Akiko retained just enough sense of dignity not to squeal in embarrassment, but she could feel herself blushing all over as she bolted into the house, still clutching the mask. Back in her room, the door closed, she collapsed on the floor, breathing heavily. The wood of the mask was smooth and cool against her chest, and she could hear the wail of the sirens as the fire engines arrived, then the shouts and running footsteps of the fire-fighters.

Gradually, her mind began forming coherent thoughts again, and her breathing slowed to normal. The smell of smoke, and the acrid stench of burned plastic, filled the air, and Akiko realised that she should go back, check the situation. And she should get dressed, because if the fire spread to the house, she didn’t want to be evacuated naked.

But she didn’t want to let go of the mask. Even though she knew she wasn’t in a fire now, as she put it on the table memories of the burning pain swept back, and she found herself trembling, fingers resting on the mask’s surface, fighting to let go.

With an effort of will, she lifted her fingers a fraction above the mask, ready to press them down again if necessary. There was no pain, no burning, just a strange sense of regret. Letting her breath out, Akiko sprang up and started pulling clothes on as quickly as she could.

The fire-fighters were still trying to bring the blaze under control when she got out to join Shiraishi. They had pulled hoses up the steps and were starting to douse it, but it was obvious that there was going to be nothing left. The priest was simply staring at the ruins, unmoving, not even reacting when Akiko came up beside her.

As the flames died down, one of the fire-fighters approached them.

“Ms Tanahata?” he asked, looking between them.

“That’s me,” Akiko replied.

“Thank you for the call. Do you have any idea of the cause of the fire?” Akiko shook her head, and the fire-fighter frowned, glancing over at the blackened ashes that were all that remained of the shrine buildings.

“No candles or lamps inside?”

“Only electric ones, and they were turned off for the night.”

“There’ll have to be an investigation, of course. We can’t rule out arson.”

No, Akiko suddenly thought, we can’t. She remembered the kegare gathered around Wakabayashi, the smoke and smouldering fire, and his near-threats over what would happen if they didn’t sell out. She looked at Shiraishi, but the priest showed no signs of wanting to respond. We can tell them later, she decided, and just nodded to the fire-fighter.

He asked her a few more questions, which she answered as best she could, and then turned to Shiraishi. The priest answered almost entirely in monosyllables, and fortunately chose not to mention Akiko’s plunge into the flames. The fire-fighters put tape up around the ruins and left, leaving Akiko and Shiraishi standing by the house, looking at the thin smoke rising from the ashes in the light of dawn, as it began to rain.

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“Revd Shiraishi, we should go inside.”

The priest did not respond, the brocade bag holding the go-shintai still clutched by her side, ash and smoke still marking her face and clothes.

“Revd Shiraishi?” Akiko was starting to get worried. The priest shuddered, and then nodded.

“Inside. Yes.” She turned round and walked back into the house, heading for the kitchen, Akiko behind her. As soon as she got into the kitchen, she went to the sake cupboard, and took out a large bottle and a glass, before sitting at the table and opening the cap. Akiko started to reach out to stop her, but faltered. What could she say? Instead, she took a seat across the table from Shiraishi, hoping to provide some moral support at least.

Shiraishi poured herself a glass in silence, and drank it at one gulp. A second glass followed, drunk a little more slowly. The brocade bag was on the table between them, and Akiko saw an opportunity to start a discussion.

“Can I see the go-shintai?” She expected a refusal, but at least it would start them talking about what happened.

“Sure, go ahead. What difference can it make?”

For a moment, Akiko wasn’t sure whether to take advantage of the permission, but it was an opportunity she might not have again. She reached out for the bag.

There was a snake on top of it, scales flashing in red, green, and purple, sliver and gold lines marking their edges as its eyes flashed at her and it reared up and hissed.

Akiko snatched her hand back, and the vision passed.

“Er, maybe I’d better not.”

Shiraishi knocked back another glass of sake and shrugged.

“Suit yourself.”

“But at least we got it out of the shrine.” The priest put her glass down, and looked at Akiko as if examining her. For a moment, Akiko had the distinct impression that Shiraishi was undressing her in her mind, and she shifted uncomfortably. The priest blinked, and the moment passed.

“How did you…” she began, and then shook her head. “You don’t know, do you.”

