Things were different out here. So much of it was emptiness, endless tawny hills in languid, reclining poses. Now and again, something strange would rise out of the landscape: gray lumpy insects the size of boulders, inching over the grass and plowing up paths behind them, herds of vaguely bovine things with muscular tails to whip at attackers.

Chichiri had long since run out of trails to follow. As fast as he could, he made for a vaguely discolored line in the grass toward the horizon. For the first time in weeks, it looked like rain; he needed those limits on the directions he could wander.

Hours later, the rain sheeted down, and the hills still rolled on into the growing darkness. There was a road, at least, but no buildings loomed up in the distance. Chichiri's pauses became more frequent; several times he knelt to press his palms against the increasingly sodden track, sigh deeply, and stand up again, slowly. There was no shelter.

One last time he bent, resting his elbows on his knees. Looking carefully from side to side, he considered each roadside's prospects for not drowning him in his sleep.

Light poured suddenly from a door that opened in the hill ahead. There was a screech of greeting, and the lumpy figure of an old woman hobbled toward him.

She continued shouting welcomes until she reached him, carefully considering his appearance. "Cor, you wouldn't happen to be one of them tormented fighter types, what with a tragic past?" Her birdy eyes glittered.

"I don't think so."

"Not got anyone murderin' your entire family for revenge, then?"

"No."

"Not runnin' away from your troubles in a delirium looking to live the simple life of a farmer?"

"I'm looking for someone."

"Blast. I hear them lapsed fighting-masters make grand workers. Old Tako's got the rheumatism, we're short-handed in the fields. Come in out of the cold anyhow, young man." She led him in through the door in the hill.

Dripping, Chichiri surveyed the room: both walls and floor were packed dirt, held up with rough-hewn beams. An old man with gnarled, swollen hands sat in the corner, raising a bowl of soup to his mouth every so often. "If you want more visitors, you might try having some beautiful maidens around, no da."

"What, you mean like the ones in old stories? White as milk and born mute or blind or summat tragic."

"They must be very brave, and sweet, of course. It sets a good example."

"Ee! You are a wicked one, sir. But that's a good idea, ennit…"

"Do you get tormented souls through here often?"

"'Course. They like all the nothingness, it doesn't remind them of anything. Only heard of the one staying in all my life, but there's always room for more. Your tragic maidens wouldn't do much good there, hee!"

"Why's that?"

"She's a woman herself. Never saw the like, did we, Old Tako?" The hairy old man grunted into his soup.

"Ah. That's very interesting." Chichiri perched on a rough bench by the fire to dry, listening to the old woman mutter to herself:

"Maybe Kenda's daughter, she's got the club foot. Face like a goat, though. Riu's youngest looks right enough, but there's nothing wrong with'er…bet she could act mute, when she's older…"

"That was a good bit of information-gathering," muttered Kai. "You're tricksier than you look."

"Yes, well. The old woman did have me hauling wood and water for a two weeks before she'd tell me the way to Ou Akiame's farm. Never mind that it happened to be fifty miles away."

The house was not built into the landscape, as he'd expected, but it seemed to have grown into it: moss grew up the plastered walls and new grass in a carpet over the roof. The single window was dark; the sun had already set. Chichiri lowered the hand he had raised to knock, and carefully considered the weathered door for a long minute. Finally, he circled the house and knocked at the door of the barn instead. The horse's snuffle was a welcome greeting, the last thing he remembered before falling fast asleep..

The girl wore a sense of age like a yoke on her shoulders. It stooped her, took all of the shine the early morning light should have given her. Even her clothes were old: farmer's trousers folded and tied around a meager waist.

She set down the wash bucket she carried and paused, crouched. Slowly, she turned; she made no sudden moves, but subtle shifts in balance suggested that something in her had been set, like a spring-loaded trap. She turned, cold anger in her eyes, and faced Chichiri.

All the tension flicked away in half an instant. She took a quick step forward, froze. "I remember you," she said.

Without the questions he had prepared to answer, he was dumb, motionless as she walked quite matter-of-factly to him. Her hand remembered where the edge of the mask should be and took it away. Suspiciously, she studied the old wood and paint before her eyes moved back to his nervous face. "I remember you," she repeated, and now there was no question in her voice.

His awkwardness caught hold of her. Both stared at each other without a place to start.

"Mama!" came a cry from the house, and a tiny girl in a red dress toddled out, holding a bowl she could have used as a boat. Surprised by the stranger, she tripped, the wooden bowl flying into the mud and rolling to a comical halt, the girl's pudgy starfish hands landing splat in a puddle. She paused as if to make up her mind, and then began to bawl. "Imi," murmured Akiame, and rushed to pick the little girl up, smudging her shapeless shirt with mud and tears.

"Ouch," hissed Genrou, taking another drink. "Women, huh?" He looked to Kai for support. Kai ignored him, and motioned Chichiri to continue.

When Imiko had finished her cry and run back to the house on some small errand, Akiame turned back to him. "Do you remember my brother? Doukun?"

"Yes, I--" He paused, realizing something. "Of course I remember him."

"Imiko is an orphan. We both are." Her voice grew fainter. "But I hope she'll never have to know."

Kai broke in, "All she knew was that you'd saved her brother, once. Not that you'd been his friend, or that you'd seen him die."

"I realized that around that time," Chichiri nodded. "But you've got to understand…hasn't there ever been anyone you haven't been able to move around? Kouran had been the only one to do that to me; I loved her. Akiame…well, until then, I'd never had to face anyone I'd hurt, do you see?" There was a certain pleading in his voice.

"But did you tell her?" Kai leaned forward, though his eyes were beginning to swim. Genrou, too, looked flushed and distracted.

"Yes."

He sat on the floor, watching Imiko babble and run her toy animals back and forth, listening to stifled sobs through the wall. He rested his face in his hands a moment, then stood quickly.

But even as he took a determined step toward the next room, a piping voice, frighteningly familiar, rang out: "Chichiri-sama!"

"Chiriko-kun?" he gasped, and stumbled. Imiko looked curiously up at him, and disbelief churned in his stomach. Her eyes were green, something he surely should have noticed earlier…

She crowed with laughter, suddenly, and ran out into the brightening yard.

Akiame appeared at his elbow, covering her red face slightly with one hand. She cast about for Imiko, spied her in the yard splashing in puddles. With a surprised sigh, she noticed what she held in her other hand. "Iya da--I've ruined this. I'm so sorry…" The face on the old mask had been smeared away by tears.

"Oh, it's all right. I find myself repainting it now and again…no da." The cheerful tone caught in his throat, and he put a hand on her shoulder, instead. "Why don't you keep it, after all? It was yours to give; it's yours to take back."

Imiko ran in and twined her arms around Akiame's legs. She babbled happily as she looked up at Chichiri, her bright eyes black as a beetle's wings.