then," Kenshin murmured, and gave Kaoru a warm look. "That's that, it seems."

"I'm sorry, Lady Takani," Kaoru said, flushing. "Ayame was very rude – "

"Yes, she was." Lady Takani raised an eyebrow. "But it worked out in the end. How's your shoulder, Sir Ken?"

"Well enough, that it is."

"Have you been using the salve I gave you?"

"Yes, Lady Takani." Kenshin ducked his head, obedient and mirthful, only to have Suzume grab a fistful of his hair and yank. "Oro!"

"Follow!" she commanded, imperious, and pointed after her sister. Ayame and Katsuo were already disappearing into the crowd around the puppet theatre.

"Forgive me, Lady Takani – honored wife – oro!" Another tug of his hair. "It seems that one's duties are not yet discharged, that they aren't – "

Suzume pulled again and Kenshin hurried to catch up with Ayame, casting a single apologetic glance over his shoulder as he went. Kaoru covered her mouth, trying to hold in the giggles.

"You should see him when Katsuo wants to play Susano-o fighting Orochi," Lady Takani murmured. "He's quite helpless with children."

"I know." Kaoru couldn't stop the small smile that curved the corners of her mouth, any more then she could lessen the fierce lightness in her heart as she watched him carrying Suzume, bending his head to listen to her observations.

"He'll be a wonderful father." There was still a note of challenge in Lady Takani's voice. But not as much as when they'd last met, in that strange interview that had left Kaoru feeling like a cleaned-out wound.

"Yes," Kaoru answered, without thinking. "He will."

"My, but you sound sure." Lady Takani's voice was rich with amusement. Kaoru blushed, suddenly too warm for the cooling evening.

"Well – I mean – if he ever – "

Lady Takani laughed. It wasn't a cruel laugh, but it was definitely at Kaoru's expense.

"You've changed, Lady Himura," she remarked. "Are you a little more certain, now?"

Kaoru turned to face Lady Takani, studying her eyes. There was regret there, like a comfortable friend: she wore pain as a cloak and pride for armor. But there was hope, too, bittersweet and resigned, and Kaoru wondered if she would have the same courage, in Lady Takani's place. To love someone so well that it was enough if they were happy, even if it wasn't with you…

She touched the bandages on her wrists, lightly, remembering. He'd been so gentle.

This man has wronged you. What is your will?

Asking, when he could have decided for both of them, ignoring her to focus on his own injury. Asking her to tell him if she was ever hurt or frightened so that he could set things right, when he owed her not a single scrap of consideration. Asking that she live, when he was entitled to demand that she die to preserve his honor…

"I am, Lady Takani. A little more certain."

Lady Takani raised an eyebrow. "I'm glad to hear it."

She looked about to say more: then her eyes widened in shock and she stared over Kaoru's shoulder for half a heartbeat before bowing low, almost parallel to the ground. Kaoru whipped around, startled, and it took her half a second to realize who it was – who it had to be, dressed so finely and cloaked in power – before she, too, bowed as low as she ever had. Her heart hammered in her chest.

"Your Eminence," she murmured.

"There's no need, Lady Himura. Lady Takani. This is a festival, after all." His voice was low, his manner of speaking deliberate and slow. And why not? When this man spoke, the nation craned itself to hear.

Kaoru straightened slowly, not quite daring to raise her eyes.

"Pardon my intrusion," Lord Tokugawa said. "Lady Himura, if you have a moment, I had hoped to speak with you."

Kaoru nodded, momentarily wordless.

"Of – of course, Eminence," she said, blood pounding like a drum between her ears. "I am at your disposal."

---

"So, Lady Himura." The shōgun watched her with a mild, quizzical look that didn't fool Kaoru for a second. "Are you enjoying the festival?"

"It's very pleasant," she murmured politely, and didn't ask why he wanted to speak with her. For one thing, it would be rude; for another, it was always better to make someone come to you.

They had strolled away from most of the bustle, out towards the garden surrounding the false avenue constructed for the false festival. His guards surrounded them in a loose net, eyes pointedly averted. The sun was drifting towards the horizon, and their shadows stretched and merged before them.

"I had thought that Lord Himura might be too wary to come, given what occurred," he remarked.

"My lord husband is confident in his abilities." Kaoru's heart beat slow and hard, pushing too much blood to her brain. It roared in uncertainty and she pulled in deep, silent breaths, trying to calm herself.

Lord Tokugawa wore power easily, as unassailable as a mountain and just as overwhelming. She could see, now, why men had been moved to follow him into rebellion and death: they could no more have resisted him than the tides could deny the moon. She could even feel herself bending towards him, wanting him to acknowledge her – except that she needed only to remember her father's body coming home, and what awe he drew from her curdled in her stomach.

The shōgun snorted, almost laughing. "As well he should be." He seemed to sigh, then, clasping his hands behind his back. "I must offer my sincerest regrets, Lady Himura. That individual's success in penetrating the palace's security is my failure. I do not know how he was able to acquire the passes that he used to deceive the guards, but an investigation is proceeding and the guards in question will be disciplined."

"Disciplined? How?" Shock tore the words from her. She had forgotten that not only her father's men stood to suffer from her mistake. The guards at the gate would be held responsible, too; the guards who had laughed as they accepted Black Hat's faked pass, laughed as she threw herself against the side of the palanquin and he excused the noise as a woman who didn't know her place…

Her hands tightened, not quite clenching.

"They have requested, and will be granted, an honorable suicide." Lord Tokugawa's face and voice were smooth as a sheltered pond on a windless day, reflecting only the surface and showing nothing of the waters beneath.

The guards had laughed. She remembered it too well, how Black Hat had joked with them as they checked his pass. Because what did it matter if a woman did not want to go where men wished to take her?

Let them die, then, some cold part of her whispered. It's no less than they deserve.

Her pause had gone on too long. She had to say something.

