Note : As always, I'm sorry if there are mistakes, I finished the translation ten minutes ago. I'll try to correct them later. Enjoy your reading.
Chapter size : 14000 words.
Opal and Obsidian
Part 6
Hinata
June 4 1017
Land of Iron
How many minds had Shisui Uchiha manipulated? A dozen? A hundred? A thousand? Who could she trust?
Alone and sitting in the middle of the hot spring, her legs curled up on her chest and a soaked towel on her obsidian hair, she submerged half of her face under the water and steam.
Shikaku had not known how to answer this last question, at least not clearly. If Shisui had explicitly confirmed that the Raikage had been his first victim, the Nara had only assumed the same.
All she knew was that during the summit between Fire and Lightning, which had aimed to sign a non-aggression pact between the two countries, Shisui had used his Sharingan on the Raikage. It had been subtle, and no one had noticed it. Not even the guards of the Kumo leader.
A Kage acting strangely is replaced, an inconsistent Kage is replaced. A Kage who acts as usual and works coherently remains. At least, this was a proven fact until the enthronement of the Fifth Hokage.
Four months.
Her abduction had been arranged four months before. This means that at that time, when she was four years old, while she was swinging, practicing in the morning and in the evening, reading old books, men and women had made a plan that would ruin her life.
Organizing the kidnapping of a four-year-old child...what kind of sick mind does it take to do that? Sure, they were following orders from their superiors, but that doesn't excuse it. In fact, it doesn't excuse anything.
She had asked the Nara why her. Why Danzō had done all this, and the answer had not satisfied her at all. Why her? Because she was important to the Hyūga, to Konoha. She had been chosen because of her birth. That was all. There was no other reason. She had been taken because she was born and there was nothing she could have done about it.
Why had Danzō done all this? Again, it had nothing to do with her. It was just a coincidence. Once again, she had been born into the wrong family at the wrong time.
Four years before her abduction, even before she was born, at the time of Danzō's investiture, the most influential faction of the Leaf, known as the Moderates, had objected to his enthronement and to the faction he represented, the Nationalists. Since the Nationalists had been supported by the Uchiha and the Hyūga in exchange for promises made by the Shimura, the tension between the two most influential factions of the Leaf had stopped at mere political disputes.
Throughout history, only the Senju had dared to stand against the Uchiha, and they were no more. Distilled within the villagers and with the almost simultaneous death of the Shodaime and the Nidaime, the hierarchy of the clan had finally disappeared over the decades. To make matters worse, the Hyūga were on board, which meant that at that time, standing up to the Hokage would have been synonymous with suicide, and few people were willing to die for their ideals.
However, the number was not zero.
Pulling the towel from her head, she dipped her face under the water before removing it and tucking her hair back.
However, the number was not zero.
Pulling the towel from her head, she dipped her face under the water before taking it out and tucking her hair back.
If her father had supported Danzō at first because of the promises he had made to him, to bring his clan to the forefront of the village and to protect their heritage, he had quickly become disillusioned with the oppression that the Shimura was exerting on the factions that did not support him.
In great secrecy, the Hyūga had switched sides. It had taken four years, and contrary to what Danzō might have predicted, in that time the Moderate Faction had gained far more power and influence than those who supported him.
In the words of Shikaku, one of the Moderate's brains at the time, they were about to make a big move. A coup to be exact. And if the Nara had been sure of one thing when he had told him, it was that the opposition would have had no chance if it had taken place. And that even if the Daimyō of the country supported the Hokage.
They outnumbered them two to one, and more than two-thirds of the Jōnin were with them. Only a few weeks before they were to act, before they were to free the village from the yoke of the Man of All Plots, she was kidnapped and the Fourth Great War was declared.
Quite a coincidence, wasn't it?
Retrieving the piece of natural soap from the mineral stone, she lifted one of her legs out of the water to gently scrub it.
Her father and the elders of her clan had been part of the coup that had taken place and the rest of the story she knew. Shisui Uchiha knew it, unlike the innocent victims who had been robbed of this opportunity.
Danzō had used the war to prevent the coup, gain new allies, stifle the Moderate Faction, and emerge as the true hero of the conflict.
He had joined forces with the Wind Kage, the Sound Kage, and had painstakingly wiped out the leaders of the Moderate Faction during the first five years of the war. With the Hyūga back on his side thanks to Shisui, the oppression had reached unprecedented levels.
Threats, beatings, murder, forced suicide. Shikaku was the first, and once again in the greatest secrecy. Well, let's just say that no one dared to talk about it.
Some time - months - after the war began, the leader of the Deer Clan was sent by Danzō himself on a mission to the borders of Waterfalls and Fire to meet with the Kage of Taki to represent the Leaf at the exchange.
Taki, which had no ties to any major power and possessed a beast, was considered the most powerful minor nation on the Ninja Peninsula at the time. Making them an ally would have meant a sure victory.
The Nara had not been fooled, he had already known before he went there that there would be no mission at the borders, no meeting, no exchange. Even if the Waterfalls were left alone in the war, even if it reached their border, they would never have agreed to an alliance after the debacle Konoha had caused them in the Third Great War. Not after what the Yondaime had done alone.
His every move spied on, watched, day and night, Shikaku had not even been able to say goodbye to his family, and that was, according to him, his greatest regret.
The second thing they had in common.
As the Nara had suspected, there had been no meeting. In fact, halfway through the encounter, the team assigned to him had tried to eliminate him, plain and simple. He had lost his arm, part of his left leg as well as his friends and family. The mission report? An ambush by Tsuchi who, with the death of the respected and feared Shikaku Nara, had confirmed it.
Any lie was good to take if it galvanized the troops.
Shikaku had not explained to her how he had survived all this, how he had been accepted in Tetsu, and to be honest, she had not wanted to know.
All through his explanation, she had had only one thought, only one confused emotion.
Her father had loved her.
Sure, he had been and still was a victim of one of the most powerful Genjutsu in history, if not the most powerful, but the facts were there and that was good enough for her: He had not sacrificed her willingly. It had not been his choice. Behind a veil of chakra and illusion, he had mourned her.
While the Nara had continued his monologue, telling her why the Waterfalls had allied with Earth and how the war had ended, she had digressed to ask him a question.
The answer had immediately made her forget about her father.
Gently, she rubbed her shoulders, collarbones, arms, then her chest, before getting down on her knees and, with the warm water in the middle of her hips, cleaning the rest of her body.
More than fifteen hundred kilometers away, in a village she could not remember, she had a little sister.
All her captivity, all her life, she had wondered if the child her mother carried in her memories was a brother or a sister, and now that she had the answer, she couldn't say how happy it made her.
According to her calculations, she should be twelve years old. She had to admit that she had spent most of the night imagining what her life had been like, what she was like, what she had done and was doing, what she liked to eat, if she liked to practice, if she liked to read... if her mother had told her about her. If she knew about her older sister.
Questions she would never have answers to.
Washed, sitting in the water again, smelling of lavender, she watched the soap dilute around her.
For the first time in over two years, she had spent an entire night without thinking about him. For the first time, his golden hair was out of her head, and the painful emptiness it created in her left her stunned.
Even after two years, did she really want to forget him?
The sliding door at her back opened and she turned to look at the stone wall that separated nature from the mansion she lived in. The current of fresh air made the surrounding steam dance and blur her vision before she could see the motionless man in the corridor.
About one meter tall, with long brown hair tied up in a bun, the man was dressed in a dark blue kimono jacket, a t-shirt, and white pants. Barefoot, with pale green eyes, he couldn't have been more than twenty years old.
With one hand in his pocket and the other awkwardly pointed in her direction, he blinked several times in deathly silence before finally speaking in an indignant voice.
"You... who are you? And what are you doing in my house? Who... who allowed you to wash here? ... Guards!"
