Ai of the Mountain (A Fairy Retelling #2)

by Dorian Tsukioka

  I don’t want to help Lord Nakaguchi, but I also don’t want to watch him drown. The experience of it is still burning in my chest. “Stop!” I say. “You’re going to drown yourself.”

  The daimyo pays no attention to my words, but only rails against the weeds, completely enraged. With each twist and turn, his body is pulled farther off the bank and closer to the river. After a few moments, he is grasping the edge of the bank, his legs and chest fully pulled back into the river. He swears again.

  “Please,” I beg, “let me help you.”

  The daimyo stops thrashing around and holds his hand out to me. Instead of taking his hand, I reach for Kaitos’s sword. While I’m turned away, the daimyo’s hand seizes my ankle and pulls. I fall to the ground, and the daimyo begins to drag me into the river. I yank my foot out of his hand, and see his head disappear as the riverweed pulls him down under the surface of the water. I lunge for Kaito’s sword, and look over the edge of the water, but see nothing under the surface of the water. The daimyo has disappeared.

  I look across the river to the opposite bank. The red fox is gone as well.

  “Ai-chan,” a gravelly voice says behind me. Grandfather Koi.

  I put a hand on the side of the giant fish. Blood pours out of the gash in his tail. His sides heave with the effort of breathing. I put my arms around him and pull, but his body is so great and heavy, there is no hope of lifting him back to the river.

  “Tell me how to help you, Grandfather Koi. What do I do?”

  “Oh, Ai-chan. There is nothing that can be done for me now. Even if you could push me into the river, it would not save me.”

  “But, we have to do something. Please, Grandfather, help me.”

  “It is too late for me. But do not fear, little one. I am ready for death. I have been alive a long, long while. It is my time.”

  A great sob escapes me, and I put my hands on the side of my friend. “Please, don’t give up, Grandfather. Let me try to save you.”

  “You have saved me. And now, I have a way to save you, as well. Quickly, before my spirit leaves me, you must take as many of my scales as possible.”

  “No, Grandfather. I cannot hurt you more.”

  “Please, Ai-chan. The pain of knowing I could do something more for you, and not doing it, will cause more pain than the edge of the sword. Please, let me do this for you. I don‘t have much time.”

  I pick up the sword that saved me from the depths of the river, and hesitate.

  “Let me give you one last gift, little mountain girl,” he says.

  I nod and begin to cut away his scales. Tears stream from my eyes, and I am barely able to see them transform into gold coins. The gold of the coins blurs together with the orange of the scales, and the blood on my hands.

  It’s too much. I can’t do this.

  “More, Ai-chan. Take more. Free me. Please.”

  I nod, too heartsick to say anything, and continue to cut away at the scales. White flesh shines in the sunlight where I have stripped his body clean. With each scale that I take away, the koi’s skin lightens, becomes more transparent. I continue to pull scales off of Grandfather’s Koi body. He continues breathing shallowly. It will not be long now.

  “Faster, Ai-chan. Hurry. Please.”

  I take on a new sense of urgency, and slice off more and more scales faster and faster. Before long, there are only a few left. I stop for a moment and put my hand to his side. The skin is so translucent, I can nearly see through it to what lies beneath. I look closer. Pressed against his flesh from inside, is the outline of a hand. A human hand.

  Grandfather Koi’s breaths come slow now, in great, heaving pants. I am surprised he has been able to survive this long. “It is almost time for me to go, mountain girl,” he says. I cut another scale and stop. There is only one more scale left on his great body. Something rings in my memory. I missed something important. I’m not sure what it is, but I know there is something in what Grandfather Koi has said that I should have caught.

  “What did you say?” I ask, but he doesn’t answer. Instead, his body shudders and he exhales one last time, then lies still against the ground. Glimmering coins surround us in piles, but I care little for them. I would gladly give them all back to have Grandfather Koi alive and well. I stare at the blood-stained sword in my hand. Kaito’s sword. I hear a whisper of his voice on the wind. My little mountain girl.

  A gasp escapes my lips and I press my hand against the outline of the hand on the great koi’s skin. I can feel the hand, just underneath. Somehow, someone is truly in there, trapped beneath the beastly flesh of Grandfather Koi. I take the sword and try to slice the fish’s skin, but there is no cut. I try again. Nothing happens. Again, and again, I attempt to free the body from inside the fish, but the sword will not pierce the skin.

  The final remaining scale winks at me in the sunlight, as if it is mocking me. At least I am able to cut it off, if nothing else. I take the sword to the place where the scale meets skin, and slice. The scale falls into my hand, but does not change into a gold coin. It remains a thin, delicate, orange scale. Where the scale fell off, a small tear in the koi’s skin remains. I put the edge of the sword to the tear, and the skin falls freely away from the blade, beginning at the bottom of Grandfather Koi’s tail, and leading all the way along his body.

  I expect to see blood pour out of the gash, but none comes. I lift a flap of the fish’s skin, and instead of the inner viscera of a fish, I see a person. A real, living person. I think he is living. The body is curled up around itself, knees pulled up to his chest, and arms bent in front of his face. I pull away the remaining skin, and free the body completely.

