Chapter Hundred Twenty-Seven

The Layers of Human

 

 

He could not forget the expressions on the faces of the Nagare siblings long after he fled the seashell form and settled back in his human one.

He sagged against the wall to the floor, hugging his knees to his chest, shaking all through. He felt like vomiting. And he didn't even know why -- because of the desperation he felt at knowing how much Kasuga and Mikawa were hurting... or because of the words Okinaga had said on the Tribunal.

...

He, Nekohiko... had murdered Kazuragi? And Hinokuma?

WHEN???

Why?

Oh gods, this was too staggering to even understand -- his head spun and his thoughts clashed. He didn't notice when hot salty tears scalded his cheeks, but they did. He was crying, too. Completely unable to stop himself.

This day that had begun so wonderfully... had ended up being so...

...he moaned, trying to calm down his painful thoughts.

ARGH...

Everything hurt... his memories, his heart, his inability to remember a single thing about Kazuragi's or Hinokuma's death.

...

WHY couldn't he?

Had he actually...?

Had he been the one to kill people he knew so well? Before, Nekohiko had heard that Etsuko witnessed Abihiko murdering Kazuragi, instead. So... which one was it?

None of it made sense, yet the fact that Okinaga had been under the effects of truth spells when he had announced this...

Nekohiko buried his face in his hands, slowly curling into a ball of ache. So alone even though the whole Empire now knew his name and was so excited to meet him.

...

He regretted ever wanting to reign. He regretted ever wanting to be known. To be talked about. To allow others to judge him and tell such conflicting things about him without him being able to control what they said and why.

How much time he spent, hiding in some small theater's storage room -- he didn't know. But the daylight had shifted into the caramel-hued dusk when he finally saw Aomi again, peeking back from within his seashell when the girl called him.

...

He didn't want to see or talk to her now.

Perhaps, to anybody. Maybe only to Abihiko, but Abihiko... had shut him off like this and left him grappling with these horrible truths all alone?

Damn it.

"You can speak now! I drew you a new mouth," Aomi pled, shaking his seashell before her puffy face and sniveling with her congested nose. "Neko... Neko -- what is happening?"

...

How should I know?

I am as alone and lost in it as you are.

He came to his senses in the seashell, reluctant as he was.

"Quick -- hide your Binding, your body, your... anything from sight," Aomi cried. "Kasuga and Mikawa can track you not solely through Binding, but through the scent, the sound of your voice, your very body shape. And they were so determined about it, I feel the moment they leave the State Hall -- they will hunt you down!"

Nekohiko blinked around Aomi, trying to see where the girl was.

Still in the State Hall, still in the vicinity of all the murmury talks and rumors thrown between the loud councilors, priests, and nobles who had witnessed the Trial. The utter catastrophe that this Trial ended up being.

She clung to a spot beside a huge window that opened into the square before the Quiet Palace -- one brimming with the commoners and lesser Binders who also wanted nothing more than to discuss and cause unrest due to the conclusion of the Trial. The ruckus they were making outside was also quite frustrating.

Bad. Very bad... everything unraveling, everything in such incoherent shambles.

"If Kasuga and Mikawa want to hunt me down... and so does Iokirihime and Okinaga," Nekohiko began, choked, "I don't know if there is any real point in my hiding. Everyone despises me so, and I... don't even know the reasons for it."

I do not remember murdering Kazuragi.

I do not remember killing Hinokuma.

I do not... I did not. I am not the kind of person who would do something like that, Aomi.

Never was. Never will be.

"HIDE," Aomi ground out, fierce. Just as Abihiko had done hours ago when he had told Nekohiko to run whatever it cost him. "The Great Lords want your head, but the people -- do not! Look, Neko! Listen to them!"

Grudging, Nekohiko still lent his attention to the window behind Aomi. There, in the gentle glow of dusk, the crowds in front of the State Hall were not screaming for his blood like the Great Lords were. The Crowds were...

...on his side?

He couldn't hear much with how disjointed and chaotic the mob was, but he heard more cries against the Great Lords than against himself.

"Break down the terror and power abuse by the Lords!"

"The Lords betrayed the Emperor first! They deserve what they got!"

"Black Ship Forest! Black Ship Forest!"

...

Nekohiko flinched in horror.

"Black Ship Forest? What--?"

"Ah yes," Aomi hurried. "Okinaga also told everyone that you were behind the making of the Black Ship Forest, which scared quite a lot of the people at first. Actually, it left them speechless when they found out that one single person could have done something like that. But then Morokata--"

Moro...kata?

