| Chapter 10 |

Kochoushu skips in the next day just as Shizuka is leaving for work. She passes him at the gate, chuckling.

"Well? How was it?" she asks Watanuki, guessing he will turn funny colors.

As expected, Watanuki reddens. "I have no idea what you're talking about."

Kochoushu snickers. Watanuki folds his arms and clears his throat. "Setting that aside, you need to meet with your new teacher."

"So do you have something to teach me before then?" Kochoushu bobs a curtsy.

Watanuki gives her the side-eye, and Kochoushu subsides. "Yes, I do have something to teach you. Go wait out on the porch, I have to fetch something from that finicky storeroom."

Kochoushu skips onto the porch and kicks her feet over the side until Watanuki comes back.

"There are some lessons the Sakurazukamori should expect you to already know," says Watanuki. "So I want to prepare you. First, the most basic type of divination. Second, your sigil. Third..." He gazes at her; his fingers ghost over the lid of the box at his side. "...I haven't decided yet."

Kochoushu tucks her bangs behind her ear. "All right."

"I want you to close your eyes and listen. Then tell me the first thing that sticks out to you among all the rest of the noises. Something that seems significant. Sit or stand still, the most important thing is to meditate."

"Sounds easy. But how will I know that what I get is significant?"

"I said it was basic," Watanuki tells her. "The basics are often more useful than you might imagine. As for how we know what is significant: we ask a question first. And then we accept the answer that comes."

Kochoushu wrinkles her nose.

"Just try it," Watanuki encourages her. "Hitsuzen is the idea that all things come about for a reason, as a result of what has happened in the past—affecting all choices and intentions—and that this moment is inevitable as the culmination of all those things. Thus nothing occurs by chance. What magic can do is to manipulate hitsuzen to some degree in order to interpret it, to trace a strand of reality back to its origins, for instance, or implant an idea in the supernatural realm that will guide reality towards a reflective response."

"But we're just listening and asking. Nothing will hear us," Kochoushu objects.

"Because we are performing a kind of divination, the effect of that action is to garner insight. The goal is not to change the future of the world, but to hold a mirror to the future upon which the present has currently set its course. We ask a question. The response is usually metaphorical or open to interpretation, but valid. All that is required is that you trust that all the elements that are present today are here for a reason, and part of that reason is to inform your divination."

Kochoushu thinks about this. "So you don't ask yes-no questions, when you do this."

"No. Open-ended ones, yes. Should I provide an example?" asks Watanuki.

Kochoushu nods.

"In my first divination, I was not listening for any reason in particular — so the result could have been anything — I listened and heard of a person who was important to me, though I didn't know it at the time. The second time I used the technique, I wanted to select my sigil. I heard the chirp of a bird, and it so happened that some very dear guests had appeared with one."

"Huh." Kochoushu looks thoughtful.

"I would suggest that you also try listening for your sigil," Watanuki prompts her.

Kochoushu nods again, frowning. "I just ask the question, close my eyes, and listen?"

"Yes."

"For however long until I get my answer?"

"Yes."

"This is going to take forever," Kochoushu complains, and draws her long legs back up onto the porch so she can sit crosslegged. Kochoushu catches Watanuki speculative look and sweeps back her hair. "Well? Are you going to stare at me the whole time?"

"No, of course not," says Watanuki, smiling faintly. "Are you ready?" He turns to leave.

"I'm fine, so leave already! I'll call you when I'm done!"

"That's it, then. Do your best." Watanuki slides open the porch door and re-enters the shop.

Kochoushu sighs and centers herself, then closes her eyes. What is the form my sigil should take?...

A breeze goes by.

In her mind she attaches herself to it, and attunes.

Watanuki's garden remains expectant and still.

After waiting fifteen minutes leaning against the doorpost, Watanuki gives it up. If it has taken her this long, Kochoushu won't be done anytime soon. For all her complaints, she is tenacious. Just like her predecessor.

Having forecast the general outlines of the future that morning, Watanuki knows there won't be customers for a few more hours. Watanuki disappears into the kitchen to prepare—meals, snacks, seasonal foods. He never knows when he will need them for barter. And besides, Kochoushu would surely be hungry when she was finished.

