Chapter Text
Her story begins in a call, one that draws her from slumber, one that she follows, quick-footed and quiet.
Night-time is a place where she seldom explored; as a child she finds it frightening, the shadows of the unknown creeping along the places of which she was once familiar, blades of grass tucked away by leering darkness, the world around her so very dark and veiled. Only the voices of the crickets remained the same as they sang their proof of existence, their brief trills like a pulse of night; the frost not having taken them yet, a hot autumn only just beginning to fade into breaths of white mist.
She counted their chirps with her mind as she used her hands to count fourteen seconds, then added forty to her estimate. Fifty-six degrees, the crickets told her. This year is unusually warm in a climate like theirs - what would that mean for the lake? Would it not freeze over like the year past, come winter? Her mouth screwed up at the thought; her sisters will be so very upset.
The stones felt like ice under her toes as she stepped off the engawa, peering down into the koi pond, curiosity guiding her feet. The moon stared back at her, white and luminescent; it was all-knowing, ever present. She brought her hand down over it, dipping her fingers in the water, skewing the image. Koi fish mouthed over her fingertips, seeking food, their scales glowing under the moon’s reflection, the sight enthralling, mystifying.
She raised her hand, playful and transfixed, watching the shapes of her silhouette playing over the reflection of the moon. There was a sense of peace in the atmosphere in place of her fear of the dark, a strange pulse to the air, a pull, the stars ever bright against an abyss-like sky, a high frequency humming her ears.
The night had not welcomed her kindly before, but here, tonight, she belonged.
As the thought came to her, something reverberated through the air, the hair rising on her arms.
There was a voice in the wind. Touch it, it whispered, coaxing. Touch the moon.
She reached down, breath caught behind her ribs. Her fingertips graced the water, shivered through the moon’s reflection. Something solidified in her palm, the pale glow giving away to something physical, like silk flowing around her fingers, forming shape.
Peering down, her eyes went wide in wonder, her breath leaving her in a gasp. It was ghost-like with a translucent body, but the shape was familiar; small, with a rounded head, long antennae, sharp hind legs.
It was a cricket.
She giggled in disbelief, then joy. It chirped and flicked this way and that, twitching in her palm, this spirit of a cricket, this form made of moonlight. Strangely, it reminded her of her grandmother, a woman she dearly missed—the one whom had taught her of crickets, and their usefulness. She rubbed a fingertip over it, then gasped in amazement as her finger seemed to pass right through it. It was beautiful, she thought, the most beautiful thing she’d ever seen.
Nature opens for her doors to the honest and vulnerable soul, the book of the divine had said, and the gods live through her; she, the conduit, them, the mind.
It had never felt quite so real until now; things she had thought of, understood as fact were also wondrous, mystifying in their own right. Knowing is different to seeing; and here in her face lay the truth of it all, nature entwined with the favor of a moon god, a physical weight she held in her palm.
Nature and her beauty are reflected back at you, again came the voice of her memories, pages inscribed with symbols and deities, sacred and dreamy words followed by beatific illustrations.
“You’re wonderful,” she told the cricket, smiling widely. It jumped between her fingers, moving from hand to hand in a almost playful manner. Wherever it went a wisp of light followed it—blurred and thin, like a tail, or an afterimage. The chirps it made sounded louder and almost seemed to echo hauntingly, overwhelming all other crickets in the forest. She sat on the stone steps for a while, watching it dart about, in awe of the way it glowed in the darkness, humbled by the lovely attitude it adopted towards her.
As she sat, something rumbled through the forest — a howl, somewhat subdued, yet close. She jerked up and to her feet, head snapping towards the tree-line in alarm. In her peripheral, the cricket dissolved into air, light fading in her palms, taking with it a sense of warmth and instead leaving behind a sense of loss.
A wolf, fur snow-vivid under the moon, slunk from the shadow. “Heiress,” it greeted her with it’s rumbling voice, brushing against her side affectionately, body like a furnace of heat against her chilled skin. “It is late. Why are you not inside, safe?”
“I’m listening to the crickets,” she said, scuffing her slipper against the stone stair. Dread rolled her stomach. “Please don’t tell, Kyo?”
The nin-wolf tilted it’s head slightly, then turned to look into the forest, from where a voice rang out, stiff and stern, “Do not presume to give Kyo orders, Miyatsuki.”
Her uncle stepped into the dim light, his worn face wrinkled in disapproval, his mouth in a thin line. His armor, black edged with silver, nearly had him blending with the shadows; a shinobi of the night in his natural element if not for the blindingly silver-white hair.
