Chapter 21 #2
I tried, but the power resisted. It wanted to run wild, to flow freely, but I pressed against it like pushing a door closed against strong wind. My movements stuttered, sped up, slowed, sped up again—
“Don’t fight it,” Haru said. “Guide it, like steering a horse, not dragging it by the reins.”
Steering. Not dragging. Something clicked.
The power didn’t slow exactly, but I could feel where it was going, could nudge it in directions that felt more intentional. My strikes became less wild and more precise, though they still moved faster than any normal person could track.
“Better.” Haru’s smile was genuine now. “Much better. You’re learning to—”
“Prince Haru-sama!”
The voice shattered the moment like a stone through glass.
Haru’s power winked out as mine surged, sending me tumbling past him into the dirt, my bokken flying across the yard.
The man who’d called out looked deeply displeased, his elaborate robes and carefully groomed beard flowing in the crisp morning breeze.
He didn’t so much as flinch as my bokken rattled to stillness near his feet, simply looked down with one brow cocked, as though I’d come very close to offending his sensibilities.
“Prince Haru-sama,” the Grand Minister repeated, his tone making it clear that he’d been calling for some time. “Your presence is required at the war council. Immediately.”
“I’m busy,” Haru said flatly.
“The council cannot proceed without you. The generals are waiting. Your mother is waiting.” He looked at me with barely concealed disdain.
Something dangerous flickered in Haru’s eyes.
For a moment, I thought he might refuse, might tell this pompous minister exactly where he could shove his war council.
Instead, he drew in a breath, and I watched him don his mask—the same neutral expression I’d seen on my father’s face when dealing with difficult lords.
“Of course,” he said. “One moment while I—”
Two servants shot forward, one with a ceramic bowl filled with water and a towel draped across his arm, the other carrying golden robes, perfectly folded and ready for their master’s shoulders.
Haru glanced back at me and muttered so quietly I barely heard him.
“Sorry, but no lesson is worth angering my mother. We both have gods we fear.” He chuckled, but I heard only bitterness.
Then his head lowered as he said, “We’ll continue this later.
You’re doing well, Yoshi, better than I had hoped.
Keep practicing what we worked on today. ”
He rested a hand on my shoulder, squeezed once, and then pressed a bokken into my palm. “Use this. It’s got better balance than that stick of yours.”
“But—”
“Keep it. Consider it a gift.” He smiled, lopsided and genuine. “From one speed-cursed idiot to another.”
Then he turned and strode away, his training clothes somehow looking regal despite their simplicity, the Grand Minister, servants, and guards falling in around him like pond water closing over a tossed stone.
And just like that, I stood alone in the ring, holding a prince’s bokken, power still vibrating through my veins.
For the first time since my curse had awakened, I felt like I might actually master it, like I might become strong enough to make a difference.
Kibo’s face flashed unbidden through my mind.
She’d been twelve years old when stolen away.
I imagined her eyes, wide with terror, as rough hands dragged her toward ships.
“I’ll find you,” I whispered to the empty training ground. “I swear it, Kibo. When I’m strong enough, I’ll find you.”
Across the yard, the crack of wood drew my eye.
Kaneko and Esumi had resumed their training. I’d been too lost in my own world to notice. Now, watching them, I understood why Haru had been so curious.
Kaneko moved nothing like the other students at Suwa. Hells, he didn’t even move like the Kaneko I’d grown up with.
He was faster, yes, but not magically so.
What made him different was the economy of his movements.
There was no wasted motion, there were no flourishes, only brutal efficiency.
He struck from odd angles, used his smaller size to slip inside Esumi’s guard, and when Esumi pressed him, he didn’t retreat in neat, controlled steps like we’d been taught—he melted away, then reappeared in places he shouldn’t have been able to reach that quickly, his bokken finding gaps in Esumi’s defense that shouldn’t have existed.
It was stunning and terrifying in equal measure.
They broke apart, both breathing hard, and moved toward the water barrel. I followed, my legs still trembling, Haru’s bokken feeling strange and precious in my hands.
“That was intense,” Kaneko said, using a ladle to pour water over his head. Droplets caught the morning light as they ran down his face. “You weren’t holding back.”
“Neither were you.” Esumi accepted the ladle, drank deeply, then fixed Kaneko with a look that held too much knowledge.
“I had a good teacher.” Kaneko shrugged, his face blank.
“Very good.” Esumi’s tone held no judgment, just observation. “A teacher who knew how to kill efficiently rather than honorably. The way you dropped your shoulder before that strike to my ribs—that’s a shinobi technique, meant to make your opponent expect a high attack while you go low.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Kaneko.” Esumi’s voice was gentle. “I’m not accusing you of anything. I’m just . . . curious. How does a fisherman’s son learn to fight like a trained assassin?”
The silence stretched. The yard suddenly felt like the most uncomfortable place in the Empire.
I wanted to defend him, to tell Esumi to back off, but the truth was that I’d been wondering the same thing.
Not the whole assassin thing, exactly—Kaneko would never turn to darkness—but something was off about his story.
It had never felt right, if I was honest with myself.