  The moment the last of Grandfather Koi’s skin is pulled away, it disintegrates into dust, and blows away in a quick gust of wind. The body of the man shudders with a great gasp, and I sit back in surprise. He pulls his arms down, unfolds his body, and blinks as his eyes adjust to the light.

  Underneath our maple tree, in the light of the day, I see Kaito in the waking world for the very first time.

  I put my hands to his face as he sits up underneath the tree. He is as solid and as real as in my dreams. More so, because now I know he is really, truly here in the flesh.

  “I’m not dead?” he asks. “I thought I died. There was the struggle in the river with Lord Nakaguchi, and then you came to save me, but I knew it was too late. I told you to take the only thing I had left to give you, my scales, and then there was nothing but darkness.” He puts his own hand to my face. “I thought I lost you forever.”

  I pull him close, and press my lips against his, hungry at first to feel with certainty the truth of his existence, and then caressing his lips more gently once I have been convinced that he is truly real. I am not dreaming.

  “You helped free me from my curse,” he says when we finally pull apart. I remember the dream I had where he confessed how he was cursed by a kitsune spirit for his selfishness. I thought it was all part of my imaginary world.

  “It really happened? You really lived so long ago?”

  “Yes. For more than a hundred years I’ve been trapped in the body of a fish. I stopped daring to hope that I would ever be freed, but then you came. I watched you grow and become such a beautiful, strong woman. The kitsune told me that I would only be freed if I gave my life for love. I didn’t understand what he meant until today. If you somehow managed to get me to the river, I might have survived, but then, what would you have been left with?

  “But, if I gave you my scales, knowing that they would become golden coins, I could do something to help you, even if it cost my life. That is why I expected to be dead. When I saw you, I thought I had died.” He smiles. “I thought I was in heaven.”

  I look at this man who I thought was only a dream, then a ghost, and now is truly here, holding me. I would think I was imagining it all, if it weren’t for the ache in my heart and the sweetness of his lips against mine. “You gave me a reason to give, Ai-chan. The old man said I would only
be able to gain my life back if I could give it away for love. Thank you. You saved me, in more ways than one.” Kaito picks up a handful of the enchanted rose-shaped coins and puts them in my hands. “Now, with these, you’ll never have want for anything ever again.”

  I drop the coins to the ground, press my lips against his for a moment, and pull back to look him squarely in the eye.

  “Together, we’ll never have want for anything. Ever again.”

  Glossary

  Ai – girl’s name; love

  arigatou gozaimashita – formal form of ‘thank you’

  -chan – a suffix of endearment attached the end of a girl/woman’s first name, used to show affection between family members and friends

  Edo – former name of Tokyo, the capital of Japan

  obento – lunch box

  daimyo – feudal lord of a region

  furoshiki – large cloth used to wrap and carry items

  futon – a thin mattress for sleeping, usually placed directly on a tatami mat floor

  honne – a person’s true feelings

  kimono – traditional Japanese dress

  kitsune – a fox, thought to have mystical or spiritual qualities; a kitsune spirit could transform from a fox to a human

  konbanwa – ‘Good evening’

  konnichiwa – ‘Hello’; ‘Good afternoon’

  obasan – aunt; sometimes used to refer to older woman

  okaasan - mother

  ohayou – ‘Good morning’

  ojiisan – grandfather; sometimes used to refer to an elderly man

  onigiri – rice ball

  otousan - father

  -san – honorific attached to the end of a name; ‘Mr,’ ‘Miss,’ ‘Ms.,’ “Mrs.’ (Note: Japanese names are introduced opposite of Western names, in the following manner: Family Name, Given Name)

  seiza – a position of sitting on one’s knees, with feet tucked underneath the buttocks

  shouji – sliding door made of a bamboo frame and covered with semi-translucent washi paper

  tatami – a traditional Japanese flooring made of rice straw

  tatemae – literally “façade”; feelings shown in public as opposed to one’s true feelings.

  washi – handmade, Japanese paper

  yukata – a casual, thin kimono or robe

  Author’s Note

  Thank you so much for taking the time to read Ai of the Mountain. If you enjoyed my story, and would like to stay informed of new releases, as well as receive discounts on future books, make sure to join my mailing list by going to http://eepurl.com/7OjkP You’ll get access to the first chapters of an upcoming novel I’m working on as well.

  The inspiration for Ai of the Mountain came from a writing contest. The goal of the contest was to write a new version of the classic fairy tale, Beauty and the Beast. For the contest, the story could be dramatically different, as long as key elements of the story were still present. However, the rules did not specify which key elements. It was up to the writer to determine that.

