by Yuya Sato
Kayu Saitoh left the hut and walked through the forlorn morning. Masari Shiina’s manor was her destination. She couldn’t predict the reaction she’d receive, but she felt obligated to inform the chief of the plague’s reemergence. Kayu Saitoh’s thoughts were still in turmoil, but as she stepped across the snow, she vowed to oppose the death sentence should one come from Masari Shiina’s lips. If Kayu Saitoh could do nothing else, she would at least prevent Nokobi Hidaka from becoming a sacrifice. As she swore this to herself, she also felt a duty to talk about the resettlement. Though unsure of the reception any of her words would receive, Kayu Saitoh nevertheless stepped into the manor.
And there she saw that further events had already developed.
Someone had come to the manor ahead of her, and it was Hotori Oze.
The woman’s white robes were stained red and exuded a foul odor.
“What the hell is this?” Hotori Oze was yelling. Kayu Saitoh had never heard her in such a rage. “I’m serious. I don’t want to die to some plague. Listen, Doves, what the hell is this? I didn’t eat the bear meat. We killed the ones who did. So why do I have the plague?”
Hotori Oze directed her hostile gaze on Masari Shiina and Hono Ishizuka. Her eyes were wild, seething in surrender to the heat of hatred. Kayu Saitoh had never seen her like this either.
Masari Shiina and Hono Ishizuka faced the crazed woman head on. They were determined to overpower her with their knowledge and their pride, and without retreat, denial, or deception. Maru Kusachi, on the other hand, was looking anywhere else, uninvolved.
“Well, even if you ask us like that,” Hono Ishizuka said, “we still won’t have an answer for you.” Her expression remained composed, but a twitch in her cheek revealed the effort that took. “Hotori, would you please calm down? We don’t know the source of the plague either.”
“I don’t want to die this way. I need to destroy the Village. Why the plague?”
Trying to placate her, Hono Ishizuka said, “Going forward, I’d like to reinvestigate this plague.”
“Reinvestigate? Nonsense. Utter nonsense. I’ve had enough of your mockery!”
“Wait a minute, Hotori. Why are you yelling at me?”
“Don’t look at me like that! I’ll give you this damn plague.”
Hotori Oze lurched for Hono Ishizuka, but Kayu Saitoh restrained her. Hotori Oze flailed about, yelling, “Let me go!” but Kayu Saitoh wrapped her arms around the woman’s. It was only then that the women noticed Kayu Saitoh’s presence.
“Kayu,” Hono Ishizuka asked, “what are you doing over there?”
The woman’s eyes went to Kayu Saitoh’s face, dropped to her blood-stained robes, and then went wide.
“It’s not me,” Kayu Saitoh explained reflexively. “Nokobi Hidaka caught the plague. It happened this morning.”
“Nokobi Hidaka, huh?” Hotori Oze said, putting on an expression not far from a smile. “So it’s not just me, then. Hah, well, well, so the plague attacks Dendera once more. That’s the end now, isn’t it?”
Kayu Saitoh asked, “When did you start showing the symptoms, Hotori?”
“Just a moment ago. I threw up blood,” she replied brusquely. “I didn’t eat the bear, but I still threw up blood. Foul-smelling blood, and a lot of it too.”
“Well, Hono Ishizuka, how are you going to explain this to the rest of Dendera?” Kayu Saitoh glared at Hono Ishizuka, with the thought of Ire Tachibana and Kushi Tachibana on her mind. “Anyone can see that the plague had nothing to do with the bear meat. It’s out in the open now.”
“Again, you can ask us that sort of thing all you like, and we still won’t have an answer. We know next to nothing about the plague, and that’s that.”
“You don’t know what this plague is. Your food reserves have dried up. The Doves’ reputation is plummeting.”
“Kayu, this is hardly the time to be talking like—”
Hotori Oze shook free of Kayu Saitoh’s arms. “What are you going to do? Tell me, Dove. What are you going to do? What are you going to do with me? What are you going to do about the plague? Shall I spread it for you?”
