Bonus Short Story
IT was a fine spring day. Sekka strewn by the citizens filled the air like snow, drifting lazily on a whimsical wind. A straight, main street connected the imperial grounds to the city gates, and I waited with Emperor Haruka at the top of the slope before the palace. We both sat in the Amawashi’s crimson-painted palanquin.
Bureaucrats formed a long procession in front of us, and lining the thoroughfare were the people of Orient. Everyone was waiting with bated breath for the arrival of the Oriental emperor…and his wife, Sai.
I heard the Left and Right Wings, Lord Yukinari and Lord Hiaki, making a long speech about something. Their voices were clear in my ears, but for some reason, as if I were dreaming, my mind couldn’t string their sentences together.
It really does seem like a dream come true. I…am going to marry Emperor Haruka.
“…Sai? Are you okay?” He gently clasped my hand, and my shoulders jolted in surprise.
As the groom, Emperor Haruka wore a robe of white silk even more lavishly ornate than his usual attire. Ornamental cords tipped with precious stones hung from the eaves of our palanquin, and they swayed, the prisms casting a spectacular display of light on the emperor.
Compared to the inner walls of the vibrant palanquin, which boasted artwork of the deity Amawashi, Emperor Haruka’s pale coloring seemed as transient a dream. I glanced at his ivory hair, his fair skin that glowed like moonlight, and his ash-blue eyes lighter than haze. The cloudless sky above was a striking azure, and the palanquin decorated to a luxurious degree, their vividness contributing to my impression that Emperor Haruka might suddenly melt away like morning mist.
“It’s almost like a dream…” I whispered.
After a moment, a smile tugged at the corners of his lips. “Yeah. I think so too.”
No veil obscured his face. Instead, on his head lay a refined gold crown of remarkable workmanship, and from its back cascaded a layer of thin silk like a bride’s wedding train, blending into his clothes and shrouding his frame. He had lost most of his mana, so he could appear before his people without covering his face—the powerful magic in his eyes would no longer sear the eyes of others.
I looked down at my hand in his and the ensemble I wore. In contrast to Emperor Haruka, who appeared so ethereal that he would vanish into light, I was dressed in a black wedding garment. White robes comprised its base, and many layers of translucent black fabric had been draped over it, creating an elegant gradient. Several jeweled chains wound around the sash at my waist. And on my shawl was embroidered a large wagtail.
I was black, and the emperor pure white. I wondered what the people around us thought of the choice.
Ornamental mirrors adorned the palanquin, and my reflection wore red-accented makeup designed to draw the eye. Carefully crafted gold hair ornaments tied my hair. I almost looked like a doll.
Secretly, under our sleeves, Emperor Haruka intertwined his fingers with mine. “You’re stunning, Sai.”
We had spent the previous night in the same bed and greeted the morning light together. Although the emperor was clad in the most beautiful and intricate attire, I knew the heat of his chest beneath all that cloth. I knew the sensation of his breath against my skin. I knew everything there was to know about him. The thought was surreal. Because when I sit next to him like this, it’s almost as if…the man who cherished me last night is truly the same person as the emperor so gorgeous that he looks too good to be true.
“Emperor Haruka…” I whispered.
“Hm?”
“Is it…really all right for me to be by your side?”
“You’re saying that at a time like this?” He raised an eyebrow, his eyes shining with mirth. He wore light makeup as well, and the corner of his eyes, subtly enhanced with pigment, softened. He turned his gaze to the street before us.
A band was playing solemnly as it marched down the road. Dancers twisted in its wake, livening up the ceremony as they dedicated their art to the emperor and empress soon to appear. When our palanquin started to move, the citizens would likely shower us with more sekka.
“Hey, Sai,” Emperor Haruka began, “there’s a legend of a certain married couple in a distant world.”
“A…legend of a couple?”
“Yeah. No matter how many times they reincarnate, they can’t accompany each other to the end of their days. The husband is always swept away by an untimely demise, and the wife condemned for his disgraceful death. Her heart is trampled to pieces under the pressure, and she finally perishes as well. The pair marry each other every lifetime, and in each one, the husband dies and the wife’s heart is torn apart.”
I cast my eyes down. “Is there any salvation in this tale?”
“You see, as the story spread across the world, people took pity on the couple and started weaving different fates for them. For example, altering the story so that the husband isn’t destined to die or that after all their hardship, the divine leads them to a blissful paradise, and so on.”
“Ah… The determination of those who wish for their happiness is what changed the story, I see.”
“Yeah.” He looked at me, and a smile bloomed on his face. “Sai. In that other world, you saw a different fate for me, right?”
I hesitated before I nodded. “Yes.”
After the incident with Lilly and Alexei, I had spilled everything about my previous life to Emperor Haruka. He was aware that, to me, he had once been a foolish emperor who came to a shameful end in a work of fiction.
“Sai… You used your very life to carve out a path of happiness for me, huh?”
“Emperor Haruka…”
It was then that the music stopped. The palanquin shifted, and we experienced a moment of weightlessness as we were lifted into the air. Everyone in the capital fixed their eyes on the palanquin, where the Amawashi—where Emperor Haruka—sat. I felt as if the sound of my gulp would echo so loudly that it reached the heavens.
“Sai.” The emperor studied me, his smile wide. “Even if I have but a single wing, even if I lose all my magic… No matter how I end up, will you still stay by my side?”
“Of course.” I placed my hand over his—almost as if to hold him still while I bound him into a happy story. I nodded, smiling at him from the bottom of my heart. “I am your other wing. When we fly, we fly together. If we fall, we fall together. I will be with you forever and ever.”
✦ ✦ ✦
🐦🐦🐦
PAPERCUT flowers fluttered in the blue sky. Surrounded by the deafening cheers of blessings from their people, the palanquin carried the emperor and his wagtail wife forward.
The horizon was forever clear, and their hands forever entwined.
At last, after all of fate’s cruel trials, Sai and Haruka were heading to their happy future.