In the failing sunlight, as day gave way to the dark of night, she looked up ahead, and saw a blond-haired white girl standing hand in hand with a big Japanese guy, the two of them intimately close. There were other gaijins on the beach, mostly tourists but some who lived in Miyazu City, so with the girl turned partly away from her, it took Mai a moment to realize she was looking at Kara Harper.
Her hands balled into fists.
“Do the different colors mean anything?” Kara asked.
At first Hachiro did not reply, and she wondered if it was a stupid question or if he was trying to come up with an answer. He squeezed her hand and nodded toward the bay. Night had arrived in full at last and the paper lanterns were lovely and ethereal in their pale colors.
“The white ones,” Hachiro said. “I’m not sure about the others, but the white ones are supposed to represent those who have died within the past year, since the last festival.”
Kara gazed out at the lanterns spread across the bay. There hadn’t seemed a vast number of white ones in comparison to the others, but now that she knew their significance, there seemed far too many.
“Another thing to remind Sakura of her sister,” she said.
Hachiro looked down at her. “I don’t think she needs any reminders.”
“No. You’re right.” Kara leaned against him, comforted by his solid presence.
“The fireworks will start soon,” Hachiro said. “Do you want to head back and join the others?”
“Not really,” she said, tilting her chin back to look up at him. “Is that horrible?”
Hachiro smiled, and for once, his grin held no trace of its familiar silliness. “Not at all. I’m enjoying just being with you. I’m glad we wandered away for a little while.”
She searched his eyes. “We haven’t had a lot of time alone together, especially lately. There are a lot of things I’ve been wanting to say to you.”
He hesitated.
“We’re here right now, Hachiro,” she went on. “You’re here, and I’m here. Maybe when this school year is over, I’ll be going back to the U.S. But maybe not. With what’s going on at school, your parents could pull you out of Monju-no-Chie without any notice. Then what? I’ve got a curse on me. A curse. But I’m still here. Right now, I’m here, standing in front of you, and there isn’t anywhere else in the world I’d rather be. Can’t you let that be enough?”
Her heart pounded in her chest, but she felt its beat pulsing throughout her body. Her face felt hot as she studied his face and she tightened her grip on his fingers. Hachiro had never looked so serious to her.
“Come on,” she said, with a nervous smile. “Don’t you have anything to say?”
Hachiro reached out with his free hand, brushed her hair from her face, and then cupped the back of her head as he lowered his mouth to kiss her. Kara began to protest, wanting a reply, and then his lips touched hers and she understood that this was his reply. He had never kissed her like this before, tender and urgent at the same time, their bodies so close, and as he broke the kiss and pulled back, she felt unsteady on her feet.
They grinned at each other.
Which was when Mai appeared, practically between them, standing ankle deep in the rippling water on the shore.
“You two seem to be enjoying yourselves,” she said, her upper lip curling. Kara thought she looked like a shark on the prowl. “It’s a shame that Wakana and Daisuke can’t be here to watch the fireworks.”
Hachiro stepped closer to Kara, as if he feared Mai might try to hurt her. “You need to leave her alone, Mai,” he said.
Mai laughed humorlessly. “Of course I do. Everyone else does. Why upset the girl who knows exactly what’s going on, and might be able to do something about it?”
Kara shook her head. “You have no idea what you’re talking about. If I thought there was anything I could do to help, I’d do it without hesitation.”
“So American, bonsai,” Mai sneered. “You’d be a hero, if only you knew who to hit.”
“What do you want from me?” Kara demanded.
But Mai had already looked out across the bay, at the soft colors of the paper lanterns eddying in the currents.
“The white ones are the most beautiful,” Mai said. “I wonder which two are Daisuke and Wakana.”
“You don’t know they’re dead!” Hachiro said.
“No?” Mai said, whirling on them. “Then where are they?”
