IX. ...and Waking
Sei went to the door and opened it, and stepped through. Yumi was right behind her. "Close it after you," Sei said quickly.
The broken, silent water harp was nearest the garden door, and then came the dry fountain, and then the sludgy koi pond, in a rough, staggered line moving toward the back of the house, where the moon glowed, huge and yellow, moving toward them. The vile ghost, the un-Ren, stood on top of it, a serpent coiling around her feet. Sei saw clearly for the first time how much she looked like Ren-san – apart from her eyes, which were a deep, deep black, with no whites visible – and she felt both anger and uncertainty. Below the moon, the great cat Yamiko-san, shining black with red glints, slowly crept toward them, moving deftly around the jutting crags of the fountain. Then the un-Ren paused in her glide, seeming to consider them, as the sound of the garden door closing reached Sei's ears.
The un-Ren didn't say anything, and yet Sei felt the words: So, you betray your mistress?
A quick glance to her flanks told Sei what was meant by this: Yumi was beside her as expected – she was trembling a little, but she had a brave face on. But little Katsuko was also there, at Sei's other side, close enough to hold hands. Sei smiled at her, wishing there was time to ask the girl what the hell was up with her. Katsuko made a twisty mouth and looked away. Sei looked back toward her opponents. They had moved a little closer.
Take the strong one first, the un-Ren said.
Yamiko-san bunched, shrank, tightened and leapt majestically, straight for Sei. The heaviness of her shadow smote Sei like a blow, but Sei had drawn her sword in a winking.
Before she could do anything, however, the panther was met in mid-air by a thing that rippled and shone and flashed in the light of the earthbound moon. There was a splashing sound, and a muffled, gargling yowl! and the panther fell to earth, several paces short of Sei.
Yumi's sake-creature recollected itself, and stood in a crouch.
Sei grinned, the grin with all her teeth that made her enemies whimper with annoyance. She could almost have sworn she saw a smug expression on the sake-creature's blobby, three-eyed face. Well, it was entitled.
What have you done to her! came the shout in Sei's mind. The un-Ren jumped down off the moon, the snake climbing her and coiling about her shoulders. But Sei intervened before the un-Ren could get to Yamiko-san, waving her sword like a lunatic. "Ya-HAH!" she shouted, and the un-Ren leapt back, an astonished look in her eyes.
Yumi watched in amazement as Sei-sama launched herself at the ghostly woman like a child playing with a toy sword. The creature actually fled, briefly, like a bird and yet like a mist and yet like neither, before stopping and turning upon Sei-sama with a glare. No time, Yumi told herself. Here goes –
She knelt down by the prone cat-beast, Yamiko-sama as she must be, who was hacking and spitting, seemingly as revolted by sake in her feline form as any of the catwomen in the house. Yumi spoke right into the cat's ear, in a piping, but clear voice:
"You know Ren-san is dead. You, you saw her die, didn't you?"
The cat stared at her, its eyes glowing a dull red. It was struggling to get on its feet again, and when it did, Yumi knew there would be trouble.
"I never knew Ren-san," she went on, "so you'll have to tell me. Did she have her own moon? Did she have a pet snake?"
A ratcheting growl.
"Sei-sama tells me that she was a gentle person, and an excellent hostess. Would she have told you to murder guests?"
The Cat roared, and leapt, and Yumi danced away...
Ren pulls herself up short, her embarrassment crystallizing into fury, and turns on this dancing ass with the sword. She releases a bolt of sky-fire from one fist, shouting, Fool!
And then starts as the bolt comes back at her. It doesn't hurt her, of course. She just absorbs it. But it wasn't supposed to come back –
The mad, foolish, surprise sorceress with the tousled yellow hair looks back at her. Her feet are bare, and in a guard stance. She is dressed in strange trousers that cling tight to her shapely, strong legs, and a large white shirt that hangs loose about her torso, making one think of a child wearing her father's shirt, at least until one sees her move in it. Her free hand stretches out before her, trembling and slightly blackened; she has deflected the sky-fire with it. In her other hand, the sword does a brief twirl, making moonlight dance, as if of its own accord, without instructions from the hand that holds it. "'I am the word of knowledge,'" she says. "'I am the speaker of the word.'" She doesn't sound as if she is really speaking to Ren, though her gaze is fixed on Ren. She is dancing very slightly from foot to foot.
Looking at that smiling, pale, scarred face, and feeling the words sink into her mind, Ren begins to have an understanding of how much trouble this one is going to be. She banks the fires of her sudden rage and spreads herself over with smooth, sweet ice. After all, it's more amusing than anything. The word of knowledge, she purrs at her adversary, putting lulling tones in her voice. Well, isn't that fine. What is your name, strange voyager?
"See if you can guess it."
Ren hears a gasp. The merest glance finds out the source: the stupid cat who followed the sorceress out of the house is half-crouched at the sorceress's right hand and staring up at her with a look in her eyes that makes Ren's lip curl with mirth. Hero-worship, she thinks. The silly little twit.
She turns her attention back to the vastly more significant person present. What if I know your name already, but won't say it? she teases.
"A name you haven't the courage to speak has no power," says the sorceress lightly. "What sort of blood-drinking magical ghost are you, that you don't even know that? No, no, my dear old cloud of gaseous bird-droppings, there is no hesitation in these matters. Just say something, if you've got something to say."
Ren is perplexed. She has been trying to summon her dear Yamiko-monster to take this prattling showoff from behind and tear her in two with her teeth, but Yamiko-monster is gone. Why would she leave at such a critical moment? she wondered. And where is the other girl who came out of the house? – No time. Perhaps there's more than one dangerous human awake. Take care of this one, first. You know how to take care of this one. She talks bravely, and dances well, but the more she talks, the more you can hear the fear singing in her voice… I'm curious, my dear, strange traveler from far lands. You say you are the word of knowledge, and the speaker of the word? How can you be both at once? Isn't that rather difficult?
"I'm pleased you're curious," says the traveler. "'I am the sound of the wind before; I am the world after the word is spoken.'"
More of those words. Ren hates the sound of them. She will stop their flow now. Insinuatingly, she says, How many different things you are, all at once. Can you be in two places at once?
And as she says the words Ren reflects herself, and there are two of her, one on either side of the traveler. The traveler's eyes widen, her feet blur as she tries to get out from between them. The stupid cat, startled, moves with a hiss to attack the Ren at the traveler's left hand, but a beam of light from Ren's moon catches the beast and throws it into the woods negligently. It goes with a low, raspy shriek like a goosed frog.
This startles and upsets the traveler more than anything Ren has done or said yet, and most important, it distracts her; she reaches vehemently, almost as if she hoped to catch the flying cat. Two Rens become one Ren, and the traveler is between Ren and her moon.
And Ren says, Séighin nic Cormac, you are mine.
And that is all. The traveler goes to her knees suddenly, jerkily, actually flinging her sword away behind her. Her clever mouth hangs open, its golden hinges jammed, its spring unwound.
