Chapter Twenty-Seven
Parting Gifts
As his last act as a father to Ilya, and as a hero insofar as doing his utmost to protect the world from the Grail and its wars, Kiritsugu set explosives such that an earthquake would result in roughly thirty or forty years on, based on his calculations, such that it would create a "bump" in the Fuyuki leylines and prevent a Fifth War. That and to protect Shirou, for he didn't want his son dragged into a world where such a War took place. It was the last thing Kiritsugu could do for both his children with regards to this matter, and then...maybe Ilya...
Even now, when he was beyond hope, he still had a little left. He imagined Irisviel probably would too. Stubbornness was another thing he realized with a sad laugh that the two of them had had in common.
Now that he was done with that last task, he could wash his hands entirely of the arsenal of his former life. And quite soon after that, he found himself at Dr. Wakahisa's office discussing how he was just shy of having to walk with a limp, because his body was simply showing signs of slowly deteriorating.
Unfortunately, Akiko Fukui, privy to the proceedings, seemed unable to abide the fact that a 32-year old man would be dying when he didn't show anything that was really wrong with him per se, just that he had the spryness of a terminally ill patient spending his last days of being "relatively and manageably healthy enough to get by".
"I just don't understand it," she told him when she couldn't help herself and insinuated herself into speaking privately with him about it on his way out, sounding close to tears.
Kiritsugu couldn't help feeling for her. It was clear she cared about him, and even though he couldn't return the feelings she had harbored for him for some time now, he knew only too well what it was to watch a beloved person slowly die away. Or just die.
And he was fond of Akiko as a kind of companion, even if that was as far as he could take his feelings. In a sincere gesture of amity, he reached over and took her hand, oddly enough being the comforting one even though he was the one slowly dying.
Rather like Irisviel had been for him.
"It's all right. I've made my peace with it. It is what it is and it can't be helped. I just try my best not to let on to Shirou for as long as I can, so he won't worry so much."
"But..."
Kiritsugu shook his head, smiling with a mixture of melancholy and affection. He already knew what final argument was on her lips.
But I'm in love with you.
Leaning over, he gave her a token kiss on the cheek, a gesture of his gratitude for her bountiful kindness toward him. After all, she was part of the reason he had Shirou in his life.
He felt her gasp, knew that she was blushing and struggling with her feelings for him, yet at the same time fulfilled in this simple touch.
And then he walked away, and felt her watch his back as he made his way at a stiff, elderly man's pace, out of the hospital. Though he didn't look back, he knew Akiko Fukui had tears in her eyes.
Later that night, the pain in Kiritsugu's stiff legs got so bad it woke him up from a sleep that was pretty restless and uneasy anyway. Even more so, he had to move with care and a slight limp when he got up with the intention of getting a little fresh air in the moonlit garden outside.
There though, he found Shirou out of bed, sitting on the edge of the porch and looking up at that moon, his legs still short enough that he could swing them over the edge, though he did so in an agitated way, like he had something heavy weighing on his mind.
"What's wrong, Shirou?" Kiritsugu asked him, crossing over to him at a bit of a shuffle. "Can't sleep?"
Shirou looked up at him, and then spoke to the wood of the porch. "Um...I had...that dream again..."
Kiritsugu didn't have to ask which one. "Ah. I see." He heaved a heavy sigh, the guilt at how that terrible, great fire had so damaged this young boy, an ache that still twinged, now and then, as it did now, in his heart.
"Nights like these...make me uneasy..." Shirou admitted, with just a small note of fear in his voice.
"I see." Kiritsugu took another deep breath, but his voice still trembled when he added, "I don't blame you," while his eyes prickled a moment, and he too appealed to the moon, as if Irisviel were there, and could tell him what to do.
Shirou traced a circle in the wood with his finger. "Jii-san? Do you think...I could have some of that medicine you make me? Could I take a little now?"
Kiritsugu blinked in surprise but assented. "Of course. It's a little early, but I don't see why not. But I thought you disliked taking it."
"Well, of course I don't like it, I don't think I ever will," Shirou admitted as he followed the shuffling Kiritsugu into the kitchen. "But you've always made it using your magic, right?"
Kiritsugu could already see where this was going, but he couldn't help a demonstrative laugh. "Well...really that's just one way of putting it."
