Reclaimed – Chapter 25

Sometime, after dawn, the sound of rustling grass wakes Jiro then me.

“Time to get up!” a high voice calls. I blink my eyes a few times in the sleeping bag before pulling it away to be face to face with an older silver fox. Jiro’s head swivels left and right. I push myself up from him. We’re surrounded by foxes, at least ten of them. They’re either lying down asleep in a tight ball or sitting up watching us or the woods.

“Hi,” I reply, and Jiro laughs. “We can’t sleep in today?”

“No,” says the fox, shaking his head. “You want to visit the Koga Kuroi Ninjas, right? Then you should walk into their town early before they’re too awake to turn you away.” The silver fox trots over to his sleeping friends, nudging them with his nose until they wake.

“That’s so strange. I was just dreaming about foxes last night. It’s like they know.” I yawn and melt into Jiro’s chest, unwilling to let go of sleep. “What does it sound like to you when they talk to me?”

“Sort of whining and whimpering? It’s hard to describe. What did he say?”

I sigh and push back, throwing my legs over the side of the mattress so I can put my shoes on. “That we should go to the ninja village now before they’re all too awake to tell us to get lost.”

We break camp, eat more protein bars and suck down caffeine supplements while walking down from the campsite, away from Akuyama to the south. Foxes leap through the underbrush around us, herding us onwards, chattering about bugs, birds, and eggs. I think they’re hungry so I call for Himitsu. Daytime means he becomes a source of food for predators, so I cradle him under my chin before opening my backpack and placing him in a pocket where he’ll be safe.

We exit the woods to the shore of a deep, black lake.

“Kuroko Lake,” I announce, “the weirdest place on all of Yūsei.”

Jiro shakes with a chill. “You can say that again.”

The ‘water’ of Kuroko Lake is as still as glass. A soft breeze rushes at my feet and ruffles the hair around my head but the black water doesn’t ripple. Jiro steps to the shore, but I stay rooted in the long grass, a fox by my side. I expect the water to lap about Jiro’s feet but it ebbs and recedes slowly, only a centimeter or two, in and out of the lake. He bends over and dips his finger in, and a rush of panic speeds up my heart. Does he have no fear? Pulling his finger from the lake, the midnight ooze clings to his skin, stretching in an impossible line from Jiro’s hand back to the surface.

“Oh my gods, what is that stuff?” I shiver, Jiro’s chill now infecting me.

“It comes from the river and from deep below the ground,” the fox whispers as Jiro flings the viscous liquid off his hand. “But nothing lives in this lake. The white lake in the north has fish we eat. Here, we must forage.”

I can’t believe that Julia’s assistant, Taya, actually put her feet in this lake. I get the chills imagining drowning in it, the thick water coating my face, up my nose, down my throat. The hair on my head stands up, and my vision fades at the corners, a darkness threatening to pull me under. I groan and fold myself down into a ball, my head between my knees.

“Kōtaigō, are you all right?” Soft, little paws sink into the sides of my leg and a wet nose brushes against my ear.

“What’s wrong?” Jiro asks. Squatted next to me, he rubs my back in circles.

“The lake.” I breathe out in a long breath through my nose. “I’m going to drown in the lake.” Maybe not today, maybe not this year, but I’m certain this lake will be my grave.

“Nah,” Jiro says. “If you’re going to die anywhere, it’ll be on the battlefield or in bed as an old woman. Can you stand up?”

I lift my head and look at the water again, still, silent. Along the shore to the right of us is a dock with small boats aimed at the distant shore.

“What did you call me, fox?” I ask, sucking in a slow steadying breath.

The silver fox sits back on his haunches. “Kōtaigō. You are the Queen Mother who can hear the voice of all animals.”

“Kōtaigō,” I repeat aloud for Jiro’s benefit.

“Kōtaigō? Interesting.” He hums and rubs the shadow across his cheek. “The people call you Tennō Heika, emperor to the people. Kōtaigō is empress to the animals. Father and mother.”

I let my butt sit on the dewy grass. “I’d prefer to be one or the other or nothing. Not both.”

“Yes. It’s too much pressure.” Jiro reaches out his hand to the female fox on our other side. “May I?” She walks to his fingers as he scratches her head. “I think the animals will be the most loyal followers, friends, and allies. Humans are just not as trustworthy. They have their own agendas, whereas animals live and survive with little thought to politics. How do they feel about Fujiwara?”

I turn to the silver fox. “We’re forced out of the capital, imprisoned, and slaughtered. This is why many of us live in Owari where we can be safe.”

“They don’t like Fujiwara or the capital,” I relay to Jiro. “What about people who eat meat?”

The fox’s tail twitches. “Many animals willingly give up their bodies to be sources of food. It is the way of things. Most birds and all pigs do not communicate with people. They are the first to go.”