Whether or not the decision was beyond Hono Ishizuka’s capacity, Masari Shiina stepped forward. She swept her single eye across them. Kayu Saitoh couldn’t detect any trace of frustration in the leader’s gaze.
“I commend you for not hiding your condition,” Masari Shiina said, looking to Hotori Oze. “I do not believe that killing you will bring any peace of mind to the women of Dendera. Instead, we would prefer to work toward the discovery of the plague’s cause.”
“Work toward the—” Hotori Oze sputtered. “That’s the best you can say? Well, what are you going to do with me?”
“I’d like you to tell me your actions over the past several days. We’ve been in this besiegement for twelve days. We know the plague couldn’t have come from outside. Therefore, the source must be somewhere within Dendera.”
The leader next looked to Kayu Saitoh. “Bring Nokobi Hidaka here as quickly as you can. I want to hear her story. The plague’s source could be hidden in something both of these women have done.”
Kayu Saitoh hesitated, then looked Masari Shiina straight on and said, “Instead of that, won’t you consider leaving Dendera? It’s not too late. Let’s resettle. Abandon Dendera. Right now.”
“You’re still talking about that?”
“This has happened because you forever persist in clinging to Dendera. Why won’t you even try looking for a new place where there’s no bear and no plague?”
In a menacing tone, Hotori Oze said, “Listen, Kayu Saitoh, you’re only able to talk like that because you don’t have the plague. You think you can start some new life, but it’s only a fantasy that has enthralled you.”
Masari Shiina said, “I won’t abandon Dendera. And I won’t run from the plague. Quit this foolishness and quickly bring Nokobi Hidaka here. And don’t stir up a fuss about it.”
“Shit! How obstinate can you ladies be?” Kayu Saitoh retorted, but it amounted to nothing more than a parting shot. She had said what she needed to say, had behaved how she needed to behave, and had done all she could do, and she recognized that what she now needed to do was listen to Nokobi Hidaka’s story.
Kayu Saitoh turned in anger and left the manor. She was on her way back to the hut when she noticed Maru Kusachi moving ahead of her. What Kayu Saitoh immediately felt was nothing more than a hunch, but she sensed that Maru Kusachi was trying to escape to somewhere far away. She tackled the woman from behind and pressed the back of her head into the snow.
“Don’t try to escape,” Kayu Saitoh said. “Where do you think you’re going?”
“Would you let me go?” Maru Kusachi said through the snow in her mouth. “You’re hurting me, and I’m cold.”
“If you’re straight with me, I’ll let you go. Where are you—you three—going? Try to deny it and I’ll kill you right here.”
“Go ahead.”
“Damn you.”
Kayu Saitoh clicked her tongue and removed herself from the woman.
Maru Kusachi stood up, projecting an aloof air, then brushed the snow off her face and white robes and looked at Kayu Saitoh with an entirely unperturbed expression. That was when Kayu Saitoh realized that this woman wouldn’t bow to any manner of threat. There had been people like her—though not many—back in the Village. Nothing unsettled them, and nothing got to them. And Kayu Saitoh didn’t know how to deal with people like that.
And so she decided to be blunt. “I hate your kind most of all.”
“You can say that to me, coming out of nowhere?” Maru Kusachi was blunt as well. “I don’t believe I’ve ever done anything to bother you.”
“No?”
“If I—just for example—were to destroy Dendera, would that bother you?”
“I don’t know. I don’t know
what you’re talking about. But it would bother me if any more people died. Isn’t that what you three are planning? Aren’t you three planning on going somewhere?”
“But where would we go?”
“How the hell should I know? It’s just a thought I had. I got the feeling that you, Hogi Takamiya, and Shijira Iikubo might be going somewhere.”
Immediately Maru Kusachi replied, “And here I thought you were the one going away. Aren’t you about to go resettle somewhere? Aren’t you going to move to where there’s no bear and no plague? Tell me now, where is such a place?”
“I think you three know that better than any of the rest of us.”
