Archive of Our Own

I might owe you an apology. All that’s happened was directly or indirectly due to my actions, even if it wasn’t my fault.

Allow me to explain.

I don’t remember exactly when it all started, but it was a simple time, where people worked the fields for their own food and homes were scarce and shared. Magic was worshiped and sacred, only given to those with the power and will to wield it. But, sometimes, we didn’t know we had been chosen for such great deeds until we had no choice.

I was a normal girl. I lived with my father and we were happy together. My sister had long since left our house, married to a merchant from another village, and visited once a year with my nieces. I hadn’t found anyone, but it was alright. People said I was pretty and sometimes men courted me, but I always declined. I had to help my father with the fields, he didn’t wield a hoe with nearly as much strength as he once did. And he never said anything when I returned home without a man to wed, so I’m sure he didn’t mind me staying with him.

But then he arrived. He was strange at first, with lilac hair and light blue eyes, and when I talked with the rest of the women in the village they agreed they had never seen anyone like him in those parts. While he acted like a merchant in his travels, looking for unique items to collect and sell, we started to wonder if he wasn’t a prince instead, in search for a bride, and laughed away at his expanse.

He was persuaded to stay in the village until our crop festival, and that’s when I learned his name. Me and another young girl had to dance together by the fire, in calling for the spirits to give us their blessing and grant us another fertile year and, in the midst of the heat and the sweat, of the shadows and the beat of a hand on the tanned skin of a cow, it’s said he noticed me. He introduced himself and asked me to dance with him when our elders started playing and singing lighter tones, meant for everyone to dance by the fire at will. I accepted without too much worry. I still love dancing, and Shigure wasn’t half bad, not to mention cute, even with his strange hair and bewitching eyes. It was a very fun night.

I was shocked when he came to our house the next day, claiming he would stay in the village a while longer, and wished to know me better. I readily declined his offers, standing by my duty to my family, but he proved to be persistent and stubborn to a fault. At first, he tried to win my heart over easy compliments and gifts, but I was well raised, and the women of the village warned me of the dangers of accepting such caresses. He kept telling me how pretty I was, even with my hair drenched in sweat and dirt on my skin, but he started picking up a shovel himself and giving me his scarf to clean my face when we were done. I was beyond speechless every night, wondering why he wouldn’t just leave with every worse rejection I could think of giving him, as he came back stronger. It was like my own stubbornness fueled his. Like we had been made for each other.

When my father put his foot down and told me to accept his help without further question, I started going easy on him. Maybe I would’ve done so even without his order. I don’t know when it happened, but it’s the kind of thing you just know. He had earned my heart somewhere down the line, but I had earned his. How, I’ll never know. I don’t remember being particularly nice to him until I suddenly was, and with my age, I know being pretty doesn’t justify the kind of love we had. Even after my father’s sudden death, I didn’t feel lonely with him, singing by my side, as the year ended, and we harvested another good crop with the rest of village. He had the most beautiful singing voice, and he knew an entrancing melody of unknown origins that touched the heart. While the sun was out he shared everything good he had with everyone, but when the moon was out he was mine alone, giving me all of his tender love, hiding from the silver light and the cool breeze outside.

The day he proposed to me and offered me a chance to go on the road with him with a renovated caravan and travel the world was one of the happiest days of my life. It made me sad, leaving the village where I grew and lived for so long, but I was also eager to see all the things he told me about the world outside.

But then…

We were days away from leaving, and, as the sun was setting, I had gone to get the rest of the wood for our fire when a hooded figure approached me. I believed it to be a youkai at first, eying me like a predator, but when it spoke it was a woman I had never heard.

“Are you the one they call Midori?”

My face must have given her all the answers she needed, and I never repeated that mistake again. Before I could even speak a massive crow with eight red eyes, embellished with green feathers, appeared behind her and its claws grabbed me. I was too afraid. When I came to, I was deep inside the woods, trapped in a cage made with twisted trees and branches. The witch was there, waiting for me to wake up, holding her white wooden staff like I’ve held it, hand on the ice blue stone.

I was barely up from the floor, with my head still aching, when she started questioning me.

“Why did you steal him from me?”

I was confused, of course. I had never stolen anything.

“What do you mean? I’m afraid I’m not the one you’re looking for-”

“Yes, you are,” she said, standing up in a flash of anger. I was even more scared and jumped back to the wall of the cage. “I saw you casting your charms. Actually in love, he says…”

That’s when I realized she was talking about Shigure. But he had never mentioned that witch, and I had never seen her before, even if she claimed to have been watching us. I let my thoughts transpire again.

“I don’t blame you for wanting him. He is a work of art, I might say,” she said with a smile that me want to vomit. I had never thought of him like that. “So, he’s never told you about me.”

A branch lowered to support her as she leaned backwards, crossing her arms but keeping her staff on her hand, and she spoke with a twisted smile.

“My name is Shiroko, and I am, as you might have guessed, a witch. Shigure has been my thrall for many years, ever since I saved him from the brink of death when that thing he calls a caravan was raided by a band of bandits. As the obedient thrall he is, he was happy to do anything I ordered him to, including keeping me company when I was lonely at night.”

I felt sick, disgusted and angry that he had never told me that, and her smile grew wider as my face twisted. To be honest, I still feel angry every time I think about that, but I would go about it in a quite different way today.

“I let him roam free every now and again, when I have other businesses to attend to,” she continued, pulling herself from the branch and walking towards the cage. “When he said he wanted to have his way with some girl in the village, I obliged. I knew he had done that and discarded many others after getting under their skirts, why should this be any different? He was meant to come back to me. But then he fucking falls in love?” When she stared at me again all of my emotions left and I was only afraid of losing my life again. “Easily fixed. Drop your charms. Now.”

