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By no means is Souza the only one here with a trauma of flames.
Sometimes during the evenings they gather and socialize or eat, their surroundings lit up by the lamps in the room. Sometimes, Souza can catch one or more of them, or even startle himself out of a trance, and he knows they all irrationally imagine the rock of the lamp shaken by some magic wind. The lamp tips over, ignites everything, paints them red and black. And just like before, just like always, there’s no escape.
Souza wonders what the saniwa carries over for them when she makes them become human and physical in a new way that involves legs and hair and clothes and hands that they can hold themselves in. Having spent years piled on years inside, Souza is more well-read than most of those in his company (Kousetsu or Yagen usually help him fill in the gaps), and so he knows their histories. He knows that’s why some of them constantly picture the world on fire, awake or asleep, and it glows dangerously in their eyes.
So do they have the scars on their body? Did they will themselves to be flawless? His brother, Kousetsu, is porcelain, finely-cut ice. Their younger brother Sayo is riddled with small cuts and scars that lined his skin even before his first battle in his new body.
Souza’s robes drape and fall over on his form like a wilting bouquet of flowers, and it shows off quite a bit of his body. There are no honor-driven scars on his smooth skin like some of the others (how could there be, when he was caged for so long, never serving his true purpose, never being held, never proving his worth-- Or maybe he had none?).
Oh. But there is one thing. There’s one thing, and it’s worse than fire.
"This is the mark of the Maddening Demon King."
The collar of his robes drops just so when he gets truly angry on the occasions he does get taken out to the front lines. The phantom touch of conquerors that marked him at last lend him their power, and when Souza comes back from his rage, there is Kousetsu, calm and still after the vanquish of their enemies. He adjusts Souza’s robes again, covering up the mark they both know well.
“Are you alright?”
It takes Souza a moment to process the meaning to Kousetsu’s question, and that he’s not asking if the memories of being marked had stolen the very soul of breath from his body. No, blood stains Souza’s skin and clothing, and that is what Kousetsu inquires about. (Not that he’s oblivious to Souza’s ghosts.) Some of it is his. The cuts hurt quite a bit, especially once the wind hits and kicks up dirt into them. But he offers a smile, albeit a shaky one after using so much stamina he hardly got the opportunity to tune to something stronger. He pats his hand over his chest (it burns, but nothing like fire), and nods.
They return home, and as leader of their party, Kousetsu departs to watch over the repairs of the others. Souza takes priority (for what he guesses is to get rid of his unsightly injuries, there’s no point to broken possessions) but after he’s done, it gives Souza a chance to sit in the room he shares with his brothers (it’s usually one or two to a room, but little Sayo feels unrest everywhere else at night if not sleeping with Kousetsu and Souza. It’s endearing in its own way).
Souza sits, and stares. This is something he’s gotten used to enough that he doesn’t realize when he stares off to get lost in his thoughts. Things like boredom of sitting his cage never cross his mind when it is quick and jumping thoughts around like sparks on a log. The world is fast-moving when he is still, and this is what he knows better than the alien territory of the outside world that’s far too big and beautiful for him to comprehend.
His body is all stitched together now, without a single blemish upon it. It’s a bit odd that during repairs injuries leave without so much as a scar, but the marks they’re “born” with are eternal. Souza could be injured a hundred times over but once repairs were done, he’d still have the accursed mark of Oda Nobunaga tattooed on his flesh. Nothing could be done about it. Nothing.
Nothing. Helpless to be adorned like a prize, and no polishing could get rid of this stain.
And sometimes, he thinks about it. That if they’ve come back to the past, then perhaps he could make it so that he never fell into that demon’s hands, that he’d never scream so loud and know the misery of not a soul hearing it, much less the men he believed were his masters. Master in name only, as it turns out. Because bit by bit, they clipped Souza’s wings to their fancy, and then finally, Nobunaga made him forever flightless.
Souza closes his eyes a moment, his breaths echoing in his ears.
When he opens them again not but a few seconds later, the world is aflame.
The walls are orange, his breaths are husky from smoke. Outside, he can hear the cacophony of siege, and even though he has legs, and a voice that can be heard, Souza remains still, seized by panic. Will someone remember him? Will someone come save him? If he were a proper sword, he’d be at someone’s side already--
No. At Nobunaga’s side. And the thought repulses Souza like nothing else.
He claws at the front of his robes, his nails tearing into his skin. The mark doesn’t lift, doesn’t so much as smudge, but it’s not a mere leaf that he can brush off his shoulders, it’s engraved in him, defiled on his body, and now he is going to burn along with it, he is going to burn burn burn burn burn---
Cold hands slide onto his wrists gently, and Souza jumps. The world snaps back into place with one gasp, the fire and battle inhaled into his body. He’s looking up at Kousetsu’s eyes. Nothing is aflame, and what is painting the room orange is but the evening sun.
