For a moment, Mitsuhide's hands almost shake as he lifts up the bowl, eyes a bit on Kiki before him, before he passes it over, watches when she picks it up, looks at it quietly as if she's examining the tea that he's just made. And Mitsuhide's half-sure that his life is caught in that weird mix of difficulty that follows Samurai everywhere.
And then Kiki turns the bowl, carefully she lifts it up and takes a sip. And when she smiles after that first sip, Mitsuhide feels a little less awkward, a little less lost. Just he isn't sure when or how something's going to happen that might lead to his death. It's not like he's well liked at the moment.
And she sets down the bowl, and the Matcha's gone, and there's just a hint of relief as Mitsuhide takes the offered bowl back, just to clean things up. And Kiki enjoys the treat that he'd baked earlier, that he'd worked hard on making.
He's the host right now, and he's supposed to be relaxed, but all the lines feel like a script. And the familiarity of the steps of a tea ceremony feel terrible, like he's caught in an endless time loop that he can't escape from.
But Kiki looks relatively calm, and Mitsuhide's trying to absorb her calm, to let it transfer into him. And it's quiet, the tea ceremony seems frustratedly quiet, but he knows the lines and knows the silence well, and he's just trying to be a good host, even though he feels his heart racing mile after mile after mile a minute, and even though as he finishes cleaning up, he feels terribly sick and a little bit faint.
Kiki's eyes are on him, even as she goes through the usual lines of gratitude, and Mitsuhide for a moment, feels like she really, really means these words. And he tucks them away in his heart, memorized lines given real and genuine feeling. And as they slowly leave the tea room, Mitsuhide feels weight slowly fall off his chest.
He needs to put his armor back on, and Kiki, a woman who seems like every bit the common lady in Japan, will adorn herself with armor and truly follow the transformation from common lady to samurai, a transformation that Mitsuhide knows she's grateful for.
"It will be alright." Kiki tells him, resting a hand on his shoulder, and Mitsuhide tries to breathe that encouragement right into his veins.
"They're angry." He tells her, "And I don't know when they'll strike."
"We can take them on." Kiki tells him, and for the moment hidden by a particularly large tree in his garden, Kiki leans up and gives him a kiss, and Mitsuhide practically melts under her support.
If she wasn't also a Samurai, Mitsuhide wonders if they'd be able to marry. He doubts her father would approve of her marrying a samurai, in the same sense that he isn't entirely sure her father knows that she is one.
Kiki's never clarified who knows, and it might just be Mitsuhide who is aware of the truth. He hopes that they have a long time together and that no samurai attack them, and yet, he feels as skittish as if he's walking into his first fight.
"I've got you." And she smiles so confidently that Mitsuhide suddenly believes her.