Storm (19 page)

So Jun was amassing an army of followers. Wouldn’t the police know who the Kami really were? But maybe those who knew couldn’t say. And maybe they thought it was just a gang name. None of them had the power to kill like Jun, did they? I shuddered. He was becoming a prince, just like he’d wanted to. Who wouldn’t be grateful to him for taking out criminals, for making the world safer? But he didn’t have the right. No matter what the police weren’t saying, they still saw Jun and the Kami as the enemy, so we still had some time.

We stopped at an ancient towering building that looked like something out of a samurai movie. “This place?”

Tomo nodded as he counted out yen for the driver. “It’s a
ryokan
.”

“That’s a Japanese-style hotel,” Ishikawa said, but really, looking at the place it was obvious that’s what it was. The entrance had automatic glass doors, but inside, the hallways were lined with rice paper doors and vaulted wooden ceilings. It was like a giant version of the Three Palace Sanctuaries where we’d seen the Magatama.

Ishikawa leaned back, resting his hands behind his head as we wandered the lobby. “Relax,” he said to me as he looked around. “I’ll get my own room.”

I flushed with heat. Should I tell him it was okay? The rooms here had to be expensive, and I was pretty sure Ishikawa didn’t get much payment for the questionable work he did. He had a
baito
, a part-time job,
at the karaoke place Tanaka liked, but he didn’t strike me as someone who’d think ahead and save up for some kind of emergency trip like this. The train tickets alone must have cost him a lot. I was lucky, that way. Tomo hated using his dad’s money, but this time it had come in handy for us.

“It’s fine,” I blurted. I wished I hadn’t, but I had. “You can stay with us.”

Ishikawa shook his head. “I’ll get another room.”

“It’s fine,” Tomo said. He didn’t even look at us—he just kept staring at the window and rubbing the back of his neck. “We should stick together.”

“You okay, man?” Ishikawa said, stepping toward him. “You look pale.”

I realized then what the problem was. That look in his eyes—I’d seen it at the Imperial Palace.

“It’s Amaterasu’s mirror,” I said. “It’s calling to him.”

Ishikawa looked at me like I’d grown another head. “It’s what?”

I rested a hand on Tomo’s arm. He tensed under my touch, a wild look in his eyes. “Let’s go to the shrine, Tomo, okay?”

He nodded, and I led him outside into the cool morning air.

Ishikawa trailed behind us. “He’s losing control again, right?
Oi
, Yuuto!” He smacked his hand against Tomo’s back. “
Shikari shite
zo!
Get ahold of yourself, okay?”

“I’m fine,” Tomo breathed. “I just need to...to get closer.”

“Wait here,” I told Ishikawa, and he nodded, watching Tomo as I returned to the hotel to confirm our stay. We had everything we needed in our backpacks, so once he bowed and passed me the room key card, I nodded and returned to Tomo and Ishikawa outside.

We followed the signs for Ise Jingu, which were pretty straightforward. It was the major reason people came to Ise, after all. One of the imperial family members even lived here to watch over the shrine.
And over the mirror
, I thought. It’s been kept carefully ever since Emperor Jimmu received it at the beginning of Japan’s history. What truth could we see in it that we couldn’t see in the one Tomo had sketched?

Tomo moved like a wounded animal on the hunt, lurching toward the shrine with hunger in his eyes. Ishikawa shot me a creeped-out look, but I just shook my head. He’d seen enough of Tomo’s ability that he didn’t need me to reassure him. He could suck it up and deal with it like we both had to.

Ise Jingu actually had two major shrine locations—you were supposed to visit Geku first, and then Naiku, but Tomo ignored the signs for Geku. It was Naiku that housed the mirror.

We walked through the streets of ancient-looking houses and shops, all of them worn wood and rice paper, like we’d stepped back in time. Vendors in aprons and head scarves sold souvenir crackers and plastic Magatama necklaces, steaming udon noodles and leather wallets and gleaming statues of zodiac animals. But to Tomo, it was like the city had vanished, like Ishikawa and I weren’t even there. He advanced toward the mirror, drawn by the force of the ink inside him.

