Akemi had another sneezing fit the minute she entered the storeroom. The
dust in here seemed thicker than it had around the rest of the mansion,
and it shifted around the floor in little balls as they moved. After the
encounter with the apparition in the hallway, none of them was feeling
particularly like wandering the mansion anymore, and at the moment it
seemed within their best interests to stay where they were and think
things through.
"What do you think it was?" Akemi said. Eien shrugged and Isamu shook his head.
"If I didn't know better, I'd have said it was a..."
"Don't say it" Eien interrupted him "We're freaked out enough as it is, let's not go making it any worse." Isamu nodded.
"I don't want to seem weird," Akemi said, "but I can't help but wonder if that's what that newspaper article was talking about, the one about the family that moved away I mean." Eien nodded.
"Could be," he said, thinking it over "but I still don't get it. Ghosts don't exist right? I mean there's no proof of life after death and I wont believe in them until proven otherwise."
"What was that then?! You tell me what that... that THING back there was!!! If that's not a ghost then I don't know what is!!!" Isamu shouted, shaking with nerves.
"There's no proof it was a ghost Isamu," Eien said, trying to remain calm but unable to hide the shake in his voice "It could have been a trick of the light, shadows, anything!"
"Oh! Well, call me a freak but I think that's highly unlikely Eien. It looked solid for a start, it left streaks of blood on the walls, it floated, it chased us, do you want more proof??"
"Yes please! More proof would be great! In fact, why don't you go back out there and get your Casper friend to come back here and show us some of his ghostly magic?"
"Hell no! You go back out there! I'm not going anywhere!"
"Will you two SHUT UP?!" The boys stopped arguing and turned to look at Akemi. She was stood shaking, her hands clenched into fists at her sides and snarling.
"Arguing is not going to get us anywhere!" she shouted "whether it was a ghost or not isn't important, what IS important however is that our friends are somewhere in this place with that thing! We need to find them and get out!" The boys stood in silence, looking guiltily at the floor.
"She's right" Isamu said "sorry man."
"Yeah, I'm sorry too" Eien said. They hugged quickly in apology and turned back to Akemi.
She was opening the storeroom door and looking down the hall, searching for the man. She saw nothing and beckoned them to follow her. They stepped out and wasted no time in sprinting down the hall to the door that the ghost had stopped them getting too last time. They went through it, into a playroom. Two small kimono hung on the wall; they looked about the size for an eight-year-old girl. They were faded with age. Toys and dolls littered the floor and scrolls depicting children playing hung alongside the kimono. The room suddenly went very cold. Akemi turned and saw a little girl in a white kimono stood by a small door in the corner, just tall enough to fit her through. Her long, black hair hung down her back, her eyes out of sight behind the fringe.
"That's her!" Isamu whispered, "That's the girl I saw before! I told you I saw her!" The girl said nothing; she just stood by the door, looking up at them.
"Hey there," Akemi said, putting on her best I-love-kids voice, "do you live here? Where are your Mum and Dad?" The girl pointed at the small door.
"Through there?" Akemi asked. Again, the girl said nothing. She just carried on pointing at the door, not moving or speaking. Then, she vanished.
Akemi let out a short, startled "Oh!" and turned back to Eien and Isamu.
"Please tell me you saw her too," she said. Eien's jaw had dropped, and he nodded. Isamu just stared at the door, looking as bewildered as Akemi felt.
"Through there?" he said.
"Through there," Akemi repeated. She stooped low and pushed on the door. It opened, and she ducked through it. Isamu and Eien followed her. It led to a narrow, dark, dusty staircase. Spider webs stringed their way across it and the dust irritated Akemi's allergy again. It looked as though it led up to the attic space. Eien went up first, with Akemi clinging onto his hand. Isamu followed behind them, shining his flashlight up towards the top of the staircase. Each step creaked precariously and the rotted wood of the banister crumbled away in their hands. They edged up the stairs in single file, ears alert for any noises, though there were non- besides the groaning of the wood beneath their feet. Another small door stood at the top, Eien looked back down to Akemi and Isamu for confirmation that he should open it. They both nodded.
"Do you think the kids used to use these doors?" Akemi asked "as a kind of secret passage way around the mansion?"