She is mine…
The beast was violently angry. She was soaked in this nasty yet strangely familiar liquid, and her fur was all sticking together as her muscles bunched and reached with running. She wasn't as dizzy as she had been at first, when the liquid got into her nose and her throat, making her cough and sneeze, but she didn't seem to be thinking as well as usual. These were her woods – she had roamed them for years, the mistress of them – but this interloper seemed not to mind that. I'm almost caught up to her, she thought. There she dances – oh, very lightfooted, faster than any other human I've ever seen, but I'm still faster... almost... THERE...
And there was a strange blobby liquid creature blocking the way. It stank like the very liquid that soaked the beast's fur.
The beast shrieked, and managed to do a quick sidestep to avoid running into that disorienting mess again, but at the cost of losing her footing and taking a tumble in the undergrowth.
She struggled to her feet again, harfing with rage. She looked around. There the little vermin was. She had the lead again, but she just stood there between two trees, looking back at the beast. The blobby annoying liquid creature stood beside her.
It put its hands to the side of its oval head, waggled its fingers, and did a little dance. The girl looked at it, openmouthed.
The beast growled, and dashed forward.
The girl seemed startled and distraught, and actually looked like she was about to apologize to the beast for her companion's behavior, then seemed to remember where she was. With an odd squealing sound like a young gryphon, she dashed away again.
The beast was snarling and growling as she ran, picking up momentum once more, but in her heart she sang a song to the moon. She knew what was waiting for them up ahead, in the direction her quarry had chosen, and it couldn't have been better if the slip of a girl had allowed the beast to choose her direction for her. Any minute now –
Through the trees and into a small clearing, and the quarry was bayed. Here was a nearly sheer rock wall rising impenetrably up into darkness, merely one wall of a cul-de-sac you didn't so much as suspect until you were in it. There the girl was, her steps slowing as she doubtless gazed in consternation at the barrier ahead. No way out but past ME, the beast would have said if she could speak, and plowed forward, her huge paws barely touching the earth as she moved to claim her prize.
And her prize laid on more speed.
Hopeless –
And then her prize was hopelessly running up the nearly sheer rock wall.
The beast watched this eccentric ascent, astonished, but she was still running while she watched, and she realized only just in time that she had no time to be angry or even startled. A bone-crushing impact was a few paces away, and she couldn't slow down. She leapt, and tried to redirect her momentum up the wall. She actually made it up two lengths before hitting the wall, hard enough to knock the wind out of her – luckily no worse – and then fell back into an ignominious heap at the bottom.
Dizzy and aching, but at least whole, she looked up.
High above, her quarry launched herself backwards away from the wall. She soared a remarkable distance, arms and legs spread like a flying squirrel, and caught onto a tree branch. She swung on it nimbly, twisting herself in the air so that she landed on the branch, seeming almost to clutch it with her feet. Then she danced rapidly and nimbly from branch to branch, then from tree to tree, going back the way they had come. The beast's clever ears picked up the strange girl's frantic, quick, sobbing breaths.
Everything was tinted red. The beast heard ragged, thick, wet breathing in her ear, and knew it for her own. She was on her feet. She was dashing back toward the house, following this mad, impossible girl flying high above. The beast could climb trees, too. The beast could dance. The beast would catch the girl in the end.
Sei was just gazing at Shiori, unable to move or speak. It was more than three years since she'd seen her, but the girl hadn't changed a bit. She was still the loveliest living creature Sei had ever seen, still the face, and the voice, and the spirit that Sei had sought over thousands of miles of ocean, over great sheets of ice at the top of the world, under alien stars. Still all the peace and happiness Sei had ever known, there in that slender form, those lustrous brown eyes. Still the one mistress Sei would happily submit to. Still hers, and still mine. She reached out a hand to her.
"My darling," Shiori said. "Has it been hard, without me?"
Sei began to cry. How could Shiori ask that?
Shiori's beautiful moon was hovering next to Sei's head. It was singing to her, in three or four most harmonious voices, a song about sweet rain, and reunited lovers, and all the springs of the world renewed. Sei's tears became tears of joy.
"Love me," Shiori said, smiling sweetly, and Sei obeyed, had been obeying, would obey always. "Love me, and trust me one last time, sweet Sei. Joy shall be yours. Ours. Ours. I can end your pain, beloved." Sei was dazzled by the beauty, by the promise of peace and sweetness in those eyes.
She saw the curved blade coming toward her, and a voice cried out within, but most of her accepted this blade as part of the promise of joy she'd been made –
– and then little Katsuko was there, between them. There was a struggle going on. Sei didn't follow it very closely; she was mostly just annoyed that Katsuko was obscuring her view of Shiori. She did notice that Katsuko was limping, and appeared to be a bit beat up; there were scrapes on her hairless arms, and a jagged gash on one shoulder. And she saw the blade pierce Katsuko's side. Katsuko yowled, and slashed at Shiori with her claws. Shiori stepped away, almost dancing, laughing a sweet, happy laugh.
Wait, Sei thought. Wait. Shiori?
Katsuko stood clutching at her wound. She, who had seemed so savage and inhuman when she attacked, suddenly had a human look on her face: pain, and worry, like a child sick to her stomach. Something about the look pierced Sei's fog… she doesn't want to die, she doesn't want to lose the light. Katsuko reached toward Sei, gave a plaintive cry, and then she fell, and landed in Sei's lap.
Shiori was moving in again, with that most beautiful of smiles, and that sharpest of knives, and Sei was frozen, holding a cold, bleeding cat-girl in her arms, staring at oncoming destruction –
But then there was a big, hairy wind that blew through, stinking of sake, and Shiori was hurled aside, squealing with fury. Even her moon was nudged hard enough to send it bouncing toward the trees, making it cut off its gorgeous song with a sort of confused glommer-ing noise. Out of the corner of one eye, Sei caught a brief glimpse she would remember and love for all of her life: Yumi, running so that her feet hardly touched the ground, her eyes bulging and her teeth clenched as she tried to outrun doom. Only a glimpse, and she was gone, with dust, some dead rotten leaves, and an enraged, rowling Yamiko-san hurtling in her wake. And in Yamiko-san's wake: dancing and prancing in long leaps in the rear, the sake-creature, with one arm upraised, as if calling upon the first- and second-place runners to slow down a bit and let it catch up.
Sei almost failed to take advantage of this reprieve. She still sat there in the dirt of the garden with a broken Katsuko in her arms and broken thoughts in her head.
One whole thought presented itself: You almost died stupid, it told her.
That brought the sharpness back to her glamoured, glimmered mind. Glimmer? There was a knife glimmering on the gravel in front of her. Shiori's knife, she thought. Ren's knife, she corrected herself. HER knife, she corrected herself again, and reached, and she took it by the blade, and brought it up to her face, looking at it quizzically. A cold, cold blade. No blade is this cold naturally, unless it's been sitting in snow... Oh, here was Shiori coming back. Shiori was so beautiful. Sei smiled at Shiori's cold, pale, angry face.
Sei held the knife up by its blade, waggling it a bit between her fingers.
"You dropped this," she told the beautiful Shiori.
She resisted a very brief temptation, swiveled her upper body, and threw the knife into the woods instead, as hard as she could, sort of in a westerly direction.
It whickered as it went between the trees. If it hit any of them, Sei didn't hear the impact.