“Aren’t you something,” Maru Kusachi said with an approving nod. “You have quite the knack for grasping the situation, even if you don’t have much practice at it.”
“What are you going on about?”
“And such superb intuition,” Maru Kusachi continued. “You just might have been able to hold Dendera together—if only you were more experienced. It’s a shame, really.”
“Enough of that. Just answer me.” Kayu Saitoh raised her voice in impatience. “You, Hogi Takamiya, and Shijira Iikubo. What are you plotting? You’re not Hawks, and you’re not Doves.”
“Neither are you.”
“Don’t lump me in with you three.”
“That’s right. What do you suppose we should call your faction, the Swallows?”
“No, that label better applies to you three—you’ve already decided where you’re flying off to.” Kayu Saitoh held her eyes on Maru Kusachi and continued with words founded purely on intuition. “And you’ll go there as soon as your plague has destroyed Dendera.”
“You’re talking as if I’m behind the plague.”
“Am I wrong?”
“It’s not me.”
“It’s not you?” The woman’s reply struck her as odd. “What do you mean by that? Why did you say it that way?”
“I meant what I said.” Maru Kusachi didn’t break Kayu Saitoh’s gaze. “Spreading the plague isn’t in my intentions. I … no, we—that is Hogi Takamiya, Shijira Iikubo, and I—don’t really care. We couldn’t care less about the rest of you. But that woman is different.”
“Who is different?”
“I wonder if you’ll figure it out when you put together Hotori Oze’s and Nokobi Hidaka’s stories.”
“Enough with the secrets. Tell me straight out.”
“Maybe later.”
“Tell me now.”
“The place we’re going might actually be somewhere nice. Maybe without a bear. Maybe without a plague. And maybe without starvation.”
“Where? Where is it?”
“It’s a place you know better than anyone.”
At that, Maru Kusachi turned to walk away.
Kayu Saitoh stepped forward, either to catch up to the woman or to pummel her, but then she saw someone running in from a distance. The swiftly running woman, spear in hand, was Hikari Asami. Seeing the elderly woman sprinting, puffing out white plumes of breath, Kayu Saitoh’s intuition announced the worst.
But still, she had to ask. “What is it?”
Hikari Asami clenched her fist around her wooden spear.
“The bear is here.”
6
Starvation once again tormented Redback.
As she had predicted, the Two-Legs hadn’t again set foot in the mountain. Not wanting to enter the land where they dwelled, she had resisted making an attack, but her resistance had its limit. Redback descended the mountain, moving toward the land where the Two-Legs dwelled. Normally, she moved during the night or the early morning, but hunger overrode her reason, and she set out after dawn. This was against her animal nature, but such rules meant nothing to a creature captive to her craving for meat. Moving quickly, Redback soon reached the ridge overlooking the land of the Two-Legs. Only one thought moved her: Kill and devour. Her mind was empty of anything else—save for one other thought. One crucial thought.
Redback was counting on spring.
She had the feeling, a baseless conviction, that if she survived until spring, she would be all right. This thought underpinned her decision to attack and dispelled even her slightest hesitation. Her life depended on this, and her life she would stake upon it. She accepted that death could be the outcome. She had lost any notion of caution or guard. She understood that only by ridding herself of such things would victory be possible. She tensed her powerful front legs, bared her sharp fangs, and charged into the land where the Two-Legs dwelled.
7
Masari Shiina immediately called the women to assemble, but the bear had already begun its charge. By the time the women had sprinted to the manor, the watchtower had been destroyed. They gathered at the manor to the sound of the tower crumbling like paper before the bear’s single strike. But not all the women were there; only nine had arrived: Kayu Saitoh, Hono Ishizuka, Ate Amami, Hikari Asami, Kyu Hoshina, Ume Itano, Usuma Tsutsumi, Hotori Oze, and Masari Shiina. Shigi Yamamoto’s absence was to be expected, but the other six failed to materialize. Kyu Hoshina clicked her tongue and called them cowards under her breath, but Kayu Saitoh had expected at least four of the six wouldn’t show: Maru Kusachi, Hogi Takamiya, and Shijira Iikubo, who had disappeared off somewhere; and Nokobi Hidaka, who had lost all hope to the plague’s sudden onset.
