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runicloreBurn Like the Sun
Author: Amber Michelle
Day/Theme: April 8 - lit like a burning city
Series: Fire Emblem 10 / Twelve Kingdoms
Character/Pairing: Sanaki, Marcia, Sephiran (Renki)
Rating: K
Words: 4456
Warnings: it's a cracktastic crossover with no redeeming value.
Notes: Late on purpose so I won't be lynched. I needed to write something stupid. Also, I don't know the names of Ren's cities or provinces, so I just made them up. I didn't do much research on 12K courts or such for this because I'm lazy and this is not an epic or particularly important.
Vocabulary:
Kirin - (quoted from Wikipedia) "The holy creature that is bound to and chooses the ruler of each kingdom. It resembles a white horned deer; black kirin are extremely rare and called Kokki. ... A kirin will only bow before his or her ruler. Kirin are named after the kingdom that they are bound to, with "ki" and "rin" used for male and female kirin, respectively."
Taiho - also Saiho, the official title of the kirin.
Shitsudou - a disease that afflicts the kirin when her/his king loses the Way. Usually deadly.
Hanjuu - literally 'half beast,' humans whose natural form is some kind of animal.
Shouzan - the journey to Mt. Hou; made only if you hope to be chosen as the next ruler.
Mount Hou - birthplace of all kirin, home to oracles, immortals, and gods.
Hourai - Japan.
Kaikyaku - people swept into the 12 Kingdoms from Hourai/Japan.
Shoku - a violent storm, also an opening to Japan; usually the way kaikyaku end up in the 12 kingdoms.
Twelve Kingdoms - Ren (the country in this story), En, Sou, Kei, Kou, Han, Sai, Kyou, Hou, Tai, Ryuu, Shun.
There's a complete list of terms, but the above should be enough.
.............................................
It was winter in Ren when the king died, and Sanaki woke to bright sunlight shining through her window on the day of mourning, sparkling dust swirling above her pallet, and a clear blue sky past the shutters. The university bore the scars of his reign; two teachers were called to the palace several months ago, never to return. Her roommate, Elincia, had gone back to the province of her birth to join their rebellion, and the only information to reach Sanaki in the capitol was a message in the form of a bird and rumors the governor's mansion, where her roommate's family served, had been burned to the ground while its occupants screamed. They said the governor was trapped behind falling beams, and his daughter ran back to help him. A sterling example of filial piety, it was said. What courage! Sanaki tried to ignore them.
She passed the civil service exam on her own, and donated half her stipend to a temple in her friend's name. The king was assassinated by one of her classmates after the award ceremony, the kirin's life spared by chance. Word from the high offices said he was too ill as yet to travel to Mount Hou - the shitsudou still mottled his hands with black and blue, as if each of the king's crimes were a strike, a blood-letting. Sanaki was a low-ranking official at the time; she could not see the truth of the rumors for herself. But it was true, she mused the night of the memorial; kirin were, in fact, the embodiment of the people. The wounds inflicted upon Ren were a beating upon his slender body.
She saw him once, when she served at the inauguration of a steward as part of the Ministry of Ceremonies. Sanaki was at the bottom of the chain, not allowed to speak to him, even to look up at him, but when he walked past her to ascend to the throne and approve of the government's choice, she glanced up and saw the indigo shine of his dark mane drift in his wake, shimmering in the sunlight. His eyes were green like new leaves, and they flickered down to her for an instant. His step paused, faltered, and then he was pulled onward by his bodyguard. She remembered her heart pounding in her chest, a drum, stealing her breath.
"Well, you weren't supposed to look at him," Marcia said when she heard the story. She worked in the kingsguard, and they were of similar rank - allowed into the palace, but restricted to the outer areas and official corridors. With Elincia gone, she was the one Sanaki approached when searching for someone to room with. Neither rated a suite in the palace. "He must have thought you were an insolent brat. You were what, twelve?"
"Thirteen," Sanaki said, narrowing her eyes at the other over her ceramic tea cup. The leaves reminded her of plum, apricot, the scent like honey and summer fruit. Tea was the only luxury she allowed herself. Even her robes were plain, the dye a pale, diluted blue. "No one my age had ever passed before. He was probably just curious, if he noticed me at all."
Marcia snorted, rubbed her nose, and pulled the shutters closed when the wind carried the scent of flowers in, sneezing on cue. "If I hadn't been around back then I wouldn't believe it. You sure don't act that smart--"
Sanaki kicked her under the table and talked over her shrill ow! "Are you taking the shouzan?"
"No thank you." The other girl bent to rub her shin. Dust motes danced in the beams of light reaching past the wooden screens to cast bird shapes on the carpet through the carvings. Her chair scraped and seagulls called outside. "I know someone who got mauled by a demon on his way up to present himself. I don't want to see the kirin that badly."
Sanaki let herself smile, looking down at the leaves gathering at the bottom of her cup. "You don't want to be queen of Ren?"
Marcia frowned, still bent over the table. "Do you?"
The descent of the previous reign began with a steep rise in taxes. We are a prosperous country, the proclamation said, behind En and Sou only by a small count of years. Let us refine ourselves, and Ren will be the jewel of the twelve kingdoms!
