Chapter One
Chapter One
“Where is your master?” Setsura asked, facing the tree. “It’s about time we formally met. Her address and telephone number, please?”
“It is etched upon my heart,” came Shuuran’s voice amidst the rustling canopy of the dark tree. “If you want it, you must take it from me. Before the day dawns.”
“Then that is what I will do.” Setsura walked quietly to the tree.
Kusama stepped forward. “I’m still here,” he growled like a wild animal. His fangs glittered.
“That is not necessary,” said Shuuran.
A flash of silver cleanly severed Kusama’s stout neck. His head popped up into the air, followed by a fountain of blood. Setsura didn’t spare a second glance as his friend collapsed onto the ground. Instead he faced the treetops from which the silver comb had flown.
“These trees that spring from concrete are a natural treasure here in Shinjuku. They cannot be stripped bare of their leaves. Either you come down here or I will come up.”
She didn’t answer. Setsura felt a strange presence. Several of them. He glanced sideways at Kusama’s corpse. A black substance like tar poured from his neck, spreading out in a growing puddle. Many small shapes and figures bobbed on the surface. Clay dolls.
“I used my own blood to start with,” Shuuran laughed in her high voice. “But having run out of useful things to do with your friend, his will do. Think of them as your kindred spirits.”
Before Setsura could dodge out of the way, the things born of living blood flew at him as one. Each mouth boasted a shiny pair of fangs. Unable to find any blood vessels, they had proved ineffective on Doctor Mephisto. But Setsura—
He could feel the thrall of excitement radiating from the treetops. The dolls paused with their fangs in his neck and cast their eyes at Shuuran’s face high above.
“Oh, look! The children are confused. That bite in the bar was effective after all.”
Setsura nonchalantly fastened the lapels of his coat.
“Ha! That makes my word your command.”
Her voice floated down from above. Several yards in front of him, a young woman in Chinese dress quietly alighted on the ground. She straightened, casting off beams of moonlight. Her arms were bare to the shoulders. She beckoned to him.
“Come.”
The bronze bracelet around her wrist sang out in a small, clear sound. As if a slave to her words, the beautiful, magical being called Setsura Aki stepped forward. Shuuran grinned from ear to ear. It was hard to imagine that such a refined and innocent countenance could take on such an appearance, even for a vampire.
Her glittering, fiery crimson eyes—her nostrils flaring with each ragged, panting breath—the greediest, most vulgar face in the world. She beckoned more forcefully.
Setsura walked straight towards her. Then he stopped, like a beautiful doll disobeying the yanked strings of his puppeteer. A look of consternation crossed Shuuran’s face.
“As I might have expected. I have been alive for four thousand years and you still defy me. Princess curses you. Kikiou fears you. Now I understand. Sir Ryuuki is also in danger. Here and now I will sweep away every reason for their distress.”
Shuuran proceeded forward, her right hand stretched out in front of her. She looked like a large cat on the prowl. Setsura didn’t move, like a mouse frozen in place, as if he did not possess the means to escape those fangs and claws and resistance was useless.
A dark line appeared through the palm of Shuuran’s hand, separating the bent barbs of her fingers down to the wrist. Then the line reached further, from her wrist to her elbow to her shoulder.
At the same time, the invisible brush drew similar dark lines across her throat and waist. Her hand split lengthwise like a stick of kindling struck by a sharp axe. Her neck and torso neatly bisected like sliced cucumber, the line spreading out like spilt ink.
But Shuuran continued on as if impervious, the fierce look of pain rising to her face only after passing through the hidden spider’s web.
“I don’t believe it—the threads—stretched there—” The words emerged from her mouth in a bubbly, bloody froth.
“A cocoon,” Setsura helpfully explained.
He’d spun it to protect his frozen body, the same way he had in the hospital to fend off the assault from Shuuran’s master. The difference in effectiveness came down to the difference between master and servant. The exception being that in order to draw Shuuran closer, he had to feign obedience to her commands.
“And will you die like that?” The black-clad, half-human genie called Setsura addressed the lurching vampiress, a touch of compassion in his voice. “I do not believe so. But its effects will surely be felt. There are many things I wish to ask you. Why don’t we go back to my shop and talk it over?”
“You beautiful, foolish man. I am not dead yet.”
