In The Name of Love

Fifi’s eyes dart back and forth between the water lily and Kai, who looks as tense and wide-eyed as a rabbit about to bolt away from intruders in its meadow. A million thoughts clamor for her attention. Slowly, she reaches out and touches the full water lily blossom that was a closed bud mere moments ago. It looks and feels like all the water lilies she’s seen and touched before—but how can that be?

“How…?” Fifi asks. She wants to say more, but too many questions demand to be voiced all at once and that one word is all she manages to make heard.

“You’re not going to report me to the king?” Kai questions, his voice low. Every line of his body looks as taut as a bowstring.

Fifi shakes her head. “Why would I do that?”

“It’s…forbidden. What you witnessed. Your great-grandfather—”

“So?”

Some of the tension leaves Kai’s body, but his brow is still furrowed with either concern or skepticism—Fifi cannot tell which.

“How did you do it?” she asks again. “And why take that risk, if you were so concerned—”

“I wasn’t thinking. You wanted the flower to be in bloom, for your sketch, and it’s an easy thing to do, so I—”

“An easy thing?!”

“I mean…it was one of the first things I learned to do. When I started learning….”

“On your own? With a book? Did someone teach you?” It’s all Fifi can do to sit still. Her forgotten sketchbook sits precariously close to the edge of the bench, prone to falling into the pond at the slightest provocation. Kai pushes it towards her and away from the peril of the water.

“Careful.”

“Thank you.” Their hands brush each other as Fifi takes the sketchbook, glad to have it as an anchor while she tries to process this new information about Kai. Her cheeks flush and she looks away from him, back at the water lily. Maybe, if I go back to sketching, if all my focus isn’t on him, he’ll be willing to say more… she thinks, picking up a pen to add the water lily to her sketch of the frog.

“This is dangerous, you know,” Kai mutters after several moments. “For both of us.”

Fifi dares a glance up at him before returning her gaze to her sketchbook. His hazel eyes look almost black in the fading daylight, and his jaw is tense, his expression serious. But breaking rules has never bothered Fifi.

“It’s already against the rules to be out here together without a chaperone,” she points out.

“Easily passed off as an accident. We can always pretend we’ve never met like this before, if someone were to see us. But what you’re asking for….”

“I just want to know.”

“That knowledge is considered criminal. And you’re a princess. Your father—”

“Will never hear anything about it. Even if I wanted to tell him, which I don’t, he never listens to me anyway.” Fifi’s grip on the pen tightens. “If it’s so dangerous, why show me? Why be involved in it at all?”

“Like I said, I wasn’t thinking. I guess…in that moment, I felt…safe. To be myself.”

“I’m honored.” She means it wholeheartedly. Until the bud opened at Kai’s command, she felt the same way with him. His hesitations and guarded moments from the other times they’ve talked make sense to her now, but she wonders what else he might be hiding. Dangerous, he said, she muses. But he’s not the type to hurt people. Not like Emiliano or many of the so-called nobility. So then what could he mean?

“As for why…why I am….” He shakes his head. “Sigurd would be so mad….”

“Who’s Sigurd? Your father?”

Kai snorts. “I wish. My mentor. He taught me…everything, really. Everything worth knowing, anyway. None of the skills I used in the Quest for Favor, but—”

“But what you just did. He taught you.”

“Yes.”

“Can you teach me?”

Kai starts and looks her over with new skepticism. “Teach you?”

“To do…whatever it’s called that you did. Magic, I know, but—”

“Cybarein.”

Like Cybarei, Fifi realizes. The priest of Chuezoh in the Royal Zoche has warned those who worship there on many occasions against acknowledgement of Cybarei, the personification of nature’s power, as anything more than a folk tale. There is no god but Chuezoh, his voice echoes in her head. But she doesn’t believe him. Chuezohm has never resonated with her the way it seems to resonate with others at Court.

“Cybarein,” she repeats. “Will you teach it to me?”

“It’s not just making flowers bloom. It’s a way of living, a sort of spirituality. Are you prepared for that?”

Fifi hesitates, uncomfortable under the intensity of Kai’s gaze. “I…I don’t know. No one ever asks me that. I’m just told what’s happening and that I must be ready, whether I want to be or not.”

“This isn’t like anything else,” Kai assures her. His voice is softer and gentler than before, almost like he pities her. “You’re free to choose, to commit or not to. My one requirement, if I am to teach you anything, is that you say nothing about it to anyone else. Even your sister.”

Fifi bites her lip. Until Minna’s Quest for Favor and betrothal, the two of them shared everything. But now Minna has her own adventures, and she’s always taken the priest more seriously than I have, she reasons. Why shouldn’t I have an adventure of my own?

“I promise I will tell no one, regardless. And…as for preparation…am I free to see as I go, whether I’m prepared or not?”

“You have complete control over how long you follow this path.”

A brilliant smile overtakes Fifi’s face. “Then when do we start?”

“That depends on you. I believe your schedule is more…structured than mine.”

“Not tonight. It’s getting dark, and they’ll be looking for me if I’m not back to my rooms soon.”

“No, not tonight. Do you have a favorite courtyard?”

“This one, actually.”

Kai smiles as though her answer is somehow funny to him. “Then…shall we try to meet on purpose here, tomorrow after supper?”

“I will do my best to get away. Until then…” Words fail Fifi as she gathers up her sketchbook and pens, suddenly shy.

“Bring those with you tomorrow,” Kai instructs with a slight smile. “Just in case.”

“Right. See you then.”