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400 Years Apart	By : Cynthermes Category: +M to R > Mirage of Blaze Views: 4238 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: Mirage of Blaze and its characters solely belong to Kuwabara Mizuna. I’m just going to creep into a corner of her sand box and play the part of a wannabe historical writer. No profit has been made in the construction of this story.

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Chapter Seventeen:

War of the Usurpers: Part 5

A/N: The Hojo are caught in a confusing pincer tactic deployed by two unusually cooperating (or are they?) rival/ enemy clans.

Warning: Possible character death and some mild* lord/shinobi interaction. Should I consider this chapter a half-lime if you squint?

***

Prologue:

Forgive me Saburo…

It seems I cannot keep my promise to you…

Mimasetoge, a battle brought forth by a few of Ujimasa’s mightiest generals, unexpectedly bring the Hojo a great loss…

The Hojo outnumbered the Takeda at first but the arrival of Shingen turned the tide. Ueda Tomonao and Daidoji Masashige could barely hold out against the combined forces of Takeda Shingen, Baba Nobuharu, and Yamagata Masakage. This unfortunately pushed the Hojo in the defensive.

Shingen with his main unit came by like an unforeseen storm. In one steadfast charge, he broke the two flanks cornering his two generals, Baba Nobuharu and Yamagata Masakage. Their lord’s rescue fired up Yamagata intensely and commanded his cavalry unit to make a hasty counterattack. The Hojo couldn’t recover in time and was on the brink of defeat when the reinforcements led by Ujiteru finally reached them.

The Mutsu no kami’s presence equally raised the morale of his battle-worn men. He quickly ordered his men to regroup while Ueda and Daidoji easily deferred leadership to him. The Hojo were not the only ones affected by Ujiteru’s appearance. The Takeda –Baba greeted Ujiyasu’s second son like his own as he whipped past on horseback.

Yamagata scolded his co-general and vanguard but inclined his head a little. Then the fiercest cavalry general of the Takeda set his hawk’s eyes on him. Ujiteru knew at that moment that Yamagata intends to crush them no matter what. The second Hojo overlord decided he would meet the charge with the same might of his own.

With veteran Ueda Tomonao on the right flank and Daidoji Masashige on the left, the two Hojo Generals engage the Takeda’s vanguard, Baba Nobuharu first. As the Hojo’s main unit moved to intercept Yamagata’s kiba-tai, no one could have predicted what happened next.

Ujiteru was suddenly leading a charge against Takeda Shingen himself! The regal Tiger of Kai with his spear pointed straight rides past his vassal, Yamagata. Does he still keep his tessen when he goes to war? It seems nothing much has changed about him, Ujiteru observed. The hard countenance, his posture, the blazing aura of authority emanating through and the stare that could melt mountains of ice was directed at him!

He couldn’t admit it but he was a little daunted. Only the greatest daimyo have personally fought Shingen in the battlefield. If he could at least hold his ground against the Kai no Kami would his late father be proud of him, perhaps?

Come! Ujiteru silently beckoned him. Nothing but a calm cool sea meets the Takeda warlord’s charging form.

A controlled intensity was palpable as Ujiteru simultaneously advanced towards the enemy warlord from across, which Shingen couldn’t be none other than. He was an almost father to his aniue, a righteous man who returned his mother even when Saburo was refused to him. And this time, Ujiteru was deliberately withholding something from him again: The conquest of Sagami. The warlord’s determined stare hardened as if he could see right through Ujiteru’s schooled composure.

‘I shall kill you’ said those eyes. Shingen has not stared at someone with this intensity for so long. He pins his foe in place, his blade raised as the final burst of speed brings him to the other side and then— his chest explodes in a chasm of pain. His hand curls a fist against his erratically beating heart. Each breath, each thump, is a stab of agony. The Tiger of Kai could barely keep himself upright on his mount.

Ujiteru’s eyes widen as the mighty warlord directly across from him falters, face contorting first into shock, then painful anguish… Shingen doubles over almost falling off the saddle.

“Shingen-sama!” Yamagata Masakage’s voice thunders aloud the battlefield already rushing to reach his lord’s side.

“Halt! Stay your blades!” The Mutsu no Kami barks at his troops. The least they could do is dishonor him by attacking when the enemy war commander is already down. He forcefully grabs the reins of his horse and dismounts to the horror of his vassals. Ujiteru runs towards the injured horse carrying an unconscious Shingen and blocks its path. The animal had lost control after being accidentally stabbed on the side and is now on a rampage but a human obstacle abruptly makes it hesitate and stop.

