Spirits of the Noh

by Thomas Randall

  The house proved a better choice anyway. Miss Aritomo obviously felt more comfortable there, which was no small thing, considering how traumatized she was. The woman sat primly on the love seat beside Kara’s father, and he held both of her small, birdlike hands in his own. She didn’t look up often, and had spoken not a word from the moment Mr. Yamato had arrived. Kara’s father had told her that Miss Aritomo had spoken to the police, but that otherwise she had said little in the days since the horror that had unfolded in her living room.

  It hurt her heart to look at Miss Aritomo, and to think of how hard she had made it for her father to fall in love with someone who wasn’t her mother. Kara regretted all of that now. Miss Aritomo had always been kind to her, and now the woman had gone through a terrible ordeal, her body violated by something awful. Something … evil. Kara felt awkward even thinking the word, but there could be no denying the Hannya’s nature.

  Miss Aritomo needed someone to hold her now, and Kara found herself glad that her father could be that person. It would still be hard to share him, but she knew that she and her father would get through it all together. They needed to have their own lives, but they had to support each other, too. If they didn’t, who would?

  “You can’t be serious!” Mai snapped, staring at Mr. Yamato.

  The principal’s eyes narrowed and his lips formed a tight little line. “You are upset, girl, so I will forgive your insolence.”

  But Mai only shook her head in amazement and turned to Wakana. The roommates stood with their arms linked together not far from the door, as though they might flee the house at any moment. Wakana still looked drawn and pale, though her bruises and scratches were fading. Mai, on the other hand, had a long recovery ahead of her. Doctors had put a cast on her broken arm and she wore it now in a sling. Of greater concern was the long gash on her right cheek, which had been stitched closed as deftly as her surgeon could manage. Even with plastic surgery, the scar would be significant.

  “I don’t want your forgiveness, nor do I need it,” Mai said, turning back toward the principal. “We are not in school, Yamato-sensei—”

  Mr. Yamato’s eyes blazed with quiet fury. “But you are still a student of Monju-no-Chie school, girl. For the moment.”

  Kara knew she had to step in. She took a deep breath, glancing around the room at her friends who had gathered there. Sakura sat with a bandaged and bruised Miho on the floor. Ren had pulled a chair over from the dining table and taken a seat, while Hachiro stood behind him, hands on the back of the chair. The way he stood, he seemed almost to expect trouble. He kept glancing at Kara, checking over and over again to make sure she was all right. She liked the way those protective glances made her feel, and discovered that the instinct had become mutual. Later, when the meeting had broken up, they would go for a walk together and talk about what the future held for them. She had a feeling there would be lots of walks for them, many places they would wander together. But not by the bay. The time had come to make a new path, together. They would ramble in the hills and mountains around the city, explore the other beauties that Miyazu had to offer.

  Soon. It was a promise she had made to herself.

  “Please, stop,” Kara said, holding up her hands.

  They all looked at her. Even Miss Aritomo lifted her sad gaze to see what Kara had to say. Mr. Yamato turned to her with the same glare he’d given Mai.

  Kara gave the principal a small, informal bow. “Yamato-sensei, you must realize that it is not for our own sake that we argue. If you go along with the story the police have concocted—the latest in a series of ridiculous lies—no one will ever know what really happened.”

  Her father cleared his throat. “Kara, honey, that’s the point. That’s what we want.”

  She shook her head. “No, Dad, it isn’t.” Again she glanced around at her friends. Hachiro and Miho both nodded to urge her on. “People need to know so they can be on guard.”

  “On guard against what?” Mr. Yamato shouted. “It’s over!”

  Miss Aritomo flinched and shifted closer to Kara’s father, the loud noise troubling her.

  “But what if it isn’t?” Ren asked quietly.

  “’What if?’” Sakura said, throwing up her hands. “We know it isn’t over!”