“Ojisan,” she murmured as he made his way to her, his steps soundless.
“Child,” he said, patting her on the head in a way that seemed to tighten her chest uncomfortably, “You know you aren’t allowed outside on nights like these. You’re a target, and a lady at that.”
“Can’t Kyo stay with me then?” she asked hopefully, glancing at the wolf. “It’s a full moon tonight, I-I would like to stay…”
“Kyo is patrolling with me,” his eyes narrowed, red like her own, more burgundy-brown in the dark. “Did you hear me, niece? You could have been taken.” His tone told her that he was not at all happy with her.
She pouted. “Tsukuyomi-okami-sama was watching over me,” she mumbled, wringing her hands.
“The gods watch over us all, yet bad things still happen, child,” he said, with a note of condescension. “In any case, it’s no excuse for your actions. I will escort you back to your rooms.”
It’s unladylike to argue back, her mother had taught her; head down, eyes to the floor, the picture of obedience. But the cricket swam in her mind’s eye, pale-blue light and hair rising on her skin. It was the work of the moon god, the specter. She wanted to see it again.
“No,” she said haughtily, just as her mother would sound when she would speak in the tea rooms, in the place where the ladies reigned. It came out nothing like her mother, and a little shaky, but she stared resolutely into his eyes as she told him, “I will stay!”
He stared at her without expression, until something cold passed over his face, then breathlessly she found herself clutched against his side as he carried her into the house, his movements far too fast to predict. Kyo stared on after them, voiceless and obedient.
“I want to go back!” she cried, clawing her way up his shoulder and over to his back, heaving her way up until the moon was in sight. It shone brightly through the open gap of the screen door, moonlight swimming along the outside engawa floor. The further away it got the more upset she felt. Escaping was a fool’s game; her uncle was a huge man, not to mention a trained shinobi, one of the best her clan has to offer.
“Do as you’re told,” he hissed sharply, jostling her into stillness. Her eyes filled with tears at the abrupt harshness of his tone. “If you behave like a child then I shall treat you like one! You are thirteen name-days past. Has your mother not taught you to listen to your betters? Apologize.”
His words filled her with shame. What had she been thinking, arguing with a man, no less her family? Her mother would punish her horribly. “I’m sorry, Tatsuma-ojisan,” she sniffled, lip curling into a wobble. She rubbed at her eyes.
“Very well. I will hear no more demands from you. You will be married one day,” he went on, “And your future husband will not tolerate a bride who will not defer to men. Do not forget your place, niece.”
“Yes, ojisan,” she whispered; she did not trust her voice to be steady. She pressed her forehead against his shoulder helplessly, fighting back her tears. His arms tightened around her, so softly she nearly didn’t feel it.
“No more late night trysts, understood?” he said, as they neared her door, his voice bounds gentler. “It is unbecoming of a lady of your stature.”
She wanted to resent him, but she couldn’t. He was just saying it as they all knew, after all. In the Hatake Clan, women have no voice amongst the men. His callousness towards her would not be frowned upon, rather it would be actively encouraged.
You see, her uncle is a powerful man, and projects an intensity that works against him just as well as it helps him, his tongue sharp and not often filtering his words. And though his mouth cuts her down, more so often do his hands heal. Green tinged with chakra, sealing small cuts from running and falling. A comforting embrace in times of need. Hands on her shoulders, leading her from tittering ladies of allied clans. Always there when she needs him, even times when she wishes he weren’t. She loves him just as much as she feels caged by him.
Her voice comes out small, almost meek, “Yes, ojisan. Goodnight.”
He sets her down gently, and she keeps her head bowed so he doesn’t see evidence of her crying. “Keep this lesson with you. Goodnight, Miya.” A hand smooths down her hair, soft and careful, always careful because he is rather strong, and she is young, delicate; a girl.
He’s gone, of course, before she even looks up, and howls ring through the night, echoing through a silver-spruce forest blanketed in darkness.
Do not forget your place, niece. As if she could.
Her mother had made sure of that. She was going to be married young, was going to have children young. If she had a daughter, she would be expected to teach her to defer to men just as she must. If she was lucky, she would bear only sons. Her duty lay in obedience, submission. Nowhere else.
She wondered, silently, if Amaterasu-okami-sama would still shine as brightly as she did if she had to defer to the man-gods in her life, if they told her how she should rule the sky during the days, if they treated her as if she was less-than. Would the sky dim? Would the sun feel cold?
Closing the door behind her, she finds that she can’t hear the crickets anymore, not even through the thin walls of her bedroom.