Shoji and the Field of Memories
CHAPTER 19 - The Truth Will Out
(The Bangkok Institute, Thailand)
Thunder crashed overhead like a train wreck; rain pouring down in a squall on Sho's head, streaming off his brows, nose and chin. He could taste the bitter, metallic water passing over his lips, stray strands of inky black hair sticking to his face and neck, and his body felt heavy under the weight of his waterlogged clothes.
Blinking through droplets he saw a wall of stacked smoke ahead of him, rising like a Titan from the ground all the way into the clouds. Flames were spilling out from cracks in the smoke and surging skyward through the wind and rain. The fire burned so brightly it lit the surroundings like daylight. Sho felt the immense heat washing over him and raised his arm to shield his face.
He stepped backward and felt himself collide with a body. When he turned around he saw Filly standing there, her eyes wide. She looked at him through the rain and blinding heat and mouthed something he could not hear over the roar of the storm. He reached for her but she disappeared in a flash of sparkling gold light. He swung back around to the wall of smoke and saw her standing just feet away from the flames. Embers flew past her silhouette already licking the edges of her wild gold hair.
She was facing away from him, her head turned to the side so that her profile was just visible in the blinding light. Sho called out in the loudest cry he could rally but his voice melted away in the blasts of thunder. He reached up for his blades but found they weren't there. He tried to run toward her but his legs remained stationary in the wet earth where he stood. Sho watched in horror as Filly turned her face away and walked forward, the smoke wrapping around her until the fire engulfed the last flapping shred of her charred dress—
"Sho! Hey, Sho! Wake up, you're dreaming," Sho heard as he awoke with the blinding light of the fire leaving phosphines in his eyes. He regained his focus and saw Kevin standing beside his bed, still in his sleep wear, one hand firmly gripping Sho's shoulder.
"Are you alright? You were shouting so loudly I heard you from the other room." Kevin stood up straight and looked at Sho worriedly. Sho sat up and untangled the paisley sheet from around his legs.
"I'm fine, it was just a nightmare." He wiped the sweat from his forehead back into his hair and ran his fingers through the long black strands. "Sorry to wake you up."
"Naw man, it's fine. I wasn't sleeping well either," Kevin replied kindly.
There was a small knock at the door. Sho and Kevin both turned as it clicked and swung open slowly, revealing Shadowhunter Theera who soundlessly slipped inside. He held a finger to his lips to infer silence and beckoned Sho to come with him.
Sho nodded toward Kevin but Theera shook his head shortly. Sho glared at him conveying his insistence.
Theera's eyes darted from Sho to Kevin and finally nodded. He turned and slipped out the door. Kevin and Sho exchanged confused glances but quickly followed him out of the room, their bare feet slipping silently on the dark wood floors.
Sho guessed it was quite late at night as the halls were vacant. There were lamps spread along the way that cast their long shadows over the walls. They passed through the main lobby and an unlocked door down two flights of service stairs. The hallways were more constrictive down in the lower levels and the stone floor was worn from years of use.
Theera pulled out a heavy ring of keys to open another door that led them into a pitch-black hallway. It was so narrow they had to pass single-file into the darkness, Kevin looking over his shoulder at Sho to confirm their willingness to continue on this unexpected, late night venture. The padding of their feet on the cold stone floor reverberated off the walls like light rain as they slipped deeper and deeper into the shadows.
After a short while they saw light as Theera opened yet another old door. He motioned them into a room that resembled a sort of storm shelter or wine cellar. The walls were lined with shelves stuffed with scrolls and large folders spilling papers and wood blocks over the edges. Sealed crates were stacked against the far wall collecting dust. In the center of the small room there was a simple wood table with a few tall candles placed in the center on a metal plate.
Damyun was seated on the far side of the table with candles casting their light on his stern expression. Bella stood behind him with her long hair resting in heavy ringlets against her chest. She had her hands clasped low in front of her, ever the picture of decorum, but her face betrayed her collected air. She was looking at Sho with a sorrowful expression that worried him.
"P̄hm bxk khuṇ thī ca nả k̄heā xyū khn deīyw," Damyun said in steady Thai.
"Mạn pĕn phī chāy k̄hxng k̄heā," Theera responded flatly.
"Ok, what the hell is going on?" Kevin asked in an exasperated tone. He held his arms out casually, welcoming an answer from any of them.
"Don't look at me," said Sho, "I'm just as much in the dark as you."
"I've brought you here," Damyun looked to Sho and motioned for him to sit at the seat to his left, "because I have found some answers to the questions regarding your mother."
Sho froze for a second then carefully made his way to the table. He was hyper aware of the eyes on him and did his best to hide the torrent of emotions that crowded his head at the possibility of knowing more about his mother.
Damyun looked at Kevin and continued. "If you should wish to hear this news privately…"
"No," Sho answered quickly, "Kevin is my parabatai, he stays." He pulled out the small stool and sat down, his arms resting on the table in anticipation. Kevin was standing with his arms crossed at the table across from Damyun, and Theera played sentry at the door.
