by Yuya Sato
Facing down Hogi Takamiya, Kayu Saitoh insisted, “The bear isn’t going to destroy the trap, we are—with the bear inside it.”
“Assuming the bear abides by the plan,” Hogi Takamiya said, sounding bored. “When I look at you all, I only see little children playing at digging holes for wild rabbits to fall into.”
“That’s because you’ve expected to lose from the beginning.”
“Then you who expect to win can give it your best,” Hogi Takamiya said, and beside her, Shijira Iikubo responded with a laugh that shook the withered lips of her toothless mouth. Maru Kusachi, whose stooped back made her small frame appear even smaller, didn’t display a particular response aside from placing her hands on her hips. Kayu Saitoh surreptitiously sniffed herself, catching a whiff of charcoal mixed with her own body odor. Producing a disapproving grunt from her sore throat, she thought, They’re nothing more than feckless, spoiled children. A wild rabbit facing death at the bottom of a pit has far greater beauty than they.
3
Amid Dendera’s reconstruction, Masari Shiina reorganized the nineteen survivors’ living arrangements. She emptied the four western huts, including the two that had been destroyed by the bears’ ferocious incursion, and redistributed the women among the five huts to the east. In the easternmost were Kayu Saitoh, Shigi Yamamoto, and Nokobi Hidaka; next door were Hotori Oze, Usuma Tsutsumi, and Itsuru Obuchi; followed by Hogi Takamiya, Ume Itano, and Tsusa Hiiragi; next were Ate Amami, Hikari Asami, and Shijira Iikubo; next were Kotei Hoshii, Tamishi Minamide, and Tema Tsukamoto; and in the manor were Masari Shiina, Hono Ishizuka, Kyu Hoshina, and Maru Kusachi. Kayu Saitoh saw one ulterior motive to the reorganization. Seven of the women—Ate Amami, Kotei Hoshii, Hotori Oze, Hikari Asami, Ume Itano, Kyu Hoshina, and Nokobi Hidaka—had belonged to the Hawk faction, and Kayu Saitoh suspected that Masari Shiina, wanting to quell any potential problems, had divided the Hawks to prevent them from forming an alliance.
When Kayu Saitoh returned to the hut assigned to her by the calculating chief, Shigi Yamamoto and Nokobi Hidaka were huddled around the sunken hearth. Kayu Saitoh sat facing Nokobi Hidaka and extracted a potato from the hearth’s ash. The vegetable had cooked through, and she broke it in two and stuffed the pieces into her cheeks. Coldness had permeated her body, and her gums protested the potato’s scalding heat more than they should have, but she chewed anyway. The Doves’ food reserves were a fair bit more plentiful than Kayu Saitoh had supposed, and the women were rationed several potatoes daily. When she stirred the ashes in search of a second potato, Nokobi Hidaka found it first and handed it to her.
“You found it,” Kayu Saitoh said, “so you eat it.”
“This isn’t my potato,” Nokobi Hidaka grumbled. “It’s the Doves’ potato. It’s table scraps, courtesy of the Doves.”
“If you let things like that bother you, you won’t be able to keep alive.”
“But Kayu, you must be thinking the same thing as you eat those potatoes.”
“Hawkish talk is dangerous in Dendera now—and futile.” To communicate her point, she snatched the potato from the woman’s hand.
“If things go on like this, the raid will be nothing more than a lost dream.” Nokobi Hidaka looked at the ashes that clung to her empty hand. “Mei must be so sad now.”
“Quit that talk.”
Masari Shiina had forbidden any discussion of not only the plague but of the former chief and the mutineers. Just like what was done sixteen years ago, she was trying to make the events be forgotten.
“Quit it, huh?” Nokobi Hidaka snorted. “You can only say that because you haven’t been in Dendera long. I think I’ve told you this before, but I’ve lived here for eighteen years now. I’m eighty-eight. That’s a long time. So I knew Mei well. As I do Masari.”
Kayu Saitoh lowered her voice. “Do you think Masari Shiina was waiting a long time for this to happen?”
