Show Me

Unlike the wedding that I had envisioned my entire life, I requested things be kept private and to a minimal. I was officially announced as the first wife of Nobunaga Oda three weeks after my final answer was given. My things were brought to the tenshu where he stayed and where I would be staying from now on unless he decides he prefers the company of another over me in the future, or I suppose if I tire of him.

My stomach was in knots thinking about this night. I had grown used to a kiss here or there from him and no longer felt the cold sweat of anxiety when he lingered so close to my face after. However, I still feel like running at the thought of more, and the only thing holding me together while I waited for him to join me in the tenshu was a sense of duty. The marriage had to be consummated or it wouldn't be considered legitimate, but the thought of intercourse sent unpleasant shivers throughout my body.

I was on the balcony of the Tenshu looking out over Azuchi and all of it's people celebrating their Lord's wedding day with their own parties, their own small fireworks and songs burst beneath me and when I looked up to deep blue sky painted with stars and a full moon I lost myself in its beauty.

I was lost in thought, imagining what the parties in the city below were like, when Nobunaga came out onto the balcony, two cups in his hands and a gentle smile. He extended his arm out to offer me the cup and I slightly jumped away from him. "I'm sorry." We both said at the same time causing us both to blush ever so slightly.

"Thank you." I bowed as I took the cup of sake from him and drank it distractedly without waiting for him. A small, bitter laugh escaped him as he watched me stare back out at his kingdom.

"Rina." He reached for my chin and all I could see is Kenshin roughly holding my face and I jerked away again and hurriedly walked into the Tenshu.

"Rina." His steps were soft as he followed me and silence and stillness took him over as I began to unwrap my white and gold kimono.

"Let's get this over with." I whispered as the kimono fell from my shoulders and were caught by the inner crook of my elbow.

He sighed before sitting on the ground at his desk and sounded distant and uninterested when he spoke. "I may own your body now, but if that's all you're going to offer me then go to sleep without my touch." He pulled a scroll and began reading it with a scowl on his face.

My words sounded cold and removed as I climbed onto the futon with my kimono untied but still covering everything. "You will lay claim to my body tonight otherwise this union is nullified."

"Neither one of us are untouched. If I say we consummated no one will doubt my word. If I bed you like this however; You will remain resistant, or worse, you'll become more resistant to my touches. People will begin to question wether or not I'm the—what was it you called me before? Carnal hedonist?"

"Exceptional" I mumbled.

"Hmm oh yes. That was it. You said I was an exceptional hedonist. I can't have you destroying such an accurate reputation about me now can I?" His eyes never left his paperwork and he sounded bored.

I rose to my knees and sat on my ankles. "Those are only rumors." I mumbled again.

"I thought I told you to rest." He looked up from his reading, looking as irritated as a mother scolding her own child for disobedient behavior.

I felt embarrassed, which I'm certain was his goal, for making him feel rejected. I looked down at the futon in front of me. "I have no lovely or pleasurable experiences to draw from for this. I only have nightmares that I'm fighting back when you touch me with that intent—"

The glare stopped me in my tracks. His red eyes full of anger. "Don't confuse my desire to be with you for what those men did. Ever again."

I bit my lip as I shifted under my gaze. "Do you have it in you to show me how you differ?" I was still nervous, but he had pulled me out of hell, he was still choosing me for his first wife despite everything I had put him through already, and I was going to tempt my luck with him again. I'm either a fool or genius. Only his response can decide.

He set the scroll down on the desk and pinched the bridge of his nose as he took a deep contemplative breath. "I don't have the patience to continually ask my wife for permission to touch even the most innocent places on her body. Once I begin to claim territory, I don't stop until it is all mine. I'm certainly not going to lie and tell you I am some chaste angel. I'm simply stating that I am nothing like the men that—" He had been so flustered and ranting he didn't hear me rise from the futon to make my way behind him. He fell silent when my arms cascaded onto his shoulders along with the white and black silk of my kimono sleeves. His body tensed as I kissed his ear, not completely sure of my own actions. "The rumors are that you are an excellent lover..." I hummed the words in his ear as one of my hands dipped into his robes to glide my manicured nails, still adorned with several decorative rings, adding extra texture to my touch, across his chest.

He grabbed my wrist and pulled my hand close to his lip. "Then you've heard correctly." He smirked before kissing the palm of my hand gently and began to build pressure into my hand.

"I heard that you have enjoyed many women—" He hummed low at my words as if to say "what of it?" as his kiss migrated from palm to wrist. It was getting somewhat difficult to focus with him continuing to sprinkle kisses all over my hand. "And men." I got the words out after a moment of hesitation, unsure of how he might respond. With his lips pressed against my wrist he let out a huff that tingled and sent small shockwaves through me. I was stunned by the sensation that made my legs feel a little weak.

He let go of my hand and turned his torso in order to see me. "And what if those are also true? Does that ruin me for you?" He asked, trying not to care about my response.

I brought my lips closer to his ear again. "I asked you to show me how different you are from the men that defiled my body. I meant it. Show me how you make your lovers sing Nobunaga so I can see that sex isn't about pain and screaming."

He suddenly turned his body around, my arms were still around him and now my legs were on either side of his torso and soon his hips were between my legs as he pulled me into his lap. "Will that bring you closer to me?" He asked with furrowed brows framing his hungry wine colored eyes.

"If you show me how different you are with another, I will believe you." My words were sure, I could hardly believe how much a believed what I was saying.