An observatory was erected at the center of the Monsoon Plains; the cost was thirty thousand lives, half of which were spent hauling stone from the mountains. The new university complex was started, another project of stone, and nearly as many lives were lost. Roads were paved and the workers were not paid, mines were emptied and laborers were lost in collapsing tunnels. Sanaki remembered hearing the figures and knowing she could plan it better, though the smartest course was, of course, to forgo such projects altogether. Did they not have the kindest of climates in Ren? Their crops yielded harvests year-round. Those who could not produce enough food in their own countries purchased grain from Ren.
I would do better, she'd thought, listening to her tutor make an example of the poor planning behind the north road project. A hundred lives instead of a thousand - but better not to lose any at all.
The king was a good ruler once. His name meant 'kindly sage,' and though the kirin, Renki, chose him to rule in the twilight of his years and chained him to an ailing body, the first century was still lauded as a golden age. She heard the end of his ascension speech quoted often: what we term 'misfortune' is merely an opportunity to empathize with those more miserable. When did the disease set in, the degeneration? What warped the king's mind and poisoned his kirin?
Marcia laughed, drew Sanaki out of her thoughts. "Don't tell me--"
"No," she said, and rolled her eyes to the ceiling. No, she didn't want to be queen. "Not really."
*
Six years passed while they waited for Renki to choose a new ruler. Sanaki's name was added to the registry of immortals when she achieved a proper rank and left the humiliating task of running errands behind to do real work. Her new position put her in charge of the ceremonial items reserved for the king's use: the bow and arrows to be shot upon ascension to banish demons, the mask worn during the harvest dance. A bracelet glittered on a pedestal she was warned never to touch. It was Ren's imperial treasure, and at the command of ruler or kirin, it would uncoil and make a gateway to Hourai, the fabled place known as Japan to kaikyaku and others who had been to that world.
What use was a relic like that? Sanaki would stare at it sometimes, when her work took her down to the store room to catalog new items, gifts the previous king had received, things obtained for the glory of Ren before the dream died. Demons crossed the coast and traveled inland. Some of the treasures they received were salvaged from the ruins of towns in areas plagued by attacks and disasters. A shoku struck off the western coast, and an entire fleet of fishermen was lost. Where is the new king? she heard in the hallways, in the offices, even in the garden when she rested and took her noon meal. Why does the kirin wait on the mountain when he should find a candidate more quickly here? Yet with such a useless treasure, she didn't see what a king would do about these disasters in any case. Kei's imperial treasure was a sword, or so she heard - that would be useful. Han had a staff capable of calming - or creating - the worst of storms. That would have stopped the shoku appearing to ravage the coast.
Everyone knew demons and disasters only appeared when there was no one sitting on the throne. And yet in En one hundred years ago, when the country lay dying without a ruler, there was one province to remain prosperous - Gen - under the care of a capable governor. He didn't wring his hands and cry when demons attacked, but mustered the provincial army and sent them to defend the people.
Ren's general did nothing. He'd purchased the rank when the king needed gold, and clearly wasn't worth the weight of his money. Marcia agreed with her. He can't even use a sword properly, she said over tea one afternoon. He learned when he was young, but how long ago was that? Ages, she would answer then, and laugh. Even if he had any skill - which he didn't - he'd be too decrepit to fight.
"What about your commanding officers?" Registries and scrolls were piled on her table, against the carved screen over the window. Sanaki had to speak to Marcia over a stack of codices and a box of ink and brushes she'd left there earlier. "Tanith has a good reputation. Sigrun is--"
"Gone," Marcia said, and looked out the window. Her smile faded.
Sanaki moved the scrolls to an empty chair, and the books to the floor next to it. Her friend hooked a finger in the mesh and pulled the shutter open to admit gray light. Clouds lay heavy across the sky. The air was still, smelled like green - grass, leaves, and wisteria. It was winter again, but warm as summer - too hot even for Ren at this time of year. She wondered if the Emperor of Heaven would choose to dry them like raisins with heat and dryness. Perhaps the rain this day promised would be their last for a long while. There were many ways to kill a nation.
"Dead?" She got up and took the pot across the room to the shelf with their tea. She could hear people walk by their door in the corridor outside, talking - one was crying, and she supposed someone had received word of misfortunes at home, wherever that might be. She reached over and turned the lock once she saw their metal pot of water was still hot and mostly full. It was supposed to be refreshed every hour, but the servants were lax They were almost out of oolong leaves, but the jar of green and roasted rice on the shelf was still half full. "I thought she survived the last official purge."
Marcia twisted the end of her ponytail. She was still in training when the king died, but she'd advanced to the command chain since then, and her hair had grown long enough to pull over her shoulder, still a brighter pink than the flowers outside. "She went home." The chair creaked when she leaned back, and her feet thumped on the edge of the chair holding the scrolls. Sanaki didn't scold her. "When the higher ups refused to send troops to Sui, she left the guard and said she'd defend it herself."
Wind stirred, drifted through the window, and from the door to the bedroom. Sanaki left the tea on the table to steep and went to close the garden doors in the other room. Marcia's bed was unmade, the blankets rumpled on the floor. Her own were folded neatly, rolled back to the foot of her bed. Who needed blankets in this heat?
"Maybe we should go to Mount Hou," Marcia said when she came back out. She was already pouring tea into her cup. Sanaki's was full. "You must have thought about it."
"No." She went back to her chair and took a sip. The taste was a bit weak. "I'm not really interested."
"You talk all the time about what a bad job the ministry is doing."
