Glossary:
Bokutō: How people call wooden swords in Japan.
Silk tofu: Really soft kind of tofu.
-san: Honorific to refer politely to anyone who is not a close friend nor someone above your station.
-sensei: Honorific to refer to a master or expert in a field. Also used for teachers.
THE SWORDSMAN (I)
In the bright red dark behind his eyelids, he focused on the pulsing warmth on his left cheek. On the cool, soft brush on his right ear. He inhaled. He followed the air to the back of his throat: thick, humid, piney. He could almost taste the damp earth all around. When he exhaled, his own breath tickled the tip of his fingers. He relaxed his grip, and the crisp, bubbling sound of water, still too cold for comfort, drowned everything else.
He opened his eyes and charged: "HaaaAAAaah!"
And fell.
Hard.
Jaw clenched and fists tight around the bokutō, Kenshin stood up. His clothes now stuck to the skin of his forearms, his knees, his shins, all drenched by the stream… "Damn." It hadn't been a good week. Couple of weeks. Three full moons' worth of them. He glowered at the little white and green buds that now swayed gently from their branches at the side of the brook: Against his will, they started to come out now they were no longer bitten away every night by frost, as it had turned into morning dew, and into the amber mist that now glided around his ankles, trickling down along the stream. The next full moon would have come and gone by the end of the week, and there still was no word from his Master.
"Why?"
There were some nights when fear won; nights when he really thought his master wouldn't come back. It wasn't because he thought anything would happen to Hiko Seijūrō the Thirteenth, but the exact opposite: After hearing Shakkū-san's stories of old—although he'd never say that to his face, lest the man cracked his skull open with an iron rod,—the fact was that sometimes, just some times, he thought his master would not want to come back for a boy that could never live up to him. Those nights he would grab his coat, his bokutō, and he'd sneak away to the forest, to this very brook, to train as hard as he could stand to. That was the only way to make the stupid fear go away.
Then, there were days when anger won. Days of getting up at first light to fetch wood and make coal for the smith. Then, as soon as Shakkū-san would come back from the shrine, he'd take him to work the bellows or whatever he fancied that day. He'd laugh at how he couldn't even lift the hammer properly, how he couldn't take the heat of the forge for more than a couple of hours at a time, how he dropped on the snow at the entrance of the workshop and—oh, was he feeling ok? Those days, he'd wait until dark, and train until he greeted the first farmers sauntering their way to the rice paddies.
But then came the baby. The first few days he wasn't allowed to get near the newborn, not even check on Iori-san. He'd wait around the midwife's house, glaring at the kids that stared at him until they turned around and left. He had tried to train there, but he just couldn't focus: People stared. At every move he made, and at every one he didn't. Unable to understand, he just waited. And waited. When they finally let him in, when they let Iori-san go back to their home, there was no turning his back on the baby. He was so impossibly tiny, and his face turned as red as Kenshin's hair when he cried his heart out. His master would go on and on about how small and feeble and everything he was, but babies were much, much worse. Now, he was no girl to be tasked with taking care of the baby all day, but that didn't mean he could say no to Iori-san. She was exhausted, so why wouldn't he be a good boy and take the baby around for a while until she woke up? And could he help around the kitchen while she fed the baby? Before he realized, spring was already blooming and he was at the beck and call of the Arai family. What drove him mad was that he couldn't get himself to hate it. At all.
Ok, once more. But this time, do it right.
Eyes fixed ahead, he forced himself to take a deep breath. A big, drawn out one from the very bottom of his navel. As he brought his bokutō overhead and down the side of his right arm, he turned left and forced his grip to loosen. That's it: Now—don't swing back—go! He hit an imaginary sword, his own doubling back in a circle to hit the imaginary swordsman from the other side. He raised the bokutō again, mirroring his movements to the other side. Hands centered! Go! Slash. First small, then large, now! Slash. Don't just block dammit! Dodge! Again!
By the time he got it right, his feet had gone numb from the cold; but when he made it, it felt so good he almost forgot how angry he was at himself. Heaving but still smiling, he picked up his neatly folded coat, slid his arms inside—his master was right: It was kind of falling apart—and put the bokutō in his belt to head back to the Arai home.