The lush mountains, carpeted in reddening autumn trees, nestled against the shrine like a barrier, a wall that rose up to the clouds dotting the sky. The wind blew and the trees rustled together in a great sound, like the breath of a
kami
blowing through their branches, all of them dancing in unison. I’d never seen anything like it. It was easy to believe the mirror could be in a place like this. It was like the landscape of one of my dreams. Nervously, I checked the nearby hedges for
inugami
. Who knew what was real anymore?

The leaves on the row of bushes shook with a loud rustle, and I tensed. Oh god. Were there wolves in Ise? There could be anything. Even just thinking about
inugami
...maybe that was enough for Tomo to create one, or for one to escape his notebook.

A creature burst from the bushes and I ducked, covering my head and screaming.

No pain, though. No sharp jaws of teeth. Only the sound of Ishikawa laughing.

I opened my eyes slowly, daring to peek at the bushes. A chicken pecked at the gravel on the pathway, its head bobbing up and down.

“Beware the deadly chickens of Amaterasu,” Ishikawa managed between laughs. The chicken circled around us, totally indifferent to our presence.

“Um,” I said. “Why is there a chicken?”

We continued down the pathway, and I spotted another chicken near a group of trees.

Ishikawa shrugged. “Sacred chickens,” he said.

“Sacred chickens?”

“Did you prefer
inugami
?” Tomo said, his tone way more serious than Ishikawa. He looked grim, haunted, pale.

I shook my head. “I’ll take the chickens, thanks.”

An unpainted, square-looking torii loomed above us. And behind it, the longest wooden bridge I’d ever seen, lifting over the shallow river that lapped against the shore of the shrine.

The bridge was made of fresh light cedar that smelled musty and sweet. It arced up so steeply that I couldn’t see the end of it, only the top of the second torii that towered above the other side. The shore itself vanished into the thick forest of trees that shrouded Naiku in mystery.

“Uji Bridge,” Ishikawa said. He took out his phone and passed it to me.

I stared at the
keitai
in my hand. “What?”

He rolled his eyes and leaned against the leg of the torii. “Take my picture, dumbass.” He held his hand out in a peace sign.

“Are you serious?”

The posed smile dropped from his face as he gave me a mean look. “Yes. Now come on.” He plastered the fake smile back on. I sighed, pushing the button to take the photo. Ishikawa snatched the phone from me to look at the picture.

Tomo spoke, but his voice sounded strange, like it wasn’t quite his. “The bridge,” he said. I knew that other voice, and turned to look at him. His eyes were pools of vacant black, beads of sweat slicking his bangs to the sides of his forehead.

“Tomo?” I asked quietly. “Should we leave?”

He didn’t answer. “This bridge,” he said. “This is the Ama no Uki Hashi, the bridge of the
kami
.”

I opened my mouth to answer him, but Ishikawa was at his side faster than I was.
“Chigau,”
he gently corrected. “This is Uji Bridge.”

“The mirror is here,” he said, stepping forward onto the planks of the bridge.

I stared at the giant torii. “Are you going to be okay?” He’d passed out walking under one before. He stopped thoughtfully, and then went around the torii instead, squeezing himself through the narrow gap between them.

Ishikawa and I stayed beside Tomo, one of us on each side. The look on Ishikawa’s face told me he knew what I knew—that Tomo could lose control of the ink at any moment. I peeked over the side of the bridge into the river below.

Something dark was swirling in the water, the ripples spreading out in tendrils under the bridge.

I hesitated, curling both hands around the railing as I peered over.

Ink dripped from the bottom of the bridge into the water. I looked up at Tomo, and down at the water again. It dripped only where he stepped, following him across the bridge. It swirled into wriggling shapes before it lifted in a faint golden dust that clung to the boards of the bridge.

“Greene?” Ishikawa called. He and Tomo were halfway across the bridge already. “Little help?”

I ran toward them, wrapping my arms around Tomo’s to help guide him across.

“I’m okay,” Tomo said quietly. “I just need to...keep breathing...”

I could hear the water swirling below us. Was the ink forming into something?

We were near the other shore now. The fall weather meant not as many tourists around, but there were still enough to make things difficult. Tomo squeezed around the other side of the torii, to the other visitors’ confusion. They turned and bowed underneath the gateway, giving us a look of disapproval, like we’d just eaten the last piece of the birthday girl’s cake.

“Never mind them.” Ishikawa laughed. “You’re the heir of a god, Yuuto. Who cares what they think?” I knew he was just trying to take Tomo’s mind off it, but it sounded eerily like the things Jun was always saying.
You’re not human. You’re a prince destined to rule.

