Each morning was a gift, from Amaterasu, Michikane told himself. Each morning he was blessed to be able to awaken and to see to matters at his leisure. As Sesshō he was the most influential man in the whole of the Empire. He was therefore of a mind to enjoy himself, as his father had before him and their uncle ought to have done before him.
Masanaga was the finest of the Tahara, and had forged his position from one of weakness. Masanaga was the son of the usurper Kaneie, who had usurped his cousin the legitimate Sesshō, and had struggled to pass down the position to his son, Masanaru. It was Masanaru who reigned as Kampaku for seven years after his father, only to perish to illness whereupon he was succeeded by his younger brother Takemichi. Takemichi was himself to rule for but a year, during which time Masanaga was briefly banished from the capital and made into an outlaw. Surviving as such he was to stay a little ahead of his elder brother's many servants who sought to capture the youngest of the sons' of Kaneie only to give himself over near Mt-Sakurōka a mere eight kilometres to the west of Miyakō.
It was under these circumstances that he was brought back to the principal city of the Empire, only to follow his disgrace by slipping away from his guards over to his then sickly brother. The man's eldest son attempted to proclaim himself Sesshō, but Masanaga was far more clever. He was to promise the Tennō to restore him to power at which time when appointed Sesshō he ordered Kanzei-Tennō to be stripped from his office and his nephew imprisoned for life. Now taking up the title of Kampaku, Masanaga was to usher forth the greatest age of peace and prosperity in the history of the Empire in two centuries.
It was to his spirit that Michikane prayed to everyday, first when he awoke and later when he went to sleep. It was therefore with more than a little irritation that he noted a slight ache in the middle of his back. He did not recall that ache having been there the previous day, or the day before then when last he drank.
"Koremichi! Koremichi!" He called impatiently, rising for the day with his aide Koremichi hurrying forward to help grab his sheets and pillow from where they had been laid out in the man's private bedchambers.
Once these had been handed over to a number of servants who had them taken away in the room next to Michikane's private chambers, they had his garments laid out. His kimono was one of the purest silk, brought to the capital from the western province of Unshū. It was then spun by the Sesshō's wife the lady Momohama no Akiko who was for her part a great friend of a number of merchants' wives in the Capital. A great lady who was popular and good natured she was fifteen years her husband's junior and mother to six of his children, with a penchant for gossip.
This last hobby of hers was one that her husband revelled in even as he loved to indulge in painting and the art of poetry.
It was for this reason that he was to call for his aide, even as he groaned and complained inwardly over how his wife was absent on account of her visiting her elder sister, the wife of the Crown Prince. She had spent the night with him, as he liked her to do more and more since he had turned fifty-four more than ten years ago. He hated to be apart from her, as the days were dull and none of his other concubines or mistresses could offer him the sort of conversations, and cheered as loudly as she over his paintings. There was also the matter of their having more children together than he had with others of his women, so that he often found it easier to discuss their children's future together than with anyone else. The other concubines and ladies also harped on about how he ought to appoint their son, or this cousin to this or that office. It annoyed him. No matter how often he repeated that Kanemichi would be Sesshō after him, none of them remained convinced it was appropriate as the youth was not popular with the women of his father's harem. He was a severe man who spent much of his time with Kiyoharu and a number of his other uncles in place of his half-brothers, so that this had also made him unpopular with them.
His desire for reforms and seriousness with which he tackled state matters was not popular with many of the heads of the other noble families and branches of the Tahara clan. Michikane for his part, was fond of his eldest and of the view, all criticism towards him ought to be silenced. None of them understood that he would grow out of his sternness, as Michikane had.
"What news is there on this day?" Michikane asked of his aide Koremichi stretching lazily, having only just awoken in spite of how it was already well past noon. A regular drinker, he had long ago become habituated to late nights and a great amount of saké. It was for this reason that he was infamous in some parts of the city as the 'Slattern Regent' in contrast to his uncle of old Masanaga who was though a man popular with the ladies of the capital was nonetheless a fearsome wolf of a man.
