Triptych
"Risai!" Taiki leaned out of his sedan chair and waved. "I'm over here! We just arrived!"
The woman smiled and bowed. "Good evening, Taiho. You certainly look cosy in there. Your maidservants did a good job wrapping you up."
Even above the Cloud Sea, winters in Tai were fiercely bitter once the snows had fallen. It seemed nobody wanted to take chances with the young Taiho. He'd been swaddled in a thick quilted coat over his robes, bundled into blankets and given hot tea and braziers to warm his covered chair. Four of the three blinds were firmly pulled down to keep off the wind.
One of his escort tittered. "The Taiho was so excited, we could barely get him to stand still long enough to dress him."
Laughter spread amongst the group and Risai hid her mouth behind one hand.
"Risai-dono, aren't you cold?"
"I'm a hardy specimen, Taiho. Besides, I'm sure all the exercise will warm me up soon enough."
"You're taking part in the demonstrations?"
She nodded. "I'll be one of the archers."
"Wow. You must be really good."
She laughed. "I hope so, or my humiliation will be before a very large audience."
This evening, the Imperial Court was arrayed along the shores of the palace's largest lake. It had frozen completely solid, and that very morning the Palace Guards had tested the ice and declared it safe. Snow frosted the pines and lay banked in piles around their trunks. It was a clear night and the stars were glittering.
"It's a demonstration of skill and athletic ability," Risai explained as Taiki sat eating steaming mushroom buns. "All the soldiers, officers and ministers who wish may take part. Ice skating is an important skill here in Tai. But it can be enjoyable too. Have you ever tried it yourself?"
"Not yet."
"Well, I suppose people might be a little anxious when it comes to teaching you something like this. One may injure oneself quite easily. That's what makes the displays so impressive."
Taiki blew a breath into the air to watch it crystallise. It made him think of dragons, and it was strange to be a creature on the same plane of legends.
The ice and the surrounding slopes of snow were hung with poles and bright flags and large paper lanterns of all colours. It was all very like a summer festival. How odd, he thought.
"What are those?" he asked, pointing to the tall poles dangling wooden circles like washing lines full of drying clothes.
"They're targets for the archers."
"You mean they fire arrows while on skates?"
"Yes – and they go very fast too. As I said, it's a test of skill – a way for the soldiers and the more athletic ministers to prove themselves to their superiors and earn favour with the king. Do you see them doing warm-up laps?"
She pointed one gloved hand. The skaters drifted anticlockwise in a large ring, gliding underneath the targets. Servants at the lake's edge were arranging racks of bows and quivers.
"Afterwards there'll be performing gymnasts and ice dancers. Then anyone who wants to may try their hand. It's always amusing to see some of the more stuffy old ministers flapping around in their houshi."
Taiki giggled, and looked out to the ice. "Master Gyousou's really good, isn't he?"
As if he had heard, the figure in black came swooping to the lake's edge, hair streaming out behind him, hatless. He stepped seamlessly onto land and came stomping through the snow on his blades.
"I'm not invited to this tea party?" he said, pushing windblown hair out of his eyes. His cheeks were coloured from the cold, and Taiki found the effect absorbing as his master crouched down in the snow in front of his chair.
"But Master Gyousou, you looked like you were having too much fun out there." He formally picked up the teapot on its porcelain tray. "Can I offer you a cup now?"
Gyousou took the delicate teacup in two large hands and bowed slightly before taking a sip. "As the king I'm not really allowed to take part in the archery show, in case I take the focus away from those who want to show off. I used to like testing myself when I was just a general. You're not cold out here, Kouri?"
"Not at all. Actually, I'm a little too hot with all these blankets."
Gyousou smiled. "You must forgive your maidservants their fussing, Kouri. You're very important to all of us. You have to remember to keep safe and warm and take care of yourself."
Taiki looked longingly out at the ice. The soldiers were out, carrying their banners. He could hear the flags flapping as the torchlight caught their colours.
"Do I have to sit here all evening? Can't I skate by myself, just a little?"
"I'm afraid not. I'll teach you to skate when it's quiet, one day. There are too many people on the ice tonight. You might be hurt by accident."