"Anybody can see that." Sanaki lifted the lid and poured her tea back into the pot. "I'm not queen material. If I were, Renki would have chosen me when I bowed to him at the mourning ceremony."
"Maybe the heavenly mandate can be late."
"Doubtful."
"Don't you think we should all go?" The wind ruffled Marcia's bangs. "It's been six years. If everyone is presented to the kirin, he's sure to get a revelation about someone."
Sanaki laughed, soft, heard Marcia kick the table leg. "Yes, I suppose that's true - unless the proper ruler hasn't been born yet. That's happened before too - in Sai, remember? We heard about it during the internship up north, at the harbor."
Marcia stuck her tongue out. "Huh."
"But if you'd like to try, I'll go with you - and record every step, so I can show everyone once you've been embarrassed. Twenty ryo says you'll trip on the way to the altar."
"Come over here and say that--!"
*
Ren's kirin came to them, in the end, for which Sanaki was grateful - though she wished Elincia were alive to meet him and be chosen. At the beginning of the eighth year after the previous king's demise, Renki returned to the palace on the mountain to look for the mandate of heaven within his own borders. Plum blossoms still clung to the branches in red and white clumps, like spun sugar and flavored ice. Ren had never seen snow, even on the highest mountain, but the petals fluttered from the trees with each breeze and littered the walks just like it. Marcia was called on duty, and Sanaki was charged with retrieving the bracelet from the treasury to present to Renki. If he did not find the king here, perhaps he would travel to Hourai and determine if the proper person had been swept over there instead.
She wore her finest robes, a layering of sky blue and white with a dark blue outer robe and ruffled sleeves and hem, and Marcia helped her roll her hair up in a formal style, braid the tail, and secure it with a gilded comb and silver pins. Don't trip, she said when it was time to leave, and ducked back inside to put on her armor before Sanaki could throw her fan. She put it behind her belt and dragged her feet all the way out of the dormitory.
Why the Minister of Ceremonies chose her was a mystery. He remembered very well that she'd broken the rules last time she met the kirin, and he made her scrub the walls and floors of the entire treasury as punishment, which had taken her over a month and sprinkled her hands, knees, and feet with blisters and dry, cracked skin. She'd never had to do a job like that in her twelve short years; as soon as her family realized how quickly she learned to read and write they sent her to an uncle in the capitol, who placed her in a university class - she'd met Elincia there, who'd come from far-off Shin on the northwest coast, and Marcia, and the two older girls who became her commanders.
But now Elincia was gone, possibly dead, or surely Renki would have followed the heat of heaven's revelation all the way to her side. She would have been interested in Ren's treasure, and the possibility of sending someone to Hourai to learn the secret to creating a utopia. She'd talked often about peace, and equality for hanjuu, and the poorer people in the southern provinces, where the land was mostly desert and rock.
The bracelet felt warm to the touch when Sanaki removed it from the pedestal and rested it on the indigo pillow. It gleamed gold around the edges, and silver on the sides where waves marched all the way around, a never-ending ocean like the Cloud Sea in the sky.
She'd seen it only once - an ocean in the sky, so far above the ground the waves looked like clouds when they crashed against the highest peak of the mountain on which the palace was built. It smelled like an ocean, and sounded like one; she'd read one could dive in and swim forever downward, never to reach the bottom - yet she saw the jungle beyond the capitol through the water when she peered over the rail.
Marcia was there to escort her with three other guards when she ascended the staircase with the pillow resting in her hands. They saw the sea again that day when they climbed staircase after staircase, higher and higher, above the clouds where the high officials lived and conducted business, and where the kirin and his ruler would sit and use their power to make Ren a peaceful country. If Sou could do it, if En could do it, so could they. The disasters would stop when a king sat on the throne again. She wouldn't hear about innocent people attacked by demons anymore.
Despite the enchantments on the staircases that sped their ascent, Sanaki's feet ached by the time they reached the hall at the peak of the mountain. The sea breeze was no longer refreshing, but too warm, and too heavily scented with lilies. They clustered in the garden outside of every window. She wanted to sneeze, but didn't dare.
They were told to wait outside the doors to the throne room while the court finished their business with Renki. They had to stand; a wide, crimson carpet stretched from the outer door to the inner chamber, but there weren't any benches, chairs, or tables. The windows were open wide to allow the cloying flowery scent to thicken the air in the room, but the walls were dark, almost black, and the floor was dark gray stone, polished like a mirror. The waves made a distant roar beyond the decorative trees. The sparkle of the ocean was hidden.
"What could they possibly have to say?" Marcia muttered when they'd been waiting fifteen minutes. "He can't make any decisions. They're just delaying his search. Don't they get that someone dies or loses a crop every hour we go on without a ruler?"
"They want favor," Sanaki said. The doors were dark tropical wood, polished to a sheen, and the panels were carved with lotus flowers and lily pads, and swirling koi. "I bet some of them haven't made the trip to Mount Hou yet."
Cowards, the other girl said under her breath. Tanith would have scolded Marcia for that, but she was probably in the audience chamber - unlike them, she'd served the throne for years, and her rank allowed her that privilege. Lucia reminded her she'd not wanted to risk her neck on the shouzan either, and one of the other guards glanced around. No one was there to censure their lack of discipline.
"That's because I don't want to be a queen," Marcia said. "What a pain. I don't care about taxes or land allocation."
