Gravitation Storybook: Rapunzel
Title: Gravitation Storybook: Rapunzel
Fandom: Gravitation
Pairing: PG-13
Rating: Hiro x Ayaka, Hiro x Eiri, Eiri x Shuichi, Noriko x Tetsuya
Disclaimer: Gravitation and its characters do not belong to me, and neither does the story of Rapunzel.
Once upon a time, in a strange land far away, there lived an old and slightly senile man who had a young and very attractive wife. The old man, named Tetsuya Ukai, was not very popular amongst the people in this far away kingdom; for, when he first moved into the town, he built his house right beside the tall and frightening fortress that belonged to a very wicked and powerful wizard named Shuichi. Any man who would choose to live there, of his free will, was obviously insane. But this did not stop the curious and beautiful Noriko from marrying him. No one knew how it worked. They figured it must’ve been love.
Whatever it was, it worked for several years. During this time, the couple worked very hard to have a baby. Noriko wanted to be a mother very badly. She kept a big calendar in their bedroom, with the days of her “time of the month” circled in red. She wore sexy and scandalous outfits, and often paid trips to the town’s apothecary to buy her husband stimulants (because, remember, he was OLD). For a long time, nothing seemed to work, and they despaired.
But then, FINALLY, as if by magic, Noriko woke up one morning and was pregnant. She and her husband were very happy, and they rejoiced.
But Tetsuya did not rejoice for very long. Noriko experienced many different cravings of the unusual variety. One morning, she wanted beans on her pancakes. Another day, she asked for milk to dip her celery in. And one day, one very fateful day, she demanded a stick of strawberry pocky.
“Strawberry pocky?!” Tetsuya was aghast. Everyone knew that the only strawberry pocky in the kingdom was owned by the wicked and powerful wizard Shuichi. You know, the one whose fortress Tetsuya built his house next to. That one. “Are you sure you don’t want chocolate?”
“No!” She screamed and kicked him. “It must be strawberry!”
And so, because he loved his wife so very much (and because her kicks smarted something awful), Tetsuya valiantly scaled the walls of the fortress and snuck in through the back door, into the wizard’s kitchen. Once there, he opened the cupboards until he found the stash of pocky-a stash which was so plentiful, it tumbled out of the cupboard and onto the floor. Tetsuya quickly dove under the table to hide…but no one came. So, cautiously, he crawled out and picked up a box of pocky which he stuffed in his pocket. He should have left then, but he hated to leave the kitchen in such a mess. It simply wasn’t good manners. Only after he put back every box of strawberry pocky, did he start to leave, however-
“Who dares to steal my pocky?!”
He was too late. He turned to kneel before the evil, mighty, pink-haired wizard, in shame.
“I am sorry, I-” He paused. “You’re a little late, aren’t you?”
“Huh? Oh, yeah. Well, I heard the boxes falling, but I tripped on my way down here-do you know how many stairs this place has? And why they’re always slippery, I’ll never know. I think I bruised myself, too, which really sucks.” Shuichi reached down to rub soothingly at his knees, exposed beneath the shiny yellow shorts he wore.
“Oh yes, I hate to bruise,” Tetsuya nodded empathetically. “I hate especially hate it when you fall and land on your backside, it’s so tender back there.”
“Tell me about it,” Shuichi sighed. Then, clearing his throat, he hardened his gaze and narrowed his eyes at Tetsuya. “Now, intruder, explain yourself before I turn you into a sheep.”
“Well, I-A sheep? Why not a toad? Or a newt?”
“I don’t like toads or newts. I like sheep. They’re cute. Now,” he practically growled, sparks of lightening cackling threateningly from his fingertips, “tell me why you are stealing my pocky!”
“It’s my wife!” He answered quickly, realizing that their lovely conversation was over. “She’s pregnant and she wanted a stick of strawberry pocky. She wouldn’t take chocolate, although personally I prefer it over-”
“FOOL! Strawberry is obviously the better choice!” He huffed, bristling. “Your wife has good taste. But that does not excuse your rudeness. Haven’t you ever heard of asking?”
“May I have a box of pocky for my wife?”
“IT’S TOO LATE NOW!”
Tetsuya cowered, sweat beading on his forehead as he tried to bargain with the wizard.
“Spare me! Let me take this box back to my wife and you can have anything you want! My mustache! My teapot! My stimulants!”
“Do you honestly think I need stimulants?”
“Anything you want! My neckties! My toilet! My-” He swallowed, hard. “My firstborn child!”
“Your firstborn child?”
“All right, all right, it’s yours!”
“No, wait a minute, what would I do with-”
“I promise you can have it if you’ll only let me go!”
“But, I-”
“Please!”
Shuichi frowned. “Well…okay, if you want to get rid of it that badly.”
Tetsuya thanked the wizard profusely and went back to his wife. He told her what happened and she cried, barely able to enjoy her stick of strawberry pocky. He slept on the couch that night.
Months later, Noriko and Tetsuya had forgotten about the foolish (and unnecessary) promise made to Shuichi. One happy day, Noriko gave birth to a baby boy. He was perfect. They named him Hiroshi, or Hiro for short. They spent one wonderful, lovely day with Hiro, until Shuichi appeared in their door. Though filled with remorse, they knew they had to keep to their promise. Shuichi felt bad when they saw how sad they were, but really, it wasn’t his fault. Even so, he encouraged them not to despair, and promised they would have a child again. Spirits raised by the wizard’s words, they went back to their peaceful and odd life together, and eventually they forgot all about Hiro.
