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Tahomaru paces outside of the door, trying to decide his best course of action with confronting his mom with the new information he learned today. Sure, he wasn’t meant to learn it, but his eavesdropping and information gathering skills were impeccable. After all, everyone was acting so secretive, so why shouldn’t he prod into his parent’s business, especially if it concerned the whole family?
He takes a deep breath and grips the door, quickly sliding it open and stepping in. He gazes upon his kneeling mother, doing her usual daily prayer to the religious statues in the family altar. For all these years he has seen her pray religiously to these figurines, but he never knew why. But after today, the clouds in his mind started to part and he was starting to see more clearly now more than he ever was before. Forgiveness is what she wants.
Tahomaru hesitates for a moment, contemplating whether he should mince his words to his suffering mother. “Do you remember a baby born without eyes, a nose, ears, and limbs from sixteen years ago, mother?” He asks bluntly.
Her breath hitches in her throat, but she doesn’t turn to face him immediately. How could she?
“The same baby who you and father fed to the demons in exchange for prosperity?” He continues mercilessly.
She doesn’t answer and turns further away from him, causing a moment of anger to seep through his usual mellow demeanor. “Mother, answer me! Please….” He doesn’t mean to beg, but he just wants answers after being kept out of the loop for so long..
After hearing her youngest son’s pleas, she finally turns to face him, “There’s not a single second I have forgotten.” She retorts.
Tahomaru scoffs at her, “...You sacrifice your firstborn child for this land? Then, you have the nerve to call yourselves parents….”
Almost as if on cue, Daigo suddenly bursts through the door with his permanent frown plastered on his face, “It’s because we are parents that we did this. Tahomaru, do not speak on subjects you know nothing about.”
Tahomaru’s face twists in agitation, but yet he can’t find it within himself to say anything to his relentless father.
“You were not alive when this land was barren and our people were dying from famine. Crops wouldn’t grow, constant droughts occurred throughout the land, and overlapping periods of epidemics and diseases…. This was all before you born. I had to do something, you don’t understand what we’ve been through.” Daigo defends himself.
“Does power mean that much to you that you would sacrifice your own flesh and blood? Your firstborn of all things?” He bites back, anger starting to rise in his veins. He tried to restrain himself, but he couldn’t hold back what he was feeling. Tahomaru turned to his father, “I may not understand everything, father, but I know what you two did was wrong.” He pauses, “....And you hid it from me….”
“It was for the best.” Daigo concludes, “For all of us.”
“You don’t think your actions will have any consequences, father?” Tahomaru questions, “Do you really believe that with all of you heart?”
Daigo’s face contorts in obvious frustration, “Such insolence, Tahomaru. Where did you learn this from?” He sighs, “Take the rest of the day off. We have a big battle tomorrow, so prepare your body and clear your mind of all this silly nonsense you’ve been spouting.”
“But father--”
“We shall speak of this no more.” Daigo commands, and as always, Tahomaru obeys.
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It was night.
Although his parents had both went to sleep already, his father’s austere words reverberated deeply in his mind.
It was for the best.
But was it really?
Tahomaru knew he wasn’t an insomniac, but there’s something on his mind that kept preventing him from just shutting his eyes and drifting to sleep like every other night. He slowly shifted his body in his futon and turned onto his side, gazing out of his window and onto the scenic outlook from beyond their royal castle. Everytime he attempts to shut his eyes, images of Hyakkimaru appear on the back of his eyelids, almost like clockwork.
How could he not see the resemblance their first time meeting? It was almost as if for every feature he lacked from his mother, Hyakkimaru had and vice versa. In a way, he had to admit it was a bit ironic that each child resembled the favorite of each parent.
He sighs, shifting his legs in his covers once more, trying his best to find a comfortable position, but his body, no matter how he laid, feels absolutely restless. An obviously ungratified Tahomaru groans loudly and rolls out of his futon, stands up abruptly, and begins to gather his belongings. He slips on his ornament garments and hand brushes his hair briefly before grabbing his katana and slipping it through his waistband. He slides open his bedroom door and he sees Mutsu and Hyogo on the opposite side of the wall, perched against it on guard duty.
“Young lord, is something the matter?” Mutsu asks worriedly at the sudden commotion.
“It’s nothing, really.” He lies and all three of them know it, “I just -- I just need some air.”
“Please give us a few minutes to gather out items and we can --” Hyogo begins, but is interrupted when Tahomaru raises his hand to stop him from continuing.
“Actually, I’d like to go out by myself. I want to clear my mind off some things.” He confesses, and almost instantly, both of them knew the hidden meaning behind his words. “Please don’t mention this to my parents.”
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Tahomaru doesn’t know what time is, or rather, how much time he has spent wandering around outside so far, but it didn’t really matter. A constant stream of questions flooded his mind for every minute that passed, and yet, none of them were getting answered.
