The Princess of Akaishi Castle

The Princess of Akaishi Castle

Prologue — Alley Cat

Meiko Hashioka stepped out into the alley behind the nightclub for a smoke. Loud music thumped from within. After three vodka Red Bulls, her heart thumped in beat. The thin frigid autumn air shocked her cheeks, a pleasant respite from dancing against sweating bodies all night. The same could be said for the ringing silence of the night.

She glanced at her smartphone to check the time with hazy eyes. It was three in the morning, and though she’d like to think her night was just getting started, her body yearned sleep.

At twenty-eight it became harder and harder to keep up with her schedule of going out night after night to the clubs and bars to entertain her clientele — mostly foreign businessmen.

As much as she enjoyed her job, and though she kept herself in flawless Geisha-like shape, her age was catching up to her. Mentally, she felt like a sixty-year-old woman.

But the money still flowed, and there was a lot of it. A night’s work was good for a month’s rent for her fabulous Shibuya penthouse. And that’s without the tip, which could be double, or triple the base daily rate. All she had to do were the things most girls would find unscrupulous or humiliating. It was worth it. She enjoyed it, even, and couldn’t imagine herself doing anything else.

A silver tabby cat emerged out from behind a dumpster as she lit her cigarette. It gave her a meow and rubbed up against her leg.

“Hey you!” Meiko giggled.

She leaned down and ran her hand along the cat’s back. The cat enjoyed the scratching, arching its back against her fingers, weaved between her legs, flicking its ears excitedly. It sat on its haunches and licked its lips, meowed again and fixed its patient moonstone blue eyes to hers.

The cat reminded Meiko of one she had befriended in her days at the orphanage. It filled her heart suddenly with a nostalgia for simpler days, even if those days weren’t necessarily more pleasant.

“Oh, sorry little one, I wish I had some food, but I don’t,” she said to the cat in a cooing voice.

“Got anything tasty for me?” A gruff voice came from the front of the alley.

Meiko stood startled. The cigarette fell out of her mouth. The cat darted into a pile of trash bags piled up against the dumpster. Three silhouettes stood against the lights of the street. All sizeable men.

“Yeah, you do,” said the man who had spoken. They walked towards her.

“I’ll scream if you come closer,” she warned shrilly.

A vicious looking blade flashed silver at the side of the speaking man.

“No, you won’t.”

She quivered. Turned quickly and tried the door back into the nightclub but it was locked. She whimpered, then backed up farther into the alleyway.

“Stay away from me!” She shouted.

They men chuckled.

The other man then spoke. “Just give us what we want, and we’ll let you walk away without a scratch.”

The third man clarified, “well, except maybe a sore ass and some scuffed knees.”

She turned and ran into the alley, the only way she could run. She didn’t know if there was a way out, but it was worth a try. They ran after her.

Sure enough, the alleyway was blocked. A chain linked fence stood in her way. She put her back against it, slid down to the wet asphalt and curled up into a ball. “Stay away!” she screamed.

“Shhhh… no one’s around to hear you.”

Meiko began to cry. The men were remorseless and rather encouraged by it, like sharks smelling blood. And they were likely right. No one would come to help her. No one ever did.

“Shut your pretty little mouth.”

The slow sound of a zipper coming down caused Meiko to tighten up into her ball. The thought of the knife kept her silent. The image of it hung in her mind like a cold fang. The night was cold. The wet asphalt soaking through her silk stocking was a biting cold, as was October in Tokyo. So was her lot in life. She braced herself for the coming pain.

A meow echoed through the alley. The cat that made the sound, the same silver tabby from before, jumped out from the darkness and pranced playfully between the legs of the men.

“Get out of here,” the man with the knife growled and pushed the cat aside with his foot. The cat hissed and swiped at him.

He kicked it harder. It screeched and darted off into the dark shadows.

“Now, where were we? Oh yeah. You were about to wrap your pretty little lips around my cock.”

He grabbed Meiko’s wrist and tried to pry her arm away from covering her face. She resisted as hard as she could, heaving and weeping.

“I’m only going to say it once. Cooperate or you’ll have more to worry about then whether you should spit or swallow.”

The meow came again from the dark. But this time the meow resounded with an ephemeral quality, as if it materialized out of the air.

It was an odd enough a sound — a voice not belonging to a cat – to cause the men to freeze and the one with the knife to free his hand from Meiko’s wrist and turn to brandish his knife towards the shadows.

“Who’s there?”

A woman’s voice, clear like crystal, broke the silence to answer.

“How ungentlemanly to demand sexual pleasure without a promise to requite. And in such an uncouth place.”

From the shadows emerged a cat-like motion, a feline feminine shape.

She was tall, elegant, her hair, silver, cascaded straight down to her hips. Her eyes glowed like moonstones.

She wore a silk kimono that was all ebony black and shimmered phosphorescent in the dim city lights.

The knife was turned on her. The men fanned around her in an uncertain, traipsing fashion, as if they ought to be relaxed given that she was just one delicate woman, but something about her informed them to be extremely cautious. It wasn’t that she appeared to be police or anyone with any capability to take on three burly men, it was the confidence and the casual grace with which she carried herself and spoke that made them uneasy.

“And who the fuck are you?”

“Only a woman looking for another woman.”

“Yeah? Well, this one’s not who you’re looking for. So, get lost.”

“Please forgive my candor: I don’t think I will, and I am certain you are mistaken.”

She walked past the men towards Meiko unperturbed, as if their being there was inconsequential. Her black kimono flowered out around her like a fallen blossom as she knelt, and she held a tender finger to Meiko’s chin to tilt her head up to face her. The men watched nonplussed.

She flicked her silver hair from her eyes to get a good look at Meiko’s and gave her a slanted smile.

Meiko’s eyes were swollen red. Tears streamed down her face washing out her makeup like chalk on rainy asphalt.

“You’re not quite where you thought you’d be, are you?”

“W-What?” Quivered Meiko in response to the woman’s cryptic question.

The woman nodded, patiently, as if clarification for her question will come in due time.

The man with the knife spoke loudly: “Are you deaf? I said get lost!”

To Meiko, the woman whispered, “Won’t you stay right here? I’ll be just a moment.”

Then she stood, brushed her kimono straight and turned to face the men.

“I really didn’t care much for how you treated me earlier,” the woman told them.

The men looked at each other.

“What the fuck are you even talking about?”

“You kicked me. That was a bit rude.”

“Oh, you really are a crazy bitch. But you know what? I don’t discriminate against crazy. Since you’re going to stay, why don’t you get down on your knees with your friend.”

“I’d rather not.”

The man with the knife shrugged and walked towards her. “Then I’ll have to make you.”

He held the knife to her throat. She remained motionless, only staring unblinking up into his eyes, seeming amused at his attempt to scare her.

The man sneered. “I said get down on your knees, bitch.”

“Why?”

“Why!?” He laughed. “Why, she says!”

He put his hand on top of her head. “You poor little thing. Don’t worry, it’ll be clear soon enough.”

He shoved down hard on her head, forcing her down onto her knees. The other men chuckled to themselves, eager already for their turn. Meiko watched this scene in paralyzed terror.

The man with the knife whipped his cock out in the woman’s face. It grew erect.

“Now, suck.”

The woman looked up at the man, smiled and replied, “I have a better plan.”

Her hand shot out from her kimono, grabbed his testicles and squeezed.

He howled from the crushing pain. His knees buckled. The woman rose slowly to her feet, her hand still grasping his crotch like a steel trap. He glared at her through shocked, tearing eyes and muttered through tightly gritted teeth, “Now you’re fucking dead!”

He brought his blade up and swung it down hard with a plan to plunge it into the soft part between her collarbone and her shoulder blade. Her reaction, however, was swift and precise. Her free hand came up and grasped his wrist and tightened, crunching bone. The knife clattered on the pavement. He howled louder.

The other two men rushed forward to help their friend but stopped in their tracks. Their mouths and eyes widened in horror at the sight of the woman’s eyes glowing golden like a wild beast in headlights. Her canines grew long and sharp. She sunk them into the man’s neck.

His friends fell over each other as they fled from the alley.

Meiko closed her eyes as soon as she saw the first blood splatter, and she closed her ears to a grotesque sound, a sound not unlike a tiger feeding at the carcass of a dead ox. She fainted from the trauma.

She wasn’t sure how long it was before she opened her eyes. But when she did, she found the woman kneeling in front of her again, with the same gentle smile she gave her earlier, only now, her cheeks were smeared red, and her lips dripped with warm blood. The man was lifeless on the ground behind her, his blood pooled out around him.

“W-What are you?” Meiko breathed.

With a tender finger, the woman wiped away the tears from Meiko’s cheeks.

“Didn’t I already say? Just a woman looking for another woman.”

Chapter 1. A Sweet Introduction to Chaos

My name is Etsuko Hinata, a thirty-year-old Tokyo homicide detective on the verge of losing her job and likely, her mind.

It all started with the discovery of two bodies in the alley behind a night club — a man, and a woman.

Kabukicho is the red-light district of Shinjuku, a seedy neighborhood full of hostess bars, massage parlors, and a variety of clubs with dubious relationships with the law, and with the Yakuza. Although homicides are exceedingly rare these days there’s nothing unordinary about a double homicide in Yakuza land. Except there was something quite unordinary about this one.

I showed up to the crime scene early that morning. The sky was a pale white and the street sweepers were still out cleaning up last night’s filth.

A Shinjuku City PD officer spotted me and gave me a curt bow before guiding me to the bodies. The scene was in the process of being cordoned off. Forensics investigators took photographs, measurements. They had only just arrived as well. Two patrol cars blocked the alley entrance to block the macabre scene from curious onlookers.

“The bodies were found just two hours ago. The deaths were recent.”

“Any witnesses?”

“No.”

“Who found the bo-” I froze as I saw the woman.

She was laying on her back, her arms crossed her chest. Her eyes were closed. Her face pale blue like the rest of her body but was serene. Her face was very familiar. That’s what startled me.

The officer that accompanied me waited for me to continue my standard line of questioning, but when I didn’t, the realization hit him.

“Do you recognize her?”

I only glanced quickly at him in my attempt to offer no emotive signal to the positive. But not only did I know her, I knew her intimately.

I met her this past summer. It was a memorable night.

***

Not many in the department really had a clear idea of my love life. They all knew I wasn’t married. A rare few of the guys tried unsuccessfully to ask me out on dates. Otherwise, there was a consensus, as far as I’ve been told, that I was married to my job. That I didn’t have time for a romantic life. That’s usually the conclusion when a single woman never takes to any of the guys’ advances. That’s how, they reasoned, I was able to be so shit hot playing a man’s game — in my case, rising to detective at so young an age. No one knew I had in fact, been in a relationship for many years. I just never told anyone. Mostly because it was with another woman — who I had met at the university of Tokyo while I studied there. Many of the guys were old school. I didn’t want issues.

When I broke up with her, I figured if I was going to catch another fish, I might as well go fishing. That was the night I met Meiko. It was at a lesbian bar in the Nicho neighborhood.

Because the bar was near my apartment, I always walked by and each time I did, it piqued my interest, but because I had been in a committed relationship, and, mostly, because I was deathly afraid of getting caught going in there by any of the guys, I steered clear of it.

I sat at the bar by myself, ordered a cocktail and wasn’t sure what to expect. I didn’t really know what to do except make myself present. Halfway through my cocktail, I started to feel invisible. That’s when she popped herself into the seat next to me.

She put her elbow on the table, rested her cheek into her hand and looked up into my eyes. She was beautiful. Soft cheeks hair shiny black, wavy. Impeccably and carefully applied makeup without overdoing it. And her eyes were light latte brown and had a foreign look to them. I could tell she was a ‘hafu’ – mixed race.

I gave her a polite smile, shifted in my seat, sipped shyly on my cocktail. She reached up, lowered the hood of my hoodie.

“What are you trying to hide? You are cute!” she giggled. I blushed. I forgot I still had my hoodie pulled over my face.

“Whatcha drinking?” She asked.

“Um, whiskey sour.”

“Ooh, very nice. I think I’ll have one of those.”

She tapped the table with her fingernails to catch the bar tender’s attention. The heavily pierced butch bar tender looked at her. She pointed at my drink and said to her, “could I have one of those?”

The bar tender winked at her. “Sure thing, Meiko.”

Meiko blew her a kiss.

“I’ve never seen you in here before,” Meiko remarked.

“First time,” I admitted.

“First time? Like first time here? …Or first time in a lesbian bar.”

“Both.”

“Well, well, well… trying out for the other team now, are we?”

“No. I’ve been playing for the other team. Just, you know, never really gone to a bar like this.”

