Work Text:
-1-
“I don’t WANT to be the center of attention!” Takumi cried.
“You’re not,” Corrin replied. “Kiragi is. You’re just an accessory, love. An appendage.” Her voice carried a incongruously cheery lilt.
Takumi groaned and slouched in his seat at the table. “It’s so difficult to take him anywhere. People are always turning heads and—Thank you—” Corrin filled his cup with tea, and took the seat across from him, “—I just want to buy my onions and pork bones in peace! But apparently we can’t have that. Apparently, we need every single merchant and his mother making googly eyes at us, cooing and all that gross stuff in that weird baby speech—”
“You say all that gross stuff and use that weird baby speech at home,” Corrin accused, sipping her tea in small increments, blowing in between.
Takumi leaned forward, placing his palms on the tabletop. “That’s different. He’s my son—”
“Ours.”
“—and I can use all the wittle baby words whenever I damn please.”
Corrin smiled and blinked languorously. “Whatever you say, dear.”
“Okay, but here’s what happened last time: Kiragi was waving at every. Single. Person. That we passed by. Do you have any idea how long it took to get to the butcher’s?” He took a gulp of his tea and coughed. “Ouch, hot. Anyway—our boy has learned the what power The Wave possesses.” He flapped one hand briskly, two sharp smacks in the air. “He knows that it captures the attention of many. He basks in it. He knows his charm. He flashes them that smile that makes him look like the sun and whoever doesn’t wave back or says hello comes up to him or me and starts making conversation. I am just a humble father trying to make some SOUP here!”
“I do love that smile,” Corrin sighed.
Takumi’s head was in his hands. He sniffed. “I do, too.”
-2-
A consequence of Takumi’s boundless love for his only child was that Kiragi was showered in toys and treats. And a consequence of Takumi’s inexhaustible generosity was Kiragi’s own sense of benevolence.
“You’re my friend,” Kiragi might say. “Here, you can have this.” And then the shiny little trinket that his father had given him just last week would be lost in the irretrievable unknown that is a stranger’s nursery.
Takumi would be furious if he wasn’t so proud of his precocious son’s rejection of attachment to the material world, and deep-rooted value of sharing and cooperation. Oh, he is surpassing his own father by leaps and bounds!
But then, while alone:
“He gives them everything,” Takumi whined to Corrin. Who cared that the moon was high in the sky and Kiragi was sound asleep and an early morning awaited them and it was the perfect time to fall asleep? This was important. “Why can’t my son have nice things? I want him to have nice things.”
Exasperated, Corrin turned over in their shared bed, hoping that if she didn’t look at the source of the noise it would stop on its own.
“Kiragi is so precious,” he went on. He moved closer to his wife and put an arm around her waist. “Corrin, he deserves the world.”
“Maybe Kiragi thinks that of other people,” Corrin mumbled.
“No, only my son deserves the world.”
A sigh.
-3-
At dinner:
“Kiragi,” Takumi said, he and Corrin both looking expectantly at their boy, “who do you love best, mommy or daddy?”
Without a second thought, Kiragi smiled wide and exclaimed, “Mommy!”
Corrin wiped the food off Kiragi’s face, a tender smile masking her absolute triumph, while Takumi hung his head.
Takumi ruffled Kiragi’s hair. “Break my heart, won’t ya, kid?”
Kiragi laughed.
-4-
Husband and wife were doing chores around the house when Corrin saw something that prompted her to ask, “Takumi, are you teaching Kiragi archery?”
“Yeah!” he answered. “We’re still at the very beginning, though. I just wanted to get him started early.” Takumi had a bow specially made for someone with Kiragi’s stature. He, uh, was so young that they needed one custom-made. Takumi neglected to tell Corrin exactly how much it cost. Just a rough estimate.
“Well that’s swell,” Corrin replied. “Soon enough he’ll be as skilled as you are.”
“I have no doubts. He’ll be felling bears by the age of five. That’s a whole two years before my first.”
“Please don’t bring my young son into the proximity of wild bears.”
“Our son.”
A roll of the eyes.
“We’ll have him participate in all the regional competitions,” Takumi continued. “We can hire a private coach if he doesn’t like me (but why wouldn’t he) or if he doesn’t get along with the other kids (in which case I would also need a talk with the other parents). We can have all his equipment made at the same place that I get mine and he will want for nothing in the realm of archery.”
“Um… Takumi…” Corrin was craning her neck to see into the adjacent room. “You taught him how to safely handle the arrows, right?”
“WHAT?!” He dropped everything and ran.
-5-
“Kiragi killed a spider today.”
“THAT’S MY BOY!”
-6-
“Lord Takumi,” Kagero addressed him, seeming to appear out of thin air. The usual.
“Yes, is there a problem?” Takumi asked. Kiragi had been left in her care several hours before, as he had been given several assignments by King Ryoma at the castle.
