春

Pai jerked awake with an inhaled gasp, eyes flying widen open, pupils contracting to into dots at the flare of light before her that faded quickly as her senses settled. A gentle hand on her shoulder kept her from sitting up too quickly, and her swinging gaze finally settled on the person kneeling next to her on the floor of the haiden.

For a moment, she thought she was still looking at Konohana, still listening to the mesmerizing tune of her sing-song voice. But the face above herself was all wrong, too diferent to be Konohana's. It was wrinkled, with hardly-there white eyebrows over deep-set dark brown eyes.

It was Tsukuda. He was saying something, but she couldn't hear him around the faint buzzing in her ears.

Her eyes drifted off from Tsukuda as she looked around her, at the gaggle of people standing around and talking mutedly to each other, wearing looks of open concern and worry on their faces. A trickle of sound filtered in. She turned back to Tsukuda when she heard his voice again.

"Can you hear me? Are you all right, dear child?"

She frowned. Why was he asking her these questions? Why was she on the floor? Why were those people ogling at her like she was some sort of exotic zoo animal?

Her tongue was heavy in her mouth when she finally mustered enough energy to say, confused, "Tsukuda-san?"

He smiled, relief spreading its wings over the weathered planes of his face as he motioned to a young woman in miko clothing, who stood behind him. Her black hair was pulled into a ponytail at the nape of her neck. Her eyes were dark and look distinctly disapproving and irritated as they looked at Pai.

Even though she still had no clue what was happening, what had happened, she felt like she was a disobedient child caught breaking the rules, under the miko maiden's stern but polite glare.

The miko maiden bowed respectfully to Tsukuda before turning to the men and women still standing and staring.

"Please, if you will follow me." She said, perfectly calm and collected. "The young lady needs space."

It took her a moment to realize the miko maiden was talking about her.

They all turned and started to leave with the miko maiden coming up behind them, as if she was a shepherd bringing up to rear to ensure no one strayed. Pai turned away from their lingering gazes and focused on Tsukuda while she tried to take stock of herself, to figure out what was wrong this time.

Her muscles felt leaden, her very bones weak and felt so easily breakable if she moved to abruptly. She didn't think she could, at least. She was – tired, the way she got after a gruelling day of non-stop moving about with no breaks in between, as was sometimes the case when dealing with the kids back home, or in the beginning when Shiori would excitedly take her out to places in the city for the whole day that quickly exhausted Pai, every single time. Her eyes were heavy as she tried to keep them from closing while she looked up at Tsukuda, who knelt on the cold wooden floor beside her like he was ready to catch her if she passed out.

...again?

Was that what happened? She fainted?

She shook her head and tried to sit up straight, with Tsukuda's helping hand gently pressed to the middle of her back to guide her up. She noticed the headache as soon as she moved; a dull, throbbing pain pounding at the base of her skull, spreading out from a point at the back of her head to the cut on her neck.

"What...happened?" she asked, groggy like a bullfrog.

"You fainted. One of the visitors found you unconscious on the floor, right where you sit now." He put a gentle hand on her shoulder, and she had to resist the urge to shake it off. She didn't like people touching her, for any reason, but – it would be rude to do that, now. Tsukuda was helping her.

"I fainted?' she repeated.

Tsukuda nodded. "Dear child, does that belong to you?" he asked mildly.

With a puzzled frown on her face, she followed his line of sight to her hand, where her ring sat comfortably on her finger. She thought he meant the ring, but her gaze snapped down to her wrist at the peek of white from under the sleeve of her coat.

Oh shit.

It was real.

She stared at the pristine white sash double knotted securely around her wrist. Having it touching her bare skin didn't feel weird in any way, as she thought it might since the fabric somehow contained enough magic in it – or something of the like – needed to suppress a Makashi. It was surprisingly soft. It looked like it was made from cotton, but it felt like the fibres were spun from silk.

Odd.

She gently ran a finger over the sash, then quickly took it away as her mind flashed with all the memories of seeing Shin always, always wearing this on his own wrist. She shouldn't have been wearing this now. She had no right to, especially because it was her fault Shin lost it to begin with. It was her fault that she was wearing it now, when it should have been with the person it was made for.

