Outside Tokyo, Japan
Inari
The woman arrived without much fanfare. She came from the city, that ugly stone heap where people live on top of each other. A residue of chimney smoke taints her hair and skin but no one notices. No one but me, and the foxes that bring me a loose thread from her kimono.
We watch them from the compound at the back of the property, I seated on an overturned crate, the foxes twining around my feet and begging for affection. I give them each a good scratch before sending them back to spy on her.
She is the reason Masakiyo let the forge go cool for a week. I force myself to be fair—he didn’t go to the city for her. He went to find work, clients to buy his swords. That meant attending parties and buying sake for rich men with more money than they need. His craft took him away from us.
I put my chin to my fist, leaning forward. Their voices are wicked away by the breeze, but I know what they are saying.
This is my new wife. Everyone welcome her.
Welcome, Lady Akera!
There hasn’t been a Lady Akera in residence for several years. Sometimes they are respectful and keep to the house. Sometimes not.
Here is the housekeeper, the cook, the maids, the gardener…
I am so happy to be here. I’m sure we’ll get along just fine.
The smile on Masakiyo’s face sours my stomach. He puts his hand at the small of her back and leads her inside, the servants following in neat lines. The boys run back to me, their white apprentices’ robes gleaming in the midday sun.
“Ina-san! Did you see her?” ten-year-old Eiji reaches me first, chest pumping.
“I saw. Sit with me and tell me about her,” I offer as the rest catch up. They spread themselves around me in a half-circle, Tetsuo, himself nearly a man, leans against the compound wall, the younger ones ranged on the ground. Tiny Shiro inches close so he can play with the spreading hem of my kimono. I pretend not to see.
Eiji skips the obvious, we already know her name and where she came from. Nakamura Yoritada, of central Tokyo. “She’s taller than Junko,” he says with some awe. The housekeeper is an indomitable figure, always ready to give a naughty boy a smack. She must seem huge to the little ones. “And she dresses different.”
“Fancy,” agrees Shiro.
“Everything’s fancy in the city,” says Tetsuo in a bored, worldly sort of way. He is the only one old enough to have been to Tokyo. I don’t miss the look he shoots my way, hoping to have impressed me.
“Oimikado-san wears silk just as nice,” Eiji says stubbornly, naming a wealthy neighbor. “The new Lady’s different—no one here wears their hair like that—“
“You spent all that time looking at her hair?” Tetsuo scoffs.
Eiji’s plump cheeks turn red. Not unlike a chipmunk, I muse. “It was weird. Ina-san, she talks funny.”
“She has an accent.”
“Shhh!” Shiro glares at Tetsuo.
I want to ask the boys what kind of accent it is. If it is cultured or raw. If she speaks with a delicate tongue or thickly, uneducated. It’s hard to get a good sense of that from such a distance. “What did you think of her?” I ask instead.
“Sensei was happy,” Shiro offers.
“I course he’s happy,” I say indulgently to encourage him, “he married her.” Masakiyo’s joy makes my smile strained. “But I don’t want to know what Sensei thinks. What do you think?”
“She looked nervous,” Eiji says.
“Nervous?” I lean forward slightly. He grows bolder under the attention.
“Like she just wanted to go inside and hide from everyone. I feel bad for her. I wouldn’t want everyone staring at me either.”
Warm honey coats my voice, and he might well have wagged his tail. “That’s a very considerate thing to notice, Eiji.”
Tetsuo stands up, away from the fence, jaw set at a stubborn angle. He has sliced his chin shaving. “I’m sure Lady Akera knows how to talk to her servants. Sensei won’t like you saying bad things about her.”
“Ina-san said it was considerate!”
They both look at me. Dogs ready to fight unless I give the word for peace. My foxes wait in the bushes, watching us. Hungry.
I get to my feet, shaking my kimono free from Shiro’s clinging hands. I don’t want him to think of me as his mother. “Sensei will be coming to check your work tomorrow. You’d better make sure the workshop is tidy.”
All three begin to look guilty. They’ve let their work idle while the master was gone. They know better than to leave the forge a mess, neither Masakiyo nor I will stand for it. The boys file into the compound, taking up the rake, the broom, and the cleaning cloths. They enter the building that holds the forge, and I wait until I can hear them hard at work.
Kita, the lead vixen, slides out of the bushes and wraps herself around my ankles. I bend to run my hands over her luxurious fur, a rich red. She lifts her head so I can pet her white belly, her golden eyes meeting mine.
