Chapter Text
It’s been a week already. The boy has yet to speak a single word.
At first, Shouyou is obviously not surprised. After all, who knows what he saw, what he went through, what he endured and what he still lives with to this day. No need for them to have elaborate conversations to understand that this child has been traumatized, one way or another.
It is all in his eyes. In the skittish ways he walks next to Shouyou, always a little bit removed, further back, enough to be sure his back is not exposed but not far enough to be potentially distanced. In the fact that he’ll devour everything Shouyou puts in front of him but won’t sleep in his own futon, will keep his sword clutched to his chest and rest sitting down, head dropping and back surely hurting, yet against the bedroom wall – a safe position, one he certainly assumed back when he slept in the street and had to hide from stray dogs or ill-intentioned folks.
This is all okay. This is all perfectly understandable. Truly, Shouyou probably understands it better than anybody else – those days are long gone now, but the memories of his youth, of being hunted down are still fresh in his mind. He knows how it feels like, to be a child who is constantly hungry and afraid.
But he really thought that after a few days of proving he was trustworthy, the child would open up somehow. And he hasn’t yet.
This is obviously fine. They’re in no hurry – Shouyou has the eternity, and he’ll wait for that long if necessary. The last thing he wants is to scare the boy or make him feel like he owes him anything. He doesn’t. Shouyou doesn’t want him to talk – he doesn’t need him to talk.
He knows he’s not mute or disabled. Shouyou very much heard him scream, the first time he grabbed him by the back of his stinky yukata and dropped him in the river so he’d wash off the scent of corpse and entrails. He saw him open his mouth, let out a sound, then reconsider and keep quiet. He sees him nod, he obeys if Shouyou tells him to keep quiet or to get low, he sometimes throws him a little side glance when Shouyou makes a bad joke.
So he does understand Japanese. He is able to talk. But he won’t.
Shouyou tries telling himself that he just needs to be patient. It’s just been one week. They’ve only just arrived back in the town where he lives most of the time, where he owns a room and a small bathtub, after a few days of travelling through the country. From the looks of it, either the kid had never slept in a futon before, or it had been so long he saw it as luxury – that doesn’t mean he ever sleeps in it, but he did steal the comforter and the pillow as soon as he got the chance and built his own nest in the corner of the room.
Shouyou is used to silence anyway. He lived with it for a very long time and has learned to make one with it. Such a long time spent talking to himself and no one else – it is an improvement to talk to someone who can hear him, even if they don’t reply or comment on anything he says. It’ll come eventually. Just like with a wild animal, he needs to build trust – to prove that he’s safe, that there is nothing to fear, and eventually, they will be able to communicate through easier means than vague gestures and words thrown into the abyss.
They are faced with a few hurdles though. The first one – and biggest one – being that he still doesn’t know how to call him.
He thought about asking the boy if he could write his name – but it felt insensitive, considering what the boy seems to have gone through. He has a hard time imagining he was able to learn hiragana while scouting the battlefield for leftover food for hours on end, stealing weapons and clothes from dead men to survive war and winter. And if the boy does have a name, then he feels like it would be in bad taste to give him another one of his own choosing, just because it’s more practical.
So, they are quite stuck in this position. He calls him “little one”, “boy” or “kiddo” in the meantime. The boy clearly doesn’t mind.
One thing he does mind, however, that much is clear, is when Shouyou tries to convince him to bathe. He shies away from the water like a cat, no matter what he tries. Every time Shouyou tried to entice him to the little square room where the small wooden tub is filled up to the brim with warm water, he ran and shook his head nervously.
That’s another moment when he wishes he could simply ask him what the issue is. Is it the water? Is it the small room with a very small window to evacuate steam? Is it being vulnerable next to Shouyou? Is it being left alone in that room? He doesn’t know – the moment he suggests it, the boy always starts anxiously shaking his head and clutching his sword against his small body.
But it is getting dire. The boy hasn’t bathed in five days – and being dropped in the river didn’t exactly count as washing himself. This is getting unbearable, even if he changed clothes since then.
So he decides to bring him to the public baths. He tells himself that maybe, the change of environment will help. Maybe he’ll relax and bathe if there are other people around – peaceful ones, going through their own routines and not even glancing at him, like he’s just a regular boy going to wash up after a long week. Or maybe it’ll be worse. Maybe he’ll run the moment he sees other people. Maybe it’ll turn out he’s allergic to hot water. Shouyou has no idea. But he’s kind of at the end of his rope, there.
The boy follows him there without a fight, and while he looks intimidated then suspicious of the place, he doesn’t make a ruckus even when they get inside and it gets very clear what they’re here for. His hands slightly shake when he has to release the sword and leave it with their clothes, but he gets undressed, small emaciated body, still covered with bruises and scars that a child his age shouldn’t have – then keeps his head low and follows Shouyou through the steps.
