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Carried forward by her momentum, Akiko stumbled on the path as the shock distracted her from running, and fell to her hands and knees. She winced as her injured knee sent new waves of pain running up her leg, and quickly gave up her attempt to stand, sitting on the dry stone of the path.

The shrine building rose ahead of her, the peaked roof of burnished copper shining as it reflected the sunlight. The pale wood of the walls was unpainted, and Akiko realised that she could smell it on the air. A gentle breeze ruffled her hair as she looked around. The shrine stood in a clearing in a forest, with trees towering over it. She couldn’t see far into the wood, as the leaves blocked the sunlight, leaving it deep in shadow, but she could see that there were other trees beyond.

Slowly, taking care not to put weight on her injured leg, Akiko turned to look back the way she had come. A stone torii stood behind her, shining white but apparently dry. She couldn’t immediately see the road, but then she had come up quite a steep slope. Carefully, she got to her feet, and walked to the torii.

As she looked out and down, she found herself grabbing one of the uprights for support. A flight of stone steps, far steeper than the ones she remembered climbing, plunged down between ancient trees until they disappeared into a bank of mist, as if there were clouds below her.

Akiko took a step back from the torii, and found her knee was hurting considerably less now. She looked around the shrine precincts again, but could see no sign of other people. The grass around the building seemed to be interrupted only by the stone path up to the shrine, its polished surface glittering in the sunlight.

The grass was short, as if regularly cut, and Akiko started to walk around the edge of the wood, looking for anything that might explain where she was. It was only as she did so that it occurred to her to wonder why she was so calm. Even though this shrine didn’t look dangerous, it also looked like it couldn’t possibly be at the top of the steps she had climbed, and then there was the little matter of the missing storm.

Or, come to that, the missing Kawasaki when she had looked out of the torii. Directly behind the shrine building, Akiko paused, trying to work up at least a touch of nerves, but she remained stubbornly calm. Maybe this is a dream, she thought. Maybe I fell asleep in the rain, and now I’m dreaming this.

The absurdity of the idea made her laugh, the sound surprisingly loud in the shrine precincts. She quickly got herself under control, and looked over to the shrine building. It really was the obvious place to look for answers, but now she thought about it she was, not scared, but somehow reluctant to approach it.

Taking a deep breath, Akiko walked round to the front of the shrine.

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The shrine building was a simple rectangle in plan, with a veranda running around it above Akiko’s head. The roof sloped down to the front and back, with two beams projecting above the ridge at each end, and a number of cylinders apparently resting on the ridge itself. Back at the front, a simple wooden flight of stairs led up to the veranda, and to a double door.

Akiko paused at the bottom of the steps, unsure as to whether she should do this. A glance around reminded her of why she needed answers, however, and, holding tightly onto the rail, she began to climb.

As she stepped onto the veranda, she realised that her knee was no longer at all painful. She wondered about that for a few moments, but then dismissed it as just another mystery, and an excuse not to think about the door.

It was a simple double door, although it had elaborate metal hinges, which appeared to be gold. Akiko looked at the closed doors, and wondered what to do now.

“Hello?” she called out. There was no immediate response. “Is anyone there?” The precincts remained silent apart from the rustling of the trees in the breeze. Akiko looked around again, hoping that someone would appear to explain things, but there was no-one. Tentatively, she reached out to touch the doors.

As soon as her fingers brushed the wood, smooth and warm, somehow alive and welcoming, the doors began to swing slowly open. Akiko stepped back, and looked into the dim interior, lit only by the light falling through the now open door.

The floor was bare wooden boards, no different from the veranda, and halfway in a line of white curtains, supported on wooden poles with golden fittings, divided the single room in two. The curtains were decorated with a circular design, of something that looked like a string of beads spiralling in to the centre. Akiko stepped into the room, the floor warm on her bare soles, and called out again.

“Excuse me? Is there anyone there?”

There was still no response, so she made her way to the curtains, and carefully pushed them aside. The rear of the shrine was even darker, and she paused to let her eyes adjust.

As they did, she could make out several shapes, apparently items of furniture, but the central area was dominated by a square platform, surrounded by curtains. These curtains were embroidered, although all that Akiko could make out was the occasional glint of light on gold and silver thread, and the gleam of dozens of small bells lining the bottom. She stepped forward again, letting the central curtain fall shut behind her, deepening the gloom. No longer entirely sure what she expected to find, she reached out and slowly pulled the curtain aside to the gentle murmur of bells.

