Wolf's-own: Koan (31 page)

"Look, Joori.” Morin took hold of Joori's arm and stopped him. Several paces ahead, Samin seemed to sense it, because he stopped, too, turned around, and calmly waited. Shig and Naro-yi were deep in conversation and only stopped because Samin took gentle hold of Shig's collar, balancing Morin's ridiculous fishbowl carefully in his big hand. Morin waited for a clump of cloak-clad pedestrians to flow around them, then insisted, “He'll be all right."

"You don't know that.” Joori didn't like the way it came out hoarse and a bit whiny, but he couldn't help it.

Morin snorted. “It's Jacin, for pity's sake. He's a fucking lunatic with—"

"He's
not
a—"

"In a good way, Joori, calm the hell down, will you?” Morin shook his head, runnelets of rain flying off from the updrawn hood of his cloak. “Our brother is a well-armed lunatic, a crazy, batshit bastard who might think he wants to die but has no idea in the world how to do it. And even if he figured it out, he's so sure that you and I couldn't live one second without him gutting himself to keep us alive that he'd walk back here on stumps with his own head in his hands to make sure we're all right. You're worried about
him
? I'm more worried about the people who get in his way."

Joori was glad it was raining; that way, Morin couldn't tell the rain on his face from the sudden tears he couldn't hold back. “You didn't see his eyes,” was all he could think to say.

"This time?” Morin shook his head. “No, I didn't. But I saw back in Ada. I saw someone who looked exactly like my brother but who turned into someone else entirely right in front of me. I saw him hold his own, hurt and unarmed, against a man who turned out to be a maijin. And then I saw him kill him. And then I saw him put a knife through the eye of another. And
then
I saw him mow through guards, and might-as-well-be-dead bodies, and all of this while he—"

"Yeah, all right, I get it,” Joori cut in, unable to take the subtle awe that always crept into Morin's voice and eyes when he talked about... all of that. “I know, Morin. He shouldn't
have
to... he's
not
what... I mean, I just....” He trailed off, throat aching, because it was there, somewhere, but something in him wouldn't let it come out.

He's not what Asai made him. He
can't
be.

"You just think he did all that because he had no choice,” Morin said, his voice so improbably soft and even that Joori just had to see what was on his face. He wished he hadn't. He didn't need
sympathy
from fucking
Morin
. “And now that he's got a choice, he should... what? Paint his face and go repent at the temples? Maybe
you've
got a guilty conscience over what you did in Ada, but that doesn't mean you should. And neither should Jacin. He's got enough guilt over Mother and Caidi—he doesn't need more for not being what you seem to need him to be. He's only being what he is, Joori."

What he is.
Maybe that wouldn't be so bad, if what Jacin was hadn't been ordained and manipulated by a treacherous maijin and then perpetuated by an obsessed
Temshiel
. Joori could feel the rage and frustration building—at Morin, at Malick, at himself, even at Jacin—instinctively throttled it down, and then realized he didn't have to anymore. There was nothing there, no frightening power inside him to keep hold of, nothing that could lash out but him. It was appallingly disappointing.

"Let me tell you something about our brother, Joori,” Morin went on. “He hasn't just gone ‘round the bend—he passed the bend four psychotic episodes ago, and now he's digging grooves in the crazy-ass loops in his head, skidding along and trying to figure out how to act like a normal person so everyone will stop looking at him and waiting for him to grow some sanity. He doesn't even know what ‘normal’
is
anymore. And trying to figure out how to be what other people want him to be?—
that's
what's going to push him over into truly insane. He's not the same Jacin you knew back in Ada, and the more you try to make him into that, the crazier—"

The swing was instinctive. So was Morin's dodge away from it. Joori didn't manage to deck him like he wanted to, but he did manage to clip him a glancing blow on the chin with an almost satisfying
crack
of knuckles. Out the corner of his eye, Joori saw Samin start back toward them then pause a few steps away, saw a few passersby jerk their glances their way and then quickly away again. That Naro-yi was staring at them, benevolent warmth radiating from him and seeping out into the rain-soaked atmosphere through his sympathetic smile. Shig looked worried.