From the looks of it, he’s been to a bath house before, so Shouyou leaves him to his own business and only keeps an eye on him from the side. He fills up his bucket and splashes it on himself, on his head, so frail looking now that he’s not hidden by his wild tufts of hair, his oversized yukata and a sword almost as long as he’s tall. He washes up mechanically, first his hair, his dripping locks almost reaching his shoulders, then his body, going over his arms, his torso, what he can reach of his back and then between his legs and down his thighs and calves.
Shouyou suddenly feels some kind of relief. He worried about nothing. The boy was probably just scared of the small and indeed claustrophobic room back at home. He can wash up on his own. He ties up his hair and makes the decision to leave him be for a little while, standing up from his stool and entering the bigger bath, the one with the highest temperature. At long last, he feels like he can relax for a little bit.
After a few minutes, he hears the quiet patter of steps on the tiles, and the slosh of someone entering the bath. He opens one eyelid and represses a smile when he sees the boy, settling down about two meters away, hands on his knees and head still lowered, but close rather than apart from Shouyou. At the other side of the room, some older men chat quietly at the mirrors, washing their backs with their towels. There’s only the two of them in the tub. It’s peaceful.
He loses track of time; maybe he falls asleep a little bit. But when he opens his eyes and stretches himself, enjoying the feeling of his muscles being completely relaxed after quite a few tenuous days – he notices that the boy’s head is even lower than before.
And he’s panting.
It only takes him a second. He stands up in a hurry and pushes a hand against the boy’s face – bright red, eyes glazed over. Panic takes over him as he grabs him from under the armpits and pulls him out of the bath – all the while berating himself for being such an idiot, for forgetting that a child this age, with what he can only imagine are several deficiencies, could not handle such heat for such a long time. The old men see him fret and free the space, offering small towels that they drench in cold water, softly dragging it on the boy’s face, on his mouth, and then carrying him to the changing area, where the air is cooler and he can sit down until he stops feeling dizzy from the heat.
One of the older men offer him a bottle of milk, and the child feebly takes it between his hands then downs it down – so fast Shouyou is worried he might choke on it. But when he empties it, arms flopping down on the bench, his eyes finally get some light back. He blinks, he drags a hand through his silver hair, he wets his lips – looking weak but alive.
Shouyou breaks down. He knows he should let him breathe, take it easy, but he throws him arms around the boy and squeezes him against himself, muttering apologies in his little curls. He doesn’t get any reaction, the boy keeps his arms against his body, and says nothing, as always. This only makes him apologize harder.
Later that night, after a very stilted dinner and an even more silent than usual evening, Shouyou is in his bed and cannot find sleep. He can’t handle looking left and seeing the little bundle of sheets against the wall, keeping his distances – because he’s probably right to do that.
Shouyou forgot it so easily, the ugly truth which is that he doesn’t know what he’s doing. He’s always wanted to share his knowledge, to transmit all that he’s learned through his very long and never-ending life. He tried once already. No need to remind himself how it ended – an older boy, with actual training, and Shouyou managed to get him killed. Why did he think he could do better this time? Why did he think he’s allowed to even try?
He’s a weapon of war and destruction. He’s only known this, in his entire life. Death and mutilation. Drought and fire. A night with no moon. A void. Empty.
How could he think for one moment, that he could help anyone, ever, when he can’t even save himself?
Sleep comes to him eventually, out of sheer exhaustion and and the aftermath of his long soak in the bath. He sleeps with his back turned to the child for the first time – he can’t handle looking at him. He can’t handle the proof that he failed, even with something as small as a trip to the bathhouse.
So imagine his surprise when he wakes up and feels a weight – solid, warm, shifting with every breath – right against his back.
He cannot move at first. He doesn’t dare. He’s afraid he’ll wake up and this’ll all be a figment of his own imagination, a dream, a fantasy he cannot afford to even indulge. But minutes pass, and the weight stays there. And when he finally manages to turn his head over his shoulder – slowly, the slowest he’s ever been – he sees the lump of sheets from before. The tufts of silver hair. The glint of his sword.
The boy is not settled against the corner of the bedroom – he’s right on the edge of his futon, almost completely on the tatami, against Shouyou. Sleeping. His back pressed against his own. Being vulnerable. Feeling safe.
Shouyou turns his head back with a jolt, so quickly this time he briefly wonders if it woke him up. He doesn’t breathe for some very long seconds. But as soon as he lets go, as soon as he starts breathing again, berating himself for being so silly, he softly buries his face in his pillow and allows himself one single tear, one tiny sniffle of relief and genuine gratefulness.