That was all well and good, really, because Hiro forgot all about them. In fact, he never even knew them. In fact, he never knew anyone, except Shuichi. The wizard, not really knowing what to do with the boy, kept him locked away inside one of his tallest towers. There was no door to the tower, and the only way in was through a window at the very top. Hiro asked about it when he was old enough, and Shuichi told him he’d simply had a boring day.
For many years, Shuichi was Hiro’s only company. The wizard was, in some way, his captor, but also his teacher and his friend. Hiro asked once if Shuichi wanted to be called “Dad”.
“If you call me that,” Shuichi threatened, “I’ll turn you into a sheep.”
Hiro did not dislike the wizard. In fact, he was fairly fond of him. Granted, he didn’t have much of a choice, but Shuichi didn’t give Hiro any reason to despise him. Although, he did have a tendency to pull nasty tricks on him. By the time Hiro was eighteen years of age, his hair was ridiculously long; Shuichi had never cut it. Shuichi, noticing its astounding length, soon developed a habit of beginning his visits by standing at the bottom of the tower and calling, “Hiroshi, Hiroshi, let down your long hair, so that I may climb the auburn stair!”
Hiro knew that the wizard could easily use his powers and fly up into the window-indeed, that was his previous method of entry-but he could never refuse the request. And so, he obligingly turned his back to window and allowed his long hair to tumble down the tower, where Shuichi would grab hold of the auburn strands and climb up and into the window. The first time Shuichi did it, it hurt a great deal and Hiro considered sulking about it. But he thought better of it when the wizard revealed that he’d brought with him a gift.
Hiro had never received a gift before, as birthdays and holidays were not recognized by the wizard, and his heart swelled with joy when he was presented with a new and extravagantly crafted lyre. He’d heard the faint sounds of lyres being played from a distance before and reckoned that he’d probably mentioned to the wizard how much he liked the music they made. With the aid of books the wizard bought for him, Hiro quickly learned how to master the lyre and spent many hours a day strumming the instrument to various tunes-songs the books taught him, songs he’d perhaps heard when a caravan passed through the town, songs that Shuichi had sung to him when he was younger, and other songs that he simply composed on his own.
While he loved playing for the music alone, he also greatly enjoyed playing for an audience. As Shuichi was his only audience, nothing made him happier than to play for the wizard. At first, Shuichi was only too happy to listen to Hiro play, but as months passed, Shuichi’s visits to Hiro’s tower grew less and less frequent. One day, when about a week had gone by without a visit, Hiro heard the familiar call from below: “Hiroshi, Hiroshi, let down your long hair, so that I may climb the auburn stair!”
Hiro frowned, for he was quite unhappy at being ignored for so long, but, as always, he could not refuse the request and hastened to lower his hair out of the window, for the wizard to climb up and join him.
“It’s been a while, Shuichi,” Hiro said curtly, unable to hide his displeasure and, in fact, not quite wanting to.
“I’m sorry,” the wizard apologized, as he truly was. But he couldn’t help smiling as he said, “Hiro, I am in love.”
“Love?” The word itself was not foreign to Hiro, for it appeared in many of the songs he’d learned. But the wizard had never before spoken of it and Hiro was clueless as to what its meaning was.
Shuichi wasted no time in describing to Hiro the man with which he was so utterly smitten. It was, as it turned out, the kingdom’s own Prince Eiri, a handsome but stoic man with fair hair and golden eyes. Hiro listened, curious and rapt, as Shuichi told him of the fluttering way his heart reacted when the prince was near and the shameless way his skin tingled when the prince touched him.
“He’s been to see me every day this week,” Shuichi explained, feeling only somewhat guilty. “I hope you can give forgive my absence, now that you know.”
And Hiro did forgive him, for what else could he do? If he rejected the wizard’s apology, he might never visit him again and Hiro would be alone for the rest of his life. Or, even worse, he might be turned into a sheep.
Time passed by in this way for quite some time, the wizard paying Hiro a visit only when he could not be with Prince Eiri. Hiro felt lonelier than ever and only the music of his lyre could comfort him. One day, when Hiro was a young man of twenty, a young maiden, who happened to be riding through a nearby forest on her favorite mare, heard the sound of beautiful music and, upon discovering its origin, dismounted at the bottom of the tall tower. Hiro, hearing the sound of the horse’s hooves stop so suddenly and so near, ceased his playing and went to look out of the window. When he saw the maiden below, he was surprised to feel his heart fluttering in the manner befitting only butterflies. He wondered if this was the feeling of love Shuichi had described to him little more than a year ago.
“Hello,” he greeted her, after reassuring himself that the prince had come to the fortress today and Shuichi would not hear his call.
“Hello,” she replied, her sweet voice increasing the fluttering in his chest. “Was that you playing such beautiful music just now?”
“Yes.” He didn’t say anything more, suddenly overcome with a modesty he’d never before experienced.
“May I ask what it is you are called?”
“Uh-” This, Hiro decided, was most certainly love, for no other feeling could possibly cause him to forget his own name. “H-Hiroshi. And you?”
“I am-Ayaka. Do you live in this tower?”
“Yes.”
“Where is the door?”
“There isn’t one.”
She seemed taken aback at that.
“Then, how-how does one get inside?”
“Through this window.”
“If you don’t mind me saying…that is very strange.”
“Is it?”
She laughed then, and Hiro almost fell over from the powerful way his heart thudded in response. She couldn’t stay long, for she had matters to attend to, but she promised to return the next day, if he would play his music for her. He agreed readily, not thinking of the wizard and not caring, for he was in love.
For almost a month, Ayaka came to visit him, each day the same, wonderful routine. He would play music for her and they would trade questions and answers for a bit; she would promise to return the very next day, if he agreed to play for her. It was a happy time for Hiro and he found he didn’t even notice that Shuichi had not visited him once.