I can only look back and think about it, but the fear helped me at the time. It didn’t allow me to show how hurt I was with Shigure after hearing the whole story. She would eventually realize I wasn’t a witch and didn’t have any charms on the man, but she continued rambling, that killing me would just have the same effect. I was sure I was going to die, trapped on that cage. It was so long ago, but I remember so well, how the fear and the despair made me try and open the branches behind my back, only to realize magic was much stronger than my own strength, and how it made me shiver and sweat, unprepared to meet my end for something that wasn’t my fault.

And it woke her up. My one true ally, my only companion, my best friend. It was only power at first, but power with a voice, echoing in my mind and ready to defend me. I let her, of course. Nimble manifested for the first time, a nine-tailed fox as green as the leaves and blue as the rivers that course the forest, with shining yellow eyes that glared at the witch who threatened to take my life.

To her credit, she didn’t even blink. Her crow spirit manifested as well and Nimble leapt at it without thinking. I felt her pain, but it was distant, as if she was trying to defend me from it. We’ve never actually fought again after that. But I was helpless again, and Shiroko was glaring at me, readying a glowing orb on top of her staff.

“Die, witch.”

I was screaming when she threw it my way, and I covered my eyes. But nothing hit me, and she screamed at someone else. When I opened my eyes again, Shigure was standing in front of my cage, with another spirit next to him, a white coatl with red-brown membranous wings. We had been told since we were young that spirits only belonged to nobility and sorcerers and, while I didn’t fit in either group and didn’t care, he was also holding a staff. I couldn’t reach that conclusion at the time, but it seems obvious that a witch’s thrall has to learn some of her tricks at some point.

“Out of the way, Shigure!” she shouted.

“No! It’s time to stop this nonsense!” he yelled back. I was at least relieved he was on my side, and I wanted him to kill her more than anything.

“Not until you’re mine again!”

She held her staff above her head and called lightning down to their feet. I still don’t know how she had gotten so much power, being as crazy as she obviously was. The coatl spirit shielded Shigure while he conjured a shield that was soon protecting both of them and my cage. Nimble and her crow kept battling each other when we could not, and I gave her all the support I had.

“Shiroko, listen to me!” Shigure bellowed, getting the witch’s attention. “I am grateful that you saved my life and I would be your thrall until the day I died. But I don’t love you. I thought you had realized it, you don’t treat me with respect. All these years I felt like I was your pet, obeying your every command, not a true companion and much less your lover. And then you let me court someone else? What did you expect would happen?” He pointed towards me and what he said afterwards almost made me forgive him for everything he hid from me. “I love this woman and I will defend her until I die if I have to!”

While I felt my heart warm up to him again, she glared at him and his snarling spirit, but she didn’t do anything else at first. Then she closed her eyes and called for Blaire, and the crow left Nimble alone to be absorbed into her skin, appearing as an aspect on her forehead. I thought it was all over. Oh, how I wanted it to be all over.

But it wasn’t meant to be.

The image on her forehead glowed and the dark light passed onto the stone on her staff. Then she opened her eyes and gazed upon us with the black void of her soul. As she raised her staff she gained altitude, lifted by an ominous wind, and spoke clearly in a voice that reverberated on the forest and trembled the earth beneath us.

“Curse you! Let your firstborn bring misery to your family, on this life and the next, until the end of time, and let you watch and be powerless to stop her! Let it all happen when the Moon dies on the First month of Ice, the cursed day when I decided to be merciful!”

“Shiroko, no!”

But his plea met deaf ears. A dark mist erupted from her staff and threw us all down. I hit my head on the back of the cage and I passed out.

When I came to I was back home, alone with the man I loved. I had Shigure explain everything that happened, and he was compliant to every question I asked, including, begrudgingly, how he had bed that witch. I was livid for days. He told me how the power the noble houses on the country had been built on a lie, as the spirits appeared to whomever they pleased, and urged me to keep Nimble hidden. Her aspect has always been above my left buttock, so she was always very easy to hide. I had seen Shigure’s coatl on his chest, but he had claimed it to be a charm granted to him by a sorcerer on his travels. He fooled me well.

Our wedding happened on the village and our journey went on as planned. We traveled the country buying and selling spices and furs, for the most part. I quickly found out Shigure’s talent for words had been used for more than just women, as he masterfully put the deal into what was most favorable to us, even if sometimes that wasn’t exactly fair. We lived well, and we had fun, sleeping under the stars for so long. Those were such carefree days. He got me two gifts I cherish dearly, a silver medallion I gave Hina, and a necklace with a beautiful red crystal that had a much more tempered fate. We even forgot about the witch and the curse, or at least we didn’t care enough about it. He said there was nothing he could do against it, but he’d try and find a way to break it. I remember when we arrived at cities with libraries, he’d spend days inside while I took care of our horse and our cart, but he never came back with something to brighten his mood. I remember I always had to do it when he was crestfallen and worried.

Eventually I got pregnant. We didn’t have a plan against the curse, but we couldn’t let the baby ruin our family and our life. It was the most painful decision I have ever made, but we didn’t see any other way out. When Edonisu was born, we were far on the north of the country, and we gave her to an old couple Shigure knew from his childhood. Our hope was that she could grow happy, away from a curse that she wasn’t to blame. Even if it meant growing away from her parents.

We were still on the road when the moon died on the first month of ice. We didn’t even stop the caravan that night, restless, with our spirits close by and watching our backs for anything that could come to threaten us. But when the sun rose, we were both alive and well, and the next city was in plain sight.

