Disclaimer: Natsuki Takaya owns FB, and anything else you recognize is also not mine.
Chapter 37
"You said seeing his true form would chase that girl away," growled Asheno, snapping out "that."
Shehure merely shrugged his shoulders. Privately, he knew his hour of reckoning had arrived. The Dzuni god slouched in his chair, fuming, all the blood rushing to his face and filling it with an unusual amount of color. As long as Asheno remained seated, Shehure would be safe from projectiles. For now, the dog decided it was wisest to remain still and take Asheno's verbal knives.
"You," said Asheno accusingly, straightening up, "you convinced me it was a good idea, and I assented. I trusted you, and Lhadoman becomes her boyfriend! That girl's BOYFRIEND!" His fist crashed down onto the armrest.
"Uh-oh," thought Shehure. "He's already started shrieking." He started to take stock of all the potential weapons within Asheno's reach, while keeping his expression blank.
"You insubordinate dog, Haku!" There was a strange light around Asheno's head, like a halo, and he looked fuzzy.
Shehure's response was inaudible.
"Haku! Haku! HAKU!" The frustration in Asheno's voice increased. The room's contours began to twist, forming a tunnel bordered by blackness. Everything shriveled and vanished down the tunnel…Somewhere, a loud slap could be heard, and the sound echoed in the now empty space.
"What is wrong with that boy?" Asheno asked to no one in particular, looking down at a prone, unconscious Haku being shaken by Hotohori. "The doctor couldn't find anything wrong with him. Maybe I should get a psychologist in here."
Hotohori was quick to interject. "Haku's not insane. He's just…under a lot of stress." Hatsuharu joined the two on the floor, calling to Haku. Khosure, Lhurone, Khezuke, and another teenager, a newcomer from Rhenigroth named Hatsumi, watched worriedly from their seats at the table.
"You mean to say because of me, right?" sneered Asheno. Hatsuharu glared at him. Asheno let it go and contemplated his ward, finally beginning to stir. He didn't think Haku was insane, either. Haku was still well enough to resist Asheno and to hide his symptoms whenever the doctor came. If it had been otherwise, Asheno would've known something was really wrong. But Haku's odd behavior had been steadily grating on Asheno's nerves more as time passed. In the two weeks since school had ended, Haku ate and slept well enough (albeit with much tossing), but he sweated profusely, as if afflicted with a fever. His eyes had a distant, delirious look most of the time. It was impossible to get his attention, and everybody at the table, plus Rhena, had tried various ways to snap him out of the trances. Purple shadows under his eyes and his thin frame attested to the strain his mysterious illness put him through. And when he holed up in his room, he would always be drawing, as though under hypnosis. In his rare lucid moments, he wouldn't say anything about what was plaguing him! Asheno suspected that the other teenagers had some idea, but of course, they would never tell him. They stuck together against him.
As Haku blinked and came to, Asheno realized Haku was finally seeing him for real. The dark brown eyes, the old antagonistic expression reserved for Asheno fully restored, were fixed on Asheno's face, and not at an invisible object in the distance.
"Asheno," said Haku.
"Haku, are you all right?" asked Hatsuharu, for lack of a less ridiculous question to ask someone so obviously ailing. A tiny hope began to grow that Haku's illness had finally broken.
"Yes, miraculously," muttered Haku, his voice faint and cracked. His friends, Asheno, and the surrounding environment slipped in and out of a bluish haze. "I feel so exhausted…" He sat up, propped by Hotohori and Hatsuharu.
"Have you finally returned to the real world for good?" Asheno queried.
"I need sleep…" repeated Haku. His head felt weighed down with rocks; it wobbled slightly on his neck.
"Very well," acquiesced Asheno. "Take him to bed, Hatsuharu. He can catch up when he's rested."
For once, no one argued with Asheno's order. Hatsuharu obliged and carried Haku in his arms up to the cluttered room. The mountains of paper with scribbles and drawings rustled under Hatsuharu's feet, and Hatsuharu wondered once again what Haku had been doing. He'd not looked carefully at the drawings, under the assumption they were only reflections of a feverish mania. He settled Haku gently on the bed, and Haku had his first visionless sleep in two weeks.