The sound of Tsukuda shifting on the floor roused her from staring unseeingly at it. She looked up at him and couldn't muster the wits to come up with a lie. Why was he asking, anyways? Did he...could he tell that this was Mask?

How much did he really know?

"It – I..." she trailed off hesitantly. "I – I need to go home."

She wasn't planning on saying that, exactly, but as soon as the words were out, she realized it was true. She needed to go home. She wanted to go home, she was so tired and all she wanted was her bed in Ayashi House, the safety of the four walls that were her room, and the walls that surrounded the house.

Tsukuda nodded, not pushing further than he already had. "Are you all right to stand? We should go to the administrative office and get you to a hospital first before you go home. It could be something serious."

Her nose twitched at the mention of hospitals, recalling the stale, chemical smell she was subjected to for longer than she would have liked. She wasn't going back to a hospital. Over her dead body. Or, well – if she was dead it would be the morgue she would go to.

She shook her head off those morbid thoughts, immediately regretting it when a spiking ache pulsed from her nape. She started to stand, using the wall and Tsukuda's outstretched arm as support even though it had ants crawling over skin to be touching someone.

"It is fine, I do not need to go to the hospital," she looked at him apologetically. "I am so sorry for being such a bother to you."

Tsukuda kept a hand lightly on her shoulder, as if he was worried that if he took his hand back she would suddenly collapse again. "It isn't a bother. I hope you are not ill?"

She paused, and thought about it. Am I, or aren't I?

She couldn't even answer such a simple question. For a year now, she hadn't been able to do a lot of things because she got so tired far faster than she should. Her hands shook with tremors like Parkinson's disease despite not actually being ailed by it. She was always cold now, after what happened with the Oni; the chill never went away, no matter how much she bundled herself up, or how close she sat to the heater. It only ever really went away, just a little bit, when she sat right up against the boundary walls at home.

There was the drastic change in her hair colour, too – that was not normal, not at eighteen.

She almost – she could have died, that day, with the Oni. Whatever happened with her hair, in those three years that her subconscious mind was so terrified of returning to...what if that day with the Oni wasn't the first, or the only time, that she had almost died?

She was not all right. Something was wrong with her ,and she didn't know what it was, or how to find out, or if it was possible to fix any of it.

She shook her head. "I am fine now. I was not feeling well the last few days, but I am not ill. I just need to go back home."

His eyes lingered on hers for a moment longer. "The cut on your neck speaks otherwise." He said, motioning with a nod of his head to the bandage neatly stuck to cover up the base of her neck where the cut was.

Pai stared at him for a moment, because – how did he know? Her wound was covered up by a bandage; how did he know that it was a cut, that it wasn't some kind of burn or something else entirely? What if it was a recent tattoo, healing?

How long had Tsukuda served this shrine? Did he know? Could he see Yori Chiisai – did he know who exactly lived on the mountain this shrine stood at the base of?

"I just need to go home," she repeated meekly, hand reaching up to touch her neck. "I have someone waiting for me, outside. I will be fine, Tsukuda-san. Thank you for helping me."

He still looked hesitant, like he was about to argue and insist that she go to a hospital to check that she truly was all right, but he finally acquiesced with a reluctant nod.

He led her out of the haiden, his arm gently by her elbow to help her on her wobbly legs. By the time they stopped at the shelves where people left their shoes, she was able to walk on her own unaided. She pulled on her boots, moving slowly so that she didn't give herself a rush from moving too quickly so soon after waking up from fainting. She ignored the looks people who came to visit the shrine give her. She was too tired to care.

They made it to the top of the stairs that lead down to the torii, stone lanterns silent and still, lining either side of the path down. Pai noticed a familiar figure standing at the foot of the gate.

She turned to Tsukuda. "See? There is nothing to worry about."

Tsukuda gave her a small smile as he released her elbow and took a step back. "I would not quite say that. But I am gratified that you are not alone."

She bowed respectfully to him and fought not to lose her balance as she straightened, a wave of dizziness rushing through her. "Thank you for your help, Tsukuda-san. I am so sorry for the inconvenience."

Tsukuda waved away her apologies with a flap of his hand. "It is not worry, dear child. I wish you a safe journey home."

