Just over, on the other side of the bridge, rests a castle big enough for multiple families to fulfill their lives. The magnificent traditional Japanese build, the golden decorations and statues surrounding it, their beastly mouths wide open as their presence suck in all of the glory and light, as though it shines together with the sun, with nothing to rival against it.
Such beauty, though old as it appears to him, drags him further close to it. Dangerous, noble families did not want anyone to just enter their privilege with no permission especially to merchants like him. He would love to take a look inside and inspect human skills…
Gallop of horses hit the ground hard with men's voices shouting over the yard. Their words unidentifiable, he turns around, the sun glances upon those covered in mud and sweat, their swords hit against themselves. The frame of a small human catches his interest, possibly a child of six or more winters lies motionless on the back of one of the man's horses, one in armor and glamor, allegedly protected from harm and scratches. He doesn't move, yet the man stops right in front of him, drawing dust and dirt around them. "Who are you? I seem to recognize…"
"Just a simple medicine seller."
"Ha! You! Perfect timing, I knew you are from somewhere, didn't you sell us medicine before?" Vaguely, a distinct memory of this man, and yes, his harsh features and the deep, troublesome voice recall it. Once, the medicine seller gave him some healing herbs for his fever sick daughter.
"Move along with us, immediately. My son got poisoned! But until the healer arrives, it will take time and I can't afford that!" As he gallops further to the castle, the medicine seller hurries behind, not changing anything on his expression.
There it is, crawls and gnaws on the inside of him with fierce. Back, in the huge wooden box he carries, his friend vibrates in an almost funny manner giving it a massaging feel.
Here, here there is. Something lurks in the shadows of human hearts.
"What bit him?!" What seems the mother, a woman dressed in a luxurious red Kimono, thick around her body with her white-painted face, watches over the boy whose face glows red.
"I couldn't see it. But it appeared like a snake."
As the medicine seller now and then gives them a look, he mixes ingredients. Hard enough, with no knowledge about what got into the boy's fragile body, he starts first with something that can reduce his fever. "Hurry hurry, He's getting worse with each minute!" Silently pressing them together into a powder, he glances at one of the maids, what seems to him as such. "I need water."
"Give him what he needs! Hurry your lazy butt!"
"Language, Tori." The man from before carefully examines the medicine seller, whose eyes pierce inside their minds.
"What did the snake look like?" he calmly asks, a relaxing feeling to his raspy voice, as if everything in the world is alright.
"I couldn't see it, as soon as it bit him it disappeared. I could only hear my son scream in pain. It was rather dark but that could have been the shadows."
The medicine seller takes a deep breath. "A hard case to cure," he mumbles to himself.
After finishing the first remedy, he gives it to the woman Tori who, with the help of the maid, forces it inside of him. "Drink that." Water drips from the boy's dark tanned skin, his black curls stuck to the sweaty forehead.
"Hang in there until the healer comes." The husband turns around to him. "I don't understand. I never knew that snakes lived here. At least not nearby where we go and I taught my son about them, even if there appeared some. Why would he have touched it…" his voice trails off into the hot summer air. "Oh, dear gods please let it not be something dangerous."
The medicine seller shrugs as someone throws their body against him, pulling on his Kimono. "Who are you?" High pitched tone, small hands. He looks to the side, a little girl even younger than the boy. "Natsumi! I told you not to just touch any strangers you see!"
"Mother, his Kimono is so pretty! Can I also have one like that?"
"Natsumi!" demanding and strict, her features distorted, the girl flinches and hides behind his arm.
"I'm a medicine seller." Natsumi's head lurks behind his arm. "Mr. Medicine seller, will my brother be alright?"
A twitch of the corners of his lips, slightly light up. "I wonder."
"Where is that goddamn healer, I will sure as hell cut his head off should he come too late for my son's survival. Medicine boy, can't you do more?"
Fever gets worse, the remedy did nothing. Heated up, he tries another one. This could cleanse his body of poisons though there is a little chance.
Natsumi, eyes wide in awe of what the medicine seller does moves no step away and half of her head blocks his view. Tanned skin like the brother. Both probably spend time together playing outside in the burning sun. "Natsumi, get away from him, he needs to do his work! Don't make me force you away." This time around, it is the father to demand from her. She quickly stumbles behind but continues to watch. The man seems tired, sights.
Sweet child, her curiosity flatters him. He gives her a small, comforting smile.
"Maid, take the bowl and refill it!"
"Yes."
As the next cup of medicine goes inside of the boy's stomach, he watches carefully. Leaned against the wall stands the wooden box, his friend's power sending shivers over his body. Times flies, hours become longer but the boy's health worsens. "I have the feeling that your medicine is making everything worse!"
The seller stands up, holds a hand over the boy, and concentrates his energy. There it is, struggles around like a worm, moving in all directions.
There, right there. Tender growl, as if the creature avoids to scare the humans, but evil enough to burn up their fear. "What…was that?"
"Your son might not be bitten by a snake" the medicine seller starts, all their faces turn pale, the man digs his fingers deeper into the handle of his Katana. "This…is a Mononoke's work."
"Mononoke? Evil spirits? Why, no, impossible! Something bit him! Why would that be a Mononoke?" He reaches the box and opens the second-lowest drawer from a total of four, out of which his scales flat up, no taller than his finger, with their arms stretched to their sides. Their sharp tip appears like a weapon to stab someone. "What are those, what are those, Mr. Medicine seller? They look like toys; can I have one?" Natsumi gazes up while she clings on his leg, watching him as he effortlessly wields the white and pink scale on his finger. Then, he lifts his finger slightly and they float up one by one until they stop directly in front of the door to the outside.
