A/N: Thank you to everyone who has voted for this story on the inkitt fanfiction novel contest! (Please keep voting if you haven't at inkitt dot com slash fandom2, scroll down to find The Other World.) As a token of my appreciation, here's another chapter early :)
A little girl wandered the forest, crying for her parents. Chihiro appeared before her and took the girl by the hand. She did not have the body she was used to. Her hands were older and the skin cracked and hardened from wind and cold, and her body beneath the heavy robe she wore was weary. The girl's hand, still chubby with baby fat, felt smooth and soft on her own. She bent before the girl and wiped away her tears with a bell-shaped sleeve, and then led the girl up the mountain. The girl would not survive. Her parents weren't coming back. They couldn't afford to feed both her and her baby brother, and they'd wanted a boy. The girl was too young to understand. Some of them, a little older but still only seven or eight, came knowing what was happening. Knowing they were being abandoned by their loved ones. The parents were sometimes crying, too, as they said goodbye to their daughters, leaving them in the care of the mountain spirit. Sometimes they left the old ones as well. The grandparents who were too old to work for their keep.
The spirit of the forest spent all of her time crying now, and never came out, so Chihiro wandered the forest day after day in her stead. She couldn't take them all in. She could only comfort them and release their spirits in their sleep, as painlessly as possible.
Chihiro woke to darkness. She sat up slowly, the dream burning bright in her mind. She thought she knew who she had been, in the dream. It wasn't the first time she'd seen through his eyes. It had felt the same this time, only wearier. He was older. And the girl, the forest spirit in his mind, whoever she was, she was sick. I have to find them. It's not his fault, or her fault either. The man who committed suicide, it's too late to save him. And the girl on the mountainside just now, it's too late for her too. But the mountain, and the forest. Maybe I can still help them.
Chihiro put her hands out and felt around her. Her fingertips met a rough stone wall. As her eyes adjusted, a single thin line of light appeared beneath what she could only assume was the door. Beyond that door, there were voices. One of them sounded male.
"You have done well, my dear, to bring me the girl." The voice was soft and cold, sending shivers down Chihiro's spine.
"Thank you, Master," said a meek voice. A woman's voice.
Master. That was Akuma talking, then?
"I am not finished," the cold voice snapped. "You left witnesses. You were fully aware that there were witnesses, yet you did not take care of them as soon as you were aware of their presence."
He must mean Yumi and her boyfriend, Chihiro thought. Please let them be okay.
"But they were innocent!" the woman protested.
"They saw," the cold voice hissed. There was a little strangled noise, then the thump of a body hitting the ground. Chihiro muffled a gasp. Over the woman's ragged breathing, the voice continued, softly: "It is no matter. Their memories have been erased. As your reward for bringing me the girl, I will indulge in your silly notions of innocence." He spat out the word 'innocence' like it was poison.
Suddenly, his voice was sweet again. Chihiro found this even more frightening than when the voice was cruel. At least the cruelty was honest. "What are you doing on the floor, my dear Kitsune? It's time to prepare the spell. She'll need it within the hour, and we want to take good care of her, don't we?"
The woman picked herself up with a rustle of silk. "Yes, Master." She walked away, her footsteps uneven and echoing slightly. Stronger footsteps strode off in the opposite direction.
Chihiro listened carefully for any other movement on the other side of the door, but heard nothing. So after a while, she got up carefully, and pushed gently on the door. It moved. Chihiro drew her hand back. She hadn't expected it to actually open. Before her imagination could fill her mind with nightmares, she pushed open the door. Its weight resisted her slightly but it opened without creaking. The room beyond could've been any traditional Japanese study. It was dark, a single lamp cast shadows from the desk, but Chihiro could tell without seeing that the quality of the furnishings was higher than anything she'd seen before. Everything just seemed perfect, like it had grown that way. Another door nearby revealed a bright hallway leading to the rest of… wherever she was.
In the end what drew Chihiro through the doorway were the bookshelves that lined the study's walls. She was picking her way across the floor when she heard footsteps behind her. She spun around. The red-haired bartender and stationary store-keeper stood silhouetted in the doorway, looking just as stunned as Chihiro felt. She carried a tray.
"You're not supposed to be out here," the woman whispered. The tray shook in her hands.
"Kitsune," Chihiro whispered back. The woman flinched. "You shouldn't let anybody treat you that way."
The woman, Kitsune, placed the tray on a table and closed the door behind her. As she turned, the light outside the room illuminated her face, and Chihiro saw a dark bruise spreading up from her neck where she had been strangled.
"Why do you serve him, if he just hurts you? You deserve better than that," Chihiro said softly when the door closed.