Stomach rumbling, he made a bee line to the nutty smell of breakfast simmering in the kitchen. He could almost savor the porridge already when Shakkū-san's scratchy voice called from the workshop: "Hey! Kid! C'mere a sec."
He knew better than to give the smith any reason to make fun of him, so he bit his tongue, turned around, and marched on. The man was waiting for him leaning against the entrance with a devious smirk, as if he were a devil mocking the pleated strips of white paper that hanged behind him. Kenshin braced himself for the worst.
"I've got an errand for ya," I knew it, "catch."
The redhead snagged the bundle more by instinct than by his own will, its surprising weight almost causing him lose his balance. A long, hard, heavy bundle wrapped in straw and cloth. Could it…?
Heart fluttering, he undid the end of the bundle to reveal the rough metal he'd stared at anxiously all this time, now distinctly shaped as a sharpened, curved edge. His eyes darted back to the smith, beaming: "Thank you!"
"Hoo! Don't get ahead of yourself," the man cautioned, his smirk now having turned into an amused grin, "Seijūrō still needs to pay for that. Besides…" the smile disappeared, "no matter what your intentions are, a sword is a tool for killing."
All blood drained from Kenshin's face.
"When it's finished, that edge will cut through flesh as if it were silk tofu. Whenever you unsheathe, you're bound to draw blood and then some. You following me, kid?"
Eyes somber, he nodded.
"Good."
Kenshin lowered his gaze back to the unfinished sword: Sobered up by those words, the metal now looked much darker, rougher, almost sinister in its cradle of straw. "It's heavy" the redhead muttered, more to himself than to be heard by the smith, but he still replied: "Yeah, had to: If I had made it any lighter, as soon as you try any of that Hiten stuff you do, it would be the end of it."
"But enough with the lecture, Seijūrō will drill that into that thick skull of yours," the man poked Kenshin's forehead, snapping him out of it. "Just take that to the polisher, will ya?"
Carefully wrapping the sword once more and securing it on his back, Kenshin took the down payment, fastened it to his belt and bowed respectfully before taking his leave. As he walked past the kitchen, Iori-san's voice made him pause: "Wait, Ken-chan!"
The woman emerged carrying parcels and a wooden bucket, the baby's beading eyes peeking behind her back. "Shall we go grocery shopping, Ken-chan?"
There was no saying 'no' to Iori-san.
He walked one step behind her, not because he couldn't keep up with the woman's easy steps, but because from there he could make some faces at the baby on her back, to its cooing delight. He cheered Kenshin on with a gurgling giggle. An infectious giggle. One that had never seen a cold night. One that made him smile back in spite of the weight on his own back. He didn't remember enjoying himself that much when traveling, but then again, he only did so with his master. Not the kind of person to laugh at a face… unless he was tormenting someone, that is.
By the time they arrived at the village, the sun stood directly above, casting stark, maze-like shadows on the gravel path at his feet. Vendors announced their wares at the top of their lungs, competing with the loud chatter of old ladies trying to gossip over their loud calls; carts and palanquins joined the strained creak of wood under the weight of fish as large as him, while trays of vegetables like rainbows laid at his fingertips, and piles of rice stacked to the very roofs adorned the insides of shops. The air was warm and thick, pungent and fragrant at the same time, bustling with life. But just out of the corner of his eyes, he could feel the hunger following everyone around from the depths of the alleys. He'd better stay close to Iori-san.
He took as much of the load as possible, but fell short once the wooden bucket filled with tofu made him way too unsteady to walk. With a smile, the woman lifted the weight from his hands: "You don't want to fall over that, do you?" she excused, gesturing to the sword on his back. Embarrassed, Kenshin was about to protest when the world came to a halt: First came the impact, then the cries to stop the thief. His eyes widened as he saw the woman collapse, her knees buckling when the cowering shape of a boy slammed them on his way to the ground. In the chaos of flailing arms and scattering groceries, he lunged forward, arms outstretched toward the baby.