The Leonine Sesshō had been dead for nigh on fifty years now, and he had been succeeded by his far more corrupt nephew. It was the line of Takemichi that had retaken power and prestige from the lineage of Masanaga. This had left the younger man's line alienated from power and forced to scheme and at times work to take back their high rank.
They wielded enormous influence through their own close familial links to the Imperial line, which had long favoured the heirs of Masanaga. It was therefore a troubled and tempestuous city that Michikane had ruled over for nigh sixteen years. He had in that time grown to love his position and come to believe that it was to endure for another sixteen years.
"There has been news from thy brother Kanenaga, who has said that Prince Shōtoku has gone to visit once more with his wet-nurse's niece's family." Koremichi reported quietly kneeling just a short distance behind the highest of the Empire's nobles.
"Hmm, really now?" Michikane demanded indifferently, "I have never quite understood his affection for the young girl."
"I could look into the matter if you wish me do?" Koremichi asked of his master, who glancing outside noticed how the flowers were in full bloom.
Noting this fact and realizing it would be the last bloom of the season, Michikane could not help but bemoan this fact. "Oh no! Once the flowers bloom as brightly as they do now, as they did some time ago it is always the sign that the season has shifted!"
This was to draw an impatient sigh from the aide, who swallowed his bitter words. Any other man and he might have barked at him, but it would not do to do so with the ruler of Zipangu. In rank he was just below the Tennō, and yet with regards to authority he was far above that man.
Mayhaps, he mused to himself it might have been better had Kanemichi been made ruler, and if Michikane had retired as had once been suggested to him. The old man had after all since some time ago begun to focus far too much on personal matters, neglecting those of official affairs.
"What would you have me do, regarding the matter of Prince Shōtoku?" Koremichi asked curiously, eager to please his liege lord and excited at the opportunity that he might have to humiliate and otherwise undo the hopes of Shōtoku.
Quite what those hopes might be neither man quite knew but they suspected it was the same as that of Go-Kazan-Tennō from the time of Masanaga; to see the Imperial clan restored to power. It was this therefore that motivated him to wish to see the Prince properly alienated from power and all forms of influence within the Court.
This was why he was to stroke his chin thoughtfully only to decide, "Nothing though I am curious regarding this maiden of his. What have his servants had to say to us regarding her?"
"That she is a daughter of the Nohara."
"And? What else have they discovered?" Sesshō demanded of his aide growing ever more impatient with him. "I have no wish to hear of this matter if it is of negligible importance to me for I have matters of the gravest importance to look into."
The great matter which he spoke of was the pre-eminence of his son, Kanemichi over his highly ambitious eight brothers. Each of these brothers, were men who had each of them been favoured by their highly fecund father, who for his part had reigned as Sesshō for thirty-eight years before him, and later also by their uncle who had ruled for twenty one years himself.
It was for this reason that he fretted over what to do with them, and over how he might secure his son's appointment as his successor. He needed the means to prevent them from usurping the youth after his death, he told himself. Each of the generations of the Tahara had proven themselves since the time of Nakatari highly susceptible to usurpation by their uncles or brothers as proven by Masanaga the greatest of their lineage. His line had been usurped as he had his own nephews before his sons' were themselves displaced.
He could resort to killing, but he loved his brothers and was of the view that such an act was barbaric and unfit for the head of the Tahara clan to accomplish. The man could not outright remove them from his family. If one of them was a rival he would have to find some means by which he might remove them from the succession without killing them. His son might have need of their assistance when the time came for him to become Sesshō and rule. He may not have trusted his brothers but he trusted his other sons' and his women even less.
That aside he told himself, there was still the matter of Prince Shōtoku. He was an avowed enemy of the Tahara clan, and had the support and friendship of Kiyoharu, who was the only one of Michikane's brothers that he regarded with suspicion and dislike.
"Life is so fleeting, and the flowers' bloom but a mere moment before it is supplanted by autumn decay! How true it is that a ruler's fortune is fleeting, like a wheel that is always turning," Michikane complained loudly to his aide.
"Kanemichi-donō always says that the ruler is temporary but the state eternal, as are the Tahara," Koremichi rebutted only to ask, "What is to be done about Kiyoharu?"
