Saiunkoku Monogatari Fan Fiction ❯ Your Uncle Reishin ❯ Chapter 1

Flowers bloomed joyously in the imperial gardens; the thunderstorms that frightened her so were still far in the future; Reishin had chosen the time and the place perfectly. Shuurei had blossomed and shown the promise encapsulated by the adornment that she wore as a badge of office. He faced her, one government official to another, come together to discuss policy and the future of Saiunkoku, but first...

"Shuurei, before we discuss your plans for the Imperial Capital, there is something that I must confess."

She smiled, hiding it imperfectly with the fan that he'd left in her room as a birthday gift. Shuurei expected a proposal. She'd been inundated with offers of marriage ever since her brilliant tactics united the country under the Kou family and ousted the Emperor, who now shod horses for a living.

Reishin paused, before divulging his long-held secret. "Shuurei, my name is Kou Reishin and I am your uncle."

"What?" She stared at him, her lips repeating his words: your uncle, your uncle.

He nodded. "I have been watching you from the shadows, ever since you were a baby. I have tried to protect you, from everything that your father couldn't and give you a sheltered and happy life.

Shuurei let out a keening cry and rushed at him, burying herself in his shocked arms. They closed around her for a tender and loving embrace.

"I always knew," she gasped between sobs, "that there was a special bond between us. Why didn't you tell me before?"

"I couldn't," he replied, his throat catching. "I was afraid that you'd regret my choices and hate me for them and blame me for things that weren't my fault."

"How could I do that, dear Uncle Reishin," she replied. "I love you."

"Let's make up for lost time, Shuurei and get to know each other. I have so much to tell you."

"Oh, Uncle Reishin. You're much better than Uncle Kurou."

The flowers had long since faded. Brown, decaying leaves dappled the ground. Reishin was careful to avoid the worst of the litter as he paced.

"Where is Shuurei?" he asked himself. It would be dark soon and the city was dangerous to travel alone.

"Oji-san?"

Her voice was light and confused. He looked up and saw the young, proud woman he'd been waiting for. The wind tunnelled through her robes, fluttering them. She looked cold, but wouldn't mention it, not Shuurei.

"Shuurei," he said warmly. "I have something to tell you."

She cocked her head, confused why the old man whom she'd met while posing as a boy had asked to meet her, these many years later.

"Shuurei," he said again. "I am your uncle, your real uncle, Reishin."

A smile lit her face and Reishin continued. "I'm Shouka's brother, the head of the Kou family."

It was then he realised that the smile didn't reach her eyes. Her smile was the default reaction of an official, who's listening to the little people, but not really paying attention. Reishin could spot the very moment when his words hit home and the smile drained away.

"What?!" she screamed. "My, my, my uncle? You?!" The wind howled yet Shuurei's words cut through it easily. "No! NO! It can't be!"

"It's true, Shuurei. I'm your loving uncle..."

"You're a fraud," she cried. The wind whipped her hair up and lashed at Reishin, somehow reaching across the ten foot distance and raising welts on his face. "You pervert! You nuisance! It must be a lie!"

He shook his head, desperately, shrinking as oppressive clouds rolled in to cover the sky. The light dimmed. "It's true. Shuurei!"

"How can I trust you? Everything you've told me has been a lie. You've toyed with me, laughed at me, forsaken me. Has my career just been an amusement to you?"

"No, Shuurei. I'm so proud..."

"That's it! I quit as an official." She took the flowerbud from her hair and dashed it to the ground. "I'm going to marry Ran Ryuuren and we're going to wander Saiunkoku."

"How will you live?" he pleaded, weakly.

"He has his flute. I can play the erhu. We'll travel the country and play for people in the towns and villages, living off their donations. Ryuuren is teaching me to see music as he does, to play from my soul."

"No! He's a terrible flautist. The two of you will starve."

Reishin could see Shuurei growing thinner and weaker before his eyes, fading away, the despair and hopelessness of a betrayed cause crushing her mighty soul until nothing was left until a few whispered and scandalous rumours.

It was winter. Snow had threatened for the past few days, but the heavy clouds refused to discharge their load. The air was crisp and freezing. Shuurei huffed, slightly out of breath and flushed. Her warm robes were pulled tightly around her.

Reishin smiled. His fan had been mislaid and without it to distract them, his hands twitched continually.