Shuuran pressed her split-apart hands against her throat and abdomen. They were sliding off each other like a stack of slippery plates. It wasn’t necessary to note the tide of blood pouring out from between the sections to conclude she had been bisected where she stood. Trying to literally keep herself together, a wicked smile rose to the pitiful girl’s mouth.
“Do you think nothing this bad has ever happened to me before? Do you think I’ve never died before? Four thousand years is a long time. Live and let die—die and let live. And as long as I live, I shall never obey you. You are the one who must obey me. Come—”
No matter how often she repeated herself, Setsura retreated instead, shaking free of the spell.
“You cannot resist me. You cannot escape.”
Painting thick ribbons of blood on the concrete, Shuuran pursued him. Even given her immortality, she exhibited a life force and implacable will that was stunning to behold. She chased him as Setsura glided backwards like a skater on smooth ice.
“Look, Sir Ryuuki,” said Shuuran, as if trying to convince herself. “I will eliminate the cause of your grief.”
Her blood-filled eyes observed as the black figure came to a halt. He stopped beneath the tallest of the trees.
“No, you cannot escape.” She drew up next to him. She was a big game hunter whose terrifying confidence never wavered while tracking down the prey.
A round lump no bigger than a baby’s head rolled up to her like a snowball. Shuuran stared at it, wide-eyed, as more appeared, one after the other, enclosing her in a kind of igloo.
“Tonight, the treasure of Kabuki-cho has proved very useful indeed,” Setsura mused profoundly. He juggled a white fruit plucked from the tree behind him in his right hand.
Shuuran stood immobilized on the spot, locked in. It was almost as if the “Tree of Kabuki-cho” had borne its fruit in anticipation of this day. Setsura had cast around the demon vampiress a wall of peaches, peaches that were said to extend the life of all living things and exorcise all impurities.
Yonchome in West Shinjuku. Fifty yards from a senbei shop—whose owner was as famous for his looks as his rice crackers—was a small playground. Though a relatively safe location, come night, the roving demons would increase in number. However, if appropriately armed, it was not impossible for a person to enjoy the cool of the evening.
One such man noticed the impressive figure sitting on one of the park benches. His eyes were drawn to the odd object this person was holding. A small koto. This musical instrument alone was enough to prompt him to summon the rest of the civilian patrol. They surrounded the bench.
Tied in a topknot, his long hair hung down to his shoulders. A healthy-looking Chinese man with pale skin. The patrolmen felt cold chills run down their spines. For no particular reason, they sensed this was a recent resident of Demon City.
“G’night. Sure is hot, huh?”
“That a koto?”
“Can’t sleep either? We’re with you on that. Hey, why don’t you play us a tune?”
For a minute, the man didn’t move or speak. Then he applied his fingers to the strings. The civilian patrol reacted with applause and shouts of approval. His melancholy voice drifted up into air bathed in moonlight. It wasn’t a melody they knew.
He played a song and sang about a faraway place, about an old regime even father time had forgotten, at the ends of an earth whose life and death the gods of history didn’t know.
On a clear summer night, in a corner of a small park, they saw the endless, auburn steppes. They heard the songs sung by soldiers under starry skies. Lights came on in the windows of the houses adjacent to the park. Front doors opened. Young and old faces alike crossed the street to the park and formed a ring around the bench.
The thunder of horses galloping across the land. The swords of the royal army clanging against the spears of the Hun. The fighting began at daybreak and ended with the sunset. Over and over again.
On days when the rain turned the desert to a sea of mud. On days when the winds carved the dunes surrounding the encampments into the ruins of a strange land. Thousands of soldiers ate snow as they froze to death. Tens of thousands hallucinated about their humble hometowns while dying of thirst in the scorching heat.
Nobody knew when the battle had started. Nobody knew when it would end. Not the men who fought and not the men who sent them to fight. Fighting was the only proof left of being alive. And soon not even that was sufficient.
One day, wounded, he waited in the middle of the desert for death to arrive. Dozens of cavalry faced armies of five hundred and more. Having repulsed them once, he ordered his still-living subordinates to retreat, leaving himself alone to hold this ground.
Dozens of arrows protruded from his body. Blood spurted from the breastplate of his armor. His officers barricaded in the fortress wept for him. He was the highest ranked of Emperor Zheng’s generals. Yet while praising his wisdom and bravery to the heavens, he’d been exiled to these distant lands. And yet he’d fought all the more valiantly.
