Born on the eighth of an eighth Two pine needles fell upon Empress' brow Two months later in a place of no pines Two more would fall upon another's too Tested by a broken string, a zither like a tiger Straining the Empress like a wound, these were her days Passing by like the years lost to tempests winds Drowning in the rain, but always one more breath A book inked in a tongue, in a hand only she'd know Widens the Empress' gaze when the messenger arrives The weight of paper in her hand feels like a bar of gold She hesitates before she reads, afraid of what it says The first words she reads makes her heart sing Her name written in that unsteady hand "If Grandmother Sky is good," it reads "Then this will find you sitting on your throne It's been so long for me - so long in the dark That my eyes might mistake a candle for the sun" The first time they met their mothers knew Entangled fates - their destinies entwined They were but children who did not know Shefali of the steppes, Shizuka the Empress Too many years apart, far too long to bear A flower she'd never seen, so the Empress would take Her whole garden and move, every flower for her And for Shizuka, she'd see the world from the stride of horse An arrowhead that night cut across their palms A bonding of blood, a promise The Empress slides a finger 'cross the scar At least she has the sweetness of a memory The night beneath the moon, by embers of dying flames Would forever change the course of their lives Waking to the dawn as something more In the light they'd seen the tiger approach The Empress reads with a tear and a smile Remembering the day that they'd earned their names Paintings still depict and the legends tell Of the girls of eight and the tiger they'd fell Too many are the years, so tenuous their hearts Distance and time, parchment and ink A tether for their souls The Empress stops - unable to read Pained by memories Pained that they're just memories anymore Time does not heal, time only hurts O-Shizuru! O-Itsuki! The warrior and the poet dead The Empress' parents slain by her uncle's disdain She...she would ride against her mother's wish Shefali would never leave Shizuka to mourn Day and night she'd never stop No rest until she was with her again Reunited once more, so long apart Shefali inhales the sweetness of her scent Shizuka embraces, afraid to let go And the fated once more entwine Until she mourned, Shefali would not go And the Empress weeps-another memory Plagued and blessed by her divinity And heirless emperor would marry off his niece For the flowers and the sun they followed her But in a duel the suitor must win Dancing around her suitor's blade Shizuka a child, but an unmatched sword One single stroke - out of the sheath and in Her suitor's face cut, the duel is hers Their mothers' fates entwined like them With Shizuka's now dead, just Shefali's left And she arrived, silent and god-like Claiming the Emperor' niece as her own Out on the steppes with Shefali's clan Day and night she trained, Shizuka persists Her blade must be sharp, her strikes must be swift Determined to never be caged again Beneath the moon, wailed in its light Shefali watched her train, simply entranced The way she moved, an elegant dance Only she could make death such an art Even the fated have their limits And sickness would take Shizuka that night The Empress takes a breath, pausing on the page For it wasn't the sickness that she remembered She carried her in furs, Shizuka in her arms Shefali refused, for gods could not die Feverish and weak, unwilling to yield She demanded of her, a kiss before death A million stars in the sky A million lives lived before ours Yet none would love as deep as we do The heavens would envy us I worshiped your body as you worshiped mine Like the lick of flame our lips had met A taste I long for even now I yearn for your soul to be in me again And so they ran, an unaccepted love As one had left their home, so too would the other Across the steppes, across the hills For a brief part of time they had been free The Empress smears the ink, a tear on the page If only she had known what was to come Gods, Shizuka said, they had always been And if gods they were then demons there were too In the lands they walked, stalking them in guise In their clash with the first demon Leng Shizuka would face him - fearless And in one single stroke the demon would fall Spraying from the wound the black blood swept Across the air Shefali's lips The infection sets as the blood dripped in And their eyes become locked in a horrified gaze Now Shefali would learn if she too could survive death The Empress feels a pain just behind her eyes A headache from the words - of the bottle she's dried The black infection, it had always been her fault What else was she to do, but risk her life too? Gods do not die like this, Shizuka refused Shefali would not succumb, and she had always known That the woman she loved had always been divine How could she ever be anything else? Though she had lived, Shefali was cursed By the keenest urge, the sweetest taste for her blood And when they had slain men worthy of the sword She had ravaged them with her hands Indulging in them, enlivened by their deaths Shefali couldn't see her hands around her neck Squeezing the life from the woman she loved Ashamed she fled, afraid of what she'd done Once she had returned, Shizuka embraced her Without hate or judgment For Shizuka truly knew, what her lover didn't see That she'd never hurt her again The path they took was long, but the pain was well endured And to her brother's palace Shefali would lead them To the bronze home of her kin And there they might have peace But time never heals, it only hurts The Empress knew her greatest joy was but a portent Of her greatest pain The emperor would arrive and demand Shefali gone He'd demand his niece again to be caged with a man To be under this thumb - so again she would duel But he was not divine, the heirless emperor And he could not see the beast at his side Stalking the fated, again in human guise Shizuka - blind - would face the demon Kailon An ear taken from her, Shizuka realized A demon hidden he'd been all along And demon's blood in her, Shefali would devour At the cost of her eye, she would take its life Her true nature seen, her sickness unveiled Shefali would soon be sentenced to death Shizuka takes her lovers hand, "marry me," she says "A member of Imperial blood he can never kill" Shizuka declared her love in the court Spat at her uncle's feet and challenged his divinity The emperor roared, "If I cannot kill her Then out of these lands, she will be exiled" Only by the impossible, only for the flame Of a Phoenix feather, may she return And eight years she wept for her exiled love The Empress still yearns to see her return The emperor now tarnished, removed from the throne Yet still she is incomplete, her soul in two The Empress for days, had read her wife's words Now she must know who had brought her this The messenger is unknown, but they carry one thing The feather taken from a phoenix's flame The Empress runs, it cannot be true The sight of her wife has stolen her breath The feather held aloft, a smile on her face And for now they embrace, the rest can wait