“No.” It was obvious what she was referring to.

“Why?”

“I saw Tamao still inside the shrine. I had to go and rescue him. It…” Akiko suddenly remembered, and gasped. “It was like some dreams I had, before.”

“Hmph.” Shiraishi poured herself another glass, and was about to take another drink when she caught Akiko’s eye, and put it back on the table. “So you didn’t burn.”

“No. As long as I was holding the mask, I didn’t burn.” The priest nodded, but she was looking at Akiko strangely again. Akiko started to feel uncomfortable, and looked away.

“Anyway,” she began, while trying to think of something to say. “Anyway, we saved the go-shintai, so we can rebuild the shrine, right?”

“Huh.” Shiraishi snorted, a sceptical noise, and when Akiko looked back she was drinking the sake. This time she met Akiko’s eyes with a certain defiance.

“I’ve barely been able to meet expenses. I’ve not been able to pay insurance premiums as well.” It took a few moments for Akiko to realise exactly what the priest was saying.

“The shrine wasn’t insured?”

Shiraishi shook her head.

“We can’t rebuild. It’s over.”

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Akiko spent the rest of the day fielding enquiries from the press, dealing with the investigator sent by the police, and generally keeping the outside world away from Shiraishi, who quickly became very drunk, and fell asleep slumped over the kitchen table. Akiko checked on her every so often, but she was snoring loudly enough to put any worries about her immediate state of health to rest.

She did carefully pick up the bag containing the go-shintai, feeling something hard and heavy inside, certainly like a necklace, and put it on the kamidana in the living room. The thought of the priest throwing up on it made her go cold with horror.

Akiko thought about calling someone, but she couldn’t think of anyone suitable. She certainly couldn’t tell her mother. She hadn’t even said that she was at the shrine; how could she start from “the shrine burned down”? And then there was the problem with Wakabayashi. The more Akiko thought about it, the more sure she was that he was behind the fire, but she couldn’t tell anyone before she spoke to the priest. After all, her visions of his kegare were not the sort of thing that the police would take seriously as evidence.

Effectively alone, she started to wonder about what she was doing there. Now that the shrine was gone, shouldn’t she be looking for another job? It wasn’t as if she owed Tamao anything, and Shiraishi would probably be glad to have her off her hands.

On the other hand, would Tamao let her go?

She still hadn’t reached a conclusion by the time night fell. She got Shiraishi to her bed, and then went to take a bath. It was only as she washed herself that she realised she still smelled of smoke, and she scrubbed vigourously at her skin and hair in an attempt to get rid of it.

Finally satisfied, she got into the enormous bath, and sank gratefully into the warm water, sighing as it soothed and relaxed her body. She could see the shrine woodland in the light spilling from the window, but only the first few trees were visible.

What do I do now?

The question wasn’t going away, and she still had no answer.

On a sudden impulse she got out of the bath, drying off quickly and pulling a yukata on. She went out through the windows of her room, crossing the bridge over the pond and purifying herself, again, at the entrance to the precincts. The shrine lights were off, but there was just enough light for her to see, and find her way.

First, she went to the ashes of the shrine. They seemed even blacker in the night, dead and inert, with a few bits of metal scattered among them. Behind them, however, the stones of the iwakura still stood, dark shadows in the night.

Akiko walked round to the stones, which seemed to shift as she approached. She thought she heard them grinding against each other, but she didn’t feel an earthquake.

The wind caught her by surprise, blasting from beyond the stones, blowing up from below, catching her yukata and flicking it up around her. As she fought it down with her hands, she caught sight of a red light within the stones, pulsing in the gap between them.

It was pulsing in time with her heart.

I can’t leave, she realised. Even though I don’t understand it, I have to be here.

The wind got even stronger, but now it was surrounding and supporting her, almost in an embrace.

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Shiraishi spent the next day in her room, refusing to come out, refusing even to see Akiko when she brought food, although she did eat the dinner. There was a call from Akira Takenaka, apologising for being out of town on a job and promising to come and see them as soon as he came back. That reminded Akiko about Hideo Takenaka, and she performed the ceremonies and offerings at his shrine as best she could. That, in turn, made her think of the current location of Tamao’s go-shintai, and she made offerings there as well.