Nekohiko's heart felt leaden.

"Morokata defended you by reminding everyone that the Black Ships were sent here to invade our Empire and lay waste to it. And how many raids and pillages those Black Ship people had caused before you put the ultimate end to their invasion! So the opinion about you making that place... shifted as soon as he told everyone about it."

...

Nekohiko couldn't help dwelling on this ridiculous idea. While gaping in utter confusion.

Morokata?

Defending him? Why?

And what did this imply?

It was as though Aomi could read his mind. "Morokata is a crowd-pleaser! Come on, he always knows what to do to ingratiate himself to the strongest people in the room. I don't know what he's planning, but he is putting all his bets on you. Because the crowd -- hear them? they adore you! They hate the tyranny of the Great Lords and the endless wars between them so much, they want to unite against them. And to support you, the true Emperor. And Morokata..."

Nekohiko listened, in shock.

"I don't know," Aomi said helplessly. "He probably is just looking for the safest place in any circumstance. Would that be so surprising for him to do?"

No. Not at all.

But still... the thought of being protected by Morokata after Morokata had done everything in his power to arrest Abihiko and push Kataji on the Throne...

What incomprehensible game was Morokata playing?

Nekohiko watched the distance in the window with the tides of noise rolling in from the square and the people raging out there about all the events of the Trial. But his heart was cold and empty.

Nothing he wanted to say. Nothing he wanted to do with any of them...

"Come on, save yourself! Kasuga and Mikawa are going to come after you soon -- you have to be ready!" Aomi squeaked again, digging her nails into his surface to make him pay attention.

He winced, hardly noting the dull pain of her scratching.

"For your Empire! For your people!" she tried again, to no avail.

He was too hollow to care for the Empire at the moment when he didn't know who were his foes, who were his allies. And what could he do now, when his every move was so... scrutinized and judged by so many people.

"For Abihiko," Aomi growled in the last attempt.

...

And, miraculously... that worked.

Something akin to a spark breathed just a tad brighter inside Nekohiko's dazed, numb mind.

For Abihiko...

For that lying bastard who had abandoned him just now? In this endless uncertainty?

"He defended you and gave up his throne for you! You have to fight for him now which means you have to keep yourself safe in the meantime--!" Aomi wanted to go on.

However, Nekohiko was not in the mood for being told what he had and didn't have to do for Abihiko.

Not after what Abihiko had just pulled.

"Noted," he cut to Aomi, then flashed his mind out of the seashell and into his doll form back in some dark theater, inside one of the ramshackle storage rooms.

But as he opened his eyes, grinding his teeth against each other -- he did not think about doing anything for Abihiko because he owed him.

No. What he thought was --

I really need to punch him.

And then dominate him. Punish him for this in the meanest way possible.

Then I will think if he deserves anything else from me, and only then.

His spell-casting motions were swift and exact, borne out of barely-suppressed rage rather than desire to save himself. But he never doubted himself.

One spell to protect his body from being found through scent. Another -- through sound. Yet one other -- through his body shape...

Slight alterations and disturbances clung to him, disguising his qualities, one by one. To not be found unless he wanted to be found.

And after he was done and the theater was so obviously marked with his spell-casting aura everywhere -- he had to leave. And fast.

And if -- a mere half an hour earlier he'd had no idea where to go and what to do there... Now, he knew.

He was fuming.

 

 

---

***

 

He met Aomi a few hours later in the small shrine garden off the center of the city. He had been busy earlier, deftly avoiding leaving a trail of magic or his presence anywhere he went.

It hadn't been easy, but he had managed to do everything he needed.

His back rested against a cherry tree in the garden as he waited. His hand slowly stroking the fur of his own cat body, amused that this was the first time he had interacted with both of his main bodies since they had been created.

The cat drooped over his lap, unconscious, but he still found it quite cute. A small beige body with just a tiny tuft of a black tail in the back. A very sweet kitty.

Not at all like him.

But it would still be a pity to lose this body, even if he no longer found it as useful as he had before. After a whole month of neglect, the cat body was shabby-looking and sickly. His mind had returned to it occasionally throughout his time of the honeymoon -- but never to linger for more than a few seconds. Apart from the neglect that had worsened this body's state, there was also the Master Order that had prohibited the cat from ever killing anyone.

