Shadow Magic (28 page)

“We should be moving on soon,” said Kouje aloud, for everyone’s benefit. Then he took the cloth from my forehead and patted it against my temples. I realized that he was as concerned about getting me out of the sun as he was with furthering us to our destination. Or perhaps he was feeling the effects of it as badly as I was and only thought to save himself a splintering headache.

It was very likely the former, but I tried now and then to pretend Kouje was also looking after himself.

Kichi stood up all at once, like a theatre puppet pulled to its feet. Jiang followed at a slower pace, looking less than amused at his friend’s antics. It was a kind of exasperation that was born of real affection, though, which made sense when one wondered how they could have put up with traveling together so long.

“Wanting to get it over with as soon as possible, hm?” Kichi stretched his arms over his head. He was overly tall, as well as overly cheerful. “Can’t say as I blame you. Never know who you’re going to end up stuck behind. And if there’s some poor bastard with a royal air about him ahead of you, the crossing could take all day. That is, if the guards don’t take an irrational dislike to you with no warning.”

Jiang snorted. I got the feeling that perhaps Kichi was the sort of man that guards took an irrational dislike to.

Kouje seemed to think so, too, but I saw him clench his hands at his sides and breathe in deeply instead of saying anything. I laid a hand against his back, to comfort him as much as to draw strength from his resolve.

At the palace, I would have been ashamed to draw on any outside comfort, especially now that I was of age, but I’d never before seen a
side of Kouje that faltered, that was ever anything but completely certain. It frightened me more than the imminent border crossing, and I was glad to see him taking control of himself once more.

“One more little border town and we’re at the crossing,” said Jiang. “We thought we might stop there for lunch. Kichi crosses better on a full stomach.”

“What he means is, I’m less likely to ask the guards what they’re having for lunch and end up on the wrong end of a sword,” Kichi said, smiling as though he shared an enormous joke with me.

“Sounds all right,” Kouje said curtly. I could tell that he was wondering whether or not we’d have the money for lunch. We still had some left over from the night before, but it seemed prudent to save it for a time of need rather than on another bowl of rice so soon after the first.

Jiang and Inokichi mounted while Kouje helped me onto our horse. It was an unnecessary gesture, but one we’d thought might aid the illusion that I was his maiden sister, younger and inexperienced. It made me wonder about Kouje’s real sister, the one upon whom we were pinning all our hopes. I wondered if she was like the sister I played at being, or if she was more like Kouje himself. I hoped at least that she would forgive us for using her home as a place to hide—for the trouble it could bring her, and the disgrace if she were ever caught. I hoped that she hadn’t already branded me as a traitor or blamed me for her brother’s downfall.

More than all the rest, I hoped that she would like me.

I fell into a restless dozing on the bright, sunny road that led to the border crossing. When I woke, I was rested back against Kouje’s chest, my neck bent at an uncomfortable angle and my head pounding from the heat. The only comfort I found was the shade cast over my cheek by Kouje’s profile, but my neck felt raw, and was no doubt red as summer beets.

I licked my dry lips, and lifted my head gingerly.

“Where are we?” I asked.

Kouje shifted behind me, as though he’d been reluctant to move before. How long had I been sleeping, I wondered, and how uncomfortable had it been for him? “I didn’t want to wake you. I believe we’re almost at the town.”

“Oh,” I said, squinting down the road ahead. Inokichi and Jiang were riding some way in front of us. I could hear Kichi’s laugh ring out sudden and sharp, startling birds into flight at regular intervals.

“Kouje, how long have I been asleep?”

“Not long,” he said, quiet as though I was sleeping still, and he was trying not to disturb me. “Not longer than half an hour. Does your head trouble you still?”

I nodded, regretting the movement seconds later. “I think that, even if we do not partake of lunch, I am sorely in need of some water.”

“And… what of lunch?” Kouje asked.

We both knew how hungry I was; Kouje, surely, must have been hungry as well. “Full still from the night before,” I said, offering Kouje what I hoped was a reassuring smile. “Perhaps I might fashion some sort of covering for my head before we ride out next.”

“An umbrella would work best,” Kouje said.

“Mm, yes,” I agreed, “and an armed escort—perhaps a stroll in the gardens, or a palanquin?”

