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“Are you not afraid?” I was worried that she might be scared of the large flying vehicle, but the Princess shook her head without hesitation.
“Because I'm with you, Yuki-san.” She cheerfully said that there was nothing to be afraid of, but then she looked up at me as if pondering something.
— An excerpt from “The Remembrance of a Crow” by Chisato Abe
IT wasn’t supposed to be like this.
When the enemies invaded Yamauchi, Yuki-san defended it with all his might and without a pause, but paid the price of losing his best friend in the battle. He became a shell of himself. Like an automaton, there were no emotions on his face, in his movements. He lost the one who lit his fire.
Something shifted a year after I was born.
“Thanks to you, Himemiya, he begins to live again,” said my aunt and godmother Masuho no Susuki, the Princess of the West, as she combed my long hair. “It was through your father’s insistence that Yukiya visited you. Everyone in the room witnessed how he cried upon seeing you smiled at him for the very first time.”
I couldn’t recall the details anymore but I knew in my heart that aside from my parents, I was equally drawn to him. And yet, darkness still followed him. Darkness and melancholy. My father, the Emperor, noted it. They were always together but he couldn’t get into his strategist’s head.
One day he invited him to have supper with us.
“Why don’t you stay the night, Yukiya? I’ll need to see you again in the morning.”
Yukiya agreed. He would always do whatever my father said.
“If that’s what you desire, Your Majesty. Then I’ll spend the night here.”
It was not unusual finding Yuki-san dine with us every night at the palace anymore.
\\
Yukiya’s former quarters at the Sunrise Palace used to be empty. As a child it was my favourite hiding place whenever I played with my cousins Akane and Teruo.
Staying up late, my feet brought me there. I heard murmurs coming from the chamber that I tiptoed carefully trying to reach one of the huge columns so they wouldn’t see me.
There were two figures undulating on the futon.
Yukiya was bound in red ropes, like the ones he wore around his body as a Yamauchi soldier to keep his tachi. I hadn’t seen him naked, but he was on that night lying on his stomach, crying.
On top of Yukiya was the emperor, whose face I could not see if not for his open lilac-white kimono with butterfly ornaments on it and loose black, long hair that enveloped them both. He commanded his chief adviser.
“Don’t hold back. I want to hear you scream like the courtesans from the Hanamachi.”
Yukiya’s roar bounced in the four corners of the chamber.
Hearing Yuki-san’s raw, guttural voice made me afraid. Silent as a ghost, I tiptoed back until I reached the heavy wooden door, opened it without making any sound, and began to run back to my chamber. I didn’t tell a single soul about what I saw.
//
Years passed with all the deaths and the chaos surrounding the change of leadership, a new ruler succeeded my father. It was his half-brother, whom my late grandfather hid from his entire kin. Nagi was a mere boy, only 16 years old, and Yukiya’s puppet. I am now confined to be one of His Majesty’s concubines despite my failed rebellion defying his reign.
I was forced to cohabit with my relative after the army general whose former name was Yukiya of the Kitamoto Family regarded it was a lighter sentence than slavery (binding my third leg to serve as a “horse”), death (beheading) and family dishonour (my uncles and their sons and daughters stripped off their high offices and privileges). Adopting a monastic name and practicing celibacy, Yukiya abandoned his birth name and became the prime minister of the land while he rejected to have children to show that he was just and fair to the four houses.
Beside keeping his enemies closer, I had an inkling why he wished for a child born between Nagi and myself would be more meaningful to him. Yukiya yearned to see a reincarnation of the true Golden Raven, his former master. It was so strong I could smell it from afar.
On the night I had to share intimacy with the young emperor, he fell into a stupor. The incense, Karon, a specialty of the Southern Family, had rendered him unconscious to the point of death. Compared to him, I trained myself with different types and levels of poisons as part of my education when I was still a young princess who was poised to inherit the kingdom. The new emperor lacked those skills.
There was a knock on the door.
“Come in,” I said.
A man in his early 40s, grey streaks on his otherwise long auburn hair, entered. The length of that hair was a symbol of aristocracy.
“I am here, Princess.” His tone of voice was annoyed, but I knew in my heart that he was happy to see me.
“You came.”
I sat up wearing only a white-lilac kimono with butterflies strewn on it, which I knew he recognised judging from the way his eyes glistened.
“Your letter seemed urgent. What is it that you want, Princess?”
“Come here. Share my bed. Don’t you want to be the one who will deflower me?” Yukiya turned his gaze to the boy lying on the matrimonial bed, briefly concerned. “Don’t worry, His Majesty is only sleeping.” I assured him.
