“No, you’re spiraling.” His lips brushed against the back of my neck, soft and gentle. “There is a difference.”
I tried to relax into his touch, but my mind wouldn’t stop racing. “Gods, the funeral. I gave my uncle two days to planand execute the burial of not one but two emperors, two days to prepare an Imperial funeral that should take thirty. And only one more day to prepare a coronation. Am I disrespecting Father’s memory? Will the people see it as me trying to rush past his death? What if—”
“What if the people see this as a young emperor putting the Empire’s needs above his own grief? Above his own very personal loss? Above his pride as he ascends the throne with more humility than any emperor before?” Esumi’s voice was low, murmuring against my ear. “What if they see this as a display of great strength instead of weakness?”
“What if they’re wrong?”
“What ifyouare?”
I wanted to argue, to list all the ways I was clearly, obviously, catastrophically unprepared for this, but Esumi’s hand was stroking slow patterns on my arm, his breath warm against my neck, and some of the frantic energy coiling in my chest had started to loosen.
“Es, I’m terrified,” I whispered. “Every moment of every day. I am so afraid I am going to make the wrong choice, that people are going to die because I didn’t know better, because I didn’t choose better, because I am too young or too inexperienced or too—”
“Human?” Esumi pressed another kiss to my neck. “You’re allowed to be afraid, Haru. You would be a fool if you were not.”
“That is not very reassuring.”
“I’m not trying to reassure you. I’m trying to remind you that you are not alone in this.” Another kiss, this one lingering at the base of my skull. “You have generals who know how to fight, advisors who know how to govern, and you have—”
“You?”
“I was going to say a really excellent Grand Minister, but yes. You also have me.” His hand stilled on my arm. “For what that is worth.”
“It is worth everything. Gods, Es, you’re everything to me,” I said quietly. “You know that, don’t you? Please say you know that.”
“I do, but . . . you need to stop trying to carry all of this by yourself.” His hand started moving again, drifting lower, and I felt some of the tension bleed out of my shoulders. “Let someone else take some of the weight, even if just for tonight.”
“I don’t know how to do that either,” I admitted. “How to just let go, to stop thinking and planning, to stop worrying about every possible disaster that could happen tomorrow or the next day or—”
“Then let me help you.”
Teeth sank into my earlobe as his hand slid across my stomach, fingers splaying against the fabric of my sleeping robe. Not suggestive, just present and grounding, reminding me that I was here, now, in this moment, not drowning in a sea of possible futures.
“I can’t stop thinking,” I said, almost desperately. “My mind won’t stop. It just keeps spinning and spinning and—”
“I know.” Esumi’s voice was impossibly gentle. “So stop trying to stop it. Just let it spin. Let the thoughts come and go. You don’t have to solve anything right now.”
“But—”
“Haru.” His hand pressed more firmly against my stomach, and I felt the warmth of it through the thin fabric. “You are not in the council chamber anymore. You are not on the throne. You aren’t the Emperor in this moment.”
“I’m always the Emperor,” I said, but there was less conviction in it than before. “That does not just stop.”
“No,” he agreed. “But you can set yourkatanadown for a few hours. Let me carry it for you.”
“That is not how it works—”
“Then we will make it how it works.” His lips found that spot just below my ear that always made me shiver. “If only for tonight, for right now.”
I wanted to argue more, to insist that I couldn’t afford to let my guard down, that there were too many things that needed my attention, but Esumi’s presence at my back was so solid, so real, cutting through all the spiraling thoughts about tomorrow’s disasters and yesterday’s choices.
“Those soldiers, those cities, those people—they will still be there in the morning. And you will serve them better if you are not exhausted and drowning in doubt.” His hand shifted lower, fingers tracing idle patterns. “Let me take care of you. Just for tonight.”
My breath hitched. “Esumi—”
“Trust me,” he whispered against my ear. “Let me help you forget. It will help you remember who you truly are, too.”
His hand moved lower still, and despite everything—the fear, the doubt, the weight of an empire pressing down on my shoulders—I felt myself let go.