“Oh?”

“I broke up recently. Thought this was a good way to meet new people.”

She smiled devilishly as she sipped her whisky sour. Her eyes looked me up and down. She wasn’t afraid to convey her interest. This made my heart pound with excitement. She was stunningly beautiful. She was a petite woman, like me, with a hot body. I was delighted that of all the girls in this bar she could talk to, she chose me.

“Mmm… this is a good drink.” She looked at the bar tender. “This is good!” The bar tender grinned. “Of course, it is. I made it.”

“From now on, this will be my regular,” she said to the bar tender.

Then to me she casually stated, “I’m off work tomorrow,” before finishing her cocktail and ordering another pair of drinks for us. We finished those, and then another, and I started to be quite tipsy and warm. Meiko drew in closer to me with every sip until I could feel her warmth and smell her pleasant perfume. It was jasmine. She loved touching, and as she spoke, her hands found their way to touch my hands or my shoulder, or lap, and I savored every random touch.

She got me on the dance floor after a couple more cocktails, and we danced until we were both drenched in sweat, and at closing time, we stumbled out onto the street, laughing at silly conversation like long lost friends catching up.

We started walking along the empty street with no plan or direction in mind, only to spend a quiet moment in each other’s company, to talk, and drink each other in. She surprised me with her observant wit.

“You’re not Japanese, are you?”

“How did you know?”

She laughed triumphantly. “Look at me. I’m a dirty hafu outcast. I’m good picking out the other outcasts. What are you? Wait, let me guess. Korean.”

“Yeah.” I laughed, surprised by her accuracy.

She snapped her fingers. “Still got it! Do you have a Korean name?”

“I suppose I did”

“You did? What’s that supposed to mean?”

I shrugged.

“What is it?

“I… don’t remember.”

In truth, I did remember it. It just wasn’t a name I wanted to remember because of the baggage attached to it, so, I want to bring it up.

“Aww, really?”

“It’s ok. I’m cool with Etsuko. Has a nice ring.”

“It does,” Meiko agreed. “How’d you come by it?”

I shrugged. “My first foster parents called me Etsuko. They said it would make me more accepted at school. And it stuck.”

“You were an orphan?”

“Yeah.”

She jumped. “Me too!”

“Yeah?”

She nodded excitedly and hugged me. “That makes us sisters.”

I snorted in laughter. “Ew. I hope not.”

“What, ew? Why’s that gross?”

I blushed, scratched my neck. “Oh, no reason.”

Her eyes glinted as she smiled. She bit her lower lip and brushed her hair aside.

“So, what’s your story?” I asked.

“A boring one really. Tragic I suppose, but whose isn’t, right?”

She spent a moment to gather her thoughts. She slowed her pace.

“My mom died in a car crash. A drunk driver. I was in the car too, but wouldn’t you know? Not a scratch.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

She shrugged. “I was three, so I don’t remember the crash.

“And your dad?”

“As you might have guessed by my hafu look, he was an American. A Navy officer, I think. He left long before my mom’s death, before I was born. Very Madame Butterfly, no?” She giggled.

“Have you ever thought to try to contact him?”

“No. Why would I?”

I smiled weakly, not knowing an answer that didn’t sound trite or obvious.

Her hand found its way to mine. A tentative grazing at first, then weaving into my fingers. I shot her a look of amusement, she glanced innocently upward with a smile on her face.

“What about your parents?” She asked.

“Also tragic. Murdered by gangsters. I was ten. My dad was into real estate. He had a lot of debt and couldn’t pay them off after the market crashed.”

Her hand went to her mouth as she gasped. “Oh. Now that’s way more tragic…”

“Didn’t know we were competing.”

“If this were the tragic family deaths Olympics, you’d win gold. Are you over it?”

I shrugged, nodded.

“Are you really?”

“Yeah.”

Meiko stopped and held her hands to her mouth again.

“Oh…”

“What?” I chuckled.

She spoke in a somber tone. “I know why you don’t tell me your real name.”

“Yeah?”

“You’re in protective custody, aren’t you?”

I laughed loudly. “I mean, that’s a good guess, but no.”

“Ok, so you say, Etsuko.”

We stopped by a neon-red late-night ramen stand and agreed to grab some noodles. We ate at the counter and got a couple of beers, too. Our conversation turned light, and we laughed and got lost in the hours again. A monsoon rain came pouring down, wiping out the night sounds of the city with a blanket of white noise, making the tiny ramen stand feel intimate and private. She looked out at the sheet of rain and said, “damn, I guess I can forget about walking home tonight.”

“Are you far?”

“Shibuya.”

“You were going to walk to Shibuya?”

“What? I like walking. Not in this, though. I’ll take an Uber.”

“Or you can crash at my place,” I blurted.

I cringed when I realized that came out aloud.

She snickered then said, “you’re cute.”

“God…sorry, I don’t know what came over me.” I shrank into my seat and slurped up a string of noodles.

She leaned over quickly and kissed me on the cheek, leaving a wet mark with her tongue.

I held my breath and held my chopsticks suspended mid-air with the noodles dangling into the soup. Her eyes found mine. I swallowed nervously, waited for another move, wanting another move. She read my mind correctly, and came in again, kissing me this time on the lips. The kiss was simple at first, just the lips for a second or two. I put my chopstick back down into the bowl then turned to give in fully to her kiss. Her tongue entered my mouth. Her hands went up my back and pulled me closer to her.

After the kiss, her eyes darted across my face to read my reaction, and she was pleased by what she saw.

“You taste like tonkotsu.” She laughed.

“You taste like miso,” I rebutted.

After finishing our ramen and beer, we flew through the warm heavy rain to my apartment a few blocks away, but in short order, our clothes and hair became thoroughly soaked and clung to our bodies.

We made out madly in the elevator. Our arms were all over each other. Our kisses went to every part we could put our mouths on, and we continued into the hallway on my floor, and into my apartment. As the door came shut behind us, our clothes flew off, one at a time, left behind in a trail from the door to the bedroom, to the bed. Our wet shirts first in the living room. Our bras and shoes at the threshold to the bedroom, our pants at the foot of the bed. We crashed onto the bed, thrusting our bodies against each other, breathing heavy, kissing messily all over, as fast and as much as we could. She kissed down to my breasts, sucked on my nipples, bit on one and tugged on it gently with her teeth to give me a jolt before continuing downward.

She slid my panty off, and flung it over her shoulder, then leaned down, putting her head between my thighs.

“This will be the best orgasm you ever had,” she said with a sly grin. I was too breathless, too thoughtless to utter a response. I only sighed and braced myself in anticipation of her assertion, which, at that point, I believed to be true.

Her tongue first glided up the inside of my left thigh and stopped short of reaching my pussy. I felt her thigh next on my right thigh, gliding up in the same languorous fashion. My pussy ached for her tongue, and she drew out the pleasant pain knowing that the longer I was able to stand the waiting, the more explosive the release.

At just the right moment, her tongue drew between my folds, up to meet my clit. Her fingers penetrated me, working slowly to loosen me up, and when I was loose, she curled a finger upwards into my g-spot and rubbed it while her tongue worked its magic on my swollen clit. I squirmed from the intensity of it. Since my breakup I had been in a drought, and this was like a first rainstorm. Sure, a vibrator is a technological marvel, but nothing beats the tenderness and the creativity of a woman.

I moaned as I came, and I gushed. I tightened my thighs tightened around her head. My back arched. I trembled. She came up to sidle next to me, her face glistening with my sex. We kissed, she held me, as if to guide me to serenity in my quavering aftershocks.

After I calmed down, I commenced to return her the favor. I kissed her all over. I went down on her, pulled her laced thong aside to get to her fruit. She was shaved.

She gyrated her hips, pressing her clit against my tongue. But before she got anywhere close to her plateau, to reaching her point of orgasm, I stopped, flipped her over. “Get on your knees,” I instructed. So, she did and pressed her hands against the headboard as a counter force. I pulled her thong down her narrow thighs. Her heart-shaped ass was soft. Her almond sliver pussy was slick making it easy for my tongue and fingers to enter her.

She moaned loudly.

“I’m going to cum,” she cried, encouraging me to pump faster with my fingers, use my tongue less judiciously. Her thighs quivered. She gasped for air, her pussy tightened then loosened around my fingers as she gushed, then all at once she crumbled into a curled, twitching ball, and I wrapped myself around her like a blanket. We both breathed heavily and laughed gleefully at our shared discovery of each other.

She turned to face me, kissed me, and put her hands into mine.

For hours, we lay in bed, holding hands, talking about our past and our insecurities. Talking mostly about our childhoods and what we had both mutually missed out on. A lot of our conversation meandered around the theme of loneliness. In our own ways, we had both been lonely for a long time, and it occurred to me — to both of us — that since we had both lived in the same part of Tokyo for all our lives, that we must have walked by each other countless times, on the streets, in the grocery stores, or coffee shops, stewing in our own loneliness when there was at least one person nearby with who we could commiserate. Most lonely people probably live out their lives like that, constantly passing each other by.

We talked until the sky turned pale and the early bird commuters had already started on their way, and our eyes were strained by the lack of sleep, but we wanted to stay awake for longer, to stay in each other’s company for as long as possible.

At the loose end of our conversation, she moved her mouth as if to say something, but nothing came out at first, a funny expression came to her face as if it were the first time she had ever been at a loss for words. She sighed, smiled, then opened her mouth again to say what she was going to say the first time around.

“I really like you.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“I like you too.”

“Would you wanna see me again?”

“Of course.”

She smiled, settled in cozily, nuzzling against me and shut her eyes.

“I can’t wait to see you again.”

The next morning, we woke with to the noon autumn sun hitting us with its heat. We stayed in bed, hiding from the sun, with each other for another half an hour or so before we finally got up and had a quick breakfast with tea at my breakfast nook in our underwear.

We showered, then she got dressed to head home. She gave me her number and I told her I’d walk with her to the metro station. But on the way out, she spotted my badge hanging on my jacket hanger by the door.

She held it in her hand and gave me a pained look.

“What’s this?”

I was midway through putting on my shirt over my head. “Oh that. That’s my badge.”

“Are you a cop?”

“Yeah,” I laughed. “Don’t worry, you didn’t commit any crimes last night. I won’t cuff you… unless you want me to.”

She huffed. Stood uncertainly, kneaded the tip of her foot against the floor. Flatly she said, “Why didn’t you tell me?”

I was confused by her reaction. She seemed heartbroken.

“Do you have a problem with me being a cop?”

She shook her head. “No…”

“Ok…” I tried smiling. But I knew it truthfully bothered her, and she had no plan to tell me why.

I finished pulling my shirt on and said, “come on, I’ll walk you to the station.”

She put her hand up and said, “No, it’s alright. I can go by myself.”

“Don’t be silly. I’ll go with you.”

“You better not.”

She hid her face as she opened the door. I stood pitifully in my living room.

“When can I see you again?” I asked.

She sighed and replied, “I really enjoyed last night. Thank you for that. But we cannot see each other again. Bye, Etsuko.”

She glanced up at me quickly, seeming embarrassed, but needing to get one good look at me, before shutting the door to the possibility of having something with me.

***

It was surreal to see her body lying on the asphalt in that alley. My body was numb. Sounds disappeared so that I could only feel and hear myself breathe. I trembled inside and tried my very best to not show it. I only knew her for one night, but in that one night, I got to know a woman more intimately than people I’ve known for years. Even though she had ditched me in the morning in an upsetting way, she held a special place in my heart the way a childhood friend might.

I swallowed and tensed up to stop myself from choking up. I turned my back to her to observe the corpse of the man to help me ditch the memories and focus on the task at hand.

“The man is Koji Tanaka. Yamaguchi gangbanger. Low ranking member. Did some time for extortion. Assault.”

The officer brought my attention to the knife.

“It was the only weapon we could find. But it’s completely clean.”

I looked at it, then at the vicious nature of the man’s wounds. His throat had been ripped open, exposing his windpipe. His right wrist was bent in a way to suggest the bone had snapped. He might have fallen on it the wrong way during the struggle, if there was one.

“Those are not knife wounds,” I remarked.

The officer grunted in agreement. “More like a wild animal attack. A rabid dog?”

I turned to Meiko. I shuddered, closed my eyes as the officer filled me in on her details.

“The woman is Meiko Hashioka, VIP escort. She’s got quite a file. Don’t have any direct connection with Koji-san as far as we know. But we know she is also connected to the Yamaguchi-gumi. She’s entertained many a CEO and government official and has been frequently spotted in the company of a number of the bosses.”

A high-class Yakuza hooker. That’s why she wanted nothing to do with me.