“Indeed. It seems that Shiro and Kiragi have entered a spat over the rules of sparring. Saizo is trying to sort them out right now but…”
“Are either of them hurt?”
“No, but it seems that Kiragi played a trick on Shiro. It wasn’t exactly against the rules, but it wasn’t the most honorable thing to do. Shiro isn’t taking it very well. You can imagine.”
Indeed. The little demon was probably stomping and waving his spear around and shouting pre-pubescent-grade obscenities and putting Saizo in a maternal sort of panic. The way some people raise their kids these days, Takumi thought haughtily.
“Who won?” he asked.
“Kiragi did, but—”
“That’s my BOY!”
Kagero raised her eyebrows.
“I mean, uh.” Takumi cleared his throat. “I will lecture him extensively when we get home.”
“As you should,” Kagero agreed tersely, then disappeared.
-7-
Despite being a father, Takumi still had a quick temper. He was still easy to set off, and just as likely to hold a grudge now as he was then. However, these days there was also one thing that never failed to defuse him.
It was as if Kiragi could sense it. As soon as Takumi would come home and take a seat at the table, Kiragi would scramble onto Takumi’s lap and just sit there with a determined face, like an important monarch with important business. Takumi’s frown would soften into a pout which would then attempt a smile for his son’s sake, and become more genuine as Kiragi told him about his day, until the bulk of his wrath was forgotten, left to another time when his head was significantly clearer.
-8-
They were at the corner store deciding what to bring home for Kiragi.
“Why can’t I buy him all the snacks?” Takumi said.
“Cavities,” Corrin said. Always the logical one.
“Rice crackers, then,” Takumi decided.
-9-
Some days were harder than others. People still suffered years after the war. There were those whose homes were lost, others whose farmlands became barren from ill magics, and so many—too many—who had been debilitated by illness and trauma. Takumi and the other members of the Hoshidan royalty made it a point to visit such areas and develop policies that would aid their recovery, but in the process they would also collect stories that conjured horrifying images, stirred unwanted emotions, and allowed painful memories to rise from the depths of memory.
Takumi was up late one night poring over some documents by lamplight, reviewing names. Citizens missing. Bodies not found. Property unclaimed. Unidentified remains. Causes of death. He knew he reached the point where he should go to bed and continue in the morning, but he also feared going to sleep; nightmares served as great and grim reminders for how vivid memory could be.
“Dad?”
Takumi turned. In the doorway stood Kiragi, rubbing his bleary sleepy eyes, his blue blankie dragging on the floor in his other hand.
Takumi pulled a blank page over the rest of the documents. “Hey there, little man. Can’t sleep?”
Kiragi shook his head and trudged closer. “When are you going to bed?”
“I’ve got a few more things to do for Uncle Ryoma. But you shouldn’t worry about me. You have to sleep through the night if you want to grow up big and strong.”
“You said that about eating vegetables.”
“Well, yes. Both are true.”
Kiragi glanced at the stacks of papers at the table. “That’s a lot. Are you going to sleep?”
“I just have to stay up a little bit longer, Kiragi. You should go to bed. If it’s a bad dream I’ll tuck you in with mommy.”
“You’re lying.”
Takumi stared after Kiragi as he marched back in the direction of his room, and was almost left to his own thoughts again when a small fist opened on the table, leaving a piece of candy in its retreat.
“Mommy says I won’t be able to sleep if I eat these at night.” Kiragi pulled on Takumi’s sleeve and beckoned him close. He gave Takumi a quick kiss on the cheek, said, “Goodnight, dad,” and yawned on his way back to bed.
-10-
Kiragi doesn’t like reading, but he likes his dad’s stories and he likes his dad’s voice, so he loves it when his dad reads to him before bed. Takumi changes his voice for every single character, and reads the dialogue so that all the intended emotions are clear. When his father reads to him, Kiragi is able to build cities bustling with people, or rich hills bursting with colorful flora, or lazy countrysides with grazing cattle and the like. In his mind’s eye, he watches as generals fasten their gear as they prepare for battle, the glint of a knight’s lance as he storms by on his armored horse, or the shine of a princess’s hair as sunlight from the tower window reflects off it. He thinks if magic had a voice, it would sound like his father, though he knows his mother is the only one with any tangible magical ability.
“He stood at the edge of the earth, battered and bruised, but still filled with the resolve of his comrades to redeem their cursed land…”
His eyelids grew heavier and heavier, and the pictures slowed and blurred. He was nearly in sleep’s grasp when he felt the sensation of lips pressing gently against his forehead, and the world suddenly grew dark behind his eyelids. But he wasn’t scared. He knew his father would linger several minutes more before stepping out into the hallway and closing the door behind him. Safe, sound, warm, and loved, Kiragi would fall slowly to sleep. Come morning, he would rise with the sun to a new and refreshing day, which would, again, be better than the last.