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CH 1 | Pickled Herring
The mansion came to life.
Late at night, amidst the mid-winter storm, wooden beams creaked and groaned under the weight of the snow-covered roof. Strong winds groped along the exterior walls and pushed their way inside through any crack or crevice they could find, filling the silent places with piercing screams. The windows themselves seemed to rattle in fear from the powerful gusts beating against them. A deep chill ran down Hikari’s spine. She blamed the cold and how it seemed to creep deep into her bones, but when a particularly strong gust of wind caused a branch of a nearby tree to pound against the window, she couldn’t help the racing of her heart, dropping the full basket in her hands. It dropped to the floor at her feet as she let loose a gasp in surprise, sending neatly folded towels and rags scattering across the floor of the dark hallway. Hikari slapped a hand to her chest to calm her nerves and shook her head at her reaction, gathering the clean laundry around her. She paused a moment, kneeling on the floor, listening to the sounds of the storm.
She was still getting used to working these overnight shifts. Not so much scared of the darkness that settled within the mansion within those hours, but, more so, for the silence. The type of silence that made every noise feel loud. Every footstep. Every breath. Every dropped item and clinking of a glass. Even every thought that went through her mind might as well have been an explosion within silence like that. It made the noises from the storm far more frightening. The lack of idle chatter and general sounds of life to soften them.
Gathering up the last of the dropped towels, Hikari sucked in a deep breath to calm her nerves before standing back on her feet. It had been a long night; that must’ve been why her nerves were shot, she thought to herself. Her usually quiet and slow shift was abnormally busy today. A group of young slayers had been brought to the Butterfly Mansion earlier in the morning after a mission went a little awry. As such, she found herself with a growing list of responsibilities. Usually, her nights were spent housekeeping, more or less, managing stock and preparing whatever was needed for the work to be done the following day. Boring and manageable. But, after the hectic morning the mansion had, Hakari found herself with more patient check-ins, laundry, and cleaning than usual.
A sudden flicker of light pulled Hikari from her thoughts. It was faint, streaking out into the hallway from a recovery room down the hall. She placed her basket back onto the floor and walked over, sliding the door the rest of the way open before peeking inside. All the beds in this room were empty, save one. A young boy sat up in his bed, his head turning from the curtain-less window to the opening door, a candle lit on the table beside him. “Ah, medic!” Despite the late hour, his voice was a cheerful boom in the quiet space, as if trying to be heard over the winds still beating against the mansion. Hikari gave a quick bow of her head, shuffling into the room. The young boy’s eyes seemed preternaturally wide and bright, watching her with a certain intensity she could only attribute to a fellow slayer, as she walked to the edge of his bed. Yet, warmth also resided there - a subtle upturn of the corners where his smile reached his eyes and the candle’s light making them glow, to her, like dusk in the summer, when the deep red of the sun dips low on the horizon and fades to soft orange and yellow before it meets the night sky. His head slowly tilted to one side, eyes focused as if trying to discern her features in the dark. “I don’t think I’ve met you yet,” he said.
Hikari gave a low bow. “Sakurazawa Hikari,” she told him. “I’m the overnight attendant here at the Butterfly Mansion.”
“Rengoku Kyojuro,” the young patient replied. Without thinking, he made an attempt to bow, the action sending a shock of pain to jolt through his body. He clutched his left side, a deep groan hissing through his clenched teeth. Hikari rushed over to prop him back up.
“Is the pain keeping you awake, Rengoku-San?”
A deep breath of a laugh huffed from his nose. “Not until now,” he told her, grunting as he adjusted his position, hand still clutching his ribs.
The corners of Hikari’s lips twitched into a smile, humming a small laugh. “With your injuries, Rengoku-San, you should be resting.” She grabbed the chart on the edge of his bed and perused it as best she could by the soft candle light. “Your chart shows you had been given a sedative earlier that should have had you sleep through the night.”
Rengoku’s eyes rolled away from her. “I’ve only just woke up.” His voice suddenly went sheepish, as if he had been scolded, setting his lips in a tight line.
