The True Confessions of a Nine-Tailed Fox

Chapter 115: My (Or, Rather, the Kitchen God's) Head Temple

Camphorus Unus, Lord of the First Camphor Tree and Hereditary Steward to the Earls of Black Crag, was having a ghastly day.

The sort of ghastly day that he had once – oh, youthful innocence! – associated with watching typhoons wreck his forest, uprooting the young camphor laurels under his and his brothers' protection.

The sort of ghastly day that began with his fretting over an emerging leaf-wilt epidemic, and that ended with soldiers threatening to murder his grove. Camphor, which had always been prized for its uses in medicines and perfumes and insect repellents, could only be extracted by brutally chopping the wood into chips and then steaming them and finally condensing the vapors to crystallize the substance. This forest of camphor laurels had been planted long, long ago at Imperial behest and placed under the Camphorus Brothers' stewardship, and even after the Empire collapsed, they'd retained their position under the new petty monarchs.

Until the day that Black Crag forces overwhelmed the Camphorus Brothers' mosquito spirit guards and surrounded their trees with axes raised. The Earl at the time (not the current one, who was his many-times-great-grandson) had spared the brothers' lives after they surrendered. But he had evicted them from their grove, which was another form of death for tree spirits. Weakened by their exile, they had served in his household for a time, defending it against insects, both spirit and normal, and maintaining his castles. Over the centuries, his brothers had been gifted to or lured away by allied Houses one by one, until only Camphorus Unus remained.

It wasn't a bad life for a tree spirit who'd been cut off from his own tree and his own land. The pain and homesickness had faded, like a cut that scabbed over with resin and wore down in the wind and the rain. He performed his job efficiently and loyally, and if, from time to time, a member of the Black Crag line threatened in a fit of rage to chop down his tree, none of them ever meant it seriously, not even the current Earl. Camphorus Unus had never again faced a threat to his immortal existence.

Until today.

This ghastly day, that began with his exterminating a termite colony in the rafters of His Grace's Goldhill mansion, and that ended with the Queen's favorite barging in unannounced, alongside a horse spirit, a bamboo viper spirit, and a Northern mage, to demand –

"The keys, Unus, the keys! My dear steward, I don't have all day!"

Camphorus Unus was feeling distinctly put upon. "Of course, my lady. I am always happy to be of assistance. But as you can see, this mansion is no fit state for a visit from such an exalted personage as yourself." Under his stewardship, it was, of course, fit to host the Queen herself on a moment's notice, but Camphorus Unus was stalling for time.

The current Earl was young and headstrong and had landed himself in the political equivalent of a firestorm. (Camphorus Unus had warned him not to tangle with tree spirits, but been laughed out of the room.) In the aftermath, Queen Jullia, who was even younger and even more headstrong, had sent the Earl home to the Black Crag fief. It was only a matter of time before cooler heads prevailed upon the two to reconcile, though. Everyone knew that.

So why was his master's niece's pet raccoon dog spirit here, demanding that he turn over the keys to the mansion?

He had to tread carefully. On the one hand, he couldn't disobey the monarch, but on the other, his master was in close physical proximity to his tree.

Spreading his hands in a calming gesture, like branches that shaded picnickers from the midsummer sun, he said, "If you might return a few days hence, I shall arrange for all the necessary preparations – "