"Surprising to find you here, Miss Kayo," the medicine seller commented as he followed her up the stairs towards what the innkeeper promised to be a comfortable room.
"Same to you," she replied. She hadn't encountered him for years, not since the incident on the ship through the Ayakashi Sea. She didn't particularly want to remember that time. It was horrifying as she saw her own worst fear manifest in front of her eyes thanks to that creepy fish ayakashi.
But something had happened. As snide as the medicine seller could be, he had helped quell her fears. No one else's, only hers, as he reminded her it was just an illusion. She glanced at him over her shoulder.
"Hm?" he peered back at her. He hadn't seen her for some time, but this was the third time he'd crossed paths with her. There was something about this girl that either was some sort of ayakashi magnet or just plain intrigued him.
She got straight to the point. "Are you here because of a mononoke?"
"I wonder," he replied.
"Do you ever give a straight answer?" she huffed.
"I do," he replied.
For once, that was a straight answer. She still frowned a bit at him. Perhaps he really just was here to stay the night. Perhaps things wouldn't get crazy for once. Perhaps she was expecting way too much here. Sure he was a medicine seller, but he was also some kind of wild mononoke-slaying exorcist that just seemed to cross her path every so often.
"Why are you here?" he quickly changed the subject.
She hadn't expected such a personal question. "Well, since you asked. Ever since the fall of the Sakai house, I just can't find work. Some reason everyone actually heard of the bakeneko incident like it's some kind of famous tale now! They think I'm cursed or something." She puffed her lips out, frustrated.
"You were not the source of the mononoke's reason," the medicine seller pointed out.
"Well I know that," Kayo huffed again, "but none of the upper class houses will believe me. They think that I'll bring a bakeneko to their house or something. At least Mr. Hidehiko gave me a place to work after I couldn't pay even for food."
The medicine seller smirked just slightly at the name. Hidehiko roughly meant heroic prince. It was rather fitting for the overzealous innkeeper. "He does seem to favor the lower class quite a bit."
"Perhaps a bit too enthusiastically at times," Kayo frowned.
"I noticed," the medicine seller commented.
She turned to climb up the last few steps. "Here, this one's yours. I'll be back with dinner in a bit."
…
"So then the samurai lord said, 'I thought that candle was my kid! My mistake!'" Kayo bellowed a laugh, nearly choking on the rice dish.
The food she'd brought courtesy of the innkeep had been far too much for his needs, so he invited Kayo to stay a bit for some much needed gossip. Hidehiko seemed more than happy to oblige and keep the medicine seller busy in exchange for a bit more foreign tobacco. That man was way too over the top. Hidehiko probably thought it was for other reasons, but the medicine seller just wanted some gossip. It was a good contrast to the aggressive behavior of Lady Tori and the rather unsavory behavior of some of his clients following that. "Oh my. To think one would make such a mistake."
"Upper class are so weird sometimes, you know?" Kayo mused. " How does he even mistake a candle for his kid? That's ridiculous! I had to bite my tongue to keep from laughing."
"Those candles are rather life-like," the medicine seller agreed, "but that is a rather difficult mistake to make. Unless his son was red."
"That's the thing!" Kayo laughed. "He was pale as a bedsheet!"
A grin tugged at the edges of his lips. "What a silly mistake."
"You're telling me!" Kayo shoveled more of the rice bowl into her mouth. She hadn't eaten this good of food perhaps ever. Whatever the medicine seller did must've really impressed Hidehiko to get such high class treatment. She wasn't used to it, and judging by how he had only taken up a very small portion of the room, he probably wasn't either. He was a merchant, the lowest class like she was, even if he was a very interesting merchant.
And truly, he wasn't used to this sort of thing. He didn't know what to do with all the space. It was ridiculous how much there was. "Do the candles get mistook for people often?"
"They do all the time," Kayo replied. "I swear it's the reason people either stay away or purposely come here. There are so many and more and more just keep showing up."
It was as Hidehiko had said. The collection just kept growing. "Mr. Tadasuke has quite the collection," he mused.
"That Tadasuke," she puffed her lips out in anger. "He's a jerk! Mr. Hidehiko said he was once really chill, but I haven't seen it. He just likes spilling things on the floor and telling me to clean it up."
"How inconsiderate," he commented.