As Kara and Hachiro stared her down, a soft thup-thup-thup filled the air, followed by loud pops of the first three firework explosions. Multicolored flowers blossomed in the night sky, cascading down like falling angels. Several others banged in the air, loud enough that Kara felt them in her chest, and the lights played myriad hues across Mai’s face.
The crowd sighed and oohed in appreciation, and as a huge burst of blue and gold filled the heavens, Kara saw Mai’s expression falter. Her anger shattered and crumbled, leaving only desperation and sadness behind.
“Please just tell me what you know,” Mai pleaded.
Kara took a deep breath.
And then, in between fireworks booming thunder across the sky, she heard someone call her name. The three of them turned to see Sakura, Miho, and Ren hurrying toward them. Kara and Hachiro stepped out of the surf. Miho gave Mai a quick, curious glance, but otherwise they ignored her.
“What’s wrong?” Hachiro asked as they raced up. “What happened?”
Ren’s bronze hair reflected the lights of the fireworks like metal. He pushed his head between Miho and Sakura, somehow bringing them all closer together, so he could deliver his message with greater privacy.
“There’s another kid missing,” Ren said.
Kara’s eyes went wide. She glanced at Mai, then at Miho. “Someone from Noh club?”
“It’s Yasu,” Miho said.
They all went quiet. The fireworks seemed to explode all around them. They all knew Yasu, a charming guy, the epitome of boy-coolness, quiet when he wanted to be enigmatic, He wore his hair longer than some of the girls, yet never got in trouble with Mr. Yamato for dress code violations. He had the lead role of Anchin in Dojoji.
“What do we do?” Ren asked.
Her voice almost lost in the midst of crackling fireworks, Mai spoke up. “Can I help?”
Kara could not trust her. The girl was too unstable. She looked at the others. “He was here, at the festival? He vanished from the beach?”
“Just a few minutes ago,” Sakura said. “When it got dark.”
Kara nodded. “Good. The land is so narrow here, and there’s only one way to leave.” She started hurrying up the sand, cutting through the crowd, and they all followed, Mai included. “Split up. Get into the woods. Let’s try to stop it from getting him out of here.”
“It?” Mai said, tugging her arm. “What is it?”
Kara pulled her arm away, but she did look back, meeting Mai’s frightened gaze. “We’re pretty sure it’s the Hannya.”
“But that’s just a story,” Mai said.
“What if it’s not?” Kara asked, and then she ran to catch up with the others.
She could not be certain over the sound of the fireworks, their light splashing the white sand and black pines, but she thought she heard Mai start to pray.
I have seen many boys play Anchin, but you are more beautiful than any of them.
Yasu could not speak or breathe or move. His eyes bulged and his chest burned with the need for air as its voice—her voice?—wormed its way into his brain. Shadows gathered at the corners of his eyes, but he did not think this was the ordinary darkness of the night or the black pine woods around him. No, this was unconsciousness enveloping him, perhaps death drawing him down into an abyss of eternal nothing.
Air. Please.
She had been there in the crowd beside him, so beautiful and slender, her hair gleaming blacker than black, her eyes green. She wore a gossamer dress the same ebony as her hair, the moonlight hinting at delights beneath. When he had
first caught sight of her, he had inhaled sharply at encountering so fine and delicate a girl. Only a few years older than himself, she had tilted her head back and thrust out her tongue as if tasting the night, and then she’d swiveled her head to return his stare, as though she’d been aware of his attention all along. When she smiled, he lost any sense of himself. In that moment, he would have been whatever kind of fool she wished.
“Come,” she’d whispered, lips brushing past his ear as she took his hand.
Yasu gave no thought to his friends, or the fireworks that were about to start. He had followed her through the crowd. Somewhere, he heard the low, sonorous bong of a bell, and then they had reached the part of Ama-no-Hashidate where the beach gave way to the thick tangle of black pines that ran down the center of the sandbar.
The first of the fireworks had exploded behind them, finally breaking whatever trance Yasu had been in. He turned to look up at the beauty of the colors shooting through the night sky, and behind him, he’d heard a hiss.