"One day?" Taiki tried to keep the disappointment out of his voice. He knew how busy his master was. Even though the king was so considerate and did so much to keep him happy, Taiki doubted that they're be time for him to learn ice-skating with Master Gyousou, not this winter.
Gyousou must have heard the sadness in his voice, or seen it in his face. He turned and looked at the warm-up exercises with a thoughtful look.
"It'll be some time before they begin," he said.
"Your Majesty? Is that really safe?" Risai asked, looking worried.
"Of course. I won't let him come to any harm. He won't even feel cold. That is, if Kouri would feel safe with me?"
Taiki wriggled out of his blankets with such enthusiasm, he almost knocked over the teapot. "Of course I do!" he said, holding out his arms.
Gyousou laughed, reaching out both hands and scooping Taiki from the sedan chair. Blankets fell from around his small body. Gyousou secured him in one strong arm and tugged Taiki's hood up around his face.
"Hold on tight," he said, ignoring the nervous chatter of the maidservants.
Taiki shifted up close to his master's chest and waved to Risai over one of Gyousou's broad shoulders. "Don't worry," he said. "I'm really very safe with Master Gyousou."
The ministers turned to look as Gyousou stepped onto the ice and began skating slowly around the edge. Taiki found himself swaying with the gentle motion.
"There probably won't be the time to teach you to do this properly, for a while," Gyousou said, eyes fixed ahead. "But I promise to make time for it, one day. I promise. If you stay warm and your toes don't freeze together."
Wrapped up like a cocoon in his master's arms, the frost biting at his nose and his breath rising in clouds, Taiki smiled. The ministers and soldiers parted like a school of fish as a target went by overhead. The torches made holes of fire in the night.
"What do you make of it? Your first taste of ice-skating?"
Taiki thought about it. "Master Gyousou?"
"Yes?"
"Can we go faster?"
He felt his master's laughter through his chest. "General Risai and your maidservants would never let me forget it if I did."
"Please?"
"Very well, then. Hold on tight."
Gyousou heaved him up onto his shoulder and leaned into the ice, bending his knees deeply and rocketing ahead. Taiki wrapped one arm and held onto his hood with the other. His yell of exhilaration was snatched back by the wind and mixed with winter bells.
They'd twisted fairy lights into the trees, Kaname duly noticed, as he clutched with one mittened hand the railing of the temporary ice rink. The sounds of the winter wonderland installed in this Tokyo park grated on his ears – teenage girls giggled shrilly as they blew on hot chocolate, the steam whirling up like spirits drifting up to heaven. Little children cried, shrieks blew over from the fairground rides and above it all, the tinny music from the stage where three girls bounced around in fur-lined skirts.
He sighed, warm breath escaping his mouth. He moved one foot forward, feeling it slide out beneath him. He grabbed the rail so he wouldn't fall. His feet hurt. They burned and ached.
His mother tottered past unevenly, holding his brother's hand in hers, face flushed with the cold and the exercise and smiling. His brother fell and she bent down to pick him up, dusting the ice chips off and straightening his hat.
Out of the corner of her eye, she saw him. Her face darkened.
"Kaname. I brought you all the way out here so we could all have fun together. Can't you at least try to join in?"
"My feet keep trying to run away," he explained, seizing the plastic wall again. "Maybe if I had someone to..."
"I can't leave your brother alone. He might get hurt."
"But-"
She sighed and shook her head. "Such a moody child. Would it really be so much trouble to engage with others?"
He lowered his head.
"I'm disappointed in you, Kaname. I try so hard to please you and you absolutely refuse to be happy."
She swept onwards, his brother laughing. He watched them go, then transferred his attention to a boy skating backwards, holding his girlfriend by the hands, the two of them almost flying over the ice. Her hair whipped around her face so nicely.
I would like to know how that feels, he thought wistfully, it must be nice to fly.
Determined not to be left marooned on the side, he placed one bladed foot in front of the other and managed to glide a short distance, until a little boy darted in front of him and knocked into his skate. Arms wheeling desperately, he felt himself fall for a small infinity until the ice came up and crashed into his nose, cold, rough with blade-marks, and hard. His palms stung where he'd thrown them out to break his fall. The beginnings of bruises were throbbing on his knees.