No one ever questions my eyes, as yellow as Kita’s.
I give her ear an affectionate tweak, then join them.
We run laps around the property, fleet-footed beasts. I outstrip them all, pushing myself until my paws sting and my lungs ache. I limp off the run to rest in one of the beautiful gardens, tail dragging. I want to exhaust myself, go beyond thinking or dreaming. I do not want to think about her, or him with her.
The property has been ours for so long, free from any woman daring to be Lady Akera, that I forget where I am. The garden off the master bedroom is bathed in the soft light that filters through the paper doors. I catch sight of their two figures, outlined against the light, and I stumble.
He takes her chin in his hand—the hand that crafts swords as no one else has in a hundred generations—and he kisses her.
My heart is thudding again. If I leap through the thin paper I could bite her, deform her. Or the lanterns, they could burst into flames. The wood of the house could bury her alive, and Masakiyo would never suspect me.
I don’t, though. I turn and run back to the pack, nipping at them until they match my speed. I don’t want to think about them making love, learning each other as I never can. So I run until the moon sets, then find my lonely bed.
At dawn, I return to the house. The sleepy cook lets me in, as he does every morning. I’ve left my hair down, a taste of something wild after last night’s exercise. I put on breakfast for the boys, my charges, and take a seat to watch Suboshi prepare food for everyone else. There’s something absent, though.
“Nothing for Master?” I ask.
He snorts. “He’ll be in bed all morning. Maybe even all day. I would.”
The milk he’s pouring curdles and he swears. I take the porridge from the stove, half-cooked, and carry it back to the compound. It can simmer there just as well, without painful reminders.
The boys have worked hard. The entire compound is spotless, the walkways swept and the coal in its boxes. There are no trees here, nothing that could accidentally catch flame. The dormitory and the workhouse are both made of brick, made from the mud of the river a stone’s throw away. None of them realize it now, but the dormitory was once home to a dozen Akeras, three hundred years ago. They were poor people, then.
I need both hands for the pot, so I open the compound gate with my shoulder, face turned to the great house. It sits low in the mist, spreading haphazardly as their wealth and reputation grew and spread. Usually I hardly notice how long the walk between house and compound. Today it feels like another continent.
There is always fire in the compound, the forge is never allowed to go out completely. I will have to break rules to get some though. I leave the pot on the stove in my room, the matron’s room attached to the dormitory so she, I, can keep a constant watch on the apprentices. I look in on them before crossing the compound to the workhouse. The doors don’t creak for me, and never will. They almost move themselves. I give them a fond pat before going inside.
The tension that has sat in my chest all night unwinds, like a snake disturbed by reckless villagers. I loosen the outer layers of my kimono out of habit before approaching the forge itself. It stands in the center of the room, a square bin with thick walls and fire at its core. The coals still glow red, the heat of their neighbors keeping them alive. I put my hand out to judge the temperature, cupping my fingers around the thick air. The boys will have to stoke the flames when they wake. One thing I never do is touch the tools.
Still, I can admire them. Tongs, hammers, pokers. I walk the length of the wall where they hang, each waiting for its turn. They are lonely for him, as I am.
“Soon,” I promise them softly.
“Soon,” I tell the half-finished blades waiting to be perfected.
Soon, I remind myself, closing the workroom’s doors, a metal scoop of coal in my hand. Whether this morning or the next day, Masakiyo will be here soon.
It is different when he returns. Different, even, from the days after he first set his sights on her. He doesn’t reach for me as readily, doesn’t even look for me when he enters the compound. The boys are given his attention first, each hopeful and nervous and eager to congratulate his master. Holding their laundry on my hip, I wait to be noticed.
Apparently I’m not important enough. They disappear into the workroom, shutting me out.
I turn my back on them and go to the river to wash their dirty clothes. Their blades and tools will rust a little today.
Yoritada
I am going to start a new notebook, for my new life. There are still sixty-seven pages left in the old one, but no one has ever expected to read them, so I don’t need to be embarrassed. I don’t write as well as other ladies. My teachers said I hopped about like a frog, clumsy. So, I’ll never be a Lady Ise or a Murasaki Shikibu. I don’t need to be.
Masakiyo has been kind to me. It may be that he is happy to have my father’s good opinion, but I like to think he has a genuine fondness for me. I’ll have to take care not to ruin it.