Ujiteru takes advantage of the animal’s apparent fear and lunges for its loose reins. He doesn’t let go until the horse calms enough to be still. And then very carefully he puts Shingen off the saddle, safely placing him on the ground when an arrow struck him on the shoulder.

“—!”

“Ujiteru-sama!” His closest captain yells in warning before a Takeda General on horseback suddenly appears— Yamagata Masakage misunderstands Ujiteru’s intentions and stabs him with his spear. Reflexively in defense, the wounded Mutsu no Kami swings his katana upwards, slashing one eye off Masakage. And then more piercing pain splinters through Ujiteru’s body. He gasps feeling blood dribble down his mouth. Something warm and wet was spreading beneath his armor, sullying his clothes…

His vision swims, all noises in the background fade… He no longer knew what was happening.

Only a single thought grips him, making him retain a moment of his consciousness.

Home…

Could he never return?

XxXMOBXxX

From the far end of the room, ever-vigilant eyes watch two female servants fuss and fret over a young, limp body covered in layers of blankets and is shivering uncontrollably. Occasionally, the sound of splashing water could be heard over the lordling’s heavy breathing and the women’s worried mutterings.

A day and a half has passed since the night of Odawara’s siege. Due to extreme exhaustion and pushing himself to the limits, Saburo was running a moderate to high-grade fever and hasn’t woken up.

A broken wooden flute lay at the lordling’s feet… It was smeared with his assailant’s blood. Saburo bends to pick it up when a wave of dizziness assaults him. He collapses but his shinobi guardian doesn’t move a slight to catch him.

Kotarou simply stares at his young master’s crumpled form on the floor. He couldn’t dare lay a finger on him after what he had done before. Was this his punishment for committing that act of harm to the one he swore only to protect? He still reeks of a bloodbath and was covered in ugly wounds. ‘He was filthy,’ his mind made excuses for him. If Kotarou were to touch his unsullied young master now…

“Aniue!” A familiar voice; a mirror-image of his own darts to his side. Kotarou doesn’t say a word and backhands his twin.

Akito’s face snaps to the side at the force of the blow. Silently he understood the cause for his elder twin’s anger. “Forgive me,”

Kotarou remains taciturn impatiently waiting for his companion to notice.

“Saburo-sama!” and when he does, Akito all but runs to him, panicked and losing a shinobi’s preternatural calm, his aniue always resented him for.

Kotarou only speaks to him once, indirectly still, “Young Master is merely drained. He needs rest.” The Head of the Fuma Clan had no qualms of using his sibling to temporarily shirk his guilt.

Before Akito can take another step to follow, he notices a conspicuous object lying beside their young lord’s open hand. A damaged musical piece stained crimson… Could this belong to his charge? Was it not known that the youngest of the Hojo had a fine talent with the flute? For some unknown reason, Akito slips the wooden piece in his sleeve. Maybe it could still be fixed. But whose blood was it tainted with? He could find no significant wounds on Saburo... except…

Akito had lost his musings when he delivered the pale and weakened lordling to his two maidservants. The elder of the two, Sayori easily took charge, requesting the boy be put to bed. Yuri, the younger one arrived with a change of clothes, a bucket of warm water, a sponge and several linens. With his help, they divested the boy of his dirty and shabby garments, proceeding to give him a sponge bath.

It was by the time that Saburo was snoring softly on his futon that Akito noticed the presence of a shadow outlined behind the shoji.

Aniue…?

How long had he been there?

The shinobi slides the door discreetly to find an empty hallway but already felt Kotarou cross the threshold. Sometimes he moves that way, too silent, too fast, and ever careful to be noticed.

He utters only another cold word to his otouto, “Leave,” which Akito silently obeys. However, a minute backward glance at the frail sleeping form didn’t pass Kotarou by.

Wolf’s eyes narrow to the floor yet his face remain neutral. It was the very same face he wore as he vented out his rage and frustrations while single-handedly slaughtering every sohei on Hakone. Was it the same expression he wore during that time… when he all but lost control over an urge to claim what he foolishly thought his own? He killed ‘that’ train of thought.

Imitating the attentiveness of a stone, he sat cross-legged a good distance away from his young master. To be able to look at him, safe, was enough.