There was a wailing behind him. Nobody came to pick him up or help him to his feet. Wincing as the cold stung his scraped hands, he struggled to his knees and then onto the skates. Everyone was staring. He turned around.
"No!" the woman wailed as the safety wardens crowded around her. Her son was cradled in her arms, blood streaming from a deep gash in his forehead.
"I don't understand," one of the staff members muttered. "There's no way he could do that just by falling."
The red liquid spilled onto the ice, staining it, turning it pink like a slug trail as it ran towards him. Feeling his head spin, he lost his balance and fell onto his backside. He brought up his knees and pressed his head to them, sweat breaking out on his forehead and stomach churning.
A hand clamped itself onto Kaname's shoulder. He looked up and saw his mother's lips pressed so tightly together that they had turned white, like corpse lips.
"Move," she hissed. "Before anyone asks questions."
She towed him off the ice, pulled off his skates and shoved them at the man in the booth. She barely gave him even time to tie up his laces.
His feet felt strange in normal shoes. Too flat, somehow. As they left, his little brother howling, he looked back at the ice. Nobody was skating any more.
It was a shame, he thought, he would have liked to learn how to ice skate. If there had been someone who wouldn't mind teaching him how.
"That's the first time I've seen you smile for quite some time."
Taiki looked over his shoulder. "Is it? I'm sorry."
Gyousou frowned. "Don't apologise for being unhappy."
Taiki levelled a look at him from hair slowly growing out. His hands were folded into his sleeves. He dropped his eyes once his master met them.
"I never said I was unhappy," he said. "Just busy. There is so much to do."
"And little reprieve?" Gyousou looked up at the snow-blanketed hill. Through the dusting of flakes they could see the minister's children sledding and shrieking along with those of the servants. One sled came to a spinning stop, spilling the three boys into a laughing pile.
"Children play in such innocence," Gyousou remarked, face unreadable. "You used to be like that. A long time ago."
"Master Gyousou?"
He turned his red eyes downward, and smiled after looking at the younger man for a little while.
"Come, Kouri," he said.
Taiki blinked in confusion. He followed his master's gaze to the top of the hill.
"Surely you aren't suggesting..."
"Why not? If I remember correctly, the young Kouri would have pulled at my sleeve and begged until I rode down the hill with him. Then he would have made me do it all over again. And again."
"But-"
"This is the first time I've seen you smile in weeks."
Seizing his wrist in a firm yet gentle grip, Gyousou towed his kirin toward a group of young ladies building a snow rabbit, requesting a loan of their rather handsome sled.
Their footsteps crunched up the hill. "Look, Kouri. You can see both our palaces from here."
"I don't really remember how to do this." Taiki murmured, sitting tentatively on the front of the sled.
"Tell me, Kouri," Gyousou said, kneeling behind him. "Do you feel a little foolish?"
"To tell the truth, yes." He felt his cheeks warm as his master's warm bulk settled behind his back. He reached up to brush away a strand of hair and found Gyousou's hand holding his wrist again.
When he leaned in this close, Taiki could see snowflakes melting in his eyelashes.
"Let me see what I can do about that," Gyousou said, and wrapped Taiki in his arms, pulling him close.
"In case you fall off," Gyousou murmured, his breath warm upon Taiki's ear as he pushed off and the world slid.
After countless rides down the hill, Taiki wondered dimly at Gyousou not quite keeping his promise – indeed, his arms did keep Taiki from falling off the moving sled, or at least, they did until the sled slowed and they tumbled into the snow together.
Taiki looked into his master's face above him and smiled.
"I'm sorry," he said.
"Sorry? What for?" Gyousou's voice vibrated through his chest, really quite distracting.
"Growing up. It seems I was far more enjoyable company for Master Gyousou when I was small."
"I don't know about that," his master said, brushing snow from his kirin's cheek and letting the fingers remain longer than was strictly necessary. "I'm very pleased that you've grown up at last."
Taiki wondering if his shivering had anything at all to do with the cold.