Disclaimer: None of the characters belong to me. This story is the tale of Saitou Hajime and his wife Takagi Tokio. I did a fair amount of research where I could, but with any work of fiction, there will be deviations from historical accuracy. There's not much relation between the people that commonly appear in the RuroK series, except for Saitou-san. If you note major historical inaccuracies, or anything like that, or problems with names and whatnot, please let me know- politely. Thank you, and I hope you enjoy. Please give me your comments and constructive criticism! Murasaki

June of 1870 (Meiji 3)

Kurasawa Residence, Goko, Tonami

Takagi Tokio awoke to another day of heavy rains, bleak grey skies, and empty sadness resting inside of her. Although the rainy days made her feel protected –invisible-, they also left, pooled upon the ground, the tears from the sky, the tears from the gods. Slowly, she raised herself up, to sit in her futon. Around her, everyone else was asleep. Tokio was relatively new to the Kurasawa residence. It was better to live here, she reflected, than be out in the fields as she had been. The Kurasawas had taken her in due to influence, she guessed, of Teru-hime's.

Silently, she rose to greet the day before it had even really dawned, a pattern she had begun when she had first begun serving Teruhime. Teru-chan, she reflected as she dressed, moving so silently as not to wake another soul in the room, where all the female exiles that had been taken in by the Kurasawas slept, in one room, How I miss you. And Yae-chan. Where are you now? Carefully, she took her undernourished frame and stepped outside to sit on the engawa. All around her, the rain fell, making her place in the world just one more place, one more location, steeped in wetness. In front of her was the little garden that the gardener and some of the women took so seriously. Tokio was also known to be seen there, allowing her plants and her comrades to see the scars and calluses on her hands, knowing that once she returned to Edo –Tokyo-, she reminded herself, they would be viewed not as badges of bravery, but of something more disgraceful. Gentle women did not have calluses.

How melancholy, she chastised herself, even smiling a little, tucking a soft black strand of hair off of her shoulder. Tomorrow's worries will come tomorrow. All too soon, she would go to join Kurasawa-san, wife of Kurasawa Heijiemon, in running the household and doing chores. Kurasawa-san had taken a liking to her, especially after Teru-hime had given her highest recommendation, the only thing she could do to repay her lady-in-waiting and personal friend of years.

"Takagi-san," she looked up, to see one of the women- whose name she hadn't yet caught, who had come before her. The woman smiled down. "Aomura Yuuna, if you please. Kurasawa-san is rising and asking for you. Please go to her."

Tokio nodded, face graced with a small smile of her own. "Of course. Excuse me for being a bother."

Yuuna had a grace about her that transcended even her worn kimono and her own hurt hands. "It's no worry, Takagi-san."

"If you'll excuse me." Tokio rose to her feet, bowed, and walked down the engawa toward her new mistress's room. Kurasawa-san had stressed that she wished to be like a mother to Tokio, instead of a mistress, but Tokio wasn't looking for any kind of relationships with anyone, so she had only smiled.

"Pardon my rudeness, Kurasawa-san," she called, and opened the shoji.

"Welcome, Tokio-chan," the older woman and wife called from inside, and Tokio stepped in. "My husband has offered a home for another few exiles again, and I must be prepared to greet them today." Tokio's eyes adjusted gradually to the darkness of the room, where Kurasawa-san was rising. "And then there are the usual chores. Once I am dressed, Tokio-chan, might I request that you deliver a letter to the Ueno residence? Yumi-san and I have been corresponding lately, and I cannot spare anyone else to leave today, with the preparations for the new arrivals."

"Of course, Kurasawa-san," she murmured, and retrieved the woman's wine-red yukata with lighter red obi, and began to help her out of her sleeping yukata.

"Food will be rather tight, Tokio-chan, I don't know how to solve that particular problem." Today, Tokio thought to herself, would be very colorless. Immediately, she wondered where such a drab attitude was coming from. Coming to live with the Kurasawas had broken her apathy after her rough treatment after the surrender of Crane Castle.

"I will apply myself to that question, Kurasawa-san, and see if any answers can be found. Perhaps the children can collect wild vegetables." She drew the obi around the woman, and focused her attentions upon it.

