Disclaimer: Nobuhiro Watsuki is the creator of Rurouni Kenshin. This work purely for entertainment purposes only and is not for profit.

Vocabulary:

Shishou: "Master"; the term Kenshin uses to refer to Hiko Seijuro, 13th Master of the Hiten Mitsurugi Ryuu

Toba-Fushimi: A significant battle during the Boshin Wars which led to the defeat of the Tokugawa shogunate. In the manga, it is after the Battle of Toba-Fushimi that Kenshin realizes he can finally fulfill his promise to Tomoe to never kill again, having completed his mission of helping to make the way for an era of peace

(I think the above words are basically it. All other non-English words seem to be understandable enough in context)

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It was their first night as husband and wife. She was made joyfully aware of how little they had known each other before this moment. How could the accidental brush of fingers or the surprise hugs thrown in relief compare to the amount of touch they had exchanged between them that night? How much more did he seem a man to her now?

She had seen him angry to the point of madness. She had heard about his brokenness at the thought that he had failed to protect the one person who was most important to him—for the second time. She had seen him surprised, happy, and poignantly sad.

But she had never seen him as a man the way she did that night. He had never been stripped literally and figuratively to just a man touching his wife for the first time, each of them, as one minute passed, begging the other for release. She had never thought it possible to hear the sounds he had made, for never before had she thought that she could please him the way she apparently had that night.

Afterwards, they lay facing one another, holding hands between their chests. "Tell me something," she whispered, because it was a night when neither of them could bare to speak as they normally would, and sleep would not come as quickly as they thought it would.

He studied her face before he slid an arm under her head, turned to lie on his back, but kept his hold on one of her hands. After a while, he said, "At sunset in Nagoya, you can look up precisely fifteen minutes into the sunset, and see how the light taints the Castle roofs, as if it is on fire."

She waited for him to continue, not certain if he needed prompting. The Castle was undeniably connected to the Tokugawa regime, and she was not sure she had the right questions in mind.

"I worked at a very small, run-down inn nearby for a week. The owner was a very old, frail woman. Every time she came down to give us instructions on what to do for the day, I was afraid that she would slip and break her hip. But she refused help from any of us. There were three of us she hired that week. We never asked, but we understood that keeping people employed for too long meant trusting them, and by the look of things she had been betrayed many times before, when it came to money matters."

Kenshin's eyes were trained on the ceiling, while hers stayed on his face. "We had very few customers. For a time, I was uncertain with my decision to stay the entire week. I feared that fighters for hire—" here he coughed a laugh and she smiled; who would have thought any reference, no matter how small, to Sanosuke would be made on their wedding night?

"—That they would come and stay for a couple of nights without bothering to pay. But the entire week we only had men and women in their fifties or sixties, and a small group of youngsters who were headed towards Yokohama."

"What kind of work did you have to do?" she asked, although she could have easily guessed. But it was too much of an opportunity to pass up; to listen to his words as they unravelled a story—it was more than she could have ever wished for.

"Cooking, mostly. My short time with Shishou had taught me some basic skills, to which the landlady added some of her knowledge. When I found out she was teaching me recipes she had learned from her mother and from her grandmother before her, I began to protest. I felt unworthy, that I did."

He paused again, as though ruminating on a thought that he had not encountered for quite some time.

"What did she look like?" she asked, captivated and afraid that he would not finish his story.

He smiled (oh that she would see one each night they spent together!). "Like a prune on two legs, with a head of mist."

She laughed and tried to take a swipe at him. "My husband the poet! Mou, Kenshin, that isn't very nice—especially from someone like you!"

His shoulders moved with silent laughter. "My apologies. I was merely quoting the younger man I was working with. He was too imaginative for his own good, that he was."

During the brief silence, she nuzzled his neck and, pleasantly surprised, he chuckled. He began to wonder if she was starting to fall asleep, her breath pleasant against his skin, when he felt her lashes brushing open.

"Did you like staying there, Kenshin?"

"It was not unpleasant," he admitted after a few moments. "At times I felt hopeless, knowing that the inn would never be reconstructed and that the innkeeper would likely die alone. But cooking meals three times a day, checking that the roof would not fall down on us as we slept, helping the other men I worked with to accomplish their tasks—it was the first in a long time that I felt like I had a purpose. Still…"

He trailed off and for a while, she thought he would be unable to answer. Finally feeling exhaustion seep into her bones, she began to fall into a very light sleep, only to open her eyes at the deep rumble of his voice.

"I knew I had to leave. The place could offer me little and what I could do for it was only temporary. Too, it had not been long since Toba-Fushimi and I did not want to attract attention by staying long in one place. Everything I did at that old inn only served to prepare me for the road ahead...For…For…" He trailed off again.

Perhaps it was true that in the final moments before falling asleep, the human mind was more aware, more infinitely wise than during the moments of full wakefulness. Understanding his sentiments, she placed a hand on his chest, on the place where his heart was, before closing her eyes.

"For your time here with me."

"Aa. Sleep well, Kaoru."

0-0-0

Hello. First things first: because I am still feeling around, I thought it best not to overly use Kenshin's normal speech patterns (resulting in Kenshin using "I"). As I write more, I think I will most probably use a mix of different variations of the English translation of how he usually speaks, as best fits my story/stories.

Next: the Castle here refers to the Nagoya Castle. It was built upon the command of Ieyasu Tokugawa, particularly to help defend the area from any threats coming from Osaka. A good part of it was burned down during World War II. The remaining parts are now considered "Important Cultural Assets." To learn more, go to

: / / w w w . . . . j p / 1 3 _ / . (take out the spaces).

That being said, thank you for reading. I hope you can spare the time to review! Please stick around for the next chapters.