"Your Eminence, that is too much." She halted her slow stroll and bowed low, mind racing. They had laughed – but she and Kenshin had already decided that their own men would not die for this. And for the shōgun to order his men to suicide when Lord Himura did not – for it to appear that Kenshin disagreed with his overlord – yet she could not let her father's men suffer for her mistake.

"The loss of Sir Narita and Sir Yoida were terrible blows," she continued, thinking frantically of what her father might say in this position. "Black Hat cannot be allowed any further victories against the Tokugawa. And… furthermore…" She hesitated just long enough to make her message clear. "My lord husband has already decided the fates of his men in this matter."

Lord Tokugawa paused with her, raising an eyebrow. "And that fate is?"

"They are to be demoted, and their salaries cut. It is my lord husband's desire that Black Hat steal no more loyal men from the realm." She held her bow, heart pounding, and hoped that she had done enough.

He regarded her for a long moment, studying her with something that was not quite indifference.

"I see," he said at last. "Lord Himura decided." There was a strange note in his voice.

"Yes, Eminence." Kaoru peered up from under her bangs, uncertain what she might find, and stifled a gasp.

There was a smile twitching at the edges of Lord Tokugawa's mouth.

"Straighten up, Lady Himura," he said, almost gently. "Your father would be proud."

Shock and anger burst under her heart, firing her veins and she snapped herself up, rearing back to bite – then she caught herself.

"I can see that he trained you well." Lord Tokugawa went on blithely, ignoring her reaction. "Although I would expect no less from Sir Koushijiro. He had a gift for this sort of thing – staying his course regardless of the forces brought against him. I do wish, though, that he had found it in him to bend a little, at the end."

And she wanted to snarl at him for daring to say such a thing, but she couldn't: not without more consequences than she could bear. So she had to listen, and hear the softness in his tone, the regret underlying his words.

He was not gloating.

"Sir Koushijiro was a good man." Lord Tokugawa nodded, sighing deeply. "We will not see another like him soon."

"My lord father did – what he believed honor required." She almost said what honor required, without the caveat, but the words felt shallow on her tongue and she swallowed them.

"Do you agree with his actions, Lady Himura?" He had gone back to studying her. She swallowed, preparing to wrestle down her rage – and found it gone. Where her fury had been – how dare he, how dare they betray the Regent's legacy, how dare they turn against Lord Toyotomi's appointed heir? – there was only quiet grief, and an echoing confusion.

"…I am only a woman, Eminence. It is not my place to say."

He gave her a sardonic look. "I do not ask questions unless I desire an answer. Speak – that is an order, and if I dislike what you say, then more fool I for asking the daughter of a man I killed if she understands my reasons."

An order. Kaoru closed her eyes briefly, searching for the words – for something that would satisfy the shōgun without leaving her too undefended.

"I… once did, Eminence." She let the words out slowly, feeling each one as it left. Her feelings were not politically dangerous, as long as she implied that her loyalties had shifted to match her husband's. That was only proper. Yet it was only half-true: she had lost the certainty that her father had been right and gained nothing in its place, except confusion and the hatred she could not shed, hatred for of this man who had taken all that she loved. "I no longer believe that my honored father chose correctly when he opposed you."

She couldn't quite bring herself to speak the full lie.

"I see." Lord Tokugawa began to walk again, calm and stately, and Kaoru matched her stride to his. "I see, also, that you do not quite believe that he was wrong, either."

Horror spiked her heart. Lord Tokugawa chuckled.

"Don't feel bad," he said, stopping to examine a strand of jasmine vine. It was a black thread in his hands in the low evening light, dotted with half-bloomed flowers like miniature stars. "You're not quite old enough to outfox me. Though you're a sight better at hiding yourself than your husband, at least."

"Eminence – " she started to say; then he started walking again and she had to hurry to keep up with his long strides.

"This isn't a trap, Lady Himura," he said, "though I knew you must assume it is one. And I am not a monster – not when I can avoid it."

She cast her eyes down, unable – unwilling – to speak. If he needed an excuse to kill her, he already had one: he knew, now, that she potentially a serpent at his breast. Why make it worse?

"Lady Himura." His voice was very nearly gentle. "Must I repeat myself? I am not looking for a reason to destroy you."

"Eminence." She stopped where she was and bowed as low as she ever had. "You don't need one."

"Precisely," he agreed. "And I have better things to do than frighten young women. Lady Himura – " and he sighed again. "Raise your head, Koushijiro's daughter."

Startled, she obeyed. He caught her eyes and held them. Kaoru stilled under his calm, analytical gaze as he searched her face, something like regret playing out in the back of his eyes.

"Your father was one of the best men I have ever known," he said, and his voice rang hard and terrible. "It was always my sincere wish that he stand at my side in this new world. It is a source of everlasting regret to me that he chose otherwise." His eyes bore into hers. "I am surrounded by lords who grasp for power as they did their mother's milk, with as little understanding – blind and desperate and craving. I need men who do not live their lives thinking only of their next meal. Men like your husband is. Men like your father was. And you, Lady Himura, are your father's only legacy: the last gift he gave to this fallen world."

There was a blazing intensity in his face, a power in his words that forced her to take a step back. He was speaking only truth, raw and unadorned, without prevarication or lacquered courtesies.

"I do not speak to you as a captive bride, or a conquered foe. I speak to you as the daughter of a man I deeply admired, and the wife of a man whose friendship I value for its own sake. I speak to the Lady Himura, who – if I cannot count you among my friends – I would still rather not count among my enemies. You are your father's daughter. If you truly chose to set yourself against me, you would fail – but I would lose much in defeating you. The nation would lose much. And it has lost enough."

The old bitterness welled up inside her, hot as coals. She spoke without thinking, caught in the tide of rage that had coiled in her belly, untouched and unexpressed, since she'd watched her father's broken body carried to its pyre.

"What would you know of loss?" she hissed, not daring to raise her voice in case his scattered guards heard. "What have you ever lost?"

Lord Tokugawa drew back, his eyes dark – or perhaps it was only the evening shadows drawing on. There was a long pause where her heart hammered hard against her ribs, pounding like a great festival drum. Drums were starting in the distance, in the center of the false city street. Voices were chattering, raised in song that wound around the steady beat like her breath around her panicked heart.

