Blood Legacy

Will’s ribs screamed as he hacked up seawater, trying to lift his head. Salt-crusted lashes tore as he pried his eyes open – not sand. Pebbles. Sharp black stones biting into his cheek like teeth. Above him, voices sharp as shattered glass. Definitely Japanese.

He groaned. He should have been half way home by now. Instead, here he was, back in Japan again. Only this time, without a ship.

He vomited seawater again, the convulsion shredding his gut. Shadows pooled around him: straw sandals, indigo-dyed hems, the glint of spear points. A booted foot prodded his shoulder, hard. Agony detonated down his spine.

“Gaijin,” someone muttered. Disgust thick as tar.

Will’s vision swam. Tall pines speared a bruised sky. Mountains hunched like sleeping giants inland. No Dutch East India Company flags. No anything familiar. Just jagged coastline and these lean, hard-faced men smelling of fish and iron.

He tried to snarl. What came out was a wet rattle.

A hand fisted in his soaked hair, wrenching his head back. Cold steel kissed his throat. The man holding him barked orders. Will caught one word – “Emperor.”

Takashi. The name slithered through his fading consciousness. Kenshin’s drunken tales around the campfire. A spider sitting on a poisoned web.

Darkness surged.

Consciousness returned in fragments. The jolting agony of being carried on a pole like butchered meat. Rough hands stripping his sodden clothes. Stone floors. Cold. Slick with something foul.

He woke fully in choking blackness. Dank earth and old blood clogged his throat. Chains bit his wrists and ankles. Raw iron. Heavy. He was naked. Bruises flowered across his chest.

He took a deep, rattling breath, pain flared in his chest, but no broken ribs. He briefly catalogued the rest of his body for injuries, looking for anything that may become a problem, especially if he intended to escape whatever hell hole he’d managed to wash up on.

Everything fucking hurt, but thankfully nothing that shouldn’t heal fast at least.

Light stabbed his eyes. A wooden slot snapped open in a thick door. A single oil lamp’s glow framed a face – deeply lined, the left side melted into shiny pink ruin. One eye, dark and assessing, studied him.

Will bared his teeth. Why do I always get the pretty ones? He groaned internally.

“You here—” He choked on his words, spitting out more salt and blood. “—to suck my cock?” He wheezed, ending on a hacking cough.

The ruined mouth didn’t move. The eye flickered – not cruel. Appraising. The slot slammed shut.

Silence.

Hours crawled by. Wills chest finally clearing of residual sea water.

He cataloged his cage: six paces long, four wide. Stone walls sweating slime. A bucket brimming with waste in the corner. No windows. Only the stench of despair and his own rising fury.

The door groaned open. Not the ruined face.

Two guards entered. Nervous energy radiating from both of them as they actively avoided looking at him, like his lack of clothing was somehow embarrassing for them.

They carried a shallow wooden tub, dumped it sloshing at his feet. Water. Grey and scummy. A rough hemp towel followed.

“Wash,”

The water smelled nearly as bad as the waste buckets his crew emptied over the side of his ship. Will stared at it, then at the guards’ averted eyes. Their discomfort was a pinprick of light in the suffocating dark.

“Wash,” repeated the guard on the left, voice tight.

Will’s chains clanked as he shifted. “Bit difficult without hands, neko.” The Dutch-accented Japanese rasped like gravel. “Unless you fancy scrubbing me?”

The younger guard flushed crimson. The other hissed, “Silence, beast!”

Will grinned, a slash of white in the gloom. “Beasts don’t wash. But if you insist…” With deliberate slowness, he hooked a foot under the tub’s edge and flipped it. Grey water sloshed over the guards’ straw sandals. They stumbled back, cursing.

“Filthy gaijin!”

“Now we match,” Will coughed out, gesturing at his own filth-streaked body with a rattle of chains.

The door crashed open again. A third figure stood silhouetted—broad, face shrouded in shadow. The guards froze, spines snapping straight.

Takashi?

Then he heard the guards greet the man, calling him ”Okawa-san,” with stiff bows.

Will squinted. Not Takashi then.

This Okawa moved with the heavy grace of a warhorse, his haori bearing the imperial crest.

The guards fled.

Okawa stepped into the lamplight. Will’s eyes widened fractionally before narrowing again.

It was the same ruined face he had caught a glimpse of earlier. Scars devoured the left side of his face—a melted landscape of pink and white flesh where his eye should have been. The right eye, dark and depthless as a well, fixed on him.

Despite only reaching Wills shoulder and carrying no obvious weapons, he carried himself with quiet assurance, a far cry from the tense energy of the previous two guards.

Will bared his teeth again. “Come to finish the job, oni? Or just admire the view?”