The next day, Shiraishi emerged from her room and took a bath, but carefully avoided Akiko, who let her have her privacy. She still wasn’t sure what to say, even though she’d made her decision. She didn’t understand her own reasons, so how could she explain them to anyone else?

The following evening there was a visitor at the shrine. Akiko was a bit surprised, because she thought she’d talked to all the press and police officers now, but she went to see who it was.

It was an older man, but not someone she recognised.

“Can I help you?”

“Are you Revd Shiraishi?” He looked a bit surprised.

“Oh, no. I’m afraid she’s a bit busy at the moment. Who should I say came to see her?”

“I’m Masayuki Akiyama, the headmaster of Tamao Elementary School.”

“Thank you for coming.” Akiko bowed again. That was the local public elementary school; it had no direct connection to the shrine, but the shrine and immediate area had the same name.

“I really think it would be a good idea for me to speak to Revd Shiraishi. It won’t take long.”

“As I said, I’m afraid…”

“It’s all right, Ms Tanahata. I’ll speak to him.” Akiko looked round to see Shiraishi approaching up the corridor, looking calm and smartly dressed. “How can I help you, Mr Akiyama?”

“I see that the reports of the fire were true.”

“I’m afraid that they were, yes.”

“Have you considered leaving the shrine now?”

“What?” Shiraishi sounded simply surprised.

“Well, now that the buildings have been destroyed, it’s hardly worth continuing to cling to an outmoded superstition, is it? This land must be quite valuable, so I’m sure you could do something else.”

“Are you suggesting that I abandon the shrine?” Akiko was as incredulous as Shiraishi sounded. How could anyone think that this was a good time to make that sort of suggestion?

“Yes. I think it would be better for the area if there were no longer such an establishment, and this seems like the perfect opportunity. Don’t you agree?”

“No, I do not.” Akiko could tell Shiraishi was angry. “We take care of the kami, and that is very important for the health of the area.” Mr Akiyama shook his head dismissively.

“That’s just superstition. Superstition irretrievably tainted with militarism and imperialism, I might add. Really, I’d expect an intelligent woman like you to be better able to move with the times.”

“You are just ignorant. The kami must be served.” Mr Akiyama flushed then, apparently getting angry.

“Well, then. You haven’t heard the last of this. This area does not need your influence.”

Without saying any farewell, he turned on his heel and marched from the grounds.

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As soon as he was gone, Shiraishi turned to Akiko, her eyes flashing.

“The nerve of the man! It’s almost as bad as Wakabayashi.” Her eyes narrowed. “I wonder which of them burned the shrine down?” Akiko was somewhat relieved to see that the priest had also put the pieces together in that way, but hearing someone else say it made her realise how weak her actual evidence was.

“We don’t know that.”

“Hah.” Shiraishi snorted in derision, but then nodded. “You’re right. We don’t know.” Then she sighed. “And it doesn’t really matter. Even if they went to prison, it wouldn’t produce any money for us.” She stepped down into the entrance hall, into a pair of sandals, and went to the door. Akiko quickly followed her outside, where she was staring at the ruins in the fading light. Every breath of wind stirred up clouds of black ash, making the smell of burning strong again.

“We have to rebuild.” It was a statement. “Even if there are only two of us, we have to rebuild.”

“Akira Takenaka called; he said he would come to visit when he was back in the area.”

“Two of us with at least some support.” The priest actually managed a smile. “We can do it. Right?” Akiko suddenly realised that Shiraishi wasn’t anything like as confident as she was trying to sound.

“Right.” Akiko wasn’t as confident as she tried to sound, either, but she’d decided now. They had to try to rebuild.

“We could appeal to the ujiko, but that would take months, years even. We can’t leave Tamao on the kamidana for that long.

“I have to borrow the money.”

The conclusion was easily reached, and when Akiko and Shiraishi looked at the shrine’s accounts it looked as though they should be able to do it. If they took income over a long enough period, it was quite respectable, and there were no loans already, so they could secure the loan on the land. Akiko was briefly shocked when Shiraishi casually mentioned that they would need to borrow about a hundred million yen, but when the priest broke it down it suddenly sounded more reasonable. True, you could build a house that size for about twenty million, but a shrine was a rather more expensive undertaking.