"As much, in my way, as you," Lord Tokugawa said finally, and with far too much calm. "I have been sold for my family's sake, and sold my own children in return. I still remember being summoned to Lord Nobuhide's audience chamber to hear my father's response, after the Oda had kidnapped me from the Imagawa to force my father to sever ties with that clan. My life would be the penalty, if he did not: if he ever saw me again, it would be as a corpse."

He paused here, and if he were any other man Kaoru might have thought that he was composing himself.

"My father's response was only one line. 'Then kill him,' Lord Nobuhide read aloud to me, 'and seal my alliance to the Imagawa with my firstborn's blood.' The late Lord Nobunaga was there, too – his head barely shaved from his coming-of-age. I wonder, sometimes, what he made of the scene."

Another pause.

"I was six years old."

Kaoru knew the story: how Lord Nobuhide had not killed him, had chosen instead to keep the boy alive three years in a monastery, until the Imagawa had ransomed him back. How that mercy had been repaid twelve years later, when he had broken with the Imagawa to ally with the Oda under Lord Nobunaga. He and Lord Toyotomi had served Lord Oda together until the great warrior's death by treachery; then, in the ensuing chaos, he had allied himself with Lord Oda's second son, Nobukatsu, and came to serve Lord Toyotomi only after Nobukatsu had bent the knee. She had never really thought, until this moment, about the little boy this man had once been: now she did, and felt a cold hand tighten around her heart. Six year old… younger even than Yahiko.

And she did not want to pity that child, sitting alone before the lord who'd promised to kill him and hearing that his father would not save him – but she did.

"Yet, when the time came, I ordered my own firstborn son to his death," Lord Tokugawa had resumed speaking, his voice calm as ever. "For the sake of my alliance with Lord Oda, I commanded him to suicide, lest he seek vengeance for his mother's death. My own first wife, difficult though she was, whom I myself had ordered executed because the accusations of treachery against her could not be disproven. My son, my wife – lost, all for the sake of that alliance. I had thought, when my father sent that message, that I would never do as he did, never betray my own flesh and blood for mere politics. But when the time came – when the choice was mine…"

He trailed off, as though he needed to compose himself again and Kaoru thought that maybe he did. That, perhaps, there was still something of that six-year-old boy in this man who commanded armies with a single word, who needed only clear his throat to have a nation quivering at attention. Who could never afford to grieve, or regret his decisions – could never betray that kind of weakness.

And she thought, for the first time, that such power might sometimes be its own kind of hell.

"Your father never did quite trust me, after that," Lord Tokugawa said, finally, and resumed walking.

"That was one of the reasons he allied with Lord Toyotomi," Kaoru murmured, without meaning to speak aloud. Lord Tokugawa glanced at her.

"Indeed. Although he had been sworn to Lord Oda, he allied himself with Lord Toyotomi when the time came. He allowed Lord Toyotomi his dominion over the Oda." There was a challenge in his voice.

"Lord Toyotomi had sought vengeance against Akechi for the murder of Lord Oda," Kaoru responded automatically.

"As did I."

"But – " She covered her mouth, realizing what she'd done. Challenged the shōgun –

Who had good as asked her to challenge him, for reasons she could barely believe.

"But Lord Toyotomi arrived first?" There was a peculiar little smile playing over Lord Tokugawa's face. "No. I suspect that your father gave you a different answer."

"He did…" Kaoru let her hand fall, resting on her collar. "He said that – that the Oda had been thrown in disarray." His eldest son and heir had been killed with him, leaving no appointed successor. "If all the claimants had fallen to fighting, Japan would have been torn apart, after Lord Nobunaga had just begun to unite us. It was better to support whomever could keep the Oda holdings together…"

"Indeed." Lord Tokugawa sighed. "This is a dangerous time, Lady Himura. I hear what the foreign priests do and do not say; I see our increasing dependence on their goodwill for the sake of Portuguese trade and it makes me wary. A foreigner from a different nation was shipwrecked just last year, who claims to belong to a country that is at war with the Portuguese and their priests. He tells me that the Portuguese and another nation have divided the world amongst themselves; that they believe their god has given them the right of ownership over our country, among others." He snorted and shook his head, once. "Absurd – and I would laugh at it, except that when I asked the priests they paled and could not answer."

"Then you mean – " Kaoru thought of the priests in Hito, their mild manners and their clumsy attempts at intrigue. "But – how could they possibly hope – they're so obvious about everything!"

"One need not be subtle, if one commands the greater army. And what I have heard of their military power disturbs me." Lord Tokugawa's head bowed for a moment. "They would be fighting far from home, and I think we could repel them, if it came to that – but at a cost. A great one. Any instability, any war that might break out… I think that they would take the opportunity we provided them, and we would raise our heads from feasting on one another to find them bearing down on us, jaws wide."

It sounded ridiculous: it sounded impossible, given what she knew of the foreign priests, given her own experiences. Yet Lord Tokugawa sounded absolutely certain…

"Given this," he asked quietly. "Can you see why a man might do whatever was necessary to secure peace?"

Kaoru looked away. Lord Tokugawa gave a soft laugh.

"I don't require an answer now. But think about what I have said here, tonight. Your father used to say that our lives are not our own, and I have never heard a purer truth than that. I, too, did as I believed honor required." The sun had slid below the horizon as they talked, and his eyes were bright in the evening shadows. "As I believed that the nation required."

---

Lord Tokugawa had one of his guards escort her back to where Kenshin and the girls were playing. Ayame had managed to gather up enough children for a game of kagome-kagome and had pushed Kenshin into the center, with childish thoughtlessness, to play the demon. The children were circling him where he stood with his eyes obediently closed, their hands joined as they chanted.

Surrounded, surrounded! The bird is imprisoned
When will it be free?
In the evening of the dawn
The turtle and the crane fell
Who is it that stands behind?