We decided to return to my village after that. We had money to live comfortably and we could settle down and work the fields, try to make a family with the curse being pushed away. Everyone welcomed us with open arms and we danced on the crop festival, just like when we had first met. I even thought everything would work out.

And then, a few weeks after we arrived, Shigure vanished.

For the longest time I was left only wondering what had happened to him. I knew he was too smart to have been caught by the nobles because of his spirit. And when the people of the village started, little by little, to forget I even had a husband, I knew it was her doing again. Maybe she was tired of waiting for the curse to do its thing, or maybe pushing our baby away from us had truly broken it. Either way, she had me at check. I was pregnant again, and if no one remembered him, the baby would suffer the most, labelled as a bastard’s child.

Yes, Hina was his daughter, too. It was the only secret I’ve managed to keep.

Whatever Gods I prayed to heard me, for an old friend of my father offered to marry me to hide the origin of the baby. He only knew that a stranger had arrived and taken my virtue with him on his journey, and he’d help me in my late father’s stead.

It was painful living with that lie, but I had to for my little girl’s sake.

Sixteen years passed in a heartbeat. My second husband died and eventually it was only the two of us, just like when it had been only me and my father. I thought so much about Edonisu during those years, and it never got any easier. But Hina was my smiling treasure, full of energy and willing to help, either me of the others on the village. She warmed my heart and lightened everyone’s day. So, when she fell in love with a mischievous boy, the orphan who lived with the leader of our small community out of his charity, I was more than happy to give them my blessing. I actually liked Tai quite a lot, even if he loved to play my Hina a couple of pranks. He was crafty, he did it to get her attention, and boy did it work.

Nimble and I felt something stir on the air one day, as if the wind had gained a will of its own, and I sent her out to find out what had happened. She returned claiming a spirit had awoken in Tai, and we decided to have a word with him about it. But it was harvesting season and the chance never came. It was two days…

I should’ve pushed him against a wall and put a dagger on his throat. Or maybe that would be too much. Out of all the mistakes I’ve made, not talking to him was one of the most benign.

Just like Shigure, Tai vanished without trace, two days after Dragoon manifested. Well, not entirely without trace. I had Nimble watching him at the time. He had been coerced by one of the lord’s soldiers to follow him, under the threat of taking Hina instead. I was so mad. I have no idea how they found out about Dragoon, but I didn’t care. I told Hina to forget about him, hoping she’d listen to her mother, but, other than her looks, she took after Shigure and not me.

Late one afternoon as I was sewing an old dress, Nimble and I felt another energy on the air, but stronger and closer to us, as if it had been born from us. I dropped everything and rushed into the woods, releasing her when we were out of sight to run ahead and find our daughter. She told me to look to the sky, and I saw Hina on the claws of a white dragon with a mane of feathers, chasing after another spirit. Nimble turned back to pick me up and we chased them to the mouth of a cave. I hate being eavesdropped, but that was my daughter with a boy I had never seen before. They had apparently helped each other escape more noblemen’s henchmen and were drawing out a plan to release Tai from captivity.

I’d do the same for Shigure, if I knew where he was, so I let them continue. We were going to follow them and keep them safe from the shadows.

Their plan was naïve, and it obviously failed, but when battle broke out Nimble and I were ready to assist them. We defeated most of the spirits loyal to the lord of the mansion and forced them out. Instead, the entire village was brought inside its walls, me included. I mingled perfectly with the crowd and met my daughter in the confusion, told her I had been worried and demanded answers. I scolded her for leaving to look for Tai without telling me anything and told her I was very proud she had been chosen to wield such a powerful spirit. And I was. But she didn’t have to know I had been chosen first.

I was worried when the village appointed her as their new leader and tried to talk her out of it, but she, Tai and Kenichi had set their minds to make things right and demanded answers from the lords. I had never cared about their lie because I had never been caught with Nimble, and I might proudly add I never was, but all of them had been exposed and didn’t want to live in fear of losing their loved ones because of a power that was rightfully theirs. I could understand.

The mansion was the targeted by several attacks over the following weeks, and while we managed to fend them off it was clear we couldn’t stay there. Instead, Hina decided to leave and look for more summoners to aid their cause. I followed her, of course. The entire village did.

I liked the warriors she surrounded herself with. Ryoga was from across the sea, and we had great conversations about the culture that surrounded him and his village, claiming that those who could call upon spirits were honored, and not forced into subjugation, as it seemed proper. Daichi was almost like Tai’s little brother, always butting heads against each other and trying to see who was the strongest, but he was a fierce fighter and his mere mention could strike fear on enemy lines. Kaito was hard, but he warmed up to the group as he recovered from his injuries and chose to stay and contribute with his spirit and his skills with a sword.

He should’ve left.

And then we reached Makoto’s fortress. His hair was light and yellowish, strange like Shiroko’s platinum or Shigure’s lilac, and I later discovered his mother had come from across the sea as well, but from the east and not the west. They all came from that strange place they call America these days, or at least their ancestors did.

It was decided a handful of spirits would stay behind to defend the fortress and the villagers, while the army moved out to reach the Emperor. However, I kept following the army, donning a disguise designed by Nimble to make me appear as a young girl traveling with the cooks and the healers. She is very good at making illusions.

The war was hard on everyone. There weren’t just people who had been forced to fight for the nobility on their ranks. Mercenaries and many of the lords themselves had mighty beasts to serve them and act on their wishes. While Dawn is a dragon and can do whatever dragons do to tear their foes apart, her power is mostly protective, and it allowed Hina to heal men, spirit and even war horses and dogs. With our force refreshed after every fight, we pushed through towards the capital, ready to face the Emperor in person, and Tai even talked about taking him from the throne if he refused to meet their demands. I don’t think the nobles were even letting the Emperor know what was happening in the lower houses, or he would’ve stepped up to clean the mess long before anything could escalate to the level it did.

