The old Tasuku would have composed a long poem on the subject of lost happiness. Yes, they were both changed forever.

“You don’t ask why I have renounced the world?”

“No, Tasuku. Forgive me. Genshin. It makes me sad, but I understand.”

The burning eyes sought his. “How so?”

Instead of answering, Akitada took the blue flower fragment from his sash and passed it to his friend.

He heard the in-drawn breath and saw the slender fingers close around the flower.

“Forgive me,” said Akitada, “for causing you pain.”

“I have been making progress in my discipline. Soon, I hope, matters of this world will no longer touch me. I have asked to see you to bid you farewell. And to lay to rest all that troubles me still. I heard you were the one to bring her murderer back.”

Akitada’s stomach lurched a little as he remembered the president’s warning. “I don’t want to add to your distress,” he said evasively.

The pale monk smiled. The sweetness of that smile recalled the old Tasuku. “Only in forgetting is there freedom from pain,” he said. “And only the truth can help me forget.”

Akitada acquiesced. “You and the Lady Asagao were lovers?”

The other man nodded. “I have no excuses for what I did, but Asagao and I grew up together. Our parents were neighbors. I loved her then, but she was sent to serve the new empress. From time to time I used to visit her, bringing her letters from her family. I knew she was unhappy. One day she told me that the emperor had honored her with his ... attention.” He closed his eyes.

After a moment, he took a deep breath and continued. “I was filled with jealousy and turned my anger against her. Poor girl. How could she have helped herself?” His burning eyes sought Akitada’s. “I seduced her, Akitada. We met secretly in the summer pavilion of an old villa in a deserted part of the city. She would take a palanquin from the palace to the house of her former nurse, and I would meet her there to take her to our secret retreat.” He sighed deeply and looked out over the snowy garden shimmering in the moonlight. Akitada waited.

“I was not worthy of her.” His anguish sounded strange coming from the lips of this pale monk. “The risk she took was enormous, her gift of love to me. She imperiled her reputation and her family’s future to be with me, but I was not satisfied. I wanted her for myself. I demanded she prove her love for me again and again, while I strutted like a peacock in the knowledge that the emperor’s favorite preferred me. But it was not enough.” His voice broke.

Akitada shivered. The winter cold seeped through the thick planks of the veranda. He wished they could move inside or that at least he had his quilted outer robe. Strangely, his companion seemed untouched by the frigid air, though his clothing was pitifully thin.

“That final night I demanded one more proof. I insisted she stay with me through the next day and night. I knew it would mean discovery. She wept on her knees. She swore that she cared nothing for her own life, but she could not hurt His Majesty, who had shown her nothing but kindness. I was adamant, but she remained firm. When she left, she asked for my escort. I refused.”

There was a long silence. Akitada reached out and put his hand on the sleeve of his friends rough robe. The arm beneath the poor fabric felt thin. “I am sorry,” he said softly. “It must have been terrible. That night of our farewell party . . . you carried her fan, didn’t you?”

The shaven head was bowed and nodded slightly. “She forgot it. It was all I had of her, for I never saw her again. Weeks passed. I assumed she had returned to the palace. Then I heard the first rumor that she had disappeared. I was beside myself with uncertainty, not knowing what had happened to her. That was the state of my mind the night you saw me.”

“How can you bear to hear what happened?”

The monk raised his face. “I watched her murderer die.”

“What?”

“The man died horribly. His was the death I should have died. I was the one who had offended. I was the one who put temptation in his way. But I was spared. Spared in spite of the fact that they knew. Spared because I had become a monk.” He paused to look up at the starry sky. “But not spared all. The emperor’s personal secretary paid me a visit in the monastery. He informed me that the murderer of Lady Asagao had been sentenced and that he had requested a priest prior to his execution. I was to be that priest.”

Akitada said, “Tasuku, I did not tell them about you.”

His friend smiled. “I know, but they found out. I think she kept some poems of mine. And the man whose summerhouse I rented for our meetings identified me. In any case, I refused the killer’s request, claiming my lack of experience, but I was told that the condemned man had insisted on me by name. That was when I realized they knew. The emperor’s secretary told me when and where Asagao had died and then left me to the agony of my guilt.”

“It was cruel.”

“Cruel? No. I told you I watched the poor wretch die. It took a very long time. No one touched me.”

Akitada said angrily, “They may not have touched you, but it was a terrible vengeance nevertheless. And don’t waste your sympathy on that animal. He killed two poor women after using and abusing them and might have continued his bloody career if I had not guessed that he had murdered Lady Asagao.”

“You guessed?” The luminous eyes probed Akitada’s.

“Perhaps the Lady Asagao had a hand in it.” Akitada shivered again. “The blue flower fragment came into my possession in Kazusa.”

His friend opened his hand and looked at the tiny ornament in his palm. “It was part of her hair ornament. A gift from the emperor.”

“Her murderer gave it to the woman he later killed. She sold it to a peddler, who sold it to me. At the same time, a strange ghost story was traveling around the city, a story of a demon with a flaming face who killed a noble lady in an abandoned temple in the capital. He robbed her of her jewelry, then slashed her throat and threw her down a well.”

Tasuku shuddered.

“Somehow the mystery of her disappearance and the flower fragment became fused in my feverish dreams with the strange ghost story. Later, I noticed similarities between the ghost story and a local murder. I reported my suspicions to the emperor and brought the prisoner back with me. But at no time did I think they would involve you. I am sorry.” Akitada searched his friend’s face anxiously for some reassurance.

To his relief, the other had regained his calm and smiled his sweet smile again. He said, “Thank you, my dear Akitada.” Tucking his hands into his sleeves and looking up at the moon, he murmured, “Like snowflakes melting in the moonlight, like the call of the owl fading at dawn, so ends this dream we live.” Then, with a sigh, he rose, bowed to Akitada, and slipped soundlessly from the veranda.