Then they stopped. Kenshin furrowed his brow, concentrating, and Kaoru was seized by a strange, tender impulse – a reaction, maybe, to the intensity of her unexpected conversation. Or perhaps it was only that Kenshin looked so puzzled, standing there and mulling over his decision. After all, he couldn't leave the circle unless he guessed correctly.

She pressed a single finger to her lips and stepped up behind him, breaking silently into the circle. Ayame – safe on the other side – couldn't repress a giggle. Kenshin frowned.

"…honored wife?" he said finally, doubt clear in his voice.

"Right!" Ayame crowed, before Kaoru could say anything. "Big sister snuck in!"

Kenshin started. Then, a little too slowly, he turned to face her. His eyes were wide and bright, sky-blue blushing deeper around the edges like the very beginnings of a sunrise. She gave him a small smile, not sure why it made her feel so light to see him – not quite, though she could feel the knowledge growing in the space below her heart, in the place where she'd thought only hatred dwelled.

"Well done," she told him. He smiled at her, overjoyed, as if she was the most important thing in the world.

---

Kenshin sat on the porch next to Lady Kaoru, a tray holding a pot of cooling tea between them. It was very late; even the frogs in the pond were sleeping. The stars glimmered above them, scattered like millet seeds across the heavens.

They'd had to carry the girls home, in the end. The festival had been far too exciting – jugglers and puppets and music and games, and then the fire-flower display to finish off the evening: brilliant bursts of color against a black-silk sky, soaring up and fading to stardust, then to nothing. It had been a long time since Kenshin had last seen such a display. He'd forgotten how beautiful they were.

Or maybe it was only that the company was vastly improved. The last time he'd seen fire-flowers he'd sat alone, at the very back of a crowded dais, doing his best not to ruin anyone's evening with the reminder of his presence. The skeleton at the feast, as it were. The demon in the sacred ground.

This time, he hadn't been alone.

And he wasn't alone now. He'd asked, heart in his throat, if the Lady Kaoru might wish to join him for a cup of barley tea before bed, and she'd accepted. Accepted with a smile, as she'd been smiling all evening – a true smile, not a polite fiction. He'd thought of her smile as a prize too precious for his world; yet here she was, sitting as his side with her lips curving in real contentment as she sipped her tea.

"Did you enjoy the evening?" he ventured, toying with his empty cup.

"I did." Her smile faltered. "Although there were some unexpected moments."

"One had heard." Kenshin put his cup down, crossing his legs and leaning against a convenient pillar. It put him at right angles to her, so he saw her only in profile.

It wasn't that he suspected anything of Lord Tokugawa – but it would have been nice if the shōgun had thought to warn him that he planned to drag Lady Kaoru off for a private interview.

"My apologies, if you were troubled…"

She laughed. It pierced him, enough that he almost forgot what he was trying to say. He could count on one hand the number of times he'd heard her laugh; each one stood out in his memory like a summer day.

"It isn't as though you could have done anything," she pointed out. "He's the shōgun."

"True, but…" Kenshin blushed a little, feeling off-balance. "One could have warned you, at least. Had one known."

"I think my not being warned was the point." Her voice was almost amused. "It wasn't that bad. You don't have to worry."

"Ah." He let it go, not saying what he wanted to say: that worrying about her was his whole existence. He had lived too long without sunlight to bear its loss again. "May one ask what you discussed?"

She was silent for a long moment, tracing the rim of her cup. Long enough that Kenshin began to think he had overstepped.

"Forgi – "

"My father," she said, overlapping him. "We talked about my father."

Kenshin fell silent, watching her. There was just enough light to see her by: the lantern glowing from his study shed diffused light across her face, and the half-moon growing fuller above them filled the night with charcoal and silver. Her eyes were brilliant in the shadows, brighter even than fire-flowers. The half-light brought the lines of her face into stark relief, turned her full lips into a blood-dark bow.

"…I wish he could have met you," she said, at last. "I wish…" She took a deep breath and put down her cup, bracing her hands against the porch edge and leaning back to study the stars. He thought he saw their glimmer reflected in her eyes.

"You know, he made me a promise, when I was a little girl. Well, he promised Mother – but it was to me, too. And my sisters. He promised Mother first, though, so I guess – I guess it was her promise more than mine."

Another breath, and this one came out more a sigh.

"He promised Mother that he would never order us to marry. I mean – we'd have to marry eventually. But he promised that we'd be able to say no, to the person I mean. If we didn't want him. That we could choose – we could marry who we wanted. When the time came. So that we wouldn't have to be afraid, the way she'd been… so that we'd know that we were marrying a good man."

"Ah." He didn't know what else to say. "I… I am sorry. For your loss."

Small, stupid words that didn't begin to encompass the enormity of how she had been betrayed. Bad enough to be sold to a demon, but… to have lived your life with the promise that you were destined for something else, and have that promise broken…

"Forgive me," he said, and looked away.

"It's not your fault." Her voice was free of rancor. "Uncle broke Father's promise. Not you."

"Still." Kenshin swallowed, wishing he had the words. "One – wishes that – that your father's promise had been fulfilled. That you…" his throat dried as he thought of her happy, smiling and laughing, wrapped close in the arms of another man. A man who was not him. Could never be him. "That you had been free to choose."

Choose me, he wanted to beg, and knew that he couldn't. In another world, perhaps, where she wasn't bound to him, he could have asked. Could have tried to persuade her, to win her – tried and failed, probably, but at least – he could have tried.

Not here, though, not now. She was his wife: if he asked, she was duty-bound to say yes. How could he be sure that more than duty drove her? He wanted to ask her – but how could he know that it would not diminish her? How could he ever know that she had truly chosen him, when he had the right to kill her for a misplaced word?

She looked over at him, seeming only half-real. A spirit resting from her labors, something no mortal hand should ever touch.

"What was your father like?"

"My father…?" He blinked, bewildered. "I – one hardly remembers him, truthfully."

Fragments, vague memories of strong arms and a rumbling laugh. All his memories of the time before his apprenticeship were a little blurred, a little disjointed – he'd been hit on the head when the raiders attacked his village, and his master had said that sometimes such blows could affect memory.

