Manabu was the only person climbing the hill, while all the other hundreds that made up the Honoka Clan First Army were descending. There was something strange about her father, like he wasn't really there. 'But I see him,' Senue thought.
He got off his horse and walked over, gesturing for her to come closer. Manabu crouched down to hug her, and Senue felt an uncomfortable mix of nostalgia and sadness, not knowing where it came from.
When she hugged him, the feeling that something was wrong returned. The scale armor didn't feel like it should have on her skin, the heat was missing, and her father's face blurred.
Senue sought an answer to that. Why didn't the vision scare her? There was no warning, when she realized, Senue was awake and staring at the ceiling of her room.
'He is dead.' The thought invaded her head without being invited. She had awakened a moment ago, but the torment had already begun. Senue walked away, now aware that the autumn sun had awakened her. She snapped her tongue in frustration and cursed its accuracy. They were as far away as possible, but not even the sun would leave her alone.
Senue turned the other way and buried her face in the pillow. Her body felt heavy, her muscles stunted by the poor night's sleep. A few bones cracked painfully as she stretched her body to get up. She had rubbed her head until her black hair became a nest, her dark eye circles deep as chasms. The relief of being able to sleep for the first time in two days was little, she knew she had slept from exhaustion, and it wasn't for more than a few hours.
'I need to sleep more.' Senue closed her eyes, but soon dismissed the idea, she couldn't.
Senue sighed and stood up. She had no desire to do anything, but she had learned in recent days that it was best to force herself if she didn't want to spend another day in bed. She yawned and rubbed her eyes as she walked to a small closet. There was a smooth wooden box painted black above it. Senue opened it carefully, revealing a flat, cylindrical object the same color as the box.
She took the sheath and pulled the handle, displaying a short, single-edged dagger. It was small enough that she could hide it in her clothes, and it belonged to her father for decades, until the day he left the clan's territory to go to war, it was the last gift he left for his daughter.
Although the dagger was simple, without any ornament or writing on it, the blade was as smooth and reflective as a mirror, the only thing that kept Senue from seeing the reflection of her brown eyes was the sunlight. She stepped back. and stared at her own image for a while.
The dagger was her treasure, but even her treasure made her uncomfortable and insecure now. The blade's polishness and its shine were inviting. 'That's not fair,' she thought. 'You should protect me, not do that.'
For more than two years Senue had been looking at the dagger at least once every day. She looked with longing, pride, happiness and curiosity. It was a source of comfort for two years, and then a curse for two days. She had looked at it hundreds of times, knowing that her father was in a war, but never expected him to die.
She took her eyes off the blade and turned to the window. Her eyes landed on a street near the palace, and Senue imagined that in a few days what was left of the First Army would return, pulling a cart with Honoka Manabu's body inside it.
Senue turned sharply; 'Everywhere I look I see problems.' The walls of her room were bright and cheerful and decorated with patterns of various flowers, especially the yellow camellias, the symbol of her clan. 'As beautiful as useless.' She felt nothing looking at them, she felt nothing looking at anything. The room was huge, the bed was as comfortable as possible, and there was enough room for a fireplace, but Senue hadn't used anything but the bed lately. Half of the room was empty and she couldn't think of one thing to fill it with. She lived in it for eighteen years, but felt like an outsider.
She sheathed the dagger, the click that it made when it was closed used to be satisfactory and she would sheath it repetedly to listen, but now it was just another unimportant sound. 'What am I doing?'
She didn't have all the details about the current situation, no one in the clan did, but she was the one who should pursue them the most. She had tried to deceive herself by saying that the situation was not as bad as she had imagined, but it had been a futile effort. 'People are dead, my father is dead, the war is over and I'm just wasting time.'
For the past two days, she had thought much more than what should be possible, her mind being so active that it prevented her from sleeping in ways she would never expect. The only thing the thoughts created were bad emotions and problems, problems that might not even exist anywhere but in her mind.
