He found Seimei lazing on the veranda, his fan spread to shade his face from the sun. A sake jug and two cups rested beside him. Hiromasa navigated the overgrown path through the garden – it had changed again since last night, he was certain of it – and climbed the steps to stand over his friend.
The fan lowered enough for him to see Seimei's eyes. He looked pleased, the way a beloved should look the morning after. Under normal circumstances, and had he not been so muddled by guilt and worry, Hiromasa would have felt proud of his prowess.
Seimei closed his fan and propped his head on his hand. The sunlight seemed to glow from his pale skin, calling Hiromasa's attention to the faint but unmistakable shadows of bruising on Seimei's neck.
Hiromasa drew in a deep breath. The evidence of his desire started a fluttering sensation in the pit of his belly, half pleasure and half concern. He really must learn to control himself whenever he bedded Seimei.
He slipped a hand inside his cloak and hesitated. There seemed little point in prevaricating. Without flourish, he pulled out the white glossed under-robe and dropped it onto the veranda between them.
Seimei looked at it, then at him. "If you wanted a memento, I believe a lock of hair is considered sufficient."
"This isn't funny, Seimei."
"On the contrary, I'm excessively diverted." Seimei sat up, hugging his knees. "I knew you were a romantic, but to steal my clothes…"
"Seimei! Be serious!"
The mischief faded from Seimei's expression. With a flick of his fan, he indicated Hiromasa should sit. "Twice now you've left me the morning after, long before I woke. Did I fail to please?"
"It's not that." Hiromasa sank to his knees, aghast that Seimei should even think such a thing. "And I'm sorry I don't have a poem for you, but I – I think I've done something stupid."
"Indeed." Seimei raised his eyebrows. "Am I to infer from the fact you stole my under-robe that I am also involved in this something stupid you've done?"
"I think – perhaps… yes." Unable to look at him directly, Hiromasa fixed his gaze on Seimei's fan and told him everything, from Winter Moon begging him to enter the incense contest to the details of his last visit to Nose. His face flamed as he described how he'd made notes on Seimei's own scent and tried to replicate it at home. He cringed as he remembered how he'd eased the under-robe from beneath their bodies early that morning and taken it to Nose – and he felt his throat thicken with disgust as he related how Nose had reacted to the garment.
Seimei was silent for a long time afterwards. Hiromasa didn't dare raise his head, certain his friend would be looking at him with contempt. He watched Seimei's slender, elegant fingers toy with the fan before they stilled.
"Tell me one thing," Seimei said, his voice so soft the morning breeze almost stole it away, "when you came to me last night, did you just want my robe?"
Hiromasa jerked up his head. "I didn't come here to use you. What I felt – what I feel – that's real. You must believe me, Seimei. I wouldn't… I've never seduced anyone for personal gain. You offered, I took."
"And if we hadn't slept together last night…"
Hiromasa glanced away. "I would have taken one of your robes somehow."
A pause. Seimei opened the fan and ran a finger along the top edge, following the zigzag of stiffened paper. "Is this contest so important to you?"
"Not in the way you understand things to be important." Hiromasa looked at him. "But it is important to me. It's a little thing, but even little things define us. Courtiers, I mean. It's different for you. You don't care. You…"
Seimei interrupted. "Why didn't you tell me what you wanted?"
"Because you despise the court. You'd think my request was frivolous."
"It is. But for you, I'd have granted it."
Hiromasa huffed. "No, I know what you'd have done. You'd have given me an incense that smelled heavenly until the day of the contest, when it would become as rank as rotten fish!"
Seimei chuckled and hid behind the fan. "Indeed I would."
"I wanted to win this contest fairly…"
"Of course. So you went to an incense-blender."
Hiromasa defended himself: "Nose makes incense for everyone at court."
"Ah, so it is fair." Seimei lowered the fan, his eyes shining. "Hiromasa, surely you can see how foolish court life is, how utterly useless?"
"Yes. But it's my life. Am I a fool, and useless?"
"You are neither of those things." Seimei's gaze strayed to the garden, following the flittering path of Mitsumushi in her butterfly form. "Perhaps I am the fool to stay outside of your happy existence and poke fun at it. Still, what's done cannot be undone."
"You aren't angry with me?"
"What would be the point?" With a sigh, Seimei looked back at him. He smiled a little. "Besides, I can never stay angry with you for long. But come, tell me more about the scent you found."
"I can show you." Hiromasa shuffled closer.
Seimei chuckled. "Ah, Hiromasa, it seems we should add theft to your long list of talents. Let me see it."
