Wrong. Everything was wrong, but Sanemi didn’t know how to stop it. Sharing a rut had never been part of his plans. He wanted to be there for Tomioka—to be responsible, reliable, the support his mate needed—but he didn’t want anything in return. Or so he told himself. If he were honest, perhaps he did want something: to be left alone during the chaos of his own rut.
Granted, a dry rut was a hellish experience. Sanemi had never felt worse than during those times he had to isolate himself, enduring the physical and psychological torment of suppressing his nature. Even so, he preferred that pain over the alternative: the fear that he might hurt his mate for the sake of fleeting pleasure.
This had to be a nightmare. The road to the Wind Estate felt unbearably long, every moment stretching as worry twisted in his gut. The thought of encountering an entire village of alphas, all drawn to Tomioka’s irresistible scent, had Sanemi on edge. He was ready to defend his mate if it came to that—but he wasn’t ready for the prospect of losing control completely, of succumbing to his instincts and taking Tomioka in the middle of nowhere. The thought alone left a bitter taste in his mouth.
Yet, it didn’t take long for their carefully constructed walls to crumble. As soon as the door to the Wind Estate closed behind them, their restraint gave way to raw need. Sanemi’s hands tangled in Tomioka’s long hair, pulling him close with a desperation that felt primal and unstoppable. Tomioka responded in kind, their mouths crashing together in an unspoken promise. Every movement—a clash of lips, a meeting of tongues—spoke of yearning, surrender, and the push and pull of giving and taking, all at once.
He woke three days later, his rut finally over, and control of his body painstakingly restored. Sanemi blinked groggily against the dim light seeping through the room, his senses dulled but gradually sharpening as reality pulled him from the haze. Every muscle in his body ached, a deep soreness that was not entirely unknown to him and came from overexertion. His throat was raw, likely from growling and snarling, and a faint metallic taste lingered on his tongue—his own blood or Tomioka’s, he wasn’t sure.
The air around him was thick, saturated with the mingling of their scents. Tomioka’s omega fragrance, once completely non-existent, now clung heavily to the room, layered with something deeper—sharper. The primal undertones of their shared experience lingered, wrapping around Sanemi like a smothering blanket. He had never lost control so completely before—not like this. He had never blacked out for the entirety of his rut, and he had certainly never dared to share it with an omega either. Maybe that’s what made this time different.
The sheets beneath him were damp with sweat, crumpled and tangled from restless movement. His fingers brushed against fabric that was torn in places, a testament to the frenzy he could barely recall. He exhaled slowly, his breath shaky, as his resolve hardened: whatever had happened here, it would never happen again.
Pushing himself up, Sanemi winced. His joints protested, stiff from the constant strain, and his skin prickled with an uncomfortable stickiness. His eyes flickered to the side, and his breath caught for a moment.
Tomioka lay beside him, his dark hair splayed across the pillow in an unruly cascade, strands sticking to the sweat-dampened skin of his neck. His normally pale complexion was marred by dark, sprawling bruises that bloomed across his shoulders and disappeared, hidden by the bed covers. The bite at the back of his neck stood out the most—raw and swollen, the wound had reopened during the chaos, and blood had trickled down in uneven, drying streaks, leaving behind a dark, sticky sheen.
Sanemi’s stomach twisted at the sight. The scent of dried blood mixed with Tomioka’s omega fragrance, creating a heady, disorienting blend that seemed to wrap around him, guilt-inducing. He reached out instinctively, his fingers hovering just above Tomioka’s bruised shoulder, but he stopped himself.
The room was oppressively quiet, save for the sound of Tomioka’s steady, even breaths. It was a small mercy—proof that, despite the chaos, he was alive, breathing, and at rest. Yet guilt gnawed at Sanemi’s chest, sharp and unyielding.
He stood, his legs unsteady as if they were reluctant to carry him away from the scene. His bare feet met the cool wood of the floor, a jarring contrast to the oppressive heat still clinging to his body. Sanemi’s hands clenched into fists at his sides as he made his way out of the room, every step a reminder of the promise he had just made to himself.
His mind raced as he thought of his next task. He needed to find food—something substantial enough to replenish the energy they’d both lost. But even that simple act felt like a daunting penance.
He retrieved the softest cloth he could find and a basin of warm water. The quiet task steadied his hands, though his heart remained a chaotic drumbeat in his chest. Sanemi would clean up his mess; he would tend to Tomioka’s wounds. It was the very least he could do.