Shiori, the un-Ren, the Ghost, looked at Sei. Her eyes bulged so much they almost became one big eye, and she flew off into the woods like a large albino bat, shrieking as she went, yiiiiiii, in pursuit of her knife. Her moon followed her, making mad, hectic shadows of trees on trees between trees, and leaving a sound like a low, panicked moan behind it…
Sei lay Katsuko down before her on the gravel. It hurt her to do this to one of her favorite shirts, but she tore off both sleeves, and in moments had turned one of them into a pad, and the other into a bandage. She bound Katsuko's wound as well as she could.
"Satou-sama," Katsuko said in her small, rough voice, "there's no point – everything is getting far away – I'm going to be gone soon – Satou-sama, it hurts –"
"Then hurt," Sei told her, finishing, "but don't die." She stared into Katsuko's eyes, and put a hand on the already reddening pad over the wound. She spoke a few words, under her breath, and saw Katsuko wince with pain. "You may not depart until I give you leave," Sei said.
Katsuko nodded. She kept looking at Sei, with her fixed yellow gaze.
Sei took her eyes away. She had to struggle a little to do it.
Sei left Katsuko there, near the broken water-harp. She looked around for another glimmer, her poor abandoned sword, and found it, wounding the earth behind her. She unsheathed it from the world. It scraped on the gravel.
She deliberately moved away, towards the rear of the front section of the shinden, near the shutters she had been looking out of earlier. She wondered who was watching now, and what they had made of all this. "Is Satou-san demented?" That was probably what they were wondering. It was what Sei was wondering herself.
Away from the dirt and gravel of the garden. Tall grass was plentiful here, by the covered walkway leading to the back part of the shinden, where Fujiwara-dono and her charges were doubtless sleeping. She thought briefly about trying to wake Fujiwara-dono up, but no. No. Sei had started this. This was her ghost. She would finish it, and no one else. Shiori, she thought. The only Shiori I ever had, or ever will have. She plucked some of the grass, pulling a bunch roughly, hurriedly, with shaking hands, and began twining seven of the long blades about her own blade. She had to calm herself. You can't weave with shaking hands. Calm down. Control yourself. "Once more," she breathed as she did so. "Once more. 'I am the foam on the wave. I am the beast in the water. I am the winding of the horn. I am the raven on the rock. I am the cat who hunts the raven. I am the word of knowledge. I am the speaker of the word.'" She was binding the grasses flush to the metal, tight enough to stay but not too tight. She caressed, teased them into place. "'I am the sound of the wind before.'" She was almost singing the words now. "'I am the world after the word is spoken. I am the sword in the knotted roots,'" she reminded herself as she tied off the ends. "'I am the broken spear under the hoof –'"
Crazy ghostlight dancing in the trees again. The Ghost returned with the light, at first only a shadow, then a half-illuminated phantasm, at last emerging into the garden, moving implacably toward Sei, knife in hand, blood on her lip – had she run into a tree branch in her flight? More likely she had bitten herself in her anger. She still had Shiori's face, but it had stretched and no longer fit well. Sei's whole body felt cold. She knew her face was pale. She found she was still afraid, but more than anything else, she was angry. She held onto the anger. Shiori is dead. She had known it for three years, without really being sure. Now there seemed no other answer. This Ghost had stolen Shiori's essence, and ensnared Sei with it. Shiori's mistake was leaving the protection of the Guild, and she wouldn't have left if not for – Sei felt tears threatening to choke her, and fought them back. Now was not the time. There looked like only one possible way of breaking its magic, and she was not sure she was going to survive it, but what alternative was there, really?...
Care'll kill a cat, up-tails all, and a louse for the hangman, Sei thought.
The Ghost advanced on her. The blade of the Ghost's knife was glowing, and her moon was behind her head, making her look horribly like Lady Mary, with her halo, except Sei had never seen Lady Mary depicted with blood trickling down her chin.
Now, I finish you, came the Ghost's thought into Sei's head.
Sei kept her gaze on the Ghost. She looked all her hatred and anger at the Ghost, who drank it up, fattened herself on it, made herself stronger. She preened a little, glorying in being the focus of attention. As always. Sei looked and looked, doing her best to empty herself of all of it. The Ghost's mouth opened wider and wider in an empty smile, as she bore down on Sei, knife ready, Sei's hatred at the tip –
Sei bent her legs as if she were collapsing, and then jumped, and pushed at the earth with everything she was, and went spinning into the air over the Ghost's head. She had a brief impression of the Ghost reaching, trying to catch her like she was something she'd thrown away by mistake, her mouth opening too wide and stretching into an impossible shape, trying to call the carelessness back before it was too late, but it already was: Sei was out of reach, out of recall, and out of time. She spun in the air, building all the momentum she could. Her eyes found the light again, and her hands followed them, and with a terrible shout that tore at her chest, a rebel yell that split the night, she drove her sword right into the heart of the killer moon.
The moon shattered. Sei's blade cracked like childhood's end. There was a fierce burst of blue light, and Sei was hurled back to earth in dying fire.
The author's mouth dropped open. His head went back in a silent scream, and his black eyes fell back into his skull with an audible click. Sachiko struck him down with sudden fire, and dashed past him, out the garden door, into the snow, and up, and out –
Fujiwara-dono sagged, suddenly, basalt giving way to flesh and bone and then vanishing improbably in a wisp of yellowish fog. Youko turned and made a mad dash for the plum tree, looking her joy at it, finding that joy worked quite as well as rage to make the tree grow, which only increased her joy, which only made the tree taller – and she was madly scrambling up the tree, up and out –
Momoko-san, weeping, turned away from the shutters and buried her face in Mizuki's chest. Mizuki kept a comforting arm about her. She had been wanting to go outside since Katsuko had fallen – Katsuko was her friend and comrade, and they had shared many moonlight rambles – had stolen their leather jerkins from soldiers on the same daring, hilarious late-night raid – but she had doubted her own ability to do anything but get herself killed as well, and anyway, something told her that in this situation, her place was with Momoko-san, unless Momoko-san gave her leave to go. She wasn't sure why that was, though.
"Momoko-san –" she began. "Satou-sama's not – is she? I couldn't tell. Should I go out there?"
Momoko-san was looking up at Mizuki now. She looked fierce, despite the tears. "I'm only a novice. I have no magic yet that's good enough. I wish I were strong, strong... Mizuki-chan, do you know any magic? Any magic at all? Is there nothing we can do…"
Momoko-san trailed off.
They both turned, slowly. They were both hearing the same sound.
People were waking up.
The other cat-women, who had spaced themselves out in a line between the sleepers and the garden door, went into low crouches and drew back, but there was no room to draw back. Some leapt up into the rafters. Mii-chan and Yuu-chan, the tail-lashing twins, stayed where they were, chasing each other's tails. Ami-sama, who had arranged the line, sighed and went to sit in the corner. She seemed annoyed.
A tall sorceress with long black hair, bedded down near the attic stairs, was the first to rise. She was looking around. She was obviously missing someone.
"Sachiko-sama," Momoko-san said. "Yumi-sama is…"
Sachiko-sama gasped, and stared at Momoko-san, and at Mizuki too. She looked at the others.
