The front of the house was entirely gone. Part of the upper story had caved into it, and splintered support beams stuck out like ribs from a half-eaten carcass. Even weeks later, even after summer downpours, they retained their charred-black patina.

Which made the contrast all the eerier: To the kitchen, there was almost a clear view. Its colors stood out brilliantly against the ruin around it, only somewhat darkened by smoke and dust. The rotted remains of a last meal still sat on the table—what little the crows had left of it.

Across the street, demolition equipment sat idle in the shower, next to a block of houses with burnt facades and blasted-out windows. Between them, the pavement rolled in melted waves, broke and sunken here and there like the aftermath of some cataclysmic earthquake. Puddles splashed around Oriya's designer shoes, but it would have been callous to complain of their damage next to that which surrounded him. It was unbelievable, what he was seeing. Not just how total but how completely isolated the destruction had been.

How could this have happened, and he was only now learning of it? A disaster of this magnitude occurred in a peaceful residential neighborhood in the heart of Tokyo, and it never made the news?

"Excuse me! Excuse me, sir! You shouldn't be here."

Oriya turned to see a man in hard hat and reflective vest jogging through the rain toward him. Only as he got close did Oriya notice he wore underneath those the uniform of a police officer.

"This is a highly dangerous area," the officer said. "Didn't you notice the tape?"

He gestured to that which had been strung across what remained of Ukyou's front gate. Yes, Oriya had noticed it, when he ducked underneath it to come inside the garden. Just as he had noticed the barricades, and the warning signs up the street. Dangerous levels of radiation, they all warned; but judging by this officer's lack of protective gear, that was probably more to keep the public out than anything else.

"I knew the woman who lived here," Oriya said by way of explanation, knowing it wouldn't excuse this intrusion but needing information. Any information. If the officer had any empathy in him, maybe he would understand enough to provide that. "She was all but family to me. Can't you tell me what happened to her?"

The officer vacillated for a moment, but must have decided that question wasn't too sensitive to answer. "No idea. We never retrieved any bodies from this house."

"Then she's still alive?"

Oriya couldn't help himself. The weight of his dread upon seeing what remained of Ukyou's home, like a boulder sitting in his gut . . .

He hadn't thought there was any reason to hope until now.

Still, the officer shook his head. "I can't answer that, sir. This house was closest to the epicenter. If your friend was inside at the time, it's possible there weren't any remains left to find."

"But you can't be sure. Can you?" That wasn't much to go on, and judging by the way the officer shifted on his feet, Oriya was probably being unrealistically optimistic. But after seeing the things he had seen, he had reason to treat a person as alive until he saw hard proof of their demise.

A burst of color caught his eye. A rose bush still standing behind the officer, against the crumbling garden wall. The others had all been flash-burnt, but that one must have been sheltered enough for a few of its canes to survive. It bloomed still, even if it was just clinging to life.

"Exactly what happened here?"

"That I can't tell you," said the officer; and Oriya could sense from his tone and posture that, on this, he would not be budged. "This is the site of an ongoing investigation, on top of which, we have reason to believe it's contaminated. For your own safety, I'm going to have to ask you to come with me."

Oriya was willing to comply then. He had learned all he was going to here. The ruins only served to remind him of the fragility of loved ones' lives, how tenuously they intersected his own and how suddenly they could be torn away.

But they did give him some idea of where to turn next.

Cups rattled violently in their saucers when Sakaki set the tray down hard on the table. "Sir, I must implore you to give up on this damn-fool fantasy—"

"Sakaki, the china, please." Muraki grabbed one of the napkins off the tray to sop up the spilled coffee.

"Damn the china, Kazutaka!"

That made Muraki pause, if only for a moment. It wasn't like his man to use his first name. But how else was Sakaki to get the urgency of his feelings across, if Muraki would not listen to reason alone?

Yet Muraki already knew what he wanted to say. "I'm well aware you don't approve of my current trajectory."

"Why couldn't you have just left things as they were! Forget fire: You're playing with nukes this time, and it doesn't matter how careful you think you are. Sooner or later you're going to slip, and this project of yours is going to kill you!"

"And you feel that I do not fully appreciate what my death, should it occur, would do to you. Is that it?"

Sakaki silently fumed. To him, Muraki's return from Kyoto was a second chance, nothing short of a miracle, and he was not the type of man to abide seeing either wasted. But he answered with stoic calm: "I promised your grandfather that I would do everything in my power to protect you. I swore it on his grave—"

"And you have done so admirably, for longer than he ever could have hoped. You have watched over me like a shepherd who swears to keep his flock safe from all harm. But there must come a day, Sakaki, when the shepherd yields to the butcher."

The pain on Sakaki's face as he said those words took Muraki back. To the dark, wooden house he used to call home, and the sharp smell of cordite, and his half-brother's blood seeping into his clothes. Only then Sakaki's face had worn the fearful relief of one who has just averted some great disaster. Now he feared that not only was he powerless to stop the next one, but that the boy he had once saved from certain death actually welcomed it.

If Muraki could have disavowed his man of that notion, he would have. It was not that he longed to die, so much as that he had prepared himself for the possibility. He did not fear death so much as he feared leaving work unfinished. But it would not do to return Sakaki's concerns with false assurances. He respected the man too much to lie to him.

Instead, he stood, and put his hand upon Sakaki's shoulder. They had only embraced once in his life, in the days following the funeral when Muraki had found himself suddenly overcome by the loss of his parents, and Sakaki, by some uncanny intuition, had understood just how important it was to Muraki to keep that hidden from the rest of the world. He had been so ashamed then, that he was more frightened about being an orphan than he was saddened by either parent's death; but Sakaki had needed no explanation, no apology, to stand by him. He never had.

So that simple touch spoke volumes that Muraki couldn't with words, though he could try. "You've been more a father to me than any man ever was," he told Sakaki to his eyes. "And that is a debt I can never repay. All I can ask is that you trust me to do what is right, and know that all you have done has been enough. It has been more than enough. Grandfather would not have faulted you a thing. Whatever may happen to me, you have nothing to be sorry for."