There was a silence, and Tokio knew the woman was smiling. "I'm glad you've come to this residence, Tokio-chan. You've been such a help to me already. I have every confidence you will help us, and bring good things to our family. Perhaps you would like to stay with us here?" A pause, "You needn't answer that now, Tokio-chan, just understand that you are always welcome, ne?"

Tokio paused in her tying, and bowed her head, "Thank you, Kurasawa-san." It was true that she had nowhere else to go, not with her family dead, part of a system that was gone now. All that was left for her now seemed to be as a servant-daughter to someone. "For everything you have done for me, to prevent hardship for me."

She felt Kurasawa-san's smile increase, and the woman's hand touched hers. "Let's take one day at a time, ne, Tokio-chan?"

"Yes, ma'am." Outside, she could hear the rain coming down outside, in its endless waves. Unlike what the men that had sent her here had said, there was no bright, golden sun rising for her in the Meiji era.

"Now, take these baskets and spread out along here, and look for the vegetables that I taught you," she told them firmly, looking down at the excited faces of the children that currently lived at the Kurasawa household. "And if you sense any trouble, scatter and run, but make sure to take the food with you if you possibly can. Everyone is counting on you, understand?" One by one, Tokio handed out baskets to the children, whose faces and movements were bright as sunbursts in the mid-morning drizzle.

"You're very pretty today, Takagi-sensei!" One of the girls piped up from underneath their tattered umbrella, a leftover from a time when the Kurasawas had many of them. "Will you marry a Tonami man here?" The other girl under that umbrella giggled and elbowed her.

"Quiet! That's so rude to say!" But it was followed by another giggle.

"Go on, now," she said with a smile, a little more self conscious of her hair simply put up in a bun, attended to briefly after attended Kurasawa-san that morning, and her faded blue yukata with a deep blue obi, and her too-large brown eyes in an underfed face. "Maybe the vegetables will teach you some tact, Kira-chan." But she laughed, and the girls smiled gratefully and hurried away, glad for a day outside of the compound, away from the normal chores. Once the children were effectively scattered, Tokio adjusted her umbrella and continued down the road toward the Ueno household.

The morning had brightened her mood, which had come about most likely, she decided, from dreams, although she did not remember them. The children always had such a way of making her feel better, as she remembered her own childhood. Kurasawa-san had put her in charge of educating them, and other needing women, when there was spare time, because of her gentle upbringing. She was sure her father would cast some commentary at how far she'd fallen, from one of the noble families of the land to being a mere servant, answering to lower-status families and running their errands. At that moment, however, Tokio was determined to make the most of her position, the optimism that infused her happy times filled within her once again.

Down the road a way, she could see the rising walls of the Ueno house, where more exiles had been taken in upon their exile to Tonami. The Uenos were an older couple, who were very compassionate, and who could barely, as the Kurasawas, handle the numbers of people now occupying their home. Upon reaching the gate into the home, she rang the little bell by the side of the door.

There was a momentary pause, and then a young boy answered it. "May I help you, Ojou-san?" He inquired, making a very polite bow for a child so young.

"This one is here from the Kurasawa house, to deliver a letter to Ueno Yumi-san. Please pardon my disturbance."

"Welcome in, Ojou-san. Please, come inside." He led her inside and closed the door behind her. People were already bustling all around the enclosure, washing laundry, cleaning, and cooking, as well as the many other endless tasks that the house required. "May I have your name, Ojou-san?"

"This one is Takagi Tokio, servant to Kurasawa Keiko."

"Please wait here for a moment," he told her, and bowed before hurrying away. A few minutes later, the little boy returned, half-dancing in front of a rather elderly, severe woman that Tokio had learned to be Ueno Yumi, wife to Ueno Shichiro. The woman approached her and bowed, and Tokio replied in kind.

"Takagi-san. Keiko-chan speaks highly of you. It is a pleasure to meet you in person."

"The pleasure is mine, Ueno-san. You are a great friend to Kurasawa-san." There was a pause. "Please, accept this correspondence from the lady of the Kurasawa house. It is a reply to your last letter."

The woman took it and inspected it for a moment, then nodded. "Thank you for delivering this, Takagi-san. Please let us give you some food for the trip back. Shinoda-chan was making her buns this morning- if you go to the kitchen, you ought to find her there."

