The Night Itself (23 page)

Jack was gasping. Her wide, incredulous eyes travelled over all of us. “The hell? Someone explain this!”

“It was a spell,” Hikaru said, wearily. “A defensive spell on the entrance to this world. It should have been uninvoked – it
was
uninvoked – I watched it happen.”

Jack sat up slowly, running her fingers through her hair. I decided now was not the time to point out that she was leaving mushy, green streaks in her white-blonde do. “Dude. I don’t think you watched closely enough.”

If the Kitsune had been in fox form, his ears would have been drooping.

I took pity on him. “Hikaru says he saw the spell closed down, and I believe him. Someone else must have reactivated it later, without the king knowing. Who would want to do that? And why?”

“It could be anyone,” Hikaru admitted, crossing his arms across his chest. His voice was even, but the anger was still burning in his eyes. “There was a lot of resistance to my request – but there’s always resistance to anything new. Going behind the king’s back this way is something else. Whoever did it could be charged with treason, if what they did was proved, and that means they’re dead serious about getting rid of you. The fact that they were able to reactivate the ward themselves means they also have a lot of power.”

He looked down, seeming to struggle with himself. Grudgingly, as if the words cost him serious effort, he said, “I’ll do my best to protect you, but … as far as Kitsune go, I’m pretty much the bottom of the ladder. The safest thing – for all of you – might be to go home.”

“No way!” Jack cried out. “Rachel needs us. You guys don’t want to give up, do you?”

I shook my head. “Hikaru, getting your people on our side might be the only chance we have of getting Rachel back safely. How would you feel if it was your sister? As long as Jack is willing to risk it, I think we have to go on. Shinobu? What do you think?”

“I will follow wherever you lead,” he said. The words were a vow.

Hikaru regarded all of us for a minute. Gradually, a new emotion filled his eyes. Respect. “All right. I’m in.”

“Great,” said Jack. “Now let’s get down off this fricking roof and go see ourselves a king.”

I
t took us nearly forty minutes to get off the cliff that looked like my house. I was, frankly, knackered as well as being in pain, and Jack was having trouble adjusting to two legs – which made no sense, since she’d had paws for less than half an hour. But it was hardly the strangest thing that had happened in the last couple of days. If it hadn’t been for Shinobu I’d have been a Mio-pancake three times. I resolved to start doing Ojiichan’s strength-training exercises again as soon as I got back home, and maybe get some weights too.

If I got back home.

“This has sucked up too much time,” Hikaru fretted as I collapsed at the base of the cliff to catch my breath. “His Majesty doesn’t like being kept waiting.”

“It’s not like it was our fault,” Jack said, leaning her hands on her knees. “He can’t blame us for getting turned into foxes.”

“Again, I think you’re forgetting the ‘can fry you to a crisp from a hundred yards away’ aspect of this situation.”

“Is this guy really
that
bad?” Jack asked, straightening up.

Hikaru winced. “Please, whatever you do, don’t refer to His Majesty as ‘a guy’ within anyone else’s hearing.”

“We’d better take that as a yes,” I said, rotating my neck carefully. The series of crunches from my vertebrae weren’t encouraging.
Strength training and a chiropractor’s appointment
. “We should probably get going.”

The alley Hikaru lead us to was filled with huge swathes of yellow-green vines, and there wasn’t enough room for all of us to walk together. Jack ended up in front with Hikaru, while I walked behind with Shinobu.

“You’re different than I pegged you when you first turned up,” Jack was saying to the fox spirit. I thought she was trying to make peace after the way she’d snapped at him up on the cliff-roof. “You seemed like one of those guys who flies by the seat of his pants and causes trouble for fun. But now here you are, looking after us all.”

“When I first turned up, I didn’t know you,” Hikaru said dryly. “It’s easy to treat everything as an adventure if you don’t give a crap. The minute you actually start caring, it stops being fun.”

“Ooh, does that mean you
like
us?” Jack asked teasingly.

Hikaru cleared his throat, turning his face away. “You’re growing on me.”

We emerged from the alley into a cathedral-like space where dangling vines entwined in a thick canopy overhead, turning daylight to a sort of emerald twilight. A dusty trail took the place of the road I knew in my world. Hikaru’s head snapped up and he inhaled deeply through his nose. He gestured for us to stop, putting a finger on his lips.

