Chapter 21
Yoshi
Stars still littered the sky when Kaneko and I slipped from our chambers, moving through the palace corridors like thieves. In a way, I supposed we were—stealing time before the rest of the world woke to claim it.
My heart hammered, part anticipation, part fear.
After three days of feeling useless, of watching my power build like the steam of a kettle straining against its lid, I was finally going to get help.
Real help. From someone who understood what it meant to move between heartbeats, to feel his body threatening to tear itself apart from speed he couldn’t quite control.
If Haru actually showed up.
“He’ll be there,” Kaneko said quietly, reading my thoughts as he always did. “Esumi promised.”
“Esumi promised to try. There’s a difference.”
“Have a little faith.”
Faith. Right. Because faith had served me so well lately.
We navigated the maze of corridors, past guards who barely glanced at us.
We were merely two more students heading to early training, nothing remarkable.
The palace was beginning to stir; servants lit lanterns, and the first stirrings of kitchen work drifted through the air.
By the time we reached the eastern training grounds, dawn was just beginning to paint the horizon in shades of gray and gold.
Esumi was already there.
He stood in the center of the yard, two bokken leaning against his leg, his breath misting in the frosty morning air. When he saw us, his face broke into a smile that carried equal parts relief and conspiracy.
“Decide to sleep in, ladies?”
“Kaneko needs his beauty rest. You should see him—”
“Both of you can lick my ass,” Kaneko snarled, earning a chuckle from both Esumi and me.
“Did you really think we’d sleep through this?” I asked, trying to keep the desperation out of my voice.
“No, but I half expected you to get lost in the palace. This place is a maze.” Esumi gestured to the weapons. “Grab a bokken and start warming up. We don’t have much time before the rest of the guard shows up for drills.”
“What about—” Kaneko began, then stopped.
“What about?” Esumi’s smile turned knowing.
Before anyone could answer, a figure emerged from the shadows near the gate. Cloaked and hooded, it moved with the kind of silence that made my skin prickle with caution. My hand went to where my sword should have been, but found only empty air.
Kaneko had already shifted his weight, ready to move.
“Easy,” Esumi said.
The figure stopped at the edge of the training ground, and for a heartbeat, no one moved. Then the hood fell back, and Haru’s smile cut through the gloom like a blade catching first light.
“Gods,” I breathed.
“Some think so,” the would-be Emperor smirked. “Though this morning, you should stick with Haru.”
Esumi laughed and shook his head.
Kaneko and I gaped, unsure whether to bow, fall to our knees, or return his comment with a jab of our own.
“Did you think I’d forgotten about you?” Haru stepped fully into the yard, shrugging off the cloak to reveal simple training clothes beneath.
He wore no golden robes, no Imperial regalia—only the simple kimono of a man ready to work.
“Sorry it took so long. As it happens, being Emperor—even an uncrowned one—comes with significantly less free time than being the useless third son.”
“You were never useless,” Esumi said in what felt like a familiar reflex.
“Tell that to my mother or the Grand Minister or Dai Shogun or literally anyone on the war council.” He moved to the weapons rack, selected a bokken, and tested its weight.
“But we’re not here to discuss my inadequacies.
We’re here to help you stop being a danger to anyone within shouting distance. ”
“Thanks,” I said dryly. “Your teaching style is most . . . motivating.”
Haru snorted. “I’m not here to encourage you. I’m here to train you.” He spun the bokken in a lazy arc, and even that simple movement held the liquid grace of someone who’d mastered both their swords and gifts. “Ready to see what you can really do?”
My mouth went dry. “Yes.”
“Good. Esumi, take Kaneko to the ring at the far end. We need all the room we can get, and I’m sure you want to see what our mysterious fisherman’s son can actually do when he admits what he is and throws himself into his attacks.”
Kaneko’s expression shuttered. “I don’t know what you mean.”
“Yes, you do.” Haru’s voice held no accusation, just certainty. “You move like someone trained in forms that aren’t taught at temples, very specific forms. They’re like a language you might not understand, but you recognize when you hear their words spoken.”
“I—” Kaneko tried to deny again.
Haru wasn’t having it. “You killed men on the road with throwing stars. Most monks and Samurai couldn’t hit a mountain with one of those, much less men charging in battle.