'How could you handle all this?' She had no time, but they still expected her to deal with mourning and command the clan. She knew most leaders didn't have a beginning like this, but the thought of commanding was enough to frighten her. She saw herself with the Honoka coat of arms on her chest, the person she had to become. The leader everyone will turn to when they need help and hope she has the solution; Senue shivered.
In a way, Senue knew what to expect, she had watched her father lead the clan for sixteen years before his departure for war, but had not really seen anything. She didn't sit in a committee meeting, didn't receive all kinds of people with all kinds of problems in her office, didn't command an army. Senue didn't even knew if she would have the support of the population or their discontent.
Her heart, mind, and shoulders became heavy. The scene of her father waving on his horse flashed through her mind once more, growing smaller and farther away, becoming just another point on the horizon before disappearing altogether. Senue put her hands to her chest, her eyes began to burn, but no tears came.
She wanted to get rid of the memory, but it was hard. She felt that doing so was wrong, as a disgrace or betrayal of her father. The memories gradually left her head. If she went on like this, she would just repeat the same thoughts, another day lost to her own mind, another day without making any decisions.
Her body was more awake now, but her spine still felt like a stone pillar. She was hungry, but with no appetite, her stomach seemed to reject even the thought of food. She had forbidden any servant from even stepping on the stairs to the palace's fourth floor, preventing herself from having to reject food all day.
Senue stared at the sunlight for a while, blinking repeatedly, hoping it would dim her dark eye circles. She didn't want any help getting dressed or trying on different clothes until she found the perfect one. She combed her hair, and the twinges of pain were almost a salvation, at least she could feel something. She put on a light purple kimono that she liked and fixed her hair to the best of her abilities.
Senue knew she was a pretty girl, but she didn't feel it when she looked in the mirror. She regretted this and turned the mirror to the wall where it would not bother her. Slipped her dagger into the back of her waist, took a deep breath, and opened her bedroom door to an empty hallway.
Senue walked through the fourth floor of the Honoka Clan's palace, facing all the closed doors. She had vague memories of her grandparents as a child, the room they used had been empty for years now. Her father's room was the smallest and farthest from the stairs, he would never use it again. There was also the room of Manabu's personal servant, Kohaku Inori, who now served as the Honoka Clan's ambassador in the territory of the Hiroaki Clan. The only room occupied was the one used by the current temporary leader and his wife, Eguchi Atsushi and Eguchi Miyo.
Senue didn't bother to see if anyone was still there, Atsushi had an entire clan to take care of and Miyo's company was far from pleasant. The fourth floor was as quiet as a cemetery. 'They 'll be leaving soon, and I'll be the only one here.' She found it appropriate; she was, after all, the last Honoka alive. Manabu never had a second wife, his first daughter with Nozomi was also his last.
As she opened the door to the third-floor staircase, Senue was not surprised to see someone waiting on the last step. Eguchi Osingu was a tall, strong man with a simple face: short black hair and brown eyes. His armor was unique in the clan, made of metal plates and painted brown with white details, the Honoka's yellow camellia was on his breastplate and helmet, the armor identified him as the Palace's Chief Guard.
Osingu bowed, Senue imitated him a moment later.
"Miss."
'Soon they will be calling me their leader' The thought was enough to make her nervous, which didn't last more than a moment. Before she opened her mouth to respond, she had returned to her state of feeling nothing.
"Sorry for missing, I'm fine now," she lied.
Osingu nodded. Even though he didn't say anything else, Senue knew that if they came into the matter of her absence, he would try to comfort her by saying that she did nothing wrong. It would only make her feel worse.
"Do you plan to go somewhere?"
Senue was slow to answer, she had no destination in mind when she descended the stairs. The first place that came to mind was the Aki Shrine. She owed Yuno a talk about her disappearance and needed help. She was lost, and needed someone to give her a direction to go before taking her position as leader. She was able to set some goals faster than she expected.
"I want to go to the Aki Shrine, then I want to talk to Mora."
Osingu nodded, turned, and began to walk; Senue followed him. She would rather walk alone, but knew that Osingu would not allow it. Better still to be escorted by him than by some guards she didn't even knew the names off.
