".... just a little while more... "

In the cold autumn night, there was only the sound of laboured breathing. A painful, grasping sort of sound that carried clearly over the sighing wind.

The woman, visibly pregnant, suddenly dropped to the forest floor and clutched her sides.

"... my dear Lord, please .. not now ... "

Straining with the effort to pull herself up, she looked up again. Her vision was blurring, as always when pain threatens to overwhelm her. Grimacing, she leaned on to the tree and tried to calm herself down. A sudden image flashed. A sweet faced young girl, always insisting that Her Ladyship take care of herself... someone like her, who dared defy the unspoken rules of society. She shook her head to banish the memory.

As before, the image of her father always came to mind. And his age-old words of wisdom lit her mind like a flame bursting to life. She was a child again. He was holding a little twig and insisting that she place both her hands on the great oak tree...."Listen to the forest, my daughter, and take heart from its boundless strength.." And even as he said so, his copper hair glistened and challenged even the bright sun.

" ... I must not give up... " She whispered raggedly to herself. Like a child again, just like that golden period in the forest with her father, she reached out thin arms and placed them, almost lovingly on the tree. Feel the life force... and feel its boundless glory .. But this was another forest, in another time and she was a different person.

Tears raged to overflow and she closed her eyes, bidding them to shut out the view of the dark and withering trees around her. She would not be afraid. She was brave, her own Lord had told her that. A flitting smile appeared.

It would soon happen. She could feel something inside her break and a kind of liquid flowing from between her legs. Shuddering, she slowly slid her arms down from the tree and lay on the earth.

".. come, my bright one.. !" She uttered, tearing a piece of cloth off her already ragged sleeves and shoved it into her mouth. Biting pain almost overwhelmed her right there and then ...

Above her, the sakura tree seemed to weep even as the wailing wind proclaimed the coming of winter. The last peach blossom leaf trembled and fell even as the sound of a gusty, wailing babe rang throughout the whole forest ...

".. as my Lord decrees, so shall I name you Hanamichi, from the House of Sakuragi..." a soft whisper sighed in the descending winter.