In the kitchen, Shirou watched Kiritsugu put together the concoction and pour it in a glass, and then he took it in both his hands and gulped it back, pulling a face when he finished. And then he asked naturally how much longer he was going to have to keep taking this medicine, to which Kiritsugu replied with an estimation that he could probably stop once he entered middle school.
And then, after a thoughtful pause, Shirou, fidgeting with the sash of his kimono, opened his mouth, and asked what Kiritsugu already knew was coming, more or less.
"Do you think...then...at least...jii-san...you could start...maybe...teaching me about magic...?"
Seeing the look that passed over Kiritsugu's face, Shirou quickly added:
"I mean magecraft. I mean...if I were able to do things like this for myself, you wouldn't have to worry about it, right?"
"Shirou..."
"I just want to be able...to help you..."
Kiritsugu shook his head as Shirou considered the floor again, and set about putting away the things for his son's medicine. "Believe me Shirou, this is nothing, compared to teaching you magecraft."
"But...I want to be strong enough that I can do anything! Like jii-san..." Shirou blinked his eyes rapidly, their golden-brown color shining with pure admiration.
Kiritsugu couldn't help feeling an empathetic pain in his heart at this. "When I was a child..." he admitted aloud as he turned away from the sink and leaned back against it, "...I used to...think that way. But you shouldn't have to feel as though you need to follow that kind of path, Shirou."
"But...it's hard for me think about things...differently..." said Shirou, trying to explain feelings that even now he was still trying to digest after the trauma of the fire. "Every time I close my eyes, I'm back in that hot, horrible place, and I can see the white faces of all those people dying...people I couldn't help...I wasn't strong enough to help..."
Even as he made clear efforts to hold it back, Kiritsugu could tell how much his son was shaking now as he spoke. And Kiritsugu could empathize with this too. After all, it wasn't just the ghosts in that fire of those people Kiritsugu couldn't save that haunted him, but the poor children who had been made victims of Caster and his Master and their depraved violence, the people on Arimago Island, the people in all those wars he had seen...his father...Shirley...Natalia...Irisviel...Ilya...
Looking back up at his adoptive father again, Shirou went on with more resolve.
"If I could...become strong enough...to save and protect people the way you did for me...then next time something like that happens...if I knew magecraft like jii-san..."
"But Shirou," Kiritsugu pressed gently, "to accept the life of a...mage...is...really...just an acceptance that...death will always follow you wherever you go. I...can't bear losing my son to such a fate..."
Shirou stared at him, pursing his lips at hearing something this poignant and tender from his father. By now, he had been privileged to come to know Kiritsugu as Irisviel and Ilya had in their respective ways, as Shirley had known him as a boy, as Natalia had known him as a young man. But even then, like with Ilya, Kiritsugu was still guarded about many things, like his past, his wife and daughter he had lost...
Shirou blinked again, more rapidly this time, as though he were about to cry, but again, fought it back admirably.
Then he said: "Jii-san...I...don't know...I mean...right now...I don't know if I understand you...I know I don't...but...if I could..."
Kiritsugu frowned at him, realizing that they were both rather hopeless, helpless idiots in their own ways. "Shirou..." He heaved a heavy sigh and then gave a laugh in an attempt to lighten the mood. "Why don't we both try and get some sleep? I know you might still feel uneasy, but you should try to get some rest."
"But..."
"You have school tomorrow, yes? Taiga-chan would be furious if you were late."
Shirou's shoulders slumped, and in a very kid-like way indeed he shuffled off, muttering a grudging assent under his breath.
Leaving Kiritsugu alone to ponder on how torn he was now, in face of Shirou's stubbornness, wondering just what he should do.
What would you do...Iri...?
Even with Kiritsugu's deteriorating condition, he wasn't about to let what energy he had left go to waste. So even if Taiga made her teasing comments, he could still keep up with her with an effort in a kendo match. And he knew that she only teased because she was worried about him, baffled just as Akiko Fukui had been that a man in his early thirties seemed to have so suddenly become like a man twice his age.
Still, like with Shirou, Taiga didn't go easy on him, and as expected, she claimed yet another victory against her former English tutor.
"Ha ha! Once again I have proven my superior skills against you, Kiritsugu-san!" she proclaimed, holding her shinai up high.
Kiritsugu leaned on his shinai a moment just to catch his breath before he grinned up at his honorable adversary. "Well done, Taiga-chan. I don't think there'll ever come a day where I'll beat you."