The hands that grabbed him could not have been her hands. One folded over his mouth and nose and one wrapped around his torso, pinning his arms to his sides. But then something thick and cold and rough coiled around him, squeezing, and now he felt something crack inside of him, the darkness at the edges of his vision rushing in.
Someone came into the trees, calling his name. Other voices shouted for him as well. The fireworks popped and thundered, throwing multicolored ghost lights among the pines.
Half-conscious, he felt himself being carried. Branches scratched his face and arms, but suddenly he could breathe again. Air rushed into his lungs. Still, he felt barely aware of his surroundings. His body swayed from side to side, still clutched by cold flesh. The touch was cold and rough at the same time. It flexed and shifted, and as awareness filtered back into his brain along with oxygen, he tried to turn his head, to get a look at the thing that had grabbed him. A single glimpse showed him red scales and dreadful yellow eyes, small black horns, wisps of white hair, and jaws opened so wide that they seemed capable of swallowing him whole. And teeth. He saw its teeth.
Yasu’s first instinct was to fight, but even as he bucked his body, trying to get loose, his gaze caught on a half-dead pine tree. He thrust his arms out and grabbed hold of a branch, gouging his left wrist but adrenaline overcoming all pain. His fingers closed tightly and he tore free of the creature’s grasp.
Breathing in ragged gasps, heart drumming hard, he snapped a branch off the dead pine and spun to face the thing with the yellow eyes. The woods were empty. Nothing moved. He scanned from shadow to shadow, strange colors still filtering through the branches from the fireworks high above. That single glimpse of the creature flashed in his mind and he twitched, whipped around, thought he’d seen it just out of the corner of his eye.
“Help!” he screamed. “I’m here! Help me! Anyone!”
Two seconds passed, maybe three, before he heard shouts in reply. People were looking for him. His friends, and others. After the other kids had vanished, everyone was on guard, paying extra attention. He would be—
The hiss came from his left. He twisted, wielding the branch. Soft and low, as if just beside him, he heard the slow bong of an old bell; a church bell, a funeral bell. Something darted across his field of vision, darkness against darkness, low to the ground, and the hiss came again, to his right.
The voices were coming closer, from either side now, surrounding him. They would find him. But too late.
It rose up behind him and he felt the chill of its breath like the cold of the grave, and then its rough tongue against the back of his neck.
Yasu screamed.
Fool, it said.
Kara glanced through the trees back at the beach. Many people had come up near the tree line now, peering in from the sand, wondering what the hell was going on, or knowing, but without any idea what they could do to help. Others truly had no clue, and weren’t about to be distracted from enjoying the Toro Nagashi Festival by the scrambling panic of a bunch of high school students and various adults who were lending a hand. They kept their backs turned to the trees, their eyes glued to the lanterns or the spectacle of the fireworks, and they grinned with childlike pleasure or sighed with solemn appreciation of the ritual of the lanterns.
In the woods, shouts of “Yasu!” drifted here and there, drowned out by the boom of fireworks, people yelling to be heard over one another’s voices. Kara and her friends had split up. She and Hachiro picked their way among the trees, forced too many times to back up and find a new path when the pines grew thick enough to create an obstacle. Ren and Mai were a little ways off. At first she’d heard the soccer queen wincing and complaining about the scratches, but she’d quieted down quickly, and now joined the chorus of anxious searchers calling Yasu’s name. Miho and Sakura were near enough that Kara could make out their voices from time to time, but she couldn’t see them. There were so many people picking their way through the pines that she felt sure if Yasu was still there to be found, they would find him.
Yet Kara couldn’t shake the feeling that they would find nothing, that Yasu had vanished as completely as the others. If this was the Hannya, or a Hannya, whatever serpentine spirit had been summoned up by their attempt to perform Dojoji, it left no trace of its victims. Either it abducted them and took them somewhere else, like a spider binding its prey to eat later, or it consumed them all without leaving a drop of blood behind.