No one ever asked him about his childhood, though, so it hardly mattered.

"Oh." She swung her legs idly, exposing slivers of pale ankle as her kimono caught against her thighs. "It's just… I just realized, I don't really know anything about you, and… I thought, maybe… you know. This is the sort of thing people should know about each other. In our situation." She was talking a little too quickly.

"Our situation?" he repeated, still adrift. She nodded.

"It's Tanabata," she said, as if that explained everything. He blinked at her, questions crowding in his throat and fighting to make it to his tongue. There were too many to sort through; he didn't even know where to begin.

"You know the story, right? About the Cowherd and the Weaver."

"…yes?" The Weaver was the most beautiful of all the stars, the daughter of the King of Heaven; she had fallen in love with her father's cowherd and begged her father to approve the match. He'd done so gladly, until the newlywed's love distracted them so much that they neglected their duties. So the King of Heaven had set down a great river of stars between them, separating them forever – except once a year, when a flock of magpies took pity on the parted lovers and formed a bridge across the river so that they could meet.

"It's a clear night," Lady Kaoru said, still in that nearly too confident tone – as though what she was saying made perfect sense. Which it probably did, and he just lacked the wit to see it. "They should be able to meet. As long as the magpies show up…"

She looked at him, then – looked at him, as though she was willing him to understand. As though there was a message in what she was saying, something that she didn't dare say outright, and he couldn't think what it might be except – except the one thing that it couldn't possibly be.

Lady Kaoru slid towards him along the porch, pushing the tea tray out of the way until she was near enough that he could smell her perfume, could – if he reached out – curl his fingers around a lock of her hair. Her kimono's gold embroidery caught in the lantern light, sending shimmers along the dragons wrapped around her calves and knees. They looked nearly alive, dancing against the deep, deep red. Her bridal gift – his colors, his sigil, wrapped around her. Part of her.

Kenshin scratched at the back of his neck, dizzy with uncertainty. He felt very strange: light and sparkling, as if his veins were filled with fire-flowers.

"The magpies? …if they make a bridge, do you mean?"

She nodded. "It's not raining anymore, so…" An eloquent shrug as she repeated herself, drawing her legs up under her to kneel on the porch, facing him. "So there's no reason why they shouldn't meet."

"As long as the magpies allow it," Kenshin murmured, caught in her bright blue eyes. Willingly so: he would drown himself in her eyes, if she would let him. If she would let him – just let him in, to warm himself by her fire…

"Yes." Lady Kaoru nodded again and leaned forward, too close for conversation. Her brows drew down and her eyes were stern. She was nearly frowning. Kenshin fought to keep his breath even and found that he couldn't: it shook in his lungs, set him trembling like a leaf ready to fall. She was so near, less than a handspan away, rich and heady with the scent of jasmine flowers. Night-blooming, he remembered giddily. "The magpies."

Determination glowed in her eyes, fierce and overwhelming, and he opened his mouth to say something, anything, and then her eyes shut tight and she pressed her lips firmly against his. Soft. They were so soft, and he didn't know how something so soft could send so much feeling racing through him, fire his blood and make him pant after her when she pulled away, blushing.

"…honored wife…" he gasped, hoarse. Her hand rose to his face – hesitated, trembling – and then her fingers pressed light against his cheek.

"Kaoru," she said quietly. "That's my name, you know?"

"…Kaoru," he whispered. It felt like a benediction.

Kenshin didn't know, then, if he had kissed her or she had kissed him, only that her mouth was sweet and warm and he curled his fingers in her hair, combing through the black silk strands. She wrapped her arms around the back of his neck, pulling him into her and he went gladly, uncrossing his legs to let her come closer. He could feel her through the layers of cloth between them, her hard curves so close and still too far away – and he could never, ever be close enough, near enough, not to her –

He broke away, gasping for air, and buried his face in her shoulder. Kaoru's arms wrapped around him as he shook, clinging to her. Too much – he was all hunger and need, his mind and body aching for her touch, her lips, her hands, her – everything –

"Kaoru," he said again, tasting it, the snap and roll of it on his tongue. "Kaoru. I – "

It hurt to draw away from her. Kenshin did it anyway, tilting his head back to see her clearly. Her eyes were wide as she looked at him, hair undone and falling down her back, around her face, her lips swollen and parted as breath sighed out between them.

"I don't – understand," he managed to say with what was left of his reason. "Why…?"

She pressed a finger to his mouth, shy. He wanted to nibble at her fingertips and kiss her wrist, her palm, taste the salt of her skin.

"I'm your wife," she said quietly.

"I…" Kaoru hadn't taken her finger away; his lips moved against her skin and he stifled a moan, ruthlessly forced his hands not to tighten and draw her down to kiss her again, and again and again until they were both breathless. Because this was important, more important even than her soft, warm skin and the curve of her hips under his hands.

"Not – not for that reason alone. Please." Please touch me, kiss me, anything you want but only if you truly want to, only for your own sake… "Only if – only if you – "

"Oh." That little syllable, quiet and surprised, and he thought – shaky with lust – that there was a world contained within it. "No. No, I – well…"

Her face flushed with more than arousal.

"You're kind. And you're good to my sisters. And – " she laid her hand against his cheek once more, fingertips stroking the fragile skin across his temple. "And I like your eyes."

"Kaoru." He thought that he would never tire of saying her name. She kissed him again and he let himself fall into her, lost himself in her mouth and skin and the veil of her hair cascading over them. Her nails scratched across his scalp, shivery as the air before a storm, and he groaned into her mouth, clinging.

This time it was Kaoru who pulled away, resting her forehead against his. She was trembling a little, holding his shoulders to keep herself steady, and her breath came sharp between her lush, red lips. Kenshin kept himself still, waiting for her. He felt her breasts rising and falling against him and wanted to crush himself against her, breathe her in and surrender.

It was very, very hard to wait.