Then she just said, "Yumi!" and made a dash for the garden door.
Another one had risen, not far from the first. She seemed much less confused. She followed Sachiko-sama, without hesitation.
All around the room, sorceresses were waking up, looking around, and staring at one another. The room hummed with sleepy conversation, and crackled with incalculable energy.
Katsuko watched from her gravelly deathbed near the front of the garden as the moon came apart in glowing shards, the glow dying as the shards fell.
Three things happened at once:
The Ghost screamed, whether more in rage or pain, it was hard to tell. She was still reaching uselessly toward where her moon had been.
The sudden darkness lightened again, as the true moon came out from behind a cloud, and bathed them in ordinary, extraordinary, beautiful moonlight.
And a sweet, gentle rain, no more than a drizzle, began to fall, mingling with the tears on Katsuko's face.
She had one last, bitterly triumphant look at the Ghost gazing in horror at the ground – Katsuko couldn't see over the big stones around the koi pond, and could only guess at the mess. Katsuko closed her eyes. Take me now, she said to Death. This sudden, bright pain was like a hot version of the knife that had killed her, setting up a burning within her against the cold. Satou-sama was dead. How could she still be alive, after that?... I will follow her soon, Katsuko thought. Perhaps I'll serve her better in the next world –
"'I am the bed of the dying warrior,'" a familiar voice said, almost gently. "I am the blade before the forge.'"
Katsuko gasped, drawing back from Death's threshold. She opened her eyes, and looked again.
Satou-sama was slowly climbing to her feet. Her grey gaze pierced the Ghost's black one. She threw away the jagged bludgeon in her right hand, all that was left of her sword.
"Now," she said with a dark smile, "we are on more of an even footing."
The Ghost frantically waved her blade at Satou-sama's face. I still have my knife –
"What knife?" Satou-sama said. She slowly advanced on the Ghost.
The Ghost looked confused. She waggled the knife a little more.
Satou-sama took step. After. Step.
All thought of dying had left Katsuko's mind. She would see the rest of this fight. She would fight Death tooth and nail for that, if she had to –
The garden door slid and slapped open, and two women, sorceresses Katsuko supposed, came out. The Ghost looked back and forth from Satou-sama to the newcomers. Her eyes rolled like those of a trapped animal. But the newcomers, without so much as a pause, turned and dashed southeast up the mountain, past the shinden's annex. The same direction Yumi-san and Mistress had gone, if Katsuko remembered aright. The one in the lead was tallish, with long black hair, and by the way she carried herself and the look on her face, she was no one to play with.
The Ghost had seemed momentarily nonplussed at the abrupt departure. Then she smiled wickedly at Satou-sama. They don't seem to be very concerned about you.
"Sachiko's first priority is Yumi," Satou-sama said, with a happy grin. "That's good. I can stop worrying about Yumi, and lavish all my affection on you."
The Ghost frowned.
Then another girl appeared in the open doorway, a smaller girl with light-colored hair. "Mistress?" She was still rubbing her eyes.
Satou-sama pointed at Katsuko, keeping her gaze on her adversary. "Shimako, help Katsuko. Quickly."
The small, light-haired one ran to Katsuko immediately.
Treed and exhausted, Yumi felt she'd made a mess of things.
Today's flight from certain death had been both easier and harder than the last one. She was more in her element in the trees than on the streets; she had been right about that. The trouble was that Yamiko-sama was also in her element, and on her home turf as well. There were more places to hide, without fear of endangering anyone, but Yamiko-sama knew them all, or could guess. Also, Yamiko-sama was much faster than the demon had been, and cleverer. Yumi had been able to stay ahead of her, but only just. She suspected that, if she hadn't handicapped her opponent with a sake-bomb first thing, it would have been one of the shortest contests in the history of the world.
She had been surprised to find that, in a tight squeeze, she could run up a sheer wall. She felt sure that this was a skill that would come in useful in future contests, if she lived to see any of them. It hadn't even required any conscious magical exertion on her part; she simply stood back – er,in a figurative sense, of course – and let her "magic feets" do the work. But she had found, to her dismay, that running up a sheer wall was – funny thing – exhausting. She found, fleeing back through the trees, that it had taken something frightening out of her. She found that the clearing where the house stood was in front of her far sooner than she'd expected, and though she might have been able to skirt it and still stay aloft under other circumstances, it would require some back-tracking, and a quick backward glance told her that back-tracking was a bad idea: Yamiko-sama had taken to the lower branches of the deciduous trees, leaping from one to the next with that implausible, liquid agility she had shown in her human form, negotiating the attic ladder with a big barrel of sake under one arm. There was a limit, Yumi felt sure, to how high Yamiko-sama could go – the upper branches certainly wouldn't bear the weight of such a monstrous huge cat – but she couldn't feel at all sure of where the limit was – Yamiko-sama was such an… unprecedented creature, and such a determined one.
All this makes Yumi sound far clearer-headed than she actually felt at the time. She had leapt down, and heard and felt a greater mass by far touch earth behind her at almost the same moment she did, and she knew that Yamiko-sama was there, and she ran like mad. She passed human figures in the garden, but they were a blur, and she had to be careful of her footing what with the water harp and the koi pond and the silent fountain and all. She prayed fervently as she ran that she hadn't ruined things for Sei-sama.
But she hadn't managed to get much farther after that. She'd thought about risking the remembering-place but that was dangerous in the woods; she couldn't control where she came out of it, and she might end up partway through a tree. This wasn't usually fatal, but it was always humiliating, and you had to wait for someone to come along and get you out.
In the end, she had shinned up this big koda tree and shot as far into the upper branches as she dared, where she lay now, clinging to a branch, panting from her exertions, and watching Yamiko-sama in the lower branches. Yamiko-sama's back paws were braced on the bottommost bough. She was stretching herself terribly long and testing the upper reaches of the tree, trying to find a branch or combination of branches that would support her. She was no longer shrieking, yowling, or even snarling. Her mouth was hanging open, her fangs glinting wetly. She was looking intently at Yumi and Yumi couldn't imagine any possible human thought behind that face, which failure had cut short any impulse to plead for her life. That was a face that would eat her, blot out her existence and with it the annoyance and inconvenience she had caused, and never give her another thought ever after, an empty, open-mouthed, yet focused terrible splendour of teeth and whiskers and cold, round eyes… There were no passageways here, or anything that could substitute for passageways, and so no middle way. Her feet couldn't remember the earth because they weren't touching it. Were there any other tricks hiding in her stupid, confusing head?... Now was certainly the time to remember them… Nothing was coming – Yamiko-sama was gingerly hauling herself up to a choice perch she seemed to think she had found. Yumi doubted Yamiko-sama would be able to find a similar perch on Yumi's own level, but she might not need to; Yumi had seen how the creature could stretch… Yumi braced herself. She knew the sake-creature was nearby, awaiting her word. She'd try a leap into the next tree. Maybe she could scuttle to the ground fast, and then the sake-creature could give Yamiko-sama another nice surprise as she tried to close… otherwise, well, Yumi was exhausted, frankly, and Yamiko-sama was apparently a long way from exhaustion, as well as coldly furious, and Yumi was pretty sure she wouldn't make it to the ground, unless –
"Yamiko."