He finishes putting the first batch of pastries in the oven and leaves the kitchen to check in on Kochoushu. Somehow, though it has been almost an hour, she's still awake.

Watanuki feels a tiny bit jealous. He supposes he has always been lucky to get answers to his divinations fairly quickly—he seems to have some skill with them—but whenever the answer doesn't come easily for some reason, he struggles not to fall asleep. Time that had been standing still passes almost too quickly while he dreams, although in the dreaming state he is usually able to get the task done. That Kochoushu hasn't succumbed yet seems to indicate that she has a very disciplined mind already.

...So Watanuki checks in another half an hour later. She's still awake.

Watanuki receives his first customer and loses himself in the role of the Shopkeeper: courteous, fair and distant, unflappable. The customer is unusually cautious and quickly gains Watanuki's genuine respect. It takes almost an hour to work out the details and let the customer describe what he wants, but finally Watanuki grants his first wish of the day. When he is done, Watanuki allows himself to be pleased and satisfied with the result; this trade is one of the rare few that will pan out auspiciously. It is nice to see.

The customer bows and leaves. Watanuki realizes that in the midst of his Shopkeeper duties he forgot entirely about Kochoushu and he rushes back out to the porch. He is too hasty and the sliding door judders loudly.

"I thought I told you not to disturb me," Kochoushu mumbles into her arms which are wrapped around her knees. Her brow is perfectly smooth, but her tone is frustrated.

"That may be so, but as your teacher, I think it is time to take a short break," Watanuki tells her calmly. "You did very well. Let's regroup. Perhaps if we try something else, it will work better. Besides, I'm sure you're getting hungry..."

Kochoushu huffs a little, but she gets up to follow Watanuki into the kitchen. Of course, all is forgiven once she has a cup of Watanuki's warm, gold-sweet coffee with a few of Watanuki's pastries. She even squeals over those.

Watanuki makes a mental note that Kochoushu prefers coffee to tea and chuckles to himself. Kids these days. Then he laughs at himself for thinking such a thing. He's not supposed to be that old. He casts his mind back. Yuuko's favorite drink was...but of course, he's not letting her anywhere near the saké. Not for a million years. He will not be responsible for the consequences.

Finally he returns to the task at hand. "So tell me what your experience with the divination was like, Kochoushu."

She shrugs. "Nothing stood out to me. So I just waited."

"Hm. Ideally, this type of divination should be the most quick," Watanuki comments, resting his chin on his hand and leaning on the table. "Half an hour, at most. Ten minutes on average."

"Why didn't you stop me?" said Kochoushu, outraged. "Sensei!"

"There was always a chance you were simply going slow." Watanuki shrugs. "And you seemed determined."

Kochoushu scowls.

"I won't let you do it next time," Watanuki promises. "I just wanted to see how you would do, and then you were doing so well, I didn't want to stop you. I reckoned it was a good opportunity to get some idea of your limits. But honestly, I'm not some kind of Zen master, and you shouldn't need to work that hard. Understand?"

Kochoushu shrugs again, skeptically.

"You'll see. What else can you describe?"

"A lot of breeze? Maybe butterflies?" Kochoushu cocked her head. "It didn't feel right. That wasn't the answer. Maybe it was there, but I couldn't perceive it without my sight."

Well...huh. Maybe there was some kind of interference. Or perhaps she needed a different kind of input.

"Perhaps listening isn't telling you what you need to know," Watanuki says slowly. "You should try open up each of your senses in turn. Yes. Taste, smell, touch, sight, and hearing, and...balance. If you can concentrate with your eyes open, then use your eyes. Think about what is there, and also what is not."

Kochoushu blinks. Balance?

"Try that for up to half an hour and come back to me. Let the answer grow in your mind until it manifests. I never said it had to come all at once, and it very well might come from inside rather than outside, although that is how it is traditionally done." Watanuki nods to himself. "Try that. Internalize the world around you."

Thinking back over his words, he became more and more certain. Most mages needed to learn how to let the world in, or to keep it out. But Kochoushu wasn't just any mage; she was sure to become the Dimensional Witch. She needed different handling. She would fully comprehend the whole, encompass her sense of place...which made more sense. To add in what was missing or what was out of place, rather than what was present, would tell her most.

