Page 58 of Brutal Union
I finally glance at her. “So… it’s okay to cry?”
She meets my eyes. Really meets them, and the dark brown of her eyes twinkle under the orange haze of the sunset. “I’m saying pretending you’re made of stone will kill you long before a blade ever does.”
My chest tightens. I don’t want to cry more, but the words press up against my throat like they’re trying to escape. I clench my fists in my lap. “But Father said?—”
“Your father fears weakness because it reminds him he once had it,” she says. “He doesn’t hate you for crying. He fears what it would mean if he let himself cry, too.”
I swallow. “He wouldn’t like hearing you say that.”
She laughs lightly. Not mocking. Almost sad. “He hasn’t liked most of what I’ve said for years.”
I stare at her hands. They’re thin. Delicate. Not like Father’s hands—rough and knotted like rope.
She looks at me again. “Sho. Strength isn’t about hiding pain. It’s about surviving it. Enduring. Like bamboo.”
I frown. “Bamboo bends.”
She nods. “Exactly. And that’s why it doesn’t break. It survives storms that snap trees in half. It bends with the wind, not against it.”
I stare at the horizon. The sun’s dipping low now, casting the sea in gold. A fishing boat in the distance floats like a ghost. “I want to believe that,” I say. “But I don’t.”
She smiles. “One day you will believe me. When you bend, but don’t break. You will believe me.”
Present Day
The wind shifts. It’s warmer than I remember—thicker, more humid—but the rhythm of the waves hasn’t changed. I sit on the same beach, knees drawn loosely up, hands resting in the sand. The tide has pulled farther out, revealing broken shells and the jagged remains of seaweed clusters. My leg itches faintly where the scar runs—a thin white line carved across my skin.
That was the last time I saw my mother alive. The next time was at her funeral, where I stood in black with my fists clenched so tight the nails broke skin. I remember Father calling it a sign of maturity. I remember wanting to rip his throat out for saying it.
I lift my eyes now, watching the horizon bleed red and gold as the sun sinks into the sea. The sky looks the same as it did that day, as it looks every day that I come back to my mother’s hometown. It’s a shame I can’t come here to remember my mother, and now I have to kill the father of my girl.
The handle of the knife is smooth in my palm, worn down by hours of use, the blade dull from recent work. I pull a whetstone from the cloth satchel beside me and begin to drag the edge along it, slowly letting the steady scrape fill the silence between memory and murder.
I speak softly, more to the wind than anything else. “You’d probably tell me not to do it.”
My voice doesn’t carry far, and I’m glad. No one should hear this but her.
“I can hear you now. 'Sho, you can't meet violence with more violence.' You'd sit beside me and wrap your fingers around mine, guide the blade away. You’d try to make me see the bigger picture.”
The whetstone whispers against the steel, smoothing it clean. The rhythm steadies my hands, but it doesn’t settle my heart.
“I don’t know if I’m doing this for revenge or protection anymore,” I murmur, eyes fixed on the horizon. “Maybe it’s both. Maybe it doesn’t matter. But I know this—he doesn’t get to keep hurting her. I won’t miss the same way I did with dad.”
“Her name is Nadia by the way. You’d like her. She is fucking ruthless, and gorgeous. She reminds me of you.” I let out a quiet breath, half a laugh. “Actually, no. She’s worse. Or better. Depends on the day.”
I glance down at the blade and test its edge with my thumb. Sharp enough.
“She says she’s no one’s. That no man owns her, not even me. But she looks at me like I might be the first person who could prove her wrong. And that scares her. And it scares me.”
The sun dips lower, half-swallowed by the sea now. The light flickers across the surface, gold bleeding into crimson.
“You told me once that Princess Kaguya cried because she was human for a little while. Because it hurt to love people who couldn’t understand her—and still choose to love them anyway.”
My voice is rougher now, as I grind the rock down harder. The knife catches the dying light, and for a moment I see myself in the steel—eyes dark, hollowed at the edges.
“I found my girl,” I whisper. “I want to give her everything you didn’t get. She deserves peace. And he took it from her. Just like they took you from me. Just like they take everything from everyone.”
My jaw tightens. I run the blade across the stone again, once, twice. Sparks don’t fly, but I wish they would. I wish it would catch a flame. I wish the steel could carry all the rage in my blood.