"Could be" Eien said, brushing dust off his shoulder "they're too small for an adult to fit through comfortable without bending down."
"Why would kids want a secret passage around here? Why not just use the halls like everyone else?" Isamu said. Akemi giggled.
"Don't you remember, Isamu? When we were kids we were always finding secret ways around Rika's grandmother's house, playing at being explorers and adventurers. It's just what kids do."
Isamu smiled at the memory. He could remember getting lost in the attic when he was six and thinking that monsters were coming to get him, because Reijiro, who was a year older than Isamu was, had told him that the attic was where Grandma Saitou kept them locked away so they didn't come and get them when they played in the garden. He had hid in an old wardrobe until Rika and Akemi came to find him, and fallen asleep on a pile of musty smelling old sheets.
Eien pulled the little door open enough to look through the crack, and then pulled it further to let Akemi and Isamu see. They where on what seemed to be a network of rafters, above a room lit with candles. Eien frowned, knowing that no candles should have been lit, since nobody lived here, and yet there they where, flickering away as though nothing was out of the ordinary. It was lucky the room was lit, because the bulb in Isamu's flashlight flickered once then died out all together. He swore, and shoved it angrily back into his pocket. Akemi looked around, trying to find a way out of the room.
"Look!" she squeaked, pointing across the room "There! That girl!" Across the rafters, the girl stood, pointing once again to a miniature door and looking pointedly at them.
"Wait! Akemi shouted. Without thinking, she pushed past Eien and started to run along the first rafter towards the girl. The girl looked up. Her lips moved and Akemi stopped dead in her tracks. The girl had vanished once again. Akemi started to move along the wooden beam again. She reached another beam and made to step onto it, when her foot slipped and she fell down. She didn't scream until she realised that she was hanging thirty feet up in the air by nothing but her shirtsleeve, which had caught on a nail protruding from the beam.
"Akemi!!" Eien screamed. He began to edge his way across the rafter with Isamu in tow towards where the girl hung. A ripping sound turned his stomach and, throwing caution to the wind, he ran the rest of the way while Isamu gathered himself together, telling himself that now was not a good time to be afraid of heights.
"Eien?! Help me, Eien!" Akemi screeched as her sleeve ripped a little more. Eien reached her and leaned as far over as he could without loosing his balance and falling down himself. She reached her free hand up towards him, grasping for Eien's outstretched hand, her legs flailing as she made every effort to reach him. Eien knelt down carefully on the wood and took hold of her trapped wrist, then her free hand. With nothing to put her feet against, pushing herself up was proving a hard task for Akemi. Her feet kicked out wildly, and she suddenly became very aware that any one below (if there had been anyone there) would have been able to see up her skirt.
"Oh God..." Eien grunted as her struggled to keep hold of Akemi. She was only small, but she suddenly felt very heavy. He looked down into her terrified eyes, pleading with himself not to let go. Akemi started to slip out of his grasp, she was crying now and panicking more than before. Eien could feel his strength giving in on him. As he felt he wouldn't be able to hold on, Isamu came cautiously up behind him, apparently over his fear. He reached down to Akemi and, working together, they pulled the petrified girl up onto the beam.
Eien put his arms around her, comforting her. She trembled against him, sobbing.
"I can't believe how stupid I am!" she wailed, "How could I go and do something that careless!"
"Shhh..." Eien soothed "you're okay, that's the important thing." He let go of her, and she wiped away her tears and smiled weakly.
"Thanks guys", she said.
"Anytime", Isamu said, "how about we move? It's not really safe up here." Eien nodded and looked to Akemi to make sure she was okay. She smiled and nodded. They crossed the rafters with Isamu in front, while Eien guided Akemi with him. They passed through the door into what had probably been the attic at one point, but now looked like a prison. A wooden cage had been erected in the middle of the room, big enough to fit one person in comfortably. There was a cushion placed under the small, barred window with two poles at either side. Ropes were tied to each pole, and they looked ceremonial, with decorations hanging from them. A small table and bookshelf were the only other furnishings.
"Oh my God..." Isamu whispered, "Who was kept here?"
"Kirie..." "What?" Akemi looked at him.