"The bees," says Kochoushu shortly, without preamble, sliding open the screen door and walking straight into the meeting between Watanuki and his customer.

"The bees?" Watanuki asks, with keen interest, after sparing a glance at his customer, who was staring at them both open-mouthed.

"Yes. There are birds and butterflies, but there aren't any honeybees in the garden!"

Oh.

So he had been right. "If you would excuse me for a moment?" Watanuki says to the customer, a patient older man with humorous crows feet at the corners of his eyes, and then Watanuki stands and steps back from the bargaining table. "My student requires my attention. We were actually in the middle of lessons when you called..."

"No, not a problem at all," says the customer, smiling patiently, and Watanuki and Kochoushu withdraw to the next room.

"Show me!" Watanuki commands her, so Kochoushu seizes his wrist and drags him to the porch. "Look!" she says, pointing.

"No bees?"

"It's a complete garden, except... How does your garden even get pollinated, Watanuki? I checked and looked back in time and I couldn't find them. Ever! Any of them! Anywhere! Anytime, they were just...gone!"

"I imagine it's the...butterflies," Watanuki says faintly. "Pollinating."

"Not really. But the bees! They were missing!"

"You looked back in time?" he asks.

"Yeah, it's what I do when I mediate," Kochoushu says impatiently.

Watanuki raises his eyebrows. "You didn't tell me earlier."

"Didn't I?" Kochoushu is surprised. She stares at him.

Perhaps it is just so obvious to her that she doesn't realize... Watanuki folds his arms and tucks his hands inside the opposite sleeves. "Maybe you forgot."

Kochoushu shrugs.

Watanuki looks out at the garden again. "Well, it makes more sense now that you've successfully done the divination, I suppose." No wonder she had taken such a long time to meditate the first time, and was cranky when he knocked her out of it. Her method is complicated, but it seems to work. It could be streamlined, however. That's something to work on.

"Your sigil is the bee," Watanuki tries again.

Kochoushu nods, and adds quickly, "Or the wasp!"

"Which do you prefer?" he asks.

Kochoushu bites her lip.

"It could be both," he quickly reassures her. "Keep thinking about the form you want it to take. The divination only takes you to the starting point. It's entirely up to you. Your choice of sigil doesn't have to be entirely real or imaginary." Watanuki jerks his head back to the bargaining room. "Do you want to help me while I'm working?"

"Yes!"

"Good. Come and keep watch."

"That's all?"

"And pay attention."

"Oh..." she tries not to look crestfallen.

"If you weren't meant to play a part, you wouldn't have barged in while I was in the middle of bargaining," says Watanuki wryly. "So do what you feel like. Goodness knows I did that as an apprentice. Be impertinent. Ask questions."

Once again, Kochoushu grins.

Once the customer has left, Watanuki groans and stretches and looks to the clock. "It's already late. We need to get ready; the Sakurazukamori will arrive here soon."

"How do you know?" Kochoushu asks.

"He called last night," Watanuki says, amused. "There are no secrets about the myriad uses of telephones among magic-users, you know." When Kochoushu keeps giving him a confounded look, he quickly musses her hair. "It's nothing mysterious. Your elders are just colluding," he chuckles. "You'll understand when you're our age."

"Oh," Kochoushu says, embarrassed, and ducks out from under his hand. "But you're not even that old, sensei," she mumbles.

Watanuki takes off his glasses and rubs his eyes. Sometimes he forgets she doesn't know. He puts the glasses back on.

"Are you all right?" She squints at him in concern.

He makes the effort to smile at her tiredly. "Just fine." With only a hundred years of difference between my age in years and my appearance in life...

"Okay, then," she says quietly. But he seems suddenly strange and far away...

"I don't think we have time to make more progress, so we will have to leave the rest of the lessons I planned for another time," says Watanuki. "But if he asks you if you can do anything with a shikigami, just tell him you haven't created a vessel for it yet. He might want to lead you through that. Which is why I wanted to get this lesson out of the way."