Haku slept until the middle of the next afternoon. Hunger pangs woke him at last, and he threw on the least smelly of his hekashos and stumbled to the main kitchen in search of sustenance.
"Haku!" Rhena, of course. She'd been chopping meat for tonight's dinner, and she set the carving knife down upon seeing Haku's entrance. "Are you feeling better? The other children told me about last night."
"I'm really hungry," said Haku. "Could you make me a big breakfast, Rhena?" His request delighted Rhena; it was the first time he'd willingly asked for food. She wasted no time in heating a healthy amount of leftovers from the previous night's dinner. Haku sat on a stool by the baking counter, across from the carving table.
"Shit," thought Haku, "I need a shower so badly." With mild disgust, he recollected the neglected state of his room and clothes. He attempted to regain his bearings; he'd long lost track of time's passage and stopped noticing his everyday surroundings. The kitchen seemed dark and strange, even with the windows wide open and the sunlight streaming in through them.
"This is near the place Rin was beaten," he remembered, then quickly evicted the disturbing memory from his train of thought. The scent of bread, meat and fresh fruits made his stomach growl. "Rhena, what day is it?"
"It's Tuesday, Haku," she replied, stirring batter vigorously. "The 21st of June. It's been two weeks since you got sick, and you only came out of it last night."
"Sick?" Haku began to correct her, but decided against it. He needed to reestablish his grounding again, first. "Where's everybody?"
"Have some of this bread," Rhena said, pressing a large slice into his hand, "I'm almost done heating the leftovers. Everybody's here, at the estate." She began scooping a meat casserole onto a plate, and added some freshly cut fruit. Haku had already tore through half his slice when Rhena set the plate and a glass of milk next to him.
"By the way, Haku," she added in a quiet voice, "a new Dzuni has arrived here."
"Whomph?" asked Haku, muffled by a large mouthful of still-savory casserole.
"His name's Hatsumi. Oh, dear, I can't remember his last name for the life of me." Rhena's stirring tempo slowed, as she tried to recall. For the first time in Haku's life, she didn't nag him to show better table manners.
"Ah, you're up, Haku," remarked a calm bass voice from the doorway. Haku stopped slurping his milk and looked at the voice's owner. Immediately, Haku recognized him as the sheep, a taller and filled out version of Shoma Hiro. Hiro had been a little brat. Clever, but a brat, nonetheless.
"I'm Rhenuth Hatsumi," the teenager said, walking towards Haku. His clothes were worn and very casual, but in decent enough shape. His hair was the same sort of light brown as Hiro's, and his eyes just as large and wide. "I'm from Rhenigroth." His smile was pleasant, yet guarded, and gave Haku a distinct impression of toughness. Hatsumi had faced difficult times before. "I arrived here a week after you took ill." Yet, observed Haku, Hatsumi spoke quite well.
"Your guardian spotted me on the street in downtown Lhasa," continued Hatsumi, "and made me ride back here with him. I've seen some bizarre things, but I never expected to be part of a mystical family curse." One side of his mouth curved derisively.
"What bizarre things?" asked Haku, resuming his breakfast with slightly better table manners.
"Hatsumi don't like talking about his past much," Rhena said, pouring yellow batter into a muffin tray. "I've already tried."
"It's as Rhena says," agreed Hatsumi. "Besides, you wouldn't want to know." His face went blank.
"Fine with me," shrugged Haku. "We all have things like that, don't we?" Funny, thought Haku, his physique's similar to Hatsuharu's and Khezuke's. I wonder if there's a pattern? Faran-Zhuku said there was a special group inside the Dzuni for protection, or something.
"I just came here to pick up an afternoon snack," Hatsumi said to Rhena, to escape his discomfort from Haku's critical look.
"Have some of the fruit," Rhena said, concentrating intently on pouring the right amount of oil for the meat.
"Thank you," Hatsumi grabbed an apple, and left after nodding to Haku. The wolf boy resumed eating, wondering whether Hatsumi struck him as more like a fighter or an aesthetic.
