助けることは助けにはならない
Pai.
She continued walking through the halls, ducking and weaving past the attendants and other visitors rushing through the Palace. It was early morning, around half past six, but there were still a number of people going about their business, men and women of all ages dressed in traditional Japanese wear that she'd noticed were mostly worn inside the Palace.
She wondered why that seemed to be the norm, here. Everyone wore clothes that were worn in the Edo Period, or the Meiji Era. Some wore normal modern outfits, but the overwhelming majority dressed like they were still in the past.
She, on the other hand, had abandoned her homongi, leaving it in her room and choosing to wear normal street clothes. An old pair of jeans torn a bit at the thighs, her favourite dying sneakers, and a baggy maroon t-shirt. People only glanced at her as she passed by, too quickly for them to bother saying anything as they went about their way.
Pai.
She pursed her lips, clenching her jaw as she veered right , into a quiet corridor that only went on for a few feet before coming to an end at a wall with small, rectangular windows all over it. The glass was clear, offering perfect view to the outside world. She walked to the end of the corridor, glancing out down to the bustling activity of the Palace below through the curve of the windows.
The sun was rising over the wall around the Palace, bringing with it the light of day. It was early but already people in the village were awake, or waking up, bustling about on their business as people opened up their shops and the like, or helped take down the multitude of decorations hanging all over the place from the festival. Now that the signing of the Treaties was over, all the other Ayakashi were preparing to go back to their homes.
Do not pretend you cannot hear us.
She turned left and quietly slid the door open, noting that LADIES sign on the front. She couldn't help slamming the door shut, then stalked to the row of five white marble sinks by the mirrors. She glanced behind her to the five toilet stalls, but the doors were all open. No one was in the bathroom with her.
She lifted her blank gaze up to her reflection in the mirrors. She didn't recognize herself.
Her hair, black, beginning to go white at the roots, was pulled into a messy ponytail swinging from the top of her head. Her eyes were lined in pink, painful to look at. Her skin was paler than she could ever remember, made all the more obvious from the dark shirt she wore. Black shadows smudged under her eyes. She wondered if the paleness was from lack of sleep, or from the ice settled in her stomach, in her chest, in her head.
"What do you want?" she asked in a flat, monotone voice.
She didn't recognize herself in the mirror, but she knew that voice; it was the voice that belonged to the that Pai, the one who killed and drove herself to near insanity by choosing to remember the faces and names of everyone one of her victims because there was no one else to. She wondered if the line between herself and that Pai was blurring so that they would become one. She wondered what she would do when that happened.
But now, she couldn't bring herself to care.
It does not matter what we want. Kuniumi mused.
The sound of a ticking clock echoed in her head. It grew, steadily, endlessly, louder, so loud that she wanted to lift her hands and press them to her ears in an effort to ignore the grating sound. She made no such move and remained staring emptily at the vacuous expression on her face through the mirror.
Her gaze shot to the right when shadows and light bent together, distorting, warping reality for a split-second. Midori stepped forward from the shadows that righted themselves behind her. She was dressed in Agent's uniform. Her lips were painted blood red. Moving in the groves and dips of the black uniform were skulls, gaping toothed skulls that moaned in silent pain and begged reprieve from their enduring grief.
She remembered them. They made the black fabric of the furisode Kuniumi wore the first time she appeared before Pai, clothed in Midori's skin. That day, the long sleeves of the furisode had bound Kuniumi's arms together.
Now she was free.
"Don't do that," she whispered hoarsely. She sounded bruised. Broken. "Don't look like my sister."
"Why?" Kuniumi asked, unfeigned wonder painting her words. "You know what she did. You saw it. You remember it. Why do you still love her so?"
Her lips twisted as she remembered, through the murky sight of her dream, looking at the guilt-stricken face of her big sister as her eyes slid away from Pai's every time she looked at her.
"How do I know you didn't make me see that?"
Kuniumi made no move to change her appearance, only tilting her head to the side, green eyes sparking in cruel mockery. Invisible hands undid the neat topknot her hair was in. It fell in a long cascade of luxurious coal-black curls that tumbled down her slender shoulders to brush the floor.
Midori did not have long hair. She never had. She hated it, always complaining that it got in the way of her doing anything. Midori would never have allowed her hair to get so long without promptly chopping the locks off.