"Why did you get the box out, sensei?" Kochoushu asks, a little breathlessly. She needs to keep his attention.

"Still haven't decided. I might not even use it," Watanuki replies, and makes to leave, but Kochoushu gulps and snatches his sleeve. "What is it?" Watanuki asks, very gentle.

Kochoushu turns her vaguely unhappy face away from him and shifts from foot to foot. "Hey, Watanuki-sensei," she says in her softest voice, "Have you ever...do you ever get the feeling that...that still waters run deep, that some things that you know have been hidden from you, or that something that has happened before, but you can't remember it? But that...that you aren't acting like yourself as you would if you were encountering something for the first time." She stops, swallowing the rest of her words.

"Kochoushu." Watanuki crouches to stare straight into her eyes. "I promise you, there is nothing wrong with feeling that way."

Her cheeks flame with heat as she breaks eye contact. "I didn't mean it—not like—I'm not ashamed—"

"No. It's true. There's nothing wrong at all. You need to know that." He watches her expressions carefully. "There are things in your past that are beyond your control. There are memories of the body, the soul, and the spirit. And occasionally, they are passed down through more than one generation."

"Then...an ancestor, you mean?" Kochoushu asks, confused, searching his eyes.

Watanuki shakes his head. "Not necessarily. It doesn't matter." I'm not sure about the specifics for you.

"Do—do you know—?" About me? About what this feels like?

The shopkeeper pulls himself up to stand at full height. "I do." Watanuki looks at his hands. "I...because of my past, at some point, I became unable to remember specifics about my childhood. Such as learning to cook. The memory is still a part of me. But I don't remember." Watanuki flexes his hands. "When I cook, in a strange way, I feel that can come just a little closer to what I lost."

"Is that why you love to cook?"

"I..." Watanuki starts. "I, yes. That's why I feel like I must do it. But what I love about it is different; perhaps I know too much, maybe, or the process is routine to me, completely matter-of-fact. I'm not sure. What I learned to love about cooking is seeing the smiling faces of the people who eat...hearing them talk together...and I only had the opportunity once I made friends. That's what makes me happy."

"'Must,'" Kochoushu repeats, mumbling to herself. "Huh."

"Shizuka knows a little about that kind of feeling, too. There's something funny about his family line, maybe even something caused by his family traditions. But you would have to ask him for the details."

Kochoushu nods mutely.

"Was it something about the lesson today?" Watanuki asks her kindly. "What made you wonder all of a sudden?"

Kochoushu turns away, scratching the back of her neck. "Yeah. It was the lesson, sort of. Although I've been doing it all my life, I just..." She shrugs.

"Wanted to ask," Watanuki supplies.

Kochoushu sighs, resetting the hang of her shoulders. "Yeah." Now she doesn't feel like asking the other question. The one about whether she knows Watanuki...or if he once knew someone else like her. It doesn't make sense, for her to want to ask him, because Watanuki is young, but in the back of her mind, the longer they have interacted, the stronger something insists that they were once connected. Nothing makes sense, she just knows what she feels.

"You can ask anytime." Watanuki smiles at her.

Kochoushu wishes she had the courage to be more open, to get everything out of the way, right away.

Before she can reply, they hear the slide of a screen door open. The Sakurazukamori has arrived.

Watanuki exhales. "Ready?" She nods. "Stay strong," Watanuki tells her, and tows her to the door, and smoothly greets the assassin: "Well met, Sakurazukamori."

The Sakurazukamori bows slightly. "Shopkeeper. I have intruded. Ojamashimasu."

"You're very welcome. You came to pick up Kochoushu?"

The Sakurazukamori nods, and says to them both, "We'll just be going for a walk together. At the moment, I would just like us to talk."

Watanuki raises his eyebrows. "I see. We should compare notes sometime."

"If you believe it would be beneficial, certainly. Well then, Kochoushu?"

Kochoushu crosses the threshhold, puts on her shoes, and straightens, ready to go, looking back at Watanuki.

The Sakurazukamori promises, "We'll be back soon, Shopkeeper."

