Denga-san.” Jin’s voice echoed behind Denga, calm and amused. “She is just a child, after all, and a kitsune at that. She does not understand.”
“No.” Denga spun one more time, glaring around the hall, before he turned and marched back toward the exit. “This has gone far enough. It’s become perfectly clear that she is more fox than mortal, that her yokai nature is overshadowing her humanity. Something must be done. I’ll not stand for her pranks any longer.”
Jin blinked, watching him depart. “What are you planning to do, Denga-san?”
“Speak to Master Isao and convince him to put a binding on her,” Denga replied, making my stomach twist. His voice drifted up the steps as he left the hall. “Seal away that infernal fox magic for good. Before we wake up and find a true demon in our midst.”
My heart pounded. Jin watched Denga storm off, then sighed and began blowing out the kitsune-bi flames above the candles. He extinguished them one at a time, slowly and deliberately, his entire attention focused on his task. He would be done in a few minutes, but I did not want to stay here any longer, in case Denga returned with Master Isao and made good on his promise. Trying to slip out while Jin was in the room would likely get me caught, but I had one last, supremely forbidden, trick up my sleeve.
At the statue’s base, I knelt, dug my fingers between a certain board and lifted it away, revealing a narrow hole that led under the floor of the main hall. It was too small for a human, even a petite human, to fit through. But I wasn’t just human. I was also kitsune.
Closing my eyes, I summoned my power once more, feeling my heart start to pound with anticipation. Most fox magic was illusion and trickery, just as Denga had said. Images laid over truth, making you see and hear things that weren’t there. Flawless copies, but no more substantial than a reflection in a mirror. But there was one form that I could shapeshift into for real, though I was forbidden from using it without permission.
Today seemed a good day to break all the rules.
My body grew warm, and I experienced the abrupt sensation of shrinking rapidly, along with the familiar cloud of white smoke. When I opened my eyes, I was much closer to the floor. Sounds were sharper, shadows nearly nonexistent, and the air was alive with new smells: the musty earth, the sharp tang of metal and the hint of candle smoke still in the air. In the blurred reflection in the statue’s pedestal, a pointed muzzle and golden eyes stared back at me, a bushy, white-tipped tail curled around its legs.
Master Isao did not approve of me being a fox. You are human, he’d told me on more than one occasion. Yes, you are kitsune, but being Yumeko is much harder than being a fox. If you spend too much time in that body, someday you might forget what it means to be mortal.
I wasn’t quite sure what he meant by that and right now, it didn’t matter. Ducking my head, I slipped easily into the hole, glided beneath the floorboards and came out beneath the veranda. After making sure no monks, and especially Master Isao, were nearby, I headed into the garden, to the old maple tree leaning against the temple walls. Fox paws were quick and nimble, and the wood was very rough; I scurried up the gnarled trunk, dropped to the other side and escaped into the cool stillness of the forest.
* * *
Later that evening, I was sitting on a flat rock beside my favorite quiet pond, dangling my bare feet in the water, as I pondered what to do next. Jewellike dragonflies zipped over the mirrorlike surface, and small whiskered fish swam lazily below my feet, eyeing my human-again toes. The sun had warmed the rock, and a breeze whispered through the bamboo grove surrounding the pond. It was a good place to forget your troubles, and I often came here when life at the temple got too dull, or when I was hiding from Denga. Normally, the water, the breeze and the fish could erase my worries in no time. But today, I couldn’t forget what had been said in the temple hall.
Seal away my magic? Just like that? Make it so I couldn’t weave illusions, change my shape, or call upon my foxfire? That seemed excessive. I’d never actually hurt anything with my pranks, except Denga’s pride. And maybe a sliding panel or two.
I glanced at my reflection in the water. A girl with pointed ears and yellow eyes stared back, bushy tail curled behind her. She is more fox than mortal, Denga had raged as he’d stormed out of the hall this evening. Her yokai nature is overshadowing her humanity.
“That’s not true,” I told the kitsune staring back at me. “I’m still mostly human. At least, I think I am.”
“Talking to yourself, little fox cub?”
I glanced up. A squat old woman was making her way slowly around the edge of the pond. She wore a ragged robe, a wide-brimmed straw hat and tall wooden sandals that sank into the grass as she minced along the bank. In one gnarled hand she held a bamboo pole, resting on a shoulder; the other gripped a cluster of tiny fish dangling from a string. Her eyes glimmered yellow beneath the brim of her hat as she looked up at me.
I smiled. “Good evening, Tanuki-baba,” I greeted politely. “What are you doing out here?”
The old woman snorted and raised the cluster of fish. “Planting flowers, what does it look like?”
I frowned in confusion. “But...those are fish. Why would you be planting flowers, Tanuki-baba? You don’t eat them.”
“Exactly. Some of us actually have to work for our food, unlike some spoiled, naive half foxes I won’t name.” She eyed me from under her hat, raising a thin gray eyebrow. “But what are you doing out so late, cub? Those humans of yours don’t like it when you wander off.” She chuckled, showing a flash of yellow teeth. “Is Denga-san on the warpath? Did you turn the cat into a teakettle again?”
“No, not in a long time—it scratches me when I try to put a leaf on its head. But...” I shivered, clutching at my arms. The sun-warmed rock suddenly felt cold. “Denga-san was angry,” I told her. “More than I’ve ever seen before. He said I was more yokai than human, and that Master Isao should put a binding on me. What if Master Isao listens to him? What if he really does seal off my magic? I...” I faltered, feeling my stomach twist at the thought losing my power. “I can’t imagine having no magic. It would be worse than cutting off my fingers or plucking out my eyes. If that happens, what will I do?”
Tanuki-baba snorted. “Come,” she said, gesturing down the trail with the end of her bamboo rod. “I’ll make you some tea.”
I hopped down and followed the hunched form away from the pond, onto the narrow winding path through the bamboo forest. Her pole bobbed as she walked, and the tip of a bushy brown tail peeked from beneath the hem of her robe. I pretended not to notice, just as I knew she pretended not to see my ears and tail. It was an unspoken rule among yokai; one did not call attention to their...yokai-ness if one did not want be haunted, harassed, or cursed with extremely bad luck. Not that I was afraid Tanuki-baba would do so. To me she had always been a grandmotherly old yokai, and the stories of the tricks she used to play on humans when she was a young tanuki were always entertaining, if sometimes scary.
We emerged from the bamboo into a deeper, darker part of the forest. Here, ancient trees grew close together, intertwining branches nearly shutting out the sun. Thin streams of light cut weakly through the leaves, dappling the forest floor, and the air had a still, almost reverent feel. Curious kodama, the tree spirits of the forest, peered at us from behind leaves or followed us down the trail, their ethereal green bodies no larger than my finger.
Tanuki-baba led me along a familiar babbling brook, over a tiny arched bridge that was being eaten