Akiko was, therefore, quite optimistic when Shiraishi went out to visit banks. When she got back with nothing to report but refusals, it was disheartening, but there were still places to try, and Akira visited the shrine to offer support, and some money. Akiko almost wanted to refuse it, but she had to admit that the shrine needed it about as badly as his company did.

It took several days for Shiraishi to find somewhere willing to make the loan on reasonable terms, but while she was searching she was also carrying out the ceremonies and continuing Akiko’s training as a miko.

For her part, Akiko had no strange dreams, and no visions. Maybe, she thought, the threat to the shrine building had been everything that Tamao was worried about.

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The following day, when Akiko came back from shopping, there was someone standing at the bottom of the steps to the shrine, carrying a sign. As she got a bit closer, Akiko realised, with a shock, that it was Naoyuki. She could see the sign, as well.

“No Militarism, No Imperialism, No Shinto”

Steeling herself for a confrontation, she walked up to the entrance. Naoyuki moved to block the steps, holding the sign up.

“Don’t support the shrine!” he said. Akiko could tell he was pretending not to recognise her, but he wasn’t doing it very convincingly.

“Naoyuki, get out of the way.”

“You should reconsider your support for this superstition. It’s not even harmless; it caused the Pacific War.”

“I thought it was the decision to bomb Pearl Harbour that caused that? Or the decision to invade China?”

“But it was Shinto that supported those decisions.”

“I don’t remember that. Now get out of my way.”

“No.” Naoyuki was defiant. “I tried to warn you about this. You can’t deny that. I told you that you shouldn’t be associated with shrines; look at their history. Well, you wouldn’t listen, so now I have no sympathy for you. Whatever happens to you is your own fault.”

“Naoyuki Watanabe, are you threatening me?” Akiko was shocked, and a bit angry. Naoyuki, however, flinched back visibly when she said that, blushing and shaking his head.

“No, no of course not. I’m warning you.”

“What’s the difference?” Now it was Naoyuki’s turn to look surprised.

“I’m not the one who will cause you the problems.”

“Who, then? Your friends?”

“No!”

“The kami?”

“Don’t be silly. The kami don’t exist.” Akiko smiled wryly. He might even have had a point if he had said the kami, but then it would hardly be a foolish superstition.

“So who?”

“Look, I’m just warning you.” Naoyuki looked rather confused and flustered now, as if he had realised that his claims didn’t entirely make sense.

“Fine. I’m warned. Now are you going to get out of my way?” Akiko felt that it was getting darker, and glanced up. Black clouds were indeed thickening overhead. She looked back at Naoyuki, who was looking around, but still hadn’t moved. “Well?”

“You should get out of the shrine, you know. It’s not good for you.”

“Oh, since when were you so concerned about me? You only ever wanted to get me naked. And then what about that little girl you were with the other week?” He looked confused. “The high school girl. I saw you going into a love hotel.”

He went bright red, and looked down.

“She…” He broke off, obviously unable to think of any defence.

“Right. Well, I don’t know why you are trying to keep me out of the shrine, my home, but if you don’t get out of my way right now, I’m going to call the police and suggest that you might have had something to do with the fire.”

He looked up in shock.

“That was deliberate?” His surprise sounded genuine enough to Akiko, but he still hadn’t moved, and the first drops of rain were falling.

“Move, Naoyuki!”

And, finally, he stepped aside, watching her as she climbed the steps.

Probably trying to see up my skirt, Akiko thought.

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It was already raining quite heavily when Akiko reached the house.

“I’m back!”

“Welcome back! Did you see the welcoming committee?” The priest’s voice came from the office.

“All one of him?”

“Only one? There were three when I went out. The weather must have put them off.” Akiko looked out of the kitchen windows as she put the shopping away; the rain had got very heavy, and as she looked away she heard the first clap of thunder.

“Wise decision.”

Akiko went back to her room, where the rain pounded on the windows, driven by the strong wind as she read the latest book Shiraishi had made part of her training.

The thunder and lightning didn’t let up, and the drumming of the rain got louder. Akiko looked out, and the water coming off the roof on the edge of the veranda was a waterfall, a grey curtain hiding the garden.

There was a knock on the door, and Shiraishi pushed the panel open.

