Kurinai’s eyes slowly opened to make out the wood beams and stone ceiling of his room. The feathers in his mattress soothed him awake, caressing his shifting body on the stuffed mattress while some of them poked through and jabbed him to wakefulness. He just laid there, unmoving, letting his mind come back to the real world from the dreamland.

            Am I really a part of this? He thought. The man from the previous day’s events returned to him in a flurry of memories, blood oozing around his dead form in the trash. He didn’t know how to feel about him, whether to feel pity or disdain. The man appeared to have been under some kind of influence, as if he were only partially conscious during the ordeal, but he had also committed a murder.

            He sat up and looked out the balcony door to his left, out to Tokeyama, the capital of the Empire. His white cloth shirt fell loosely across his built frame, a curtain on a mysterious, new play about to be performed.

            He stood and took off the shirt and looked at the mirror to the right, taking himself in for a moment. The Lukai lessons had really paid off, resulting in a well-built, defined muscular torso, despite being the least aggressive fighting art, focusing on slow and deliberate movements to fight an enemy. A true mind game.

            Not that I’ll use it much. Kurinai thought. My real skills are of the mind.

            A soft knock at the door sounded and Elixia poked her head in the small opening she made.

            “Kurinai? You awake?” She said, quieter than her normal flamboyancy.

            “Just now.” Kurinai said, only able to see her head through the crack in the doorway. His eyes still fuzzed with morning daze.

            “Ok, good. Have you seen father?”

            “Well, I would be surprised if I had. I just woke up.”

            “Right…”

            “But if I had to guess,” Kurinai said. “I would bet he is in a council meeting with Emperor Turinai.”

            A servant dropped a platter down the hall, making Elixia suddenly jump.

            “Are you alright, Elixia?” Kurinai asked.

            “I’m fine.” She said, quickly, then left.

            What’s going on with her? Kurinai thought. She’s been a bit absent lately.

            Despite their sibling rivalry and lack of bonding because of their different purposes in the family, his to inherit the Seat, and hers to marry and bind to another family or house, they have been able to stay close. This lack of bubbly personality had Kurinai unsettled.

She hasn’t been this way since around the time mother died. Kurinai thought. He pushed the concern to a separate place in his mind and continued to dress and prepare for the day as he thought up how to proceed with his and Zenji’s plan, even if he could call it that yet.

            After dressing, Kurinai walked over to a drawer and pulled it open. Bags of coins, gold wens to be exact, filled the wood drawer. Kurinai grabbed one and hefted it out of his dresser. He pulled a rope hanging down from his ceiling next to the bed and a bell sounded down the hall.

            Then, Zenji jumped up onto the balcony and walked into the room.

            Kurinai jumped as Zenji ascended the balcony and stepped into the room. He held his hand to his chest, a few deep breaths escaping.

“I have not been startled like that for some time.” Kurinai said.

            “Hey Kurinai. Breakfast up yet?”

            “Soon. I have to take care of something.” Kurinai said. “Hide for a minute.”

            Zenji nodded and disappeared underneath Kurinai’s bed. Kurinai laughed as he watched him scurry like a mouse under the bed.

            A servant walked into the bed chambers, after a knock, and said, “My lord?”

            “Take this to the old shop on sixth and find the owner and ask if this will be enough to buy it.” He held up the bag of coins.

            “Yes, sir.” The servant said.

            “However, do not say anything about it to anyone. If anyone asks, tell them I sent you to buy me some pastries.” The servant nodded and left the room.

            Zenji skittered out from under the bed and stood, wafting the dust off his chest with his hand, falling off of him in a tiny cloud.

            “The shop on sixth? That’s the run down one, right?” Zenji said as he got out from under the bed.

            “Yes. We need a private place to talk and work on our…plan, I suppose.”

            “Makes sense. Can I sleep there? It gets cold sometimes without any trash to cover up with.” Zenji said.

            “That is what that smell was.”

            Zenji frowned. “Hey, you’d stink too.”

            They both laughed.

            “It is our shop now, or will be, that is. You can do whatever you want with it.”

            “Like a secret hideout!”

            “More or less.” Kurinai said, smiling. “I will go get breakfast. Stay here and hide again if anyone comes.”

            “I know.” Zenji said.

            “And lessons will continue, regardless of our nightly activities.”

            “I’m fine with that. I’m actually pretty excited!” Zenji said. “In the shop?”

            “Absolutely. Twice a week for now. If needs be, we can change the schedule. I get pretty busy sometimes.” He then walked out of the room.

            An image of the assassin’s face flashed in his mind, but it wasn’t the one he remembered.

