The Twelve Kingdoms: A Thousand Leagues of Wind

they'll get stubborn and say, 'So tell me what you really think.' I think a lot of people come to feel that way."
    Suzu gave him a surprised look. "I sounds like you know what's it like to be Riyou- sama. "
    "It's not hard to imagine."
    "I guess not."
    When she thought back about it now, she had never tried to imagine what it must have been like to be Riyou. She only thought about what a mean bitch she was.
    "Honestly, I never gave a moment's thought to how Riyou- sama felt. Putting up with her was enough. It's hard to imagine that it also frustrated and rankled Riyou and that's what made her so cynical. And when she couldn't stomach what you said, she'd heap a lot of unpleasant chores on your back. The only place you could catch your breath was in your own bed. Even then, she'd wake you up at all hours."
    Seishuu sighed. "That really is sad."
    "It was awful."
    "Not you, Suzu. You were there because you chose to be there. That's not true of Riyou."
    Suzu gave him a reproachful glare. "You're not me. Are you telling me you feel sorry for her?"
    "Isn't it a pain always having to be such a stick-in-the-mud like that? It looks like you ended up hating yourself, too. Sure must suck being you. But the problem is, you can never run away from yourself."
    "I suppose," Suzu said peevishly, looking the other way. She lifted a corner of the tarp and glanced out at the road. "It may sound funny to you, but it really was tough. It's sad to think that my happiest moments were when I could crawl into a freezing bed on winter nights and have all my own thoughts to myself."
    "There were other people, weren't there? You never thought of talking to them?"
    "I did. But me being a kaikyaku, most people didn't get me. They'd laugh at me every time I'd ask about something I didn't know, so I lost interest. To be sure, it was bad of me not to try and learn stuff myself, but when people are always laughing at you, and they don't have much of desire to learn anything about you, pretty soon there's not much point to it."
    "So you'd lie in you bed and tell yourself how pitiful you were, how you were the unluckiest girl in the whole world, and cry yourself to sleep."
    "That's not . . . . " she started to say. But it was, she realized, blushing at the truth. "I didn't do that. I thought about lots of things. Like, how it was all a dream, and when I opened my eyes again I'd be lying in my real bed at home."
    She laughed wistfully. "After I found out about the Royal Kei, I'd dream about what kind of person she was. I was sure that she must be homesick for Yamato, too. I'd imagine us getting together and talking together like we are now, me telling her all about my hometown."
    And the Royal Kei would be so happy to have someone to talk to, and would tell her all about where she was from, too.
    Suzu let out a breath. "But when I woke up, it was right back in the same place. Riyou was as unpleasant as ever, working us to the bone, and everybody was mean to me all the time."
    Seishuu gave her an exasperated look. "Suzu, you do carry on like a little kid. What did you expect? You never do anything for yourself."
    Suzu's eyes flew open in disbelief. Seishuu answered with a tired sigh. "Daydreams sure don't take any effort. Compared to the problems in front of your face and the things that have got to be done, daydreams are a lot easier. But all that time, you're just putting off till tomorrow the things you got to think about now, that you got to do now, right? Instead, nothing changes, nothing gets decided, nothing gets settled."
    "That is true."
    "Keep on like this, with your head stuck up in the clouds, you're never going to grow up, Suzu."
    "You know, there are times when you really are a pain."
    Bleah, said Seishuu, sticking his tongue out at her. He curled into a ball. "You're always so weepy, Suzu. I can't stand it."
    "Sorry I'm such a crybaby. I think it's because when I was little, I never cried. I was a very patient kid." The man who bought her from her family and led her to the mountain pass said so, too. He said how he appreciated that she didn't get all teary-eyed. "But it was a lot of hard times that turned me into a crybaby."
    Seishuu looked at her. "Our home in Kei got burned down, most of the people in our village killed. We had to leave. Before we left, we went to see the burned-down ruins of our house and everybody cried up a storm. It was so sad we couldn't stand it. Because we were kids, we cried all the time. It wasn't like normal