Hana did as Yanagi instructed and went home with Hazuki.
In the car on their way back, she told her sister that their parents had come to see her.
Hazuki was horribly shaken. “Don’t tell me they came to take me home.”
“If that had been the case, I would have given them a little bit of credit as parents,” Hana said. “Actually, not a single syllable of your name came out of their mouths. The only thing they’re concerned about is the Ichise name.”
Hazuki’s face clouded over. “Oh…”
Unlike Hana, who had thrown away any affection she had had for their parents long ago, for Hazuki, it had only been a few days since she had left the Ichise household, and her feelings toward their parents might not match Hana’s.
“You still have expectations for them?” asked Hana.
“…”
Hazuki neither confirmed nor denied the statement. Perhaps it wasn’t that she didn’t, but that she couldn’t.
“They might be planning to get a hold of you, too. Don’t let yourself get swept up in their scheming,” Hana warned.
Hazuki had always followed their parents’ commands. It was impossible for her to combat them all of a sudden.
She had only been able to say her piece when she had run away because momentum had been on her side.
“They might try to butter you up, but it doesn’t matter how kind their words are; they haven’t changed one bit. Your feelings won’t ever get through to them. I’m sure of it,” Hana said.
She couldn’t imagine their parents saying anything nice, but she threw in the warning just in case.
“…Yeah,” Hazuki mumbled.
It wasn’t clear whether she truly understood what Hana was saying or if her emotions had yet to catch up.
She hadn’t thrown away their parents completely the way Hana had.
Well, that was hardly unusual.
It had taken Hana a long time to abandon all her feelings for their parents.
Demanding Hazuki cut off all ties immediately would be too harsh.
“Shitty bastards,” Hana grumbled in a small, small voice.
They would harass her to the ends of the earth, until the end of time. Sometimes, the bonds of blood proved to be nothing but a burden.
The twins returned to the Ichinomiya residence without incident, and Towa came to greet them.
“Madam, Miss Hazuki, dear Junior has called for you. He says to come to the sitting room upon your return,” she relayed.
“There you go again with the ‘Junior,’” Hana said. “Saku’s going to be angry.”
“Ho-ho-ho-ho.” Towa merely laughed, showing no inclination to change her ways.
Saku was surely doomed to be “Junior” forever. The thought made Hana want to giggle.
It was even more funny because of his usual pretentious attitude.
“Pfft…” Hana snickered.
“This is no time to laugh,” Hazuki chided. “We have to go. We can’t keep Lord Ichinomiya waiting.”
“Let him wait,” she said, still nursing a grudge from the teasing Saku had subjected her to a few days before.
“We mustn’t.”
Hazuki dragged Hana to the sitting room and found not only Saku but Yanagi waiting for them. Both the twins were equally surprised.
“What? Why…?” Hana said.
She had heard from Hazuki that Yanagi stopped by the Ichinomiya residence on occasion, but she hadn’t known he would be here.
“You’re back. Come on in,” Saku said.
The two of them approached, their expressions bewildered.
“Never mind Yanagi for now. More importantly, I heard your parents visited you, Hana. Are you okay?”
“Yeah, no problems there. I was more worried about Aoi and Miyabi going ballistic.”
Suddenly, it occurred to Hana that she might as well have had the two of them manifest and threaten her parents a little bit.
“Good. Just to make sure, what did they want?”
“Something along the lines of convincing you to favor the Ichise family,” Hana said. “I refused, of course.”
Who in their right mind would help such an awful family? Not her.
She wasn’t so soft as to obey orders from people who had mistreated her horribly.
If she had been asked to help destroy the family, on the other hand, she would have happily cooperated.
“Water under the bridge and all that. So what’s he doing here?” Hana asked. It was obvious to anyone she was talking about Yanagi even without her saying his name. “He didn’t come to take Hazuki back, did he?”
Hazuki twitched in surprise.
“If that’s the case, I won’t hand her over without a fight. Even if it’s you asking, Saku,” she added.
Hana had no intention of giving Hazuki back to the Ichises. She could predict how their parents would treat Hazuki if she were to return.
“Relax. It’s not about that,” Saku said.
Hana was relieved, but that didn’t explain why Yanagi had come.
“I’ve thought this from the start, but you all need to talk to each other more!” Saku yelled, raising his voice suddenly. “Especially you!” He stabbed a finger at Yanagi.
Yanagi’s expression didn’t change one bit.