The number of guards continued to increase as they descended floors. They passed a closed door on the third floor with two guards by their side, where Atsushi was probably dealing with issues right now. 'With my clan's issues.' Everyone paused for a moment to bow to them, Senue felt ashamed of herself for not being presentable anymore, but kept walking. Even though most of the guards were not inside the palace, dealing with the pressure of their eyes was still a burden.
On the first floor, a dozen men gathered in a corridor, they greeted her from afar, and Senue responded equally unwillingly. Atsushi would receive each one of them in his room to hear their problems. It was hard to see the honor or glory of leading a clan when thinking about spending the afternoon listening to complaints and solving small conflicts.' And then march to war and never come back. Why do I need to do this?'
They passed the entrance, their footsteps making a loud sound on the stone floor around the palace. There was a wall surrounding the entire building and two gates. The front gate was open and guarded by half a dozen guards at the moment, made of wood and reinforced with metal. If ordered by the leader, the guards would not let anyone pass, regardless of their position.
Osingu and Senue walked in a straight line and the guards made room for them to pass. The ground went from stone to earth as soon as they walked through the gate. Senue glanced briefly at the houses surrounding the palace, the closest to them belonging to high-ranking soldiers and people who had a job at the palace. The city that surrounded them was not even half the population within the Honoka Clan territory. Senue thought of them, the people looking toward her from the street and through the windows of their homes, the outlying villages, the families and plantations that followed the great Kara River. 'They are all my people.'
A shiver runned down her spine and she clenched her fists for a moment, feeling pressured even without a single word. Osingu's silence only made the situation worse.
"Any news from the army?" she asked.
Osingu slowed his pace and turned to her. They were walking side by side now, swiping his spear from the right hand to the left so as to not block his view, slamming the naginata on the floor like a staff with every step.
"No news, miss. We still need to confirm the number of surviving soldiers, but the last message said that we can wait for about half"— 'Three thousand men, then.' Senue realized that he had stopped talking.
"Go on."
Osingu nodded, his mouth opened, but something made him rethink his words. 'I'm not a child, don't hide things from me.'
"They should return within a maximum of five days with the Creeper's body."
Senue frowned, took some time to understand who he was talking about. She couldn't understand why they called her father the Creeper. She knew the story, knew that her father had been hiding and crawling through the bodies for two days, escaping with his life, and winning the next battle with what he learned about the enemy strategy near his death. It was a horrible story, but it seemed like a title his enemies would use, not his own people.
Her stomach churned as she thought of the pile of bodies. She didn't like to think about it, but it remembered her of other stories. Senue heard about all kinds of atrocities during the Unification War, which happened even before she was born and ended with the founding of the Hiroaki Clan. Soldiers were beheaded after a battle so that they could not be identified. If the pile was too large, they would still be burned with their clan's armor and weapons on so that they would not be used against them again. She imagined a mountain of bodies, too big for anyone to worry about setting it on fire or noticing a person crawling for two full days. She felt something rising in her throat and almost spat with the taste of vomit. "I was not this weak.'
Osingu was looking forward, focused on watching the way. He was a guard, not a soldier, so he was not sent to fight in the war, but came to call Manabu The Creeper after a messenger brought the news. They came and went much faster than an army, but there was still a delay of about a month from the travel time. That was the penultimate message before the end of the war. After more than two years away from home, her father was killed in the last battle.
Senue felt like she hadn't seen him since she was a child. She took a deep breath and cursed her own mind; lately it was very easy to get lost in thought.
"Is it Earth Day tomorrow ?"
"Today is Earth Day, tomorrow is Sun Day, " corrected Osingu. "Do you plan to go to the committee meeting?"
'It is past time I try to do something,' Senue nodded.
Osingu smiled for the first time, probably content with her wanting to assume her position as Leader Honoka. The smile faded as quickly as it came, and Osingu faced the street in front of him again.
She had a few hours until the meeting, it was probably enough to do everything she wanted without being late. 'But what am I going to do when I get there? Watch?'
"Osingu. If you were in my shoes, what would you do first?"
He didn't seem to be expecting that kind of question and took a few more steps to answer.
