Steel Wrapped in Silk
Copyright© 2026 by Megumi Kashuahara
Chapter 13: The Eve
One week before the wedding
The final preparations consumed everything.
The Mōri household buzzed with activity—servants cleaning every corner, gardeners manicuring the grounds for the pre-wedding rituals, Aoi coordinating deliveries and inspecting every detail with exacting precision.
Mio felt like the calm center of a storm. Everyone moved around her, preparing her trousseau, her wardrobe, her ceremonial items, while she sat still and practiced being serene.
Inside, she was anything but calm.
Seven days, she thought, watching Tama carefully fold the Shiromuku for transport to the Shabazu estate. Seven days until I marry a stranger.
She’d tried to remember the young samurai from the sword shop—the one who’d been kind, who’d appreciated her knowledge—but eight months had blurred the memory. She could recall his politeness, his interest in her father’s work, but not his face. Not his voice. Not anything specific enough to build hope around.
He was an abstraction. A role she would fill opposite her own performance. The husband she would serve, the man whose household she would manage, the father of her future children.
But not a person. Not yet.
“Mio.”
Aoi’s voice pulled her from her thoughts. Her adoptive mother stood in the doorway, holding a small wooden box.
“Come with me. There’s something I need to give you before you leave this house.”
They walked to Aoi’s private room—a space Mio had rarely entered during her training. It was spare but elegant, with a small alcove holding a scroll of calligraphy and a single flower arrangement.
Aoi knelt and gestured for Mio to sit across from her.
“When I married my husband,” Aoi began, “I was terrified. Not of him—Kaito is a good man—but of the unknown. Of entering a household where I knew no one, where I had to prove myself worthy every single day.”
Mio listened quietly, surprised by this unexpected vulnerability.
“My mother gave me something before the wedding. Advice, yes, but also ... permission.” Aoi opened the wooden box. Inside was a small jade pendant on a silk cord—simple, elegant, clearly valuable. “She told me: ‘You are my daughter. You will always be my daughter. But you must also be his wife. Those two identities will sometimes conflict. When they do, choose wisely. Choose survival. Choose strength. Choose what allows you to protect the family you’re building, even if it means letting go of the family you’re leaving.’”
Aoi held out the pendant. “I’m giving this to you now, with the same message. You are my daughter—legally, formally, in all the ways that matter for this arrangement. But you’re also still Mitsui Mio, the girl who came to me eight months ago. And soon you’ll be Shabazu Mio, a new person entirely.”
Mio took the pendant, feeling its cool weight in her palm.
“Three identities,” Aoi continued. “Three versions of yourself. There will be moments when they clash—when the merchant’s daughter sees opportunities the samurai wife can’t acknowledge, when the adoptive daughter feels loyalty to one family while the married woman serves another. When those moments come, remember: you choose which identity to use. They’re all real. They’re all you. But only you decide which one is needed in any given moment.”
“Thank you, Aoi-sama.”
“Don’t thank me yet. This is harder than it sounds.” Aoi’s expression was serious. “You’ll be tempted to erase parts of yourself. To commit fully to being just Shabazu Mio, just the samurai wife. Don’t. Keep all your identities intact. They’re tools. Weapons. Use them strategically.”
Mio fastened the pendant around her neck, tucking it beneath her kimono where it wouldn’t be visible. A secret. Like everything else about her real self.
“I’ll remember, Aoi-sama.”
“Good.” Aoi stood. “Now come. We need to practice the wedding ceremony one final time. You’ll be exhausted on the actual day, and I need you to be able to perform it perfectly even when you’re terrified and overwhelmed.”
The wedding rehearsal was grueling.
They practiced every step: the entrance, the formal greetings, the san-san-kudo sake ceremony, the costume change, the reception protocols.
Again and again and again.
“Your bow is too quick. Slower. More controlled.”
“The sake cup needs to be turned three times before you drink. You only turned it twice.”
“When you change from white to colored robes, you must maintain composure even though you’ll be exhausted and emotionally overwhelmed. Practice that transition.”
By evening, Mio was exhausted from the rehearsal alone.
“Good,” Aoi said, watching her struggle to maintain perfect posture despite fatigue. “This is what it will feel like on the actual day. You’ll be tired, anxious, performing for hours under scrutiny. If you can do this while exhausted in practice, you’ll manage it during the real ceremony.”
“Yes, Aoi-sama.”
“Rest now. Tomorrow we’ll practice again.”
Mio retreated to her room and collapsed onto her sleeping mat, too tired even to change out of her formal practice kimono.
Six more days of this, she thought. Then the wedding. Then the rest of my life.
Five days before the wedding
A messenger arrived from the Shabazu estate with formal correspondence.
Kaito opened it in Mio’s presence—a letter from Shabazu Matsui outlining the final arrangements, including a pointed note at the end:
“My son is eager to meet his bride and establish a harmonious household. He asks that his future wife understand he values intelligence and competence in a partner, not merely ornamental accomplishment.”
Mio stared at the words, surprised.
“Your future husband sounds more enlightened than most,” Kaito observed. “That’s fortunate.”
“Or it’s a trap,” Mio said quietly. “If I show too much intelligence, his mother will use it against me. If I show too little, he’ll be disappointed. How do I calibrate?”
“You calibrate by reading the room. Start deferential—give Koko no ammunition. Then, in private with your husband, show him your real capabilities. Let him discover what you’re truly able to do. If he values it, he’ll protect you. If he doesn’t...” Kaito shrugged. “Then you hide it and use it anyway, just more carefully.”
“Either way, I hide.”
“Either way, you survive. That’s what matters.” Kaito set down the letter. “Five days, Mio. Are you ready?”
No, she thought. I’ll never be ready for this.
But she said: “Yes, Father. I’m ready.”
Three days before the wedding
The trousseau was completed and packed for transport.
Mio watched as servants loaded the marriage chest—black lacquer decorated with gold maki-e—onto a cart. Inside were all the beautiful, expensive items her birth parents had purchased with their life savings:
The wedding robes.
The cosmetics.
The kai-awase shells.
The writing materials.
The sewing supplies.
And hidden at the very bottom, wrapped in cloth where no one would find it: her birth father’s knife. The small, plain blade he’d made with his own hands. The one thing she had that was truly hers.
The cart rolled away toward the Shabazu estate.
Mio felt a strange emptiness watching it go. Those items represented everything her parents had sacrificed. And now they were leaving—going ahead to her new life, the life bought with their hearts.
“Mio.”
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