Somewhat surprised, she watched the young man without blinking. She observed his clothes, which were surely worth more than the future she had planned for herself, his jade pupils that tried to distinguish her through the smoke, but most of all the pendant he was wearing.
The same Kamon drawn on the cover that had warmed her.
My house... was he...?
Faced with her silence and with an annoyed step, he moved into the onsen and, under the swirl of his jacket, brought his threatening forefinger to less than three meters.
"I just asked who you a... ar... are..."
Suddenly stunned and livid, at the edge of the hot spring that Tsukuba Mountain produced and closer than he had ever been, her new interlocutor was unable to finish his sentence.
At first, she thought he had been frightened by her byakugan, like the people who crossed her eyes, but following the lines of his gaze, she realized that was not the case. It was not her eyes he was looking at. His attention was a little lower, on the translucent water that moved with the movement of her legs.
She was now convinced that the man in front of her was the Third Crown Prince... what had Kashira said his name was?
Suddenly realizing the situation and the lack of respect she was showing, she left her seiza position and stood up. Water streamed down her body and the towel left her hair to plunge into the hot spring. With a calm expression, she waved both hands in front of her face.
"It's a misunderstanding, Kashira Deisuke has... has..."
Just like the man had done before, she stopped her explanation. The look in his eyes alone made her realize that she didn't have to explain herself.
Panic spread through her as the Prince's face turned red, even purple, and she thought he was suffocating. She swung her leg in his direction, while at the same time several frantic runs were heard on the wood of the corridor.
With his eyelids suddenly wide open, the Prince turned abruptly and started running toward the wide-open door. So fast that his toe caught the corner of it, causing him to scream in pain, before hitting the canvas wall in front of it with a loud bang.
The next second, two guards in light armor and bandanas appeared in front of the gaping hole, panicking.
"Mitsunari-sama, what's going on?!"
"Are you all right, Your Highness?"
The smaller of the two guards, and the first to arrive, about the Prince's height, turned his head slightly toward the inside of the wide room, toward her, and the Third Crown Prince's hysterical voice stopped him just in time.
"DON'T TURN AROUND!"
Getting up despite the pain in his foot, Mitsunari left the room through the hole he had made and pointed with a grimace and a shake of his head into the hallway.
"I-It's nothing, you can go, I just saw a big spider and I-"
"A spider?! Where?! Is it poisonous?! Did it bite you?! Are you going to die?!"
It was the turn of the second who arrived to turn his head toward the steam, but he did not have time to cross her opal gaze that the prince pushed him to seize the door and close it abruptly.
"I killed it! There is nothing more to admi... f-fear! To fear! You can go, it was a simple test I wanted to see how fast you would run if a ninja ever tried to kill me hahahahahaha..."
With the door closed and one eyebrow raised, she watched the three silhouettes through the canvas.
The Third Crown Prince... had he fallen on his head as a child?
"A... test? Mitsunari-sama, you said there was a spider that was also a-"
"E-Exactly that was too! Now go away."
The guard's arm, which had met her gaze, inevitably rose to the door.
"There's a wo..."
"WILL YOU GET OUT OF HERE?!"
The shadows of the guards on the canvas wall bowed in fright, then turned as quickly as they had come, in panic.
Silence returned and she listened carefully for any sound on the other side of the door. Hearing none, not even a breath, she immediately became concerned.
"Are you all right?"
The startle did not wait, but the answer never came.
A sharp gasp spread through the corridor as she made her way out of the pool. The waves created by her leg movements didn't have time to reach the wooden structure of the hot spring that the prince's voice rose.
"I... I'm sorry... I didn't mean to... I didn't know that... and besides, I hardly see any... well, I do, but it wasn't... what I mean is that..."
The babbling continued until she emerged from the water, and as the cool air surrounded her, she managed to decipher the reason for the embarrassed tone.
She lowered her eyes to her naked body and slapped her forehead several times with the palm of her hand.
Turning around, she looked for the towel and quickly remembering that the towel was in the water, she stepped closer to the door. The heartbeat on the other side of the towel became more exciting.
She could put her dirty clothes back on, but the smell that would come with the water didn't appeal to her.
"It's okay...could you get me a towel, please? I didn't think anyone would come here, so I..."
The door opened a few centimeters and a dark blue cloth immediately appeared in the gap. Impressed by the speed with which her problem had been solved, she retrieved the towel, taking care not to touch the Prince's hand.
"Thank you."
The door slammed and she jumped slightly as her attention was drawn to the textile.
It was no towel, but a jacket. The dark blue jacket she had seen on the Prince's shoulders a minute earlier.
"Are you sure? I'm going to sla..."
"Just get dressed, I beg you."
She studied the silk for a moment before shrugging. Dressing quickly, she tilted her head to the side and wrung out her hair. Then, with the water running off the wood and holding the garment to her chest, she opened the door.
At that moment, the only thing that came to her mind was to warn him next time.
She stepped aside so quickly that she had time to see surprise spread across the Prince's face as he fell backwards, as well as disbelief and finally fear. With a thud, he crashed to the floor, and she gritted her teeth at the sound of his grin of pain.
With an innocent expression on her face, she leaned over her victim as quickly as she could say sorry.
"Are you okay?"
Totally tetanized on the floor, eyes closed, jaw clenched, he tried to answer her question, but with his mouth half open and his breath cut off, he contented himself with answering in the negative with a movement of his head.
Slowly, he opened one eye and then, taking a breath, opened the second. Then he watched her with a grimace as a look of surprise distorted his face. With a quick gesture of his hand, he swept the emptiness between them before frowning.
She understood in no time what was bothering him, which confirmed what she had thought earlier: he really hadn't bothered to look at her face until then.
"I'm not blind."
Seconds passed without him taking his eyes off her, making her believe for a moment that she had another dōjutsu since he was so mesmerized by it.
"Am I dead? Are you an angel?"
Blushing slightly, she could only smile at the last question and tucked some of her hair behind her right ear with a flick of her hand.
"You are alive, Your Highness."
He took his eyes off her for a moment to pat his chest and face.
"I am alive."
Then he turned his attention back to her, or more specifically, her bare feet, which he moved up until he reached her knees, then her hips. Once again, his cheeks blushed, but this time she did not worry. Now that the jacket was closed at her crotch as well as her chest, she knew she had nothing to blame herself for. For once, if he fainted, it would not be her fault.
Realizing what he was doing, the third prince closed his eyelids and ran his forearm over them.
"Can't you put on some pants?"
"They're dirty, I've been wearing them for..."
"I don't care, just put them on."
Listening to the order she had just been given, she turned to the small piece of furniture in the corner of the room where she had left her clothes, but as she moved to stand up, the one giving the order tensed in pain, causing her to turn back.
"Are you sure you're okay?"
Fear inevitably crept into her mind. If she ever hurt him, she couldn't even imagine the consequences.
"I think I... I dislocated a vertebra."
Despite the situation, she held back a breath of relief.
If he thought that, then everything was fine.
"A vertebra doesn't move that easily, you must have pulled a muscle."
Almost immediately, she received the Crown Prince's lightning glance.
"I know what I'm saying, when I say I've dislocated a vertebra, it… means… I've..."
Before his eyes fell on her legs and she lost him for the third time.
"Try to sit down, I'll see what I can do to make you feel better."
To her surprise, he did so without a word and... with almost surreal speed, if she was to believe the grimace he made.
"T-That's fine, but I warn you, I'm not taking my shirt off."
"That's not necessary, Your Highness."
Facing the Prince's back, she let go of the jacket at the height of her chest and gently placed her middle and index fingers on the top of his spine. She felt him shiver, but she did not formalize it, another question was already tormenting her.
