MARRIED TO A KITSUNE

CHAPTER XXI

Minori saw Katsumi as Yuuji lead her away from the crowd. Yuuji had a worried look on his face while Katsumi stops smiling whenever he's not facing her. He saw one of her tails snatched a glass of rice wine as they passed by the refreshment area table and then smashed it to a tree nearby with a furious expression on her face. He somehow wish that he heard what they've talked about, but if he walked a little closer than he already did, Katsumi will saw him eavesdropping and it will cause a fight between them.

What could have Yuuji said to her that she dare showed him that kind of eyes? When Yuuji left her alone, he saw her took several deep breathes before returning to the table, resuming the topic she probably left off. She smiles and laughs to her friends as if nothing happened. Minori had the sudden urge to walk over and praise her ability to put up a pretentious attitude that easily.

Minori had been watching Katsumi since the party started, but watching is a weak word. He was admiring her. He admires everything about her. Her graceful way of doing things. How she dress herself. How she smiles and threw her head while laughing. The gentle rhythmic swaying of her tails. Had Katsumi never lied to him before, maybe things have gone differently for them.

He met Katsumi during a meeting with Inari one hundred seventy years ago before Yuuji was born. They're both walking in their fox form with two tails because shifting into a human child form drained much of their magical powers. It was Katsumi who initiated their friendship and before Minori knows it, he was already hunting rabbits with her. Rabbits were their favorite pastime dish. They would race to the top of Mount Haku from morning until sun down and talked about the beauty of the thousand stars twinkling on the evening sky. Minori compares Katsumi's beauty to that dark sky. It was enticing and mysterious. The danger lies in being attached to their beauty that one may forgot that there are other beautiful things beside them.

When his mother, the Queen Aki, chose Katsumi to be his wife, he thought he was the luckiest kitsune spirit in the kingdom. After the announcement of their upcoming marriage, he immediately sets off to complete the necessary diamonds for the dowry on the following day. Unlike Yuuji, it only took him one hundred and fifty years to do so.

Katsumi considers herself the luckiest too. The idea of marrying a prince in the kingdom thrilled her so promised Minori that she will be the best wife he could ever hope for.

At first, it was just an arrange marriage intended to strengthen the bond of kitsune spirits and continuing the family line, but as Minori spent almost all his time with Katsumi and saw more of her caring and loving nature, he began to see their relationship in a romantic way. He believed that though he's a prince, it is still his responsibility to initiate a love confession to her. So one day, he confessed to her at the top of Mount Haku, offering her his heart and loyalty.  Katsumi cried in happiness and in return promises him that she'll do anything for him. Minori thought that it was the happiest moment of his life.

How foolish I am at that moment.

It all happened one evening, after a trip to the marketplace at the other side of the world. He was walking at the hallway to his bedroom. The bunch of books he carried slightly blocked his sight, so he made sure to take small steps to avoid tripping. When he passed by the mansion's music room he heard Katsumi yelling behind. It was unusual for Katsumi to raise her voice and for a moment Minori feared that there might be something wrong with her. He dropped his books and marched toward the slightly opened door. What he saw made his heart leaped for a second. Katsumi was talking to two yako foxes kneeling in front of her. She seems to be disciplining them for their mistake of not bringing her a kitsune spirit. Minori turned around and run to his bedroom.

Zenko foxes like him knows the smell of yako foxes when they encounter one, and yako foxes had long been forbidden to live with the zenko foxes in the kingdom. Inari separates them because of their malicious tendencies that made humans believe that all kitsune spirits are trickster, seducers and thieves. Minori ran his mind for the possible reasons why he saw Katsumi with the yako foxes. He couldn抰 think of any business a zenko fox might do with yako foxes. In addition to that, all of the reasons he listed lead to a certain conclusion. Katsumi might be one of them. The idea was absurd but possible. It's only when Minori embraces Katsumi during dinner that he got to smell yako fox blood in her. It was a faint smell but it was there. He didn't have the chance to confront her about his doubts and for a month he struggles with the truth. If he found out that what he thinks is right then he couldn't marry her because it will be impossible for them to have children. He told himself that maybe he was wrong.

He's got to be wrong.

One night, he saw her summon white cloud smokes to travel at the other side of the world and followed her. He saw her seduces a samurai on his way home from a battle. She appeared to him in a very beautiful young woman dress in an elegant kimono that he can't resist. The following day, he did not hesitate to ask for the truth. Katsumi laughed at him and praised the fact that Minori lived up to his reputation as one of the wisest kitsune in the kingdom. She told him that she's a yako fox adopted by zenko foxes and that she manage to conceal her scent by asking Shingo, a thousand year old kitsune, to make her a potion that would take away all her yako fox scent. She succeeded, but not all of the smell was gone. Katsumi became angry when he told her that he followed her to the other side and saw her seduce a samurai. As a punishment, she broke his heart by admitting that she never loved him and that she only wants the diamonds from the dowry. Minori stormed out of her sight and never left his room for three months, refusing to talk to anyone, even with Toshi. He planned to reveal Katsumi to the kingdom, bearing in mind that it's his duty to do so, but he knew deep inside that he doesn't want to hurt her.

Minori made Katsumi promised that in exchange of his silence, she should not go to the other side of the world again. Never did he know that she broke it already when she appeared to a young man several years after she made her promise. Luckily, the young man was married by then and she failed to seduce him.

To his disappointment, his younger brother, Yuuji fell to her seduction too. Yuuji asked for Katsumi's hand in marriage and starts collecting diamonds for the dowry. The only thing Minori can do is to make sure he wouldn't end up with her. He sets off to collect diamonds before Yuuji found them. He hid all he gathered to a safe place in the mansion. It took Yuuji almost five hundred years to collect the necessary amount of diamonds, and to Minori's horror, it didn't take long for the kingdom to finally prepare for the wedding after.

Then, he came up with another plan. Two days before the wedding, he teamed up with the same kitsune that provided Katsumi of scent concealing potion. He had him made up two empty replicas of Yuuji and Katsumi's pearl of life. He hid Yuuji's pearl of life on the honden* of Inari shrine at the other side of the world, believing that it wouldn抰 be seen by anyone and took Katsumi's pearl of life before Kenta could present the wedding rings to the altar. What Katsumi slipped on Yuuji's finger during the ceremony has a spell that will bind Yuuji to someone who will wear his real ring that contains his pearl of life.

Minori cannot afford to let Katsumi have Yuuji's pearl of life because he believed that she will only manipulate his younger brother. It was all a scheme to protect him. He never intended for a human to saw the ring on the honden* and wear it. And he never expected, even in his wildest imagination, that it will be found by Honoree Ishirama.