  “You don’t know that,” Kara’s father said. Mr. Yamato started to speak up, but Rob Harper raised a hand to forestall any interruption and kept talking. “I know, I know. The curse. But you’ve said yourselves that Kyuketsuki told you there were few … what, demons? Ancient spirits? Old gods? Whatever they are. You said there weren’t many left in the world. How do we know any others will ever make their way here? It took the Hannya months, and even then, it might never have found the entry point it needed if Miss Aritomo had not had that mask on her wall. She—”

  “Sssssshhhh,” the art teacher said, putting a finger to his lips. “Please. Don’t.”

  A flicker of pain crossed his face and then Kara’s father fell silent. Miss Aritomo didn’t like to talk about the Hannya. Kara couldn’t blame her.

  Mr. Yamato cleared his throat. “Months. Harper-sensei is correct. There is no way to predict what might happen. It is possible no other … entity will ever trouble you again.”

  Hachiro glanced at Kara, hope lighting his eyes.

  “Is it?” Ren asked, glancing over at Sakura and Miho. “Is that possible?”

  Miho shrugged. “I suppose, but what are the odds? This curse is real. None of you should let yourselves forget it, no matter how much you may want to.”

  Wakana spoke then, her voice quiet but carrying the power of condemnation. Firm and unwavering.

  “So no one will ever know how Daisuke died? Or Yasu? We all pretend to believe the lies the police are telling?” she demanded.

  Fed up, Mr. Yamato stood from his own chair, arms crossed, staring at Wakana and Mai with stormy eyes.

  “What you call ‘lies’ are a service to the public,” the principal said. “The truth would either cause utter panic, or it would be discarded as absurd, and no one would take the Miyazu City police seriously. No one would believe.”

  Kara stared at him, trying to figure out how the story the police had created sounded any more believable than the truth. The cops had not only fabricated a story to explain the two boys’ deaths, but one that made them look competent at the same time. Yasu and Daisuke had been murdered by a man who had been part of the crew of a freighter that had been docked in Miyazu Bay for nearly a week. He had stalked Miss Aritomo and had killed two of her students, leaving Daisuke’s body in her attic as a way to torment her. Only when the smell of death began to permeate the house did she realize something was wrong, but at first she had thought some kind of animal had died up there.

  Then, at a meeting Miss Aritomo had held at her home to discuss the future of the Noh club, Rob Harper had gone upstairs to seek out the source of that smell, only to find that the killer had broken in and was hiding in the attic. His ship had been scheduled to sail that night, and he had intended to rape and probably kill Miss Aritomo before departing. A fight had ensued, with the killer using a knife from the teacher’s kitchen, but the man had gotten away, at which point Miss Aritomo had called the police. While waiting for officers to arrive, Kara’s father had found Daisuke’s remains.

  The killer, according to the official police report, had left port that night aboard the freighter upon which he served as a deck hand. But the ship had been bound for Osaka, and Miyazu City police were working closely with Osaka police, who were especially intrigued because the man fit the description of a suspect they were seeking in four similar cases in their own city.

  The story was convoluted, which made it the worst sort of lie—one that would be difficult to keep track of. It was what her friends from home would have called “one hundred percent, grade-A bullshit.” But the police were the police. The lie belonged to them. Kara had been told, along with her father, her friends, Mr. Yamato, and Miss Aritomo, to rebuff any inquiries by explaini
ng that the police had asked them not to talk about it for legal reasons, as it was an ongoing investigation. Miraculously, the dodge had worked so far. Kara thought that, in spite of its audacity, the police lie was somewhat ingenious. By blaming the killings on an outsider—someone who was not only not from the community but who had already left the area and become the responsibility of the police department of a major Japanese city—they had created the implication that the case was, for all intents and purposes, solved and closed.

  It troubled Kara that the cops could lie so well. She also had to wonder how much of the truth about what had happened in April they really knew. Had they spun lies about Jiro and Chouku’s deaths because they didn’t want people to be afraid, or because they knew something supernatural had killed them and were purposefully covering that up? And if the latter were true, what else did the police know? What other secrets and mysteries were they hiding from people?

