Shyuurin

NSFW

In fact, it was another two months before Eitsu was satisfied with her methods of beating up all of the elders of Hanasan. One very late spring evening, still warm with the promise of summer, Eitsu glanced about at the elders of Hanasan, flat on their backs on the ground around her, and then up at Tsubaki.

“I think we should go home.”

Only Zhāng Yàn seemed genuinely disappointed by this news. The others were evidently relieved that they didn't have to be beaten up any more, not that they could lose any more face in front of their disciples. In a effort to try and stop their reputations from being tarnished any further, they had made the spars with Eitsu private affairs, which none of the disciples could attend, but the results were always obvious.

At least their attitudes had changed. She was being treated much more respectfully, although the deference of some people was so disgracefully obsequious that it took all the little self-control Eitsu had not to laugh. Sometimes she laughed anyway.

Cheng Guk Lung still hadn't returned. A pity, but it couldn't be helped. Eitsu was itching to leave. Besides, when everything was over, she could always come back and see him. She had time.

What concerned her most was a certain dancer, who at the present moment stood contemplatively at a window, considering the night over Hanasan.

“You'll get wrinkles if you worry,” Eitsu teased.

“Will I be less beautiful then?” Tsubaki asked bluntly.

“Well, the faces that you make in bed give you wrinkles too, so no.” With one finger, Eitsu extracted a thin lock of Tsubaki's hair, tracing its length delicately. Her fingertip brushed the skin of Tsubaki's neck like a whisper. “Are you scared of getting old?”

“I've never had that luxury.”

With a sigh, Eitsu wrapped her arms around Tsubaki, resting her chin on the dancer's shoulder.

“What are you doing?”

“Well, I thought I was comforting you, but apparently not.”

Tsubaki snorted. “There are better ways to comfort me. Take my clothes off.”

“What am I, your sex slave?”

“This is your punishment.”

“For what, exactly?”

“If I need to spell it out, you need to be punished more.”

“Tsu-bo-”

Tsubaki sealed her mouth with a deep kiss, pushing the kaibyou back onto their shared bed. She efficiently removed her own clothing, then began to undress Eitsu.

“This is so unsexy.”

“That's why this was supposed to be your job.”

With a thoughtful expression, Eitsu tapped Tsubaki's lips gently.

“You want a kiss?”

“Do you want to kiss me?”

“No, I'm talking to the person behind you.”

“Oh, sorry for interrupting you then. I'll be on my way.”

“Don't go.” Tsubaki covered her face with both hands.

“I'm not going anywhere.” Eitsu sat up to hug Tsubaki, her face pressed against the dancer's bare chest. She tenderly kissed the small pale breasts. Tsubaki's hands dropped to the kaibyou's face, but her eyes remained shut.

“This is ridiculous.”

“What is?”

“I'm still so unsettled.”

“What a surprise! Ow,” Eitsu added, as Tsubaki tweaked her ear.

“If you're talking, that means your mouth isn't doing what it should be doing.”

“Wow. I see how it is.” Although her tone was teasing, her hands moved across Tsubaki's body, lovingly stroking every part of her from neck to -

Tsubaki flinched and sighed as Eitsu's hands wrapped around the backs of her thighs. The kaibyou had not stopped kissing and licking her breasts.

“So much fun to play with. They're so hard.” Eitsu teased the nipples with the very tip of her rough tongue.

“Why... Why do you always talk... so much?”

Tsubaki was pulled down to the bed and Eitsu took her place, although the kaibyou pushed her hips up under the dancer's as if preparing to thrust into her. Sliding her robes from her shoulders, Eitsu shrugged.

“Just making up for lost time.”

“You think that's enough?” Tsubaki demanded.

“Nope. Never. That's why I'm going to keep on talking.” Lean and feral, Eitsu hovered over the birthmark on Tsubaki's neck as though she was about to devour it. “I'll talk enough to fill up eight lifetimes, and more. I won't shut up, even if you beg me to.”

“Not if I make you beg first.”

“You can try- Ah!”

Tsubaki's nails scratched lightly at the base of Eitsu's spine and she unconsciously arched her back. “What were you saying?”

“Ugh. This is... cheating...”

“Gods, you're still talking.” With her other hand, Tsubaki reached down the front of the kaibyou and hooked her fingers, tugging lightly. “Already so wet. Are you just constantly in heat?”

“I am for you.” Eitsu burst out laughing at the disgusted expression Tsubaki made in response. Her laughter abruptly cut short as the dancer yanked again.

“Come up here.”

“Why...?”

Tsubaki's expression was deadpan. “So you can sit on my face.”

“Have I told you how hot it is when you say things like that with that face of yours?”

“Yes. Get up here before I change my mind.”

“But I want to lick you too...”

“You're being punished. You don't get a say in this. Here. Now.”

Obediently, Eitsu crawled up and knelt, her hands resting against the wall. She felt Tsubaki' fingers spread her, then the warm pokes of a tongue. Her nails scraped lightly against the wall.

There was silence for the next while, only the soft, wet sounds of kissing and licking, and Eitsu's quiet, ragged breaths. Suddenly, Tsubaki dug her fingertips into the flesh of Eitsu's thighs, pulling her close, and began to suck. Eitsu felt it like an electric shock.

“Tsu-bo! That's too-”

Whatever she wanted to say was instantly forgotten. Her whole body shaking, rigid, she wanted to move but Tsubaki was holding her tight. She felt a pair of fingers slid inside and rub firmly and all she could do was close her eyes and let the feeling take her over.

