An Inhuman Shadow

Noa grew up like any other bastard daughter of a daimyo's relative-treated like a princess, expected to be married off around fourteen or fifteen. Instead, the mother of her bodyguard and close friend passes away, and Mamoru's half-brother appears.

Takeo lost the woman he loved sixteen years ago, and the sight of his half-brother's desired mate sends him reeling. Noa looks precisely like Kazumi, but the soft nature of the woman he loved is hardened and sharpened in Noa, from the softness of silk to a sharp battle-sword of iron. Normally he would have been able to restrain himself, but the continued interest his hanyou brother shows in her drives him insane, and rouses a possessiveness in him that he had never thought himself capable of having.