Then the clouds of dust ahead of him took on the appearance—not of the Hun—but of a small group of men and women. He believed that his destiny was finally at hand.
The sound of the koto ceased. His audience stood transfixed. The lyrics and the melody burrowed into their souls. They each felt as if they had come to the end of a long journey.
They were about to applaud when they realized the musician wasn’t there anymore. The bench was empty except for a few grains of sand blown by the wind and glittering beneath the moon.
They all could believe he’d returned for good to the scene of that battle.
Setsura Aki stood at the entranceway to the park. The night wind rippled the sleeves of his slicker. His clear black eyes beheld the kind of moon that must have shone over the western Chinese steppes.
A shadow emerged from the darkness of the park and the light of the moon. He stood in front of Setsura.
“That was a nice song.”
“At least nobody covered their ears.”
“General Ryuuki. The first among equals of Emperor Zheng’s generals. I never imagined we would meet.”
“That is such an old name. I would be rid of it but Princess insists.”
They strolled down the night-lit street. Setsura said, “It’s not much, but I can offer you senbei and tea.”
Ryuuki flashed a relaxed smile. “You are the first outsider to make such an offer since Princess rescued me. I am grateful.”
“More importantly, a guest of mine incurred your Princess’s anger and is in the hospital as a result. I’d like to meet her and ask that she at least cover the bill.”
“That would be the end of us. Not that I would necessarily object, but it would be impossible for me to utter the words if I so chose.”
“Indeed.” Setsura added in a sad voice, “I guess all I can do is ask.”
“It is impossible. It must be against God’s will. Incidentally, how did you sustain that wound to your hand?”
“Ah, yes.” Setsura grinned sheepishly. “I grabbed hold of something I shouldn’t have. But I concluded one task in the process. And there is one more—”
The most beautiful melody in the world rang out. “It is called Silent Night. That night we met, this is the instrument that put you and the Doctor to sleep.” Ryuuki continued as Setsura backed quickly away from him, “It looks like you and I are doomed to fight in any case. One note from Silent Night will send you into a sound sleep. It is already too late for you to escape.”
The wind ceased. A black cat observing them from a nearby hedge fell like a loaf of bread onto the ground and began to snore. In all the houses within earshot of the koto, human activity ceased.
The frightening power of the ghost koto. The moon grew forgetful of its own light, slipping into a thick haze. The eyelids grew heavy. This koto could even cause a nuclear reactor to slumber. It was only natural that Setsura would fall to the ground on one knee.
“Princess said not to make you one of our own.”
Ryuuki couldn’t hide the fatigue in his voice. He hung the koto from his shoulder and slowly reached out his hand. “I do not understand Princess’s feelings toward you, but I do not question her word. You should be thankful to conclude a life that will not go on forever.”
He released his qi. But in the moment it left his hand, the energy reversed direction and struck the upper half of his body. His hand and wrist pointed at himself. The unseen pain was the handiwork of an unforeseen power. The cold, debilitating shock knocked the breath from his lungs and threw him to the ground.
A black-clad shadow stood unsteadily before him. “That night, while Mephisto and I slept, the patient moved freely. Don’t I look like one of you?”
Ryuuki’s eyes colored with excruciating pain and cast out a beam of fierce light. “You’ve been bitten?”
Setsura opened the collar of his slicker, revealing the two marks on the left side of his neck. “Sorry to say so, but this is the work of a vampire doll in a curious little bar. Luckily, just the tips of its fangs. Is that puppet master someone you are close to?”
“What happened to Shuuran?” Ryuuki frantically raised his head.
“Oh, she’s not dead. I checked her into Mephisto Hospital. That’s why I was late getting home. You really should join her. A qi powerful enough to kill me has got to smart, even for a vampire.”
Ryuuki grunted and reached out his hand. The burst of invisible, odorless energy faded away almost at once. At the same time, another blow rattled him down to his bones. Ryuuki threw in the towel.
Looking down at the twitching body, Setsura said, “I’ve caught two so far, and all I’ve got to show for it is two big pains in the neck.”
There wasn’t a hint of victory in his voice. Instead, a rather surprised look of dismay on his face.