At the Mouth of the River of Bees: Stories

by Kij Johnson

  “Mother,” I said, shocked. “What if he sees both?”

  She looked ashamed and Grandfather asked what was going on. I explained and he laughed. “He won’t. He is a man; he’ll see what he wants to see. Are you happy, Granddaughter?”

  “It is all beautiful, I think. But my lord does not love me.”

  “Yet.” Grandfather cackled. “I’m enjoying this. It’s too long since I got into mischief—not since I was a kit, and my brothers and I used to lure travelers into the marshes with fire in our tails.”

  I heard Brother sigh. I longed to see his expression, but the curtain separated us. Grandfather said: “Be respectful, Grandson. Be as human as you can, for your sister’s sake.”

  Brother replied, “Why can’t she be happy as a fox? We played and ran and I thought we were happy.”

  “Because she loves a man,” Mother said. “We are doing this for her.”

  “I know,” Brother said. “I will try to be a good brother to her, and a good son and grandson to yourselves.”

  “This man will help us all,” Grandfather said. “He will be a good provider, and perhaps he will find you a position in the government somewhere.”

  “I will try to be dutiful and satisfy all your expectations,” my brother said. He didn’t sound dutiful, only melancholy.

  “Well,” said Grandfather. “Granddaughter, are you ready for the next step?”

  “Grandfather, I will do anything.”

  “Then go tonight. Walk in the woods, and when Yoshifuji comes out, let things happen as they may.”

  I left the beautiful house—which meant I crawled from our dusty little hole—in the company of several ladies-in-waiting. There was a fox-path that appeared to lead through gardens and over a stream to the cedar forest-path, but it was really just passage through some thick weeds behind the storehouse. We moved down to the cedar path and walked there in the twilight.

  He came. My fox-eyes saw him before he saw me. He was in house-dress, simple silk robes without elaborate dyed patterns. He wore no hat but his queue was arranged just as it should be. His face was sad—missing his wife, I imagined, as well he might, she was so pretty and gentle. What was I doing, stealing him like this? Now she would wait in her dark halls forever, with no one to break the dim monotony of her life. I wondered if I should just shed this maiden’s body and ease back into the ferns that fringed the path.

  But I am a fox, whatever else I have become: I steeled myself easily, and said aloud, “I would rather she were alone than me.”

  Perhaps he heard me, or saw the ladies-in-waiting, who were dressed in bright colors that glowed even in the gathering dark. At any rate, he walked toward us. My women squeaked and averted their faces, hiding behind their fans. They were magical so of course they did just as they ought; I, who was only mortal (and a fox), stared bare-faced, with no maidenly reticence. He met my eyes. I have given that hunting stare; I know it well. I responded as the animal I am. I turned to run.

  He was beside me before I could gather my skirts, and laid his hand on my sleeve. “Wait!”

  I felt trapped like a mouse in his killing gaze. My women fluttered up, making meaningless noises of concern. “Please let me go,” I said.

  “No. A pretty thing like you?” I remembered my fan and brought it up to hide my face. He caught my wrist to prevent me; the touch of his skin against mine made me dizzy. “Who are you?”

  “Nobody,” I stammered. Of all the things we had remembered, all the unfamiliar things we had been so clever about—the tea set, the stones in the gardens—we had given ourselves no names! But he seemed to accept this.

  “I am Kaya no Yoshifuji. Why are you walking in my woods with no men to protect you?”

  I groped, thinking desperately. “It is a—a contest. We write poems to the dusk, my women and I.” The ladies chirruped in agreement.

  “Do you live near here?” he asked.

  “Oh, yes. Just on the other side of the woods.”

  He nodded. Fox magic made him accept this, even though the woods are a day’s hard travel deep and he has made this journey himself. “Still, it is very unsafe, and it is really too dark for you to walk home. Would you and your ladies honor me by coming as guests to my house, to wait there until your relatives can be sent for?”

