thought, these hands have been hers. The appropriate thing would be to take your own life. Still bowing, I realized that Yukako had just told me how she cared for me: with her whole heart, like Shonagon’s Empress. We were vassal and liege, no less, no more. Like Rikyu, I meant enough to her that she would ask this much of me, that she would dignify what she was asking with a name this grave. For a moment I wished I had Nao’s gun to point at my stomach and prove myself worthy of the comparison. These hands are hers, I thought fiercely. This is my place.
