my proper blog is at: http://autumn-leaf16.livejournal.com/

Chapter One

Yuri sat by the window, watching Seishuku, who was working hard outside on the fields. Usually she would be helping him, or at the very least doing some sort of task that would help the farmers of the village indirectly.
But she was ordered by everyone to stay out of the summer sun, just in case she would be harmed somehow along with the children that would soon arrive into this world.
Smiling happily she rested her hand over her abdomen again, very soon she and Seishuku would finally be parents, what they wanted for such a long time. For this dream to come true, she would do anything, even if that mean being treated as a piece of glass ready to break at the slightest vibration.
When she was empress she had been carefully guarded too as one in her role must be, being constantly accompanied by guards or her maids, but that had been different, she had the power to walk anywhere in the palace. Right now, everyone seemed to think that even walking would harm her and the children inside.
It had been eight months since she married Seishuku, or she could say that she remarried him, and soon it would be one year since they got reunited again.
Yuri was very happy with her new life, she had all that she wanted, along with additional happiness that she never expected. Not only was she with Hotohori/Seishuku again, she was close to Miaka as a sister should be, and her parents in law really became like parents to her.
“I am very happy, please be at peace.” she whispered out her only regret, as she touched her hair. Even though she was no longer shadowed by the death of her mother, she still missed the woman who loved her the best, and sometimes she would wished rather wistfully that her mother could be beside her, seeing her grandchildren.
“Are you feeling well, Yuri?” her mother in law asked in concern as she entered her son and daughter in law’s room, carrying a glass of water.
“I am fine, I’m pregnant, not sick!” she laughed. “You and otousan can be as bad as Seishuku sometimes, you don’t have to take care of me that much! I’ll be fine!” (1)
“You are like our own daughter, Yuri.” The older woman said with true affection in her voice. “And now you are carrying my grandchildren.”
At the plural Yuri smiled, she had been shocked when the village midwife told her that she was carrying twins.
“And there will be at least one son.” The midwife had promised.
“I don’t care about that!” Seishuku had declared out as he pulled his wife into his embrace. “As long as they are Yuri’s then that is enough to make me love them madly!”
“I also came because there are some letters for you and Seishuku.” Saying so, her mother in law took out the bundles of papers that were covered by the tray.
The village of Konan was isolated so the most effective way of communication was through letters, not that there were many as few would leave the village.
Opening the first letter Yuri immediately smiled, Miaka’s letter was filled with repeated congratulations as well as the trivia in her school along with saying how happy she was with Taka. The last paragraph consisted the confirmation of her visiting very soon and staying in order for the birth of her nephew and/or niece.
Her other letter was from her brother, it was not as long as Miaka’s letter but the fondness in it was still very clear, they were both linked due to their affection for their younger sister. He ended with the apology of not being able to come to see her as he was tied up in doing some thing for the society he was in at university.
“I am really glad that my sister will be able to stay here until the children’s birth.” She said rather happily as she carefully folded the letter and tucked it in with the rest of her letters. It was truly a shock to discover how much Miaka actually wanted to be her sister. Most of the time, she was grateful for that.
“It happens to be at summer vacation too, although it is amazing how small the world seems to be. You were Ju-An’s flatmate and then your half sister become Ryoen’s friend.”
“Maybe it is fate.” Yuri said this with a slight smile on her lips.
Seishuku choose to enter, he was clad in the village’s traditional plain working cloths with his hair tied in a red ribbon. He was carrying a large tray of food for his wife, and with her pregnancy Yuri’s appetite increased very dramatically. (2)
“I swear you can compete with Miaka now with the amount of food that you eat.” He teased her lightly after he kissed her, and then acknowledged the presence of his mother with a nod.
“You have some letters, Seishuku.” she told him before she left the two people who were still very much in love.
“Letters…this one is from Ryoen.” Seishuku said, he sat down beside her and pressed his hand over her’s. “He says that he will be returning to the village in his holidays, well, we all know that…and he…what is wrong?”
Yuri’s face darkened considerably at the mentioning of his ‘brother’. Sighing she leant against him before she spoke.
“He still doesn’t approve of your marriage.”
“He will understand as soon as he remembers who he had been.” He reassured her.