Not that Nekohiko wanted to kill people, per se. But the limitation was, nonetheless, a breach of his autonomy. A distrust in him as a human being.

It severely disadvantaged the body and made it downright useless in the long run.

Still... the thought of it falling into Kasuga's and Mikawa's hands just because they would fail to find his human body and might want to get the cat instead...

It hurt him.

Many things did. Old Ema's house was obviously off-limits to him as well, seeing as Mikawa knew the place and would tell Kasuga all about it. The Nagare siblings might plant a trap in it and wait till he appeared there.

Which meant he absolutely could not visit it for the time being. One more shelter and a hiding place that he had lost without gaining any in return.

...

At least he could save the cat.

He had visited the Spring Sunlight Shrine and taken the kitty out of the stone lantern where it had been stashed after the wedding. Then, he'd had to navigate the city's biggest doll-making stores -- just to see what services they offered, and to make notes.

A very productive evening.

"Tell me something nice," he said to Aomi instead of a greeting. The girl was clever enough to have dressed down and hidden all of the luster of her outfit beneath a nondescript cloak with a deep hood. Smart. Neither of them needed more attention from the crowd. "I've had it with bad news for today."

"Bad news? The city adores you," Aomi answered miserably.

Nekohiko could not help a tired sigh.

He did not care about the city thinking anything about him! As he'd been running through the streets -- yes, he'd heard all about how treacherous people thought the Great Lords were for conspiring against the true Emperor and wanting to hurt him for defending himself. 

Nekohiko's story, told in Abihiko's heartfelt delivery seemed to make Nekohiko a... victim.

A hero. The main character in a very sympathetic tale.

Somehow, he had ended up being someone to root for? Because other than him, the government was solely filled with people who were too overly powerful, conceited, and arrogant enough to abuse their privileges. And the common folk was, frankly, tired of them.

Their favorite, Morokata -- was on the true Emperor's side, too -- which helped Nekohiko's cause significantly.

Not that he minded but... 

He really did not want to dwell on this. People of the Empire were too fickle. Last night, they hadn't even known about his existence, and today -- he was their favorite new toy? Just because all the old ones were so boring and sinister, in Abihiko's defense speech?

Tch.

"What did you find out in the Palace?" he asked the girl. "Was Kataji... disagreeable?"

He had asked Aomi to try and get closer to Kataji no matter what. As his sister, shouldn't she be allowed near him?

And once she did -- would not Kataji be coerced into telling her what the hell was he even doing, conspiring with Hibiki and Morokata to get to the Throne and arresting his own brother in front of everyone?

"There were too many councilors and advisors swarming him after the Trial. Some weren't even allowed to see him, so busy he was with the state affairs," Aomi muttered, reaching for the cat to rub its ears. "Morokata was among them, and all those nobles, too. A few were even debating and doubting Kataji's position, so he had to deal with a lot of stuff tonight. And above all..."

The girl paused, raising her scared eyes at Nekohiko.

"He had to go and meet with Abihiko in prison, so... the two of them were talking for about an hour already when I left the Palace. I saw no chance for me to talk to Kataji or to Abihiko." Her chin dropped. "Everyone is too busy for someone like me. They all dismissed me outright -- because the state matters are so much more important."

...

Nekohiko closed his eyes, annoyed. There was nothing he could do about what she was telling him, but he still felt tricked out of what he was owed.

An explanation. A justification. The reasoning behind today.

"Why is everything so awful?" Aomi sniffed, blinking rapidly. "Even this... Morokata. You should have heard him and how he sang praises to you -- as if he would have any right to do that! Neko--"

Nekohiko glared at her, displeased that the girl might call the attention of the Nagare twins to them if they heard his name being said out loud.

"Please do not trust Morokata no matter what," the girl told him, fervent. "He sang so sweetly after the Trial, telling everyone how happy he is about the true Emperor's return even though it saddens him that the royal wedding had left House Hisome by the wayside. He is like an eel -- slippery and evasive. He wants to be associated with you and as though he and you are on the same side while all the other Lords are somehow evil. Out of all of them, he is the only one who hadn't had any motive or part in your murder, so the public eye is thinking very favorably of him!"

Ugh, Nekohiko felt his teeth cracking from the strain he was putting on them.

Abihiko had said Morokata was there.

Right there, in the moment of Nekohiko's murder. Hidden out of sight, but there -- among all the others who were now rightfully blamed for the murder -- and even condemned and put to prison for it.