            Kurinai stopped in the hallway, trying to remember the face again and it came right back, not the clean-faced man he remembered first, but a rugged, bearded man’s face with a scar down the middle of the nose and an extremely glossy left eye.

            Is that a glass eye? Kurinai thought. What am I seeing?

            “Sir, are you alright?” A servant asked.

            Kurinai turned to see the servant holding a tray of food.

            “I am quite fine. I just suddenly had a headache. Where is that food going?”

            “To you, Sir. I was on my way now.” The servant bowed slightly, as far as the tray of food would allow. On the tray was a plate with a breakfast pastry, ham and cow’s cheese with a slab of pig’s hide on top, with a glass of water.

            “I would like another pastry, please. I am quite hungry, and extra eggs, if you can.”

            The servant nodded and turned to leave.

            “Wait.” Kurinai said, causing the servant to stop. “Why were you bringing me food? I never ordered it.”

            “Your father said he did not wish you to work too hard. He’s worried about you, I think.”

            Kurinai nodded and the servant left to fetch more food. Kurinai walked back to his room and opened the door to find Zenji naked in the bath tub.

            Kurinai looked away but not in time to have the image in his head. There were unfortunately no bubbles in the water yet.

            Zenji squirmed under the water’s surface, trying to form soap bubbles to help cover himself.

            “I’m sorry! I thought you’d be gone longer!” Zenji said, dirt flowing off of him like a freshly cleaned cobblestone street.

            “You are tanner than I thought you would be.” Kurinai said, chuckling.

            Zenji looked down and blushed. “I’m sorry.”

            “Do not be. I know you do not get many baths. But, be careful. A bath is a pretty easy way to get discovered. I stopped a servant on his way back to deliver food to me. If I would have missed him, you would likely be arrested by now, or running stark naked through the estate.”

            Zenji’s face went white. “By Pan’s left nut.” Zenji said.

            Kurinai frowned. “How does a giant crystal that stood two thousand years ago have a ‘left nut’? It cannot reproduce.”

            “I don’t know. Sounded good in my head.” Zenji said. “And I’ve heard others say it.”

            Kurinai laughed.

            A knock sounded at the door.

            Kurinai turned just in time to see a stark-naked Zenji run across the room and burry himself behind some curtains to a separate sitting room attached to Kurinai’s bed chamber. The curtains began to slowly absorb the remaining water as it flowed down Zenji’s legs, throwing off the tones of the colors and embroidery to a darker hue.

            Kurinai barely held back the laugh before opening the door and nearly slipped on some water from Zenji’s violent escape.

            The servant entered with more food now, and placed the platter on the table to the right of the bed. The servant looked around and said, “A bath? I could have helped, my lord.”

            “It is no trouble. Besides, it has been very entertaining.” The servant looked at him with a raised eyebrow, but left without a further word, closing the wooden door behind him after bowing.

            Zenji waddled back to the bath, hand over crotch, and slipped into the now-cold bath.

            “Is that for both of us?” Zenji asked.

            “Yes. It is not much, but I figured it could work.”

            “It looks delicious.”

            Kurinai handed the other pastry to Zenji and he scarfed it down in a few bites, resembling a sea monster engulfing an unfortunate merchant ship passing by its hunting grounds.

            “Careful. Try not to get a stomachache.”

            “I have one every day. This will be a stomachache I welcome. It’s delicious! Like I said.”

            Kurinai smiled. “Hurry up and get dried off too. We need to go see our new place of operations.”

            “Operations?” Zenji said incredulously.

            Kurinai raised his eyebrow in a mischievous way. “Our secret hideout.”

            Zenji smiled. “That’s better.” He grabbed the towel near the edge of the bath and nearly stood, but stopped to wave off Kurinai.

            “Not like I have not seen everything already.”

            “Yeah, but—” Zenji said, then sighed and stood, all air of bashfulness gone, as well as a smile.

            “What just happened? You changed demeanor suddenly.” Kurinai said.

            Zenji shrugged. “Not like I had privacy before anyway. It feels too much like the gang when—well, we were really close, mostly physically. So, privacy was nonexistent. Sorry, I just—it made me think of the gang.” Zenji shivered.

            “The food gang, correct? The one you mentioned the night you came to the mansion?”

            Zenji only nodded, slowly drying himself down.

            “Well, you are here now, with a friend, Zen. No need to worry about that.”

            Zenji smiled and quickly rubbed down, stepping out of the bath and onto the stone ground as he dried his feet and legs one at a time. He dressed into the same dirty clothes and headed for the balcony.

            “Meet me down the road a bit.” Kurinai said. Then, Zenji was out the door and onto the street.