Authors: Jennifer Fallon
‘It may well be,’ she said, but she didn’t look convinced.
‘I’ve been in close proximity with the boy for days and I have the worst head cold,’ Annad told her. ‘Is it possible he’s caught that?’
‘I doubt it,’ she said, frowning. ‘His lungs are clear. To be honest, I can’t tell what he’s fighting. His blood work is bizarre.’
‘Bizarre how?’ Pete asked, glancing through the glass at Darragh. He looked like death.
‘His antibodies are all wrong. It’s hard to explain. He has no immunity for things we vaccinate babies against, and antibodies
for diseases nobody has seen in a first world country in decades.’ She sighed and shrugged helplessly, which was a very bad thing for an ICU doctor to do. ‘Right now we’re leaning toward some exotic disease,’ she said. ‘But to narrow it down, we need to know where he’s been.’
Pete shrugged, wishing he knew more. ‘I really can’t say, Doctor. He’s been insisting he comes from another reality. And on the face of it, he might as well be telling the truth because we’ve had no luck tracking his movements in this one.’ He turned to study the lad, wondering what had brought down such a healthy young man so quickly.
And then he noticed something odd. He turned to Annad. ‘Hey, Annad. Look at Darragh and tell me what’s different about him,’ he said.
Annad glanced at Pete oddly, but stepped up to the observation window and did as he asked. ‘Um … he seems paler than usual …’
‘That’s not what I meant.’
‘Am I looking for something specific?’
‘Look at his hands.’
Darragh was lying with his palms up, the right hand closest to the observation window. Annad studied the lad curiously for a moment, and then he turned to Pete, his eyes wide.
‘Jesus Christ, Pete,’ he exclaimed. ‘The tattoo. On his right hand. It’s gone.’
Trása flew back to
Shin Bungo
in hawk form, and then changed into a cat after she landed on an isolated section of the wall out of sight of the people of the Ikushima compound.
She was amazed at the difference a few days had made in the outside world. It was hard to keep track of the time in
Tír Na nÓg
but she hadn’t realised so much time had passed and that
Lughnasadh
was already almost over.
The courtyard of the Ikushima compound was transformed. Gone was the pristine raked sand with its carefully laid-out pathways connecting the buildings, small and large, in an intricate, but functional design. Now there were huge rectangular
akunoya
tents covering the paths, housing the Empresses’ entourage, maybe even the displaced Ikushima clan. Trying to explain what to expect now the Empresses were still at
Shin Bungo
, the lesser
Youkai
had warned Trasa that the Empresses had probably taken over the family house, as was the custom among high-ranking officials. The common soldiery, the
taiko
drummers, the servants and the displaced family would be in these brightly coloured temporary shelters, or just bedded down wherever they could find a dry spot inside the walls. Complete with tatami floors, the wooden-framed tents looked plentiful enough for a small army. This army was dedicated to
the care and comfort, as far as Trása could tell, of two spoiled little girls.
There were six or seven of the
akunoya
, tall, decorative tents woven from brightly coloured silk, dwarfing the main house with its pretty upturned eaves and deep shaded verandas.
Trása was both relieved and curious, not sure why the Empresses were still here in
Shin Bungo
when they were only a short trip through the rift to their capital,
Nara
, located faraway in
Chu-cho-
, which was what the lesser
Youkai
— and presumably the humans of this realm — called this reality’s version of Japan.
It made no sense, Trása thought, as she morphed into feline form, that they would still be here for
Higan No Chu-Nichi
. According to the lesser
Youkai
, everyone in this realm was preparing to visit their family tombs at this time of year. In this realm the autumn equinox was a time for honouring ancestors and that’s where the Empresses should be — back home honouring their ancestors. Or maybe in Sweden or Gaul or somewhere, given their Nordic appearance. Celebrating the
Higan
and the end of the summer was a big event, the lesser
Youkai
claimed. It was something they would not want to miss.