"Rhena, could I have an extra clean hekasho? I need to do laundry," asked Haku ten minutes later, when his ravenous appetite had finally been sated.
"Of course, I'll leave it on your bed, while you take a shower," she said, giving him a stern look. "You need one."
The rest of the afternoon was consumed by the gargantuan task of clearing up his room, so clogged by paper that it was basically unlivable. Haku refused help from anybody—he didn't want people seeing the drawings up close until he decided what to do with them. For now he piled them into boxes, and stacked the boxes in his closet. His energy was still depleted, and the cleanup work sapped most of it. He was asleep when Hatsuharu came to summon him to dinner.
"Haku," called Hatsuharu, shaking him awake. Haku opened his bleary eyes.
"Wow, I didn't have any visions, again," murmured Haku, slowly raising himself into a sitting position. Dizziness was still a problem if he moved too quickly.
"I'm glad," Hatsuharu muttered, his arm poised if Haku started to fall.
"The ghost wolf must've exhausted himself, too," theorized Haku, "going for two straight weeks like that."
They walked slowly down the stairs. "Listen," whispered Hatsuharu, "Asheno will be at dinner." Haku groaned softly.
"No, he's not going to attack you," quickly reassured Hatsuharu. "He's going to tell you what he told the rest of us last night. I'm just warning you—it's a little weird."
Haku only nodded, and they entered the dining room. It was one of the regular dining areas, not the hall used for the New Year Dzuni's banquet. In the center was a dark, rectangular mahogany table, large enough to seat ten. Asheno sat at the head, and he gestured for Hatsuharu to seat Haku at the opposite end. The prospect of facing an entire meal sitting across from Asheno was distasteful, but Haku still felt a little weak for putting up a fight.
"Welcome back to the world of the living, Haku," Asheno said, smiling acidly. "We're so glad you condescended to rejoin us."
"Hi, Haku!" piped Khosure, unfortunate enough to be at Asheno's right.
"Shut up!" snapped Asheno. Khosure shrank into his chair. "You may begin serving the food," Asheno said, snapping his fingers. A young serving girl entered with an oversized tureen of vegetable soup, her arms shaking slightly from the weight. She managed to safely place it next to Asheno, and fled gratefully.
"Servants," huffed Asheno. "And why did they use such a monstrous dish? Khezuke, pick it up, would you? I can't possibly lift this."
Silence dominated throughout the soup, broken only by Haku's occasional slurping, which earned raised eyebrows from Asheno. After the main dish, a delectable roast with a white wine sauce, was served by another frightened servant, Asheno finally spoke.
"Haku," he began, "since you were kind enough to faint last night, you missed my speech to the Dzuni about my plans for the summer." Haku concentrated on cutting his slice and not looking at his guardian's face, and the other Dzuni followed his example.
"I shall be plain, as I was with the rest last night," continued Asheno, chewing a small bite serenely. "My intent is to finish gathering the remaining six before the New Year. As you know, I am aware of the whereabouts of all but one."
"Which one?" Haku asked.
"It doesn't matter, I shall find out soon enough."
"Isn't this the same one you've been having trouble finding for a long time?" pressed Haku.
"Why, pray tell, are you so interested in this particular person's case?" Asheno set his utensils down.
"If we knew who it was, we could watch out for him," Hatsuharu explained quickly, to defuse the building tension.
Unconvinced, Asheno let the question go. He looked hard at Haku. By now Haku had raised his head, and returned the suspicious look. He wouldn't put it beyond Asheno to be lying—the Dzuni could be dead, or something similarly horrible had occurred.
"Anyway, as I was about to say," resumed Asheno, sipping his coffee and addressing the entire group again, "I will need your help in retrieving some of these Dzuni. Three of them won't arrive until the fall, after the school year begins. It's more convenient for their families, and I've graciously agreed." Everyone else grimly wondered if the three even had real families, based on the experiences they'd had thus far.
"Last night, Haku, I told the children that I would ask a few of you to escort two of the girls back to this estate this summer."
"What, are you planning to have us kidnap them?" Haku said sarcastically.