Lucia crossed her arms, swept her hair back. "So if you're chosen today, you'll leave all the work to Taiho and waste time swinging your sword in the practice yard?"
"King En does it. He's fine."
"So if you become queen, you can hit on him shamelessly."
"Absolutely! I hear he's--"
The door cracked open and silenced them, admitting a thin official with thinning hair and bony hands, and arms that looked fragile as reeds poking out of his sleeves. His face was deeply lined, his hair and beard white. Sanaki turned away from her escort, curling her fingers around the edge of the pillow, into the cushioning. The golden thread felt rough on her sore fingertips.
Her escort was ordered to remain outside; their spears snapped into position, scraped the floor, and Marcia said something Sanaki couldn't hear past the roaring in her ears. The door wasn't even open all the way, yet her face and hands felt hot, her layers of robes sweltering. Her job within the ministry rarely required her to interact with more than a few people at a time; she'd appeared at court once, and only remembered the impression of black silk hair and sea green eyes, and the hard floor beneath her knees. Now she could barely breathe, and only walked forward when the old man motioned for the girls to open the door for her.
Would he be sitting on the throne? Would she have to walk up those stairs? There were at least fifteen, but that was plenty of time to step on her ruffled hem, trip, and send the bracelet clanking and rolling over the floor. Her hair pulled, and her neck felt stiff. She must be hunching over her burden - not that it mattered, because she wasn't allowed to meet his eyes; the kirin was too holy a creature for a minor lady of a low ranking, whose job involved cataloging, dusting, and sweeping. They said working with the kingdom's treasures was an honor, but it really meant she was a glorified maid. It is an important position, her uncle assured her. You are trusted with the most important objects in Ren. Someday you will rise in the ranks and sit in court as Minister of Ceremonies.
It would be hundreds of years until she attained that honor. The man in charge now didn't appear ready to give up his immortality, so unless his head was removed from his shoulders--
An eternity passed before the doors were open and she was commanded to enter, but her walk across the chamber was over in a blink. Renki stood at the bottom of the stairs, a dark shape in her peripheral vision - dark hair, dark purple robes, and she made herself keep her eyes on the floor, or on the gleam of the bracelet, which felt heavy as lead. Sanaki bent her neck lifted it over her head when she knelt to speak the proper greeting, though she didn't remember what the words were.
He didn't take the bracelet. Her arms trembled. It looked so small, perhaps small enough to fit around her own wrist. Why was it so heavy?
"I remember you."
Sanaki's shoulders jerked, and she almost dropped the bracelet. He hadn't spoken very loudly. Did that mean--?
"Raise your eyes."
After she was explicitly told not to? After years of teasing, and backhanded scoldings, and assurances no one in the ministry would forget her audacity, regardless of how long she served? She heard a rumble, a sea of murmurs and whispers behind her, where the high officials sat on their knees in rows of five. They were all in black, the formality as stifling as the lily perfume on the winds.
She did as she was told, and Renki looked just as she remembered him: his sleek black hair hung almost to the ground, and his face was pale, smooth, as young as her own. His eyes were the color of the Cloud Sea when it sparkled under the summer sun like wavy glass to show the green of the hills on the surface. "I didn't think it was possible to see it in such a young child when we met," he said, taking the pillow from her hands. "You burn like the sun."
Sanaki blinked and lowered her arms. Was she supposed to say something? She wasn't supposed to--
Renki slid the bracelet over his hand. It looked too small, but fit snugly just above his hand. "Will you stand?"
He was asking her? Sanaki tried to rise smoothly, but almost stumbled. "Taiho?" Her voice came out strained and dry, and caught in her throat. She couldn't ask why, or how may I serve you?
"By the law of Heaven," he said, dropping to one knee, bending his head so the light gleamed around the crown of his head like silver and pearl, "I swear to serve as your loyal servant--"
Sanaki opened her mouth to shout at him to get up, but her voice was frozen in her throat and her body ice cold. She felt her leg tremble when Renki reached for her ankle and lowered his forehead to the toe of her sandal. "W-wait--"
"I swear my obedience, my constancy, never to leave your side as long as we live."
Marcia might laugh about this. Sanaki wondered if they were watching - if she would be mocked later for her imperious tone when she'd said so many times, I don't want to be queen. No, I wouldn't make a good queen, and yes, any fool could do better, but-- You go on the shouzan if you want to, and I'll be here to laugh when you slink back.
Now she would learn the truth of her arrogant statements - that is, if she wasn't about to wake up in a cold sweat and find out one of the others piked her tea with sake.
She waited.
Renki lifted his head. She wondered what he looked like in his kirin form. Like a piece of the night sky, perhaps. "Say you accept," he said, shifting on his haunches.
Don't they get that someone dies or loses a crop every hour we go on without a ruler?
Sanaki swallowed to wet her throat, her mouth, and tried not to notice the deafening silence that replaced the whispers slithering around the chamber earlier. He didn't prompt her again, but he wouldn't stop looking at her, and he didn't release her ankle. In spite of its normal size, it felt fragile. She could break his grip if she wanted to.
Break the kingdom's grip.
"I accept," she said. Her skin prickled and tingled when she spoke, and she felt lighter than air.
Renki inclined his head again and released her ankle. "Then it is done." She felt the weight of what he said pull her down, return to her body. "May you rule Ren with wisdom and mercy."
It appeared she wasn't going to wake from this dream after all.