Were all princes so carefree? She really wondered. They didn't know her, yet they kept turning their backs on her. She could kill him right then and there. Was it because she was a woman? Did that give her extra confidence in this world, with men? Or did this society unconsciously give her more trust because she was pretty? So pretty that her opal pupils had gone unnoticed.
The white fabric disappeared to reveal thousands of bluish veins and vessels. Following the tenketsus of the Crown Prince's lungs and heart, she gently slid her two fingers along the curve of his back before reaching the anomaly at the level of the liver.
With a simple push, she relaxed the muscle causing the pain and could only see her success when the chakra in the face in front of her calmed. She then withdrew her hand and the Prince immediately made some movements with his pelvis.
"It's amazing, the pain is gone. How did you d-AAAAH!"
Turning around in astonishment, he finally saw his Byakugan for the first time. His activated Byakugan moreover, and the scream was quite memorable. Well, especially for her eardrums.
He moved back on his hands so quickly that she thought the spider he had mentioned was actually in the room. It was only when he struck the wooden wall violently with his back that she saw the muscle she had just relaxed return to its original position.
This time, at less than twenty centimeters, her opal eyes had not gone unnoticed. In fact, they had simply made the beauty of her legs, chest, and face disappears.
Did he still see her as a beautiful woman or as a bloodthirsty ninja?
The answer was in the expression he gave her. From the look of terror on his face alone, she didn't have to watch him for long.
An assassin.
"Y-Y-You're a... a Hy... a Hyūga...?"
Panicked, he glanced quickly down the hallway, hoping that his scream had attracted the attention of the guards, but they did not appear. Both were standing at the entrance of the house, about forty meters away, hands on the guard of their katana, they had heard him perfectly and had even turned their heads, but believing in a second spider and not wanting to be yelled at, they had not moved.
"Yes."
The panic increased tenfold with her confirmation.
She was now able to catch his gaze with a disconcerting ease, it was almost disturbing.
"W-What do you want? W-Why are you here?"
She did not answer the question. She had no need to.
She deactivated her Byakugan and turned her face to the sliding door to observe the newcomer. Her first reflex was to stand up and close the cloth against her chest before finally staring at him.
Dressed in a black hakama, black t-shirt, black hoari, and black jikatabis, his jet black, loose hair fell down to the base of his spine. She had trouble understanding who he was, but was able to guess from the structure of his face.
Although he was thinner, he had the same look as the first Crown Prince. The same glance as dark as a stormy night.
The Third Prince, seeing her lack of attention, turned his face to the door, and his reaction confirmed her thoughts.
"B-Big brother!"
Big brother had been fast. Very fast. He had appeared to her only a few seconds earlier, a hundred meters away. The Third Prince had only had time to ask her a panicked question before she saw him land on the floor of the corridor the next moment.
One hundred meters in four seconds, including reaction time... was that possible for a samurai? Besides, how could he hear them from such a distance?
She knew the First Crown Prince, and the Third Crown Prince had just called him big brother. This meant that he could only be the Second Crown Prince. And if she remembered Kashira's words correctly, there were six in total. So, now, she knew half of them.
With a tense face, the Second Prince paid no attention to his little brother. But that did not mean that he did not address him in a stern tone.
"What are you doing here, Mitsunari?"
The latter could not help but be shocked by this question.
"What am I doing here? Are you really asking me that?"
He immediately pointed at her with his index finger without her paying the slightest attention to him.
"CAN'T YOU SEE THERE'S A HYŪGA RIGHT IN FRONT OF YOU?"
It was strange. Most of the time, even if the meeting had been prepared, when a person met her gaze, they were either frightened or amazed, depending on how she approached them. Here, there was none of that, this man seemed to be completely calm in front of her gaze.
Had he ever been able to see the Byakugan in his lifetime?
For the first time, she lost eye contact with the Second Prince.
"She is a guest of Father, Deisuke has put her here until she meets the court."
She looked at the Third Lord, who was still sitting on the ground, frowning and not understanding anything. Only that what his brother had just said confirmed what she had told him a minute earlier.
The same sentence he had forgotten because of her skin color.
"W-What? Why wasn't I told? Deisuke-sama could have at least told me that he was going to take this... woman into my hou-"
"If you had spent less time in the public baths and more time in the palace, you would have been told. Now if you have nothing more to say, get up and go to Father, he is waiting for you."
She turned her attention back to the dry tone and was surprised to catch the Second Prince's gaze as he examined her again. Despite the intensity of his black pupils, she managed to remain impassive.
Unlike Musashi, who had a hoarse tone, and Mitsunari, who had a higher tone, the Second Prince had a voice between the two. Less... fleshy, more elegant, the opposite of a warrior's, more like a noble's, the two titles a samurai possessed.
Standing about one meter eighty, with an age she could not guess, but which was somewhere between his two brothers, between twenty and thirty, he had no visible scars, like the Kashira.
Had he never been in a fight or had he never been touched? The same question remained. Had she not seen him move so quickly, she would have chosen the first answer, but now she had no doubt that it was the second.
This man was underestimated. If it wasn't for her Byakugan, she would have done the same. It was crazy to say, but if she compared the chakra of Kashira, the First Crown Prince, and the guards she had seen so far to this man, then they were just students and he was the master.
Yes, she felt it deep inside. He intimidated her a bit.
Holding his back, the Third Prince limped past her, mumbling a few words that faded away as he passed his older brother.
"I... in my home... lecture... child..."
He lifted his head and gave the Second Prince a brilliant smile before walking past him and letting his forced grin disappear into the hallway.
A movement of his upper lip and an appearance of responsibility later, the elder's calm tone finally rose.
"Go see Kōan-sama about your back and tell Father that we're coming."
The footsteps grew farther and farther away until they could no longer be heard. Then the distant, high-pitched voice of the Third Crown Prince sounded one last time.
"Get the jacket back! It's part of Grandpa's collection, if I lose it he'll kill me!"
Closing his eyes for a moment, the Second Prince sighed slowly before looking at her again. What followed left her speechless.
He touched his left wrist and a cloud of ephemeral smoke spread to the doorway, revealing clean clothes in his hands.
Mechanically she moved her head to the side, as if to say that she did not believe in what she had just witnessed, then he put the pile of laundry in front of the door and she had no choice but to come back to reality when he spoke to her for the first time.
"Get dressed then we will go to the Palace. I'll wait for you at the entrance."
And he closed the door, just like that, without any explanation.
She remained motionless, breathless. She listened to his footsteps, and when they were no longer audible, she took a deep breath.
Had he just... used Fūinjutsu? How?
Time passed, as did the questions, until she turned her attention to the clothes and her thoughts took a back seat. Her eyebrows furrowed, her temporary mood vanished, leaving only a shiver that chilled her blood.
She took one step toward the door, paused to hold the kimono jacket, took a second, a third, a fourth, then knelt. Her eyes widened, her jaw clenched, and her fingers tightened on the silk.
"He will come back, wait for him. He loves you. He loves you more than you know."
Since that day, she had always wondered.
It was true that she sometimes forgot her face, but her tears and her Byakugan always came back to her in her dreams. The woman she had seen when she had thrown herself from the bridge, when he had brought her back to life. That phrase that haunted her and was part of the reason she kept hoping.
She had always wondered if it had been a hallucination, a last act of her brain to make her want to live. But for some time now, her reflection in the river had made her doubt it. Had made her think that maybe she knew her. A tiny possibility that she might know this woman better than anyone else.
A breath of both mirth and amazement escaped between her half-open lips. With fear, delicacy, and a slight tremor, she lifted the pile of clothes. She lifted the black yukata with the white flowers, the red ribbon, the gold brooch.
Getting up, she opened the door and walked quickly to her room, which was just beyond the corridor. She locked herself in and immediately took off the Third Prince's jacket to put on the yukata. What she thought was a simple formality turned out to be a real ordeal. The underwear and the socks were easy, the jikatabis were a formality, but the yukata...
