(D2 Entry) Butterflies of the Night, ch. 5

[Fallen Angel]

Title: Butterflies of the Night
Author: Fallen Angel, fallen_angel_2012@hotmail.com
Rating: PG-13 for now, but contains LEMON in ch. 13
Categories: Alternate Universe, Series, Romance
Disclaimer: Don't own, don't sue.


Chapter 5: The Kamo River

{


Relena and Heero walked along in companionable silence. Occasionally she would point out famous places around Pontocho and along the Kamo River and Heero would nod in reply. She knew he heard her, but she was also suspicious that his mind was elsewhere and as they reached the bridge, she asked him.

“I’m just wondering if I’m doing the right thing,” he murmured, almost to himself.

“What do you mean?”

“This peace treaty…you’ve heard? Good. Well, I’m not sure if this is how it’s meant to happen.” He sighed, his broad shoulders slumping. “All during the war, I expected the victor would be the side to win the most battles. I never thought that this could end with a piece of paper and a set of signatures. I never thought it would end with me.”

Relena placed a comforting hand on Heero’s arm and was glad that he didn’t object. “Perhaps,” she suggested, “this is your idea, and your initiative. But maybe it’s the people’s wish acting through you. A peace treaty could only come about if people were tired of war and tired of fighting. Maybe if you didn’t suggest it, someone else would.”

Heero turned to her, his brow furrowed. “Peace is a nice ideal, Relena, but can it really be achieved? Say this treaty is signed, and we do reach a settlement with our enemies…will that really do anything to stop future wars and future enemies? Who’s to say that if I stop being a soldier, my sons and their sons won’t have to fight their own wars?”

“No one can,” Relena said softly. “But you have to try. Peace may not be achieved through a treaty but it definitely won’t be achieved if we don’t try.”

There was a moment when Heero’s eyes seemed to brighten, just a little, at the prospect of her words. But just as suddenly, he turned away from her, the moment passed and that same heaviness was in his expression. Beneath all that, though, Relena could see how handsome he was and was curious to see how he would look with a smile. But then she would be just like the other geisha - trying to cheer him up to make him something he wasn’t. Heero was after the truth, not pretty words and empty promises.

“So,” he went on, watching the river run beneath the bridge, “what happens to us soldiers after that?”

Relena shrugged. “I honestly don’t know. I wish I could tell you there was a place for everyone in the world no matter what they were. Is there anyone you can go home to?”

He shook his head. “No one. I never knew my parents and the only time I’ve ever been part of something was when I was part of a regiment. And even then, I never got attached to my fellow soldiers. I couldn’t afford to…not when I couldn’t know who would live through the next few days.”

“That’s so lonely.”

He turned to her then, and watched her for a moment. Under his intense gaze, Relena wanted to turn away, but she couldn’t. It was like he had trapped her with his eyes. “You know,” he said quietly, “your eyes are really blue in this light.”

Relena couldn’t hide the blush that crept into her cheeks. She only hoped it wasn’t too visible under her makeup. “Thank you.”

He didn’t look away, though, and Relena spoke to break the tension in the air. “I want to tell you a story,” she said, turning back to the river. “It’s an old Japanese folk tale.” He said nothing so she went on. “Once upon a time, after the last survivors of the Genji and Heike wars had fled, there was a beautiful young girl who lived in Shikoku. Every day she would draw water from the well and do the housework. One day she forgot to draw the water and so had to do it at night. When she went out to the well, it was a fine night, and the moon was full in the sky.

“She bent over the water and there, below the surface, was a face looking up at her. At first she was scared, since she thought it was a ghost. But then she forgot her fear, because the face was so handsome and looked at her with such longing. This, she thought, had to be the ghost of a warrior long dead and she gazed at him all night long.

“She fell in love with the ghost, and went out whenever the moon was full. She would spend the entire night looking into the well, gazing at her handsome lover, who stared up at her. This went on for a while and she became thinner and thinner, pining away for her love she could never have. Finally, after some time sick in bed, she died and her ashes were buried in the temple graveyard. People forgot about her and moved on.

“One day, though, many years later, something was the matter with the well and they had to empty it. They took out all the water and went down to fix it. What do you think they found at the bottom?”

