Chapter 12
Haru
The fire crackled and popped, sending sparks spiraling into the darkness above our heads.
Around us, the forest breathed—leaves rustling in the evening breeze, branches creaking.
In the distance, an owl hooted, claiming its territory.
The moon hung full and heavy overhead, painting everything in shades of silver and shadow, bright enough that we could have traveled by its light if we weren’t already exhausted.
I poked at the fire with a stick, watching embers glow and fade, trying to ignore how much my backside hurt from a full day in the saddle.
Suwa Temple had kept us fit, but apparently not the right kind of fit for riding.
My thighs ached, my lower back complained, and I was fairly certain I’d never sit comfortably again.
The remnants of our evening meal lay scattered around the fire—empty rice ball wrappers, a small pot we’d used to heat water for tea, and the last few strips of dried fish that none of us had the appetite to finish. It was the kind of food that sustained you without being particularly enjoyable.
“Stop fidgeting,” Esumi said from beside me. “You’re making me nervous.”
“I’m not fidgeting. I’m maintaining the fire.”
“You’ve poked it seventeen times in the last five minutes.”
“You counted?”
“I had nothing better to do while you murdered that perfectly good fire.”
Across from us, Kaneko laughed quietly. He and Yoshi sat close together, close enough that their shoulders brushed. They’d been like that since we’d stopped for the night. It would have been sweet if it wasn’t so painfully obvious they were trying to be subtle about it.
The forest around us was alive with the sounds of night.
Crickets chirped in endless rhythm, their song rising and falling like gentle waves, something rustled in the underbrush—probably a rabbit or fox—the horses snorted and shifted where we’d tethered them to a nearby tree, their tack jingling softly.
It was beautiful in a wild, untamed way, so different from the carefully manicured gardens of the palace or even Suwa’s ordered grounds.
“For the love of the gods, leave the fire alone, Haru,” Yoshi said, his voice carrying that amused tone he got when he was trying not to laugh. “It’s suffered enough.”
I dropped the stick into the flames with more force than necessary. “Everyone’s a critic.”
“Only when you’re being ridiculous,” Esumi said, but he was smiling.
The fire had burned down to comfortable coals, radiating steady warmth against the night’s chill. The temperature had dropped significantly since sunset. I pulled my traveling cloak tighter around my shoulders, grateful for its weight.
Our guards camped some distance away. Giichi already slept, bundled into a nest of blankets atop his bedroll. That left only the four of us, a small fire, and an ocean of darkness pressing in from all sides.
We were heading home.
Well, two of us heading home.
Yoshi and Kaneko were heading into the unknown, but they seemed glad for the journey anyway. They’d said something about owing me a debt, about wanting to help. I suspected it had more to do with wanting to stay near each other and away from masters’ reeds, but I wasn’t going to say that out loud.
The road to Bara would take at least a week, maybe longer depending on weather and how often we stopped.
I pushed that thought away and focused on the fire instead, on its warmth and the familiar comfort of Esumi sitting beside me and the quiet companionship of our friends slouched across the flames.
An owl hooted somewhere in the distance, its cry lonely and haunting.
For one blessed moment, everything felt peaceful and safe.
“Can I ask you something?” Yoshi’s voice broke the silence. He’d been quiet most of the evening, lost in his own thoughts. Whatever divine power had awakened in him was still new, still frightening, and I recognized that look—the uncertainty, the fear of what he might become.
“Always,” I said.
“What do you think Kioshi-sama will do? As Emperor, I mean.” He glanced at Kaneko, then back at me, his face half in shadow, half painted silver by moonlight.
“I know it’s not . . . I know this isn’t easy to talk about.
You just learned . . . about your father .
. . but we’re riding toward the capital to support your brother, and I just realized I don’t know anything about him except that he’s your older brother. ”
The question settled over me like a shroud. I’d been so focused on getting home, on the fact that Father was dead and everything was falling apart, that I hadn’t really let myself think about what came next.
About Kioshi wearing the crown and taking Father’s place.
“He’ll be perfect at it,” I said, though the words came out more bitter than I intended. I caught Esumi’s glance and forced a smile. “I mean, he’ll be good, probably better than Father—better than anyone, really.”
“That’s not what I asked.”
I poked the fire again.