He began at Tomioka’s neck, the cloth damp against his swollen, bloodied scent gland. Sanemi worked carefully, his movements slow and deliberate, wary of causing further pain. The warm water turned pink as it absorbed the dried blood, and the faint scent of iron mingled with the lingering traces of sweat. He tried to ignore the way Tomioka’s skin twitched under his touch, as though even unconscious, his body remembered the violence of the past days.
With a determined breath, Sanemi moved downward, tracing the angry bruises scattered across Tomioka’s pale back. His hand trembled as he cooled the mottled skin with the damp cloth, the sight of each mark carving fresh waves of guilt into his soul. The silence in the room was deafening, broken only by the soft drag of the cloth against skin and the occasional hitch of Sanemi’s own breath.
Like father, like son, the saying went. Sanemi hated that saying. He hated the way it echoed in his head, each word a dagger twisting in his chest. He hated the way it felt so damning, so inescapably true.
He clenched his jaw against the thought, but it surged forward anyway. He hated feeling like his father. Hated being like his father. Alphas, he thought bitterly, did nothing but cause harm, their strength a cruel curse disguised as a gift. And omegas? Too innocent, too trusting to see the truth for what it was.
He had accepted being mated to Tomioka because he believed—hoped—that he could be better. That he could be more. But the past three days had shattered that illusion. There was no beating nature. He was a monster, just as his father had been. He would do nothing but destroy the people he cared about.
Sanemi’s hand stilled for a moment, the cloth hovering above a particularly dark bruise near Tomioka’s ribs. He swallowed hard, his throat tight. He should have stayed away. He knew that now.
He resumed his task with renewed determination, though the self-loathing churned in his chest like a storm. The gentle care he was giving Tomioka now—this deliberate, reverent attention—was meaningless. It should have come three days ago, before his body had acted on primal instincts, before he had left Tomioka battered and broken. This was nothing more than a desperate attempt to patch what could never truly be mended.
Tomioka’s eyes watched him quietly, their gaze steady but unreadable. Sanemi wouldn’t have realized he was awake if he hadn’t glanced at his face—drawn there by guilt and regret. There was no anger in Tomioka’s eyes, no recrimination, and no trace of fear.
He’s crazy, Sanemi thought bitterly. That was the only explanation. Either that, or Tomioka’s omega instincts were still in control, overriding logic and self-preservation.
Tomioka stretched languidly, his movements fluid despite the obvious soreness that must have been radiating through his body. He reminded Sanemi of a cat, all grace and silent resilience, even though Sanemi knew his muscles had to be screaming louder than his own. Yet he didn’t complain.
Strangely, he seemed... at peace. Comfortable, even. Satiated. His body language spoke of quiet contentment, as though the past days had been an act of intimacy rather than a chaotic, primal frenzy.
Then, with an air of nonchalance, Tomioka shifted. The blankets slipped lazily down to his hips, exposing the expanse of his torso. His eyes never left Sanemi’s, holding him captive, even as the evidence of what had transpired came into view.
A dark bruise circled Tomioka’s neck like a grim necklace, the imprint of five fingertips unmistakably spread over his pale skin. Below that, love bites marked his chest and throat in a cascade of rounder shapes, deep shades or black that Sanemi would have guessed were red or purple, stark against the ivory of his flesh.
Sanemi’s stomach churned. The sight was almost unbearable, each mark a testament to his loss of control. His fingers itched to reach out, to touch the bruises as though he could erase them. But he didn’t dare.
Guilt coiled in his stomach like a living thing, gnawing at him from the inside out. It was a monster he could never quite tame, no matter how fervently he tried to repent. The sight of Tomioka, bruised and marked by his own hands, made his insides twist painfully. He couldn’t even bring himself to meet Tomioka’s gaze for more than a fleeting second.
The damp cloth he’d been using hung limply in his hand, forgotten. His resolve crumbled as he stood, turning his back under the guise of retrieving the tray of breakfast he’d prepared. His throat tightened with the weight of unspoken apologies, and he could feel the sting of unshed tears welling at the corners of his eyes, blurring his vision.
“Sanemi,” Giyuu’s voice broke through the oppressive silence.
It was soft—so soft it was barely more than a whisper. But it struck Sanemi with the force of a blade, cutting through every defense he’d tried to muster. He froze, his breath catching in his chest.
When had it changed? When had he stopped being ‘Shinazugawa’? The casual formality of his surname was gone, replaced by a gentleness that left Sanemi feeling raw and exposed. And why? He couldn’t fathom why Tomioka would grant him such intimacy, such trust, after what he had done. He was certain he didn’t deserve it.