"But how can you be sure all this trouble is worth it?" Sakaki hissed, albeit chastened. "How can one man, no matter who or what he is, really be worth all this?"

Muraki smiled. "Trust me. If you love me, Sakaki, that is what you must do. It's all you can do."

"What I'd really like to know," he said, crossing his arms over his chest, "is how you managed to get yourself free of my circle."

Tsuzuki snorted. "Haven't we already been over this? You know they say the definition of madness—"

"Just because you keep evading my question doesn't mean I expect your answer to change. I expect an answer, and I will not stop asking until you supply me with one."

Tsuzuki only glared at him—though the defiance shining in those eyes as they stared rakishly through his hair managed to only endear Muraki further to him. "You should already know the answer without me telling you. Unless you're just testing me to see if my version of the story matches up. You really expect me to believe you didn't have me under surveillance the entire time I was in your trap? It wouldn't be like you to be so trusting."

"I did have you under surveillance," Muraki didn't mind confirming, "but whatever you did in your final moments under that spell destroyed the camera I had trained on you outright and fried everything else. As though you unleashed some sort of electromagnetic pulse when you broke free."

That information sobered Tsuzuki, who was already shaking his head before Muraki could finish. "I don't remember any of that. I wish I could say I remember what I did, but I don't."

"Don't lie to me—"

"I'm not lying!" Then, after some consideration, "Though I wouldn't tell you how I did it even if I knew. You'd only come up with tougher traps to stick me in, or worse poisons."

Muraki raised his hands in a gesture of surrender. "I promise. No more traps, no more poisons. You've moved beyond that now."

"But why? I'm still susceptible to them. Enma will put me through worse, if he ever gets his hands on me again. So what's the point of your little exercise if all it proves is that I can get out of your trap?"

Muraki caught the way Tsuzuki watched him as he paced around the room, like a predator sizing up the creature before it, trying to determine how much trouble it would give him if he tried to bring it down. Tsuzuki insisted he didn't feel any different, that nothing had changed, but everything about him had. It was in the way he carried himself, his voice, his eyes—even his aura. And either he just couldn't see it for himself, or all of this insistence on amnesia was a careful ploy to throw Muraki off his guard. Meaning Muraki had to be especially careful what he did next.

And just the thought that Tsuzuki might have turned the tables on him, playing at deception and muddled motives, was enough to quicken Muraki's pulse, and stimulate those reward centers within him that thrilled at the chase, the subtle manipulation. Even if he was the one now being manipulated.

"Is it also true that you don't remember the things you said while you were under the poison's influence?" Muraki asked him.

He thought he caught a hint of a mischievous grin twitch on Tsuzuki's lips, but it disappeared again so quickly he had to admit he may have only imagined it. "According to you," Tsuzuki said, "I was talking to myself."

"Yes. A riveting debate, by the sound of things. Don't worry," Muraki added to the other's side-eye, "I have no interest in holding any private details of your life or afterlife over your head, so long as you give me no cause. But I do hope some sort of consensus was reached."

A breathy chuckle. "You could say that."

There it was again! So, I didn't imagine it. That Muraki was glad to see. And just a little unnerved. He admired this side of Tsuzuki, but—to use the analogy again—did feel rather like the prey thrown into that violet-eyed predator's cage.

"I'm not sure how much sense this will make," Tsuzuki said, "but I feel as though, for the first time in a long time—hell," he revised after a moment's thought, "maybe for the first time ever, I know what I really am—I mean truly know it, really feel it to the depths of my soul—and I'm not bothered by it. Well, I don't mean 'I'm not bothered by it' as in 'I've killed off my conscience entirely'; I'm not like you."

You wound me, Muraki thought, but thought it best not to interrupt. Not when Tsuzuki was being so frank.

"But I know why Enma chose me," Tsuzuki said with a nod. "I was made to be a shinigami. Like you said, I'm a weapon. Whether I like it or not is irrelevant—killing is what I'm good at. It doesn't do anyone any good if I feel guilty about my purpose. It isn't for me to decide who lives and who dies anyway. Just follow my orders."

After all that Muraki had done, after everything he had put Tsuzuki through to make him see the truth, that was the conclusion he came to? Muraki shook his head. "Spoken like Enma's loyal little lapdog. . . ."

That got the rise he was looking for. Tsuzuki shot forward, and grabbed the front of Muraki's shirt tight with both hands. "What other options do I have? Do you know how hard it is to stay sane, after doing the things I've done?"

"You could always fight—"

"I've been fighting it my entire existence," Tsuzuki said through his teeth. "That's the problem!"

"Then the solution should be obvious. I'm not talking about denying what you are, Tsuzuki. I know all too well how futile that is. I'm suggesting you fight the system that made you this way."

Muraki could only stare into those purple eyes as he watched a succession of reactions pass over them, from disbelief and sacrilegious outrage to a gradual hope, even—dare he think it?—agreement. He lowered his voice to say, with the intimacy of a lover: "Who gave Enma the right to decide who lives and who dies? Why should anyone's fate be decided in advance, and regardless of what deeds they have done? You want someone to blame for what you've become, blame the Judges of the Dead. If you wish to see justice done, start with those who prevent it from ever being meted out."

"Take power over life and death into my own hands, huh?" Tsuzuki scoffed at that. "You want to turn me into another you."

"No. That is, I would prefer we were in agreement, but not if it comes at the cost of your ability to think for yourself. As I've told you countless times, I only want the innocent to be rewarded with life, and the guilty to suffer in equal measure to their sins." When he felt Tsuzuki's grip on him ease, Muraki took hold of Tsuzuki's wrists, and pulled his hands gently away. "Once I thought you desired the same—"

"I do."

"Then why yoke yourself to the service of the very entity that stands in the way of that becoming reality? Don't you feel as though someone else might do the job better?"

Muraki was aware of Tsuzuki's eyes on him as he stepped away to remove his tie, just as he was aware of what blasphemy, to a shinigami, he had suggested with that question. But surely Tsuzuki's silence was proof that he could find no reason to carry on his sorry defense. None that he could prove had merit, in any case.

"Why don't we change the subject?" Muraki said as he turned to face him again, unbuttoning his cuffs. "Do you feel you've recovered enough to spar?"