It only served to remind her that, no matter how much she wished otherwise, this was not Midori. From the dream – the memory – of walking in on Midori and Rikuto talking in that corridor, she was no longer sure if she truly wanted to see her sister again.
She wasn't sure what she would do if she did. She wasn't sure she wouldn't put her unwanted skills to good use and kill her. She didn't know what she would let Kuniumi do, either.
"We said we are sorry that we left you alone. We had to. We almost lost control. If we didn't leave, we would have hurt you. We promised we wouldn't hurt you, sweet Bibari."
"I don't care. I don't care if you stay or go."
Closing her eyes as she fought off the exhaustion that wanted her to succumb to blissful slumber, she retreated to lean back against the door of one of the toilet stalls. She opened her eyes again, to see the long-haired Midori still standing in the mirror and watching her with cat-like curiosity. Her gaze flicked to the side and saw nothing there, but this mirage of Midori wasn't real. It was just Kuniumi, clothed in Midori, only seen through reflective surfaces.
She wasn't real, yet she was.
"It doesn't matter," she continued. "You can do whatever you want to."
Midori in the mirror turned her head, watching her with eyes that melted to black. She didn't look like she much believed in Pai's words. "What do you care about, then? What do you care about that you try to kill your emotions now because you're so scared of what that caring can do to you, how it can hurt you?"
Her lips twitched. Of course Kuniumi would know the reason behind the lack of any true feeling behind Pai's words. She was in Pai's head. Of course she'd know.
"Why? Why shouldn't I be afraid when Shinigami told me I'm dying?"
Midori – Kuniumi – shook her head. "Oh, but what a reprieve it would be for you, after all you have been through. There is nothing to fear in death, and you know that." She smirked. "But that is not why you are so scared."
She curled her lips, closed her eyes, and forced the lid back on the bottle holding her raging emotions in. "Shut up."
"You are scared because of what is happening to Shin."
"I said," she pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes. "Shut up."
"You're scared because Shin is losing control of himself. You blame yourself for what is happening to him, and that is why you are going to speak to the one man, the only man, capable of helping him."
She snapped.
"Shut up!"
She didn't know what happened, or how. A loud, piercing crack cut through her shout and had her jumping out of her skin with fright, lifting her hands to her ears as a high-pitched siren's scream threatened to break her skull. Then, just as suddenly as the sounds had come, there was total silence. It sucked her into a void of rolling nausea and she swallowed down the bile coating the back of her throat.
Slowly, she lifted her head and gaped at the mirror in front of her.
A thin, hair-line fracture splintered the mirror in two perfect halves. The crack ran right down the middle, and her reflection in the mirror split her in two shocked pieces that stared back at her.
As she watched, the half on her left stepped back from the mirror, even though she was frozen to the spot. In the mirror, her hands slowly lowered from clutching the sides of her head as she stared at the errant half of her that was smirking coyly at her.
"You did that," it spoke. "Not us. You."
She shook her head in disbelief, stumbling back against the door behind her. No. No. There was no way.
This was like last time at the pawn shop, when they'd gone to visit Shiharu's grave. Kuniumi made her imagine that she broke the mirror...or maybe she really had and Kuniumi had somehow warped everything so that the mirror wasn't broken anymore.
It was Kuniumi doing this now. Pai hadn't even been near the mirror. Not close enough to break it in half like that, not close enough. She couldn't believe it. She didn't want to.
"I didn't."
The other Pai smiled sadistically, pleased. "You did."
"I did not!"
Kuniumi's laugh bounced off the walls of the bathroom. It was merry, edged with a snide cruelty that had her head jerking up, cursing herself for allowing Kuniumi to bait her like that. Midori was no longer standing in the mirror, but she knew that Kuniumi was still there. She could feel her stirring restlessly, wanting something to happen that she wouldn't voice aloud, wanting someone she wouldn't name.
Didn't you make a promise to Shin? Kuniumi asked.
She flinched at the memory of facing Shin yesterday, her fingers crossed behind her back in a weak, childish attempt to ward off the promise she made to him.
But that does not matter to you, does it? Not when you think Kagetora can help him. No promise matters more than a life.
She swallowed thickly as she finally let herself give in to the exhaustion sweeping through her in waves. She dropped to her knees, legs folded out on either side of her as she rested her hands limply in her lap. She stared at them blearily, a haze of hot tears clouding her vision. The lid was barely on anymore, and she didn't know how to put it back over the bottle.