“She hated Mei. When the Mountain-Barring happened, Mei was the one who incited the women of the Village to a frenzy.” Nokobi Hidaka scratched the splotchy skin of her neck. “Relations were stormy between them even back in the Village.”
“I didn’t know that,” Kayu Saitoh whispered. Being much younger than the two women, she hadn’t been aware of their animosity in the Village.
“Apart from that, they were the heads of the Hawk and Dove factions. For Masari, the bear’s coming might not have been that unwelcome. But the saddest part is that without Mei, the raid will never happen. Even Itsuru grieved her passing deeply. I … wonder if that woman is all right.”
“Living long doesn’t seem to be that easy.”
“You got that right. I wanted to attack the Village.”
“Then do it alone—if you’re brave enough,” Kayu Saitoh replied, peeling the skin from her potato. But then she realized she sounded as if she had completely submitted to Masari Shiina. “Of course I have my own thoughts sometimes,” she added. “No matter who the chief is, I don’t see any purpose to living in Dendera.”
“So what are you going to do then, Climb the Mountain?”
“I don’t want to. There’s even less purpose to that. I can’t go to Paradise. I can only live. So I have to do something that only a person who’s alive can do. That’s how I’ve come to think. That’s the only way I can think now.”
“A raid is something only someone who’s alive can do.”
“No, that would be a small thing. Sure, the act itself might be big, but it wouldn’t resolve anything. At the very least, it wouldn’t fulfill me or even change how I feel.”
“What do you want to do, Kayu?”
“I want an aspiration,” Kayu Saitoh said, thinking back to her final conversation with Mei Mitsuya. “I don’t need anyone else’s approval. The act itself could even be something insignificant. But I want an aspiration—something to believe in.”
“And you’re saying it would have nothing to do with the Hawks or the Doves? I’m not sure I understand.” Nokobi Hidaka tiled her head to the side. “And working for the Doves, in this Dendera they’ve taken over—that’s how you’ll find your bigger purpose?”
“Before I can do anything else, I need to eat, and I need to live.”
Kayu Saitoh put the potato in her mouth and looked to Shigi Yamamoto. She couldn’t tell whether the woman was listening to their conversation or not.
Even as Dendera changed, Shigi Yamamoto’s behavior remained constant. Now, as before, she muttered words that no one but she could understand.
Kayu Saitoh chewed her potato, wondering if Shigi Yamamoto had found her own aspiration. No one else would share it, or even know what it was, but possibly she had found something that could bring her true fulfillment, and possibly, at this very moment, she might be devoted to doing everything she could to achieve it.
4
Patting her starch-filled stomach, Kayu Saitoh headed for the edge of the clearing, where she saw and entered a circle of women with Hono Ishizuka at the center. The hut that was to be a bear trap needed to be sturdy enough to contain the beast, and its construction required a great many materials and laborers. Like the other huts, the vertical posts would consist of wooden logs plunged into a foundation of leveled dirt. In this case, however, logs would also take the place of the straw walls.
Hono Ishizuka cheerfully directed the project. The woman’s high spirits quickly sapped Kayu Saitoh’s desire to work. Hono Ishizuka probably didn’t see anything inappropriate about giving orders with that smirk on her face—after all, no one remained to oppose her viewpoint—but her manner came across to Kayu Saitoh as something unforgivable. But Dendera’s currents had shifted course, and Kayu Saitoh was merely engulfed in them—opposing the new order while keeping herself alive wouldn’t be easy. Instead, she hid her feelings and joined in. But in this state of mind, her efforts went as poorly as would be expected, and she accidentally stubbed her toes on the wood quit
e a few times. Hono Ishizuka regarded her with scorn and asked her if she wouldn’t please try taking the work seriously. Kayu Saitoh’s anger came to a boil. She tossed down the wood she’d been carrying on her shoulder and asserted how much she’d done for Dendera, but her protests found no sympathy; all her self-justifications, founded upon little more than pride and privilege, didn’t change the fact that she couldn’t work worth a damn.
Without interrupting her duties, Ate Amami advised, “If you can’t help, you should go home.”
