Akane shook her head. Though her senses were not as strong in this form, she was an excellent hunter. It didn’t matter what his request for winning was, she was going to beat him.
She found signs of a deer straight away and followed it through the forest hardly making a sound. As the hunt took her across the landscape, over rocks, and through thick brush, she let everything go and lost herself in the moment.
A stag dipped its head to get a drink, directly in her sight. It was a beautiful specimen. Pulling back on the bowstring, she aimed her shot for a quick kill. Then a howl rang out through the forest. It called to the primal part of herself. Her inner wolf, already too close to the surface stirred. Then it howled in response to Shin. The deer looked up, startled. It flickered its head around. When it spotted Akane, it bounded away. Akane swore. Shin had done that on purpose. She attempted to track the stag down again, but any time she got close it ran.
Defeated, she went in search of Shin and found him in a nearby clearing, dragging a dead boar by the throat. His muzzle and fur were stained crimson with blood and his tongue lolled to one side. The coppery scent of blood filled her nose and the wolf inside her salivated.
“You’re covered in blood.” She scrunched up her nose for show. She craved the blood and meat like nothing she’d ever wanted more in her life.
He walked over to her and sat down in front of her on his haunches. He dropped the boar carcass at her feet. She stared at it, mesmerized. The wolf howled inside her, desperate to break free and to glut on the feast in front of her.
She turned away from him, as if that would be enough to fight the urge.
“Go ahead, I know you want to,” he said.
She clenched her hand holding the bow. “I am not an animal.”
“Aren’t you? Because I was awake when you transformed. You’re a powerful wolf. Why pretend otherwise?”
“That’s none of your business,” she said with a growl. Her fangs had begun to descend.
It was almost too much. Her spiritual power was weakened. That combined with the thrill of an unfinished hunt was still hammering away at her veins. Shin’s scent, mixed with blood. Her inner wolf was restless and hungry. She couldn’t keep control.
“You can’t hold it back. It will only drive you insane,” he said moving closer to her.
His scent was maddening. Desire and revulsion warred within her. “Stay back!” She roared but it was already too late. The transformation had already taken over. Her nose elongated and her face was covered in coarse white fur.
She fell to her knees as the transformation ripped through her. She rose up a snarling beast.
“See, now is that so bad?” Shin said.
But Akane was gone, and there were only the wolf and a threat before her. She growled and lunged for his throat.
Shin pivoted just before her jaws from clamping down on his throat. Her teeth sank into the flesh of his shoulder and blood filled her mouth. He shook his arm and threw her across the clearing where she collided with a tree. She was momentarily stunned. Stars danced in front of her eyes. When she shook off the pain she faced a large, white wolf. His feet were planted apart, teeth bared. The human was gone, and though she was tense with unspent energy, she knew better than to tangle with a wolf bigger than her and she backed up a few feet. When she was a fair distance away, she turned and ran.
Her senses were under attack and everything felt brand new. Even the flowers had a more fragrant aroma than before. She heard the water burbling in a stream that was up ahead and everywhere there was the prevailing scent of animals. The blood from kills, old dead blood, and also fresh pumping blood in the bodies of hundreds of potential prey. She craved it, wanted it more than she thought imaginable. But as she ran, some of her bloodlust dissipated, turning to a low burning flame in her gut.
She sensed him following her, but her instincts told her to keep running. He caught up with her with ease. She looked to her right and the giant white wolf ran alongside her. She bared her teeth in warning. If he wanted, he could tear her to shreds. But he did not come any closer and so she let him join her. He howled and she responded. The sound bubbled out from deep in her chest and expelled from her lungs. It lifted her and drove her to run faster and further.
The white wolf raced ahead and led her on a chase through the forest. They weaved through trees and over shrubs. But no matter how hard she ran, he easily outpaced her, clearing hurdles that caught at her feet and slipped through spaces that made her chest constrict with panic. He looped back around, waiting for her to catch up as she went around a gap under a fallen tree, rather than squeeze under it. Finding her legs at last and gaining speed, she leaped over streams and boulders, and surpassed the white wolf. The forest was hers.
