Chapter Text
There are a plethora of hobbies the common folk use to pass the time: playing instrument, origami… Scaramouche though– personally– prefers plucking the wings off live birds.
They fit so perfectly in his fist, so soft against his skin. He revels in the way they cry out: wriggling and bloody. He especially likes it on days like today, on the misty mornings of Nazuichi beach when the sun has yet risen and the clouds block the sky.
“Yeah, look up,” he whispers, almost reverently. He squeezes just a little tighter and watches the light fade from the little black finch’s beady eyes. “You’re never gonna see that sky again.”
This is his fifth victim today. It makes a horrible, ear-splitting screech before going still and silent. He drops its corpse the pile with the rest.
“What are you doing!?”
He turned, smirking. “What does it look like?”
A stranger stood there, sword wielded, stance ready to fight. He had gentle features: the soft curve of cheekbones, the pretty pink tint to full lips, blending like watercolour with the tender morning air. He could almost be a painting; like he would dissolve into the mist and become one with the wind at any moment.
But then his eyes flicked down to the red mass of guts and torn-off wings, and he made an ugly face. “What’s wrong with you?” he shook his head. “You’re sick!”
“Aww c’mon, they’re just birds.”
“And you took their wings,” he seethed, stepping forward. “Stripping something of its freedom is a sin deserving of one thousand strikes of the whip.”
How noble. Like a fairytale prince. “You talk like poetry.”
“Monster.” He threw himself forward. His blade was well-made and sharp: you could hear it’s shing as it cut through air. The hilt, too– Scara surreptitiously admired as they traded blows– was elaborately crafted: red and white maple leaves.
“Hey hey, you have a weapon.” Scara tilted his head. “Isn’t this a little unfair?”
Another blow. This time the man aimed his stab right through the chest. Scaramouche dodged, just barely.
“No reply? Aiya, is someone getting mad?”
“I’ve never met…” A slash. A huff. Mister Stranger’s head was downcast but his eyes remained trained on him, bloodshot and deadly. “Such a foul woman.”
He had to stifle a laugh. Pft, sure, a woman.
The insolent brat– though Scara didn’t want to admit it– had skill. Seemed to be professionally trained. From the quality of his sword and the clothes on his back, to his pretentious way of speaking, he was at the very least nobility, if not of royal descent. If this were a fair fight, Scaramouche could– with difficult– outwit him. But he’s not so arrogant to think he can win without a weapon: especially vision obscured by mist, and on uneven, slippery ground.
“Hey hey,” he reasons. “You really gonna stain your noble hands with this commoner’s blood?”
Stranger squints, glaring.
“Isn’t taking a human’s life worse than taking a bird’s wings? Ah, what were your exact words– are you not ‘stealing my freedom’ as well?”
The words seem to stop him in his tracks. He lowers his sword, thinking. Scaramouche smirks. The thing with nobles is: they go on and on about philosophy and the higher plane of life, but it’s not hard to beat them with their own twisted sense of justice.
Or at least that’s what he thinks.
Guard let down, he isn’t at all prepared to dodge when Stranger suddenly slashes right across his face; his left eye; blood spraying out like a waterfall.
“Then I’ll let you feel a sliver of the pain you’ve inflicted,” he says. “As repentance.”
Scaramouche goes limp with pain.
And as he falls to the ground, something like jelly (probably his nerves, ah, possibly his eyeball?) dripping down his cheek, and his senses attack him with mind-blowing, mind-numbing pain that comes in festers and sparks, Kazuha sheaths his blade and walks away: silent and carried by the wind.
This is the first time Scaramouche loses a battle.
This is how it begins.
The wound does not stop bleeding for a whole hour. He takes the scissor and thread and stitches the damn thing himself.
A life of fighting eventually teaches you how to glue yourself back together: like a broken vase.
Afterwards, he makes the trek to a nearby village where he’s heard of an old lady who tends to the injured free of charge. Scaramouche cannot afford any better. When she arrives, the woman is all calloused hands and tired eyes and tells him,
“The eye has many different parts, young man. You’ve scratched the outside layer. Open wide.” She brings a bowl of something close to his face and Scaramouche squirms away, squinting at it.
“What’s that.” You’re a fucking stranger why the fuck would I let you put stuff in my orifices.
“Salt and water.”
“How can you put salt in a wound?”
The woman sighs. “Have you ever cried?”
A nod.
“Have you tasted your tears?”
A nod.