Kouje flushed, and laughter sparked momentarily in his eyes. “Perhaps we’ll figure out some kind of veil, then,” he agreed. “Though I don’t know if it would suit you.”

“It would cover my face,” I pointed out. “Which might be useful, all things considered, for reasons beyond protection from the sun.”

“Still,” Kouje said, “it wouldn’t suit you.”

It might, I thought, allow me to avoid any further comments from Kichi as to what a delicate flower I was, or how it wasn’t fair of Kouje to be so dead set against my receiving compliments. After all, I wasn’t
that
young, and Kichi was certain there’d been a young gentleman or two—probably, he added with a wink, more like a whole army of them—knocking down Kouje’s door to be the lucky bastard who could convince my brother he was worthy, and was that what we were on the road for, hm? Running away from all my blockhead suitors?

I was grateful, at least, that I was convincing in my part. When Kichi went on and on in that fashion, it was easy enough to blush and duck my head, for all the world acting like the delicate flower he thought I was.

What I was most worried about was being
too
delicate. Even though we were a party of four, I couldn’t run the risk of being too aristocratic.

Occupied by my thoughts, it wasn’t long before we crested a hill
and Kichi reined in his horse for long enough to wave back at us and gesticulate toward the horizon. What I saw there took my breath away.

One of the many great walls lay before us, large gray stone weathered by time and bleached by the sun, and a thriving wallside town in the valley below. It was a busier place than we’d seen in a long time, more people than we’d been among since we left the palace, houses and shops crowded together beside the protection offered by the wall.

“How tall do you suppose it is?” I managed to ask Kouje once I’d regained my breath.

Kouje paused for a moment to appraise the height, with the horse whinnying and snuffling below us in annoyance at our strange whims.

“Fifteen feet I’d say, at the least,” he answered finally. “Can’t tell for sure until we’re closer.”

“Are you gonna spend all day staring at it?” Kichi howled back at us, though it was clearly a good-natured demand. “Or are you gonna get a move on? Hicks!” He let out a cheerful whoop and spurred his horse suddenly on, tearing off down the hill, leaving Jiang to give us a long-suffering look and follow after at a more dignified pace, with us trailing behind him.

The town wasn’t nearly so big as the capital, but it was large enough for me to realize how much I had missed city life—even though most of my opportunities to observe it were through a palanquin window, it was still the knowledge of its bustling presence, its constant activity, its arts and pleasures and luxuries, that I’d been missing. We might have grown accustomed to our isolation in the woods, to sleeping on beds of leaves and to hearing the owls hooting in the night, but I’d never once stopped missing what I’d lost. All that became painfully clear the moment what I’d lost was, in some ways, returned to me—the noise and the light and the excitement of a real city. I could smell dumplings cooking, ducks being roasted, could hear the commotion of shop owners chasing orphans away from their doorsteps or calling to the passersby, trying to tempt them inside. My stomach grumbled so loudly I knew Kouje must have heard it—I didn’t like that he should have to catch me out in a lie, no matter how necessary it was—but he didn’t say anything, and I willed the grumbling to be silent. We barely had any money left, and I tried my best not to stare at the children by the roadside eating their dumplings, entirely oblivious to just how lucky they were.

“Fried eel,” Kouje said, almost without thinking.

The smell was torturous, but I breathed in deeply anyway, storing the scent and trying to let the memory of what fried eel tasted like fill my stomach. It didn’t work as well as it might have, but it was the only taste of eel I would have for a long time, and I savored it.

All around us, people were talking in the cruder dialects I was coming to understand better and better, slurring their conjugations and elongating their vowels. Sometimes they used words I didn’t even recognize, which left me scrambling after the meaning of what I’d overheard, trying to piece together what the word must have meant by the context of the other words surrounding it. If I was to be a commoner, then it was necessary for me to understand their language, though their slang often made me blush.

What I recognized most of all, to my shame and growing agitation, was my own name, usually spoken in loud whispers; the rest was gossip, each tidbit more ludicrous than the last. One of them had Kouje fighting mountain demons in the north; another had me already in Tado, across the ocean, in talks with the royal family there. Where had I found a boat, I wondered, and how had I got across the water so quickly? And yet, when I thought of the guards at the checkpoint, I wished that I
were
in Tado, dining at the royal court, speaking with them of true treason.