She noticed the way Tsukuda's eyes flicked over to the mountain the shrine stood in the shadow of. She wasn't going to ask him, but she had a feeling that he really did know who lived there.

He turned and hurried away to a little building to the left that looked like a slightly bigger version of the security outhouse at Ayashi House. Her eyes jumped over to where she could just see the horned roof of the honden, behind the haiden.

Her hand went to the sash around her wrist as she started untying the double knot. With a frown on her face, she turned away from the shrine, unwinding the loosened sash from her wrist and stuffing it in her coat pocket. She kept close to the baluster of the stairs, fingers trailing lightly over the cold stone surface as she made her way down to Karasatengu.

He stood just at the entrance of the torii gate, muscled arms folded across his chest and a not-so-subtle stern look in his eyes – dark brown, because his height alone attracted curious glances from people around him – as they tracked her slow progress down the stairs.

"You were gone for longer than twenty minutes." He remarks sternly.

"Sorry," she mumbles, unable to keep the flat, tired note from her voice.

His eyes lost their hardened quality as he took in her pale face, the wide eyes that stared sightlessly at her boots as she walked to him, and the way she kept rubbing at her ring.

"Pai-san," he said as she came to a stop beside him. "What is wrong?"

She looked up at him, and wondered if she should use Daichi's lessons on lying with him. She decided against it; she didn't feel like lying. She didn't want to. She already knew how much she might convinve herself to when she got back to Ayashi House.

As she had walked to him, a semblance of a plan began to form. For that, she'd need to avoid telling the truth, and not let anyone know (yet) that she had Shin's Mask. They'd ask her how she got it, and she would need to tell them that Konohana gave it to her.

She would have to tell them that Konohana told her she'd need to use Shin's true name to get the Mask back on him. They would be sure to ask her how she knew his true name, but the fact was, she didn't. Konohana said she did, but Pai couldn't think of what it was she'd noticed enough to connect it to his true name.

But more than that...she trusted everyone, but Konohana's words were sticky, remaining stuck fast to the front of her brain, niggling at her and bothering her. She trusted them all, but this...Konohana had to have told her that for a reason, right? That most would want to use Shin's true name against him – what reason could Konohana have to lie about something like that?

What if a Hengen's true name worked differently than she thought, in a way that anyone who knew it would be tempted to use it for themselves? Wasn't that what Konohana meant, when she said that even those closest to Shin would try to use his true name against him?

Or was Pai thinking too deeply about this, being overly paranoid for no real reason?

But why her, then? What made her different enough that she could be trusted with his true name, but others couldn't? This wasn't some trashy novel where some random girl was picked to be the 'chosen one', this was real life.

This was a god, a god, that entrusted her with this task. There had to be a reason Konohana came to her, instead of going to her own vessel, Shiori.

Pai just didn't know how to figure it out on her own.

Karasatengu's eyes narrowed on her as she ducked her head from his penetrating gaze and walked ahead of him, instead of answering. She turned left and began the walk up the mountain to Ayashi House, thankful that she heard Karasatengu follow after her a moment later rather than press her for answers. She kept her attention focused on her boots as she walked, mind in a lull as she went over her 'plan' with Konohana's words weaving themselves in and out of the holes that were glaringly obvious in said 'plan'.

She didn't even notice when she strayed off the path and would have walked directly into a tree, if Karasatengu hadn't grabbed her elbow and pulled her away. She blinked stupidly at the tree she almost collided with. Karasatengu walked in front of her and peered down at the glazed look on her face.

"Pai-san, what happened?" he asked, in his gruffly gentle manner. "You do not seem like yourself."

"Nothing. I am fine. Just tired.' She tried to force a smile on her face. It was tight at the corners. It didn't reach her eyes. "Maybe Kanou-san was right. I should stay in bed for a while longer."

Karasatengu gave her a suspiciously disbelieving look. "Is that so."

This time the quirk of her lips was a little more heartfelt, though she still felt like she was stumbling around in a dark dream and only pretending to be lucid. "I guess."

The rest of the walk up the mountain was quiet, and tense. She thought that this was probably on her own end. She was too aware of how Karasatengu kept close to her back, as if he was positioning himself just right to catch her if she so much as wavered.

