The Twelve Kingdoms: The Shore in Twilight

The color and length differed according to the rank of the person holding it. The insignia he took from his tattered pocket was indeed that of Nisei-shi of the Daiboku of the Ministry of Spring. As his name suggested, Nisei-shi attended to the Hakuchin in the Nisei-kyuu ("Castle of the Two Cries").
    "What is this about, Nisei-shi?"
    "It's the General. The General of the Palace Guard. The Palace Guard of the Right."
    "Asen."
    "Yes. The former General Jou. The night of the terrible disaster, he showed up at the Castle of the Two Cries accompanied by a phalanx of soldiers. He inquired if the Castle had sustained any damage and if any of us were injured. By right, no one may open the doors of the Castle without the permission of the Daiboku. But the situation being what it was, the doors were opened and the General was allowed to enter."
    "And then?"
    "As soon as he stepped inside the castle walls, General Jou--Asen--tried to slay the Hakuchi. But his sword passed right through the Hakuchi without touching it. Realizing this, he ordered my colleagues to bring him a pheasant, one of the birds used under for ritual purposes under the jurisdiction of the Palace Time Keeper. Surrounded by soldiers and threatened with their swords, my colleagues led them to the Time Keeper and returned with a pheasant. Then Asen killed it and cut off its feet. The bird was stuffed in a jar and buried in a hole."
    He covered his face with his hands. "They went so far as to murder all the officials there." He'd just managed to escape, thanks to the damage caused by the meishoku. "I had a bad feeling ever since Asen came in. There've been these rumors about saying that His Highness got spooked by one of the generals and set out for Bun Province to escape a particularly persistent assassin."
    "What about these rumors?"
    "Well, they'd been on my mind. That's why I figured those bad feelings weren't all in my head. So I stepped back into the shadows and made myself as small as possible and looked for a way out of there. When things got really dicey, I ducked down amidst the rubble. I found a hole and slipped through to the outside."
    Under the cover of the surrounding disorder and darkness, this young civil servant returned to his quarters. Guards soon came after him. He was able to conceal himself beneath the floorboards and evade capture. But at the time he heard the guards talking about how the bodies didn't add up and one of them had probably escaped.
    "I made it out of the castle by the skin of my teeth and hid in a wagon carrying dead bodies. I played dead myself and made it past the gates. I managed to crawl away while the wagon was being unloaded at the cemetery temple outside Kouki. I headed for Zui Province territory first, but spotted the air corps operating there and figured I'd better put distance between myself and Zui. I mingled with the refugees and fled here."
    He grasped Risai's hands as if clinging to her for dear life. "Please help me. Asen will kill me for sure."
    Risai nodded. "Don't worry. I'll take care of it." She ordered an aide-de-camp to find himself a place to rest, making sure not to reveal his presence, and not talk about it to anybody else.
    She prepared two communiqués. One she gave to an aide-de-camp and sent him to Kouki under the guise of requesting advice in subjugating the uprising. Contained therein was secret missive that was to be delivered only to the addressee, and which must not be allowed to fall into any other hands. The recipient of this communiqué was Haboku, in the Imperial Palace.
    At the same time, she sent a second communiqué by messenger pigeon to Sougen in Bun Province.
    Asen was behind the coup d'etat. She disguised Nisei-shi among the camp followers and solemnly proceeded through Jou Province. Ten days later they were intercepted by the air cavalry adorned with insignia identifying them as troops under Asen's command. They bore an official-looking document bearing a garish red seal.
    "We already know that you've been communicating covertly with Nisei-shi," the squadron captain stated. "And that in order to make the Hakuchi's foot your own, you broke into the Castle of the Two Cries and murdered the officials there." To which he added that she'd also assassinated Gyousou and Taiki. "General Ryuu is hereby ordered to return to the Imperial Palace. It'd be better if you didn't make things any worse for yourself by resisting."
    She of course insisted that she didn't know him, but the captain