Chapter 6: The Vilge Girl

  The girl arrived on a Tuesday—or what passed for Tuesday in a world without calendars—carrying a basket of sweet dumplings and enough energy to power a thunderstorm.

  "HELLO! You must be the new miko! I'm Hana! I live in Wakaba Vilge! Grandfather said there was a kitsune miko now and I had to come see for myself!"

  Yuki had been sweeping the front steps.

  She was not sweeping anymore. She was standing very still, staring at the person who had appeared from nowhere and started talking at approximately the speed of light.

  "...hi?" Yuki managed.

  Hana was sixteen at most, with her hair in two side-ponytails and bright brown eyes that didn't seem to blink often. She wore a simple indigo kimono, and she'd pnted herself at the base of the steps like she intended to stay there forever.

  "Oh WOW your ears are real!" She leaned forward. "They moved! When I spoke they just—" she made a little swiveling gesture with her hand, "—turned! Can I touch them?!"

  "Absolutely not—"

  "Please? Just once? I won't pull or anything!"

  "No."

  Hana pouted for about one full second, then got over it. She held out the basket. "I made dumplings. Well, Mom made them, but I helped. Sort of. I stirred things."

  Yuki stared at the basket, then at the girl.

  There was no angle from which this was not overwhelming.

  "...thank you," she said finally, and took the basket.

  Kuroki emerged from the guardian's quarters around midmorning, stopped when she saw Hana sitting on the shrine steps chattering at Yuki, and visibly considered retreating.

  Too te. Hana had spotted her.

  "Kuroki-san! Good morning! I was just telling Yuki-san about the water-rights argument in the vilge—there's this merchant who keeps diverting the stream and old Tanaka-san is absolutely furious—"

  "Hana." Kuroki's voice was patient in the way that suggested long experience. "Breathe."

  Hana breathed.

  "She visits often?" Yuki murmured to Kuroki.

  "Weekly. Since I arrived." A pause. "She means well."

  "I can hear you," Hana said cheerfully. "And yes, I do mean well! Someone has to keep you informed about the vilge! You can't just live up here on the mountain and not know what's happening down there! What if there's trouble? Information is important!"

  "The information we usually receive from you is about merchant disputes and which farmers' crops are growing fastest," Kuroki said.

  "That's local intelligence! Very useful!"

  Yuki snorted. Kuroki's mouth twitched.

  They sat on the steps—all three of them, somewhat inevitably—and Hana talked while they worked through the dumplings. She was easy to listen to, Yuki found. Not because she said anything particurly important, but because she said everything with such genuine enthusiasm that it was hard not to get pulled in.

  She talked about her family, her friends, her goal of eventually becoming a miko herself ("Not to repce you! I just think it's beautiful work"). Then, more quietly, about the vilge.

  "People are nervous," Hana said. "About the forest roads, mostly. There are rumors — travelers hearing things at night, animals acting strange near the tree line. Nothing anyone's seen directly." She picked at the hem of her sleeve. "Grandfather doesn't talk about it much. But he checks the door twice before bed now, and he never used to."

  She said it the way teenagers say things about their grandparents — halfway between worried and embarrassed to be worried.

  Yuki's ears fttened.

  After Hana left, Yuki walked to the edge of the shrine grounds where the mountain dropped away. The vilge was visible through a gap in the trees. Small from up here. Smoke from morning fires already thinning. Rooftops. The distant sound of a bell from the market.

  Old Daichi checking his door twice before bed.

  Yuki thought of what she'd been doing for the past week. The sweeping. The offerings arranged in the correct order. The purification ritual performed because Tsukuyomi said to perform it.

  "That changes," she said, to no one.

  Kuroki had appeared at the path behind her — quietly enough that Yuki hadn't heard her approach. She didn't ask what changes. Just waited.

  "I've been treating this like a job," Yuki said. "Ticking boxes. But if the shrine's barrier actually does something real out there—" she nodded toward the vilge, "—then I need to get better at it. Faster."

  Kuroki regarded her. "Yes."

  No ceremony in it. Just agreement.

  Yuki looked at the vilge below, smoke rising from morning fires, half-visible through the treeline.

  People are scared down there because this shrine went quiet.

  She squared her shoulders.

  "Fine," she muttered. "I'll get better at it."

  Her tails swished with something that wasn't quite stubbornness and wasn't quite determination but lived in the neighborhood of both.

  Before she left, Hana had hugged Yuki—an abrupt, tight squeeze that made Yuki's ears pop up in surprise—and waved cheerfully at Kuroki, who received it with the expression of someone who had made their peace with being hugged.

  "She's a lot," Yuki said, watching her disappear down the mountain path.

  "She is," Kuroki agreed. "But the vilge trusts her. If you have her approval, they'll warm to you faster."

  "She seemed to like me just fine."

  "She likes everyone." Kuroki gnced at her. "That's different from approval. But she was watching you when you said you needed to get better. The way she looked after—that was approval."

  Yuki turned that over. "You notice a lot."

  "It's my job to notice things."

  "Right. Guardian." Yuki picked up her broom again—she'd dropped it when Hana arrived. "Is that all I am to you? Part of the job description?"

  She said it lightly, like a joke.

  Kuroki was quiet for a beat longer than felt casual.

  "No," she said.

  Just that. Then she walked back toward the shrine building to resume whatever she'd been doing before.

  Yuki stood holding her broom, watching her go.

  No.

  She had no idea what to do with that.

  Her tails moved in a slow, uncertain wave, and she made herself look away and start sweeping.

  Stop it, she told herself. She didn't mean it like that. You're imagining things.

  The sweeping helped.

  Mostly.

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  [Author's Note]

  Thanks so much for reading! ? I'm working hard to keep updates consistent for you all.

  This month I'll be dropping 2 BONUS chapters featuring Yuki in standalone adventures — completely separate from the main story, just Yuki being Yuki in random situations ?

  Drop a comment below telling me what you want to see her get into — your suggestions decide what I write! Every comment and follow genuinely means a lot, and I read every single one.

  See you in the next chapter! ?