The knot in his throat tightened further, and for a moment, he was sure the tears would spill. His hands trembled as he set the tray down with more force than intended, the quiet clatter breaking the fragile stillness of the room. He wanted to speak, to say something that would make sense of the chaos within him, but the words wouldn’t come.
“What is it?” Tomioka asked, his voice soft yet firm, cutting through the heavy silence. He shifted to sit upright, his movements slow and deliberate, ignoring any pain that laced through his body. His focus remained entirely on Sanemi—the very source of that pain—as though nothing else mattered.
Sanemi’s instincts screamed at him to fall back on the habits that had shielded him for years: to deflect, to lash out, to fight his way out of the suffocating guilt that threatened to consume him. But something stopped him, held him in place, like a weight tethering him to the present. His gaze fell to the dark bruise on Tomioka’s neck—a damning reminder of his loss of control, of the harm he had caused.
“I hurt you,” Sanemi said, his voice barely above a whisper, raw and broken. His eyes, puffy and red, betrayed the tears he refused to let fall.
What right did he have to cry? What right did he have to play the victim when he was the one who had inflicted the pain? The thought churned in his stomach, bitter and consuming, as he swallowed hard, trying to keep his emotions at bay.
But as he began to retreat into himself, Tomioka’s hands reached out, grounding him. One hand cupped his cheek, firm yet gentle, while the other wrapped around his wrist with a familiarity that brought Sanemi to a standstill. The touch was light, a silent echo of their unspoken understanding. One tap for yes, two for no. But there were no taps this time—only the steady reassurance of Tomioka’s fingertips, tracing soothing patterns against his skin.
“You did not,” Giyuu said, his voice echoed with a strange warm quality that Sanemi had never heard before. His fingers drifted up to his own neck, tracing the line of Sanemi’s gaze. The faint motion seemed to pull Sanemi’s focus away from his spiraling thoughts, redirecting it back to the present.
“Your neck…” Sanemi began, but the words caught in his throat, weighed down by the guilt he couldn’t articulate. His free hand hovered uncertainly before carefully brushing against the dark bruise, his touch feather-light. His fingertips traced the mark with a reverence that was equal parts worry and adoration, as though he could will it away.
“Did it occur to you,” Giyuu interrupted gently, his lips curving into the faintest hint of a smile, “that that might be what I like?”
Sanemi was at a loss for words. Part of him wanted to argue, to insist that Giyuu’s so-called “taste” had nothing to do with his own failure to control himself. But another, more treacherous part of him whispered insidious ideas—images of all the things they could do together, ideas he had no right to entertain. The tension in his body coiled tighter, his fists curling against the scratchy fabric of the hakama as if trying to anchor himself.
“That is... beyond the point,” Sanemi finally managed, his voice gruff and tight, teetering on the edge of self-recrimination and the lingering embers of lust after his rut. His throat felt raw with the heat of his own thoughts, as though every word was scraping against the walls of his guilt. “I lost control. It wouldn’t have mattered if you wanted it or not.”
“It would,” Giyuu countered, his voice calm, unshaken as always. The quiet conviction in his tone was like the steady pull of a tide. In another moment—back when they could not see eye to eye, or before Sanemi realized he had been looking at an idea of Tomioka rather than the man himself—he might have mistaken that calm for apathy. Now, he knew better. This was strength, the kind that could stand unyielding against storms. It was the kind of strength Sanemi doubted he could ever possess.
“You would have stopped if I told you to,” Giyuu said, his certainty slicing through the tension like the first rays of light after a storm.
“You don’t know that!” Sanemi shot back, his frustration cutting through the stillness like his own green blade. His voice was too loud, too sharp, and the moment it left his mouth, he felt the sting of self-loathing rise in his chest. Why did every disagreement have to turn into this—a raised voice, a weaponized tone, the specter of violence lingering in the air? Violence was etched too deeply into his being, as much a part of him as his scars.
“I do.” Giyuu’s voice softened, but lost none of its certainty. The firmness in his tone wasn’t a challenge—it was a truth. He had never been afraid of Sanemi, not of his anger or his shouting. He didn’t flinch or shrink away, didn’t cower or plead. He simply was, and that steadiness left Sanemi feeling raw and exposed.
Sometimes, Sanemi wished he would be scared. Fear might keep him safer.
Giyuu’s gaze caught and held Sanemi’s, steady and firm, like an anchor. His empty eyes were not accusing, not judging—they just were. They refused to let Sanemi look away, grounding him even as they threatened to drown him.
“How much do you remember of the last three days?” Giyuu asked, his words quiet and his tone just as unrelenting as falling snow.
