The Sun Prince

Ch 10, Pt 1 - "I know what you'll do to me."

Ren. Kuro opened his jaw to speak, but he cupped his hands over his mouth just in time.

The smiling man on the dais wasn't Ren. He was His Imperial Highness Tendo-no-Renjiro. That was the name he'd stumbled over, back in the merchant's garden.

To call the Sun Prince by a familiar name meant death.

"Kuro?" Ren — the Sun Prince tilted his head. "Are you all right? They didn't hurt you, did they? I sent a message to Uncle Gorou as soon as I could, but—"

Uncle Gorou. He called the Shogun by a nickname. No houseboy did that, not even in palaces.

"I sent instructions for them not to hurt you while I met with Uncle Gorou. I didn't think he'd agree. He was so stern, lecturing me on how foxes weren't pets and if I was that bored, he might see if he could find me a puppy to raise—"

Kuro jerked straight at the mention of a dog.

"I didn't agree," Ren said. "I didn't think you'd be comfortable. I kept insisting that I needed a companion."

"A companion." Was companion supposed to mean 'pet'?

"Are you that surprised?"

He'd thought Ren had abandoned him when the samurai surrounded Kuro. He'd thought Ren wouldn't care enough about a spirit to intervene like he had on the human girl's behalf.

But Ren must have left to save him. To argue with the Shogun, according to the onmyouji. Why?

To keep himself from flapping his lips like a koi fish, Kuro said, "All the clues were there. A houseboy doesn't have such soft hands. And that sword." He stared at the mats. "I tried to toss away the Imperial Sword of Oyashima."

"The Kusanagi," Ren corrected.

The Imperial Sword, one of the three symbols of the emperor's divine right to rule. For a thousand years, the sword had decided who would rule over the empire.

And Kuro had dropped it. He'd thought Ren had stolen it, and the eccentric sword had decided to make Ren its master, but Ren was its master. By blood.

Worse, that was the least of his offences. Kuro had humiliated the Sun Prince. He'd ordered him around, insulted both Ren as a person and as the Sun Prince. Kuro had touched him.

The boy-samurai had sent his retainers to murder Kuro for the crime of bumping into him. What Kuro had done to Ren was so much worse.

Well, at least Kuro wouldn't have to tiptoe around, jumping at the prince's every twitch, waiting to mess up enough for a punishment. So where were the Sun Prince's demons? Hiding in the gardens?

Ren — His Imperial Highness — just sat cross-legged on his dais. Kuro stared at him, ears perking every time Ren rubbed his hands down his hakama trousers.

"I didn't mean..." Kuro fell silent, since anything that followed would be a lie. He'd meant every insult. If he'd known the Sun Prince commanded the Night Parade... Kuro would have still insulted Ren. There was no winning.

The Sun Prince flexed his fingers, curling and uncurling them in the silk. What was he waiting for? The back of Kuro's neck prickled, but it was only a phantom sensation. Even Kuro's dull human ears didn't pick up anyone else in this part of the palace.

"I—" Kuro started to bow.

Ren jumped up and stopped Kuro's descent with two fingers on his forehead. "Don't do that."

"Isn't that why you brought me here?" he asked. "To watch me grovel and beg forgiveness?" The words came out more bitter than appropriate. Kuro couldn't stop being insulting, even with his neck on the line.