"And serving humans is better?" Kitsune said. Then the anger faded from her face, and she sighed. "I don't have any choice," she said. "I'm sorry about your friends. I hope they're safe."
"You can always choose again. As can humans. As some of us have," Chihiro said.
Kitsune shook her head. "Go back in there, and eat some of this. You must be hungry." She picked up the tray and herded Chihiro back into the cell with it. In the faint light from the lamp, Chihiro could see a small mat at the back of the cell meant for a bed and a bucket in the corner. A candle in its stand stood in another corner. Kitsune handed the tray to Chihiro. There was a bowl of rice on it, topped with something. "It's only sleeping potion," she said, as if to reassure Chihiro. She lit the candle. Then she touched Chihiro's arm, whether in appreciation or apprehension Chihiro couldn't tell, and left. The door closed behind her. Chihiro touched it. It wasn't locked.
Chihiro looked at the food. It smelled good. She was starving. She didn't know how long she had been unconscious, and she didn't know how long ago it was that she last ate. So she ate it, and then she slept. Kitsune had told the truth – it was only a sleeping spell.
Haku was frightened. Not of Yubaba, no. She cared about Chihiro in her own way, though not more than she cared about the money coming in. She would come around. Besides, she was right. He didn't know the first thing about using the powers he now had. He would not be so overconfident now. No. He was frightened of himself. He hadn't realized the effect his anger would have on the water around him until he had felt the tengu die, and it frightened him how satisfying it had felt. Did all dragons feel so… feral? he wondered.
He followed the bathwater into the river, where the ferry was carrying its third load of passengers of the night into the spirit world. Still more spirits were queued at next to the North Gate, waiting for the boat to take them to the vibrant town that had sprung up at the crossing point. He wove through the emigrants into the Human World.
It hadn't been real to him until this moment, crossing the Gate where an impenetrable barrier had met him years before, that he had a home again.
Past the Gate, he was alone. Lesser spirits could not assume physical forms in the human world, except as the object or animal they embodied. Only the kami, the spirits of the earth, were able to, and even then often chose not to.
Haku felt the breeze on his face. Remembering his last encounter with a wind sister – aurai, the Greeks called them - he held out his hand. This one was older and more cautious than the first. It touched Haku's hand, darted to his face, back to his hand, and circled around. Haku stood patiently. It reminded Haku of the little silvery fish that lived in his river before… Haku stopped the thought. It was still too raw a memory, even now. He took a deep breath, calming himself. He could not afford to scare the wind sister away.
"Sister wind," Haku said. The wind blew into the treetops in fright, making the leaves rustle. "I won't hurt you. I just want to talk to you."
The leaves rustled again to show that the wind was still there, listening.
"I need to know what happened to a dear friend of mine – a girl named Chihiro who was in Ueno Park earlier today, in Tokyo. Will you help?"
There was a strong wind and then the air was still. The wind had left. Whether it would return remained to be seen. Having done all he could, Haku sat down against the stone guardian statue, where eons ago it seemed, he had found Chihiro sitting there, asleep, to wait.
In the forest, a ring of children holding hands laughed and sang some nursery rhyme as they ran. The forest was still young. Chihiro could almost see the leaves on the saplings growing as the children sang. The mountain rose up behind her, and beyond the forest was the village where many of the children came from. Chihiro, even in the dream, was lucid enough to recognize the place, though it must have been thousands of years before the other dreams. She had seen it in recently enough in the news. It was almost as much a symbol of Japan as the rising sun on the flag. And she was the soul of this place. The littlest girl ran up to Chihiro and took her hand. "Oniisan!" she said with a wide smile, and pulled Chihiro up to the circle. "Play with us!" The other children bowed, but then lost their formality and they ran and played and laughed, even though they had to crane their necks to look up at her, she was one of them. They were friends. Friends. Chihiro was shocked by the joy that ran through her at the thought.
Then the sky darkened and it started to rain. The other children (human children, Chihiro realized) ran down the mountain with their arms over their heads, shrieking. They left Chihiro and the little girl alone on the mountainside. "Mommy," the girl pouted, "we were playing!" A woman formed out of the rain and scooped up the girl into her arms. "The plants are thirsty," she said. "Weren't you thirsty, Aokigahara?" "I guess so," admitted the girl, looking around at the little trees. "And if the plants are thirsty, then your friends won't have anything to eat during the winter." The woman took Chihiro's (still young, Chihiro noticed) hand with her left hand, held Aokigahara in her right, and together they walked up the mountain.
Chihiro woke up, feeling a powerful sense of deja vu. The woman had been beautiful and kind. She had been wearing a long flowing kimono that reminded Chihiro of another she'd seen before… Chihiro had seen that exact image once before, when Haku had been telling her about… his mother. Was that his mother? She was a rain spirit then. And the little girl. That would make her Haku's sister. Aokigahara. She had heard that name somewhere before, perhaps in class?