He rested his head on my shoulder and took deep breaths. "Fine." He gently moved me off his lap and went to look for something in his desk and when he found the scroll he was looking for he sighed. He handed it to me and walked towards the cupboard where he kept his sake and konpeito candies. Before I opened the scroll he was pouring sake. As I unraveled the scroll I found a list of names, many names, and most of them I knew. I must have looked shocked because he was laughing as he started to pour a second cup of sake for himself.

"Is this…" I didn't know how to feel as my eyes poured over the scroll. "Is this a menu? Of sexual partners?" I could tell by his laugh that I had amused him with my unbridled curiosity.

"Something like that." He chuckled as he sat back down beside me and tugged on the scroll, which I did not give back to him.

"Some of these are quit surprising. Have you been with all of them?" My eyes were glued to the scroll when I felt the cup of sake pressed against my lips I tried to take the cup from him but he would not release same as me with the scroll. "Let me." He nearly begged. So the game has started. He's going to try to loosen me up with alcohol, and I was okay with that for now if it distracted me from the shadows of my past. He poured the sake into my mouth slowly, I could see him enjoying making me wait and it excited me a little, imagining it as a sign of what was to come.

When I drank the sake a light smile spread along his lips. He leaned in to my ear, returning the favor I had given him earlier, he kissed it and I surprised both of us when a barely audible hum came from me. "Not all of them. Just some of them have warmed by bed on particularly cold nights." He did not pull away from my ear, he was using his nose to trace the outside of it.

"Then how did their names end up on this scroll." I was fighting the urge to hum for him again, and I didn't know why I was fighting it when it had felt so good to make even the smallest of pleasant sounds again.

"Hideyoshi." His voice was getting huskier.

"Hideyoshi?!" I pulled away so I could see his face and ascertain wether or not he was joking. Based of of the half lidded pouting from the sudden distance from my ear, I don't think he is joking. "So… Hideyoshi has been with all of these people?" I asked completely confused. Hideyoshi had never struck me as someone who would be so adventurous, even if he was known for being desired by many women.

"I'm sure he's been with one or two of the women… they do seem to flock to him…" He was still looking pouty as he continued to explain. "In order for someone to be on this list, they have to be approved by Hideyoshi, and at any point he is allowed to remove someone from the list if he doesn't think it safe for me to be with them. It's something he did for me so I can relax in a warm bed when the need arose without worrying too much about a threat to my life." He looked utterly bored after explaining it all to me.

I leaned towards the desk and poured another small cup of sake. Before drinking it I swung a leg across his lap to face him. A flame was beginning to light in me as I watched a fire of his own beginning to rise. "Share with me." I said before taking the sake into my mouth. He leaned into my lips as I began to let some of the sake from my own run into his mouth, some of it spilling out of the corners of my mouth and down my neck and further. When the sake was gone we were feverishly kissing each other. He happily hummed in our kiss. He moved from my lips and began kissing one of the trails of sake on to my chest and before starting on the second trail he looked at me very serious. "What I've done with them is not what I want with you." He said before beginning to kiss the second trail of sake down to my chest.

My eyebrows furrowed in confusion. "What do you mean?"

He pulled his face away from my chest. "With them, I claim their bodies. With you I want your heart and soul. I want you to feel how much I love you so you will stay by my side so I can witness your rise from the ashes, so you will sit next me full of pride and fire like the Phoenix you are." With that he placed his hands at the small of my back but he didn't need to because I was already pulling us into another kiss, this time inviting his tongue to dance with mine. The sake and sugar I tasted on his tongue seemed oddly appropriate as we were heading towards something taboo that had the sweetest intentions underneath it all.

He pulled away for a moment. "Have you decided what you would like to order off the menu?" He asked with a devilish smirk.

"Mhm." I felt nervous all of us sudden wondering what he might learn about me based off of my decision. "I'd like to see you with Ranmaru."

He had a kind of intense interest in my decision that made me feel like I had made a right decision. "The pageboy. Why him?"

"I have always thought he had such an elegant way about him about him." I stated matter of factly.

His words were genuinely curious without a hint of challenge."Why not pick a woman then?" He said as he brushed the back of his fingers across my cheek.

A blush flooded my cheeks at the vulnerability of my words. "I don't think I would like to watch you with another women, not on our wedding night."

Nobunaga carried me to the futon and before leaving to summon Ranmaru he kissed me on the forehead.

When he returned to lie down next to me he traced my hip with a finger. "We will need the bed. You should watch from there." He pointed towards a pillar not that far from the bed. He was kissing my shoulder when my kimono slipped down and revealed the brand there.I thought I heard a snarl before he spoken a low growl. "I'm going to take that Dragon's head off the first chance I get."

"I'd like to be there when you do." I growled right back at him. I know that the brand is the worst of the scars, my body is riddled with the markings of that dragon though and while Nobunaga feathers his fingers across my skin they are all I can seem to think about.

I turned to Nobunaga and put my hands on his chest. "I'd like to fix that mark." I told him.

"What do you mean? Rebrand you?" He sounded somewhat intimidated.

I didn't move my stare from his eyes. "Yes."

There was a knock at the door and a soft voice announcing himself. "My Lord, You summoned me?"

Nobunaga didn't turn to the door yet, his red eyes warmed as he spoke. "We will discuss this another time. For now focus on the song I'm about to play for you."