"Red or white?"
"Red."
Meizuki let go of Awazuki's hair to retrieve the red ribbon and place it next to her on the floor. Awazuki took the opportunity to rub her neck before bringing her arms to her chest to ward off the cold.
Snow had fallen as soon as Hijiri had left, slowly but inexorably turning Reishoumiya into a white abyss so firmly separated from the outside world that it might as well have belonged to a different dimension altogether. It wasn't all bad — the villagers were used to being self-sufficient, and the harvest had been plentiful — but the longer the cold season stretched on, with the bitter frost slowly spreading to Awazuki's marrow and showing no signs of shifting no matter how close to the fire she sat, the more convinced she was they'd never see another spring at all.
She tried not to think about it as Meizuki busied herself with her hair, combing it with the tender care one would normally reserve for the finest silk rather than the somewhat brittle mane it really was. Instead, she thought about summoning a great light, something she had mastered a week after the first frost, and whether she could disguise it as a divine power to use it to warm up Meizuki, too.
Almost as if she had read her thoughts, Meizuki paused with several strands of hair in hand. She brought them closer to the lantern standing by their side.
"What is it?" Awazuki asked.
"Are you sure you wouldn't prefer white?"
"Does it make a difference?" This was the first time Meizuki had ever commented on her choice of colours.
"I just think it would suit your hair better."
"Pick white, then." She attempted a small smile. "I always thought red and black went together just fine."
Meizuki said nothing, but at her proximity it was impossible to mistake the sudden intake of breath.
"Seriously, what is it?" She snagged several strands of her hair from Meizuki's ever-loosening grip and examined them as closely as she could in the dim light. They looked the same as ever.
Seeing Awazuki do this appeared to shake Meizuki from her strange reverie. "I'm sorry. It must have been a trick of light."
"Right. Don't worry." She relinquished the hairs and allowed Meizuki to tie them with what in the end proved to be a red ribbon after all. As she collected her hair together, her fingers brushed against the helix of Awazuki's right ear. Again, she paused and hesitated, but before Awazuki could ask what's wrong, she continued as if nothing had happened.
Once she was finally freed, Awazuki touched the ribbon and resisted the urge to do the same with her ear. "Thanks. Your turn, then."
"That's fine. You don't have to."
Awazuki halted with her hand already in the air to snatch the comb. Meizuki was staring at her knees, biting her lip.
She ignored the comb and reached instead to place a hand on Meizuki's shoulder. "Meizuki, if it's about Grandmother—"
Her words of reassurances were interrupted by a set of stumbling steps barging to the door, followed by an awkward silence and finally a respectful, but urgent series of knocks against the door frame.
Awazuki exchanged a confused glance with Meizuki. "Enter."
The door slid open, the blisteringly cold morning air streaming in feeling like a full-body assault. One of the villagers, so heavily wrapped in clothes and a massive straw cloak that Awazuki couldn't make out her features, bowed her head onto the floor before quickly raising it. Her eyes, the only visible part of her face till she pulled down the cloth around her mouth and nose were blazing with alarm.
"Lady Hakurei," her eyes flitted from Awazuki to Meizuki and back again, as though she couldn't quite decide who she was addressing. She swallowed. "There has been an incident."
Awazuki stood up at once. No-one bothered to make the dangerous trek to the shrine in this weather if it wasn't of the utmost importance. "Very well."
When she turned towards her sister to tell her she'd be back soon, she saw she had gotten up, too. "I will come as well."
Awazuki blinked, first startled, but ultimately unable to keep the smile from her face. When was the last time she had seen Meizuki venture past the shrine gate? "Let's go, then."
Her cheer didn't last long. First there was the torturous journey down to the village — Why was it that the worst cold burned rather than simply froze? — which forced her to breathe through the cracks between her fingers if she didn't wish to gape like a dying fish, and which left precious little room for conversation.
And then, there was the corpse.
No matter how many times she saw one, the sight of a dead body always made Awazuki grimace. It didn't help this particular one had been partially eaten, with several long strips of flesh and internal organs missing, likely torn from the man's body while his heart was still beating.
"No mistaking it," she said out loud as she got up and replaced the cloth that had covered the body for the benefit of the dead man's son, who was staring at the proceedings some feet away, looking ready to throw up. Meizuki stood by his side, ready to support him should he collapse. She was pale in the sunlight, too pale, but as much as Awazuki would have liked to take her home and tuck her under some sheets, she had to focus on the crime at hand.