Never having dressed in such a way before, it took her literally more than ten minutes to do so, and sweating, out of breath, she bit the red ribbon before twirling her obsidian hair and tying it up. Finally, she tucked the brooch into her bun and, picking up the yellow-rimmed book on the coffee table, which disappeared in a cloud of smoke, she left the room.
Clutching two of the flowers sewn to the silk, she lifted the yukata a bit to ease her way through the hallway, the courtyard, the forty square meters of floor and the perfectly cut stones that served as a guide to the great archway. The sun's rays warmed her porcelain face and made her sweat even more. Halfway out of the house, she suddenly turned to her right and headed for the garden, or more precisely, the bridge and the water court.
She leaned over the wooden ledge, and the reflection that moved beneath her opal pupils took her breath away a second time.
It was her. She was the woman in her dream.
Slowly, she ran the palm of her hand from the center of her forehead to her hair and could only freeze as she took a breath.
It all seemed so implausible that she wondered if her memory was playing tricks on her. If there had never been a woman, a dream. Or at least if this memory was just a figment of her imagination. If time had altered it so that she could see herself in it.
She raised her head and looked at the three men about twenty meters away. She watched the two samurai on either side of the arch, but most of all, she watched the man dressed in black, standing in the middle of the alley that led to the street, his hands clasped behind his back, waiting just below the structure.
With a simple impulse of chakra in her calves and hips, she propelled herself about ten meters into the air, landing less than a meter from the second prince. Though he did not turn in her direction, she had no doubt that he heard her, especially if she was to believe the sound of the gravel that had cushioned her jump.
Without really thinking, she grabbed his right arm and forced him to face her. Even though she used some strength, it was... harder than she thought.
As he turned halfway toward her, she didn't have time to ask him a question before the guard on her right raised his muffled voice and the scabbard of his katana.
"Remove your hand from the second crown prince immediately!"
The few passers-by at about ten meters, curious, stopped in their walk in order to observe the incongruous scene which was played under their eyes, in order to observe the second crown prince as well as the affront which she dared to commit.
The guard came closer, but stopped when he saw her pupils. She felt the tension suddenly rise and the samurai's periodic breathing behind his mask become erratic.
"What the..."
Deeply disturbed by what she had just discovered, she paid no attention to the two helmets or the villagers, only to the two irises towering over her, and her questions did not wait.
"Where did you get these clothes? Who gave them to you?"
The two black irises slowly descended on her hand and remained there for a moment before moving to the samurai who drew his blade from its sheath and made the same gesture as his colleague.
"Put your blade away or you will use them for the last time."
Again, she did not look at the two men to her right and left, but she knew that, behind their masks and helmets, there were two surprised faces.
It wasn't her who had spoken.
Even as a Hyūga stood before their eyes, the two guards tucked their blades back into their respective sheaths and, though hesitant, returned to their original positions without expressing any disagreement, as if nothing had ever happened.
She stared at the Prince as another question crossed her mind.
Was he really so feared?
She watched him without blinking. Which he reproduced with even more phlegm.
"Withdraw your hand, I will not repeat myself."
She withdrew her hand. The sun illuminated even more the thin and oval jaw that overhung her, the hollowed cheeks, as well as the shaved skin.
The more time passed, the more intimidated she became. The worst part was that it didn't seem to be a feeling over which she had any authority.
"We'll walk through the city. Use a metamorphosis for your eyes, it shouldn't take more than ten minutes".
Again, she obeyed without a word. She closed her eyes and the next moment opened them to reveal her turquoise pupils and waited. Waited again. She thought he would never answer her, but surprisingly he looked at her outfit.
"You don't like it?"
"I never said that, I just want to know where they came from.
He did not answer immediately, content to stare into the blue of her eyes. A behavior that annoyed her. Or was it because the situation was getting out of hand?
"I bought them on the way. Are you satisfied or would you like to know the price and where the silk comes from?
"I'm fine, thank you."
He let his dry tone linger for a few more seconds before turning and beginning his advance toward the crowded street, which, strangely enough, began to move again.
"Let's go before you run out of chakra."
She glanced at the guards, who immediately turned their helmets toward the grass, and of course she followed his lead.
He stopped suddenly and she almost bumped into him. Turning around, she thought he was going to use his condescending tone on her again, but he didn't, instead, an authoritative tone came from his lips and it was addressed directly to the two samurai.
"You two, leave your post and go to the South Temple. Tell Kashira Mineko that you saw her. If anything happens here, I will take full responsibility."
The two guards bowed at once under the clanking of their armor.
"At your command, Your Highness."
His Highness turned and she took a step, but he stopped for a second time and this time she was less than ten centimeters from his back. Without bothering to turn around, he spoke to the two guards again.
"If a single word comes out of your mouth during your travels, I will personally come and brief you."
She did not need to think to understand that it was a threat and unconsciously her nose almost stuck to him, she smelled the silk.
Immediately, thousands of memories sent her into a free fall. A descent of painful memories.
Jasmine.
Fate was making fun of her.
Not without glancing at her, which she did not catch, he resumed his walk, and she remained frozen. Then he stopped for the third time to turn halfway to her and stare at her.
"Is something wrong?"
Recovering her senses, she shook her face and made her sad face disappear to leave room for an impassive one. Then she resumed her walk.
"No."
She, who had imagined so many questions about the black yukata, remained surprisingly silent the whole way.
Her eyes remained fixed on the ground as they passed through the many arches that separated neighborhoods, gardens, temples, and dojos, and her expression remained emotionless as they descended the huge street and its wooden and canvas dwellings. The houses, shops, taverns, and onsens had been passed too many times to count, as had the prying eyes and muffled tones.
"Did you see how white her skin is? Is she a princess from the far north? From Hokkaidō?"
"This is the first time I've seen the second prince accompanied by a woman. Who is she?"
"Is she the one who entered the Third Prince's house yesterday? She is beautiful, do you think she will join His Majesty's family?"
"She looks very much like her, don't you think? For a moment, I thought Kimiko-sama was here again."
"Use your chakra for your eyes rather than your ears, it would be wiser."
The prince's voice echoed in her eardrums and she immediately stopped injecting chakra into them. The surrounding sounds became indecipherable buzzes and her inner questioning took place.
How did he do it? Did he guess or sense? Was he a sensory one? ... Did that even exist in the Bushidō? If so, was he even a samurai? She couldn't even see his weapon, was it sealed as well?
Despite her growing curiosity, she asked no questions. It would be useless, it wasn't important. In an hour or so she would not see him again.
The traditional architecture of the Provincial War Era was beautiful. She could not deny it. Those shapes, those huge wooden posts and beams, those huge tiled or thatched roofs and sliding partitions. Those color palettes, both sober and extravagant, from black to beige to blood red.
A tradition of the Sengoku period that had been lost everywhere else.
Unlike the concrete buildings that had spread across the peninsula since the founding of the Hidden Villages, Tetsu had stuck to an architecture close to nature. Welcoming the cold of winter and the heat of summer, withstanding the most violent storms and the most violent earthquakes. Close to the ground, to mother earth.
Rarely were structures taller than ten meters. As far as the eye could see, the dwellings allowed a view of the flora and fauna and respected the surrounding nature. But like every rule, there was always an exception. There was always that grain of madness, that defiance that man could not resist.
Slowly she looked up.
She had been watching them since they left the Third Crown Prince's house. Since the gossip about their crossing had grown louder.
She watched the gigantic archway in the middle of the city and the three mountains.
She looked at the huge Torii, about thirty meters high, made of two concrete pillars and painted vermilion, with the symbol of Tetsu, a black circle with a kanji in the center, at the top, just below the roof.
Honesty, Courage, Loyalty, Honor, Respect, Compassion, Integrity. The seven virtues of the samurai. Bushidō, the way of the warrior.