"You're telling me," Kayo huffed. "I don't know why Mr. Hidehiko keeps him around. It's like some sort of conspiracy."
"Oh?" he picked up on the specific word choice. "Have you heard something?"
She leaned closer. She liked to gossip and the medicine seller liked to hear it. "I heard rumors from the other servants that a samurai had come to stay here with his wife, not the one who mistook a candle for his kid mind you. Lord Tomotoshi or something. Maybe Tomotoyo. Anyway, here's the weird thing. No one actually saw him and his wife leave except Tadasuke."
"He does seem to be the one at the front desk," the medicine seller pointed out.
"Yeah I thought that too," Kayo cradled the rice bowl in her hands, staring down at it. "But then I found two candles that looked a lot like them. I mean maybe I was seeing things, but after everything I've been through so far, I started getting worried that maybe there was more to this. Can people be turned into candles?"
"I wonder," he peered at the candle sitting at the far end of the room.
"That's a pretty unsettling answer!" she exclaimed, scooting a bit closer to him. At least if they were alive, he could fight them.
"Yokai exist at every corner of the human realm," the medicine seller informed her. "There are candle yokai and even ones that can possess your toilet."
"I don't really want to think about a toilet yokai!" she gripped the bowl tighter. She glanced at him nervously. He looked amused but it was hard to tell with the upturn of the makeup on his upper lip. But what she did notice was that he seemed focused on the candle now. "Do you think it could be a yokai? Or even a mononoke?"
"Who knows," he replied. "Nothing is quite clear yet." But there was something there. These candles were perhaps the source of the tingling in his supernatural sense.
"You know, there are a lot of rumors about people not leaving this place." She set the bowl down on the tray, standing up and tugging on the shoulder of his kimono. She had him here, the supernatural expert. Perhaps he could put her fears to rest but perhaps he would just give her another nonchalant answer. He was nothing short of the embodiment of mysterious at times. "I'll show you the samurai one. Mr. Hidehiko is likely off smoking at this hour and Tadasuke is probably asleep at his desk again."
She had been quite insistent, but he had to admit the candles did pique his interest. There was something here in this inn, something supernatural that likely didn't belong, but he wasn't certain quite yet that it had crossed that line to become a mononoke. There was one yokai that came to mind concerning candles but he'd have to witness these candles himself.
Taking to his feet, he followed Kayo out of the room, pausing only momentarily to plaster the candle there with ofuda to prevent anything from happening with it. He followed her down the stairway and behind the front desk where Tadasuke was predictably asleep. She quietly opened the door of the side room, beckoning him in before quickly shutting it.
"There it is," she pointed at the pair at the far edge of the room.
He stared at them for a moment. They were the same ones that had watched him sell the tobacco to the innkeep earlier that day. He glanced at the doorway where he'd left the ofuda before. It had been peeled off, likely from a servant that didn't know what it was.
The candles caught his attention at the moment. He hadn't the opportunity to look at them up close before as he padded over to them in his socked feet, leaning over to get a closer look. The candle definitely looked like a man contorted then frozen. He even had the typical topknot of a samurai. The one next to him had the updo popular among women currently. She had several hair sticks and combs adorning her waxy hair.
"They do look lifelike," he commented.
"See I told you!" Kayo exclaimed. "These suddenly appeared after the lord and lady supposedly left. There are others too, ones that looked like people I'm certain I took to their rooms."
"Hm," he stared at the candle some more. The candle possessed an expression of horror and perhaps a bit of ire. Something about the candle bothered him even more when looking at it up close. Kayo was pretty observant to notice how unusual the candles were, even when noticing the candles appearing after a person suddenly left the inn. Or disappeared. More likely the latter.
It almost felt like the candle was crying out to him. He reached forward to touch it but was quickly interrupted as Kayo leapt forward, clinging to the medicine seller tightly. "Th-they moved!" she exclaimed.
"Oh?" He didn't bother prying her off him, turning instead to see where she was pointing. The candle was still but it definitely wasn't in the same place as it was a moment ago. There was a wax marking on the tatami where it once stood and that was a different location than where it now stood. "They did move."
"W-why did it move?!" she clung to him even more.
"We may perhaps," he replied, "have a mononoke on our hands."
...
Author's musings
So Kayo and the Medicine Seller have another mononoke on their hands. Oh boy. Wonder what it is this time!