Miaka had wanted to visit the village of Konan as soon as she heard about it from Hotohori, who was now called Seishuku. She was filled with the excitement and curiosity at seeing what the equivalent of the kingdom would be in Japan.
“I told you before, Miaka, it is only a small village. Apart from those who are native there, Konan is nothing interesting.” Ryoen muttered at Miaka, who was eagerly peering out of the window again at the sight of the station. “And I will tell you when we arrive there!”
“But it is interesting!” Taka quickly defended Miaka.
“Why?” Ryoen asked rather flatly.
At this Taka froze, after all, he couldn’t exactly say it was because in his past life he had lived in a country that bore the same name, and technically their village was almost like a reincarnation of the kingdom the seven celestial warriors of Suzaku had been from.
“Well, the legends of Konan…” Taka quickly yelled out. “How the village have Chinese tradition instead of being influenced by Japanese culture…”
“You have been talking too way much with Keisuke.” Genro muttered. “I am really surprised that he didn’t just drop everything and charge here.”
“But why are you here?” Ju-An asked good naturedly, “You are not from this village, and you are not related to Yuri in anyway.”
“Neither is he!” Genro pointed to Taka. “But lover boy is here because he couldn’t even be parted with Miaka for a few seconds. Because he doesn’t want to be seen as an intruder, lover boy here drags me to accompany him!”
“What did you just call me?!”
Miaka was going to the village to see Yuri; naturally Taka was beside her; Genro was somehow there due to the insistence of Miaka and Taka, who hoped that the sight of the village of Konan might be able to trigger some of his memories as Taisuki. Due to this reason, Dokun was there too, but he knew Yuri to some extent and he was Ryoen’s good friend.
The only one missing was Hojun, according to Ju-An he was somewhere in South Korea now.
“The one person who should be here.” Ju-An muttered out. “He is one of Seishuku’s best friends, and that poor girl…”
“What are you talking about? What girl?” Miaka asked innocently, just as she had in their previous lives, she managed to quickly earn their affection in this current life too.
Ju-An was just about to explain when Ryoen let out another sigh.
“Why is it that the two who should have married a long time ago is still not marrying, while the one who should have took his time married immediately?” (3)
“You mean Seishuku should have waited?” Ju-An asked.
“He married someone he didn’t even know! You told me that Houki Yuri…”
‘Konan Yuri.” The elder quickly corrected. “She is married to him and her name…” (4)
“That’s not the point!” Ryoen snapped in frustration. “He just proposed to someone in their first meeting and then he married her only after three months! You told me that Yuri never once mentioned anything about Seishuku, and vice versa…”
“I admit that their meeting had been very strange but Ryoen, your brother is truly happy with his marriage!”
“What if she just married him for wealth?”
At this Ju-An burst out into laughter, this unusual display of emotion from the one who was always very quiet silenced everyone, including Taka and Genro, who were engaged in another fight.
“Ryoen, Ryoen, Ryoen, your brother is the future village leader of our village and for those in Konan that is indeed a prestigious role, but outside Konan no one would regard Seishuku as a rich man, he would only been seen as the future heir to some small village that no one ever heard of. You talk as if Seishuku was an emperor and Yuri was set out to ensnare him!” (5)