I had feelings long before we reached that valley, with the mountains that flanked the capital just within our sight, and I hoped they wouldn’t mean what I imagined them to be.

But Shiroko was far crueler than I had anticipated.

A missive arrived to intercept us and presented us with another spirit wielder we had to face. She should be impossible to recognize with her long robes, but I knew like a mother does. Edonisu had been captured by them and used her spirit, a terrible hound capable of controlling the darkness within everything, to attack us. I couldn’t even conjure Nimble. For the first time, my feelings because visions, and in the middle of the attack I dropped to my knees and I saw. Red over white as the full moon mingled away and vanished in the night sky, and the ominous words of that dreadful witch.

“Sisters, who share their blood, will also share the feeling that haunted me. At that time, when one dies so shall the other, six months after, until the end of time.”

The curse hadn’t been broken. She had never even told us exactly what it entailed until that moment. The army was forced to retreat and recover from the surprise attack. It gave me time to recover from the vision. The first month of ice was almost upon us, and I had to save my daughter.

I made sure there would be no attack the following day from either side before I made my move. With a cloak over me, the appearance of an older woman and my red crystal on my neck, I entered the nobility’s encampment claiming to be a wise woman who wanted to read the good fortune of the men fighting for our country. Nimble helped me made the disguise work, making the jewel shimmer with visions of her own design, as we imagined what these people wanted to see. Soon we were left to our devices, when the few soldiers who were entertained by us fell asleep.

I expected to find Edonisu incarcerated, but not on an open tent with pillows and fruit. The nobles valued her and wanted to give her the bare minimum to keep her comfortable and ready for battle. But that wasn’t what tore my heart. The tent was open, yes, and she was shackled to the floor by her feet, which shouldn’t be a problem for a spirit as powerful as hers. No. What made me go into despair before I even heard her voice was her fading presence and the lack of glow in her eyes. She had no hope of leaving that place. I should’ve known better than to try and force her, but I tried anyway.

“Miss,” tears were coming to my eyes, hidden by my hood, but I kept talking when she looked up to me. “You must escape. You are in danger.”

“Who are you?”

“A wise woman from the South,” I answered, showing my crystal to her but keeping my face hidden. “Heed my words, fair lady.”

“What do you mean?”

“A terrible curse has been brought down on your family, many years ago, and you will suffer its consequences if you stay here.”

“Has my father been cursed?” she asked, gaining a glint of worry on her eye. Oh, she was just like Shigure on the outside, but on the inside, she was me, through and through.

“No, my child. That’s not the one I mean.”

“The parents who abandoned me, then.”

“They didn’t do it by choice,” I said, letting the pain get to my voice. Then, I took a deep breath, and I told her everything. Except for the most important thing. “A witch lost her thrall to a farmer girl and cursed them, so that their firstborn would bring them misery and despair. They couldn’t find how to break the curse, so they gave you away, hoping you’d have a chance of happiness away from them. If you stay in this army, you will die at the new moon on the first month of ice, and with your death, your sister will die as well.”

“That does sound like a tragic curse,” she said, looking back down to her hands, resting easily on her lap. “I never knew I had a sister…”

“She is Hina, the one people call the Priestess of Light,” I knew I was losing her, but I still tried to bring her to my side with the one thing she seemed to respond to. “She is in love with one of her most trusted warriors. When you fall in love, you two will be tied in blood and soul, and meet the conditions for the curse to be fulfilled.”

“Then there is nothing for you to fear,” she said, gesturing with her hand outside. “There is no one here I could nurture such a feeling for.”

“I must insist-“

“If you are a wise woman, why don’t you know about my father?” she asked in a cold tone. She didn’t look at me, but I shivered. “If you want to help me, find him. Guard!”

It was Nimble who forced me not to take her away against her will. I didn’t have time for anything else other than turn around and leaving. Every time I think back to that conversation, I imagine I said things differently and had her come with me. Why couldn’t I do it before? Was it too hard to admit to her I had been the one responsible for her fate? Who had left her on that house so far away from us?

I cried the rest of the night with Nimble’s head on my shoulder to give what comfort she could. And after that, I spent every night away from the camp. Every little pocket of time I had was spent searching for the man I had entrusted with my daughter. Nimble was always separated from me but we were connected in a way that distance couldn’t touch. I saw everything she saw and talked to her at will. I stayed awake at night to keep giving her power to continue her search. I even collapsed and forced her to return when we didn’t anticipate. Meanwhile, the war continued, and with my firstborn’s help, the lords seemed to be finally regaining ground. I didn’t care. I had to find that man and bring my daughter back, even if it cost us the war. I had to fight that curse, I had to prove I was better than Shiroko. I always knew I was better than her. But her plans didn’t fail. At least not at the time.

The first month of ice was coming and all I had found was how a string of sleepless nights felt. I left my tent for a bit of fresh air and I saw Hina leaving for a nearby clearing. Nimble was with me, so I asked her to keep an eye on her and fetched some water. When she said my two daughters were talking, I asked her to meet with me and rushed to woods. Edonisu’s spirit was carrying her back to their camp. I asked Nimble to get their attention with the glow on her tails and they did come down to meet us by the tree tops.

“I need to know where your father is.”

“You’re the wise woman from the South…”

“Yes, but I need to know where he is. We’ve looked in every single fort held by the nobility but didn’t find anything.”

“If I knew where he was I would’ve been gone months ago,” my daughter said, lowering her head in defeat. “I apologize for doubting you. I fell in love with someone I barely even know.”