"Very well then," said Damyun. He nodded to Bella who turned and picked a small wooden chest from the shelf behind her. Though she seemed delicate, Sho noticed she handled the heavy chest with ease as she placed it on the table in front of her husband. She gently touched his shoulder for a moment as Damyun lifted the cover, shuffling through two rows of identical books. They looked like leather-bound journals.
Damyun pulled one out and flipped back the worn cover where Sho saw the contents were hand written in messy, scrawling Thai. Damyun flipped through until he found the page he was looking for and slid his fingers down the paper, taking a deep breath.
"Alright, so you may already know that Institute Heads, such as myself and your own Sone-san in Tokyo, keep detailed records of our time in charge of the region. These records I have here belonged to the Bangkok Head thirty-five years ago. He kept a pretty detailed account of his time here, including the time that your mother was living in the Institute."
He glanced up at Sho who was trying hard to keep his face void of expression. Finally, he was going to have some answers. It seemed his early impression of the stoic-faced shadowhunter may have been unfounded after all.
Damyun looked down at the papers and continued. "The Head was also kind of a traditionalist and from his tone we can pretty much infer he didn't care for your mother. It seems she had a rebellious nature, sneaking out in the evenings and smuggling various Downworld items into her room. She was lightly reprimanded a few times but that seems to be the extent of it. She was sent to Alicante for her final training exams when she was seventeen and that was the last that the Head wrote of her for some time; over seven years."
Damyun placed the journal back in the chest and pulled out another, flipping through the faded pages on the table.
"Here the records talk about bumping into her again at a Clave gathering in Alicante with her new husband, Ichiro." He paused and leaned back looking at Sho, "I'm assuming that's your father?"
Sho shifted uncomfortably. "Yes, that's my father's name. He died when I was nine."
Damyun nodded and looked back at the pages. "It seems that she was living in Alicante with your father by then. She was pregnant with you at the time, which we know because the Head mentions not much later that it's a shame they didn't give you a Thai name."
Kevin snorted at that but Sho was contemplative. He had secretly wondered the same thing himself. Damyun finished reading the page and put the journal back, pulling out the very last leather-bound book.
"Toward the end of his time here in Bangkok the Head wrote of the dishonor your mother brought to the Institute. He described, at length, the actions your mother took to get her marks removed and herself banished from Alicante and among the Shadowhunters."
He looked up one last time in hesitation, his hands still on the unopened journal. Sho felt the weight of his gesture and leaned away from the table, preparing himself for whatever terrible news those pages held within them. He could see Kevin swaying eagerly to his left and Bella standing quietly looking at the floor behind her husband's chair.
"And?" he prompted.
Damyun cleared his throat before continuing. "Your mother was banished for refusing to follow direct orders and for harboring the identity of a half-breed Shadowhunter child. This was about a year after you were born. Thisula was ordered, along with a special team of Clave-appointed Shadowhunters, to assassinate a faerie who had killed two young human children. The faerie's name was Ròs-chraobh and due to other prior offenses against the Clave, as well as the deaths of these humans, they had decided to… do away with him."
"Seems about right," Kevin mumbled under his breath. Theera huffed his agreement by the door.
"Your mother refused to go on the mission. When they interrogated her on her dissidence she confessed Ròs-chraobh was her former lover and that they had a child together who was living with the fairfolk-"
"Woah! What was that?" Kevin exclaimed.
"Just as I said," Damyun sighed "Thisula had developed a relationship with a faerie prior to meeting Sho's father and the two had kept the existence of their offspring a secret. Though, I imagine the Faerie Court knew of the whole thing and had never felt inclined to share that information with the Clave…"
"Well yea, why would they?" Kevin said in a nervous laugh. "They don't have to tell us anything if they don't want to. They love to keep their secrets and revel in any melodrama they can cook up-"
"Kevin," Sho said in a low voice.
Kevin stopped his rant before it could really get going and crossed his arms tightly over his chest again. Sho could feel his parabatai's eyes on him and tried to ignore it and process the story that was being presented to him.
"When the Clave went to retrieve the child and apprehend Ròs-chraobh," Damyun continued "they discovered your mother had tipped them off and helped them to escape. The Shadowhunters hunted them down and in the fight that ensued, your mother was captured but both Ròs-chraobh and the child were killed."
Damyun stared at his hands folded on the table, unable to look up and meet Sho's gaze. Sho realized he was gripping his fists so tightly that the blood had stopped circulating in his cold fingers. He felt a deep pounding behind his ears and heat rising in his chest and face.
He couldn't place the emotions coursing through him. He was angry with himself for assuming his mother had done something as unforgivable as murder. Not that her actions were blameless. To keep a Shadowhunter child, even a half-breed, from the Clave and to betray official orders was strictly against Shadowhunter code, akin in ways to treason. And to have a child out of wedlock or to have an affair with a Downworlder was taboo even now, so he could only imagine what it was like back then.
But what the faerie had done, to kill humans, that was just plain blasphemous and morally reprehensible.