It was too much. Her hips jerked and every spasmed uncontrollably, the blood rushing away from her head to the point of dizziness.

“Tsu-bo, st- stop. I'm...”

Tsubaki finally let her go. Eitsu collapsed to one side, shivering, her legs still tangled around the dancer's upper torso. Tsubaki's mouth and fingers were sticky with clear fluid. Some had even dripped onto her chest.

They stared wordlessly at each other.

“Give me... a moment. I'll... your turn...”

“Stay there,” Tsubaki said. “Just be quiet and stay there.”

“I'll clean you up-”

“Stop doing things for me. It won't change the past.”

“... I'm sorry.”

“Stop apologising.”

“You really don't want to go back to Yamato, do you?”

“I said, 'Stop apologising', not 'Please attack me'.”

Using her legs, Eitsu pulled the dancer closer. Tsubaki turned and pressed her face against Eitsu's lower belly.

“What's this, Round Two?”

“You really can't shut up, can you?”

“Nope.”

“I'll have to try harder next time.”

“You already did an amazing job. Or did you miss the fact that your entire lower face is covered in my-”

Tsubaki blew a raspberry against Eitsu's skin.

“GAH! WHAT- STOP THAT!”

“Oh, it worked.”

“Ugh, all the nice feelings have gone now.”

“I'll just have to make you feel good again.”

“Where did you learn to that, anyway?”

Tsubaki's head whipped up. “From the things you did... I didn't learn it from anyone else!”

“Okay, okay. Calm down... Why do you feel so defensive about that? You're talking to someone who has had sex with... I don't even remember how many people. There's nothing wrong with it... Is there?”

Tsubaki looked sick. “Are you going to do it again?”

“While I have you? No. Did that worry you, my flower?”

Tsubaki pressed her face back into Eitsu's stomach. “I'm daring to believe in a future for us, right now. It's... scary.”

“Thanks for waiting for me. You know I wouldn't have been upset if you found someone else. Or even just casually-”

“I know.”

Eitsu curled herself up so she could reach Tsubaki's face. Her tongue traced the dancer's lips.

“Hey! Let me wash my face!”

“What's the problem? I'm a cat, we lick ourselves all the time.”

“Get off!”

Tsubaki pushed her to one side and got up to dip a cloth in the basin of water they kept in their room. A pair of sneaky hands slipped around her from behind and began to wander.

“You...”

“Problem?”

“No.”

“Are you done washing?”

“Yes.”

“Good.”

Eitsu lifted Tsubaki up and brought her back to the bed.

Later, wrapped up tight together despite the warmth of the night, Eitsu drowsing with her face pressed into Tsubaki's neck, the dancer asked, almost to herself, “Do you really want to go back to Yamato? Isn't it nice here?”

Eitsu, eyes still closed, spoke like she was dreaming. “It was nice being here, but this isn't home. It's not where I was born and grew up. The energy in this place moves differently. The seasons creep up in different ways. It smells different.”

She breathed in the smell of the camellia oil that Tsubaki combed through her hair. The scent was beginning to fade. It wasn't possible to get the oil in this country.

“It's not the place where I met you.”

Tsubaki's fingers tightened in Eitsu's hair. “It's the place where you died.”

“So let's make some new memories there. Let's make enough memories to overwhelm eight lifetimes.”

“Like how you're talking enough to fill eight lifetimes?”

“Exactly.”

“Have you forgotten there's an obsessive kitsune after you?”

“Who?”

That flippant response earned her a poke in the side.

“Ow. Hey Tsu-bo, why did you decide to become a dancer?”

“Where on earth did that question come from?”

“You were in your mid-teens when you began training. That's late for the profession. Most people start learning when they're small children. And yet, you insisted on it. And then, when you became famous, made an announcement that anyone named Eitsu could come and watch you for free. With the luck blessing I gave you, back in my first life, you could have been successful in any profession. You could have gone and lived your life out somewhere else. You could have stayed in that first town where we met, or the second. You could have had a simple life, or an extravagant one. Why?”

“How do you suddenly know all this about the dance profession?”

“Aya-chan and I talk a lot you know. She doesn't show it, but she's lonely... She wants to go home too.”

“I've been selfish.”

“You've been selfless for so long, it's only fair to be a little selfish. You chose a flashy, public industry to work in, that doesn't suit you, and set out a lantern to bring me home to you. It really worked. I tried to come back every time.

“So now it's my turn. Let's go home and paint over the old memories. You don't have to be a dancer anymore, if you don't want to. Once this is over, you won't have to do anything you don't want to again.”

“And when I get old?”

“I'll still love you. What's the difference? … What?”

Tsubaki was shaking. Her tongue fumbled on the words. “Do you really love me?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Because you're prickly and fun to tease. Because you're brave and resilient and decided on a path that had no guarantees but you did it anyway. Because when you're sad, it hurts me to see. Because my favourite thing in the world is for us to lie like this together. Even better when it's raining a little outside and we're safe and warm inside.”

Eitsu kissed the tears dripping from Tsubaki's eyes.

“My proud, brave flower. How could I not love you?”

Three days later, Eitsu, Tsubaki and Ayame, carrying small packs of supplies, gifts, and protective talismans from Hanasan, boarded a boat bound for Chikyou¹地峡 (chikyou) – 'isthmus'., the western-most port city of Yamato.