I meandered about, taking in the view. The straw mat flooring—tatami mats—crinkled softly beneath my slow, aimless footsteps. I felt like I was inside a cabinet of curiosities brought to life, and the heady scents of lacquer and varnish only added to the magical feeling in the air.
As for the tables, the biggest one was simply a mess. It was covered in books and loose leaves of paper. Several ink wells scattered about. Most of the cabinets and drawers had been left half-open, overflowing with writing supplies, as well as kinds of scientific tools I’d never seen before. There was a curious, globe-like object made of multiple concentric rings. Each of the rings could be freely rotated, as was carefully demarcated with intervals meant for measurement. I saw wooden semi-circles framed and mounted on moveable stands; the things reminded me of old-fashioned land surveying tools, and pages and pages of detailed diagrams spread everywhere. Several were nailed onto a cork board on the wall, but many just spilled onto the tables or floor, indifferent to their surroundings. Most of the diagrams looked like connect-the-dots drawings, but filled out by a madman. There were also several tall, pillar-like clocks on the wall; they indicated the time by the vertical position of diamond-shaped pointers.
Neither Andalon nor I had any idea what these things were for, but that didn’t stop us from being enthralled with them. Fortunately, by the look on Lord Uramaru’s face, I imagined Yuta would be happy to explain them to us.
“I can already tell this observatory means a great deal to you,” I said.
Yuta looked up at the telescope. Moonbeams shone through the opening in its domed roof. “It is the largest of my children, yes,” he said, only to lower his head and sigh, “and it was just as ill-fated as its older brothers.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
Yuta took a seat by the main table, positioned cross-legged on the floor. He interwove his fingers, letting the hems of his haori’s sleeves press flush against one another. He motioned to Andalon and I, signaling we join him, so we did, sitting down across from him, on the opposite side of the table.
“I was not born a noble,” Yuta said, “nor was I exactly enamored with the prospect of being elevated to that class.”
I could have asked him “Why not?”, but I didn’t want to impose. The question could wait; besides, I had a different follow-up question in mind.
“But you are a samurai lord, correct?”
He nodded.
“Then why accept a position you did not feel passionate about?”
Yuta chuckled softly. “Oh, I feel quite passionate about it.” Sighing, he ran his hand over the desk. “I accepted Sakuragi’s boon out of naïveté. I thought I could make a difference for the better.”
“But…?” I asked.
“As you said, Dr. Howle, the colonial government of Munine Trenton was set in its ways, and, as fate would have it, I was not in a position to change that.” He looked up. “So, I made the observatory my instrument of change, instead.”
“What makes it ‘ill-fated’?” I asked.
Yuta looked me in the eyes.
“For all its wonders, Dr. Howle, this observatory was built with your countrymen’s blood. The townsfolk were forced to build it, on Sakuragi’s orders. They wouldn’t have been whipped and beaten if I hadn’t off-handedly mentioned my interest in astronomy to Sakuragi, nor would he have cared to build it, had I not attracted his interest through my accomplishments. I was lifted to the peerage atop the backs of all the Trenton-men who died at my hand, or under my orders, and on the backs of Munine soldiers who died to see them dead.”
He looked up at the telescope.
“Sakuragi…” I muttered. “What was he like?” I asked.
I couldn’t believe I’d just asked that question, but Yuta obliged me by answering it anyway.
“Cold, calculating,” he said, “seemingly dispassionate, but unflaggingly cultured and polite, more jade than man.”
“You saved his life from an assassination attempt, right?”
Yuta nodded. “Just so. It was merely the capstone of a long sequence of labors I’d made on behalf of the regime. You have to understand, in my era, discontent sprang up like a weed, sewing blockade runners and armed rebels. I was just a mercenary when I helped lead the assault on the rebel stronghold in Seasweep, but then, when I managed to broker peace by convincing the local magistrate to employ Trenton-men in the military police, and as tax collectors and other local officials, Sakuragi must have caught wind of me. The mayors and regional governors were too conceited to consider enticing Trenton rulers with a place in the Imperial hierarchy. For these accomplishments and other insights, I was elevated to the rank of samurai, only to be plucked up by Sakuragi, and made into his bodyguard. Then, I saved his life, and he made me a lord—estate and all. ”
This story originates from Royal Road. Ensure the author gets the support they deserve by reading it there.
There was skepticism in his voice.
“Why do you sound like you have suspicions?” I asked.
“With Sakuragi, there was never just one reason. Sometimes, I wonder if he might have had a hand in orchestrating the rebel assassins’ attempt on his life, just to elevate me to the peerage.”
I stammered. “What?”