Taking the bottle from inside his cloak, Hiromasa handed it over. "It's my scent, so how can it be theft?"
"Hiromasa!" The chuckle became a laugh. Seimei took the bottle and examined it closely. He held it to the light, shook it, tapped it, and then rolled it across his palms. "Interesting. It had no label?"
"None of them did," Hiromasa said, recalling the time he'd spent handling and sniffing the contents of the ceramic bottles. "I recognised half a dozen personal scents. She could have made more. The bottles were all plain, but this one was sealed with wax."
"Perhaps your scent wasn't quite finished." Seimei popped open the lid and inhaled. He stoppered the bottle and sat back, frowning. "Oh, this is… Hmm."
Hiromasa leaned forward. "What?"
Seimei hooked a finger in the collar of his cloak and drew him closer. He let go only when they touched. Hiromasa felt himself blushing again, hopelessly confused by what was happening.
Seimei lowered his head and nuzzled at Hiromasa's neck. "You must have a good nose. It's hard for a man to recognise his own body scent," he murmured, his voice pitched so low it sent shivers through Hiromasa. "Let me… mmm…"
Hiromasa remained still, aching with awareness. Seimei's scent and warmth tantalised him. He stared at Seimei's upswept hair and the curve of his ear, and felt his body respond with predictable speed. As Seimei continued to nuzzle him, Hiromasa wondered if it was too soon for them to go back to bed.
Seimei sat up straight. One tendril of hair had loosened during his actions, and now it fell across his face.
Hiromasa liked Seimei looking untidy. His mind gave him images of other occasions when his friend had looked dishevelled. He was enjoying the mental tableaux so much he didn't listen when Seimei spoke to him. Realising he'd missed something, Hiromasa coughed in embarrassment.
"What did you say?"
Seimei tucked the errant strand of hair behind his ear and gave him a quelling look. He tilted the bottle, recalling Hiromasa's attention to it. "I said, it's almost exact, but there's something missing. You opened the bottle before your scent had ripened."
"Ah." Hiromasa determined to focus on the subject at hand. He frowned at the bottle. "Nose said that wearing someone else's personal scent would make them trust the wearer. I'm worried she may intend to use her perfumes to get inside the palace and befriend various nobles. She has many clients – even the Chancellor himself uses her fragrances. What if she wants to steal from her patrons?"
Seimei looked thoughtful. "I wonder…" He handed back the bottle and stood. "Had you heard of this Nose before now? A woman of her talents must surely be well known at court, even if her existence is only talked of in whispers."
Hiromasa shook his head. "This is the first I've heard of her. But normally I pay little attention to such things."
"Perhaps you should ask one of your servants," Seimei suggested. "Ask now, while I fetch a few items from my study."
The idea of questioning his servants seemed novel. Most of the time, Hiromasa forgot they were there. He hurried through the garden and peered out onto the road where his ox-cart waited. Three menservants sat in the shade of the cart, urging on a pair of crickets wrestling on the ground. As soon as the men noticed his presence, the insects were separated and scooped into tiny boxes.
"Do you go home now, lord?" the ox-handler asked, bowing.
"Not yet, thank you." As Hiromasa approached, he noticed a stack of bowls on the ground by the cart. Seimei had obviously thought to give the men their morning rice, a task that should have been Hiromasa's duty as a master. Instead he'd walked his men from one side of the city to the other and back again, without even a thought for their comfort.
Feeling guilty, he gave his servants his most charming smile. "I'd just like to talk to you."
Not long after, Hiromasa returned to Seimei's house with more information than he could process. Climbing onto the veranda, he said, "My servants know everything!"
"They usually do." Seimei didn't look up, intent on inking a pentacle onto a small square of paper. "What did you learn?"
"Nose started selling incense to low-ranking courtiers this year sometime during the Third Month. She asked only for small amounts of rice in exchange. Later, as she began making perfume for the higher ranks, her price increased and her competitors complained. There was talk of a number of incense-sellers banding together to drive her away, but nothing ever came of it."
"Interesting." Seimei finished the pentacle and wrote a series of obscure wriggling characters beneath it.
"My men said she must be a demon who used magic on her rivals, but maybe she took their personal scents and used them to gain the advantage, as she must plan to do at court." Hiromasa sat beside his friend and watched him add a few lines and dots to the unintelligible script.
"We'll see." Seimei folded back his right sleeve, then licked the back of the paper and attached it to the bottle. He stood, holding the bottle at arm's length, and waited.
