Fates Parallel Interlude 6.2 - Hearth and Home

Lady Tennin tried to always smile. It was important that the villagers never thought she was displeased or unhappy. If she ever so much as pouted or sighed, the priests and the miko would be all over her in an instant, bending over backwards to eliminate the cause of her discomfort.

Of course, the more logical part of Lady Tennin realized that they did so because she was so reluctant to display any negative emotions in the first place. The villagers knew that she hid her emotions for their sake, and so they treated any little lapse as if it were a huge emergency. It was an exhausting, self-perpetuating cycle, but such was her nature.

It was also quite necessary. If not for the tender care of the villagers and her shrine maidens, Lady Tennin would have wasted away centuries ago, giving up all she had for the sake of her village. Even if she knew it was worse in the long term, how could she not give up some of her essence to heal a sickly old woman, or an injured child? She’d give up her immortality to give her village even just a few extra moments of comfort.

But they wouldn’t let her, and she thanked them for it. She accepted their tributes of essence to sustain her power, because she knew it was necessary for their protection. It was what they wanted, and that was what mattered most.

And so, it was with great hesitation that she allowed herself to frown at the conundrum before her. Two letters, each from completely different sources, yet inextricably related. One was a tired old message that Lady Tennin hated to see, but had long-since grown accustomed to, the other was a joyful message which might have otherwise offset her dour mood.

Taken together, however, the two letters painted a picture that brought her to the brink of despair.

“My Lady, is something the matter? Has the levy increased?”

Bless her Shinji, the head priest of Lady Tennin’s shrine. He was always a perceptive one, often predicting her rare turns in mood and preparing for them in advance. This time, he wasn’t quite on the mark, but it was a good place to start.

“It has. Lord Noguchi, under orders from the Shogun, is demanding a full mobilization of all able-bodied men and women. Only mortals who have already completed their mandatory service are exempt.”

The priest paled.

“That’s...we—”

“Have a higher rate of martial artists than most villages. This will mean losing about seventy percent of our population until the end of whatever war Hayakawa is waging. The remaining workforce will only be able to tend perhaps a quarter or fewer of our fields, depending on how quickly the infirmed elderly can train the children.”

The very thought of it made her sick, but the village had resorted to such dire measures in the past.

“Will that be enough? We’ve had a good few years, but...”

Lady Tennin shook her head.

“Even with my blessings, and assuming the good weather persists, it will be all we can do just to keep up with the taxes.”

“Perhaps we can weather it...priests and miko are exempt—I can have our shrine lend aid to the people. The first few seasons will be hard, but once the children are trained and the elderly...”

He trailed off, and Lady Tennin gave him a sad smile. He was trying to spare her feelings, but she knew from experience that the elderly would be the first to perish in a famine.

“This all presumes that the taxes will stay the same. However, I suspect that our Noguchi province will be a key staging ground. That means our lord will have more soldiers to feed, which means higher taxes.”

“Eh?! Here? But we’re nowhere near the Qin front, and Goryeo are our allies. Even if it’s a civil war, Noguchi is surrounded by Hayakawa vassals—surely there are better places for Hayakawa’s armies to settle.”

Lady Tennin pursed her lips.

“It’s not certain. I may be reading things incorrectly, but the risk is there. If this levy is imposed on us, and the taxes are raised...it will be the end of Urayama. My protection won’t be enough to sustain our village.”

“But that’s impossible! Urayama has always stood fast. Our village has survived lords worse than Noguchi.”

“And it has perished under better ones. Shinji, I have lived in this shrine for centuries, but despite my best efforts...I haven’t always had a village to protect.”

It wasn’t something she liked to talk about. She usually told the story as though her sacrifice had saved the village, and that she’d been its guardian ever since, but the truth was far more grim. When she merged with the guardian spirit of Urayama, the village was already destroyed, and it had taken decades before the remaining miko could rebuild it enough to accept new settlers.

Since then, though Lady Tennin had done her best, the village had perished and been resettled at least twice. Her heart couldn’t bear to see it happen again.

“I...I see. What can we do, then? If we refuse the levy, Lord Noguchi will take it by force—I’m sure he’d be happy to have an excuse to march on you.”

Normally, Lady Tennin wouldn’t be able to answer. At best, she would ask her shrine to help evacuate and relocate the remaining villagers, then simply wait out the war and resettle the village once again.