  Something to think about, Kara realized. But not today.

  A deeply awkward silence had come over the room. Mr. Yamato still looked angry, but now his expression softened a bit.

  “I know this is frightening, and I know it is difficult,” he said, glancing around at each of them in turn—Kara, Hachiro and Ren, Sakura and Miho, Kara’s father and Miss Aritomo, and Mai and Wakana. “But it is necessary.”

  When none of them replied, the principal stood up from his chair.

  “You will not speak of this to anyone. I would prefer you not even discuss it among yourselves, though I know that would be next to impossible. The school would suffer terrible embarrassment if it became known.”

  “Embarrassment?” Wakana asked. “The school would be destroyed. No one would send their children here ever again. That’s more than embarrassment.”

  Mr. Yamato sighed and looked at her, shaking his head sagely. “You don’t listen. Yes, that is what would happen if people believed such things were true. But they will not. The police will lie. I will lie. It would seem nothing more than a wild story made up by a group of students …” He glanced at Miss Aritomo and Kara’s father. “Or by dishonorable faculty members wishing to draw attention to themselves. It would be considered a hoax, and that would be an embarrassment.”

  The principal began to walk toward the door, but paused to look at Kara. “If anything else happens, if there is any sign of supernatural presence at all, come to me and I will do whatever I can to help. The police will help as well. But unless such a presence appears, this is over. It is ended.”

  Mr. Yamato went out the door, pulling it firmly shut behind him as he left.

  Kara glanced at Mai, then searched the eyes of her friends, and finally looked at her father, who was holding Miss Aritomo close to him on the love seat, whispering soft assurances in her ear.

  They all knew that it wasn’t over.

  Kara feared it would never be.

  AUTHOR’S NOTE

  Though Miyazu City is a real place, and I certainly recommend that you visit it someday and take in the beauty of Ama-no-Hashidate, I have taken certain liberties in creating its fictional counterpart for The Waking. Shh. I won’t tell if you won’t.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I would like to thank super-editor Margaret Miller, as well as Melanie Cecka and the whole Bloomsbury team. Thanks to Allie Costa for all of her work on behalf of these books, both in making sure I don’t screw them up and in helping to get the word out. Thanks again to Jack Haringa for his keen eye and helpful feedback, and, as ever, to my family for their love and laughter.

  1

  Winter had come to Miyazu City, yet instead of the silence and darkness it so often promised, it had brought Kara Harper happiness and renewal. Most people making their way through the shop-lined streets of downtown Miyazu seemed trapped in a long, grim hangover now that the holidays were over. The city had to return to business as usual. In two days, school would start again and Kara would have to do the same, but she was looking forward to it.

  A new year. After the nightmares come to life that had plagued her first two terms at Monju-no-Chie school, she relished the idea of a fresh start.

  “Hey, lovebirds, wait up!” she called in English, hurrying to match stride with her father, Rob, and his girlfriend, Yuuka Aritomo.

  Her dad and Miss Aritomo were both teachers at Monju-no-Chie, a private school on the outskirts of Miyazu City, where he taught English and American Studies, and she taught art. Their relationship had taken Kara a lot of getting used to—her mother, Annette, had been dead only two years—but she had come to accept it.

  It helped that Kara had also fallen for someone. After all that they had endured, it seemed so improbable that she and her father would both be so happy at the same time, but she never spoke about that unlikeliness of their good fortune because she did not want to jinx it. Kara had definitely had enough of curses to last her a lifetime.

  “Here we are,” Kara said, guiding them into the shop.

  “How much are these boots, anyway?” her father finally thought to ask.

  Kara gave him an innocent look. “Dad, they’re lined and waterproof. Can you put a price tag on keeping your loving daughter’s feet warm and dry?”

  He gave a good-natured sigh. “That much, huh?”

  Inside the shop, where several customers were lined up at the register and others milled about trying on winter coats and boots, Kara stopped and batted her lashes at him.

  “Not that much, but …”

  “But?”

