by Amanda Sun
Her voice was weak, her body singed and crumpled on the floor. “Here.”
Alive. She was alive. Izanagi rushed to her, curling his arms around her. The embers on her burned robe dug fiery teeth into his skin as he cried out, her head bumping once again on the floor. “No,” she coughed. “Leave me. I’m...I’m dying.”
“Dying?” He’d never heard of such a thing. He knew there was a time before Izanami had existed. Would there now be a time after her?
“I know now why the fish Hiruko called from the ocean flailed so,” she said. “Things grow dark, Izanagi. The fire of bitterness raged too deeply. Love our child Kagutsuchi in my absence. Do not blame him for our mistake.” She reached her hand for Izanagi’s. “I loved you,” she said.
Izanagi grasped her hand desperately in his, tears and smoke blurring his vision. “I loved you, too,” he said. “I’m so sorry.”
The blood on his hands was sticky against Izanami’s fingers. She stared at the redness of it. “Izanagi,” she said, her voice frail. “Where is my son?”
His haunted eyes told her everything. She saw the truth in him, his horrible last betrayal.
Her eyes went wide and pale, and then empty.
Izanagi wept over her as Yamato threw baskets of inky water on the pagoda’s crumpling tiles.
In the corner of the room, the golden ink on the naginata singed black as night.
Chapter Eight
Yuki threaded her fingers through the red scarf folded in her hands as she fought against the chill of the wind. She thought for a minute about waiting for Tanaka inside the station, but she wanted to make sure they didn’t miss the bus to Nihondaira. There wasn’t much of a line in this weather. She closed her eyes and tried to think of warm campfires, of the fireplace she’d seen on that ad at the travel agency inside. She’d only roasted marshmallows once on a campfire a long time ago, on a school trip. Usually the only open fires she saw were at the Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples for different festivals during the year. She remembered flipping yen into the tithe box at the front of Sengen Shrine with Tanaka, his smiling face as he shook the thick rainbow rope back and forth to ring the shrine bells. The thought warmed her as she waited, the softness of the yarn enveloping her hands.
She’d barely had time to finish the scarf with all the homework Suzuki had handed out. She’d even woken up early to tie the tassels to the ends. But it was worth it, when she looked at it, all that time and effort.
“Yuki!” She looked up to see Tanaka running along the curve of the bus loop outside of Shizuoka Station. She waved to him from her spot at the bus stop for number 12, the bus to Nihondaira. He reached her, running a hand through his hair, which stood up a little unnaturally. Had he put too much gel in it? “Sorry I made you wait,” he said.
She shook her head. “I just got here a couple minutes ago,” she said.
“Yeah, but how bad does it look?” Tanaka groaned. “Late for our first date.”
Yuki’s cheeks flushed. “It’s not completely our first date. We go everywhere together, all the time.”
Tanaka pushed his glasses up his nose as he stood beside her in line. “Yeah, I know, but not like this. Um. Here.” He reached into his pocket for a small bag that was wrapped with ribbons of gold and cream. “They’re macarons from the new bakery that opened near my place.”
“Oh, thanks!” Yuki reached for the bag, her hands full of fluffy scarf. “Ah,” she said. “Um, this is for you.” She placed the coils in his open palm and gently took the bag in its place. She could see the pink and mint green of the macarons faintly through the bag. She smiled and slipped it into her bag for later. But when she looked up, Tanaka was still staring at the scarf with wide eyes.
“Did...did you make this?”
Yuki smiled. “I think red’s still your favorite color, right?”
“Sugoi,” he said, still staring. “It’s...it’s... Ya-be, why did I only bring you macarons?” He groaned, his brown eyes clouding over with anxiety.
Yuki waved her mittened hands back and forth. “No, no, I like macarons!”
Tanaka opened up the scarf, wrapping it tightly around his neck twice, covering his mouth. “How does it look?” he asked, his voice muffled through the yarn. He breathed out and his glasses fogged up.
Yuki giggled, reaching up to pull the scarf down. “Like this,” she said as Tanaka laughed, smoothing the bundle of scarf under his mouth. Her finger brushed his lip and they stopped laughing. His eyes gleamed, and she felt all the warmth of the summer, then. It was like a painting, something she’d imagined so long that she couldn’t quite believe it was real, moving, alive.