And if I am not mistaken, you carry a very particular coin, one bearing far greater weight than that of my father’s likeness—or his dragon’s. ”
I watched as Kaneko’s jaw fell and eyes widened. He’d been so careful whenever his past was raised, but then—when confronted by such directness—he blanched.
Silence stretched tight as a bowstring.
“We’re not here to interrogate or reveal your secrets,” Esumi said quietly, moving to stand beside Kaneko. “We’re here to train. Whatever skills you have, whatever training you received—show us. Let us help you.”
Kaneko looked at me, something complicated passing across his gaze.
“It’s okay,” I said, though I had no idea what I was giving permission for. “Whatever it is, it’s okay.”
He nodded slowly, some decision made, and moved with Esumi to the far side of the training ground.
Which left me alone with Haru.
The almost-Emperor looked at me with an empathy I had only seen him display a few times. “How bad has it been? The power, I mean.”
“Pretty bad.” I saw no point in lying. “I think it’s getting stronger. Every day it’s harder to suppress. Last night, I woke up tangled in my sheets because I’d been moving so much in my sleep. The nightmares are getting worse, too.”
“Nightmares?”
I nodded. “I’m running, always running, so fast the world blurs into nothing and I can’t stop, can’t slow down, can’t—” I cut myself off. “It’s stupid. They’re just dreams.”
“It’s not stupid, Yoshi.” Haru’s voice held steel.
“When my gift first manifested, I had similar dreams. I was falling because that’s what it felt like.
I moved faster than my mind could process—like the ground kept disappearing beneath my feet.
I don’t know why you would run when I fell, but the dreams sound similar. ”
“Do they stop? The dreams?”
“Eventually. When you learn to trust yourself, when control becomes instinct instead of effort.” He raised his bokken. “But we’re not there yet. First, we need to see what you can do. Try the third form, full speed. Don’t hold back.”
“But I might—”
“You won’t. I can handle it. Trust me.”
I took a breath, raised my weapon, and let the first threads of power uncoil.
I’d meant for it to be a trickle, a fine thread I might weave into a simple pattern, but power roared through me like fire through dry grass, hot and hungry and demanding more, more, always more.
My arm blurred forward, the bokken singing through air.
In a heartbeat, I was overextending, already losing my balance—
Haru’s blade intercepted mine with a crack that echoed across the yard.
He hadn’t moved.
He hadn’t even shifted his weight.
He was just there, in the exact right place at the exact right time, his eyes tracking me with the calm focus of someone watching a butterfly land on a leaf.
“Again,” he said. “Faster.”
I attacked.
The world fractured into snapshots—strike, parry, strike, stumble, correct, strike again.
Power poured through my limbs in waves that made my bones ache and my vision swim.
I was everywhere and nowhere, moving too fast to track even my own gestures.
And Haru met me at every turn. His blade was always there, always exactly where it needed to be, deflecting my wild strikes with minimal effort. He moved with me, around me, through the spaces between my attacks like smoke through fingers.
“Good!” His voice cut through the rushing in my ears. “Don’t think, just move! Let the power guide you!”
Let the power guide me? How the hells was I supposed to do that? It was wild and unpredictable. It wanted release, to roar and rend and wreck. It wanted—
His words unlocked something inside my chest.
Instead of fighting the speed, instead of trying to control every movement, I just . . . let go.
And suddenly, I was soaring.
The training ground blurred beneath my feet as I spun, struck, and spun again.
Haru’s blade sang against mine in a rhythm that felt almost melodic.
Power flowed through me and out of me in a river of shimmering light.
I saw it now, dancing along my skin like liquid starlight, responding to my will without conscious thought.
This. This was what it should feel like.
It wasn’t a curse. It wasn’t a burden.
It was a gift.
I laughed.
I couldn’t help it.
Pure joy bubbled up from somewhere deep and primal.
For the first time since my power had awakened, I felt alive, as though my body had been sleeping my entire life and only now, moving at speeds that should have been impossible, had finally breathed life.
“There he is!” Haru was grinning now, his own power flaring to meet mine. “That’s what I wanted to see!”
We moved together across the training ground, and I realized with shock that the sun had risen. Full daylight painted everything in shades of gold, and I could see the trail of light my movements left behind—afterimages of magic that hung in the air like brushstrokes.
It was terrible. And it was beautiful.
“Control!” Haru commanded, his strikes coming faster. “Can you slow it down without stopping completely?”