My throat tightened up as I approached her. I crouched down to her body. Her eyes were closed. Her mouth was half open, frozen in a moment of ecstasy. There were no indications of any pain. Unlike the man, there were no obvious signs of struggle. Only her body was cold, and blue, the same characteristics a body had when there’s no heart to continue pumping it. The frigid blue color covered her body uniformly. The strange part was, normally, gravity pulled the blood from the top part of the body to the lower parts making the lower parts a darker port wine color. That wasn’t the case here.

“She has no blood,” I stated.

The officer breathed out in disbelief. “How’s that possible?”

I spotted a part of her neck that had an odd veiny discoloration unlike the rest of the body’s blue. I pulled her collar down for a better examination. Two puncture wounds. Deep. Each the same diameter. Neatly in line with the common carotid artery about 4 centimeters apart.

“That’s odd,” I murmured.

I stood. Shoved my hands into my leather jacket pockets to warm them. They were numb from the frigid October morning chill.

“I don’t know what to make of it,” the officer commented.

I replied, “whatever did that to him,” I pointed to Koji Tanaka’s corpse, “did this to Meiko.”

***

I didn’t tell the Chief Inspector that I knew her. He would have taken me off the case if I had. I wanted the case. I wanted to be the one to solve it. To bring Meiko’s murderer to justice. It soon became a deeply held desire, much in the same way the murder of my parents drove my passion to becoming a police officer. I couldn’t deny that it was a desire burning on the fuel of vengeance.

However, in the subsequent week, as hard as I tried, as many late nights as I could spend racking my brain around it, the case went cold. It was cold as soon as it was a case. I brought in all the usual suspects. As for the Yakuza with the ripped-out throat, of the ones that knew who he was, no one gave any indication that he had it coming, so, though I couldn’t rule out a mob hit, there weren’t any indications that it was one. The same could be said for Meiko.

Couldn’t find very much hard evidence at the crime scene either. There was the clean knife. There were no prints or anything else for DNA evidence on either body, which was particularly odd given the nature of their deaths. The only thing discovered at the scene that gave me a hopeful lead was a lock of silver hair, but DNA testing said it belonged to a common housecat. Meiko’s autopsy confirmed death by exsanguination — she had a loss of over 90% of her body’s blood volume. Her only wounds were the two punctures into her carotid artery, indicating that her blood had been drawn out that way. The coroner’s only explanation, and he seemed half-serious about it, was vampires.

Chief Inspector saw the stress the case was giving me. He smelled the alcohol on my breath from the drinking that it had driven me towards. Everyone did. I also fucked up bad in one other way — I pulled my revolver on an izakaya bar tender for refusing to serve me another shot of sake. I was drunk out of my wits. He was mouthing off. The gun was unloaded, but that didn’t matter. The case was given to others, and I was put on suspension and rehab.

The night I was suspended, I stopped by a 7-eleven and picked up a bottle of the cheapest Suntory whisky before heading to my apartment. Strung my detective badge on my jacket hanger. Put my New Nambu Model 60, which I had forgotten to turn in, onto the kitchen counter. Stripped down to my underwear and plopped down on the couch. Didn’t bother getting a glass, just drank straight from the bottle. Put on the TV for warmth.

Although that summer night with Meiko was a while ago, and it was only one night, her death still hit me hard. I guess it made my loneliness starker, added an element of the macabre to it.

I tried another quick fix to the loneliness. I picked up my phone and opened a dating app. In my moment of drunken misery, it was the only thing I could think to do to take my mind off her. Perhaps there was another lonely girl out there that could commiserate with me. I started swiping. Found some interesting leads. But after a bit more of the whisky, I slowly faded into a drunken stupor, then sleep.

My last thoughts as I drifted off was, of course, Meiko. Her body on the dark alley pavement. Lifeless, bloodless, angelic.

I woke startled by a sudden shift in the atmosphere. The living room glowing a strange blue. It wasn’t the TV, which had switched off while I was asleep. My living room window was open. A bitter wind came in, causing my curtains to flutter ominously. A bright full moon glowed above the Tokyo skyline.

As I went to close the window, I jumped back and screamed when I spotted a silhouette of a human body floating just beyond the curtains.

I hit my coffee table and fell to the floor, wincing in pain from my Achilles hitting a sharp edge. My head still swam with whisky.

I glanced up through the window again. The human body was gone. A hallucination. Likely from the stress.

I went to drink some water to flush the alcohol. Then a creaking noise. The window swung farther open. The air grew cold. A presence in my apartment. Someone was in here.

I swiped my revolver off the kitchen counter. It was loaded with five .38 Special hollow points. More than enough firepower to put down an intruder.

Like most Tokyo apartments, mine was exceedingly small. A living room with a kitchen, a small bedroom, and a bathroom. I looked around me. The living room was cluttered chaotically from weeks of neglect, but empty, so if there was anyone hiding here, they were in the bedroom.

I held my breath as I grabbed the doorknob to my bedroom. I closed my eyes, cleared my head, exhaled then swung the door open, and came in at an angle, holding my gun steady, banking it quickly to my left then sweeping it right to clear the room.

Nothing.

Nothing in the bathroom either.

I relaxed. Set my gun down on my nightstand. Went to the living room to shut the window, gulped down another glass of water, another shot of whisky, took a hot, thoughtless shower, then plopped down onto my bed.

I tried sleeping, but I just lay there, head-spinning, for an hour or more. Then I heard a whisper. A familiar woman’s voice calling out my name.

“Etsuko…,” the voice whispered.

I sat up in bed.

“Etsuko…”

“Who are you? What do you want?” I demanded.

A shadow crossed the bedroom wall, like a cloud passing across the face of the moon.

I watched the shadow. It grew darker and came closer to me, materializing into a shape. A human silhouette. Then rendered in corporeal detail. A woman’s body. Naked. Pale skin. Black hair that floated in the air as if in a pool of water.

Her eyes glinted like a cat’s. Her face was soft and perfect. Even in the dimness I recognized her.

“Meiko…”

“Yes, Etsuko,” she answered. “Oh, don’t look so scared.”

“You’re alive.”

“More than alive,” she giggled.

The punctures were gone from her neck.

“What are you doing in my home?”

“I wanted to see you.”

She sat at the foot of my bed. Her hand touched my foot. It was a cold touch. I quickly retracted my foot, but oddly, felt a pleasure from her touch.

She climbed onto the bed, sat cross legged at the foot. I pushed myself nervously up against the wall, scrunched up into a ball. My eyes darted to my gun on the nightstand. She saw this and said, giggling, “You won’t need that.”

I responded, “I must be dreaming. You must be a dream.”

“I can certainly be, Etsuko. I can be the woman of your dreams.”

Still cross legged, she leaned forward. Put her hands on my legs, slid them up my legs to my thighs giving me the same shock as a jump into an ice bath.

Electricity crackled through my body. I breathed heavily. Closed my eyes and muttered, “Why would you do that?”

She crawled up between my legs. Her fingers grazed up my thighs, curled around the band of my panty. She kissed the top of my left thigh, leaving a wet cold mark.

“For caring so much about me. No one ever cares. Most would rather forget I ever existed. So, thank you.”

Her teeth grazed my skin, causing me to utter a sigh. My voice came out drunkenly. “You really don’t need to…”

But I felt so much pleasure from her kisses, her light, cool touches, I was paralyzed by it. I couldn’t talk.

She continued kissing the inside of my thighs, sending shocks of lightning straight to my pussy. My muscles tensed with every soft kiss. My back arched. My hands clutched bed-sheet tightly.

She pulled my panty down over my legs. Tossed it to the floor, leaving my pussy bare and vulnerable. I looked down at her, both with fright, and with desire. Her face was beautiful. It was perfect.

The image of her dead body flashed in my mind. Her skin cold, silver-blue, set by rigor-mortis. Now here she was, her face between my thighs, more than alive. I couldn’t make any sense of it. But in this moment, I didn’t want to make any sense of it. I just wanted to feel her tongue on my pussy, and she was happy to oblige.

There it was. First a wet touch on top of my vulva, then, over my already swollen clit, releasing a gasp from my mouth, then sliding into my wet folds, penetrating me tenderly.

I spread my legs. My hands went to her head, grabbed her hair in bunches and pulled her deeper between my thighs.

Her tongue worked its magic inside me. Moments later, her fingers came in, penetrating me, curling up inside to reach my g-spot, while her tongue went to my clit with a clear intent to bring me to orgasm.

Very quickly she did. I exploded into pleasure, crying out loudly in uninhibited ecstasy. I became lightheaded. I was floating.

She came up to kiss me. We made out tenderly. Her kisses went down to my neck, and she lingered there, planting wet marks with her soft lips on the super-sensitive skin of my neck, tracing her tongue up and down. I bent my neck to give more of it to her to kiss and lick. I closed my eyes in languorous ecstasy. I felt the grazing of her teeth. They paused for a moment, just touching. They were sharp. A gentle pressure was applied. Her hands went up and down my naked body, massaging my breast, raking across my abdomen and my thighs while she sucked on my neck. There was an odd smell in the air. A sharp metallic smell that I was more than familiar me, and this bothered me. It was the scent of blood. Then,

“Ow!” I winced.

Her teeth dug into my neck. I opened my eyes and found her face smeared dark red. She grinned widely, and I saw her sharp canines and mouthed a silent scream of horror.

“What the fu -”

She put her finger to her lips. “Shhhh…,” she whispered, then sidled up next to me, kissed me with my blood on her lips and her tongue. A taste of copper filled my mouth.

I passed out from the shock. Or from loss of blood.

***

The next morning, I woke with a pale noon light beaming in through my bedroom window, gasping for air as if I were drowning. My skin was clammy and beaded with sweat. My short hair was matted against my forehead and cheeks.

I grasped my neck. Didn’t feel anything. I ran to the bathroom to look into the mirror and found no puncture wounds. It was a dream.

I grabbed my phone to look at the time. But something else first caught my attention. A text message from a strange number.

I opened the message. My heart stopped. It read:

I enjoyed last night. I hope you did too. If you want to see me again, find me here:

The next message was a Google maps pin drop in the middle of the Akaishi mountains, 200 kilometers west of Tokyo.

At once I put on clothes, grabbed my detective badge and ran down to my Nissan Sunny in the parking garage.

I went straight to the morgue, where Meiko’s body was supposed to be interred.

***

I flashed my badge to the morgue attendant and instructed him to show her corpse to me. Fortunately, he didn’t ask any questions. The flash of a badge was enough for him. He escorted me into the sterile cold chamber and to a metal hatch in an array of metal hatches along a wall. After double checking the number on his register, he clicked the hatch open, and let out a loud gasp.

“What?”

Color drained from his face. He looked back down at the register and scratched his neck.

“It’s impossible. This is the one.”

I peered in and felt my heart jump into my throat. It was empty.

“Try the other ones,” I suggested.

He shook his head, but nonetheless swung one door open after another, checked the bodies in the bags.

“She’s not here,” he said. He ran back to his desk and picked up a phone. “I’ll have to call my supervisor.”

I nodded at him and started for the exit.

“Wait. I’ll need you to…”

“Sorry, got something urgent I need to do.”

“But you need to give me your name!”

I left without giving an answer. I didn’t want the Chief Inspector all over me for working a case that wasn’t mine. Especially when I’m supposed to be suspended and checking in to rehab.

“I should call,” I heard myself mutter. My finger hovered over the call icon on the screen. I held my breath and pressed it.

It went straight to an automated operator telling me politely that the number was not in service.

I checked her message again. If you want to see me again, find me here…

I looked at the pinned location. Zoomed in with the satellite overlay on. It was nothing but mountains and trees there. Not even any paved roads. There were small villages scattered all around, lonely mountain huts, and forest service roads, but the pinned location seemed highly inaccessible.

Telling the Chief Inspector and the detectives currently working the case about the message and Meiko’s missing body would have been the prudent thing to do. But I was far from being in a prudent state of mind. I went home, packed a bag with hiking gear, put on hiking clothing and hiking boots. I took my revolver, rotated the cylinder to make sure it was full, and when I was satisfied, I put it in a shoulder holster and tossed it in the bag as well. I didn’t know what to expect, so I assumed the worst.

I was almost out the door before I remembered it was probably smart to leave a note here in case something was to happen to me in the wilderness. I scribbled a quick note with the latitude and longitude of the pin drop and left it on the kitchen counter. If I was missing for long enough, at least they’d know where to start raking for my body.

It was near twilight when I took off in my Nissan Sunny. The car sputtered and accelerated weakly when I gave it gas. It was an old car, and I hadn’t exactly taken good care of it.