But one day, one very fateful day, Ayaka did not come and Shuichi did. Hiro was waiting patiently for his love to come, when he heard the frightening sound of lightning and a rather angry-looking Shuichi came flying in through his window. The lack of the usual request-not to mention the way the wizard was bristling-concerned Hiro greatly and he quickly set aside his lyre and thoughts of Ayaka.
“What is it?” He asked, reaching to take hold of Shuichi’s hands, but then wisely thinking better of it. “What happened?”
“It’s him!” Shuichi bit, spitefully. “Oh, he is a foul thing!”
“Your prince?”
“Oh, ho! My prince, is he?” Shuichi laughed, the sound hollow, and some lightning zapped at the floor near Hiro’s feet. Hiro stepped back, cautiously, when he noticed the wizard’s anger dissolving until he simply looked miserable. Hiro’s heart gave a lurch, for, despite the wizard’s flaws, he still held only fond feelings for him. “No,” Shuichi sniffed. “No, he isn’t mine and he never will be. He’s getting married. He even knew about it days ago and apparently decided it wasn’t important enough to tell me-” Shuichi’s voice cracked and Hiro almost reached out to hold him, but a fresh crackle of lightning changed his mind. “He said he thought I would figure it out! Figure it out?! I’m a wizard, not a psychic! I mean, I admit, I thought it was odd when I heard that Princess Ayaka had come all the way from her kingdom without giving a reason, but I wouldn’t have thought that! And he told me their fathers arranged it, but that doesn’t excuse the fact that he didn’t even care to-”
“Princess Ayaka?”
Shuichi halted his rant to give Hiro an exasperated look.
“Yes, Princess Ayaka. She’s the one that he’s marrying in two days-”
“Two days?”
“Are you a parrot today, Hiro? What’s wrong with you?”
“N-Nothing.” But that was a lie. In truth, he felt that his heart was being ripped out of his body and stomped on. Then eaten. By a sheep. He cleared his throat and tried to salvage something in what sounded like a hopeless situation for both him and the wizard. “Why-why don’t you just enchant him? Make him refuse the engagement and stay with you forever!”
“No.”
“Why not? If it’s all arranged anyway, I don’t think anyone’s feelings will be hurt or anything, I mean-”
“No! No, no, no!” Shuichi stood tall, glowering at Hiro, electricity sparking around his fingers. “I don’t want it to be like that! I want him to love me on his own or not at all!”
With that, Shuichi flew out of the window and left Hiro, who could then be openly miserable. Not even his lyre cheered him up; he played one single, sour note before abandoning it to wallow in his despair.
The next morning, Hiro saw Prince Eiri return to the fortress, no doubt to try and smooth things over with the angry wizard. He leaned out of his window and called, “He won’t want to see you!” He received a glimpse of those golden eyes as the prince glanced up at him, but was ultimately ignored. That suited Hiro just fine. He hoped Shuichi turned him into a really ugly sheep.
Hours later, the prince reemerged, looking nothing like a wooly creature of the field. As he neared the tower, he sported an irritatingly smug smirk and Hiro desperately wanted to punch him right in the face.
“Just watch your back,” he warned, but Prince Eiri’s smirk merely grew.
“Not necessary,” he replied. “The fool’s crazy about me.”
“I can’t see why,” Hiro growled, wishing Shuichi was there to zap him.
“Can’t you?” Prince Eiri quirked an eyebrow suggestively, fueling Hiro’s passionate dislike for him.
Before he could respond, they both heard the fortress door being opened and Prince Eiri slipped into the shadows of the trees. Shuichi went to stand at the bottom of the tower and called in a cheerful manner, “Hiroshi, Hiroshi, let down your long hair, so that I may climb the auburn stair!”
Hiro did as requested, grudgingly, not looking forward to hearing about how the prince had managed to patch things up between him and his love-blinded friend.
“You forgave him.”
“Well…he apologized.”
“And that’s that? He kept his engagement from you! He was using you! But he says he’s sorry and you can just forgive him like that?”
“Hey, it isn’t his fault that his father arranged a marriage for him!” Shuichi huffed. “He didn’t tell me before because he didn’t want me to reject him…”
“Ha!” Hiro couldn’t help it. He’d never been so angry. He only wanted Shuichi to see what a jerk the prince really was. “You can’t let this guy make a fool of you.”
“No one would dare make a fool of me!” Expression darkening, Shuichi took out a dagger and placed it on a table before Hiro. “Do you know what this is?” When Hiro shook his head, Shuichi explained, “This is a magic dagger. See this blade? It’s extremely sharp and can cut anything. It can only be used once and it will always do the task its holder wants it to do.” As the wizard spoke, his voice took on a dangerous tone, as if his very words were laced in pure venom; Hiro had never heard him use this tone, and it frightened him a little. “Now, I believed my prince this time. But if he ever does me wrong again, I will take this dagger and slit his throat.”
“Uh…oh.” Hiro gulped. “Okay, well, that works.”
Shuichi left the dagger on the table when he flew out of the tower, distracted by the thought of some sheep blood potion he left boiling in a cauldron somewhere. After a few minutes, Hiro heard footsteps from outside and, with a quick peek out the window, he saw that it was Prince Eiri.
“What do you want?” Hiro scowled down at him, receiving another annoying smirk in return. He could see heat banked in those golden eyes, and he was no stranger to what that meant. He’d had that same heat simmering in his own eyes sometimes, when his beloved Ayaka looked particularly appealing. The thought that the prince lusted after him in any form or fashion made Hiro sick to his stomach, and his was quick to make that clear. “Look, I’m not interested, all right? Besides, you couldn’t even get up here. Find someone else to mess around with behind Shuichi’s back. And don’t think he won’t catch you.”