Light spilled out, briefly dazzling her, and for a moment she thought there was a pile of jewels inside, flashing red, purple, green, gold, and silver.

Then they shifted, and she realised that she was looking at an enormous snake, its head as large as her whole body, coiled on the platform. Its eyes snapped open, fixed on her.

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Akiko backed away, letting the curtain fall. She backed through the central partition as the ringing of the bells died away, and only turned when she was out of the doors. She heard them swing shut behind her as she started to run down the steps, lost her footing, and tumbled to the bottom, banging her head.

“Miss! Miss! Are you all right?”

A woman’s voice, someone she didn’t know. Akiko opened her eyes, her head pounded, and became aware of the cold water soaked through her clothes. The sound of wind and rain filled her ears, and a crash of thunder brought her fully awake. She groaned, and tried to get up.

“Can you stand? Let me help you.” The woman reached down, and Akiko took her hand gratefully. She struggled to her feet, her head throbbing, and realised that she was shivering from the cold. The woman noticed it at the same moment.

“Come inside, quickly. You’ll get a chill. Can you walk?” Akiko just nodded, and followed her to a house standing within the shrine’s precincts. She glanced behind her as lightning flashed, reflecting off the wet green roof of the shrine building, its copper covered in verdigris from long exposure to the elements.

In the entrance hall, the woman pulled off her waterproof and hung it up on a peg. It was hard to judge her age; she looked as though she looked younger than she was, but Akiko couldn’t work out how old she might be. She stepped up into the hall, and beckoned Akiko to follow.

“Come on. You’re absolutely soaked.” Akiko put her shoes down, and stepped up into the slippers the woman had put out. Once they were both standing in the hall, the woman bowed slightly to her.

“I’m pleased to meet you. I am Reiko Shiraishi, the chief priest of this shrine.” Akiko bowed in return.

“Pleased to meet you. I am Akiko Tanahata.” It didn’t seem sensible to give her company affiliation, and Shiraishi did not seem to be expecting it. She just nodded, and smiled.

“Well, that’s enough formalities for now. There’s hot water in the bath; I really think you should warm up a bit. I can dry your clothes for you.” Akiko found herself almost at a loss for words.

“Bath?”

“Well, it’s up to you, of course, but you look soaked through. I would have thought you’d want to get out of those clothes and get them dry before you went home.”

“But…” I don’t know you was the thought going through her mind, but she realised it would be very rude to say it. And it wasn’t as if she was suggesting that they take a bath together. Nor was she wrong about Akiko’s desire to get changed; Akiko could feel that her underwear was about as wet as her jacket. For a moment, she worried that Shiraishi might try to steal something, before dismissing the idea. She could have left her unconscious in the rain, after all.

Shiriaishi was still looking at her, expectant.

“You’re right. I would really appreciate a bath right now.”

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The bath room was a shock. Bigger than Akiko’s living room, half of it was taken up by the bath itself, and the whole room was paved with stone. Akiko half wondered whether she had wandered into another world again, but then she heard Shiraishi call from the changing area.

“I’ve left a yukata here; I imagine you’ll want to get out of the bath before your clothes are dry.”

“Thank you,” Akiko called back, and walked over to step into the bath. The water was pleasantly warm, and came up past her knees even while she was standing. She sat down, the water coming up to her neck, and leaned back against the side of the bath. The wall on the far side was a window looking out onto a traditional Japanese garden, albeit one that looked like it could do with some attention, and Akiko let herself relax as she felt the chill leaving her body.

For a moment she just enjoyed the warmth, but the questions soon demanded her attention.

What had happened? The obvious answer was that she had slipped and fallen, hallucinating the whole thing. Akiko was almost ready to believe that, but one detail stopped her feeling confident.

She remembered the shrine changing as soon as she entered the precincts through the torii, but Shiraishi had found her at the foot of the steps leading into the shrine building, quite some distance from the entrance. And also, she couldn’t help remembering, where she been running in the other shrine when she slipped and fell.