“They’re salty, right? This is the same mixture. I’ll use it to clean your eye, so whatever nasty stuff from the thing that cut you doesn’t stay in there.”
A bit sated, Scaramouche takes a deep breath and leans back closer, silently giving her permission. She drops two little beads of the solution into his eye: it feels strange, like raindrops falling on a tongue. He blinks a few times.
“Now you have to close your eyes.”
Scaramouche hums, following the directions.
“I’m going to tape it shut, so that light doesn’t bother it.”
Her medical explanations somehow soothe him, make him feel like he’s listening to a fairytale rather than the gruesome details of his own insides.
“And then I’ll make you some soothing tea, to relieve the pain.”
“Ah, no need.”
“What?”
He already knows he’s screwed in the head, but he wants to feel it. Some masochistic curiosity in his head is telling him This is what the birds felt like; this is what loss feels like; learn it; become familiar. And besides, years of violence have gifted him an astounding pain tolerance.
“I can’t drink many teas,” he lies instead.
“I see.”
And that’s the end of that. Or so he thinks. Until the woman comes to cup his cheek, intensely admiring the patches of his face. He almost gets self-conscious.
“I can’t do anything about the outside wound though,” she sighs, brushing her thumb along the slash that goes right down his eye. There was badly-stitched thread there, barely holding it together. “It’s definitely going to scar.”
Something passed in her eyes. A gentle, pitying look that Scaramouche couldn’t understand why he deserved.
“Your beautiful face,” she laments. “And you’re so young. How will you find a husband, ah?”
And it clicks. His mind replays a memory of a voice: I’ve never met, it says, Such a foul woman. Woman. Woman.
The idea of a master plan, in that moment, is born. It grows and grows rapidly, too big for the cage of a man’s mind, and his mouth falls open, eyes widening with excitement . All the pieces fall into place so perfectly for a single push to set the dominos off, and Scaramouche realizes all he needs to do is push.
“Auntie,” he asks. “Have you heard of a noble young man from the neighboring village with red eyes and white hair?”
“Kaedehara Kazuha!”
Lightning strikes. Thunder rumbles the ground and disturbs the Yoshinori Village peace. It rains hard and heavy, making seas out of muddy puddles and weights out of a woman’s clothes.
Woman’s clothes which Scaramouche is wearing.
“Kaedehara Kazuha!!!” he screams, like a dying animal. His long hair frizzes from the torrid storm and his clothing snags upon brambles and weeds. He is the very pinnacle of a helpless, broken woman.
A helpless woman with a beautiful face.
“Miss!” A group of men rush up to her. One of them, older and bearded, holds large bedsheet and covers her in it like a drying towel. “What are you doing out here!? Please, it’s not safe!”
This is the moment , he thinks, Time to put on the performance of a lifetime.
He lifts his head, slowly, making sure to shake and tremble from the cold and from tire.
His hair slowly, revealing his forehead, then his eyebrows, and then his…
Thunder roars. The men gasp.
“Miss!!!” One cries.
“What happened to your face!?”
A pause. He lets the dread truly sink into their features. By now, a crowd has formed: women and children gathering at their doorways or peering through windows to eavesdrop.
“... Kaedehara Kazuha,” he cries, even sniffling for a little dramatic effect. “I have been maimed by a man named Kaedehara Kazuha.”
After that, he is taken into a house and warmed and fed hot green tea and biscuits. He weeps solemnly but beautifully, always beautifully. He tells a tale of a family who no longer wants her, of a fiancé who could no longer look at her, of having nowhere else to go. To the women, he speaks of skincare routines and makeup and the long hours spent maintaining something only to have it ripped away by a powerful man. To the men, he speaks humbly and shyly. And to the children, he plays games, and wins hearts, and then when morning comes, he goes around apologizing for the ruckus he caused and offers sweet treats as retribution for the interrupted sleep. You can imagine what replies he got.
“Nonsense, I heard what happened to you. You have a right to cause as much a scene as you did.”
“You’re too kind. And you’re still beautiful. You deserve so much good.”
“I would’ve gone mad if it happened to me. Any man knows not to touch a woman’s face!”
But even better are the others:
“I couldn’t believe when I heard the culprit’s name.”
“Shame on that clan… Honestly, to such a pure-hearted girl…”
“I’m not surprised. They make so many weapons, of course they use them to hurt people.”
Scaramouche has spent a lot of his life sneering at the nobility from his spot at the bottom of the barrel. But sneering is still a form of looking at them, watching. He knows their behaviours and logics better than anything. He knows their priorities: first status, then money.
