Todoroki Shouko sat in her room, staring out the window from her perch on the window-seat. Her muscles and body ached, and she had a few minor burns below her sleeves that their family doctor had covered with burn salve and bandages after easing them with her Quirk.

The garden down below was beginning to get weeds, and the bushes were getting overgrown. Nobody had touched it in the past two weeks, now that her mother was no longer in the house. None of the staff had permission to, and none of her children had the heart to take it over yet.

Breathing out a sigh, Shouko accidentally frosted over the window. Blinking at the frosted pane of glass, she slowly lifted a hand and used the tip of one fingernail to sketch a lily on the glass - her mother's favorite flower.

Sighing, she turned her attention back to the outdoors, ignoring the slight ache the bright light caused in her left eye.

When it had gotten hurt, she wasn't sure if her father was more furious at the injury or the fact that it had marred her face, impacting future marriage agreements. Either way, he hadn't waited more than a week to start training her again, and he didn't hold back just because her vision was slightly off in that eye, and the sudden pain and slight blurriness threw her off.

Heavy footsteps in the corridor caught Shouko's attention, and her spine automatically straightened as her father paused outside the door.

"Shouko!" he boomed, causing Shouko to wince a little at his volume. Ordinarily, he would have barged in if it were any other room, but her room and her sister's room were the two places where he waited (if not for very long) for confirmation before entering.

"It's open," she called, just loud enough to be heard. The door banged open, and he swept into the room. His eyes swept the space critically, taking in the spotless floor, perfectly made bed, and shining windows. Well, the almost shining windows. Endeavor's eyes paused on the patch of frost and the lily, narrowing.

"Clean that up," he barked, turning his attention back to her. "We're having hiyashi chuuka tonight for dinner and you'll be helping Fuyumi with the preparation. Sunday we'll also be having dinner with a business partner and his wife and daughter, and I expect you to be on your best behavior."

Shouko nodded, knowing that a verbal response from her was neither wanted nor needed. Endeavor nodded sharply, casting a final glance around the room before turning to leave. As he was on his way out he paused and turned back, looking pointedly at her left eye.

"And cover that up before you come down," he said irritably. "Your mother may have ruined your face, but you could stand to do more to make it less noticeable."

Shouko inhaled shakily as her father left the room and banged the door shut behind him. She clenched her hands in her skirt for a moment and took a deep breath as she fought her ice and flames back into control. After a moment, she sighed and unclenched her hands, smoothing out her skirt as she stood and moved towards the vanity in the corner of the room, long hair sweeping out behind her.

She sat down and looked into the mirror directly for the first time since the Incident had happened.

A dark reddish-purple scar stretched across her left eye, blotchy and stark against the pale skin of the rest of her face. Her face stayed blank, even as her aching muscles stayed taut as she reached to grab the bottles of concealer and foundation that were already waiting for her.

Looking herself in the eye through the mirror, she swiped a pale swatch of color across the dark discoloration of her scar.

"Shouko?"

Fuyumi's voice came from behind Shouko, and she gestured towards the small pile of vegetables as she continued to wash a cucumber in the sink.

"We're making hiyashi chuuka, as Father requested," she said evenly, not looking up from her task. Fuyumi hovered for a moment behind her, before moving to begin shredding some of the carrots that had already been washed. Once Shouko was finished with her task, she moved to begin mixing a pickling solution together for some of the veggies.

Her sister moved quickly through the preparation steps - making sure to take any task that could involve a knife since she didn't want Shouko using knives until she was at least ten, she'd said before. Shouko was pretty sure she'd be fine using a knife at seven, but she'd never argued the point with her older sister.

Once the pickling solution was done, she tossed the slices of cucumber in and moved on to cracking eggs into a bowl to whisk together. Fuyumi noticed this and moved to get things ready to fry the eggs. She got out a pan and set it on the stove, twisting the dial to light the flames to begin heating it. At the clicking sound of the lighter and hiss of the gas, Shouko froze. The last time she had been this close to the lit stovetop, her mother had thrown boiling water over her face.

