Witness
Tree ~ Prologue
Disclaimer:
I didn't own Sagara and Aoshi then, and I don't own them now.
Rating:
PG.
Notes: A
huge heartfelt thanks to everyone who read and/or reviewed For War is Kind.
This is the sequel to that. If you haven't read it, I strongly suggest you do.
Stuff happened in that story. Important stuff. But if you're not feeling up to
it, I did my best to summarize it here in the prologue.
This
picks up nine years after the last fic ended. For those of you keeping score at
home, that's shortly after the beginning of the series. Where did Aoshi go
after he was wounded during the fall of the Oniwaban? There's only so far a man
can walk with three bullets in his legs…
* * *
Outside
of Tokyo, night fell in slow, determined black brushstrokes. Blood reds and
overripe yellows fanned from the western horizon, and in the east the sky faded
to the color of a plum. On a moonless night, an inky blackness could swim up on
you, and wherever you were when it happened, you wouldn't be going far until
dawn.
It was
quiet out here, quiet and tragic and a little lonely sometimes. Sagara couldn't
have been happier with the arrangement. On a cloudless night, the sky would be
torn apart by stars; he wondered if a more complex man would be able to survive
in such close proximity with eternity. But he didn't mind knowing that he was
insignificant. It would be nine years that winter since a single night had made
him realize how fragile his life truly was, how inglorious his death - when the
time for it at last came - would seem to the rest of the world.
And so it
was on this small plot of farmland, half a day's walk from the gates of the new
capital, that Sagara found himself. He kept a garden, and there was a small nashi
grove behind the house. As long as he looked after them, they produced enough
to live on. He had a little money saved from selling off most of the
surrounding acreage. It was enough to get by, and that was all that was
important.
Sagara
slipped out of his dark shirt to keep the cuffs clean as he knelt at the edge
of the garden. Some of the daikon had been showing promise lately, and
he had always liked the bitter taste, the acidic burn it left on his lips. With
one hand, he brushed a few leaves out of the way.
Every
year, just before night fell in the spring, he would remember how, many years
back, he had sworn he would never return here. His life since that point had
been a series of concentric circles, a whirlpool pulling him back, inevitably,
to this place.
This land
had belonged to his father, and to his brother. Though they were gone, it still
held their memories, like restless spirits. He had spilled blood here, but not
as much as he had spilled once he'd been away. Cut hands and scraped knees were
safe compared to what Sagara had found past the edge of this field.
Life was
simpler now, and painless except for the old ache that sometimes flared in his
left shoulder on chilly mornings. But even that was bearable because he had
long ago stopped associating it with the pale, spider-web scar carved beneath
his collarbone by a bullet.
Slanting
across his right thigh were two more scars - two more long-healed bullet
wounds. In the bend of his right elbow was a fourth, and a fifth in the hollow
below the sharp part of his hipbone. But he wasn't the same man anymore as the
one who had stared down a row of rifles, had watched fifty men whom he had
considered his comrades and his friends become the last casualties of an old
régime. He remembered their names and their faces, but only in the way he might
have remembered particularly vivid characters from a book. He had been one man
then and he was another now, and he didn't regret that. There was no place for
regret.
At first,
it hadn't been easy. The truth was, Sagara should have died as well, on that
night nine years ago when the Sekihoutai had been betrayed, but somewhere
between luck and tenacity he had been spared. A shinobi - young, barely more
than a boy, but already leader of the Oniwaban Ninja - had dragged him out of
snowy, blood stained woods. He had tended to his wounds, hidden him, protected
him, seen that Sagara was cared for until he could walk again.
Many
times, Sagara thought he had forgotten the name of the young man. He had been a
ghost, an enigma, the type of person who was named only to have that name
forgotten. But Sagara would never be able to forget him…
Shinomori
Aoshi.
In the
months that had followed the fall of the Sekihoutai, Sagara had been searching.