Joori didn't care. Neither, it seemed, did Morin. The little bastard was
laughing
.

"Yeah, I know,” Morin said through his snorts, “you think you know him so well."

"And you know
nothing
about him!” Joori seethed. “You hated him, all your life—you think he didn't
know
? And then you watch him take apart a few guards, and he's suddenly your hero, you bloodthirsty, black-hearted little thug. You never even knew him, you didn't even
see
him back when it counted, because
Father
told you not to, and you bloody well did everything Father said, didn't you? Treat him like shit, treat him like nothing—for fucking
years
—and now you're going to try to make it
my
fault that he believes it? Maybe I didn't do it right, maybe I hurt more than helped, but I only
ever
wanted to help, because that's what you do for people you love—you help them and keep loving them, even if they won't be helped and don't want to be loved. Whether I did it all right or did it all wrong, I was
there
for him, Morin—where were
you
?"

Morin was silent for several long moments, holding Joori's eye, tongue poking out every now and then to run along his bottom lip; it was going red and would probably start to swell pretty soon. And then Morin merely shrugged, said, “Yeah, all right, you have a point,” and he adjusted the hood on his cloak. “Neither of us deserves what he did for us. Nobody could, not really. I think I'm not as bad off as you, though, because I know better than to try to make myself into someone who can live up to it.” Bloody hell, the soft look Morin was giving him was making Joori want to... he didn't know, but whatever it was couldn't be good. “You've always been a good big brother, Joori, and I sucked as a little brother. Maybe I still do, I don't know. But I'm trying not to anymore, all right? And you're trying too hard to fix what won't be fixed. You can't be ‘there’ for him in the same way now. He's just not that Jacin anymore. He's got his own kind of ‘normal’ now—let him
be
."

"
I can't
!"

It came out high and wobbly, nearly hysterical. It shut Joori up, stuck in his throat. Because what the hell had he meant by that?
I can't... let him be?
Maybe. And there was something very, very wrong with the fact that the statement was true enough that it had spilled out his mouth without thought, and yet he couldn't lay hands on any good reasons behind it.

Morin just looked at him with that same infuriating sympathy as before. “Just like Father couldn't let Mother be?"

It was like a punch to the chest. It winded Joori; he could actually feel himself paling. Anger rose, hot and tight, but it was too confused to take on any form of reason. He wanted to strike back,
hurt
like he'd just been hurt,
gutted
, but he didn't know how. The snarl was building again, but it died of latent confusion when Morin reached out and patted Joori's cheek. And then the little son of a bitch
grinned
.

"He's crazy, Joori. But he's a
good
kind of crazy. He's the kind of crazy I want at my back when I walk into a room full of other crazy people. Maybe we won't find him, but he'll damn sure find us eventually.” He jerked Joori in and gave him a weak, weirdly affectionate swat to the forehead. “You worry too much.” He patted Joori on the shoulder this time, then just spun about and ambled back toward Samin.

Joori only blinked after him for a moment or two. Because what the fuck had just happened?

He wasn't sure he'd ever been this confused, this thoroughly jumbled.
Ever
. And considering his life up ‘til now, that was saying something. He stood there, in the rain, watching Morin and Samin catch up to the others, watching them all dip their heads in a conversation he really didn't want to be a party to, and wondered at the white buzzing in his head.

Seriously. What the fuck had just happened? And why did Joori feel absurdly reassured?

He didn't want to feel reassured. He wanted to dismiss all the disturbing things Morin had said as the nonsense he desperately wanted it to be. But damn it, he wanted Jacin back and safe and whole and as happy as Jacin could possibly be and... that had to be more important than being right. Because Joori had never had the arrogance to think he was completely right, but he'd certainly thought he was more right than the rest of them.

Now, he wasn't so sure.

And when had Morin started making sense, anyway? Fucker.

Joori had known Morin was growing up, but he hadn't really associated “growing up” with “maturing.” It was so hard sometimes to look at Morin and not see the little bastard who'd tormented Jacin just for fun because he'd learned from their father that their Untouchable brother was somehow not a real person. Had been taught that one day there would be no more Ghost haunting their run-down little house on their run-down little farm in a Jin prison camp, so why bother to get attached?