Eventually her hands left his shoulders to brush through his hair. She let out a shuddering sigh.

"Sorry," she said quietly, her eyes hooded. "I – I don't know what to do next."

"What do you mean?" He curled his fingers into her scarlet kimono, dragging the silk across her skin. She shivered.

"I mean – well – we never did have a wedding night."

"Oh." His mind went utterly blank. "Oh. Oh, Kaoru…"

Too much, the faint, dying voice of sanity whispered. It's too much. But he couldn't tell her no, that he didn't believe her – didn't believe that she wanted him the way a woman wants a man. She had always been honest, even with her hatred; it would be an insult to accuse her of lying now.

"So…" She was speaking again. "Anyway… if you could just show me…"

A thought occurred to him, at her words. He smiled at her, smoothing his hands up her back to her shoulders, coaxing her to raise herself on her knees.

"Tell me," he murmured against her skin, pressing his lips to her collarbone. "If you don't like something – if you want me to stop, or do something else. Just tell me." His eager tongue darted out to taste the sweat beading in her clavicle. "Promise?"

"…yes," she whispered, grabbing at his hair. The tug – the pressure, light and insistent – sent a shiver of lightning down his spine. He ignored it, stroking down her back and around under her ribs, across her belly. The silk pulled at his fingers, heavy and smooth and slightly cool.

"Here…" Kenshin steadied her, sliding one hand around to rest on her shoulderblade. His other hand shook as he raised it towards her collar, resting his fingers carefully just on the safe side of the border where cloth met skin. "May I…?"

A light tug made his meaning clear. Kaoru's breast heaved under his hand.

"…yes," she said. "Yes."

Carefully, trying to keep his hand steady, he pulled her kimono and the cotton slip beneath it gently aside. Her nipple peaked in the night air, cold only for a moment before he covered it with his palm, pressing his mouth lightly against the side of her breast. She let out a startled noise, half a gasp, and clutched him tighter.

"Oh!"

Kenshin couldn't quite stop himself from grinning against her skin. As long as he gave to her, and didn't take – ignored his own pleasure for hers – that was all right, wasn't it? He could do this much for her.

And maybe his thinking was a little skewed. But she was here, warm and wonderful in his arms, responding to his touch, to the slow kisses that he draped across her skin. So he had to believe.

He ducked his head to mouth gently along the underside of her breast. Kaoru moaned, dropping her head on top of his and pushing up against him, all warmth and sweat and fading jasmine perfume. His head swam with it, with her, with the sounds she was making and the clutch of her fingers in his hair.

"Kenshin…" She fairly gasped his name, fluttering and breathless, and he ached with it. Wanted to hear it again, over and over, until he forgot that he was anything else – until he was only Kenshin. Her Kenshin.

Kaoru's hips jumped, rocking towards him, and he slid his hand down her side to just above the delta of her thighs, brushing his thumb across the crease of her hips. She stilled, then, and he drew back to look up at her.

"Is this too much?"

Her eyes were dazed. She swallowed, breathing hard.

"I don't know," she said finally. "Keep going?"

Kenshin nodded. He kept his eyes on her, easing his hand under her skirts. She jumped when he touched her thigh and he paused again, watching her. Waiting.

"…it's all right." Her voice wavered a little. "Go on."

"If you're not sure…"

"I am sure." She caught his face between her hands and kissed him, fiercely. He gasped, composure flooding away with the movement of her mouth against his. "It's just new, that's all," she murmured against his lips.

"Yes," he whispered, and traced the line of her skin blindly upwards to the softness at the apex of her thighs. She was hot there, slippery and ready, and cried out his name when he stroked his thumb over the nub at her cleft's peak. He rocked his hand against her, matching her thrusts as she panted in his ear, clutching at his shoulders. When he leaned forward to kiss her breasts again she fairly snarled in frustration.

"What's wrong?" Kenshin asked, dry-mouthed. She was bucking against him, hair falling wild and shielding them from the world. Her flushed, panting face was the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen; the only thing he could see, the only thing he wanted to see, and he didn't dare move more than his head and hand. If he did, he wasn't sure he'd be able to stop.

"I – I don't know," she groaned. "It's not – it's not enough."

"Ah." Kenshin slid his hand a little further down. "Here, then."

And he curled two fingers carefully inside her. Her eyes flew open as she twisted, searching: he went with her, followed where her body led him and – yes, there, a little harder, with a press of his thumb to that cluster of nerves –

Kaoru nearly deafened him, muffling her shout in his hair. Her body convulsed, clenching around his fingers in waves as she collapsed against him, gasping, her arms winding tight around his neck while she shuddered in her aftershocks.

He stroked his way out gently, soothing her, and kissed the tip of her breast one last time before he gently pulled her collar shut to keep out the cold.

"Oh." She curled up in his arms, shivering, and the press of her body against him was almost painful. He wanted her – his entire being yearned towards her, ached for her skin and her hair and her lips.

Kenshin held her close and waited. In a few minutes she calmed, relaxing into his chest, and her hand came up to toy with his collar.

"Is that – " she started to say, and swallowed. "Is that what happens next, then?"

"Ah." He squeezed her a little tighter, doing his best to ignore his own body. "Yes."

She made a contented little humming noise, splaying her hand across his chest. Her fingers brushed his bare skin and his cock jumped at the contact. Kenshin suppressed a whimper.

"So, then…" Kaoru bit her lower lip, and he couldn't help the distressed moan that escaped him at the sight. Her hand stroked across his skin, trailing lightning across his nerves. "I guess…"

She shifted to face him. Her hand slid down his chest to his stomach, then further down as her other hand curled once more around the back of his neck.

"Kaoru – "

She kissed him, so sweetly that he lost his breath, and gingerly pressed her hand against his aching cock. It was his turn to bite his lip, trying desperately to strangle his cries as she explored him with too-gentle touches. He thrust against her hand, unable to stop himself as her careful fingers caressed almost the right places, with nearly enough pressure and gods, yes, please – he was coming apart. It took everything he had just to keep his grip on her, to bury his face where her neck met her shoulder and breathe her in, and he clung to her like a drowning man.

