Twelve Lies I Told Shingen Takeda

Chapter Ten: Full Frontal: The Naked and the Unafraid

Shingen was naked. And completely nonchalant about it.

Well, now you know he's in proportion to his height was my semi-hysterical thought.

Fixing my eyes on the wall to the left of his shoulder was the best I could do. But the afterimage was burned into my retinas, probably with a mental half-life of at least six months.

He shrugged into a yukata – which covered his shoulders and arms and back and... not the area I was doing my absolute best to avoid staring at. "What is it? Did someone find her already?"

Find who? Between the attempt on Mai's life and the full monty right in front of me, I wasn't sure I had enough brain cells left to carry on a conversation. Focus. Focus. Don't say naked. Don't say penis. Don't .... Augh!

I took a deep breath and held out the arrow. "Someone shot this over the wall at Mai." Ok, managed a sentence with eight words. A coherent sentence, even.

His demeanor changed instantly from semi-relaxed to intent. Those grey eyes of his narrowed with concern (ten points for looking at his eyes, Katsuko!). Not even bothering to finish dressing, or fasten the yukata, he strode over and took the arrow. "Was she hurt?"

"No. Yoshimoto saved her life." I explained in more detail what had happened. "She refuses to tell Kenshin, but ... Yoshimoto and I felt someone in authority needed to know."

Shingen examined the arrow. "This isn't from the Kasugayama armory."

"Sea eagle feathers are fairly easy to obtain around here, though." Eager for something concrete to do – and remove myself from the naked – I offered to search through the area blacksmiths to see if anyone recognized it.

"You can do that later." He went to the desk and found a clean piece of paper and a brush. "Can you draw?"

"Not at all." I felt the need to apologize for my lack of drafting skills. But Katsu would not do that either. Nor would Katsu continue to side eye the naked, so stop that!

He bent over the desk, the yukata sliding forward to provide more coverage (Damn... I mean yay!), and roughly sketched out a map of the archery grounds. "Show me where everyone was standing."

I knelt in front of the desk and drew barely recognizable stick figures where Yoshimoto, Mai, and I had been standing, then added some curly flourishes near the wall to represent where the tree line was visible over the wall.

He leaned over me (oh dear God) and pointed to my happy little trees. "The arrow came from there?"

Gah! He was too close! And too naked. I threw up a mental block and imaginary blinders and concentrated on making sense. It helped to remember that moment of shock when the arrow had come zipping out of the sky, and the fear I'd felt when I'd realized how close Mai had come to being killed.

"Um. Around there, yeah. This one, probably." I put my finger on the spot, then traced an invisible line through the air toward the place where we had been standing. "One of these trees had to be it. There's a lot of cover – I climbed the wall, but he was gone when I got there. Or well hidden."

He was silent long enough for me to wonder what he was thinking. I turned my head to look up at him, and he finally stepped back and fastened the yukata. I couldn't interpret the expression on his face, but there was enough sternness that this time I did apologize. "I should have searched the woods. Now it's too late. I'm sorry."

"Don't be so hard on yourself. I doubt he stuck around after that one shot. He was likely gone before you even got to the wall." He patted me on the shoulder in a manner that felt distinctly fatherly. Ok. Yes. That's a good way to think about him. A father figure. A naked father figure. No! Not a good way! No one wants to see their father naked!