“We aren’t… there anymore, Kouje. You don’t have to shelter me so from everything. I would have borne his insult gladly if that was to be the price of crossing the border. We must both make sacrifices.”
“You don’t know what he expected as the price for crossing the border,” I said, the words coming so unexpectedly that I didn’t have the time to stop them. “For their generosity at the noodle house!”
Mamoru sucked his breath in sharply, perhaps in surprise at my sudden outburst, but the words were rushing from my mouth now, as if they’d found a hole in the dam that had always kept them back. I lifted my head to look him in the eyes.
“He said that he didn’t know about Kichi, but that he at least expected a chance between your legs before we parted ways. That it was the proper thing to do—and neighborly. That you couldn’t expect to get anything for free these days.”
I could feel the bile rising in my throat, sharp and hot all over again just remembering Jiang’s words. Even if the man hadn’t known who he was speaking to, it didn’t matter. My obligation to Mamoru ran deeper than the fealty I’d sworn. That had to be true, or else how could I have ignored the Emperor’s command in the first place? The sooner I dealt with the troublesome rebellion within me the better. It was causing problems left and right. I couldn’t tame it. It made me too sharp with him, too cross with myself.
“All the same,” Mamoru insisted, though he looked troubled now, and his voice betrayed the fact that he was growing increasingly distressed. He had balled his hands into fists, and his voice cracked in places, like the spider-line fissures in the fine lacquer of an ornamental table. “I didn’t know that, but as you are not my brother in truth, it is not your duty to protect my honor!”
“It is not for duty that I do it!” I said, raising my voice to be heard over his. I took a breath to rein my temper in. I could not afford to lose it again, so hot upon the heels of the first time. “Mamoru,” I added, more softly. The name still sounded strange to my hearing, such a fine name on such an uncultured tongue, but I had to do my best to please my lord at his command when I could, as it seemed there were many areas where I could not.
I did not know what was worse. That it might become easier to say it, or that it might not.
My lord ducked his head down. When he lifted it, his eyes were bright with tears. They were not the beautiful, elegant tears that I’d seen the women of the court weeping, for the loss of their sons and husbands during the war, or even the restrained weeping done behind fans and closed doors for the death of the Emperor. These were messy tears, streaking down his cheeks and reddening his nose. His breath came in short, painful gulps, as though he was no longer able to control himself. I was reminded sharply of the boy he had been, back when the rules laid on our heads had not been so unyielding. I had allowed myself to comfort him, once, when it had been clear that mere words would not do the trick.
Did I remember the way of it now?
“Why?” my lord asked, the word nearly lost in his next wet intake of breath. “I don’t understand it. Why?”
“Mamoru,” I said again, counseling my voice to hold firm and steady. If I was to calm my lord, I would have to be the steady one. This I knew, above all else.
I reached out one hand to take him by the arm, to draw him close enough to put my arms around him. They knew the way, and it was not so difficult a thing to remember as I’d feared. I could feel the rough, homespun garments stretched thin against his back. He was trembling with the force of his weeping. I could feel it choked and wet against my neck.
“Perhaps what I hold for you is not duty, but something closer to friendship,” I told him in hushed tones, willing him to understand what I myself did not. “Is that not how we are meant to conduct ourselves now that we’ve left the palace?”
It was not entirely the truth, since my disobedience had begun