Chapter 2. Mountain Village

I left Shinjuku city, at around 8 PM Friday night, arriving at Nirasaki a few hours later, a quiet, village north of Mount Fuji past midnight and stayed at an inn there. It was peaceful, except that night, I dreamt strangely and lucidly of dogs howling. They howled all night under my window, and all night I was thirsty, I had to wake and drink frequently.

For breakfast, I had a simple dish of smoked salmon and poached eggs. A local specialty the innkeeper said and that I should be able to get it anywhere in the mountain villages. It was a nice dish and put me in comfort more than I deserved on this trip.

I departed the inn when the sun broke the horizon and began to break apart the heavy mist in the rice and the flowering buckwheat fields. Mount Fuji was a graceful, curved silhouette above low and silky clouds, striking me with a peaceful awe. The rising sun made the sky pink and golden. I felt a rejuvenated resolve from it to carry out my mission.

With Nirasaki behind me, the mountains rose around me quickly after following a mesmerizing countryside of rolling, misty pastures, picturesque thatched and baked tile roofed villages.

I drove alongside the winding Haya River, guided by my GPS. The river was narrow in some places, and wide in others with wide stony banks that showed how high the river flooded in the summer months.

Along the way, my GPS guided me away from the river up a narrow and steep forest road, squeezed in by dark mossy cedars. I lost the cell signal first. Then shortly the GPS.

I stopped receiving directions. The phone just went haywire. But I pressed on, making it to the mountain village. There was an inn there, just as I had guessed. It was about noon, so I figured I would have lunch there and talk to the innkeeper about how I might get to the pin, and, more importantly, what may be there.

The village seemed a strange place. It felt as if it were from a different time completely, as if I had stumbled into one of those tourist folk villages, except here, there were no tourists here. Only the locals in their traditional garbs.

An elderly couple, who I guessed to be the innkeepers, came out and beckoned me in as soon as they heard my car crunch gravel as I pulled into the driveway.

“Welcome! Welcome!” they cheered as if they had not had a visitor in a long while.

The old woman was bent over, holding her hand to her knee for support as she hobbled over to grab my arm. Her face was wrinkled so deeply that the wrinkles were deeply curved carvings set in oak. The man was wiry and tall, and stood with trembling hands. He looked ready to fall over if he leaned slightly in one direction

“You must be hungry. How about something to eat, dear?” The old woman asked.

I responded, bowed respectfully. “Yes ma’am. That sounds lovely.”

“Good, good. Please come in. We have grilled trout, freshly caught!”

I thought to press her immediately about my location, and if there were a map, I could orient myself with. I had thought enough to write down the latitude and longitude on an index card, which I had in my pocket in case my phone stopped working and I lost my battery. My phone was fully charged, as I had it plugged on the drive here, but it wouldn’t hurt to have a contingency. I thought also to ask her about a landline telephone, which I suppose they had, since a cellular signal would be hard to find in these wild mountains.

But I had time first to rest and enjoy a meal.

The old man sat at a table and read a yellowed book in a dusty beam of sunlight while the old woman buzzed around the kitchen. Before long, she came out with a beautifully prepared dish of a golden brown, sizzling trout with a side bowl of rice topped with a generous amount of nori seaweed and sesame seasoning and set it in front of me, then sat across from me, waiting with a wide grin for me to eat.

I bowed my head graciously again and gave a “thank you” before I shoveled a morsel of trout and rice into my mouth.

“Mmm, its very good!” I remarked. This gushing feedback seemed to make the old woman’s day.

She chuckled and replied, “Oh, it’s so nice to have a guest. Isn’t it dear?”

She turned her neck to her husband. He grunted like an old dog in response.

A detective tends to develop an intuition about a place or a situation. My ears perked, the hair on the back of my neck stood on end. There was something about this place, about this couple, that I found strange, but in a way that I couldn’t quite put a finger on. It was old here, like the inn ought to be an antique shop, but at the same time, everything felt new and clean as if it were just built. The rafters had no dust or cobwebs, the floors were clean and varnished, and the tatami smelled like fresh hay. Something that was missing caught my eye: not a single electrical appliance or outlet in the room.

This information alarmed me, but I shook the thought to the back of my head. The old couple must be truly dedicated to the old way of life. Perhaps a selling point for their mountain inn to tourists that wanted to leave the hustle and bustle of Tokyo.

Halfway through my meal, I decided to inquire about my location. I took my phone out to ask her to point out our location, and the best way to get to the saved pin, but the phone was dead.

“Is there something I can help you with dear?”

“I wanted to show you something on my phone, but it appears that my battery had gone out on me. You don’t happen to have an outlet for me to charge my phone, do you?”

She chuckled. “Of course not, dear,” she said as if it were supposed to be obvious to me that she wouldn’t have any electricity.

“I see. Then perhaps you have a map?”

She nodded and brought one to me. It was a crinkled old trail map. Old enough that the road I had come here on was not indicated on it.

It did have latitudes and longitudes labeled on it on the sides of the map, so I pulled out my index card, and drew my finger using the guide rules to my destination. I tapped on it, and in response, as if I had pushed a sensitive button, the old woman gasped in a way that sounded like a terrified shriek. I jumped in my seat.

“What do you want to know about that place?” She demanded shrilly.

I lifted my finger and saw that the spot, located in a gap between two mountain peaks, had been marked with a crudely drawn skull.

“I want to know how I can arrive there.”

The woman sucked her teeth and answered, “impossible.”

“Impossible to get there? Or for you to give me directions?”

“Both.”

She snatched my plate and rushed into the kitchen. I hadn’t finished eating. I glanced at the old man. He was still sitting in the dusty sunbeam, still reading his book.

I stood pulled out my badge for the old woman to see from the kitchen.

“I’m looking for the missing body of a murdered woman. I require your assistance.”

She shuddered, shook her head. “No, no, no. I cannot help with that dear. I’m sorry, but you must leave at once. Go back from where you came.”

“Please, ma’am. This is an important case. I just need to know how I can get to where I need to go.”

“You and those evil creatures that intends to prey on you. I refuse to let you go.”

She spat dryly as she spoke those words, putting a chill down my spine.

“Evil creatures?”

“Enough! You can leave now. Go back home!”

I sighed loudly to signal my displeasure at her confounding behavior. I could tell I wasn’t going to get through to her, so I took out cash and asked how much the food was.

She didn’t look up from the dishwasher as she washed the dirty dishes. “Your money is no good here. Just leave.”

The old man didn’t budge except to turn the page of his book.

I shrugged and went back out to my car. I had the map now, and though it wasn’t exactly the most up to date, I could use the map to dead reckon my way to the latitude and longitude of the pin.

It was not later than one in the afternoon when I got back into my car, but the sun leaned against the top peaks of the nearby mountain, casting only a dim silver light, like the light from a solar eclipse.

I plugged my phone into my car charger then turned the key. The car whined and sputtered and wouldn’t start.

“Fuck,” I mumbled. I tried again. It whined again and that time didn’t even bother sputtering. My phone wasn’t charging either, which meant that my car battery was dead too. Must have left the headlights on or something. The battery was old. I would have to go back to the inn to ask the old couple to jumpstart my car. I slapped the top of the steering wheel with both my hands then exhaled slowly to try to calm my nerves.

“Ok,” I finally said, and pushed my car door open to climb out. I noticed it had gotten darker. The mountains turned a strange purple, and the other people from the village had gathered in their yards and in the dirt streets to watch me. Their curiosity in me unnerved me greatly.

I stepped out of my car and asked to the gathering crowd, “hey, can anyone help me jump start my car?”

Only silent stares in return. And when I looked their way, they only looked to the ground as if ashamed they couldn’t help my plight. I thought to go back to the inn and ask for help but gave up on that notion without trying, knowing they would not help me, if it meant I would proceed to head to the skull on the map, and I had every intent of doing so.

I wasn’t going to let my circumstances disturb me from my plan. My car wasn’t going anywhere, and I had a hiking bag packed with enough gear, food and water to last me several days if I needed it.

From the map, I estimated that I could get to the skull and back in a few hours at most. It wasn’t more than a 20-kilometer trip round trip. At worst, it would make for a good scouting trip, and by the time I get back, it would only be just after dark.

I put my shoulder-holstered pistol on then my leather jacket over that, then hoisted my backpack onto my back. I walked in the direction of the road towards the skull.

A large torii gate greeted me at the far end of the village, like one of those gates at the entrances of Shinto shrine, except there was no shrine on the other end, only a continuation of the road, which had turned to dirt. The torii was covered in lichen and moss and flecks of faded paint indicating that at one point it had been painted red. It was crowded in so much by gigantic dark wood firs, and maple trees with blood red leaves that it seemed the forest intended to swallow it. The path beyond was unkempt and covered in maple leaves, making it appear as a river of blood in the darkened sky.

As I crossed the threshold of the torii, I heard the pattering footsteps of the woman chasing after me.

“Wait!” She huffed, stopping before me. With tears in her eyes, she bowed twice, clapped loudly, enough for the sound to echo off the trees, and muttered a soft prayer before bowing again. “A ward against evil,” she explained. “May it protect you.”

Chapter 3. The Castle

The old woman stared, with her hands wringing, as I walked up the road past the mossy torii, watching me pitifully, in a way I found amusing — like a mother seeing her daughter off on the first day of school. She stood there until at least she was out of view.

Between tops of the towering pines, I spotted the snowy peaks rising like majestic spires. The sun shone brightly on them, causing them to glow amber.

As I slowly ascended into the mountains, the road grew narrower, until it was just wide enough to be a walking path. The leaves were slippery beneath my feet and soon I was walking along the edge of a mountainside, looking down on my left into a deep chasm, where far below, white jets spewed in a rapid.

The temperature dropped and my ears grew numb, so I tied a merino wool headscarf around my head to warm me up.

The chilled darkness of the maple and pine forest around me issued a mistiness that ran up the between the craggy spines of the mountains. Splotches of snow that had been left in perpetual shadow began to appear within the forests and on the muddy road, and the declining sunlight caused the mist to glow with a ghastly grimness.

At one point, the road became so steep that I had to pause every few steps.

I need to start working out more, I thought to myself.

I froze as I heard a sound I never thought I’d hear in the wild — distant howling like an agonized wail borne on the wind. Wolves. I recall someone telling me that wolves had long been extinct on Honshu. It must have been my imagination. But it sounded so real, I couldn’t be sure. Nervously, I continued forward, feeling a bit of comfort from my gun inside my jacket, but nonetheless thinking worryingly how I would fare against a pack of starving wolves. Would five rounds be enough?

Dark clouds rolled overhead giving the sense that an oppressive thunder brewed above me. The air suddenly became heavy and frozen, as if I had just entered another world.

When the road flattened out, I looked at the map again and found that I had made good progress. I was nearly there. So, I pressed on, moving faster now.

Soon the maple trees were gone, and I was crowded in by tall firs. I looked out into the woods and saw only a blackness like I’ve never seen before. Though the trees were thick, I heard a howling wind through them, and the branches creaked, and the needled leaves rustled. I was afraid of the wolves hiding in the trees, observing my every move. I unzipped my jacket a bit farther for easier access to the gun.

That’s when I saw it. Something that made me cry out. A blue wisp weaving beneath the boughs of the fir trees. It came out from the trees and onto the road directly in front of me, existing there for only a moment, but in that moment, I swear I saw it transform into a fleeting figure — a blue ghost of a woman — before disappearing. Muffled laughter echoed throughout the woods.

My heart pounded hard against my chest. I stayed frozen there, swiveling my head around me to see if the blue wisp would come out at me again from another direction, but it never did. A cuckoo bird called out with a haunting, echoing call from deep within the forest. The wind came through again and rattled the tree branches and rustled the leaves that still hung on the branches. It took an eternity, it seemed, before I was able to summon the courage to continue.

The path came to a sharp bend at the edge of a precipice, and I looked out onto an extraordinary scene. An Edo period castle, with tall white walls that glinted in the dim afternoon sun, sharply curved towers that grew up around two large keeps. The castle had many slitted windows like watchful, haunted eyes. It sat atop a pillar of a mountain, and below it, thick white mist hovered.

I looked at the map and judging by the contours of the mountains on it, the castle was certainly my destination. The same location marked by a skull on the map. Where the woman asserted an evil creature resided. Could Meiko be there? There was only one way to tell. I hoped the ward hadn’t already worn off.

***

In an hour I found myself standing in front of an imposing iron studded door, three times my height. The sun was long hidden behind a thick blanket of clouds, and a whipping wind brought with it, a frantic flurry of snow, which I was not prepared for.

