Mamoru was weirded out by the fact that once he and Usagi entered the room, everyone, all sixteen of them, stood out of respect. He knew it had nothing to do with him and everything to do with her as she stood at his side. While he felt intensely uncomfortable with the attention, it was apparent to him that Usagi was taking it all in stride.
He saw Rick and immediately made his way over to his classmate and former lab partner. He felt the most comfortable around him. "Everyone showed," he commented, not knowing what else to say.
Usagi watched Mamoru and Rick while she worked to conceal a smile. What her love didn't realize in his nervousness was that everyone in the room was looking at Rick in awe. Not only had he found Usagi, but they all realized he had been searched out for conversation by her bonded mate.
Rick said, "It wasn't in question if they would all show up. But to be fair, I did call this meeting in time for my cousin to get here after his business trip."
Mamoru leaned in and whispered, "I have your word that I can trust them?"
"Yes. Not just anyone in the family is invited into the knowledge of our past."
"I'm glad."
Rick looked at him with curiosity. "You trust my word that much?"
"I know it was you who reported Akito for plagiarism. His father has power, and that was a risky move. I never wanted to expose that fact since he would come after you. But it made me think highly of your integrity."
"How did you find out?!" Rick asked, worried that someone else could piece it together.
"I almost knocked on the Dean's door to tell him the exact same thing when I overheard you telling him. Then I lingered around the corner, ensuring no one else stumbled upon you talking to him, too."
Rick smiled, "That's actually a relief. I'm glad you watched out for me."
Mamoru shrugged, "You're going to make a great doctor. I wanted to preserve that."
Usagi watched as a woman, obviously, Rick's mom, beamed in pride.
She then walked over to Mamoru and smiled up at him. "Feel better about me being here?"
"I do," he confirmed.
She then took his hand and pulled him up to the seats placed in front, facing sixteen seats. They sat, and then everyone else sat, too.
"How much do you know about what happened back then?" Usagi asked, referring to the circumstances around what happened about one hundred and fifty years ago.
One of the middle-aged women said, "We have a written and oral account, but we would love to hear about what happened from you."
Usagi had figured as much, and she came prepared. She pulled out a jade necklace and held it up for everyone to see. "He didn't get it in the end."
There was a gasp from the room, and a man said, "She never told anyone where the necklace went."
"One hundred and fifty years later, circumstances have changed. Even if any of his family line had cared to look for it, no one exists to carry on that monster's legacy."
"They're dead?" someone asked her.
Usagi shrugged and said, "In a way. He went on to have one child who was just as awful as him. He had pretended his mistress' child was Chiyo's. That horrible child grew up and then went on to have one illegitimate child with a prostitute to whom he gave financial support. That was until he disappeared one night, and the authorities never found him."
"He disappeared?" Rick asked.
Mamoru chuckled, "Usagi, did you take care of the issue?"
"Not like you're implying, but I assisted a bit. He beat his wife, and her brother took exception to that. Her brother was caught and brought to trial for his murder."
"Back then, they had to have a body to charge someone with murder," another commented. "You said he was never found."
"They did have the body," Usagi said, confusing them all. "I just later compelled everyone to believe they never found it. News reached me of the trial, and I made it go away.
"His child, a daughter, grew up to be like her mother and died young of disease."
"After all that, that's how his line ended?" Another asked.
Usagi grasped the jade pendant. "He knew without her, his line would end. A witch told him the fate of his family when he was still a teen. That's why he sought Chiyo out."
She closed her eyes and thought back to the past. "She was beautiful. It was the excuse he used for wanting her. But, the truth was, one I only found out two decades later, that same witch had told him of the importance of her family line, and he wanted to change his fate by attaching his life to hers.
"Her Uncle had taken charge of raising her after her father's death. Her mother had died in childbirth along with her son, and her father had a fall from horseback, dying instantly. Only his younger brother was witness to what happened. He became heir and guardian to Chiyo, a girl who already had many offers for her hand that came along with payoffs. It wasn't typical to pay a woman's family for her hand back then, but she wasn't a typical beauty.
"Then he purchased her from her Uncle. His family line is still wealthy to this day."
Mamoru shifted uncomfortably and asked, "This sounds similar to your mother's circumstance."
"And that is why it all felt so personal to me," she replied.
Usagi then continued, "He was a fool. He couldn't alter his fate with his marriage to her. That's not how things work. No matter who he married, his destiny was already sealed.