.
Author: Amber Michelle
Day/Theme: April 8 - lit like a burning city
Series: Fire Emblem 10 / Twelve Kingdoms
Character/Pairing: Sanaki, Marcia, Sephiran (Renki)
Rating: K
Words: 4456
Warnings: it's a cracktastic crossover with no redeeming value.
Notes: Late on purpose so I won't be lynched. I needed to write something stupid. Also, I don't know the names of Ren's cities or provinces, so I just made them up. I didn't do much research on 12K courts or such for this because I'm lazy and this is not an epic or particularly important.
Vocabulary:
Kirin - (quoted from Wikipedia) "The holy creature that is bound to and chooses the ruler of each kingdom. It resembles a white horned deer; black kirin are extremely rare and called Kokki. ... A kirin will only bow before his or her ruler. Kirin are named after the kingdom that they are bound to, with "ki" and "rin" used for male and female kirin, respectively."
Taiho - also Saiho, the official title of the kirin.
Shitsudou - a disease that afflicts the kirin when her/his king loses the Way. Usually deadly.
Hanjuu - literally 'half beast,' humans whose natural form is some kind of animal.
Shouzan - the journey to Mt. Hou; made only if you hope to be chosen as the next ruler.
Mount Hou - birthplace of all kirin, home to oracles, immortals, and gods.
Hourai - Japan.
Kaikyaku - people swept into the 12 Kingdoms from Hourai/Japan.
Shoku - a violent storm, also an opening to Japan; usually the way kaikyaku end up in the 12 kingdoms.
Twelve Kingdoms - Ren (the country in this story), En, Sou, Kei, Kou, Han, Sai, Kyou, Hou, Tai, Ryuu, Shun.
There's a complete list of terms, but the above should be enough.
.............................................
It was winter in Ren when the king died, and Sanaki woke to bright sunlight shining through her window on the day of mourning, sparkling dust swirling above her pallet, and a clear blue sky past the shutters. The university bore the scars of his reign; two teachers were called to the palace several months ago, never to return. Her roommate, Elincia, had gone back to the province of her birth to join their rebellion, and the only information to reach Sanaki in the capitol was a message in the form of a bird and rumors the governor's mansion, where her roommate's family served, had been burned to the ground while its occupants screamed. They said the governor was trapped behind falling beams, and his daughter ran back to help him. A sterling example of filial piety, it was said. What courage! Sanaki tried to ignore them.
She passed the civil service exam on her own, and donated half her stipend to a temple in her friend's name. The king was assassinated by one of her classmates after the award ceremony, the kirin's life spared by chance. Word from the high offices said he was too ill as yet to travel to Mount Hou - the shitsudou still mottled his hands with black and blue, as if each of the king's crimes were a strike, a blood-letting. Sanaki was a low-ranking official at the time; she could not see the truth of the rumors for herself. But it was true, she mused the night of the memorial; kirin were, in fact, the embodiment of the people. The wounds inflicted upon Ren were a beating upon his slender body.
She saw him once, when she served at the inauguration of a steward as part of the Ministry of Ceremonies. Sanaki was at the bottom of the chain, not allowed to speak to him, even to look up at him, but when he walked past her to ascend to the throne and approve of the government's choice, she glanced up and saw the indigo shine of his dark mane drift in his wake, shimmering in the sunlight. His eyes were green like new leaves, and they flickered down to her for an instant. His step paused, faltered, and then he was pulled onward by his bodyguard. She remembered her heart pounding in her chest, a drum, stealing her breath.
"Well, you weren't supposed to look at him," Marcia said when she heard the story. She worked in the kingsguard, and they were of similar rank - allowed into the palace, but restricted to the outer areas and official corridors. With Elincia gone, she was the one Sanaki approached when searching for someone to room with. Neither rated a suite in the palace. "He must have thought you were an insolent brat. You were what, twelve?"
"Thirteen," Sanaki said, narrowing her eyes at the other over her ceramic tea cup. The leaves reminded her of plum, apricot, the scent like honey and summer fruit. Tea was the only luxury she allowed herself. Even her robes were plain, the dye a pale, diluted blue. "No one my age had ever passed before. He was probably just curious, if he noticed me at all."
Marcia snorted, rubbed her nose, and pulled the shutters closed when the wind carried the scent of flowers in, sneezing on cue. "If I hadn't been around back then I wouldn't believe it. You sure don't act that smart--"
Sanaki kicked her under the table and talked over her shrill ow! "Are you taking the shouzan?"
"No thank you." The other girl bent to rub her shin. Dust motes danced in the beams of light reaching past the wooden screens to cast bird shapes on the carpet through the carvings. Her chair scraped and seagulls called outside. "I know someone who got mauled by a demon on his way up to present himself. I don't want to see the kirin that badly."
Sanaki let herself smile, looking down at the leaves gathering at the bottom of her cup. "You don't want to be queen of Ren?"
Marcia frowned, still bent over the table. "Do you?"
The descent of the previous reign began with a steep rise in taxes. We are a prosperous country, the proclamation said, behind En and Sou only by a small count of years. Let us refine ourselves, and Ren will be the jewel of the twelve kingdoms!
