Chapter Text
Is this how lives change? Is this the beginning of a fairy tale? Am I to be rescued now, from my poverty, the endless hunger, the shame of the things I've done to keep living? Am I going to stop pausing at every bridge I cross, wondering if the depths of the water below hold eternal peace? If I had the courage, if I was strong enough, I would have ended my life years ago. But I was always weak.
The structure that rises before me under the dull light of a half-moon is , for the lack of a better word, overbearing. Dark, tall, impassable, dripping with the gloom of years, appearing abandoned. And who is the owner? The younger Lord Yamazaki. The black sheep of his family, the younger son with no prospects, the eccentric left to live his life out in this desolate corner of the family property.
I remember glimpses of him as a young man. My mother used to work in the kitchens of the Yamazaki estate when I was younger. And sometimes, I would be asked to carry piles of wood and help one of the maids light fires early in the morning. I was only 13 then, and lucky to be living the life of a kitchen maid’s son. My father died when I was very young, my mother told me, trampled by a coach and four owned by the Yamazakis on his way home from the farm one night. As our family were vassals of the Yamazakis, they’d seen fit to let my mother and me move into the servants’ dwellings and labour for 2 meals a day and a roof over our heads. I was even allowed to attend lessons at the estate church, where I learned to read and write. I also made it a habit to sneak into the library after dark to read the endless array of leather-bound books. It was a miracle no one ever caught me.
The younger Yamazaki son, Sousuke, was always angry. Kicking things, shouting at the servants. He scared me to tears once when I accidentally knocked over a table while lighting the fire in his room. He screamed so much I thought he would kill me there and then. But when I started to weep, he had calmed down instantly, and offered me some fruit from his table, ruffling my hair to calm me down. He wasn’t much older than me; 17 when I was 13. But even then he looked a full-grown man. Dark hair, deep-set eyes that couldn’t decide whether they were blue or green, always frowning, always furious at something. And I was a lanky boy, with limbs askew and always knocking things down, and dreams far above his station. My best hope would have been to grow up and be a page for the Yamazakis. I used to dream what it would be like to serve the young lord, of whether I could coax a smile from behind all the doom and gloom distorting his beautifully carved features. I didn’t know it then, but he was my first love. I used to dream of ways to make him happy. I left little bouquets of wild flowers in his room to cheer him up. Not that he ever noticed. I always found them on the same bedside table where I left them, until they'd rotted away and had to be tossed out. That never stopped me from leaving another and another and another to replace the dead one though.
Of course, the young lord was being eaten away by something else entirely; nothing that my useless flowers could cure anyway. Because I fancied myself his guardian angel, I took to following him around. And that’s when I saw it. His best friend had come for a visit. They would go out to walk in the woods every evening before dinner. This friend, the heir of the renowned Matsuoka family, he cheered up Lord Sousuke in a way that no one else could. My lord was all smiles and grace with Matsuoka around, and I hated the red-haired young man for it. When I happened upon them that night, they were both leaning against a tree deep in the estate's woods, Lord Sousuke hanging his head over his friend’s shoulder, whispering something. And then he’d pushed Matsuoka against the tree and forced himself on him, leaning in for a kiss. The slap on Lord Sousuke’s face echoed through the night and I heard myself gasp. After Matsuoka ran past me, unseeing, unheeding, running as fast as his legs would carry him, I stayed behind. Lord Sousuke fell to his knees before the tree, howling with angry tears. I still don’t know what came over me, but I left my hiding place and walked up to him, placing a clumsy hand on his shoulder. He was so desperate for comfort, so wrapped up in his pain, that he didn’t push me away, didn’t question my presence. Just reached up to hold my hand even tighter against his shoulder, tears running down his face. After what felt like an eternity under the starry sky of that impossible night, he left, ruffling my hair, but without sparing me a look. I doubt he remembers me at all. I hope he doesn’t.
Of course, nothing lasts forever. My mother lost her job later that year. Something about being caught in bed with one of the lordly guests. We were both thrown out, and after 3 weeks of no place to sleep and nothing to eat, my mother threw herself into a lake. I should have followed suit, I know that now. But I couldn’t bring myself to. All the books I’d read in my other life had turned my head. I knew all I had to do was stay alive long enough for the page to turn, for my life to turn into a rose-coloured fantasy where all my wishes would come true.
I took to living on the streets, picking pockets, stealing petty items from shops to sell off for food. But when the winter came, I found it harder and harder to survive. I didn’t know another way to get by. Most people knew my mother’s fate, and refused to give me a job. I don’t know when it was first that a shadowy figure offered me a piece of bread for my services, and I followed my hunger down a dark alley, not knowing what waited for me at the end of it. I woke up in the morning with a swollen face, ripped clothes, blood in unlikely places, and a pain so sharp and deep it surpassed any physical discomfort. But the piece of bread I was clutching in my hand was the promise of another day, another night above the ground instead of below it.
I was 16 when I found my way into a real brothel. It came with its own security. No more fear of getting stabbed in an alley, no more risk of being paid with a beating instead of bread or coins. Using my body for labour, whatever the definition of that labour was, earned me enough to keep living, so I took my chances. Besides, this way I earned enough to treat myself to a book once in a while. As long as there were lands beyond the horizon and across the sea to dream of, I didn’t care what I used my mouth and hands for while I was awake.
When the rigid-looking procurer from Duke Yamazaki’s estate showed up, I was summoned to meet with him by the brothel's owner. I fit the requirements quite well apparently. I was still fairly young at 19. 3 years at the brothel had left me with a full, lithe body and my own efforts had made sure I did not go soft living off the streets. My eyes were another charm point, being the color of sunlight shining through a canopy of the greenest trees in spring. The brothel’s mistress had also made sure my activities with the guests were limited to mostly the use of my mouth, and she tried to pass me off as a virgin to the wealthier customers. I knew how to act shy and scared, and managed to convince most of them I was worth every penny they paid for me.
The representative of the Yamazaki clan apparently found me satisfactory in terms of appearance. He’d brought a physician with him, who examined every inch of my body to make sure I was free of disease and other disfigurements. Only the best for Lord Sousuke, I suppose. He also took samples of my waste for who knows what. If I still knew how to blush, I would have gone red all over.
And a week later- a week of freedom from debasing myself, a week of reading the few books I had over and over again, of thinking about the teal eyes and gentle hands that waited for me- I was taken away.
“Remember who you are, Tachibana. Your services may be terminated at any point in time if you fail to satisfy the young lord. And then you’ll be back in that dump, like the piece of trash that you are.” The grey-faced man sighed as he said these words to me, worn by the cares he was burdened with.
“I know how to do my job. Don’t worry about me.” I reassured him in the calmest voice I could muster.
“If the young lord had been more discreet about his…activities, it would not have come to this. Just so you know, you’re here to prevent him from going after stable boys and field hands. We do not need another little bastard trying to blackmail the family. And he always gets bored with them so easily. And then they start acting like discarded lovers. Who knows why he always picks the most exasperating boys. So try to keep his interest for as long as you can. Because the day he's bored with you, you'll be returned to where I found you.”
As I enter the dark building late at night, I feel my hands going numb, my heart beating so hard it threatens to burst out of my chest. I remind myself that he is just another customer I have to satisfy, but that is not true. I want to make him happy, whatever the cost to my own person. I have vowed to use everything I have to try and please him. Even I’m not stupid and deluded enough to believe he will ever come to care for him. But if I can get him to smile again, to ruffle my hair just once, I won’t have to be a coward anymore. As I step towards his room, I suddenly understand why I’ve been forcing myself alive for so long. My life and all its miseries have always been leading me back to him.