"I am in the process of contacting their families now," Asheno went on icily. "One lives in Lhose, and the other comes from the Gashuni district, on the western side of Lhasa."
"The same district as Lhoru," mumbled Haku, finishing the last bite of his meat.
"What?" yelled Asheno. The teenagers jumped all at once. "Where'd you hear that name?"
"Eh?" Haku froze, feigning fatigue and haziness. Damn you, he scolded himself, Asheno's suspicious enough already! Before the prolonged period of visions, it'd occurred to Haku that if Asheno ever found out how much Haku was learning about the previous Dzuni, he could murder Haku if he felt threatened enough. A new, non-threatening baby would replace Haku then. The less Asheno knew, likely the safer he would be.
"How'd you learn that name?" demanded Asheno, standing up.
"What? I'm sorry, I'm still tired," apologized Haku. "I was just thinking about what I need to do, like finish cleaning my room and getting myself healthy again."
"Yes, I've heard Haku talking to himself some," added Hotohori. The rest of the Dzuni stared at Asheno in astonishment. Their head was frightened, a rare sight.
Sensing the eyes upon him, Asheno recomposed himself, only with great effort, and seated himself again.
"Haku." He couldn't let that dog off easily, not just yet. "Tell me about the ghost wolf. I know you're connected to it somehow."
A tense standoff ensued between Asheno and Haku, each measuring the other. Now he had to give Asheno some scrap about Faran-Zhuku, Haku knew.
"I do not transform into a wolf," Haku finally said. "But there is a phantom wolf that comes out of my body. I don't have any control over it—it comes and goes when it pleases."
A look of disbelief crossed Asheno's face. "I know it sounds incredible," Haku said, "but it's true."
"Is this the same thing that killed those servants?" asked Asheno. "Did you order it to?"
"I told you already, I have no control over the phantom," reiterated Haku. "It killed the servants, but I had nothing to do with it."
"Do you expect me to believe something as wild as that? Are you trying to insult me?"
"No, Asheno. Is it so strange a ghost wolf would pop out of my body, considering how none of the Dzuni have turned out the way you expected? Judging by your reaction to us, it seems you expected something different from the curse." Haku kept his voice as controlled as he could, and felt gratified when Asheno winced almost imperceptibly at the last part. He'd hit one of Asheno's weakest spots. None of the Dzuni missed Asheno's reaction.
"I'll ask you again: do you have any control over that thing?" asked Asheno angrily.
"No. As a matter of fact, I think the reason I was so sick was because the ghost and I are having trouble living in the same body." It wasn't far from the truth, either. Even Asheno was forced to conclude Haku's response made sense.
"That's enough for one night. You're all dismissed," said Asheno. The Dzuni stood up, bowed quickly, and left the dining room.
Asheno slumped in his chair. Of all things, a phantom wolf killing willy-nilly! One that could easily kill Asheno. Fleetingly, Asheno entertained the idea of poisoning Haku. It could be accomplished, but it left him with the problem of dealing with a replacement, which in all likelihood, would have a ghost wolf, too. Even if he killed Haku, how could he know the ghost wouldn't kill him in retaliation, on its own? Where had the wolf come from? Was the old curse back? No, he would bide his time. He'd managed to get Haku to reveal some niblets of truth—he was sure Haku was telling the truth, he was terrible at lying—and he certainly would pry more out of the boy later on. Haku was probably just as afraid of being killed by Asheno as Asheno was by him; it'd serve as a counterbalance in their relationship for now.
In a deep recess of Haku's mind, the phantom cursed Haku heartily. The stupid child had put himself in mortal danger by blabbing to Asheno! Luckily Faran-Zhuku could exit Haku's body at will; he'd be able to watch for any murder attempts. The ghost wouldn't hesitate to kill to keep Haku alive. It was too important to set the Dzuni on the correct path again. He would rest a while longer, and regain his strength. Then he'd finish telling Haku the epic he'd begun two weeks ago.
"Haku, are you still delirious?" scolded Hatsuharu. "I thought you said you had to keep Faran-Zhuku a secret from Asheno!" The teenagers all crowded into the room Khosure and Lhurone shared.