"Kanemichi would say so, he is beneath his steely exterior something of a dreamer, and I do not like the influence that Kiyoharu has over him. He encourages such strange ideas and is friends with that schemer Shōtoku!" Michikane said plaintively only to shake his head, "What is to be done with him? And then there is that guest of his, Tsubaki of the Nohara clan. An Imperial Prince having familial relations to a bushi clan is horrifying."
"Why not suggest to Kiyoharu that Shōtoku dance for his birthday and that this girl be invited to his birthday celebration?" Koremichi demanded impatiently of the Sesshō, of the view that the old man was too often distracted in recent days.
His father had served the man for a great many years before him, and he had once remarked to his son that he was the finest member of the house of Tahara and that to serve him was an honour in and of itself. This then was the cause for so much of his disappointment towards the man that he had come to serve as the man was hardly all that impressive.
It was a shock his aide complained if only to himself that the man could even manage to get his chopsticks to his own mouth. It was Kanemichi he mused who was far more impressive and had something of a brain between his ears.
"I should think that a good plan, what has Kanemichi and my wife said regarding the matter? And what of Kiyoharu?" Michikane wondered slowly, as always hesitant to make any decision without first consulting with those around him.
"They are certainly in agreement that it is for the best," Koremichi lied thinking to himself that as always it was perhaps best to prod the old man forward whilst seeing to the matter of persuading those around him after the decision had been made. It was always best where the indecisive old Sesshō was concerned.
Satisfied when he was soon given the order to resolve the matter of organizing the birthday celebration for Kiyoharu, he was to depart with the intent to now persuade Kiyoharu to allow it. It should not prove difficult he mused, as Kiyoharu was never one to refuse his brothers anything, least of all a request from his eldest brother and nephew.
Now he had only to discover who this guest of Shōtoku's was, and for that he would have to consult with Kiyoharu himself, as the man was after all one of the dearest friends of the Prince.
*****
There were few sites more beauteous than that of the grand city that dominated the whole of the Empire. Few places that were of greater importance to the Yamatai people, so that Satomine was filled with amazement at the manner in which the great buildings and roads stretched forward. The streets were cleaner than he remembered. Same could be said for the great palatial estates of the various princes of the Imperial blood and of Tahara descent.
"I had almost forgotten how beautiful it is," He murmured as he entered the city riding a short distance behind the Prince who chortled as was his wont.
"Indeed? I shan't imagine ever doing so," Shōtoku replied cheerfully with a fond look all around him, "It is the loveliest of the cities of the earth."
The affection he felt for the city built by Takuma was evident, with Satomine understanding of why this would be. He himself had always had a great love for the city since he first saw it as a child when he was first accepted as page to Yoshinobu. It was at that time that he swore to himself to someday live within the boundaries of Miyakō.
It was an oath that he still felt embarrassed to have sworn due in no small part to how childishly he had resisted returning north. It was with a hearty laugh that Yoshinobu had plucked him off of his feet and onto his horse, proclaiming that someday perhaps he might leave him behind in the greatest of Zipangu's cities but not that day.
He could still hear him, Satomine mused tartly, as the words of that distant day resonated not only within his heart but his ears. Oh how he wished that he could go back, he thought to himself melancholically. If he could he would do what he could to warn his liege of the dangers of the northern campaign, and of the danger posed by Motonaga.
"What is wrong?" Tsubaki asked of him, from where she sat behind him on the horse that Shōtoku had given over for his usage. "You look sad, Tonō!"
"It is nothing," Satomine replied morosely, not wishing to discuss with the haughty if overly familiar maiden where his thoughts dwelt at present.
Visibly disappointed, Tsubaki was to huff a little. She was to look away while he distracted himself with a careful study of the city. It was large and populous, with more than five hundred thousand inhabitants. These people were each of them clever and a people wholly apart from those accustomed to life in the north he mused. He could see that though a great many of the local people wore similar dress to those in the north, there was a different air about them. Those of the north were a people who revered hard-work yes, but also had a sense of independence from one another where the southerners he could already detect had a strong sense of attachment to one another. They knew themselves to be a community in a way that the north did not yet know.