Heero, who had been listening intently throughout the story, said, “I don’t know. The armour of the warrior, I suppose.”

“No,” she replied. “They found a mirror.”

Heero frowned. “What’s the moral of the story? I suppose the obvious one is that we can be overly vain at times, since she fell in love with her own image, distorted by the water. But that’s not why you told me the story.”

“No, it isn’t. When I first heard the story, I thought of that reason too, but then I realised how much it reminded me of myself.” She bit her lip and bowed her head. “So many times I’ve fallen in love with - or dreamed of - something that wasn’t really there. Or was just an illusion I was believing to be real.”

“Is this to do with a man?” asked Heero, surprised by the tiny pang of jealously the thought of her loving another sprung in him.

“In a way. My brother. He went to war a long time ago, and only now I’m beginning to fear that I’m waiting for him to come home in vain. Maybe he has already left this world and maybe my dream is only that - a dream. And that reminded me of you,” she told him. “And peace. You’ve convinced yourself that all you can be is a soldier, and so you only see yourself as one. But it’s an illusion, and it’s making you miss the bigger picture.”

“Which is?”

She turned to him now and found herself somehow closer to him than she’d been when she started the story. Had she moved, or did he? Did it even matter, when the warmth of his body seemed to be penetrating every layer of her kimono, touching the bare skin beneath?

“Before tonight I was afraid of coming here. I hate war, and I hate soldiers because they represent war and the reason my brother isn’t here and my sister-in-law is without her husband. And then I met you.”

“You hate soldiers?” he asked, a little worriedly.

“I did. I still do. But the bigger picture is that even though you’re a soldier, and a General, and all those other things, beneath all that you are something more, something greater than that, something that will still exist even when this war is nothing but a memory.”

Heero’s heart was beating faster and his mouth was dry. “Yes?”

She turned her face up to his and smiled, the light in her eyes brighter than that of the billion stars above.

“You’re Heero.”

Then, like the moon passing out from behind a cloud, Heero blessed her with a smile.

And after all her years surrounded by lavish kimonos and the very finest the arts had to offer, Relena was sure she’d never seen anything so beautiful.


{ { {


Wufei awoke to the warmth of a room.

How long had it been since he’d known that, he wondered. Too long. The journey from China was difficult, the journey through Japan even harder, skulking through alleyways and resting whenever he could. Which wasn’t very often.

It was foolish, he knew, to have let himself get so worn out. Anything could’ve happened while he was passed out. And it seemed it had. Though not in the way he would have expected. He wasn’t dead - far from it. Unless this warm room and comfortable futon were part of heaven. And if so, was that woman an angel?

That woman! Startled, Wufei turned his head to see if she was still around. Perhaps she had been the one to help him.

His theory was confirmed when he saw her, kneeling by the lamp a few feet away, a small bowl of some sort in her hands.

“Woman…” he murmured and she turned to him, smiling.

“Oh, good, you’re awake. I promised myself if you weren’t awake by tomorrow, I would have to call a doctor. And I wasn’t sure if you wanted that.”

“I don’t,” he said, surprised at how croaky his voice was. How long had it been since he’d spoken to another human being? Again, too long.

Sensing his confusion, the woman moved over to him and said, “You were exhausted, probably undernourished and dehydrated. I managed to carry you back here and was planning to feed you, but you looked too tired, so I let you sleep. You’re in my bedroom,” she added, a little nervously. “Do you have a name?”

Wufei hesitated.

“I could have turned you into the authorities if I wanted to,” said the woman. “But I didn’t. Can’t you even trust me with a name?”

“Wufei,” he answered finally. “My name is Chang Wufei.”

“Chang Wufei,” said the woman, rolling it over her tongue. “My name is Sally. Po Sally.”

“Po? That’s a Chinese name.”

Sally tilted her head to one side. “I guess you don’t remember me telling you I was Chinese. I’m afraid I don’t speak much Mandarin anymore.”

The way she said ‘anymore’ and the sudden sadness in her eyes prompted Wufei not to pry any further. He didn’t think she wanted to dig up any old memories. It was written in her eyes.

Which was one of the reasons he found himself trusting her. Every emotion, every tiny worry and hope seemed to shine so brightly in her eyes it was as if she was saying more with them than with words. No, this was not a woman who hid things easily, thought Wufei. Not that he would trust her straightaway either: there was too much at stake.