I pounded on the door. Nothing. I looked for another way in, but there really wasn’t any that I could see. The castle hung over the edge of the mountain, and the door was at the end of a drawbridge above a high chasm. This was the only way in. The dark windows high above me glared at me, and my voice when I shouted simply echoed off the cold, stone walls. I waited indecisively, shivering in the snow, and about to come to the conclusion that I should rush back to the village, when, suddenly, the door creaked open.

I watched in apprehension for what awaited me on the other side. I put my hand in my jacket, onto the grip of my pistol, ready in case of danger.

Inside the opening door stood a slender woman clad in a black kimono. Her straight silver hair shimmered. In her hand a silver lamp that seemed to cast not light, but a pale shadow.

Behind her an expansive courtyard a snow blanketed rock garden with immaculately kept bonsai pines. Although the woman was wearing only a light silk kimono, she seemed unbothered by the cold.

With a soft accent, she said, “You must be incredibly tired from your journey.”

She bowed, then motioned with her hand, but so gently that she seemed to move only like a statue. Strangely, as she beckoned, my feet moved, and I walked forward as if compelled to do so. I attributed the strange sensation to my emotional exhaustion.

She looked at me to study me, and with her eyes darting over my body, she smiled and gleamed and then turned to glide towards the main keep of the castle past the garden. I followed her, my eyes scanning around me suspiciously. High on the castle wall, a black cat walked gingerly in the same direction, stopping to observe us curiously with every few steps.

When I entered the cavernous entrance hall of the keep, she turned to me and bowed her head again and said, “I bid you welcome Lieutenant Hinata. You must come in and eat and rest. It is late.” As she said this, she hung the lamp on the wall and took my backpack.

“How do you know my name?” I asked.

She bowed and gave as her only explanation, “I know much about you.”

With the backpack draped in her hand, she moved again, preventing me from asking any more questions, gliding along the entrance hall to the back and noiselessly up the stairs, and down long alcove passageway where she slid open a shoji door upon which was painted intricate and colorful artwork. All the walls in fact, were painted with intricate and colorful artwork, as is traditional of Edo period castles. Inside, tatamis were laid out in the entirety of the room. There was a central pit with a roaring fire in a brazier that warmed the room. To see the orange light and feel its warmth against my skin was a welcome sight. It lifted my spirit.

A plush futon was laid out with clean sheets on the other side of the brazier, and at its foot, a pair of neatly folded kimonos, a silk one that was white and purple, and a gray cotton yukata.

She set my backpack down at the entrance and bade me to enter. I’d much rather get right to investigating, but I was also curious to see where this would go, so I took my shoes off and entered the room. The warm tatami crackled pleasantly under my feet as I walked across it.

“This will be your room,” the woman said.

She took off her slippers and entered, walked to the far side of the room, and opened a pair of shoji doors to reveal a beautiful sight — a steaming hot Onsen bath in a private garden, beset by amber glowing lanterns and draping, snow covered red maples.

“As I know it was a difficult journey for you to arrive here, I took the liberty to make your bath. Please, take your time to refresh yourself and when you are ready, I will humbly ask that you join me for dinner.”

She gave a courteous bow and silently left the room. As she started to slide the bedroom door shut, I interrupted.

“Wait. Who are you?”

She smiled up at me. Her eyes, which I noticed for the first time, were a beautiful light blue.

“That you will discover soon enough. I hope you will first enjoy your bath.”

Though a certain duty proscribed me from leisure, it wasn’t hard for me to concede obliging the mysterious woman’s polite insistence for a hot bath and dinner.

***

I took off my clothes and put on the grey yukata. I took my gun to the onsen with me as a precaution Water trickled into the bath by a bamboo conduit. Steam rose to meet the falling snow and filled the air with a balmy humidity. I hung my yukata on a hanger, set my gun at the edge of the onsen and entered the hot water, sighing audibly as I entered. The water warmed me to the core. My muscles relaxed. I slid in chin deep and couldn’t help but smile.

I was never one to enjoy a bathhouse. It was just something I didn’t think was worth spending my free time on, but after the feeling of the stress just melting away with warmth, the serene scenery around me, the gentle trickling of the water, and the soft hissing sound of the heavy snowflakes hitting the blanket of snow that had already accumulated, I understood its magical allure. The feeling of the bath was a pure pleasure. I had half a mind to ask my mysterious hostess of the possibility for a massage.

A light sound interrupted the serenity. I opened my eyes and looked up at the tall wall and saw the source of the noise. The black cat had hopped up there and was now watching me. Its tail waving serpentine. It yawned, stretched out and licked its paws. There was an odd familiarity to its eyes.

After a few minutes, it disappeared, hopping off the wall. I sunk lower into the water and shut my eyes. My mind drifted off into pleasant thoughts, which didn’t include evil creatures that the lady of the inn warned me of, or the skull on the map, or of the need for that old woman’s protective ward.

My mind drifted naturally to that night I spent with Meiko. Of meeting her at the bar and drinking whisky sours, of eating ramen. Our first kiss. Running through the rain to my apartment. Our uninhibited passionate sex. Our endless conversation. There was no denying we had a special connection.

Thinking of her naked body, her face between my thighs, her perfectly shaped ass, gave me a heady arousal, an arousal I felt a strong desire to relieve. I looked around me to make sure I was alone, then slid my hand down between my legs. I pictured her in that bath with me, sitting beside me. My finger slid between my folds, down and up. My clit swelled. I rubbed it with a finger thinking of her kissing me, holding me tightly, running her hands up and down my body.

These erotic thoughts were surprisingly lucid. These thoughts came to me not by my choice. They entered my mind on their own accord. Meiko felt not like an imagination, but a physical presence. Her kisses seemed real. Her hands touching my breasts seemed real. An effect from the onsen?

I stopped touching myself, my arms fell lazily to my sides so I could focus on the pleasure given to me by this imaginary Meiko. I kept my eyes closed because I was afraid that if I opened them, she would disappear, but I could feel her warmth next to me. I could feel her heat and smell her jasmine scent.

She kissed down to my breasts, wrapped her mouth around a nipple, and sucked. Her hand went down to my clit, and she rubbed it slowly, bringing me closer and closer to orgasm. When she was done sucking on my breasts, she kissed down my abdomen until she reached my clit with her mouth. She sucked on it sending up my body wave upon wave of shivering pleasure. Before long, the waves of pleasure grew into an explosive orgasm. I came, then jolted, feeling suddenly watched. I opened my eyes and looked all around. I grabbed my gun instinctively, still breathing heavy from the orgasm.

A meow sounded from the wall. I looked up and saw that the cat had returned, sitting on its haunches on the wall, licking its paw again.

“Have you been watching me?”

The cat responded with a meow and by tilting its head slightly. I relaxed. Sighed. Laughed in surprised disbelief. What had come over me?

I left the bath and committed myself to focus on the task at hand, discovering the mystery of the castle and the disappearance of Meiko’s body.

I toweled myself dry and went to dig out a clean set up clothes from my backpack. But when I reached it, I was shocked to find that my clothes were absent.

I opened the closet, thinking maybe I had absentmindedly put my clothes in there, but could only find neatly folded kimonos on all the shelves. Did I forget to bring clean clothes? Or had the woman come in during my bath and take them? I wasn’t sure which was more likely.

I glanced at the silk kimono and the accompanying thin cotton undergarment that lay at the foot of my futon. Obviously, she had wanted me to wear it.

I hadn’t worn a kimono since grade school, so was slightly amused by how it would look on me. I struggled to remember how to put it on but deciding that I shouldn’t worry too much about it. I remembered the most important detail, which was that the left side should always wrap above the right. Only the dead wore it the other way around. After donning the undergarment, and the outer kimono, I slipped on the split toed tabi socks, and wrapped the outer sashes haphazardly around the waist of my kimono. Finally, I slipped my gun into my undergarment sash, and tightened down on the most outer sash to flatten the kimono, to hide the bulkiness of the gun.

When I was finished, I looked myself up and down in the mirror. The kimono was white and red and patterned with black plum blossoms. I bunched my short hair up tightly and grinned at the sight of me in the kimono. With a bit of makeup, I’d make a good geisha, I thought.

The kimono wasn’t exactly perfectly arranged, but it would suffice. Next task, find the dining room. I slid the bedroom door open, found slippers waiting for me. I slipped into them and walked down the drafty castle hallway. I found the dining room easily. It was on the first floor and marked by an orange glow through the rice paper wall of its shoji door. The only sign of life in an otherwise dark castle.

The door slid open immediately upon my arrival, and the woman stood on the other side of it. She bowed and stood aside to let me in.

“You look wonderful in that dress,” she remarked.

“I couldn’t remember how to put it on correctly,” I replied. I glanced at her immaculate black kimono and noticed immediately that even she had made a mistake in her wrapping, in fact, the most egregious faux pas you could make with a kimono — her front panels were wrapped right over left. I thought to say something but bit my tongue. There were more pressing things to worry about.

A large low table was situated at the center of the room. On the far side, the doors were slid open upon a vast haunted vista. Grey outlines of craggy peaks in the flurrying white snow. The sky was a dark blue twilight, and the only hint of the sun’s low hanging existence was the pale gold color on the snow clouds above us. In the foreground were the tops of snow-covered conifers.

Despite the exposure to the outside, the dining room was warm.

The woman motioned me to sit at the low table.

I kneeled at my place, and she immediately poured me a warm sake then sat on the corner seat beside me, then removed a silver tray cover to reveal a beautiful array of traditional dishes. Miso soup, and a variety of okazu including mushrooms, roasted pumpkin, and grilled fish. From a softwood rice barrel that sat beside her, she scooped a steaming mound of rice and placed the rice on a plate in front of me.

“This looks incredible,” I said to her. She bowed her head humbly.

“Thank you very much.”

I took the opportunity to get a better look at her. I had originally thought her to be an elderly woman given the graceful way she carried herself, and the wisdom in her eyes, but her face was youthful, seeming not more than twenty-five, this youthfulness. She had a thin, sharp nose, eyes that were thin and curved and hair pulled tautly around her ears and her eyebrows in a manner that made her prominent and assertive. Her lips were thin and cold. Her hands porcelain smooth. When she talked, she touched me gently with a hand and I could hardly repress a shudder as a striking cold would travel to my spine.

When she noticed my discomfort, she withdrew and stood to go stand by the tall window that looked out upon the mountain forests. I sat, eating and drinking the sake politely. Wolves howled from the valley below and the woman responded by grinning with her lips at the rim of her ceramic sake cup. Seeing the fearful expression on my face, she reassured me.

“They are hunters, but do not worry yourself. You are safe here from hunters.”

After gulping down my food, I put down my chopsticks, and my hands in my laps.

“Who are you?” I asked directly.

She giggled and replied, “forgive me, but I have completely forgotten to introduce myself.”

She turned to face me, she bowed and glanced humbly to the floor. “I am Yuna-Hime, lady of this castle.”

I raised an eyebrow. Hime, as in Princess. I was immediately suspicious of her title, but then again, I was in a castle.

“It is an honor to meet you Yuna-Hime, but I must inform you, I am here for official business that is quite pressing. So, I hope you will forgive me if I must attend to that business at once.”

She went to kneel at her position beside me. Her sake cup, I noticed was empty, so I offered to pour. She nodded in approval, and I filled it. She took a sip.

“I know you seek Miss Meiko Hashioka,” she said when she was done with the sip.

I perked up.

“Yes.”

She nodded, smiled slyly.

“You suspect she may be within the confines of this castle.”

“Yes.”

A gut-wrenching revelation suddenly hit me. She knew who Meiko was. She knew that I was searching for Meiko’s body.

“You sent me that text message.”

She did not respond in the positive, or the negative. She only sipped her sake again, which I took as confirmation of my suspicion.

“What are you playing at?” I demanded.

My eyes were narrowed on her now. She was pissing me off with her coy behavior. My hands twisted into fists in my lap. When she didn’t reply, I asked, “what did you do with Meiko’s body?”

“Her body is her own,” Princess Yuna answered.

“Not a helpful answer.”

A cold terseness came out in my voice when I spoke again. “Princess Yuna, I am a homicide detective. I am trying to solve a murder. Right now, you are the prime suspect. The only suspect, in fact.”

“Yes, I am quite aware of all that you’ve just stated. You are right to suspect me.”

She took another sip of her sake, and added, “indeed, I had stricken Meiko of her mortal existence.”

I stood abruptly. Slid my hand into my kimono and put my hand on the grip of my revolver.

“Then you’re under arrest.”

My heart pounded. Another wolf howled in the distance. A fearful realization hit me: I had seen no other human in this castle.

“Your weapon won’t help you here, I’m afraid,” she said.