Kousetsu doesn’t say anything, but tilts his head just so, examines Souza’s expression knowingly. These nightmare visions are not a first, something Souza is ashamed to admit. But at least only Kousetsu has ever caught him. This is something he’d rather not even let Sayo see, lest he grow worried, or worse, issue the impossible vow to kill the Demon King.
“Are you alright?” Kousetsu asks it for the second time that day. But this time, he addresses the ghosts.
Both their gazes fall down to Souza’s exposed chest, his nails frozen on Nobunaga’s mark. Souza’s hands slowly fall to his lap. Then, hair falling on his face, he presses his forehead to Kousetsu’s shoulder.
“Compared to actually going through it - this is nothing.”
If Kousetsu wants to argue it, he doesn’t say anything. He only strokes through Souza’s hair, then readjusts his robes.
The thing about Souza is that he always smiles.
Some have already picked up on the fact that Souza’s expressions are false, and even his smiles hold something callous and bitter, an out-of-tune chord in the melody that tries to enchant the listener. The smaller ones look as though they weigh the truth of his smiles, but in the end they accept the face-value of it, and skip along past him to go about their sunshine days.
No one ever calls him out on this habit of his. They know the struggle. They must all cope in their own ways in holding the ashes of their past without letting it smudge all over their whole being, without letting the slightest wind scatter it all. Souza keeps the torment inside his delicate-looking body, and walks around the citadel, looks out windows, and smiles at the scenery outside.
The sky is...
Ideally (or not, if Kousetsu has a word in it), swords are used for battle. It is a symbol of strength and protection, and it is to remain at its master’s side loyally for these purposes. That was the pride of the sword itself.
But in the end, Souza could only be decoration. Passed from hand to hand as a prize, standing in a room as little less than a conqueror’s treasure. Not even looked at. Purpose unfulfilled, rewritten - literally - within engravings - a new story - a new sword, reforged, nothing but pretty metal - so he must always smile and be ready to receive his admirers.
Souza meets the saniwa, and smiles. He greets his new comrades with nothing less than a physical expression of being content. Presentation is the only thing that matters, and so if it comes down to putting on these masks and cosmetics, then Souza doesn’t think it difficult at all. If he can pull up these illusions, then there will be nothing else taken from him. Not that he realizes quite yet that it’s all technique to protect himself.
“Shorten it so that it may suitably be for my hand.”
Ah. That hurts. A lot. It hurts. It hurts me, it hurts me, why are you hurting me this way, why do you toss me in a forge, cut into me your name, I am not yours, I’m not, it hurts it hurts it hurts, don’t, please please PLEASE--!
This bird must be plucked accordingly and sit in its cage.
What a pretty thing.
Sayo has put his clothes on for the day, and Souza helps to make sure everything is in place as he ties back the sleeves so that they’re not in the way. His unkempt hair spills at his little shoulders, and Souza offers to tie it up, wrapping the cord around the blue bundle. He ties it neatly. It looks presentable.
As Sayo goes off for breakfast, Kousetsu already gone, Souza stands and makes his way to the vanity. Tossing and turning at night (he doesn’t sleep, only follows the shadows that shift with the spinning moon) has made his robes a bit wrinkled, the collar slightly open. He fixes it, covers the mark on habit. It’s hideous, an ever-festering wound on his otherwise flawless self - and yes, he knows he’s beautiful, very much so, and he’s not sure if it is because that was his “true form” or simply the intents of his previous masters instilled in him to be a sightful gift.
(Who is to say the two aren’t related though?)
But the mark is a blemish, a stain, and doesn’t suit Souza’s appearance. Which is probably why when Heshikiri Hasebe saw it in the middle of one battle, registered its meaning, both of them knowing firsthand the man that carved it there - Souza felt dirty. Tainted. He still does. Always. The disgust and fear and rage bubble right under the surface of his skin, boiling on his chest like freshly heated broth spilling on his body.
Even so, Souza’s expression is relaxed as he watches his reflection tie his own hair up, sweep his bangs to the side so that they frame his face just so. The remaining tendrils crawl down his neck, and reach below his collar to--
He meets his dual-colored eyes. Others in the citadel have shown interest in them, shown by how they always meet his gazes. They see the strangely peaceful colors, so beautiful, and don’t give the smile a second glance. And that’s probably why they understand how Souza’s expressions and mannerisms are a bit dismissive. Flippant, almost.
Even now, his reflection looks back at him. They both smile.
It’s for no one’s benefit but his own.