My heart ached in pain. I was so absorbed with trying to find her adoptive father, I hadn’t even considered the possibility of that happening. How could I have been so blind? That was another mistake I would not repeat. And, drastic times require drastic measures.

“Who is he?” I asked. Rather, I ordered her to tell me his name, and she felt my intentions while Nimble questioned my rash decision.

“Why do you want to know?”

“That is not of your concern.”

“You’re not a wise woman, or you’d know who he is from the start.”

“No, but I am your mother and you are going to me tell who he is!”

A spark of anger lit on her eyes, but I was angry too and not intimidated by her.

“My mother died when I was five years old. I have no ties and I do not care about my blood family. Dusk!”

With a deep growl her hound turned into a dark arrow, but Nimble had been one the spirits that gave birth to it. Dusk’s attack pierced us but didn’t harm us. Edonisu was surprised with the result, but merely turned back around and left. And I howled at the night for my failure.

It was just as the witch had foreseen. In the middle of the battle the following day, while Nimble had stayed out and tried to keep Edonisu’s safe, she was pushed aside by Dusk and my daughter was slain by Kaito’s sword. And I was powerless to prevent it.

That was the first and the hardest. So many after that followed, each of them harder than the first, but none of them riled with so many of my mistakes as Edonisu’s death. I never forgave myself for allowing it to happen. And Kaito never forgave himself for having done so. It didn’t take long for me to realize he had been the one she fell in love with and, in a twisted spin, true to the witch’s nature, he killed her while loving her as well. Cheated and hurt beyond words. I pity him when I look at him that way and I curse him and wish him dead by my own hands when I think of his on the other side of the sword that pierced her heart.

Edonisu’s death triggered the end of the war. Everyone returned home after the final treaty was signed. Tai talked to me about asking Hina’s hand in union and I gave him my full support as his friend. And then, before he could actually ask her, she fell ill and never recovered.

We moved to the first mansion we had conquered and Hina stayed in the master room, with Tai and Kenichi guarding her, while everyone else left to find a cure.

Makoto set out to find the mother of the Priestess of Light, having been left in his fortress, but I was long gone from there and people assumed I had died of heartbreak, watching my daughter lead the ranks of an army. I let them believe that. Kaito set out to find the woman with the red crystal, thinking I had the answers they were looking for, and particularly looking for answers of his own. It was time to leave my life as the Priestess of Light’s mother for good. I decided to return to my disguise as a wise woman, and I obliged to him. With Nimble’s help, I showed him everything. How I had met Shigure, how we had been cursed by the witch, how Edonisu and Hina were born and how they grew apart from each other, how they had been connected to the curse by their blood and their feelings, and how he was responsible for everything that was happening.

I shattered an already fragile mind to pieces. But I was angry at him. I left him with my crystal, ready to show a vision to Hina when she got her hands on it and returned to the mansion before he did, keeping my disguise as a friendly cook. She had never seen me wear that necklace. I kept it hidden, my own private memory of Shigure. I was ready to part with it and keep him only in my heart.

Six months is nothing now, but back then it was so much less than that. My daughter’s life was slowly being drained away and no matter what anyone did, no matter how hard they searched for an answer and a way to break her curse, nothing they found was enough.

I remember like it was yesterday. I was helping the other girls on the house with the laundry when I heard Tai’s wail, coming from the balcony of the master room. A genuine cry of pain.

It still hurts more when I think about that cry than when I think about the picture of her death.

I was prepared for that. I had six months to prepare for the inevitable. And, after the inevitable happened and my daughter no longer needed her sham of a mother at her side, I set out to do one other thing I had prepared six months in advance. Nimble found the witch and dropped my disguise. I was going to face her just as I was, a farmer girl whose only crime had been falling in love with the wrong person.

She was in a clearing, giggling away at something inside an orb of light and talking to her staff. She fooled me so well. She noticed me and urged me to join her, she had something nice to show me. I knew there was nothing nice about her, but I wanted to get close anyway. She turned the orb of light my way and showed me how Edonisu and Kaito talked quietly by a lake, as their feelings slowly but surely grew, and then how Hina died in the middle of a passionate kiss with Tai.

“How dumb do you have to be not to enjoy a man’s heat for six months? And he was more than willing to give it to her!”

My fists clenched so hard, my fingernails crossed my skin and bled when she laughed her heart out over his pain.

“How could you?”

“I should ask you the same thing,” she said, jumping straight and looking at me in the eye. The aspect of her spirit wasn’t on her forehead anymore, which confirmed my suspicions. She had sacrificed it in order to create the curse. “Those girls were living proof of my thrall’s infidelity. Why should I have to keep them alive?”

“And those two men? They were good people and they had nothing to do with your pathetic curse.”

“It’s their fault they didn’t listen to their hearts and do the right thing,” she answered with her nose stuck up in the air. “Especially that Kaito guy. What a cruel thing, love can be.”

“You’re the only one who’s been cruel here. Why did you take everything away from me?”

I shouted. Deep down I wanted to understand why she had done all those terrible things, even if I knew I’d never get an answer that would satisfy me.

“I didn’t fake my death so that I didn’t have to answer to my daughter on her deathbed. I didn’t lie to my daughter so that I didn’t have to tell her how all of her misfortune was my fault until it was too late to change her mind. I didn’t steal away a witch’s thrall, had sex, and two daughters with him with absolutely no regrets,” she pointed her staff towards me. “You deserve everything that’s happened to you, pathetic little woman.”

Our rage was shared, and it flared into life with her last words.

“NIMBLE!”

