by C. J. Anaya
And now here we were, back in the gardens where he and I had had our first real conversation; also the place where I was almost killed…and the place where he promptly forgot about me once the guards had shown up.
My beautiful gardens were now tainted.
Katsu stood as I approached, and I nearly stopped my laborious tread. I had forgotten how very tall he was, and how broad his shoulders were. He wore a warrior’s vest of brown leather and brown trousers…nothing like the traditional style of clothing that my father wore, complete with kimono, jacket, and split skirt. I guessed as a warrior god you had to wear what gave you more freedom of movement. I tugged on the confining fabric of my kimono and longed to be a man.
“Mikomi,” he said, bowing from the waist.
I bowed and then waited in that same position.
“You may rise, Princess. You needn’t be so formal with me.”
I refrained from voicing my thoughts and merely rose from my bowing position.
“Tell me what you know about the veil,” he commanded.
“Very little, I’m afraid. All I know is what the prophecy has stated.”
Katsu looked at me in surprise.
It irked me that my ignorance had become so painfully obvious or that I might care about his regard for me.
“So little, Mikomi? Were you never allowed to touch the veil when healing someone?”
“I…I…never knew I could. I didn’t think it possible to access the veil when healing someone.”
Katsu took my hand and bid me walk with him on one of the winding paths through the foliage.
“In truth, the veil is all around us because the land of the dead is here, but in a different dimension. You’ll be able to sense it the same way that I can once you have had a feel for it during a healing. You will also be capable of noticing where the veil’s weaknesses lie based on its texture. When weak, the veil bends easily, like glass under extreme temperatures, but when the veil is at its strongest it will feel like an impenetrable wall. It won’t matter if you have to travel halfway around the world to strengthen it…you’ll be able to sense where it needs to be fortified once you connect to it.”
I nodded and pretended confidence where none was felt. I found it difficult, picturing myself sensing anything other than someone’s ki.
“Now, in order to sense the veil you will need someone to practice on.”
I felt anxious all of a sudden. “Surely you don’t mean to injure yourself so that I might heal you?”
Katsu looked confused for a moment, and then his face cleared.
“No, practicing on my person would be wholly useless. There is no veil to sense when healing a kami.”
“I don’t understand.”
“A kami is immortal, and you cannot gain access to the veil with our ki because the veil is for those people who are meant to die.”
I absently plucked an oval-shaped leaf hanging from a tree we were passing and worried it between my hands as I contemplated this new information.
“We will find someone who is mortal for you to practice on.”
I grabbed his arm without thinking. He looked down at my hands and back at me, and I dropped them immediately. I could have sworn he had been about to hold my hand in his, but for whatever reason he stopped himself. I thought I saw some intense emotion flash across his face, but then it was gone. It was frustrating. He was extremely adept at shielding his emotions.
“I…I’m sorry…I just wonder if it is safe. I wouldn’t want to hurt anyone.”
Katsu took another moment to compose himself. Somehow, he had managed to build up a wall that my empathic abilities couldn’t penetrate.
“The man you will be practicing on is already very ill and will soon die. There isn’t anything you could do that would possibly inflict more damage.”
Katsu motioned with a flick of his finger, and two guards materialized out of nowhere, carrying a frail looking man with tattered, soiled clothing. They carefully placed him on the grass before me.
I knelt down by his side and grabbed his hand. He looked at me, but didn’t actually see me. The pupils and irises of his eyes were covered with a thin milky substance. His gnarled, bony hand gripped mine with surprising strength. I sensed his fear as he reached out with his other hand. Did he not understand the reason for which he’d been brought here?
“Where did he come from?” I asked, horrified.
“I believe he was found in the village a few miles north of here.”
“Where is his family? What is his name?” I could hear the slight rise in my voice and felt tension in my body.
“Does it really matter? He is being of service to The Healer and all of mankind.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. This poor man had no doubt been kidnapped and brought here without one word of explanation.
“The Healer.” I heard the old man mumble. “Where is The Healer?”
“I’m here.” I grabbed both his hands in mine and brought them to my face. “I’m right here.”
He used his hands to read the curve of my chin and cheeks, the length of my nose and width of my forehead.
“You can heal me?” he asked once he lowered his hands into mine.
“I can try.”
I placed my hands on either side of his face to connect with his ki. My heart sank when I saw the extent of his illness and felt certain his fate had already been decided. The one downside to my gift, the one thing I never had any control over, was who would live and who would die. Who could be healed and who could not.
This man had probably been promised a cure for his illness, but he was meant to die.
I broke away from him and sat back.
“If you will give me just one moment please,” I said, keeping my rising emotions in check.
I stood up and walked the short distance to Katsu. He raised a questioning eyebrow at me.
“Katsu, please forgive me, but I think there has been some mistake. This man believes I can heal him, but he is meant to die. Was there no one else with minor injuries that I might have healed?”
