Who felt so alone.
She passed the ring of woven grass and branches, into the sacred space. She heard thunder, a storm on its way. The small shrine lay at the base of a great cryptomeria tree, but when she approached, the echoing laughter of the Hososhi came back, deafening her, and she fell, a fierce pain shooting through her limbs. As though a thousand paper-cuts sliced themselves across her body, as though she’d been slashed by invisible knives. She cried out, feeling them criss-crossing her arms, her hands, her face, blood-thin lines cutting into her; when finally she looked up, her skin was untouched, but the pain remained.
“What’s happening…” she muttered. Her skin felt on fire. Somethingburned in her chest. She thought she saw someone floating in the air above her, a specter, a shadow of the god.
Hososhi. The god of the barrier between this life, and the next.
Her vision wavered; the air seemed to distort with heat. Shadows talked to one another in the branches.
The god appeared.
“This is your future,” they said. “This.”
She saw it instantly. She saw herself, her own body lying on the bed, in old Goro’s hut; the body of another, of Lady Iyo, struck by two arrows like small thorns.
Saw Sen arguing with the others in the keep.
Saw Jobo, working over her, watched him try to heal her, from a strange place, floating in the ghostly air.
She saw herself, delirious, racked with pain.
The world and all within it faded from her sight.
In the darkness, the Hososhi came again.
They loomed above her, their cavernous voice reverberated through her bones. “A demon has broken the bounds of this earth,” they said. “Daiaku. If this demon is to succeed in its murderous path, thousands will lie dead in its wake, and all of humanity will suffer. Ten, one hundred, one thousand years from now, the blood of its curse will remain. The earth will begin to die and the war between the gods will resume… And those of you unlucky enough to survive will only have lived to witness the slow death of all the spirits of the world.”
“Help.” She struggled with the words. “Help me…”
But the god vanished, and the world heaved, and when she opened her eyes, Jobo was there, running to her.
“Get back! Away from the shrine!”
“Why…?” she slurred, suddenly feverish.
And Jobo stared at her, eyes wide – like he knew, like he had just realized what had happened. “Tatarigami,” he muttered. “The cursed gods.” Then, firmly: “Come with me.”
He brought her to Tokuon’s diviner, Hassho Tayu, who threw bones into a fire and watched the cracks they made. She whispered to herself. She closed her eyes, cast a sparrow’s skull onto the altar and watched it land. “Not good,” she mumbled. “Not good…”
“Hassho,” he asked. “What do you hear?”
“The gods reveal,” she said, swaying slightly, eyes closed in thought. “There has been a new vessel. I thought it was gone… haven’t felt it for twenty years, since the time of the uprising.” She looked at Rui. “Sincethe time you were born. It disappeared after the fighting. The emperors restored their order, fragile as it is, and the Keishi took power. I kept waiting for it to come back, but it never did…”
“What was it?”
“An onryo,” the old woman said. “A vengeful spirit, summoned by the demon-emperor when they threw him from the throne; who he promised would kill those who took part in his removal from power… She’s back.”
The diviner crouched low. “Sutoh. The demon-emperor. When he was deposed, he became a monk, and cursed the imperial family and those who expelled him. He conjured a giant spirit to bring revenge against the sinners who wronged him…”
She looked at Rui. “Someone has made a deal with the demon-emperor’s spirit, I fear. Someone who is willing to do anything, to sell their souls, to keep power and stop those who would get in their way. That is why Hososhi has come… You, Rui, must stop this evil. Only then will you be free from this curse.”
“What is the Hososhi?” Rui asked. “What is this god?”
“They watch the endless barrier between our world and the next. And if they have come with a warning, we must not ignore it.”
Rui held her palms against her eyes. Her vision had been blurring, and an ache hammered itself through her skull.
“The Hososhi cursed you for a reason,” the Hassho said. “They want you for something, but we cannot be sure what it is. The gods work in strange ways.”
