The house went quiet after the river sound thinned.
Akane lay on his bed and let the dreamspace form the way he always let it, by softening and not by tearing. The violet did not need to be called. It was there when he reached, vast and moonless.
The tree with no season still at the centre, the swing still. The small warmth on his lips from two nights before had cooled, but the peach on the altar was still there in the waking room, where evening light had touched it.
He reached past the garden, past the island, past the white stones and the sand, to the residence that held high windows and a garden wall.
She was asleep.
The dream took shape around Himari before she knew it was a dream.
It was not a green garden this time. Instead, it was a room with a low table, a window and a bowl of water that was too full. The bowl sat on dark wood, and the water reflected a light and moved around without spilling, though the table was at the same level. The air smelled faintly of oil, not the slow incense Akemi had used in the Capital, but the clean oil the maids used on hinges.
Himari sat on a cushion. She wore the light sleeping robe the maids had given her, and her hair was loose. She looked at the bowl, then at the room, then at the boy who sat opposite her on another cushion, his hands flat on his knees, his gaze calm.
She recognised him by the weight he had on her rather than his face, which always disappeared when she woke from the dreams.
"You," she murmured.
"Me," Akane replied.
She glanced toward the window, as if expecting footsteps, but none came. The residence beyond the dream room was quiet.
"Is this the garden?" she asked.
"No," Akane said. "This is a room. The garden was for names, and this is for hands."
Himari frowned a little as she heard the words, and then she asked, "Did everything go well?"
"It did." Akane just affirmed her words and didn't explain anything else. Himari waited for a while, but when she understood he wouldn't tell, she asked, "Why am I here?"
"Because there are things to do," Akane said. He nodded toward the bowl. "The courts watch, and you have spent your life being watched by people who wanted you to spill."
Himari looked down at the bowl. The water was very near the rim, just about to spill.
"What do you want me to do?"
"Hold your breath," Akane said. "Then hold the bowl."
She looked at him as if he had made a joke and forgotten to smile.
"That is it?"
"That is the beginning," he said. "Just ten heartbeats, no more. Breathe in, hold, breathe out while keeping the bowl still. It is not the big kind of holding. Just a small work, hold your breath and hold the bowl."
"Why does this matter?"
"Because the difference between the ones who fear your father and the ones who want his position is often a hand that does not shake when it is looked at," Akane replied. "You will learn servants, faces, men who come to the study. That is the second work. This is the first thing you have to learn."
Himari considered his words. The bowl was ordinary, but the instruction was not. It was quite different from what she had experienced. She had been taught to pour, to kneel, to lower eyes, but never to hold still as a task in itself.
She took a deep breath first and then placed her hands on either side of the bowl. The wood was cool, and the water trembled a fraction, catching light.
"Ten," Akane said.
She breathed in.
On three, her fingers tightened too much. The water lifted toward the rim, a small crest that caught the light and threatened to fall.
"Less," Akane said, his voice going quieter.
She loosened her grip and the crest settled. On seven, her shoulder rose. On nine, she remembered to breathe out, and the water shivered.
She let go at ten and looked up, irritated at the spill that happened at the last moment.
"It moved," she said.
"It did," Akane replied. "Again."
She set her hands again. This time she held too loosely at first, as if not holding could be a kind of holding. The bowl slid a hair's breadth when she breathed in. She corrected, too quickly, and the water tipped toward her.
"Correct yourself slowly," Akane said. "The bowl learns your hands before you learn you are touching it."
Himari's mouth moved as something came to mind.
"The river," she said suddenly, remembering what he had told her in the green garden about the current beneath Roran that her aunt's mother could draw on. "You said the power beneath Roran"
"I said your blood carries it," Akane interrupted, his tone gentle but plain. "I did not say you will carry. Tonight you carry water so that you can carry wind later."
She stared at him, then down at the bowl. She set her hands a third time.
Ten heartbeats. In, hold, out. This time, the water held.
The room let out a breath she had not known it was holding.
"Good," Akane said.
"It was not hard," she replied, but her voice was pleased despite herself.
"It was not meant to be hard," Akane said. "It was meant to be steady. Start again, but this time longer, twenty breaths at least"
She scowled, but she reset her hands. The dream held its shape. Beyond the dream the wind moved sand, and beyond that her father's study held a letter that had come across the desert, as it had for three days now, sitting where he ate and did not eat, where he asked for traders from Roran and was told they were few.
She wanted to hold for at least twenty heartbeats. At twelve the water rose near the rim and held. At sixteen her wrist ached, at nineteen she wanted to look at him to see if he was watching but she did not. She breathed out at twenty and kept the rim dry.
When she looked up, Akane nodded once.
"You kept your teeth," he said.
"What?"
"The first time you survived, and the second time," Akane said. "You kept them."
Himari looked at the bowl, then at her hands. They were small, felt a little unfamiliar to her, but steady.
"Will this be enough?" she asked, a little hopeful.
"For tonight, yes. But for the court, no. That part is yours to practice and this is a beginning."
He let the room soften a little at the edges. The bowl stayed solid longest, as if water held dreams better than other things.
"When will you come again?" she asked, curious about how long she would have to take it.
"When you are asleep after sunset," Akane replied. "Knock yourself to sleep. I will come."
"Will that come again?"
"Not for blood. It waits in the desert. It will not go nearer unless I am there."
Himari absorbed that. She did not ask what it was. She had learned not to ask for names before they were given.
"You can try something similar outside" Akane said, after thinking about how she could practice her focus.
"And learn the court," Himari replied, misreading what he wanted to convey.
"And communicate with her." Akane said.
She looked at Akane for a while and then nodded.
The room thinned further and the bowl's light dimmed.
Akane watched her hands one more time. They were a little steady than before, not the steadiness the river, nor the Vein, but she had done something, which was the only kind she needed to be tonight.
"Sleep well," he said.
She smiled a little at those words. "I will try not to spill."
The dream ended the way his dreamspace ended, by softening and not tearing, until there was only her room, the wind and the quiet residence beyond.
In Konoha, Akane opened his eyes.
The peach was still on the altar where he had left it. The house beyond was quiet. The white hair that had followed him at noon had moved away after watching how he wanted, and the market's shutters were closed for the night.
He lay for a while and went over the exchange which has become his usual bed time activity.
The bowl had held. The hands had learned a little of steady before they would need to learn steady under a river. No word about Vein had been spoken, and she would continue to communicate with Seramu, which would become a good leverage in future.
'Bowl-steady tonight,' he thought. 'River-steady later, when the queen can hold her hand.'
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