Everyone except Morokata.

And now he dared to pretend to be on Nekohiko's side just because there were no witnesses other than Abihiko to prove he had been at the time of the murder?

DAMN it.

"Don't worry. I will never forget."

Aomi put her forehead on his shoulder, slowly drawing herself toward him in a needy, frightened hug.

"I am sorry I couldn't be of any help and that I haven't managed to get to Kataji--"

"It's all right." Nekohiko felt calm, if stewing in morbid fury. "I will talk to Kataji myself tonight."

"But-- I thought all of your body parts in his possession are destroyed."

The thoughtful hue of twilight colored the shadows under the trees in lilac. Morokata's signature color, gentle and innocent -- yet already so tightly associated with House Hisome and its endless plots and schemes that Nekohiko couldn't avoid perceiving it as somber. Sinister.

Vile.

Far in the wooden shrine behind which they were sitting in the shadowy garden, the bamboo fountains rocked, wood on wood -- with only the splash of water as its accompaniment. The subtle music brought a peaceful rhythm to the flow of time here. Watching some of the local Spirits wavering out of sight, Nekohiko slowly extended his hand to Aomi. He patted her head and even attempted to seem kind.

"I will talk to Kataji myself."

"Wha-- but--!"

...

"He might not listen to you. Or to my other bodies, sure," Nekohiko said, watching the skies above, wistful. "But I can bet he would talk to this body. If only because he wants me to beg his forgiveness."

Or to grovel before him.

Or to acknowledge I had been wrong and had hurt him gravely.

Or else -- for petty revenge and gloating. Or maybe just to punish him. Like Kataji had always done, whenever he and Nekohiko had had their disagreements.

Kataji tended to be... bitter and passive-aggressive. He tended to be quite vengeful, too, even if he never went beyond mere guilting and pressure.

Well... before today, he had never gone beyond those.

Things change, apparently.

"I owe him an apology anyway," Nekohiko told the girl. "As I owe Kasuga and Mikawa... and Sakami, and Okinaga, and Iokirihime. And even you."

"Me?"

Yes, you.

During his chores in the city a few hours earlier, Nekohiko had walked into one of the Towa Memory exchange buildings on the main streets. He had seen the reverberations of the most scandalous moments of the Trial.

Like a spectator, idly amused by the drama.

Abihiko's confession, his arrest, on repeat. Kataji's rushed ascension to the status of the temporary ruler...

And Okinaga's reveal of the reasoning behind the Great Lords' conspiracy against Nekohiko, years ago.

Nekohiko hadn't had the time to watch it fully -- and anyway, the Towa Binders didn't repeat the entire Memory. Only the most dramatic bits of it.

Like the expressions on Kasuga's face when Kazuragi's murder had been mentioned.

Or Aomi's expression, or Mikawa's.

Because, really -- not one of these people had expected to hear that. And not one of them had believed it at first.

They had tried to deny it or reject the truth, at the very beginning. The pain, the heartache of betrayal was all so... raw in their eyes...

Then the slow realization that came out in tears down their ashen faces.

It hurt Nekohiko to even recall the image...

He collected himself and gave Aomi a stilted nod. "The truth about... what I have done, years ago. I am sorry about it, Aomi. I wish it weren't true."

I wish I even knew what had happened.

Apologizing or being guilty for something I had no control over... not even the knowledge of it...

This was hell.

But it wasn't as though he could argue with the truth. If everyone said he'd done it, then... he supposed he had. Who else had done it, after all? Every crime needed a perpetrator, and thus -- he had to take the blame for whatever had happened five years ago even if, deep inside, he knew he was innocent.

"It isn't true," Aomi whispered. "I bet it isn't!"

...

"How would you know?"

"Eldest Brother believes in you! He stands on your side without flinching. Without a single shred of doubt. And I -- I believe in him. So I have to believe in you, too, since you are everything to him--"

What nonsense.

"The only person I would talk about this is Abihiko." Slowly, Nekohiko got to his feet and passed the flaccid cat body to Aomi. "I have to go and do my best to save him. From Kataji -- if not anyone else."

"What--how?? Even I couldn't pass into the Emerald Palace to see him -- how would you? The Palace is watched by Towa Binders and the Memories are channeled across the Empire to give everyone a chance to see if the true Emperor ever comes to the Palace! The people are so excited about it!"

Surely, they are.