Masari Shiina stepped forward.
“We’ll burn that bear to ashes,” she said. “But first, we need to lure it to the trap. Each of us will be bait to draw the bear. That’s how we will win. That’s our only path to victory. I am not at all saying any of you will die, but don’t think of your lives as precious. Think of those who have lived in Dendera and have died in Dendera, and fight. Think of Dendera itself, and fight. It is with that resolve that I too will face the bear. Aware that I am only bait to draw it into the trap, I will face the bear. That is all.”
The women took their positions in the clearing.
As Kayu Saitoh moved into place, she caught sight of the trap at the edge of the clearing. Beside the impressive, reinforced structure, a fire basket blazed. The sight of the building inspired the old women to courage, confidence, and absolute determination.
Even from the distance at which Kayu Saitoh stood, she could see the bear occupied in the further destruction of the tower. She questioned whether the women, no matter how determined, could really lure such a beast into the trap—especially when the bear had already been injured beside it.
The bear seemed to be making a display of its strength, but then the creature suddenly stopped its attack and hunched its shoulders. Kayu Saitoh understood what the bear was about to do.
She shouted, “It’s going to charge us!”
Her guess proved true as the bear bore swiftly down on them.
The tremendous charge came with a sound like the earth itself was rumbling. The bear kicked up snow as it ran, quickly closing the distance. As it neared, the savage beast seemed to grow even more giantlike, and the women reacted in fear; with their feet frozen in terror, they weren’t capable of leading the creature anywhere. The bear ran faster than seemed possible. It was close enough now that Kayu Saitoh could see every part of it—its thick front legs, wild tangles of fur, fangs thirsting for raw flesh, stout shoulders, the single eye, and the red fur that covered its back. The women didn’t move. Kayu Saitoh couldn’t even stick her spear out in front of her. Then, just as the women had resolved themselves to die, all the while cursing their rigid legs, the bear changed course. The creature kicked through the debris of the storehouse and vanished off somewhere.
“What was that?” Kyu Hoshina said. Freed from her paralysis, the woman watched the bear go.
“This isn’t good,” Masari Shiina whispered harshly. “After it. Hurry.”
The women swiftly gave chase and soon learned the bear’s target. Two of the five eastern
huts had been partially destroyed, with pieces of their walls and even roofs torn away. From within came heart-rending shrieks and the sounds of flesh and bone being shredded, in a slow, drawn-out process that went on unbearably long.
“Ah,” Usuma Tsutsumi said dispiritedly, “they’re being eaten.”
Kyu Hoshina gritted her teeth. “They’re being eaten because they hid in their hut.”
Her low voice almost lost in the horrific sounds of the creature feeding, Hikari Asami said, “The bear must have decided … to start with the ones who wouldn’t resist.”
Tiny shreds of flesh flew out from one of the openings in the wall. Soon after came the rest of what was left of Tamishi Minamide, which was most of her. Kotei Hoshii, who must have seen the terrible sight, came crawling out from the adjacent hut. The bear saw her, smashed through the wall of her hut, and sank its teeth into the flailing woman’s skull. Kotei Hoshii wasn’t even able to let out a death cry. The bear held down her twitching body with its front paws and triumphantly began to devour her. The women were too far away to be able to do anything but watch. Gripping their wooden spears, they just observed. As they were watching Kotei Hoshii being eaten, they heard a strange cry and saw one of the women running forward with her hands up, defenseless.
“You bear! Over here! There’s meat over here. Plague-diseased meat! This is all your damn fault.”
It was Nokobi Hidaka.
The shouting woman was running straight toward the feasting bear. She looked like she was crying, weeping as she wailed, though she was far enough way that Kayu Saitoh couldn’t be sure.
“What are you doing?” Kayu Saitoh yelled. “Get back. You’ll be eaten!”