By the way he kept picking at the edge of his blanket and his eyes looking at anything but her own, Hikari surmised that he had something on his mind. Not a hard point to grasp seeing as he was now opening and closing his mouth as if wanting to say something but choosing against it. She quirked an eyebrow. “Is there something I can do for you?”
The young boy’s eyes flicked up to hers. “Could I bother you for…” He paused again, humming as if thinking over his request. “…for something to eat?”
“Oh!” Hikari’s lips pulled into a wide smile, his nervous demeanor over such a simple request making a soft laugh bubble past her lips. Suddenly, the realization of the time of night pushed her laugh back down her throat. “Oh…” she repeated, the tone more thoughtful this time as she began to think about what exactly would be available in the kitchen at this hour.
“Would it be too much trouble?”
Hikari inwardly laughed at how desperate Rengoku was looking at her, eyes wide and pleading, like a cat begging to be let inside during a rainstorm. “Depends on how high your standards are.”
Rengoku’s face lit up within the dark room. “Ah! Well, anything hearty and nutritious to aid my healing would do.”
“Hearty and nutritious?” Hikari’s hands flew to her hips. “That might be too tall an order at this time of night!”
“Then whatever you can muster, Sakurazawa-San, would be greatly welcomed.” Rengoku smiled softly, his deep laugh coming out in brief huffs. No doubt the action brought him discomfort.
“I suppose I shouldn’t be making you laugh,” Hikari observed with a downward pull of her lips, “considering your injuries.”
“Maybe not,” The young boy hummed, wincing again as he readjusted himself in the bed. “But it feels nice to laugh.”
Silence settled around them. It wasn’t awkward or tense, but something that enveloped them comfortably, like those brief moments just before sunrise, before the world wakes and everything is still. The sounds from the storm came flooding back into the room - the shrill howling of the wind whistling through a crack in a nearby window. Hikari made a mental note to find the issue another night and fix it before it could become a bigger problem. She then shot the young slayer a playfully determined expression. “I’ll try my best,” she told him. Rengoku mirrored her expression, giving her a quick nod before she scurried out the door.
Grabbing her basket from the hallway, Hakari walked through the dimly lit mansion, dropping the linens off in the supply room for later, before making her way to the kitchen. As she expected, the kitchen had been cleaned after dinner, not a speck of anything left behind. She thought over her options for a beat. Knowing, though, that Rengoku gave her the impression of being quite hungry, seeing as it roused him from sleep, she opted to pull together some preserves from the pantry. Cooking anything would take too long and she did not want to keep him waiting. She pulled together a tray of fermented vegetables and preserved fish, throwing in a few red bean buns for good measure, hoping it would hold off the young slayer until breakfast. With all she could muster, Hikari carried her tray back to the waiting patient.
As she reentered the room, Rengoku’s face brightened when he noticed the tray in her hands, bright eyes shining in the candlelight. She placed the tray atop the slayer’s lap. “I hope this serves for the time being, Rengoku-San.”
He hummed in thought as his wide eyes carefully considered the food before him, gaze narrowing, playfully judging her efforts. His mockingly critical gaze softened into a closed-eye smile. “Thank you, Sakurazawa-San! Despite the late hour, you seemed to have pulled together a hearty and nutritious meal!” Hikari bowed her head, hiding a small smile. A surge of pride flickered in her chest at his praise, feeling a pathetic sense of accomplishment from such a simple task. “For your efforts, please share this meal with me, for you look as if you're hungry yourself.” Rengoku handed her a piece of bread from his tray with an encouraging smile.
A sudden feeling vibrated through Hikari’s body, taken aback by the ease of the offer from someone she barely knew. She couldn’t name it. Shock. Surprise. Confusion. Something kept her frozen in place, keeping her from politely and immediately turning down his offer to focus on her work. Her eyes blinked unnaturally, a sudden flutter of her lashes batting against her cheeks. Slowly, timidly, she reached out and grabbed the proffered bun from Rengoku’s hand, and, without a thought, she sat herself down on the edge of his bed. Her ‘thank you’ came out in a slow whisper, brow drawn in confusion, as she stared at the bread in her hands. Rengoku didn’t seem to notice the feelings she was so obviously displaying, too busy with the food in front of him. Or, if he did, he was polite enough not to ask her about it. “How long have you been the overnight attendant here, Sakurazawa-San?”