"What's wrong?"
"Who's Kirie?" he said.
"What are you going on about?" Akemi said, confused.
"You just said 'Kirie', didn't she Eien?"
Eien looked up from the bookshelf he had been inspecting and nodded. They both looked at Akemi.
"I didn't say anything!"
"Oh yes you did!"
"I didn't! Honestly! I've never heard of anyone called Kirie anyway!" she protested, getting more annoyed.
"Is this what you saw?" Eien asked, holding up an old, dusty book. She looked at it. It was bound in black, the pages old and curling. Charcoal ink had been used to write in it, and the name 'Kirie' was written in perfect traditional calligraphy on the first page.
"It must have been" Akemi said, glad that some explanation had been found.
"It looks like a diary," Isamu said, leaning over to get a closer look.
"It is a diary" Eien confirmed, scanning the pages, it looks like she was kept her for...a ritual I think. I'm not sure, the writing is old style, it's a little hard to understand. She says she was here for a while, and that the family master...Oh my God..." Eien trailed off.
"What? The family master what?" Isamu said impatiently. Eien swallowed, his throat had gone dry.
"She was a 'rope shrine maiden', as part of one of the Himuro family rituals to stop a calamity or something...they killed her..."
Akemi put a hand to her mouth, and Isamu felt his blood run cold. Eien set the diary back on the cushion and stood up.
"The Himuro family master went insane..." he said "he went around and killed anyone and everyone who so much as breathed near him..." Akemi shook her head to rid herself of the thoughts of massacre.
"We need to get out," she said, tying her hair up quickly in a bobble she found on her wrist "we need to find the others and go. Phone or no phone, before something..." She stopped. Eien was staring behind her, his dark eyes full of fear. Isamu was trying to draw breath but finding it difficult. She followed their gaze to the huge mirror that was on the wall outside the cage behind her. A face had appeared, followed by a body until the image of a woman in a white kimono was fully formed in the glass. She looked up; her dark hair covered most of her face. She reached forward at them, and her hand protruded from the mirror. Her arm, then her chest and head came through, until she was stood outside the mirror. Shapes of people formed around her, their faces contorted with pain, arms outstretched and writhing in agony. She advanced towards the cage. Akemi stared at her.
"Kirie..."
"What do you think it was?" Akemi said. Eien shrugged and Isamu shook his head.
"If I didn't know better, I'd have said it was a..."
"Don't say it" Eien interrupted him "We're freaked out enough as it is, let's not go making it any worse." Isamu nodded.
"I don't want to seem weird," Akemi said, "but I can't help but wonder if that's what that newspaper article was talking about, the one about the family that moved away I mean." Eien nodded.
"Could be," he said, thinking it over "but I still don't get it. Ghosts don't exist right? I mean there's no proof of life after death and I wont believe in them until proven otherwise."
"What was that then?! You tell me what that... that THING back there was!!! If that's not a ghost then I don't know what is!!!" Isamu shouted, shaking with nerves.
"There's no proof it was a ghost Isamu," Eien said, trying to remain calm but unable to hide the shake in his voice "It could have been a trick of the light, shadows, anything!"
"Oh! Well, call me a freak but I think that's highly unlikely Eien. It looked solid for a start, it left streaks of blood on the walls, it floated, it chased us, do you want more proof??"
"Yes please! More proof would be great! In fact, why don't you go back out there and get your Casper friend to come back here and show us some of his ghostly magic?"
"Hell no! You go back out there! I'm not going anywhere!"
"Will you two SHUT UP?!" The boys stopped arguing and turned to look at Akemi. She was stood shaking, her hands clenched into fists at her sides and snarling.
"Arguing is not going to get us anywhere!" she shouted "whether it was a ghost or not isn't important, what IS important however is that our friends are somewhere in this place with that thing! We need to find them and get out!" The boys stood in silence, looking guiltily at the floor.
"She's right" Isamu said "sorry man."
"Yeah, I'm sorry too" Eien said. They hugged quickly in apology and turned back to Akemi.