“The two of you, come sit,” Saku ordered.
“Huh? What do you want?” Hana asked.
“Don’t sweat the details. Sit across from us.”
His tone left no room for refusal.
Hana and Hazuki exchanged a look. Hana could feel her sister’s confusion, but they took a seat facing Yanagi.
“Wh-what now, Saku?”
It wasn’t as if anything would change if they talked.
“It’s a problem that you three don’t communicate, this affair with Hazuki being a prime example,” he said. “In fact, Hazuki, if you had confided in Hana from the beginning, you could have avoided several years’ worth of misunderstandings, right? You keep too much bottled up.” He turned to Hana. “That applies to you, too, Hana. Giving up immediately is a bad habit of yours.”
“Easy for you to say, but… You know. Right, Hazuki?” Hana said.
“…Yeah.”
Sure, her relationship with Hazuki might not have soured had they spoken openly with each other, but their household environment had made such communication impossible.
“It’s true that your parents did the most harm. However, the way I see it, you each created whatever excuse was convenient for you and didn’t try to look any further,” Saku said.
“Hmm…”
Hana couldn’t refute what he was saying, but she was reluctant to accept it, too.
“It was wrong of you, Hazuki, to keep everything to yourself to the point where you self-destructed, but Hana, you’re also at fault for being indifferent!”
“I don’t get what you’re trying to say,” Hana said.
“Stop interrupting. Let me finish. The two of you were wrong, but the one who kept quiet all this time is also to blame. I mean you, Yanagi!”
Yanagi looked down at the floor.
Saku continued. “If you had paid more attention, your sisters wouldn’t have drifted apart, don’t you agree? Hazuki’s problem could have been resolved earlier, right?”
“I apologize. I have no excuses,” Yanagi said.
“Sorry isn’t going to cut it! I know you treasure your sisters. Yet I haven’t heard them utter a single syllable of your name since they came to live here! Are you fine with that?”
“As long as they are happy…”
“I told you to stop trying to solve everything on your own!” Saku shouted. “Your sisters have a right to know the truth. It’s wrong of you to shoulder everything alone. You’re siblings.”
Hana and Hazuki listened to the conversation with bewilderment.
“Saku?” Hana said.
Saku turned toward the two of them and asked, his tone equal parts angry and exasperated, “Don’t you find it strange at all? Despite Yanagi being the youngest practitioner to rise to the Lapis rank, he is ignored by your parents in favor of Hazuki. He may not have a human shikigami, but with a brilliant practitioner like him in the family, the Ichises’ future should be secured, no? There should be no reason to hound Hazuki to study.”
“That’s…true,” Hana said.
She hadn’t realized until he had explained it. Yanagi was already an established Lapis practitioner working in the field. To have such an accomplished heir should have been the greatest blessing for the Ichise family.
However, their parents’ expectations were placed not on Yanagi, but on Hazuki.
Why?
“If you don’t know the answer, ask him. That’s all I have to say,” Saku concluded.
For a moment, no one spoke, and silence filled the room.
“Ask,” Saku had said, but neither Hana nor Hazuki knew what to say. They looked at each other with troubled expressions, glancing at Saku and Yanagi in turn.
Then Yanagi abruptly bowed his head.
“I’m sorry,” he said, to Hana and Hazuki’s surprise. He straightened up again and looked at them with solemn eyes. “Let’s talk. I’ll tell you the story behind our family. It has to do with you, too.”
They nodded, confusion still written on their faces.
Yanagi began his tale—a tale neither Hana nor Hazuki knew about the Ichise family and about their parents.
“It starts before you were born. At the time, the previous family head—our grandfather—was still alive. He was an upright man, but ambitious, too. After I was born, he was overjoyed to see my talents as a practitioner bloom at an early age. He favored me, and our father couldn’t forgive that.”
Their grandfather had passed away while Hana and Hazuki were still infants. They only knew him from photos.
Needless to say, they had no clue what his relationship with their father had been like.
“Why?” Hana asked.
“To our grandfather, our father was inferior. He had concerns about passing the head seat of the family down to our father, so he considered passing over Father and making me his heir instead.
“Inferior… Is that shitty old man of ours that weak? Did you know anything about that, Hazuki?”
“Come to think of it, I don’t think I’ve ever seen him use his powers,” Hazuki said. “What about you, Hana?”
Hana hadn’t, either. She shook her head.