Strangely, her voice managed to retain its monotonous quality. "What am I supposed to do?" her fingers twitched weakly when she tried to move them. She failed. She was failing in everything. "What do I do? Shin, he – he's suffering because of me. He won't show it, but I can see it. What am I supposed to do? How can I help him?"
Kuniumi chuckled mirthlessly. Do you really think you can help him? You are too weak as you are to be of any use to anyone. Isn't that why you are going to Kagetora? He's stronger than you.
She winced at the brutal truth. She knew Kuniumi was right. What could she do? She, a mere human. She had no idea about the existence of Makashi until Kouta and Haru explained what they were to her only a scant few months ago. She didn't know just how bad of a position Shin was in with his Mask losing its power – she didn't know how much of his pain he was keeping hidden from those around him.
But Kuniumi was right about the rest of it, too. It was why Pai was wandering the Palace instead of packing her bags to leave with everyone else back to Sapporo that afternoon. If she couldn't help Shin, she would find someone who could. There had to be Hengen who lived without their Masks. There were over twenty million Ayakashi living in Japan. Kouta said that Masks were made for them – but there had to be those who didn't have Masks, or survived without them. If one of them could teach Shin how to live without it, he had a chance to remain who he was.
The best person she could think of was Kagetora. The only person she could think of was Kagetora.
No matter how much she tried not to the whole of last night, she couldn't tear her thoughts away from him. At first she thought it was because she'd come face to face with the King of the Kitsune. The man who'd saved the Tengu nine years ago by killing the Ueno's without a thought, a ninetails with powers she couldn't even begin to fathom.
She thought that maybe it was because of the nostalgic pull that tugged at her heart every time she recalled his strange eyes, the mocking smirk that made him look like he knew more than everyone around him. But that wasn't it.
Kagetora was a ninetails. Kanou once said that ninetails had incredible powers that strayed into the realm of fantasy – and they were old. It took Kitsune a hundred years to gain one tail. Kyubi no Kitsune had nine. That made him, at the very least, nine hundred years old. The sheer number stunned her when she thought of it, but she focused on the more important issue at hand, using the logical mind she prided in to find a way to fix the mess she'd made.
"He is almost a thousand years old. If he's been alive that long, he must know of a way to help Shin. He could sense the Mask weakening, he said so himself." She mumbled, remembering the way Kagetora looked at her after he'd taunted Shin with the knowledge he had of Shinigami breaking through the failing Mask.
So tame, a thousand, Kuniumi chuckled to herself, like she was thinking of some private joke. Oh, he most definitely does know.
She frowned. "How do you – never mind." Kuniumi always seemed to know things. It was useless to ask her how because she simply deflected the question every single time.
The problem with your poorly thought out plan is Shin. He loathes Kagetora.
She tipped her head back on the door behind her, looking up at the cracks in the wood of the ceiling above her. "I know."
It is a deep-seated hatred that can consume him if he's not careful with it. So far he has been. You going to Kagetora behind his back might tip him over the edge.
She gulped, nervous at Kuniumi's words. "Why? Why does he hate Kagetora so much? Is it because of what happened nine years ago?"
That, and that Kagetora chose to keep himself out of something that would have otherwise changed the passing of certain events. Little does Shin know that Kagetora did it to prevent a worse future. He would not take it too kindly if you went to Kagetora after you promised you wouldn't.
"I know that. But I'd rather he hates me than lose himself."
Shin could never hate you, even if he tried. Her voice was sad. And he won't.
Again, that horrible, aching grief that opened a hole in her chest washed over her. Her breath caught as she squeezed her eyes shut, trying to push the heavy weight of it off her. It wasn't her sadness – it was Kuniumi's. She had enough to deal with on her own. She did not need the added emotional pain of Kuniumi's, and she didn't want it. She wouldn't let herself be overcome with it.
A second later it vanished and the mad Kuniumi returned with a gleeful laugh that scraped at her nerves.
You are lucky. If we had that, maybe we wouldn't be here now.
"What do you mean?"
Want us to help?
She blinked. It was difficult to keep up with and follow Kuniumi's wayward train of thought that shot from one thing to the next in seconds. "What?"
Do you want to find Kagetora?
She hesitated. "You know where he is?"
We can find him.
"How?"
Because Touka always could.
