Archive of Our Own

He bends his knee at the foot of a blond lord whose tiny shoulders are weighed down by robes in purples and blues.

Nine years now and only two seasons older, his eyes reflect intellect and education. The royal's skin isn’t seared by the summer sun. Pristine. Smells of sandalwood. Look of luxury. He could melt into the backdrop, blend in with those elegantly painted walls.

Foreign smells and sights and concepts unknown to a masterless swordsboy.

.

Daring to snap and growl and challenge the world, the little ronin's chin is always raised in the presence of the young lord. Masterless he may be, but not yet desperate enough to bow his head.

The lord smiles behind his sleeves, and his smaller brother and sisters join in his amusement and jeer, until a classic snarl from the stray jolts the little ones to huddle tighter at their eldest’s knees. The lord remains unflinching.

The stray is all bark.

.

On the lord’s thirteenth birthday, when the humid summer is singing with cicadas, a gift from overseas arrives at the castle.

Shrouded in a oddly patterned cloth in blues as stunning as the young lord’s eyes, it’s passed from the daimyo's hands to his eldest son with a grimace.

“Father says I’m not to let her out the cage.”

The lord’s eyes never leave the falcon in his stupor. Mesmerized as the silver wings flap and yellow beak snaps. As though searching for any truth about his mother through her gift, a concept as unknown to the royal as it is to the ronin. A concept only ever painted in raging hues by the daimyo’s belligerent ire.

The falcon’s wings unfurl, casting a brief and astonishingly wide shadow over them before launching into the sunlight in a silver sparkle.

“But she never flees,” the lord boasts, chin craned up at the sky. “She likes me. She’s a good girl.”

The stray eyes the lord’s gloved leather hand, unable to recall the last time he took it off, and sneers with a hint of skepticism and ill-concealed jealousy.

.

The lord is in hysterics.

The bird slowly dies in his shuddering hands. Shot down in flight right before their ever watchful eye, and caught in time before her spine broke from the plummet. On her back and motionless, she seems dead.

Calloused hands move to snatch up the limp bird despite a traumatized cry of protest. Bringing the wound to his lips, the stray sucks, spits the poison at the ground, and dives down again, bloody mouth disappearing into the plume of feathers.

Disturbed, in awe, of the the desperation blazing in those green eyes, the lord stares speechless at the savage sight.

The poisoned dart had come under the daimyo's orders. By an attendant’s own whispers does the stray learn of this.

He’s careful to not be as clumsy, resolved never let this news pass to the lord’s ear. But it’s several days later that he sees the lord’s prideful, impish glint has sharpened to a distant and removed hatred as he rehabilitates his grounded falcon.

.

The fortress talks. Whispers from attendants behind corners and closed doors of the unwanted bastard child that plagues the daimyo’s household like a blue-eyed disease.

“You understand, don’t you, Yuuichirou? Look at me. Daimyos are not blond. Daimyos do not have blue eyes. I’ll never rule.”

As the lord turns his back, a hummed melody floats in the air, and the stray recognizes it to be from the Russian music box given to the lord on his fourteenth birthday.

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As small children ronin learn never to compare themselves to their master:

Keep low. Keep humble. Keep distant.

You are a warrior. Your life is not your own.

When the lord first teaches him letters and numbers, the stray resists the pull at first.

What need is there to learn to read? He’s gotten by fourteen years without the knowledge.

What need is there to write his own name? If ever written down on paper, he knew there would still be nothing spectacular in writing.

‘Yuuichirou’ isn’t as fascinating as ‘Mikaela.’ The latter rings of something alluring that, despite his discipline, cannot be resisted, no matter how many walls he fortifies around his heart.

.

The wall crumbles completely one night, when the ronin and lord are fifteen.

A chilly winter night. In the astronomy tower they call their sanctuary, the stray bends his knees and bows his head. Pledging his sword, his life, to the lord. His lord.

“Why?”

He doesn't answer. Instead, he peeks up through a veil of hair to see the surprised curve of the lord’s mouth, emotions impossible to untangle and unravel in those eyes. Carefully masked, tucked away under pretenses and lordly formalities, but underneath that veil is something too vulnerable, the ronin knows.

The stray ducks his head and utters his oath again. With more promise, purpose.

.

They flee.

Weighed down by long robes and plated armor. Snow crunches at their feet. The swordsman urges them to press farther, to run faster, because the smoke still stings his nostrils and the screams are still freshly heard.

A distraught sound stretches from the whistling wind, breaks through their huffs:

“Yuuichirou.”

There’s no time to stop and look now. There's no time to mourn.