Sanemi’s jaw clenched. The muscles in his throat worked hard against the weight pressing down on him. “Not much,” he admitted, the words barely more than a whisper. They felt jagged, broken, like they had to claw their way out of him.
“You were going to take me from behind,” Giyuu said, his voice steady, a monotone that felt deliberately neutral. There was no judgment there, no malice, only the simplicity of truth. “The first day here. I tapped twice. I could feel how hard it was for you to fight yourself—but you did. You stopped.”
Sanemi’s breath hitched. The confession struck him harder than an accusation ever could have. His chest felt tight, his pulse thundered in his ears, and his hands twitched with the urge to do something—anything—to undo what he had done but Giyuu didn’t seemed too interested in changing anything, he was speaking of it as if he were reading it from a book, as if it was not deeply traumatizing for him.
“Because even when you lost control,” Giyuu continued, his voice softening into something almost tender, “you were still you. Don’t insult yourself by pretending otherwise.”
The silence between them was tense at first; no one could argue otherwise. But it soon grew natural, settling over them like a fragile truce. Silence had always been Giyuu’s default, a familiar companion that wrapped around him like an old cloak. He moved through it effortlessly, his breathing even and measured, his expression unreadable as ever. Only on rare occasions did something compel him enough to break it. And even in those moments, it was rarer still that Giyuu knew what to say—or that he managed to say it instead of simply enduring the discomfort of the unspoken.
Sanemi, however, was less at ease. He shifted where he sat, his knee bouncing slightly before he forced it still. His shoulders were tense, his hands curling and uncurling at his sides as though searching for something to hold on to. Despite the restlessness in his body, he made no effort to fill the silence, as if speaking might shatter whatever fragile peace had formed between them.
Unprompted and unintentionally, Giyuu had turned his world upside down, shaking the very foundations of his beliefs. Sanemi had lost control—there was no denying that—but he wasn’t ready to concede that it was entirely a bad thing. He clung to the wishful thought that he would never lose control again. Even then, Tomioka’s words echoed in his mind: that he had been able to fight against his instincts. Or perhaps—Sanemi could hardly admit it—his instincts weren’t to harm his mate at all. But he wasn’t ready to entertain that possibility, not yet.
Giyuu shifted slightly, the movement subtle but enough to draw Sanemi’s gaze. He wasn’t looking him directly in the face; his focus seemed fixed somewhere else, in the middle of his chest or near his right collarbone, his hands resting loosely on his thighs. There was no tension in his frame, only a quiet stillness that seemed as natural as breathing. Yet Sanemi could sense the weight of Giyuu’s presence—steady, unchanging, like a stone at the center of a rushing current. It was grounding in a way that unnerved him.
The silence lingered, but it no longer felt suffocating. It stretched between them, not as an oppressive force, but as an unspoken agreement: neither would push the other, not yet. It was a rare, uneasy balance that neither dared disturb.
Or maybe it was just Sanemi.
“Maybe you should take a look in the mirror,” Giyuu said, his tone calm but purposeful. He sounded so certain, so convinced that his words held weight or meaning even when, to Sanemi, made no sense at all, that for a moment, he questioned whether he’d been so lost in his own thoughts that he’d missed part of the conversation.
“What?” Sanemi asked, the word slipping out before he could stop it. It was the only thing he could muster to encapsulate his confusion.
“You should take a look in the mirror before you keep obsessing over my neck,” Giyuu repeated, his voice unshaken, as though he were stating an indisputable fact. The second time around, the words carried a strange kind of logic—or at least the kind of logic that invited curiosity. It still felt like it had come out of nowhere, catching Sanemi off guard, but there was an undercurrent of something more that he couldn’t quite place.
He stared at Giyuu for a long moment, searching for a clue in his serene expression, but Giyuu remained unreadable as ever. There was no mockery, no judgment, just a steady patience that left no room for argument.
With a low grunt of resignation, Sanemi rose to his feet. “Fine,” he muttered, the word tinged with reluctance. He moved to where the small, polished mirror hung on the wall. It was nothing fancy, just a simple, practical thing, but the reflection it offered struck him harder than he expected.
The reflection offered him what it always had: himself, stripped bare of illusion or softness. Scars crisscrossed his body like battle-worn maps, each one of them told a story he’d rather forget. The scowl that seemed permanently etched into his features remained—a grimace of disgust and anger, with eyes that held storms instead of calm.
But today, the mirror revealed something more.
The stinging scratches marking his sides and back demanded his attention, vivid against the canvas of his skin. Each line, jagged and raw, burned faintly, like the remnants of a fire that refused to die out. They weren’t the careless marks of a brawl or an accident; they were deliberate, desperate, alive. The skin around them was inflamed and stood out against the older, weathered scars of his childhood.