Her lips twitched. "Will you tell me? How they're connected? Your Touka, and him?"
'Our' Touka, Kuniumi snickered. She's not ours. She's his. He's hers. Separated by time by fate by death by life yet they always will they be each other's more than.
"Will you tell me?"
No. That is not our story to tell.
Her curiosity burned, wanting to know who Touka was, how Kagetora was connected to her, why Kuniumi was obsessed with them. She wanted to know how it had anything to do with her, if it did at all.
But she had more important things to concern herself with. Whatever that story was, it was the past. She didn't have time to worry about something that already happened. She needed to think about what was going to happen.
She pursed her lips in a fine line. "Tell me where Kagetora is."
×
She found him in the village, by a big stall attached to a house on the street with a portly, red-cheeked woman selling a variety of fruits. Kuniumi's guidance led her to him faster than if she went with her original plan of wandering the Palace grounds until she came across him.
She'd caught stolen glimpses of the other Kings in the Palace, recognizable from their private guards escorting them everywhere, and their far more elaborate clothing. She wondered why Kagetora went about his merry way without guards the other Kings had, and chose to dress more simply than his counterparts. She wondered if it was confidence in his own skills to protect himself, or if he was just arrogant enough to think that no one would dare attack him. Admittedly, the latter wasn't entirely wrong.
Who would be stupid enough to bait the fox fire of a King?
The only sign of his reaction to seeing her standing before him as he turned around, just about to bite into a pear he'd bought, was a raising of one brow. She couldn't tell if he was surprised to see her or if he had been expecting her all along. From the way his red eyes flickered when they landed on her standing with her arms held stiff at her side, she decided that he may have known she was coming.
For a moment she had no idea what to do. She didn't know if she should bow before him or say something customary out of respect. Even though she lived in Ayashi House, she didn't know anything about the rules and laws that governed the Ayakashi world. What she knew was only a bare fraction. Her gut instinct told her that if she ever found herself forced to survive, alone and without guidance in the supernatural world, she wouldn't make it for very long.
He chuckled as he lowered the pear from lips that curved up in a sardonic smile. "Well, well. Isn't this a lovely surprise?"
She didn't respond, more because she didn't know what to say than anything else.
He wiped the smile from his face, but looked no less like he was in a joking mood for it. "Didn't you promise Shin to never approach the tyrannical me?"
He has a heightened sense of hearing. All Hengen do. Of course he heard us. What disconcerted her was that Kagetora hadn't been around anymore when she made that 'promise'. How far did Hengen need to be to hear something said?
"I had my fingers crossed."
Kagetora laughed aloud, drawing glances from the men and women – especially the women, always attracted to physical beauty – around them. He threw the pear up in the air before quickly snatching it up again, without taking his eyes from her. "Even orphaned Tengu seem to hold themselves to a higher integrity nowadays, do they? No matter how false such moral soundness may be."
Why does he answer every question with another twisted question?
He's Kitsune. They invented the term 'silver-tongued'. She rolled her shoulder when she felt an ice cold hand land on it. The invisible hand tightened for a brief instant before falling away. Shiori's noticed that about you. Your particular way with words. Much like Kitsune, wouldn't you say?
She had the disturbing feeling that Kuniumi was trying to tell her something with her confusing riddles. But she didn't have time to think about what Kuniumi was saying, or about herself. She was here to find out one thing and there was absolutely no point in wasting time.
"I need to speak to you about something."
He cocked his head to the side. "Dear me. Sounds serious." He leaned forward, slowing when she froze at his movement. His lips curved in an amused smile at her reaction, his breath whispering over her cheek as he murmured, "Sweet ladies like you needn't be so serious all the time. Terribly unattractive, don't you think?"
She was unable to say a word as she stood still as an ice sculpture, expression frozen in a blank slate. He finally leaned back after another long second, watching her inquisitively.
"I do not care about that." She finally managed.
Kagetora lifted the pear in his hand again and bit into it. He closed his eyes for a moment, almost as if in ecstasy of the delectable taste of the fruit, before opening them again. He extended the pear to her in offering.
With a frown, she shook her head. Daichi once warned her that Hengen could enthral humans with their saliva. It wasn't something she'd thought she needed to know, really, and he'd been fairly awkward about it when he told her, but she was glad she did anyway.
