"By the roots of my hair some god got hold of me.

I sizzled in his blue volts like a desert prophet.

The nights snapped out of sight like a lizards eyelid:

A world of bald white days in a shadeless socket

A vulturous boredom pinned me in this tree.

If he were I, he would do what I did."

"The Hanging Man" by Sylvia Plath

Of all the cherry trees in Ueno Park, one is more arresting than the others. It's trunk is fat and diamond hard with the blood of those who lie buried beneath it, and it's bark is almost black; gnarled and twisted like a mass of snakes. Unfittingly, the blossoms that bloom on the Tree's branches are arguably the most beautiful in all of Japan, delicate and ephemeral. When the wind blows, they gently flutter downwards in lazy spirals, as if procrastinating, taking as long as possible to reach the dirt and die.

Reluctant to leave this world, like the victims of the Tree. Nobody ever wanted to die, pardoning himself and the Dream-Seer of the Dragons of Earth, but now even the frail clairvoyant was gone. The Sakurazukamori wondered if Kakyou had wound up with his late sister in the Hereafter, Hokuto had spoke often and zealously of him.

The thought soothed Subaru a little. At least his twin could be with the one she loved, even if he himself couldn't.

After a while though, the former clan-leader's anarchic mind twisted round his altruistic joy, wrenching and kneading it into stagnant jealousy. If she could be happy, then why couldn't he? Why couldn't he have died in her place? The dead had it easy, he thought. They didn't have to deal with the absolute pain of living; watching the ones you love fall like sakura petals before you, helplessness, at being incapable of doing anything to stop it.

He had watched so many people die that he had developed a sort of macabre indifference to death. He could watch a man wretch and convulse as he choked to death on his own blood, eyes bulging freakishly out of their sockets as his body gave way, and could nonchalantly light a cigarette as he observed. He would see the wretched individual claw at his throat through the flame of his lighter, and when the flame was extinguished, the man would be dead.

After all, the Sakura Barrow was vulgar and gluttonous. It desired more blood than it could eat, necessitating Subaru to sometimes take as many as five victims in a given week.

Sometimes, when it rained, the soil at the roots of the Tree would wash away, leaving stiff, grey fingers poking out of the earth like grotesque testimonials to their owners. The Sakurazukamori would always crush them under the thick soles of his boots. Though he welcomed rain (it washed the blood from his clothes) he could not afford to have stricken tourists running to the police to say that they'd gone for a picnic lunch and found cadavers protruding from the ground.

But he could rest assured he would never, ever stand a chance of being incarcerated. Arguably the most talented onmyouji in all of Japan and now the Sakurazukamori as well, the Government needed him, he was a civil servant, in the loosest sense of the term. He didn't want to attract the attention of the police because frankly, he didn't like any kind of attention.

He had developed an unhealthy habit of gravitating towards shadowy places, and he never wore any colour other than black. Blood wasn't noticeable on black. His ebony hair was long in need of a cut, one side of his fringe was much longer than the other, and hung over his eye like a curtain.

Subaru's blind eye was much like Seishiro's, the same milky, off-white. Cool and apathetic. He realized that in his desperate bid to keep the memory of Seishiro fresh in his mind, he had become a dead man. He had become Seishiro. The emerald-eyed, bleeding heart of a 16-year-old was gone along with his twin. Now, Sumeragi Subaru was slave to the monster that had killed his sister (he was also a slave to the Sakura Barrow.)

The Barrow. If it had never existed, Hokuto would still be alive. He would have never met the Sakurazukamori all those years ago, never engaged in that deadly bet. Maybe then, he would have met Seishiro another way; bumped into him on the train, blushed and apologised, or taken an injured bird to the Veterinary Clinic, and Seishiro would say something ambiguous, and he Subaru would blush, and get tongue-tied. Maybe… they could have been together.

For seven years, the festering malice he harboured in his heart was all for Seishiro, every last vengeful shard. Now, with the eyes of the Sakurazukamori he saw, it was not Seishiro who was the ultimate cause of all his suffering, but the Tree.

He resolved to destroy it; he would hack the wretched thing into a million splinters and burn them into ash. It was the least he could do to mollify his vengeance.

And so the Sakurazukamori had strolled casually to the nearest DIY store, picked up the first axe he could find and took it to the checkout. The pitiful store clerk at the till had shook like a leaf as he handed the stranger his change, trying to smile genially like his boss had told him to, and failing miserably. He meekly pointed out to the decidedly unnerving customer that smoking was prohibited inside the store, but shut up promptly as Subaru lifted the axe off the conveyor belt with a gloved hand, and strode decisively back out through the revolving doors.

By the time he had arrived back at Ueno Park, rain was pouring down in torrents. People were scurrying for shelter with their coats pulled over their heads but it was pointless, really. This kind of rain could soak through anything. Trees were bent unnaturally with the blustery gales and branches ripped off and tossed to the winds. The Barrow however, was unyielding, and towered over Subaru, smugly static.

The bitingly cold breeze tore the feather-soft petals off its lower branches, so they clung to the Sakurazukamori's hair and jacket. Subaru licked his upper lip in anticipation, tasting dirty water. Overhead, lightning cleaved through the blackened sky. He felt the comforting weight of the blade in his hand, its handle smooth and laced with rivulets of rainwater.

Now, he thought. Now. Stepping forward, he readied himself, digging his heels in the muddy ground for purchase. Now. The Sakurazukamori lifted the axe with both hands, and swung it at the Barrow's knotted trunk, clenching his back teeth together. Simultaneously, another bolt of lightening illuminated his frenetic countenance.

But instead of feeling the axe meet with something solid, or hearing the dull thud of metal connecting with wood, Subaru felt himself being lifted roughly through the air. He heard a sound like floorboards buckling under a great weight. And when the lightening struck again, his feet were metres above the ground, his head amongst the blossoms. A threadbare rope was wound around his neck, crushing against his windpipe. He did not remember how he had got there.

The pain was receding, and his toes and fingertips prickled. Darkness was creeping into the corners of his vision. Subaru almost laughed, almost. He heard that grating noise again, but now he thought he knew what it was. It was the Tree, scoffing at him for being so foolish as to believe that he, a mere onmyouji, could destroy a being so ancient and mythical as the Sakura Barrow. No one could kill the Tree.

Tomorrow, he would be written off as a suicide. Nothing novel or supernatural, Japan after all, has the highest suicide rate in the world.

When he was younger, Subaru had been terrified of dying. Death was a glaring unknown. An ominous, secret room he avoided at all costs. Now he was dying, it felt warm, consuming, possessive even. It was strange, he thought. Death's arms were a lot like Seishiro's…