Moments later, sparks streamed from the pentacle. Hiromasa exclaimed in shock. The sparks rained down over Seimei's skin, but he remained unflinching. Hiromasa made an inarticulate sound and flapped his sleeve at the sparks. He backed away when his brocades began to burn.
Thick black smoke choked the sparks, and then a character, written in fire, flashed through the darkness. The fire spread, consuming the pentacle. Seimei muttered something and tossed the bottle into the air. He caught it in his left hand then clamped his right hand over the flames. He hissed a chant before dropping the bottle, with the paper still smouldering, onto the veranda.
Seimei brushed off his hands, looking intrigued. "Well, well."
Hiromasa gulped as the pentacle burned itself out and the paper fluttered into ash. "What does that mean?"
"It means, my dear Hiromasa, that your servants were right. Nose is a demon."
"A demon!" Hiromasa toppled backwards. "Seimei! I didn't –"
"A scent-demon, to be precise." Seimei sat and adjusted his sleeve. He seemed pleased. "Ah, Hiromasa, you've involved us in something very remarkable. Scent-demons usually hunger for incense – they don't create it in exchange for rice and silk."
Hiromasa righted himself, smoothing his brocades across his lap. "So why would she give away the thing most precious to her?"
"That's what I want to know."
They were silent for a moment. Hiromasa thought back over his conversations with Nose. He said slowly, "It may be nothing, but when she mentioned personal scents, she spoke about… about seduction."
Seimei gave him a mischievous look. "She meant possession."
Uneasy, Hiromasa glanced at him. "Possession?"
"Yes." Seimei shifted forward onto his hands and knees and prowled towards him with a slow, languid sway. Hiromasa leaned back, suddenly breathless as Seimei moved over him, pinning him to the floor. "Was that why you did it, Hiromasa?" Seimei's voice lowered to a teasing purr. "Do you want to possess me?"
Hiromasa fought equal amounts of arousal and panic. "Seimei! How can you say that at a time like this!"
Seimei retreated, laughing.
Trying to regain his dignity, Hiromasa sat up. "I need a drink." He pulled the sake jug and cups towards him, and poured for them both. When he felt calm again, he said, "By 'possession', you mean…"
"I mean in every way." Seimei accepted a cup, smiling his maddening little fox-smile. He sipped at the sake then put it down. "A person's body scent is unique. It's a kind of spell…"
"Like a name?"
"Yes, but even more basic than that. Scent is animal. It works on humans without them realising it. Sometimes decisions are made purely because of scent." Seimei dipped his forefinger in his sake and ran it around the rim of the cup. "You may have an irrational hatred of someone just because of the way they smell. That's partly why you use incense to disguise your personal scent – to make yourself seem harmless; to gain the trust of others who find pleasure in that fragrance."
"Nose wants people to trust her."
Seimei nodded. "Imitate someone's body scent and the true owner will trust you, invite intimacies… allow possession." His eyes flashed. "Sexual possession – and spiritual, demonic possession. If she wishes it, Nose will be able to possess the entire court… including you and me."
"Ah." Hiromasa gazed down into his cup. "That's not good, is it?"
"A demon's power is greatly enhanced when it takes possession of humans," Seimei said, his voice light and easy. "A demon's power multiplied by possession of the entire court and channelled through the body of an exceptional yin yang master… that would be bad."
Lifting the cup to his lips, Hiromasa tried to match his friend's casual tone. "She could destroy the city, I suppose."
"She would destroy everything between the coast of Wakasa to the west and the shrine of Ise in the east."
Hiromasa choked on his sake. "So much!"
Seimei shrugged. "It would cause less damage if she didn't have my scent."
"Because you are exceptional." Hiromasa remembered Nose's excitement as she pawed at Seimei's under-robe. He looked at his friend. "She said you were a fox." It came out sounding accusatory. He corrected himself. "A half-fox."
Seimei smiled.
"Well?" Hiromasa demanded.
"Half-fox sounds terribly untidy." Seimei gave him a flirtatious glance over the rim of the wine-cup. "You of all people know I have only one tail."
"So you deny it? You're not a fox?"
"What do you think, Hiromasa?"
Exasperated, Hiromasa poured more sake. "I think you're avoiding the question."
Seimei laughed. It was such an infectious sound that after a moment Hiromasa joined in. With a shimmer of blue, Mitsumushi appeared beside them and giggled. The selection of flowers cradled in her arms spilled onto the veranda.
Hiromasa admired the splashes of colour. He inhaled their fragrance, pleased that she hadn't picked lavender and late autumn roses. He never wanted to smell that particular combination again.