  I thought of those rooms, and thought suddenly of Shikibu drifting aimlessly, waiting as she so often did for Yoshifuji. She would be a ghost there even in her absence. I shrank back. “No, I couldn’t possibly!”

  He looked relieved. Perhaps he felt her, as well. “Then where do you live? I’ll escort you home.”

  “That would be very nice,” I said with relief. “I live just over there.”

  Maybe he would have seen the falseness that first time when he stepped from the true path onto the fox-path, but he was looking at me, his head bent to try to see past the fan I had managed to raise. It was hard walking in my many robes, but he mistook my inexperience for blindness in the dark and he was very solicitous.

  The fox-path was long and wandering. We walked along it until we saw lights. “Home,” I said, and took his hand and led him the last few steps. He was lost in the magic then and didn’t notice that he entered my beautiful house by lying belly-down in the dirt and wriggling under the storehouse. We stood on the veranda. Servants clustered around, shielding me from his gaze and exclaiming.

  “You are the daughter of this house?” Yoshifuji asked.

  “I am,” I said.

  He looked around at the many torches and stone lanterns that lit the garden, and the quality of the bamboo blinds edged with braid and tied up with red and black ribbons. “Your family must be a fine one.”

  He followed me into my reception room, where servants had set up a curtain-of-state; they would preserve my womanly modesty here, even after I had committed the solecism of allowing a man to see me walk and to see my face unshielded. I sank to the mat behind the panels of fabric.

  My lord still stood. “Perhaps I should go, having seen you home,” he said.

  “Oh, please wait! My family will wish to thank you for your kindness. Please sit.” I heard servants bring a mat for him.

  A door slid open with a snap, by which I knew it must be one of us foxes, as the servants were all perfectly silent when they moved around the house. My brother’s voice spoke. “I have only just heard of your presence in our house. Forgive me that my sister was your only welcome.”

  I think Yoshifuji gestured, but I couldn’t see this. After a moment, my brother went on, “I am the grandson of Miyoshi no Kiyoyuki, and in his name I welcome you.” I sighed with relief. Someone had remembered! “Please accept our hospitality for the night.”

  “Thank you. I am Kaya no Yoshifuji.”

  “There will be food brought to you. Let me inform my grandfather. He is in seclusion tonight, but he will be deeply honored by your presence when his taboo has been lifted and he may socialize again. Please excuse me, so that I can arrange to have a message sent to him.” The screen snapped shut and I heard my brother’s narrow fox feet pad away from us.

  He did not come back that night. Nor did my mother or my grandfather appear. Our only company was my women, silent and efficient. We talked and Yoshifuji teased a little. After a bit, I dropped my fan in such a way that one of the panels of the curtain-of-state was pushed aside and I could watch his face in the dim light of a single oil lamp.

  My women brought my lord a lacquered tray with dried fish and seaweed and quail eggs arranged on it, a heaping pot of white rice, and a little cracked-glaze teapot with green-leaf tea brewing in it. There were also carved ivory chopsticks and a small shallow bowl for the rice and then the tea. I sniffed the air and smelled perfume and these delicate little foods; and at the same time I smelled the single dead mouse my brother had been able to catch and save. My lord lifted bits of the mouse with scraps of straw held between his fingers, and drank rainwater from a dead leaf, and thought nothing of it.

  We talked and talked. He said:


  “ ‘A mountain seen through shredding clouds;

  a pretty woman glimpsed through a gap of the curtains.’ ”

  “I would be glad of a clearer view.”

  I knew the appropriate response was another poem, but I had no idea what to say. The silence was stretching. If I said nothing, he would know something was strange. He would look around and see that he was not in this house, but crouched in the dirt, hung with cobwebs—“Please sit beside me,” I said.

  This was forward of me, but I could think of no other way to distract him. At any rate, it worked. He barely blinked, just stood and moved behind the curtains with me.

  A woman of rank is hardly ever alone, so my ladies-in-waiting were present; but they slept, discreet little piles of robes in the darkness. One even snored, a tiny undignified sound. I was grateful for that snore. It must make the women seem real, and our privacy seem absolutely convincing to my lord.