A voice from the base of the tree. A voice Yumi knew, a voice she would know anywhere.
And as the voice finished speaking the name, the terrible cat shuddered, dwindled, and fell.
"Aaaaah!" cried another voice, and Yumi heard running feet.
She started to shin down. She was being carefully deliberate about her descent – it would be stupid to survive all that and then break her neck falling out of the tree – but she was trembling with her eagerness to be on the ground.
Her hands gripped the bottommost bough, she swung down, and her feet had touched. She took in with her impatient gaze Ayanokouji-kun cradling the unconscious, blessedly human-shaped Yamiko-sama – Ayanakouji-kun looked tiny holding her, like a child cradling her mother – but there was only one person Yumi was really looking for, and there she was, running to Yumi, her face gentle and happy in the moonlight, and Yumi ran to her, launching herself into her trembling, welcoming arms, and oh, everything was right again, everything… She felt Sachiko-sama's kiss on her forehead, and nothing else in the world mattered, for these few moments –
There was a rough, gasping cry behind her, like a bark. Yumi turned her head to look but leaving Sachiko-sama's arms was not an option; Yumi didn't want to, and Sachiko-sama plainly wouldn't allow it. Has she been fighting to reach me?... Yamiko-sama was sitting up. The moon, the real moon now, was reflected in her eyes, which were still the eyes of the monster cat, searching, finding Yumi, fixing on her emptily, hungrily. Her hands, almost claws, reached for Yumi. Ayanokouji-kun gripped Yamiko-sama's wrists desperately – she would obviously be borne down by Yamiko-sama's size and inhuman strength in another moment – except she said firmly into the empty face, "Yamiko-sama – Ren-sama is dead."
And the eyes were human, and wounded, and staring at this slip of a girl who was comically trying to hold her back from her prey. "Why, what would you know about it, girl? –"
"I dreamed it," said Ayanokouji-kun. "The whole thing."
Yamiko-sama went on staring at Ayanokouji-kun. "You dreamed –"
"You came back from hunting. You felt better than you'd felt in days. And you found Ren-sama lying ill on her pallet. She was too far gone to speak. You realized she was dying. You'd been wrapped up in yourself, gloomy, thinking about the past, no thought for the present, and she'd been sick and dying, and you hadn't known." Ayanokouji-kun's voice was a bit wobbly now. "You used all the magic you knew, but none of it helped. She died a little while later. You thought maybe she was aware that you were holding her, you thought maybe she squeezed your hand once, but you couldn't be sure. And then she was gone."
Yamiko-sama was crying now, and her head would move to one side – stop – move to the other – stop – "Don't –"
Ayanokouji-kun was crying too. "This ghost came to you several nights later, when you were half-asleep. You didn't understand – she didn't really explain – but you seized on this. Oh yes, of course, you thought, it was all a stupid dream. She's not really dead after all. But, Yamiko-sama, she is."
Ayanokouji-kun looked down, then looked up again. Yamiko-sama continued to stare at her, tears running down her empty face.
"And killing Yumi-san will not bring her back."
Leaves rustled in the breeze. A night bird cried out.
"What have I done?..." Yamiko-sama stood. She reached down, apparently without thinking about it, to help Ayanokouji-kun to her feet. She looked at Yumi, and at Sachiko-sama, shaking her head. "I'm sorry, so sorry…"
"It's all right, Yamiko-sama," Sachiko-sama said coolly. "As long as you're yourself again. But this isn't over yet. The imposter is still back there – and Sei-san is trying to deal with her –"
And, before Yumi knew it, they were all running back to the house.
Ren has never felt such hatred for anything as for this scarred, wicked, grinning face moving toward her, her golden-haired enemy. She doesn't think more hatred than this is possible; this hatred takes her through red rage and sick green loathing and out into a blue wintry silence where she thinks she need only reach down into snow and pull death into her fists, pack it tight, and hurl it at her enemy's heart –
"I know you," says her enemy.
And her hatred doubles, her old hatred of discarded lovers, of a past that could follow her, and wouldn't stay dead. You can't! she thinks into her enemy's head. Impossible! I was never there! She makes a wild slash at her enemy with the knife, and yelps as this horrible, horrible person catches her wrist with one hand and taps her elbow sharply with the other, making her drop her knife. Quick as a wink, the enemy's foot is over the blade, her grey eyes boring into Ren's. Ren backs away quickly, rubbing her arm.
"None of that, now," says the enemy, still with that grin. Advancing. Arm's length again –
Ren thinks, I have a friend in my hood.
And she thinks at her snake, Strike, and strike clean!
And, lunging from the hood of her cloak, the viper strikes –
I HATE YOU! Ren screams, at the same moment –
But before the YOU is even out of her mouth, she sees her viper dying a clacking-fanged, rolling-eyed death in her enemy's fist.
"Do you?" says her enemy, casually, holding the ghost's eyes in a gentle, smiling gaze, for all the world as if she weren't strangling a viper. "Well, I don't hate you. I don't hate wasps or spiders, either. Sometimes they have to be killed, that's all. You can't go out and hunt them all down – life isn't long enough, not even Yamiko-san's – but you can't share a tent with them either. A practical matter, you see." She flings the limp snake aside, and then her hand is on Ren's arm. Gripping it.
Ren struggles, twisting her arm, trying to get free of the enemy's grasp. Her hate is like a living thing, made cringing and hopeless by her enemy's declaration – I hate you! Why, O why don't you hate me? How have I failed you? – She raises her free hand, begins to conjure with it –
– but that hand is caught and twisted toward earth again by another strong grip. Ren swivels her head, her sanity stretched to the snapping point, and beholds a determined, pale, even face, with black hair cut above the shoulders.
You! Ren shrieks.
"What a pleasure to see you again," said Mizuno Youko. With a very small smile.
Yamiko burst in upon the garden, to see Ren being held fast, Satou-san on one arm and Mizuno-san on the other. Her drinking companions of the previous evening.
The ghost swiveled her head to look at her, and it was Ren. It was Ren. She glared at Yamiko. Where have you been! she howled. Kill them! Now!
Running back to the house, Yamiko had felt calm and crisp and strong. Stepping back into her own garden, the nimbus of the Ghost's influence oppressed her again like a heat wave. Yamiko felt herself ebbing, felt her powers being turned firmly away from her own disposition of them and moving again into someone else's. Change, the river of energy was urging her. Change, and attack.
She staggered. She couldn't move. It was suddenly all she could do to stand on two feet; the urge to drop down onto four was as pitiless and imperious as an ocean wave.
I'm all you have, the river said to her. The choice is a simple one: obedience, or loneliness, probably for the rest of your life. One simple chore to be done, and they're done, and we're happy again. Only obey. Obey, and save me.
And obedience was really all Yamiko had left.
Except… Kikuyo-chan's hand was on her arm.
Not pulling, or pushing. Only gently resting there. And the girl was looking at her with complete trust and confidence.