The bus rumbled up and Tanaka looked away. “The bus is here,” he said with too much enthusiasm, and they boarded, taking the little ticket slips by the door.
They didn’t say much as the bus wove through Shizuoka, heading toward the towering greenery of Nihondaira. Yuki had been up the ropeway once on a school trip to see Kanozan Shrine, but it was the base of the mountain they were headed to for their date. Before long the bus pulled up at their stop, and Tanaka dropped their bus fare and their paper tickets onto the conveyor belt by the driver.
“Nihondaira Zoo,” Tanaka said. “It’s not cheesy, is it?”
“You worry too much,” Yuki said. “It’s nice.”
The zoo wasn’t as busy as Tanaka had worried it would be. The cold weather kept most couples away, but he liked it that way, anyway. It was like the whole world belonged to the two of them. He didn’t want to screw this up. This was the beginning of everything.
They looked at the red pandas first, and then the flamingos, kept inside away from the fall chill. The birds nestled their beaks under their wings as they teetered on one leg, always looking a moment away from falling over. I’m like that, Tanaka thought. Without Yuki, I’d fall over. Why had it taken him so long to realize? He’d had to take the risk of asking her out. The knife of wondering had been cutting into his ribs so long he’d grown used to the sting.
“You okay?” Yuki said, bumping her shoulder gently against Tanaka’s.
Tanaka grinned. “How come you can do that?”
“Do what?”
“You can always see me,” he said, looking out at the flamingos as they dipped their beaks into the stream as they waded through. “Everyone else just sees Tanaka Ichirou, class clown. But you always look beneath that. You always see, well, me.”
Yuki was silent for a moment, and Tanaka tensed. Had he even made sense? But then he felt her hand wrap around his arm. He wished they weren’t wearing bulky coats, that he could feel the softness of her fingertips. But he could feel the warmth of her nearby, hear her breathing as she looked out at the birds. “You always saw me, too,” Yuki said quietly. “Every last cookie you insisted you were too full to eat. Every time you ‘forgot’ your homework so you could walk me home after Tea Ceremony Club.” She leaned forward, the nape of her neck pale against her black ponytail. “You never forgot me, Tan-kun. Not ever.”
“I’m so sorry,” Tanaka said, turning to face her. “About the bentou. I wanted to skip baseball practice. I should’ve.”
Yuki smiled, her cheeks as pink as her scarf. “It’s fine.”
“It isn’t,” he said. “Would you...would you make it for me again sometime? I want to share it with you.”
Yuki stepped toward the exit of the indoor enclosure, pulling open the door with a swirl of cool fall wind. “I’ll think about it,” she teased.
“Chotto,” Tanaka protested, following behind her. “You’re not going to punish me to a lifetime of my sister’s onigiri are you?”
Yuki laughed, but stopped suddenly, her back pressed against Tanaka’s chest. “Hey,” she said, motioning to a teen in the distance. He wore a black wool coat and held a sketchpad and paper as he stood by the pen that contained the Hokkaido f
oxes. “Isn’t he from Katakou School?”
Tanaka squinted as he tried to make out the figure. “Yeah,” he said. “He fought Tomo in the kendo competition.” The boy kept looking around, like he was waiting for someone. “Why? Do you think he’s cute?”
Yuki shoved Tanaka gently. She knew he was only half joking. “No,” she said. “I’m just wondering if he’s okay. He looks really worried about something.”
“Maybe he’s skipping kendo practice to sketch and he’s worried he’ll get found out.”
Yuki rolled her eyes. “So daring,” she said.
“I knew you thought he was cute.”
She yanked on Tanaka’s scarf as he laughed. “I don’t!”
As they neared the fox pen, Yuki leaned in to see the drawing the boy was working on. Strange, she thought. He’d drawn a sketch of a man, not a fox. He suddenly saw her looking and flipped the page of the sketchpad so she couldn’t see. He frowned at her, waiting.
“Oh,” she said. “Um, I was just saying that I think we know you.”