Something’s up
. None of us said it, but I think the sentiment was pretty universal. I hooked the back of Jack’s coat and pulled her over to stand with me at the same time that Shinobu stepped forward, putting himself in front of us.

Three foxes trotted into view on the trail. They walked in a triangle formation, their legs moving in perfect synchronization, as if they were marching. The trio caught sight of us and came to a perfectly timed halt. Each of them plonked their behinds down on the dust at the same moment.

The air around them shivered, and then there were three people standing in the road. The lead fox had become a woman, tall enough that she could look over Hikaru’s head with ease. Her long, dark hair was streaked with grey and bound back neatly from her pointed face. She wore a grey hakama – a short kimono and pleated split pants, a bit like a kendogi – and the traditional wrist guard and three-fingered glove of an archer. A quiver on her back was filled with grey arrows, and the top of a bow nearly as tall as she was protruded over her left shoulder.

She had four tails.

The two people behind her – one male, one female – seemed a lot younger. The girl looked a few years older than us. She was extremely pretty and was dressed in a red-and-gold kimono with a gold comb twisted into her elaborate hairdo. She had two tails. The male next to her could have been a kid from my school; he looked around fifteen, wore a grey hoodie and a pair of jeans, and had short hair gelled into a spiky quiff. Only the three tails poking out of a hole cut into the seat of his trousers gave away the fact that he was an ancient, powerful fox spirit.

The woman’s face was neutral, and the boy looked at us with interest. But the girl’s face was marred with a look of disgust and – yes – shock.

She expected to find foxes here, not humans
.

The girl Kitsune only had two tails, and from what Hikaru had said, that meant she was too lowly to have rigged the trap with the transformation ward herself. But I was sure she alone, out of these three who’d come to greet us, had known about it. I glanced at Jack and saw that her hands were flexing, a sign she was itching to punch someone. I shook my head at her. She gave me a
duh
look that made me smile.
Aw. My little girl is growing up
.

“You’re late,” the woman said brusquely to Hikaru. “He’s annoyed.”

“We had some trouble with the wards.”

“Trouble?” The woman’s eyebrows drew together. “What kind of trouble?”

“The kind where two of my friends turned into foxes the moment their feet hit our soil,” Hikaru said, folding his arms.

The woman opened her mouth, then shut it and pursed her lips together. “Interesting.” Her surprise looked real to me. If she was faking, she was a very good actress.

“It certainly explains a few things,” said the boy fox, grinning to himself.

“Like what?” Hikaru asked.

“I think you’ll see for yourself when you get to court,” the woman said, giving the boy fox a repressive look. “Come on now. Best not to keep him waiting any longer.”

The three Kitsune turned and marched away. Hikaru motioned for us to follow. His expression wasn’t particularly reassuring.

As Shinobu fell back to flank me again, I raised my eyebrows at Hikaru and flicked my eyes towards the three foxes. He shook his head and put one finger over his lips again; a warning that it was not a good idea to talk in front of them.

Hills shaped like buildings rose up on either side of us as we followed the foxes down the trail. Bird calls and unfamiliar animal noises echoed around us, mixing with the wind to make nature’s version of muzak in the greenery, but it still felt uncomfortably quiet as we reached a dip where wide steps had been cut in the earth, leading down to a dark cave entrance. I blinked at it, confused because it seemed familiar.
Oh, right!
It was the entrance to the Tube that Jack and I took to school every day. The entrance to the Underground.

Kitsune territory.

As the foxes started down, Jack took a step back, shaking her head. “No. Not again.”

Hikaru touched her arm. “What’s the problem?”

“The dark. I can’t. I’m sorry, I just can’t. Isn’t there another way?”

Hikaru called out. “Araki-san, Hiro-san, it’s a little dark down there for our human guests. How about some fox lights?”

The older woman – Araki – was poised to disappear into the cave, but she stopped and looked up at us. “Of course. Thank you for reminding me, Hikaru-san.”