An observatory was erected at the center of the Monsoon Plains; the cost was thirty thousand lives, half of which were spent hauling stone from the mountains. The new university complex was started, another project of stone, and nearly as many lives were lost. Roads were paved and the workers were not paid, mines were emptied and laborers were lost in collapsing tunnels. Sanaki remembered hearing the figures and knowing she could plan it better, though the smartest course was, of course, to forgo such projects altogether. Did they not have the kindest of climates in Ren? Their crops yielded harvests year-round. Those who could not produce enough food in their own countries purchased grain from Ren.
I would do better, she'd thought, listening to her tutor make an example of the poor planning behind the north road project. A hundred lives instead of a thousand - but better not to lose any at all.
The king was a good ruler once. His name meant 'kindly sage,' and though the kirin, Renki, chose him to rule in the twilight of his years and chained him to an ailing body, the first century was still lauded as a golden age. She heard the end of his ascension speech quoted often: what we term 'misfortune' is merely an opportunity to empathize with those more miserable. When did the disease set in, the degeneration? What warped the king's mind and poisoned his kirin?
Marcia laughed, drew Sanaki out of her thoughts. "Don't tell me--"
"No," she said, and rolled her eyes to the ceiling. No, she didn't want to be queen. "Not really."
*
Six years passed while they waited for Renki to choose a new ruler. Sanaki's name was added to the registry of immortals when she achieved a proper rank and left the humiliating task of running errands behind to do real work. Her new position put her in charge of the ceremonial items reserved for the king's use: the bow and arrows to be shot upon ascension to banish demons, the mask worn during the harvest dance. A bracelet glittered on a pedestal she was warned never to touch. It was Ren's imperial treasure, and at the command of ruler or kirin, it would uncoil and make a gateway to Hourai, the fabled place known as Japan to kaikyaku and others who had been to that world.
What use was a relic like that? Sanaki would stare at it sometimes, when her work took her down to the store room to catalog new items, gifts the previous king had received, things obtained for the glory of Ren before the dream died. Demons crossed the coast and traveled inland. Some of the treasures they received were salvaged from the ruins of towns in areas plagued by attacks and disasters. A shoku struck off the western coast, and an entire fleet of fishermen was lost. Where is the new king? she heard in the hallways, in the offices, even in the garden when she rested and took her noon meal. Why does the kirin wait on the mountain when he should find a candidate more quickly here? Yet with such a useless treasure, she didn't see what a king would do about these disasters in any case. Kei's imperial treasure was a sword, or so she heard - that would be useful. Han had a staff capable of calming - or creating - the worst of storms. That would have stopped the shoku appearing to ravage the coast.
Everyone knew demons and disasters only appeared when there was no one sitting on the throne. And yet in En one hundred years ago, when the country lay dying without a ruler, there was one province to remain prosperous - Gen - under the care of a capable governor. He didn't wring his hands and cry when demons attacked, but mustered the provincial army and sent them to defend the people.
Ren's general did nothing. He'd purchased the rank when the king needed gold, and clearly wasn't worth the weight of his money. Marcia agreed with her. He can't even use a sword properly, she said over tea one afternoon. He learned when he was young, but how long ago was that? Ages, she would answer then, and laugh. Even if he had any skill - which he didn't - he'd be too decrepit to fight.
"What about your commanding officers?" Registries and scrolls were piled on her table, against the carved screen over the window. Sanaki had to speak to Marcia over a stack of codices and a box of ink and brushes she'd left there earlier. "Tanith has a good reputation. Sigrun is--"
"Gone," Marcia said, and looked out the window. Her smile faded.
Sanaki moved the scrolls to an empty chair, and the books to the floor next to it. Her friend hooked a finger in the mesh and pulled the shutter open to admit gray light. Clouds lay heavy across the sky. The air was still, smelled like green - grass, leaves, and wisteria. It was winter again, but warm as summer - too hot even for Ren at this time of year. She wondered if the Emperor of Heaven would choose to dry them like raisins with heat and dryness. Perhaps the rain this day promised would be their last for a long while. There were many ways to kill a nation.
"Dead?" She got up and took the pot across the room to the shelf with their tea. She could hear people walk by their door in the corridor outside, talking - one was crying, and she supposed someone had received word of misfortunes at home, wherever that might be. She reached over and turned the lock once she saw their metal pot of water was still hot and mostly full. It was supposed to be refreshed every hour, but the servants were lax They were almost out of oolong leaves, but the jar of green and roasted rice on the shelf was still half full. "I thought she survived the last official purge."
Marcia twisted the end of her ponytail. She was still in training when the king died, but she'd advanced to the command chain since then, and her hair had grown long enough to pull over her shoulder, still a brighter pink than the flowers outside. "She went home." The chair creaked when she leaned back, and her feet thumped on the edge of the chair holding the scrolls. Sanaki didn't scold her. "When the higher ups refused to send troops to Sui, she left the guard and said she'd defend it herself."
Wind stirred, drifted through the window, and from the door to the bedroom. Sanaki left the tea on the table to steep and went to close the garden doors in the other room. Marcia's bed was unmade, the blankets rumpled on the floor. Her own were folded neatly, rolled back to the foot of her bed. Who needed blankets in this heat?
"Maybe we should go to Mount Hou," Marcia said when she came back out. She was already pouring tea into her cup. Sanaki's was full. "You must have thought about it."
"No." She went back to her chair and took a sip. The taste was a bit weak. "I'm not really interested."
"You talk all the time about what a bad job the ministry is doing."