"Your loss. The food here is quite, quite scrumptious." He shook his head as he took another bite out of the pear. "Now do tell, dear Pai. What is it you care about so much you would seek me out?"
She faltered. Hesitation stopped her from opening her mouth to speak when she would have done. She remembered the hostility coming off Shin in waves as he stood before Kagetora, the steel grip of his hand around her wrist, as if he'd been afraid to let go of her. She remembered the angry blaze in his eyes, eyes that were his and Shinigami's at the same time. She remembered how scared she'd been at how Shinigami had looked at her in the Torimaku, in Shin's room; with such anger, such loathing.
Recalling all that, she dragged in a deep, cold breath and fixed her eyes on Kagetora. "I need to ask you something."
He cocked his head to the side. "Ask me something, or ask something of me?"
Both? It's both.
"That depends on what you say."
"What makes you think I'll say anything?"
Anxiousness traipsed out a drumming routine in her chest. "I am hoping you will."
"Hm." He mused. "You are either foolishly naïve, or incredibly desperate."
You're a bit of both.
And, for once, she thought back scathingly. We're in agreement.
"Will you listen to me?"
Kagetora grinned sharply at her. He turned, holding out his hand behind him. With a slight frown, she walked ahead of him, assuming that he was willing to hear her out. Her heart thumped wildly in her chest as he took up a steady pace she could easily keep up with as he continued eating through his pear.
They walked in silence for a minute longer. She glanced up at him when he threw the skeletal pear into a dustbin by a stall still being taken down from the previous day's festivities. Blinking, she realized that she recognized this street. It was the one Kobayashi Health stood on, and just above the clinic was Daichi's family home.
What if someone who knew what she looked like saw her walking with Kagetora and told Daichi? And Daichi told Shin?
A group of children – four Tengu, little black wings fluttering excitedly at their backs – ran past them. They were screeching in laughter, running circles around each other, having all the fun in their little world. She was glad to see that none of them were Daichi's nephew. Daichi would know then, that she'd been talking to the Kitsune King. He'd want to know why.
She moved to the side, away from Kagetora, when the children barrelled past, and re-joined him as she jumped back from almost knocking into a ladder at her back. She glanced behind her and saw the wooden ladder pushed up close to the front of a tall wooden house with a huge, leafless tree at its side. Up at the top was a man taking down decorative lights.
"I daresay we can speak aloud, can we not?" he asked mildly, bringing her attention back to the present. "Or is this so sensitive a matter that it requires more shadowy quarters to conduct?"
For your own mind's safety, stay out in the open. He is the same, but he has changed too much in how he stays the same. We don't know what he might be driven to do if he sees you as weak.
She blinked in surprise at Kuniumi's sagely word of advice. Kuniumi rarely said anything useful. That she did now without teasing meant she was deadly serious. Pai looked down at her feet, wondering what it meant that Kuniumi had – at least temporarily – abandoned her cruel taunts.
Doesn't he already think I'm weak?
Do not underestimate your own strength, dear Bibari. Your soul shines through your face. It is what makes you beautiful, and what shows people the strength in you – even if you are weaker now than you were then.
Swallowing down the nauseating anxiety tightening in her stomach, she steeled her nerves and asked, "Yesterday. Last night. Do you remember – what you said to Shin-san?"
Just saying his name only served to remind her of the terrible weight of guilt sitting on her shoulders from what she was doing. She'd made a promise to him and now she was breaking it. She was doing it for his sake but that didn't change the fact of the matter. She was betraying him.
She could only hope that he could find a way to forgive her. She'd said that she would rather he hate her than be dead, and it was true, but she didn't want him to hate her.
Kagetora glanced down at her, but she remained stoically watching her sneakered feet. "If I were any lesser man, I'd be insulted with your belief that my memory would be so...perfidious."
She peeked up at him at that, finding his words hitting too close to him, but he'd already looked away.
"Since I'm in a charitable mood, the answer to your question is yes. I do remember what I said. And Shin's frankly affronting insinuation that I'd eat you." He wrinkled his nose in distaste. "I'm vegetarian."
Her lips twitched as she bit the inside of her cheek. Ridiculous as it was considering the situation, she couldn't help finding his reaction funny. Of all things for him to take offence at, Shin's meaningless jibe at his dietary choices wasn't what she'd expected to rub off on him.
"Then you know what is happening to him?"