Sweet girl. Silly girl. No, not silly. Complicated. She'd been silly with wine last night, but now she was serious. She had dreamed Yamiko's reality somehow –
No. It wasn't real.
It was, though.
I'm still here!
Yamiko straightened up.
She took Kikuyo-chan's hand off her arm. As she did so, she squeezed it gently, and gave the girl the closest thing she could manage to a smile.
She stepped forward.
The trio had frozen.
Mizuno-san said, "Sei –"
Satou-san said, "Wait, Youko."
They were waiting for Yamiko. They looked at her expectantly. The Ghost was still too, but then made a massive effort to shake them off. They held firm, like steel, almost as if more than their own strength might be keeping their grips strong.
Please! The ghost thought into Yamiko's head, pleading with Ren's voice, Ren's face, Ren's tears. Please help me! I love you!
Yamiko shook her head. Her breath was coming short. But she spoke:
"You are not Ren."
I am all of Ren you will ever have!
"Ren is dead. You killed her, and absorbed her essence, which is why you seem so like her – why there actually seems to be something of her here, in the garden with me. What you have of her is truly her, and all that is left of her. But it doesn't belong to her anymore. It is… stolen property… and you neglected to absorb her principles along with it. Ren would never have asked me to murder guests, whatever the provocation. Would have been horrified at the mere suggestion. Would sooner have died herself.
"If I do as you say, I will be unworthy of Ren's love, forever." Yamiko felt the beast coming back, as she thought about this, and heard the hissing and the snarling under her voice. Can the others hear it? "And that is a sacrifice I will not make. Not even for Ren's love."
The Ghost looked at Yamiko in confusion and horror and pain. Ren's pain. I am hurting Ren, or all that remains of Ren. Yamiko shook her head again, and tears fell. She ignored them.
"I revoke my invitation," she said, harshly. "You are no longer welcome. Get out of my house!"
There was a moment when everything seemed quite still, and then a scream split the night and the Ghost changed, like that, her Ren-shape altogether gone – O goodbye, my love, goodbye – her black eyes now burning red, and the rest of her entirely tangled silver hair and ice-blue face, screaming and squirming, trying to get free, but she was in the grip of two powerful sorceresses, who had her by either hand.
And Satou-san spoke, words that seemed to soften sound and slow motion, as if all of nature had paused to listen:
"Whose is the name roared by the stones?
Who
is the dancer whose steps wake the earth?
Who will speak beginning at the end of all
things?"
The Ghost's scream rose in pitch until it was inaudible. The blue of her skin turned to grey, and shriveled.
Satou-san and Mizuno-san were falling back from each other, catching their balance. There was nothing on the grass between them besides a tattered grey robe, and some shiny bones, clattering, thudding, bouncing briefly, then lying still.
And that was the last anyone saw of the Blood-Drinking Ghost of Hieizan.
Or was it?
"Sachiko-sama," came a faint voice. "Please help me…"
Sachiko started, and dashed around the little group to where Shimako was kneeling over a supine figure. One of those cat-people Youko had seen earlier.
Youko looked down again at the bones, all that was left of a creature she had remembered and feared for three years now, feared more on Sei's account than her own. If it comes back, one of them is going to have to die, she had often reflected. All Nihon isn't big enough for the two of them. Now the meeting had finally happened, and Sei and Youko had both survived it. A burden had been lifted.
Youko looked up at Sei. "Well. Good morning," she said. It was difficult to know where to begin.
Sei turned and ran.
The unflappable Youko was momentarily flapped. She stood slightly open-mouthed, watching her friend as she ran over to where Sachiko was kneeling, hovering over her as she worked.
Sei cuts through these difficulties with such ease, she thought.
Youko looked down, and cast an appraising eye over the bones on the grass. She took out a large handkerchief. Wrapping it around her hand, she reached down and selected the jawbone of the ghost.
It turned in her hand, its pointy teeth trying to bite her.
Swallowing her revulsion, Youko firmly wrapped the twisting jawbone in the handkerchief, told it "Mind me, now," and stuffed it inside her robe. There was no further movement from it.
Then she went after Sei.
The garden door was open, and faces were peering out. There were many sleepy, confused voices, asking for explanations. There was a shortage of explanations, however. Even Yamiko-sama had none, and she lived here. Youko had never met Yamiko-sama before last night, and she had trouble interpreting Yamiko-san's haggard expressionlessness. Was she embarrassed, humiliated? She would certainly be grieving for poor Ren-san double, as if Ren-san had died twice, and her shame at having been taken in, having endangered her guests, must be terrible. But when she finally opened her mouth to speak, the plaintive question that emerged was "Where did all the bloody cat-girls come from?"
"They live with you," Yumi explained excitedly. "But they only become human – well, human-like – when you become a cat, and they stay human till morning, but you usually only become a cat when you're going out to hunt, and they either stay in the house, or they're just careful to stay away from you, because I don't know if you realize this, but you're a bit scary when you've transformed." Yumi seemed to realize she was talking too much, and stopped, and put a hand over her mouth. She looked down.
There was a pause.
"I see," Yamiko-sama said at last, with a very faint smile. "But what happened to this one?" she added, indicating the supine cat-girl Sachiko-sama was now ministering to. Shimako was sitting next to her, apparently exhausted.
"She took a knife-blow meant for me," Sei said, kneeling at the cat-girl's other side, across from Sachiko. "Sachiko, I don't like to rush you –"
"How are your energies?" Sachiko asked, in a clipped way.
Sei was clearly not offended; she knew Sachiko had a tendency to speak that way when she was preoccupied. "Not at the highest, but I think I could manage one more greater action –"
"Your hand, Sei," Sachiko said, reaching. She looked tired. "I only need a little more."
Sei gave Sachiko her hand immediately.
Minamoto Momoko-chan stood nearby with another cat-girl, a tallish one. "Is she going to be all right?" the cat-girl asked worriedly.
"Wait, Mizuki-chan –" Momoko-chan said.
The freezing tempest
Having rent the rice fields,
A warm rain
soothes them.
"Warmth is the problem," Sachiko went on, as if the poem had been ordinary conversation. "If she makes it till morning, she'll be all right. But feel her hand."
Sei did. "Like ice," she said wonderingly. "I wouldn't have thought a person that cold could still be..."
Sachiko nodded. "She must be kept absolutely warm and absolutely quiet." She looked around, at sleepy sorceresses and wondering cat-girls, and the general susurrus of conversation softened and stilled.
Youko smiled. "That's my girl," she murmured.
Katsuko was looking at Sei, who hadn't taken her hand away from Katsuko's yet.
Sei nodded, smiling back at her. "Leave it to me," she said.
With help from Sachiko, she lifted Katsuko in her arms. She carried her inside, past all the people looking on, to her own open bedroll. She laid Katsuko down on top of it, lay down next to her, and folded them both inside it.
"Satou-sama?" Katsuko said, in a softer voice than Sei had heard her use yet. Her eyes glowed huge in the dim light.
"Hush." Sei put her arms around Katsuko. It was like snuggling up to a block of ice, but Sei had once lived through a sojourn in a very cold place indeed, and she had both a sun and a moon inside her somewhere, and she simply called warmth out of herself, until it spread all through the bedroll, and the cold from Katsuko became less and less. Katsuko sighed. "Hush," Sei said again, pulling her closer. "Sleep. Sleep, and dream of basking in the sun."