  I hid my face with my fan, which he took away from me; with my sleeve, which he gently brushed aside; with my hands, which he captured in his own and held against his face.

  From there things progressed. I had mated before with my brother but I think we were too young for it to take, for I had no cubs. Mating with a man was not so different from that—though cleaner and more polite—and yet I found it completely different. Yoshifuji was very handsome even with his hair in disarray and his robes kilted aside. I wept at his beauty, at the touch of his hand on my human breast, at the feel of him in my fingers, at the heavenly shower of his consummation. He brushed at my tears with a fingertip and I sobbed more helplessly and hid my face in my hair.

  “What is wrong, my love?” he whispered.

  “How she will mourn,” I said to myself.

  “Who?” he asked.

  “Your wife,” I said.

  He shrugged. “It is you I love.”

  And that’s how I knew that the fox magic had taken him.

  Dawn came and Yoshifuji did not leave as he would have had I been a mere flirt. He stayed beside me, and played with my hair as my women rearranged my dress and scented my robes.

  One of the shojis slid open, and my grandfather stood there in his red-orange robes. I squeaked with embarrassment—the evidence of our earlier occupation was clear around us, and even the curtain around the bed platform was in considerable disorder, its panels flipped out of our way in the night—but Grandfather said nothing of this.

  “Ah, you’re the lad,” he said. “I’m Miyoshi no Kiyoyuki. It’s good to meet you.”

  Yoshifuji bowed. “I am—”

  “I know who you are; my grandson came to tell me about you last night. Please forgive me for there being no one but my graceless granddaughter to entertain you.”

  My lord bowed his head. “Your granddaughter is a woman of rare beauty and intelligence.”

  “Yes, well,” Grandfather said. “I hope you mean that.”

  “I do,” said Yoshifuji. “And your home, so elegant—”

  “Well. You were always meant to come here, and now you must stay.”

  “It will be the delight and honor of my life,” my lord said.

  “Come drink with me,” my grandfather said. “We have a lot to arrange.”

  Light-headed with happiness, I watched Yoshifuji and my grandfather leave the room. When my love returned, it was settled. We were to be married.

  We slept together the three nights it takes to formalize a marriage and ate the third-night cakes, and drank sake together in the presence of a priest. I saw the wedding as my lord saw it: our bright robes and the priest’s hands gesturing at us, my family watching, wisteria in my mother’s hair; but when I cried, the wedding blurred into patches of color over the truth of the thing: four foxes and a dirty madman crouched in the filth and dust and darkness. I loved Yoshifuji. Didn’t I want the best for him? Could this be better than his lovely house and his beautiful waiting wife?

  No. I didn’t care what was best for him. I wanted what I wanted. I am only a fox, after all.

  We settled easily into a life together. At first Yoshifuji spent every night and most of each day with me. We mated often, most often when he quoted poetry to me. What else was I to do? When we were not pillowed together, he lounged in my rooms, twiddling with the soft-bristled brushes and ink. He sat many times writing quickly on a lacquered lap desk, the ink black and shiny as wet slate in the snow. I looked over his shoulder once and read, in large, strong characters:

  “The bowl’s dark glaze reflects the sky:

  Which color is the bowl? Blue or black?”

  “What does that mean?” I asked and then I realized: poetry again. He looked at me strangely, and I blushed and blurted, “What are you writing, all the time?”

  “I keep a diary,” he said. “I always have. My wife …” His voice trailed off. I held my breath, for I knew he hadn’t meant me. After a moment, he shook his head and laughed. “I had a thought but it escaped me. Perhaps it will come again.”

  “Come to bed,” I whispered, and he left that thought and did not return to it.

  After a time, Yoshifuji began to leave me alone more, to be with Grandfather and Brother. I sighed but I knew it was appropriate: men will seek out the company of men. The fox magic was such that my lord had responsibilities as he had in his other life. There was a constant stream of people in our house, with messages and problems. There were even envoys from Edo. He had many contacts. He found a position in the neighborhood for my brother as a secretary for an official of some sort.