What way to prohibit Nekohiko from besieging or assaulting the Palace other than to make it public? To protect themselves by repulsing him with the opinion of the agitated masses?

Just being watched by the Memory spell-casters had spooked him once already. Why not again?

"I also saw that Morokata and the others had protected the Palace perimeter with spells to detect any dummy or doll passing through it! As though waiting for you! Do you have any idea how well-prepared they are for you?"

Yes, quite.

After seeing that doll-protecting barrier in the dressing salon Iokirihime liked to visit, Nekohiko had already imagined what measures Morokata and others might take to get ready for his arrival in the Palace. Why arrest Abihiko and keep him away from Nekohiko if the Palace walls were all too easily traversed by someone with the power of the true Emperor?

Nothing would stop him, really. His powers were just too immense if he truly wanted to come.

So, the best defenses against him were: the publicity through the Towa Binders, and in case he wanted to come quietly, unnoticed -- the doll-identifying barriers around the Palace.

With both of these, the chances of him coming in there without being noticed were so slim, Morokata and Kataji would have no worries about it. Whatsoever.

But Nekohiko wasn't a complete piece of wood, either.

He hadn't spent his today in vain.

He nodded Aomi at the cat, then took the lead out of the shrine garden and into the dark, crowd-brimming street.

"Keep an eye on the cat for me while I'm gone, will you? I have cast spells on it to throw off Kasuga or Mikawa's Wind-searching abilities. The cat should not be easy to find for them now, so you'll be safe. Also, please find Kotone. I might need her help afterward."

"Mn, mn." The girl hurried alongside him, anxious. "And where are you going now?"

"To a Doll-making store," Nekohiko replied calmly. "I found a good one, nearby."

"...HUH? What-- why?"

He had found a good one, yes. And had waited in the shrine directly next to it so that he and Aomi wouldn't have to go far to visit it.

"I need to get myself a full-human cover-up for my doll joints," Nekohiko explained. "I have never wanted to look like a human in this... fake body, but it seems I have no choice."

Being covered with layers of fat and skin and flesh... Ugh. All those body parts would have come from animals, land or marine ones. Not something Nekohiko was very keen on slathering on himself.

But his face had been made like this already, and the lack of skin and flesh on his other parts had always been just a whim of his.

It was time to get rid of all whims. If he had to take this doll body seriously for what he wanted to do... he had to go the full distance with it.

This body had to look completely human if he wanted to enter the Emerald Palace tonight.

Well, so be it.

A temporary, yet fully human body.

"And you will make the deal with the vendor for me," he told the girl and opened the door of the store before her. "Because I am, after all, nothing but a dummy. And in this country, a dummy has no rights of his own." He lowered his voice, pained. "Including the right to rule."

 

 

---

***

 

The spell in the dressing salon for Iokirihime had reacted to certain elements that were hard to mask within a doll body. The lack of true will, the exposed joints, the overabundance of the Binding magic keeping the thing together.

Nekohiko had the will of his own, of course. But not the other qualities the identifying spell would react to. The exposed joints would be easily negated with a good Binder putting the flesh and skin on top of them. And the overabundance of magic?

That was Nekohiko's part, later.

For now, all he cared about was giving himself the thinnest layers of humanness on top of his wooden carcass. The Binder working the store was just proficient enough to handle it for him without too many questions about it. Once the issue of payment had been dealt with, the Binder had very few problems with doing everything exactly as Aomi was telling him.

"Young miss, are you sure you should be asking me to give your sex doll a skin layer?" he had tried to ask, at first. A very tired-looking bald man with such an apathetic way of going around his small store. Perfect for Nekohiko's needs. Uncurious and clearly too exhausted to be a nuisance. "That is rather inappropriate. Perhaps your father, or your brother -- or a suitor could take part in this trade deal, instead?"

Aomi didn't even bother getting offended.

She simply snapped the hood of her cloak off her head, giving the poor man her most impressive scowl. One that worked on him immediately because his face slowly shifted from stunned bafflement -- into the vaguest shade of recognition.

"D-do I know you, young miss...?" he breathed, unsure.

"Have you seen the Memory Exchanges of the Grand Imperial Trial today yet?" she asked him softly.

The man's face paled as he sized Aomi's small stature up and down. His eyes froze on her distinctly red clothes under the layers of unattractive grey cloak and shawls she was wearing.

"T-the... Sister of the Supreme Divine Emperor Abihi--" He gulped, realizing his mistake. "Of Emperor Kataji," he added, fainter. "What does this inadequate place owe Your Highness's visit? We... are so beneath your status..."