"Any excuse to get your hands on me, is that it?" Tsuzuki began to say.

But before he could finish, Muraki came at him with a right hook, hoping to see if he might throw Tsuzuki off his guard. He was pleasantly surprised when Tsuzuki ducked beneath it and seized hold of him, trying to throw Muraki over his shoulder.

But Muraki saw what he was doing before he could complete it—he had used the same move on Tsuzuki any number of times during his incarceration here, after all—and was able to land on his feet and twist away. Some witticism about his lesson having been absorbed was on his lips, ready to deliver, but Tsuzuki refused to give him that chance. He pressed onward, jabbing at Muraki, kicking at him, his attacks lacking the proper discipline of the martial arts, perhaps, but more than making up for in accuracy and sheer determination what they lacked in structure.

And certainly not lacking in force. That was the difference Muraki felt most of all, with each block. He hadn't felt so corporeally punished since he was an adolescent, and Sakaki had put him through the same rigors instructing him in self-defense. He had hated it then, resented his guardian for what his spoiled upbringing branded abuse, and for the ugly bruises that bloomed beneath his clothes. Somewhere along the way he had started to take pride in those wounds, however, and feel a morbid sense of satisfaction in the soreness he woke up with, or the tender spots that twinged throughout the day, in doing so reminding Muraki of what he was becoming: stronger. He had learned to see a difference between the bruises that were a sign of his failure to protect himself, and those that were marks of his growth as a student.

Yet somewhere between that time, some twenty years ago, and now, he had dealt plenty of blows with bone-shattering force and forgotten what they felt like to receive. His ulnae and shoulders soon ached from defending himself from Tsuzuki's attacks. It was clear the techniques he was using before Tsuzuki's breakthrough would no longer be sufficient. Not if he wanted to avoid a fracture.

He caught Tsuzuki's ankle, and gave it a sharp twist. Pulled off balance, Tsuzuki hit the floor—but landed lightly and rolled away, out of reach, where he crouched, catching his breath.

"Impressive," Muraki breathed as he pushed sweat-dampened hair out of his eyes. "I see I'll have to give my all if I want to last more than a minute with the new you."

Tsuzuki scoffed, but let the "new you" comment slide. "You mean you were holding back before?"

"I was, actually." Though it sounded almost like an admission of defeat to say so now. An admission of just how mortal Muraki was compared to his opponent. "I wanted to teach you a lesson, not kill you."

"You could have killed me, though. You know it wouldn't have mattered."

"Except that if I had killed you, however temporary your death may have been, it would have only fed into your martyr complex, and that thing has given me quite enough trouble already."

That earned Muraki a saucy laugh. "And here I thought my martyr complex was one of the things you loved most about me. I thought you found it charming."

That last uttered in a breathless grunt as Muraki pushed him against the wall, pinning Tsuzuki's wrists at the level of his eyes. "Charming" was certainly one word for it. More evidence that Muraki was finding all of these changes rather head-spinning. He could tell himself that this was a side of Tsuzuki he had been desperate to see—dreaming of seeing, again, ever since that night in Kyoto when he had awakened something he had only suspected was there. But now that he was confronted by it in a state of lucidity, Muraki wasn't entirely sure how best to react.

"You're not afraid," Tsuzuki murmured while he wriggled enticingly in Muraki's hold, "that I'll martyr you, Muraki?"

If Tsuzuki had reacted to his advances on the Queen Camellia like this, rather than freezing up and playing hard to get, would Muraki have wanted to possess him half as much? Or tenfold?

"I take it as a challenge," Muraki said, matching his tone. "To stay alive to enjoy this." He couldn't help himself. His teeth grazed Tsuzuki's ear, his breath echoing warmly back against his own skin. Tsuzuki chuckled again.

But at the last moment, his laughter turned dark. Sinister. Muraki knew what a risk he took, allowing himself to give in to—as Tsuzuki might have put it—any excuse to get close enough to touch Tsuzuki, to taste him. But he could feel Tsuzuki tensing to attack, emboldened by the advantages their proximity gave him, and made sure he wasn't there when the shinigami chose to make his move.

Finding Muraki suddenly out of his reach, Tsuzuki huffed, and spread his arms. "So, this is what you wanted all along. For me to embrace the side of me who's a murderer."

"No sides," Muraki said, maintaining his gaze. "Human, demon. Murderer, saint. Both. Neither. I don't care. All I wanted was to make you whole. No more repression. No more delusions. I need you as fully you as you were ever designed to be."

That pulled a smirk from Tsuzuki's lips—but it was only temporary. Even now, even though it appeared as though the two halves (if Muraki could justly phrase it as such) of his nature had been fully united, still Tsuzuki struggled to accept what he was.

Or perhaps what he struggled against was the thought that he was anyone's agent but his own. "That's an awfully big risk to take. It might just backfire."

"As I'm well aware." Just as Muraki was aware of the racing of his heart, as he waited for a circling Tsuzuki to make his next move—and of the strain of anticipation, dread and excitement all mixed up in a pleasant churn behind his navel. "But it's always a risk, to bare your innermost self to another soul. To let them see you as truly are, and not just as you want to be seen. All our faults and complications included."

Whatever it was specifically that Muraki said that triggered something deep inside Tsuzuki, he couldn't know. Tsuzuki gritted his teeth, and his eyes flashed with some old, secret hurt. Muraki had to act quickly to deflect the wave of energy that burst from him. He felt the impact of it against his barriers, the sudden change in air pressure in his inner ears. But it was the fireplace mantel that took the full force of the deflected attack, its decorative molding exploding into splinters.

To think, that could have been my ribcage, Muraki thought. Or his skull, for that matter. But he could lament the destruction of his property at some more convenient time. Tsuzuki rushed at him, his head colliding with Muraki's stomach, as though to erase whatever shameful truth about him Muraki may have seen, and the viciousness of it nearly bowled the doctor off his feet.

But he kept his wits about him, landing a blow to Tsuzuki's spine that made the shinigami reel, and gave Muraki just enough of a break to get a more solid grip. He lifted Tsuzuki off the floor, slamming him back into the broken mantelpiece, and saw chunks of it break away streaked with Tsuzuki's blood. Muraki could swear he felt bones pop beneath his grip.