He wondered if it had something to do with how long they had lived in such a small confined space. They were also to demonstrate as he was soon to learn, an artistic sense that was to prove seductive in a way that Satomine was utterly unprepared to defend himself against.
"No matter, we should resume the lesson. Let us dance once more, I will have Aimi play the drum since you are not dancing quite as correctly as you ought to," Tsubaki stated with a shake of her beautiful head.
Grateful for her aid, Satomine was to wait for her to return, lost in his own thoughts. He had a great deal more interest in her movements then than he had previously demonstrated in her lesson in poetry. Distracted for a moment, he was to tear his mind from what he had already found to be the most distracting lady of his entire life that he might concentrate once more on the piece of paper before him, and his brush.
Staring long and hard at the brush and the page, he could feel his cheeks burn with shame at the poorness of his own poem. He had sought to impress the lady of the Nohara and had only shown how boorish his own upbringing was. It made him feel hopeless and as though his every effort at emulating the nobles of Miyakō was doomed to failure.
It was more of an unconscious act, than a fully aware one but he was to thinking of Yoshinobu's own lack of talent in the field of poems and songs, and of their composition pick up the brush. Longing for the man who had raised him as warmly and lovingly as a father might have done, Satomine was to run his brush along the page.
It was only when he had finished that he became aware of what it was that he had done. The words had flowed from him, as he looked out onto the suns as they held fast to the middle of the heavens with a number of clouds to attend them here and there. Brimming with light they shone down upon the whole of the land, so that the capital city built as it was of marble and great stones became a place of golden and silver glimmering brightness.
"The golden sun,
Untouched by dark clouds,
Why then did it fall in the distant western horizon?"
Returning with a great cheer, Tsubaki very nearly stepped forward whilst the bushi was bent over the page, her beloved maid Aimi loudly calling after her as she was stepping forward behind her only to complain when she was shushed. "What is it that you are about milady? Why shush me now?"
"It is only that he is… writing!" Tsubaki gasped eagerly.
"Yes, what of it?" Aimi asked confused, "Have you not been teaching him to do just that hitherto now?"
"Yes, but he is in the full throes of composition." Tsubaki retorted with a tinkling laugh and a smile that could well have dazzled even the likes of Tsukuyomi or Susanowo-no-Mikoto.
"And so?"
"He must not be interrupted; I have pushed for him and waited endlessly for him to at LAST give himself over to the poetry, as a true aristocrat should." Tsubaki replied with a glee that startled her maid, who studied with some interest.
It was only with the slightest awareness of their presence that Satomine did as thousands of Zipangu-folk had done before him. He composed then another poem, this one though he did not at once admit to it to her, was inspired by Tsubaki's beauty.
"The tulip flourishes,
Petals purple as the finest of robes,
And shimmering brighter than the brightest of torches."
The poem was one which he had just to say finished composing when he glanced about, only to leap some feet into the air at the sight of the approving lady of the Nohara and her disapproving maid. It was thus with more than a little enthusiasm Tsubaki was to read the poem, tasting it even as her maid studied her mistress with hard eyes.
The enthusiasm of the young woman for the man that had rescued them was a sentiment she had encouraged, and yet it was one that she began to question. Tsubaki's interest in the youth only grew and grew to the consternation of one as concerned with the dignity of the Nohara as Aimi who was to mutter to herself about the poem, once it had been recited.
"Such a mediocre thing," She grumbled meanly.
"I see," Satomine said somewhat crestfallen.
"Nonsense, what do you know of poetry Aimi? It was remarkable, I quite like them," Tsubaki exclaimed stunned to hear her servant speak out against the youth, turning to Satomine with glimmering eyes she was to praise him. "It is among the finest works you have ever composed Satomine. Well done!"
It was now the turn of Satomine to redden. A man who though half in love with Himari for a number of years, was certainly no stranger to women or their beauty. It was therefore for this reason that he was to find his breath stalled and his heart beating against his chest with enough force it seemed to tear itself free.