“I trained in the capital,” Kaneko said finally, the words coming slowly and carefully. “There are places in Bara where they teach different skills, different ways of fighting.”
“To people like you?” Esumi asked.
“To people who want to survive.”
Esumi nodded slowly, accepting the non-answer for what it was. “Fair enough. Just know that if you ever want to talk about it—”
“I don’t.”
Another silence stretched, this one even more uncomfortable than the last.
I took the ladle, more to give myself something to do than because I was thirsty. The water was chilly, shockingly so, and helped ground me back into my body after the euphoria of mahou-enhanced training.
Then a question slammed into me, one that threatened to shatter what little knowledge I’d gained of this new power Haru was teaching me to harness.
“If mahou vanished when the Emperor died as abbot claimed back in Suwa,” I heard myself say, the words falling out before I’d fully formed the thought, “why does it still flow through Haru’s veins?”
Both of them turned to stare at me.
“What?” Kaneko’s expression was unreadable.
“The magic. The Emperor’s death was supposed to sever it or pause it or whatever .
. . until there’s a new emperor, right? That’s what Gūji Giichi said.
I assumed that’s why the Shinto can’t use their nature magic anymore and why the monks at Suwa lost their combat enhancements.
” I gestured with the ladle, water sloshing over the rim.
“But Haru still has his speed. He’s still moving like a god.
And I—” I looked down at my hands, still feeling the residual tingle of power. “I still have mine, too. Why?”
The question floated in the air like smoke.
Esumi’s face had gone very still.
Kaneko set down the ladle with careful precision.
“This is not a conversation for the three of us,” Esumi said. “This is the realm of the gods.”
“I am a Daimyo’s heir. We are told things others will never know,” I said, not intending to sound so mysterious, but there was little to be done for it.
Esumi’s head lowered, and his eyes closed. “Fine.”
“Maybe . . . maybe the gifts that were already awakened don’t disappear? Maybe it only affects new manifestations?” Kaneko guessed.
“That doesn’t make sense,” I pressed. “If the source of all magic is cut off or muted somehow, how can existing gifts continue to function? It’s like saying a plant can keep growing after you’ve pulled its roots.”
“Maybe the gifts aren’t plants,” Esumi said slowly. “Maybe they’re more like . . . fires. Once lit, they burn on their own fuel. The tether might have lit them, but now they sustain themselves.”
“Or maybe”—Kaneko’s voice had gone quiet, almost afraid—“the tether isn’t actually severed.”
We all looked at each other, and I saw my own dawning horror reflected in their faces.
“But the Emperor is dead,” I said. “We know he’s dead. Everyone knows he’s dead. The monks and priests can’t use mahou at all.”
“Yes.” Esumi was frowning now, his mind clearly racing through implications. “But what if death isn’t enough? What if the tether doesn’t break just because the Emperor dies, but only when—”
“When there’s no heir to take the throne,” Kaneko finished. “When the bloodline ends completely.”
The training ground suddenly felt very cold despite the risen sun. Haru might never produce an heir. Would that end magic forever? Would Amaterasu reclaim her gift?
“That still wouldn’t account for me,” I said, looking up at Esumi. “I don’t have a drop of royal blood. I’m not even from the mainland. Why would I still have power when everyone else, except Haru, lost theirs?”
Neither Esumi nor Kaneko had an answer for that. We stood there, three young men at a training ground, staring at each other as the implications washed over us.
“We need to tell someone,” I said. “Haru, or the generals, or—”
“Tell them what?” Esumi cut me off. “That we have a theory based on the fact that some gifts work while others don’t? That’s not evidence. That’s speculation.”
“But it makes sense.”
“Making sense doesn’t make it true.” He ran a hand through his hair, frustration evident. “Gods, I hate politics . . . and magic. There are too many moving pieces, too many unknowns.”
“So what do we do?” Kaneko asked.
“We wait, and we pay attention.” Esumi looked at both of us.
“We watch, we listen, and if we learn anything concrete, we take it to Haru. But until then . . .” He glanced toward the palace, where the war council was presumably grilling Haru about matters we couldn’t begin to understand.
“Until then, we trust that smarter people than us are figuring this out.”
“That isn’t very comforting,” I said. “Have you met Haru’s uncles?”
“It’s not meant to be.” Esumi managed a grim smile. “But it’s all we have.”
The palace bells rang the hour, and servants began appearing in the courtyards. Our stolen morning was over, returned to the world of protocol and duty and questions no one could answer.
“Same time tomorrow?” Kaneko asked, looking at Esumi.
“If we can manage it. No promises.” Esumi started gathering the training weapons. “You two should get cleaned up before someone important sees you and decides you’re loitering.”
We headed back toward our chambers, and I found myself still clutching Haru’s bokken like a talisman. The wood was smooth under my fingers, worn from use, and along the handle someone had carved tiny characters too small to read in passing.
Later, sitting alone in my chamber, I would examine them and discover they said: “Speed without wisdom is falling with style.”
Typical Haru, making a joke even in his weapons, even as magic failed and the world crumbled around us.