“You’re talking like you’re one of them.” A new anger bubbled up inside Kayu Saitoh. “Weren’t you a Hawk, Ate Amami? I seem to remember you babbling about attacking the Village.”
“We don’t know when the bear will come back, that’s all.”
Even Kyu Hoshina joined in, saying, “She’s right, Kayu. Nobody’s talking about Hawks or Doves here.”
Disappointed, Kayu Saitoh said, “Disgraceful. Go ahead, build your trap for all I care. Just drop that unseemly attitude.”
“Kayu, we’re all doing what we can to survive,” Kyu Hoshina said. “If you’re going to get in the way, then just go home. Even when things change in Dendera, you still complain. You should be ashamed.”
“Your submission is more shameful.”
“If you keep trying to stir up trouble, we’ll use you as bear bait,” Kyu Hoshina said. Derisive laughter spread among the women.
Kayu Saitoh couldn’t forgive Ate Amami and Kyu Hoshina, who had supposedly been in the top ranks of the Hawks, for letting themselves be used by Hono Ishizuka, and worse still, for working without carrying any anger or a sense that anything was wrong. Though Kayu Saitoh hadn’t backed either the Doves or the Hawks, feelings of condemnation and betrayal overwhelmed her, and she left the area. She recognized that the work of building the bear trap belonged to others, and then she realized that she had nowhere she needed to go, and no one she needed to meet, and her footsteps faltered. If she had decided to get sentimental, she could have, but upon reflection, she judged it a disrespect to think of those who had departed only now that they were gone. She decided that if she was going to walk her solitary path, she should at least do so with a steady step.
Kayu Saitoh’s feet had taken her toward the burial ground.
After the outbreak, the graveyard had come to be seen as a taboo place. With no visitors, the grounds had become half-buried in mounds of snow. The accumulations of snow on the gravestones seemed to swell like the hunched shoulders of beasts, and an imposing stillness inhabited the burial ground. Kayu Saitoh tried to block out any thoughts for the dead, but she couldn’t help thinking of Kura Kuroi, Mei Mitsuya, Soh Kiriyama, and the others.
As she tried to rein in her reminiscences, she heard the crunch of footsteps in snow. Behind the graveyard—at what could be called the boundary between Dendera and the Mountain—something moved. Kayu Saitoh sought cover behind a group of trees. From her new position, she could see several footstep trails leading away from Dendera. She followed them and found that group of three women—Hogi Takamiya, Shijira Iikubo, and Maru Kusachi. The three were talking as they amused themselves by trampling on the snow and the bamboo grass. Crouching, Kayu Saitoh moved close enough to hear what they were saying. Careful not to make any noise, she hid herself in a patch of bamboo grass and focused on listening.
Only barely could she make out what Hogi Takamiya was saying.
“They’re building a storehouse and a trap and all that. And they’re making them so good and strong. Such diligence. And yet they’re blind to what’s far more serious.”
“Utterly blind.” This voice belonged to Shijira Iikubo. “If I may be so pompous, we control whether or not Dendera lives or dies. That’s being pompous, of course.”
“But it doesn’t matter if we can’t figure out what exactly it is. Should we make her talk? We could beat it out of her.”
“It would be dangerous to do anything that would make us stand out. There’s only nineteen women left in Dendera. If we make a move, we’ll attract attention. And that Masari Shiina’s got sharp eyes. She’s not like Mei Mitsuya.”
“If it were up to me, I’d rather do everything at once instead of sneaking about.”
“That’s because you make up your mind before you think,” Shijira Iikubo snapped.
“That’s being harsh,” Hogi Takamiya said, but then laughed cheerfully. “Anyway, what about you? What do you think?”
“Well,” a soft voice said. It was Maru Kusachi. “We should keep observing a little while longer. Being put into different huts is a hindrance, but we’ll figure something out.”
“Observe, huh?” Hogi Takamiya muttered. “But if someone else gets killed in the meantime, what then?”
“If that happens, maybe it won’t matter anymore.”