Puzzled, Trása jumped down from the wall, wondering what the evil little girls were up to. It was almost sunset, she saw with concern — or at least as much concern as she was capable of as a cat. She began to walk towards the largest tent, thinking that would be where she was most likely to find Rónán, assuming the Empresses hadn’t killed him already and were only still here because they hadn’t finished celebrating his demise.
If he wasn’t there, she would have to try the main house, but she wasn’t sure what the reaction would be to a cat wandering inside. She might be able to roam about unobserved and unhindered, or someone might chase her away with a broom. Trása wasn’t sure and decided if she couldn’t find Rónán in the tents, she would stop and ponder the problem for a while, before doing anything
rash. The smaller a creature one became, the harder and harder it got to retain the sense of one’s self. A seagull was about as small as Trása was prepared to go without someone to watch over her. She had just found a way to break the curse that kept her trapped as an owl in her own reality. She didn’t want to inadvertently trap herself in another animal form, just because there was nobody about to remind her of who she really was.
‘
Atsusa samusa mo Higan made
,’ the servants called to each other as they passed, rushing back and forth.
Heat and cold last until Higan
. She heard the phrase several times as she wove carefully between the tent pegs and the guy ropes securing the tents, and figured it was some sort of ritual greeting. Members of the Empresses’ entourage hurried to and fro carrying bunches of wildflowers, ewers of incense and trays of sticky round
ohagi
, the treat made from
mochi
— a glutinous rice pounded into a paste and then rolled into balls and covered with soybean flour or
azuki
bean paste, known as
anko
. The lesser
Youkai
in
Tír Na nÓg
had been anxious to educate Trása about their realm. They had bombarded her with information like that. Some useful, some utterly absurd. The description of the
ohagi
, however, had been for a very practical reason. She might need to eat, Toyoda reminded her, while she was out in the mundane world. Real food. Like the food the humans lay out for their ancestor spirits, which the sprites and the pixies usually carried away in the dark of the night, to convince the poor souls their ancestors were actually paying attention to their pitiful mundane lives, and their ghosts had nothing better to do than hang about waiting for a snack every three months.
He had a point, although Trása was not yet hungry enough to steal food left out for the dead off their graves. It may have been her feline appetite at work, too. Cats were carnivores and had no interest in tasty balls of rice. They were much more interested in rats.
Trása reached the largest tent, a magnificent structure, striped with red, yellow, blue, white and black, adorned with gold trimmings and the Empresses’
kamon
painted onto the silk in gold paint. The pattern of the girls’ family crest — their
kamon
— looked alarmingly like the triskalion branded onto the palm of both Rónán and Darragh, but she supposed it made a twisted sort of sense. Somewhere in history, the Undivided shared a common point of origin with these twins who wielded the power of the
Youkai
and yet were bent on destroying the true owners of that power. Every realm Trása had ever visited had something in common with another world. Even where the Undivided were unknown, there were still the same
sídhe
races. It was as if they populated the world and the humans came later, twisting their tradition, imposing their will on their more credulous magical neighbours, until eventually, whether out of ignorance, jealousy or malice, they destroyed them. On closer inspection in the rapidly fading light, Trása realised even the guy ropes were made of a gold-painted rope and the pegs themselves seemed coated in the precious metal.
What a waste
, she thought, wondering who was responsible for such frippery. Was it the girls who demanded such pretty shiny things or the adults charged with their care? Feline Trása realised she wasn’t all that interested. She was more interested in the smells coming from this tent. Somewhere inside, she gathered, there was a meal going on, and they were eating fish. Raw fish. It smelled delicious.
Trása was able to slip into the
akunoya
on the heels of a servant rushing a platter heaped with the most delicious-smelling fish. She told herself that shadowing the food was probably the quickest way to find Rónán. That the food had the enticing aroma of raw fish was just a bonus for Trása’s feline senses, and in no way influenced her decision to follow, she told herself.
Her instincts proved correct. The Empresses were hosting a banquet.