They whispered of moments he couldn’t reconcile, where instinct met intimacy and control gave way to something primal. Each scratch was a stroke in a map of passion, tracing the fevered rhythm of hands that clutched too tightly, of nails digging into flesh not to harm, but to hold.
The sensation lingered, even now. The faint sting of the scratches flared with each movement, as though his skin remembered better than he did. It was a reminder—sharp and unrelenting—of Tomioka’s touch, of how his mate had held him not out of fear, but trust.
And then there were the bruises, roundish and small, deep, dark hues winding in a jagged path down his torso, disappearing beneath the waistband of his hakama. They pulsed faintly, a dull ache that throbbed in time with his heartbeat. He forced himself to stay rooted, to keep his eyes from following where that path led, but the temptation gnawed at him.
A shiver ran through him as his fingers ghosted over one of the scratches on his side, the skin hot beneath his touch. He would have flinched had he not been a Hashira—not from pain, but from the surge of memory it carried. The desperation, the need, the overwhelming loss of control that had marked those three days.
They were a map, yes—a map of passion and chaos etched into his skin. And as he stared at them, Sanemi couldn’t tell if they marked a road he wanted to travel again or one he needed to turn away from, forever.
“You did not hurt me, Sanemi,” Tomioka said, his voice as soft as ever—a sound that seemed to exist somewhere between a sigh and a whisper. It was the kind of calm that could guide even the most frayed edges of a soul back to the present.
They were close now, Tomioka standing just behind him. Sanemi could feel the gentle warmth radiating from his mate’s body, a heat that seeped into the cold spaces within him, softening the sharp edges of his thoughts. It was a warmth that stirred something distant and fragile—a memory, faint but vivid.
He could almost feel himself back in his mother’s house, tucked safely inside the nest she’d made for them. That small, sacred space where the scent of lavender and worn wood mixed with the rustle of fabric, wrapping them in a cocoon of safety. He could almost hear her voice, soft and soothing, as she pulled them close and promised that nothing would harm them.
But this was not his mother’s house. There was no nest here, no gentle hand to shield them from the world’s cruelties. The looming shadow of his father, the constant threat that had once hung over them like a storm cloud, was gone.
Now, the only dangerous people in the Wind Estate were the two of them—Tomioka and Sanemi.
“Since when am I Sanemi?” he asked, his voice low and rough, cracking just slightly under the weight of the question. He didn’t know why it mattered, only that it did.
He needed to know. To understand when the shift had happened—when he had stopped being "Shinazugawa" to Tomioka. When he had become something… more, more personal, more vulnerable. Something that felt as terrifying as it did precious.
“I can go back to ‘Shinazugawa’ if you want,” Tomioka said. His eyes looked impossibly large against his delicate face—not frightened, but uncertain. There was something raw and tentative in his expression, as if he feared he’d overstepped, feared he’d broken whatever fragile thread had been forming between them.
“No!” Sanemi’s response came swift, almost cutting Tomioka off mid-sentence. It was abrupt, almost desperate—a collision of apology and plea. A sharp inhale followed, as though the force of his own reaction had startled even him.
‘Sanemi.’
The name lingered in his mind, echoing in Tomioka’s voice, gentle and warm. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d heard it said with care. In truth, he couldn’t remember ever liking his name at all. Certainly not when it came from his father’s mouth, spat like a curse or an accusation. His name had always felt heavy, like it belonged to someone he hated but couldn’t escape.
But now, hearing it fall softly from Tomioka’s lips, it felt... different. It wasn’t just a name anymore. It was a balm, a tentative reassurance, a quiet acknowledgment of who he was beneath the storms and scars. Tomioka said it as though it mattered, as though he mattered—as though Sanemi deserved something gentler than the violence he’d grown used to.
He didn’t know how to explain what it meant to him. Words wouldn’t come, but the feeling settled deep, warm and unshakable.
“Please, don’t, Tomioka,” Sanemi said, his voice quieter now, almost pleading. The weight of explaining himself felt too heavy in the moment, something to be unpacked another day—if ever.
“Giyuu…” Tomioka interrupted gently, his tone carrying no hint of reprimand, only calm insistence. “We agreed on it three days ago.”
The words struck something deep within Sanemi, a warmth unfurling in the pit of his chest. His heart twisted, and for a fleeting moment, he felt something foreign—something tender, something dangerously close to trust. The sound of his name from Tomioka’s lips wasn’t just a name; it was a bridge, a quiet reassurance that no matter how frayed and broken he felt, Giyuu saw him.