"Fine, then if you won't tell me, I'll fill in the blanks." He hummed to himself as he tapped his chin. "Akito was a childhood friend, a boy you met by chance when you were young—" He smiled and Suzume looked away and towards the thick trees that surrounded them. "He was always quiet and mysterious, but you couldn't stay away from him. You watched him go from a stoic boy to a courageous young man and it wasn't until he was beyond your reach that you knew how you felt about him. Did I get it right?"
Suzume stopped walking and put her hands on her hips. "Akito never existed. I've never been in love. Are you happy now? I knew my father would choose for me from the time I was young and I never held onto the illusion of love. In the White Palace, as a woman, your value is in your ability to bear sons and marry well. Love doesn't come into the equation."
He appeared momentarily stunned as she stormed past him. Her eyes burned from unshed tears, but she told herself it was just leftover effects from the spider's poison. I don't care about love. I don't need it. Power is what matters and I can control that. I just can't marry Daiki… because of his mother… It was a lame excuse and she knew it.
She didn't hear his footsteps behind her and she was glad that for once he was giving her space. Suzume walked at a determined pace for quite some time until she came upon a roadside shrine. It was made of plain unvarnished wood with a slanted roof and an open front that looked out onto the road. There was a bench beside it where travelers could rest under the shade of a tree with low-hanging branches. Since they'd been walking for quite some time, Suzume decided it was time for a rest. She put on a brave front, but after everything that had happened, she was exhausted.
She plopped down on the bench and rubbed her sore feet. I really need to get better shoes and soon. I wish I had some thicker sandals that were meant for travel. She glanced down at the ground and a pair of sandals lay at her feet. She glanced around in either direction. Were these here before? She shrugged and picked them up. They were thick sandals made of a tight weave without any visible wear.
Why would anyone leave such good sandals here? She shrugged again. Their loss. She discarded her worn sandals by tossing them over her shoulder and put on the new sturdy travel sandals. She wriggled her toes and admired them. Much better.
She sighed and leaned back. From her vantage point she could see inside the shrine. An idol sat inside. It was the image of a short fat man with a necklace made of large coins, an empty offering bowl lay before him, and beside it incense burned down to ash. The shrine was relatively clean, aside from the empty bowl and incense. Unlike some roadside shrines, there were no discarded offerings or debris. Someone must come here often to keep it clean.
Suzume eyed the shrine. The empty bowl made her think of her own empty stomach, which rumbled in protest. She hadn't eaten in—well, she wasn't sure how long. The dream food had been nice, but it hadn't actually made its way into her stomach. She glanced down the path from where she had come, but Kaito was nowhere to be seen.
I'm starving. I wish I had something to eat. Suzume sighed. Suzume looked down the road in the direction they were headed, and a hunched form approached. She stood up, prepared to run, but as the figure scooted closer she realized it wasn't a monster but an old woman who hobbled down the pathway. She wore a plain brown robe and her back was bent, so she had to lean on her cane to walk. With her free arm she carried a basket. The blanket over the basket blew back and revealed several large dumplings. Suzume's stomach growled audibly. She's probably going to leave that as an offering. Suzume contemplated stealing them once she was gone. Then again her history with shrines hadn't been a good one. I'd hate to unleash another dragon because I stole his offering. She grimaced at the thought of two Kaitos.
The old woman reached Suzume and the shrine. She nodded in Suzume's direction and then went inside the shrine and knelt before the idol. She folded her hands and prayed. Suzume pretended to be enjoying the scenery while watching the old woman from the corner of her eye. As a test, Suzume made a cursory probe into her well of spiritual power but found no change from earlier. It remained dormant despite her proximity to a holy place. The old woman finished her prayers and then cleaned up the ashes from the old incense. She then reached into her basket and extracted a few dumplings, which she set down before the shrine in the bowl. She lit a new stick of incense and stepped back to admire her offering. I bet she's the one who's maintaining this shrine. And she can barely walk.