"I am," was the slurred reply.
"Well, this is a to-do and no mistake," said Fujiwara-dono.
Youko managed not to jump. She was used to Fujiwara-dono turning up where and how she pleased, without reference to other people's notions of plausibility. She turned to face the Fujiweird. "A to-do, yes."
Fujiwara-dono smiled happily down at Youko. "You and Satou-san did a splendid job of vanquishing the creature, I must say."
"I think – that Sei must have done most of the work," Youko said. "We were under an enchanted sleep. Sei almost woke me, but I went back under – only I wasn't really asleep. It was like a dream, but –"
"I, also," Sachiko said unexpectedly. She stood with an arm around her Yumi, who leaned against her. Yumi's eyelids were drooping a little now. "Yumi was calling to me, and I was trying to answer, and I knew I was dreaming a kind of reality, but I couldn't waken from the false to the true." Sachiko glowered. "A most potent spell."
"Between them, Yumi-kun and Satou-san sorted things," Fujiwara-dono said. "It was touch-and-go there, for a bit – I wouldn't have said taunting Yamiko-san in her beast-form would be a wise move, but you did an excellent job of evading her grasp, young Yumi."
There was a pause. Yumi's eyes were wide open now; she was staring at Fujiwara-dono in wonder.
"How long have you been awake, Fujiwara-dono?" Youko asked, very calmly.
"Oh, quite some time now," Fujiwara-dono answered. "I would have intervened, had it looked like anyone needed it – almost did – but didn't, in the end. I will have to have a talk with Satou-san in the morning."
Youko was feeling distinctly ill-used – she wondered what Sei would think of this. She knew that Fujiwara-dono liked to let them handle things as much as possible, but this was absolutely –
"And with you, of course," Fujiwara-dono said, and Youko froze.
"With me?..."
"Yes. You and Satou-san had met that creature before, had you not, Mizuno-san?"
"Well... yes."
"And never saw fit to mention it to me?"
"Well... no."
Fujiwara-dono's eyes were very sharp on Youko's face. Youko stood tall, and met her gaze. It was the best way, she'd found.
"I won't chide you," Fujiwara-dono said, after another pause. "But I'll want to hear the whole story. Tomorrow," she repeated. "Yumi looks like she needs a little more sleep. I worry about her stamina."
Sachiko shook Yumi's shoulders gently once. "Yumi, shall we?"
"Just a moment, Mistress," Yumi said, rousing dutifully. She held out a hand.
Sorceresses stood fascinated, and cat-girls kept their distance, on their guards, hissing slightly, as Yumi's sake-creature sloshed toward her obediently. "Let's put you to bed in the kitchen," Yumi told it, in a sleepy voice. "Under the spigot of the cask. It would be a shame to waste good sake."
They walked and sloshed inside.
"What a considerate girl!" Fujiwara-dono said.
Smiling, Sachiko followed her imouto.
In the morning, Sei woke to find a warm, rather adorable calico cat lying curled against her chest, purring in its semidoze. She smiled, and kissed its head, and its ears twitched, and it purred louder.
"You dashed away awfully quickly last night," said a well-known voice.
Sei looked up from the calico surprise on her pillow to meet the eyes of her annoying, invaluable friend. "Nothing personal, my old fish."
Youko was kneeling by Sei's bedroll. She was not yet dressed for travel; she had apparently just risen herself. Around them, most of the party seemed to be still only stirring, not yet waking. Sei felt a warmth at her back, and realized that Shimako, though in her own bedroll, had snuggled up against her back in the night.
"She was probably feeling a bit neglected," Youko commented.
Sei could hear nothing worse than mild reproach in Youko's voice. But that meant nothing; Youko was awfully good at concealing. Too good for her own good, maybe; at times I think she even manages to hide herself from herself. "I wanted to see if there was anything I could do for my new young friend here." She put a hand on Katsuko's flank, and felt her pleased rumbling. "People have died for me ere this. I don't want it happening again if I can help it."
"I understand that." Youko tickled Katsuko between the ears. Katsuko stretched her neck a bit, purring even louder. "Though when you said that sometimes a girl has an obligation not to let people sleep alone, I assume you didn't mean this."
Sei smiled.
Youko hesitated, then said, "About Shiori –"
Sei sighed. "What about Shiori?"
"Well… if the Ghost, or whatever it really was, killed Ren, and became Ren –"
"I know."
Youko nodded. "You know."
"What else is there to say?" Sei was feeling the stirrings of anger. "We were pretty sure she was dead anyway, weren't we? She told you she was going to Yogawa. She never arrived; the head monk told us so. Remember?"
Youko had looked away. She was looking at Katsuko. It was easier to look at a cat, at such a time. Sei was in agreement with that. "I'm sorry, Sei…" Youko said miserably.
Sei shook her head, and touched Youko's hand. "Thank you, Youko."
Youko didn't say anything.
"Truly. Thank you for last time, and thank you for last night. I don't think I ever thanked you properly for last time."
Youko sighed a bit. "You saved my life then, too."
"After you'd got done putting it on the line for me. And I'd been a complete bitch to you, before. How do I apologize, how do I say thank you? –"
"You don't. I'll think you're going soft." Youko paused a moment, still only looking at the drowsy Katsuko. "Just don't leave, Sei. Don't leave the Guild. Stay with me – with us."
Sei went back to petting Katsuko. They were both petting Katsuko, and not looking at each other. Katsuko stretched her whole body and almost rowled with joy. She was warm and comfy, and two people were paying attention to her at the same time, and it was simply a perfect morning. "Oh, you know me, my Mizuno," Sei said, carefully flirtatious. "I'm a sorceress of the Guild now, like you, but I've never forgot my roots, and there's more than a suspicion of hedge wizard in my nature. I need freedom, but it's equally true to say I go where I'm sent. Any moment, I'll have moved along the hedge and disappeared behind the first cloud I see –"
"I know. I told you, I know. But if I have any say, it's for you to stay."
"I know. I told you," said Sei. "I may."
Youko made a disgusted little noise, and they went on petting Katsuko, who suddenly attacked them both, in the playfully non-injurious way of a domesticated cat, made a mad dash up the attic ladder, and disappeared behind the first roof-beam she saw.
Yamiko-san wasn't moving or speaking.
Fujiwara Akiko found this one-sided conversation to be difficult going. Everything she and Satou-san had said had been ignored.
Satou-san tried once more. "How could you have seen something like this coming, Yamiko-san?... You were confused, grieving. The thing moved in on you. She did the same to me. That seems to be how she operated. She wanted love, but didn't know how to spark it, make it grow from a seedling; all she could do was take a love that had already sprouted, and re-pot it to her own garden. Create weakness, and then use the weakness –"
Yamiko-san spoke at last: "I put you all in danger."
You didn't put me in danger, Akiko very nearly replied, but decided that wouldn't be helpful.
