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Seiei Nouzen feels strangely out of place in front of his grandson's home. Unlike his family's manor, the entrance is not grand. It is an ordinary building, with no servants clad in black and white in the front to greet him. Who greets him instead is Shinei's wife, the commander who led an army into war, Colonel Vladilena Milizé. She doesn't quite meet her intimidating reputation, dressed in simple clothes and with the corner of her lips tilted up. In the living room behind her, Seiei spots a plethora of gifts.
Gelda beat him by a few hours, then.
As his servants carry a wave of gifts into the same spot, Seiei shifts awkwardly, unable to find the right words to speak. Vladilena finds them for him.
“Do you want to see her?”
Her.
His great-granddaughter.
How undeserving he is to have such a thing, after he'd locked away all the letters his son wrote and condemned him to death.
“Please,” he says and tries to not sound too eager. He'd been restless in the trip to the small town Shinei and Vladilena lived in—the book he'd brought with him laid forgotten in the backseat of the car, still. Vladilena walks him through a short walkway—although his concept of short and small is incredibly distorted—and leads him into a room with pale yellow walls and bathed in gentle sunlight. He spots his grandson in the corner, sitting on a chair with a newborn in his arms, looking awfully soft for a man descended from a long line of warriors and masterminds.
Did Reisha look similar, when Shourei and Shinei were small enough to fit in his arms? He never got to see that scene for himself. Seiei himself never cradled Reisha like that, either. Babies who were held when they cried grew into weak adults, or so it was believed. So he didn't. Neither did the maids or wetnurses who were well-acquainted with the Nouzen household and followed tradition with the utmost zeal. His son, who broke out of tradition in multiple forms, certainly followed no such belief. Seiei has no doubt that Shinei will follow suit.
Shinei lifts his head at him. He resembles the princess of the Maika clan, but he sees Reisha there, in the slope of his nose and his attentive gaze. Shinei gives him a gentle smile, though he imagines it's an aftereffect of interacting with the child in his arms rather than due to affection for him.
“Grandfather,” calls Shinei. “Come here.”
“Is that… alright?”
“Why wouldn't it be?”
Seiei breathes in, then breathes out. Right. His grandchild holds no resentment towards him. Shinei is much like his father and nothing like his grandfather, kind in ways Seiei doesn't deserve. Not even the war was capable of rooting that kindness out of him. Seiei takes Shinei's seat, and in turn, Shinei carefully transfers the child into Seiei's arms.
At first, he freezes in his position. With the proper guidance from Shinei and Vladilena, he's able to hold her more comfortably, enough to free her squirming arms from the tight, soft bundle she's in. In that moment, he takes his first good look at her. The child is, as expected, far from pure-blooded. Decades ago, a child that lacked the physical traits pertaining to the Nouzen bloodline would have been a disgraceful child. Reisha, who fell in love for a woman from another clan, was certainly aware of that fact, and as such, ran away with Gelda's daughter and had children in a land beyond the suffocating grip of the noble houses they belonged to. Seiei and Gelda paid dearly for their own ignorance.
He brushes his thumb against the top of the newborn's head and marvels at her dark hair, inherited from her father's side—the side in which Seiei was placed.
Truly, the gods were kind to him.
“Hello, little one. Look at you..."
The child reaches out an arm to grasp at his face, and Seiei takes hold of her small hand. She makes a little sound and he releases his gentle hold in surprise—was he too rough?—but she resorts to gripping the front of his suit, stronger than he'd anticipated. She will grow to be a wondrous warrior under his watch, if Gelda doesn't get her hands on their grandchild first.
Even with the argent eyes inherited from her mother, Seiei recognizes her features as that of a younger Shinei, from the pictures Reisha had sent of him before the war had begun. Through long days and nights, he'd stared at those pictures, wallowing in guilt and regret. He can't hope to undo the regretful past, but he's prepared to grasp this second chance with all he still has to give.
“Thank you,” he says, to either a divine being or Shinei and Vladilena or his great-granddaughter or all of them at once. "Thank you.”