The silence between them dragged on for a little until Sally gasped. “Oh, I’m so sorry. You must be starving. Here.” She brought the small bowl across and Wufei could smell the enticing scent of noodle soup. When he went to sit up, though, he found to his horror that he was unable to do so.

But Sally made nothing of it. As naturally as if she’d been doing it her entire life, she simply lifted his head with one arm and - with his torso half resting on her lap - held the bowl to his lips.

Wufei couldn’t deny that being hand fed like a baby was humiliating, but at the same time, if he ever hoped to get strong again, he would need to eat. Plus, the soup was just too tasty to refuse.

When he had drunk it all - noodles included - Sally lowered him to the bed again.

“Thank you, woman,” mumbled Wufei awkwardly.

Sally shook her head to herself as she turned to put the bowl away. “My name is Sally.”

But there was no reply and when she turned around, Wufei’s eyes were closed and he was fast asleep.

Sleeping, his expression was far more peaceful than that of the abrasive young man he was when awake. Sally had to admit to herself that, even with his noticeable weight loss, he was a handsome man with striking features and the most intense eyes she’d ever seen. She smiled to herself - who would’ve thought that when she left for the night she’d be returning with a young Chinese man over one shoulder?

And I was complaining that my life was mundane…


{ { {


The light streamed into the window and Sally awoke to not one shock, but two.

First of all, she wasn’t in her own bed. She was in the one of the empty guest rooms next to it. Which was okay, when she remembered that Wufei was asleep in her own room. Or at least, it was okay, until she had the second shock of remembering that Noin came into her room every morning to make the beds.

On cue, there was the sound of a woman’s cry from the room next door. Scrambling from the blankets, Sally was just in time to catch Noin fleeing the bedroom, her eyes wide with fright and the fresh blankets clutched tightly to her chest.

“Noin…”

“Sally!” the young woman hissed. “There’s a man in your room…”

“I know that.”

“…asleep in your bed!”

“I know that too.”

Noin’s eyes widened even further. She did, however, manage to keep her voice down, aware that having the entire house involved in this was not such a good idea. “Sally, how can you be so calm? There. Is. A. Strange. Man. In. Your. Bed.” She said, annunciating each word as if Sally might not be completely understanding her.

“We’ve established that,” said Sally, rubbing wearily at her eyes. She was not, after all, a morning person.

“But Sally…I mean…did you have to bring him here? What will the maids think? What will the neighbours think? ”

Sally sighed wearily. “Noin, I didn’t sleep with him. I was just giving help to someone in need. Besides, I’m my own woman now, so I really don’t care. ”

“Sally, if you wanted to prove your independence, you didn’t need to go bringing strange men home.”

“He’s not strange,” insisted Sally. “His name is Wufei.”

The blankets fell to the floor as Noin stared in shock. “He’s Chinese?! Oh, Sally, he could be a spy! An assassin! He could be planning to kill us in our sleep!”

“I highly doubt it,” said Sally, still calm, but desperately in need of a good cup of tea. “He’s still suffering from exhaustion.” She then proceeded to tell the other woman about how she’d met Wufei.

When she was done, though, Noin still looked doubtful. “How much strength does it take to slit a person’s throat anyway…” she blinked in remembrance. “Was that a sword I saw next to his bed?”

“I think it’s a katana.”

“Oh, Gods.”

“Noin, you’re overreacting. He’s sick. I’m taking care of him. He’s not planning to kill us.” She paused, thinking. “I…I trust him.”

“Oh, yeah?” Noin raised an eyebrow. “What did he do to earn this trust? Because you realise we could be harbouring a criminal here.”

“Well, nothing really,” confessed Sally. “But I just know I can trust him, ok? Please don’t tell the others.”

Noin stared, then sighed in resignation. “Fine. But dear Gods, Sally, if you’re meant to be the sensible one around here, I hate to think what the rest of us have got hidden in our rooms…” she gathered up the blankets and began to walk away, muttering, “…next thing you know, Hilde will bring home an American, or something.”


A/N: That Japanese folk tale is an actual story, just in case you were thinking ‘wow, she made that up?’ or more likely, ‘what on earth was she on when she did?’