Tomoe ༄˖°.🍂

The shrine is quiet.

It always is now, ever since you stopped visiting. The foxfires still flicker faintly at night. The sakura trees still shed petals in the wind. But the laughter—the warmth—vanished the day you walked away.

And he let you go.

Tomoe stands in the shadows of the torii gate, eyes locked on the path below the mountain. You come here less now. Rarely alone. He watches as your figure approaches—familiar and unfamiliar all at once—laughing at something someone else has said. Your smile cuts him like a blade.

Because once, that smile was his to protect.

He had told you to leave. He had told you humans and yokai should never cross the fragile thread of fate. He said cruel things—things he didn’t mean—because he believed it would keep you safe.

“This world will only hurt you if you stay with me,” he’d said. “Leave. Forget me. Live a normal, safe life.”

You had cried.

You had begged him to say he didn’t mean it.

But he never did.

Now, you’re here again—but not for him. Never for him. You visit out of nostalgia, maybe. Or because it’s the one place your new companion doesn’t quite understand. The man beside you smiles gently. Human. Harmless. And Tomoe hates how easy it looks.

He steps back into the shadows, his claws curling into his sleeves.

He watches you from a distance—never close enough to be seen, never far enough to forget the sound of your voice.

At night, when the wind is still, he swears he can hear your laughter echoing through the halls.

He sleeps on the floor where you once napped.

He drinks the tea you used to make, though it’s bitter now.

He never lights the lamp in the garden anymore. You always liked that light. Said it made the shrine feel alive.

It doesn’t feel alive anymore.

⸻

He tells himself this is what you deserve — a real life. One that doesn’t involve curses, gods, blood, or the cold eternity of yokai existence. He tells himself he did the right thing.

But then you return to the shrine one evening, alone.

And he breaks.

You don’t see him at first, sitting at the old steps, hidden in the shadows. But when your eyes finally meet his — gods, he nearly falls apart.

You whisper his name.

“Tomoe?”

And it’s the first time he’s heard it from your lips in months. A sound he once took for granted. A name that only felt like his when you said it.

He rises slowly, eyes locked on yours.

“You shouldn’t be here,” he says, voice low.

“Neither should you,” you reply, just as quietly.

A pause.

“You told me to leave you.”

“I did.”

“You told me to forget you.”

“I did.”

You swallow hard.

“I can’t.”

And Tomoe looks away, pain tightening across his face. He wants to touch you. To hold your hand. To kneel at your feet and beg for forgiveness. But he doesn’t move. He never does.

“You’re not alone anymore,” he says instead, his voice thick.

You don’t deny it.

But you don’t say the other man’s name either. You both know that name doesn’t belong here.

You step closer.

“Did you mean it?” you ask.

“What?”

“When you told me to go. When you said... you didn’t love me anymore.”

Tomoe closes his eyes. And the truth trembles in his chest, buried under centuries of grief, honor, pride.

“I’ve loved you every moment since,” he whispers. “Even when I told you to forget me.”

Your breath catches.

“Then why...?”

His eyes meet yours — fierce, aching.

“Because I’d rather break my own heart... than let this world destroy you.”

Silence.

Then you step forward and lay your hand over his.

His fingers flinch—then fold around yours like they never forgot the shape of you.

“Don’t fall in love with someone else,” he breathes. “Please. I don’t know how to survive that.”

You don’t answer right away.

But you don’t pull away either.

And for the first time in what feels like lifetimes, there’s something in the air that isn’t sorrow.

It’s fragile. Small. But real.

Hope.