On either side of the arch, surrounding walls extending beyond the largest dwellings formed a tight circle, with the only entrance being the one she had just passed through. She didn't know how many square meters the interior covered, four, maybe five acres, but one thing was certain: never before had she seen a human structure so large.
Even Izumo Taisha, the famous Shrine of the Claws, where the most spiritual people of the peninsula gathered every year, looked small next to it.
Her reflex was to avoid the gaze of the twenty or so guards, but her chakra, disappearing as the seconds passed, and her turquoise eyes reminded her that she had the luxury of doing so. So she did. And nothing surprised her more than the realization that none of them had the slightest regard for her.
Dressed in their uniforms, straight, stoic, and with their hands on the scabbards of their katana, yari, naginata, and for some even bows, they watched before them, without a word, without moving their helmets. The only samurai allowed not to bow in front of a Prince, in front of the Majesty. When they were at their post, they were allowed to do only one thing: watch.
Maybe they were watching her behind their mask, maybe not, but one thing was for sure, it wasn't her presence that made them so rigid and perfectly still, it was the man walking in front of her.
Would she finally know who he really was?
She sighed softly.
Five minutes and she was asking herself the same question again.
The courtyard was incredible. Where the whole city was interspersed with flora and river, the courtyard was made of concrete and stairs. A huge slab of several acres that led to the largest staircase she had ever seen. About thirty meters for more than fifty steps.
To the right and left were two four-meter walls with countless coats of arms decorating the cement. She had no doubt that these were the many noble families under the yoke of the Daimyō of the region, who himself was under the yoke of the Shōgun of the country. And there was even less doubt that this place was used to gather an army before going on a mission.
Deisuke's Ban had certainly gathered here before coming to pick her up at her hovel.
Passing the dozens of guards that were stationed in front of the stairs, they began their ascent. Her thoughts were disturbed only by the sound of their footsteps, and she began to doubt if this was a good idea.
If she was going to leave, it was now or never.
She had her answers, she knew who the man who wanted to see her was, and she knew more now than she could have hoped for. But once again, her curiosity won out, like always.
She wanted to know what the Daimyō had to offer her, and especially why Shikaku had explicitly asked her to accept, for her sake, her happiness, her serenity, and whatever else she knew.
Not a word, not a sound, but the two guards in front of the huge steel doors and inner walls opened the entrance when they reached the top of the stairs. The two guards bowed to the prince, and she understood that Darumasan's game was over, replaced by another: spying on her without any discretion.
The two doors closed behind them and he stopped in front of her. After reflexively lowering her gaze to the concrete once more, she paused in her turn and raised an eyebrow in surprise before looking over the Prince's shoulder.
She watched the three women in the middle of the second courtyard, or rather the one in the middle of the group of women. The other two, further back, younger, seemed to be there only to serve the first.
As tall as she was, nearly one meter sixty, the woman in her forties was dressed in a remarkably elegant white and red flowered Jūnihitoe. However, it was not the unique garment that caught her full attention.
Above the woman's black, shiny, perfectly coifed shimada hair were yellow flowers, a white pin, and most importantly, another kanji: Seishitsu.
An important woman.
She could have thought that the forty-year-old woman in front of her was the wife of a member of the court, but just by looking at the look of disdain she directed at the Second Prince, she knew that it was not that. That it was more than that.
"It has been almost an hour since your father gathered the Kugyō. May I ask what took you so long?"
An… hour?
She watched the Second Lord's back from the corner of her eye.
It had only been ten minutes since they had left his little brother's house... had he taken that long to buy her clothes, or was it something else?
"Step aside."
The Prince's soft voice echoed among the many buildings that made up the palace, or more specifically, the one that stood behind the woman. A large building in the traditional style, the same as those that made up part of the city.
High, spacious and polychrome, the building with its many indiscreet attentions seemed to have only one entrance, and that entrance was right in front of them, beyond the small staircase of a few steps and beyond the woman and her two servants.
No doubt the prince could get around them, but that wasn't the point. It wasn't a matter of simply avoiding the problem, it was a matter of taming it.
"Who is this Wo... Girl? W-Where is the Hyūga?"
The faces of the two young women behind the one who spoke widened in surprise.
Were they surprised by the name the Seishitsu had spoken or by the fact that the Seishitsu had stammered when she turned her attention to her?
She didn't know the answer, and she didn't know this forty-year-old, but she did know one thing: discretion was not in her vocabulary.
"Step aside now."
The woman stepped aside... but not for the pleasure of the Prince.
Bypassing the Second Heir and positioning herself in front of her, the woman studied her from top to bottom without the slightest embarrassment.
"Is it her? I am disappointed, I had always wanted to see the Byakugan with my own eyes."
With a sigh, the woman came a little closer and, placing her face a few centimeters from hers, squinted her eyelids.
"I had always heard that Hyūga pupils were white, even opal for the purest of them. Why are yours turquoise? Are you a mongrel?"
"That's enough."
The dry tone of the lord's voice put an end to the insults, the two incomprehensible faces of the two servants, and the eavesdropping of the guards making their rounds. The mocking laughter of the forty-year-old lady did not take long.
"There's no need to get upset, Second Prince, I was just asking questions, that's all."
Before she turns her condescending smile on her.
"I apologize, that was inappropriate of me."
Inappropriate. That was... inappropriate?
This woman, whom she didn't know, had just assumed that her mother was having an extramarital affair. And she just thought it was inappropriate.
Sometimes it was true that she regretted very much that she never managed to get angry on demand. Her kindness would eventually lose her, no doubt.
She could have put on a smile just as fake as the one she was doing, but instead she remained as cold as ice.
"I accept your apology."
The speed with which the woman's grin disappeared made her realize that her reply had been more than adequate. This one was not used to someone not bending over her, even if she was haughty.
It's nothing, Madam.
There's no harm done, Madam.
You didn't say anything out of place, Madam.
So much respect, so little pride.
If the sun hadn't blocked her view, she would have bet she saw a look of amusement on the Second Prince's face, but the woman's voice didn't give her a chance to remember it.
"Look at your outfit, why on earth are you dressed so inappropriately? And your hair, my god, who made you that bun? It's horrible, just horrible, and I mean that."
A voice so bland that after listening to it for a minute, it suddenly became unpleasant.
Why was this woman wasting her time trying to put her down? Didn't she have other things to worry about?
She wanted to answer, but once again, the second prince beat her to it.
"I-"
"Have you finished your childish comments?"
The false grin immediately returned on the woman's face as she turned to the Prince and pointed to the building with a wave of her hand.
"Go and wait inside, I will make her presentable for your Father. It would be an affront to let her enter like this."
He seemed genuinely annoyed by what he had just heard, but with a soft sigh he looked at her before turning back to the stairs. The two maids hurriedly stepped aside to let him pass.
Disappointment materialized between two of her thoughts.
He had just left her to this woman. Sure, she'd only known him for twenty minutes, but for some reason she couldn't help but feel disappointed.
The sliding canvas door opened as the Prince approached, and the guard she caught sight of closed it as soon as he stepped through.
Her vision blurred as the forty-year-old's makeup came into view.
"How silly of me, I completely forgot to introduce myself."
A snap of fingers later, the two maids stood on either side of the woman, and the tallest of them, about one meter seventy, blond with green eyes and no more than twenty years old, bowed her head before speaking for the first time.
"Takara Teitarō, first wife and Seishitsu of His Majesty, mother of the first Crown Prince Musashi Teitarō and the fourth Crown Prince Yasuharu Teitarō. Only daughter of the Daijō-Daijin, Kintarō Atami, Minister of Supreme Affairs of the Shōgun, the illustrious General Mifune Asano."
She was speechless. If she could have opened her lips without giving the Seishitsu a semblance of satisfaction, she would have done so. Which, besides, reassured her.