A burst of energy emerged from me and collided with the spell she prepared, but Nimble made short work of it. She forced the witch down on her face, bit the staff from her hands and tossed it my way. It fell right by my feet, but I paid no immediate attention to it. The witch’s laugh was getting on my nerves.

“Are you going to kill me?” she asked with glee on her eyes when I looked down to her and pulled the dagger I had prepared for the occasion.

“You bet I am.”

I don’t understand how someone could laugh while they’re being cut open, as if it’s all a bad joke. For a moment I thought I was playing right into her hands, but I had to forget about it.

I deserve everything that’s happen to me?

What about the way she treated Shigure?

What about what she had done to Tai and Kaito?

What about my daughter dying during her solace?

What about my other daughter being killed by her only solace?

She was the only one who deserved what I was giving her.

I learned the cuts from the best butchers in the country. They wouldn’t catch any main blood vessels neither did I want them to.

I crafted the poison with instructions from an old alchemist. It wouldn’t kill, but it would give her excruciating pain until she either gave up on living or I decided to be merciful and stabbed her heart.

And I was not merciful.

When I was done I reached for her staff and planted it in front of me. It became a sort of trademark pose, standing up with my staff in front of me and my hands both laid on its stone. The poison started to work, and her laugh became shouts of pain. She even begged me to stop. I offered her no such gift. Both me and Nimble stayed there, across each other in perfect silence and stillness, me holding her staff, and she holding her body, basking ourselves on her screaming and her pleas. It was thrilling while it lasted, and I have no idea how long it lasted.

But she eventually died, and we felt empty. Shiroko died in agony and thinking about it fills my crying soul with joy. But it’s ephemeral. I always knew killing her would never solve anything. That was why we were prepared for another deed, to be made that night as well.

My spirit left her cold body and laid down behind me. I dropped the staff and produced the dagger again. And, in one simple movement, I pierced my own heart.

There was nothing left for me other than a death with my only friend. I sat on the floor, leaning on Nimble, and we waited, as my blood steadily left my chest. I didn’t even feel the poison at work, at it should have happened.

But death didn’t come to me.

I sat there and wondered for so long. The answer was obvious once I remembered it. I even felt stupid not to have thought about it sooner.

“Until the end of time.”

The curse stated I’d watch my daughters die until the end of time. How could I die before then?

Blood still dripped from my chest when Nimble and I got up, accepting at least the fact that we were immortal. She returned to her home inside of me and I took the witch’s staff for myself. I had no idea how it worked, but I didn’t care. It looked pretty. It could remind me of my mission, if I even had one from that point forward.

I returned to the mansion in time to watch as Hina’s body leave for Makoto’s castle, where they had decided to put it. Only Kaito didn’t show at her funeral. No one knew where he was.

I stayed close to Tai for a while, to try and support him as the girl who had battled with them from the army’s kitchen. I was there when he handed my medallion, that I had given to Hina and had been given to me by Shigure, to one of my nieces. She was a nice girl. Both of my nieces had husbands and were starting their own families. I envied them, of course. That could’ve been my future, or my daughters’ futures. Instead, we had all ended up with nothing.

I followed Tai as he returned to the village and helped him steer towards a girl who liked him for more than just being a war hero. I stayed there for a while and watched their family grow. He was a good father, but he still wondered about my girl, gazing at the night sky once in a while with a deep sigh. His spirit never showed again, but I could feel it in his sword, just like I had felt Hina’s spirit sleeping in my medallion. I didn’t know what drove them to do that, and for a very long time I didn’t bother with such thoughts. Naturally, they had to believe they were needed in the future, but I couldn’t fathom what for.

Three years after Hina’s death I left the village, and I never returned.

Without a particular destination I decided to track down Hina’s warriors. Daichi was easy to find. He had returned to his homeland in the heart of the country and was living like a king, reaping the rewards from his hard work during the war. He had never really cared about girls, only good food and drink, but when I left he had his eyes on someone with a stomach just as big as his. I don’t know how his story ended, but I think he was just fine.

But he was the only one left in the country. In Makoto’s fort I found only a steward who sent me out towards the sea, where they had last seen their leader and his best friend, Kenichi. So, I boarded with a spice shipment set for the land they now call China. Eventually I found Ryoga, on his home town with a family of three young boys and a beautiful wife. He welcomed the formed cook of the army he had served on with open arms and told me how Makoto and Kenichi had set sail to the country on the east of the archipelago, where Makoto’s mother had come from, looking for scriptures and other lost knowledge that could save someone like me and my daughters from their fate in the future.

I was so touched by his story. I almost cried in front of him. I left that village the very same night.

I kept travelling west. I don’t know why, but I followed a feeling, you could say. Nothing like what Shiroko had given me before of my vision of despair. It was something of my own design. Eventually I reached a cold land, broken by mountains and lakes, where the snow reminded me of Edonisu and her death, and I knew who I was looking for.

When I found him, Kaito was on the brink of death. Anyone would’ve called it meditation, the way he was sitting in the blizzard in fake concentration, but I knew. My red crystal danced with the wind, its chain held firm on one of his hands, burning with his spirit trapped inside. I planted my staff in front of me, faked the voice of another man and talked. I knew he wouldn’t turn around to face me. Not then.

“Why are you here, child?”

“I wish to die.”

I was so close to turning around and leave him right there. But my daughter had protected him before. I needed to hear from his own voice.

“Why?”

“I’ve committed a terrible sin. Betrayed the only one I have ever cherished. Betrayed my own heart. There’s nothing left for me in life.”

“She wanted you to live, Kaito.”

I dropped all pretenses, all of my disguises, and he turned around at the strange voice and the mention of a name no one on that icy land should know.

“So, you’re going to live.”

