A Mortal Song

by Megan Crewe

  “Maybe,” I said. Kenta Omori. “We don’t know a lot about it.”

  “Well, I can try to find out more about different types of demons too. I think I’d better leave the physical combat to your friend with the sword. I’m surprised he left the mountain—he seems like the type who’d want to stay and fight.”

  “He did want to,” I said. “So did I. But someone had to come for Chiyo.”

  Keiji cocked his head, and a moment of silence stretched between us. I should be going back in to help with Chiyo’s training right now, but the intentness of his gaze behind the shine of his glasses held me in place. My fingers tensed around the flute.

  “Both of you had to come?” he said casually.

  “It’d be risky to send only one,” I said. “What if something happened on the way here?”

  “I guess that makes sense,” he said. “Or... maybe you came because you’re the girl they switched Chiyo for.”

  My throat closed up. In that first second, all I managed to do was stand there, lips parted and soundless, like a fool.

  Keiji dipped his head. “I thought so. Don’t worry, I don’t think anyone else has a clue. But I saw how you looked when Chiyo’s mom asked about her real daughter—and Chiyo just turned seventeen—and the way you ran out here—”

  “I’m worried about my family,” I said roughly, scrambling to recover.

  “Except they’re not your actual family.”

  “You have no idea—”

  “No,” he agreed, and stood up with a thump. “I know that. I just have more of an idea than everyone in there. I won’t say anything, of course.”

  He touched my arm, just for a second, his palm warm against my skin. A gesture of reassurance. My heart stuttered despite myself.

  “There’s nothing to say,” I insisted, jerking back.

  A tremor rippled through the ground beneath us. The mountain is so unhappy, I thought.

  And inside the house, Chiyo screamed.

  As her shriek pierced the air, light blazed from the house, so bright it seemed to sear straight through the walls. It burned into my eyes. I groped for the door handle and dashed inside.

  “What the—” Keiji said behind me. Chiyo was lying on the living room floor, her knees curled to her chest. The light was coming from her, flaring from her body in quavering streams, hundreds of times more intense than the usual glimmer of ki that seeped out of her. I dropped my flute and shielded my eyes as I dropped down beside her. Takeo was already there, Mr. and Mrs. Ikeda hovering behind him.

  Chiyo let out another cry. “It hurts,” she whimpered. “It hurts, it hurts, it hurts...” The last word trailed off in a hiss. I touched her shoulder gingerly, and her skin singed my fingers. I flinched. The light emanating off her grew even brighter.

  “What’s happening?” I said to Takeo.

  “I don’t know,” he said. “A moment ago she was fine, and then... this. I’ve never seen anything like it before. It’s almost as if her ki is on fire.”

  “Can you stop it?” Mr. Ikeda demanded. “Whatever it is, it’s hurting her!”

  He’d hardly finished speaking when Chiyo shrieked even louder. Heat was wafting off her now, prickling against my face.

  Takeo lay his hands on Chiyo’s abdomen and closed his eyes. A cool wash of ki slid off him into her. The air chilled, the burning light dimmed slightly, and Chiyo’s eyelids fluttered open. I reached for her arm. She was still feverish but no longer flaming.

  Midori tugged at my hair, sending an urgent wave of energy through me. I directed it into my hands with thoughts of ice and snow. The ki raced through Chiyo’s flesh and smashed against a white-hot wall inside her.

  It wasn’t enough. This had to be some sort of magic, and it was too powerful for Takeo, Midori, and me to subdue, even together.

  My gut twisted. I could think of one being who’d shown seemingly immeasurable powers. But how could the demon have known to target Chiyo? How could he have found her from so far away?

  “We can ease the pain,” Takeo said to the Ikedas, “but we can’t stop it. If she had full control of her powers, she could shield herself from within, but...”

  Chiyo squirmed, gasping. Eventually the three of us would be too drained to continue offering what little help we could now. What if Omori had something even worse up his sleeve? We’d have nothing to protect her with.

  Nothing here.

  “A shrine’s protections keep out ill-meaning spirits,” I said quickly. “Would they destroy dark magic too?”

