...I am actually working on it, believe it or not....

[moonsheen]

"You’re not afraid."

"No," the boy agreed. "I’m not."

"So why won’t you?" His brother argued, sitting cross-legged on the steps. His shoulders lifted impatiently, his mouth was twisted into a displeased scowl—exaggerated, of course, for Hiashi’s benefit. Playing up his annoyance for all it was worth, the absent, irritated toss of Hizashi’s head spoke more loudly than his words.

Hiashi, with his back turned, sighed. "Because father won’t approve of it."

"Father!" Hizashi sat up stiffly, quickly, gone from irritated to angry in less than a second. Every inch of the boy shared a collective twitch. "I’m the one asking."

"And I am the one saying no."

"Hiashi-"

"No, Hizashi."

"Maybe you are afraid," Hizashi wondered aloud, and watched his twin flinch with the words. "Looks like I’m right." And he let himself be smug; dropping his shoulders, sweeping his hair back, standing with self-satisfaction oozing from head to toe. Lazy. Casual. Smirking. Everything he knew his brother hated to be met with.

"…Allright," Hiashi snapped. "Just…Stop that. You know that if father gets wind of this--"

Hizashi fell back into the proper stance, and stood poised and smiling. "He won’t."

He did.

They were toe to toe, Hiashi barely dodging a blow to his shoulder, slipping past his brother’s palm and dropping low. It happened fast. Like his counter, a swift upward push aiming for his brother’s stomach. Fast like Hizashi’s feint, like the fingers Hizashi held perfectly level and still as he reversed the movement and pressed forward suddenly. Hiashi shifted his balance, snapped his hand up and—

"Ah…!"

--and then Hizashi’s eyes went wide and bright with pain.
He fell before the blow was even landed, body buckling in upon himself in inexplicable agony. He landed on the stony path, hard, and lay writhing. The fingers that had been held in such perfect, graceful form clutched at his temples, scrabbling and in one vulgar move tearing away his headband, nails digging into the skin as he gasped, rolled onto his back, and screamed.

Hiashi was on his knees in a moment. "Hizashi--!" His brother’s eyes rolled up to meet him, the hands clutching at his head parting just enough that Hiashi got his first good look at…at--

"That is enough," the voice of their father intoned from the steps of the house, and Hizashi’s cries pealed away into a gurgle. The boy lay shivering, chest heaving. Hiashi reached for him. "Don’t touch him." The clan head’s long fingers tightened around his cane, and he walked with measured, confidant steps down the stairs. He loomed, watching his sons with a cool gaze. Hiashi felt that gaze rake across on his hand, still hovering over Hizashi’s shoulder, like pin pricks of ice in his blood. He dropped it.

"Father," Hiashi began. "I--"

His father overrode him, deep and angry. "A member of the Branch House…" he said slowly. "Never raises his hand against the Main House." The end of his cane wrapped against the stones.

Father, Hiashi thought but didn’t voice, bowing low and feeling his unbound hair fall in his face. Dusk was in the garden then, and it looked like blood.

Their father continued, circling them, "…And it is beneath you, Hiashi, to humor them. You are not a small child anymore—nothing of this nature can be called a game."

"I understand, father."

"No," the man told him. "You don’t. Know your place Hiashi."

He paused, hovering over Hizashi, and it was the first time that Hiashi saw the difference in the way their father looked between him and his twin. The way his eyes flattened, the way his voice hardened—and he gave him a sharp jab in the ribs with his cane. Hizashi gasped, but Hiashi could see that the boy’s eyes hadn’t closed, and his hand had slipped from his forehead enough that the mark was visible, the skin around it an angry red.

"And you," the clan head commanded, regarding his second son like an insect under glass. "Know yours."