Okawa didn’t react. He picked up the overturned tub with scarred hands, refilling it silently from a series of leather canteens attached to his belt. Fresh water, clear and cold. He placed it before Will, then tossed the hemp towel beside it. His gaze lingered on Will’s wrists—raw flesh weeping beneath the iron cuffs.

Wash, Okawa signalled, his fingers moving with stiff precision.

Will blinked. Mute? The realization clicked like a lock turning. He’d seen men like this before—his own Quartermaster, Devon, had been a mute. Best Quartermaster he ever had too. He was a hard worker, experienced, observant as fuck. Nothing got by the man. It was Devon that had taught Will how to read sign language.

Will’s eyes narrowed as he took a moment to assess Okawa properly. “Unless you’re actually planning to suck my cock, why the sudden need to wash? ” Will asked, low and raw.

Silence. The man just stood there, his good eye seeming to assess Will for a moment. Eventually Okawa unhooked a small iron key from his belt.

Handy belt, Will noted dryly.

Bypassing the tub, he reached for Will’s manacled wrists instead. The touch was firm but not intentionally cruel, his calloused fingers avoiding the raw, weeping flesh encircled by iron.

The key slid into the lock. A click. Then the other wrist, leaving only his ankles chained.

“What game is this?” Will rasped, flexing his freed hands. Blood rushed back into his fingers, stinging like fire ants.

Okawa ignored him once again. He dipped the hemp towel into the fresh water, wrung it out with deliberate care, and offered it. His ruined face remained impassive, but his single dark eye held a message. Not pity. A sort of pragmatic understanding, perhaps?

Will snatched the towel. The water was shockingly cold against his salt-crusted skin. He scrubbed at the grime on his chest, watching Okawa the whole time.

The mute bodyguard’s gaze drifted to the bucket of waste in the corner, then back to Will. An infinitesimal tightening around his good eye hinted at disapproval.

Interesting, Will noted as he kept scrubbing, the cold water biting into salt-crusted scrapes. Every movement sent dull throbs through his bruised ribs.

He watched Okawa’s scarred hands, the way they lingered near the discarded manacles.

Okawa crouched by the waste bucket, nostrils flaring slightly at the stench, then he lifted it, taking care not to spill the rancid contents, and carried it outside. Will heard the scrape of stone, then silence.

When he returned, he bore a folded stack of coarse indigo fabric and dropped it beside the damp towel. Then, without another glance, he turned and left. The heavy door groaned shut, plunging Will back into near-darkness. Only the faintest line of torchlight bled beneath the door.

Will stared at the clothes. Relief flared briefly before reality crashed back down. He was twice the size of the men in this country.

His mind suddenly conjured up an image of Kenshin... ok, maybe not all the men, he conceeded. Still, fat chance they’d fit him.

He dragged the rough trousers on, teeth gritting as the fabric of the too-small pants rubbed against his scraped, bruised skin. The tunic, smelling of lye and mildew, barely stretched over his shoulders and didn’t come with a belt, leaving him no choice but to let it hang open.

Better than nothing.

He paced the confines again—six strides, turn. Four strides, turn. Chains clinked at his ankles. His mind raced.

What would the Emperor want with him?

He knew Japs weren’t fond of foreigners sticking around too long, but it wasn’t like they’d banned foreign trade either. So unless getting shipwrecked was a crime, Will was pretty sure he hadn’t broken any laws.

Hours bled into one another. The cell’s chill seeped into his bones. He leaned against the slimy wall, drifting into a half-sleep haunted by storm waves and snapping masts.

The door crashed open.

Light flooded the cell, blinding him. He braced against the slimy wall, chains scraping stone as he squinted through the glare.

Two silhouettes materialized in the doorway. The first silhouette was so impossibly small and slight, he might have believed it was a child, if weren’t for the layers of expensive looking fabric running over a distinctly feminine shape. The other was towering in comparison, armed with a blade-hilt jutting over one shoulder.

Her scent hit him first: Sweet and floral. He knew fuck all about flowers, but maybe some kind of blossom? Beneath that was a hint of something darker, almost spicy.

The brute entered the room first, his armour and weapons clanking with every step. As he approached, Will’s nose was suddenly assaulted with the far less pleasant and all too familiar scent of male sweat, blood and iron.

Finally, the woman also stepped forward, her footsteps, in stark contrast to his, were utterly silent on the wet stone.

The moment the dim light landed on her face, Will’s breath actually stalled.

Where do they make these women? A doll factory?

Delicate wasn’t quite the right word. Despite the flawless perfection of her skin, she didn’t look one bit softer then carved ice. Hell, her skin was so pale it was practically translucent, adding to her whole ‘ice statue’ persona.