Well, not crime, exactly. Youkai never followed the rules of humans, after all. And this was the work of a youkai: only their honed claws cleaved through bone like the sharpest of swords.
Still. Hijiri had guaranteed the youkai's cooperation. Had the former nun's absence lasted so long that the youkai of Reishoumiya no longer considered what they had promised her worth the breath it had been uttered with? Or was the culprit from elsewhere, a wandering monster who had stumbled upon the village and attacked the first human it saw heedless of local treaties?
Awazuki stared down at the covered corpse. She had barely known the man, who had only moved to the village a year prior, one of very few people to ever move in during Awazuki's lifetime. And she had let him down.
She straightened her back. "We will take care of everything, and I swear on our family's name and creed that the youkai will be slaughtered." At once, she regretted her oath: Hijiri would surely be displeased at the killing of any youkai, even if it proved necessary. She would have to understand.
The young man, who was shaking and waging a losing battle against tears, nodded.
Meizuki placed a gentle hand on his wrist.
"I'm sorry for your pain," she said, barely audible to Awazuki. "If there is anything I can do, I will. Above all, I guarantee that my sister's words are true. Your father will have justice."
The young man wiped his eyes and cast a look of such overwhelmed gratefulness at Meizuki that Awazuki couldn't help but stare. The fact Meizuki returned the look with a sudden shy smile didn't help matters.
"Right." she shifted uncomfortably. "I'll go fetch the orb, then. Can you take care of things here, Meizuki?" A year of experience dealing with the youkai hadn't made the prospect of dealing with the villagers much less daunting.
"Of course."
She rushed back to the shrine. As she stumbled up the steps, she caught sight of strands of hair which had escaped the ribbon. Even in full sunlight, they looked like the same dull black she had been born with.
After retrieving the Hakurei Yin-Yang orb, she momentarily dipped into the pantry.
As soon as she had walked back down the steps she muttered a spell under her breath. A thin layer of warm air enveloped her, shielding her from the worst of winter. Emboldened, she rushed off the path, pushing through the layers of snow where there had once been clear paths.
First, she'd need a lead.
Tewi kicked her feet in the air, her left bare foot coming mere inches from Awazuki's nose. "Nope, can't tell you anything new. Too bad."
Awazuki groaned and leaned against the tree. Why, of all the youkai in the woods had Ichirin thought Tewi was the best person to set up as a contact? "Don't give me that, Tewi. It's a matter of life and death."
"Hardly if the old fool's already dead. Besides, who's to say I know anything? I'm just a harmless little rabbit in a world full of giant creatures with sharp pointy teeth."
This was a code Awazuki had cracked after her first several futile attempts at dealing with Tewi. She extracted two small, yellow carrots from within her robes and held them upwards. "Here, you greedy bastard. What does a youkai want with vegetables, anyway?"
"Thank you." Holding onto the trunk, Tewi leaned down further and snatched the carrots. Once safely back on her perch, she stashed the carrots somewhere within her grubby tunic. "It's an image thing. A traitor like you should understand."
Awazuki rolled her eyes. By now, she was so used to Tewi hurling abuse at her and dishing it right back that it didn't even sting. "Now, about the man-eating youkai?"
Tewi pretended not to have heard, picking instead at the bark of the frost-encrusted maple she sat on. Awazuki tapped her foot against the snow and waited. It was always tug-of-war with the rabbit, but she knew far more than her appearance gave away, and in the end she would usually share some pertinent information. Usually.
"She's not a local," said Tewi just as she thought this. She got up, and balancing herself with her stubby arms, stepped to the trunk and leaned her back against it. "And now that she knows you lot are after her, she's not gonna stay, either. She'll be gone tonight."
"Where?" She might still be able to hunt her down.
Tewi's smile contained more teeth than any smile should. "A place where no humans have any business being. You should let it drop, traitor. All humans die, but at this rate you're gonna die long before your time."
"Just tell me."
Tewi kept smiling.
Awazuki sighed and fished out yet another carrot.
Tewi snatched the carrot and gave it a tentative nibble. "Not bad. I'd like to say I'm surprised you haven't figured it out yourself, but maybe you're just playing dumb. What's behind your shrine?"