  “They very well might,” Takeo said. “Good thinking.” He turned to the Ikedas, keeping one soothing hand on Chiyo’s side. “Leaving may be the only way we can help her. We’ll return if we can, but if our enemies have found us somehow, it won’t be safe for us here until we’ve defeated them.”

  Mrs. Ikeda nodded. “We understand,” she said shakily. “Just look after her, please.”

  She bent to brush her fingertips over Chiyo’s hair, and Mr. Ikeda did the same, in a silent goodbye. Then they stepped back, tears shining in their eyes.

  “Chiyo,” I said, leaning close, “we’re going to help you get up. We have to go, but we’re going somewhere that should stop the pain, okay?”

  All she managed in response was a grimace. As Takeo and I lifted her to her feet, she sucked in a sharp breath. I set her arm over my shoulder and slid mine around her back, and Takeo did the same. Ki hummed between us.

  “Where’s the nearest shrine?” I asked Keiji, who’d stopped gaping long enough to sling his messenger bag over his back.

  “There’s one a few blocks from the school,” he said, coming with us to the door. “It’s really small.”

  Chiyo’s blazing glow flooded the street as we darted outside to a crackle of thunder. “Over here,” Keiji said, pointing to the left. We’d just stepped onto the sidewalk when two dim, legless figures drifted into view farther down the road.

  Before I could speak a warning, one of them turned our way and let out a shout.

  “Ghosts!” I said, and abruptly I understood. This had to be Omori’s doing—and it wasn’t just to hurt Chiyo, but to track her down as well. When she’d first flared up, the light must have been visible from miles around. It was a signal fire to the demon’s ghostly allies.

  “Sora,” Takeo said as the ghosts raced toward us, “you go ahead, feel for the most powerful shrine close by, and find a clear path to it. Keiji, take Chiyo’s other arm. Hurry!”

  I lifted Chiyo’s arm from my shoulder to set it on Keiji’s and bolted away from the ghosts to the opposite corner, pulling an ofuda from my pocket as I ran. “This way is open!” I called. Takeo sprinted after me, his ki speeding along both his and Keiji’s feet.

  We tore down the street toward a faint sense of stillness I sensed amid the city’s buzzing energy, which I guessed—and Midori agreed with a tickle of affirmation—was a shrine. In that moment I was glad that humans had build so many everywhere they went, even if their belief had faded. But we’d only made it a few blocks when a trio of ghosts charged out in front of us. I spun around. Two more had joined the couple lagging behind us. Ethereal knives flashed in their hands.

  We might have been able to fight them all, but not while dampening the fire in Chiyo. If she flared up again, who knew how many others would find us?

  I rushed to a side street. We might be outnumbered, but any kami could outrun a ghost.

  “Here!” I said. “Faster!”

  I led the others through a maze of alleys at a frantic pace. After several breathless minutes, we darted out across a wider street and nearly barreled into a group of half a dozen ghosts. “Hey!” one hollered, and they lunged at us in a mass of filmy bodies. I managed to whirl around them. A translucent blade nicked my elbow, the pain stinging through my ki. Takeo drew his sword with his free hand just as another ghost heaved a net at him. He managed to wrench it to the side with a grunt, but his protection over Chiyo faltered. Her body flamed brighter, and Keiji yelped as if he�
��d been burned.

  We dashed on across the sidewalk, my heart thudding as quickly as my feet. My lungs were starting to ache. A rasp had crept into Takeo’s breath. He managed to dampen the fire in Chiyo’s spirit again, the light within her shuddering dimmer, but she whimpered.

  More legless figures slipped through the gates and walls, converging around us. How much of Omori’s force had he sent to Tokyo? If we stopped moving for a second, they’d overwhelm us.

  “The city’s full of them,” I said to Takeo as we whipped around a corner. “We can’t stay here. There’s no way we can get enough distance to escape them completely. Even if we make it to a shrine, they’ll know exactly where we are. Do you think we can reach the mountains? We’ll have a better chance if we can get a long head start on them and then lose them in the forest.” And there were shrines there too, like the one we’d slept in last night.