“Yeah? Why don’t you let me be the judge of that,” then more formally I continued, “Princess Yuna, following your admission of the murder of Meiko Hashioka, I hereby place you under arrest.”

“Please be patient, Lieutenant Hinata. You shall be reunited with your dear Meiko, and you will discover something about her, about yourself, and about me, that will have you reconsider your proposition. All in due course, but for now, please, continue your meal. I cannot allow you to be malnourished.”

She patted the cushion that I had been sitting on, beckoning me to sit back down. A cheerful expression on her face.

“I’m not making a fucking proposition, princess. I’m telling you to get off your ass.”

I whipped out my gun, pointed it at her.

She nodded, obliged and stood, clasping her hands in patience for me to make the next move. I felt a tremendous unease in my current situation. I was without handcuffs, without a phone, without a car. It was only me, my revolver against the perpetrator, this eerily patient woman standing before me. I had zero evidence, only her casual admission to the crime. Moreover, outside a strong snow fell. There was no way I’d escort her back to the village in this weather and not tonight.

As it was also impractical to take her in now, I decided to interrogate her here now, to discover new evidence. I started by asking about the missing body.

“Meiko’s body was not in the morgue. You don’t happen to have anything to do with that do you?”

“I have,” she said. I was taken aback by her willingness to confess.

“You removed her body?”

“I did not.”

“Then what do you mean?”

She smiled.

“She moved her own body. On her own accord, of course.”

“Try again.”

She took a step towards me. I cocked the hammer to demonstrate I wasn’t fucking around.

“I must reiterate, Lieutenant Hinata. Your weapon will do you no good here. Please put it away.”

I lost my cool. “Where the fuck is Meiko!?” I screamed at her.

This did not faze her. She only responded, “she is here.”

“What the fuck do you mean here?”

“In this castle.”

“Show me.”

“I’m afraid I cannot, as I do not know where she is at this moment.”

“Show me her body,” I demanded.

“When she wishes.”

“When she wishes?” I echoed, confused. “She’s dead.”

Yuna nodded. “That is a matter of perspective.”

She took a step closer.

“I’m warning you, do not take another step.”

She did anyways. Given her small stature and timid movements, I felt confident in taking her down. I went to grab her for a wrist lock, to push her down to the ground. But as I reached out, I grabbed only at air. She moved aside with a quickness my mind couldn’t register.

I went to grab her again. Grabbed at air again. I swung my pistol hand to hit her with the butt and missed completely, and I stumbled in a three-sixty spin. She moved as if I were moving in slow motion, like I was swatting fruitlessly at a fly.

When I caught myself from the stumble, I held out my pistol, swung it around to find her. I felt her behind me. I spun to face her. All I saw was a blurred motion towards me. I fired a shot. It hit her, causing her to stumble backwards. I fired another shot. Then another.

A popular misconception people have about the police, thanks in no small part to cop flicks and crime thrillers, is that handguns are a weapon of precision. The common trope involves a slick hero detective that must decide in the heat of the moment: shoot at the head to kill the perp, or the hand to disarm him. Usually, a hostage is involved. Usually, the detective is a crack shot. The reality is quite different. Although a single .38 special round is fully capable of taking a person down, the shooter cannot necessarily rely on a single well-placed round. Handguns have a limited effective range, and the stress of a live situation reduces accuracy to, at best, half the cop’s average performance at the range. The moment the gun comes out, the moment a trigger is pulled, the objective is to put as many rounds as possible on target for a kill.

I fired repeatedly at the broadest part of the body — her chest — and watched her kimono burst into clouds. Three shots I fired. Three times she stumbled backwards. She went to her knee. My though was that she would next collapse to the ground, so I stopped shooting and lowered my gun. The air was acrid with gunpowder and smoke from the burnt muzzle blast chemicals. My ear rung from the powerful shockwave sounds of the .38 blasts. The night was silent save for the crackling coal in the brazier and the humming made by the candle flames in the howling mountain wind that came in from the opened shoji doors.

She stayed on her knees for a hesitant moment. What happened next terrified me. She stood back up, straightened her ruined kimono and gave me a look of annoyance.

“That was my favorite kimono,” she said, annoyed.

I raised my pistol to fire again at her. Stoically she stood, bracing herself for another volley. Given the utter failure the first three solid hits had in neutralizing her, I changed my mind. Instead, I ran.

I burst out into the hallway, to the main entrance chamber and ran towards the main door. I knew the weather was bad, I knew I was underdressed for it, but I knew that I had a better chance facing exposure to the cold than attempting to fight whatever thing Yuna-Hime was. The old woman’s plea for me not to go flashed through my mind like a firecracker. Yuna-Hime was the evil creature. She was that thing that sucked the blood from Meiko’s neck.

I flew out the entrance of the keep, past the rock garden, which was now heaped full of glistening snow. The snowing had stopped, and the sky was clear, revealing a blood orange full moon rising above the fanglike mountain peaks in front of me. I pushed the heavy iron studded doors open but stopped in my tracks, widened my eyes and cried out in horror.

Three large white wolves, tongues lolling from slobbering, ravening mouths running towards me from where I would have made my escape. Their sudden appearance caused me to fall backwards and hit my ass against the slushy stone path. They slowed their fast gallop to a slow slinking walk, threatening me with bared teeth. Demonic guardians, not to keep anyone out, but to keep me in.

I got to my feet and walked backwards slowly, holding out both hands as if to calm them from attacking. When I passed the threshold, I swung the gate shut.

The wolves howled angrily from outside as I collapsed with my back to the gate. Shadows cast from the moonlit rocks and bonsai trees in the garden seemed to dance, as if possessed by some spirit. I felt as if the Princess was somehow there, in those shadows, watching me, laughing at me, just as she was in those wolves outside, threatening me for trying to make my escape. I was hopeless. I came here searching for a murderer, and I found her. Only now I will be the next victim.

Through my bleary eyes, I saw her blurred shape walk towards me. She knelt down at my side, put a hand on my shoulder and said, “do not worry, Lieutenant Hinata. I do not wish to hurt you.”

***

I didn’t remember sleeping, but I stirred awake in the futon in my bedroom. The shoji doors were opened out to the private bedroom garden. The deep fresh snow glittered like a crust of fine diamond in the high sun. The sky was a bright, uplifting blue, as if ignorant to the horrors of my new prison. Despite the events of last night, I felt refreshed.

My revolver had found its way into the holster and sat at the foot of my futon.

I put on the cotton yukata and left my room, leaving the gun behind, in a listless attempt to find the princess and confront whatever destiny would befall me. I walked first to the dining room and found on the table a breakfast of rice and a tamagoyaki omelet, a warm tea and a card on which was written a quick note — I will find you in the evening. Please do not wait for me. – Yuna

My appetite wasn’t there, but as I had nothing else to do, I sat and ate. I ate quietly, letting the events of the night before race through my mind and tried to straighten out what exactly I had gotten myself into. I accepted, for a start, that I had entered some supernatural realm, ruled over by a supernatural creature, an evil spirit, or a demon perhaps, invulnerable to my bullets. Yes — now that I was more collected, and now that I’m sure that Yuna has no plan to kill, at least immediately, my only chance of survival was with my wit.

Given Yuna’s indication that she would seek me out in the evening, I now knew the length of time I had to find an escape route. In parallel, I would also use the time to discover Meiko’s fate. After the quick breakfast I began my investigation in earnest. I went first to explore the castle on the southern side, where I knew the castle to hang over a large precipice and found a large bedroom with a magnificent balcony over at least a thousand feet of air or so. The vista around me was magnificent. In every direction there were improbably steep mountain spires, with snow blanketed pine trees and fir hanging in every deep crevice, and fog that seemed to be the expirations from the trees, floating through in wispy veils among the treetops. A silver thread of a river ran in the valley far below through the ancient forests, where there were red and yellow deciduous trees scattered like drops of paint among the dark evergreens. The snow had not reached the base of the valley. The view was stunning, but nothing was there that would help my cause for escape.

With further exploration, I found an inner vast courtyard, with rows of skeletal pear trees. Here, a pleasant stream of water trickled from a conduit that came from beyond the castle wall and into a beautiful little sozu, a water feature in which the trickling water filled up a bamboo shishi-odoshi clapper, which in turn slowly lowered to dump the water contents into a koi pond and came back up, clapping against a backstop, disturbing the snowy silence with a polite ‘tok-tok-tok-tok’ that echoed off the castle walls. In the summer and fall fruiting months, the clapper would serve a practical purpose, scaring off crows and squirrels and other wild pests that would scavenge the orchard fruits, but in the late fall snowy season, it served only to bring a Zen to those that would linger here. I stood a moment in the biting chill to appreciate my environment, and allow it to clarify my mind, before I continued across the unbroken snow to the other side of the courtyard, where a keep, identical in size and structure to the one I had just exited, stood.

I walked lightly through the snow. The snow made a pleasant crunching noise not unlike the sound the tatami made when one walked across those, which made me wonder if tatami mats were designed with this aesthetic in mind.

My cotton white tabi socks soaked through with melted snow by the time I crossed the snowy path, so I took my socks off and walked barefoot while I explored the second keep.

I walked up the many stories of the keep. Investigated every room that was open to me, ready to confront Yuna should she appear, but as the hours passed, I grew certain that I would not find her. In each room I peered out the windows to see if I could find an escape route beside the main gate, without much hope. I concluded that, being situated on a tall granite pillar, the castle could only be accessed by a single drawbridge. The sky served as an effective moat.

I discovered a large library with a vast collection of various books. I collected books randomly from the shelves and poured through them, sitting at a small table facing outwards towards the blue mountains, piling the finished ones into pillars on the floor, I did this for a long while, reading the interesting histories and myths within them. Knowing I had no chance of escape, I might as well entertain myself. I read until twilight came, the sun set into the distant mountains, and covered the landscape and sky in a rosy alpenglow hue. When my mind was exhausted, I rested on the tatami to watch the sunset. I was at peace, so I thought to stay. If the princess of death needed me this evening, she would find me here.

I doze to sleep watching the rays that pierced the sky fade into red, then purple, and black, and the first stars began to appear and twinkle in the sky.

I woke to soft sounds, like whispers in the dark shadows of the library, but heard nothing more. Moon beams fell gently on me. The moon light was soothing, and the warm tatami and the dusty books gave me a feeling of a haven. I felt that it was a room where, in centuries past, women sat and lived sweet lives, and prayed for their samurai who were far flung fighting brutal wars. From here I could look out to the east and the south onto the forests and mountains.

I thought I had drifted back into sleep but was startled by the sound again from the shadows. I sat up and peered timidly into the dark corners of the room to investigate the noise and saw nothing in the nocturnal room. The sound came again from behind me. Excited feminine whispers.

I turned swiftly and saw before the tall open windows, three silhouettes in the moonlight. They came closer to me, so that I could see that they three wore plain white kimono that were not tied by sashes, so flowed freely, doing nothing to cover their naked bodies.

They each had porcelain skin, and their teeth were like brilliant white pearls against the ruby of their lush lips and their bodies curved and thin.

I crawled backwards and trembled in shocked silence as the three supernatural women slowly approached. Their hairs were platinum white like the color of snow in a bright sun. Their eyes were vibrant in the moon, like jewels. The middle one and the tallest had eyes like deep sapphire. The second had verdant eyes of emerald, and the third, eyes of smooth amber. All three were youthful, beautiful, and moved not with the ancient grace with which the princess moved, but seductively, like predatory animals. They descended upon me with shrill echoing laughs that could not be made by human lips.

“I’ll go first,” cooed the sapphire eyed one in the middle with a honey-sweet voice. She clapped her hands excitedly and licked her lips.

“You went first last time,” the emerald-eyed one snapped. “It’s my turn now.”

The third one said, “sisters, let’s not worry about who goes first. There is plenty of her to satisfy us all.”

My limbs were frozen and my throat too tight to say a word. I simply whimpered as two on the side crawled alongside me like slender predators, and sapphire eyes crawled serpent-like onto my body.

“Hello, darling,” hissed her lips into my ear. Her hand raked the side of my face and I felt chills in my spine. I heard the wet sound of her tongue running over the bottom of her lips and felt her raking fangs as she drew her mouth down from my ear to my neck where I felt her breathing.

The other two held my arms down while sapphire eyes gently turned my face so that my bare neck showed more to her.

I was paralyzed. I could do nothing to resist. But I also felt a strange arousal come over me. Perhaps it was the overwhelming fatigue from the restless day and night, perhaps it was the raving madness that had finally descended upon me, or it was their dark magic, putting me in a trance, like flames might to a moth. Whatever it was, I admit, I was lured in.