And he knows the best way to get to their ears is bad press.
“You.”
Stomping footsteps. He turns, and he’s being hurled round by the collar, right up against the harsh bark of a sakura tree. “You.”
“Me,” he echoes back, smiling. “Remember me?”
“How could I forget such a disgusting thing?” Kaedehara – he now knows the name and will never forget– squeezes his windpipe harder, seemingly unhappy Scaramouche can still respond. “You witch.”
Scaramouche giggles. It doesn’t hurt at all. Nothing compared to the constant prickling in his eye.
“I should’ve killed you,” he breaths, hot and furious. “That day. Should’ve killed you and made it hurt.”
“But you didn’t. And you can’t now. What would the village think– a young girl claims a Kaedehara assaulted her, and then her corpse is found the next day?
“Bold of you to think I’d leave your body to be found.”
“Bold of you to think that’d change things.” He lifts his chin and looks down at the pathetic stranger to which he now knows the story of. Kaedehara Kazuha: the only son and soon to be Leader of the Kaedehara Clan. “I’ve already sown stories into their heads. Go on, kill me, see if the outrage gets better or worse.”
“Why you–” he grits his teeth and lets go, Scaramouche finally breathing freely. “What did I ever do to you?”
“Hah! What did you do to me?” He pointed to his face. “Is it not fucking staring right at ya?”
Kaedehara swallowed, pensive.
“Consequences of your own actions. Maybe you’re not familiar with those, noble boy. But if you didn’t want this, you shouldn’t go around maiming women’s faces.”
“You shouldn’t go around tearing birds–!”
“Who will believe you?” he asks. If there is one thing he has learnt about the world: it is unjust, and cruel, and nobody ever believes in you.
“...” Unable to answer, Kazuha pulls a scroll out from his Haori and throws it at Scaramouche’s feet before walking off.
He picks it up, and unrolls it carefuly. It reads:
KAEDEHARA KAZUHA
KAEDEHARA CLAN, YOSHINORI ISLAND
OFFICIAL REQUEST FOR MARRIAGE
DEAR…
It occurs to him, in a cramped dressing room surrounded by fussing handmaidens, that this is probably a day most women spend their lives looking forward to.
That profound thought is quickly swept away by another handful of white powder… seriously, how much white powder does one need on their face!?
His hair is tied painfully tight and hidden underneath an ornate and giant wig that’s almost in the shape of a dick if you squint hard enough. There are flowers and ribbons all over it. His entire face is so stiff with product he feels he cannot fully contort it. And he hasn’t even gotten to the clothes.
There are so many layers and so many fancy, rich people names. First padding– to give shape, then wrapping, then the nagajyuban layer, the kakeshita layer, then the obi, (or as he– a peasant– calls it: a really big belt) then the uchikake (peasant language: coat) which is way too thick even for cool autumn weather. It’s beautifully embroidered with a hundred swirling, glittering flowers all of which have meanings and symbolize different things he couldn’t bother to learn: only that it belonged to the Kaedehara Clan’s current Head’s wife.
And then to top it all off, as if this shit wasn’t heavy enough, he has to wear this hat shaped like a damn riceball to hide his face because God forbid a woman show her face!?
He groans. A handmaiden slaps him on the shoulder slightly and spins him round, painting a maroon rouge with a paintbrush upon his lips.
“Don’t frown. It’ll mess up the makeup.”
“I’m going to be your Clan Head’s wife soon,” he shoots back.
She rolls her eyes, annoyed but unable to fight back. He likes this one a little. It’s better than the handful of other servants who treat him like an outcast in his own future home.
Then again, he has a whole house to himself now. A few bitter servants don’t matter.
“You’re ready,” she declares. With force, she hauls him out of his chair and through the ceremony doors. He’d received the long guidebook of each step of today’s process when they’d legally registered the marriage at the municipal office.
“Why do we need a ceremony if we’re already legally married?” he had asked.
Kazuha glared at him. “Because we are nobles. If you don’t have a ceremony, it’s like saying you don’t have enough budget to throw a ceremony.”
So they had gone and booked the most appraised Shinto shrine in the nation, and had settled all the little payments and endeavors, and now Scara was to wait at the entrance, under red Torii gate for his fiancé to come collect him.
In that time, he admired his scenery.
Sunlight flickered through the tree branches and leaves, which had turned honey gold for the season. The stone pathway had been swept clear, and shone brightly under the light of glowing lanterns and lit lamps.