"The first word I heard of her circumstances reached me a year and a half later. By then, she was chained up and imprisoned on his estate. He was sure she was getting pregnant with his child and finding a way to rid herself of the child.
"Truth was, she wanted nothing more than to get pregnant. She knew he would leave her alone then, and she would have some rest from his forceful attention."
Mamoru felt incredibly upset over what had happened. "He forced himself on her, and no one did anything?"
"Who? Her uncle didn't care. He was rich, and the authorities couldn't have done anything if they did care. She was his property."
He said, "He was just allowed to…" Mamoru then smiled. "You got involved." He was sure that Usagi could fix anything.
"I stole the two most precious things he had. One was the jade pendant his family got from Emperor Go-Sai in 1663, around the time he abdicated the throne. And the second was Chiyo. The pendant I just stole out of spite.
"His mistress grew pregnant around that time, and to preserve his pride, he secreted her away and pretended she was his wife. No one had seen Chiyo for over seven months, and he kept her hidden. He did it to hide the embarrassment he felt in having her stolen from him and to try and have a 'legitimate' heir.
"That didn't stop him from trying to hunt Chiyo down. Once she was out from under his grip, he had no intention of bringing her back. He was determined to kill her as punishment for running off. He got close one day, and I took issue with that. I killed him before he could find out his mistress had given him a son."
Usagi stood, walked over to the table that had been pushed to the side of the room, and placed the jade pendant on it. "It's yours. She told me to hide it away for good, but I feel like she would want you to have it now that no one can claim ownership of it after I stole it from him.
Mamoru asked, "And She ended up marrying again? Obviously," he muttered in answer to his own question, looking around the room.
Usagi smiled at him and sat back down next to him. "She did." She then said, "I had placed her in the home of Keiko, a widowed friend of mine. She kept watch over her and helped restore her health. In the end, he not only had her locked up, but he would beat her when she showed proof she wasn't pregnant.
"I knew Keiko had a son, Saito, but he had been off fighting for the Choshu army when I first brought Chiyo there. It wasn't until almost a year later that he returned. When he did, she was back to full health and helping to care for his mother and the family home."
She smiled, thinking back to what happened. "Saito distrusted her enormously at first sight. He didn't put any stock in her beauty and tried to stay away from her." Usagi laughed, "That lasted all of a day and a half. It wasn't hard for him to quickly tell that she didn't rest on her looks and had even come to hate them. After all, they had led her into a horrible first marriage. He quickly saw what anyone with sense would in her character and fell irrevocably in love with her.
"His kindness and his gentle manner, despite having been a warrior, won over her heart eventually, and they married. She was pleasantly shocked when she got pregnant one month after their marriage. They had four children together and lived a long and happy life. Their marriage was like a fairytale."
Rick asked, "What was the fate her first husband wanted from her descendants?"
As her way of answering Usagi said, "Raise your hand if you're a doctor or going to be a doctor," Four hands went up. "How many lawyers?" Three hands went up. "How many own their own business?" Seven hands went up. "How many get to choose to be a stay-at-home mother because your family can afford it?" Three hands went up. She looked at the last three, "What do you do?" Each answered respectively as she pointed at them. One was a politician, one was a veterinarian, and the other was a chemical engineer.
"And his line died out from syphilis," she stated. "While her descendants were all destined to be incredibly successful. He was obsessed with preserving his 'good' family name."
Her family had become a notable family in Japan, and Usagi was proud.
She thought back to one of the two times she found Chiyo weeping all those decades ago. The second time, she was doing her level best to walk away from her happiness. Saito had asked Chiyo to marry him three days earlier, and in response, she had told him that she would never marry him.
Usagi found her trying to hide in the woods as she wept. "Whatever is the matter?" Usagi asked.
"Saito, he asked me to marry him. I can't." Chiyo tried to wipe all the tears from her eyes. She then looked at Usagi and pleaded, "I know I'm asking a lot of you. You already saved me once, but I need your help. I need to leave —I can't stay here."
"Of course. I didn't bring you here to be impositioned by a man. I don't want you forced into a marriage ever again."
Chiyo curled in on herself and sobbed out, "He didn't… It's not like that. I love him!"
"Then why do you want to leave?" Usagi was able to make out Saito circling around a tree further back in the woods. They had both been looking for her. When Usagi arrived at his home, he begged for her help and told her that he ruined everything by asking Chiyo to marry him.