Morin had believed it. He'd loved their father, admired him, even, and why not? It wasn't as though he could have learned what a real father was supposed to be from someone else. Not until....

Joori's eyes shifted against the rain, landed on Samin.

He shook his head, still somewhat boggled, as he was every time it occurred to him, that a paid assassin was somehow a better father figure for Morin than their own father had been. Hell, bloody
Malick
was a better father figure than their father. And that was just fucking tragic.

Then again, the brother Joori loved more than life was a paid assassin—had been an
un
paid assassin—and was too bloody good at it; had maybe even liked it in an incomprehensible, vengeful-spirit sort of way. Maybe even liked it in the same way Joori had liked it when he'd been overwhelmed by the sweet tang of blood and the sizzling-meat scent of destruction, and smiled as death came by his own hand.

And how fucking tragic was
that
?

Maybe you've got a guilty conscience...

Shit. Maybe Joori did. And maybe it wasn't about Caidi or Mother or those men he'd killed, or even for demanding more of Jacin than Jacin could give. Maybe it was for something worse than unforgivable.

Maybe it was for standing there in that overgrown dooryard and weeping like the frightened child he'd been all those years ago while he just watched Asai walk away with his brother.

Maybe it was for failing Jacin before he'd ever even really tried not to.

It took a little while for Shig to figure out what was bothering her. Not really
bothering
her, but at least giving her a feeling that she couldn't pin. Not unpleasant in itself, but unpleasant because she couldn't figure out what was not-really-bothering her. She wasn't quite sure what to make of that, so she just let it simmer at the back of her head and waited for it to make sense of itself.

The house was done in the old Jin style. Or, more precisely, in the style of the
Temshiel
who'd made the Jin, which then the Jin had adopted and the Adan had distorted, incorporating more Adan styles into it until the Jin origins were nearly phased out altogether.

Curled eaves descended from a slanted roof with a wide plateau from which three slim chimneys jutted. Shig wondered if perhaps at least half of Malick's decision to buy this particular house had solidified when he'd seen that roof. Because Malick was all about anticipating Fen, and when Fen was out of sorts, when he felt threatened, Fen went up. Height and open space. Separating himself from the world and everyone in it. Closing himself off, shutting himself down, and regrouping. Or trying to. It hardly ever worked out that way.

"Roof,” Shig said quietly to Samin, then she waited out the initial look of confusion until it melted into more of an
oh, yeah, why didn't I think of that?
then gave him a smile. Samin smiled back, a little grimly, then rewarded Shig with an affectionate squeeze. He was such a sweet man, for a cold-blooded killer.

"I've arranged for minimal furnishings,” Naro-yi was saying as he let them all in. “Linens, kitchenware and the like, as well—the necessities. Kamen's account, however, is at your disposal, and you may, of course, do as you like with what's here."

"Furnishings aren't exactly a priority,” Joori muttered, shouldering in through the doorway and past Morin and Naro-yi to have a look.

Shig followed his gaze. She wouldn't have pegged Malick for someone who appreciated such wide-open space. Whatever he'd been before Wolf turned him, he hadn't been Jin, and this deliberate-seeming embrace of the traditions and style said more about a sincere wish to please Fen than it did about Malick. Though, Shig supposed, his wish to please Fen said a lot about Malick, anyway.

Kadamo mats covered the polished floor, rather than rugs or rushes. Painted rice paper screens served as partial walls, separating what must be the main living space from what Shig guessed was the dining area, with its low table and flat cushions. A small sitting room was screened off to the side of the main entrance, a low couch and table along with several wide cushions giving it a more private air of intimacy. The hallways of the second and third floors were more like galleries, open and overlooking the first floor, though Shig was pleased to see that up there, at least, it looked like all the rooms—she counted at least ten, but she couldn't see every angle from here—had actual walls and doors, instead of screens.

Most of the furnishings she could see seemed to be variations of fat, molded cushions in varying colors. Damn. She was going to miss comfy chairs and couches.