The path turned sharply to the right through a huge expanse of gardens that were probably impressive in season. As it was, everything looked half-dead and grim, like some sort of apocalypse had hit.

We were at the base of the mountains now, and they rose all around us, rolling hills blanketed entirely with trees. It felt like a different world. No wonder Tomo had said it was the Heavenly Bridge of the
kami
that we’d crossed. Something felt different here. I had so little ink in me, not even mine by right, and yet I could feel it pulling me forward, could feel it swirling as we neared the mirror.

Tons of small shrines dotted the area. At the end of the clearing, several stone stairs rose up to a shrine flanked by wooden fences that blocked off the area beyond. Above the fence loomed two thatched, angular roofs, the tops of the roof extending out like a bright white
X
. The other shrines were easy to access, and each of them had a little touristy kanji sign beside it. Not so helpful for me, but it didn’t matter. I didn’t need a sign to know what the barricaded area was.

The shrine of Amaterasu herself. The home of the mirror.

And completely off-limits.

Here we go again.
Was Jun going to interfere again, all the way from Shizuoka? Was he even that powerful?

“All right,” Ishikawa said. “Plans? There’s a large temple there.” He pointed to a building on our right, made of dark wood and white with golden scrollwork that wrapped around the rooftops. “The sign says it’s dedicated to Amaterasu.”

Tomo shook his head, his eyes staying on the thatched rooftop behind the wall. “It’s in there,” he said. “It’s calling.”

“You need to get your ears checked,” Ishikawa said, looking along the perimeter of the fence. Would a sacred site like this have guards? He glanced at the myriad priests walking around in their long white and yellow robes. “We could probably outrun them in that getup,” he added.

“Could you be serious for a minute?” I said. “Unlike you, I don’t have a criminal record, and I want to keep it that way.”

He narrowed his eyes at me. “Why’d you invite her along, anyway?”

I fumed. “You weren’t even invited!”

“Sato,” Tomo said, his voice trembling. “Katie.”

“Tomo?”

He climbed the steps one at a time, his arm reaching toward the wall. “My whole life I’ve fought against this curse, never thinking that I could be free of the ink, never understanding why it was so destructive.” He closed his eyes at the top, lowering his head as he gritted his teeth. “There’s a war inside me, right now. I’m tired of the noise. I’m ready for the truth. And to see that, I need to get to that mirror. No matter the consequences.”

“I get it,” Ishikawa said softly. “The consequences are a lot bigger than jail time, huh?”

Tomo stepped toward the wall, running his hand along the wood panel. “Takahashi said I’d take out a whole sector of Japan.”

“Stay here,” Ishikawa said, pulling his dark news cap over his white hair. He shoved his hands into his pockets and strolled along the side of the wall, as if he was just another tourist. He blended right in—you could tell he’d had experience with this kind of thing.

“Couldn’t you just draw a door again?” I asked, but Tomo shook his head.

“Too much of a crowd. Anyway, the sections of fence I could draw on are against steep cliffs. I don’t think I could make the climb.”

I glanced at Ishikawa out of the corner of my eye. He was standing by priest’s booth at the left of the stairs, which was attached to the long wall. The cloth lightning bolts attached to the hut fluttered in the wind, floating up toward the tree branches. “Too bad we can’t just fly,” I said.

Tomo smirked. “I think ink wings would get just as much attention.”

Ishikawa turned around and started walking toward the little building at the bottom of the stairs, where bamboo ladles were laid out to wash our hands before approaching the shrines. My heart was pounding, but I tried to walk down the stairs as casually as I could. I already looked out of place being the only blonde tourist at Ise Jingu this late in the year.

Three priests passed us on their way up the stairs. “There’s so many of them,” I whispered to Tomo.

“Yeah, more than five hundred.”

I gaped. “Five hundred?”

“That’s why we have to tread carefully. Believe me, Katie, every fiber in my soul wants me to break down that fence and get to the mirror. But I can’t be so reckless. If I am, then Takahashi will win.”

“Don’t worry about him right now,” I said. “Right now we need to fight Tsukiyomi.”

Tomo grimaced as we walked toward Ishikawa. The copper spikes of his hair flopped against his head, slicked with sweat. How much energy was it taking for him not to lose control?