"Indeed, you are," Aomi sighed, grace incarnate. "But yes. I came here precisely because of how low you are compared to the usual places I would frequent. Trust me -- I can and will pay you handsomely after you make this doll the way I want you to. And if I don't -- you always know where you find my brothers, exactly as you have wanted to do when you began asking about them earlier. No?"

The girl was all smiles and coquettishness, and her obvious high noble status and connections only made her more intimidating.

She had some of Morokata's attitude, Nekohiko noticed. Perhaps, observing him for too long today wasn't such a great influence on someone like her.

"Y-yes, of course!" the Doll-Binder cried, nodding and bowing and ushering Aomi and Nekohiko to the inner rooms of his small store. "Please, come and pick the Matter Aspects you would like to use! The type and color of skin, the firmness and smoothness of flesh. Everything you want, m-lady!"

Aomi winced.

"Just make it pretty and nice to touch. And the color... make it the shade that the wood paint on top of him already is. How fast can you make it?"

The man scanned Nekohiko -- just a single glance over Nekohiko's exposed wrists.

"Ahh, such a full-body job would take three to four hours?"

...

Dammit. So long.

Nekohiko already itched to jump into action and get to the Emerald Palace before midnight! He didn't want this awful ambiguous state of things to last longer than one day.

More than one day of Abihiko being in prison was already... too long for him to endure. Especially when that prison was in Morokata's hands.

"Three to four hours? Are you kidding me? Who has so much time in their life? Make it in two," Aomi warned the man and grinned in the evilest way possible.

"..." The man stopped breathing, then blinked rapidly. "Y-yes, Your Highness."

Spirits bless you, Aomi.

You will be my most important advisor once I am on the Throne officially. I swear to heavens.

 

 

 

---

***

 

 

It was a bit past midnight, alas, when Nekohiko was done with the Binding process. He had waited it out in the cat that Aomi had been stroking gently all through the painful time it took the Binder to pull the goopy lards of fat, of the gossamer-thin layer of skin, or connective tissue between them to channel sensations and temperature.

A lot to do, and even more to take care of after the spell was done and Nekohiko had to make sure the Binding seams weren't too obvious for any doll-identification spells later on.

It was a hell-ton of work.

But nothing Nekohiko couldn't handle when he was so close to achieving what he needed.

He and Aomi separated after she helped him walk out of the doll store. The Binding had left his human doll body woozy as always -- due to the uncomfortable new sensations and vertigo that the added flesh and skin evoked in him. If the wooden surface of his body was highly sensitive to touch, then having to swaddle it in layers actually removed the sensitivity.

It didn't get rid of it entirely, but it dampened the overstimulation Nekohiko had always felt at being touched too personally. And frankly, with what he was getting into -- tonight -- he needed some of his senses dulled to endure the stress of being among so many people. Some of which were his enemies, and others -- his very reluctant... friends.

If he could still call Kataji that.

He wobbled on his feet as he strode beside Aomi. But he pushed through the first awkward stages of getting used to the new layers of his body. And with each new step, it was easier to do.

Soon, he almost ran, excited about the final parts of his preparations of infiltrating the Emerald Palace.

"Make sure the cat is safe," he reminded again. "It is one of the last of my bodies I have, and if something today happens to the one I am in..."

"What would happen?" The girl frowned, worried. "You said you just wanted to talk to Kataji one-on-one!"

"I still do. But--"

He dithered, watching the currents of people in the street waver past them as they walked. The elation in the capital was palpable. And so was the giddiness about the continuation of all the events that had happened today.

People knew something bigger was coming, too.

It was odd, for Nekohiko, to be both so invisible to them -- yet so central to their thoughts and anticipations. He was as though on the stage, for everyone to see. For everyone to follow each of his movements with greedy passion.

Yet now, he was not only hidden from them, but going right beneath their noses -- to keep as far away from their sight as he could.

And five years ago, he had thought he craved attention most of all.

How silly of him.

"I want to convince Kataji to let Abihiko go," Nekohiko said, grim. "I am unsure of how he will take such a plea. Especially if it comes from me."

"Are you insane? Don't talk to Kata about Abihiko! You will only aggrandize him more!"

...

Ah, Aomi.

She didn't know the depths of Kataji's need for validation -- from Nekohiko, most of all. Perhaps Kataji and he were no longer friends. But, still -- there were ways for them to connect.