“I understand your distress, Princess, but I made no mistake. I picked him myself. I too sensed that he was meant to die.”
I stared at him, dumbfounded.
“Yes, but he is under the impression that he will be healed.”
“I may have allowed him to think you would be capable of healing him. He might have put up a fight, otherwise.”
I wasn’t sure how I restrained myself from smashing my fist into Katsu’s head. I supposed a life schooled in the art of repressing my emotions had served me well.
Katsu finally seemed to take note of my distress and placed his hands on my shoulders in a placating gesture.
“Mikomi, the only way you can sense the veil at first is by attempting to heal someone who is meant to die. What you will find when you start the healing process is—”
“A wall,” I mumbled automatically. “A block of some kind.”
I knew it well. It was the thing that taunted me every time I fought to heal someone that deserved to live but died anyway. The obstacle I struggled to overcome any time I tried to do something good and right.
Katsu smiled at me as if I had just earned a nice pat on the head for responding with the correct answer.
“Yes, then you have felt it before. The veil is there, preventing you from healing anyone whose soul is ready to pass over. I want you to try healing this man, and once you sense the veil, take special note of how it feels.”
“Feels?” I struggled to follow his instructions, worrying about the fate of the sickly, old man.
“Mentally. In a way you are touching it with your own mind…your own ki. Become accustomed to the way it feels, and you will be that much closer to sensing the veil. Connect with him again and focus this time.”
I turned around and slowly walked back to my patient. After kneeling down next to him, I gently took his head between my hands, once again connecting to his ki. The pain
was awful, worse than it had been the first time. I wasn’t sure if his illness had a specific name, but it resided in the lungs and made it very difficult for him to breathe.
I tried to instruct his ki to minimize the size of a large mass lodged within his lungs, but I received no response. I pushed his ki aside and tried to minimize the mass using my own—something I had tried several times before whenever another person was unresponsive. My instructions and suggestions never reached the tiny intelligences within the lungs. Instead, the wall that I had been dreading rose up before me and blocked me at every turn. I pushed against it. The veil felt like a very thin pane of hardened glass. Unyielding and immovable. I tried feeling my way up, down and to the side, seeking an end to the impenetrable wall.
Nothing but cold, hard glass.
Frustrated, I disconnected from the old man and let go.
“I’m sorry, sir,” I whispered. “I cannot heal you.”
He grabbed my hand and held on tight.
“But you’re The Healer. They promised me you would heal me.”
I glanced to Katsu, who had the decency to look slightly ashamed of himself. He flicked his fingers again and the two guards who had brought the stranger in, reached down to remove him from the gardens.
The man held fast to my arms and began to cry. One of the guards hit him over the head in an attempt to free me from his grasp.
“No, stop,” I commanded, surprising both of Katsu’s guards and myself. In the seventeen years I’d lived here within the palace, never once had I given any kind of command nor raised my voice like a man.
“Mikomi, what are you doing?” Katsu asked.
But I wasn’t listening. I wouldn’t listen to someone who valued life so little and behaved in such an unfeeling manner.
The guards continued to hold the man in their arms while I placed my hands on either side of his head and connected with him. I gave instructions to his ki to heal the damage that time, age, and illness had caused and did my best to take away all of his pain.
When I opened my eyes I was looking into his. They were beautiful and completely healed.
“I cannot give you back your health as you were promised,” I said in a shaky voice. I raised my hand to his face and gently held it there. “But I can give you back your sight.”
The old man stared at me in wonder as tears slid from his newly healed eyes. I looked at the astonished expression on the guards’ faces. “You will return him to his home and make certain he sees his family before he dies.”
“Yes, Princess,” the guard to my right said.
I couldn’t be sure, but I thought I saw a small look of respect on each of their faces before they turned away and left. I stared after them, wishing I could have done more to ease the poor man’s burden. There was much I could accomplish if I didn’t have to heal the veil.
Katsu cleared his throat. “That was very kind of you…what you did for that man. You didn’t have to.”
I turned to face him, but I had cooled my anger and schooled my face. He would never know how sickened I felt at his utter lack of feeling.
“May I speak freely?”
“Of course,” he said in surprise.
“There are many things we are not forced to do, but perhaps we should do them anyway, whether they are considered duty, destiny or simply a matter of choice. If we have a choice to make then we should choose it. If we have a gift for healing, then we should use it. We should lift people’s burdens and make things right.” I stepped closer to him and clasped my hands in front of my heart. “There is too much suffering and too much sadness. Just as I have sensed that there is suffering and sadness within you.”
His eyes widened at my bold statement. I reached my hand out slowly and softly placed it against his heart.
“I can fix it, Katsu. I can make it right.”