Akiko only considered the possibility that she had slipped to another world for a moment, dismissing it as ridiculous. Some sort of hallucination was still the obvious explanation. But if she had fallen and hit her head, she could hardly have moved from the entrance to the centre of the precincts. Two possibilities occurred to her. One was that she had fallen on the steps after running up to them in the normal way, and lost a little bit of memory. The other was that she had hallucinated, but actually walked around the shrine while hallucinating.

She quickly decided that the first option was more likely. She had been planning to run straight to the shrine building to get under cover, and she could easily have slipped on the wet steps. She had heard that brief memory loss was not rare as a response to a blow to the head. It occurred to her that she should go to a hospital to make sure that there was no serious damage, but she felt fine, without even a headache.

She even thought that dreaming about the shrine made sense. After all, that would have been the last thing she saw. But where did the snake come from?

The memory came back, intense and vivid, and for a moment she almost thought she could see the snake reflected in the window. Its shining eyes were fixed on her, and the brilliant colours of its scales flashed in the darkness.

Akiko shook her head to clear it, and stood to get out of the bath. Just a dream.

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Akiko dried off and wrapped herself in the yukata, feeling rather self-conscious about wearing it without any underwear. She looked at herself in the mirror, confirming that the material was fully opaque, and that she could go to a summer festival dressed like this without anyone being the wiser.

“Revd Shiraishi?” Akiko stepped out of the shower area and looked around.

“In here.” Shiraishi stuck her head out of a door. “Come and have some tea; your clothes won’t be dry yet.”

“Thank you.”

The room was traditional in style, with tatami mats on the floor and sliding panels for the walls. A scroll hung in the alcove, and Shiraishi was sitting on the floor next to a low table. Akiko sank down, paying attention to the yukata and making sure she stayed decent. Shiraishi poured her a cup of green tea and offered her a Japanese sweet. Akiko thanked her, but then the silence lengthened, becoming awkward. The room looked out over the same garden as the bath, and rain was still falling heavily.

“So, which Buddha is this shrine to?” Akiko asked finally, desperate for something to say.

“This is a shrine, Ms Tanahata, not a temple. We don’t have a Buddha, we have a kami.” Akiko was puzzled.

“Aren’t they the same?” Shiraishi sighed, and poured Akiko some more tea.

“No, they aren’t. These days, they aren’t even really connected to each other. Buddhas are Buddhism, and kami are Shinto.”

“Er, Shinto?” Akiko was starting to wish that she had chosen a different topic of conversation, acutely aware that she appeared to know even less than she had thought.

“The kami religion. The one you have at shrines. It goes back nearly two thousand years at least, to before Buddhism came to Japan.”

“Oh, I see. I hadn’t heard the name.” Akiko was aware of the existence of shrines and temples, but she’d never been clear on the differences, beyond the fact that shrines had torii and temples didn’t. Shrines were Shinto, then. “So, which kami is this shrine to?”

“Tamao Ohkami,” Shiraishi replied. “He’s a local kami, not one of the famous ones like Amaterasu or Hachiman.”

“Oh, I’ve heard of them. Amaterasu is Ise, right?”

“Yes, that’s right. As far as I know, Tamao is just here, however.”

“I see.” The conversation trailed off again, as Akiko couldn’t think of anything sensible to say to continue it.

“So,” Shiraishi began, “why were you out in the storm?”

“Oh, that. I left my commuter pass at home, so I was walking back. It wasn’t raining when I set off. Come to that, the forecast was only for clouds.” Shiraishi nodded, looking out at the torrential downpour.

“It was, wasn’t it. They seem to have got it a bit wrong.”

“They do.” There was another lengthy pause. “Your bath room is very nice.”

“Thank you,” Shiraishi replied, looking genuinely pleased. “My grandfather built it; according to family tradition there used to be a hot spring here, so there’s always been a large bath, apparently.”

“Family tradition, then.”

“Yes. Yes, it is. Well, let me go and check your clothes. They could be dry by now.”

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The clothes weren’t completely dry, but Akiko decided that they were dry enough; she was starting to feel really hungry, and wanted to get home. She laid them out on a shelf in the changing area in the bathroom, and took the yukata off, hanging it up to avoid creasing. As she reached for her underwear, she thought she saw some movement out of the corner of her eye.

She spun round, quickly trying to cover herself with her hands, worried that someone was watching her. The changing area was quite large, like the bath itself, but not so large that someone could actually hide there. Seeing things is getting to be a habit, girl. You need to be careful, she chided herself, turning back to the shelf.