“Spar with me.”
Souza is sitting on the porch, his toes just barely out of reach of the sunlight. If he stretched out more, perhaps his bare feet would meet the blades of grass below, and his skin could soak up the heat of the summer day. But he sits rooted in his seat, gazing out. Most of the others have left for the front lines, his brothers included. Souza stays behind, but it’s not surprising.
At the rather straightforward but gentle request, Souza turns to see Heshikiri Hasebe over his shoulder. The sight of him alone, a sword who was faithful to his master, to Oda Nobunaga, with all willingness and unquestioning pleasure - it makes Souza’s insides twist.
Instead, as always, he smiles. “What’s this? Were you not sent out to fight this day?”
“Our master hasn’t ordered it. Thus, I have stayed behind until my use comes.”
Don’t hold your breath, Souza thinks bitterly. But with an apt name of destruction alone, Hasebe has worth that far exceeds Souza’s. They both know it. The saniwa probably knows it.
Nobunaga knew it.
Hasebe beckons with a nod. “Spar with me,” he says again. “If we have free time, we should use it to sharpen our skills.”
“So to speak,” Souza says, with a small chuckle. It sounds like a scoff.
It goes ignored. “It wouldn’t do for our skills to rust.”
“I daresay you’re saying these things on purpose. You’ve a sense of humor under all that stalwart loyalty?” Souza almost laughs for real this time, but Hasebe’s expression doesn’t change. Figures. And so Souza plucks at his clothes. “I’m not dressed for sparring.”
Hasebe reacts to that. “If you get changed, we can meet around back at the sparring grounds.” Without saying anything further, he turns and leaves the porch.
Well. It’s not as if Souza’s day was exactly vibrant with excitement, so after sighing one soft breath of farewell to the outside fields and sky, he rises and makes to his room to change. When he’s done, he takes his blade - himself - his body - without looking at it. Even when he draws it, he does not look at it. To be fair, he thinks about it sometimes, knowing what it is like to be inanimate and stationary, to let out the blade for air, or carry it around at his side because he wants its fealty to be known and proven. But it’s an odd sensation, to handle himself while also being this new physical self with solid awareness. He feels as if his own eyes judge him and ask not to take pity on him.
At any rate, if he just leaves the blade alone, and never looks at it, perhaps he won’t have to confirm the engraving that could be at his tang. For it to have claimed him twice, to exist just the same on two different pieces of himself, is a nightmare he doesn’t want to know the reality of.
Hasebe is waiting on the grounds as he said, already dressed for combat. Souza’s anklet jingles softly as he approaches.
“You know,” he begins, tilting his head, “I don’t fight very often, whether it’s on the battlefield or just for practice. I don’t think I’d be a very good opponent for you.” He says it airily, and by now, he supposes it’s better to just be upfront with this kind of thing. Souza knows he is who he is.
Hasebe only bows, then assumes a stance. “All the more reason for us to meet like this.”
Souza mirrors the action in his own languid manner. “Alright, but don’t cut me up too much, please. The saniwa is good to us, but it doesn’t mean wounds don’t hurt.”
At that, Hasebe almost smiles. Then, he pounces.
It takes a fair bit of effort for Souza to keep up with Hasebe. Even with the base difference of their skill levels, Hasebe is just far more cunning and swift. He moves as if this is a dance, and he knows what the melodies of Souza’s movements sing out before he can even complete the tune. If this is a dance, then it’s something Souza has only fumbled with in the privacy of his own room, alone, where he can distantly hear the waltz play downstairs.
Souza swings right, but Hasebe has already clashed their swords together, pushes it away, moves to strike. The only reason Souza’s side isn’t cut is because he makes the awkward twist of his ankle work in his favor, pivoting out of the way. Souza’s movements are airy and fluid, almost slow and lazy like a summer breeze. But Hasebe is lightning and winter storms, striking at every movement, never letting up its energy and precision.
When Souza blinks next, Hasebe has him frozen, his blade hovering over his jugular. Souza inhales sharply, then his chest heaves slightly from his physical efforts.
“Slow,” is all Hasebe remarks.
Souza narrows his eyes, brushes the sword away with the back of his hand as if he’s moving a hanging branch. A minor inconvenience. Not like Hasebe could’ve killed him.
They assume their stances again, and continue. Wisps of breath and the resonating cling of their clashing blades are all that can be heard. The sunny world swirls as Souza dances with Hasebe, trying to find patterns in his movements, moving enough so that an opening is never given. Souza wills his mind to become something unhesitant and ruthless, to strike, to kill.