What would it feel like, as the last person you see before you collapse from cold, is someone who knows your name and your deepest secret? Hope? Despair? I guess I’ll never know.

With Nimble’s help I took him to a monastery and made sure he would survive before I left again. How many years had passed since he killed her? Four or five? What a trivial amount of time. There was so much more left to suffer, and even then, even if I knew it wasn’t his fault, I could never truly forgive him.

Finally, I decided to find Makoto and Kenichi, and I did, in America, before they boarded a ship back home. They seemed close in a familiar way. Who am I to judge who loves who? I didn’t ask for their results. I doubted they had found anything.

They all died. I kept living. Afraid of what else the curse had in store for me, I traveled far and kept traveling. I have been on the five continents of this small planet more times than I can count. I have seen every single corner of every cave and I have sat on the peaks of every mountain, looking down with wonder at the clouds and the snow that chilled me to the bone without being able to triumph over my curse. All I wanted was to run. I had burned the curse in my mind, and I knew it said I had to watch my daughters die.

But what if I never met them? What if I never found their reincarnations? Could I fight the curse like that? I had an eternity to try.

And I failed. No matter where I went, they always found me. Edonisu and Hina, with the same faces and the same personalities, no matter where I traveled and in what wretched hole I crawled into, they found me and offered help. Even if I ran to the other side of the world, they were there, and they died in front of me. Sometimes due to the actions of their loved ones, others because of misfortunes or strange diseases. The result was always the same.

Meanwhile, the world around me changed. People stopped being able to manifest their spirits on their own, using objects to house them instead. Then they stopped being able to commune with their spirit altogether, save for a select few in abbeys and sacred locations of meditation. And then more years passed and there was no one left who shared a bond like Nimble and me.

Around that time, I was approached by individuals of a secluded clan, who claimed to know who I was and about my curse. They claimed their ancestors had fought in the war with my daughters, and, in order to protect the world from such devastation, they had vowed to seal away the Sacred Beasts, the spirits that remained in the world. If I helped them achieve their goal, they would help me break my curse. It was an interesting offer. They did ask me what had happened to the spirits of my daughters, which they called the Equilibrium, and the Holy Spirits of Hina’s warriors, and I told them they had perished with them. If their goal was to seal those spirits, why should I have to tell them that those were already sealed?

I only discovered that they didn’t believe in me recently. It was smart of them.

In the meantime, Nimble and I helped them gather most of the remaining spirits and watched as they sealed them in several stone tablets, to be hidden across the world. It was something different and refreshing, compared to all the running I had been doing up until then.

But one of them fell in love with one of my daughters, and then he was responsible for her death. Not directly. But he was. And then he tried to hide it from me. Did they forget I have a second pair of eyes and ears watching everything I can’t?

In my rage I almost destroyed their petty clan and their work, but I remembered not to stoop down to Shiroko’s level and restrained myself. I merely left the village after yelling at their incompetence.

It was then I decided to try a different approach. In my travels I had learned, and I could use that information to make a name for myself. The Industrial Revolution gave me the opportunity I was looking for and I gathered quite the large sum of money. I kept investing, conservatively, and I used the money to change who I was after each generation. My name was always Midori, but my surname was what I felt like. I worked in coal, engines, fashion, agriculture, furnishing, and jewellery. I tried using that influence to watch over my daughters, not only with Nimble’s help but with whomever could be paid to keep an eye on them. Instead of being nowhere I was being everywhere. And I was good at it. I couldn’t prevent their deaths, but I could learn from every mistake I made. Sooner or later I would succeed in protecting them.

I noticed something shifting as I started to chance my way of acting. Another feeling, whenever they managed to confess their love to someone else. But it was never enough, and they died again and again. It didn’t take too much of that for me to get to the conclusion it was another of that wretched witch’s tricks. I ignored that feeling ever since.

I had just begun a new business as a jeweler with several mines, most of them in Africa, when beyblade stopped being an idea and became an actual thing. I had seen something of the sort taking fruit during my time, but they were used in rituals for the spirits. Thinking about it as a sport was something that had never crossed my mind and it amused me during my free time. With it, spirits returned, housed on their metal and called bit-beasts, which peaked my interest. I decided to throw some money in and watch the scene grow, but most of my focus was still on my daughters. They hadn’t emerged in a while and I was restless to find them.

And then, when I was on a business journey to Russia, close to the place where I left Kaito, I came across an abbey where children were housed and trained to play beyblade. It seemed to be more than what met the eye, so I demanded a guided tour from the one responsible. Boris seemed to be reliable, and with a couple of well-placed questions I got him telling me all about his plan to use bit-beasts to fuel a weapon that could be used to dominate the world. Devious, but simple. As he needed quite a lot of children to accomplish that goal I offered him a deal. I’d contribute to the funding if he found my daughters and gave him a thorough description of both. With a deep bow, he assured me he’d find them and let me know as soon as he did.

The fucking bastard.

When he introduced me to our other partner in a social event the following night, Mr. Hiwatari was joined by one of his grandchildren. Even if he was still very young, I recognized Kaito in him. He even had the same determination of his eyes. After the event, Nimble kept a close watch on the boy, following my hunch. The reincarnations of the warriors weren’t uncommon, and if he had surfaced, it was possible my daughters would follow. And that location was no coincidence. Days after I left Russia, Nimble watched as Voltaire presented his grandson with a beyblade containing great power. Dranzer was successfully called by Kai, who looked at the phoenix in awe, but also like an old friend.

I never found the crystal, but it wasn’t hard to infer about what happened to it.