"My concern is with the people, it would be my priority to protect them. If necessary, I would seek an alliance with another clan."
'If necessary?' she thought. 'If what survived from our army is so little that we cannot protect ourselves?' Senue clenched her jaw.
Protecting the people was the answer she expected from Osingu, but it was not helpful advice. 'Of course this is my priority.' She knew this was a leader's job for years, the advice did not give her much to work with.
An alliance was a complex matter. The recent war had begun because of the Takeo-Ryota alliance, which declared war against the Hiroaki, Hito's largest clan; and ended because of the Hiroaki-Honoka alliance. She still remembered how much she heard about it a few years ago, her father talked to an Hiroaki ambassador for days until he accepted the alliance. She had seen her father busier than ever with the war preparations, but she didn't know much about it.
"Thank you," she said, realizing she had not answered.
They continued walking without exchanging many words. Within minutes, they had left the city surrounding the palace. The ground was overgrown with green grass and the trees with autumnal brown could be seen far from where they were. Even if it wasn't the same place, Senue remembered her dream, there were many places that looked like this in the Honoka territory.
Osingu turned south and led the way. It took a few minutes for a thin dirt road to appear, created more by the movement of people than by actual labor. The road led them to a forest entrance, a place surrounded by maple trees, painted orange, red and brown. Senue loved the comfortable atmosphere of autumn and was always amazed by the way the area around the shrines bursted with life during their seasons.
The dirt road was replaced by a stone road that led to a series of twelve red-painted wooden arches, the first one larger than the other eleven, the torii gates that indicated the entrance of a shrine.
Shrine's received visitors only during their seasons, there was little point in praying for an absent god. Despite this, the Aki Shrine was empty and silent, no one was crossing the entrance but them. Most people, like Senue, only visited a shrine during their god's arrival and farewell.
The area in front of her expanded into a circular ground at the end of the corridor, where the trees had been cut down and were prevented from growing back again. The Aki Shrine was a large, triangular-top timber construction, but unlike the vibrant forest surrounding it, the shrine was a boring shade of light brown.
Senue saw two priestesses on the left, in their white and red clothes and busy gathering dry leaves with their rakes, piles and piles of leaves. None of them were Yuno. 'Kotori and Mayumi, isn't it?'
Senue began to walk toward the bell that was used to call the priestesses, it was common for them to accompany the visitors — especially the most important ones. Before she reached the rope, a woman appeared at the shrine's entrance.
Arakawa Kyoko, the head priestess of Aki Shrine, was a woman with gray hair and tired eyes. Senue had a feeling she had no more than a few years to go as priestess, if not of life.
"Miss Honoka," Kyoko bowed.
"Miss Arakawa," Senue answered equally.
Kyoko turned her face, looking at the two priestesses who had stopped gathering the leaves. They had only noticed then when they began to speak.
"Sorry, they were focused on their job. I will accompany you," she nodded to Osingu.
"No, that's fine. Actually, I came to talk to Yuno. Can I?" asked Senue. She knew Miss Arakawa was a strict woman and didn't want to make trouble for her friend.
Kyoko stared at her for a moment, whispering to herself.
"Yes, of course," she said after a few seconds, "She's back there."
Senue thanked her, turned and nodded to Osingu, a gesture that told him to wait for her. Before she turned, he called her attention.
"Should I call Mora? You said you wanted to talk to her."
Senue just nodded.
"Should I bring her here, or ask her to wait for you at the palace?"
"At the palace."
Osingu bowed to her and to Miss Arakawa. Senue turned to her right and started walking around the Aki Shrine.
While a pair worked at the front of the shrine, there was a lonely priestess in the back. Senue stopped walking, peering at Yuno.
The sleeves of her clothing were pulled as she worked with the rake, revealing thin, long arms. Yuno was pale, with shoulder-length black hair and equally dark eyes.
She had not gathered half the amount of leaves that the other two had, fortunately, gathering leaves was not what determined a good or bad priestess. Yuno stopped for a moment, looking at her own reddened palms and blowing on them.