Awazuki frowned. "A pond and a forest." She tilted her head. "There's an overgrown path through the woods that leads to a rocky hillside, but not much else. We've gone there to pick wild plums sometimes."
Tewi gave her along, appraising stare, her lip curdled up. Finally, she shrugged and bit into the carrot, chewing slowly and swallowing before continuing. "Guess you really are just stupid, then."
Awazuki swallowed her indignation, but added the idea of slowly roasting Tewi over an open fire to her list of potential daydreams. "That's where the youkai will go?"
"Yup."
"Why?"
"Who knows?"
"You might." Awazuki was sorely out of bribes, but there was always a sliver of hope Tewi would throw in a useful detail for free.
"I might, or I might not. You'd better keep you eyes open and get ready to become a youkai soon."
Before Awazuki could muster a heated reply, Tewi was gone, leaving behind nothing but her misty breath and a single chewed carrot stump.
Though her magic kept her warm, Awazuki still shuddered by habit every time the frosty night wind rushed over her.
This was her sixth hour of vigil on the edge of the shrine grounds, and already proving more arduous than the fifth. When she had first crept out of the shrine, which had been as soon as Meizuki had gone to bed, she had expected to apprehend a sneaking youkai at any moment, but with hours of witnessing nothing more exciting than a white hare loping across the clearing, she had begun to struggle with sleepiness. Unfortunately, she knew no spells of wakefulness, and thus had to repeatedly pinch herself to keep her eyes from sliding shut.
The few thin clouds that had remained on the sky parted, revealing a full, pale moon. The cold was everywhere, and though Awazuki felt none of it thanks to the layer of warm air enveloping her body, she could sense it surrounding her, clawing her at her barrier in hopes of penetrating it and freezing her to death. She held on, refusing to allow the way her breath froze solid in the air to perturb her.
The witching hour was rapidly approaching, if it wasn't already upon her. If nothing happened during it, Awazuki had decided, she would head home.
It never came to that, however. While she was trying to keep herself alert by mutely reciting every song she remembered from her childhood, she heard cat-like footsteps approaching in the snow. Gingerly, she tilted her head to see from behind the tree she was sitting against, hoping her earlier camouflage spell was still working and made her look like an extension of the maple like Hijiri had guaranteed it would.
It was a youkai, but that she had known before seeing her: who else would it be at this hour? She was wrapped in simple white clothes, like ones used to dress the dead. Her resemblance to a ghost didn't end there: her skin was as pale as the surrounding snow. However, her carefully coiffed hair decorated with delicate snowflakes and the glimmer of frost all about her betrayed her true identity.
Awazuki frowned at the yuki-onna as she glided across the snow with perfect ease, almost as if she'd been flying after all. Was this the murderous youkai? She didn't look the type, but that meant nothing.
Before she could pounce, she caught sight of something else and gripped the tree's bark.
The yukionna wasn't alone. Not even close.
She flattened herself against the maple, unable to divert her eyes from the medley of youkai making its way across the woods. There were animals of several kinds, cats, foxes, birds, hares, some walking on two feet, some flying. Tsukumogami followed, from umbrellas to hoes and pots and pans, along several sombre tengu flying above everyone else, their plumages carefully cleaned and arranged. There were youkai Awazuki couldn't even name. There must have been a hundred of them altogether, yet not one said uttered a single sound as they walked past her hiding spot.
She held her breath and prayed her wards would last. She had sworn she wouldn't turn Hijiri's teachings against any other youkai but the one with wings, but even if she had been at full combat capacity, she'd be torn to pieces before she could get a single spell off. Fortunately, her camouflage held: one fox halted for a brief moment while passing the tree and raised his head, sniffing the air, but then shrugged and kept going.
Almost as soon as they had appeared, the youkai were gone, heading further into the woods. Awazuki clambered from her hiding spot and muttered two additional spells, one supposed to make her blend in with the snow, and another that raised her feet just high enough from the ground that she wouldn't leave any footprints, then beckoned the Hakurei Yin-Yang orb to her and got moving. One of the youkai had to be the one she sought.
She rushed across the snow. Seeing her legs move without a single sound was unnerving, but then, she reasoned with herself, it'd be even more unnerving if she could hear them. She soon saw the backs — and the wings and tails — of the gaggle of youkai, and maintained her pace.