"Kaoru, oh, Kaoru please – I – wait – "

She stopped. He fell back against the pillar, sucking in air like a landed fish, and tried to get a hold of himself. Kaoru leaned in, worry lighting her beautiful eyes.

"I'm sorry, did I – ?"

"No," he sighed out, barely conscious. "No. It's just that – if you'd kept going, one would have – that is to say…"

"Oh." She drew back, face reddening. "Oh. Um."

Kenshin swallowed, wordless. She looked at him for a long time, studying him, and her face took on that same fierce determination it had before. Like she'd seen the height from the top of the cliff, the small space in the rocks below, and was going to jump regardless.

His heart pounded against his ribs.

Kaoru took his hand and stood up, pulling at his arm. Kenshin followed her, too dazed to resist, and she led him down the porch to where the doors of her room stood open to let in the night breeze. She stepped over the threshold easily, and that was where he stopped.

She looked back at him. Her grip tightened around his hand.

"Well, come on." Her eyes were so bright.

"But…" He could barely keep his breath; it danced in and out of his lungs like a blow, short and sharp. "That is…" The world was slipping out from underneath him, everything changing and sliding faster than he could keep up, and the only certainty he had was her strong hand warm in his.

"You're my husband," she said, in a voice that was a little too firm, shaking underneath but determined not to back down, and he loved her for it. "And you're coming to my room." She raised her chin. "I'm inviting you."

"Kaoru." He couldn't think of anything but her name, couldn't see anything but her eyes, couldn't feel anything but her skin.

"I'm inviting you," she said again, her thumb tracing idle figures on the back of his hand. "I want you to come in."

The fading remnants of his common sense said no, wait, talk about this in the morning. Not here, they whispered, not under the half-grown moon that barely knew itself, much less the right thing to do. Not now, when he was still drunk with her scent, her taste, her cries of pleasure ringing in his ears…

But there were so very few remnants left, and he wanted her so very much.

"…Kaoru," he breathed, and crossed her threshold.

---

Something changed when Kenshin stepped into her room. Or maybe it was only Kaoru who was different: she certainly felt changed, like she was growing too big for her skin, her entire being encircled and tangled with shimmering nerves and hot, slick ache. It was easy to pull Kenshin close and kiss him again, to wrap her arms around his neck and bury her hands in his hair. He was hot against her, trembling as he pressed his lips to hers her so tenderly that it took her breath away.

"Kaoru," he mumbled into her hair, running his hands along her sides, over her ribs and down again to her hips, again and again and trailing sparks behind him. "Kaoru."

She'd never heard her name said with such raw adoration.

"It's all right," she murmured, stroking his hair. "I want this." I want you, she didn't quite dare to say, but she thought he might have heard it anyway. His arms fairly crushed her, his hands tracing delicately across her obi's bow.

And she wasn't lying. She – hadn't planned this, exactly – but as they'd watched the fire-flowers together, Ayame and Suzume clutching wide-eyed at their hands, she'd felt his gaze on her. It had made her shiver, in a good way, to think of him watching her with his strange, bright eyes: wanting her, waiting for her word. She'd wondered, suddenly, what it would be like if she was truly his wife, with his child growing inside her, and her hand had risen unconsciously to rest low against her belly. Without quite knowing how or why she was so sure, she'd seen a future unfolding: long warm days of ruling at his side, raising sons and daughters with hair the color of maple leaves in autumn.

Her father had given her a maple leaf, before he'd gone to war. For loyalty – it had always been his creed, more than honor, more than glory. And yet…

Although he had been sworn to Lord Oda, he allied himself with Lord Toyotomi when the time came. For good reasons. Reasons that mattered. For the sake of the nation – to prevent civil war.

I, too, did as I believed honor required. As I believed that the nation required.

Loyalty to her father, to her fallen clan… but her clan had sold her without a care, and her father was dead. Her father, who had made a choice and been, if not wrong, perhaps not completely right either. Her father, who above all would have wanted her to be happy.

Our lives do not belong to us. But that didn't mean she didn't have a choice.

She'd looked over and met Kenshin's eyes, seen what was shining there – what had always been there – and known that he was a good man and he loved her. That she could be happy with him, if she chose.

So she'd chosen.

Kaoru reached behind her and guided Kenshin's hands, setting them on the trailing edges of her sash.

"Here. If you just pull a little, it should…"

His hands shook under hers, as they had when he'd pulled back her collar to kiss her breasts, and he pressed himself against her as though he could never be close enough. She pulled his head down to hers, her mouth slanting over his as she rode a sudden wave of fierce desire. He moaned into her kiss, darting his tongue into her mouth. She copied him, stroking her fingertips down his neck, his shoulders, letting her hands come to rest at his belt.

"May I?" he asked, gathering the ends of the bow in one hand. She fumbled at the knot in his belt, thrillingly aware of the male hardness just below it.

"If I can, too," she said, giddy with her boldness. So like him, to ask even now, when she had said over and over again that he could. To assume nothing, even given what had come before. It made her feel – powerful, in an odd way, and strangely tender.

"Ah." Kenshin's eyes fluttered shut. He bent his head towards her, and she felt his chest rise as he breathed her in. "Yes."

Kaoru pulled at the knot and felt an answering tug at her back. She hid her blush in his shoulder, trusting her sensitive fingertips to guide her at his belt as her obi fell away. He drew the long cloth carefully out from between them and let it fall to the floor at their feet. It coiled in on itself, thick silk shimmering in the moonlight.

Her fingers were clumsy, catching on invisible threads. Kenshin waited for her, running his hands through her hair and breathing long, shaky breaths as she eased his hakama down to hang low on his waist. Her courage failed her, then, and she simply wrapped her arms around him. He was all lean, strong warmth, smelling of clean earth and fresh-brewed tea.

"Kaoru." His hands slid down her biceps, soothing, and his eyes were bright. "You don't have to."

"Stop saying that," she grumbled into his chest. "I want to. Just – show me what to do."