"Shouko? Shouko. Shouko!"

At Fuyumi's voice, she jolted, whipping around to look at the stove, only to see that it had been turned off and her sister was leaned over in front of her. Shouko blinked, confused, before looking directly at Fuyumi for an explanation.

"Oh, Shouko!" her sister gasped, eyes stuck on her face. Her hand reached out slowly to cup Shouko's cheek, gently tipping her face up towards the light. Fuyumi's other hand came up to lightly touch the place where boiling water had scarred her, and Shouko closed her eyes. While the color had been fixed by the makeup left in her room by the maids, the texture was still there, leaving that portion of her face slightly warped and distorted beneath her sister's fingers.

"Father didn't want to see it," Shouko said softly. "This was the best I could do."

There was a moment of silence, and a shaky breath from her older sister, before the hand that had been lightly running over her scarred skin moved to stroke her hair. Shouko opened her eyes to see Fuyumi's eyes filled with tears while a soft, sad smile played about her lips.

"I'll show you some tricks in the morning, for the next time he asks," she promised softly, smoothing some of the color in a little better with her thumb. "But I want you to know that you're beautiful with or without your scar, okay? Father's wrong if he ever tells you any different."

"I know," Shouko said, an unexplainable lump in her throat as she gazed up at her sister. "But I don't care what people see when they look at me. If this makes it harder for Father to pair me off to some stranger, then good. And I'm not embarrassed by the scar, but if he is, then that's his own fault since he made Mom do it."

"Oh, Shouko," Fuyumi sighed, drawing her in for a tight hug, before stepping back. "Alright, how about you go set the table, and when you're done with that, you can finish prepping the vegetables. I'll handle the eggs and noodles, okay?"

Shouko nodded and left the kitchen to do as Fuyumi had requested.

"Kiai! Kiai! Kiai!"

The shouts rang through the room late in the evening, and Shouko paused in her practice to catch her breath. The target was just high enough to be a challenge for her, even with the reach she had with her kicks. Contrary to her expectations when she first began, her martial arts practice was one of her favorite times of the day.

It was relaxing, especially since her father never wanted to attend them and her tutors knew only to come for actual lessons. So she often was left to her own devices and was allowed to break the rules that lay beneath every moment of the rest of her life.

She could wear pants, she could yell, she could braid her hair, she could fight back, she could drop her perfectly straight posture. Shouko was allowed to get scraped, messy, and gross, and she loved it. Every other moment of the day her father forced her to be demure and silent as much as possible, claiming it would be easier to marry her off that way.

In this space, none of that mattered. So, she ended up doing her martial arts practice as much as her father and sister would let her get away with it.

Huffing a breath, she straightened again and got into the right stance to do another kick. Shouko had just shot her foot out towards the center of the target when the door opened. At the unexpected sound, the kick went wide and she stumbled forward. Glancing behind her, she saw Fuyumi hovering in the doorway.

"Is it time for bed already?" she asked, wiping some of the sweat off her face with her arm, grimacing at the sticky feel of the makeup covering her eye coming off too. Fuyumi shook her head.

"No, but Father just messaged that his dinner event ended earlier than expected, so he's on his way back," she explained. "I figured you'd rather be asleep by the time he got back then have to deal with him again."

Shouko sighed but began moving to put away the various targets and the mat. She could already feel herself slipping back into the role Endeavor made her play. It didn't take long to clean up the space, and within a few minutes, she was walking to join her sister at the door, fingers undoing her braid as she went until it hung in a two-toned curtain behind her again.

Pausing by the door, she hesitated, before wrapping her arms around Fuyumi's waist.

"Thank you," she said softly into the fabric of her startled sister's shirt. "I know you don't like dealing with him either."

"You're my little sister, Shouko," Fuyumi replied after a moment, equally as soft as she rested a hand on Shouko's hair. "I think you'll find there isn't much I wouldn't do for you."

Shouko's arms tightened a little at that before she made herself step away. Taking a deep breath, she closed the door to the training room and turned to walk down the hall, posture straight and hair sweeping out behind her as she went.