Chapter 35
Yoshi
The bokken fell from my nerveless fingers, clattering against the stone.
Kaneko.
This wasn’t a dream. It wasn’t a vision.
Kaneko was here. He was alive.
Blood soaked his clothes, blossoms littered his hair, and he was swaying on his feet like he might collapse at any moment, but he was alive.
My body shot forward before conscious thoughts could form. One moment I stood frozen at the edge of the training yard, the next I was running—sprinting—my feet moving faster than they had in any of my training.
The injured being tended, the blood-soaked stones, the shocked faces of guards and monks—none of it existed.
My world had focused on a single point: the boy I’d loved, the one I’d lost, the heart I’d mourned—and never stopped searching for in every meditation, every dream, every desperate prayer to indifferent gods.
I wove between horses still wild-eyed from flight, dodged around Samurai and masters trying to restore order, shouldered past fellow students calling my name. Nothing mattered but closing the distance, crossing the impossible chasm that had stretched between us for more than a year.
I crashed into him with enough force to stagger us both. Only Esumi’s arm held us upright. My arms wrapped around him, crushing him against my chest, and a sob tore from my throat that didn’t sound human. It was joy and grief and relief so overwhelming my body couldn’t contain it.
“Kaneko,” I gasped into his shoulder, then again, “Kaneko,” like saying his name enough times would make this real, would keep him from dissolving like every dream before.
He was solid in my arms. He was warm. Sweet Amaterasu, he was real.
I pushed back long enough to drink him in, to scan his blood-drenched clothing for injuries and test if my senses lied, if this Kaneko really was standing before me, really was in my arms.
He looked different—thinner, harder, and carrying himself like someone who’d learned to move with a different purpose—but underneath those changes, he was still .
. . him. Still the boy who’d knocked me into the harbor and laughed.
Still the one who’d kissed me in the rain.
Still mine, despite everything the world had done to tear us apart.
I was sobbing openly now, my face buried in his neck, drinking him in. He reeked of blood and road dust and something expensive that wasn’t him, but beneath it all, buried beneath everything, lay the salt-sweet scent that was purely, singularly Kaneko.
“You’re alive,” I choked out between sobs. “Gods, you’re alive. I searched—I tried—they said you were dead, but I knew—I knew—”
His arms came up around me, tentative at first, then tighter, and I felt him trembling.
Or maybe that was me.
Maybe it was both of us, shaking and holding each other together in the middle of the courtyard while the world watched.
I pulled back again, enough to see his face, my hands coming up to frame it, to trace the lines and angles, the faint scar on his cheek I didn’t remember, the exhaustion haunting his eyes. “I thought I’d lost you. I thought—”
My voice broke entirely.
For a perfect moment, nothing else existed.
Not the rebellion. Not my failed awakening. Not the years of emptiness between then and now. Only us, holding each other while blossoms fell around us like the universe itself was blessing this impossible reunion.
Then someone cleared their throat.
Loudly.
We looked up—when had I fallen to my knees?
The entire temple stared at us.
Monks, Samurai, guards, students, even the wounded who could still sit up were watching with expressions ranging from shock to disapproval to barely suppressed amusement.
Esumi stood closest, one eyebrow raised, his mouth twitching. “Well,” he said brightly, “this explains why you weren’t interested in the pleasure houses in the last town. You were saving yourself for temple romance. How beautifully pure.”
Haru elbowed him hard in the ribs, which drew gasps from several monks—a prince striking anyone, even in play, was unthinkable.
“What?” Esumi wheezed, rubbing his side in mock pain. “I’m just saying, if all temple reunions are this passionate, I might convert to a religious life myself.”
“You’re bleeding,” I said to Kaneko, ignoring the Prince and his irreverent friend, suddenly aware of a dark stain spreading across his shoulder.
“It’s nothing,” he said, but his voice was rough and raw.
“Yoshi-san!” My master’s voice cracked like a whip across the courtyard. “Return to your position immediately!”
I looked back at the training ring where my classmates stood frozen, bokken still in hand, staring at me like I’d grown a second head. Daichi’s mouth was actually hanging open—I’d never seen him so undone.
“I—” I started to protest, but Haru stepped forward smoothly.
“Master,” the Prince said with a perfect bow, “surely Anzu Yoshi-san should be permitted to tend to his wounded friend? They clearly have history, and the man did arrive under my protection.”
The master’s jaw worked, trapped between protocol and royal request.
“Let the boy go.” Master Giichi appeared as if from nowhere. “Bonds forged before temple walls often matter more than those made within.” His eyes found mine, and something knowing flickered there. “See to your friend, Yoshi-san. Report for evening meditation.”
“Thank you, Master.” I bowed deeply, struggling with releasing Kaneko long enough to do so.
Master Giichi turned to Haru, bowing precisely—a respectful depth but not subservient. “Your Highness, we thank the heavens for your survival, though your journey was clearly harrowing. How many were lost?”
“Too many,” Haru said quietly. “Good men died for nothing more than traveling with a spare prince.”
“No death in service is meaningless, and no member of the Divine House is a spare, regardless of how the boy inside the kimono might feel,” Giichi replied, his voice so quiet only we could hear.
Then he spoke clearly for all, “But we will mourn them properly on the morrow. You will wish to convene a council?”
“Yes. But”—Haru gestured at his blood-stained clothes—“perhaps after we have cleaned up.”
“Of course. Teshi-san,” Giichi called to my nervous classmate, “show His Highness and his companion to their quarters.”
Teshi scrambled forward, bowing so low he nearly fell over. “Of course, Master. Your Highness, honored Samurai, if you would follow me, I will show you to your respective rooms—”
“One room will suffice,” Haru said casually.
The silence that followed thundered across the yard.
“I . . . one room?” Teshi squeaked.
“One room,” Haru confirmed, taking Esumi’s hand. “The time for pretending is over. The Empire burns while we play games of propriety. I am done with it.”
I thought Teshi might faint right there in front of Haru, Master Giichi, and all the gods.
Several monks looked like they were considering it.
Even Giichi’s eternal calm cracked slightly.
Esumi, of course, simply grinned and raised Haru’s hand to his lips. “Does the room have a nice view? I have standards about accommodations.”
“I—yes? Maybe? I don’t—” Teshi looked desperately at Master Giichi.
“Show them to the lotus chamber,” the abbot said after a pause that felt like eternity. “It has . . . adequate space and a window.”
As Teshi led the Prince away, Haru called back, “We meet in one hour, Master Giichi. That should allow time to tend the wounded and recall your Samurai. We have much to discuss.”
The moment they were gone, the courtyard erupted in whispers.
A prince and his Samurai lover, openly together? It was unprecedented. Scandalous. Many Samurai took their students or mentees as lovers. No one blinked at such bonding.
But a prince? A member of the Divine Han?
All I could think was how Haru’s spectacle made my reunion with Kaneko look positively tame by comparison.
Then another thought struck.
Perhaps that was Haru’s intention.
Was the Prince so calculating, so thoughtful, that he would use his relationship with Esumi to draw attention away from the scene we had just created? To give us a moment’s hard-earned peace at the expense of his own embarrassment?
Kaneko’s breathing against my neck startled me back to the present.
“Come on,” I said, helping him stand. He swayed, and I pulled his arm over my shoulders. “Let’s get cleaned up.”
“Yoshi,” he said softly, my name a question and answer and prayer all at once.
“I know,” I said—because I did.
I had so many questions.
But for now, none of them mattered.
He was here. I was here. We were together.
And maybe, after years of emptiness, that was miracle enough.