“Only recently,” Hakari answered, her words slow and quiet. She took a timid bite of the bun, as if testing the waters, but as soon as the soft bread and sweet bean paste hit her tongue, she couldn't stop how eagerly she finished off the rest of it. Apparently, this young slayer was able to notice something in her she had not yet been able to notice herself - she really was hungry. “Kanae-sensei was kind enough to offer me a place here, to teach me the healing arts that her and her sister, Shinobu-San, have implemented here at the Butterfly Mansion.”
“A very honorable role indeed!” Rengoku hummed loudly in satisfaction after swallowing a bit of food, his eyebrows shooting to his hairline. “I have heard many good things about the Kocho sisters and their talents. Especially Hashira Kocho! While I have never had the honor of fighting alongside her, I have heard she is very talented indeed with her flower-breathing style. My father has mentioned her many a time.”
Hikari bit her lip at the mention of Rengoku’s father. She was, of course, familiar with the pillars of the Demon Slayer Corps and, as such, recognized the young slayer’s family name. At first, she had thought the person before her had been the Hashira himself but quickly remembered that he was supposed to be older. “Your father is the Flame Hashira, isn't he?” Rengoku gave a curt nod in response. “I have read that your family has quite the lineage in the Corps. You must be very proud to carry on the responsibility.”
Rengoku’s eager chewing came to a sudden halt, swallowing hard at her statement. Hikari could just barely see a flash of something in his eyes before he turned away, suddenly fixated on the window beside them. This time, the silence that fell between them was awkward. She followed his gaze out the window and watched as the snow fell gently onto the ground outside. Neither of them had noticed, but at some point the storm had stopped, dying down to nothing more than soft snowfall. “It’s suddenly so quiet,” Rengoku observed. Hikari looked at him, watching his bright eyes as he looked out toward the inky black night. She mentally berated herself for her comment about his family. Obviously, she had struck a nerve and she did not like the idea of causing any sort of distress to someone who had been so friendly to her.
His eyes then turned to hers, his mouth pulling into a wide smile. “I love the snow! Don’t you?” His voice returned to that cheery boom he had introduced himself to her with, as if he was purposefully pushing back whatever feelings she had trudged up for him.
Despite his previous flicker of a feeling, Rengoku’s smile was genuine. Hikari found herself wanting to mirror his smile - so wide she feared her cheeks would hurt, so bright it beamed through her eyes and leaked out of every pore, so honest and earnest that it put others at ease. “I do.” She did her best to match the tone of his voice, desperately trying to crawl back to that casual feeling they were sharing earlier. “Especially when it’s like it is now. When everything out there is so quiet, and I’m inside sitting by a nice fire with a kettle of tea.” Her smile turned soft, recalling a feeling from her old life within the fog of her memories.
If it were physically possible, the young slayer’s smile widened. “My brother loves when I take him out to slide down the snow that piles outside of our estate!” A huff of a laugh came from his nose as he recalled all those times. “I hope I can heal quickly enough to do that with him this season.”
“You seem to have a strong constitution, Rengoku-San,” Hikari told him. “I’m sure you’ll heal in no time.”
The air between them loosened from its previous tension, allowing the young pair to relax in each other’s company. Both of them eager to forget the late hour. They sat side by side, enveloped within a bubble of amber candlelight, getting lost in conversations about past snow days, favorite meals, and, honestly, whatever else came to mind - finding things to say about everything and nothing at all. Their murmured words and soft laughter went unnoticed by the rest of the residents within the Butterfly Mansion, hidden beneath the soft whistling wind and flurries of snow, as if the world outside had decided to give these two some reprieve from their heavy lives - their respective burdens lightened from their shoulders for this brief moment. Pain and worry forgotten.