"Shh! Keep your voice down, or the servants—or Asheno—will hear!" hissed Haku. "I couldn't stall any longer," he continued whispering vehemently, "I had to tell Asheno something."
"Are you going to tell Asheno about the visions?" Hatsumi asked.
"How'd you know—oh, the others must have told you."
"I felt he needed to know, so I filled him in," Hotohori explained to Haku. "By the way, Haku, were you just having visions for two entire weeks?"
"Yeah, I was," nodded Haku. He sighed, rubbing his temple.
"What about?" asked Khosure.
"Oh, about the generation when the Dzuni curse was 'broken,'" Haku said, straightening up and leaning against Khosure's dresser. "But Faran-Zhuku never got that far, to when the curse was actually broken. He wants me to know every tiny detail." Haku rolled his eyes. "Clearly there's some complicated process by which it happened. I don't know how we fit in yet, or how Asheno got control of us."
"That name you mentioned at dinner?" asked Hatsumi. "Lhoru? Why'd it scare Asheno?"
"I slipped," said Haku. "Lhoru was an outsider who was taken in by the family. Hm, I guess I could say she helped the Dzuni open up more. Maybe she broke the curse, if Faran-Zhuku ever gets that far. And going back to your question, Hatsumi, no, I won't tell Asheno about the visions. It's too early, and it's not safe enough yet."
"Safe?" Hatsuharu said.
"What I know is dangerous to Asheno," said Haku, "but I don't know why."
"Let me clarify for you, Hatsuharu," said Lhurone. "In gang culture, when someone knows a story that could implicate a person in a crime, the witness gets eliminated before he can testify." Khosure gasped, and everyone looked at Haku. "It's something like that, isn't it, Haku?" Lhurone asked gently.
"Yes," admitted Haku. "I do think Asheno is too afraid of the ghost to kill me, though. At least for now."
"Good heavens," breathed Hatsuharu.
"You've been around Rhena too long," smiled Haku. They all chuckled, and the stress lightened. Lhurone offered some excellent mimicries of Rhena's plain speech. Khezuke's scars turned a darker purple from laughing. They'd finally healed completely, although they would always give strangers the false impression of a hardened criminal.
When the gaiety faded, the mood of gravity returned.
"Haku, what kind of animal am I supposed to be?" asked Hatsumi. "Do you have any idea?"
"A sheep, or a ram, since you're a guy," responded Haku. "As for your 'powers,' I wouldn't know."
"A ram, hmm?" Hatsumi contemplated the thought.
"Everybody…" The others swiveled their heads towards Hotohori's hesitant voice. "There may be a possibility that the Dzuni were like us, before the curse started."
"What do you mean?" asked Haku. "Faran-Zhuku once said something similar."
"I found this ancient bookshop," Hotohori said, dropping her voice even lower, forcing everyone to strain their ears. "The woman who owned it, Hina, had paintings, incredibly old paintings from before the dark ages, and I saw two of them. One was of a scarlet dragon, just like when I transformed, and another that looked like Faran-Zhuku. I was there only twice before Asheno forbade us to leave without his permission. I'm sorry I kept this secret from you, but I didn't want anyone else to get punished if Asheno found out." The boys immediately waved off Hotohori's apology.
"And there's something else," Hotohori continued, "Hina knew a member of the Shoma family, someone who had a cursed child."
"Who?" asked Haku. The name Hina sounded very familiar to him.
"I think his name was Shoma Khazuma, if I remember rightly. Hina said her husband found the cure to the curse and passed it on to Khazuma."
"Well," Haku started slowly, after a long moment processing the news. Now he remembered Khazuma—the man who'd taken in Lhadoman, the cat, when no one else would. "We'll have to find a way to get to the bookstore, when school starts again. It'll be easier to slip from Asheno then. And don't worry about Asheno punishing people, Tori, he does it all the time, whether or not a fair reason actually exists. He enjoys it too much." A summer breeze blew in through the open window, carrying the fresh smell of still-new greenery along.
"The plot thickens," remarked Hatsumi drily. The teenagers huddled in a companionable silence, pondering the new developments.