PRESENT DAY

“Kisaki! Lady Kisaki, where are you?”

Shitoro stopped in the hall, feeling quite exasperated. Where in heaven’s name was that ungrateful whelp of a child? She was late for her lessons again and if her mother found out, he would share in the scolding.

Late, that one. Always late and always up to no good. Why, if he had his way, he would have long ago taken a switch to her backside. He would have taught her the true meaning of resp...

The diminutive tiger demon sniffed the air and sensed something behind him a moment too late.

The attack came without warning. He was thrown off his feet and went sliding across the exquisitely carved but damnably slippery floor. Before he could push himself up, he was pinned as a weight fell upon his back.

“Gotcha!” a cheerful voice said into his ear. His attacker reached down and pinched his cheek playfully.

Shitoro’s teeth were as small as he, but they were sharp. He turned his head and bit the hand of his harasser before he could think better of it.

“Ouch!” Kisaki cried, jumping away. “You bit me.”

Shitoro pulled himself to his feet and dusted off the regal red of his robe. He rounded on the girl, his teeth bared. He’d hoped to teach her a lesson, but upon looking up at her face, he saw only mischievous good cheer. “Impudent whelp!”

“You’re just mad because you’re getting slow in your old age,” she chided.

“Old age is meaningless to ones such as us. We’re immortal.”

She bent down and poked him in the stomach. “Too much good food, then.”

Shitoro swatted her hand away. Yes, he thought, definitely in need of a switch to the backside. “I’ll have you know I have fit into these same robes for at least five centuries, long before I was charged with dealing with your childish antics.”

“Oh, don’t be grumpy, Shitoro,” Kisaki said, her face turning serious. “I was just having some fun. I’m bored.”

“Then you should study more so as to keep your simple mind occupied. In fact, that’s why I was calling for you. It’s time to...”

“Not more lessons!” She leaned back against the wall and sulked, for a moment appearing much younger than her age – making a face one might more expect from a toddler being denied a toy. “All I ever do is study.”

“Of course you do. Your mother has high expectations for you. A lady of your standing should be knowledgeable in the ways of the multiverse.”

“I’ve been studying that stuff for years.”

Shitoro crossed his tiny arms and stared up at the much taller girl – almost the same height as her mother, he noted. Kisaki had inherited her mother’s flawless skin and exquisite looks, but her hair and eyes were both several shades lighter. Ironic, Shitoro often considered, that the daughter of Lady Midnite should possess features more closely related to the morning sun.

In human terms, Kisaki appeared to be a girl in her late teens, but appearances had nothing to do with one’s true age in the celestial palace, something Shitoro had to constantly remind her of.

“One does not learn the intricacies of billions of years of rich history in the span of barely six decades. It is doubly impossible when one spends so much of that time whining about it.”

Kisaki’s face fell and Shitoro knew he’d won, for now. With each passing year, she’d grown more willful. Despite his official status as her mentor and guardian, he knew his job would only continue to become more difficult.

That was a worry for another day, though.

“Come along, child,” Shitoro said, leading the way to Kisaki’s study chambers. Her steps were light, but his hearing was excellent and he heard her falling in line behind him.

“Maybe we can study somewhere else today,” she suggested hopefully after a few moments of walking.

“If you wish,” he replied. “Your bedroom, or perhaps the walled garden.”

Kisaki’s steps fell silent behind him and he turned to find her again pouting. “That’s not what I meant. I’ve studied there hundreds of times.”

“Yes, and they have somehow managed to survive your tantrums.”

“I’m not having a tantrum,” she replied before sticking her tongue out at the little tiger demon. “I’m just bored. Maybe someplace new will, I don’t know, stimulate my mind.”

“I sincerely doubt that,” Shitoro muttered. “Besides, you know the rules.”

“The rules are stupid.”

“The rules were put in place by your mother. Perhaps you would prefer an audience with her to let her know how stupid you find her judgment.”

That finally gave Kisaki pause. Shitoro knew the girl wasn’t afraid of him by any stretch of the imagination, but she knew better than to risk a tongue-lashing by her mother. He almost wished she’d push the point. Watching Lady Midnite at work was pure pleasure, something he would never grow tired of despite his relatively new station as the girl’s guardian. “I thought not,” he said. “Now come along.”

Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.

Kisaki paused for a few moments longer, stopping and staring at the door leading to her mother’s audience chamber. Beyond it lay the exit to other wings of the celestial palace, places Kisaki had never been.

Sadly, he mused, noting the heavy reinforced bars sealing the door from the inside – bars he himself oversaw the construction of over seventy years ago – despite her inclinations to the contrary, Kisaki would never be permitted to explore the rest of the palace.

It was for her own well-being.

♦ ♦ ♦

Kisaki fumed at being rebuked yet again. All she wanted was a change of pace. Ever since she could remember, she’d seen the same walls, the same floors, the same faces. True, she had servants, and yes, she lived in finery – never being hungry, never feeling threatened – but it felt to her like a prison nevertheless. She’d read about them in her seemingly endless studies, knew they were where those who broke the law were put to serve their sentences. She also knew they were designed to break the spirits of those trapped within.

Why couldn’t Shitoro, or her mother, for that matter, understand that her spirit would eventually break, too, despite everything that was provided to her?

