The next morning, I watched from my bedroom window as the carriage drove Mai away. Madame Quoli sat next to her, escorting her to a special school that lay in a secluded town on the far side of Mount Ko Mei, just north of the Imperial Temple. Lai and Miss Nishio were standing at the gates seeing her off.

Just as his sister disappeared down the road, Lai turned back towards the tea house, his face appearing as though it had turned to stone, gazing onward without any sort of expression. It was as if his soul had been taken away. My eyes had witnessed a shyo mu separated from his precious shyo mah, and yet, deep down, what I truly saw was a bond between brother and sister heartlessly broken.

True to our nature as performers, Lai became one of the musicians playing with the rest of the entertainers in the evenings. But his passion was gone. The energetic smile that I was used to seeing was replaced with a stagnate look of forlorn. It was as if each day were thrust forcefully upon him and it saddened him that he could not give it back. He wandered aimlessly throughout the tea house, doing chores and laying idly in his room for hours. Amidst Madame Quoli's protests, Miss Nishio allowed him his moments of peace, even if it meant letting him stay in his room for the entire day.

The days continued like an endless stream of water, stretching out into nothing. True to what the governor promised, the contracts steadily became less and less. Where as much as twenty clients used to come in a single week, bidding against each other for the price of the house's services, now only one or two would come. Some weeks it was none at all, and after a month, the grand era of my life as a chienkuu ko had almost completely faded.

Later, we learned from the old man, that this was not the governor's doing. The times were changing, and it was affecting not just my life, but the lives of everyone all over Rui Nan.

                                                      **********

Foreigners saw it as a time of turmoil, of revolution for the small, but powerful nation of Rui Nan. But for all of us that lived there, we hardly knew what to make of it.

General Fung, the man I had seen speaking with Master Lu so long ago, had given in to his ambitions and seized control of the government, wresting the Emperor's divine right to rule, away from him. The Emperor’s pacifism and his continuing quest to disarm our country for the sake of negotiating peaceful relations with the Kin Ju continent, had left him gravely unpopular with the officers and men of our armed forces. As the chief of staff of the nation's military, General Fung had mobilized every loyal soldier in the empire and declared our country bestowed with the sacred duty of uniting the world under our will, or so that was what his voice had said on the radios and the loud speakers that bellowed from the tops of steam-driven trucks as they hissed up and down the city streets.

Over night, countless flags and banners were raised from every rooftop, building and flagpole until the city and countryside shimmered with fields of cloth gleaming in bright, defiant colors. They were the proud symbols of a new government. In those times, I often felt as if we were being tested for our patriotism and whether or not the spirit of our nation was stronger than that of our old loyalties to our once, powerful emperor.

For hundreds of years, Rui Nan had been a nation ruled by a deified family. And after only a month of discourse and sporadic fighting, the old ways were swept aside by a man who preached progress and prosperity through imperialism and military might.

As to the fate of the emperor and his family, no one could say. He had disappeared, and anyone who toted rumors of his return were quickly arrested.

As with the new formation of any government, many of us were watched with discerning eyes. Whether it be from the newly reformed police, government officials, or even the military we, the citizens, were kept under careful scrutiny until it was proven that our true loyalties were for General Fung and his new regime.

For some of us, our lives continued as they always had. Farmers tended to their fields with hardly a worry and craftsman cared very little about politics, focusing only on their skills with making things. Merchants on the other hand felt the greatest sting from this change. One of General Fung's newly appointed ministers, Master Lu, enacted policies which halted almost all trade with foreign countries. Any nation who’d ever thought ill of Rui Nan had been ex-communicated and deemed a potential threat to our livelihood.

With the merchant business almost completely gone, every house in the city competed for what little contracts were left. Chienkuu ko, which had once carried mighty ships through the untamed skies, had been reduced to nothing more than servants and petty entertainers. Some were even put to work at the factories, or even worse, abandoned by the very houses that cared for them.

For Miss Nishio, the tea house had become her sole source of income. Soldiers and military officers of the new regime were her new customers. Night after night, they crowded in front of the stage, drinking sake and shouting words of patriotism, taunting and challenging each other for who had the greater warrior spirit. Their cries often drowned out the musicians, but the female dancers who strained to follow the beat of the music carried more leering eyes and hungry, disrespectful gazes from the audience than ever.

One night, a soldier leapt onto the stage and danced with the other geisha. While surprised, Madame Quoli saw that the man was doing no real harm, other than having a small bit of fun. With obvious reluctance, she allowed it to happen.

General Fung's name was mentioned several times, and each time, the men cheered, waving their cups and glasses in the air. Kassashimei and I, along with Meng and the rest of the house servants were serving the drinks and food. There were more patrons than we could handle that night and everyone who could hold a tray were hurriedly put to work. Though Miss Nishio made it a rule never to have too many customers in her tea house, she found herself unable to refuse the constant pouring of soldiers that streamed in, arriving dutifully at the request of a certain colonel that sat at the head of the biggest table in the main dining room.

Even when there were no more tables to fill, men stood against the walls and even loitered on the balconies. A few of the delicate, wood and paper doors as well as some of the walls were torn and broken by the clumsy, crowded mass.

One of the solders that sat next to the colonel had taken my arm, almost causing me to drop my tray in surprise. He ordered more sake. But just as he let me go to carry out his demand, he stopped me again and waved me back to the table.

"What has happened to your eyes?" he asked bluntly.

He asked me to come closer.

Hesitant, I did as he requested and leaned forward. He placed both his palms against my ears and turned my head like a disappointed fisherman observing some undersized fish he‘d recently caught.

"It's like someone has rubbed a piece of lead into your eyes," he said. "Sir, do you see this?"

"Yes I do," the colonel said, hardly amused by the soldier's find. "I've seen people with eyes like that before. Sometimes you can find them at the tea houses all over this district, though I believe most of them have eyes of green."

"But sir, this one has silver."

"Oh?"

At some point, I found myself terribly annoyed by his big, gruff hands, squeezing at my temples, so I stepped back, swatting away his palms.

"Stupid boy. Come back here."

He reached up to grab my arm again, but I managed to back away from his reach. The colonel ordered the soldier to behave himself as he stood from the table to approach me.

"Such a strange color," he uttered to himself as he leaned down to examine me. "Tell me boy, do you feel cursed or blessed to have such eyes?"

He gave me a doubtful look, as if he was not expecting an answer from me.

"Both, I suppose," I replied quietly.

"He feels blessed," someone said bluntly.

I turned to see Kassashimei with her usual aura of confidence.

"Silver is the color of strength and courage," she continued. "He has those eyes because he’s special. There’s no one with eyes like his in the entire world. He's destined to do great things."

The colonel chuckled while vigorously ruffling my hair.

"And so, you let a little girl tell me what you could not," he said. "I hope it’s only because you were being humble. Otherwise she may be more deserving of those eyes than you."

I was offended, but all I could do was offer him a frustrated gaze. He reacted by pinching my cheek.

Suddenly, one of the dancers on stage screamed, and a loud crash was heard throughout the dining hall. Lai, who was playing his shamisen with the rest of the musicians had bashed his instrument against the shoulder of the soldier that had earlier climbed on stage.