"Anybody can see that." Sanaki lifted the lid and poured her tea back into the pot. "I'm not queen material. If I were, Renki would have chosen me when I bowed to him at the mourning ceremony."
"Maybe the heavenly mandate can be late."
"Doubtful."
"Don't you think we should all go?" The wind ruffled Marcia's bangs. "It's been six years. If everyone is presented to the kirin, he's sure to get a revelation about someone."
Sanaki laughed, soft, heard Marcia kick the table leg. "Yes, I suppose that's true - unless the proper ruler hasn't been born yet. That's happened before too - in Sai, remember? We heard about it during the internship up north, at the harbor."
Marcia stuck her tongue out. "Huh."
"But if you'd like to try, I'll go with you - and record every step, so I can show everyone once you've been embarrassed. Twenty ryo says you'll trip on the way to the altar."
"Come over here and say that--!"
*
Ren's kirin came to them, in the end, for which Sanaki was grateful - though she wished Elincia were alive to meet him and be chosen. At the beginning of the eighth year after the previous king's demise, Renki returned to the palace on the mountain to look for the mandate of heaven within his own borders. Plum blossoms still clung to the branches in red and white clumps, like spun sugar and flavored ice. Ren had never seen snow, even on the highest mountain, but the petals fluttered from the trees with each breeze and littered the walks just like it. Marcia was called on duty, and Sanaki was charged with retrieving the bracelet from the treasury to present to Renki. If he did not find the king here, perhaps he would travel to Hourai and determine if the proper person had been swept over there instead.
She wore her finest robes, a layering of sky blue and white with a dark blue outer robe and ruffled sleeves and hem, and Marcia helped her roll her hair up in a formal style, braid the tail, and secure it with a gilded comb and silver pins. Don't trip, she said when it was time to leave, and ducked back inside to put on her armor before Sanaki could throw her fan. She put it behind her belt and dragged her feet all the way out of the dormitory.
Why the Minister of Ceremonies chose her was a mystery. He remembered very well that she'd broken the rules last time she met the kirin, and he made her scrub the walls and floors of the entire treasury as punishment, which had taken her over a month and sprinkled her hands, knees, and feet with blisters and dry, cracked skin. She'd never had to do a job like that in her twelve short years; as soon as her family realized how quickly she learned to read and write they sent her to an uncle in the capitol, who placed her in a university class - she'd met Elincia there, who'd come from far-off Shin on the northwest coast, and Marcia, and the two older girls who became her commanders.
But now Elincia was gone, possibly dead, or surely Renki would have followed the heat of heaven's revelation all the way to her side. She would have been interested in Ren's treasure, and the possibility of sending someone to Hourai to learn the secret to creating a utopia. She'd talked often about peace, and equality for hanjuu, and the poorer people in the southern provinces, where the land was mostly desert and rock.
The bracelet felt warm to the touch when Sanaki removed it from the pedestal and rested it on the indigo pillow. It gleamed gold around the edges, and silver on the sides where waves marched all the way around, a never-ending ocean like the Cloud Sea in the sky.
She'd seen it only once - an ocean in the sky, so far above the ground the waves looked like clouds when they crashed against the highest peak of the mountain on which the palace was built. It smelled like an ocean, and sounded like one; she'd read one could dive in and swim forever downward, never to reach the bottom - yet she saw the jungle beyond the capitol through the water when she peered over the rail.
Marcia was there to escort her with three other guards when she ascended the staircase with the pillow resting in her hands. They saw the sea again that day when they climbed staircase after staircase, higher and higher, above the clouds where the high officials lived and conducted business, and where the kirin and his ruler would sit and use their power to make Ren a peaceful country. If Sou could do it, if En could do it, so could they. The disasters would stop when a king sat on the throne again. She wouldn't hear about innocent people attacked by demons anymore.
Despite the enchantments on the staircases that sped their ascent, Sanaki's feet ached by the time they reached the hall at the peak of the mountain. The sea breeze was no longer refreshing, but too warm, and too heavily scented with lilies. They clustered in the garden outside of every window. She wanted to sneeze, but didn't dare.
They were told to wait outside the doors to the throne room while the court finished their business with Renki. They had to stand; a wide, crimson carpet stretched from the outer door to the inner chamber, but there weren't any benches, chairs, or tables. The windows were open wide to allow the cloying flowery scent to thicken the air in the room, but the walls were dark, almost black, and the floor was dark gray stone, polished like a mirror. The waves made a distant roar beyond the decorative trees. The sparkle of the ocean was hidden.
"What could they possibly have to say?" Marcia muttered when they'd been waiting fifteen minutes. "He can't make any decisions. They're just delaying his search. Don't they get that someone dies or loses a crop every hour we go on without a ruler?"
"They want favor," Sanaki said. The doors were dark tropical wood, polished to a sheen, and the panels were carved with lotus flowers and lily pads, and swirling koi. "I bet some of them haven't made the trip to Mount Hou yet."
Cowards, the other girl said under her breath. Tanith would have scolded Marcia for that, but she was probably in the audience chamber - unlike them, she'd served the throne for years, and her rank allowed her that privilege. Lucia reminded her she'd not wanted to risk her neck on the shouzan either, and one of the other guards glanced around. No one was there to censure their lack of discipline.
"That's because I don't want to be a queen," Marcia said. "What a pain. I don't care about taxes or land allocation."
