He twisted around to get onto his knees, and now he could see the lights coming around the long curve toward the station. Pain seized him, lancing into his back, but a rush of adrenaline got him up onto his feet. Cursing, frantic, Ren crossed the tracks to the platform’s edge.
Air blasted past him, pushed ahead of the incoming train. Ren cried out in fear as the train thundered into the station, its roar obliterating his voice. Seven or eight people were scattered on the platform. One little girl, holding her mother’s hand, turned and spotted him, pointed and said something to her mother, but her words, too, were stolen by the guttural snarl of the train.
Brakes squealed, echoing off the walls of the station.
Ren raised his hands, pain shooting through him, nearly making him falter, but then boosted himself up onto the platform, rolling out of the way with seconds to spare. The train lumbered to a hissing stop beside him. He lay on his back, still racked with throbbing pain, and stared at the ceiling of the station.
Two men in business suits bent over to look down at him. One of them asked if he was all right, but the other went off on a tirade about how stupid he’d been. Didn’t he know that he could have been killed?
Ren laughed at them for a few seconds, until the adrenaline began to subside and he felt the jolts of pain that the laughter cost him. The men shook their heads and boarded the train. Moments later, it began to move again, straining to roll along its tracks like a sled dog in its traces, picking up speed.
He lay there, catching his breath, heart pounding inside his chest, and as the fear and pain subsided, he remembered how he had gotten there in the first place.
“Miho! Oh, no.”
Ren reached into his pocket and plucked out his cell phone. Its face had been cracked in the fall, but the crystal display still showed a signal. Praying, he called Kara.
Kara ended the call with Ren and turned to stare at Hachiro, clutching her phone in her hand. Her eyes welled up but she bit her lip, not allowing the tears to fall. She didn’t have time to cry.
“What is it?” Hachiro said, his gaze urgent. “Talk to me, Kara. What did Ren say?”
They stood in the genkan, surrounded by cubbyholes filled with blue and pink slippers. The lights in the genkan were bright, but they only made the night outside the glass doors seem even darker. Kara reached up with her free hand and pushed her hair away from her face, fingers fluttering.
“You’re trembling,” Hachiro said.
Kara steadied herself and reached out to grip his shoulder, taking strength from him. “The Hannya came after Ren and Miho. It threw him onto the train tracks. He’s hurt, but not badly. But Miho…”
She faltered, her throat closing up, and then she couldn’t stop herself. Tears began to flow and she shook all over. Hachiro pulled her into his arms and held her tightly. For several seconds they stood like that, and then Kara became angry at her own indulgence. She pulled away, wiping at her tears and thrusting her phone into her pocket.
“Ren thinks he was unconscious for about twenty minutes. When he came around, Miho was gone. The Hannya took her.”
Hachiro nodded. “Then we’ll find her. We will find her.”
Kara shook her head. “Not alone we won’t. It’s time to tell someone. We should’ve done this before. I’ve been so stupid.”
“You can’t blame yourself,” Hachiro said.
“Sure I can. But blame can wait.”
She turned and strode deeper into the school, took a right and broke into a run. Hachiro kept pace with her and when they reached the door to the basement stairs, Kara shoved it open and then they were pounding down the steps. They knew that three of the Noh club students they’d been keeping track of were still in the art room, storing away the masks and set pieces that had already been created for the play. Miss Aritomo would wait until they were all gone before locking up after them.
Kara and Hachiro rushed along the basement corridor to the art room, slowing as they approached the door. Just outside, they stopped. Kara caught her breath and glanced at Hachiro, afraid of what she was about to do, afraid that Miss Aritomo wouldn’t believe her, that her father would be humiliated, and worst of all, that it wouldn’t help Miho even if they did believe her.
Please, God, let her be all right.
She stepped into the art room with Hachiro right behind her. The three students were cleaning up after themselves, one boy sweeping, another moving chairs, and a girl sitting on a table. They looked up, expressions curious.
“Hi. Sorry. Isn’t Aritomo-sensei here?” Kara asked.
“She’s in her homeroom,” replied the sweeping boy. “She had work to do.”
Kara nodded and turned away, not giving them another thought. Hachiro led the way, but they found the doors to Miss Aritomo’s homeroom closed. Like those upstairs, they were the sliding doors so common in Japan. Kara knocked on the frame.
“Aritomo-sensei?” she ventured. “It’s me, Kara.”
They waited a few seconds. She grimaced and looked at Hachiro. He nodded toward the door.
“Try again,” he suggested.
But as Kara raised her fist to knock, she paused, frowning. From within the classroom she’d heard a sound, low and insinuating and hideously familiar. Now it came once more and there could be no doubt. This was no breeze, no voice, no rustle of pages being turned. The hiss brought her back to that night in the dark, when the Hannya had pursued Miho, and she knew that it was there right now, on the other side of the thin door.
It had come for Miss Aritomo.
Ice flooded her veins. She wanted to scream, to run, but instead she reached out a shaking hand for the door. Hachiro snatched her wrist, stopping her, and she turned to see her own fear reflected back from his eyes.
Firmly, she pulled her hand away. As quietly as possible, she reached for the door and slid it open just a crack. Kara pressed her right eye to the opening. At first she saw only the light above Miss Aritomo’s desk-the overhead lights were off. A dull glow of moonlight shone in the small box windows near the ceiling.
Then she saw a pale arm outstretched on the floor, beyond the reach of the desk lamp. The moment she noticed it, the rest of the dark silhouette on the floor came into sharp focus, and she saw the gentle, pretty features of Miss Aritomo. The teacher did not move, but in the gloom Kara could not see any sign of blood or injury, or even if she still drew breath.
Aritomo-sensei. The name was on her lips, but before Kara could speak, the hiss came again, now from the shadows at the back of the room. Kara had seen the masks hanging on the wall there so many times that she had barely noticed their baleful expressions back in the shadows.
Then one of them moved, and she realized that one was not a mask at all. Kara’s throat went dry. Rigid with terror, she could only watch as the Hannya emerged from the shadows and knelt beside Miss Aritomo. It reached slender, clawed hands toward the petite, helpless woman, and Kara wanted to scream but could not find the courage. Hachiro touched her arm but she barely recognized the contact.
The Hannya diminished even as she watched. In the space between eyeblinks, the horned face of the demon became that of a seductive woman, and the woman began to lie beside Miss Aritomo, only to alter her form further. Demon had become temptress, and now woman became serpent, a thing of red and green so dark as to appear almost black, with tiny horns that seemed more dragon than snake.
As it slithered onto Miss Aritomo’s body in a lithe, intimate coil, it shrank even further. The serpent’s head prodded at the sleeping teacher’s lips and Miss Aritomo’s mouth opened, her head falling back.
The demon slid past her lips and down her throat, vanishing inside her.
Kara could not move. Could not breathe.
Then Miss Aritomo opened her eyes.
Kara jumped back from the door, shaking her head at the impossible. She twisted to look at Hachiro, who only looked mystified. His view blocked by her body, he had seen none of it. He opened his mouth to speak and, eyes wide with terror, she shook her head more firmly, grabbed his wrist, and together they ran.