Having come from Tokyo, Yuri was used to seeing people still wandering outside if she ever peered out from the window of her rather shabby apartment on the nights that she couldn’t sleep. Sometimes she would just sit by the window and read, occasionally looking outside.
Tokyo had been a city that never sleeps, unlike her new home. Funnily enough the real Konan was probably more like Tokyo then the village of Konan. There were usually guards patrolling around the palace every hour of the day, they might be kept out from her private quarters but they were still stationed just outside, never completely away.
The quietness almost seemed unnatural, although it was very comfortable. She was sitting by the window again, enjoying the view just as she had in day time. As she carefully untangled herself from Seishuku’s embrace, her husband muttered slightly and tried to held onto her tightly. Bending down, she kissed him, causing him to cease the subconscious’ movements.
In the first few months that she came here, before the children in her belly grew this big, she would spend many of her nights outside, content in spending the whole night watching the stars. In Tokyo, a person could never truly see the stars this clearly due to the towering buildings in almost all part of the town, the only possibility was to go to the famous Tokyo tower. (6)
As for Konan, she had lived in the palace in the capital, the buildings in the palace themselves prevented her from seeing the stars clearly.
“They are so pretty,” she would whisper to Seishuku, pointing at somewhere random in the sky. “The stars are like beads plaited in the hair of the fairies.”
“I’ll plait flowers into your hair so you can have beads that rival the fairies.” he had said, running his hand through her long hair as he actually began to pick some flowers.
That was how they come up with the name of their daughter, if they would have a daughter. (7)
Ryoen would be returning tomorrow with Ju-An, along side with her sister and Tamahome. She knew that this would be regarded as quite an excitement for the rest of the village, as they rarely get any visitors.
What did she feel about it? When her parents in law asked her she had laughed and said that she was overjoyed to see her sister as that was surely a great act of affection to ask a young girl to come to such a place in her long waited holiday.
But secretly…secretly she was not so sure. In the village of Konan she had been very happy as she was rarely reminded of her past, something that would cease to happen when those who had been the warriors of Suzaku returns here.
Miaka…most of all, Yuri did not know how to face Miaka. Initially she had been overjoyed at the fact that Miaka wanted to be her sister even to ask Suzaku to alter their past, but now she was not so sure. It seemed too unfair for a person to redeem them self in such a fashion.
The action might have happened but it did not happen in a way that she was aware off. She woke up knowing about these changes, but she remembered what had happened in her first life so much more clearly. All that she did in her second life only seemed like an act.
Someone, probably Miaka, told her that they had been very close but these memories of time spent with Miaka did not seem real to her, it only seemed like a performance.
What she remembered more clearly was how she was taken away by that man who smiled at everyone but her, she tried to hold at the end of his coat, only to have him unwind her fingers. It was not a rough act, but the pained caused by the rejection from her own father never left.
Then she had stood alone, with only her doll as a protection. It was the last toy that her mother had ever given her, she could still remember how happy she was on that day. Her old doll had broken to the point that her mother threw it away, and she had spent a week crying for her.
Walking across the room, Yuri took her precious doll down from the shelf, one of the few things she had left of her mother. Even though Seishuku had teased her about placing a doll like that on his book shelf, which contained his collection of legends he was glad of her action: it was an acceptance of her mother’s death, and she was no longer afraid of her past as she openly displayed the object.
Yuri smiled as she examined the doll, this was one of the few things that she missed quite a lot when she was in Konan, she had been quite happy to discover that it was still sitting on the little table in her shabby apartment.
The most distinguished thing about the doll was that it had very long hair that was bound in the same way as her, when Miaka’s mother forced her to cut her hair, Yuri had practised on her doll instead.
This doll was her only solace in these days, living with a father who saw her presence as a mistake.
She had held the doll in her hand as she watched the two strangers fight, turning, she saw two kids standing near the door, peeping in.
Were they her new siblings? She recollected something about how she had a brother and a sister, they seemed scared of her, maybe they would understand…
She actually walked toward them, but they turned away from her, running out of the doorway.
Later on, whenever she saw either of her new siblings they would quickly turn away from her. She knew that this was partly done due to their mother’s orders, and she never held this as a grudge against them. After all, Houki Yuri’s presence caused the illusion of a happy family break apart.
The past was always what could not be changed, and everyone had to pay for the consequences of their actions. If Miaka truly wanted to be a sister to her, then she should amend the actions she did in the past in the present instead of simply altering the past.
She held the doll tighter, seeming to be a little girl once more. Why was she unable to simply just let everything go? Did not she have all she wanted? A family. A man who love her, with her siblings loving her as well.
The ignorance had hurt and alters her, making her into the way she had been. A woman who was afraid of being loved as not even those who should loved her did, a woman who was also yearning for love as she had received little love.
It seemed so unfair that all this could be changed just because of one wish. Miaka seemed to truly believe that she could change the past completely.
It did not turn out that way, the memories of Miaka giving her a present was suppressed by what she regarded as the truth: walking alone because she had nowhere to go, refusing to go home because there was no one who would care.
The lines of happiness…they were all just what she said in a dream.

