Risk of Conviction

SAID YOU WAS HIGH CLASSED

 

Koenma pulled back, grinning triumphant as some primal king. He looked like golden Gilgamesh over conquered Enkidu. Though to say he was Hades with a twisted face over abducted Persephone, Death’s conquest and contractual wife, was even more apt.

 

My breath came faster. Prince Koenma looked at me with an ownership that frightened me, for I was the only one in the world who could oppose it and I had no power at all.

 

I sat up. Whipping my shoulders around, I slapped him.

 

It was not hard, but loud. I was afraid to hurt him; my hand opened flat in the air. But my face did not waver.

 

Koenma grabbed my throat. Then he breathed and let go.

 

I pulled my hand across my face, scraping the mess off. I wiped it on the bed. My eyes underneath the shit and sugar must have been so furious that he stumbled through an apology.

 

“Sorry about that. But you had fun too, right?”

 

I jerked a handful of the sheet up, patting my eyes. “No.”

 

“Calm down.”

 

I shut my eyes. He wasn’t listening. “Cumming on someone’s face while you hold them down…it’s more of a second date activity.”

 

“Aren’t you a smartass.” He had a look tall people got when they can see the top of your head, the part in your hair, and they think it’s funny: that effortless superiority of height. I was small to him. I was funny.

 

“Turn that off, will you?” I snapped. The garish lounge music was the only thing to which I could displace my anger.

 

“Sure. What do you listen to?”

 

“I don’t know.”

 

“You’re too busy training against stray demons to go to a concert? You should try. It’s very vogue for a human teenager.”

 

I avoided this trite conversation twice a day at school, and now here I was in an alternate dimension, asked to swap favorite foods and TV shows with a man who’d obviously overdosed on commercial porn.

 

“I don’t care for music.” I balled up the sheet in my lap, sitting cross-legged. I was going to cry if I couldn’t make myself forget what had just happened. I tried to count the threads.

 

“Who doesn’t like music?”

 

I just pointed at myself. I grew up using music as a cover to steal jangling purses and scabbards at elegant balls in south Makai . Music was noise.

 

“Fine,” Koenma said. “Botan!”

 

“What are you doing?” I threw my leg out to stand, looking around.

 

“BOTAN!”

 

“Yes, Koenma,” the chipper, rain-smelling girl came in through the wall, holding a clipboard and dressed as a school girl from one of the rougher inner city schools. She was grinning like a happy little soldier and reading something.

 

I stood quickly and turned away from her, closing my robe.

 

“Urameshi’s healing fast. And look,” the girl spun, smoothing out her skirt. “I signed up at his school and got a uniform – “

 

“Play dress up on your own time, Botan. I have an important question. I need to know what kind of music Kurama likes.”

 

“It’s in the file, sir, but we have more important issues. No one has located - Oh! Kurama?” She recognized me. Apparently, she hadn’t know about the contract. “What are you doing here?”

 

Even though I was facing away from her, my hand went up automatically to push my fix disgusting, sticky bangs. As if I could become marginally presentable after all that.

 

“I didn’t mean to interrupt,” she said, stricken.

 

“There’s nothing to interrupt,” the prince snapped. “Just two friends getting to know one another.”

 

Botan corrected the situation in her mind immediately and her voice rose. “Prince Koenma!”

 

“What?” Koenma blocked her from coming to me.

 

“This sort of punishment hasn’t been allowed since the Soul Welfare Code was instated. We’ve talked about this!”

 

“Time spent with me is hardly a punishment. And his warrant was issued ages before that thing was enacted. The amendment isn’t retroactive. So it is not applicable to the Silver Fox.”

 

“Use your common sense. Kurama!”

 

I held my robe tight at the neck. I looked her in the eye and saw her spirits drop. His every fingerprint on me was obvious from my expression.

 

Botan said, “Sir, this is very inappropriate. You said you wanted to recruit him as a fighter.”

 

“And we will. He’s just closing the deal. We want to make sure he can obey orders. And that he never pulls one of his little thief stunts again.” He patted my shoulder. “Right?”

 

I cringed.

 

“Koenma, if he’s on salary, this is sexual harassment of an employee, in modern business terms.”

 

“Well, Botan, we are not modern, nor are we a business,” Koenma said. His voice dropped, honey again, smooth and low. Watching him control his people or bargain was like watching a cobra flare its neck at a rat. “We are a monarchy. My father engages in acts with his prisoners and I don’t think I’m banned or even discouraged from similar satisfaction. This is a difficult job and I’ve every right to enjoy the benefit of my situation.”

 

“This is rape. Kurama, you know you don’t have to put up with this nonsense.”

 

“Is it legal?” I asked, quietly.

 

“Of course not! Didn’t you get a lawyer to advise you before you took the offer?”

 

“What would the punishment have been if I declined?”

 

Botan caught herself before speaking. She grimaced.

 

Prince Koenma grabbed the tie of my robe. I let him draw me near, rather than be stripped in front of her. “He didn’t need a lawyer. He already signed his pardon. Besides, this is completely consensual. Isn’t it, Yoko?”

 

Justice or his mercy. I could not protest. I caught Botan’s eye enough to let her know how I truly felt, then looked down. “Completely.”

 

“So, you go run along and douse a map or something. Do some flybys and don’t come back till you’ve got real news.”

 

Botan stared. I tucked my dirty hair behind my ear again and watched her.

 

“You heard him, Botan,” Koenma said. “Get out.”

 

She crossed her arms and did not move. “No. Absolutely not.”

 

“Botan!” He chided, waving his arm. “Do you know what’s left out there? A cursed sword that could make an army of demons – “

 

“This hell is what’s in front of me.” She jabbed her finger at the ground.

 

Koenma said, “Go do your job.” He flung out his hand and she seemed to fall backwards, then was gone.

 

I stared at the blank space as he lowered his hand, then flinched when he turned on me. “What were you so quiet for?”

 

Did he expect me to defend him or to scream? I sat down on the bed, avoiding his gaze.

 

“Aren’t you going to beg her for help?”

 

I shook my head.

 

The spirit world’s prince was too powerful for escape. I’d been thrown into a river heading straight for a waterfall - I would have to go over, relaxed, and hope that lenient disposition kept me alive.

 

“If I acted ungraciously, I did not mean any offense.”

 

Koenma looked me over and his lip curled. “You’re disgusting.”

 

I tried to smooth my defiled hair down again. I tried to make myself small.

 

“Why don’t I show you the bath?” He grabbed my hand and dragged me up as if I were a child.