This time, however, she had a potential alternative. The second letter—so auspiciously timed—presented both the bulk of her trouble, and also her best chance at salvation.

“Shinji, what is Urayama to you?”

The priest blinked at her sudden non-sequitur, but as always he did his best to humor her.

“Urayama is our home, my lady. The place which I am sworn to protect, as my father did before me, and his mother before him—all the way back to the founding of this very shrine.”

Well, not quite. Shinji’s family had indeed been the head priests for as long as Lady Tennin had been enshrined, but when she had been a mere miko, it had been a different line. They had died, but she didn’t bother correcting him. To most of Urayama’s residents, Lady Tennin had always been the guardian of their shrine.

“But what is that home, exactly? What is it that you protect? Is it this mountain, for which the village is named? Is it the shrine, where you and I live? Is it me?”

“Well...begging your pardon, my lady, and I mean no offense by this, but of course not. Urayama is not a single place or person. As you say, the village has been destroyed and rebuilt, but it remains our home all the same. Urayama, my lady, is the people we serve, and while it would break all of our hearts to do so, we would continue to be Urayama even without you.”

Lady Tennin wiped her watery eyes on a silken sleeve and smiled at her head priest.

“Yes, exactly. Full points, Shinji—that was a perfect answer. I knew I could trust you to understand.”

He chuckled.

“Well, that makes one of us. Might I impose on you to share whatever it is that led you to these questions?”

Lady Tennin held up the letter.

“This is from our good friends, Yoshika—you remember them, yes?”

He raised an eyebrow and accepted the letter.

“The Goryeon girls who wandered in from the wilds—one oni, and one tennin like yourself. I could hardly forget, especially since they brought a pair of foreign princesses on their second visit.”

Shinji began scanning the letter, but Lady Tennin gave him a quick summary.

“It seems that they’ve started their own little city state, to the north through the wilds. Where the academy they came from once stood. The letter contains an open invitation to send any promising young martial artists to study at their academy, free of tuition.”

The priest’s brow furrowed.

“In exchange for what? The levy is bad enough without sending our best young talents on a dangerous trip through the wilderness.”

“Nothing. The offer is in thanks for the aid and shelter that we have given them before. They even promise to encourage anyone from our village to return—though they warn that they intend to provide every incentive for academy students to stay as residents.”

“How honest of them. My lady, I still fail to see how this helps our situation in any way.”

Lady Tennin gazed wistfully at the shrine around her. For centuries, her priests and miko had maintained it, and it had been her home for as long as she could remember. But she’d never cared much for the trappings. It was the villagers who insisted that she stay in a beautiful shrine and wear fine clothing and jewelry—she was their pride and joy.

And they, of course, were hers. As Shinji said—Urayama was not a place, it was a people.

“What if we all went? There’s nothing in the letter that says we can’t. ‘As many or as few as are willing—no obligations’ or so it says.”

“You...want to resettle the entire village? To leave Noguchi—no, leave Yamato behind, and take a risk on this ‘Jiaguo’?”

Lady Tennin sighed.

“No, Shinji. I don’t want to do that at all. I want my people to be safe and happy in their homes. I want to protect them from war and famine. I have lived under many lords and shoguns, given of myself and my people over and over, yet war and famine are all they ever bring in return. Is it wrong of me, if just once I selfishly turn away and say ‘no more’?”

Shinji smiled.

“I don’t think there’s a selfish bone in your body, my lady. As you say, our village is doomed if things proceed as they are. I do not know if things will be any better in a new land, but...perhaps  they can’t be any worse. I’ll hold a meeting with the village elders, and see what they think.”

“Thank you, Shinji. I’m sorry to ask something so difficult of you.”

“Nonsense! I know that everything you do is out of love for us and our people. I’m always honored to be of service to such a cause.”

He bowed deeply and excused himself, leaving Lady Tennin alone with her thoughts. Well, not entirely alone. Within moments a group of miko appeared to fuss over her hair, makeup, and jewelry, but she left them to their devices while her mind wandered elsewhere.

“Jiaguo...”

A new land, with new opportunities, and a leader who might actually care for her people as much as Lady Tennin did. She knew that the elders would agree, even if they didn’t want to. That was why Lady Tennin was so reluctant to ask in the first place.

Soon she’d have to prepare to protect her people through the long journey north—the wilderness was a dangerous place, after all.

She only prayed that she wasn’t making a mistake—leading her people from one side of a war to the other.