Lion Head Mesa Shinzō-byō

seeing him hurt now, as she retold the tale of his betrayal and his injury, should not have been satisfying. they were friends. and yet the queen could not put aside the simple, powerful truth of it.
as he spoke she frowned and was swift to reprimand him.
no, absolutely not.
i don't have any more answers for you crowfeather, but i can tell you this with my whole heart: you mean too much to me, to akashingo now, and there is no way i'd have let you be abandoned there.

her cheeks were red. there was a livliness to her eyes that had been so carefully hidden before, but now cracked and bled in to her expression the way water seeps from the surface of a frozen lake. she is incensed.

whatever your reasons for lying to me, and... and getting hurt, i have to trust that it was a good reason at the time. but she still could not fathom it; better to accept it and move on, at least as best she could.
she breathes, trying to ease back from the intensity of her own emotions. it is a difficult task to control what was set loose.

i know you dislike it here, especially so being confined to a sickbed. i should have visited more often, been a better friend to you - she shakes her head lightly and looks away from him, contemplative. when next satsu speaks it is with the controlled authority of a queen. be well, crowfeather. do not despair.