I swallow the bile in my throat. I think I’ll be vegetarian again before long.

“Kōtaigō, we must get to the other shore before the sun crests the horizon.”

I shake off the dew and anxiety, squinting my eyes to see across the black lake to the other side. The opposite shore is awash with green trees climbing high into the sky.

“What can I call you?” I ask, following behind the fox with Jiro to the dock.

“You can name me, if you like.”

I sigh. I’m horrible at names. “Fine. Ginza is your name since you’re silver in color.” Ginza was once a famous shopping area in Tokyo of Old Japan, so the name feels appropriate.

We stride the length of the dock, Jiro takes off his backpack and sets it in the last boat on the launch, then motions for mine.

“Be careful. Himi is asleep in the top pocket.” I hand off my backpack and climb in behind him, reaching under the seats for paddles.

Ginza circles the dock impatiently before jumping in with two other foxes. The rest of the fox crew waits on the shoreline.

“You’re coming with us?” I ask, pushing the boat away from the dock as Jiro unties a rope from the bow.

“We have been asked by Oda Clan to watch after you while you are gone from Owari. We followed you around your town for days before catching up with you here.”

“I didn’t see you once!”

“Foxes are clever.”

Foxes are clever, cunning, and devious, too, though they have only ever been sweet and loving to me. Fox statues used to protect temples in Old Japan, like the many temples dedicated to Inari, the fox spirit. They were the patron saints of sword smiths, merchants, and warriors, and even though they also were accused of possessing people, they were well-loved and fawned after. So much of my life is like this, love hate, hate to love, and love to hate. Foxes are just as misunderstood as I am.

Jiro and I paddle the boat across the lake at a swift clip. We alternate our paddles to the left and right of the boat, keeping the bow pointed straight at the green shoreline across from us. The sun peeks above the horizon, bathing the sky in pink, so we paddle faster. Each time my oar dips into the black water, I have to push it down and back as hard as possible to move the boat forward. It’s like paddling a boat through mud, and at the half-way point, I need to rest my arms. I tip to the right, looking over the side as Jiro continues. The black water is motionless and almost greasy, like thick crude oil. I can’t see past the surface, can’t even know how deep it is. I inhale but it has no scent that I can discern. A wave of déjà vu throws my stomach upside down. I’ve been here before.

I bite down hard on my lip to ground me before picking up my paddle and joining Jiro again. With Akuyama and a dense forest plus more hills surrounding this lake, it would have taken at least a day to round the circumference and enter the Kuroi Ninja’s territory from the side. I decided not to shuttle in because I want my visit to be a low-key surprise. After only thirty minutes of paddling, we reach the opposite shore. A dock sits here with several boats tied up awaiting their eventual passengers.

“We got here quicker than I thought we would.”

Jiro nods. “I think the bottom of the boat is coated in something to make it move faster through this sludge, but the oars are a pain.”

We tie up the boat, grab our backpacks, and head to the edge of the forest. I stroke my hand up the length of the tree in front of me. “It’s not a tree. It’s bamboo.” The dense bamboo forest stretches out and above at least four meters tall, obscuring anything that may try to infiltrate this area from the shoreline. Each bamboo is as thick as my leg, some the size of ancient trees. A breeze rustles the leaves along the top, swirling them around in a typhoon of green.

A stone path a meter wide leads into the forest so we proceed with the silent foxes at our sides.

“We’re being watched,” Jiro whispers at me. “On our right.”

I don’t turn my head to look. Instead, I lift my chin and walk faster. They can watch me all they want, as I walk straight into their village.

The path opens up and carved into the bamboo is a small clustering of one-story houses, quiet, shutters closed, and fires extinguished. A sharp whistle rings in the air and I jump, reaching for Kazenoho in my belt.

Jiro’s hand comes down over mine. “No. Look.”

A young man in a lookout tower aims a bow and arrow up into the bamboo tops, shoots, and hits a giant bird that crashes to the ground. Three men cheer as they leap and climb down the tower to their victim lying in the grass. The large bird, a hawk, I think, thrashes with the arrow in its wing before the men grab it and break its neck. Tears well in my eyes and the sleeping dragon in my chest, numbed by death and depression, awakes breathing fire.

“Hey!” I yell, running at them. “What did that bird ever do to you?”

The buildings explode in alarm, men and women opening doors to their porches and converging on Jiro and me as we make it to the group of men.

I shove the man with the hawk in his grasp. Jiro hisses my name at me, but it’s not enough to stop the blind rage.

“This hawk killed several of our young chickens,” the man huffs, “and who the hell are you?”

“Sanaa Itami herself has come to see me,” says a deep voice behind us.

I whirl around, my hand on my sword, and Shiro Koga stands behind us with a band of a dozen men.