She saw the edge of his sharp smirk at that. "A double-edged sword, having a Makashi such as his. In battle it aids him, and in a somewhat normal life," Kagetora looked from the corner of his eyes. "It keeps him from chasing after that elusive thing people call 'happiness'."
She halted.
Kagetora walked on a few steps before turning back, sticking his hands in the pockets of his jeans as he balanced back on the heels of his boots before standing straight again. Her gaze was fixed on the ground as her lips moved soundlessly, shaping words that she was finding hard to voice.
She was stupid. It was obvious to her why she was here; she just hadn't realized it would be so painfully obvious to him as well.
"You're going to have to speak up, darling. I may have good hearing, but one can't exactly hear what isn't said. Unless you're psychic. That's an entirely different story, isn't it?"
She pursed her lips a moment. Then she looked up, a scowl pulling her brows low. "You already know."
He cocked an eyebrow. "Know what?"
"You know why I am here."
Kagetora didn't say anything. For a second, he simply looked at her, his eyes flitting from hers to the top of her head, her shoulders, her feet. When he brought his eyes back to hers, they seemed to glow as he took two long-legged steps closer.
She stiffened at his proximity, but she didn't move away when he bent his knees slightly so that his eyes were level with hers. The thought that he might try to enthral her crossed her mind, but she wasn't too concerned about that. She had Daichi's ring nestled comfortably on her finger. She still wore her pendant around her neck. She was safe from enthralment.
Or so she desperately hoped.
"I want you to say it." His tongue flicked out to lick his lips. She wondered if he was lying about being vegetarian. "I want you to tell me in your own words, with your own will, why you have come to me."
Still the same as ever.
Her lips twitched in irritation as she tried not to let her lips curl. This reaction, the strength of her annoyance at him, it wasn't hers. It was Kuniumi's. She knew how to tell the difference between her own emotions and Kuniumi's, but it scared her how close the two's feelings and thoughts could run together.
She stepped away from Kagetora. He leaned back as he continued to watch her with idle curiosity as her gaze jumped from stall to stall, person to person, Ayakashi to Ayakashi. When she looked back at him, she'd brought herself – Kuniumi – back under control.
"I want to ask you something."
"As you have already made abundantly clear."
She bit the inside of her cheek again, rotating the ring on her forefinger with her thumb. "I want to ask you if you know of anything that can be done."
"Be done about what, dear Pai?"
Why does he want me to say it?
She shifted uncomfortably, her heart clenching into a snowball in her chest. She shook her head. She ran her tongue over her upper teeth as she tried not to close her eyes when she finally managed to drum up some of the last bits of strength left in her.
"I want to ask you if you know of anything that can be done to help him."
He didn't say anything for a few seconds, choosing to simply watch her as if she was a lab specimen deviating from the norm. Maybe he thought she wouldn't say it. Maybe he thought she would change her mind and walk away.
She wanted to – she wanted to walk away from him, to stop herself from betraying Shin's trust in the promise she'd made not to go near Kagetora. But she'd already done it; she'd said the words out loud and she couldn't snatch them and stuff them back where they'd come from.
Shinigami was breaking through the Mask. What choice did she have?
"Why do you think he needs to be helped?" he asked, genuine curiosity colouring his words. "All that is happening is that Shin's simply returning to his original state. Is it for your own self-preservation that you want to do this?"
She blinked, indignation flaring and shoving aside the alarm that flashed at how could he know that Shinigami meant her harm. "I'm not – I am not asking this because of myself. I want to help him."
"And what if I do?" he tilted his head to the side, a crude smirk kicking the corners of his lips up in wild amusement at the reaction he brought out in her. "If you knew what would happen to you once Shin is able to control his Makashi, would you still want to 'help' him?"
Without hesitation she said, "Always."
"You don't even know what will happen."
And you do?
"It does not matter." Not after everything Shin had already been put through after saving her life. The least she could do was return the favour by saving his. It was all she could do, all she could think of, in her limited capacity as a human.
He watched her the way a hawk would a mouse. Like prey. "Even with your own life at risk."
"Even then."
Chuckling, Kagetora shook his head as he spun round on the heel of his foot and resumed walking again, not bothering to check if she was following. After a moment of gathering herself, forcing her turbulent emotions down and rebuilding the ice walls around her heart, she hurried after him.
"You're a fascinating one, you know that" he mused. "Anyone can say they're willing to risk their lives for those they care about. Not many can actually carry out the deed. It calls for too much sacrifice on their part. So, which are you?"
