Chapter 13
Kaneko
Sakurai led me deeper into the house, into a part that felt different—somehow quieter, heavier, as if the air itself carried weight.
My palms began to sweat. I wiped them on the sheer silk clinging to my body, but the sweat only smeared and grew worse.
I had abandoned my post. I’d run from the common area like a frightened child.
The mistress would be furious, and there would be punishment.
I’d not seen another beaten beneath this roof, but that was a punishment for slaves, wasn’t it?
Perhaps I would be sold to a lesser house, as Hana had warned could happen.
Momoko had invested money and time, a lot of each, into making me her perfect addition, another porcelain doll who might turn a coin and enrich her purse. Surely, she wouldn’t abandon all that for a simple moment’s fear. Would she?
Perhaps I would be given to the guards, as she had threatened on my first day. I had heard of that punishment, of others facing one or more of the men and their sadistic games.
My thoughts spiraled, each worse than the last.
As we approached the elaborate doors to Momoko’s private chamber, the temperature dropped. It wasn’t gradual, like descending many stairs to enter a cellar. It was sudden, as though we had stepped from summer into winter in the span of a single breath. I could see my exhale misting before my lips.
Something was wrong. Something was very, very wrong.
The air felt wrong. It tasted wrong.
And there was a smell I could not identify—sharp and metallic.
Steel, perhaps. Or was it the tang of blood?
My legs wobbled and slowed and then stopped. I could not make myself take another step. Sakurai’s hand touched the small of my back, and I dared a glance back, seeing something I had never before found in his perfectly composed features: fear.
His hand trembled through the fabric of my kimono before he caught himself and withdrew it.
“Go and listen,” he whispered, and his voice was not quite steady. “If you have grown to trust me, even a little, hear her out.”
Her? Momoko? Why would I—?
Without another word, he pressed a kiss to my neck, reached past me, and slid the door open.
The room beyond was dark. Too dark, considering the lanterns that should have scattered brightness throughout.
Shadows pooled in corners where shadows should not be, refusing to follow the rules of light and flame.
Every instinct I possessed screamed at me to run. Damn the consequences. Damn the lash. Damn the mistress and her endless games. But Sakurai’s hand pressed gently against my back again, not pushing, just . . . encouraging.
So I stepped inside.
Behind me, I heard him exhale—whether in relief or regret, I could not tell—then his presence vanished and the door slid closed.
I was alone.
No.
Not alone.
As my eyes adjusted to the darkness, a figure resolved behind Momoko’s desk, a figure dressed entirely in black—inky clothing that seemed to drink what little light existed, wrappings that covered the face, leaving only eyes visible.
Rising above shrouded shoulders, I saw the handles of crossed twin blades.
The candlelight caught their edges, showing the blackness of the leather wrapped tightly, ready for their master’s grip.
The woman—for her bearing suggested a female—sat perfectly, impossibly still, like a statue or . . . like something that was not quite human.
And her eyes.
Gods, her eyes.
They didn’t reflect light the way eyes should. They were dark—and not just brown or black, but dark in a way that suggested the complete absence of light. Looking into them felt like standing on the edge of a cliff and feeling the pull of the drop.
I tried to look away, to tear myself free of her gaze, but I couldn’t. She held me transfixed. My heart clamored so loudly I was certain those downstairs could hear it, certain the entire house could hear it.
But the silence was absolute. It pressed against my ears, my chest, my thoughts until I wanted to scream just to break it, but I couldn’t scream.
The woman simply watched.
Time became meaningless.
Seconds? Minutes? Hours?
I tried counting my own breaths to ground myself in something real, something measurable.
Ten breaths. Twenty. Fifty. A hundred. A thousand.
My legs began to tremble.
Sweat ran down my spine despite the unnatural cold.
My vision tunneled, edges going dark, until all I could see was her, those eyes, that perfect, inhuman stillness.
The urge to fill the silence became physical. Painful. A pressure building in my chest that wanted release.
I opened my mouth—to say what, I did not know—
Only then did she move. It was little more than a raise of her hand, her fingers pointing to the cushion across from her.
Sit, I heard in my mind.
The spell broke. Or it was cast. I couldn’t know.
I gasped and sucked in air like I’d been drowning.
My legs nearly gave out as I crossed the room, each step like wading through deep water.
The distance could not have been more than a few paces, but it felt infinite.
I kneeled on the cushion, my hands pressed against my thighs as I’d been taught, though I could barely feel them.
Still, she watched, those terrible, unblinking eyes never leaving my face.
I tried closing my eyes, tried to escape that gaze for just a moment, but I could still feel it, still sense the woman’s unwavering focus boring into me, peeling away layers, seeing things I did not want seen.
I opened my eyes again.
It was worse to not see her.
She reached into her clothing with one hand. The movement was too fast to track—there, then not there, then there again. When her hand emerged, she placed something small on the desk between us.
A coin?
It was gold—pure gold, by the way it glistened—and larger than any currency I had ever seen. The craftsmanship was exquisite, each detail sharp and clear.
Pick it up, the voice slid smoothly between my thoughts.
I reached out with numb fingers and turned it over.
On one face, the Emperor’s profile. Noble.
Distant. Perfect. On the reverse, a dragon.
Magnificent and terrible, its mouth open, flames pouring forth.
Every scale rendered in miniature detail.
And its eyes—its eyes seemed to follow me as I moved the coin.
Watching. Always watching. Nawa. The Emperor’s dragon.
The coin felt warm against my skin, too warm, as if it was readying to melt—or as if something lived inside it, radiating heat. The weight was wrong, too. It felt too heavy, even for gold.
I lifted it closer, examining, and caught a scent. It was faint but unmistakable.
Blood.
My gaze flicked from the coin to the woman’s eyes. They gave nothing away. They never blinked. Not once that I recalled since I had entered this room. Not even now, after all this time.
Something mystical shrouded her, something that drew me in even as every instinct screamed to look away.
The silence stretched again.
My vision swam.
Every instinct I possessed was screaming a single word when I looked at the woman: predator.
And I was her prey.
I knew it with the certainty of a priest and his faith.
One wrong move and her blades would sing. I would die before I even registered the movement.
The pressure in my chest built and built and built until I thought I might shatter—
Until . . . she spoke aloud.
“I come to offer you a new path.”
Her voice made me flinch. It was low and controlled, wrong somehow, as if it came from somewhere other than her throat.
The air around her seemed to shimmer. Or perhaps it was my vision.
Either way, I felt something—a pressure or a presence—that had nothing to do with her physical form, something that made the hairs on my arms stand, that whispered of a power I did not understand and could not name.
Mahou.
The word rose unbidden, but magic was the purview of monks and priests, not whatever this woman was. Yet I could feel it, taste it on my tongue like copper and smoke.
“You live in shadows already, Hiromi Kaneko-san,” she said, using my full name. “Hidden behind silk and paint, trained to slip into the desires of others, to become what they need, to see without being seen.”
She gestured to the coin, to me, then to the space between us. The air rippled again, like heat rising from stones. But the room was cold. So cold.
“Let your life serve a greater purpose,” she said. “Let it serve the Son of Heaven.”