Seishuku was still slightly paranoid by how Yuri had left him when he was sleeping when he had been Hotohori, he could still feel all the emotions that he had experienced when he realized that she was gone because of him.
That was why he tended to get worried when she was not in his arms, as the past could not be forgotten so easily.
But his worry was quickly gone, as he saw her standing beside the now opened window, with that doll in her hand, her fingers absently adjusting the doll’s hair do.
“Can you not sleep?” he asked tenderly as he draped the blanket over her, he was told that it would not be unusual for her to be sleepless as her pregnancy would affect her mood very strongly.
She nodded as she used her free hand to adjust the blanket, while her other hand placed the doll down so she could take her husband’s hand.
“Are you thinking about your mother again?” Seishuku asked, he knew that she was rather sad at the fact that her mother did not have the opportunity to see her daughter in a respectful marriage made from love, and the opportunity to see her grandchildren.
Yuri gave another nod.
“We can go to Tokyo and see her as soon as you recover from the children’s birth.” He told her. “We can stay with Ju-An or Ryoen when we get there.”
“I like that idea.” Yuri said, smiling. “I believe that they would be able to meet if we go to her grave.”
“Yuri…do you believe in an afterlife?” he finally asked.
This question had plagued him ever since he remembered his past as Hotohori, as he naturally recollected her death. But he did not mention this at all, as Tamahome had told him exactly what had happened to Yuri when Seiryuu began to devour her.
“I do.” Yuri whispered. “And I even remember some of it.”
Softly, she began to describe what had happened when she died. Contrary to what she had thought of death, it was a not a sleep.

She had been standing in what seemed like an elaborate temple for all the four gods in the universe of the four gods as she could see all four statues.
Seiryuu’s statue was right beside her, someone whom she no longer remembers had smiled at her as they helped her up. Then another approached her, and dimly she could recollect the embrace the other gave her.
But she could no longer recall their faces at all, not the two who stood right beside her, or the others who were at some distant, slowly approaching her. All she could remember was Seiryuu and Suzaku, who quickly ordered the others to leave her.
“But she is finally here! Everything has finished! Why should she suffer again?” someone had said out angrily, grabbing her even more tightly.
Sadly, she could not even remember the gender of this voice that was full of concern for her.
“Let her go back once more to live life as she always wanted to.” Seiryuu commanded, but his voice was rather kind. “She would be happy, and then she would come back here.”
“Because of the priestess of Suzaku?” someone one else demanded.
“Do not forget that you were all responsible for what happened to her too.” Suzaku interrupted before he turned to Yuri. “Come, priestess of Seiryuu, I will return you to Hotohori.”
“But why should she go now? He will come to her anyway!” the first speaker protested again, not releasing their hold on her.
“Do they not deserve one happy life?” a new speaker interrupted, but this was not Seiryuu or Suzaku’s voice. Turning, Yuri saw two people standing beside the statue of Genbu, one being the speaker. “Let them have one normal life, the life that she dreamt of having before she was chosen to this fate.” (8)