The countryside is so different from Edo. We passed miles of open land without seeing another soul. It is almost an entire day’s journey from my parents’ house to the Akera family land. And what land! It is not so big as countryside lords go, but it is big enough for me to feel alone here. The house is set far back from the road, so that you can see nothing but trees as you approach it. It’s like we live in a park. There is a stable for horses, only two that live here, and the rest for guests. The house itself is built in the old style, with a covered porch running all the way around it. I expect kabuki actors to step out at any moment and enact the death of the emperor right in front of us.
There is no theater here, and no market. The river is too small for trade boats. “Yori-chan, you might not see another person for days at a time!” my sister Yukime said when she heard where I would be living. She forgot about the servants, though. Masakiyo employs nine people, and three apprentices. All of them came to greet me. I’m not used to having so many eyes on me, expecting something from me. I hated it even in school. That’s why I was never chosen to perform in recitals.
You see? I can’t stay focused even when I’m preparing to put pen to page. Masakiyo has expressed interest in my writing, but I pray he never sees any of it. He would think his wife is a scatter-brain, and think twice about letting me raise his children.
Will we have children? Of course we will. Mama had three.
I’ve been shown around the house now. The housekeeper, Junko, is a very solid-looking woman who doesn’t smile much. She reminds me of Mama, especially in how she treats her husband, our cook: affectionate, exasperated—he is almost another child. She showed me where everything is, but I forgot soon after so I cheated. I took a piece of paper and my pen and made a map of the house. Tomorrow I’ll add the grounds. There is a walled off area in the back by the river, but no one has told me what it’s used for yet. Smoke rises from its thick chimney, so I assume it must be where my husband works.
There are three public rooms, one for entertaining guests, one for impressing them, and one for the smith to meet with clients. There is an entire room for worship, though it is very sparse. It is much more personal than my family’s shrine, they clearly had their cabinetry commissioned. The designs are unusual, foxes and clouds everywhere. I will try to sketch them later, for myself or to send to Yukime.
The kitchen could feed fifty people. Junko tells me that they have, in the past. I can’t imagine where so many guests came from, I haven’t seen any neighbors. In Edo, we couldn’t step out our door without seeing someone we knew. Junko assures me people will come to congratulate Masakiyo when they hear that he has returned. She seems like a very capable woman, she ran the house for years when Masakiyo’s step-mother lived in Tokyo. Sometimes I think no one would notice if I walked away and never came back.
I hardly got to see our bedroom at first. I have been given a lady’s maid, Michi. She seems to know everything, or at least acts as though she does. She got me ready for bed, and left me alone with Masakiyo.
Some of my friends made terrible jokes in Tokyo about what it would mean to sleep with a smith. Dirty hands, hammering away… They were wrong. They were very, very wrong. When our light went out, he became a lover. There is a story I heard once in school, about a blind man who has to make dinner for the emperor in someone else’s kitchen. The man uses his hands to feel the countertops and the shape of the knife, listens to the water pouring and boiling, he smells the spices and the fresh fruit. Masakiyo does not need the lamps to make a meal of me. If this is how he treats his swords, we’ll never go hungry.
Inari
Masakiyo has started work on a new sword. The boys are allowed only to watch, or fetch and carry. Tetsuo has puffed himself up because he will help to hammer this one. The client can’t be too important. He still hits too hard. I often feel bruised when it comes to him. He’ll learn in time.
But Masakiyo’s touch is always right. He knows where the knots are, the weak spots. He knows better than to slam his tools against the metal until it bends for him. If the steel were not white-hot, he would smooth it with a loving caress. He is better than his father ever was, master or not. Working with him became steady, predictable. Forty years of good work, until his second wife left him and he grew lazy. The work suffered. We suffered. I pined for something more. Then the old master passed away, and his son returned from his apprenticeship in the mountains.
Young, handsome, sure. The small boy I wasn’t allowed to touch returned to us with a gift for smithing. His mountain education has done well by him—he was more skilled then than any of the Akera men in six generations. I wanted him.
I feed the boys, just in time for their master to arrive. Masakiyo hardly gives me a first look, let alone a second. I feel the absence like a blow. Tears sting my eyes as I return to the hovel that is my room. Kita is stretched across the bed, watching me. When I sit, she settles herself in my lap. Our breathing falls into synch, and I wait for the call.
The smithing is a sacred thing. Wise men recognize this, and give honor to their patrons.