She glanced up at him, but he was tilting his head back to look up at a young Tengu boy flying above their heads, untangling a banner that stretched from being tied around the pole of a house on one side of the street all the way to the other.
She looked away from him, mulling over his words. He was right, and she wanted to say that she was the type who would risk her life for others. But then she thought about it. In her dreams, her memories, she killed so many people. Why?
She knew that deep down inside, at least before she went missing, she wasn't a killer. So why had she been so willing – so able – to kill those people under the orders of some shadowy organization she still wasn't entirely sure actually existed?
At that moment she didn't know if she was the type of person who could risk her life for someone else...or if she was the type of person who'd end other people's lives to protect herself. Because despite everything the dreams had shown her, she didn't know why she'd killed those people. Deep down, at least before she went missing, she knew she wasn't a killer. So what was it that she sacrificed her humanity for that drove her to murder people without hesitation?
"You're neither," he finally remarked. Jerked out of her depressing thoughts, she looked up at him to find him watching her with those eyes that so discomfited and enchanted her. The crimson softened infinitesimally, not enough for her to be sure if he understood her motives or not. "You're willing to put your life in danger, but only to those who've earned your absolute trust and loyalty. Everyone else be damned."
"That – "
"You're desperate to 'help' Shin because you know him, don't you? You know that he'd rather end his own life than allow his Makashi to rain death and destruction wherever he goes." He smirked. "But now, the only way for him to control his Makashi and not become it is to learn to live without the Mask."
She swallowed thickly at his words, remembering the glowing red of Shin's eyes with the pristine white Mask tied around his wrist, in his room two nights ago. She couldn't possibly imagine him without his Mask. It was something she was so used to seeing, on every single one of the Daitengu. Trying to picture him going about his daily life without it was almost impossible. Without the Mask, he could only keep Shinigami in control for a limited time.
"Is that possible?" she asked quietly, twisting on her heels to the right, closer to him, to avoid a head-on collision with a man who rushed past her with a long wooden ladder hoisted on his shoulder. She righted herself again, looking up at Kagetora when the Kitsune stopped in the middle of the street. "Is it possible to live without it?"
With a cryptic smile, he inclined his head and tapped the Kitsune Mask amidst the dark curls of his hair with one long, pianist finger. She caught a brief glimpse of the red string tied around his pinkie that she had seen before, and she wondered to whom the other end of the string belonged to.
"I only wear this for appearance's sake, dear Pai."
Her eyes widened in surprise. Her gaze shot from the delight glittering in his eyes to the white Kitsune Mask on his head, tied around with a thin black string that was practically invisible in his dark brown hair. She couldn't believe she'd heard him right. There was no way it could be.
"Ar – the – are you saying that Mask is not a Mask?"
"Oh no, it most definitely is a Mask. But see, I don't need it." Kagetora turned to the left and stepped behind an abandoned stall, the table-top being tall enough that he comfortably braced his elbows on it as he put his chin in his hands and grinned at her. She faced him from the other side of the stall, somewhat glad for the distance the wooden contraption created between them. "I keep it for sentimental reasons. Like you keep that blue ribbon in your hair."
She stilled, just barely stopping herself from reaching up and touching the dark blue ribbon she always tied on her hair.
She couldn't remember exactly how she'd gotten it, but she did remember that she wore it all the time, right up until she disappeared. Shiori found it in the auctions sale that went up to get rid of all the things from the Momozono's old house. She knew how much Pai loved the ribbon, so she'd taken it before something could happen to it, and kept it. Shiori gave it back to her when it was determined that she wasn't a risk factor in staying at Ayashi House, and she clung to the ribbon, the only piece of her old life that had survived whatever it was that led to her forgetting the next three years of her life.
She pressed her lips tight together and tried very hard not to glare at Kagetora, crossing her arms. She had no idea how he knew about her ribbon. Or maybe he was just pulling her leg and bluffing, poking to see what made her tick. She wasn't going to give him the satisfaction of reacting to him. It disturbed her that he poked in the right place on the first try, though.
She started to say something again, but hesitated when Kuniumi spoke up, already knowing what it was she wanted to ask.
Why bother? You know what he will say.
With an annoyed frown, she dragged her attention back to the enigmatic Kitsune before her. "And is there someone who can teach him to control his Maka – his True Ayakashi without the Mask?"