Esumi sighed but didn’t comment.
I tried to find words for the complicated knot in my chest.
“Kioshi is . . .” I paused, gathering thoughts. “He’s three years older than me, which means that by the time I was old enough to start training, he was already the masters’ star pupil. He was always the perfect heir—and everyone compared us.”
Memories slammed into me.
The pair of us standing in the training yard at four and seven years old, the wooden sword too heavy in my hands, while Father watched with that look, the one that said he was mentally comparing me to Kioshi and finding me wanting.
“That must have been hard,” Yoshi said quietly.
“You’d think so.” I laughed, but it sounded hollow even to me.
“The thing is, Kioshi is actually everything they say. He’s a skilled warrior, a brilliant strategist, and a dutiful son.
He can quote poetry and philosophy, knows the name of every provincial lord and their heirs, can debate theology with priests and economics with merchants.
” I grabbed another stick and jabbed it into the fire, angering the coals into brightness.
“It’s actually infuriating how perfect he is.
It’s as though the gods took all the princely qualities and gave them to him, then made me out of a half empty bottle of sake and a pile of dung. ”
“Haru—” Esumi growled.
“No, it’s true.” The words spilled out, faster now.
I couldn’t have stopped them if I’d tried.
“According to Mother, the greatest scorekeeper the Empire has ever known, Kioshi was walking at nine months. I didn’t walk until I was halfway through my second year.
He was reading at four. I struggled with it until I was seven.
He mastered every sword form on his first try.
I had to practice for months just to get the basics right.
” I could hear the edge in my voice, that old familiar resentment bubbling up.
“Even our births were compared. Kioshi came exactly on the day the astrologers predicted and during an auspicious hour. I came three weeks early, screaming my lungs out during a thunderstorm. The priests said it was inauspicious, if that’s even a thing. ”
“Stars aren’t everything,” Kaneko offered.
“They are when you are Imperial princes.” I stared into the flames. “Everything Kioshi touches turns golden. Everything I touch . . .”
Silence settled over the fire.
I could feel everyone watching me, probably pitying me, which made it worse somehow.
“But you admire him,” Yoshi said carefully. “I can hear it in your voice, even when you’re angry.”
And there it was.
The truth I’d been dancing around.
“I guess I do.” The admission was painful—and oddly freeing.
“Maybe that’s the worst part, you know? I can’t even properly hate him.
He’s a genuinely good person—and that’s a lot rarer than you might think within an Imperial family.
” I shook my head and stirred the coals, no longer trying to kill whatever lived within the flames.
“It would be so much easier if he was an asshole, if he lorded over me or used his position to make everyone miserable, but he doesn’t. He never has.”
“He sounds like a good man,” Kaneko said.
“Gods, he is. He’s brilliant and compassionate and everything an emperor should be.
” The words felt like they were being dragged out of me.
“That’s why it’s so gods-damned frustrating.
I want to resent him. I’ve spent my whole life in his shadow, being compared to him, being found wanting, but I can’t hate him because he’s actually worthy of it all: the praise, the expectations, the crown.
” I looked up at the stars, cold and distant.
“He deserves to be Emperor, and I deserve to be . . . whatever I am.”
“You’re more than you think,” Esumi said softly.
“He protected you, though,” Yoshi said. “Right? You said he always protected you.”
“He did.” I nodded slowly. “That’s another thing—Kioshi never made me feel less than, even when everyone else did, even when I deserved it.”
After a moment’s silence disturbed only by the crackling of the fire, I continued, “I’ve spent my whole life being angry that he’s better than me, but I’ve also spent my whole life knowing the Empire is lucky to have him, knowing that I was the luckiest brother in the whole world.
” I looked around at their faces, fire-lit and attentive.
“When he becomes Emperor—really becomes it, with the crown and the ceremony and everything—the Empire will have a ruler who cares about people, who sees the servant boys and fishermen and farmers, who understands that power is a responsibility, not simply a birthright.”
“That’s high praise,” Yoshi observed.
“It’s the truth.” I forced myself to say the next part. “I’m jealous of him. I’ve always been jealous. But . . . I also worship him, I think. Is that pathetic? To worship your own brother?”
“It sounds human to me,” Esumi said quietly. “Especially if he is everything you say.”