No matter how small, she at least had an ego... and she quickly realized that it was not so nice when she felt the urge to introduce herself in return for the sole purpose of seeing the Seishitsu's face decay.
The desire to start a peninsular war on an emotional impulse. That too was implausible.
"You two, fix her hair and then wait for me in my quarters."
The woman left, leaving the two servants, with their backs bent, behind her.
Cautiously, she concluded that the forty-year-old only wanted to have the last word with the Second Prince and that she didn't care if she was presentable, quite the opposite.
"Don't forget to wash your hands when you are done."
She half-opened her mouth and with a giggle that was both hilarious and stunned, she couldn't stop a dry gasp as she watched the red Jūnihitoe disappear behind the sliding door.
It was rare that she felt like hitting someone. In fact, it had never happened, considering that she really wanted to inflict pain. It was a strange feeling that created a thousand and one crazy scenarios in her mind.
A simple flick of the wrist and she would never hear from her again.
Just one... a little one.
"After you, please, Madam."
One hand under her chest, the other toward a stone bench about ten meters away, just under a cherry tree, the second maid, a brunette with blue eyes, offered her a small, sorry smile...
Or was it afraid?
She lowered her face as she turned to sit on the bench. With her back straight, the two women walked behind her and worked on her hair, allowing her for the first time to concentrate fully on the surrounding scenery.
Focusing on the building in front of the entrance, she noticed out of the corner of her eye the two others to her left, perfectly arranged, leading to a huge lavender garden about forty meters away. She inhaled softly and smelled the tiny scent of the flowers. Several servants came out of the two buildings, cloths in hand, and she understood that this was their quarters.
Farther to her left was a huge red and beige religious shrine, only the upper half of which she could see as the vegetation around the building obscured her view. To her right, beyond the river and the bridge that crossed the western part of the palace, was a huge mansion. She only had to look at the ten or so guards stationed in front of it to understand that this was the residence of the Crown Princes.
Then, in the center and overlooking the building where everyone was waiting for them, the Daimyō's quarters, no doubt. Twenty, maybe twenty-five meters high, the building towered over everything, even the city.
As tall as Gamata-
She closed her eyelids tightly, pushing away every last thought.
"Your hair is beautiful."
"Yes, it feels really nice."
She opened her eyes again, astonished, and a male voice came back to her using the exact same words... which had no effect other than to crush her mood.
Why did she always have to bring everything back to him? Couldn't an hour go by without her thinking of him?
"How shall we call you, madam?"
The voice behind her back quickly brought her back to reality. A reality she no longer really appreciated. But she managed to hide this detail of her life in her tone, letting only serenity shine through.
"Call me however you want. I don't mind."
The movements on her hair stopped for a few moments before resuming in an equally hesitant manner.
Had they just been watching each other to reassure themselves? Did she need to reassure them?
"I won't hurt you."
The slight tremor subsided, and the courage she had just offered brought the long-awaited question.
"Are you really a... Hyūga? From... the Hyūga clan of... Konoha?"
The respect, or rather the fear, that her name carried was surreal. It seemed even more so than in the books she had read on the subject. Everything pointed to the Fourth Great War as the cause, to her abduction as the cause.
Had the fear of the Hyūga surpassed the fear of the Uchiha?
"Yes."
The fingers stopped for a second time, but this time, with the return of the tremors, the movements resumed more quickly so as not to arouse her suspicions.
She sighed discreetly.
Her words had not been enough to calm her. She had to find a way. Two more breaths and the one on her left was going to have a tachycardia.
"And you, what are your names?"
"Tohime, Madam."
"And I am Mineko, Madam."
"Well, Tohime, Mineko, would you mind answering some of my questions?"
Her question went unanswered for a few moments. It was as if it had never been asked before. Or was it because she was the first person in this place to show them respect in her voice?
"No, we don't mind at all, Madam, you can ask as many questions as you like, and if we can answer them, we will be happy to do so."
"In that case, can you tell me the Second Prince's name?"
"You... you don't know His Highness' name?"
She heard a light tap on the shoulder of the one who had just spoken and a very quiet whisper.
"Do you think she would ask if she knew?"
"Forgive her manners, Madam, she did not mean to disrespect you, His Highness the Second Crown Prince is called Kenshin Teitarō, Madam.
Kenshin...
"Who is Kimiko?"
Silence and stoicism returned behind her, only to be broken by a surprised tone.
"H-How do you know that name?"
Her second question, and this one already sounded thorny.
"I heard it in an alley."
The maid's strange, yet truthful answer took several seconds to come, and in a whisper at that.
Was the subject... taboo?
"Kimoko-sama was the twin sister of Kenshin-sama. Sadly, she died in a tragic accident six years ago."
She gently turned her face toward the servant to her right, the one who had just answered her, and watched her out of the corner of her eye, eyebrows furrowed.
"Do I look like her?"
The young woman tilted her blond hair.
"You look very much like her, Madam."
She turned her attention back to the trees about ten meters away.
Had she found the explanation why the Second Crown Prince was so cold to her? Or was it just another coincidence, after all, the first Crown Prince, Musashi, had behaved exactly the same way. Maybe it was just because she was a Hyūga?
Why look further, it was more likely. But no matter, another question plagued her. A much more important question that always revolved around the same person.
It seemed to haunt her.
"The Second Prince, is he a samurai?"
This time it was the brunette who answered, and the certainty in her tone confirmed that they were more comfortable when it came to gratifying the Prince than talking about a dead person.
"Yes. His Highness is a very great warrior. The most famous of the Teitarō family for seven generations. It is said that he defeated the Shōgun himself in a private confrontation three years ago."
To remain impassive after what she had just learned was... difficult.
The Second Prince would have won against a samurai of Kage level. Three years ago. So he must be even stronger now.
Was this a joke?
"We're done, Madam."
Suddenly, the urge to go to that building did not appeal to her. Her chances of escaping if she didn't like what she heard were... diminished again.
"You... you may go, Madam.
She snapped out of her thoughts and stood up quickly, then turned and bowed to the two women.
"Thank you very much."
And they did not wait to shake her hand at the height of her face.
"What are you doing, Madam? Please stand up."
"Get up madam, the guards are looking at us, it is very dishonorable for your person."
She stood up immediately. Not because she didn't like being watched - that was the case - but because it seemed to really offend the two women. And to disrespect them by offering them respect was not what she wanted.
Then she just gave them a gentle smile to soothe their panicked looks.
"I'm sorry, that was inappropriate of me."
An expression that only made them panic more.
"Don't apologize, you didn't do anything wrong."
"Yes, don't apologize, they're waiting for you, go ahead Madam."
So much respect... so little...
Reflexively, she wanted to bow a second time, but taking it upon herself, she simply turned and walked toward the building. She stopped in the middle of the alley to let the group of four guards who were making their rounds pass, but strangely enough, they were the ones who stopped to make way for her.
Walking alongside the Second Crown Prince seemed to open up... paths.
She climbed the stairs, and just like the previous two times, the door opened as soon as she stepped in front of it. The guard, his back straight, staring out, dressed in his armor, helmet, mask and katana, never looked at her. The first one in the building not to.
From the moment she was alone, not a second passed without at least ten pairs of eyes on her.
Walking with the Second Prince opened the path, but not the trust.
The sliding door closed behind her and she took her eyes off it to look into the inky black irises of the Nara. She gave him a small smile, which she immediately wiped away as she noticed the serious look on his face.
"Did you sleep well?"
The question echoed through the canvas corridor as she simply nodded. Out of politeness, she was about to return the same request, but with a quickly raised hand, he pointed to her left.
"Let's go, they're waiting for us."
She lowered her face before venturing down the corridor. They passed one, two and then three rooms before they stopped in front of the biggest one. Shikaku opened it without waiting.