Senue felt the urge to step back, turn around and return to the palace. 'No, Yuno deserves it, I have to talk to her,' Her friend wasn't scary, in fact, she was the only person she could really talk to. Unknowingly, she clenched her fists as she took a step forward.
Her step broke dry leaves with a crunchy sound. Yuno took a long time to turn around. A smile slowly formed on her face as she walked closer.
Senue realized that she would be hugged and allowed her to do so, even though she felt nothing with it but Yuno's warm clothes. Her friend pointed to the shrine's porch and rested her rake on it.
"Having trouble sleeping?"
'Dark eye circles,' Senue sat on the porch and turned to her, nodding.
"Then I have something for you."
Yuno climbed onto the porch, opened the door and disappeared into the house. It was part of the same building, but the back half of the Aki Shrine served as a home for the priestesses. It was not a rule that they all belonged to the same family, but at the moment the four priestesses of the Aki Shrine were of the Arakawa family.
'To sleep?' Senue thought as Yuno appeared in the doorway, she was not the kind of person who used to gift others. She held out a paper envelope to her.
Senue tried to imagine what it would be like as she opened the envelope, thinking that medicine was not a good gift. She changed her mind when she saw the incense sticks and tied herbs smelling of earth.
"It will help you sleep," said Yuno as she sat beside her on the porch.
Senue thanked her with a smile, feeling her spirits rise, the problems gone from her head for a moment. She didn't usually use incense sticks outside of special occasions, but she would make sure to light them if they were Yuno's gift. 'And I really need to sleep.'
"Have you been eating well?"
Senue put the incense back into the package and set them on her lap. She bowed her head, trying to hide her embarrassed gaze.
"It's fine if you can't, but did you try?"
Senue disagreed with her head, without saying a word. Yuno brushed back her falling hair, hanging it behind her ear.
"I'm not fighting with you, but you need to take care of yourself," Yuno sounded therapeutic, like a mother talking to her daughter. Senue suddenly realized that she had never been through this. Nozomi had died to give her life.
Senue took a deep breath, but couldn't hide the first sob. Yuno looked shocked, she stared indecisively at her face for a few seconds, until she came close and hugged her.
"Thank you, " Senue's voice was barely audible, weeping.
She didn't expect this. She knew that Yuno could help her feel better and that she would have good advice to give, but just one touch was enough to make her lose control. Senue went from feeling nothing to feeling too much, and now everything was slipping away. She could not cry in front of anyone else, it would not feel comfortable, and was not something that the leader should do. However, with Yuno, the wrong thing would be to try and hide it.
"You can count on me, Senue."
Senue nodded, enjoying the calm in her voice.
"No need to say anything if you don't want, you can just stay here as long as you need."
The strength of Yuno's hug increased, but Senue didn't react. The only thing she could see was Yuno's hand, the contours of the bones and the green lines of her veins. She was so weak, but it was Senue who relied on her.
Little by little the rhythm of her sobs slowed, neither of them moved for minutes during the intimate moment. Yuno's arm had received all the tears Senue had to shed, wetting up her sleeves.
Senue was the first to move, lifting her head and taking a deep breath when she thought her face was more presentable; she knew it wasn't, but tried to fool herself. Yuno slowly backed away with the movement, resting her hands on the porch.
"Better?"
"A lot."
It was not part of her plans, but it was a pleasant surprise. She was embarrassed that she couldn't hold back, weak that she couldn't handle her emotions on her own, but she couldn't continue to be selfish. Her body seemed lighter, her mind clearer. 'Maybe you better not hold back.'
Senue stared at the scenery before her, not much more than piles of dried leaves to look at. She pulled on her kimono collar and sighed, she was starting to sweat.
"Want to come in? You can eat with us if you want."
Only then did Senue realize the inviting, appetizing smell coming from the back of the shrine. 'Appetizing, I hadn't felt that for two days'. She nodded at her with a thin smile on her face.
"That's a good idea, and I want to talk to you in the meantime."
『..❆ ..』
Yuno closed the door, sitting on the floor across the small table with a bowl of food in each hand. Senue had been eating alone for a long time, only realizing how much she missed the company when she had it again.