But Tsuzuki's face showed little sign of discomfort. If anything, it only stoked his bloodlust. He grabbed Muraki's wrists, holding them to himself, and wrapped his legs around Muraki's arms. A sharp kick to the jaw had Muraki seeing stars as he stumbled back, his left arm feeling stretched as though it had nearly been pulled from its socket. He ducked Tsuzuki's next blows, hooking him around the neck with his right arm, attempting to turn Tsuzuki around to a position more advantageous to himself.

Tsuzuki had a similar idea, however, and used Muraki's own momentum to throw them both to the floor. Muraki grimaced as he landed with all his and Tsuzuki's weight on his shoulder. If the bone was not bruised, or worse, he would be surprised. He was sure to be sorer than in a very long time in the morning.

If he even made it till morning. They struggled on the hard floor for supremacy over one another, both desperate not to be overpowered; but Muraki did not possess the same advantages as Tsuzuki. He was mortal, he tired, and his attempts to siphon off Tsuzuki's energy were thwarted. He could not get a grip on Tsuzuki long enough to do so, before one arm or the other was wrenched to just about the snapping point, or another hard jab of Tsuzuki's elbow or knee to his ribs stole his breath away.

Muraki could only take so much of it before he was forced to acknowledge he was losing. He knew the symptoms of a torn rotator cuff, a fractured rib; and though Tsuzuki's blood had allowed him to heal with inhuman speed from much worse in the past, he had had one advantage then that Tsuzuki was certain not to allow him now: time.

So when he found himself slammed back onto the floor, Tsuzuki's hands around his throat, he saw the futility in struggling further, and ceased.

If Tsuzuki expected him to fight back, he would just have to be disappointed. Muraki even surprised himself how at peace he was in the moment. But in many ways, this was what he had been preparing himself for since the night of the fire in Kyoto—perhaps, if he were honest, even longer than that. Perhaps from the moment Saki pointed their father's sword at his throat, a part of him had been waiting for the moment of his death, aware that every minute it did not come was time he should never have been granted.

Ever since then Muraki had thought his death would come in the form of a blade. He had almost gone so far as to romanticize it. A slow death by suffocation wouldn't be his first choice, but there were far less pleasant ways to go, and he could not deny there was a certain poetic justice to it, after everything he had done. . . .

"Go on," he muttered. Tsuzuki had left him just enough leeway to get a little air in with each breath. "Do it!"

He saw Tsuzuki grit his teeth, and was sure the man's jaw must be aching behind it. How much self-restraint did it take, not to snap Muraki's neck and be done with him? "You actually want to die?"

The hands around his throat twisted and forced Muraki's head back. But Muraki could still keep Tsuzuki in his sights. If this was to be the end, he was going to make sure his killer's face was the image he took with him to his judgment. Enma should at least know who deserved the credit.

"I thought you'd at least plead for your life," Tsuzuki hissed. "Like your victims pled for theirs."

If Muraki had had the breath in him, he might have laughed. "You don't know my victims . . . as you call them . . . as well as you think you do. . . ."

If he could only show Tsuzuki—if he could just take him back to that cherry grove under the eclipse, and hear his precious boy plead to be allowed to die, promise anything to stop the pain, to bury the humiliation.

And perhaps reading his thoughts, or at least their direction, Tsuzuki tightened his hold.

But only momentarily. "No. A quick death would be too merciful for you," Tsuzuki decided. His fingers may have loosened, but they could still end Muraki's life at any moment. The pressure of them was still painful, making every breath a struggle, every inhalation burn.

"It's . . . your right . . ."

"And it's my right to see you suffer, too," said Tsuzuki.

Through the black spots dancing along Muraki's vision, Tsuzuki never looked more like an avenging angel than at that moment, straddling Muraki's waist. Aloof, otherworldly—wounded but still radiant with his power. He even had a halo—though that might have been the hypoxia.

Either way, he was magnificent. The pinnacle of what he was meant to be. Longing for him surged within Muraki.

And when Tsuzuki shifted his weight, just how Muraki was suffering could no longer escape his notice. The corner of Tsuzuki's lips pulled up in a sadistic grin. "God," he chuckled, "even when I have your life literally in my hands, you just can't help yourself, can you? You still seem to think you can have me."

This time the shift was not so incidental. Tsuzuki moved his hips in achingly slow waves, rubbing himself on Muraki's erection; and under the circumstances, Muraki could not find the will to resist his body's reaction. If he was going to die at Tsuzuki's hands, he might as well die getting what he had wanted for so long. Even if Tsuzuki's only motive in giving it was to embarrass Muraki at the end—to drum in just a little deeper who was in control and who had lost it.

"This is what you really want, isn't it?" Tsuzuki taunted as he teased. "Forget all that shit about fulfilling my destiny, or turning me against Enma. This is all it's ever come down to for you. I don't know whether that's more flattering, or pathetic."

Muraki need not have answered for Tsuzuki to know the truth, even had he been able. His groan caught beneath the pressure of Tsuzuki's hands, but surely Tsuzuki felt it. Muraki grabbed his wrists and held those hands in place, just as he held his stare. He needed Tsuzuki to know: This was exactly where Muraki wanted him. He could feel every dip and curve of Tsuzuki through his trousers. The heat of him, that Muraki had long dreamed of burying himself in. The intoxicating pressure of Tsuzuki's thighs squeezing his waist—just as his hands squeezed Muraki's throat. There was something sensual even in this act of slow destruction, something rousingly primal. And more intimate than words could do justice: this sharing in the act of extinguishing a life, even if it was his own.

The incestuousness of it struck Muraki then in a way it had only in an abstract, intellectual sense before—not as anything deserving of shame or condemnation, but like the pure selfishness of a serpent eating its own tail. Like a line coming full circle, spiraling in on itself into a tight, warm singularity. A wheel of fate, finding justification only in the hour of its fulfillment.