"And that's just as well," said Taiga with a wink. "I have to be better than you at something, after all."
After they changed out of their hakama, Kiritsugu invited Taiga to have a cup of tea with him. With Shirou out of the house and at school, there was something he wanted to discuss with her concerning their little red-headed charge.
Taiga knocked back a sip of the hot brew of green tea Kiritsugu made for them in the main room and let out a satisfied sigh, giving Kiritsugu a contented smile. "This is nice. I've been so busy with work getting my license and finding a position at a school my head's felt like it was about to explode!"
"How is that going?" Kiritsugu asked, taking a sip of green tea himself.
"Very well, all things considered. I'm hoping I can get a spot at Homurahara Academy."
"Your high school alma mater?"
"Mm-hm. And I've already been thinking if I get to I'd like the chance to advise something like the old Archery Club."
"Not kendo?"
"No...kendo has become too...personal." Taiga ran her pinky finger over the ridges in her cup. "I don't want it to be what I'm known for anymore. From now on, I want it to be something special between you, Shirou, and me."
Kiritsugu raised his eyebrows, intrigued. "Is that so?"
"Absolutely." Taiga shook back her ponytail proudly. "When I think back to why I got into kendo in the first place, I think I wanted to prove myself in some way. And now I think I've done that, even if my own personal preferences got in the way of some things." She patted the tiger stripe pattern on her shinai that had gotten her barred from competing in Nationals. "Now I just want to be able to pass on that joy to someone else, like Shirou. And who knows? In the end, he might get into archery too. But for me, I'm glad I did it, if only to find out a little more about myself, and now I can offer what I can to the present."
"Hm. I see." Kiritsugu thought about this a moment as he considered his own cup of tea. "I think...Shirou wants to prove himself too. Ultimately to be of use to people in some way, but still..."
"Ah, like you?" Taiga asked rather perceptively with a teasing note in her voice.
"Oh, well..." Kiritsugu gave a rather nervous laugh. "Maybe."
"Well, I don't see why that would be so bad," said Taiga, pondering her tea as well. "You're a very kind person, in your own way. And Shirou looks up to you. You can't know what he's capable of unless you let him test himself of course, but that's why we try things. Like kendo."
"Hmmmm." Kiritsugu thought about this a moment, looking out to where he could make out the garden beyond, as Taiga took a deep gulp of tea. Maybe...in that case...I should...
"Are you having a problem with Shirou?" Taiga asked tentatively as she finished her drink.
"Not so much a problem, just a difficulty." Kiritsugu swilled the last of the tea in his cup. "After all, I won't be around forever...to protect him..."
When he ventured to look up at Taiga, he saw her wearing the expression he was afraid she would be if he hinted at the fact that he was not long for this world. A pinched expression of pain and pity.
"Kiritsugu-san..."
Kiritsugu shook his head and gave another laugh, this one a little stronger. Then he knocked back the rest of his tea, down to the dregs. "It's nothing," he a reassured Taiga with a smile. "Just thinking aloud. Trying to plan ahead."
"Hm." Taiga raised a suspicious eyebrow at him, but Kiritsugu could handle that.
"Listen, why don't you stay for dinner tonight?" Kiritsugu invited. "I know Shirou acts like you annoy him, but I know you're really important to him too."
"Eh? Well, I guess so." Taiga's expression softened though. "But what's this all about?"
"Hm, I just have something important to discuss with Shirou, but I think he's a bit on edge about it. You seem to have a knack for calming people's nerves. I think it's your laidback attitude." Kiritsugu gave Taiga a teasing wink.
Though Taiga blushed, she still beamed amusement. "Oh, Kiritsugu-san, you're always quite the devious charmer, aren't you?"
"Ah yes," Kiritsugu agreed, thinking bittersweetly of the way Irisviel once teased him. "You have me all figured out, Taiga-chan."
For dinner that night, Shirou presented his attempt to make his first dish of onigiri, rice stuffed with different fillings, kind of like sandwiches.
Taiga, of course, ate with her usual gusto. "Oh...Shirou!" she exclaimed in absolute raptures with her mouth stuffed full of rice and filling. "I think you're the goddess Inari reincarnated."
