Year of the Boar, Seventh Month, Day 15.

Atsuko has organised a group of six maids to take care of me. She thinks I need to get used to seeing people. I feel too tired to argue over it. So long as all of them take care of the bird; I care little when all is said and done. Nanami will be back in two or three days and then she can deal with them. Quite why Atsuko thinks I do not see people, I have no idea. I see the Diplomats almost daily, there are maids in my ante-chamber constantly, there is Nanami and there has been Chiyo... I see people all the time...
I have asked Atsuko to make sure that Chiyo learns to read and I have also told her to find out if any of the other staff are illiterate. She did not look impressed but I will not have people working in my House who cannot read. I simply will not. It is unthinkable and ridiculous. I cannot imagine that Kaede has maids who cannot read her correspondence to her or Kenta... Kenta... my fingers spasm around the handle of my brush at the thought of him... would things have been different if I had not sent him away...? If I had allowed him to help me... perhaps... perhaps... perhaps Shigeru would be dead and I would not be so afraid. Or perhaps Kenta would simply have offered a shoulder upon which to cry and little else... I should have talked to him; I can see that now but then... I could not. Had I never met Broken Rampart, I would not be sitting here thinking about confiding in Kenta. There has still been no word from Broken Rampart. He promised none but I had thought that he might... that he might think enough of me to want me to know how he fared... Crystal has been chirping incessantly for most of the afternoon. No... not chirping, squawking. She has been acting strangely. Flitting about in her cage and refusing to settle. She has enough food and water and she has been let out today so I cannot think what ails her. I will ask Atsuko to do something when she comes in later... for now... I must try again to sleep... I am so very tired and if I can sleep, I will not think about smoking...

Year of the Boar, Seventh Month, Day 14.

Chiyo did not come to feed the bird today; instead, Atsuko slipped in sometime in the stick just after the sun rose. I saw surprise in her face when she found me awake and still in the clothes I wore yesterday which I had also been wearing the day before.  Pride is a strange thing; it will not allow me to have someone find Nanami and bring her back but it has no difficulty in letting the staff of my House see me in this state... I have plenty of tantrums, I shout and scream and throw things but rarely do I cry; this morning my eyelids are swollen to twice their usual size because I have not been able to stop. My silks are crumpled and grimy and I feel filthy but I have been too afraid to go the bath house again. Now that I know for certain he intends to come to Dying Crane to find me, I have no desire to leave my chambers where I might be found unprepared and defenceless. 

Atsuko did not bother to bow, she merely knelt beside me and sat quietly until I was ready to talk.  At first, I remained silent, stubbornly refusing to acknowledge her but eventually, I asked her how it was that I had not seen her in such a long time. She used to look after my needs often when I was a child but I could not recall having seen her for years when I gave the matter proper consideration. There was a slight raise of the eyebrows but no further expression on her face and when she did speak, it became apparent that I had no idea of Itsuki's true evil for it is she who has kept everyone away... kept me isolated here without a soul to help me except those she chose. Atsuko has filled in many of the gaps left by the weed this morning and when I cried again, she held me as she used to do, resting her chin on my head and letting me weep until there were no more tears. I told her things I could not even talk to Broken Rampart about then... about how afraid I am now that Shigeru has written to me; sick with fear that he will do as he threatens...  the disgust I feel when I look at myself in the glass... and about how I long for the weed... 

Atsuko said little other than that she would accompany me to the bath house and when I told her that I felt so tired that I could hardly bear the thought of lifting my head she left for a minute while she sent for hot water and towels and then she bathed me herself before putting me to bed. She was still there when I woke, with food which she made me eat and only then did she see to the bird. I feel a little better now, calmer and a little less afraid of what might happen. Atsuko said one more thing to me before she left to organise a selection of staff to look after me; that I should apologise to Chiyo. It is not her fault that she cannot read, nor is it her fault that I terrify her so much that she could not tell me. Atsuko also pointed out that if Chiyo had been able to read, I would still be shut up in my room wearing three day old silks... I was a little cross at that but I suppose she is right. She was always right when she advised Mother and I remember that it used to irritate Mother, too. One thing is certain - Chiyo must learn to read whether she likes it or not; I cannot have staff about me who lack the most basic of skills...