It was no wonder his mother's name had been stripped from the books. It also explained why his father never talked of her. The shame it must have brought him and his family name would have been disastrously harsh, especially by Japanese Shadowhunter standards which were steeped in highly regarded tradition. No doubt he didn't want Sho mentioning his mother for fear of the prejudice it would bring him, and the Clave sending him to Tokyo would have been a way to keep him out of Alicante where he may have found out the truth.
So, it was likely Liam had known all along and had no plans to inform Sho.
No one said anything for a long while. Sho's eyes darted around as he tried to piece together the story in his mind. His mother had taken a lover, a faerie at that. It wasn't unheard of but rare, and certainly frowned upon by most Shadowhunters. They had a child, and for whatever reason had kept its identity a secret from the Clave. And when forced to relinquish the child into Shadowhunter custody his mother had instead helped them to flee, which ultimately resulted in their deaths.
Four lives lost all together. But one of them had shared Sho's blood.
"The child, do the journals mention a name?" Sho asked dryly.
Damyun leaned forward slightly. "Her name was Caladium. She was five years old when it happened."
Sho felt Kevin's hand on his shoulder as he stared through Damyun's eyes, not seeing anything ahead but an orange blur from the candlelight.
"I had a sister," Sho mumbled. He thought of what Shakara had asked when they first met. She had wanted to know if Sho had faerie blood in him. It turns out it was not Sho that was part faerie, but an older sister whom he would never know.
"It means 'Great Joy', Caladium," Belle added softly. "She must have been very loved."
"Not loved enough to unite her with her own kind," Kevin said bitterly.
"It's not surprising considering your mother's tenuous relationship with the Clave that she didn't want her child to be raised a Shadowhunter," Damyun stated. "It was only decided recently that half-breed children would be allowed to choose where their allegiance lay, when they were old enough."
"My sister never got that chance," Sho said sadly. The mix of harsher emotions had pulled back like the tide and now he was left with the dark and heavy sands of sadness. He grieved for a sister he would never know and a mother who had risked ever seeing her son again in order to save her daughter. He pitied his father who had kept a picture of his beloved wife all those years, loving her and cherishing his memories in secret.
"Hey, how did they know it was Ròs-chraobh that killed those humans?" Kevin asked.
"According to the journal, the Unfaerie King and Faerie Queen admitted to his wrongdoing and sanctioned his death as a way of placating the unsteady relationship between the fair folk and the Clave. Apparently, the human children had been trespassing in a sacred place called Cairn Gluze near St. Just.. The cairn is located on a faerie path, an ancient kind of faerie road. The children picked some stones from the walls of a funerary circle and when Ròs-chraobh discovered them he killed them, presumably in anger over the desecration of the site."
Damyun sighed heavily. "It seems at least Caladium's death was an accident by all accounts."
Sho scowled and rubbed his temples with the bottom of his palms. "Liam should have told me. Someone should have said something as soon as we knew my mother was behind this. How can her motives not be an important factor in this fight?"
He couldn't sit any longer. He pushed the stool back and stood up, pressing his closed fists on the table, his long hair falling around his face.
"Who else knows about this?" he asked severely.
"No one beyond this room. I'm not even sure if Liam or anyone on the Clave Council knows," Damyun said, staring up at Sho.
"He must know, the guy is more organized than anyone I've ever met," Kevin grunted.
"We wanted you to be the one to decide if this information should be shared," Bella added gently.
Sho nodded to himself, his eyes feeling heavy and his mind foggy with the strain of all the information. "Thank you both for searching for answers and finding them for me." He looked over at them and stood up straight, resting his arms at his side. "I'm not sure if everyone needs to know about my mother's betrayal. It might create more strain and dig up prejudices that are better left buried. But I will tell the rest of our group, I trust them. And I would encourage you to share this story with your Shadowhunters. They deserve to know why Aom and the others died for this fight."
Damyun stood up at that and extended his hand to Sho. Sho grasped his wrist and they locked gazes for a moment in understanding and a newfound respect. Bella held Damyun's shoulder and the woeful expression fell from her face, replaced with a small, kind smile.
"You will always have a home at the Bangkok Institute, Shadowhunter," she said assuredly.
Sho forced himself to return her smile and then turned from the table. If he could only get back to his room he could sleep off the heaviness in his chest, he was sure. Kevin had backed up beside the door and stood with his hands linked and resting on top of his head. He looked to Sho for their next move with a patient and open face.
Sho walked to the door and Theera opened the latch for them to exit. Kevin followed Theera out of the room and into the dark hall with Sho taking up the rear. Bella and Damyun remained behind. They were standing together, whispering in hushed voices. Sho lowered his gaze and closed the door behind him.
Once a few yards down the narrow stone passage Sho heard the footsteps stop ahead of him and felt Kevin turn back to face him. He stood there in the pitch black and waited for his parabatai to say something but there was only silence. Then the shuffling of feet and he felt himself being embraced by Kevin's muscular frame. Kevin's arms reached around him and held his head to his shoulder. Sho could smell the sweat on his shirt and the same sweet, floral scent of the Institute's shampoo.
Kevin didn't say anything, but let out one long, heavy sigh and squeezed Sho tightly. In the strength of his brother's embrace Sho buried his face and with a shuddering breath, silently wept.