Dressed in her black yukata with white flowers, her jikatabis, her golden pin and a cup she had no idea what it was, the entire attention of the room turned to her and fell into an exemplary silence.
The fifty-square-meter room had six pillars supporting the roof and two steps in the middle that descended to form a rectangle. On each side, left and right, were eleven men.
To her right, eight of them sat on white linen cushions in seiza. All of them were about the same age, between forty and sixty, and dressed in the same way, either black or white sokutais, two cushions always seemed to be waiting for their owner.
She understood at once why the Kashira had not come for her, as he had told her the day before, and she did not need to think to know that the two empty seats were those of the samurai and Tadaaki Okuda, the man who had been called a traitor by Shisui Uchiha, but whom only she remembered.
Well, to be exact, the Nara who closed the door behind her knew it too, since she had told him.
To her left were three familiar faces. Four black pupils that observed her without the slightest emotion, unlike those of the Third Prince who, after she had crossed them, turned away almost immediately, embarrassed.
She glanced at the irises of the First and Second Princes for a moment before finally looking at the two people sitting cross-legged on the other side of the room.
The two most important people in the room.
The Seishitsu and the one she thought was the Daimyō.
With his hair tied back and graying, he was the spitting image of the first two Princes, dressed in a dark gray kamishimo, and like most of the people present, he watched them with an impassive expression.
The Nara walked past her and told her to follow him, which she did. Three steps later, down the only stairs in the room, he pointed to the cushion one meter away, right in the middle, and she put her knees on it to sit down. The former leader of the Jōnins then walked up the stairs to her left and placed himself a little further behind the three sons, making it clear to her that he was not part of the court, but that it was still permissible to be present at a meeting as important as this.
There was a leaden silence, and she really didn't know what to do, what to say.
Should she speak first? That didn't seem like a good idea. Kneel before the Daimyō? That had already been done. Should she continue to bow until her head reached the ground? Should she introduce herself? Or should she stop wasting her chakra?
She stopped breathing into her eyes and the turquoise disappeared. The opal made the neutral mines to her right disappear and left the eyelids of the woman five meters in front of her widening in amazement. Uneasily, it made the Seishitsu's heart race in her chest, making her flinch as she crossed it.
Her Byakugan had just begun the presentations.
A calm tone, a calm expression, a calm chakra. The Daimyō had already seen her pupils.
"Hinata Hyūga, I presume. It is an honor to meet you."
It was short but intense. The fear in Seishitsu's eyes at the pronunciation of her name was very satisfying to watch. It made her realize that until then, she had no idea who she really was. Only that she was a Hyūga. Strangely, the only daughter of the Daijō-Daijin, Kintarō Atami, Minister of Supreme Affairs of the Shōgun, the illustrious General Mifune Asano, was no longer observing her with her disdainful face, in fact, she was no longer able to observe her at all.
Faced with the silence directed at her, she placed her palms on the floor and lowered her face to the Daimyō as a sign of respect before raising it. She wanted to speak, but for the umpteenth time, she had no idea what to say.
Although she was completely calm, she was intimidated by all the eyes on her.
What was that feeling? like they were expecting something from her. As if they wanted to owe her respect. Was it fear or something else that caused that?
"Do you have anything to say, anything to ask before we begin?"
The voice of a member of the court rose, and she did not know who it was. Without looking away from the governor, she moved her face from left to right, and the Daimyō observed his subjects for the first time. With a simple nod, one of them immediately stood up.
Small and wearing glasses, she took advantage of his movement to read what was written on the man's clothing.
Dainagon. The great counselor of the Daimyō.
Just that.
The man in charge of the administration took out a roll of paper from his sleeve and opened it without delay.
"Today, on this day of June 4, 1017, at ten thirty-two o'clock, I will list the charges against you in the presence of the court, the family of His Majesty, His Majesty himself, and finally Shikaku Nara. You will have the opportunity to speak after I have finished."
It was like the trial of the movie she had seen at the Herb Theater.
Slowly, she turned to the Nara who was looking straight ahead, not watching her at all.
Only her lawyer was missing.
She simply nodded and the man wasted no time.
"You have been living illegally on Teitarō land for more than two years. You have built a house without the consent of the Kokushu of the province, and you have hunted and farmed on their land without the consent of the village of Shinjō and its Ryōshu. The same village you deceived and terrorized in order to extort goods and food from them."
The man raised his glasses and looked her straight in the eye. She stared back at him out of the corner of her eye and didn't blink. She had nothing to say. It was all true, even if exaggerated. She had done all that and more.
"According to the calculations of the advisors in charge of the palace treasury, Toshikasu and Sanraku here, the losses from your actions are estimated at six hundred thousand ryōs."
Her breath stopped short.
Six... six hundred... six hundred thousand? Had she heard right?
What kind of drugs did these advisors take? Even if she worked in the fields all her life, she could never earn such a sum. A kilo of rice must have cost a hundred ryōs, or even fifty in the Sound, she hadn't eaten that much.
Was it rice or diamonds?
"If you want to express yourself, now is the time, after that it will be too late."
With her face turned away, she remained stoic. Glancing for the umpteenth time at the man who had just spoken, the one closest to the Daimyō, she finally turned her attention back to the Governor, who was still sitting next to his wife, not taking his eyes off her and listening intently.
She inhaled as calmly as she could.
"I have nothing to say for myself, everything is true. I lived illegally. I hunted and robbed a whole village. I cannot deny it."
She didn't know if what she had just said was not expected, but the silence of the court and the Crown Princes told her that it was.
What would it be like after what she was about to say?
"If I had to do it again, I would."
She exhaled just as calmly and continued under the many scowls of the advisors, the impassive ones of the Lord and those who knew her.
"It allowed me to survive this far without hurting anyone. Sure, I blew up some families' meals and gave them nightmares that I could never make up for, but it also allowed me to hide my identity. So yes, if I had to do it again, I would do it again without the slightest hesitation. The reason I agreed to come all the way here is to apologize. What I did is unforgivable, but I had to apologize nonetheless. One day I will pay back what I have stolen, but you should know one thing, depending on the sentence, I will not accept it. I cannot afford to give you my freedom. I cannot offer you my trust. One war has already been fought in my name, I don't want to be the cause of another. So please don't beat around the bush, tell me what you-"
"How dare you talk like that in this place! Don't you know where your pla-!"
Just as she had cut her off in her monologue, the Seishitsu was cut off as well, but only by the hand of her husband, who raised it abruptly to order her to be quiet.
She didn't really know what had caused the forty-year-old to grow wings, she who hadn't been able to hide her gaze a few seconds before. Maybe it was because she understood that she was not a guest here, or maybe it was because the First Prince had just started to stare at her. Maybe it was both. She didn't know, but one thing to consider was that the Daimyō didn't seem to be offended in any way, and that was the most important thing.
With his hand raised, the Governor of the Region watched her for a long time without saying a word, before finally raising an astonished eyebrow.
"How old are you?"
It took only a second for an counselor to answer in her place.
"She's sixteen... years old..."
A tall, thin man, about one meter ninety, who began to stutter when the Daimyō's attention fell on his person.
She would not be surprised if one day someone claimed that he knew her better than she knew herself.
The Governor's hand went down slowly, very slowly, and the silence was palpable. She even heard the swallowing of the man who had just spoken. Until both of his hands slammed down on the wooden floor and he bowed to his Lord.
"M-My apologies, Lord Teitarō. I did not wish to answer for the accused."
Turning her attention away from the council, she looked again at the one who was waiting for her answer, the one who could terrorize a man with a single glance, and, taking pity on the poor man of the court, put an end to the discomfort.
"I am sixteen years old, Your Majesty."
Seventeen by the end of the year.
He looked at her skeptically.
Did he not believe her?
"Are you a virgin?"
