Chapter Five: Waning
Silence greeted Mahiru's words.
Then Akira said, "I never doubted her for a second!" He hugged Mahiru. "Thanks sooo much, Mahiru!"
"But if she is on our side, why did she send you here when she knows you would not be able to sleep here?"
"Maybe we are not supposed to stay," Misoka said. "But we can use the library's resources…and maybe find some more information."
The queen smiled. "You always have my leave to find information that can help us," she said. "The library is open to all. Do you need quiet? Should I extend a ban to the library for the rest of the day?"
"That would be most kind, you Highness," Misoka said, and bowed again. Then he turned and took the path that led to the library, not glancing back.
The others hurriedly followed. Misoka, when he had reached the library, turned to them and said, "All of you must leave me alone. I will be researching something about…well, you can't know yet. But I must not be disturbed for the rest of the day."
"That's fine, Misoka," Nozomu said.
"Yeah," Akira said, subdued. "Is there anything we should look up?"
"Two of you stay here and look up information on seers, premonitions, and palace illnesses in the history of the Lunar Race," Misoka said. "The rest can go where they will."
"I'll stay," Mahiru volunteered instantly. "Since this will be helping me, I should be doing my share."
"Then Mitsuru should go too," Nozomu said. "He had a dream too, after all."
Mitsuru glared at him. "You just want me to be here so you two can go off and eat!"
"Well, duh," Akira said happily. "But it makes sense Mitsuru," and he transformed in a huge werewolf and carried the struggling Mitsuru into the library, dumping him on a chair by a table laden with books. Some titles were, The Moon Palace's History, Seers in the Distant Past, and Interpreting Premonitions.
"This is a good place to start," he said. "See ya!" He and Nozomu raced out of the library before Mitsuru could gather himself together and yell at them.
"Looks like it's just you and me, Mitsuru," said Mahiru. "And Misoka too, of course." The fox demon sat at a table with a thick volume, not even noticing them.
"Yeah," Mitsuru said, and suddenly the library didn't seem so bad anymore.
They didn't talk much. Whenever they ran across something that might be substantial, they would tell it to the other and write it down on a piece of paper. However, there wasn't much to find. The Moon Palace had never encountered a disease like this before, and as far as the books knew, no human seer had ever sent premonitions to the Lunar Race. But the book on interpreting premonitions proved Misoka's assumptions correct. The two dreams combined made the interpretation: "If you dream of darkness and endless cold, it means that you will be away from the ones you hold dear for reasons that are not your own. If you dream of a disc of any color hurtling at you, it means your greatest enemy will take something that you hold dear."
Mahiru made no mention of the fact that Mitsuru held her as something dear, and Mitsuru was glad. It would've been awkward.
Suddenly Mitsuru ran across something on his page of the book The Moon Palace's History. "Listen to this, Mahiru! 'In 1914, the year of the human Word War I, a disease was spread among the Lunar Race. It was a wasting illness that did not kill but sapped the powers out of the Lunar Race. Some elderly demons died because all their strength had gone with their power. It came every month at the night of the full moon and struck everyone in the Moon Palace. The only reason the race did not lose all their powers was because of the Lunar Race that lived in the outside world.'"
"That's great, Mitsuru!" exclaimed Mahiru. "It matches up to what I found a few pages ago, except I didn't think it was important…" She flipped back a few pages of Seers in the Distant Past and read, "'In the year 1917, a seer involved in the human World War I was dying. Her name was Maya Yuan, and she sent a premonition to a demon vampire whose name is unknown. He was elderly, dark-haired, and had poor memory. However, the night he had the premonition, he remembered it long enough to tell a demon ox. The demon ox discovered what it meant. He failed to record it and died the next day at the hands of a wasting illness that had struck the Moon Palace...'"
"All this history is really great," Mitsuru said, getting up. "But what does something in World War I have to do with us?"
Mahiru looked at hi, awe on her face. "Mitsuru, that's exactly right!"
"What? Huh? What is exactly right?" Mitsuru asked
Mahiru had a rapt expression on her face. "The seers of the distant past….Mitsuru, help me find the book called Reincarnations-Fact or Fiction?"
"Why?" he asked.
"Because," said Mahiru. "It might help us. And it might've helped Maya Yuan."