This time she was sure that something moved behind her, and she turned back towards the mirror. It was large, covering almost the entire wall, and something moved behind her in the reflection, with a flash of colour. She spun back round again, but could see nothing. Quickly, she took the yukata off the hook and pulled it back on, holding it shut. There still didn’t seem to be any hiding place, but Akiko was sure she had seen something. She opened the door and called out.

“Revd Shiraishi!” Shiraishi appeared from a room at the other end of the house. “Is there anyone else here?” The older woman looked puzzled.

“No, just the two of us. Is anything wrong?”

“Er, no.” Akiko suddenly found her worries ridiculous. It was probably just a piece of cloth flapping as she knocked it. “Sorry, I… I just thought I heard something. No problem. Sorry.” She closed the door again, and picked up her knickers, planning to put them on before she took the yukata off, this time. They were a bit cold and damp, and for a moment she didn’t want to put them on.

Again, she had the sense that there was something behind her, and she turned to face the mirror, searching the room with her eyes. Nothing. I’m just nervous, she told herself. She kept looking around the room while she pulled her knickers on, and then took the yukata off so that she could put her bra back on. She finished settling it, glanced in the mirror, and screamed.

Behind her, coiled on the shelf, was a brightly coloured snake.

She spun to face it, backing up as far as she could against the sinks in front of the mirror. But there was nothing on the shelf but her clothes.

“Ms Tanahata? Are you OK?” Shiraishi called from outside the door, sounding very concerned. Akiko took a deep breath.

“I’m fine. Sorry. I just…” She paused. Just what? What could she say she had done? “I just banged my knee. It was surprise more than anything else. Sorry to disturb you.”

“Oh, I see. Be careful.”

“Yes, I will. Sorry.”

Akiko finished getting dressed, her clothes a little clammy against her skin, but far better than they had been. She thought about getting home while she started fixing her make-up, and decided to ask Shiraishi if it was all right to call a taxi to get her from the shrine.

She was fixing her lipstick when she saw the snake again.

It was behind her, coiled on one of the shelves. Its scales glittered red, green, purple, gold, and silver, and it seemed to be looking straight at her reflection with shining eyes.

Akiko couldn’t move, could hardly breathe. If it weren’t for the difference in size, she would have thought it was the same snake she saw in her dream, but it seemed to have trapped her in its gaze. She kept thinking so beautiful, so beautiful, while a cold hand seemed to squeeze her heart with what if it moves?

But the snake moved no more than Akiko did. Its eyes remained fixed on hers, its head raised above the coils of its body on the shelf. It seemed to be watching her, as if waiting for her to do something.

Akiko forced herself to take a deep breath, and another one. This time, she wouldn’t scream. She willed herself to turn around and face it, but her muscles did not obey. Another deep breath, and this time she did turn round.

The shelf was empty. Frantically, Akiko looked for anywhere the snake could have gone, but, although there was enough cover for a serpent, she didn’t think it could have got to any hiding place while she was turning. Her heart was beating quickly now, and she was beginning to feel genuine fear. She decided to get away from the shrine as quickly as possible, and turned back to the mirror to gather her make-up things.

The snake was clearly visible in the reflection, sitting on the shelf in the same position, looking straight at her. Looking back over her shoulder was a reflex. The shelf was empty. But when she looked back in the mirror, the snake was there.

She felt herself begin to shake as she took her pocket mirror and turned to face the empty shelf. She held the mirror up, and then closed her eyes. Did she really want to see?

Summoning up all her willpower, she opened her eyes again and angled the pocket mirror so that she could see the reflection of the shelf.

The snake looked at her from the mirror, while the shelf in front of her was as empty as ever.

A dam broke inside Akiko, and the fear overwhelmed her. She stuffed her mirror into her bag, and, grabbing her things, dashed out of the changing room and headed for the front door. Shiraishi emerged from a room as she passed.

“Do you want to call a taxi?”

“No, thank you, I’ll walk.”

“Walk? It’s still raining. Are you sure you’re all right?”

“I’m fine. Thank you for the bath, and the tea. I really appreciate it.” Akiko had the door of the house open as she said that, and ran out into the wet night, not really caring how she appeared.

She didn’t stop running until the front door of her flat closed behind her, and she sank back against it, gasping for breath.

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