Muraki saw the moment the same realization dawned on Tsuzuki: that what Tsuzuki swore he would never do, he had. And he didn't back away. He did not let up his agonizingly drawn-out assault. He studied Muraki with cold fascination, even the sadistic grin fading from his lips. "But you are beautiful," he murmured, tossing Muraki's words back at him without any sense of irony, "when you're suffering."

Muraki had to wonder if he had been deprived of so much oxygen that he was hallucinating when Tsuzuki bent over him, and covered Muraki's mouth with his own. One way or the other, it seemed, Tsuzuki was determined to cut off his air; but Muraki would take this victory with him to the grave.

The pleasure building behind his navel spilled over, and Muraki found himself tripping into orgasm. He, who prided himself on his restraint, his patience, his ability to set himself above base desires. He ought to have been ashamed at such a loss of self-control, but in the cruel perfection of the moment, he couldn't bring himself to be.

Even when Tsuzuki pulled away from him, laughing. Christ, how he sounded like Saki in that moment. "Jesus, Muraki, if I knew that was all it would take . . ."

Then, just like that, he released his hold on Muraki and got up.

Leaving Muraki to hoist himself back into a sitting position, and rub in vain at his bruised throat while his vision cleared of flashes and dark spots. "Why didn't you finish me off?"

"I think I just did," Tsuzuki grinned, glancing down at Muraki's lap. Then he sobered. "But if you mean why didn't I kill you, I changed my mind. For now, anyway. That wasn't how I wanted to end it. Besides, you still haven't told me how to get out of this place."

"What makes you think I will?"

"Because you promised you would let me go. When you were done with me."

"And you think I'm done with you?"

To that, Tsuzuki had no response but an impudent glare.

Then it was Muraki's turn to grin. "Maybe finding your own way out of here is your next test, Tsuzuki. Maybe that's always been the test. Did that ever occur to you?"

He hated the way the words came out. Gravelly, like a scratched record. Like the first hintings of old age sneaking up on him. Muraki had always believed he wouldn't live long enough to see them.

"Then I guess I have no choice but to accept the challenge," Tsuzuki shrugged. "In any case, I think I've proved myself enough for one day. We'd better stop here or there might not be anything left of you to teach me my next lesson."

He picked Muraki's jacket up off the chair beside the door before he left, and tossed it back toward the doctor as if it were refuse. "Clean yourself up, Muraki. You're embarrassing yourself."

This was a risk Muraki had never allowed himself since beginning this venture. Sharing Tsuzuki's cage for a supper or conversation or even a fight was one thing, but to bathe in the same apartment, to make himself so vulnerable, and to do so without a clear exit strategy—surely that was inviting trouble.

And tempting death. Sakaki's warning had not been necessary: Muraki had known long ago just what he was stepping into. Yet he had always been confident in the power of Tsuzuki's own guilt to stay his hand, and the shinigami's uncertainty that killing Muraki was the right choice. Tsuzuki's compassion had always been his undoing in the past, and Muraki's salvation. Only now that he found himself with the same Tsuzuki who stabbed him in Kyoto did Muraki begin to doubt that Tsuzuki could continue to act with the same restraint he'd shown this afternoon.

Contrary though it should have been, knowing what a razor's edge Muraki walked only excited him more. Being aware that at any moment, while he relaxed there in the claw-foot tub soothing his wounds, clad only in water and steam, even his glasses set aside, Tsuzuki might come stealing into the room, armed with a knife, like Clytemnestra come to slay Agamemnon. Or perhaps with only his hands; Tsuzuki needed nothing more.

Surely, Muraki acknowledged not for the first time, there was something wrong with the wiring of his brain. In particular the self-preservation instinct. Just the thought of his own impending assassination attempt was terribly arousing. To add fuel to the flame, the weather had taken a turn for the worse, dropping the curtain of night early on the day's performance. Even through the insulated walls of the mansion, Muraki could hear the rumble of thunder and the pummeling of the heavy raindrops of a summer storm, as though the elements were echoing the tension within these walls. Or, as if God himself were setting the scene of his demise. Beneath the surface of the bath water he still ached recalling the passion of his last encounter with Tsuzuki, but he refrained from any attempt to relieve it. It was better to burn than to be quenched of that fire.

Another muffled boom of thunder. But this one must have been much stronger, or closer. The lights over the sink winked out, plunging the bathroom into darkness.

And sending Muraki's heart hammering, as now would have been the perfect opportunity for an ambush, were he in Tsuzuki's shoes.

The darkness, however, was only a minor inconvenience. Though his right eye had been giving him trouble ever since the night at Ukyou's house—a detail Muraki had thought it best not to mention to Sakaki, and certainly not to Tsuzuki—there was still enough of a spectral light penetrating the window glass for it to see by.

And to show Muraki that he was still all alone in the room. Very well. If Tsuzuki would not come to him . . .

Muraki donned a yukata and stepped out into the hall to investigate. There too, darkness prevailed. The mansion's generator should have kicked on within seconds after losing power; but the house's wiring was old, and it was certainly within reason to assume that while Sakaki was enjoying a well-lit supper downstairs, power to the upstairs apartment had been completely cut off.

But Tsuzuki appeared to have made do just fine on his own. He had found candles, and—though Muraki was certain he had left no matches lying around—had been capable of generating enough of a spark to light them.

Following the trail of light left him, Muraki found his man easily enough. Tsuzuki was already in bed, sitting on top of the covers in his clothes and facing a candle on the side table. Passing his hand repeatedly over the flame and watching with mild fascination as it flickered, back and forth, around his unmarked flesh.

It seemed only polite to ask, "You're still awake?"

Tsuzuki did not answer.

That was, not until Muraki had taken the liberty of seating himself on the mattress. Even feeling it dip beside him, Tsuzuki made no comment about his being there, only observed, as if interrupting some reverie: "I was just thinking about this place, seeing if I can't work out some concrete details about my surroundings."

"And have you?"

"I was able to tell from the electricity going out that there's a storm on outside. And if there are storms and electricity, we're almost certainly on Earth, in the Living World. I still can't be sure what part, though. Japan gets bad storms around this time of year, but then so do a lot of other countries. Of course, knowing you, we could be on a rock out in the middle of the ocean somewhere."