  “I think that’s our best chance,” Takeo agreed. “Join your ki with mine—if we can keep her dimmed enough, it’ll be harder for them to continue tracking us once we pull farther ahead.”

  I ducked close to Keiji, who threw his other arm around me. “I’m sticking with you,” he declared, even as his voice shook. I reached behind his back toward Chiyo and found Takeo’s hand. Midori’s wings trembled against my hair. Ki surged through me and back to Takeo. The light inside Chiyo contracted. I sent every particle I could spare into my legs and ran.

  We fled through a parking garage and under a bridge. When we seemed to have lost the ghosts momentarily, we veered toward a train track where we could speed unimpeded beside its snaking path through the suburbs. The wind buffeted us, yanking at my hair. My chest ached and my legs throbbed, but I pushed myself forward. All that mattered was reaching the vast stretch of trees I could now see beyond the urban sprawl.

  We raced on for several minutes, bracing ourselves when a train roared past, but as the dark line of the forested slope grew, we had to slow down. Our energy was fading. Midori’s fatigue echoed through me, and I sent her a wisp of apology.

  Then a cluster of ghosts drifted through the track-side fence ahead of us.

  “There!” one of them said. “I told you I saw something.”

  I knew without a word spoken between us that neither Takeo nor I had the strength to outrun them, not anymore. We had to face them, exhausted as we were.

  In a swift movement, Takeo shrugged off Chiyo’s arm and laid her on the ground beside the tracks. Keiji crouched next to her, panting. I dug out the rest of my ofuda, and Takeo drew his from his belt.

  The ghosts charged at us. My body repositioned itself automatically with the moves I knew by heart. I struck one figure across the belly, sending ki to my hand so my corporeal body would connect with her ethereal form, and shoved her into the path of one of her companions. Both fell. I slapped ofuda against their foreheads as they tried to scramble around, and a third ghost hurled himself at me with a swipe of a switchblade. I ducked, heaving him across my back. The charm I struck out with missed by an instant. He spun around and raked at me with his knife. The tip caught my wrist. I grabbed his forearm, fast enough this time, and yanked him into my waiting charm. His body dissolved, but my wrist still panged. I didn’t have enough energy left to heal.

  A bang thundered through the air. Takeo flinched as he struggled with a burly ghost carrying an axe, a circle of blood blooming on his shoulder.

  “That one’s got a gun!” Keiji yelled, waving his arm.

  A ghost at the fringes of the fight had used his ki to turn corporeal so he could make full use of his weapon. With newly formed feet planted solid against the ground, he was sighting along the pistol as he waited to get another clear shot.

  One of his ethereal companions leapt at me, wrenching my hair dangerously close to where Midori perched. I swung around, slamming my fist into the ghost’s ribs with a jagged edge of ki. He staggered backward, and I darted around him.

  The gunman saw me at the last moment and jerked around, but I slammed into him, ofuda in hand. He disappeared beneath me.

  The wild lash of the ghost’s ki had licked over my body as I’d felled him. So strong, even while he should have been using most of his energy to stay solid. It must be all that power the demon was lending his ghostly followers.

  Maybe I could gain a little power for myself here. Confirm who the demon was, at least.

  The ghost who’d grabbed my hair was charging at me again. He’d unfolded a net like the one the earlier ghost had been carrying. A strange, rotten smell hit my nose as he hurled it at me.

  “Kenta Omori will never succeed!” I shouted as I dodged to the side.

  “He’s better than any of you,” my opponent snapped.

  That was all I’d wanted—I didn’t have the time or energy to press for more. But even that small delay cost me. As I threw out my hand with its clutched ofuda, the ghost managed to whip his net at me again. Just before my charm hit his forehead, the interlocked ropes swept over me, brushing Midori’s thin body. At the contact, she flinched, and the last flicker of her ki connecting to me went out like a snuffed candle flame as the ghost vanished.

  “Whoa!” Keiji said. “Not one more step. Back off. I mean it!”

  I swayed around, every muscle in my body quivering, my limbs feeling abruptly heavy. Midori adjusted her grip on my hair, but she must have been too drained of ki to share any more. Takeo had just banished the man with the axe, but two more ghosts were springing at him from opposite sides. Three had ignored us and were flying straight for the spot where Chiyo lay crumpled, writhing in agony.