Inside the workshop, the men light incense at the small shrine kept high on one wall. They all clasp their hands and pray.
I leave my skin and join them.
I am the heat of the fire, the rising flames, the wavering air. That is where I am happiest, in the burning air. I rise on the currents, shaping the tendrils of smoke to suit me. I have hair of shadow, limbs of searing white. They see me without seeing me. Once, Shiro finds me, his little mouth agape. I flow into his lungs and kiss him. Little smith to be.
Now I ache to fuse again with Masakiyo; a pulse inside me that only his hand can master. I watch hungrily as he arranges their tools, instructs the boys. Shiro and Eiji kneel, hands on knees, thrilling to an excitement they are too young to name.
Masakiyo takes up the ore, routed from the earth by miners, and now carefully selected for this sword. It goes into the fire, to melt and fuse—and I breath the sigh of first penetration.
We spend days lovingly caressing that ore, tending it like an egg. The smiths hardly leave my side, keeping the fire neither too hot nor too cold. The little ones stay until their eyes close on their own, and their elder carries them out to the dormitory where Kita wears my face and puts them to bed. She is not allowed in the forge—no one but my men. I will not stand rivals in my space, no matter how I adore them.
I lose track of the time, it doesn’t matter. The sun has been gone for a long time before Masakiyo lifts the ore from its nest—I shiver—and nods. The right color, the right malleability.
Tetsuo is allowed the honor of holding the tongs while Masakiyo hammers. His back to the fire, the man lifts the hammer high over his head and brings it down with the first ringing clang. I wrap my arms around him from behind, strengthening him, whispering to him. Higher, softer, take your time. He hardly needs to hear them, the words only confirm what his instincts already tell him. The confident smith is back, back where he should be. We stretch the ore and fold it back upon itself, only to hammer it out again. When it grows too cool, we return it to the fire, then start over.
Sweat stands out on his forehead. It rises all across his back beneath the cotton of his shirt. I press my cheek to his neck, breathe in his scent as he works. I feel each pull and push of his chest, every lungful taken in. I breathe with him.
Even Masakiyo cannot carry on forever. I don’t want to give up the real work, but he hands the hammer to Tetsuo. He kneels with the tongs, and I settle myself at his shoulders. There is still work here, watching the boy for trouble, ensuring that the ore is still workable. Even I am tired, and I rest there, arms around my beloved.
The apprentice strikes. The air rings with a false note. Again, the hammer landing skew. I hiss like the rising steam—the next time he brings down his arms, I snarl.
I leap over the anvil, and for a split second I see fear and recognition in Tetsuo’s eyes. Then I am with him, and he forgets me.
He is ripe for me, for anyone to push him harder. I seize his muscles and together we lift the hammer and bring it soaring down. Up again on the same momentum, and then back down. Never strike there, always look for that—I want to scream at him. Fool, listen to me next time! What stops me is the surge of another energy through his young, primed body. I tear away before I can respond, and retreat back to Masakiyo, stroking him as though that can be apology enough.
He doesn’t notice.
Life in the compound revolves around the sword for months at a time. Commissioned work has to be perfect. Masakiyo has to earn back the trust of clients displeased with his father’s slacking. I don’t believe it will take long, but it will take work. I sleep in the fire when they do, drawing the coals over me, better than any woven blanket. Too much, I lie awake.
I wasn’t missed. When we work as one, we are as attuned as ever. But Masakiyo does not come to the fire pit to gaze on it. He doesn’t call for me when I leave him again to guide Tetsuo’s hands. He is greedy for me, but I don’t want him. I want Masakiyo.
Then she comes. Kita warns me, a stone thrown against the metal doors so they ring. The ore is in the fire again, and I am resting. But I can’t stay any more. I pull back, draw myself from the nurturing flame and back into my body, the blank shell that houses me. It is cold and stiff. I shake my arms out, throwing the rigor mortis off. It is midday and the sun will do me good.
I walk stiffly to the entrance of the compound, picking up a pail as I go. A pretense.
They are nearly upon us, her and her maid. The girl is a nuisance, always showing off. Mouth set in a proud smirk, the lady of the house’s right hand. She could be a problem if she learns true loyalty to her lady.
I study Yoritada as she comes toward me, veering off the path to the river with some hesitation. I clench my teeth so as not to bear them. She can have Masakiyo every night that there isn’t a sword in the forge. She can share.