He looked at me in wonder and slowly lifted his hand, placing it on top of mine. We stood there like that for a few precious moments—a connection that shattered with the snap of a branch and the approach of more guards. Katsu blinked and stepped back…and the moment was gone.
“Honorable Masaru Katsu, the emperor wishes a word with you.”
I glanced at the soldier speaking and thought he looked familiar. He glanced at me so quickly no one would have noticed, but in that moment I wondered if he was another samurai warrior.
“Of course,” he said, turning to address me. “Princess, we will begin tomorrow at the same time. I will want to discuss what you learned from our training exercise today.”
I barely had time to bow before he was off.
Dismissed again.
I really should have become more accustomed to it by now, but in truth, it hadn’t bothered me as much in the past as it had lately. I watched as he strode confidently back the way we had come and then out of my sight.
“Princess, this message arrived earlier from Master Tutor Kenji,” the guard said. He bowed from the waist and offered the small piece of parchment to me.
“Thank you,” I said, taking it and opening it immediately.
Be ready before dusk for our educational outing. Your personal guards will be accompanying us for your protection.
I smiled. Kenji had been able to convince Father of the necessity of our outings, and from the looks of it had already found a way for us to be accompanied by our allies. He really was terribly good at all of this intrigue and subterfuge. I wasn’t well practiced in the art of deceit, but for a cause like this I would willingly become an expert.
I folded the note inside a pocket within my kimono and looked at the guards. “I wish to stay for a few moments in the gardens, please.”
The guard who had handed me the note nodded and stepped back. I walked at a normal pace around the winding path and headed straight for a large, copper colored rock that sat next to a wild looking bush with leaves and twigs pointing in every direction. There was another bench, dark green in color, placed next to it. I sat down and then reached forward toward the rock, pretending I had discovered a flower on the ground. I checked the rock for a message from Daiki, but found nothing.
On the one hand I was relieved. No news was good news, but I wished to visit with Hatsumi and check on her baby boy. I would look again for a message from Daiki in seven days. He didn’t always leave them, but I knew it was important that I never miss the first day of the week.
Straightening myself into a standing position, I noticed my maid, Aiko, touring the gardens with an older soldier. My curiosity piqued, I took a few steps forward, thinking I might follow them, but then paused, not wishing to intrude. Aiko never mentioned anything about a possible suitor.
I should have expected her inevitable departure. Now that I was to be married off and carted away within the next six months it only made sense that she would do what she could to secure her future.
I fully intended to tease her about it later when I saw her next. I had a grin on my face as I headed back toward my rebel guards waiting just within the garden gates. My mood lightened at the thought of Aiko finding her own happy ending.
* * *
Once again my guards escorted me to my rooms. I almost lost my footing as I closed the door due to the surprise I felt at the strange specter of my mother sitting primly on my bed.
“Mother?”
She looked at me with barely concealed disdain. It was a look I was unfortunately familiar with. That didn’t mean it hurt any less to endure.
“I’ve heard you started your training today,” was her opening remark.
“Yes, I just finished.”
“I’ve also been informed that you healed a diseased-ridden man’s eyesight, and a peasant at that!”
“That’s true. I was hoping to give him the opportunity to see his family before he passed on.”
My mother studied me for several seconds. It appeared she was unimpressed with what she saw. I knew I would never be as strikingly beautiful as she, but I wasn’t a hopeless case, surely.
“I tho
ught your father and I had impressed upon you the importance of reserving your healing powers. You’ll never be immortal if your powers are wasted on filthy peasants and ailing servants.”
I assumed she was referring to the maid within the palace whom I had helped during childbirth several weeks ago. I should have known that everything would be reported back to her. Her spies were larger in number and far superior to that of my father’s. I would need to be doubly careful now that I had given her reason to be displeased.
“I am sorry for my error. I merely wanted to help them—”
“Don’t talk to me about your noble desires or your foolish wishes.” She now stood and walked over to me, taking my chin roughly in her hand and squeezing hard. I felt her nails digging into my skin and could have sworn she enjoyed the obvious pain it caused me.
My mother had never shown much love for me, but she had never been cruel like this. I hardly understood what was happening.
“I have sacrificed my life and my happiness, agreeing to a loveless marriage with a vindictive fool so The Healer, the child of prophecy could exist and save the world, and you are jeopardizing your destiny by giving in to your weak, nurturing side. I won’t allow it. Do you understand me?”
“Yes, I understand. I…I didn’t know you felt that way about Father,” I managed to say.
She let go of me and stepped back. “Who doesn’t feel that way about your father? This empire has fallen into disarray due to his lust and greed for power. My people suffer at his hand, and he sits high and mighty on his pedestal thinking his good fortune is due entirely to his own prowess. He may be a kami, an entitled deity, but he is emperor because I made it so. I fulfilled my duty and gave birth to The Healer. I married him so you could exist.”