  Keiji’s human eyes couldn’t have made out more than three faintly glowing streaks of ghostlight, but he must have recognized what they meant. He’d braced himself in front of Chiyo as if he’d be able to hold them off on his own, his jaw tight and his hands balled into fists. I felt a twinge of admiration, seeing him display such nerve, but they’d be able to sweep right through him.

  Still not the slightest ribbon of energy traveled from Midori into me. My vision of the ghosts was fading. My skin turned cold. I was losing my grasp on the spirit realm.

  But I couldn’t stop now.

  I reached down inside of me and clamped onto a shiver of energy that came with a touch of Mt. Fuji’s warmth. The last shred of the ki the mountain had lent me. Without that, I was nothing. But we were nothing without Chiyo anyway.

  I pushed that ki into my legs and hurtled my body forward, thrusting out with a charm in each hand. I knocked into two of the ghosts, and they snapped out of this world with a shimmer. The final ghost swerved past me, her knife aimed at Chiyo’s chest. I kicked out and knocked her to the ground. Rolling over, I wrenched out one more ofuda. It caught the back of her head. Her body disappeared into the air.

  I slumped, aching and empty. Takeo halted a few steps from me, his arms sagging to his sides, his hair come loose from its knot and drifting to his shoulders. I forced myself to look around.

  We were alone on the train tracks. We’d defeated all of them. A rush of unsteady laughter tickled up my throat.

  Chiyo’s breath was ragged with pain, and there was no shrine in sight, but we’d protected her. I’d held my own. Takeo would tell Mother and Father. Chiyo would tell them. Then my kami parents would have to say that I could stay, that I’d earned at least that one reward.

  If we rescued them. If we saved Mt. Fuji. As I hauled myself to my feet with no power but my own human muscles, I felt just how far away that goal still was.

  10

  I WOKE up the next morning with a sense of peacefulness that seemed strange, considering that every part of my body was aching. A bird was twittering outside. Leaves rustled in a soft breeze. I arched my back, stretching out my arms, and reached instinctively for my flute case. My hand found only bare floor. Because I’d left it in Chiyo’s living room last night. The memory of our flight from the city rushed back to me, and I sat up abruptly.

  We were safe now. I had only blurry impressions of our last exhausted dash
through the night, but here I was in the inner room of the shrine where we’d taken shelter, on a mountainside just beyond the edge of the suburbs, though it didn’t appear to be the same one Takeo and I had stopped in before.

  The summer heat was already rising through the dark wooden walls. I pressed my hands against the cooler floorboards and willed myself fully awake. A wisp of ki tingled through me. I swallowed hard, remembering how drained I’d been after our final battle. Midori wasn’t here right now, but she would have recovered some of her energy as she rested. She must have passed a portion on to me before she’d gone out. Yet it didn’t quite reach all the way down to the deepest ache inside of me—the hollow spot where I’d been holding the last of Mt. Fuji’s gift without realizing it.

  The room around me held a small altar ringed with faded paper charms and coated with dust, a row of built-in cupboards along the back wall, and Keiji, lying at their foot. Takeo and Chiyo must already be up. How would Chiyo be feeling now? The one thing I remembered clearly was the firelight washing out of her body the second we’d stepped onto the shrine grounds.

  Keiji was still dozing, his bag tucked under his head like a pillow. His glasses had fallen off during the night. I reached over and righted them so the lenses wouldn’t get scratched. He shifted with a murmur, the wiry muscles in his arms flexing.

  Asleep, his face looked much softer than it had last night when he was grinning and offering to keep my secret. Or when he’d grimly faced the ghosts he could barely see. Chiyo and Haru shouldn’t have been so dismissive of him. I suspected most humans would have run screaming at the sight of all those ghostlights. Keiji had been terrified, clearly, but he’d stayed with us. He’d been willing to fight for us even if he didn’t know how.

  Unbidden, my mind conjured up the image of his copper-bright eyes opening, his lips curling into that slow, knowing grin. An unexpected warmth washed over me. Shaking myself, I stood up.