They were in Yuno's room, it was smaller and fuller than Senue's room, but less than half its size. She had asked to eat alone with Yuno for privacy, she was not so comfortable with the other priestesses, and did not plan to talk about trivial matters.
"You said you wanted some advice?" Yuno asked.
"Yes. I wanted to know what you would do in my place, if you had to command the clan."
Yuno tilted her head for a moment, thoughtfully. A priestess would be one of the last people a leader would ask for commanding advice, but they both knew it was a special case. As the second oldest at Aki Shrine, Yuno would eventually become the head priestess after Kyoko, unless she refused the position. 'But she would only have two priestesses to care for, not thousands of people, and I'm sure she would still do it better than me.'
"Did you asked it to someone else?"
Senue nodded, finished chewing before answering.
"Yes, to Osingu," she said, confused.
"And what did he say?"
"That he would protect the people, and depending on the situation, seek an alliance with another clan. Because?"
"So I don't repeat the same thing as him."
Yuno rested her chin on one hand and took a serious look, setting her food aside for a while. Senue was used to seeing her concentrated like this since they were children, often alone. Conversations with Yuno used to be long, she always thought a lot before speaking.
Senue began to eat more slowly, realizing that she was going to finish her food before Yuno touched hers again.
"I agree that protecting the people is important," Yuno started, "but this involves a lot of things. Training new soldiers, population cooperation, my own experience and more stuff I can't think of. Something different that I would do would be to bring together a few people I trust, drawing as little attention as possible."
"Why's that?"
Yuno went back to eating, they talked between bites.
"I would be very afraid of being betrayed, It would be a precaution, and to prevent them from hiding anything from me for a lack of trust. If it is a small group, it would also be easier to control them."
Senue thought of Mayumi and Kotori. There was something she could learn even when dealing with such a small group. The biggest difference, though, is that Yuno would never feel anything even close to the pressure that the leader of a large Hito clan would have to live with.
"The members of the committee?" Senue asked.
Yuno shook her head at both shoulders, neither agreeing nor disagreeing.
"Not necessarily, they can be good at it, but I may have a problem with them. It's good to have influential people supporting you, I wouldn't want to be the enemy of someone influential like a committee member, but they can also get a lot of attention. There is no way to get a perfect spy for every group, reliable and invisible, but I would do what I could. The Palace's Chief Guard, for example, is not on the committee, but I would want him by my side."
'Well, Osingu has no problem with me.' Senue tried not to show it, but didn't like everything she heard. 'I have to doubt everyone?'
Yuno was not expecting an answer, remained quiet just to think for a moment and spoke again without ceremony.
"About an alliance, I can not say without understanding the situation, but I would look for one if i thought necessary. I prefer that the clan is not absorbed by another, so I would not accept anything that could lead to it. Even if it's not part of the deal, I would probably even end the alliance if we were strong enough to defend ourselves and thought we could end up being absorbed by some other clan."
Senue forced a nervous smile.
"Wouldn't that be risky?"
"Alliances are risky."
Senue stopped for a moment, it made her think about the war again. An alliance could start and end a war, affect all the great clans of Hito without even involving them in the deal. During the recent war, they had about a thousand soldiers in the territory, a dangerously low number, but no other clan dared to attack them. The Izanagi stayed out of the war, the Isao were too far away to engage, and the Nobuo and Sadao did not march towards the Honoka territory.
The number had grown with the return of some soldiers and the formation of new ones, but it still would not be enough to protect the clan from an invasion. If a clan had taken over the Honoka territory, they would be hunted by the Hiroaki-Honoka alliance right now, perhaps even by another clan that might gain something from it.
Senue could easily think of various reasons why they had not been invaded: the intimidation and risk of plunging into a war that was not theirs, the inability to manage larger territory or the lack of support from its population. All the big clans could stand on whatever they produced within their own territory, it was not worth the risk. So why did the war start?