I was aroused by the touch of their bodies, their fragrance of night blossoms, of being helplessly pinned down. Sapphire eyes held her mouth to my neck, lapped her tongue against my skin, as if to savor my taste. It filled me with such immense pleasure, that I felt a burning desire for more. Slowly, my yakuta came undone. I writhed in hopeless pleasure.

“Look! She loves it!” one remarked delightedly.

“Mmm… I love it too. I love how she tastes. I can’t wait to try more.”

Her canines raked against my skin sharply. I squirmed with languorous ecstasy, but suddenly another sensation swept through me like lightning. I felt a great energy enter the room like a violent storm.

My eyes opened, and the three women were launched off me with a hidden force, and they shrieked and sat hunched over each other against the wall like hunted wild animals. My heart stopped when I saw the twin glowing coals in the dark shadows. They emerged into the moonlight as the eyes of the princess. Her hand was stretched out towards the women, as if controlling them as a puppeteer might her puppets.

She clucked her tongue at them like an annoyed schoolteacher and said, “Awfully naughty of you to lay your hands on her when I explicitly instructed you to leave her be.”

Sapphire eyes laughed a soulless laugh and responded with a playful tone, “what is she to you Yuna-Hime? Look at her! Look how tasty she looks! You can’t throw a slab of meat to the wolves and not expect them to eat!”

“She is here as a guest. Now leave us, before I do something I might later regret.”

The three whimpered, complained, then laughed amongst themselves as they slinked into the shadows like stray dogs. Yuna crouched beside where I lay and gently wrapped my yakuta to cover my body.

“You shouldn’t wander in the castle alone at night,” Yuna chided softly.

“You could’ve told me there were other monsters in the castle beside you.”

“Yes. Well, somewhere between you shooting me and running off into wilderness, I must say, it slipped my mind.” She smiled.

I glowered at her.

“What are you?”

She didn’t respond immediately. She snapped her fingers, and candles burst into light. A cold brazier burst into a crackling roaring flame and the moonlit room suddenly turned orange. Shadows from the flames danced on the floor and the walls. She sat kneeling at the table and motioned silently for me to sit there with her. I sat.

“What do you suppose I am?” She finally asked.

“A vampire.”

She nodded. “Then that is what I may be.”

I gulped. “What do you want with me?”

She smiled. “I need your help.”

“Go on.”

She nodded. “I’ve been watching you for a while Etsuko Hinata. You are a talented detective. One with integrity. One with compassion. Which is to say, I need a person with your set of skills and your character, that I could put complete trust in. I need your help to accomplish what I had long desired to accomplish.”

She looked out with a melancholic expression at the moon. “Do you know who Taomi Kurosai is?”

I nodded. “Yeah. Commonly known as Taomi X. Head of the Kuroi Kiri gang. A brutal man.”

“That is a fitting superlative.”

“You know him?”

“He was once my husband. Two hundred years ago. Once, I suppose, we were in love. But those are days I find difficult to remember. I only remember the betrayal.”

“He betrayed you?”

“One could say it was I who betrayed him. But the brutal manner in which he punished my offense…”

A soft pain twisted her face.

“What happened?”

“I fell in love. He discovered her. Murdered her in front of my eyes.”

“But he let you live?”

“That was not his plan. He banished me to the forest for the wolves. He did not know, and neither did I at the time, the wolves were allied to the tree spirits, and these spirits pitied me. You see, my ancestors did well to honor them. So, the wolves became my friends, my guardians, and tree spirits imbued in me powers to have my vengeance. That is how I became what I am now. Shapeshifter. Bloodtaker. Vampire, as you put it.”

“Then you are immortal?”

She shook her head. “There are certain things to which I am vulnerable.” Wryly she added, “that is information I am not willing to share with you, yet.”

“Let me get this straight. you’ve been turned into a vampire to have your revenge. But it’s been two hundred years, and you’re still out for revenge, so…”

“My mistake has bred terrifying results,” she completed.

“What happened?”

“I came into his home with a plan to kill him. I went to his room. I took his blood. I did not know at the time, that by doing so, I would turn him.”

“Fuck. So Taomi X is a vampire.” I laughed incredulously.

She answered flatly. “Yes. And perhaps many more in his circle.”

“I don’t believe this.”

“I am asking you to believe it.”

“And what would you have me do? What can I, one cop, do against fucking vampire Yakuza?”

“Help me track him down. I will do the rest.”

“Hmm… I don’t know if I can. He hasn’t been answering my phone calls lately,” I said sardonically.

“You have a vested interest in helping, Lieutenant Hinata.”

“Yeah?” I crossed my arms.

“I could say that your life depends on it. But I prefer that we stay on good terms. That is, I assume, it’s the only way in which can ensure that you are productive.”

“Then what else could you possibly offer that would make me agree to help you?”

Her lips curled into a slanted smile.

“Would you like to avenge your parents’ deaths?”

That gave me a shuddering pause.

“If you help me with my revenge, I will help you with yours.”

“An offer I can’t refuse.”

“Good,” she grinned. She stood and bowed deeply and said, “That makes me happy. Well, there is another promise I have made to you that I must now fulfil.”

She glided out of the library and beckoned me to follow. Confused, I followed.

We exited the keep into the snowed orchard. The moon was full and hung above, sailing between calm, silver clouds giving a bright enough light to fully illuminate the snowy garden. The shishi-odoshi made its tapping sound. A gentle and slow snow fell.

The three white wolves from the night before sat at the entrance of the first keep, watching me. I suddenly recognized them by the colors of their eyes.

“Those wolves. They’re the women that tried to have me for dinner earlier, aren’t they?” I whispered to Yuna.

She nodded. “They are the Okami sisters. Guardians of the ancient forest and of me. They are shapeshifters too, but not originally human. They are not accustomed to our human etiquettes.”

“You don’t say.”

Then I spotted another pair of eyes glinting in the branches of a pear tree. The same black cat that snooped on me the previous day. It sprung from its perch onto the ground and sauntered over to me and sat at my feet, staring up into my eyes. From the way it looked at me, I realized who it was.

“Meiko?” I croaked.

The cat meowed. A brilliant blue flash blinded me, then when I opened my eyes again, she was there, crouched on the ground at first, rising up then giving me a smile and a wink.

It was her. It was Meiko.

“Hi Etsuko.”

I didn’t know how to react. All sorts of emotions washed over me, and I couldn’t comprehend any of it. Seeing my reaction, she laughed, then hugged me.

“You don’t know how happy it makes me that you came,” she said.

“I came here to solve your murder case,” I replied numbly.

“And now you have. Here I am. Not murdered! Case solved!”

I hugged her back. Kissed her on the cheek.

“I’m glad you’re alive,” I said. “But you have a lot of explaining to do.”

***

After the reunion, we had dinner. Meiko and I sat at one side. Yuna sat opposite. The three she-wolves that tried seducing me into becoming their meal earlier sat at another corner bickering over a piece of grilled salmon.

“Taomi Kurosai has built his army. He is untouchable, hiding behind an impenetrable defense. To get to him, I must build my own,” Yuna said.

“It’s a nice army,” I remarked staring at the three practically naked women. Emerald eyes heard the sarcasm and stuck her tongue out at me.

“Yuna-Hime, I wouldn’t even know where to begin. His gang is notoriously secretive. They don’t go by names. They make no public appearances. They don’t even allow any tattoos that would mark them as members. They live in the ‘Shadow Realm’.”

“Shadow Realm?” Yuna asked.

“Inside joke at the PD. Not a real shadow realm. At least as far as I know.”

“I see.”

“And I’m just one detective. Oh, a suspended detective by the way.”

Amber eyes started, “If she can’t help us, then can we –”

“No,” Yuna interrupted. “She’s not food. She is an ally.”

Amber eyes shrugged, winked at me as she chewed on a chunk of salmon she held with both her hands.

“It’s just…,” I sighed. “It’s just, it’ll take some time.”

Meiko put her hand on my lap. “You will have help,” she reassured. Yuna nodded in agreement.

“So, the plan is to kill Taimo X…”

“The plan is to fully set right what I have wronged.”

“You mean, kill every member he has turned? How many is that?”

“I don’t know.”

I exhaled apprehensively. “Let me guess, they can all shapeshift.”

Yuna nodded. “Yes.”

“They can all turn others into vampires.”

“Yes.”

“They are all immune to bullets.”

“Practically, yes.”

“And how many do you have on your side?”

“Meiko, you, the Okami sisters.”

I waited for her to say more, but she stopped speaking, and only smiled at me, waiting for my response.

“That’s it?”

She nodded.

“There won’t be many of them. He will understand the danger of turning others. I suppose only those most loyal to him, he will have turned,” she said.

“Yuna-Hime, I don’t think you understand. There are thousands in the Kuroi Kiri.”

“If they are not turned, then they are inconsequential.”

“How do we know which ones had turned?”

“To find out will be your task,” Yuna said and bowed with thanks.

***

After dinner, I retired to my room. The bath was hot, so I took a long one, and promised myself that if I got out of this alive, I would make the onsen a regular treat. The snow fell in fat wet flakes, dissolving quickly in the water as they hit it and fell on my face from time to time leaving a sharp momentary coldness that was a pleasant contrast to the heat of the bath.

I tried taking my mind off how I should proceed and what would happen if I failed (likely a brutal death — Koji Tanaka’s grotesque end comes to mind), but I couldn’t.

A small part of me held out hope that this was all just a weird dream. But I was also happy. I was still hostage to Yuna, the vampire princess, sure, but knowing that Meiko was alive and well made that bitter pill easy to swallow.

After finishing the bath and drying off, I wrapped myself in my yukata and went to slide the shoji shut, but then a black cat hopped through the door. I finished sliding it shut, and Meiko transformed into her human self.

“Ugh, finally I’m able to get some alone time with you,” she said. She came to me held my face and sighed as she kissed me.

“I’m sorry,” she muttered between kisses.

“Sorry for what?”

“For all this.”

“It’s not your fault.”

She smiled at me. “Thanks. That sounds good coming from you. But –”

“But nothing. I’m happy you’re alive. Aren’t you happy?”

“Yes.”

I leaned against the wall, crossed my arms and spoke in a hushed tone. “What is she like?”

“Who? Yuna-Hime?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, she’s like us, you know?”

“What do you mean?”

“An outcast.”

“How does she treat you?”

“She saved me.”

Meiko walked over to me, leaned against the wall with me. Coyly, she dragged her fingers up and down my arm.

“She treats me with dignity and respect. She treats me like a person. Not something I’m used to back in Tokyo. She’s a broken soul, you know. That’s why I like her. Its why I trust her.”

“She’s using you.”

“I agreed to help. Didn’t you agree to help?”

“For a price. Yes. What was your price?”

Meiko kissed me tenderly on the cheek.

“Like I said, she saved me. I owe it to her. I would do anything for her.”

Meiko ran out to the middle of the room, giggled cheerfully and spun a pirouette with her arms freely outstretched. “Oh, Etsuko. I feel just wonderful. I wish you could feel what I feel.”

She stopped spinning, stumbled dizzily, then blew her messy bangs from her eyes. She looked me up and down, bit her lip, and came over and pressed her body to mine, kissed me deeply, putting her tongue in my mouth.

She went to her knees. Unraveled my sash, tossed it aside so that my yukata came loose to reveal my semi-dry body to her. She kissed my abdomen. I uttered a moan. She went lower, spread my pussy folds apart with her fingers, slid her tongue in, sliding it down to my hole then up to my clit. I tightened up, braced against the wall, ran my fingers through her hair.

“Fuck…” I sighed. She smiled while she licked me. Her eyes gleamed with excitement, seeing me in so much pleasure by her tongue.

A minute or so of this, she stopped and led me to my futon, laying me down, kissing my body up and down, while simultaneously removing her kimono, impatiently so, almost tearing it as she tore it off her body.

When she was finally naked, she thrusted her body against mine, rubbing her clit against mine. She gazed into my eyes. She breathed hard, exhaling sharply through her mouth. I breathed hard too.

I spread my legs apart and clutched her back to hold her tightly to me while we moved together, rubbing our breasts, and our pussies together.

Our breathing was rapid, our moans were loud. Our bodies became moist with perspiration. As we entered the plateau, and on the verge of climax, she uttered, “I love you, Etsuko.”

I uttered back, “I love you too, Meiko.”

She smiled, then kissed me. She kissed me on the mouth, and then the neck. I felt the wave of orgasm rushing forward. My legs tightened. My pussy tightened. She thrusted harder, faster, kissed me all over. My nose, my chin, my ear, then my neck.

I felt her lips lock onto my neck. I felt her warm tongue. Then the grazing of her teeth. Her canines. First it was soft, then a sudden sharp, electric pain into my neck.

