The note was not long.
Aika read it once, then again, standing beneath the soft paper lanterns of the entrance hall, her fingertips pressed against the familiar characters drawn in neat, careful strokes. Renjiro's handwriting was distinct, clean, disciplined, as though each word mattered more than he could say aloud.
"I am sorry for my silence. I had to be certain.
If you still wish to leave this place—not as debt repaid, but as your own—
meet me beneath the plum tree, just beyond the Shirogane bridge.
At first snowfall."
— Hayama
She stared at the final line as if it might vanish.
Aika pressed the note to her chest. Her body felt too full. Of breath. Of hope. Of fear.
But most of all.
Decision.
The first snowfall came three nights later.
The city was quieter than usual. Kyoto's outer roads lay still beneath the weight of snow that fell in slow, whispering veils, blanketing the stone lanterns and softening the world's sharp edges.
Aika stepped through the side gate in silence.
The brothel slept behind her, unaware.
Or so she thought.
The matron had said nothing since the night Renjiro left, but she had watched Aika more closely since. There had been a night, a few days before, when she and Renjiro spoke in hushed tones behind a shoji door. Aika hadn't heard what passed between them. But there was an exchange, a transaction. And the next morning, the matron had summoned her.
She had offered Aika a new hairpin.
Silver camellia, real gemstones.
"For the good work you've done lately," she said.
It wasn't a gift.
It was a reminder.
You belong here.
That was what the teahouse wanted her to believe. What every client, every rule, every smile trained into her had meant to ensure.
But Aika walked anyway.
The silk of her crimson kimono brushed the snow as she made her way past the still market stalls, across the bridge where the river barely flowed beneath thin sheets of ice.
She stopped beneath the plum tree.
No lanterns. No sounds. Just the dull thump of her heart and the slow drift of snowflakes caught in her lashes.
"Aika"
She turned.
He stood not three paces from her, a dark cloak around his shoulders, snow melting in his hair.
She didn't speak.
She couldn't.
So he stepped closer.
"I waited," he said softly. "Even when I didn't know if you'd come."
"I wasn't sure," Aika whispered. "If it was real. If I was."
Renjiro lifted a hand, not touching her, but close. Close enough to offer her the choice.
"You are real to me," he said. "Not a courtesan. Not a flower behind glass. Just Aika."
She let out a breath she hadn't realized she was holding. Then nodded.
And reached for his hand.
They didn't run.
Not that night.
But the next morning, after a final bow to the house she had once belonged to, Aika stepped through the gate for the last time.
Her debt had been cleared.
Her name had been returned.
And the snow melted behind her, leaving only footprints.
Hers and His.