The prime minister didn’t make another step, but sniffed the air. He smiled, then shook his head. He, too, was trained to withstand the poisons as part of his studies as a soldier.
“I only care about Yamauchi. I don’t care about my own happiness.” He clenched his both hands.
Really, Yuki-san? All those sacrifices and your self-control? “Most of all, this is not proper, Princess. I won’t cater to the whims of a child.” He turned his back, wanting to leave.
“You implored me to escape with you after your disappointment with my father’s will.” I reminded him, painful as it might be. Coming closer, I whispered to his ear. “Don’t you want me now?” I, Shion no Miya, wouldn’t be defeated this time.
He clicked his tongue. That fateful day in the early summer was not a good memory for Yukiya, who dedicated his entire life to my father and Yamauchi as a whole. He looked at me straight in the eye. What would happen if I did leave my life behind and run away with you?
“I could kill the emperor,” I said pointing at the silver dagger on the nightstand, “then I could kill you then kill myself.” Contrary to my calm voice, my heart was pounding fast.
I discarded my kimono and let it slip off to the floor. I had long abandoned my undergarments and my shame. My visitor was as tall as my father. I stood in front of him with my breasts hitting just below against his chest.
“Make love to me. Give me the child who will inherit Yamauchi.”
I slowly undressed him. He didn’t resist my hands as I removed his pieces of clothing. I took his hand and lead him to bed. At first glance, Yukiya’s docility seemed calculated. After all, this was the creature who ordered to kill and maim his fellow Yatagarasu.
Observing his naked body, memories long buried resurfaced. Our parallel lines began to connect again.
“These are fresh welts…” I touched the angry red lines decorating his chest and flat stomach, his strong arms and shoulders, his buttocks and powerful thighs. From what I heard, he showed up at the dojo every day when there was no one around. A few guards would see him train with his sword and then disappeared without their knowledge. Even without his weapon of choice, he could crush a man with his bare hands. As a young girl, I had always admired him and felt safe whenever he was next to me. It was a task that he didn’t find odious apart from protecting the emperor.
~~
“Let Yuki-san be my husband, Your Majesty,” I said not thinking of the consequences.
My father, surprised, only laughed.
~~
“Sit down on the bed.” I caressed his skin and every time I put pressure on the elongated wounds his face scrunched.
“Of course, Haruma, your adjutant, does this to you. Is he much better than my father?”
I sat on his lap and moved my body leaving my wetness on his thighs.
“You see, Yuki-san, I am ready for you.”
I untied my hair black as a night. Next to the young sovereign was a bundle of red ropes. I started to tie Yukiya. Slowly but steadily. He didn’t have the heart to stop me.
“When I was a young girl, I saw you and my father in your former chamber. At first I didn’t understand it at all. Scared of your screams. Red ropes all around you. Then before you left Yamauchi to study abroad I went back and watched the two of you again,” I said, tying the last piece around his groin. Tight enough for him to feel the pressure, biting his ears. “Then my father kissed you on the lips, everywhere his hands had been. He never showed that kind of affection toward my mother. Well, not when I was in front of them. But you, Yuki-san, he worshipped you. And you betrayed him!”
I pushed him down and sat on top of his genitals that gradually reacting from my ministrations. With my hair loose, like a cage imprisoning him, he covered his mouth with his arm as I let him take me.
I removed then my hand replacing it with my lips and tongue. “No, I want to hear you scream like the whores from the pleasure district.”
Placing his untied hands on my breasts and buttocks, encouraging him to squeeze them, I rode him. Night after night we slept together. On a few occasions, I let Nagi watch us while he was lounging behind the bamboo curtains, cavorting with his spouse. Otherwise it was only the two of us: Yuki-san and me.
I resembled my father in many ways.
//
Finally, I bore a child. The young emperor found the way to abdicate his throne, which in the first place he never wanted. Together with his empress they moved into a monastery never to be seen again by the public.
Without a reigning monarch on paper, Yuki-san became the one and only authority in the government. He doted on my son, who looked and behaved exactly like my father. He retained memories of the past true Golden Raven. Yukiya couldn’t take his eyes off him.
On my child’s 13th birthday, before Yukiya succumbed to a rare illness, he and I managed the smooth transition paving the way for my son’s future role to lead Yamauchi. Haruma, Yukiya’s adjutant, refused to join his group of advisers. He served no other master, he declared to everyone at the Shishinden Hall. Then one day he killed himself.
~ fin ~