When they arrived in Suruga, it was already spring of the next year. Lovely sakura trees bloomed along the streets. Maybe it was because the scene was so dazzling, but she couldn’t help remembering Harun.o.bu’s face before she left; she couldn’t forget his tortured facial features full of hatred and bitterness. She didn’t know until now if it was a wrong choice for her to escape to Suruga without saying goodbye to him.
Before setting out, she left Itagaki n.o.bukata a message saying that she went to Suruga to make it clear why Imagawa Yoshimoto wrote the letter to Harun.o.bu. She and the master needed some time to calm down. And she said sorry to the good man, even though she had agreed to stay with the master.
On the way to Suruga, she wore men"s’ clothing and used a bamboo hat to cover her face, until she arrived in Suruga.
In poor Kai, you could never imagine seeing the blooming flowers flourish like in Suruga. Now she was watching the flowers along the street. Beside the spring sakura, roses, orchids, and some other plants she didn’t know the name of were also in their blooming period. She tried to fix her attention on the adorable things to forget her unhappy memories in Kai. When she saw the ikebana artists who were showing their techniques alongside the street, she recalled the scene when she said goodbye to Imagawa Yoshimoto and the flower arrangement he made for her named Enchanting Blue on a Sunny Day. A bitter smile floated on her lips.
Suddenly, a tiny raindrop fell on her shoulder. Suruga was near the sea, so she could smell the taste of sea from the rain, soft and salty. If she was still the Sakura of the modern era, she would be enjoying this beautiful spring scenery quite thoroughly; until the rain stopped, she was meditating, full of sorrows that couldn’t dispel.
“Tears, your tears fall down for separation,
We never see each other after this time,
I print your shadow in the depths of my heart,
Just like burying some old memory. . . ”
By reflex, she began to hum a song from her era. . .
Wait! What was she singing? Harun.o.bu didn’t deserve to be missed like this.
“Sakura, was the memory you want to bury about me?”
A pleasant voice came to her ears. Who? He understood Chinese songs? Sakura suddenly turned her head. She found Imagawa Yoshimoto was standing behind her, wearing purple clothes, his right hand holding an oil paper umbrella with mountains-and-waters painted onto it. His umbrella was covering her head, and his eyes were full of affection. His soft look was not like the elegant arrogance of their last formal meeting. His smile was as tender as a full moon.
“Imagawa Yoshimoto?” She was surprised by his appearance here.
“I have been waiting for you here seven days, since the beginning of the flower festival. The G.o.ds really sent you to my side.” Imagawa Yoshimoto took up her hands to hold them, like holding warm jade. “In fact, you are from the Ming Kingdom, right? Though the Chinese I learned in my childhood was not as fluent as your song, I can still understand the meaning. Anyway, Sakura, whether you are Chinese or a Nipponjin (j.a.panese), I won’t let you go this time.”
“But . . . Yoshimoto. . . ”
Sakura didn’t want to break this romantic atmosphere, but what she wanted was the truth about the letter. However, she couldn’t speak out her doubts right at this moment.
“The letter was written by you. I recognized it when I saw the letter at first sight. You like Chinese characters, and though you changed the handwriting style, I can still read the difference from our writing, like the tail of the horizontal drawing was upward.”
Wow. . .
She sighed for his circ.u.mspection as a male. It looked like he had a totally different personality compared to what the history books said. But, she could only agree that the letter was from her.
“My mother promised me to not ask about private issues anymore. Zen Master had gone to another country, and he wouldn’t come back in one or two years.”
When they’d just returned to the Suruga mansion, Yoshimoto said this to her immediately, and arranged for the servants to prepare a living room for her, right behind the reception of the Outer Compound. Sakura wondered, since he definitely knew that she had run away from Kai, was he now taking her as a family member of Suruga?
“Why are you looking around with hesitation? You don’t want to live in Suruga? Or you are regretting that you left Kai and Takeda Harun.o.bu?” He noticed the difference in her.
Sakura cleared her throat to cover her real feelings and said, “Oh, I thought you had some misunderstandings about me. As for my purpose in coming to Suruga, I came here to figure out why you knew that the letter was written by me. I wasn’t prepared to live in your mansion. Nor have I regretted leaving Kai, since the day I left.”