"Yeah."
"And what became of the Marquis of Baku?"
Youko shook her head with an exclamation of exasperation. The man's name was Koukan. Koukan had once been province lord of a Baku, on the western coast of Kei facing the Blue Sea. After Kei fell into chaos under the rule of the pretender, Baku continued to resist.
When Youko asked for Shouryuu's assistance in overthrowing the pretender, the first thing he encouraged her to do was contact Koukan and obtain the support of the provincial guard of Baku. But before this communique could be delivered, the Marquis was captured by the pretender's forces.
"It seems that the Marquis of Baku had designs on the throne as well."
"Really?"
With Youko's arrival, those not actually residing at the palace had difficulty deciding whether she was the true king or not. Many of the province lords far from the capital flocked to the pretender's side, but Koukan did not. He carried on the fight.
What in the world was he up to, wondered the government functionaries. Far more than the province lords who had sided with the pretender, they focused their criticism on Koukan.
He dared to seek the throne for himself and refused to bow to the pretender, that's what some said of Koukan. Others rose to his defense, and so the Imperial Court was split in two. In the end, the weight of evidence tipped the scales in favor of his critics. Koukan was relieved on his authority, taken into custody and was now awaiting sentencing.
Shouryuu listened to Youko explanation and shook his head. "So that's what it's come to."
"The court officials are sticking to their guns. Keiki has repudiated their handling of the case. And so everything is up in the air. The word is they'll give him a sinecure and put him out to pasture and sweep the whole affair under the rug."
"You speak of it as if it were somebody's else's problem."
Youko managed a thin smile and didn't answer.
Shouryuu said, "Getting a handle on the Imperial Court is always a challenge for a new king. But you've got to know when to take it easy, too. You ride everybody hard all the time and your fair-weather friends will start thinking up with ways to bite back. Backbiting is always the easy first step."
"So it is."
"If they're the type who will back down when the king turns up the heat, then don't make a big deal out of it. In any case, you want to keep things in proportion."
"Was it hard for you starting out?"
"You might say. There's no need try and hurry things along. With a king on the throne, the natural disasters and calamities will abate. By that alone, you are performing a great service."
"But that alone won't do."
"Why do you think kings are given such long lives? Because what needs to be done can't be done in fifty years or so. You're not working against a deadline, so pace yourself."
Youko nodded. "But you must have things that weigh on your mind."
"You mean the things that make your head hurt just thinking about? There's no end to them."
"Oh, great."
"If you didn't have any problems, you wouldn't have anything to do. It'd get boring." So said this king, who had ruled his kingdom for five hundred years. With a tone of voice somewhere between sarcasm and self-mockery, he added, "And if it did, I'd probably destroy En just to see what happened next."
2-2
"Say, do you think maybe Youko's getting a little down in the dumps?"
The water in the lake was warm. Rokuta took off his shoes and sat down on the shore and splashed around with his feet. Rakushun sat down next to him.
"It's hardly surprising that you would come to that conclusion."
Rakushun glanced over his shoulder at Rokuta. He'd thought he was the only one this had occurred to.
"Yeah. I have to wonder if Youko and Keiki are getting along."
"Don't be silly."
"But you hardly ever see them together."
"That's true." Rokuta rested his chin on his hands. "It could be that Keiki's just uncomfortable around guys like us. That's why we never see him. Shouryuu and I being the way we are, you know. We're not the kind of company that a super-serious guy like Keiki wants to hang with. And then you have to consider that he and Youko got off to a pretty shaky start."
"You think so?"
"Like I said, a super-serious guy. If Youko was all kicked-back like Shouryuu, they'd probably be at loggerheads already. But Youko taking herself pretty seriously as well, Keiki just keeps himself busy as a bee. Not to mention that Youko is Keiki's second liege."
"How's that factor in?"
"It factors in all over the place. When you've served two kings, you can't help comparing the two. You invest a lot of yourself in your first king. No matter what, the next one's going to take some getting used to. For example, even if the previous king was a bad man and his reign short-lived, the kirin's going to regret it. It's going to stick with him. No doubt it would have been better had Youko been a boy."
Rakushun exhaled. "Probably so."
"Youko can't help but remind him of the Late Empress Yo-ou. On top of that, there's his straight-laced personality, and the man doesn't exactly have a way with words. Makes him hard to read. Not to mention that hardly any time has passed."
Rakushun brought to mind Keiki's brusk, blunt manner, his expressionless face, his limpid, golden hair. Golden hair was particular to kirin, but comparing Rokuta and Keiki, their hair was each golden in its own way. Rokuta's hair was more of a bright yellow, while Keiki's was a colder, translucent color. It almost seemed an extension of his personality.
Rokuta laughed brightly. "One way or another, I'm sure Youko will make it work."
Rakushun nodded. "I'm sure she will."
Youko glanced at Rakushun and Rokuta, sitting there at the water's edge, absorbed in conversation. She said in a low voice, "I still don't get this place."
Shouryuu responded cheerfully, "No, I'm sure you don't. Anyway you look at it, it's different here." He chuckled. "Children growing on trees, now that was a shock."
Youko smiled thinly. The smile faded. "Not knowing all this stuff seems to irritate a lot of people."
"You mean Keiki?"
Youko glanced at him and shook her head. "The ministers and officials, too. Everybody seems taken aback by how totally clueless I am. And who can blame them?"
Every time she said, I don't get it, Keiki and the ministers shook their heads and sighed.
"It's because I'm a woman, that's why they're not happy with me." She'd heard the whispers plenty of times already. This is what you get with an empress.
"Not quite," said Shouryuu.
Youko looked at him. "No?"
"When I came here, the most perplexing things to me were that woman could become ministers and the strange relationship between parents and children."
"Meaning?"
"In Yamato, women were at the center of the family. They never ventured into the outside world. But here, women will leave their children in the care of the father and go to work. Because the Late Empress Yo-ou expelled all the women from the kingdom, Kei doesn't have many female ministers, but in En they make up almost half of my staff. As you would expect, men predominate in the military. Even there, a good third of the soldiers are women."
"Really… . "
"If you think it over, there's nothing unusual about it. The kirin choose the kings, and as many of the kirin are female as male. Every generation, the scales may tip one way or the other, but in the long run it balances out to about fifty-fifty. The kings chosen are about half women and half men. Go through the historical records and do the calculations and you'll see that neither sex is favored in the long run."