Prince Eiri did not seem fazed, which bothered Hiro a little bit. He wondered just what the other man was up to, but he didn’t have long to wonder.
“Hiroshi, Hiroshi, let down your long hair, so that I may climb the auburn stair.”
Hiro turned from the window, gritting his teeth and trying his best to deny the prince, but-as always-he found that he could not refuse the request. But as he lowered his hair out of the window, the shine of the magic dagger’s blade caught his eye. He grinned a wicked grin and, once he felt that the prince was close to the top, he grabbed the dagger and, squeezing his eyes shut, reached behind himself and cut straight through his long auburn locks.
Prince Eiri fell a long ways-for he had been quite close to the top, indeed-but the fall was not a fatal one; he was saved, for he landed in a bush. It was, however, a thorny bush, and the thorns punctured both of his golden eyes. Blinded and in great pain, the prince made his way to the forest, where he wandered aimlessly for a long time.
Hiro, not only feeling that he had avenged Shuichi’s honor, but also that of his fair, sweet Ayaka, felt quite pleased and was about to compose a happy little song on his lyre. But he never got the chance when a furious Shuichi, who’d been watching since he’d heard the prince’s voice, was quite suddenly in his window, eyes burning with a fiery rage and lightning cackling about his entire body.
“Hiroshi,” he snarled like an angered mother tiger, “what have you done?!”
“I’ve done nothing wrong!” Hiro exclaimed. “I told you that the prince was using you, and now you have proof!”
“The only proof I have is proof that you and my prince have been seeing each other behind my back!”
Hiro balked. Surely Shuichi didn’t truly think such a thing.
“No, I would never do that to you! He, on the other hand, would. You clearly saw that, as he was trying to climb into my window-”
“And why would he do that, had you not tempted him?”
“I? Tempt him? Just saying it makes me ill!”
“Do not lie to me!”
The sky darkened behind the raging wizard and thunder boomed in the distance. His eyes flashed to the dagger, now useless, in Hiro’s hand. If possible, he grew even angrier and his eyes began to glow a vicious red.
“No wonder you didn’t want me to forgive him, you wanted him for yourself! I took you in, raised you, taught you, befriend you! And all this time you two have been together, laughing at me behind my back, thinking you were making a fool of me!”
“No, please, you have it all wrong!”
“Be silent, Hiroshi!” He pointed a single finger at Hiro, the tip of it crackling dangerously. “No one makes a fool out of me!”
Without warning, a single bolt of lightning shot out of his finger and hit Hiro straight in his stomach, knocking him onto the floor. Hiro clutched at his stomach, as it was stretching and swelling quite painfully. Shuichi continued, lifting him up off the floor and casting him out of the tower, onto the dirt below-his lyre followed him as an afterthought. When the pain subsided, Hiro looked up at the wizard floating about him, expecting something far worse.
“I hope you’re all very happy together!”
With that said, he vanished, and a short time later, it began to storm.
Hiro took his lyre and, after much deliberation, went into the forest. He thought of going into town and trying to find a way to Ayaka, but now that he knew she was a princess, he knew that he didn’t stand a real chance with her. He had nowhere to go except the wilderness, where he lived for weeks before realizing that there was something growing inside of him, in the spot that Shuichi’s lightning bolt had struck. The wizard’s last words came back to him: “I hope you’re all very happy together!” He realized, looking down at himself in utter horror, that he was actually with child. With this knowledge, he grew even more frightened and concerned about what to do and where to go. He’d been kicked out of the only home he’d ever known.
He spent his days in the forest playing his lyre, though most of his tunes were melancholy and didn’t do much to make him feel better. But one day, one fateful day, the music of his lyre lured to him quite possibly the last person he wanted to see-Prince Eiri, in all his blind and stumbling glory. He felt the strong urge to be as mean to him as he could possibly be…until he saw the ungraceful and fairly comical way the prince walked straight into a tree. Hiro sighed, cursing his naturally kind heart, and went to help him up. At least with the prince there, he wouldn’t be so terribly lonely.
“Oh, and by the way,” Hiro spoke casually as he, somewhat tenderly, picked thorns and twigs out of the prince’s hair, “I’m having your child.”
“What?”
“Just thought you should know.”
Prince Eiri was silent for a moment, before he frowned in complete confusion.
“But I didn’t even get to your room!”
Months later, Hiro gave birth to a baby girl. She was healthy and beautiful, and the two men had no idea what to do with her. She spent too much time crying and not enough time sleeping, and they were clueless as to how they were supposed to feed her properly. They grew increasingly frustrated and tired and they simply wanted to kill each other. And they missed their pink-haired wizard. They knew what they had to do.
They left the beautiful baby girl on the doorstep of a cute and friendly looking house that was close to Shuichi’s fortress. They knocked on the door of the fortress and when the wizard Shuichi opened it, he found Hiro and Prince Eiri on their hands and knees. He denied them forgiveness, because he was a very stubborn wizard, but he couldn’t deny the love that he still had for both of them. And so he took them both back. After he turned them into sheep.
When Noriko Ukai, now a woman of many years, opened her door that night, however, she found a baby at her feet. She remembered, with great delight, the promise that the wizard Shuichi had made her and her husband years before, and cried many tears of great joy. She and Tetsuya named the girl Saki and raised her as their own daughter, giving them all they love and nurture they’d held inside for so long. They taught her to be very friendly and polite with their neighbor, who gave her as many boxes of strawberry pocky as she wanted. And she enjoyed playing for hours in the wizard’s large backyard, mostly because of the two sheep the wizard owned-one of which was quite friendly and kind, and the other which kept running into the fence. All of them made for a very odd group.