Year of the Boar, Seventh Month, Day 13.

Chiyo cannot read and so my shame is known all about the House.  I could no longer bear the thought of what the scroll might contain so when Chiyo came in with some food for Crystal, I asked her to take the scroll away and read it. She was to come back and tell me the contents. If only I had made her read it to me there and then but the idea of watching her face as she read it was too much and so I thought it better if she took it away. If only I had not... When I thought back... perhaps there was a look of fear, embarrassment... of something... but she said nothing and when I looked up from my papers, she was gone and so was the scroll.
It has been a long while since I practised calligraphy and the weather was so beautiful this afternoon that I thought I would sit on my verandah with some ink and my brushes. It felt good to sit in the sun; the ink dried quickly and for a while, I let the fluid motion of my brush strokes soothe me and I quite lost myself as I filled page after page with standard practice characters. My hand was a little unsteady at first; the characters I produced spiky and uneven but as I repeated the practice strokes over again, I regained my natural, smooth hand reasonably quickly. I suppose I had been practising for two sticks or so and I thought I would write out some poems. I had re-dampened my ink and selected another brush when the doors to my chamber slid open and my peace was shattered.  One of the older maids entered my chamber dragging Chiyo by her sash. She knelt, pulling Chiyo to the floor with her and touched her forehead to the matting; her fingertips did not quite meet as she drew her hands together in an arc. I waited, expecting one of them to speak but neither did. I shifted, clearing my throat and breaking the silence but still neither of them drew themselves up from the floor. It occurred to me that Chiyo was crying and Atsuko (whose name I remember belatedly) seemed also, to be trembling.
It was only then that I remembered the scroll and I felt bile rise in my throat instantly. I tried to keep the fear from my voice but it shook anyway as I snapped "Tell me." Atsuko rose slightly, keeping her head lowered, her face curtained by straight, glossy hair which is unusually dark for the North. I could not see her expression. I did not need to.
Chiyo cannot read and so she took the scroll to another for help. Instead of taking it to one of my personal entourage or a Diplomat, she took it to her friend, one of the stable-hands. Naturally the gossip has spread faster than a wild fire and now there is not a person in the House and probably the Lands, who does not know the sordid details of what passed between Shigeru and me. Atsuko told me some of the things he had written but I cannot bring myself to defile the parchment with the disgusting, base things he threatens. Atsuko described his letter as sounding deranged; she said the Diplomats are actually concerned enough to have convened some sort of council. Half of them want to hide me away in the countryside or at the coast while the others believe that I will be safer here within the House walls.  I gripped the door frame, trying to stay upright, Atsuko's words spinning around in my head, refusing to settle; the only ones I could focus on at all were the ones concerning Chiyo.
"How is it" I hissed at them "That a member of my Household cannot READ?!" Chiyo seemed to actually shrink into the floor, the beige of her kimono blending into the matting as she sank. My knees trembled so much that I could barely stand and I felt so very sick. I knew that I focused on the wrong thing but I could not concentrate on anything other than the fact that Chiyo is illiterate. The only answer I had to my question was a sobbing, burbled answer which was muffled by the matting. Atsuko had no answer for me either and I could not stand them to be in my chambers any longer. I sent them away sharply before I allowed myself to sink to the floor and curl into a ball. I stuffed my sleeve into my mouth to stifle the scream that rose from my belly and I lay there for a long while with my eyes closed trying to still the sickness that rose with it.
How could I have been so stupid as to send Nanami away for an entire seven-day? Why did I not think it through more carefully? She deserves a holiday, I know she does but this would never have happened had she been here. I do not even know where she is; I have no way to contact her and bring her back. I wish Broken Rampart had not gone; I need someone to talk to so very much... and if I cannot have that... then a pipe... gods... anything to take away this sickness and this ever magnifying fear...