Muraki smiled wryly to himself. "Such fine deduction skills . . . Are you sure you weren't a detective in life, Tsuzuki?"

If Tsuzuki caught his sarcasm, however, he didn't let it bother him. "I probably shouldn't be sharing my suspicions with you, though, should I," he said, glancing briefly over his shoulder at Muraki. Yet he did not get up, did not tell Muraki to leave him. "There's no telling what you might do to throw me off the trail if you think I'm getting close to figuring this all out. What new tortures you might dream up to keep me here a little longer. . . ."

As if to prove some private point, he held his hand directly above the candle's flame, just close and long enough for the skin of his palm to start to singe. Muraki could smell the moment it began to burn. He caught a shadow of Tsuzuki's grimace, but the shinigami kept silent; and the scorch mark disappeared within seconds of being removed from the cause.

"That night in Kumamoto was a lot like this one, wasn't it? When you called me to that chapel and showed me just how responsible I was for all your sins. . . ."

And there it was again, Muraki thought. That subtle edge to Tsuzuki's words, trying to pry something out of Muraki. But Tsuzuki was playing this game with a grand master. "If this is you hoping to trick me into inadvertently revealing some clue, I'm sorry to disappoint," Muraki said, shifting himself closer. Unable to resist the temptation any longer, he pressed his lips to Tsuzuki's shoulder. On the surface, a chaste kiss, but he let its silent promises linger. "Well, to be honest, I'm not sorry. We're finally making significant headway. Can you blame me if I'm not ready for this to end?"

Whether it was something Muraki said, or the press of his mouth, Tsuzuki shivered. "I used to be so sure I hated being touched by you."

Emboldened by the confession, Muraki dragged his lips higher, to the base of Tsuzuki's throat, relishing the taste of his bare skin, as if Tsuzuki were a rare vintage he had waited many long years to enjoy again. "When in fact what you hated," Muraki purred, filling in what the other left unspoken, "was that you loved it. You need my touch. Your soul cries out for it. Just as mine longs to provide it for you. What further proof do you need that we were destined to be together?"

Tsuzuki did not confirm his guess, but nor did he refute it. He was still as ever under Muraki's ministrations, but he did not pull away or freeze up under them as he once had. In fact, his lack of response seemed to welcome them, seemed to draw Muraki in. Like a fish on a line.

If he was that fish, nipping at the bait, Muraki didn't mind. He breathed deep of the scent of Tsuzuki, losing himself to it. He clutched Tsuzuki's arm tight in his grip, but did not need to. The man was going nowhere. Muraki's teeth were at his ear, and Tsuzuki laughed. He laughed. Just an amused little puff of breath, but it felt like a huge breakthrough. "I just realized how much you remind me of someone."

Not what Muraki wanted to hear at that moment, not at all. And he told Tsuzuki so, through gritted teeth. "'For I am a jealous god, and will tolerate no other gods before me.' I'm beginning to think you only mention others when we're together to get a rise out of me, Tsuzuki. What do I have to do before you will think of no one else but me?" And he moved his hand lower, running it possessively over Tsuzuki's thigh.

But before he could go any further, Tsuzuki spun around. His fingers combed through Muraki's hair, and pulled Muraki to him for a proper kiss. With the other hand, he guided Muraki's where he wanted it: to the heat between his legs.

Not one to question a good thing, Muraki responded with gusto, and felt his efforts redeemed by the little moan that escaped Tsuzuki at his touch. Tsuzuki leaned further into the kiss, kneading Muraki's lips with a hunger that was entirely eager and new, while the flesh hardened beneath Muraki's slow, skilled strokes. Tsuzuki's hand curved around the back of Muraki's neck, the pressure of his fingertips against the fresh bruises dragging a growl of masochistic pleasure from deep in Muraki's throat.

But Muraki should have been prepared for duplicity. He should have known, after their last bout, that Tsuzuki's sudden receptiveness to him would not have come without some ulterior motive. He allowed himself to be complacent in what he perceived as his triumph, and, consequently, was taken off his guard when Tsuzuki pushed him down onto the mattress with alarming speed and force.

He pinned Muraki down on his stomach with one arm behind his back, one hand pressing the side of the doctor's face into the bed, just as Muraki had once done to subdue him. Muraki knew in an instant that any struggle on his part would be futile. It might even result in his arm being dislocated. However, with Tsuzuki's erection pressed snug against the curve of his ass, fighting this was the last thing Muraki intended to do.

"You want to be the only one I think of, Muraki?" Tsuzuki growled against his ear as he tugged at Muraki's robe, then his own fly. "This is all for you then. I am your god now, and you stand judged. Think of this as just the beginning of what you deserve."

Though it was surely not the reaction Tsuzuki was going for, Muraki's heart was racing like mad within him, not with fear of what Tsuzuki planned to do, but with anticipation. Tsuzuki pushed into him with no concern for Muraki's comfort, burying himself as far as he was able. Muraki bit back a cry at the shock of it, stifling it in the quilt beneath him.

Yet, despite the searing ache, and the painful pulling in his shoulder, "If your intent is to hurt me," he told Tsuzuki between ragged breaths, "you're going to have to do much better than this." Tsuzuki could certainly try, though. He seemed to take those words as a challenge, thrusting sadistically into Muraki, twisting his fingers in the doctor's hair and wrenching back. Nevertheless, "There's nothing you can do to me that I haven't already dreamt of a thousand times."

What shameful fantasies he had entertained as a young man, when he was alone in the dark, and the old sepia photograph of Tsuzuki would surface in his mind like a song on a record set to repeat. Shameful to who he had been then, but every encounter with Tsuzuki had only served to normalize his desires. To leave him craving more, and greater highs, with every repetition. What did it matter if he had always thought of their positions being reversed? The Tsuzuki he had always met before was a passive creature; Muraki could hardly have expected him to be capable of such intentional feats of cruelty.

But novelty was exhilarating, and in the days since Tsuzuki had been broken—or perhaps it was fairer to say "mended"—

If Tsuzuki thought he would humiliate Muraki this way, punish him, rape him into feeling guilty for everything he had done in the pursuit of this goal, he was sorely deluded. One might as well give sweets to a naughty child and expect it to learn its lesson.

