the path of the wind

Her offer is as shrewd as it is politically sound. Though Hattori cared for his children in his own aloof and perhaps misguided way, they were not his heirs. If things had worked out different, then perhaps in a twisted version of his current reality they might have been, but he'd never been the sort to linger on the what ifs. It did him no good and to question his chosen course in life would tear at the seams of what he deemed necessary, there was no taking it back now, too much time had passed. Hattori thought that he was fine alone, he didn't feel a burning desire to fill the space at his side, and yet the thought of Kiriko being there was not intolerable. He liked her more than most and perhaps it would be wise to come to some sort of understanding, an arrangement.

Instead of this situation being framed as a problem, she posed it as a solution. A convincing argument he hadn't foreseen in the brief moments he'd had to consider how he felt, wondered what she wished to do.

He grunted in thought, ears flicking as he dragged his gaze away from her form. She'd been suitably demure, phrased it as a suggestion and not a demand- to say that she was skilled at her craft would be an understatement. Not that Hattori could perceive her machinations. After all, how could a spider realise it was in a trap before it felt the tug of the web?

He couldn't disparage her bloodline, Hattori knew in all likelihood he wouldn't get a chance like this again and it wasn't as if he was getting any younger.

"Hm. If you wish to keep them I will do right by you." Not only because it was the moral thing to do, but he also had something to gain from this. "You know who I am and what I am like, does that sit right with you?" Which was to say she should not expect romance from him, this would be a marriage of obligation and situation, yet she would gain all the same.