Drinking in the sight of her wide eyes, and of her great tresses and beauty, he could not help but stare over-long. It took some time as she excitedly chattered along about the poem he had constructed for her, for him to realize how he was staring at her.
It was this moment that was to solidify within Aimi's breast the resolve to write to Masaharu warning him of what she suspected was happening.
*****
The invitation to the celebration was one that Shōtoku expressed much amusement towards. It had arrived not long after dawn with the young Prince having called forth for Satomine to attend him in place of his regular lessons.
The celebration as Shōtoku was to explain it to him was the perfect opportunity to see the likes of the Sesshō. "You see, it will be held at the palace of his youngest brother who is one of his son's favourites. He is also a mutual friend, one of the only Tahara princes I can abide and who might assist me."
"Really?" Satomine asked startled, "I had heard that the Imperial clan and that of the Tahara were not dear to one another in recent days to one another, but how is it that the two, of you are friends?"
"It is a good tale, though not particularly fascinating given that it began shortly after my beloved mother passed. She was never much liked by her yet his mother had once played with her during their infancy so that he paid his respects during the funeral. It is for this reason therefore that we first began to meet to recite poetry and play Shōgi." Shōtoku replied with a shrug of his shoulders, "He is kind if quite greedy for his brother's position. It is my hope to have him achieve the post if only to ensure that there is someone of my choosing on the Tahara throne."
"I see," Satomine said disconcerted at the self-interest that was blatantly apparent with regards to the friendship.
"We are sincere friends Satomine, it is only that it is a union of sorts of politics and the personal," Shōtoku said with a small smile on his lips, having apparently read his thoughts. He added when he saw the surprise on the younger man's face, "You truly do not know how to hide your thoughts do you Satomine-san?"
"Perhaps that ought to be the next lesson," Tsubaki grumbled exasperated, "I had thought that we might make a nobleman of him by this time, if only in spirit."
"Impossible," Shōtoku muttered with good natured amusement.
Glaring at him, Satomine was to grunt, "I have no wish to become a nobleman. My dearest wish is to avenge Yoshinobu-donō! This is my duty."
"And that is why Yoshiyori and Tomizen have failed." Shōtoku informed him sharply, "And why Yoshinobu-san would have failed had he visited the capital."
"What?" The coldness behind that one word chilled the servants present who shrunk back from him, even as Tsubaki studied him with curious eyes.
"I said that he would have met with failure, as the Court thought little of him. He was in matters of the Court a terrible fool," Shōtoku repeated firmly. Satomine leapt to his feet his fists balled together as he shot lightning with his eyes at the seated Prince who met his glare with his own.
"Yoshinobu-donō was no such thing!" Satomine hissed at him through gritted teeth, unable to tolerate the slightest insult against his liege's honour.
"He was." Shōtoku retorted, "In matters of the Court. Satomine-san, it is no insult to say a man behaved foolishly in one matter. It does not mean that I think him a fool."
"What?"
"Yoshinobu-san was not a fool, he was merely naïve in matters of the Imperial and Tahara clans. He did not understand that we have lost interest in the north, or perhaps he hoped that they had so that he might re-forge Miitsu into his own personal kingdom." The Prince said thoughtfully if with a certain amount of steel in his voice. "You see, the old man was a great bushi and even greater General. But the trouble is that by hiding himself away in the north, he made it so that the Court rarely thinks of him, and rarely interests itself in him so that should the Takimoto ever lose their northern armies they would be terribly exposed. You know what this means I see."
"Indeed," Satomine replied breathlessly, if reluctantly, "Without its armies the Takimoto serve no purpose to the Court and will be unable to influence matters. But surely if the enemy does indeed crush them, the Court would not simply stand idly by?"
"Likely they would still remain seated idly by, rather than standing," Tsubaki muttered to herself, in one of her many moments of indiscretion, fuming privately to herself.
"What? But if they do that, do they not realize that Miyakō will fall not long thereafter?" Satomine asked stunned by this revelation.
"I am afraid most of the Court does not realize this," Shōtoku revealed only to wrinkle his nose furiously, "It is entirely the fault of the Tahara clan! They have long neglected their duties and grown utterly self-indulgent!"