The old woman got to her knees and Suzume pretended to be admiring her nails. They were ragged and dirt caked the beds. She pulled a face looking at them. Never in her life had she had such filthy nails.
The old woman hobbled over to Suzume and stopped in front of her. Suzume glanced up at the old woman and forced a smile. She was never very good with the elderly or children.
"You look hungry," the old woman said, "Here, have a dumpling." She proffered the plump white dumpling. It was still warm with steam rising off of it.
Suzume raised a skeptical brow in the old woman's direction. She was offering her the food from her basket. "Isn't that for your offering?"
The old woman shook her head and the wisps of her gray hair fluttered back and forth. "Not all of it. I always bring extra in case I run across a hungry traveler. We get quite a few merchants who come through this area from time to time." She took Suzume's hand and placed the dumpling in her hand. "Enjoy."
The old woman hobbled away without another word. Suzume stared at the dumpling in her hand. Its warmth seemed to run up her arm, revitalizing her. She was beginning to wonder if she hadn't escaped the spider dream at all and now she was trapped in some kind of world where her every desire was instantly met.
"There you are," Kaito called out to her. "I'm shocked you didn't get into trouble while you were alone."
Suzume glanced up to see him a few feet away, grinning just as he had been when they were coming down the mountain.
Suzume prepared herself for the torment. Sometimes I wish he was more like Akito from my dream. At least he would be nicer to me.
As he approached her, his expression changed suddenly. "Suzume, you shouldn't wander off like that."
She frowned. "You left me in a cave with a spider who wanted to eat me and now you're worried about me getting ahead of you? You should get your priorities in line."
He cradled her hand in his. She yanked it backwards as if it had burned her. Suzume glanced up at him with a skeptical brow—not unlike the one she'd given the dumpling lady. What game is he playing?
"Oh behold beauty / With hair like the ebony night / How I adore her."
Suzume snorted. "What was that?"
"A poem inspired by you, my dearest one."
Suzume's eyes grew large as she looked at the dumpling in her hand and the shoes on her feet, then at Kaito, who looked at her with a simpering expression. Oh no, what have I done?
24
"You look pale, dear one, why don't you sit down?" Kaito asked as he approached with a hand outstretched towards her.
Suzume wasn't sure what feeling was stronger, repulsion or frustration. This has to be a joke. He's mocking Akito from the spider dream. He grabbed her shoulder and she batted it away before scuttling backwards.
"This isn't funny; I told you Akito wasn't real. You don't have to keep mocking me!"
He shook his head as he smiled. How do I fix this? He's acting crazy. She took a step back and the backs of her knees collided with the bench and they buckled beneath her. She wobbled on her feet, throwing her arms out for balance. Kaito snaked his hand around her waist and brought her to his chest, her heart resting against him. The scent of his musk filled her nostrils as his hand crept up to the small of her back. Surprisingly, she did not feel that telltale tingling or a rise in her spiritual defenses when he was touching her. She tilted her head back and stared up into his dark eyes.
He's like a different person. She sighed. Why is this always happening to me?
Kaito brushed a stray hair away from Suzum
e's face and she shivered. A new feeling was bubbling up, one that needed to be squashed immediately. She had seen what lengths he would go to, to deceive her, like back at the temple when he had tried to seduce her for the fun of it. This isn't like back at the temple. He's not trying to seduce me. He is genuinely acting like Akito from my dream.
He dipped his head close to her and his breath stirred the loose hair that had fallen across her face. "Are you all right?" he asked.
Having him this close with his arms around her was doing strange things to her head. He was an attractive, if not infuriating man, and she found when they were close together, her body made decisions that her head did not agree with. Suzume shoved him away before she gave way to her conflicted desire. He took a step back and his expression reminded her of a lapdog she had back at the palace. In particular the face it made when it was in trouble.
"What's the matter, Kazue?" he asked, with his palms facing up in a gesture of pleading.