"Shuurei. Thank you for meeting me." Reishin was not good at hiding his feelings. He could put on a blank face, but only by drawing on his anger and there was always something he was angry about. In front of Shuurei like this, that anger melted and all that was left was the small little soul that was Reishin.

"Who are you?" she asked, the exertion showing on her face.

"I am Kou Reishin," he said.

"Kou Reishin?" she repeated.

"I am your uncle and head of the Kou clan."

"My uncle?" she repeated. "Head of the Kou clan."

She left it there and the clouds drifted lower and lower, until they bumped against Reishin's head.

"I have been watching..."

"It's your doing then?" she said, blankly. "Because of you my father was cut off from the family. Because of you we've lived like peasants. Because of you I've had to work. Because of you my home has fallen into ruin and every spare penny has been wasted fixing walls that crumble again days later?"

Reishin nodded and a little frost crystallised on his topknot.

Shuurei squared her shoulders and continued more loudly. "Are you telling me that because of you, I had to enter the Imperial Harem, sate the lusts of an evil man, to sell my virtue for a few gold coins; all because you hate me and my father?"

"No," Reishin protested. "I love you both."

She pulled her clothes around her. They bulged noticeably at her stomach. "That idiotic emperor forced me to undress for his pleasure. He made me dance and play the erhu naked. He touched me. My virtue is sullied. No-one will love me now."

"They will."

Shuurei screamed and fell to the ground. It was then that he noticed the blood staining the ground at her feet. He raced to her side, but she batted away his hands, like a petulant child. "My belly is swollen with that bastard's child. I tried to hide it, as I'd left the harem; been used and discarded before I realised."

Her face strained. Her breaths now came out in ragged gasps and she grew too weak to fend off her uncle. Fighting Shuurei every step of the way, Reishin hauled her to the pitiful shelter of a barren tree.

Shuurei grasped his robes with a mighty effort and pulled his face down to hers. "Bury me here, under this tree, along with my child. Tell no-one where I have been laid to rest."

Reishin wept.

Buds on the trees and plants; bleating animals with heavily swollen stomachs; new life threatened to break out everywhere. The mannered man sipped tea from a delicate cup as he enjoyed the view with a gentile young woman.

"Your father is very special to me, Shuurei," the man slurred his words, almost imperceptibly. The girl smiled at that and refilled his cup from the heavy pot. "He's not very organised, but he's incredibly loving and gentle and protective. He's always accepted me as I am and I will always be grateful for that." He took a sip from the refilled cup and sighed. "Yes, your father is very special and that makes you special too, Shuurei."

"I'm flattered of course," she responded, filling the silence, "but this has come from nowhere."

"Not from nowhere, " he disagreed. "I have watched you since you were a baby and what a cute baby you were." His cheeks flushed and the corners of his mouth twitched back. " I held you, as a child and swore to myself to watch and nurture you, to protect you."

"We rarely meet," she reminded him. "When I worked in the Palace, during the heat wave; that was the first time we talked."

"True," he agreed, loosening his robe and relaxing somewhat. "I was afraid of what you'd say, of how you'd feel when you discovered that I was your uncle, Reishin."

"Why, I would feel happy to have an uncle Reishin." She spoke calmly, the model of decorum as she filled his cup once more.

Reishin looked at the cup, his eyebrows raising as he saw it full once more. He drank deeply, before lowering it to the table. A shudder in his hand spilled a tiny drop onto the lacquered surface.

"Please, be very careful with that cup, Uncle Reishin," Shuurei remonstrated with him.

He pulled a handkerchief from his sleeve and mopped up the spill. When he was finished, she stood up and took the cloth, throwing it into the bustling fire. "The liquid inside has been poisoned," she explained.

The office was small. Kou Reishin's hair had turned completely grey and he found it difficult to speak or concentrate. Shuurei ignored him when she entered the room, thumbing through the documents on his desk for whatever he'd forgotten to hand over.

"Would you like some tea?"

"No thank you."

She went to work on the second pile.

"Do you still make those manjuu buns?"

"Not anymore," she replied. "I don't have time to cook. Ask the kitchens for some."

"I'd love to taste your manjuu buns. No other is as moist."

"Umm, hmmm," she mumbled. Her deft fingers picked through the third pile and wrested out a document. She skimmed it and hissed in triumph.

"Shuurei," Reishin mumbled. "I'm your uncle."

She smiled. "I know," she said, before turning and leaving him behind.