She and Satou-san looked at each other. They were in a fix. Akiko didn't want to leave Yamiko-san all alone to cope with a grief and shame of this size. But the expedition was forming up outside, and they were going to have to leave soon. Duty was overriding friendship, as it too often had –
Then someone was climbing the ladder. In a moment, Ayanokouji Kikuyo-kun's head appeared over the lip of the half-attic.
"Good morning, young blot," Satou-san said pleasantly.
"Good morning," Ayanokouji-kun said shortly. She was still climbing.
Akiko was pleasantly surprised – she was so seldom surprised by anyone or anything, and this was the first really remarkable thing Ayanokouji-kun had ever done, as far as she knew – but she was also faintly annoyed. "Ayanokouji-kun, perhaps it would be better if you waited outside. I'll only be a few more minutes."
Standing now by the ladder, Ayanokouji-kun bowed deeply. "I beg your pardon, Fujiwara-dono. I wish to make my farewell to Yamiko-sama."
Akiko thought a moment, and then gave a curt nod. She waited.
Ayanokouji-kun went and knelt at Yamiko-san's back.
"Yamiko-sama, for all my companions, I thank you, for shelter, warmth, and hospitality. We are grateful."
Yamiko-san's shoulders only hunched more.
Ayanokouji-kun's hands worked a bit in her lap. "And for myself, I thank you – for teaching me that I need to be stronger. I have my troubles – they have seemed almost too heavy for me to bear lately – but you have taught me that my troubles – are light, really. I can bear them. I can be – a better self. Whether I'll succeed, I don't know. But I look forward to trying. I would be proud if... if I could bear my troubles with even a fraction of the strength you showed us all last night."
Yamiko-san said nothing. But her back no longer had that don't-talk-to-me look.
"You look now... the way I felt yesterday, Yamiko-sama. Except you have much better cause. But I feel sure that you will find the strength to defeat even this sorrow. I feel sure that no trouble or pain can hold you down for long."
Then – another surprise for Akiko – Ayanokouji-kun leaned forward, put a hand on Yamiko-san's shoulder, and kissed her shaggy head, just above the ear.
Then she said, "I would like to come and see you again, if I may."
And she stood, and walked back to the ladder. With wonder, Akiko watched her, and saw tears in her averted eyes.
When the girl had disappeared down the ladder, Akiko looked at Satou-san, who was still looking at the ladder with an enigmatic smile on her face. Then Akiko looked back at Yamiko-san and found her still faced away but sitting up, her forearms resting on her knees, her head slowly shaking from side to side.
"Yes," Akiko said. "I think that's more or less what I was trying to say. I couldn't have said it with Ayanokouji-kun's moral force, of course."
Yamiko-san chuckled.
Very dry. But an indubitable chuckle.
On the porch, Momoko was sitting with a familiar-looking strong, glossy black cat in her lap. Momoko was crying, and the cat was comforting her, purring, kissing, clowning for her a bit. Momoko stroked the cat. Occasionally she would just stop and hug the cat to herself. The cat would endure this for a bit, and then start nipping playfully and tumbling again, making Momoko giggle through her tears. Her friends Madoka and Yuko stood nearby, shuffling from foot to foot and whispering to one another. There was something about this situation they plainly found a bit unorthodox, but Momoko was their friend, and they were waiting, patiently, for an explanation. Momoko's mistress sat nearby with her arms folded, staring straight at nothing.
Nearby, the Mountain Lily Gang and affiliates stood together, comparing notes, catching up. Rei-sama, Eriko-sama, Noriko-san, Touko-san and Rikki-san had all managed to sleep through just about everything, and they had been a bit annoyed, their annoyance only fading as they were brought up to date.
"One thing I'm wondering about," Sei-sama said. "You told us, Yumi, that you frightened Katsuko off, when you were escaping from Sachiko's bedroll. She doesn't strike me as the sort who's easily scared. What did you do?"
"Well, I sort of..." Yumi was worried. Should she try to recreate that moment? What if she scared everybody? What if she made Sachiko-sama angry?...
"Well, after that pause, you have to tell us," Eriko-sama said. "What did you do, Yumi-chan?"
"Er..."
"Yumi?" Mizuno-sama said, in a gentle but insistent voice.
They were all looking at her expectantly, even leaning toward her a little.
Yumi hesitated only another moment, then put up her paws, made claws of them, and said "Hisssss!"
It was, indeed, a nasty shock for everybody. Rei-sama nearly fell down. Noriko-san, holding Rei-sama's arm, had better control, but there was a dazed grin on her face. Touko-san and Rikki-san simply stared at Yumi, the former thunderstruck, almost angry, and the latter just bewildered. Mizuno-sama and Eriko-sama, for their part, had lost all composure; they leaned on one another, helpless with laughter.
"Cute!" Eriko-sama gasped. "Yumi-chan, you're cute!"
"I nearly wet myself," Sei-sama complained. "Please give fair warning before you do something like that, O scourge of cats." She was grinning as she said it, though.
Yumi was confused, and a bit annoyed. Was it scarier if you weren't expecting it? She turned to Sachiko-sama, and found her with a hand over her mouth, and an arm wrapped around her midsection, as if she were trying to suppress her laughter, or imprison it.
"Mistress, not you too!"
Kikuyo stepped off the porch, smiling wanly at Momoko and her furry friend as she passed them. She spotted a familiar figure down by the boulder. She hesitated, but then strolled down to meet her.
Bunko-sama seemed to be contemplating something inside of her, but she looked up as her soror mystica approached. "Hello, my stranger."
"Good morning, Mistress," Kikuyo said. She stood submissive, waiting for a rebuke.
But then, Mistress's hand was on her shoulder. "Don't stand there looking like I'm about to hit you," she said. "You make me feel a complete monster."
"I'm sorry, Mistress. I am... sorry. About everything."
A faint smile. "I'm not angry, Kikuyo. I was more concerned than anything. Something's been troubling you, and you haven't been talking about it."
"I will tell you, Mistress. Just..." Kikuyo didn't know how to ask.
"You need more time?"
"Yes, Mistress."
"Well, we have that, haven't we?" Mistress offered a hand.
Kikuyo took it, feeling very unworthy.
At last, Fujiwara Akiko appeared on the porch.
Everyone was formed up, waiting for her. Looking at her.
She said to them, "Do you see? All we did was stop for the night at a friend's house. Anything can happen, my little sponges, absolutely anything."
"Will there be another drill today, Fujiwara-dono?" said one voice.
"That would be telling, wouldn't it?"
There were general sounds of disappointment, discouragement, and disunion as Fujiwara-dono stepped off the porch. "But Fujiwara-dono –" "We had a drill yesterday, and then the blood-drinking ghost last night –" Can't we have a little break?"
"It doesn't work that way," she said loudly, but patiently, walking down the mountain in the morning light. "Demons, monsters and blood-drinking ghosts don't care how tired you are, or when your last drill was. And a drill isn't really a drill if you know when it's coming, is it?" There were clever ripostes to this, and not-so-clever ripostes, and a gentle hum of conversation as the sorceresses moved on down the mountain, away at last from their home ground, conifers giving way to leafy trees as the land began to level off below them, as they moved on toward the shores of Lake Biwa, and away into the wilderness...
(...to be continued...)
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