Tokio bowed. "Thank you, Ueno-san. You are very kind. I certainly could not refuse such an offer."

Ueno-san led her to the kitchens before bidding her farewell, inquiring to be sure that Tokio could find her own way out. Alone, Tokio opened the shoji to the kitchens. "Excuse me for my rudeness!" She called to be heard over the noises outside, and opened the door.

"Please enter," the voice inside sounded almost bored, and Tokio's eyes found her instantly. She was very thin, and very tall, with a thinning layer of black hair. Although the light was mediocre, Tokio pondered if the woman was just pale, or if perhaps she was ill.

"Ueno-sama offered me some nourishment in exchange for delivering a letter to her, if you please," Tokio called, having learned long ago to obey the thoughts of her stomach if she possibly could. "My name is Takagi Tokio."

"Indeed, Takagi-chan?" The woman fixed her level gaze on the much shorter woman, looking down upon her with eyes that reminded Tokio of dying leaves. "Well, if my mistress asks it, I will certainly provide. I am called Shinoda Yaso. Please come in, and shut the door behind you."

"Thank you, Shinoda-san," Tokio replied, and closed the door, coming to kneel down at the small table in the corner as Yaso indicated. The woman soon joined her, handing her two vegetable buns.

"So, what news have you, Takagi-chan? Do you know the contents of the letter, perhaps? New gossip from up the road?"

Tokio noticed that the woman was incredibly forward and very blunt, and bowed her head, noticing Yaso was probably six or seven years older than she. "I do not know much in the way of gossip, Shinoda-san. The most I can say is that my mistress is expecting another set of exiles to arrive at Kurasawa house today."

Yaso scrutinized her for a moment as she ate her bun politely. "You seem very good, Takagi-chan," she said unexpectedly, making Tokio distinctly uncomfortable. "Very honorable."

"Shinoda-san is very kind," she murmured in reply, all too aware that Yaso hadn't quite meant it as a compliment. "I am merely trying to make my way in the world."

"Oh, aren't we all, Takagi-chan." In barely an instant, Yaso's attitude had changed from criticizing to almost wistful. "Although one makes her way, always, always, to arrive only at death." Her eyes rested once again on her young companion, sharp as an eagle. "One must never forget this, isn't that true, Takagi-chan?"

"I, personally, live for the moments I will have before death, Shinoda-san, not for death itself." This startled a laugh out of Yaso.

"Or perhaps not so good, after all! The little bird, trying to fly to a bluer sky, perhaps. Were you one of the ones who fought with Teru-hime at Crane Castle, Takagi-chan?" This question was the kindest posed to Tokio yet from this woman, and she nodded gracefully, mulling over the puzzle that Shinoda Yaso seemed to be.

"Yes, ma'am, I was. I came there as Teru-hime's personal lady-in-waiting."

"I see, Takagi-chan. Your name means little anymore, however, if I'm not mistaken."

Tokio shook her head and met Yaso's eyes squarely. "No. My father is dead and I am to survive on my own wits from now on, Shinoda-san. Teru-hime has been kind enough to give me assistance here and there, however."

The older woman looked down at her with an unreadable look for quite a while, and Tokio finished off her food. Finally, she bowed her head when she realized Yaso wasn't going to say anything. "Thank you very much for the meal, Shinoda-san. You have been very good to me."

"I like you, Takagi-chan. Come back and visit me again sometime, if your time permits. I do not stray far from this kitchen," she said, once again unexpectedly. "Between us, let there be the truth, Takagi-chan. I was not very good to you."

"You meant me no malice, Shinoda-san. I would be grateful to be allowed to visit you again."

"I mean everyone malice," Yaso replied unaffectedly as she rose, prompting her guest to do the same. "Everything and everyone. Strangers are no friends, Takagi-chan. You are young, and I will teach you that much."

Tokio could think of nothing fitting to reply to that, so she merely bowed her head and repeated her thanks.

"Run along now, Takagi-chan. We both have things to do." They were the last words spoken, and then Tokio found herself outside once more, with the shoji shut firmly behind her. Shrugging off her momentary disorientation, she headed to the gate.