“I need to check the precincts. Could you come and help?” Akiko looked out of the window and grimaced, but she could see the need. Sighing, she nodded, and got up.

The first thing that struck her when the opened the door was the heat. It was almost like a sauna, and she could feel herself sweating under the waterproof. And the rain, the rain was warm as it fell on her. She could feel it on her hands. She glanced at Shiraishi; the priest was also holding her hand out, looking puzzled.

“It’s warm.” Akiko broke the silence, and the priest nodded. “That’s not right.” The priest nodded again. Akiko glanced round the precincts.

Within the iwakura, a red light shone, pulsing brightly, waves of heat coming off it with every pulse.

“Revd Shiraishi, can you see that?” Akiko pointed.

“The iwakura?”

“No, within the stones. Between them, in the middle.” The priest peered in that direction, which was already Akiko’s answer. No need to peer if you could see it.

“No, nothing.”

“Hm. Maybe just my imagination, then.” Akiko decided not to say that she could still see the light.

They started checking the precincts, and Akiko was soon soaked with sweat from the inside out, and rainwater from the outside in. At least it wasn’t cold and clammy, but her wet clothes were very uncomfortable. Shiraishi seemed to be equally ill-at-ease.

The garden pond was overflowing, and there were ponds and small rivers forming all over the grounds, the water flowing out and down the steps in a small river. However, there didn’t seem to be any risk of anything being carried away, although they moved a few things to higher locations.

“We should check the woodland.” Shiraishi had to shout to be heard over the roar of the rain, which had got even heavier. Akiko shook her head.

“Lightning. Too dangerous.” Shiraishi frowned, and then nodded.

“Back inside.”

As Akiko followed her, her foot slipped into one of the small streams, and then got stuck in the bottom. Frowning, she tried to pull it out, only to feel her shoe come loose. For a moment, she tried to balance on one leg, but she realised that her sock was already soaked, and put her foot back down, reaching into the water to pull her shoe out. It was still stuck, and, glancing at Shiraishi, who was just going in through the door, she gave it a sharp tug.

It came up easily, and Akiko overbalanced, falling backwards, right into the river behind her.

She plunged into the water, sinking as the weight of her sodden clothes pulled her down.

This isn’t right, she thought. It can’t have this much depth. She reached down for the bottom, but there was nothing there, just more water, and now the surface seemed to be a long way above her, and she couldn’t breathe.

Fighting panic, she tried to swim up, but her clothes pulled her down. As she remembered what she’d learned as a child and started trying to get her other shoe off, she was suddenly grabbed by a current and swept up to the surface.

Gasping for breath, she looked around, and nearly panicked again. She wasn’t in the shrine precincts anymore. Instead, she was being carried along one of the nearby streets, riding the wave at the front of a flash flood.

As the water smashed into walls and cars, sweeping them aside, shattering windows, Akiko saw kegare growing. It was as if every point of damage were a seed, from which black tendrils and rotten blossoms grew with frightening speed. She twisted round to look behind her, at the kegare covering the houses, wrapping round them and snatching at the people who came running out, pulling them over into the water. Akiko saw some of them come up, bruised, bloodied, and surrounded by flies of pollution that buzzed loudly enough to be heard over the rain and the flood.

And Akiko saw other things moving in the kegare, larger spirits, like sodden corpses, bloated with gases. They pushed people over, then seemed to press them into the water. Akiko tried to cry out a warning, but the water swept her further on.

The wave seemed to get bigger as it went forward, lifting Akiko up to the height of the roofs of the houses, and then beyond. Looking down, she could see the buildings crushed by the weight of water, smashed to fragments, and she could see people within them.

The wall of water swept down to the Tama river, and crashed into it, smashing the bridge, and as the wave collapsed Akiko glanced back to see the whole of the Kawasaki side of the river knocked flat by the water. And then she was plunged under the surface again.

And pushed herself up, spluttering, in the grounds of the shrine.

“…Flood warning. Move to higher ground.” The city’s disaster announcement service could be heard over the noise of the storm. Akiko stood up, and, although the river flowing out of the shrine buffeted her hard, made her way to the house. As she reached the door, she glanced over at the iwakura.

The light still pulsed within it, and Akiko thought she felt anger coming off it with the heat.

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