He kept pace with her, nipping at her in a playful way. They chased one another through the woods playing a game of tag. He would let her catch him and she would snap at his tail and then turn and run leading him through tall grasses and through dense woods. He would inevitably cut her off and the chase began anew. When she was finally chasing him again, he led her up the hill through the trees and they crossed a river, wading in the rapids that tried to sweep her feet out from beneath her.
At the top of the rise, they reached a clearing. The white wolf was nothing more than a streak of white running through the green grass. He looked back at her with a wolfish grin before racing ahead. She howled in delight and pursued him. She met him at the other end of the clearing. When she reached him, he slipped past her and bolted in the opposite direction. She caught up with him and tried to pass him, but when she pulled out in front of him he bit her tail and she tumbled to the ground. As he tried to pass her, she brought him down along with her, clamping down on his leg and pulling him to the ground. They wrestled on the ground, teeth gleaming and fur flying. The game ended with his neck in her jaws. He whimpered in defeat. She sat back feeling triumphant.
The white wolf lay on his stomach watching her with his head resting on his front paws as she sat panting. Then he lifted his head, his ears perking up. She smelled it too. She stood up and her entire body was rigid and focused on the scent. The stag that had escaped her before wandered into the clearing. It moved cautiously but as of now, oblivious to them hiding in the tall grass. The white wolf did not move but she could sense the tension in him, the desire to kill. But this was her kill. She had pushed back her urges before but now she was free.
It raised its head, dark eyes focused on her. And then it sprung away. She howled as she gave chase. It ran through the forest, weaving in and around but before long she cornered it, closing in. It swung its antlers, aiming at her belly. She dodged his first attack and leaped out of the reach of its impaling antlers.
She turned around and came back at him, snapping at his hind legs which he kicked out and landed against the side of her head. Stars danced across her vision but she was blinded by her bloodlust and she kept going. Snarling and biting, she lunged at it over and over, relentlessly attacking. It slashed at her, gouging her side. Blood streamed from her wound but she was beyond pain. She wanted to kill. After several attempts she clamped down on his shoulder and it roared as she dug her claws into his neck and held on as it shook.
He threw her off for just a moment, but she came back in full force knocking it backward. It toppled over and exposed the sensitive underside. She ripped into the flesh, and blood filled her mouth. The deer gave a pitiful cry as it died and she tilted her head back and howled. It felt good. She felt alive. She gorged herself, filling her belly with sticky sweet meat.
She noticed someone standing behind her, and she looked over her kill and snarled. The man had a bow in hand, which was pointed at her. She snarled and the man fired an arrow which sunk into her shoulder. She did not think. He was a threat that had to be eliminated. She lunged for him and he turned to run, but he stumbled and she overtook him. He sliced at her with a small blade, but it made hardly a dent against her thick hide. His screams were nothing but a guttural so
ng. And then silence. He’d stopped moving and then she felt it, the other wolf. She’d forgotten all about him in her hunt.
He stood a few feet away from her, watching her with wide, terrified eyes.
He transformed into a man and came closer but she growled, protecting her kill. “What have you done?” he asked.
13
Perhaps it was because her bloodlust had been sated, or maybe it was Shin’s voice that cut through the fog. Whatever it was, Akane woke into a nightmare. She shifted to her human visage, but even shifting didn’t wash away the blood or the mangled corpse of the man lying at her feet. It had happened again. She’d killed an innocent.
There was little left of him that distinguished him as human. All that remained was red pulp, jagged rib bones, and his hands which still clutched a pitifully small knife. Blood stained the earth around him crimson. Akane couldn’t tear her eyes away from it. She tried to cover her mouth in horror and then she was assaulted by the smell. It was death. She stared at her hands, which were stained up to the wrist and her face and chest were all soaked in blood and gore.