  So, here’s what I decided had to be present in order for the story to be a true retelling of Beauty and the Beast:

  • An element of magic that turns a selfish or arrogant person into a beast of some sort

  • The beast has to have a change of heart and grow into a selfless person

  • The heroine both betrays the beast and saves him

  • The beast transforms into a person

  There are other elements to the story, of course. Some of them I included, and some I didn’t. For instance, in the story I grew up with, the girl’s father takes a rose for his daughter from the beast’s castle, which angers the beast. There’s also a magic mirror which the beast allows the girl to use to see her family. I didn’t use either of these elements, not because I didn’t want to, but because the story simply didn’t bend that way as I wrote it. (I did, however, make the golden coins that came from Grandfather Koi’s scales rose-shaped as an homage to the rose in the traditional story.)

  This is actually the second Beauty and the Beast story I wrote that was inspired by the writing contest. Every time I write a fairy tale retelling, I try to think of a new, unique twist. How can I make it different? Maybe what was good in the original story can become bad, and whatever bad can become good. Maybe the main characters’ roles can be switched. Maybe the setting for the story can be someplace very different than the original. This last idea is what I decided to do with Ai of the Mountain, and the other Beauty and the Beast-inspired story. The first story was set in the Amazonian jungle. I loved putting the story someplace completely foreign to the original story. I decided to do the same thing with this story, but instead, set it in feudal Japan.

  After deciding which elements of the original story to keep, I thought about where in Japan I wanted to have the story take place. For me, setting is crucial. It’s like another character in the story. I have to have a very vivid mental image of where the story is happening, in order for me to write it.

  Because I lived in Japan for three years, I naturally was inclined to place the story in a familiar setting. In fact, I lived in the town of Kawatana, near Nagasaki city. I have no idea if Kawatana was even a town back in the Edo-period of Japan, but in my imagination, it was a small village set at the base of a great mountain, next to the Omura Bay.

  The present Kawatana sits near a large mountain, called Mt. Kokuzo. I decided to change the name to Kawatana Mountain, to help the reader connect the mountain with the village in the story. I also didn’t want to overwhelm the reader with too much Japanese.

  I made a very conscious decision about which words to include in the story in their Japanese form. It was a tough decision. I finally decided to translate words for greetings (hello, good morning), people (mother, father, daimyo), and Japanese objects that aren’t found readily in the Western world (onigiri, obento, washi paper, shoji, furoshiki, tatami). All of these things are very much a part of Japanese life, so I decided to include their Japanese terms, instead of always translating them to English. I provided the glossary at the end of the story to help readers maintain their understanding of the words, though none of the words are integral to understanding the main bulk of the story. I hope you found them interesting, and that the Japanese terms helped make the setting of the story more real in your head.

  After deciding which basic Beauty and the Beast elements to keep, deciding that I wanted the story to take place in Japan, I came up with a very basic idea for the plot. It went something like this:

  Japanese girl has talking koi fish; Girl is threatened by bad guy; Fish somehow is able to help her (give his scales and they turn into gold??); Bad guy demands more gold; Girl/Fish fight bad guy – he loses; Fish nearly dies; Girl tries to save him; Fish turns into “handsome prince”; they all live happily ever after.

  It wasn’t a great plot, but it was at least somewhere to start. It was the basics, at least.

  I used this very basic plot idea to create a more fleshed-out timeline of the story. I wrote a paragraph for each important “beat”, or moment, that I wanted to have in the story. I ended up with about 15 of these “beats.” Some of them became entire chapters to themselves, such as the first time Ai meets Lord Nakaguchi and he’s completely inappropriate.

  Next, I thought about the characters of the story. I tend to be a very plot-driven writer. Some writers think of the characters first, but not so with me. I usually have a basic idea of the characters in my head, but it takes awhile before I really get to know them. I have to write about them in a few chapters before I really feel like I know them.

  I also have to know what my characters look like as I am writing them. I’m not satisfied with just seeing them in my imagination; I have to have some sort of image that inspires me. So, I searched through the internet to find pictures of men and women in feudal Japan to help guide me. I wanted to know what Ai looked like, what Kaito looked like, as well as all the other characters of the story. I put a document together with t
heir pictures, as well as a brief character synopsis that describes their background and how they fit in the story. If you would like to see what Kaito, Ai, Lord Nakaguchi, and all the rest of the characters look like in my imagination, you can view them on the Pinterest page I created for Ai of the Mountain. Go to https://www.pinterest.com/doriantsukioka/ai-of-the-mountain/ to check out the images that helped inspire me.

  After I had the initial plot ideas, the setting taken care of, and my characters all lined up, I was ready to write. As with any story I write, the beginning goes very smoothly. I have a strong idea of what I want to happen every time I start a story, so that part is easy enough. But after a few chapters, things…really…slow…down.

  One of the problems I had was with Grandfather Koi/Kaito. When I first planned the story, I didn’t have Kaito emerging until the very end, when it would be revealed that he had been enchanted and lived as a fish for 100 years. After a few chapters, it seemed a bit creepy to me that Ai was calling him “Grandfather Koi,” and then was going to fall in love with him at the end. How could she fall in love with him, if she hadn’t really known him as a person? I wobbled back and forth, and thought perhaps that she wouldn’t fall in love with him at all. I threw around the idea of her falling for Kurasawa-san instead, and perhaps he would be the one to save Grandfather Koi from the evil daimyo.