Did he just call me…? She was too shocked to respond. Kazue! Is that why he's acting this way, because he thinks I'm her? Maybe he wasn't pretending to be Akito. Maybe he was lost in some kind of delusion as she had been. Could the spider have gotten him with her poison when she wasn't looking?
Suzume snapped back to reality as Kaito reached out to grab her shoulder and twisted away from him. "I am not Kazue. I'm Suzume, remember? I broke your seal." She crossed her arms over her chest.
His smile was not mischievous like usual. He sat next to her on the bench, his thigh brushing against hers. She scooted away. "I know that is not your name now," he said as he chased after her as she moved away from him—she thought it might not be a good idea to run, considering how mercurial he could be. "That was your name once."
She slid away from him, and he followed down the bench until she ran out of room and fell onto the ground. She muttered a curse as Kaito jumped up and offered her a hand up. She ignored him and brushed off her pants. He kept grinning at her in a dopey way. Her stomach was in knots and she couldn't say why. She had met more than her fair share of charming men, the ones that thought they could win over every woman with a glance. She loved to trick them, let them believe that she was under their spell, and then expose them for the fools they were. But when Kaito did the same thing, it made her heart race. It must be an aftereffect of the spider dream. It has to be.
He frowned. "I know it's difficult for you to accept, but you're Kazue's reincarnation. Where did you think your spiritual powers came from? Why do you think it was so easy for you to break the seal? Because your soul sealed it five hundred years ago."
Suzume shook her head. To save her own skin, she had to keep denying it. How did he find out?
"You can't deny it. The visions, the memories that don't belong to you but feel real nonetheless, those belong to Kazue, they are a part of your past." His tone was soothing, almost as if he were coaxing her into believing him, which only made her more wary.
This is the Dragon that woke up eager for revenge. He wanted to kill all of Kazue's descendants! How can I possibly trust him? "I don't know what you're talking about, none of those things have happened to me."
"From the moment I awoke, I knew it was you. I was blinded by my anger. I did not want to admit it, not even to myself, but I can see the truth now. Fate has brought us back together and I refuse to lose you again." He opened up his arms to envelope her in his embrace. Suzume ducked and scrambled backwards out of his reach.
"No," Suzume shouted and then covered her mouth with her hand. Why does this bother me so much? What do I care if my supposed past self sealed him away?
And yet, she refused to believe it.
"You can't stop destiny. We are meant for one another." Kaito grinned and there was a hint of his old self in the expression.
Staring at a reality she did not want to face, Suzume did what she always did in these situations, she ran away.
"You're lying, I'm not her." She didn't wait for him to respond. She turned around and walked briskly down the pathway, away from the little roadside shrine.
"Wait, Suzume, we should talk about this," Kaito called out to her.
She spun around and fixed him with a hard stare. "Just give me some space. I need time to think about this."
She expected him to force her to stay or to argue more. Instead, he lowered his hand to his side and nodded. It was unexpected but welcome, and she all but ran down the road, with no direction in mind, just needing distance to breathe and to think. She could not accept Kazue was her past life; she refused to be believe destiny bound her to the Dragon. She was the master of her life, not some intangible force like fate. Kaito was confused by whatever spell had ensnared him, and once she figured out how to break it, everything would go back to normal. She hoped.
What if it is true? a voice at the back of her mind whispered. How did you unleash him from his seal? You've never shown any signs of spiritual power until you entered that temple. What if your soul was waiting until you went back to where it all began?
Suzume shook her head again, hoping to dislodge the unwanted thoughts. There was no way. Once she was a fair distance from Kaito, she slowed her pace. Her legs, unused to so much abuse, screamed in protest. In fact, her entire body ached, the dumpling had only curbed her appetite, and her stomach grumbled again. I can't do anything to fix Kaito in this condition, and if I just run away, he'll come after me eventually. There's no escape.