A slight void settled in her brain, somewhat shocked by the request out of nowhere, leaving her with only a single memory to replay as the question echoed under the attention of the entire room.
"If the court asks you this question, answer no and be as convincing as possible. Pretend that you met a young man or something, but don't say you are."
Out of the corner of her eye, she looked at all the men present, curious and indiscreet, before she looked at the first Crown Prince. He looked back at her and his eyelids opened slightly, clearly indicating that she knew what to say.
She had thought about it for a long time and, unfortunately for him, but mostly for her, if there was one thing she hated more than a person who lied to her, it was when she did it. And lying like that would be a betrayal to herself, but especially to him.
"Yes, I am."
In turn, and just as the member of his court had just done, the Lord took a long breath, placed a hand on his leg, and observed a fixed point above her.
Her jaw clenched, her gaze closed, she lost the Crown Prince's attention, and the Daimyō took advantage of the strange, satisfied mood in the room to sigh softly.
"Let's stop this ridiculous trial here. You want to get to the point, so I'll answer."
Was it relief?
"I will give you the security you seek. The security that Konoha has failed to provide. The hospitality, the food and everything else you want. I will erase everything you have ever done, said or thought wrong."
She remained motionless. The expression on Seishitsu's face was enough shock for two, needless to say, but she did not dare to test her husband's patience and remained silent.
With a kind of skepticism, she tilted her face slightly in gratitude before opening her curious lips.
"Thank you, but what is the counterpart."
An uncomfortable shiver crept through her, tightening her jaw and raising her hair.
She guessed what the Daimyō was going to propose, and to be honest, she didn't want to hear it, but she had asked for it, it seemed.
"You will be my fourth wife."
The tone was unmistakable. It was not a request, it was an order.
Her first reflex was to let out a breath that was both nervous and funny, then, faced with the seriousness of the situation, the fifty-year-old faces around her, she stared at the Nara a few meters away from her position.
In the same place he had been since the beginning, he watched her and could only nod.
He... agreed with what she had just heard. He supported what she had just heard.
The longer she lived in this world, the more she survived it, the more it disgusted her.
So this was what Shikaku had asked her to agree to. The nara had known about it all along, he had known even before he had spoken to her for the first time what the Daimyō had in mind if the rumor was true, if there was ever a Hyūga in the lands of the Teitarō. But he had not told her. He hadn't told her and now she was in this situation where her only way out was to run.
But a whole new problem had entered the equation, and it was a big one.
She watched the Second Prince who, with his back straight, his arms crossed and his eyes closed, was not watching her.
Was he concentrating only on her movements? If she ever got up and jumped across the canvas and the boards, would he be able to catch her? Did he even want to?
She breathed such a tiny amount of chakra into her legs that she had trouble even wondering if it was the case, but it seemed more than enough to cause the Second Prince's eyelids to flutter open, impassive.
The voice of one of the advisors came through, but still shocked, she did not pay any attention to him, even when he positioned himself between her and the Daimyō to speak directly to the Governor of the region.
"The preparations are already underway, Your Majesty, the union will be sealed in three days, at the time of the new moon. Tenmon-sama has been watching the stars most of the night, and he is certain that a son will be born of this union in the year of the tiger. He will become the next Shōgun of the land and lead your name into battle."
Several admiring onomatopoeias rose in the closed room.
"Congratulations, Your Majesty."
"Yes, congratulations, it will be a beautiful wedding."
"Are you going to stop me?"
Her delicate tone clashed with the low tones of the unexpected congratulations, and she received the attention of the entire room, except for the one she was looking for.
The Second Prince was still not looking at her, and the silence her question had just caused made the situation... awkward. Or rather, no one seemed to think it was strange. Everything seemed normal.
A man on the verge of senility had just declared that he was going to marry a sixteen-year-old girl, without asking her opinion, and all the men present to his right applauded the news.
At least one good thing came out of this burlesque, disgusting and revolting situation: her trial had really been forgotten. Even she had forgotten it.
Seemingly falling on deaf ears, she repeated her question, but this time she raised her voice, drawing the wrath of the First Prince.
"Are you going to stop me?"
The person in question finally opened his eyes and examined her with a tired look.
No one but the First Prince and the Nara seemed to understand the meaning of her request, not even the Daimyō, for whom everything seemed to be accepted.
It was not the voice of the Second Prince, but that of the Nara, and he received her opal and growing anger.
"Accept, Princess. This life that is offered to you will be better than any other life you could choose. Please remember what I told you yesterday."
Her chest grew increasingly unstable as the seconds ticked by and she tried to keep her composure.
"Give these people, this region, this way of life your trust. I know it's hard, I know it takes a lot of sacrifice, but trust them. You will no longer have to spend the rest of your life wondering who is walking behind your back, wondering if someone has recognized you, afraid to open the door to green vests one fine morning. This country, this family, can and will protect you, just like it did for me."
Even though the Nara had just betrayed her, she didn't blame him at all. She knew that the former Jōnin leader had done it for her own good, that he only wanted to protect her, to make her feel protected.
Faced with the Second Prince's lack of response, she glanced back at the Daimyō over the shoulder of the still-standing member of the court, and he didn't miss a beat of the look she sent him.
A look that went from anger to neutrality in record time.
"Have I no say in this, Your Majesty?"
The man with his back to her turned almost immediately before pointing at her.
It was amazing how, when they were in a group, even the puniest of men felt like the king of the world.
This man in front of her seemed to have completely forgotten the fact that she was a Hyūga, a trained Hyūga.
An assassin, in fact.
"What are you saying?! Have you no manners?! The great Daimyō is..."
"Step aside, Sanraku-san."
The Governor's calm tone rose, and the man in charge of the palace treasury, who suddenly turned white as snow, almost threw himself to the side.
"Don't you want this marriage? I offer you everything you sought by coming to my lands and much more, should you not thank me?"
She lowered her face and let out a small smile. A breath later, she turned her attention back to the two people still sitting across from her and, paying only the slightest attention to the Seishitsu, unable to express her anger, her humiliation, she glared at the leader of the region.
"Your offer is much less, considering what I am offering you in return."
She paused for a moment, and this time even the third crown prince looked at her warily.
Yes, she had just spoken to the most influential man for hundreds of miles like she was talking to a child.
"You don't care if I'm safe, if Konoha or Kumo try to kill me, all you care about is getting the Byakugan. I offer you more than you could ever offer me, so I ask you again, don't I have a say in this, Your Majesty?"
If the silence had been palpable before, this time it suffocated her. She simply could not breathe, the pressure she felt was immense. Behind her irascible, impassive expression, there was an immense fear that grew as the eyes stared at her.
"And what do you want, Hyūga Hinata?
She tilted her face in gratitude.
He seemed to really consider what she had to say. Though inappropriate given the situation, it was enough for her to thank him.
"I have a counterpart... no two, and if you don't accept it, I can't accept your request in return."
She was going to call herself a weathervane as she changed her mind like she changed her yukata. Wasn't she the one who said a minute ago that she wouldn't accept the sentence? Even though she did not really have one, this forced marriage seemed especially close.
"I am listening."
"I accept marriage on the condition that I can continue to live in my house. I accept your hospitality, your food, but I refuse your security. I don't want to feel under constant surveillance. Here is my first request, if you accept it, I will give you what you want."
A fraction of a second. In a fraction of a second, she observed all the tenketsus in the room, and it went without saying that the Second Crown Prince did not remain unnoticed as he moved his right hand to his forearm. Where his weapon was surely sealed.
Though provocative, her gesture allowed her to have her question answered by the simple chakra fluctuation of the Daimyō.
Although questionable, her counterpart did not seem... unacceptable.
What about the second?
"As for the second one, I will offer you the Byakugan, but I will not marry you, I will marry your son, the Second Prince."