“Kotarou-sama, you’ve been up for a day and a half and you haven’t eaten. A little rest won’t hurt.” Sayori said, placing a tray of food in front of him.

Foolish woman, at first he wanted to snap at her. Didn’t she know that shinobi were trained to function at their best even with little sleep, little food, and even with none at all? “I am no cause for worry. More importantly, how is the young master?”

“A physician is on the way and his fever is going down, so I suppose he is going to be fine.” Sayori answered kindly but was somehow a bit perplexed at this aloof behavior. She knew it had been a while since he returned from a ‘mission’ but she couldn’t help but notice the ‘cool distance’ he keeps between himself and his young charge. Sayori rarely paid attention to such affairs but if the rumors were true, weren’t they in an intimate shudo relationship?

Kotarou abruptly stands wearing another odd expression she couldn’t quite put a finger on but then a voice, too weak and soft for a young man issues from the bed. “A…Ani…ue…” Saburo whispers with a dry throat. He has pushed himself up the futon, sweating profusely and searching the room with unfocused eyes, not fully awake yet.

Sayori flies to his side already keen on convincing him to lie back down. “Saburo-sama, please, you are not well enough to be up.”

Saburo clings to her sleeve with his left hand and with the right thoughtlessly clawed at something itchy at the base of his neck. The loose wrapping falls off revealing a mostly-healed patch of discernible scabs. It was her first time seeing it: A dry wound from a bite mark? Last night, she, and Yuri couldn’t pry the tight knot one bit and was only thankful now if it stayed that way. Instead the horror that stared her in the face distracted her from what the dazed Saburo was saying.

“Sa…yori-san?” He blinks at her and continues to scratch absently. Then as if finally realizing what he had been doing stops, gaze falling upon the man standing across the room. Saburo meets that seemingly dead gaze and swallows, dry throat becoming drier like he had had a mouthful of sand. Kotarou looks away in a mechanical, doll-like fashion. He could find no guilt or submission in the shinobi’s simple movement. There were already two people who knew about his secret. His lips move, as if on their own accord, “Sayori-san, I am thirsty. Please bring me some… water.”

Sayori bows and if not for the slight slip of her foot halfway, he might not have guessed she was hurrying to leave the two of them alone.

“Come here.” Saburo beckons, breathing a little rougher than normal.

“You are not fit to be up yet. Rest some more, Young Master,” was Kotarou’s flat reply.

Having this reiterated to him, just made Saburo angrier. “Do I need to repeat myself?” The strength of his glare threatened to fray the shinobi’s resolve. Was he still surprised to learn that despite being in poor health, his young master could still command such power over him?

“Did you have a bad dream?”

“Kotarou,” Saburo interrupts him, “Is it not your duty to protect me with your life?”

The shinobi finally lifts his head.

“If so, would you protect my wounded neck from being exposed to those whose eyes are not meant to see that I have been injured for reasons, unknown?” He speaks the accusation figuratively and literally at the same time.

“You do not know how much blood had covered these hands of mine. Do you want these filthy things to touch you?” Kotarou offers in part challenge as his final straw.

“You have touched me with something much worse than your hands.” Saburo makes the final cutting reply and as if he’s seized him by the throat, Kotarou acquiesces, defeated.

He kneels by the side of his young lord’s bed, waiting for the command he already knew. Saburo doesn’t look at him. “Fix the bandage around my neck.”

“You’re still willing to trust this weak man to be your protector?” Kotarou whispers almost inaudibly as his hands busied themselves to an array of supplies left by the maidservants.

Saburo instinctively grasps for the tanto inside his sleeve that wasn’t there. This ‘weakness’ Kotarou speaks of definitely has nothing to do with his abilities as a warrior. Yet it was a weakness every man, even the greatest man possessed…

“Is this your way of humility or is this a mockery that you are directing at me, implying that I am not strong enough to handle you?” Saburo steels himself at the feel of lethal, calloused hands removing the remnants of loose gauze still clinging to his skin. He desperately hopes his poor control would not break… He shivers at the sensation of two pads of fingers brushing against the scab— his body betraying him.

”Either way you think of it, is the same.” Kotarou breathes a cryptic answer at the base of his exposed neck.

Saburo gasps and curses at his foolishness for carelessly allowing the shinobi to be this close. He had not felt Kotarou move. Since when did the shinobi trap him under his body and managed to bury his face on the soft hairs of his nape?