His caution wasn't unwarranted. She pretended she didn't notice it.

When the gate came in sight, the house shrouded in a thick mist and the sky laden with grey, pregnant clouds, Karasatengu called up from behind her, "I am going ahead to open the gates. Do not wander off the path."

"Okay." She agreed. She turned back to look at him, but only saw a large dark shape whizz up into the sky, black wings lined with sharp teeth flapping as Karasatengu flew back to Ayashi House. She watched him soar high into the sky, circling around, as if making sure there was nothing to worry about around her.

She smiled at the thought.

With her hands stuffed in her pockets, one hand holding Shin's Mask in a tight fist and the other clenching her phone in a sure grip, she continued on her way up to Ayashi House, ignoring the sliver of unease that tickled her spine as she walked. Her head was woolly, and she knew that she would need to rest of a while before she went to find Kouta.

And maybe she was putting off the inevitable, too.

She didn't know what she was going to say to him, how she was going to explain that a Kamigami appeared before her and just handed Shin's Mask to her, and told her that she could use Shin's true name to get him to wear it again. She knew he would believe her, especially when she showed him the Mask.

Him believing her wasn't the issue; he would ask her what Shin's true name was, she knew he would. How could she tell him that she didn't know it, when a goddess told her that she did?

She rubbed her ring as her frown deepened, thinking it over. It didn't make sense. Nothing, really made sense, only that she needed to get this Mask back to Shin. That was the point from which she needed to work outward form, to form an actual plan. She needed to figure it all out in her head first.

Pai watched the gates ahead swing open slowly –and heard a rustle in the trees surrounding the wall. It sounded like something large, and heavy, had just landed in the treetops, or was moving in them. She tensed, muscles locking, vibrating ants streaming through her veins as her head snapped up.

Everything turned to slow motion as she watched a dark shape in the likeness of a person – a man, with wings, dark as midnight stretched limp behind him – fall out from the branches above, a few feet away. Her eyes widen in shock as she recognized the dark red kimono lined with thick edges of black, the flashing glint from piercings, and the black-framed glasses that clattered to the ground off to the side near the bushes, glass lens cracked down the middle.

"Ha – Haru-san?" she tugged her hands from her coat pockets and ran forward, coming to a skidding stop on the ground beside him.

He wasn't entirely conscious, she thought. His face was twisted in pain, breath shooting out in short, harsh pants. She touched his shoulder and immediately snatched her hand away when he groaned. She glanced at her hand, eyes wide and her heart quavering with something uncertain and scared, as she stared at the red painting the tips of her fingers wet.

She looked back at Haru with her mouth hanging open in shock. Still on her knees, she shuffled closer to Haru and tried not to touch him too roughly as she reached over and ran her fingers over his wings. They were soft, unimaginably so, but something wet congealed the feathers together. She brought her hand back and realized that the darkness of Haru's wings hid from sight what she hadn't seen from further away; blood.

"Karasatengu-san!" Pai shouted. Her voice pitched louder when there was no answer to her frantic call. "Karasatengu-san!"

Her heart thumped hard in her chest as she leaned forward, trying to find the source of the wound. Her hands worriedly fluttered over Haru's prone figure, but she didn't dare touch him. She was afraid she would do more damage and hurt him if she did, but she didn't – what should she do? What should she do, what happened to him, what was she supposed to do?

"Ha – Haru-san?" she whispered, voice shaking. Her fingers – they were shaking too. "What – what happened, Haru-san, can..." she trailed off, feeling like her brain was blanking out in spurts, deleting seconds before snapping back to attention. She looked for the source of all – of all that blood, but there was so much, his clothes were black from it, she couldn't see anything.

What should she do? What should she do?

Then, there, she could see it, the wound that the blood leaked from. It looked like someone, or something, had tried to pry Haru's right wing off from between his shoulder blades. It was bleeding profusely; she could see the white of Haru's bone. It was a gruesome, sticky mess, and it had bile coating the back of her throat at the sight of it.

Haru stirred then, groaning when his consciousness was disturbed by the sound of her frantic shouting. He tried to turn on his back, and he let out a harsh, stuttering gasp of pain when he jostled the wound on his wing.