“Ow! Fuck!” I yelled. I pushed her off me.

I put my hand to my neck and with horror and looked down at my palm to see that she had drawn blood. I put my hand back on my neck to feel if there was any gushing blood and was relieved when there wasn’t. She hadn’t punctured my artery, though she was close to doing so.

She licked her lips, still breathing heavy, seeming disoriented, confused about what was happening, as if instinct had momentarily overridden her conscious. Her canines were long and pointed like fangs, slowly shrinking back to their normal size.

“What the fuck do you think you’re doing, Meiko?”

She looked flustered, her face reddened, by my reaction.

“I just thought, I don’t know, I thought you wanted it.”

“No. I don’t.”

Her lips thinned. Her face twisted in shame. “Oh. I see. I’m sorry.”

I wrapped my yukata around my body tightly. Meiko slid her kimono on and stood wringing her hands nervously.

“Did Yuna put you up to it?” I asked, angrily.

“No! I swear. I don’t know what came over me.”

“Yeah. Ok. Well, don’t fucking do it,” I chided.

“Sorry,” she replied meekly. “I’ll go now.”

She slid the shoji door open a crack.

“Good night, Etsuko,” she squeaked, then transformed into a cat, and slid through the crack and pounced up onto a maple tree branch, then to the top of the castle wall. I saw her eyes glint in the orange light, before she turned and hopped off the wall to the other side.

Chapter 4. The Dream

I tossed and turned that night for hours. The wind had picked up and buffeted hard against the castle wall, and the castle itself seemed alive with all its creaking and groaning. Wolves howling came from all parts of the mountain forests. Howling came also from just outside my bedroom. The sound was piercing, almost deafening. I suspected they were the Okami sisters joining in on the haunting symphony.

I wasn’t sure what time it was that I finally was able to drift to sleep, but when I did, I dreamt a memory that did not belong to me.

It was a spring evening in my dream, and the castle was buzzing with festivity. Yuna-Hime sat in a prominent place, in a pink and purple royal kimono, beside a man that I vaguely recognized as Taomi Kurosai – Taomi X. It was an event, a banquet of some sort. Many noblemen and women sat at their seats drinking sake and being boisterous, while servants hurried around with drinks and food.

I found I was able to walk around freely, so I began exploring the dreamscape, finding myself in the orchard, where the pear trees were blush with white blossoms, and the blossoms fell like snow in the Spring breeze. Children played and laughed and shrieked as they ran around the trees with their toys. A joyful sound I hadn’t heard in so long, that it was jarring.

Yuna wandered out to the orchard to watch the playing children. Blossoms fell onto her shoulders and her hair. A small child ran to her and dragged on her kimono. Grinning widely, she knelt and handed the child a piece of candy and the child skipped off.

A woman and a man came to her. Though they wore traditional kimonos, I could tell that they were foreigners. They introduced themselves as Henry and Sophia.

Both were tall, and Sophia’s golden blonde hair was long and worn in a thick braid. Likely, they dignitaries from some European country.

I perked up and watched intently as the countess greeted them. Sophia’s back was turned to me, but by the way she kept her attention on the man, yet her eyes would dart furtively back towards the woman, even I could tell, it was love at first sight.

Henry and Sophia bowed deeply and made their way back to the castle. Sophia glanced secretly back towards Yuna and I saw the unmistakable look of curiosity.

Wanting to get a better look at the woman who would be Yuna’s lover, I followed them, but then the room vanished from view, and another vision colored in the darkness. A grassy hillside warmed by a brilliant sun. The castle gleamed in the distance in the cool shadows of the surrounding mountains.

When my eyes adjusted to the vibrant scenery, I found Yuna sitting next to Sophia on a blanket in the tall grass. A woven basket sat beside them, filled with freshly cut alpine wildflowers.

They talked intimately, and laughed, and then came a momentary silence between them. A shared desire revealed itself in the silence. Yuna leaned over and kissed Sophia timidly on the lips. Sophia first winced, and appeared ready to run, but then, with a change of heart, kissed her back. The kiss turned messy. They tumbled into the tall grass, ripped the clothes from their bodies. My view was mostly blocked by the grass, but I saw skin, naked breasts, naked legs, and passionate, uninhibited lovemaking.

I turned away at first, embarrassed by my voyeurism, but curiosity overcame me, and since this was a dream after all, I permitted myself to watch. But before I could get a good look they vanished in a black swirl, and another scene came.

A bloodcurdling scream startled me. I was in a bedroom. A pool of dark red blood grew on the tatami next to a crumpled naked body of a young woman in a blood-stained dress. It was Sophia, and standing above her, with a wakizashi short sword in his hand, was Taomi X, breathing hard, and with disbelief in in his fainting eyes. His face was pale.

The source of the scream was Yuna.

She reached out to Sophia in vain, but Taomi grabbed her and pulled her back down onto the floor by her hair.

“You did this!” he screamed. “You killed her!” His voice was maniacal. The blade trembled in his hand.

Yuna stared in a stunned silence at Sophia, who, to my horror, was still alive, gulping for air, fruitlessly as her neck had been sawed open, and blood frothed out from it. Her trembling hand reached out for Yuna, but then collapsed limply.

As Sophia expired, Taomi X advanced on Yuna and raised the sword as if to strike down with a vicious swing, but he stopped suddenly, and mumbled, not to Yuna, but to himself in a maddened rage. “A quick death is not a suitable punishment for the shame she has brought me. No not for her. She must suffer for this.”

The sword fell, clattering to the ground next to the growing pool of blood. Yuna crumbled, mouthing a silent scream of pain.

Taomi X grabbed her by the collar and dragged her off the tatami and into the hallway and the scene swirled into blackness again.

The next vision was at night in a dark forest. Like the great copper red eye of the fire demon, the blood moon peered down from behind thick boughs of trees. Yuna lay against a moss covered stone, weeping, her body heaving uncontrollably. Her kimono ripped and splattered with mud. Soon, a loud howl penetrated the night. Then howls from two other locations joined the first in a banshee chorus.

Shortly, three white wolves emerged from the darkness, walking, head lowered, towards Yuna. She cried out in vain at the sight of them. She got up to run but tripped on the frayed hem of her kimono. She turned onto her back, and scrambled desperately, tossing sticks, rocks and clumps of moss at the approaching wolves.

The wolves were, of course, undeterred. They circled her, sniffing the ground, and the air, seeming curious as to what she was, and what she was doing here, unsure of her edibility.

Yuna, backed up against a tree, thinking she was at the end of her rope, bowed her head in defeat and waited for the wolves to rip her apart. But the wolves did not attack.

Instead, they sat in a circle around her, made whimpering noises, compelled by some master. They turned their heads out to the deep forest and waited.

Shimmering blue orbs of lights shone through the tree trunks. They were soon countless, emerging out from the forest into the tiny grove, surrounding Yuna and the wolves, bathing the forest in their blue light, seeming to whisper to one another. I recognized the orbs for what they were: the tree spirits.

Soon, the closest ones went to her. They entered her body. As they did so, she screamed terribly. Her skin began to glow blue. The wolves stretched out their necks to bay at the blood moon that hung above.

Anyone listening to the sounds that echoed off the sheer mountains could only imagine the most horrifying things occurring in the valley of the ancient forest. They might imagine it to be an omen of a coming calamity. They would not be wrong. That was the promise made to Yuna-Hime by the tree spirits.

That night, Yuna took the form of a nightingale and entered the bedroom she once shared with her husband.

He was sleeping in the company of a concubine. The peace with which he slept enraged her. How could he do so, after the death and despair he brought to two people simply because they were in love?

She transformed back into human form and crawled stealthily to lay beside him.

She was fully conscious of the powers imbued to her. The power to shift into animal form. The extraordinary physical strength and agility. The power to drain the life from a person’s body.

He stirred awake at the touch of her palm to his mouth, and his eyes widened when he saw her. She held him down, as her canines grew into razor sharp fangs.

His concubine woke and let out a bloodcurdling scream when she recognized what she was seeing: Yuna-Hime hunched over, sucking up the hot blood from a gushing wound.

Chapter 5. Kitsune

I woke with a clear understanding that the dream was another person’s memory. Yuna’s memory. If its purpose was to fill me with an overwhelming grief for her, it served that purpose well. I was in tears. I was heartbroken for her.

But I didn’t have too much time to think on it. Something didn’t feel right about the silent night. The wind had stopped, but there was something else.

I sat up abruptly. My eyes darted left and right. Nothing was amiss in the room. I stood, grabbed my handgun, rotated the cylinder to make sure the first of both of my remaining rounds was chambered, then, leaning against the door at an angle down the long part of the hallway, I slid it open. I saw nothing, so I stepped out.

“Princess Yuna?” I called out. “Meiko?”

The wood floor creaked behind me. I swung around, A flash of a shadow, and then a hard hit to my head.

I fell to the ground, felt warm blood trickle down my left temple, but by a miracle I was still conscious and aware. I still had my revolver in my hand. I rolled back into the bedroom and sprung to a crouched position and aimed the gun towards the dark entrance.

Laughter echoed in the hall, and from the shadow came out two figures. A woman with onyx hair with sharp purple tips, sharp eyebrows, clad in jet black leather, resting a shimmering katana on her shoulder. Beside her a muscular man with a similarly styled hair, also leather clad. His sword was sheathed, but he wore vicious pointed brass knuckles.

“Well, well, well… isn’t this a pleasant surprise.” said the woman. “Here we were, thinking the bitch might’ve already put you out of your misery.”

“Who are you,” I demanded through gritted teeth.

I felt my blood slowly stream down the side of my face and drip off my chin.

The woman laughed sharply. From her pocket, she fished out a folded piece of paper and flung it at my feet. Still holding my gun at them, I knelt to pick it up. Without needing to read it, I recognized it right away. It was the note I had left in my apartment with this castle’s latitude and longitude.

Though I wouldn’t have possibly known what sort of danger leaving that note might later put me in, I now felt like an idiot. Seeing these two now, in the manner that they are dressed, and with the impression they gave of a willingness to dole out any amount of cruelty they pleased, I knew who they were. Kuroi Kiri. My face went hot with anger at my own stupidity. I had given up Yuna’s location.

“What do you want?”

“To express our gratitude for your help.”

They came at me. I shot my two rounds, hitting the woman square in the chest. But just as with Yuna the other night, she only stumbled backwards.

She straightened up and wagged her finger at me. “Tsk, tsk, tsk…”

Then with the butt of her katana, hit me over the head, knocking me out.

***

I came to in a cold dungeon. My arms and legs fastened to chains in a spread-eagle fashion on a slab of stone. I was naked. I breathed out a puff of condensation. The cold bit at my skin.

I smelled wood and resin burning and heard the roaring of a large fire. I craned my neck to look out the dungeon window behind me. It was night out, but I saw the sky glowed orange and black smoke pluming up rapidly. The castle was on fire, and they had left me shackled here to die in the flames.

I struggled against the chains, but I was tied too tightly to move at all. The cold cuffs cut into my wrists and ankles.

“Dammit!” I screamed. It was hopeless. There was nothing I could do. I would die here.

My thoughts went to the others — Yuna, Meiko and the Okami sisters, and wondered, as a hopeful consolation, if they had escaped. It would be a comfort to know if that was true. But it was anxiety-inducing not knowing for sure and I was here, strapped helpless to a cold slab of stone, waiting for my death by fire — an end at the hands of Yakuza. Vampire Yakuza no less. It was painful to think about, not because of how I would go (likely by smoke inhalation), but because it felt untimely and undeserved. Taken out before I could even get started. It was not self-pity I felt, but a deep-seated rage.

I was all but submitted to my fate when I heard a soft mewling. I craned my neck to look backwards and saw Meiko sitting in the dungeon windowsill.

“Meiko! Oh, am I happy to see you!” I exclaimed. “Here, take these cuffs off me.”

She hopped down and transformed into human form. Her eyes were teary from weeping. She ran to me and kissed me all over my face and nuzzled her face into my arm tightly.

“They took her,” she cried in a trembling voice.

“What?”

“Yuna-Hime. They took her. There were too many of them…”

“I’m so sorry, Meiko. It was all my fault.”

She shook her head. “Don’t say that.”

She caressed me, then, as if just noticing my restraints, she gasped and said, “Oh! How do I free you?”

“A key. Do you see a key anywhere?”

She looked around the dungeon, walked around frantically, pulling at her hair.

She shook her head. “No, no. I don’t see anything. They must have taken it.”

“Maybe there’s something to break the cuffs.”

Inspecting the cuffs and the chains, I saw that they were a solid iron. What I needed was a bolt cutter, but I wasn’t holding out hope for one.