But even so, they all managed to live happily ever after.
Fandom: Gravitation
Pairing: PG-13
Rating: Hiro x Ayaka, Hiro x Eiri, Eiri x Shuichi, Noriko x Tetsuya
Disclaimer: Gravitation and its characters do not belong to me, and neither does the story of Rapunzel.
Once upon a time, in a strange land far away, there lived an old and slightly senile man who had a young and very attractive wife. The old man, named Tetsuya Ukai, was not very popular amongst the people in this far away kingdom; for, when he first moved into the town, he built his house right beside the tall and frightening fortress that belonged to a very wicked and powerful wizard named Shuichi. Any man who would choose to live there, of his free will, was obviously insane. But this did not stop the curious and beautiful Noriko from marrying him. No one knew how it worked. They figured it must’ve been love.
Whatever it was, it worked for several years. During this time, the couple worked very hard to have a baby. Noriko wanted to be a mother very badly. She kept a big calendar in their bedroom, with the days of her “time of the month” circled in red. She wore sexy and scandalous outfits, and often paid trips to the town’s apothecary to buy her husband stimulants (because, remember, he was OLD). For a long time, nothing seemed to work, and they despaired.
But then, FINALLY, as if by magic, Noriko woke up one morning and was pregnant. She and her husband were very happy, and they rejoiced.
But Tetsuya did not rejoice for very long. Noriko experienced many different cravings of the unusual variety. One morning, she wanted beans on her pancakes. Another day, she asked for milk to dip her celery in. And one day, one very fateful day, she demanded a stick of strawberry pocky.
“Strawberry pocky?!” Tetsuya was aghast. Everyone knew that the only strawberry pocky in the kingdom was owned by the wicked and powerful wizard Shuichi. You know, the one whose fortress Tetsuya built his house next to. That one. “Are you sure you don’t want chocolate?”
“No!” She screamed and kicked him. “It must be strawberry!”
And so, because he loved his wife so very much (and because her kicks smarted something awful), Tetsuya valiantly scaled the walls of the fortress and snuck in through the back door, into the wizard’s kitchen. Once there, he opened the cupboards until he found the stash of pocky-a stash which was so plentiful, it tumbled out of the cupboard and onto the floor. Tetsuya quickly dove under the table to hide…but no one came. So, cautiously, he crawled out and picked up a box of pocky which he stuffed in his pocket. He should have left then, but he hated to leave the kitchen in such a mess. It simply wasn’t good manners. Only after he put back every box of strawberry pocky, did he start to leave, however-
“Who dares to steal my pocky?!”
He was too late. He turned to kneel before the evil, mighty, pink-haired wizard, in shame.
“I am sorry, I-” He paused. “You’re a little late, aren’t you?”
“Huh? Oh, yeah. Well, I heard the boxes falling, but I tripped on my way down here-do you know how many stairs this place has? And why they’re always slippery, I’ll never know. I think I bruised myself, too, which really sucks.” Shuichi reached down to rub soothingly at his knees, exposed beneath the shiny yellow shorts he wore.
“Oh yes, I hate to bruise,” Tetsuya nodded empathetically. “I hate especially hate it when you fall and land on your backside, it’s so tender back there.”
“Tell me about it,” Shuichi sighed. Then, clearing his throat, he hardened his gaze and narrowed his eyes at Tetsuya. “Now, intruder, explain yourself before I turn you into a sheep.”
“Well, I-A sheep? Why not a toad? Or a newt?”
“I don’t like toads or newts. I like sheep. They’re cute. Now,” he practically growled, sparks of lightening cackling threateningly from his fingertips, “tell me why you are stealing my pocky!”
“It’s my wife!” He answered quickly, realizing that their lovely conversation was over. “She’s pregnant and she wanted a stick of strawberry pocky. She wouldn’t take chocolate, although personally I prefer it over-”
“FOOL! Strawberry is obviously the better choice!” He huffed, bristling. “Your wife has good taste. But that does not excuse your rudeness. Haven’t you ever heard of asking?”
“May I have a box of pocky for my wife?”
“IT’S TOO LATE NOW!”
Tetsuya cowered, sweat beading on his forehead as he tried to bargain with the wizard.
“Spare me! Let me take this box back to my wife and you can have anything you want! My mustache! My teapot! My stimulants!”
“Do you honestly think I need stimulants?”
“Anything you want! My neckties! My toilet! My-” He swallowed, hard. “My firstborn child!”
“Your firstborn child?”
“All right, all right, it’s yours!”
“No, wait a minute, what would I do with-”
“I promise you can have it if you’ll only let me go!”
“But, I-”
“Please!”
Shuichi frowned. “Well…okay, if you want to get rid of it that badly.”
Tetsuya thanked the wizard profusely and went back to his wife. He told her what happened and she cried, barely able to enjoy her stick of strawberry pocky. He slept on the couch that night.
Months later, Noriko and Tetsuya had forgotten about the foolish (and unnecessary) promise made to Shuichi. One happy day, Noriko gave birth to a baby boy. He was perfect. They named him Hiroshi, or Hiro for short. They spent one wonderful, lovely day with Hiro, until Shuichi appeared in their door. Though filled with remorse, they knew they had to keep to their promise. Shuichi felt bad when they saw how sad they were, but really, it wasn’t his fault. Even so, he encouraged them not to despair, and promised they would have a child again. Spirits raised by the wizard’s words, they went back to their peaceful and odd life together, and eventually they forgot all about Hiro.
That was all well and good, really, because Hiro forgot all about them. In fact, he never even knew them. In fact, he never knew anyone, except Shuichi. The wizard, not really knowing what to do with the boy, kept him locked away inside one of his tallest towers. There was no door to the tower, and the only way in was through a window at the very top. Hiro asked about it when he was old enough, and Shuichi told him he’d simply had a boring day.