She quickly moved forward without thinking, shifting around so that Haru's head rested in her lap while she kept him from turning onto his back and hurting himself more. There were multiple cuts and scrapes on his face, one particularly deep cut down the side of his jaw, and a purpling bruise that blossomed on his left cheekbone. His lip was torn and bleeding.

Her hands smoothed down the messy tangle of brown, trying to convey any modicum of comfort she could, as she looked back and screamed again, "KARASATENGU-SAN!"

"Pai...i...?" Haru struggled to speak, but as soon as he did, he coughed. Blood stained his lips as he squinted up at her through a haze of pain, his eyes gone red. "What..."

"Shh, it's okay, it's okay," she soothed. "You're – you're safe now." She hoped.

She cast a nervous glance at the trees towering above her. What could have done this to Haru? Was it still here? Was it...was it watching her, right now?

"Pai – " he was still trying to say something, but was cut off by another pained groan.

"You're – you're injured," she said, running her hands feebly over his hair, not knowing how else to distract him from the pain so clearly etched on his face. "Hold on, help is – help is coming."

Someone – someone, help, I don't know what to do – someone tell me what to do.

She looked up, about to call out again, when there was a thump behind her at the same time, followed closely by a second, heavier thud. Fear squeezed her heart tight before she looked back over her shoulder and saw it was Kouta with Karasatengu following close behind him.

Kouta was full-on sprinting to where she knelt, wearing a pair of jeans and a dark green t-shirt, his eyes wide with shock when he saw her and Haru. He skidded to a stop and knelt beside her, the glow of his eyes brightening as he took in the damage to Haru's wing. He reached forward, and before she could stop him – the wound, he couldn't see it, it wasn't visible on Kouta's side – he touched Haru's shoulder in much the same way she had. He quickly retrieved his hand when Haru moaned, blood dribbling down the side of his mouth.

That wasn't – that was not good. She remembered, she remembered idly searching on the internet about it, if there was an actual reason people would cough up blood whenever they had an injury in movies and dramas and anime.

People only coughed up blood when their lungs had been punctured, or their stomach.

Was there – where else was Haru hurt other than his wing?

"What the hell happened?" he growled, voice thick with anger and something else she couldn't describe.

She blinked in surprise at the hard, double-edged quality in his voice. She had never heard Kouta speak like that, especially not towards her. She shook her head helplessly, trying not to jostle Haru as he groaned. Hearing him make these sounds had her heart twisting around a knife in her chest.

"I – I don't know, Kouta-sama," she stammered. "I just – I was coming – coming back from the shrine and he fell from the trees and – and –"

"Karasatengu-san," Kouta snapped, cutting her off. Karasatengu was by his side in an instant. "We need to get him to Kanou-san, now."

Karasatengu nodded gravely, eyes hooded as he went down on one knee and put his arms around under Haru. Haru, like the other Daitengu, was not a small man by any means. He was tall – and still, pale and cradled in Karasatengu's bulging arms, he did look small. He looked small and hurt and she hated to see him like this. She was so used to him cracking jokes and messing around with everyone that seeing him like this was so jarring, like a roundhouse kick to the head.

Haru cried out when Karasatengu touched his injured wing, and her hand shot up to cover her open mouth. Too late, she realized that her hands were wet with Haru's blood; it was so warm. Now it was streaked over her lips and cheeks.

Her stomach turned over. She had to hold her breath for a few seconds to keep from vomiting, and by that time, with Haru safely ensconced in his arms, Karasatengu had turned and retreated back inside the walls around Ayashi House.

"Stand up." Kouta said to her in a firm voice, leaving no room for argument. He was already on his feet, and he reached a hand down to help her up. Pai shakily took it, and despite the hard edge in Kouta's voice, his hand pulling her up was gentle, holding her steady on her trembling legs.

"I'm – I'm sorry," she hiccuped, staring after Haru. Kouta didn't say anything, only briefly glancing down at her to ensure she was okay, that she wasn't injured as well, before he started after Karasatengu. "I'm sorry, Kouta-sama, I didn't – I'm sorry I couldn't –"

"This isn't your fault, so don't apologize," he replied brusquely. "Get back inside the house. It isn't safe."