Her mother was free to walk the halls, or so Kisaki believed. At the very least, she spent a great deal of time in her audience chamber – a place Kisaki had briefly seen a few times, before having the doors slammed in her face and subsequently locked. Even one new room would be a breath of fresh air to her stagnant life.

Nevertheless, she considered as she pretended to read the scroll in front of her, it wasn’t like she would be given much chance to enjoy any new surroundings, not with Shitoro’s seemingly endless litany of lessons. History, in particular, irked her. Not because she found it unpleasant. It was quite the opposite. Learning of the grand adventures others embarked upon, while she was kept cooped up like a pet, was maddening.

Today’s lesson was a prime example. She was reading about Yamato Takeru and his victory against an army of youkai. The scrolls in front of her discounted him as a mere human, their tone dismissive, but she could imagine the battle in her mind. Everything she read about humans had pegged them as lesser beings but, despite their frailty, time and again they were victorious over creatures much greater than themselves. In fact, despite the arrogant assumptions Shitoro made about them being a barbaric species, it instead appeared they excelled at being underdogs.

Kisaki could relate. She certainly felt like an underdog most days. Despite Shitoro and the others ostensibly being labeled as her servants, oftentimes she felt far beneath them, especially since they weren’t bound to the same rules she was. She’d seen them come and go, unlocking the barriers that kept her in, before quickly shutting them up again before she could even take a peek through.

She’d once, about thirty years earlier, tried to bully her way past one of her more easily browbeaten servants, only to find her mother’s stern gaze waiting on the other side of the door, cutting her adventure short before it could even begin.

Since then, she’d been given very strict orders to not interfere with the comings and goings of the youkai who served them. As usual, her protests to the contrary had borne no fruit.

“And what does Yamato’s victory teach us?” Shitoro asked.

“Huh?” She looked up to find the little tiger demon staring at her expectantly. He was obviously waiting for an answer, and she was in no mood for another lecture from him this day. Besides, if he thought she wasn’t paying attention, he would just make her start over again. His lessons were already painfully long as it was.

“That...” she hesitated, trying to think of an answer that would make it seem as if she had been engrossed in the story before her. “That, no matter the odds, victory is never assured. The proclamations of others that something is impossible doesn’t mean that it is.”

“Nonsense,” Shitoro replied dismissively, a look of annoyance crossing his face. “It simply means that anyone can get lucky.” He leaned over Kisaki and pointed out several sections of the scroll. “Look at this, here, here, and here. Yamato had no real strategy. It was little more than a stroke of...”

The rest of his words were lost to her as she spied the golden key dangling from the chain around his neck. It unlocked the door to her mother’s audience chamber. He was never without it, and now it was mere inches from her face.

As she stared at it, she began to consider that perhaps the little tiger youkai, despite his smug demeanor, was wrong after all. Just because something was deemed impossible, didn’t mean she couldn’t succeed. Even if it was, she should at least try.

♦ ♦ ♦

Days passed while Kisaki planned her escape. The truth of the matter was, it wasn’t really much of a plan. Sadly, she had little idea what lay inside her mother’s chambers, much less beyond. She would have to play it by ear once she was out.

Kisaki wasn’t stupid. In truth, she expected to be caught quickly. But she felt the risk was worth it. Even a glimpse of something new, something different, could sustain her for years after the malaise of confinement she’d been feeling.

In order to make it work, though, she needed two things – Shitoro to drop his guard, and for her mother to be elsewhere. Without both, she would fail and, knowing her luck, the barricades on the doors would be doubled or tripled to dissuade further attempts.

The first of those was easy enough. She fell into her studies, making it a point to be on time and pay attention. It was painfully dull, especially during Shitoro’s nearly endless lectures on mathematics and conjuration, two subjects which Kisaki seemed to have no aptitude for. She only perked up during her history lessons, becoming lost in the tales of humans – seemingly so small and insignificant compared to their divine betters – overcoming insurmountable odds and pushing their domain ever further.

Yes. If they could do it, then so could she.

It was the second part that would be tricky. Her mother was far more cunning than Shitoro. She would see through a simple ploy almost instantly.

Her mother was also quite busy, often dealing with matters of court or with the other daimao, who Kisaki assumed lived elsewhere in the palace but had never actually met. Most often this was done in her chambers, but on rare occasion, matters would draw her away. That was what she kept watch for.

She waited for the days when her mother did not summon her for tea or to discuss her lessons. On those days, she purposely pestered the little tiger demon for an audience. She wasn’t particularly intent on being granted one. In fact, she knew Shitoro would, in most cases, dismiss her with replies of how her mother couldn’t be disturbed. It was actually his answers she was most interested in.

She hoped to come off as merely a needy child. Thus, his refusals were often met with sullen responses of “Why?” At first, Shitoro stuck to his mainstays, that it was time for her to study and it wasn’t her place to question. However, she was persistent and, no doubt hoping to quiet her tantrums, as he liked to call them, Shitoro began to give more detailed answers.

“No, you cannot see your mother because she is discussing matters of importance in her audience chamber.”

“No. You cannot see your mother because she is busy entertaining today.”

“No. I am afraid that is impossible for, you see, your mother has been summoned to an important gathering and, before you ask, it is not something I can discuss with you.”

It was that last one she was truly waiting for.