He grits his teeth when soft lips touch the still reddened flesh that was yet to heal completely. “Stop—” Saburo begins to protest only to feel something warm and wet licking a hungry trail at the sensitive closed wounds on his throat. “What… are you doing? Nnh–Enough!”

An unsuspecting Yuri happens upon this scene and a half-squeal escapes her mouth before she could clap a hand on it. Flustered, she immediately slides the door shut to the questioning stares of a pair of grim-looking kokujin.

“What is the matter?” One of the samurai asks.

“Saburo-sama and Kotarou-sama are busy right now—” She blurts to her own mortification and after a deep breath, tries again. “Saburo-sama is not ready to receive you. I shall alert you once he is. Please allow me to speak your errand.”

“But this is urgent—”

The older buke seems to grasp her slip of the tongue better and nods, grabbing the shoulder of his companion. “Very well, we’ll take our leave, Kasahara-dono.”

“But— Ishimaki-dono,”

A resounding smack brings Saburo back to himself more than the one who received physical admonition. His kimono had fallen off his shoulders, his hair was more disheveled, his breathing more ragged, and his hand hurt more than Kotarou’s reddened cheek. “You, you—!” Blood was rushing in his cheeks and more was coursing below his waist. And to add that to his shame, Saburo doesn’t even know what to call him.

“A moment of weakness, Young Master. Forgive me, it shall never happen again.” Kotarou apologizes in the same flat monotone a Buddhist monk would recite countless sutras.

“Hmph!” Saburo slugs him again just for good measure.

Undaunted, Kotarou picks up where they really left off. “Allow me to dress your wound before either of your maidservants return.” This time Saburo acquiesces, defeated.

XxXMOBXxX

Sayori was hesitating by the door when Yuri could no longer make the family retainers wait.

After receiving permission, all four entered to find Saburo sitting up on his bed while his dutiful protector and shinobi guardian knelt beside him.

“Saburo-sama, I am very sorry if it took so long but here.” In a low subdued tone, Sayori passes him a bowl of clear liquid.

Saburo takes it gratefully, sips quietly, and waits for them to answer the obvious question written on his face.

“Saburo-sama, we know that you are not well enough to leave your room but… Ujimasa-kou has summoned you to his chambers.” Yuri takes it upon herself to bring the dark clouds inside.

One look at his young master’s frail form and Kotarou knew he wasn’t ready for this. Saburo was too ill to go out in the rain again to watch the raging waves of the sea in grief. “Sayori-san, about Young Master’s physician…” The Fuma Clan Head gives the buke a stern look, daring them to argue. He could easily pull rank over them if they insist… which they don’t of course but someone higher than him does.

“I will go.” Saburo, his ever stubborn young master knows what’s worst for his health.

The kokujin and the maidservants bow and wait patiently for them outside. Kotarou steadies him from the slightest wobble as he walked across the room. “How long have I slept?”

“For nearly two days.” The shinobi replies curtly. “You know you need more.”

“Why do you insist confining me to my room when it is your true master that is calling for me?” Saburo was truly testing his patience today. The Fuma Clan Head was supposed to serve the Hojo Clan Head but Hojo Saburo did not have to know that his aniue, Hojo Ujimasa had decided to bestow the strongest human shield to his otouto as a sign of great affection. Only the doubtful youngest could perceive this as something else.

To send his guard dog after me…

So I would be at my best behavior…

Kotarou was not ignorant of such things.

Sometimes he begs to differ but when he remembers that statue of the goddess, Benzaiten… He also couldn’t help but doubt that ‘affection’. “You are my true master.” Kotarou doesn’t tire of repeating this mantra.

“Only because he allows you to be.” Saburo has shoved him away. The lordling doesn’t get tired of calling him a liar, either.

“No. You are my master, because I am willing to touch you with something filthier than my hands if you keep insisting you are not.” This offering of devotion made more powerful by an obvious threat silences him efficiently.

An enraged tiger whirls around claws outstretched, ready to strike in vengeance but the wolf catches his wrist deftly and brings it softly to his lips. “This mercilessly beautiful hand I allow to hurt me belongs to my master.”

Saburo is stunned. Since when did Kotarou keep winning against him?

He doesn’t realize however that he is the true winner for being allowed to step out of this room and learn the truth he is not yet ready to bear.

~TBC

Post A/N: Kotarou is officially back to serve his one and true master, Saburo. :D One hell of a Tiger X Wolf chapter! Comments and reviews please!
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400 Years Apart