Then she realized that she had learned it by another name, that it was the name of the forest, and she knew why the forest's spirit was sick. She couldn't stay in this room. She had to go talk to Fujisan.
Shika's parents returned to make sure he was properly dressed about an hour before "dinner." They had prepared a feast that even Yubaba would envy. Shika felt sick. It wasn't even because there was nothing green on the table. It was the sheer extravagance. This was precisely the reason he and his parents didn't get along. He hated trying to impress people and playing host and guest. But still, he found himself in a formal green kimono and bowing as she came in the door. Her parents followed.
Even though Shika was feeling antagonistic toward the whole situation, he could not deny that she was beautiful. And familiar. Was it something about her face? Shika was sure he had seen her somewhere before. Was she one of Risuni's friends, or maybe he had met her once at court? He stared at her in confusion all throughout dinner, saying the right things at the right times to both sets of parents without having to think much about it. She did the opposite, and kept her gaze down at her food. Shika's parents watched this in approval - their son was showing interest and the girl was properly modest – so after the meal, the parents decided to leave the two young people alone while they retired elsewhere to talk. By that point, all of Shika's antagonistic feelings had died away.
"Have we met before?" Shika asked, once they were alone. He had completely missed the introduction in the haze of trying to figure out who she was.
"I'm sorry," she muttered, still refusing to look at him.
"For what?" he asked, confused.
She took a deep breath and looked straight at Shika. "I was at Swamp Bottom. I followed you and Chihiro into the haze. I followed her after you left and put a spell in her and her friends' drinks to get them away from the crowd. And then I took her to him." All of the breath went out of her in an instant. "I didn't know."
Her candor astonished Shika. He finally recognized the color of her bright red hair. "What didn't you know?" Shika asked after a long pause.
"Everything," she said. "I didn't know what humans were like. I didn't know that she would understand me. I had know idea she would care. And he's planning to close the Gate! I never would've done it, if I'd known. I shouldn't've overheard this at all, but he wants to sever the worlds completely. You probably don't believe me. I didn't think it was possible, I just wanted… I mean, I might have wanted that fifty years ago, when they were cutting down my trees." She shuddered. "I thought I would die for certain. But after I talked to Chihiro I checked, and they've been slowly planting them back. The little ones aren't doing so well, since I've been absent... I can't just leave them!"
Shika knew how easy it was for a forest spirit to talk tenderly and endlessly about each and every one of the trees and animals in his forest, from personal experience, and appreciated that she left off there.
"What did you think would happen, if you helped him?" he said.
She wrung her hands. "I don't know. My parents suggested it. The humans killed my brother. And he was so persuasive. I thought he could keep me safe. You're a forest too. You have to understand. They were cutting down my trees. They're like children to me. More than children."
Shika nodded. "In that case," he said. "Will you help me? You said you talked to Chihiro."
She nodded.
The voices of the parents in another part of the cave reminded them that they weren't completely alone, and they had talked in low voices. Now the intonation of these voices told them that the parents were concluding their conversation.
"How can I get in touch with you?" Shika whispered.
"I'll meet you in the void. Tomorrow evening," the girl whispered back. She stood up to leave.
"Wait," Shika said, rising as well. "I don't know your name."
"Kitsune," she said.
"I'm Shika," Shika said.
Kitsune smiled. "I know."
Haku opened his eyes. His hair billowed in the lively breeze. The wind sister was back. A small rabbit was snuffled at his feet.
"Do you have news for me, sister wind?" Haku said. The wind blew harder, knocking the little rabbit head over heels.
"Ow, Oneesannn," the rabbit complained, rubbing its ear with a hind paw. Haku smiled. The rabbit reminded him of little Kojika. It turned to Haku. "Oneesan says the girl left Oo-eno Park with another girl and a boy, and then went into the city and into a store. What's a store?"
"Humans go there to exchange pieces of paper for stuff they need," Haku explained.
"What's paper?" the rabbit asked. The wind blew again impatiently. "Fine, fine. And then the three of them went into another store, except the other Onesan said it was a trap in disguise. She said a red-haired lady built the trap right before the girls and the boy walked in. And then after a while the store disappeared and there were only the boy and the other girl lying on the ground."
"And does Oneesan know where the girl and the red-haired lady are now?"
"I don't think so. Oneesan didn't say."
"Is that right, sister wind?" Haku asked. The wind made the grass bob as if nodding.
"Oneesan says yes," the little rabbit said.
"Thank you, sister wind," Haku said. "And thank you, too, little one," he said, patting the rabbit on the head. "You've been a big help." He stood up, bowed to them, and walked back through the Gate.