For many years, Shuichi was Hiro’s only company. The wizard was, in some way, his captor, but also his teacher and his friend. Hiro asked once if Shuichi wanted to be called “Dad”.
“If you call me that,” Shuichi threatened, “I’ll turn you into a sheep.”
Hiro did not dislike the wizard. In fact, he was fairly fond of him. Granted, he didn’t have much of a choice, but Shuichi didn’t give Hiro any reason to despise him. Although, he did have a tendency to pull nasty tricks on him. By the time Hiro was eighteen years of age, his hair was ridiculously long; Shuichi had never cut it. Shuichi, noticing its astounding length, soon developed a habit of beginning his visits by standing at the bottom of the tower and calling, “Hiroshi, Hiroshi, let down your long hair, so that I may climb the auburn stair!”
Hiro knew that the wizard could easily use his powers and fly up into the window-indeed, that was his previous method of entry-but he could never refuse the request. And so, he obligingly turned his back to window and allowed his long hair to tumble down the tower, where Shuichi would grab hold of the auburn strands and climb up and into the window. The first time Shuichi did it, it hurt a great deal and Hiro considered sulking about it. But he thought better of it when the wizard revealed that he’d brought with him a gift.
Hiro had never received a gift before, as birthdays and holidays were not recognized by the wizard, and his heart swelled with joy when he was presented with a new and extravagantly crafted lyre. He’d heard the faint sounds of lyres being played from a distance before and reckoned that he’d probably mentioned to the wizard how much he liked the music they made. With the aid of books the wizard bought for him, Hiro quickly learned how to master the lyre and spent many hours a day strumming the instrument to various tunes-songs the books taught him, songs he’d perhaps heard when a caravan passed through the town, songs that Shuichi had sung to him when he was younger, and other songs that he simply composed on his own.
While he loved playing for the music alone, he also greatly enjoyed playing for an audience. As Shuichi was his only audience, nothing made him happier than to play for the wizard. At first, Shuichi was only too happy to listen to Hiro play, but as months passed, Shuichi’s visits to Hiro’s tower grew less and less frequent. One day, when about a week had gone by without a visit, Hiro heard the familiar call from below: “Hiroshi, Hiroshi, let down your long hair, so that I may climb the auburn stair!”
Hiro frowned, for he was quite unhappy at being ignored for so long, but, as always, he could not refuse the request and hastened to lower his hair out of the window, for the wizard to climb up and join him.
“It’s been a while, Shuichi,” Hiro said curtly, unable to hide his displeasure and, in fact, not quite wanting to.
“I’m sorry,” the wizard apologized, as he truly was. But he couldn’t help smiling as he said, “Hiro, I am in love.”
“Love?” The word itself was not foreign to Hiro, for it appeared in many of the songs he’d learned. But the wizard had never before spoken of it and Hiro was clueless as to what its meaning was.
Shuichi wasted no time in describing to Hiro the man with which he was so utterly smitten. It was, as it turned out, the kingdom’s own Prince Eiri, a handsome but stoic man with fair hair and golden eyes. Hiro listened, curious and rapt, as Shuichi told him of the fluttering way his heart reacted when the prince was near and the shameless way his skin tingled when the prince touched him.
“He’s been to see me every day this week,” Shuichi explained, feeling only somewhat guilty. “I hope you can give forgive my absence, now that you know.”
And Hiro did forgive him, for what else could he do? If he rejected the wizard’s apology, he might never visit him again and Hiro would be alone for the rest of his life. Or, even worse, he might be turned into a sheep.
Time passed by in this way for quite some time, the wizard paying Hiro a visit only when he could not be with Prince Eiri. Hiro felt lonelier than ever and only the music of his lyre could comfort him. One day, when Hiro was a young man of twenty, a young maiden, who happened to be riding through a nearby forest on her favorite mare, heard the sound of beautiful music and, upon discovering its origin, dismounted at the bottom of the tall tower. Hiro, hearing the sound of the horse’s hooves stop so suddenly and so near, ceased his playing and went to look out of the window. When he saw the maiden below, he was surprised to feel his heart fluttering in the manner befitting only butterflies. He wondered if this was the feeling of love Shuichi had described to him little more than a year ago.
“Hello,” he greeted her, after reassuring himself that the prince had come to the fortress today and Shuichi would not hear his call.
“Hello,” she replied, her sweet voice increasing the fluttering in his chest. “Was that you playing such beautiful music just now?”
“Yes.” He didn’t say anything more, suddenly overcome with a modesty he’d never before experienced.
“May I ask what it is you are called?”
“Uh-” This, Hiro decided, was most certainly love, for no other feeling could possibly cause him to forget his own name. “H-Hiroshi. And you?”
“I am-Ayaka. Do you live in this tower?”
“Yes.”
“Where is the door?”
“There isn’t one.”
She seemed taken aback at that.
“Then, how-how does one get inside?”
“Through this window.”
“If you don’t mind me saying…that is very strange.”
“Is it?”
She laughed then, and Hiro almost fell over from the powerful way his heart thudded in response. She couldn’t stay long, for she had matters to attend to, but she promised to return the next day, if he would play his music for her. He agreed readily, not thinking of the wizard and not caring, for he was in love.
For almost a month, Ayaka came to visit him, each day the same, wonderful routine. He would play music for her and they would trade questions and answers for a bit; she would promise to return the very next day, if he agreed to play for her. It was a happy time for Hiro and he found he didn’t even notice that Shuichi had not visited him once.