Once they are outside the gates of the wishing shop, the Sakurazukamori stops and turns to face Kochoushu. "I hope you won't be shy with me," the Sakurazukamori says. Now that he is in the daylight, Kochoushu can see that he has beautiful dark eyes and a thin, lanky frame disguised by his great dark coat. "We have a lot to cover. But first, I would like to reintroduce myself. We met in somewhat trying circumstances." He coughs once into black-gloved hands.

Kochoushu makes a confused sound.

The Sakurazukamori holds out his hand and smiles faintly. "Nice to meet you. My name is Subaru Sumeragi. I am a former onmyouji and current assassin known as the Sakurazukamori. Perhaps you know of the legend."

Kochoushu shakes his hand, shakes her head.

"No? Then I must tell you of the oral tradition of our history a while later, Kochoushu-san."

"It must have been...hard," Kochoushu croaks.

"The transition almost killed me." Subaru Sumeragi's mild smile slips away. A graveness replaces it. "Or it would have, if I hadn't already been thoroughly broken. I could have resisted my fate, but then I would have died, and for reasons I can't even explain completely to myself I...chose not to. I continue to exist."

Kochoushu doesn't know what to say. "What should I call you?" she wonders instead, with a sinking feeling that the answer to that question is going to be more difficult than intended.

"Subaru," he replies at last. "I should have told you earlier. Just Subaru. Sakurazukamori is my title, hardly a name, and after all that has happened, I am utterly unworthy to be addressed as a proper Sumeragi."

He is being difficult without meaning to. "Subaru-sensei?" Kochoushu asks uncertainly.

He shrugs indifferently. "I wouldn't want to usurp Watanuki-sama of his privilege. You need not worry about offending me."

"Subaru...san?" she tries tentatively, and it feels wrong. "Subaru-sama?" Even worse. A twinge in Subaru's face tells her it's not right.

"If you wish. It doesn't matter to me," Subaru says.

She ignores him. Every option is inadequate, but Kochoushu will go with the middle ground. "Okay. Subaru-san. What will we be doing today?"

Subaru points to the street. "Walking the city."

"Yeah, but—"

"You'll be my eyes to the past. I want to get some idea of what you can see."

"Like ghosts and spirits and so on?"

"That's included, yes."

"I thought you wanted to train me," Kochoushu objects.

"Assessment comes first. I need some knowledge of your abilities so that I can design and construct wards to hold against you." Subaru sighs. "You realize, I could have killed you yesterday."

"Yes?" is all she says.

Subaru shakes his head.

"It doesn't matter. You have something to teach me. Just tell me some place and I'll deconstruct what I see for you," Kochoushu tells him impatiently.

Subaru scans the road and points.

Kochoushu follows his direction and looks: an ordinary establishment, a grey business type building with an elevator at the bottom and a couple floors. Countless businessmen. Before, an ordinary house painted with pale cream and dark blue edging like an off-white china plate. One family lived there, moved in with their kids roughly twenty years before, and had left when their children went before them. Before that, the same house with brown trim instead, and an elderly couple that had always stayed there. The grandfather was taken away by ambulance. The grandmother died in the house, but had peacefully ascended, leaving no ghost.

Kochoushu relays this to Subaru, and Subaru nods and asks about how far back she could see, and they walk on. The next time, Subaru asks about a group of elderly people (she can't make out very much, just their younger faces—clothes and fashions blur too much); an old, knotted tree (she watches its growth backwards); a rusted car (paint, chips, accidents, this and that family); a small shrine. They also look at different landscapes and buildings about few more times, one of which is haunted, before Subaru feels has enough information to make his own conclusions.

At that point, Subaru sets them both back on the path to return to the wishing shop and begins fiddling with his fingers, and thinking aloud.

"You can look into the past. What about the future?"

"Rarely. A few hours ahead, at most. Too many things are changing."

"That's as may be... But you saw the faces of the elderly couples as they were, younger, yes?"

Kochoushu nods.

"That tells me your abilities are not strictly connected to space and time. Perhaps by force of habit... But those people were moving. They did not stand still. You shouldn't have been able to see any of their past at all, if space limited you."

"Is it—is it a kind of ley line?" Kochoushu pushes the tips of her fingers together.

Subaru looks surprised. "Do you visualize it like that?"