He smile widened, but he didn't say anything in response. He knew as well as she that he could teach Shin what he needed to know to survive Shinigami battling for control of their shared body.
See?
"How do I know you are not lying?" she asked suspiciously, glancing around them to check if anyone was watching. Half of her expected to see Daichi somewhere around, what with how close they were to Kobayashi Health.
She didn't see him, though. He was still at the Palace, readying to leave again. No one was paying them any mind, going about their own business as if the world depended on it. She was glad for that inattentiveness.
Kagetora leaned back and spread his hands out to either side of him. "Now why would I do something so condemnable? Remember," he winked at her, lifting a hand and aiming it at her like a gun. "You're the one who came to me."
Point, she acquiesced grudgingly.
The insolent smirk vanished from his face in half a second, replaced with a dark look in his eye that sent unexpected shivers traipsing down her spine like ice cold fingers. It was like a switch was flipped – one second she was talking to a lively, joking, and unsettling Kitsune. The next she was facing a cold-hearted man whose motives she had no clue of.
She gulped nervously as she stopped herself from taking a step away from him. If she did that it would be a visible sign of her weakness, her fear of him.
Ayakashi did not respect fear. They hunted it.
"Call me what you like, believe what Shin tells you of me, listen to the stories you hear of me, but heed this – I do not lie."
"Okay," she said, worried she'd trodden on a sore spot. Seeing this whole other side of him, even for a split second as his face rearranged into another smile that wasn't quite as bright and cheery as before, was more than a little unsettling. "I believe you."
He tipped his head. "Thank you." He sounded anything but grateful.
"Can you help him?" she asked. He crossed his arms over his chest and put a hand under his chin, putting on a mock speculative air. She frowned. "You said you can help."
"'Can help' is not the same as 'will help'. Why would I help a man who loathes me so dearly?"
Her frown deepened to a glower as she frantically thought of something, anything she could say that would get Kagetora to help Shin. There wasn't much of anything she could think of, though. After all, he was a King – and she, she was just a human girl. There was nothing she could offer him.
"Then what do you want?"
He gave her a questioning look. "Are you in any position to be negotiating with me over Shin's life?"
She lifted her chin defiantly, holding his gaze. Thinking about how this whole mess was her fault to begin with, she said, "Tell me what you want. In exchange, you will help Shin-san."
He cocked an eyebrow. "What could you possibly have to offer me?"
"I do not know. I am not you. I do not know what it is you want from others."
"Touché." He smirked. "As it turns out, there is indeed something you can offer. In return for my helping dear lovable Shin, of course."
"What is it?" she asked warily, bracing herself.
"A promise."
"A promise?" she repeated, surprised. She was expecting something more. This was a little more anti-climactic than she would've thought. "What kind of promise?"
A shade of the cold alter ego returned as he dropped the smile. His gaze was hard and unyielding has he trapped her in their crimson depths just by turning them on her. "Yes. A promise that when the time comes, you will answer my question truthfully, with no attempts at deception."
She shifted uncomfortably, moving her weight from one foot to the other. She crossed her arms over her chest. "One question?"
"One question."
"Which is...?"
Kagetora grinned cockily. "The time hasn't come, has it?"
She pursed her lips in irritation at his guile, reminding herself that such craftiness was to be expected of the Kitsune. She tensed when he lifted a hand, and he smiled at her reaction. With a simple flick, a plain white card appeared between his long fingers. She blinked rapidly in surprise.
He stretched out his hand and handed it to her. "When you've figured how you're going to get Shin's assent to being trained by a man he heartily detests, call me. Take care to do it soon – I'm a busy man." He nodded at the card. "It's made of seedling paper. If it isn't used within the month, it will sprout and steadily grow into a plant, and you'll lose your chance to save Shin."
She frowned, wondering where it came from as she ran her fingertip over the gold embossed digits. She was paying close attention to him. He kept his hands on the table between them the entire time they were talking. Where did did he pull the card from?
What do you think kitsunebi are? Kuniumi sniggered. They're more like personal assistants than just balls of flame to be launched on whimsical fancy.
She looked up from the card to draw a spoken promise out of him, to make him say out loud and in his own words that he would help Shin – but he was gone. He was no longer standing behind the stall, leaning on the table-top with his arms folded over each other.