But one day, one very fateful day, Ayaka did not come and Shuichi did. Hiro was waiting patiently for his love to come, when he heard the frightening sound of lightning and a rather angry-looking Shuichi came flying in through his window. The lack of the usual request-not to mention the way the wizard was bristling-concerned Hiro greatly and he quickly set aside his lyre and thoughts of Ayaka.
“What is it?” He asked, reaching to take hold of Shuichi’s hands, but then wisely thinking better of it. “What happened?”
“It’s him!” Shuichi bit, spitefully. “Oh, he is a foul thing!”
“Your prince?”
“Oh, ho! My prince, is he?” Shuichi laughed, the sound hollow, and some lightning zapped at the floor near Hiro’s feet. Hiro stepped back, cautiously, when he noticed the wizard’s anger dissolving until he simply looked miserable. Hiro’s heart gave a lurch, for, despite the wizard’s flaws, he still held only fond feelings for him. “No,” Shuichi sniffed. “No, he isn’t mine and he never will be. He’s getting married. He even knew about it days ago and apparently decided it wasn’t important enough to tell me-” Shuichi’s voice cracked and Hiro almost reached out to hold him, but a fresh crackle of lightning changed his mind. “He said he thought I would figure it out! Figure it out?! I’m a wizard, not a psychic! I mean, I admit, I thought it was odd when I heard that Princess Ayaka had come all the way from her kingdom without giving a reason, but I wouldn’t have thought that! And he told me their fathers arranged it, but that doesn’t excuse the fact that he didn’t even care to-”
“Princess Ayaka?”
Shuichi halted his rant to give Hiro an exasperated look.
“Yes, Princess Ayaka. She’s the one that he’s marrying in two days-”
“Two days?”
“Are you a parrot today, Hiro? What’s wrong with you?”
“N-Nothing.” But that was a lie. In truth, he felt that his heart was being ripped out of his body and stomped on. Then eaten. By a sheep. He cleared his throat and tried to salvage something in what sounded like a hopeless situation for both him and the wizard. “Why-why don’t you just enchant him? Make him refuse the engagement and stay with you forever!”
“No.”
“Why not? If it’s all arranged anyway, I don’t think anyone’s feelings will be hurt or anything, I mean-”
“No! No, no, no!” Shuichi stood tall, glowering at Hiro, electricity sparking around his fingers. “I don’t want it to be like that! I want him to love me on his own or not at all!”
With that, Shuichi flew out of the window and left Hiro, who could then be openly miserable. Not even his lyre cheered him up; he played one single, sour note before abandoning it to wallow in his despair.
The next morning, Hiro saw Prince Eiri return to the fortress, no doubt to try and smooth things over with the angry wizard. He leaned out of his window and called, “He won’t want to see you!” He received a glimpse of those golden eyes as the prince glanced up at him, but was ultimately ignored. That suited Hiro just fine. He hoped Shuichi turned him into a really ugly sheep.
Hours later, the prince reemerged, looking nothing like a wooly creature of the field. As he neared the tower, he sported an irritatingly smug smirk and Hiro desperately wanted to punch him right in the face.
“Just watch your back,” he warned, but Prince Eiri’s smirk merely grew.
“Not necessary,” he replied. “The fool’s crazy about me.”
“I can’t see why,” Hiro growled, wishing Shuichi was there to zap him.
“Can’t you?” Prince Eiri quirked an eyebrow suggestively, fueling Hiro’s passionate dislike for him.
Before he could respond, they both heard the fortress door being opened and Prince Eiri slipped into the shadows of the trees. Shuichi went to stand at the bottom of the tower and called in a cheerful manner, “Hiroshi, Hiroshi, let down your long hair, so that I may climb the auburn stair!”
Hiro did as requested, grudgingly, not looking forward to hearing about how the prince had managed to patch things up between him and his love-blinded friend.
“You forgave him.”
“Well…he apologized.”
“And that’s that? He kept his engagement from you! He was using you! But he says he’s sorry and you can just forgive him like that?”
“Hey, it isn’t his fault that his father arranged a marriage for him!” Shuichi huffed. “He didn’t tell me before because he didn’t want me to reject him…”
“Ha!” Hiro couldn’t help it. He’d never been so angry. He only wanted Shuichi to see what a jerk the prince really was. “You can’t let this guy make a fool of you.”
“No one would dare make a fool of me!” Expression darkening, Shuichi took out a dagger and placed it on a table before Hiro. “Do you know what this is?” When Hiro shook his head, Shuichi explained, “This is a magic dagger. See this blade? It’s extremely sharp and can cut anything. It can only be used once and it will always do the task its holder wants it to do.” As the wizard spoke, his voice took on a dangerous tone, as if his very words were laced in pure venom; Hiro had never heard him use this tone, and it frightened him a little. “Now, I believed my prince this time. But if he ever does me wrong again, I will take this dagger and slit his throat.”
“Uh…oh.” Hiro gulped. “Okay, well, that works.”
Shuichi left the dagger on the table when he flew out of the tower, distracted by the thought of some sheep blood potion he left boiling in a cauldron somewhere. After a few minutes, Hiro heard footsteps from outside and, with a quick peek out the window, he saw that it was Prince Eiri.
“What do you want?” Hiro scowled down at him, receiving another annoying smirk in return. He could see heat banked in those golden eyes, and he was no stranger to what that meant. He’d had that same heat simmering in his own eyes sometimes, when his beloved Ayaka looked particularly appealing. The thought that the prince lusted after him in any form or fashion made Hiro sick to his stomach, and his was quick to make that clear. “Look, I’m not interested, all right? Besides, you couldn’t even get up here. Find someone else to mess around with behind Shuichi’s back. And don’t think he won’t catch you.”
