Page 59 of Kimiko and the Accidental Proposal
“I cannot guess what my future holds.” He was content to hold this moment. And the one who shared it. “Better to tend to the day than worry for the next.”
“It’s night,” Akira mumbled.
“I can tend by night as easily as day.” Suuzu immediately regretted his words. They betrayed an impatience he couldn’t fully master. Maybe Akira would let it pass.
But his friend lifted his head. “Is this about my hatching?”
Suuzu sighed. Akira might share a beacon’s bloodline, but he was indistinguishable from an ordinary human. At first glance. Even a second or third glance. But as Suuzu’s trust in Akira deepened, he’d noticed the glow of something unusual. Deep within. Tucked away. At the time, he’d compared it to a golden egg, warm and waiting.
Sliding his hand over a spot to one side of Akira’s navel, Suuzu asked, “Are you curious?”
“Sometimes.” He pressed a palm over Suuzu’s hand, holding it in place. “What do you think will happen to me if we disobeyed?”
Over breaks and during holidays, they usually returned to Akira’s sister’s home, where they’d submitted to the gently intimate probing of Michael, the current generation’s top-ranked ward. Suuzu had received his first taste with Michael’s careful tending, but the spark in Akira’s soul had defied explanation. In the end, Michael had decided it was probably nothing, but it was probably best to do nothing.
Frustrating.
Suuzu couldseethe inner fire of reaver souls when he closed his eyes. And he wanted nothing more than to stir into flame the gleaming ember in Akira. And to feed the fire, tending it until it gained strength. Forging a trustworthy bond. One that would last.
“Suuzu?”
“Hmm?”
“You want to try, don’t you?”
“Yes.”
Akira whispered, “Can we?”
“Yes. But not until we are back behind my brother’s wards.” Suuzu was almost afraid to ask. “What are you hoping for?”
“Not sure.” After several long moments, Akira softly added, “I guess because part of me is … like you said, trembling because of what we might lose if we never try.”
TWENTY-SEVEN
A Private Word
on Short Notice
Dawn found Kimiko taking the shrine steps two at a time, weighed down with bags of fresh produce so they could treat Akira and Suuzu to an extra-nice breakfast. Mother had practically chased her out the door with a grocery list, and Kimiko had needed to knock at the back doors of the Nakamuras and the Satohs, to gather up all the ingredients on her grandmother’s list.
Noriko met her at the door with murmured thanks. Sakiko swished past with a censorious eye roll. “You’re even more of a mess than usual.”
Kimiko couldn’t deny it, but what else would she be, rousted from bed at four-thirty and running from door to door up and down Kikusawa’s business district.
Her sister’s voice dropped. “Signatures?”
“Nope.”
“Verbal agreements?”
“Not in the matrimonial line.”
Her sister looked her up and down, then leaned even closer. “Mutual consent?”
Kimiko cuffed her sister’s shoulder. “That only happens in cheap novels. I’ll change, then help with the fruit plate.”
But a light rap sounded at the front door. Odd, given the earliness of the hour. Kimiko was running through a mental list of neighbors who might make the trek up their hill this early, but a brief wash of power made her hair stand on end. Was Sentinel Skybellow here to scold her? But the fleeting impression hadn’t been particularly canine.