She is clearly city-bred. She walks in a pinched in manner, taking up no more space than is absolutely necessary. I want to see her hands but they are hidden in her sleeves. Perhaps they are callused from playing an instrument or mending clothes. Maybe they are soft and pink like a baby’s. I’m not sure which is worse.
Yoritada halts, staring at me. The maid hurries to her side.
“Lady, this is Inari. She looks after Master Akera’s apprentices.”
Puzzlement crosses the woman’s face, and I know I have her. Uninformed, naive, a baby. “I thought I met everyone on the first day,” she says, trying to sound neutral. She has failed.
“I was unable to come, lady.” I should bow, if I am only the apprentice’s matron. I should have addressed her with more respect. I want to smirk when she doesn’t take offense.
“It is good to meet you now,” she says. The maid is frowning at me.
I put a hand on the gate to close it. “I have work to do, still.”
“May we have a look around?” she surprises me, showing a boldness I hadn’t anticipated. “I’ve never seen a smithy before.”
My mouth works uselessly but I don’t have to say anything. The maid leaps into the breach. “Lady, we can’t go in there! They don’t allow women—“
“Inari is a woman,” Yoritada says, looking between us.
“She is—“ The maid bites her tongue, eyes on me. I know what she wants to say: She is only half a woman. “Inari has special permission. From the goddess.”
Yoritada turns back to her, “A goddess?”
“Hai, there is a goddess who guards the Master’s work.” Her agitation is growing—I nudge it along. She dares to grab her lady’s elbow. “Please, Lady, let’s continue to the river.” Let’s leave this place.
Her lady looks at me again, and the face I had mistaken for an ingénue’s is now inscrutable. “If you need anything for the boys, please speak to Junko.”
I bow, only because I would never be able to justify such an offense. “Enjoy your day, Lady.” I wait until the sound of their feet on the gravel path begins to diminish. When I stand, my back cracks. Too long in the cold. I will have to light the fire next time.
There is someone waiting for me at my room. Tetsuo, awake after a long nap. I try not to let the distaste show on my face. My respect for him has slid after his weak performance at the forge.
“Ina-chan,” he greets me. I give him a sharp look. That ‘chan’ is not for him, he doesn’t have the right to such familiarity. I continue past him with only a nod. He catches my arm, stepping forward so we are drawn together. The compound yard is deserted. “I was wondering, could you help me with something?”
I set down the empty pail. Its handle creaks. “I have much to do today, Tetsuo. I don’t have time to do your work for you.”
He chuckles, trying to sound seductive. His voice breaks midway through. “My work is fine. There’s something else I need help with.” His hand begins to move.
I swing and a fist like iron claps him on the temple. He falls against the wall, then slides into the dirt. I will have to wash those clothes later. Annoyed with myself as well now, I roll up my sleeves and begin to drag him to his bed.
I went too far at the forge. He’s tasted me and wants more. There’s no way he could have recognized me, but he knew the second best way to satisfy the need. I just happened to be closest.
I put my hands on my hips, frowning down at the young man who is itching to know a woman. He isn’t the first apprentice to make passes at his matron. At me.
I find the sticky thread of his attraction, and peel it off me, balling up the end and tossing it through the wall and beyond the compound. Let it find Yoritada, I will. Make her fail. The maid steps into its path and it sticks to her instead. I grind my jaw, but let it be. Any attention off me is good.
I leave him strewn across his bed, snoring. When they come to find him he will think he dreamt our encounter. With any luck, he’ll decide his matron is too matronly for him. I hate to waste a trained smith.
Junko
The Master has brought the boys to the house for a special treat. They’re fresh from the workshop, all of them red-faced and covered in ash. Suboshi would have let them inside but I told him to make it a picnic supper. The younger boys seem to be just as happy with this. The maids are making a fuss over the eldest and I gather Tetsuo did good work on the blade they’ve been working on.
Michi is back, that haughty look on her face. “What is all this noise? The Lady is trying to pray.”
“The Master is rewarding his students,” I tell her sharply. She thinks her mistress’s desires should be all anyone cares about anymore.
“Do they have to shout like that?” the girl makes a face at Shiro and Eiji running about the yard, chasing imaginary foxes, the ones that try to eat our chickens.
“You would shout, too, if you had to yell over the ovens and the forge all day,” Suboshi wags a finger at her and pushes a tray of food into her hands. “Take this out and they’ll quiet down.”