Shirou pulled a face, not exactly happy with being told he was the reincarnation of a female deity, but at Taiga's look of bliss, in the end he couldn't help but be satisfied. Such that he actually expressed a rare look of pride. That and Taiga was quick to point out that Inari's gender had been known to be represented as male as well as female.
And though she was going a bit heavy on the sake tonight, Kiritsugu couldn't help indulging her. She just reminded him too much of Shirley. He'd even asked her once if she'd ever consider cutting her hair, as the ponytail she wore was uncannily like Shirley's, and when she proclaimed, "Only if my pride as a warrior and kendo champion were sullied!" in a bombastic voice, he'd let it go, perhaps for both the sake of her and Shirley.
And maybe himself too.
In any case, despite her teasing, Kiritsugu could see that Shirou could still see that his "big sister" still enjoyed and appreciated his cooking efforts. Kiritsugu did too for that matter. Something warm beyond the fact that the rice was hot and fresh from the cooker slid into place when he ate it, that same feeling he'd had during those precious times he'd spent with his wife and daughter.
The ever present ache he felt for that life throbbed dully in his chest, but even so, he managed to share in Taiga's and Shirou's smiles. And he and Shirou did share conspiratorial grins of amusement as Taiga caterwauled off-key on her way to take a bath after helping with the cleanup.
Shirou sighed and shook his head, acting rather more like an adult than Taiga did. "I can't believe she's graduated high school."
"Shirou."
Shirou looked away from where he watched Taiga leave, his golden-brown eyes alight with curiosity at his father's serious tone. "Jii-san?"
Kiritsugu stood, slowly though, for the growing stiffness in his limbs. Even so, he had a kind of smile for his son. "Do you still want to learn a little magic?"
Shirou's eyes went wide. "Jii-san…."
"I don't know how much I can teach you…I'm…I guess you could say I'm actually a little rusty…but I'll teach you what I can." Kiritsugu tucked his hands into the sleeves of his kimono. "How does that sound?"
He watched as Shirou fiddled with the strings of the little cooking apron Taiga had bought for him, looked at the clock, looked again at where Taiga had gone to take her bath, and then looked at Kiritsugu again, and solemnly nodded. "Okay. I'm ready…jii-san."
Of course, the shine in those golden-brown eyes was answer enough.
Kiritsugu returned Shirou's nod. "Okay. Well, first thing, we'll have to go out to the storehouse."
"The storehouse?" Shirou asked as he followed his father out, leaving his apron behind and tossing the dishtowel in the sink.
"Yes," said Kiritsugu. "The stone walls are perfect for performing magecraft, you see. The paper and bamboo that make up most of the main house is too thin, and magic leaks out. It's important that you keep the magic you perform contained, if you want to keep your magic a secret."
"Keep it a secret?"
"Mm-hm. Mages should keep their magic a secret. It isn't something to be flaunted. At least…that's what I've always believed. When a mage flaunts his or her magic…it just causes trouble for the people around him or her."
"I see."
It had been a while actually since Kiritsugu had opened up the storehouse. There were a lot of boxes in it that contained a lot of odds and ends, like gardening tools, things for fixing up minor problems around the house like burst pipes and torn walls, and the little broken machines that Shirou liked to fiddle with now and then when he didn't think Kiritsugu knew about it. Somehow it seemed appropriate to keep those last things here, in the place where Irisviel had once lay waiting to make her final sacrifice for Ilya's sake and that of the world…where Maiya had died…in its way, the storehouse had become a mausoleum, a shrine rather like the irises for Irisviel.
For a moment, it hurt just to be here, to let his dark eyes fall on the magic circle where Irisviel had lain in order to sustain herself for as long as possible before she assimilated into the Grail…that circle that was now fading and looking like nothing more than someone's odd attempt at playing at witchcraft….
Would it even still work…?
He doubted it….
Oh Iri….
"Jii-san…?"
Kiritsugu looked over at his son looking up at him, and his resolve returned.
"Okay, Shirou: let's get to work. Eh?"
"All right. Where should we start?" Shirou was already rolling up his kimono sleeves, and then he gasped when he saw Kiritsugu notice the spoils of his dissecting an old toaster oven.
When he looked over at his son, Shirou fiddled with is kimono sleeves. "I found it…and…I thought maybe…I could fix it…you know…so we could have toast…."
Kiritsugu chuckled softly. "You know we can just buy a toaster oven, right?"