She was both sharp and soft. Hard and fragile.

Beneath the porcelain skin was an elegant, fine bone structure. His gaze traveled lower. Her body flared in impossible contradictions: hips swelling against heavy brocade, breasts straining the silk of her kimono like overripe fruit denied sunlight.

Her face, heart-shaped and unnervingly blank, tilted as she studied him. Wide-set, almost feline eyes drank in his shackled ankles, traveling up, past the ridged plains of his abdomen, exposed in the undersized prison garb, before finally landing on his face.

Behind her, the armored guard shifted, a mountain of lacquered plates and scarred knuckles. Will knew his type: the Emperor’s favored blade-carrier.

With deep rumble, the guard announced her like they were at some formal procession, rather than standing in a dank cell. “Her Imperial Highness, Princess Tatsuko.”

The fucking Imperial Princess?

Will wasn’t surprised at her identity, she looked every bit the Imperial Princess. It was more that she was here, visiting some foreigner in a dank cell.

Tatsuko lifted a hand. Not a gesture of command, but idle curiosity. Her fingers, tipped in gold-leafed nails, traced the air toward Will’s exposed chest.

“So,” she murmured. Her voice was high, girlish, but scraped raw at the edges. Like glass dragged over slate. “This is Father’s gift.”

Gift? Will’s eyes narrowed at the word. He was beginning to understand why he was here, and he didn’t like it one bit.

She stepped closer. Her feminine scent thickened, sufficating him. Will didn’t move. His chained ankles held him fast, but his gaze locked onto hers, blue ice against black glass.

“You stink of the sea and foreign sweat,” she observed, nose wrinkling. Yet her eyes lingered on the breadth of his shoulders. “Like something… dragged from the deep.”

Her guard chuckled, a sound like stones tumbling in a barrel. “Shall I make him kneel, Princess?”

Tatsuko ignored him. Her gold-tipped finger hovered inches from Will’s sternum. “They say your people are giants. Brutes.” Her other hand drifted to her own waist, slender as a willow switch. “But you look… breakable.”

Will’s smile sliced through the silence. “Funny. Was just thinking the same about you, little spider.”

Her expression didn’t flicker, but her finger snapped forward, pointing like a dagger at his throat. “Kato.”

The blow came low and brutal. Kato’s armored fist slammed into Will’s gut. Agony exploded through his bruised ribs. He doubled over, retching onto the wet stone.

Tatsuko watched, head tilted. Her silk slipper tapped impatiently.

“You speak our tongue,” she noted, as if commenting on the weather. “But your manners are uncivilized.”

She leaned forward suddenly, her face level with his heaving shoulders. Her whisper feathered against his ear, cold as winter breath:

“You’re mine to play with. To... practice on.” Her gold nail traced the rim of his ear. “I know he’s testing me. Forever trying to make me stronger. Let’s not disappoint him, shall we?”

Her gaze drifted over his straining back muscles as he stood back up to his full height, intentionally holding her gaze while be towered over her once more. Kato’s armored fist lifted in a warning. Tatsuko’s gold-tipped nail traced the air in front of him in a phantom touch that ran from his groin, up to his chest.

“Father called you a gift,” she murmured, her breath chilling his sweat-dampened skin. “But gifts require unwrapping.”

She straightened abruptly, silk whispering like snakeskin against stone. Her obsidian eyes swept the cell, noting the overturned tub, the discarded manacles, the indigo prison garb stretched taut over Will’s shoulders. A flicker of something cold and assessing passed behind her blank mask. Her gaze snagged on the damp hemp towel crumpled near Will’s chains.

“Okawa-san’s mercy?” Her girlish voice scraped the words raw. She nudged the towel with her silk-sheathed toe. “How... inefficient.”

Kato shifted his weight, lacquered plates creaking. “Shall I chain his hands again, Princess?”

Tatsuko didn’t look at him. Her attention remained locked on Will, Blood and seawater stung his split lip. He held her stare, ice-blue defiance clashing against bottomless black.

“Leave us,” Tatsuko commanded softly.

Kato stiffened. “Princess, the gaijin is dangerous—”

“He is shackled,” Tatsuko interrupted, her voice slicing through the guard’s protest like a honed blade. “Your presence bores me. Wait outside.”

Kato’s jaw clenched, knuckles whitening on his sword hilt, but he bowed stiffly and retreated. The heavy door thudded shut, plunging them back into torch-lit gloom.

Silence pooled thickly between them, Will was quite content just looking her over. He certainly wasn’t in any rush to resume their riviting conversation. In all honesty, he could tell there was something not right with her. Upstairs. But it didn’t mean he couldn’t enjoy the view.

