Taste

Nothing

"We were wrong, as it happens."

"What?" Kenshin looked up sourly from his pickled plums, eyeballing Shingen. The man held a letter between his fingers, popping sweets into his mouth and chuckling. What an appalling diet.

"The girl. The one they're calling the 'Princess' of the Oda forces. She isn't Nobunaga's concubine."

They were wrong? Kenshin took a long sip of sake, trying his best to burn out the weird, hopeful flip of his stomach. He loathed that part of him. Why in the Devil's name was he so invested in that nothing of a girl?

"Why would I remotely care about that?" He snapped at Shingen. "She's useless to us, then."

"Maybe not." Shingen dropped the letter on the table and grinned. "She's the Kitsune's woman."

His heart dropped. Kenshin poured himself a brimming glass and drank it all in one go. Of course. Of course she was. Akechi Mitsuhide's behavior at the discussions made all too much maddening sense now, though the snake had tried so hard to disguise it.

"And why would I care about that?" Kenshin spat.

Shingen stirred his sweets with a finger, appraising the blonde man with a telling smile. For not the first time, Kenshin was tempted to draw on him. "You're awfully annoyed for someone who doesn't care."

"It changes some plans."

"I'm sure it does."

"Would you like to die today, Shingen?"

"You can't fight me and expect to bury your feelings like that."

"A god needs no attachments," Kenshin retorted icily. "And certainly not to nothing waifs like the Chatelaine."

Shingen just returned to his sweets, his smug expression never changing. He hated how the man wasn't wrong. Hardly a night went by where he didn't dream of the Chatelaine's smile, of how she laughed and joked with Sasuke, how much he wished, so desperately, that were him–and the damned Kitsune had won her instead.

He poured another cup and drained it in a single go.