The following morning broke with a strange hush.
No crows called from the rooftops. No chatter rose from the streets below. Even the wind moved differently — not still, but cautious, like something unseen waited to breathe.
Kiyo sat in her chamber, wrapped in a pale-blue robe, her tea untouched beside her. The faint scent of incense clung to her skin, unable to mask the lingering cold that had settled into her bones.
She hadn't spoken of the dream.
Not to Ayame, not to Risa, not even to herself. Speaking it aloud would make it real — and she wasn't ready for that yet.
Her hand brushed the place where the serpent mark lay hidden beneath cloth and skin. It burned faintly now, pulsing like a second heartbeat. Not painful. Not yet.
But alive.
There was no more doubt.
She was bound to him.
The snake god. The betrayed, broken thing she had sung about since she was old enough to hum lullabies. The one whose sorrow lived in her voice. He had come. And he would return.
As the day grew older, messengers arrived bearing fan-letters from last night's banquet.
"Even your collapse was poetic," Ayame muttered, tossing another lacquered envelope onto the growing pile. "One lord compared it to the fall of cherry blossoms."
Kiyo barely smiled.
"You should rest more," Naho said gently. "We've turned away all invitations for the week."
"But the guests at House of Crimson Fans—"
"Will live," Risa interrupted. "You almost died, Kiyo. We're not letting you sing until that... thing passes."
They didn't know what that thing was, but Kiyo didn't correct them. She simply nodded and rose from her cushion.
"I want to walk," she said.
"But—"
"Just in the garden."
The girls exchanged looks but let her go.
Kiyo stepped outside into the small courtyard. The sun was warm, but the wind curled strangely against her skin — not cold, but alert. She walked barefoot along the polished wood of the engawa, her steps silent, her mind adrift.
The koi glided toward her, their movements slow, respectful. She knelt beside them, dipping her fingers into the water.
A whisper stirred behind her ear — a voice not heard, but felt.
Not words. Just presence. Familiar. Waiting.
"Kagutsuchi..." she breathed.
The name barely left her lips when something shifted behind the camellia bushes near the garden's edge. A single blossom fell. No breeze.
She stood slowly.
Nothing was there. Yet every part of her knew he had passed through. Not physically — not fully — but as wind through silk, smoke through doorways.
He was close.
And then, a memory rose. Not hers.
The crack of stone.14Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡR7k8AzaHmN
A palace in flame.14Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡU0PrUWx6wV
A goddess smiling, her hands red with divine blood.14Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡyR3YMYepvf
His heart, still beating, in her palm.
The world blurred. Kiyo stumbled backward, catching herself on a wooden beam. Her breath came short, like she'd been running.
The mark on her shoulder pulsed again — harder this time.
She pressed her hand against it. "What do you want from me?" she whispered.
And a voice, deep and ancient, spoke from somewhere inside her:
"To finish the story."
That night, unable to sleep, Kiyo sat at her mirror, brush in hand. But she did not paint her face.
Instead, she reached for the lacquer box beneath the drawer.
Inside, wrapped in indigo cloth, was a small wooden carving — old, smooth, shaped like a curled serpent. It was the only thing her mother had left her before disappearing when Kiyo was a child.
She had never known what it meant. Until now.
It was his.
A keepsake. Or perhaps a piece of him, bound to her bloodline. Her mother had carried it. Now Kiyo bore the mark.
Was she born for this?
Outside, the wind picked up. The trees hissed. And from somewhere in the city, a dog barked — a single cry that stopped as suddenly as it began.
She rose and walked to the open door.
The moon was not yet full. But nearly.
Kagutsuchi had said he would return then.
Still, she felt him already — threading through the wind, coiling beneath her skin.
And she knew:14Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡja3DKAzciM
This wasn't just a curse.14Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ88B7wFDNde
It was a calling.
The story was unfinished. But the next verse would be hers to write.
And when she sang it...14Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡW7cibKScnO
It would either save them both —14Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxqIV7yxFPG
Or doom them.
14Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡxQf69qLysb