“What did I do?” she asked, her voice trembling.
“I don’t know what happened. You chased after that stag and I lost sight of you. Then when I found you again...” He trailed off looking at the man.
Her hands shook, in fact her entire body felt like it was going into convulsions. How could she have given over to the wolf? She’d been so careful for so long. Her gaze slid from the horrifying carnage to rest on Shin.
“This is your fault, you tricked me!” She shouted, pointing her finger at him. But she couldn’t stand the sight of her blood-soaked appendages and dropped them to her side. Screams echoed in her ears; already she was slipping back to that horrible day. Akane put her hands over her ears but it couldn’t block out the sounds.
He put himself between her and the body, and she lifted her head to look into his eyes. She expected to see fear there, or horror. The last thing she had expected to see was pity.
“Go wash yourself up. I’ll take care of everything else.”
She wanted to argue, to force him to call her names, to condemn her for the horrid thing she had done. She should be punished for being a monster. But all the fight had drained out of her. If she lied down now, she might never rise again. She didn’t deserve to live. She was an abomination. A monster. Worthless.
Akane crouched down onto the ground, curling into a ball, resting her head on her arms propped up by her knees. Once again Shin didn’t scold her or try and force her to do as he said. She listened to his footsteps as he worked. She could hear the slither of a body being dragged across the ground and then a scratch and a crackle. Smoke tickled her nostrils, followed by the sickening scent of cooking meat. Fire. So much smoke. Mei screaming her name. Over and over. Akane, please! She screwed her eyes shut but instead she saw Mei’s bloody body torn apart, burning on the holy fire. Her stomach heaved as she emptied its contents onto the ground.
Hours must have passed because dark had started to fall. Dirt and debris clung to her. She’d clawed open her palms trying to escape her memories. Shin grabbed her by her shoulders, forcing her to her feet. She was limp as a used rag. She didn’t have it in her to fight him.
He guided her to a nearby river. It wasn’t terribly deep, but if she put rocks in her pockets and walked in, could she end it all? Akane knelt down by the water’s edge and her blood-stained hands reached for the rocks.
“I can only imagine what’s going on in your head right now. But Tomoe needs you. You can’t give up here.”
There was no point in trying to kill herself. She’d tried before, right after Mei died, but she’d been too much a coward to go through with it. Akane waded into the water and scrubbed the dried blood from her skin. She scrubbed and scrubbed until her hands were raw. But the blood just wouldn’t come out. It had seeped into her soul, and she was nothing but darkness now. A killer twice over. There was no redemption for her.
She screamed at the top of her lungs before wading into the water and submerging herself entirely. She held her breath until she popped out on top gasping for air. What have I done? What have I done? She slapped her hand on the water’s surface over and over again.
When she finished that, she climbed out of the water dripping wet and found a fresh hakama and haori hanging on a nearby tree branch. Shin had found her clothes. She shed the blood-stained ones and put on the clean. Shin wasn’t very far away, he’d started a fire and was sitting beside it staring into the flames.
He didn’t say anything as she took a seat across from him. But he was cooking boar meat over the flames. The flesh popped and crackled as the fat dripped into the flames.
“It looks like it might rain,” he commented.
Akane glanced at the clouds gathering on the horizon.
“You don’t have to do that,” she said wearily.
“Do what?”
“Pretend like everything is alright, like I didn’t kill a man today.”
Shin stopped turning the pork and pulled it off the flame. He offered it up to her, but she couldn’t stand the idea of eating. He tore off the flesh from the spit and studied the ground.
“It’s easier to pretend, don’t you think? Because when you face the ugly truth of reality, living doesn’t really seem worth it.”
It was such a surprisingly genuine sentiment.
“I didn’t think you could be so wise.”
“There’s lots of things about me you don’t know.” He wiggled his eyebrows suggestively.