Lucia crossed her arms, swept her hair back. "So if you're chosen today, you'll leave all the work to Taiho and waste time swinging your sword in the practice yard?"
"King En does it. He's fine."
"So if you become queen, you can hit on him shamelessly."
"Absolutely! I hear he's--"
The door cracked open and silenced them, admitting a thin official with thinning hair and bony hands, and arms that looked fragile as reeds poking out of his sleeves. His face was deeply lined, his hair and beard white. Sanaki turned away from her escort, curling her fingers around the edge of the pillow, into the cushioning. The golden thread felt rough on her sore fingertips.
Her escort was ordered to remain outside; their spears snapped into position, scraped the floor, and Marcia said something Sanaki couldn't hear past the roaring in her ears. The door wasn't even open all the way, yet her face and hands felt hot, her layers of robes sweltering. Her job within the ministry rarely required her to interact with more than a few people at a time; she'd appeared at court once, and only remembered the impression of black silk hair and sea green eyes, and the hard floor beneath her knees. Now she could barely breathe, and only walked forward when the old man motioned for the girls to open the door for her.
Would he be sitting on the throne? Would she have to walk up those stairs? There were at least fifteen, but that was plenty of time to step on her ruffled hem, trip, and send the bracelet clanking and rolling over the floor. Her hair pulled, and her neck felt stiff. She must be hunching over her burden - not that it mattered, because she wasn't allowed to meet his eyes; the kirin was too holy a creature for a minor lady of a low ranking, whose job involved cataloging, dusting, and sweeping. They said working with the kingdom's treasures was an honor, but it really meant she was a glorified maid. It is an important position, her uncle assured her. You are trusted with the most important objects in Ren. Someday you will rise in the ranks and sit in court as Minister of Ceremonies.
It would be hundreds of years until she attained that honor. The man in charge now didn't appear ready to give up his immortality, so unless his head was removed from his shoulders--
An eternity passed before the doors were open and she was commanded to enter, but her walk across the chamber was over in a blink. Renki stood at the bottom of the stairs, a dark shape in her peripheral vision - dark hair, dark purple robes, and she made herself keep her eyes on the floor, or on the gleam of the bracelet, which felt heavy as lead. Sanaki bent her neck lifted it over her head when she knelt to speak the proper greeting, though she didn't remember what the words were.
He didn't take the bracelet. Her arms trembled. It looked so small, perhaps small enough to fit around her own wrist. Why was it so heavy?
"I remember you."
Sanaki's shoulders jerked, and she almost dropped the bracelet. He hadn't spoken very loudly. Did that mean--?
"Raise your eyes."
After she was explicitly told not to? After years of teasing, and backhanded scoldings, and assurances no one in the ministry would forget her audacity, regardless of how long she served? She heard a rumble, a sea of murmurs and whispers behind her, where the high officials sat on their knees in rows of five. They were all in black, the formality as stifling as the lily perfume on the winds.
She did as she was told, and Renki looked just as she remembered him: his sleek black hair hung almost to the ground, and his face was pale, smooth, as young as her own. His eyes were the color of the Cloud Sea when it sparkled under the summer sun like wavy glass to show the green of the hills on the surface. "I didn't think it was possible to see it in such a young child when we met," he said, taking the pillow from her hands. "You burn like the sun."
Sanaki blinked and lowered her arms. Was she supposed to say something? She wasn't supposed to--
Renki slid the bracelet over his hand. It looked too small, but fit snugly just above his hand. "Will you stand?"
He was asking her? Sanaki tried to rise smoothly, but almost stumbled. "Taiho?" Her voice came out strained and dry, and caught in her throat. She couldn't ask why, or how may I serve you?
"By the law of Heaven," he said, dropping to one knee, bending his head so the light gleamed around the crown of his head like silver and pearl, "I swear to serve as your loyal servant--"
Sanaki opened her mouth to shout at him to get up, but her voice was frozen in her throat and her body ice cold. She felt her leg tremble when Renki reached for her ankle and lowered his forehead to the toe of her sandal. "W-wait--"
"I swear my obedience, my constancy, never to leave your side as long as we live."
Marcia might laugh about this. Sanaki wondered if they were watching - if she would be mocked later for her imperious tone when she'd said so many times, I don't want to be queen. No, I wouldn't make a good queen, and yes, any fool could do better, but-- You go on the shouzan if you want to, and I'll be here to laugh when you slink back.
Now she would learn the truth of her arrogant statements - that is, if she wasn't about to wake up in a cold sweat and find out one of the others piked her tea with sake.
She waited.
Renki lifted his head. She wondered what he looked like in his kirin form. Like a piece of the night sky, perhaps. "Say you accept," he said, shifting on his haunches.
Don't they get that someone dies or loses a crop every hour we go on without a ruler?
Sanaki swallowed to wet her throat, her mouth, and tried not to notice the deafening silence that replaced the whispers slithering around the chamber earlier. He didn't prompt her again, but he wouldn't stop looking at her, and he didn't release her ankle. In spite of its normal size, it felt fragile. She could break his grip if she wanted to.
Break the kingdom's grip.
"I accept," she said. Her skin prickled and tingled when she spoke, and she felt lighter than air.
Renki inclined his head again and released her ankle. "Then it is done." She felt the weight of what he said pull her down, return to her body. "May you rule Ren with wisdom and mercy."
It appeared she wasn't going to wake from this dream after all.
.