"I'm—I'm not quite sure," Kochoushu answers. "If I have to push for a history, though, there's usually a sort of 'channel' that is easier for me to follow, usually connected with living things; I can follow them backwards or forwards until they are born or they die, or I meet the present time, when they are still making decisions. And at the present, their choices splay out in front of them, like a thousand echoes, reappearing or disappearing as I wait. But it has to be a continuous connection, and when I follow a person, I lose their relationship to the world around them."

Subaru looks thoughtful. "Ah. So that's where the overlap with the Shopkeeper's abilities begins."

"Er, what? Why does that matter?" Kochoushu asks.

"Well, I had been wondering why he decided to take on an apprentice, especially one that appeared to have nothing in common with his specialty area and without ancestry of particular note. That happens very rarely. And you must understand that Watanuki Kimihiro has maintained a reputation for the most powerful dreamseer in Japan since the deaths of Princess Hinoto and her sister Kanoe. Watanuki henceforth took over his predecessor's duties to the inter-world dream network of seers on behalf of the Earth. If Watanuki Kimihiro has the time to train anyone, he must choose a person suitable to take his place. His position demands it."

Kochoushu blinks. She had no idea her teacher was that important.

"Watanuki's abilities are most powerful in the realm of illusion, truth-seeing, mindscape, and information gathering. His methods are the least concrete of all the disciplines—the techniques of balance, often based on careful interpretation of value in barter, and psychic connection, which is notoriously unstable. Partly because of that, he has been able to work from the wishing shop without physically venturing outside, and his powers and skills grew to accommodate the limitation. I will probably never know why exactly he chose to embrace it, but it must have been out of some necessity. From what I hear of his youth, he came from a good bloodline—one that has been wiped out—but he was never particularly ambitious and he was rumored to display no particular aptitude as a psychic. This tells me he did not choose that road for its compatibility with his spirit or a wish to pursue the profession; he had other reasons, and that was the side-effect. Not that the past matters anymore." Subaru hesitates. "The reason this gives me pause is that you would be unable to fully operate with that restriction, and would probably have difficulty with skills that come naturally to him. Mentors do not typically take on apprentices with that much mismatch. Not that it's bad, per se, just unusual."

"Then what does that mean for...?"

Subaru shakes his head. "I'm rambling. Do nothing. You shouldn't worry about the quality of your education. You have an instinctive grasp of 'fate-lines,' possibly also 'psychic traces,' which allow you to transcend both space and time—that's the grounding of your skills. Watanuki will be able to teach you to expand that ability because he has some awareness of it, probably by supplementing it with dreaming techniques. When you're done with your training, you'll actually come out knowing a lot more than the usual student, although it may take longer... My point is, you have enough overlap to explain the interest, and to assure me that the connection will be academically beneficial to you both." It also explains the history. It wasn't only Watanuki's choice of apprentice that made little sense, but Yuuko Ichihara's choice of Watanuki as well. That Kochoushu is Yuuko Ichihara's reincarnation explains much. Subaru wonders if he should keep an eye on the situation. Something isn't right there. Something went very wrong very far in the past.

Subaru clears his throat, and continues more grimly, "It also tells me what areas he needs me to teach you, and what you are likely to know without even trying. Also, how to keep you from stumbling on me while I am on assassin business. I understand your difficulty now."

"Huh?"

"You said you had to remember the way not to find the Sakura rather than the other way around," Subaru explains. "Murder always leaves a hefty psychic spoor around it. It's not surprising that you would be sucked into finding it, then had to learn how to avoid the trail. I should have thought of that years ago, and you took the risk all this time."

Kochoushu shrugs. "It was pretty clear it wasn't a place I was meant to be the first time I found the Blood Sakura."

Subaru says, with feeling, "You were lucky."

"Well, now you know. And I should have been more careful the day we met, but here we are." Kochoushu shrugs. "So what do you do when you're not the Sakurazukamori?"