"All I ever desired was for you and I to be one." The discomfort was still there, but blending into the greater milieu of sensation. "To know one another—nn . . ." The thick heat of Tsuzuki filling him, sliding alongside his prostate, trying its damnedest to chase any other coherent thought from Muraki's mind. "And be known . . ." He cursed the friction of the bedclothes beneath him. He had given so much for this moment, he wanted to make this pleasure, and even the pain that accompanied it, last. "As wholly . . . and deeply . . . as possible."

Tsuzuki swore beneath his breath. It seemed to take some of the viciousness out of his thrusts, knowing that they were welcomed. But his desire, and his determination, were not quelled one bit. Muraki felt his rhythm falter, an indication that Tsuzuki was losing himself to his own pleasure—before he attempted to reassert control, with a low growl. Tears sprang to Muraki's good eye as Tsuzuki shifted to a more brutal angle, wrenching his arm further.

But it was the heat building between them that occupied Muraki's attention, the pleasure radiating from his core and filling his whole being with the promise of long-awaited fulfillment. He felt himself tumbling headlong toward the edge, and knew that if he begged Tsuzuki to slow, he would only do the opposite. So Muraki didn't try. Just allowed himself to be carried off into wave after pulsating wave of satisfaction.

And still Tsuzuki kept on at his unrelenting pace. It was as though in surrendering to his climax, Muraki had escaped the moral he was supposed to learn. The longer it went on, the more the blissful heaviness of completion that Muraki so wanted to make last would give way to the raw friction of flesh on tired flesh. There were other ways they could finish this, and maybe they wouldn't satisfy Tsuzuki's lust for justice, but they would satisfy him. "Tsuzuki," Muraki started, but his overture fell on deaf ears. Or stubborn ears. Tsuzuki bucked harder against him, as if he might still salvage this act of revenge by sheer force.

So Muraki tried a different tactic. "Tsuzuki," he murmured in a lower register, "listen to me. Concentrate on the sound of my voice. Concentrate on the sound of my breathing," he whispered beneath his own, matching his words to Tsuzuki's thrusts, to his grunts, to Muraki's own pulse hammering in his crushed ear. "The beat of my heart, falling in time with yours . . . syncopating . . . synchronizing . . . my body becoming your body. . . ."

It mattered little if it all amounted to sentimental nonsense. Muraki concentrated his efforts on the cadence of the words themselves, and their individual sounds: the moistened pop or languid slither of certain consonants, the cloying, breathy moan in certain diphthongs, just barely heard, but their guilty suggestions absorbed in the subconscious to the point of resonance. Letting them fill up the space around them, like a mantra, a spell—like a magic circle spinning round and taking hold over its victim, until Muraki was sure Tsuzuki was setting his pace to the steady waltz of his words. He could feel the tension between them uncoil. Tsuzuki's energy flowing to him again, invigorating him, like a post-coital hit of nicotine. Tsuzuki's hold loosened, the hand pressing Muraki's face into the sheets moving to the mattress beside him.

And when Muraki was certain he had Tsuzuki in the thrall of his voice, just as he had hypnotized Maria and Tsubaki and dozens more before, he bid him "That's enough now, Tsuzuki. Let go. Don't fight your desire: Surrender to it. Let yourself go—"

Tsuzuki's thighs seized against the backs of his as he emptied himself into Muraki, a sob of blessed release falling from his lips. No longer some wrathful, avenging god, just a worn-out creature of weak flesh and base needs, he managed to extricate himself from his hold, trembling, and collapse back onto the bed.

Slowly, mindful of his injuries that had been aggravated, Muraki pushed himself up. He straightened his robe, rubbed feeling back into his mistreated arm. And examined his patient.

Tsuzuki was breathing heavily, staring at the ceiling, pupils dilated. But something else in his gaze had changed. As if he were seeing not the ceiling but something far away, something that wasn't there. Not unlike wherever he had gone to in his mind in Kyoto, only Muraki did not have to inflict any pain this time to send him there.

Confident he had his subject where he wanted him, Muraki began in the same low, even tone, "Tsuzuki?"

"Mm?" came the noncommittal response.

"You said I reminded you of someone." Muraki couldn't help it. Even after what they had just shared, he didn't let go of his jealousy easily. "Tell me."

Tsuzuki's throat bobbed, and he did not answer immediately. For a moment, Muraki feared he would have to abandon this part of the plan. But when Tsuzuki said, as though it were being dragged from him, "Count," his hope was renewed.

"Count?" Muraki echoed. He wasn't aware of anyone by that title. But at least Tsuzuki hadn't answered with the boy. Or that vexing secretary.

"Of the Castle of Candles. It just struck me all of a sudden, when the lights went out. The Western décor of this place, the obsession with matters of life and death . . . Your obsession with me. . . ."

"The Castle of Candles?" Muraki prompted. He wasn't sure he had heard Tsuzuki mention it before.

"Where the lifespans of the living are monitored. I shouldn't be talking to you about this," Tsuzuki said, meeting Muraki's gaze. But whatever misgiving he may have had instilled in him under Enma's command caved under the right, subtle suggestion to continue. "But I suppose you're responsible for a lot of them going out before their wicks run down. We've been alerted to plenty of your activities by watching those lives blow out."

So, that was how it worked. This was rather unexpectedly titillating. Muraki had long imagined some place like what Tsuzuki described, based on the testimony of less savory characters. "You've seen evidence of my handiwork personally? In this Castle of yours?"

"No. Shinigami aren't allowed access to something so delicate. We get our information from the—secondhand," Tsuzuki caught himself, tensing. (From this otherwise unnamed Count, Muraki guessed. The one who for some reason reminds you of me.) "Does that bother you?" Tsuzuki asked. "Knowing that while you've been watching us, we've been watching you?"

Muraki allowed himself a small smile. "Sometimes it's more exciting to be the knowing object of a voyeur's attentions, rather than the observer."

"Better to be the hunted than the hunter?"