It was a coupe. A massacre by the invading forces that were long thought to be squashed and caroled underground in their stone cities untouched by sunlight. The daimyo and his lineage are dead, the castle is now charred twigs, and the surviving son pleads with his swordsman in resignation.

“Yuuichirou, please. Leave me. Let me die. I'm a monster now. Look."

There's neither a sound of agreement or denial.

"Damn it, look at me!”

The one order the swordsman refuses. Unwilling to accept the reality of his failures etched in the blood-red eyes of his charge. He keeps running.

.

They travel by night.

Rogues roaming across the land.

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Highlighted by the moonlight, the falcon circles for prey overhead, waiting for her keeper to continue onward.

The gravel path stretches out before them. Winding and curling into the mountains.

 “Haven’t you rode horseback before?”

Thoughts interrupted, the lord’s eye falls from his bird to the saddle on the beast, eyeing it like those mountains in the north waiting to be climbed. Noticing that hesitation the guard unclasps his sword, bends his knee, and pats his thigh, welcoming his lord to use it as leverage. Offended, the lord bristles and puffs his chest.

“Yes, of course. I know how to ride.”

(They both know swordsman's natural skill at horseback outmatches the lord by miles.

They both know the lord will stretch the truth if it means his guard will not think any lesser of him, who has since been carried piggyback for a twisted ankle, needed a day’s more rest than originally planned.)

The swordsman scoffs. “Then by all means, my lord.” His sarcasm is punctuated with a humble bow, knowing the royal to hate formalities. Formalities had burned with the castle.

A palm shoves against the back of the swordsman's exposed skull, and a yelp of laughter bursts from the retainer's lips.

.

“Don’t—“

Lips curl back from the snarl. Wild like the animal he truly is. Crouched on all fours, lowly and bent at the ground. Small and injured, the lord shivers underneath his charge's shadow; he can feel it, a tremble in the still air.

There’s no need to look below him, only the desire to protect the wounded lord from the enemy vampire and the sunlight. (Pristine arms, now the color of charcoal. Indefinite scarring. Once again, he had failed his master.)

The swordsman digs his fingers into the earth, palms red from the indents left by his nails.

“Don’t you dare touch him.”

Eventually the vampire falls to a blade, but takes with it to dust a small victory.

He doesn’t remember the last time lord has criedーwhen? not since the falcon, most likelyーbut he assures his charge that this is nothing, that the loss of one eye is nothing. He should have sacrificed more.

He bends his knee to utter his oath, but the earth tilts and wobbles beneath him and his sword falls from his hands. He collapses.

.

“Hyakuya.”

The unknown word drifts off into the night and tangles with the lord's hum as the Russian melody slows to an end. The swordsman peers to his side, urging a response.

“Hyakuya?”

Quaking fingers brush against the swordsman's scarred cheek. Never as steady as they once were before the burns. Permanently weak.

“Last name,” comes the confirmation. “Do you like it?”

“Yours?”

“Ours. Do you like it?”

A breeze tickles the lord's cheek, teases it until he’s leering at his charge with a half- smirk.

“Are we married now?”

Where the lord expects laughter, there's only silence.

One green eye stares back. Pensive.

“Married. Family. Don’t give a damn. We can be whatever you want, Mika. I don’t care. I just want to be with you. Not just as your guard. I want to be with you. Always.”

The lord laughs.

It’s the first time the lord has laughed since the castle’s fall, unhidden behind sleeves. Laughter that flirts the boundary between dreamy and skeptical.

The swordsman suggests an eternity together so casually.

The only one destined for eternity is Mikaela.

Yuuichirou will die.

.

“Where are we going?”

So quiet, the question is almost lost as it is murmured into the blond hair. The lord had decided to lead on horseback today, with his guard's hands clasped over his as support. But the lord was leading them away from the planned route towards the mountains.

“Home,” answers the royal, simply.

The swordsman notes, distantly, his lord has grown much more severe and resolute since the fight with the vampire, and decides not to challenge this strange declaration.

“I want to have a garden," continues the charge after a pause. "I was never allowed into the gardens at the castle. This time, I’ll have my own. Plant it myself.”

“You fool. Your handsー”

“I will be fine.”

”...You’ll need help.”

“You're too heavy-handed. I’ll just have to teach you that not everything needs to be cut with a sword. I can teach you more, too. More than just how to write your name. I can teach you so much, Yuu.”

It dances in the cool night like a whispered proposal. Overhead, the falcon traces the gallop of the black horse below.

“Home." Yuuichirou sighs at length against Mikaela's back, tastes the words. Smiles. “Home. That sounds nice.”