So he is healthy?" said Lady Hisayo, the lord's young wife. She wavered back and forth between obsessive hovering and easy confidence depending on the day, and today seemed the latter.
"Yeah, he isn't in danger anymore. You—the baby's nurse should keep him close in the same way until he's four months old. But I don't think I've got to stay for that. Not anymore."
Both Lady Hisayo and the nursemaid let out a slow shuddering breath. "I'm glad," said the lady, and Kono clutched the baby to her tighter.
"I would recommend that you..." Yui trailed off at the sharp sounds of footsteps and the light thumping she now recognized as a spear hitting against the floor.
"Lady Fukuyama," announced the guard, pulling open the rice paper door. The lady strolled in with easy familiarity as she stepped into a room that she had never entered before.
Lady Hisayo was the mirror image of her supposed stepdaughter. Her face was wan, and her eyes darted from her child to his half-sister. Kono seemed to curl in on herself, falling back into the time-honored tradition of becoming invisible in the presence of nobility.
"Mother." Lady Fukuyama smile cut with false sincerity, second only in sharpness to the faux-affection that saturated the single world. "How is my dear little brother doing?"
Yui moved in front of the two women. "If you're going to bother my patients, you can't stay." She'd never expected to deal with noble politics, but there was no way in hell that she'd let them interfere with her treatment.
Lady Fukuyama's expression contorted with such deep amusement that Yui expected her to burst into back-breaking laughter. "Bother? Why, I would never do such a thing."
"I got to ask you to—"
"She can stay," said Hisayo quietly. The younger woman was shaking, but her lips were pressed tightly and set.
"Are you sure?" Yui hadn't seen Hisayo put her foot down since the first initial day she'd foisted her child on Kono. Since then, she'd wavered back and forth, agreeing to whatever Yui suggested. Of all things, this was what Hisayo decided to grow a spine about?
"Yes. She can stay."
"Of course I can," Lady Fukuyama drawled, stepping closer to the baby with an arm pressed to her chest and the other spread, letting her sleeves flutter with practiced theatricality. "Dearest mother has all she ever wanted. A healthy son to secure her place."
"You believe I wanted this?" The volume of Hisayo's voice startled everyone. Her fingers were interlocked, and her knuckles were white. "I was fine with marriage. Children. I knew my duty." She took in a deep, controlled breath, exhaling anger with every word. "I had a betrothal before the arrangement with your father. I did not want this, but I will do what I must."
Fukuyama's lined eyes widened ever-so-slightly, and her hands shifted the ever-present fan from one hand to the other. "My father does have the greater share of blame," she admitted. Yet, the lady didn't sound the slightest apologetic. She settled onto the bed, a casual gesture that clashed with the formality of her tone and posture. "Being an incompetent lord, he is the one to blame for getting himself trapped in this situation to begin with."
Kono and Hisayo reacted to that—Kono by edging further away and Hisayo by gasping, sharp and affronted. "How dare you speak about your father—"
"Oh, you know it's true," she said, smiling at her stepmother. Lady Fukuyama pressed a finger to her lips. "If it weren't for his dismal failure in jockeying over Lord Motonari for that stupid feud, he wouldn't have been strong armed into marrying you, dearest mother. You'd be off with a vapid young lord to match you in personality."