Chiyo looked at Usagi and said, "If I marry him, he'll regret it and grow to hate me. He knows a bit about my past and my last marriage. The problem is that he didn't put it all together. I can't have children."
Usagi said, "You know what the witch had told-"
"Damn her!" She yelled. "I don't believe a single word that hag said! She's the reason that man married me and dragged me through hell."
Changing tactics, she asked, "You think he cares about children?" She then looked over Chiyo's shoulder at Saito. She watched him adamantly shake his head no. "He loves you," she added as he nodded.
"He should care! He would be an amazing father, and I refuse to remove the possibility of an heir from him. And don't you think Keiko would be an amazing grandmother? How could I look her in the eyes and say I was marrying her son knowing what I would be taking from her!?"
"Interesting," Usagi commented. "You would have him marry a woman he doesn't love for the sake of children."
"Of course I would," Chiyo snapped. "What's more important to a man than an heir!? Did you forget I lived through hell for that very reason!? Plus, we all know what happens to families without sons. They starve. Who would take care of him in his old age if he didn't have kids?"
"There are an abundance of war widows right now." Usagi believed she would have a child, but she figured another argument would work better with Chiyo. "There are many mothers that can't afford to care for all of their children. You could take some of them in."
"He deserves better," Chiyo said brokenly.
"Better than a woman who cared for his mother and the family home while he was at war?"
"You and Keiko saved me. You got me out of hell, and Keiko is the reason I was able to leave it behind me. I owe you both everything. I will love and protect her until my dying breath. I helped her because I love her."
"How is this protecting her?"
"She deserves grandchildren," Chiyo said firmly. "I won't keep that from her."
"But you will deny your love and break her son's heart? Will she want that?"
"I would break it for now. But be realistic, Usagi, he can fall in love again. He's amazing, and women flock to him. He'll find one to marry and have children with."
Usagi smiled as Saito stepped forward and said, "I will marry you or none other. I vow that to you now."
Chiyo gasped and spun to face him. "Don't. Please. You deserve-"
"Enough!" He shouted. "I don't care if I raise a child of my own blood or take in another's child. Without you, I will never be happy again. Is that what you want to condemn me to? And before you say any other nonsense, know this: I know what it feels like to lose you. You told me you didn't want to marry me, and I experienced what it was like to face not having you in my life. Don't destroy me like that if you love me. Please have mercy on me. Please."
Usagi stayed and witnessed the wedding two weeks later. It was one of the happiest moments of her life. Something in her bones told her they would live, love, and have a beautiful life together.
Before a year had fully elapsed, she was holding their beautiful daughter named Usagi. All told, they had four children, one daughter and three sons. Chiyo had been right about two things, though. Saito was an amazing father, and Keiko loved being a grandmother.
Coming out of the memory, Usagi looked happily around the room. "Saito was the one who started The Order of Usagi. It wasn't formed from saving Chiyo from her first husband. He said he created it because I saved him from a lifetime without her."
Mamoru mock-whispered, "Wow. Talk about being romantic. I wish I were that smooth."
Rick laughed and said, "Looks to me like you're doing just fine for yourself."
"True," he replied, smiling.
Things then turned to the current situation in Tokyo. "You told Rick you wanted our help with The Order."
"I do," Usagi replied. "What's your name?"
"Suki."
"Suki, I would have whoever among you that would like to help work in tandem with the two moles we have in the organization and with…" Usagi shrugged, "I can't say some police officers because they won't be acting in their official capacity. And then we have others helping, too. It's a human problem, so I am comfortable with humans helping."
"And the other problem?" another asked. "I can comprehend enough to know there are others there with you. We just can't remember who they are and what they can do. But do you have adequate help?"
"I do. And you're right. One of our friends is possibly the most powerful witch that ever existed, and she's glamoured us from being identified."
"That's incredible," Suki commented.
Mamoru added, "You don't know the half of it. I'm a hybrid. I'm both a vampire and a werewolf."
Suki choked in surprise. "I've read… how is that possible? Everything I've read, every time it was attempted, they died."
"She's that powerful," Usagi said. "It turns out it was always possible to become a hybrid. The limiting factor was the strength of the witch helping the process. She's the first ever to be powerful enough, and she's now created five."
Usagi went on to explain that everyone was in vague enough terms not to expose anyone's identities.
When the meeting ended, all sixteen members of The Order of Usagi had committed to helping her in any way Usagi asked of them.