"You misunderstand. The Sakurazukamori never leaves me." Subaru closes his eyes. "At the same time... Somehow, I'm still a Sumeragi. So I do their business, too, when I can. Not as frequently anymore since I became the entity they were born to be oppose. The Sumeragi clan used to audit all the other magical clans and families in the country and impose and enforce standards of behavior. I suppose they still do, but since I became a blood traitor I am no longer privy to that process. Which partly explains why I was curious about the nature of your apprenticeship, in fact—I apologize."

"Why are you apologizing?" Kochoushu asks.

"Oh— Sharing my many mistaken suspicions and allegations," Subaru replies, tired. "I should have been more careful, but I haven't talked to anyone in such a long time. It doesn't matter."

"What is it like to be both at once? Sumeragi and Sakurazukamori?"

Subaru rubs his forehead. "Like being pulled in two. Normally, the Sumeragi head and the Sakurazukamori would fight for the outcome of that decision. But now, it's...left to my judgment. But I've never—the balance should never have been left to someone like me."

"Why?"

Subaru stalls blankly for a moment. "Because it's a choice that no mortal should ever have to make. Life or death. Afterlife or obliteration. Truth or lies." Subaru glances at her. "In the past, partly out of their upbringing, every new generation of Sakurazukamori became more amoral and scorned the study of good and evil. Truth be told, the Sumeragi have never been too concerned about the justice or mercy in exorcising the spirits of the dead. We don't kill, so we assume we must always have the higher moral ground, and I have come to realize that's not the whole truth, either. There's comfort in being certain that choosing your side will always bring about the right course. But if I consistently chose Sumeragi values though I live as a Sakurazukamori, I would die. I have to think about the outcome of each exorcism, each killing, about to whom I show more kindness and why, whose and what sort of justice I dispense. That much consideration can never be wrested from me unless I deliberately let it go, for I have too much empathy for suffering to leave my decisions up to chance. But in the back of the mind I am always conscious of that damned tree, and feeding it just enough that it sleeps and I do not fall fully under its control. And yet I can never be forgiven for the ethical decisions I have been driven to make."

"Have you ever been controlled by the Sakura?"

Subaru grimaces. "Yes. I've made that mistake. That's the worst of all. I pray I never make it again." He folds his arms and shivers, looking slightly ill.

"Do you remember? What that felt like?"

Subaru shoots her a pained look. "Of course, sometimes. I would prefer if I didn't. Stop asking questions."

So Kochoushu stops. "So what you're saying is, the balance wasn't made for any single person to uphold, let alone someone with sympathies towards one side over the other. It should be a good thing that you, the light side, are in control, isn't it? And yet all this time, for the sake of the many, you've been dying on the inside and beating yourself up over it."

"No." Subaru sighs. "The balance, which is manifested in and driven by the conflict over the hunger of a single blood tree, shouldn't have existed in the first place. It is a self-perpetuating source of corruption, pain, and horror for Japan and a drain on its collective psyche and its resources. Without the so-called balance, the country would find its own way, a way that doesn't wholly or partially rely on spirits of shadow and darkness as it did more than a thousand years ago. Whether Sumeragi or Sakurazukamori—at times, both clans left scars worse than the things we excised. I don't want to go back to the way things were. I just want to abolish the trap I was born into perpetuating and participating in."

"So that is your last and only wish."

"Yes. Only then can I rest."

Help me find the never found. It's in the sky, and in the ground.

And there's no clues they left for us—

As elusive as a snake in the grass, this isn't happiness!

I can feel it as I'm almost there, as it catches my attention.

It's the same in other parts of the world:

And how long will the wilderness last, and will I have to learn the hard way?

Every time I turn, I have to learn the real

(it's the real me thinking it's the real me it's the real me it's the real—!)

—re-arranged/augmented lyrics of "Never Found," by Fancy Colors

Author's Note: I'm sorry for the info-dump. I was just having a really hard time progressing through this chapter, and at the end of it, I feel like Kochoushu doesn't display her personality all that vibrantly. Maybe on a rewrite... What you get instead is a picture of what Watanuki's history and Kochoushu's education is going to look like from the "outside" perspective, and hints that the reality is somewhat more complicated. Also, Kochoushu knows a lot more about what she can do than the average student really should, but she hasn't had any training at all (because Yuuko). But no one can tell her that, so everyone is waiting until she discovers for herself who she really is.