She was opening the storeroom door and looking down the hall, searching for the man. She saw nothing and beckoned them to follow her. They stepped out and wasted no time in sprinting down the hall to the door that the ghost had stopped them getting too last time. They went through it, into a playroom. Two small kimono hung on the wall; they looked about the size for an eight-year-old girl. They were faded with age. Toys and dolls littered the floor and scrolls depicting children playing hung alongside the kimono. The room suddenly went very cold. Akemi turned and saw a little girl in a white kimono stood by a small door in the corner, just tall enough to fit her through. Her long, black hair hung down her back, her eyes out of sight behind the fringe.
"That's her!" Isamu whispered, "That's the girl I saw before! I told you I saw her!" The girl said nothing; she just stood by the door, looking up at them.
"Hey there," Akemi said, putting on her best I-love-kids voice, "do you live here? Where are your Mum and Dad?" The girl pointed at the small door.
"Through there?" Akemi asked. Again, the girl said nothing. She just carried on pointing at the door, not moving or speaking. Then, she vanished.
Akemi let out a short, startled "Oh!" and turned back to Eien and Isamu.
"Please tell me you saw her too," she said. Eien's jaw had dropped, and he nodded. Isamu just stared at the door, looking as bewildered as Akemi felt.
"Through there?" he said.
"Through there," Akemi repeated. She stooped low and pushed on the door. It opened, and she ducked through it. Isamu and Eien followed her. It led to a narrow, dark, dusty staircase. Spider webs stringed their way across it and the dust irritated Akemi's allergy again. It looked as though it led up to the attic space. Eien went up first, with Akemi clinging onto his hand. Isamu followed behind them, shining his flashlight up towards the top of the staircase. Each step creaked precariously and the rotted wood of the banister crumbled away in their hands. They edged up the stairs in single file, ears alert for any noises, though there were non- besides the groaning of the wood beneath their feet. Another small door stood at the top, Eien looked back down to Akemi and Isamu for confirmation that he should open it. They both nodded.
"Do you think the kids used to use these doors?" Akemi asked "as a kind of secret passage way around the mansion?"
"Could be" Eien said, brushing dust off his shoulder "they're too small for an adult to fit through comfortable without bending down."
"Why would kids want a secret passage around here? Why not just use the halls like everyone else?" Isamu said. Akemi giggled.
"Don't you remember, Isamu? When we were kids we were always finding secret ways around Rika's grandmother's house, playing at being explorers and adventurers. It's just what kids do."
Isamu smiled at the memory. He could remember getting lost in the attic when he was six and thinking that monsters were coming to get him, because Reijiro, who was a year older than Isamu was, had told him that the attic was where Grandma Saitou kept them locked away so they didn't come and get them when they played in the garden. He had hid in an old wardrobe until Rika and Akemi came to find him, and fallen asleep on a pile of musty smelling old sheets.
Eien pulled the little door open enough to look through the crack, and then pulled it further to let Akemi and Isamu see. They where on what seemed to be a network of rafters, above a room lit with candles. Eien frowned, knowing that no candles should have been lit, since nobody lived here, and yet there they where, flickering away as though nothing was out of the ordinary. It was lucky the room was lit, because the bulb in Isamu's flashlight flickered once then died out all together. He swore, and shoved it angrily back into his pocket. Akemi looked around, trying to find a way out of the room.
"Look!" she squeaked, pointing across the room "There! That girl!" Across the rafters, the girl stood, pointing once again to a miniature door and looking pointedly at them.
"Wait! Akemi shouted. Without thinking, she pushed past Eien and started to run along the first rafter towards the girl. The girl looked up. Her lips moved and Akemi stopped dead in her tracks. The girl had vanished once again. Akemi started to move along the wooden beam again. She reached another beam and made to step onto it, when her foot slipped and she fell down. She didn't scream until she realised that she was hanging thirty feet up in the air by nothing but her shirtsleeve, which had caught on a nail protruding from the beam.
"Akemi!!" Eien screamed. He began to edge his way across the rafter with Isamu in tow towards where the girl hung. A ripping sound turned his stomach and, throwing caution to the wind, he ran the rest of the way while Isamu gathered himself together, telling himself that now was not a good time to be afraid of heights.