Yuta chuckled. “He was just that kind of man. I think he wanted me, from the beginning, because of my heritage. He saw me as a bone to throw to appease the Costranaks, and, knowing my reputed displeasure with his regime, elevating me to the peerage was his way of placating internal dissent. He once told me, ‘You and I, Uramaru, we are the only genuine men in this sea of superficiality’, and, as much as it pains me to admit it, he was right. The colonial governors never saw Trenton as anything more than an opportunity to gorge themselves on wealth and power. They had no interest in reform, while I had all the interest in the world, yet none of the power. Officially, I’d become one of Sakuragi’s retainers—but, in practice, I was the local governor of Heartshorne and the surrounding lands, unless Lord Sakuragi or anyone higher ranked than I chose to intervene, in which case, I was just as powerless as the Trenton peasants.”
“So… how did the observatory get built?” I asked.
“I was younger, then,” Yuta replied. “I had yet to fully appreciate the depths of Sakuragi’s convictions. I thought he was just another noble. It was a mistake I would always regret.” He sighed. “One day, back when I was still nothing more than a bodyguard, he asked me what my heart’s desire was. So I told him. It was an off-hand remark, yet he committed it to memory. It makes me wonder how long his intentions for me had been brewing.”
“Your heart’s desire… was an observatory?” I asked.
“Wind, waves, and sky; these are the birthrights of the Costranak people. To them—to my mother—the starry night is a canvas of science, history, and myth. The three are one and the same. As a child, my mother would lull me to sleep with the tales of Kannanak’s Gems, the Children of the Tern; of the fisherman Isagani and Putri ng Gagamba, the Goddess of Weaving. Marveling at the stars was my way of remembering her, long after she was gone. After her death, I had the fortune of being adopted by the old court astrologer for the Magistrate of Vaneppo.”
“Astrologer?”
“A diviner who uses the positions of the planets and the stars to forecast future events, from a man’s love life to the fates of Empires.”
“That sounds very silly,” I said.
“It is very silly,” he replied.
I fidgeted with my lucky bowtie. “Although, we do something similar, but with birds.”
Yuta raised an eyebrow. “You can’t be serious.”
I nodded. “Afraid so.”
The samurai lord let out a long, pained sigh. “I take it back, your era is not as enlightened as I thought it was.” He glanced at Andalon. “It never ceases to amaze me, the strength of man’s urge to read fate into randomness. Unfortunately, Gouji-san—the astrologer—did not share my view. It made our relationship tense at times, though I was fortunate to have swordsmanship as an outlet for my adolescent frustrations. Even so, I will be forever grateful to him for seeing my through my youth and teaching me reading, writing, arithmetic, and how to plot a star chart.”
Yuta cleared his throat, and, for his sake, I conjured a glass of water on the table for him to drink.
He eyed it warily for a moment before picking up the glass and sipping it.
“Now that I have spoken much about myself, Dr. Howle, I feel it is only fair that you do the same, no?”
I stuck up my hands. “In here, I’m an open book.”
“Is that a good thing?” Andalon asked, looking up at me.
“It’s neither here nor there,” I said.
Andalon cocked her head in confusion. “But then… where is it?”
I patted my hand on her adorable little head.
“You are clearly an educated man, Dr. Howle,” Yuta continued. “I assume you were educated in the history of your people. I would like to know what the rebels’ descendants told of the Munine occupation.”
I nodded.
“I was taught that it was about wealth and power, and a clash of cultures,” I said. “Though, to be honest, we always focused more on the rebellion and its key figures: Lassedite Arthomer II, the Duke of Veiledkeep, the Treaty of Bald Hill, Markus Prestingham and the Wagonscuttlers, the formation of the Angelical Church, the rise of the Second Empire—that sort of thing.”
“Wealth and power, indeed,” Yuta said. “After darkpox visited Mu, the Soran Empire was nearly in ruins. Sugar cane from the Costranaks, and cod and tobacco in the Trenton colonies kept the Empire on legs it didn’t deserve. All that mattered to the colonial governors was controlling commerce. The religious persecution, the naval blockades, the compulsory labor—down to the last, everything that happened was ultimately in service to Emperor Ji’s obsession with holding on to his rotted dynasty. Sakuragi’s inhumanity only added fuel to the flames. So many lives could have been saved—so much suffering avoided—if only those fools in power had chosen coöperation instead of domination. But the aristocrats reveled in their self-regard while the Trenton-men steeped in their rage.” Yuta’s expression crashed. He shook his head and swallowed hard. “You cannot give mercy to an enemy who refuses to take it.” He tightly gripped the edge of the table, and sighed, staring off into the distance for a moment.
Then, Yuta turned to me, as if only just remembering that I was there. “Forgive me,” he said, bowing his head. “I lost myself.”
He stared at Andalon and I.
“What’s done is done,” he said, “now, more than ever.”
By this point, Andalon was definitely getting bored. She was having trouble sitting still, and had been fidgeting—and more than just a little.
The sight brought a weak smile to Yuta’s face.
“Now,” he said, placing his hands on his thighs. “I imagine you would like to know more about my observatory.”
Andalon immediately perked up at those words. “Yeah, yeah,” she said, nodding vigorously, clenching her little hands into fists. “What’s it do? What’s it do?”—the ‘it’ in question being, well… everything.
Yuta’s smile widened. “I’m glad you asked!”