  “There’s this jacket you’re going to love just as much as I do. White and gold and puffy—”

  Her father turned to Miss Aritomo and hung his head. “Save me.”

  The art teacher laughed and nodded to Kara. “Go on. Show us these boots.”

  After persuading her father that the white coat with the fake fur around the hood was an absolute necessity—with a little help from Miss Aritomo—Kara waited in line with him to pay. Someone had apparently gone on a break and left an old woman with a cranky, pinched face as the only clerk. Kara dared not complain about the wait. Instead, she leaned her head on her father’s shoulder.

  “Thanks, Dad.”

  “It’s okay,” he said. “I don’t want my little girl’s toes freezing off.”

  “Yuck. Me either.”

  “So everyone’s due back tomorrow, right?” he asked.

  Kara smiled. By “everyone,” he meant her two best friends, Miho and Sakura, and Hachiro, but he tried not to pry too much into her feelings for her boyfriend. She didn’t mind talking about Hachiro with her father, actually, but he seemed very wary about seeming too curious, which was probably for the best. As long as she was happy and Hachiro was treating her well, he didn’t need to know any more than that.

  Despite what her mother had always said, boyfriends were the one area where fathers didn’t always indulge their daughters.

  “… That’s terrible,” Miss Aritomo said. “How did she die?”

  Kara and her father both turned to see the teacher talking to a short, fiftyish man whose glasses were too big for his face. His expression was grim.

  “She got lost on the mountain during the first snowstorm we had last month,” the man said, shaking his head slowly, mouth set in a thin line. “They searched for her after the storm, but two days passed before they found her. She had frozen.”

  Kara flinched at the word. “God,” she whispered, in English.

  Miss Aritomo expressed her sorrow at the news and the man with the big glasses—who Kara now realized was an employee here, but also someone the teacher knew—nodded again. Or perhaps they were small bows, accepting her condolences.

  The conversation went on, but Kara had had enough.

  “I’m going to look at gloves,” she said, forcing a smile.

  “You already have gloves,” her father said.

  “I didn’t say ‘buy.’ I’m just looking,” she replied, and then she was off, heading over to a circular display where what seemed hundreds of pairs of gloves
hung.

  Things had been going so well. They were happy. Kara had had enough of death and ugliness and did not want to hear about any more of it.

  As she searched for a pair of gloves that would match her new jacket, not really intending to ask her father to buy them, but curious, she heard soft voices whispering behind her, and then one of them spoke up.

  “Well, hello, bonsai. Happy New Year.”

  Mai Genji had seemed like her nemesis for a while. She had inherited the position of queen of the soccer bitches when the reigning queen, a girl named Ume, had been expelled during the spring term. Ume had told Mai about the impossible, awful things that had happened in April of last year—about the curse that the demon Kyuketsuki had put on Kara and Sakura and Miho—and for a time Mai had blamed Kara for Ume’s expulsion and for the horrible things that had followed it, during the autumn term.

  Now Mai knew better, and she had a long, thin white scar on her right cheek that would remind her every time she looked in the mirror. It had all started with Ume, whom they suspected of having murdered Sakura’s sister, Akane.

  Kara’s first year in Japan had been long and strange and sometimes awful. And though the curse still lingered, and she worried that it would draw even more evil to her and her friends, she wanted to focus on the new beginning that the winter term offered.

  So she smiled at the queen of the soccer bitches, and at her roommate, Wakana, who had nearly been killed herself back in the fall.

  “Happy New Year,” Kara said.

  “Your father and Aritomo-sensei look very happy,” Mai said, an edge to the words that seemed on the verge of mockery.

  Kara bristled. No way would she put up with anyone saying anything about her dad and Miss Aritomo.

  “They are,” she said.

  To her surprise, both girls smiled. They looked at each other and then back at Kara.

  “They’re really cute together,” Wakana said.

  “We’re glad for them,” Mai added, and then her smile vanished. “I’ll see you in homeroom.”