“That is all I remember.” Yuri ended. “But it is enough to make me realize that death is nothing to be frightened of, as it is an afterlife that I will return to with you.”
“What of the people there? Do you remember them?” he asked curiously.
At this she shook her head, all she could recollect was how a strand of reddish brown hair slapped her body slightly when that person pulled her into an embrace, while the last speaker’s eyes had not matched.
“Seishuku, do you know the legend of Genbu and Byakko?” she asked impulsively, recollecting the two figures who had been beside the statue of Genbu. Perhaps they were related to Genbu in some fashion? Although she could not remember any of the people near her, and she doubted that she would recognize them even if they were the warriors of Seiryuu.
“I know a little as I had hoped to find out more about the priestess of Suzaku through the legends of the other priestesses.” Seishuku admitted, recollecting how he had once thought of the priestess of Suzaku as the symbol of perfection.
When he was Hotohori, he had wished that Yuri was the priestess of Suzaku instead, as he could then regard her as his first priority without being reminded that she was not. As an emperor Yuri lost to his kingdom, while as a celestial warrior of Suzaku he was meant to protect the priestess of Suzaku instead of the one who turned out to be the priestess of Seiryuu.
“I know that the priestess of Genbu was the first priestess to summon Genbu, and because she was not virginal she was…” his voice began to shook as he was remembering how the exact same thing had happened to Yuri.
“The sacrifice.” Yuri concluded for him.
He nodded, and continued. “It was said that she was in love with one of her warriors, and it was because of him that she lost her virginity. Other then that, I do not know. (9)
“Two of her warriors guard the shinzaho, and when Miaka took them they were allowed to go back to heaven after two hundred years. Apparently they were the first two warriors that died. The names of the Genbu celestial warriors are Uruki; Tomite; Hatsui; Namame; Hikitsu; Inami and Urumiya.”
“Hikitsu? Urumiya?” she repeated these names, there was a strange sense of familiarity in them.
“As for the story of Byakko, I know even less.” Seishuku continued. “All I have heard is that the priestess of Byakko loved one of her celestial warriors as the priestess of Genbu did, only that she remained virginal when she called out the god. She left this world as Byakko did not grant her wish of being with her lover.”
There was no familiar name among the celestial warriors of Byakko, although she realized that she was beginning to feel rather angry.
“Miaka really is lucky.” She said rather bitterly. “She could have her wish granted, unlike the others.”
“We are so happy now, more then anyone, so why think of the past?” he employed out. Taking her hand, Seishuku led her back to their bed, and held her against him, with their unborn children between them. “Isn’t that what you always say to me?”
Yuri could only nod, as she would often repeat these words during the first few months of their reunion, Seishuku could not manage to forgive Seiryuu for what he had to do to her.
“Do you think of me as selfish?” she asked.
Her question left a strong impact on him, as he had a very strange dream that night.

Yuri was kneeling in front of something, dressed as the priestess of Seiryuu as he managed to recognize the shade of her dress. (10)
He was walking to her…running. But it was too late, he knew it was too late even before she turned around.
The dagger was already stabbed in her body, although it could not have been very long ago, as her hand was still around the hilt.
“Am I selfish in wanting to be loved?” she whispered as she fell into his arms.
He was crying and so was she, but her tears was silent, she did not wipe her tears at all because they had become natural. Raising a hand she pointed toward the sky…
“He died for our crime, for our sin.” She whispered. “I will pay for my crimes with my death.”
He wanted to pick her up to take her somewhere but she only shook her head.
“I cannot go back due to what I did. I will be killed as soon as any of them sees me.”
“By being one of the chosen you would know when I die, just as you felt his death. Hotohori…I killed myself because I don’t want you to abandon your priestess and find me in the world of mortals…my old world. I let Nakago die because I refused to name you as the one responsible as I want you to live!” (11)

He would have told Yuri about the strange dream but he never had the chance, as their children announced their decision of wanting to come out that very morning. Between worrying about Yuri, as well as being assured that his children would not be born before he gets back from the train station in order to take his brother and friends back to Konan, he forgot about the dream completely.
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