He hadn't been quite certain for what, but the desire had been breathless and
urgent and that had been a volatile combination. He had felt it, a vague and
compulsory need, a tug in the pit of his stomach. It had been a different kind
of ache from grief and regret. There was a hollow place left behind by his
shattered ideals and his dead comrades. Just missing them wasn't enough; there
had to be something to fill the gap.
And Aoshi
had been there.
The five
years' difference between them had seemed significant, and, though Aoshi was
hardly a child, Sagara had never intended to allow himself to be so completely
captivated by the man. But one morning after his wounds had healed, Sagara had
awakened to find he was not alone in his bed.
In his
sleep, Aoshi would curl against him, hide his face in Sagara's shoulder. He
would snore softly, and sometimes mutter a few unintelligible words. All the
demons inside at rest…
It had
given him foolish hope, but everything Sagara had ever hoped for had been
revealed as equally foolish, so he hadn't minded. Perhaps, back then, Aoshi was
searching for something, too.
But in
three months, Aoshi had never spoken to him. Not really. He had tolerated
Sagara's teasing, and Sagara his pride. But the arrangement had been that they
not say anything of where they had been or where they were going. The
understanding had been that, one day, Aoshi would drift out of his life with
the same carelessness that he had drifted in.
In the
end, Sagara had surprised them both by being the first to draw back. He had
dedicated himself so completely to the fragile peace they had cultivated, that
he had forgotten Aoshi's loyalty was first to the Oniwaban, unconditionally.
And when the man had reached with bloodstained hands to touch him… Sagara had
pulled away.
He had
left the Aoi-Ya that night. The past - all his shame - had caught up to him and
he had fled, returned here to this pillar of a life he had once led to escape
it. Here, the past lingered only on the fringes of his perception, a distant
sound or a flash of something bright out of the corner of his eye. He had
buried it in the smell of earth and the burn of hard work.
And on
evening's like this, when his thoughts strayed uncomfortably close to the ugly
memories of things that had happened away from this place, he needed only
glance up long enough to remind himself of where he was - remind himself that
he was content - and his restlessness would be placated.
Sagara
wiped a few beads of sweat from his eyes as he turned his gaze up from the
small patch of daikon to trace the decline of the setting sun.
It was only
by chance that he noticed the shadow of movement on the road bordering the
western edge of his field. Everything slanted down in that direction, and,
framed by the sun, he could see clearly from this garden everyone who passed.
But he
usually didn't bother to look.
If it
hadn't been for his quietly wandering mind tonight, he probably wouldn't have
raised his eyes at that moment, wouldn't have noticed the dark cutout of a
person stumble and collapse.
Sagara's
expression tightened, and he was still a moment, watching the place where the
figure had disappeared. Whoever it was… he wasn't getting up. Slowly, eyes
still fixed on the spot where the man had slid to the ground and out of sight,
Sagara rose and shrugged his coarse shirt on.
As he dew
closer to the road, dodging amongst rows of vegetables, he could smell
something alkaline and metallic in the air. He recognized it immediately as
blood. Sagara's breath hitched in his chest, and he quickened his pace.
The
stranger wore indigo, and a white coat streaked in crimson. He had landed on
his stomach when he fell, but there was a ring of displaced dust around him
from struggling to get his feet under himself once more. As Sagara approached,
he lay very still.
"Oh,
God…" Sagara breathed as he knelt at the man's side. All this blood… his
eyes snapped to the three bullet holes in the man's coat. It hadn't been an
accident. One hand danced uncertainly down his spine. "Hey… can you hear
me? Don't try to move. I'm going to help you…"
"Just
get me on my feet. I don't want your help."
At the
sound of that voice, Sagara froze. All the years leading up to this moment
wound down like an antique watch, and with a sharp gasp Sagara's hand tightened
around the back of a white coat, turning the man onto his back.
The
ground seemed to drop right out from under him, leaving him with a long way to
fall. His voice was breathless, dry. The cruel hiss of a blow to the chest,
driving all the air from his lungs. The name had been on his lips all this
time, only looking for a chance to be choked free.
"Aoshi."