Akane laughed, long and hard, so hard that she cried. And he let her cry. Great heaving sobs, which turned into screams. Shin made no comment, his eyes on the flames. Eventually her hysteria subsided leaving her limp and emotionally drained. Akane pulled her knees up to her chest, wishing she could fold up into herself and just disappear.
“The first time I killed, I reacted the same as you,” Shin commented. His voice was quiet, tinged with remorse. “It was back in the early days, when the world was new. I joined the rebellion against heaven, and it was a blood bath. I fought and killed those I had once thought friends...” His gaze stared at the distant horizon, perhaps recalling his own tortured past.
“This wasn’t my first time,” Akane replied bitterly.
Shin poked at the embers of their fire. “Killing never gets easier. But from what I know of you, I know you wouldn’t have done that without reason. There was a weapon in his hand. He attacked you.”
“Even if he did. I am much stronger—” A sob caught in her throat.
“I’m not trying to tell you to not feel bad. I know that’s impossible. But sometimes you have to do what you must.”
There was a haunted look in his eyes, the same she’d recognized back at the palace. And before she knew it, the words were pouring out of her.
“The first time it was a girl, a kamigakari. The kami chose me to protect her earthly body. I’d been doing it for centuries, and though I cared for them all I never got attached. I knew my place. Then there was Mei. She was beautiful, kind, and independent. A kamigakari must remain pure, she cannot have selfish wants, she cannot love...” She cleared her throat. “Her life belongs to the kami. But I loved her all the same, more than any of the others.” Akane stared at the crackling flames for a few moments, lost in her memories of Mei. “Shortly before her ascension, she begged me to run away with her but I refused. I had a duty and so did she.” She took in a ragged breath. Just thinking about it brought the memories flooding in. “The day of her ascension, everything went wrong. The kami rejected her because she wasn’t pure. She’d been tainted by the selfish act of loving me.” She clutched at her aching chest. “I didn’t want to, but the kami’s orders they, they...” she fumbled on the words and then put her head into her hands.
Mei’s screams filled her ears, begging her not to do it. The kami’s power had compelled her, the wolf had emerged, and she’d destroyed Mei on instinct. Akane tried to stop it but the wolf
couldn’t be tamed. She had watched Mei’s slaughter like a spectator in her own body. It was then that she realized what it meant to be a wolf and vowed to never unleash it again. And now look what had happened. Tears rolled down her cheeks. Shin had moved closer to her and put his arm around her shoulder. It shocked her at first, but then she leaned into the comfort and warmth.
Mei’s death was like a scab over a wound, pick at it and it would bleed again. And now that man’s death would forever be carved into her heart along with Mei’s. She wished she knew his name or what he had been doing in these woods. Perhaps he was a hunter or even a merchant. She’d never know. Shin held her until the fire died. His arms were an anchor to the real world. He pulled her away from her painful memories as he told her stories about his time before he became Akio’s slave. He avoided telling her how he came to serve the guardian. But his old life was filled with light and music in the dragon’s service. She’d never know yokai the way he did. She had been created to serve the kami and had only ever been surrounded by priestesses.
“And then one time Rin—” he stopped and cleared his throat. “Well, I must be boring you with stories of my glory days.”
He had scars of his own he was hiding. Maybe that’s why the words she’d never spoken had spilled out of her. He understood like no one else had before.
“Not at all.” She glanced up. Without realizing it, the sun had started to rise. It was a new day. “We should get going.” She slid out from his grip. As soon as she did, she regretted it. Facing him now she felt naked and exposed.
“Too bad we couldn’t get more information at the camp,” Shin said, stretching.
After everything that had happened, she’d almost forgotten.
“I overheard them talking. They said they were headed south, to the coast.”
Shin frowned. “The coast.” He looked out on the horizon. There was that look in his eye, the same he’d had when they’d run into that kitsune and just now when he’d mentioned Rin.
Okami: A Little Red Riding Hood Retelling Page 10