Eventually, he finds himself on the familiar path towards the village he ventured into the previous day to slay the crab demon that was terrorizing the local villagers. It’s mostly dark outside aside from the faint moonlight being illuminated from the clear sky that night. He continues walking and eventually sees the body of the slain demon still laying in the lake, slightly more decomposed from when he last saw it.
Tahomaru hears a sudden splashing from the other side of decomposed body, the enemy hidden from his field of view. He immediately grasps the hilt of his sword and switches into a defensive position, “Who goes there? Show yourself!”
He continues hearing a few more splashes, then he sees a shadow of a person emerge from behind the body, walking slowly towards him. Through the darkness, Tahomaru can see the faint shape of an unsheathed sword and he immediately draws his as well.
“Stop right there. I’ll kill you.” He warns menacingly.
To his surprise, the figure actually stops mid-stream. “You….” The mysterious figure says slowly.
That voice. He knows that voice and it seems as if fate is on his side today.
“Hya….Hyakkimaru….” Tahomaru stutters out, “Is that you?”
“Yes.” He says calmly, stepping onto the sand and walks towards his brother standing along the shoreline. Tahomaru gazes upon his older brother, whose unsheathed his arms caught some fish in the lake, presumably for himself and the younger loud-mouthed kid traveling with him earlier.
For once, Tahomaru feels like he has at a loss for words when he is face-to-face with his brother, but Hyakkimaru also says nothing. In his defense, he just learned that he had a brother, so who could blame him with being so uncomfortable around him? He didn’t know anything about him or who he was. He was sure Hyakkimaru felt the same.
After the brief moments of silence passed between them, Tahomaru finally speaks up. “Do you remember me from the other day?”
“Yes.” Hyakkimaru responds without hesitation.
“Listen, this may sound a little far-fetched, but we are actually related.” Tahomaru explains, “You’re my older brother.” He asks tentatively, unsure of how well Hyakkimaru can actually understand him. “My name is Tahomaru, similar to yours.”
“I know.” Hyakkimaru answers him, “Your aura -- like mine.” He points to himself.
He speaks a broken dialect, but he can comprehend somewhat of what Hyakkimaru is attempting to say, “What do you mean?” Tahomaru asks for clarification.
“Your soul.” He explains, “Looks like my soul.”
Tahoumaru’s eyes widen in surprise, Tahomaru knows he communicated his words well and continues, “Our father sacrificed your body to the demons in exchange for our land’s prosperity. That is why you are suffering in the way you are now.”
Hyakkimaru says nothing and merely picks the fish clean from his sword, then calmly reattaches his prosthetics back onto his limbs. “It’s okay.”
“But it’s not.“ Tahomaru tries to stop himself from getting over-emotional, “It’s not -- It’s not alright, Hyakkimaru. My father -- Our father...he did this to you. He ruined our family for his own selfish gain.”
“I didn’t….I didn’t even know you existed.” Tahomaru continues, “When I saw you at this lake the other day, I was talking to you like I would with any other stranger. Little did I know, it was actually my own brother. It’s bewildering, really.”
“Tahomaru….” Hyakkimaru says his name finally, and it makes Tahomaru’s heart beat a bit faster in his chest.
“It’s almost as if the perfect image I had of our parents was shattered into a million pieces. The strong, powerful father figure image I had…..a man who brought riches to himself and others with his own two hands….ruined. I can’t look at him the same way.” He laments, hanging his head down and stares at the ground beneath his feet.
“I can’t change the past, nor can I predict what will happen in the future.” Tahomaru feels a clump form in his throat and he finds it harder and harder to speak, “I believe what our father did was wrong, but I just can’t abandon him now….not in the middle of this brewing war….I can’t let all of this be for nought…..I can’t let the kingdom fall now….not now...” He doesn’t raise his head up and awaits whatever Hyakkimaru might do to him.
“I’m sorry….” His voice quivers quietly with his apology, “I’m so -- so sorry, for everything, brother.” Tahomaru chokes out, hiding his face from the tears threatening to fall from the corners of his eyes. “It’s alright if you don’t acknowledge me as your family -- I don’t deserve the right to do so if I can’t even stand up for you in front our father as your own brother.”
Hyakkimaru doesn’t know what his brother looks like, but he can see his white aura fade and tremble a bit. He slowly walks over to Tahomaru and stops about a foot in front of the crying boy and cautiously places his hands on his cheeks, raising his face so their eyes meet.
Tahomaru can feel himself stop breathing when he feels Hyakkimaru touch his forehead with his. Although it was the faintest of touches, it was incredibly gentle and he couldn’t help but feel calmed by this true, unexplainable power only an older sibling could have over a younger one.
“I forgive you.” Hyakkimaru says these simple words, but it meant a thousand to Tahomaru. “My brother.” Under the faint moonlight, Tahomaru swears he can see a small smile on Hyakkimaru’s face.
Maybe in another life, Tahomaru thinks, he can forgive himself too.