And then, the youkai began to disappear.
Awazuki halted and goggled as the number of youkai dwindled. As soon they reached a certain point past an ancient pine, they were simply gone, as if engulfed by the darkness, till neither hide nor hair remained of a single one.
Awazuki hurried to the spot where they had vanished. It looked like any other patch of the forest, with sturdy trees and unmolested snow. She took a few further uncertain steps and was about to cast a spell to enhance her eyes when she slammed against what felt like a stone wall and keeled backwards, only barely managing to stay upright.
She gasped for air and glared ahead to see what she had struck, only to see nothing there. Groping ahead, she soon found a smooth, solid surface, warm to touch. An invisible ward, then, probably to keep humans away? She was unlikely to be able to remove it entirely, especially not without attracting attention, but...
She drew a deep breath. By now, she had a firm grasp on what kinds of spells were likely to take humans closer to being youkai, and what she was about to do was definitely of the sort. Still, if it was just this one time, and she'd discard it as soon as she could...
With that in mind, she began to chant.
At first, she felt nothing, and was beginning to suspect she had done it wrong due to playing it by ear. She kept at it, and finally her forehead began to tingle, spurring her on to complete the spell at record speed. She felt light-headed, intoxicated by the rush of attempting an unfamiliar spell, but managed to hold on even as the tingling turned into a bursts of lancing pain as a small pair of horns sprouted from her forehead.
No time to dawdle. Even though she had made her soul merely appear like that of a youkai, she could feel the disguise eating away at her humanity at an alarming speed.
She walked against the barrier, and slipped through without incident, immediately dismissing the spell. As the rush wound out from her body she felt heavier than ever, but mercifully, wonderfully, fully human. She hugged herself to make sure she was intact, and then began to pay attention to her surroundings.
The snow remained, but the field and the trees were gone: she found herself at the foot of a large hill dotted with stooped saplings and jagged rocks. No youkai, but there was an unmistakable commotion coming from behind the hill.
She crouched down and quickly advanced up the hill, intent on making no sound. The voices grew louder as she crept along. She made her way to the top, then got onto her stomach and crawled ahead, cold and water stains be damned.
On the other side of the hill was a narrow valley ending against a cliff, crowded with youkai. She spotted several of the creatures who had passed by her before, but her attention was quickly drawn to a single youkai, one with long claws and matted hair, standing apart and before the group before what looked to be cave in the cliff. Not a powerful youkai, but one her instincts told her was the culprit.
There was another presence, however, one that made the hairs on the back of her neck stand at attention. No matter how many times she surveyed the crowd, she couldn't pin-point its origin. It seemed to come from everywhere at once.
This is where the barrier is, she realised. The one Grandmother knew of. But why—
The youkai fell silent all at once. They split into two groups at the edges of the valley, leaving the bedraggled youkai alone at the centre. Before she could do more than frown, a surge of power radiated through Awazuki's head, blinding her and making her ears pop.
When she could next see, light-headed and quite sure her ear was bleeding, a transparent, floating egg had appeared before the lone youkai, shimmering with blue light. Instinctively, she made herself even flatter against the ground.
A moment later, the egg burst into a thousand pieces, which transformed into feathers and icicles mid-air. What remained in its place was a ball of light, which grew and took on a humanoid forme, then kept growing, and growing...
Every magical fibre in Awazuki's body responded to the immense waves of magic, making her skin crackle and all her hairs stand out. She looked on in wonder and dawning horror the figure of light sprouted three enormous pairs feathered wings, stretching towards the star-studded sky.
Wings...
There was no doubt about it. This was the youkai who had nearly destroyed her sister.
She looked on with a growing pit in her stomach as the light faded to reveal the winged youkai's serene, androgynous face and closed-eyed smile. It was clad in strange vestments and carried a wand of some kind in one hand.
The lone youkai bowed.
And then, the youkai with wings opened its eyes.
They were blue, Awazuki supposed; not the unusual but familiar blue of Meizuki's eyes, but the kind that reflected the snow around them, turning silver and milky white and piercing through everything around them.
Awazuki shrunk. She forgot to breathe as she continued to stare, utterly unable to tear her eyes away or even to think, mesmerised by those eyes that seemed to lead directly to a world beyond human comprehension. Was this how Meizuki had felt when she had encountered this mysterious being in the woods? Had she too been so entranced she barely noticed when the youkai raised its hands to kill her?