"Eien?! Help me, Eien!" Akemi screeched as her sleeve ripped a little more. Eien reached her and leaned as far over as he could without loosing his balance and falling down himself. She reached her free hand up towards him, grasping for Eien's outstretched hand, her legs flailing as she made every effort to reach him. Eien knelt down carefully on the wood and took hold of her trapped wrist, then her free hand. With nothing to put her feet against, pushing herself up was proving a hard task for Akemi. Her feet kicked out wildly, and she suddenly became very aware that any one below (if there had been anyone there) would have been able to see up her skirt.
"Oh God..." Eien grunted as her struggled to keep hold of Akemi. She was only small, but she suddenly felt very heavy. He looked down into her terrified eyes, pleading with himself not to let go. Akemi started to slip out of his grasp, she was crying now and panicking more than before. Eien could feel his strength giving in on him. As he felt he wouldn't be able to hold on, Isamu came cautiously up behind him, apparently over his fear. He reached down to Akemi and, working together, they pulled the petrified girl up onto the beam.
Eien put his arms around her, comforting her. She trembled against him, sobbing.
"I can't believe how stupid I am!" she wailed, "How could I go and do something that careless!"
"Shhh..." Eien soothed "you're okay, that's the important thing." He let go of her, and she wiped away her tears and smiled weakly.
"Thanks guys", she said.
"Anytime", Isamu said, "how about we move? It's not really safe up here." Eien nodded and looked to Akemi to make sure she was okay. She smiled and nodded. They crossed the rafters with Isamu in front, while Eien guided Akemi with him. They passed through the door into what had probably been the attic at one point, but now looked like a prison. A wooden cage had been erected in the middle of the room, big enough to fit one person in comfortably. There was a cushion placed under the small, barred window with two poles at either side. Ropes were tied to each pole, and they looked ceremonial, with decorations hanging from them. A small table and bookshelf were the only other furnishings.
"Oh my God..." Isamu whispered, "Who was kept here?"
"Kirie..." "What?" Akemi looked at him.
"What's wrong?"
"Who's Kirie?" he said.
"What are you going on about?" Akemi said, confused.
"You just said 'Kirie', didn't she Eien?"
Eien looked up from the bookshelf he had been inspecting and nodded. They both looked at Akemi.
"I didn't say anything!"
"Oh yes you did!"
"I didn't! Honestly! I've never heard of anyone called Kirie anyway!" she protested, getting more annoyed.
"Is this what you saw?" Eien asked, holding up an old, dusty book. She looked at it. It was bound in black, the pages old and curling. Charcoal ink had been used to write in it, and the name 'Kirie' was written in perfect traditional calligraphy on the first page.
"It must have been" Akemi said, glad that some explanation had been found.
"It looks like a diary," Isamu said, leaning over to get a closer look.
"It is a diary" Eien confirmed, scanning the pages, it looks like she was kept her for...a ritual I think. I'm not sure, the writing is old style, it's a little hard to understand. She says she was here for a while, and that the family master...Oh my God..." Eien trailed off.
"What? The family master what?" Isamu said impatiently. Eien swallowed, his throat had gone dry.
"She was a 'rope shrine maiden', as part of one of the Himuro family rituals to stop a calamity or something...they killed her..."
Akemi put a hand to her mouth, and Isamu felt his blood run cold. Eien set the diary back on the cushion and stood up.
"The Himuro family master went insane..." he said "he went around and killed anyone and everyone who so much as breathed near him..." Akemi shook her head to rid herself of the thoughts of massacre.
"We need to get out," she said, tying her hair up quickly in a bobble she found on her wrist "we need to find the others and go. Phone or no phone, before something..." She stopped. Eien was staring behind her, his dark eyes full of fear. Isamu was trying to draw breath but finding it difficult. She followed their gaze to the huge mirror that was on the wall outside the cage behind her. A face had appeared, followed by a body until the image of a woman in a white kimono was fully formed in the glass. She looked up; her dark hair covered most of her face. She reached forward at them, and her hand protruded from the mirror. Her arm, then her chest and head came through, until she was stood outside the mirror. Shapes of people formed around her, their faces contorted with pain, arms outstretched and writhing in agony. She advanced towards the cage. Akemi stared at her.
"Kirie..."