Tatsuko, seemingly unbothered or unaware of the threat he posed, stepped even closer, her layered silks brushing Will’s bare knees. He utterly dwarfed her in every way, yet her stillness felt unnervingly dominant. A spider contemplating a pinned fly.

“He taught me that strength doesn’t lie in just breaking things—” she murmured, almost to herself. Her gold-tipped fingers hovered inches from a livid bruise blooming across his ribs. She tilted her head, obsidian eyes lifting to his. “—But in knowing precisely how to break them.”

Will spat blood onto the stone floor near her silk slipper.

She stepped even closer, invading his space. Her gaze slid down his body, lingering on the strained seams of the prison tunic, the exposed planes of his abdomen, the heavy iron clamped around his ankles. Her breath hitched, almost imperceptibly before her hand drifted toward his waistband.

Will’s muscles coiled. “Touch me,” he growled, low and dangerous, “and I’ll snap that pretty neck before your pet hears you squeal.”

Tatsuko froze, her face alight with a look of fascination rather than fear. Her black eyes dilated, drinking in the raw promise of violence. A flicker of something hungry crossed her porcelain mask. “Yes,” she whispered, rapt. “That’s it. Show me.”

She snapped her fingers.

The door groaned open. Kato stood ready, hand on his sword hilt. Behind him, shoved forward with bruising force, stumbled a young woman. Barefoot, draped in a thin, short tunic that did little to conceal her trembling form. Her dark hair hung around a face bruised purple along one cheekbone. Wide, terrified eyes darted from Tatsuko to Will’s shackled form.

“Lian” Tatsuko announced, voice flat. “one of father’s... trainees.”

Will’s gaze locked onto the newcomer. Another pawn. She wasn’t as petite as Tatsuko, nor as curvey. She was average height for a Japanese woman and willowy. She looked young. even younger than the princess.

Whatever this was, he knew he wasn’t going to like it.

Her eyes, wide with animal terror, darted from Tatsuko to Will and back again. She clutched her tunics frayed edges, knuckles bone-white. Her wrists bore rope burns. Fresh ones. He’d seen that hollow-eyed terror before, in ports where flesh was traded like spices.

Tatsuko circled them both, a predator assessing prey. “She displeased him,” she continued idly. “Too weak. Too… weepy.” Her gold-tipped nail lifted lian’s chin. The girl flinched, a whimper escaping her split lip. “But waste not.” Tatsuko’s gaze slid back to Will, cold and bright. “Consider her practice.”

Will’s blood turned to ice. “Practice?”

Tatsuko smiled, a thin, brittle curve. “For you. To prove you can perform, and that you understand obedience.” She nodded at Kato. “Hold her.”

Kato seized the terrified girls arms, wrenching them behind her back. His hand poised to rip her tunic from her trembling body as she cried out, struggling futilely against his armored bulk.

“Don’t!” Will snarled, chains clanking as he strained

She lifted her hand, indicating for Kato to wait. “You were born with a weapon between your legs. Show me you know how to use it. Otherwise, Kato will demonstrate on her instead... using both his weapons.” The vile threat she uttered caused Wills lips to twist into a sneer of disgust.

“Your one sick little bitch” be spat. Rage, disgust and something else he couldn’t name, taking over and shattering his mask of cool defiance. “Sounds like daddy’s little monster is just bored and lonely,” he mocked.

Her eyes flashed at him momentarily, giving away more then she realized. “Such strength,” she breathed, her wide black eyes drinking in the taut lines of his body. “But strength is useless without direction.”

Her fingers trailed lower, skimming the waistband of his ill-fitting prison trousers. Will didn’t flinch, but his jaw tightened. The chains at his ankles held him fast.

Tatsuko smiled. It didn’t reach her eyes. “Seems you would rather watch then?” Her voice rising in feigned innocence, a subtle edge of frustration bleeding into her icy facade. “Kato?” She uttered.

Smiling with sick anticipation, Kato drew his blade, then with a practiced flick of his wrist, he spun the sword around, reversing it in his grip so that the pointed tip was now aimed towards the hidden apex of the girls thighs.

Tatsuko’s eyes stayed locked on Wills, watching for weakness. The poor girl's frightened whimpers suddenly became desperate, panicked sobs, her struggling intensifying as she fought to arch herself away from the blades destination. Kato bit down on her neck as he hooked the edge of her short tunic and lifted the material out of the way, exposing her naked core.

“ENOUGH!” Will bellowed, rapidly breathing through his nose, his face red with pent up rage.

“You want to know how I perform, witch? Want to watch me fuck her?” He snarled. “Why don’t you come closer, and I’ll fucking show you instead.”