The youkai blinked, slowly and deliberately. Its hypnotic aura diminished enough for her to shift her position, ready to move. Whether backwards or over the hill and into the fray, she didn't know yet.
You don't know yet?! a voice at the back of her mind screamed at her.. Nothing waits you down there but death!
The youkai opened its eyes again. This time, they were staring directly up at Awazuki.
Awazuki's heart didn't just skip a beat. It froze completely.
There was no apparent emotion on the youkai's face, but it had seen her for sure. Its gaze pierced through her skull, penetrating her very soul. At once, she felt small, insignificant, lower than a speck of dust.
And yet, the youkai took no action. It was almost as if it was waiting for Awazuki to act first.
Her palms began to itch. Even if she was going to die, there was no doubt this was the very youkai who had very nearly killed her sister, the very reason she had first made a deal with Hijiri. The very creature she had vowed to hunt down.
The very creature she had vowed not to approach alone while Hijiri was gone.
Her legs moved on their own accord, pushing her back down the hill.
It was as if her movement had broken the spell: an awful quiet fell in the it hadn't been her magic that had kept her hidden, but merely her stillness. with her escape now marking her as an intruder.
She didn't stay and wonder about it. Instead, she scrablmed down the hill, heart pounding so violently she expected it to tear right out of her chest. She snagged her foot on some rocks and stumbled for several paces but kept moving, never slowing down and only once turning back to look to see if she was being followed, seeing nothing.
It took an eternity to reach the border, but it let her through readily enough without any spells, as if it was glad to expel her back into the world of humans. She stumbled into the snow, then realised to her horror the mess she was making. She chanted spells faster than she had ever before in her life, first lifting her off the ground, then to patch up the snowy field to the best of her ability. It still looked like a boulder had fallen from the sky, leaving a huge dent before spontaneously vanishing, but at least her footprints were no longer there.
The border reverberated. For a brief moment, Awazuki could actually see it, like a distortion in the air where the scant moonlight didn't bend quite right. She ducked for cover, cursing herself for failing to reinforce the invisibility spell in time.
She hid not a moment too soon, A youkai emerged, the very same yuki-onna Awazuki had first spied approaching. She looked around, slowly swivelling her hands, before her eyes settled on the tousled patch of snow.
Awazuki held her breath.
The yukionna stayed still, staring at the patch, then eyed her surroundings with renewed vigour. For a moment, her gaze landed exactly where Awazuki was lying, and stayed there.
A shiver that had nothing to do with the cold shook through Awazuki.
Then, mercifully, the yukionna looked away. Without further warning, she vanished, no doubt back behind the border.
Awazuki didn't dare to move till holding her breath became painful. Then, she took a deep breath and rolled onto her back, trying to get her thrumming heart to settle down.
One thing was obvious: Tewi's warnings, no matter how snide, had held more than a grain of truth. Something extremely sinister was going on.
She got up and hastily departed from the border, brushing off the snow clinging to her clothes.
There was no helping it. With Hijiri still gone, she would have to tell Meizuki. Whatever the barrier was keeping at bay, and whatever she had witnessed that night really meant, it was clearly too much for any single person to handle.
By the time she made it back to the shrine, Meizuki was still in deep slumber. She longed to follow her example, but resisted, knowing she'd sleep well into the afternoon if she allowed herself to lie down. Instead, she dragged herself back outside to fetch some water. She splashed her face with it as soon as she dragged it from the well. It was blisteringly cold, like melted snow, and shocked her senses back to action.
She blinked at her reverberating reflection in the bucket. She saw it far more clearly than the pre-dawn light should have allowed for. Furthermore, there was something off about it.
She brought the remaining water inside and lit up a candle. Her reflection was barely more visible than it had been outside, but she saw enough.
Without waiting for her command, her hand quested to her right ear and carefully inspected the lobe. The top of it felt swollen, almost misshapen. It was no wonder Meizuki had hesitated there the other day. It was almost as if it had changed shape...
But that was merely a sideshow to what had truly disturbed Awazuki. Staring down at her troubled, sleep-deprived reflection, her hair sticking out like it hadn't been combed in weeks, Awazuki finally saw what Meizuki had seen the morning before.