#lotsa cool things on the card btw !!

[crescentmoonrider]

Truth

At six years old Ranta already understands the truth of this world and the lie of the clan. At nine, he knows how he will die. For the prompt : All of the Other Reindeer [@badthingshappenbingo]

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or under the Read More, I'm not your boss

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At six years old Ranta already knows the truth of this world : it isn’t the strong that survive and live well, but the ones lucky enough to be born up high.

Dad had the pitiful technique of a man from the lower branch and died pitifully before Ranta could even remember him. Mom broke her neck falling down the stairs going up to the compound, and it was another servant that found her body.

Ranta’s hands were too small and clumsy at the time to properly hold the chopsticks and put her bones in the urn. He doesn’t remember where her ashes are now.

Ranta is six and carrying trays and laundry to the main house, watching the lucky ones parade around in rich clothes that don’t fray and don’t look or feel rough at all.

Only Zen’in are sorcerers, and only sorcerers are human, and only the strong deserve to live – and yet Ranta barely feels human and still thinks that he doesn’t want to die.

Ranta’s technique is weak and useless, he knows this because dad had the same and still died, and because branch kids are nothing but dog meat sacrificed to keep the main line alive.

Only the Ten Shadows matters, and everyone else lives and dies only for his sake.

Ranta is six and knows he will die like dad, like mom, pathetic and worthless. He has no reason to expect anything else.

He is six when the head of Hei comes to watch a demonstration of the lower branch’s techniques, barely paying any attention as he drinks his sake. Jin’ichi-sama is only here for the sake of tradition, for the sake of pretending it is strength that matters and not only how close to power you are born. Everyone knows it.

Everyone knows it, and that’s why no one expects it when he calls Ranta up to him and says : “You have potential.”

Ranta’s nose is bleeding from overexertion, because he is weak and lacks training, and he can’t tell if his face flushes and his sight blurs from effort, or from the awe of seeing Jin’ichi-sama look down upon him in approval, and feeling his large hand envelop Ranta’s head like he imagines dad would have.

After this, Ranta is moved closer to the main house, stops carrying trays and laundry that aren’t exclusively Jin’ichi-sama’s, starts wearing clothes that feel soft against his skin. He trains under Jin’ichi-sama when he isn’t serving him, and each little word of encouragement, each warm touch on his shoulder or his head feels like one of the blessings he wasn’t born with.

Still, he doesn’t forget the truth of this world : the lucky ones are the ones who get to survive, and Jin’ichi-sama is simply sharing his own luck with Ranta now.

Without him, Ranta would be nothing.

It isn’t the strong that live well, he knew and still knows, and will forever know. If it was, the ghost he first heard of back in the lowest house wouldn’t be a curse in and of himself, and Jin’ichi-sama wouldn’t have ever felt the need to set his eyes on Ranta.

The ghost of the main family is a child two years older, who stares at Ranta with the anger of a vengeful spirit, and stands lower than Ranta ever used to, even though he lives in the main house.

He is strong, too. Jin’ichi-sama trains Ranta to support him, Ranta keeping the target immobile while Jin’ichi-sama crushes it at full power, the perfect helping hand to a technique that lacks in finesse and accuracy (Jin’ichi-sama’s words) – Toji needs none of this. Toji is fast and strong, accurate and powerful, all on his own.

Toji has no cursed energy.

Ranta thought himself worthless, and yet next to Toji his existence means the world to the clan, and to Jin’ichi-sama. Toji isn’t really a human, a person, a son. Toji is nothing except strong.

And yet, and yet, the lie of the Zen’in keeps on going that the only thing that matters is strength, and that is why the strongest sorcerer is the head of Hei, and the Ten Shadows will always be the head of the clan.

It isn’t that Ranta feels pity for Toji, it isn’t, either, that he hates him as much as Toji resents him. Something just feels wrong, is all. Or maybe not wrong, but odd. Uneven.

Ranta owes his current life to Toji’s curse, but he cannot be grateful. Cannot show any kindness, doesn’t have any reason to either because Toji is mean, to everyone and especially to Ranta, but he is also the only kid around the same age who isn’t one of Naobito’s horrible sons and it’s not that Ranta is lonely, he isn’t, cannot be when Jin’ichi-sama is so kind to him, but… but…

He doesn’t want to lose his place in the world.

It’s all that matters, this, and Jin’ichi-sama looking at him like dad would have. Ranta will do anything for this.

When Ranta is nine years old, Jin’ichi-sama’s wife dies.

He has never met her, she kept herself locked inside her room ever since giving birth to a defective child, but he knows Jin’ichi-sama loved her, or he would have divorced her back then.

Jin’ichi-sama doesn’t come to train the next day, doesn’t call Ranta to serve him either.

Ranta goes anyway.

He couldn’t get mom’s bones into the urn properly when she died, forgot where her ashes are. He doesn’t want Jin’ichi-sama to feel as lonely as he did back then.

When he reaches the main house from the courtyard, Toji is standing outside, glaring at Ranta like he expected him, like he’s been watching Ranta cross the garden from the start and Ranta just didn’t notice it. Maybe that’s the case.

“Go away,” Toji says. “He won’t train you today,” he says. Like Ranta is a stupid child who doesn’t even understand this much.

“I’m not here to train.”

“Go away,” Toji repeats. “We’re,” he catches himself, “he’s in mourning. You’re not family, so don’t come in.”

It’s a lie. They’re all Zen’in, even Toji, even someone who isn’t even a person. For some reason, Ranta doesn’t want to let him be mean today. Doesn’t want to hear those specific words.

“I want to present my condolences. I’m not leaving.”

He takes a step forward. So does Toji, grabbing Ranta’s collar and dragging him back, before throwing him onto the ground.

Ranta barely has the time to understand what happened before Toji punches him. And then he doesn’t have the time to understand anything anymore, except that it hurts and Toji is angry and shouting and straddling Ranta to hit him more.

“I told you” hit “to go” hit “away.”

Hit.

“No one wants you here !” Toji shouts at one point. “It’s all your fault ! You ruined everything !”

Ranta can’t even raise his hands to defend himself, much less speak up. He just lies here, taking in the punches and the words, and the emotion in Toji’s eyes that he recognizes for the first time.

It’s fear.

It’s always been fear.

The hail of hits stops as Toji is dragged up to his feet, and Ranta watches as Toji tries to explain himself and begs for his father to forgive him, panicked and hurried and so unlike himself.

It doesn’t stop the heavy blow he receives though, hard enough to make him keel over and throw up.

“I have no son,” Jin’ichi-san says in a cold, dead voice Ranta never heard from him before.

It scares him.

It scares him, too, when he doesn’t see Toji for a week after, when Jin’ichi-san doesn’t say where he took him.

It scares him when he finally understands, watching the doors to the underground training area open and feeling none of the cursed energy that should emanate from the numerous curses held within it.

Watching Toji slowly limp his way out, covered in blood and gaping wounds, with eyes so empty Ranta feels himself lose his footing and fall somewhere he doesn’t belong anymore.

At nine years old, Ranta understands the truths of this world : it isn’t the strong that get to live well, but the ones that are born lucky. Toji is the strongest of the Zen’in, and one day he will take revenge on them all, and he will kill them all with no struggle and no qualms. And when he takes Ranta’s life, then…

Ranta thinks he will deserve it.