The Empresses, as well as each guest, were being plied with food and drink served on low individual tray-tables set up around the tent in a semicircle. The carved, ivory inlaid
honzen
tray-tables were quite small, so the number of dishes and the amount of food that could be served at one time were necessarily limited, hence the frantic if restrained efforts of the servants to ensure the royal guests remained sated. There were so many dishes, in fact, that beside each
honzen
was a second tray-table — the
ni-no-zen
. On the
honzen
— at a perfect height for a hungry cat — the servants had placed what Trása supposed were the principal dishes of rice, soup and
san-sai
, while on the
ni-no-zen
she thought she could smell an additional soup and another couple of the
san-sai
side dishes.
Trása sat down to watch, hoping nobody was paying attention to this uninvited black and white furry visitor. The smell of the food was driving Trása mad, her stomach rumbling louder than her purr. But none of the dinner guests noticed her, so she watched without them being aware of her.
The Empresses sat at the centre of the large canopy, naturally enough, Trása supposed, given that they were, well, Empresses. Rónán was seated directly in front of them, to make it easier to talk to him, she guessed. They were having quite a discussion, she could see, but she wasn’t close enough to hear what they were saying.
On the left of the Empresses — she had no idea which girl was which — sat the woman Toyoda had identified as Wakiko, the long-suffering mother. She seemed disinterested in the discussion or anything else that was going on about her. On the right of the two little girls, trying to appear as if he was a part of the conversation between Rónán and the girls, was the Ikushima
Daimyo
, Namito. Arranged in the semicircle around them were the old lady, Masuyo, and the lovely Aoi and little Kuzusa, who spent most of the meal fixing her angry gaze on the
Tanabe contingent opposite her. They must have been invited for the festival, and could not, Trása guessed, have refused the invitation without incurring the wrath of the Empresses.
Trása was puzzled by the seating arrangement, not familiar enough with the customs of this realm to know if Rónán’s place was one of honour or something to be concerned about. The presence of Chishihero, the samurai Hyato — who’d tried to slit her throat — and several other Tanabe warriors was worrying, but not surprising, Trása supposed. Obviously, it was the Tanabe who had betrayed Rónán’s presence in
Shin Bungo
— and this realm — to the Empresses.
It was hard to tell if Chishihero was pleased or angry with the seating arrangements. Unlike Kazusa, she was far better schooled at keeping her thoughts to herself.
Trása really wanted to know what Rónán and the Empresses were talking about. The conversation between him and the girls seemed to exclude everyone else. Rónán didn’t look happy, either. Trása watched as the fading light was revealed every time the tent flap was opened by a servant hurrying in with a new tray of dishes. She wondered if Rónán realised how close they were to sunset. In their own realm, right now, Orlagh would already be halfway through invoking the aid of the gods …
You don’t have time to sit here looking pretty
, Trása told her feline self sternly, aware that with her long whiskers and her distinct markings, she was very regal, attractive and …
Oh stop that!
Trása moved off, hoping that once she had a purpose, she would find herself a little less susceptible to feline vanity.
Trying to act as if she belonged, she began to edge her way around the
akunoya
. For the most part, the dinner guests ignored her. One of the Tanabe even tossed her a scrap of raw fish, which tasted delicious, but she was sure it must be a dire breach of protocol. She didn’t wait about to find out, working her way around until she was right beside Namito. Without
being noticed, she sat down behind him. From this vantage, she could see Rónán’s face, although only the back of the little girls.
‘… release her from her oath,’ Rónán was saying, although it sounded more like he was asking a favour of the little girls. ‘I’m not leaving here until you do.’
‘If she was silly enough to swear such an oath,’ one of the girls responded, ‘why is it up to us to revoke it?’
‘Because I won’t leave this place unless you do,’ Rónán replied, in a tone that implied he’d made the statement many times before, to little or no effect. ‘She only swore the oath to keep me here until you arrived.’
They’re talking about Aoi
, Trása realised,
and her insane oath to commit
jigai
if Rónán tries to leave
Shin Bungo.