He dove chin-first into the ground with his arms above his head, holding the baby. The gravel dug into his skin, making him close his eyes just in time to shield them from the dirt kicked up by the fleeing thief. "Seikū!" A pair of desperate, loving hands lifted the weight from his hands, "Seikū, you're ok?" Kenshin sat up, spitting the dirt stuck to his teeth but still watching closely: his heart was lodged in his throat as he waited for Iori-san, checking the baby's face, his arms, lifting his legs in search of the smallest of cuts.
"What's happening here?!" A man cut through the small crowd that had gathered around them, his two swords and severe eyes making people take more than one step back. "Kamiya! Good g—what have I taught you?— Help the woman!"
Two men with the same pair of swords made their way behind him in response: One was younger, with big, round eyes and a really, really odd hairstyle with just the top of his head shaved; the other, taller but not as old as the first man, showed the beginnings of a beard and a tinge of annoyance in his gaze.
"Alright! Shall we get up, miss?" the youngest rushed, pushing aside the now empty bucket of tofu to kneel next to her. "Oh, hello baby!" He greeted, prompting Kenshin to move between them as Iori-san hugged Seikū even closer. "Don't worry kid, I'm not here to hurt you. You can call me Koshijiro by the way."
A timid smile and warm eyes made them lower their guard. The man, Koshijiro, started to lead Iori-san away from the commotion the people around them grew more and more agitated. A few raised their voices loud enough for Kenshin to follow over the tangle of indignant voices: It appeared this was far from the first time the thief had escaped. In fact, it was a whole gang of thieves that were behind this and other crimes—young delinquents that had no regard for the merchants' honest work. They all came from a rat's nest on the outskirts of the village, to the north or perhaps north-west, like all them lowlives were from. They had tried to find their hideout, but they scurried away like their father did when they started to weed out the traitors. A treacherous bunch, all of them. So, honorable warriors like them would consider bringing justice to the innocent, lowly merchants, surely…?
"We've got no time for that!" Protested the annoyed, bearded man. "We're doing our best to protect your safety and you want us to lose our time with petty theft?!"
"On the contrary, Maekawa," interrupted the oldest, "If we allow our own people to take what's not theirs, what does it say to the outside-people, the world beyond our country?" It was a second, but when his gaze paused on Kenshin, its disdain made the redhead squirm.
"Kamiya! Make sure the woman and her child get home safely; Maekawa and I will go ahead and start searching."
"Yes, Serizawa-sensei!"
Hello there! Sorry for the long wait and hope this is worth the while!
I planned and wrote and re-wrote this chapter a couple of times, hit a wall a bit more, and wrestled with four-legged fluffy editors as they walked on my keyboard. I finally decided to split this chapter in 2: better get something done than none at all haha.
Please feel free to give your feedback! I'm still learning and everything counts. Thank you for your time~
[Dec 14] Made some small adjustments and will be adding glossaries and historical notes to the chapters. I try to limit foreign words, but sometimes there's just no good alternative.
Historical notes
• Until 1947, girls were employed by other families to babysit their children; that's what Kenshin is referring to with "he was no girl".
• If I understood correctly, people in Kansai used to cook fresh rice for lunch and you only cooked rice once in the day, so... breakfast was leftovers (if you were lucky). In addition, white rice was a rich stuff thing, so it was actually a mix white or brown rice with toasted barley in this case. After 3 years of Hiko cuisine though, anything was a delicacy for poor Kenshin.
• Finishing a sword was more likely than not done by someone else, not the very same that forged it. There were professional polishers who, with jobs like these, wanted to be payed in advance. Except Shakkū with Seijūrō: they be buddies.
• The "weed out the traitors" part makes reference to the Ansei purge. Think cold war-ish but within Japan: People supporting the emperor were tortured and executed, and that meant their families probably shared the same fate.
• Unlike the pre-Tokugawa era, not everyone could carry a weapon; only samurai did. Hence Kenshin fixing on the two swords each man carry (a normal one and a shorter one for indoor combat).
• Couldn't find how Wakashū or young samurai apprentices are supposed to refer to their teachers, so I settled for the Sensei honorific for Koshijiro.