"Here." A kiss on her temple, her hairline, as his hands left her for a moment and she felt them brush against hers, pushing his hakama all the way down so he could step out of them. "Like this."

Then he was lowering himself to her futon, drawing her down with him and across him so that she was straddling his hips as he leaned back, supporting himself on one arm. His good arm, she noted – though his wounded arm was nearly halfway healed.

"It'll be easier this way. For you, I mean." He flushed. "If you still intend to…"

She nearly scowled. "I'm not going to change my mind. What do I do?"

By way of an answer he clasped her hand and brought it to his mouth, kissing her palm. His lips moved slow and soft against her skin; his eyes were hooded and utterly absorbed, as though he wanted nothing more than to kiss her hand forever. She could feel him rising hard against her inner thigh: their robes were draped open around them but didn't stop the stroke of skin on skin. It made her shudder.

"Kenshin…" She brushed his bangs away from his face with her free hand, running her fingers through his autumn-leaf hair. His throat worked. "Show me."

"…as you wish." He looked up at her, shy, and brought their joined hands down to where their bodies touched. Her fingers brushed against him: he jumped and so did she. He felt – softer than she expected, and she skimmed the pads of her fingers along the length of him, exploring. Kenshin gasped, his free hand falling away to fist in the sheets.

"Kaoru."

Kaoru had thought that he would be stiff, like wood or metal, but his – member – was firm rather than really hard, more like a flexed muscle than anything else. She closed her hand around it experimentally. He choked and it throbbed in her grip, warm and living. A part of him, she realized abruptly; she'd thought of it as somehow detached, separate, but no. It was all Kenshin, and Kenshin could never hurt her.

He was panting under her, his head falling back to expose the long column of his throat. She leaned over, filled with tender impulse, and kissed a slow line from his collarbone to the fine crease under his chin. The noise that he made – raw and pleading – was like fire in her veins. Kaoru raised herself up on her knees, holding his cock lightly in one hand.

She did know this part, at least. She wasn't totally ignorant.

It didn't hurt, sliding him inside her. Not at first. He cried out, falling down on his elbows and she slid him in a little further, realizing why he'd drawn her down on top of him – she could control things, this way, could go as slow as she needed to.

A little more, and things started to feel strange. Not bad, precisely. Just a deep, deep stretch, like working a muscle stiff with disuse, and it felt like it would be right to move her hips so she did, pushing herself down onto him with a twisting motion that set something ringing deep inside her. He gasped, bucking beneath her, and grabbed at her waist.

"Kaoru, oh gods Kaoru – "

One hand, shaking, moved to stroke the same place that he had before, just above where her nether lips parted. A shout ripped wild from her throat as he pressed his thumb against it, stroking. Kaoru fell forward, bracing herself against the futon on either side of his head and her hips snapped down as she ground against him, briefly mindless. Kenshin fell onto his back, fairly sobbing as he pulled her hard against him. Incoherent praise spilled wildly from his lips; she covered his mouth to swallow them and he buried his fingers in her hair, his hips rolling underneath her.

"Oh!"

She'd thrust one way as he did another, and he hit the same place deep within her that he'd touched on the porch, the place that filled her head with blinding white. Not as strong this time, but she had the sense of it now and – yes, there it was, again. Kaoru pushed back against him, reaching for it, and the world seemed to expand a little with every thrust, pleasure winding tighter and tighter until she thought she would burst out of her skin –

Climax seized and shook her, no less intense for all she'd known, this time, what was coming. Kenshin let out a sound that was very nearly a whimper, and suddenly his hands were tight around her waist and he pushed up into her, once, twice before he let out a strangled sob, pulsing hot and hard inside her as his back arced like a bow. Then he collapsed, curling his arms around her and shaking.

"Kaoru," he murmured, low and loving. "Ah, Kaoru." His fingers stroked warmly down her spine.

She was shivering a little herself, with the cool night air and the knowledge of what had just happened. They were married, now, truly married, and she was no longer a maiden; he was her husband in every way. No turning back, she thought, half-dazed, and her throat thickened as she buried her face in his neck.

"…you're trembling," he said quietly.

"It's a little cold." She shifted on top of him, feeling him soften inside her. Kenshin kissed her, gently, and started to ease himself out from under her. Kaoru let him go, feeling queerly empty when he left her.

He didn't go far – just to unfold the blanket at the foot of the bed and cover her with it, pressing a kiss to her temple as he tucked her in.

"Do you want anything else?"

"…no." Kaoru burrowed under the blankets, half-melted, and couldn't stop her eyes from drooping. His fingers stroked once through her hair and she let her eyes slide shut, contented.

"Then one will retire for the evening," he said quietly, and there was cold air were his warmth had been. She forced her eyes open as confusion lanced through her, raising herself up on one arm.

"…what?"

He hesitated, his eyes glowing in the shadows, and looked at her with such fierce love and tenderness that she could hardly believe she had ever thought it might be anything else. And she didn't quite feel the same way, knew that she didn't – but there was something soft and fierce swelling in her throat, in the newly empty place just under her heart.

"One does not… wish to impose, that is…" Kenshin looked away, uncertain. His skin was pale in the moonlight.

"You're my husband," she said impulsively, and took a moment to wonder at how easily she said the words. "You're not imposing…"

She stretched her hand towards him, palm up, and felt more herself than she had ever been.

"Stay."

His eyes widened. Kaoru kept her gaze steady, her hand outstretched and, after a long pause, he took it – delicately, as though he thought she might break. She curled her fingers around his, pulled him closer.

"Kenshin," she said quietly. "Come to bed."

He obeyed, sliding under the covers and twining his limbs around her. His fingers laced through hers; he pressed their joined hands to where his heart beat slow and steady. She settled herself in the crook of his arm, comforted by his warmth and the weight of his arm across her waist.

"There," she murmured, suffused with rightness. "That's better."

"…yes," he said, so softly that she almost thought she had imagined it, and the last thing she was aware of before sleep was his surrendering sigh.