“I...I don’t think so,” he said, glancing sideways. Who was he waiting for? Yuki wondered.
“You’re from Katakou, right?” Tanaka said. “We saw you in the kendo tournament.”
“Oh,” the boy stammered. “Yeah.”
Tanaka tapped the red scarf, trying to remember. “Yamato something, wasn’t it?”
“No, no, that’s not it,” he answered.
Yuki narrowed her eyes. Something was off, but she couldn’t tell what.
Tanaka tried again. “But you’re friends with Takahashi Jun, yes?”
“No! I mean, I go to school with him, sure. Everyone knows him. But we’re not friends or anything.”
“But you’re both kendouka,” Yuki said. “Hey, aren’t the foxes cute? Are you here to sketch the animals?”
“Huh?” The guy looked at his sketchbook. “Oh. Yeah, I guess. I like to draw on days off from school.”
“I’m in Calligraphy Club at Suntaba,” Tanaka said. “Tanaka Ichirou, by the way. Do you do calligraphy, too?”
The boy shook his head. “Just sketching.”
“Can I see?” Yuki said. “Hey, do you do sketches of people or anything like that?” She wrapped her arm around Tanaka’s arm, and he blushed red under the scarf. “Could you sketch us? We’re on our first date.”
“Uh, I...I’m sorry. I don’t really sketch people. I’m no good.” He glanced sideways again, then bowed slightly. “Sorry, I’m waiting for someone. Um, enjoy the zoo.” He turned in a hurry, his black coat swaying around him.
“Yuki,” Tanaka laughed. “Did you just ask a stranger to sketch us? You probably embarrassed him!”
“I’m telling you, I’ve seen him before,” Yuki said. “Anyway, he had drawings of people on the sketchpad and they were good.”
“Maybe he was too embarrassed to say yes.” He smiled, leaning his arms over the side of the enclosure as he scanned the rocky terrain for the foxes. “And maybe we could get back to our date now?”
Yuki smiled. “Sorry,” she said. “You’re right. Ah! Look at that one!” A fox rolled back and forth on the grass, all four feet sticking into the air.
“So cute,” Tanaka said. He took a breath and moved his arm to wrap it around Yuki. She looked at him, surprised for a moment, then beamed.
“Do you want to sit down for a bit and have those macarons?”
“Sure. I saw a picnic bench back by the red pandas.”
“Great,” Yuki said. She turned slowly to keep Tanaka’s arm around her as they headed toward the bench.
Suddenly the speakers on the nearby pole crackled with life. The sound of it sent the foxes scurrying around their pen in a flurry of tails and fur. “We’re sorry for the interruption,” the message blared, “but we are facing an emergency closure. Please make your way toward the exit of the zoo. We’re very sorry for the inconvenience.”
“Wait, what?” Tanaka said.
Then a gurgle of sound near the wolf pen. Yuki hesitated, looking over. A tall man in a leather coat lay on the ground, the zoo staff in light green vests surrounding him. She tugged on Tanaka’s coat arm as she watched.
“Doushita?” he asked, but Yuki shook her head.
“No idea,” she said. “Maybe a heart attack or something?”
“Look, let’s just go,” Tanaka said. “I don’t feel good about this.” He took Yuki’s hand in his, trying to ignore the warmth of it, the softness that made him want to pull her closer. They hurried toward the gate just as the others were doing.
It had to be the medical emergency, Yuki thought. Maybe the wolf had somehow managed to maul the man through the bars? But that couldn’t be.
Yuki saw a blur of black and white as they headed toward the zoo gate. “Wait,” she said, stepping backward to check the side of the gift shop again.
It was the guy in the black coat, the one they’d seen by the fox pen. He had a paintbrush out, and he was painting, but not on the sketchpad—on the wall.
“Kami Arise,” he’d written in dark, blood-like ink that oozed down the brick. And below it, a raven with wings outspread. Yuki froze at the sight of it—the new gang, the one that rivaled the Yakuza.
The boy looked up at her, his eyes cold as ice.