"But I like being able to fix things," Shirou admitted.
"Is that so?"
"Yeah. I…get this feeling for them…you know? Like…I don't know…I just know what to do after just a little bit of tinkering."
"Ah." Kiritsugu stroked his chin and studied his son a moment, and then he hunkered down beside the gutted toaster oven and invited Shirou to sit beside him. "Then that's where we'll start. I think you have a little more potential than I would have previously supposed."
"What, because I've never done anything like this before?"
"Well, yes, but that's nothing to be ashamed of. To begin with, what gives people the ability to perform magic is something called 'Magic Circuits'."
"'Magic Circuits'?"
"Yes. They are similar to the nerves in your nervous system. You've been learning about that in school, haven't you? The nervous system?"
"Uh-huh."
"Well, Magic Circuits are similar, a 'psuedo-nervous system', if you will, and come from a person's soul. Normally, they merely act as paths that convert Life Force into magical energy—or 'mana'—but humans qualified as mages learned to control this phenomenon, in order to perform magic. That's the basics of it anyway. It gets exceedingly complicated from there, particularly where the bit about the 'Life Force' is concerned." Kiritsugu couldn't help a private chuckle at the brief look of confusion on Shirou's face, as he remembered Norikata Emiya trying to explain all of this in more depth to him when he'd been even younger than Shirou.
Of course he'd proven himself to be a quick, agile learner, but even back then, carrying on the Emiya family legacy of altering the flow of time and the like hadn't been a terribly important thing in young Kiritsugu's mind, which carried its own kind of irony as his spells for innate time control had proved to have been of great use, particularly during the Fourth Grail War.
Kiritsugu went on. "In any case, for what I'll be able to teach you, that's the extent of what you need to know as far as putting magecraft to practical use."
Shirou wore a frown of focus as he listened to this, and then, after a moment, said, "Okay. I think…I understand. Does that mean then…that I have these…Magic Circuits?"
"If you do, you would have very few, since you're just beginning. Normally, the strength and number of Magic Circuits increases with each generation, so…as a first-generation, essentially, you would have very few indeed."
"I see…."
"That and Magic Circuits are not considered…normal…so most people don't even have them. But I sense you might have a couple we might be able to 'wake up', though I warn you, it'll hurt a little."
"How can you sense that? With your magic?"
"In a way. I sense…traces of mana…and mana potential…and the fact that you say you have this certain 'feeling' about the construction of things gives me an idea. Initially, I was going to get a feel for what you might be capable of—every mage is different, you see—but you've already given us a good starting point. This 'feeling' you get, could very well be something like what Magic Circuits you might possess kind of…twitching…like they're being compelled to wake up, but can't seem to. I can help with that though."
Kiritsugu picked up a small metal rod that Shirou had extracted from the toaster oven.
"With that in mind," he explained as Shirou took the rod, "I think we can actually start with a little something mages call…'reinforcement'. Very basic, but very useful, as its purpose is to strengthen an object's capabilities, like making a light bulb shine brighter, or this metal rod stronger in composition."
Shirou held the rod upwards like a sword for a moment, and then horizontally, an end gripped in each hand. He closed his eyes when Kiritsugu asked him what could he tell him about the object, and he very haltingly described a few guesses at what the rod was made of, but Kiritsugu didn't doubt that he wasn't far off the mark.
When Shirou opened his eyes again, Kiritsugu had this sense too that they were on the threshold of something, so he wanted to tell his son one last thing before they stepped over that threshold.
"Now remember, Shirou…if this is the path you choose…if you forget everything else, at least remember this: mages who use their magecraft for their own selfish ends, bring nothing but destruction. Do you understand?"
"Yeah, that sounds about right," Shirou said after only a moment's thought. And then he grinned. "But you don't have to worry about that, jii-san. I only want to help people, like you do. Nothing more. I don't care if I don't become the most powerful mage in the world…I only want to learn what I can, and even if it isn't much, as long as I have two legs that work, as long as I can breathe and my heart beats, I won't let what I can do, even if it's very little, go to waste."
Very briefly, Kiritsugu felt a lump rise up in his throat, to hear Shirou speak such words that were beyond his years in their wisdom, and yet with that same kind of naivety of youth.
Just like Irisviel.