Prince Eiri did not seem fazed, which bothered Hiro a little bit. He wondered just what the other man was up to, but he didn’t have long to wonder.
“Hiroshi, Hiroshi, let down your long hair, so that I may climb the auburn stair.”
Hiro turned from the window, gritting his teeth and trying his best to deny the prince, but-as always-he found that he could not refuse the request. But as he lowered his hair out of the window, the shine of the magic dagger’s blade caught his eye. He grinned a wicked grin and, once he felt that the prince was close to the top, he grabbed the dagger and, squeezing his eyes shut, reached behind himself and cut straight through his long auburn locks.
Prince Eiri fell a long ways-for he had been quite close to the top, indeed-but the fall was not a fatal one; he was saved, for he landed in a bush. It was, however, a thorny bush, and the thorns punctured both of his golden eyes. Blinded and in great pain, the prince made his way to the forest, where he wandered aimlessly for a long time.
Hiro, not only feeling that he had avenged Shuichi’s honor, but also that of his fair, sweet Ayaka, felt quite pleased and was about to compose a happy little song on his lyre. But he never got the chance when a furious Shuichi, who’d been watching since he’d heard the prince’s voice, was quite suddenly in his window, eyes burning with a fiery rage and lightning cackling about his entire body.
“Hiroshi,” he snarled like an angered mother tiger, “what have you done?!”
“I’ve done nothing wrong!” Hiro exclaimed. “I told you that the prince was using you, and now you have proof!”
“The only proof I have is proof that you and my prince have been seeing each other behind my back!”
Hiro balked. Surely Shuichi didn’t truly think such a thing.
“No, I would never do that to you! He, on the other hand, would. You clearly saw that, as he was trying to climb into my window-”
“And why would he do that, had you not tempted him?”
“I? Tempt him? Just saying it makes me ill!”
“Do not lie to me!”
The sky darkened behind the raging wizard and thunder boomed in the distance. His eyes flashed to the dagger, now useless, in Hiro’s hand. If possible, he grew even angrier and his eyes began to glow a vicious red.
“No wonder you didn’t want me to forgive him, you wanted him for yourself! I took you in, raised you, taught you, befriend you! And all this time you two have been together, laughing at me behind my back, thinking you were making a fool of me!”
“No, please, you have it all wrong!”
“Be silent, Hiroshi!” He pointed a single finger at Hiro, the tip of it crackling dangerously. “No one makes a fool out of me!”
Without warning, a single bolt of lightning shot out of his finger and hit Hiro straight in his stomach, knocking him onto the floor. Hiro clutched at his stomach, as it was stretching and swelling quite painfully. Shuichi continued, lifting him up off the floor and casting him out of the tower, onto the dirt below-his lyre followed him as an afterthought. When the pain subsided, Hiro looked up at the wizard floating about him, expecting something far worse.
“I hope you’re all very happy together!”
With that said, he vanished, and a short time later, it began to storm.
Hiro took his lyre and, after much deliberation, went into the forest. He thought of going into town and trying to find a way to Ayaka, but now that he knew she was a princess, he knew that he didn’t stand a real chance with her. He had nowhere to go except the wilderness, where he lived for weeks before realizing that there was something growing inside of him, in the spot that Shuichi’s lightning bolt had struck. The wizard’s last words came back to him: “I hope you’re all very happy together!” He realized, looking down at himself in utter horror, that he was actually with child. With this knowledge, he grew even more frightened and concerned about what to do and where to go. He’d been kicked out of the only home he’d ever known.
He spent his days in the forest playing his lyre, though most of his tunes were melancholy and didn’t do much to make him feel better. But one day, one fateful day, the music of his lyre lured to him quite possibly the last person he wanted to see-Prince Eiri, in all his blind and stumbling glory. He felt the strong urge to be as mean to him as he could possibly be…until he saw the ungraceful and fairly comical way the prince walked straight into a tree. Hiro sighed, cursing his naturally kind heart, and went to help him up. At least with the prince there, he wouldn’t be so terribly lonely.
“Oh, and by the way,” Hiro spoke casually as he, somewhat tenderly, picked thorns and twigs out of the prince’s hair, “I’m having your child.”
“What?”
“Just thought you should know.”
Prince Eiri was silent for a moment, before he frowned in complete confusion.
“But I didn’t even get to your room!”
Months later, Hiro gave birth to a baby girl. She was healthy and beautiful, and the two men had no idea what to do with her. She spent too much time crying and not enough time sleeping, and they were clueless as to how they were supposed to feed her properly. They grew increasingly frustrated and tired and they simply wanted to kill each other. And they missed their pink-haired wizard. They knew what they had to do.
They left the beautiful baby girl on the doorstep of a cute and friendly looking house that was close to Shuichi’s fortress. They knocked on the door of the fortress and when the wizard Shuichi opened it, he found Hiro and Prince Eiri on their hands and knees. He denied them forgiveness, because he was a very stubborn wizard, but he couldn’t deny the love that he still had for both of them. And so he took them both back. After he turned them into sheep.
When Noriko Ukai, now a woman of many years, opened her door that night, however, she found a baby at her feet. She remembered, with great delight, the promise that the wizard Shuichi had made her and her husband years before, and cried many tears of great joy. She and Tetsuya named the girl Saki and raised her as their own daughter, giving them all they love and nurture they’d held inside for so long. They taught her to be very friendly and polite with their neighbor, who gave her as many boxes of strawberry pocky as she wanted. And she enjoyed playing for hours in the wizard’s large backyard, mostly because of the two sheep the wizard owned-one of which was quite friendly and kind, and the other which kept running into the fence. All of them made for a very odd group.
But even so, they all managed to live happily ever after.