Sometimes my daughters would fall in love with reincarnations of Kaito or Tai. Sometimes they fell in love with others. Sometimes they fell in love with people that had nothing to do with that long-gone war. I let young Kai live and kept searching for them. I knew something was different that time. Their spirits emerging and reuniting with the people who had first conjured them. Could it truly be possible? For all of them?

I confirmed my suspicions rapidly. Dizzi found her way to Kenichi’s personal computer. Daichi housed Strata Dragoon, not awaken yet, but it was only a matter of time before it manifested somehow. Ryoga had been bestowed with the bit containing Driger. Makoto’s present grandmother gave him her medallion with Draciel on her last will. And Dragoon stirred inside the rusty sword, resonating with Tai’s new soul, eventually responding to his summons and making its new home on his beyblade.

Finally I found Hina’s family, and saw her leaving home and going to school, in such a carefree way it tightened my heart. She was Tai and Kenichi’s classmate, and I could feel a spark forming among the two of them again.

But I set out again in search for Edonisu. And, for the longest time, I couldn’t find her.

I kept a close eye on those children, as they rose to the top of the world of beyblade not once, but three times, each more impressive than the last, getting directly in Boris’s way more than once. It served him right for trying to take the world as his own. But I could not find Edonisu. I kept giving him money to rebuild and find her for me.

How stupid does one have to be?

Then I hired Tyson’s brother to find her. He appeared to be very reliable after masterfully directing his little brother to do exactly what he wanted him to do.

And he was. He was the one who found her. Already fifteen years of age. They ran from a group who had kept her captive, away from my many eyes and ears, but she was crafty and vanished when he dropped his guard. I was furious when he said he had lost her. When we located her again, she was recovering in Tyson’s place.

That was the first time my daughters knew each other before tragedy befell them. I had Nimble and Hiro stay with the group at all times. I needed to know if they truly fell in love and when, so I could strike. They trained for a tournament made from Boris’s will and my money. He wanted revenge from the Bladebreakers, for everything they had done against him and his plans, so he had something personal planned for them during the championship we were preparing at the end of November that year. On the first month of ice.

He didn’t tell me what his plan was, and I didn’t ask. I had so many eyes on him, they could tell me when he sneezed. I should’ve done that before.

I only saw them all for myself at the opening ceremony for the tournament. They were all there, in front of me, but I was no longer their equal. I was in charge of the entire show. I was there to make sure nothing happened that didn’t suit my interests.

That’s when I saw them. Not reincarnations, but people that didn’t belong. A girl who barely paid attention to anything around her, a patient red-haired who treated them both like a mother, and a boy with a lupine face who looked directly at me as I observed them. It was like he knew exactly who I was. My grip on my staff had tightened before I even realized it, and then they were gone. Not even Nimble could find them.

What she did find, however, made me more furious than I ever remember being.

Boris had hidden Edonisu away from me since her birth and planned to use her as a central piece to his revenge plan against the Bladebreakers. One glance at Kaito after he found out about it told me everything I needed to know about what would happen next.

I waited for Boris to make a mistake and made my move. When she was put on her own on the Russian compound, I prepared to infiltrate Hiro on the compound, so he could rescue her. And when Nimble told me that Kaito had managed to find his way inside the complex, I told her to kill him. But she was rendered unconscious and returned inside of me but a force I still don’t comprehend. I tried to connect to the security cameras, but they had been deactivated. It was my plan to deactivate them before Hiro went inside. I had no idea what was happening. I ran to the complex, trying to understand what I had done wrong that time. I can only guess who was responsible for everything that happened that night.

But Edonisu had been saved. That was all I needed to know.

As planned, Hiro got her to safety shortly after she regained consciousness. He was being helped by a group of children who also had her well-being in mind. As long as they kept her safe I didn’t care how many people joined her. I prepared an excuse to get them all on a boat and away from the island. I could dispose of Kaito in the middle of the sea without raising too much suspicion and continue from there.

But Zagart stopped me. Zagart. One of the few men on the world with more power and money than me. His constructed son was friends with that group. My entire plan fell apart in front of my eyes. But I rebuilt it. Hiro was keeping my girl safe. If he could do it for a couple more days, I wouldn’t lose anything.

On the other hand, when Boris’s entire plan fell apart again, he flew into a rampage and created a precise tremor with his machines that triggered the explosion of the dormant volcano on that island. I had never planned to keep him alive after learning what he did with Edonisu, but that excuse was more than just perfect. With Nimble’s help, I crippled him, flipped a desk over him and locked him inside a room in the collision course of the lava. And then I felt it again. That feeling whenever one of my girls had been true to their love and their counterpart. I dismissed it and left, telling Nimble to watch what they were doing. I surrendered my ship to the group and allowed everyone on the island aboard. No one should die by a volcano, except the ones who truly deserve it.

Hina was in trouble for a while, but with Tai’s help she managed to escape before I had Nimble intervene. Everyone survived the eruption. And then she confessed to him and he confessed to her in front of an entire crowd. I did more than just giggle, I laughed as I watched that. Maybe that’s why I didn’t readily realize what had just happened as they kissed.

Instead, I turned to the sea and let Nimble return inside of me. I didn’t have to wait for long. Hiro appeared with descendants of the Saint Shields clan. I scolded them lightly. They weren’t to blame for their ancestors’ mistakes and had done well in their task. I also didn’t blame them when they refused to kill Kaito for me. I was so used to doing things by own hands it didn’t even feel like a problem at that point.

But they knew. How did they know that Shigure was sealed inside of my staff? How did they know how to release him? Why should I even care?

I finally died, right where I most wanted to.

Aah, I can’t believe I’m actually dead.

Do you want to know what brings me the most joy?

I became a grandmother. After all those years.

I’m so proud of my two girls.

I can’t wait to be in his arms again.