Senue knew some of the reasons, but didn't knew the details. She knew that the Hiroaki and Takeo had disputes over territory, but she figured something else must have happened between them. Senue made a mental note of this, remembering that the next person she was going to talk to was a soldier who participated in the war.
She realized that she had been lost in her thoughts again and grinned.
"Thanks, that was very helpful."
Yuno gave a short smile back. Senue considered what she had heard as they finished their meal in silence.
Compared to Osingu's advice, what Yuno had said was far more pessimistic and complex, but that was what made it useful advice; a realistic view.
Part of Senue wanted Yuno to be wrong, she didn't like to think that everything would become a stressful environment, she wanted as few obstacles as possible. When she realized, she was thinking about how busy her father was even without any threat of war on the horizon. "I don't think it's going to happen again."
'Why can't I just keep going like this?' Her wish took the form of a question, which was followed by more difficult ones. 'What would I do if I was betrayed? What order should I give if we are attacked? Why does Yuno know these things?'
Senue could only think of an answer to the last one. There was no reason for these subjects to be taught to Yuno, but she could have heard about them and thought alone later. Aki Shrine was the nearest shrine to the palace, and if she accompanied visitors as a priestess, she would hear interesting things.
'So this is the kind of thing my dad didn't teach me?' Manabu was never strict with Senue, in fact, he was said to give her way too much freedom. Even though he never said it, everyone knew he didn't feel good about demanding things from his daughter, Nozomi's legacy. It was one of the few things his wife had left him.
'Of course he didn't like it,' Senue thought. She could only imagine how painful it would be for him. She could remember several times when she heard someone talking to her father about how he should remarry and have a new heir. For the first few times, Senue was only anxious at the thought of a livelier house upon the arrival of a younger brother. Now she didn't like the people who had made her feel disposable.
Her gaze turned to Yuno, who was almost at the end of her meal. 'I should be like you.' She knew that as someone who had to do nothing but behave for eighteen years, it was impossible for her to know how to lead well, but that didn't mean she liked the thought. It was inevitable that she would end up in this position, she knew it for years, but did little to prepare herself.
She remembered Eguchi Atsushi, who has been running the clan for over two years. She didn't have much trouble with him, but she didn't feel that letting him continue in this position was the right decision to make. She could blame everything on her father and his irresponsibility, but she couldn't keep doing that.
Having finished her meal, Yuno fixed her posture, the movement stole Senue's attention. As she thought of her father and looked at Yuno, she remembered that it was usually Kyoko who accompanied them on visits to the shrine, but sometimes it turned out to be Yuno.
"Have you ever accompanied my father when he came to the shrine?"
"Alone?"
Senue nodded. Yuno remained quiet for some time.
"Yes, a couple of times. He came here, just before the alliance was made."
"And how was he?"
Yuno sighed.
" You want me to be honest, don't you?"
Senue shivered. Suddenly she regretted asking. Even so, curiosity led her to nod.
"He was tired. Your father was a good man and a good leader, but he was still a man," Yuno straightened her posture.
Senue looked at the table, staring at the empty bowls. There was something strange about what Yuno had said, it didn't sound like something that would come out of his friend's mouth. She didn't feel bad at the thought of her father being tired, she knew he was.
'She's asking me to depend on her,' Senue realized. She raised her head and smiled at Yuno. When she did, she noticed the sunlight coming through the window.
"Thank you for your intelligence, and for the incense," Senue did something close to a joke for the first time in a while, "But I have to go now, I have to get before everyone at the committee meeting... Sorry to be gone."
Yuno nodded to her.
" Worrying about someone else is not a bad thing, you know that?"
'Am I getting a lesson?' Senue didn't know how to respond, so she just waited for Yuno to get up and followed her. The other priestesses had already finished eating and had returned to their work outside the shrine.
Senue discovered that Osingu had sent two guards to wait for her, said goodbye to Yuno, and followed them away from the shrine.
As they passed beneath the torii gates, Senue made a silent plea for the Autumn God. 'Please help me protect my people,' Senue was not versed in the shrine practices, but believed in the gods, even felt that she should pray to them more often. 'I need all the help I can get.'
『..❆ ..』