Her tails whipped at the air, then straightened, each of them pointing out at a different angle, like the spokes on a wheel. There was a faint crack and a whiff of ozone. A bluish globe of light, around the size of a tennis ball, appeared at the tip of each tail. She flicked them upwards and they sailed through the air to bob about a foot over her head. She nodded at the male fox. “Hiro-san.”

He sent three balls of light – not as bright and with a faint golden tinge – up to join them.

There was a pause.

“Miyako-san?” Araki said sternly. “You will not wish to be rude.”

The younger Kitsune sniffed and whipped her tails together. Two crackling spheres of greenish electricity, bigger than footballs, surged up past her head. But instead of stopping there, the energy shot higher, stretching thin as it flew. I flinched and saw green zigzags on the back of my eyelids. There was a fierce sizzling noise.

Greyish ash drifted down. A massive hole gaped in the thick carpet of vines overhead, singed black chunks hanging sadly from its edges.

Miyako smiled sweetly. “Oops.”

I hoped she couldn’t hear the sound of me gulping.

“Never mind, dear.” Araki’s voice was velvety. “Lots of young ones have trouble controlling their lightning. I’m sure you’ll improve as you mature.”

The boy fox sniggered while Miyako’s smile soured and dripped off her face. Her tails twitched and the smell of ozone got stronger. The hairs on the back of my neck stood up. Shinobu shifted forward, subtly getting between us. My hand lifted involuntarily, ready to grab Jack again.

“Miyako-san!” Araki tapped her foot. “I think
you
should lead the way.”

Miyako turned her back on us with a flounce and marched past the other two Kitsune into the darkness. Hiro winked at us and followed her, with Araki close behind him. I blew out a deep breath.

We trooped through the cave entrance after them. The floating fox lights revealed a wide circular tunnel, lined with thick, dark-green moss. The vegetation made faint squelching noises underfoot, and the air smelled damp.

“So … you guys can make lights whenever you want?” Jack asked Hikaru. She sounded faintly reproachful. Probably thinking about our uncomfortable experience in the blackness of Between.

“I’m not old enough to do that,” Hikaru said tonelessly. “Kitsune generally only develop the control necessary to form their lightning into fox lights some time during their second century.”

“How old are you then?”

Hikaru cleared his throat and mumbled something. It sounded like “plenty”.

Twenty?
Twenty?
These guys lived for
hundreds
of years. Twenty would make him practically a toddler!

“Hikaru-san is the only Kitsune born to King Takahiro’s people in the last century, and the only Kitsune born in the new country.” Araki’s voice drifted back to us. “His birth was a cause of great celebration and joy. We are all expecting wonderful things from him.”

The light in the tunnel was uneven, but I was pretty sure that Hikaru was turning an unattractive shade of brick red.

The tunnel opened up ahead of us, leading into a cavernous space where the ceiling disappeared into impenetrable shadows above the fox lights. The sounds of water dripping and rustles of movement echoed in the darkness. Bats? Rats? Or something worse?

“This is the station, isn’t it?” I said quickly, trying to distract myself from thoughts of what might be lurking up there. “I don’t understand why the spirit realm is so exactly like the human realm in so many ways. Or is it the other way round?”

To my surprise, Araki answered, dropping back to walk beside us. “No – you are correct. It is our world that echoes yours. The planes lie directly on top of each other, like, ah…”

“Like the layers in a sandwich,” Hikaru put in helpfully.

“I suppose that is an adequate analogy. Now, imagine that I take, say, a pen, and I press it up into the bottom layer of bread. The filling of the sandwich and the top layer of bread would be forced into a new shape by the presence of that pen on the bottom layer, even though it is not touching them. Do you see? That is why your buildings and roads change the shape of the spirit realm.”

“Then the buildings and roads we see here are, like, scars,” Jack said thoughtfully. “Are there scars in our world too? From changes you’ve made on your side?”

There was a bitter laugh in the darkness ahead of us. “We do not make changes to our world, human girl.” Miyako’s voice drifted back. “We do not crush and smash and burn and destroy as your kind do. Humanity warps the world to suit itself. We adapt ourselves to fit our world. That is why—” Her voice was cut off with a small gasp. I had a vision of Hiro kicking her in the ankle.

There was a short silence.