Michi swells up, angry, “I’m the Lady’s maid, not a kitchen slave—“
Yoritada has entered the kitchen without any of us noticing. She is looking at the boys through the open door. “Michi, take the tray to them. They deserve a treat.” The maid snaps her mouth shut and she and the Lady go outside. Suboshi joins me at the window to watch. The boys are so happy to see her, feeling doubly rewarded by her favor. Yoritada smiles on them, asking polite questions and making them feel important. Only Tetsuo tears his eyes off her to the maid.
I smirk—Michi gives him a scathing glare and comes back inside, nose in the air. “Did someone offend you, Miss Michi?”
She makes a furious, strangled noise and Suboshi laughs. “Be careful, Michi! You could do worse than a boy like him. A second son training under the best smith in the district?”
I nudge him, “Don’t give her ideas.”
“Hah! I wouldn’t go near a dirty, ashy apprentice!”
Suboshi and I chuckle, his arm coming around my waist. I certainly never care when he reeks of fried eel. It’s the times when he comes to bed smelling of fresh bread that I love.
Out on the lawn, the Master and the Lady have moved away from the boys.
No, no, I’ll get soot all over your pretty clothes.
Here, then.
She lifts her fan to hide their kiss, he bending down, and she holding her sleeve back so they won’t touch, won’t get messy. It’s as poetic as a painting. I catch Suboshi looking at me with a familiar smirk and I know we’ll have a good night tonight.
Yoritada
I asked to see the finished sword; when my father first ordered from Masakiyo he didn’t think I would be interested in seeing the weapon. Masakiyo seemed surprised and pleased, though. I’ve seen that he likes for me to take an interest in his work. He brought the sword in its wooden box to the sitting room an hour before he was to deliver it to the client. The box gleamed—another artisan crafted it months ago. I want to congratulate him, too.
The men are right, I don’t understand the excitement over a sword. I can’t imagine anyone near me using one, or needing to. My father’s armor was always kept in a cupboard in the formal room. But men seem to believe that their weapons are their own beings, that they will be offended if not cared for or used properly.
This sword deserves that kind of respect.
Masakiyo explained the parts to me, when I asked him to, but I don’t remember them all. I need to make a diagram, perhaps I’ll ask one of the small apprentices to help me. Or pretend I’m helping him with his own work.
The sword was not very long, but its surface was like liquid metal—like they had pulled it from the fire only a few minutes ago. The hamon, the waving line above the cutting edge, seemed to have a life of its own. The blade itself could cut paper in a careless flick. The client will get such a demonstration, and I envy him.
The handle and scabbard aren’t Masakiyo’s work, but they were nearly as lovely. Leather and carved wood, a brass guard of swimming koi.
They want to put the most brilliant part inside the sheath, hide it from the light. I can’t help thinking that they must be mad.
Inari
When they finish, they pay their homage. They pray to the idol, and I reluctantly seep out of the fire again and back into my human form. Disappointment clings like the cold to my unused limbs. It isn’t a masterwork. It isn’t even impressive. Just a small commission from a minor lord to his son. For practice. I rinse my mouth and spit out the stale taste. Masakiyo’s work is not for little boys to bash at each other with!
When they file out of the forge, sweaty and exhausted, but proud of their work, damn them, he doesn’t look at me.
He never looked at me before. He has never known what I am. But his eyes would lose their focus when he looked in my direction, and I would know he saw me. Me, the one who will make him a divine master on earth.
Now he doesn’t even cast around for me. He doesn’t seem to care.
I do my duties, check the boys for injuries and heat exhaustion, and send them all to bed. Masakiyo doesn’t look back when he walks to the house. Shiro squirms, when I tuck the sheets in too tightly. I offer him an apologetic smile but don’t loosen them. We have to wean him, or he’ll be no use to anyone.
When I’m done, I stand at the gates of the compound, and stare at the house. It doesn’t look any different. Smoke rises from the kitchen. The garden’s first blush has passed, the blossoms fallen and moldering. The maids do their work cheerfully—everyone’s job is secured for another few months.
He shouldn’t have to live hand to mouth. He is better than that. The clients aren’t placing orders like they used to for his father. I think of the plain, mild mannered sword we have produced today and my anger stirs. How will he ever prove his worth if they will not challenge him? I am tempted to send a punishment with this sword, but that would only hurt us. That isn’t what he needs now.
I’m lost. I don’t know what more I can give him.