Thread: Kaminoyama {Zella and Alan23}

But beautiful empress, Zumozo said, quickly, and so softly that only she could hear it. You HAVE to. He looked into her face. She did not return his gaze, of course. Her look was downwards, submissive, as if he were the man of power, and she the helpless slave. His extensive experience with women left him in no doubt as to the reason for her frantic work with her fan. She was on the verge of crying, and embarrassed about what had happened, and a blush had flared up to betray the latter emotion. AN empress could not cry, could not blush, in public. It was just not done. If you don't, he continued, still in a whisper. It's as good as an admission that your hair falling to bits... erm, the unfortunate accident... wasn't my fault. And my little lie won't carry any weight. He tried to look as humble as possible, looking down at the ground. It didn't come easy to him, especially when the person he was with was even less confident. At once, he had come to realise something about this girl. That despite her high position, despite being at least in theory the most powerful person in the empire, she was, underneath it all, a young, helpless girl. Someone who needed protecting, nurturing, looking after. And, he realised too though he tried to suppress this thought, for it was disloyal in the extreme a girl who did not really possess the poise or experience to carry off the role. She was a physically frail, shy girl, who would have been happier in oblivion and had been forced into a role that terrified her. One day, a husband would be found and forced onto her, and then she'd spend her life as a de-facto consort, the destiny of the empire controlled by a strong man - or perhaps, even one chosen for his weakness, so that the current mix of the army, the priesthood and palace officials could continue wielding the real power. Seeing her standing there, fighting back tears, her kimono crumpled and again beginning to sag at the neckline, the look of defeat on her face made every part of him cry out to stand and embrace her, hold her in his arms, kiss away her fears and tell her everything was going to be all right. Or perhaps, he heard himself saying, give me a public pardon, so that you needn't punish me, yet it still looks like my fault. After all, to do such a thing would still leave him assumed to be the guilty party, yet would make her look in control and magnanimous, an empress who could make firm decisions and retain control of a situation. But, alas, this idea came too late. For, though he had managed to fix the part of her hair that had become disarranged, the elaborate setting that Ling-We had contrived had not really been intended to stand up to anything but her sitting demurely and moving slowly, with her head held upright. Her fast retreat out onto the balcony had wrought havoc with it, and her standing for so long with her head bowed had allowed gravity to make the situation even worse. As he watched in horrified fascination another of the combs began to slip, and then another. Suddenly, one of them crashed to the ground, making a small tinkle as if to mock her. This was followed quickly by another, and then another. A large lock of her inky black hair fell forward, over her eyes, and then another comb came away. The smallest of stifled giggles came from one of the palace flunkies, which was quickly cut off when Zomozo's hand went to his sword hilt and lingered there just for a second. And there stood the empress, his sister, her hair now cascading down, all pretence of neatness vanished, a small pile of combs scattered at her feet.