By day, she would keep company with Akihito in her room—the big man watching the street from his perch by the windowsill, the girl sitting on her bed as they talked of revolution, of bright futures and distant dreams. He was at least ten years older than she, a decade deeper in the world. But when he laughed, she would feel it in her chest. When he told tales about hunting the arashitora, she found herself squirming on her mattress. She would watch him carve his blocks of clay or pine into works of beauty, the Lady Sun lighting his profile as if the Goddess herself adored him. And Hana would think of the boys she’d known—the clumsy fumbling and promises unkept—and wonder what other tricks Akihito’s hands might know.
He slept in the corner, a thin blanket for a pillow, as far from her as he could be. And when she woke in the evening as the sun was failing, he would be gone.
She’d asked Daken to follow him two days ago, more out of curiosity than concern. It turned out Akihito spent his days at the Market Square in the shadow of the Burning Stones. Pillars of blackened rock, the lingering scent of burnt hair, ashes swept into corners by a wailing wind, as if Fūjin himself were ashamed of the sight. The altar where Guild Purifiers burned children in their campaign against “Impurity.” The place where the Black Fox had been shot, where Hana had seen the Stormdancer kill Shōgun Yoritomo right before her wondering eye.
The square was filled with spirit tablets now, carved from wood, stone, clay. Wreaths of paper flowers rippling in the dirty breeze. Hundreds of names scribed by hundreds of hands. Tributes for the slaughtered gaijin, the Black Fox, sons and fathers killed in the war overseas. Akihito would work on his carvings, occasionally place a new tablet among the others. Daken was unable to read the names he scribed. Hana had a notion she knew who they were for anyway.
When she’d arrived home from her shift this morning, she found a package laid out for her on her mattress—thin black crepe tied with a bow of real silk. Unwrapping it with trembling fingers, she’d found new clothes of soft, dark fabric, a pair of good, split-toed boots. A comb of Kitsune jade and kohl to wipe around the edge of her eye. A bottle of black dye. A handful of coins. Beneath it all, a small note written in a messy hand she’d recognize anywhere.
“Love you, sister-mine.”
She’d stolen into Yoshi’s room, but found the bed empty, sheets still warm. She was still smiling as she slipped from her tenement tower a few minutes later, a poisoned autumn wind on her skin, into the bleak and empty dark before the dawn. Daken prowled beside her, his thoughts a soft purr within her own. The streets were near abandoned, smudged with dark fingerprints of exhaust, a few blacklung beggars rocking back and forth before their alms bowls in the muddy gloom. She stepped into the bathhouse on the corner, handed a copper kouka to the old woman yawning behind the counter and sat down to wait.
… bath again . .?
Again? My last one was two weeks ago, Daken.
… so . .?
So I stink like an oni’s asshole.
… whole city stinks … get clean good way to get noticed …
Let’s hope so.
The old woman nodded that all was ready, and Hana stepped into the bathroom, Daken keeping watch from a rooftop outside. A broad wooden tub was filled with cloudy water, the air hung thick with steam. Hana stripped off her grubby clothes, stared at herself in the fog-blurred looking glass. Insect-thin, long-limbed, ribs showing clearly beneath her skin. A too-flat chest, a narrow neck, hung with a tiny amulet on a leather thong. It gleamed in the candlelight; a golden oval set with a rearing stag, three tiny horns shaped like crescent moons. No matter how hungry, no matter how desperate things got, Yoshi had never let her sell it. It had been a gift from their mother, those brilliant blue eyes shining with love as she’d tied it around Hana’s neck on her tenth birthday.
“Wear it with pride,” she had said.
All they had left of her.
Sitting on the edge of the tub, rinsing black dye through her hair and watching the stains pool on the tile about her feet, she looked at the pile of new clothes Yoshi had brought her. The cut was good, the thread was fine. The boots alone would have cost two irons. Her thoughts turned to dark places, and she wondered again where her brother’s coin had come from. Who was missing it out there in the dark.
She’d asked Daken of course, but the cat had simply set sandpaper tongue to his not-so-privates, pretending like she’d never spoken. Though it had been Hana who raised the tom, though he slept beside her every day, it was Yoshi who’d fished the crying, bedraggled mop of fur from the storm drain all those years ago. The kitten had been near-dead, chewed by vermin, ears missing, tail gnawed; a lucky escapee from one of the last restaurants with coin to run the breathing pens required to keep kittens alive in Kigen’s roiling stink. And ever since that moment, there was something between Daken and Yoshi—something beneath the violent jibes and the excrement surprises planted beneath the bedclothes. An affection she supposed brothers would share, hidden behind coarseness and cruel jokes and indifference.
A debt as heavy as a sopping handful of mewling fur.
And so, Hana let it drop, let the cat and her brother keep their secrets. She knew one night she might learn the hard way where the money came from, but for the next few days at least, she had bigger issues to think about …
And walking through the predawn streets of the refinery district half an hour later, there he was. Leaning in an empty doorway. Framed by the crumbling shell and boarded windows of an abandoned tannery like some street-side master’s portrait.
“Well, well,” Akihito smiled. “I almost didn’t recognize you.”
“Bath day,” she shrugged. “New clothes.”
“You look nice,” he said, eyes on the street over her shoulder.
Hana smiled, trying to still the thrill of delight inside her. “I finally spoke to Michi. She has a plan to get herself out of her cell.”
Akihito nodded. “You can tell me about it when we get back to your flat.”
Daken prowled up to the big man, brushed against his leg, purring. Akihito stooped with a smile, scruffed the tom behind his mangled ears.
“You know he usually hates people,” Hana said. “Last stranger who tried to pet him got opened up from elbow to wrist. But he’s taken to you like a fiend to the pipe.”
“Well, we hunters have to stick together.”
Hana watched Daken push back against Akihito’s fingers, purring soft, eyes closed.
Gods, you’re a slattern, boy.
… nice hands …
Don’t tease.
… my job …
“All right then.” She nodded to Akihito. “Shall we be off?”
“Hai.” He straightened, pulling his hat down over his brow. “The drop box is secluded, but there might still be bushi’ about, so keep your eyes open—” Akihito’s gaze snagged on her leather patch, his cheeks flushing.
She smirked to see him stumble, running one hand over his braids, abashed and mumbling and sweet as sugar-rock.
“Gods, I’m sorry,” he said. “You know what I mean…”
“I know what you mean, Akihito-san. And it’s fine, really.”