"I see," Satomine murmured uneasily, only to growl and curse, "But how could they be so blind that they shan't see the dangers of such a direction in policy?"
Shōtoku shrugged his massive shoulders, "I know not how best to answer that query Satomine, likely, I know only that it is because of this our shared duty, you and I, and that of Nohara-donō to wake the Court up."
Invigorated once more by the bold words of the Prince, Satomine very nearly leapt to his feet but instead nodded his head approvingly, only for his brow to furrow. How were they to do this? It was the principal query that echoed within his mind as he leant forward towards the Prince, "But how do we accomplish this miracle? For miracle it must be if all that you say is true about the Tahara clan and the rest of the great nobles?"
"It is simple; we must present you as intended as a nobleman of the Takimoto, with Tahara no Kiyoharu to canvass his family into action, whilst I speak to my cousins and brothers in turn. I know of a great many nearer to the Tennō who might be able to speak to him so that he might beg Tahara no Michikane to support Takimoto." Shōtoku told him piercing him with his eyes, with Satomine mesmerized nodding his head.
He did not say it at that time. It was impossible to do so, with the youth to remark the following day to Tsubaki that he could not fathom how it could be that an heir of Amaterasu could possibly lower himself to begging a vassal of his for any sort of favour.
"It is a humiliation it is true," She agreed full of disdain also for this state of affairs, only to remark to him, "But it is the legacy we have been left by our ancestors, who submitted long ago to the Tahara clan just as the Imperial Clan did."
Satomine could only stare.
"Now, shall we return to our lessons?" Shōtoku asked as he regained his feet to leave, "I must abstain from the next one, on account of having been summoned to the Northern Pavilion, where Tahara no Kanemichi lives."
Satomine nodded his head, brooding over his newfound knowledge of how dire the Imperial Capital's situation was. The notion that the rulers of Zipangu might not resist at all, or even consider doing so, was a stark one that he had not truly considered. It was so bizarre to him, so that he felt an instinctive desire to reject what he had just learnt.
This new reality as one could term it was one reason for which the youth was to wish to rebel against the ruling by the Prince that he was not to leave the house. He longed to search the city, to explore it and to for the first time bear witness to the beauty he had heard so much of and even as he wished to conquer it for Shōtoku and restore sanity to it, he longed with equal ardour to lose himself in it.
He had just begun to listen to Tsubaki once more, regarding the form and style of poetry from the city of Miyakō when one of the guards hurried forth from before the gates to inform Prince Shōtoku, who had just summoned forth a number of his guards and his stable-master to inform them of his intentions to leave for the Northern-Pavilion. "My Prince! My Prince! A messenger from Tahara no Kiyoharu has arrived!"
"Has he now?" Shōtoku asked not unkindly, as he ordered the man, "Do show him in and I will speak with him."
The man in question hurried forward, he was a stout fellow with a balding head, a short beard and an air of perpetual worry about him. Dressed in a simple kimono he was to throw himself forward in a deep bow to Shōtoku who grunted impatiently in response to the man as he said, "Prince! Do accept my rudeness and that of my master, for this sudden intrusion."
"Yes, yes," Shōtoku replied sharply, "Please do hurry I was just about to go join thy master, Kanemichi-donō when you arrived."
"Ah yes, regarding that fact, he has sent me to offer his apologies as he was suddenly summoned to look after the Crown Prince." The herald of the heir to the house of the Tahara explained reluctantly, only to add hurriedly, "He has however proposed that you might join him for evening tea on the morrow."
"But of course, and what of my cousin?"
"He has fallen ill again," the messenger informed him regretfully, "I am not at liberty to say much more than that."
"A shame."
"Quite how he has fallen ill is a mystery to me though," the messenger mumbled whilst rubbing his chin thoughtfully.
This was a mystery that troubled Shōtoku as surely as it did the messenger himself, with the two pondering for some time together the matter of the Crown Prince's health. It was later that the Wild Prince was to inform Satomine that the Crown Prince who was a close friend of Kiyoharu who at one time was his caretaker had recently celebrated his twentieth birthday. The Crown Prince was at one time a hardy fellow renowned for his austere dignity. The source of his ill health something that no physician could quite determine, as his symptoms included a great cough, and increasing blindness, and increasing weakness.