Chapter Nine
Izanagi looked down at the washi paper in his hand, a thin, veined sheet Kunitoko had fashioned from the pulp of the inky reed leaves on the shore. Kunitoko had sketched a living map of ink on the washi, which had led Izanagi to this remote spot, a valley of large rocks cracked open like eggs and scattered across the brown grass. He didn’t remember ever painting this place, nor did it seem to have come from Izanami’s hand. He wondered if the ink that had dripped from the naginata spear had spread out on its own, splaying out in tendrils against the waves, creating a darkness he’d never seen before. Even the inky chaos of the oceans was beginning to empty of shadow, eroding away from its black origin, catching the light of the pale blue sky that Yamato had taken to painting over top of the rainbow fireflies.
Kunitoko’s map had led to this place, barren and quiet, nothing but rocks and boulders and silence. This was the last place he’d expect to find Izanami, so vibrant and full of life—but that was before, wasn’t it? No, an empty place like this echoed in his own heart now. This had to be the gate to Yomi, the World of Darkness.
“Who created it?” Izanagi had asked Kunitoko. “Was this your doing, or Ameno’s?” But the older kami had shaken his head.
“It was necessary,” Kunitoko had said. “Shadows gather in corners and lurk by themselves. No one needs to create them. Painting light will rouse shadows to movement.” And so this World of Darkness had lurked here, waiting for Izanagi one day, knowing he would come. He shuddered. All of those happy years behind him, and this gate had always waited, knowing the fate that would play out.
“Izanami?” he called out into the fields of shattered rocks. No one replied. He stepped carefully over the boulders, the wood of his geta sandals scraping against the sediment. “Are you here?” He looked around, but Yamato had not painted this section of sky yet—it was still black as ink, the gems of fireflies shedding little light to help him see.
“Izanami,” he called again, and then a pain like fire shot along his ankle as he fell. It was impossible to see all the rocks, and he’d tripped over a shard. He hurtled toward to the hard ground, moaning as he rocked back and forth and clasped his ankle. After a moment he draped his arm over a low boulder, pushing himself upright and testing his weight on the leg. How could he ever find her here? She who had once surrounded herself with living things, now here among these sharp and silent stones—no, it couldn’t be.
But a shadow moved, deeper in the valley, and he heard the rustle of fabric caught against the rocks.
“Izanami?” He
listened, looked for another shadow.
Halfway down the valley, a golden fox stepped out from behind a stone, his singed ears pricked up as he watched with unblinking eyes.
Izanagi’s heart unfurled like a paper crane—Izanami’s kitsune. She had to be here.
He lifted his hand out to the kitsune, who sniffed thoughtfully at the air. Its golden paws padded gently between the stones, two of its tails singed nearly to its backside from the fire at the pagoda. Izanagi took another step, and the fox’s ears flattened against his head, his tiny lip curling back to a row of miniature fangs. He disappeared behind a half-smashed boulder.
“Wait, please,” Izanagi called after him. Then he saw it at the very bottom of the valley—the gaping mouth of a dark cave, nearly invisible among the rocks and the dim glow of the gemstones. A thin fog curled from the cave, like the shadows of the chaos that had once foamed on the oceans. They swept uneasiness over him, the depth of this world stirring his heart with fear.
The World of Darkness. He hadn’t expected Yomi to seem so foreboding. And to think Izanami might be here alone.
“Izanami?” he called again, half hoping not to hear an answer.
A shadow moved against the wall of the cave, lit only by a deeper blue light shining from inside. He caught sight of her hand, as delicate as ever, clutching an iron lantern that gleamed with the blue glow.
“Izanami, it’s me,” Izanagi said. “Kunitoko said I could find you here. I’ve come to bring you home.”
Her voice was the same as before, but without warmth. It was cold as the ink spray of the ocean. “Where is my son?”
“H-he was your executioner,” Izanagi stammered. “He is the reason you’re here in this horrible darkness.”
“He was my son,” Izanami said. Izanagi could see the silhouette of her face against the cavern wall, the shape of it flickering in the blue lantern light. “He burned with the bitter fire that kindled in me for too long. And I burned willingly for him.” Her shadow retreated, the light fading into the mouth of the cave.