She collapsed onto a log on the side of the road. She glanced around her—there was nothing but a dirt road and paddy fields in either direction. Further down the path lay a village made up of tiny rows of wooden houses.
I bet the old woman came from this village. Maybe I can convince someone here to feed me and give me a place to rest. I doubt it will be too hard, these country folk never see regal beauty like mine. Suzume preened in her mind while conveniently forgetting that she had just spent the better part of a couple days wrapped up in a spider's web.
Suzume arrived at the village as the night was beginning to creep in. Orange light filtered through the collection of huts. Farmers with their tools slung over their shoulders trudged in after a hard day's work. Suzume also stumbled into the village. Children ran out to greet their fathers with shrieks of delight and were carried in swinging from their father's arms. People walked past her without so much as a second glance. So much for entrancing them with my regal beauty. Then she spotted the old woman outside a tiny hut at the edge of town. She walked over to her and the old woman looked up as Suzume approached.
"I saw you at the shrine today," said the old woman. She looked even smaller and more bent in the dying light of the day. "You look ready to fall off your feet. Do you have a place to stay for the night?"
All Suzume could manage was a shake of her head.
"Come with me, I can give you a place by my fire." The old woman motioned with her hand for Suzume to follow.
Suzume followed her wordlessly. The old woman's hut was not far away. It was a small one-room dwelling with a fire pit sunk into the center of the room and a hole in the roof where the smoke escaped. The old woman waved to a place across the fire pit for Suzume to sit. Suzume sat down, her legs burning from overuse and her joints complaining like that of a woman twice her age. The old woman hummed a tune under her breath as she ladled broth out of a pot that was boiling over the fire.
"Here, something warm will make you feel better," the old woman said as she handed Suzume the steaming broth in a lopsided bowl. "You look like you could use a wash and a change of clothes. I think I have some old clothes of mine around here," the old woman muttered to herself as she went to find means to accommodate her guest.
Suzume took the soup without a word. She held it in her hands, letting the warmth seep into her fingers.
The old woman shuffled about the hut as she hummed, leaving Suzume alone with her thoughts. She was still surprised Kaito had not come after her. It wasn't like him, but then again whatever this spell was, it made him into
a stranger. What can I do to turn him back when I can't even unleash my own power at will? She frowned as she stared into her broth.
After Suzume finished eating, the old woman brought a small bucket of cold water for Suzume to wash in and a change of clothes. They were too small, and Suzume's ankles and wrists peeked out from beneath the fabric, but it felt good to be in clean clothes, even if they were a bit itchy. Clean and dry, Suzume sat by the fire, warming her hands. I might as well see if this grandma can give me any information about the shrine, since I'm here.
"That shrine by the road, do you visit it often?" Suzume asked.
The old woman nodded as she swallowed a mouthful of food. "Yes, I used to go daily, but now that my bones are getting older, I go much less, perhaps once a week. Why do you ask?"
Suzume shook off the question and lapsed into silence for a while. A thought had begun to form in her mind, but she feared speaking it aloud. It was too ludicrous, yet it wouldn't stop gnawing at her.
"Do you know who built that shrine?"
The old woman looked into the fire, thoughtful for a moment. "The first villagers would have constructed it, and I believe my grandfather once told me it was blessed by a wandering priestess. It's dedicated to our local Kami." The old woman gave her a gap-toothed smile.
Suzume swallowed hard. "Do you know the priestess' name?"
The old woman thought for a moment and then shook her head. "I'm afraid I don't. It's said the shrine brings good luck, though. There are stories of it granting wishes and things like that."
Suzume choked. That's it! The shrine was granting my wishes. I wished for sandals and they appeared; I wished for food and she showed up with dumplings. I wished Kaito was more like Akito and… Suzume groaned aloud.
"Something wrong, child?"
"Nothing," she blurted before clamping her mouth shut. First thing in the morning, I am going back to that shrine and demanding that idol turn him back.
The Dragon Saga Box Set Page 17