His illness had come upon him quite suddenly. So much so that the Court had whispered it might be poison though none could quite determine who might be the culprit. The Crown Prince after all was young, genial and hardly a threat to anyone, least of all his Tahara cousins. It was precisely why he had been chosen as Crown Prince by them after all.
It was also due to his geniality and goodness that Shōtoku and others like him had not moved against the Tahara clan. They loved the Tennō just as they loved the Crown Prince. So that to hear that the younger man was dying distressed the Prince a great deal. The younger man was the same age as his eldest son at twenty-one years of age, with Shōtoku who was thirty-seven years, was to mutter, "Extraordinary and terrible tidings these be. I had hoped we might rely upon his strength, the love he inspires in all around him to convince the Tahara to turn their attention to the north."
Still troubled by what he had been told, Shōtoku was to inform the former herald of Yoshinobu of the message given over to him, which drew a gasp from the Lady Tsubaki. Tsubaki sat nearby as the young man practiced his archery on targets at the other end of the courtyard that stretched out before the great house of Shōtoku.
"Really? How could the Crown Prince be ill? Oh what will his brother the Tennō do? He must be beside himself with grief!" She said unable to keep from fretting over the fate of the man next in line to become the ruler of the Empire.
The sentiment was one that the Prince was visibly grateful for, even as he brooded over what had befallen his cousin. It was his view as he was later to comment in private to them that he blamed the Tahara clan, "It is entirely the fault of the Tahara who regard we Imperial Princes as mere prizes and tools for their own rule."
His condemnation of the Sesshō was one that Satomine had never heard before, not that he considered it treasonous. To the contrary, he thought it regrettable more than anything and was to remark to his benefactor, "A shame, but what does this mean for the frontier?"
"It means that I have not the means to assist thee, not directly I should hasten to add." The Wild Prince retorted with more than a little regret, "I am lending day and night what aid I can, messengers come and go hither, thither and everywhere throughout the capital yet still little can be done to wrangle a sense of obligation from the Tahara. They are much too venal and corrupt and now the heads of my family lie dying."
"What of the Tennō?"
"He is old and feeble, and has never been the strongest of men," Shōtoku admitted with more than a little regret, "It is my hope that the Crown Prince will rally and recover. He is a good man, if a little indecisive still he is fond of me in his own way, as his father is my uncle."
"I see," Satomine replied grimly, before a thought occurred to him, "If he dies who will become the next Crown Prince? Yourself?"
This proposal drew a raucous laugh from the Prince who shook and chortled until he had to wipe a number of tears from his eyes. Feeling embarrassed at this strange behaviour on the part of his newfound liege, it was all Satomine could do to keep from snapping at him furiously.
He was saved from doing so and disgracing himself when Tsubaki defended his query, "It is not so ridiculous a question cousin."
"But it is! The succession is in the hands of the Tahara clan, so that there is little possibility that I should ever come to inherit the crown." Shōtoku retorted with even more amusement.
He did not say much more, and though he chortled for quite some time, there was a glint in his eyes. One that left Satomine with the certainty that there was much that Shōtoku had left unsaid on the matter of the succession. The Prince might claim that the throne could never be his, however there was in his eyes neither greed, nor ambition but determination.
This was the first hint of his ambitions; of his mind that the bushi had that there was more to the Wild Prince than most might well have believed. He knew him then to not be a hard-nosed pragmatist as most men believed, but instead something of a noble dreamer.
*****
It was several days after this conversation that a messenger arrived bearing news. Arriving at the gates just as Shōtoku was in the middle of sitting a pet cat of his on his lap, and playing a game of shōgi with Tsubaki whilst Satomine practiced his archery in the courtyard nearby. Naomori and Sadamori were nearby also in the midst of stuffing down their gullets pastries that Aimi had generously provided for them as they watched the bushi shoot every shot perfectly. They cheered at every one even as they exclaimed in amazement as each one hit its mark.
Their admiration for the youth had only grown, and was now bright upon their faces as the suns' were in the skies above.