A step forward, and there was a plaque erected from metal from the ground. Its gold tablet read, in cursive: Sacred Sakura. 800 years old. This tree cleanses the land of its impurity through the Thunder Sakura, defending the safety of earth and water alike. All the Sakura Blooms around Inazuma fall from this tree. It bestows Electrogana upon–
“This shrine is dedicated–”
Scaramouche flinched. Dear fucking Shogunate. His fiancè made no sound when he moved.
“To the Electro Archon and her lover, The Pink Fox Princess. It is therefore synonymous with eternal love and happy marriage.”
How ironic, Scaramouche thought, knowing Kaedehara was thinking the exact same thing.
Taking him in, he realized their garments matched. The Kaedehara Family Crest was embroidered on his Haori: once on the back below the neck, once on each sleeve, and twice on the chest. Kaedehara looked up at the tree, and Scaramouche was struck with the thought that they were two people, about to be wed, wearing matching robes, thinking matching thoughts, gazing upon the same sight.
It was almost romantic. A feeling he had never felt before.
“At night,” Kaedehara said, “This great big tree is said to light up with its foliage: orange like a sun in the night sky.
“...You know an awful lot about this,” he mumbled.
Kazuha smiled. It did not reach his eyes.
“I always wanted an autumn wedding.”
Then he had been led to walk side-by-side in a line, with three men dressed in blue playing flute for them, and a woman behind them carrying a great big umbrella over their heads so they wouldn’t be touched by falling leaves. It felt oddly private, with only Kaedehara’s parents and grandparents watching.
His wood sandals somehow made no noise against the ground, and they fit so perfectly against his feet, and even his socks felt like high quality fiber. And the ancient court music’s melody… and the pavillion… and when they had finally stopped and knelt before the shrine master, it finally hit how elaborate it all was, and how Scaramouche had never experienced something so thought-out– before this, he hadn’t even been allowed a thorough check-up at the Doctors. And he thought about how now he’d have a personal attendant, surely, and would his clothes always be this soft– even if they had to be a woman’s?
It was so beautiful. So perfect. Just like his hair all the way down to his stockings: not a thread out of place, not a single flaw. He felt almost like a princess, coming to be collected by her prince, at the happy end of a fairytale novel.
I never thought, he thought, in a soft and unbefitting voice of his, That I’d get to be married.
Before he knew it, a cup was being placed in his palms, and sake was being poured: once, twice, thrice. He sipped: once, twice, thrice.
When reading the instruction manual, he had thought it overly tedious ( “Why do you need to drink from three different cups? And in different sizes? What’s the point?” ) But now, it felt so sacred. He savoured the taste of the best liquor he’d ever tasted all three times.
And then there was a long scroll, prepared by the shrine, and he took one side with his left arm, and Kazuha took the other with his right, and read aloud their vows to God:
“On this great day, we are sincerely thankful to you for this ceremony. Going forward, we will l-love each other, trust in one another, share in the good and the bad, and swear this will stay unchanged throughout our lifetime. 3rd October. Husband: Kaedehara Kazuha.”
“Wife: Kaedehara Scaramouche.”
They bowed, perfectly in sync, like one body completely, two halves of a whole, clapped twice and departed, his heart full.
“I can never love you,” Kaedehara– no, Kazuha whispers when it’s just the two of them who can hear. “You know that, right? You have to know I can never love you.”
Scaramouche knows. He knows, logically, the heart of a wedding is that the two people love each other.
But he looks around: at the great tree that survived 800 years all on its own, and at the heirloom dress, and at his high quality socks, and at the simple beauty in music and in hummingbirds and all around. He isn’t even looking at his husband.
This is more than he has ever gotten. This is more than he has ever hoped to get.
A single tear falls from his untaped eye.
It’s enough; it’s enough; how could it not be enough? The love is missing but it doesn’t need to be there.
“Why are you crying? You forced me into this.” Kazuha took a step toward him, decisive. “I’m the one upset: not you.”
Scaramouche clears the blur from his eyes and looks up.
Upset? Ah, he was so brilliantly happy… he forgot the someone else whose expense this came at. The someone else who he had tricked to get this life.
He was not a good enough person to regret it. But suddenly feeling grateful, he made his own vow: not to love, not to stay by in sickness or in health…
I vow to be a good wife, he thinks. This is my atonement: to repay you for making you marry a broken thing.