"These are scales."
"Scales? What are you weighting?" the mother asks. "They determine the position of the Mononoke."
One after another, they make a perfectly straight line in front of the door, and as he takes up the box again, he continues his work outside the castle, where they form two rows as long as a few humans. Natsumi follows his every step. "As if this is really a Mononoke. You're just making a scene! Why would it be?"
To answer his question, something howls on the outside, a stretched, high screech awfully distorted, it shakes the ground and sends everybody down with their heads covered. The child holds tight on his leg, while the medicine seller moves no inch, not leaving the scales out of his vision.
Then, they shiver. They fall to the side, point to the outside, with their bells that fell ringing, but repeat the same process of the right, toward him, to which he stumbles back a few steps in surprise, to the left and back to the front. A repeated process, as if they dance in circles, their bells don't stop.
"What?..."
"Mr. Medicine seller, they are so funny! They're moving out of themselves, so funny!" Her laughter soothes the seller's heart. "Can I have one too, can I?"
He tilts his head to the side and takes out one more scale from the drawer. Natsumi jumps in excitement, as the scale floats into her hands. "Can I have it forever?"
"I'll see."
They confuse themselves with the position of the Mononoke, which baffles the medicine seller. For the centuries he's been living now this never happened before.
This is going to be an interesting hunt. His lips curl up.
"Alright, whatever is hunting us down, can you do something against it?"
"I will kill it."
"You, the medicine seller? Our son is ill and the healer is not coming! How are you even going to do that?! You aren't even allowed to have a weapon!"
Back to the box, he opens it entirely, revealing a room cushioned with soft silky fabric, and a-
"A sword! A sword! Mr. Medicine seller is a samurai as well!" Natsumi exclaims, hands thrown up in the air. "Will you give it to me to hold it?"
"Natsumi, how many times do I have to-" the seller takes it out, protectively covered in its sheath. The handle has a tiny head figure, similar to a monkey with white hair and big, white teeth gritted together. He removes the seals, paper with symbolism around an eye, and the sword opens its mouth. "Wow! That's so awesome!"
"A sword? A merchant like you wields a sword?" Her husband scratches his sunburn cheek with his stare at the luxurious covering.
"Before I can unsheathe the sword, I need three things to acknowledge. The form, the truth, and the reason of the Mononoke. And to achieve this…" With slow steps, as if this was a lazy walk in a spring's blossoming day of Sakura trees, he approaches the sitting members. The maid, the couple to whom this castle belongs and the children, of which Natsumi doesn't seem to leave his side in particular.
"…I need you all to speak."
"What could we know?! These terrifying demons only want damage! And my son is going to suffer!" The mother hits the ground, followed by a sob.
"Are you sure…" the medicine seller turns to the man. "That it was a snake?"
"Of course! What else should it have been? It was, so far as I could understand, the length of my arm!" With a bit of thought, he asks again: "What was its color?"
The man rubs his beard, stares at his son, who still lay motionless on the ground under a thin blanket. "Dark, it had a dark color. I had never seen a snake like that, and it was so fast too…not that it would be so surprising, some snakes can be extremely fast, but…this one was…weird. But!" he coughs. "What else could be so long like my arm, if not a snake?"
"Can your son speak?" A possibility forms of what it could be. Personally, the seller never saw any dark snakes around in the area, much less one that was black, and he's been wandering around for a long time. It must've been something similar. If the son speaks, he might get his assumption confirmed.
"Nariaki? Nariaki, can you say something, my dear? Just a few words?" Nariaki's eyes flutter for a few seconds, he tries to grasp what is going on around him. "Can you say a single bit about what bit you? About the thing you saw. If it is only a tiny detail, my son, that's alright."
For a long time, it stays silent, Nariaki finally opens and closes his eyes, with his mouth doing the same as he attempts to form words. "Long…black…bug."
"…Bug?" His father turns to the seller. "A bug as large as my arm?"
"A…"
"…centipede," finishes the seller for the boy. He lifts his sword. "An Ōmukade."
The sword shuts closed; its teeth give a clacking sound of metal on metal. His assumption is correct.
"A centipede? A centipede bit my son?"
"It is possible for some centipede to have poison," the seller explains. He continues to talk to himself while making his way back to the scales. "The form we have, now we need truth and reason…" absent in his mind, the child follows him, dragging at his Kimono on the way. Roaring energy inside of him, the worm-like feeling of being eaten inside out. The Ōmukade does this, now linking the senses together. Quick movements of his hands push the sword between the Obi and the Kimono and throw seals on the walls of the entrance, covers it. As they glow red, another screech rumbles, causes an earthquake.
The mother screams in the same way, she holds onto her son and cries, shivers in the sheer eye of death lurking just outside of this castle. With a calm voice, while pushing power against the door to hinder the Ōmukade from entering, he asks: "Who has a grudge against this family?"
"A grudge? Who could have a grudge? Many people might envy us because of our fortune, our belongings. Why would we suddenly have demons on our doorsteps?"
Grudge goes deeper. The man's eyes betray him, the flickering glance, to the side, to his wife, with his hands he knits and scratches.
"Maybe…" now, the wife wrings out the clothing she uses to cool down her son's temperature. "Maybe it was our former maid."
"Tori-"
"She was always extra jealous of us. She came from a peasant's family but her life wasn't the easiest."