Yet—and this was the strangest thing—the men and women on the street, when speaking my name or Kouje’s, uttered them without any animosity at all. I was a runaway and, for all they knew, also a traitor. I ought to have been vilified. Men should have spat on the street when they spoke of me, and women should have looked up to the heavens in apology when they acknowledged my existence. Why didn’t they loathe me? There was some piece of the puzzle I was missing, and I didn’t know how to go about understanding it.

Kouje reined the horse in suddenly, to avoid trampling a group of small children as they darted out across the road and almost directly under our horse’s hooves.

“I’m
Lord Kouje,” the child in the lead called back over his shoulder, waving a short stick in a way that intimated it was not, in fact, a stick at all, but rather a great sword.

“You
were Lord Kouje last time!” one of his companions accused,
deeply affronted by his friend’s selfishness. “And Sanji was Prince Mamoru last time, too!”

They disappeared past us down a side street in a chorus of shouting and laughter, leaving Kouje and me baffled in their wake.

“Imagine that,” was all Kouje finally said, and we hurried along, so as not to lose Jiang and Inokichi in the crowd.

We stopped at last in front of another noodle shop—and spending so much time near noodle shops without buying any noodles, I realized, was going to drive me mad sooner or later. My favorite noodles had been the wide, flat rice ones, served hot, usually in broth; Kouje preferred buckwheat noodles, served cold and sprinkled with sesame oil. Just thinking about it made me ache all over.

“My old friend runs this place,” Kichi said, after we’d dismounted. “He’ll give us the best noodles for cheap. Can’t find better noodles, not even in the capital!”

“We’re not hungry,” Kouje said, a bit too quickly. I understood the reason why—the longer he hesitated, the more difficult it would be to refuse.

Inokichi looked at us, mouth wide open in shock, like a dead fish’s. “Not possible,” he said finally, pointing toward me. “I’ve been listening to that one’s stomach grumble for miles now.”

I felt the blush rising in my cheeks almost before I could duck my head. Of course I knew that Kouje’s stomach must have been empty too, and that there was no shame in so simple a thing as hunger, but I couldn’t help wishing for a little more control over the noises that made it so evident to everyone else.

Kouje looked at me with uncertainty in his eyes for the first time. It was easier to believe that I was full when I had no one to contradict the lie of it.

Kichi sucked his teeth in a way that reminded me of a tutor I’d once had, and snapped his fingers. “Ah, so
that’s
the trouble, is it? No worries; I’ll cover the cost myself.”

“That’s not necessary,” Kouje began.

Kichi shook his head. “What kind of man would I be, letting a delicate little blossom like that starve? If you’re not careful, she’ll drop all her petals.”

“You’re too kind,” I murmured.

Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Kouje bow his head, his jaw clenched tight against any further protest. I hoped he wouldn’t think the less of me for compromising his pride along with my own, but if there was a chance that I could silence my stomach’s complaints—and if there was a chance that Kouje could have something to eat, as well—I knew that we had to take it.

I didn’t regret it. I would have done it over again, given the chance. Besides which, refusing the offer a second time would be an insult to the man, and we couldn’t afford to make any more enemies.

“It’s decided, then!” Kichi slapped Kouje’s back, looking quite pleased with himself. “I know we don’t always see eye to eye, brother, but you’ve got to at least be flexible on the road. Think like a reed, and less like a rod, hey? There’s other things they say about rods, but I can’t tell that one to you with fine ladies present.”

At once, I felt myself blushing all over again. Kichi laughed his raucous laugh and pushed aside the colored banners that hung in the open doorway. Kouje touched my hand with his own in a gesture of reassurance, and I held on to it tightly for a moment, wishing I were not
quite
so delicate as to be left out of all interesting conversation. It wasn’t that I felt there would be any special merit in Kichi’s joke. In fact, it wasn’t even the joke at all but rather the spirit of camaraderie behind it. As things stood, I was in very nearly the same position of isolation as I had been in the palace. No one spoke his mind to a prince if he could help it, and apparently no one spoke his mind to the sister of a strapping young man like Kouje, either.