Souza lunges, right for Hasebe’s shoulder, but he parries, the tip of his blade then pointing right at Souza’s heart. It’s heavy, and pounding from the exercise. His skin is tissue paper, he knows, and right now he is powerless. He lets out a loud exhale of defeat, his bangs sticking to his forehead with sweat.
But Hasebe doesn’t lower his sword. He prods it forward, not in malice, but just enough to grip Souza’s clothing, to nudge the collar open.
His expression softens at seeing the mark, the seal of abysmal, hellish black on Souza’s pale skin. Souza isn’t sure if it is out of sympathy, or perhaps he was just looking down at him. Maybe Hasebe couldn’t forgive him for never submitting to Nobunaga.
No. Unforgiveness isn’t what he sees in Hasebe’s eyes. But it still burns like flames. If he could, he’d just step forward and let the mark be cut right into its heart and into Souza’s. Maybe that’d be enough to bring them both down.
“I thought you were the sword of conquerors.”
Souza smiles. It is not a pleasant one. He feels the malicious twist of his lips. “Sword?” he scoffs. “No. Just a symbol. Just presentation. A possession.” He reaches up, grips Hasebe’s blade, hard enough to feel the first bite of its edge on his flesh. Red runs slowly down his wrist.
Hasebe’s eyes widen at the sight, and he opens up Souza’s hand to pull his sword away. “What are you doing? Come, we should try to repair this.”
“No,” Souza says, and wrenches his hand out of Hasebe’s hold. Blood droplets fly out to get greedily soaked into the earth. He sheathes his sword and starts to walk away. Before he does though, he spits out,
“You are a sword, Heshikiri. I am not.”
There are two kinds of scars: the ones the powerful earn, and the ones the weak have no choice but to bear.
Souza has been in the hands of the powerful, proof of their conquests. Yet they held sway over him instead of him being their equal. Their power never rubbed off on him. He was still weak, and he was defenseless to the nightmares their hands and sightless eyes gave him. Souza was a bird that could easily be crushed with a fist. Frail flowers could not hope to hold any weight.
That was why, in the end, Souza lost.
Although Souza wipes up the blood from the cut he inflicted with Hasebe’s blade, he doesn’t have any intention of actually treating it. There are speculations that because of the saniwa’s skills, and the fact that these aren’t their “real bodies”, that cuts like these will heal themselves anyway in time. There’s no hurry for Souza to be mended though. If he just keeps his palm down and keeps the focus on his face and smiles, no one will be the wiser.
Souza doubts it will even leave a scar. Their “flesh” is unreliable like that. The steel of swords is much more dependable. When he was reforged, even when he went through the flames and having Nobunaga’s mark engraved in him - none of these things made his steel bleed. He couldn’t even say it hurt. That was the benefit of being inanimate. The pain he cried out in during these traumatizing times were something beyond physicality, which ironically should’ve been his only scope of reality.
Something had hurt back then, and during all those lonely years. Being “human” only serves to make it so much worse, so much more tangible. And it’s terrible. Souza didn’t understand how to keep the ashes in his cupped palms anymore.
Everything is
slipping
through
the cracks. And leaving him behind.
Souza flexes his injured hand, traces the dark red line with his gaze. Slowly, like a flower through the days, his fingers open up, then curl in.
“Here. This is my gift to you.”
“Please accept this.”
“It is yours now.”
“Shorten it so that it may suitably be for my hand. Then...engrave this onto its tang.”
Souza slams his injured hand into the wood of the wall, screaming. His nails dig deep in his palm, and his skin opens up again, bleeding. Souza doesn’t notice. He screams in frustration again and again and again and hits his knuckles to the wood all the while.
“Not yours,” he says, “not yours not yours not yours, never never never never never never. I AM NOT YOURS!”
He tears open his robes, panting, the world dizzying, but he knows exactly what his target is. Propped against the corner of the room, he catches sight of himself - the lonely blade, finally at last able to break open its cage--
With a clatter and shriek of resolve, Souza carves the tip into his chest over and over again. One slash, two slash, red rivers cascading down to soak everything. The blood looks black running from the darkness of the Demon King’s mark.
All Nobunaga is anymore is this mark. And Souza finally has the power to exorcise him from his body. While flightless, this bird still has a beak and talons with which to destroy his captor.
Shaking and out of strength, Souza drops himself to the floor with a clatter. In his blurred vision, he’s just able to make out the morbid smear of blood and cuts that have mutilated the scar Nobunaga forced onto him. His chest looks like a corpse husk torn open, the ripped shell a moth leaves behind to decay.
Souza coughs a bit, spits out blood that tastes like the forge and flames and powerlessness. Even so…
He smiles. Wide, and he laughs. With freedom and mirth. It’s out of tune, and hurts his throat.
Well. He was never a songbird.