  This sounds so strange, even to me. We were foxes, what kind of work could we do? And there really was no job for Brother and no messengers, no reports to be sent to Edo. It was all just dreams. But our family felt benefits from this influential life Yoshifuji lived, as though it had been real and we had been human. Hunting was better than it had been and the weather was good. I can’t explain. Fox magic.

  One day, my husband was hunting with Grandfather. I drifted through my rooms looking for things to do. I played with my fan and tucked it into my sleeve; when I reached for it, I found instead the small white ball my grandfather had given me. I was looking at it when my brother ran in.

  “Sister!” he said, out of breath. “Something terrible is happening up at the house.”

  “What? What?” I said, knowing he meant my husband’s other house, terrified that somehow Yoshifuji had slipped from the magical world we had made for him back into the real world and found his way home.

  “They’re searching everywhere for him. They have the servants out everywhere. You have to see.” He pulled at my sleeve, dragging me outside.

  I held back. “Is she there?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t think so. It’s just all the servants and his son—”

  “He has a son?” I said, and let myself be taken out.

  It was hard easing out of the woman’s shape to become just fox again. I felt as though I had stumbled on a stone and wrenched my muscles falling. I crouched in the dirt under the storehouse with my brother, watching all the activity.

  There was a boy with Yoshifuji’s features. How could I have missed him all those days I had watched my husband? He was still young but he gave orders with an assurance that seemed very familiar. Servants ran in all directions. A priest walked in the gardens, calling the Buddha’s Name and reading sutras for Yoshifuji’s return. I saw the priest’s feet slow as he passed us and I tensed; but he didn’t stop. I had to laugh: the mighty Buddha, confounded by mere foxes? We watched all this for a time but no one looked under the storehouse. No doubt it seemed too humble a place to find a man.

  When I slipped back into my woman’s body, I made a discovery.

  Mother shrieked when I told her. “Pregnant?”

  “I could feel it. When I made myself a woman again, I could feel it, a little male.”

  “A son! Oh, such news! You will bring such honor to the house!”

  “How can it? I am a fox. My child will be a fox. He will see and l
eave me.”

  Mother laughed at me. “You have lived all this time with a man and you have not learned the first thing yet. He will see a son because that is what he wants. He will be so happy! I’m going to go tell your grandfather. A son!”

  It was just as she said. Yoshifuji was thrilled. I grew heavy with the child and after a time I could hardly lift myself to walk from room to room. My husband’s responsibilities kept him often away. Though he spent every spare moment with me, I found myself often bored. I took out the little white ball from time to time and amused myself by tossing it in the air and catching it, and when it rolled from my grasp, my women retrieved it for me.

  My delivery of my child was easy, comparatively painless as these things go. Yoshifuji rushed into the room as soon as Mother would allow him, and brushed through the curtain to my side.

  “My son, let me see him!” he said. “You marvelous wife of mine!”

  I gestured for the nurse to show my husband the child. He peeled away the tight cloths. “What a child! Wife, you are extraordinary. A beautiful healthy boy.”

  I said nothing, seeing for a moment the shadow of a man in filthy, ragged robes crouching in the dark to kiss a fox kit on its closed eyes.

  Time was strange in the fox-world. Years passed for us and for Yoshifuji. Our son grew rapidly until he hunted birds with toy arrows and began to ride a fat gold and black spotted pony. Years passed but they were only days in the outer world. My brother, who brought us much of our food, said that my husband’s other wife had returned.

  “What is she like now?” I asked. I watched my son practice his brush strokes, tilting his head to see the shine of the fresh ink over the matte black of dried ink from earlier lessons; all our magic, and paper was still too scarce to allow a child to destroy more than the absolute minimum number of sheets.

  “Sad,” Brother said. “What do you expect?”

  I shook my head, then remembered he couldn’t see me. I was behind my curtain-of-state. As always. “I hoped she would feel better in time.”