Their conversation had apparently ended. Kayu Saitoh heard the three pairs of footsteps approaching, but the three returned to Dendera without noticing her. She’d only caught a fragment of their conversation, not even enough for her to speculate what they were talking about, but whatever it was, it didn’t seem good for Dendera. But, unsure of her place in Dendera, Kayu Saitoh didn’t know whom she should tell—or shouldn’t tell—the things she’d overheard. Her discovery of this group of women with their own ideas was utterly vexing. Nevertheless, she was getting back on her feet, beginning to return to Dendera, when she felt something cold touch the scar on her head. She looked up and saw several droplets falling.
It was raining.
Rain was unusual this time of year and at this temperature. Being bathed in this rain from another place and time had an inexplicably therapeutic effect on her mood. The rain came at first in a weak drizzle but soon gained in force and volume until it came in a pattering torrent. The snow absorbed the raindrops at first, but soon gave way, turning clear and wet. Kayu Saitoh walked through the rain, and the moisture quickly ate through her straw coat and straw sandals. Her body, mostly skin and bones, immediately froze. She looked up again and saw a mass of rainclouds that had appeared where the blue sky had once been. In the Village, unseasonal winter rains such as this were abhorred as signs of coming famine. If such a rain continued, the young women were forced to perform a Rain-Stopping. Since fiery disasters were said to visit the hut of any woman who entered the Mountain, the Rain-Stopping turned that punishment to the Village’s benefit. When the unseasonal rain came, multiple women lined up in clear view at the Mountain’s base and simply waited for the storm to lift. Sometimes, some of the women died from lung infections, but the custom persisted to this day. Kayu Saitoh walked through the rain and contemplated that somewhere down the Mountain, women from the Village would be standing there, trembling. Kayu Saitoh returned to her home, where Shigi Yamamoto was sitting in front of the sunken hearth. As Kayu Saitoh removed her dripping-wet white robes and her straw sandals, Shigi Yamamoto stared into the hearth, incognizant of her arrival and indifferent to the sound of the falling rain.
5
Night came, but the rain didn’t stop, soon making its way through the flimsy roof and into the room. Kayu Saitoh and Nokobi Hidaka tried stuffing more straw into the ceiling, but their efforts proved ineffectual, and they gave up, instead placing an empty stone pot on the floor beneath the leak. The stone bowl filled quickly, and they had to keep tossing the rainwater outside. With no expectation of receiving any help from Shigi Yamamoto whatsoever, Kayu Saitoh and Nokobi Hidaka had to take turns dumping the water themselves.
“What an awful downpour,” Nokobi Hidaka said as she put more wood into the hearth. “I hope the trap isn’t destroyed. We just finished it.”
Kayu Saitoh draped her damp white robes over shoulders and said sourly, “If rain like this could destroy it, that bear would blow it down with a single breath.”
“I was only saying. The trap is fine. We can be at ease now.”
“There’ll be no ease until we store up more food
.”
“The trap and the storehouse are both finished. From tomorrow on, we’ll spend the days foraging. Also, we’re due for another Climb, and we need to hurry and find whoever got sent into the Mountain. We have so much to do.”
Only upon hearing Nokobi Hidaka’s words did Kayu Saitoh realize the obvious truth: Others besides herself would turn seventy this year; she would not be the only one to Climb the Mountain.
“I get the feeling it would be a better kindness to let her die in the Mountain,” Kayu Saitoh muttered. “Life in Dendera isn’t easy. Rather than drag her feeble body in search of food, and live trembling from the snow and the rain and the bear, she might be better off dying in the Mountain thinking thoughts of Paradise.”
“Dying alone in the darkness of the Mountain is certainly not better. Besides, the more we can increase our numbers, the better our chances of attacking the Village become.”
“Nokobi Hidaka … you’re still thinking about that?”
“Won’t you attack with me, Kayu?”
“Huh?”
“I can trust you, so I’ll tell you this.” Nokobi Hidaka leaned forward. “Today, when we were building the trap, I was able to have a little talk with Hotori Oze without anyone noticing. She hasn’t given up on the attack.”
The log crackled in the hearth.
After a moment, Kayu Saitoh spoke, her voice automatically dropping to a whisper. “That was a dangerous thing to do.”
“I said that no one noticed. I was careful.”