They might well have looked forward to another lazy day, with some of the guards likely to have also expected little more than another day of relaxing by the gates, and waiting for something to happen or distracting themselves with games of dice if it were not for the sudden arrival of a messenger.
The man's shouts echoed across the courtyard, making even the guards jump as they leapt into place, while Shōtoku was resting on his back in the middle of the hall. It was the first time he was caught resting during the day, with Tsubaki currently helping the servant girls with sweeping the floor and otherwise cleaning it. In the midst of his swordsmanship practice he swung and swept about the courtyard, and had been in the midst of doing so since the early hours of the morn. From the corner of his eye he studied the steady breathing of the Prince, and at times the movements of Tsubaki. For her own part she was to throw very frequent glances in his direction when he was not looking.
"I have come bearing news," someone shouted from outside the Pavilion gates, startling the two men from their lunch.
In the midst of teasing his cat, Shōtoku was to sigh wearily. It was the first time that Satomine could see just how the continuous racing about the capital had begun to wear upon the noble Prince.
Pity mingled itself with sorrow for his friend as he sat there, watching as the messenger was ushered forth, bowed deeply and delivered his letter, "It is from Tahara no Kiyoharu."
The servant was soon dismissed by the Prince with a wave of his hand, as he opened the letter which he unfolded. Reading through it quickly, his guests and servants all of whom crowded about to hear what he had to say, from the likes of Naomori to Sadamori, to Shinosuke the captain of the guards and even his aide Fujimitsu each of them looked on eagerly.
"What is it?" Aimi asked of him, speaking for the two younger folk who leant towards him also.
"Kanemichi has decided that for Kiyoharu's birthday celebration to have myself and someone of my choosing dance at Kiyoharu's birthday celebration," the Prince informed them, his face impassive at this request. Raising his eyes he looked out to each face before he turned his eyes to the distant suns' even as the wind hewed through the capital bringing with it more humidity and heat and bringing with it a sense of foreboding.
*****
The revelation that the Prince intended to have him dance with him before the Court was one that threw Tsubaki into action at once. She it was who was to be tasked with supervising and teaching Satomine how to perform the dance. It was a great honour that Satomine was not blind to, what also did not slip by his attention was a detail that his host was not altogether unaware of; Satomine did not know any of the traditional dances.
It was with more than a little incredulity that he was to demand of the other man when the time came about to ask of him, "How might I do so? And why select myself for such an honour? I have never danced for such important people."
"Satomine-san, have thou learnt nothing from thy time herewith me?" Shōtoku asked irritably of him, as he ate with him.
The two were seated together as always for breakfast, which consisted of rice, salmon and pork all of which they picked at from a number of bowls with their chopsticks. The food was prepared by one of the finest cooks in all the land, a middle-aged woman by the name of Akiho. She was mother to a trio of servants that toiled and worked in the Prince's household. The trio was called Yanosuke, Yanonaga and Satonosuke, with each of them prone to frequent infighting since they were all eleven, nine and seven years of age respectively. Each of them daughters of the former captain of Shōtoku's guards who passed away three years prior to illness. Though his rank had been filled out since then, some measure of affection had remained so that the Prince had kept the man's children on as servants.
The children in question were often tasked with picking up this arrow or that one, or cleaning this hall or that one even as Shōtoku often played games of chance with them, or hide and seek. These games often exasperated their mother who had only grown even more severe since her husband had passed, so that she was often prone to accusing her children of taking advantage of their benefactor's compassion. He in turn never failed to laugh at her concerns.
"It is no matter," he would always tell her, "They are but children and ought to enjoy themselves if only for a time before they are forced to become adults."
It was with more than a little eagerness that the Prince was to when he saw Satomine turn his gaze upon him, "Are you prepared? We must begin practicing the dance from this day onwards until the celebration."
"Which is when?"
"In a month's time," Shōtoku answered only to frown as he echoed what Satomine was thinking, "We must pray that the Takimoto could hold out until that time."
"And pray I will, even as I assist thee to prepare." Tsubaki declared proudly as she threw back her head proudly.