She stopped yelling his name. Hachiro, caught up in the moment, didn’t seem to notice, but Kara gave up on Yasu. She kept moving through the pines, kept searching the shadows, but she did not believe they had any hope of finding him.
And then she heard the shouting from up ahead.
“What?” she said, pushing through a scrabble of pine branches that raked her skin in order to reach Hachiro. “What was that?”
Even as he reached for her hand, he picked up the pace, pulling her behind him as they weaved among the pines.
“Someone heard him. He’s calling out up ahead, or something,” Hachiro said.
Kara listened carefully and thought that she could actually hear a voice crying out for help. But by then the frantic shouts for Yasu had increased to a fervent cacophony that drowned out everything but the staccato explosions of fireworks.
They ran, dodging trees, whipping through the pines, and then there were many others around them, the circle closing. She saw Mai and Ren, and behind them Sakura and Miho, and others on her left side as well.
A scream tore through the pines, rising up, louder even than the fireworks’ finale, so close must they have been to its origin. They all went faster, harder, rushing, snapping branches, calling to one another now, trying to pinpoint Yasu’s location.
Kara’s steps faltered and she slowed. Ahead, a dozen or more searchers had come to a complete stop, forming a strange kind of half circle. An audience.
She let go of Hachiro’s hand and padded forward, finding a narrow gap between two others who had participated in the search. In between them, she had a view of a small clearing in the pine woods, and of the twisted, broken, bleeding human wreckage that had been left there, a rag doll cast aside by some giant, monstrous child.
She’d been wrong, after all. They had found Yasu.
And now she wished they had not.
10
Kara is drowning.
She cannot breathe, and blackness swims at the edges of her vision. Angry red spots flash in her brain. Her hearing is muffled, and as she lashes out, struggling, she feels as though she moves in slow motion. Water. I’m under water.
The realization is an epiphany. Disoriented, chest aching for air, she pushes herself in a direction she believes is upward, and her arms burst from the water. She sips at sweet relief, the air like magic in her lungs.
All around her, bobbing on the surface, paper lanterns float. Yet these don’t have the variety of hues of the festival lanterns. These come only in white—white lanterns, the spirits of the recen
t dead, eddying around her, floating closer as though drawn to her.
Something tugs her from below the water. She tries to cry out, but no sound escapes her lips as she is dragged under once more.
No, no, no. I don’t want to—
Her thoughts fall apart. The last of the air inside her struggles to be exhaled. Kara knows that if she opens her mouth she will drown. She will die. But her lungs demand air, and her thoughts are losing coherence, and she cannot stop herself.
She opens her mouth in a scream … but this time it is not silent.
With a gasp, she looks around. No longer in the water, she finds herself in a thick tangle of pines, and recognizes the place immediately. The black woods of Ama-no-Hashidate. Without the water muffling her hearing, the silence is gone. The air is filled with a loud hiss, layers of sound, the voices of serpents.
They hold her arms and legs, their coiled bodies emerging from the branches of the trees, more and more snakes reaching for her, tongues darting, eyes unblinking. Her throat is torn apart by her scream, her chest clenched by utter panic.
Please! she cries. Please!
She does not know to whom she appeals for mercy, only that mercy is her only hope.
Something grips her wrist, colder even than the skin of snakes, but not rough like the serpents. Soft. Gentle. Kara spins to see the hand on her wrist, peers into the thick bristle of darkness between two trees, and her eyes widen. Hope grows.
“Mom?”
The woman smiles. The serpents fall from Kara as though fleeing her touch, driven away. Kara blinks in astonishment and gratitude. Her mother has protected her.
Then the terrible truth crashes in from a part of her mind that cannot be deceived by dreams.
“But you’re dead,” she says before she can stop herself.
The sadness in her mother’s face breaks her heart. The serpents return, but not for Kara. They coil around her mother’s arms and legs, drape over her shoulders, and begin to pull her deeper into the trees.
Spirits of the Noh Page 12