And with that, he was gone.

One minute he was standing by her side, the next he was following so quickly after Karasatengu, he might as well have been running on air. She glanced back with wary eyes at the trees that didn't feel quite so calming and friendly as before. Her eyes drifted down to the dark red stain on the grass at her feet.

Everything had happened so fast. She hadn't processed it all – she felt like none of it had actually even happened. Like this was all part of some crazy fever dream, like any minute she was going to wake up and go about her day only occasionally thinking back to, Huh, what a weird, awful dream that was.

She knew it was real. She was this was real. She could see the blood, she could feel it drying on her fingers, she could smell the iron tang of it in the air, she could almost taste it on her tongue.

But it didn't feel real. She didn't – was it real? What...what was this? What was going on? She didn't understand.

Pai abruptly came back to herself with a wince at the stinging, buzzing pain in her hands. They were trembling again, shaking with faint quivers, stained red with Haru's blood drying on them. She stared at them for a moment, eyes unfocused as she remembered touching Haru's shoulder, touching his clothes soaked with his blood, there was so much of it, so much –

Her feet moved on her own as she walked past the puddle of blood on the ground, bent down, picked up the fallen, broken glasses, and straightened again. She looked up at the trees as she took a slow, single step forward – and started running.

She didn't stop until she was past the gate, and she looked back, expectantly, waiting for the gates to shut behind her like they always did, running on automated electric gears. Karasatengu wa always the one to press a button in the security outhouse that opened and closed the gates, though; he wasn't there now to do it. He was taking Haru to their healer.

She quickly turned left and went to the outhouse, tugging open the door. Inside the empty room that only held a single rolling chair set in front of a large computer-like interactive machines that she didn't have a hope of operating. She went straight for the wall directly opposite from the door and pressed on the dark red button. There was a faint buzz as the mechanics in the gate click and whir, slowly closing.

She raced out of the outhouse. She kicked off her boots before entering the house, not bothering to pick them up as she ran through the brightly lit halls of Ayashi House, turning right, left, left again, and skidding to a stop across the wooden floorboards in front of the open door to the infirmary and Kanuo's office.

She stared at the scene within, feeling like an intruder caught snooping into business that was none of her own. Karasatengu was laying Haru on his more uninjured side on one of the beds as Kouta knelt beside it. Kanou was raiding the cabinets and shelves, pulling out bandages, herbs, tubes with strangely coloured pastes in them, gloves, several scalpels and other sharp tools that made her stomach clench at the sight of them. His desk was in absolute disarray, a stark contrast to the orderly manner it usually was one a regular day.

Kouta was speaking. Pai stepped closer, hovering at the threshold of the room, trying to hear better.

"Haru, can you hear me?" he murmured softly, the Ayakashi tone of his voice blending away. Haru groaned. "Tell me who did this to you. Tell me so we can find them."

Haru shook his head, eyes squeezed shut as he fought to remain lucid for just a little bit longer. Her fingers loosened around holding Haru's glasses, then tightened as she saw the blood already pooling beneath him and soaking the mattress as he laid, barely conscious, on the bed.

"Don't – you can't..."

"Why? Who was it, Haru?"

"Enough of that, Kouta!" Kanou snapped, sharp as a razor blade. "There's time enough for an interrogation later. Karasatengu-kun, get him over to that table, I need to clean out that wound before it can get infected."

"Kouta, Kouta don't go after him," Haru muttered feverishly. Pai could see the whites of his eyes as he struggled to open them, to say what he was so desperately trying to. "You can't, don't go after him – "

"Who was it?" Kouta pressed, heedless of the black glare Kanou shot him as Karasatengu stepped forward to pick Haru up again. "Who did this to you?"

Her heart froze to a block of ice and plummeted to the floor when Haru managed to ground out a name through the pain before he passed out. His glasses slipped from her hands when she heard the name of the person who attacked him, clattering to the ground loud enough for Kanou and Karasatengu to glance over at her while Kouta stared in disbelief down at Haru.

"Shin," Haru coughed, a hacking sound that spat up blood. "It was Shin."