The girl let out another sob, and black tears ran down her cheeks. Tears made of ink. I reached a hand toward her.
“Katie!” a voice shouted. I jumped, frightened to be recognized in this strange world. I wanted to wake up. I pinched my arm, twisting the skin back and forth. I didn’t want to know any more. “Katie,” the voice said again, and the shadowy fog pulled back.
It was Jun, hunched over on one knee and adorned in broken armor, his face streaked with ink. He wore a helmet on his head with golden horns, but one had broken off in a jagged cut and lay in the sand and tangle of brush grass at his feet.
No, that wasn’t the horn in the sand. It was the wrong shape, too...too sharp.
It was a sword, stained dark on the blade.
My blood turned to ice. My world turned black.
“Katie,” Jun said quietly. “Gomen.” I’m sorry.
No. It can’t be.
“Abunai,” Jun warned. “Look.” I heard the sound of sand shifting under paws. I looked up to four pairs of glinting eyes, four mouths filled with sharp and angry teeth. Inugami had advanced while I was looking away; they’d found us. They growled and crouched low to the ground, ready to spring, ready to destroy us all.
I reached for Tomo, stroked my hand through the copper spikes of his bangs, the ink sticking to my fingertips.
This was the end of everything. I closed my eyes, unwilling to see any more.
The inugami pounced.
* * *
I screamed into the darkness of my room, so disoriented that I barely heard the slam of my door sliding into the wall as Diane stumbled in and threw her arms around me.
“It’s okay, hon, it’s okay,” she soothed as my scream turned into sobs. My arms burned like fire; I could still feel the wolf teeth sinking into my flesh, like I’d been torn to pieces. “It was just a dream,” she said, smoothing my hair as I tried to calm down. “It’s not real.”
But it had felt more real than anything I’d dreamed before. Were these the kind of nightmares Kami had? Did Tomo suffer with these every night?
I gasped in air, trying to focus on Diane so the room would stop spinning.
“Do you hear me, Katie? You’re safe. You’re okay.”
I nodded, wanting to believe her. My heart pounded so hard against my chest it ached. My eyes had adjusted to the darkness of the room, but Diane reached for my lamp and clicked it on, banishing the gray shores of the dream to the corners of my mind.
“Thank you,” I said, tears streaming down my face.
Diane frowned, her lips pursed together, her hair a disheveled mop on her head. “Was it about your mom?”
I shook my head. “I don’t want to talk about it.” I wanted to forget everything. The sound of the lapping waves, the sharp grains of sand digging into my knees. The smell of inugami ripping into flesh...
“It’s probably the stress from all this school nonsense. Getting suspended when they don’t have proof he did it.” She shook her head. “They just want someone to blame.”
I smiled a little. If only it was just that. Diane was always on my side, no matter what. I was so glad to have her here with me.
“You must think I made a bad choice, but he’s not like that,” I said. “He’s not like that at all.”
“Well, you need to bring him here so I can meet him for myself, okay?”
I wrapped my arms around her tightly and she took a short breath. I’d startled her. “You can stay home today if you want,” she said. “No need to face school right away after that.”
“That’s okay. I think I’ll get up.” I didn’t want to risk going back to that dream, that world drowned in kami tears.
Diane stroked my hair for a bit and nodded. “I’ll start on breakfast,” she said. “Come on out when you’re ready.”
She slid my door shut, and I swung my legs over the side of the bed, pressing my feet against the cool tatami floor.
It had seemed so real. The mirror has seen it, Amaterasu said. Did she mean it would happen, no matter what?
That ancient sword that had lain at Jun’s side in the grass, the blade covered in ink. Did that mean Jun would... Would he kill Tomo?
Had he killed Hanchi?
I padded across the cold tatami and opened the drawer of my dresser, pulling out a pair of dark kneesocks and throwing them on the bed.
I didn’t want the ink to dictate my life. I wanted us to choose for ourselves. But were we really free to choose? Tomo had always said he didn’t have a choice.
It was just a dream, anyway. A frightening one, but nothing more.
I grabbed my navy uniform skirt and slid the drawer shut with a thud.
I hesitated, the dream still living vividly in the corners of my mind.
Amaterasu had said Tsukiyomi died long ago. That must mean there was a way to stop him. He had been stopped before.
I looked at my fingers, remembering the slick feel of the ink spreading through Tomo’s hair, pooling on his lifeless body...
I had to figure it out. I was running out of time.
* * *
I knew Tomo wouldn’t be at school, but it didn’t stop me from scanning all the students as they entered the front gates. They entered in groups, laughing and chatting through the chill of the crisp autumn morning. I tugged on the end of my fuzzy plaid scarf, my breath turning to fog in the air. It wasn’t like Tomo and I had any classes together, but knowing that he was at home, that he wasn’t welcome at school, made the crowded space seem empty.
“Katie!”
I turned, and saw Yuki darting toward me, clutching her book bag to her black wool coat. She pressed the bag against my stomach and I folded my hands around the handles without asking. Hands free, she grinned and leaned over, tugging at the kneesock that had coiled around her ankle on the way to school.
“I’m glad to see you here,” she said, straightening again. “I thought you might get suspended!”
I handed back her bag and she smiled. Our shoes crunched the momiji leaves that had fallen off the courtyard trees.
“I’m sorry,” I said, pressing the tips of my fingers together. “I should’ve called you to let you know how it went.”
She waved her hand back and forth and pursed her lips. “I know you’ve been busy,” she said. Truthfully, it wasn’t that. It was that I had so much on my mind I’d become forgetful about the people that mattered.
“I am really sorry,” I said, and her smile brightened. “I didn’t get in much trouble, which is fair because I didn’t do anything.”
“But Yuu-senpai,” she said. “I don’t see him here.”
“Ohayo!” Tanaka pressed his face between ours suddenly, and we jumped back, Yuki screaming as my book bag dropped to the ground.
Yuki sighed. “Tan-kun, you can’t go around terrorizing people on a Monday morning.”
“I’m