From there, Kirtsugu could no longer feel any doubt anymore concerning teaching his son magecraft like this. Solemnly, he nodded, and said, "Okay. Then let's wake up those Circuits, shall we? In order to do that, you have to do something that's like making a very quick pact, thus opening those circuits. What you do, is you come up with a phrase to call out whenever you wish to employ a particular ability. For reinforcement magic, there are few choice turns of phrase, but it's best if you always come up with a spell—also called an 'aria'—of your own. Making magic personal makes it that much more powerful and effective, because it belongs to you and you alone."
"I see," said Shirou, and Kiritsugu watched as he set down the metal rod on the ground and traced the length of it with his fingertips as he thought. "Hmmmm…how about…mmm…'trace'…? 'Trace'…trace…trace…trace…on…?"
So things went on from there. Kiritsugu did his best to teach Shirou reinforcement magic, and even though Shirou showed potential for taking it even to the level of producing what were called 'projections'—exact copies of real life objects materialized by magic—he did advise against it purely on such an endeavor's lack of practicality. Besides, what little Shirou managed to project was purely and literally hollow, only like the original on the outside. Really, it would only do him any good if he managed what was considered virtually insurmountable and projected something well enough that it was only degrees below the original's quality simply by its being a copy, and at the same time coupled with the ability of producing such things on an infinite, unlimited scale.
But that would just be an insane waste of energy.
Other than that, Shirou showed true grit in his practice time, grinding his teeth against the pain of awakening his Circuits and feeding bits of mana through them. At first, Kiritsugu felt a knot in his stomach at seeing his son deal with that, thinking too much of what terrible torments he knew Ilya must be undergoing, as she was basically what Jubstacheit had called "a human-shaped cluster of Magic Circuits", but somehow, seeing Shirou overcome such things made it easier to bear.
True, there wasn't much else Kiritsugu could do, not just because of his failing physicality and the disrepair of his own Magic Circuits, but also because, as Shirou was not his biological son, he couldn't do anything like pass his Magic Crest onto him when his time came to die. But even so, he found he was glad he could do at least this much for him.
At the peak of that summer, the two of them went to a festival to see the best fireworks Fuyuki City had to offer. Such things never ceased to enchant Shirou, no less than when the fireflies lit up and rose up out of the grass in their illuminated courtships.
As the two of them cut through a path in the pond in the trees on the edge of the festival, Kiritsugu did his best not to imagine Ilya at his side in a little yukata, eagerly calling out, "Look, Kiritsugu, it's the starbugs!" and he replying, "Yes, indeed Ilya! Do you remember the word in Daddy's language for them?" and she answering, "It's…hotaru…right?" and he praising her, "That's right!" before scooping her up and lifting her on his shoulders, the both of them laughing.
Then he realized that there was no one walking beside him, and he stopped and turned around, and found Shirou had stopped too, a ways back. The boy was looking after him, as if spellbound by something.
Kiritsugu found his smile for him again. "Shirou? Everything all right?"
Shirou blinked and then called out, "It's fine! I'm coming!" And he hurried to catch up to his father.
Kiritsugu waited until his son reached him, and then the two of them continued side by side along the path over the pond.
"The fireflies are lighting up the water so bright that the pond looks like a piece of the starry sky," Shirou marveled.
Though Kiritsugu was again bittersweetly reminded of Ilya's calling them 'starbugs', he didn't fall apart. He was floating peacefully along in his daily life now, despite what pain he still carried in his heart. It was all he could do to manage it from one day to the next anymore.
"Ah, I completely agree with you, Shirou. It's a very lovely image, isn't it?"
"It almost makes me wish sometimes…that the night would stay forever…."
"But as fate would have it, dawn will always come."
"Yeah. But that's a good thing too. Because then dawn chases away night's darkness."
Kiritsugu looked over at his son and then grinned. "What do you know? I think there might be a poet trying to climb out of you, Shirou," he teased.
"What?" Shirou looked genuinely bewildered. "No, that can't be. I'm just making observations."
"Well, you are very perceptive. About some things, anyway."
"What's that supposed to mean?" Shirou grumbled.
But Kiritsugu only laughed in genuine amusement for an answer.
And there it was again, at long last: that same precious golden feeling that Kiritsugu had felt in the time he'd spent with Irisviel and Ilya, as the silver moon shined above, as though watching over the two of them.