Now, why had he phrased it that way? "In some ways," the doctor played along, aware that Tsuzuki's words might constitute a trap. "I suppose I'd be disappointed if you weren't watching, after all the trouble I've gone through to get your attention."

Muraki was content to play the part of the observer for the moment. Stretched out beneath him, eyes heavy and dark and skin glistening from his exertions, innocent in his debauchery and debauched in his innocence, this was the Tsuzuki Muraki had always fantasized he would find himself with. Only more perfect, for being real and solid beside him and entirely at his mercy. Incapable of pulling away from Muraki's touch, let alone from his voice.

But he was fading fast. Muraki could see his eyes start to swim. In light of the ferocity of their lovemaking (if that was indeed the right word for it), perhaps he should not have been quite so greedy in satisfying his own demands. He only needed Tsuzuki pliant, not senseless. He took Tsuzuki's chin in his hand, and pulled him back.

"Tsuzuki, I know right now your mind is spinning and telling you it wants to sleep, but this is important. I need you to listen very carefully to what I'm about to tell you. Do you think you can do that?"

From Tsuzuki, no response. Not that any was necessary. He was receptive; of that much Muraki was certain. That was all that mattered for his purposes.

"Are you familiar with the Kiseki?"

"The book that records the expected dead," Tsuzuki mumbled to the ceiling. "Of course I'm familiar with it. Every shinigami is. I didn't pay that little attention at my job."

The sarcasm was cute, but Muraki didn't have the patience for it just at the moment. "Yes, but are you familiar with it? Have you seen it with your own eyes?"

"No. We're not supposed to get that close to it, as shinigami. It's . . ."

"Classified?" Muraki supplied.

"Delicate," Tsuzuki settled for. He stretched like a cat, and Muraki couldn't help his gaze drifting lower, following the dimple of his navel down to his spent cock. . . . God, but he wanted seconds already. "It's a delicate matter. Like—"

"Like the candles in the Castle. Yes, I think I'm beginning to understand." And what had he been expecting, really? That security was so lax in the Land of the Dead that a shinigami bureaucrat from what Muraki had been given to understand was a low-level department would be given free access to those devices that controlled the very commodity their world relied upon?

If his scheme was so far-fetched, however, maybe there was no harm in revealing it. Perhaps to a kindred spirit, if he had not misjudged Tsuzuki too wildly. "I'd like your help in something, Tsuzuki."

"Mm?" came the tired response from under one crooked arm.

"I would like you, when you return to Meifu, to retrieve the Kiseki. For me."

"The Kiseki?" Tsuzuki peeked out from under his arm at Muraki; and for a moment the doctor worried that perhaps he hadn't lulled Tsuzuki into as thorough a hypnotic state he had thought before confessing his motives. "What could you possibly want . . .? No. Mm-mm," Tsuzuki shook his head, "I don't think that's a good idea."

"Why not?"

"Never mind the part where you want me to steal from Enma. Even if that could be done, and I somehow succeeded with my immortal soul intact, you can't have the book. Someone like you shouldn't have that kind of power."

The power to erase life or return it with the stroke of a pen? Didn't he know Muraki well enough by now to understand he was nearly halfway there by his own ingenuity?

Muraki leaned over him, and settled himself between Tsuzuki's legs. They were already parted; it wasn't much of an intrusion to nudge them a little wider. Even drained, hypersensitive to any touch, Tsuzuki shivered beneath him and stifled a small groan, the hedonist within at war with that part of him still determined not to respond to any of Muraki's overtures, and the former winning fast.

"And what about Enma? I quite agree with you, Tsuzuki, that I shouldn't have the power. But the better question is, should anyone? Even a so-called god?"

It seemed Tsuzuki had no ready answer to that. Or, judging by the furrow in his brow, the bit lip, perhaps it was the press of Muraki beneath his balls. Which was just as well. A distracted mind meant less competition for Muraki's logic.

"You said that, more than anything, you wanted justice, Tsuzuki. Yet how can such a thing ever exist so long as the time and manner of an individual's death is decided well in advance? Those who seek to change their fates are deemed sinners. Or, they are sent you for their troubles. A failsafe designed into the system to ensure no one, no matter how worthy of it, escapes the plots of the Judges of the Dead. Surely if you believe in fairness, in compassion, you can agree that that qualifies as neither one."

Muraki was well aware they were going in circles with this argument, and Tsuzuki still resisted it, like a stubborn child determined not to let one bite of some hated dish pass its lips. It seemed with each repetition, however, Muraki wore down his defenses, even if it was only by chips instead of chunks. He was wearing them down; that was all that mattered.

"You need not make a decision right now. Merely . . . think about my proposal. And should you decide it has merit, I believe there is something that may help you to accomplish it."

While Tsuzuki lay blinking at him, Muraki lowered his lips to his ear, so that his conspiratorial whispers might better be heard. Not that he needed to whisper here, with only the muffled storm for competition.

"You see, the more I study the legends surrounding the various Lords of the Dead, the more a common theme seems to emerge. Each of them is rumored to have been given some item, some article of invisibility, to allow them to better move throughout the Living World undetected. Hades had his cap of invisibility, others possessed a robe or a cloak . . . or a mask. . . ."

That got the reaction he desired. Tsuzuki backed his head away and stared at Muraki, eyes wide with surprise. "Does that ring a bell for you, Tsuzuki?"

"How could you . . ."

"How did I know?" Muraki smiled. Tsuzuki needn't know he'd just been cold-read. "Irrelevant. You know to what I refer, and that's all I care about. Should you find it difficult to complete your mission, take the mask, and with it, with that little piece of his power in your possession, even Enma will have trouble standing between you and the Kiseki. And then, when you have the book . . ."

He brushed his lips over Tsuzuki's cheek, back to his ear, relishing the little arch in Tsuzuki's spine, the stirring against Muraki's belly. Even as he tried half-heartedly to push Muraki away.

"Come find me again.

"Now, get some sleep. I can see that you need it. Think long and hard about what I've said. When you wake, you will not remember that we had this conversation. You will not remember that it was I who suggested this plot. But you will remember what I said. It will be waiting there, in the back of your mind, as though you came up with it all on your own."