To relate.

To owe each other a semblance of respect and dignity. Nekohiko was sure of that.

Kataji was his maker, after all. Not any of the Binders who had taken part in Nekohiko's body-assembling, not Hibiki, not Morokata.

It had always been Kataji. The first person to trust a blank piece of wood and want to befriend it and... be kind to it.

Besides, even though Nekohiko didn't want to acknowledge this after today's Trial, but -- Kataji was just a non-Binder. He had been dealt with so easily by every single Binder he had met. Mikawa could fly away from him. Hibiki could destroy him. Abihiko had put him to sleep with just a single touch.

Yes, the Binders abused their powers against the weak.

And though Nekohiko hated the idea of doing so himself... if Kataji gave him no choice, he would.

He was not so stupid as to walk into the Emerald Palace without fully intending to fight his way out. Kataji was just the most obvious pathway to get through that he knew of.

Obviously not through Hibiki or Morokata.

"Goodbye, Aomi. Thank you for your help, tonight. And..." Just in case, he wanted to add. He averted his eyes, ashamed of such a sudden weakness that peeked from within him. "I am sorry for everything if I have hurt you. I didn't mean to. I--"

Rather than take his mumbled apology, Aomi rushed into a hug against him.

She bumped her head into his chest and crushed her arm around him, the cat squished pathetically between both their bodies.

And for the first time ever, Nekohiko didn't even mind being touched.

He didn't feel anything significant through the layers of the added tissue on top of his wooden skeleton. But deep inside, he felt... something else.

Not overstimulation or stress at being hugged so tightly.

Only endless warmth and gratitude. For at least one person in the world who was near him now, and not afraid to embrace him.

"Be careful! And... please. Save my brothers," she whispered in his shoulder. "Both of them."

...

He patted her back and waited till the girl would find it enough to withdraw. But she didn't -- for a long, long time. She clung to him. And he was grateful for that, too.

 

 

---

***

 

The place he needed to go to afterward -- was not that far from here.

He had been very careful to pick the exact spot that benefitted him most. To the outskirts of the city, he went -- searching for the crooked alley with the dilapidated and abandoned houses. Once, only a month ago, he had hidden here a dummy sculpture of himself, for later use.

He had worn the emerald uniform of the Imperial Bodyguards after having infiltrated the Emerald Palace that night. Of course he had to discard the uniform and hide in here along with the dummy twin.

He had used the dummy twin, exactly one month ago, too. But he had not used the uniform yet. Frankly, he hadn't planned to use it again, ever.

But -- oh well. There was a perfect time for everything as long as one knew how to prepare for it.

The abandoned house looked just as he had seen it last month. Nekohiko carefully crept over the ruined wooden boards in the splintered floor, searching for the small gap in the wall where he had hidden the Imperial Bodyguard uniform. Wrapped in a dusty cloak, there it lay, in a haphazard jumble of parts Nekohiko had Bound to be more flexible for hiding.

He had to be quick now. A few spells to undo the possible damage and wear to the uniform and make it appear new and shiny again. Then a spell to put it on with the minimal effort.

Then the same round of masking spells he had done today a few times already.

Singly to not be found before he wanted to be. By Mikawa, by Kasuga, by Morokata -- or anyone else who might want to meddle in this business.

Sorry, but not tonight.

Tonight was devoted solely to him, Kataji, and Abihiko. Everyone else would have to wait in line. And gods, was that a long line to wait in...

The last touch Nekohiko took care of before going toward the center of the city with the Palace glowing menacingly in the suffocating night -- was the seashell.

The Kitten's Paw seashell Aomi had passed to him right before they separated.

She had no use for it since she had a ladybug with her. And now, a cat, too.

It was Abihiko's seashell. Nobody else's. And Nekohiko would give it to him tonight, whatever it took. But for now -- there it was, hanging discreetly and so lonely and cold on Nekohiko's neck cord.

It was bizarre. It was almost... painful, to hang suspended from somebody else's neck rather than Abihiko's. The feeling of abandonment and betrayal once again crashed over Nekohiko, but he chased it away.

Not a betrayal. Not yet, at least. Merely a temporary separation, but one easily undone and then forgotten.

Yes?

"I'm coming for you, husband. Whether you like it or not," Nekohiko said.

Then he placed the faceless helmet of the Imperial Bodyguards on his head and got to his feet.

Ready.