"Seimei avoids the question!" Mitsumushi declared. She scattered the rest of her flowers between them. Another giggle and she was gone, vanishing into the house.
Hiromasa looked at the untidy bouquet of pink dahlias mixed with white chrysanthemums and red camellias. He caught his breath as he understood their meanings. Arranging the flowers into an abstract design, he murmured, "Good taste, truth, and love."
"It's not just servants who know everything," Seimei said softly.
Hiromasa spluttered. "I was quiet last night. You, on the other hand…"
To his surprise, his friend looked abashed. Seimei picked up a camellia and twirled it by the stem. Changing the subject, he said, "I wonder why Nose wants all those scents."
"You already said. She means to possess the entire court."
Seimei pursed his lips. "No. There are easier ways to possess a human."
"Perhaps she wanted you all along."
"Doubtful. There was no guarantee you'd enter the perfume contest, and she certainly couldn't have predicted that you'd want to make my scent."
Hiromasa blushed. "You smell good."
"Thank you." Seimei smiled and took a chrysanthemum, twining the camellia's stem around it. "There's another reason she's doing this. Demons always act according to their nature. Nose is a scent-demon, so any magic she produces will take the form of perfume. Whatever her ultimate goal is, it must also be related to scent…"
He stopped, his eyes widening. Dropping the flowers, he jumped to his feet, his agitation obvious. "I am a fool!"
"Seimei?" Hiromasa rose as his friend hurried inside. Curious, he followed, stepping around a series of standing curtains until he reached a small room at the back of the house. The temperature changed, becoming cooler as he ventured into the shadows. He found Seimei kneeling before a large wooden chest, its lid flung open as he searched within for something.
Hiromasa glanced around the room and shivered. The air felt alive here, potent with the promise of old secrets and terrible mysteries. He dismissed his fanciful imaginings and moved closer to Seimei. "What is it? What are you looking for?"
"I found it." Seimei reared back from the chest, a box wrapped in faded blue silk held in his hands.
He stood, cradling the box against his body, and ushered Hiromasa from the room. They did not go far. Seimei stopped beside the dais of his bed and sank down onto it, setting the box on his knees. Looking up at Hiromasa, he said, "The most powerful scent of all is spirit-summoning incense."
"Spirit-summoning incense?" Hiromasa stared at the box, feeling a creeping sense of unease as Seimei unwrapped the cloth covering it.
"Many centuries ago in China," Seimei began, "an incense was created to summon the spirits of the dead. The secret of this incense was known to only a handful of scholars, who used it to ask the spirits to reveal prophecies. But as in life, the dead have their own agenda and are not always truthful. The spirits urged the living to take up their causes and seek revenge for ancient hurts. The living became puppets of the dead. Peaceful states erupted into war. As more people died, the spirits' power grew, and the living no longer knew where to look for guidance."
Hiromasa shuddered. "Seimei, that's horrible!"
"The King of Qin banned the use and making of spirit-summoning incense within his country. Soon his ministers and generals could think clearly again, free of the spirits' influence. The king saw how weak his rival states had become. He seized the opportunity and took them, one by one, and made an empire."
The blue silk unravelled across Seimei's knees. "The emperor worried that the children of his rivals would use spirit-summoning incense and rise up against him under the control of their murdered sires. To prevent this, he ordered the destruction of every book of wisdom, and when the scholars protested, he had them burned alive."
Speechless with horror, Hiromasa gazed at Seimei. As a youth he'd read and heard stories about the first Chinese emperor, but had given them no real thought. They'd seemed no more relevant to his life than the story of the Herdsman and the Weaving Maid. Now a link between himself and a long-dead tyrant sat contained within a box in Seimei's lap. Hiromasa swallowed and took a few steps backwards.
The box was made of interlocking pieces of cherry-wood. Seimei examined it, splaying his fingers to touch at different sections of the box. "It's been years since I opened this," he murmured, almost to himself.
Addressing Hiromasa again, he continued, "The knowledge of spirit-summoning incense almost died with the scholars, but one man hid a cache of incense balls. Many years later, a peasant discovered them by chance."
"What did he do?" Hiromasa asked. He was more interested in the story than in the contents of the box. The story seemed safer.
Seimei turned the box over. "The peasant burned one of the balls of incense and was visited by a spirit who told him the value of what he'd found. At the time, China was ruled by Emperor Wu of the Han dynasty, a man obsessed with immortality and magic. The death of his favourite concubine, Lady Li, had devastated the emperor. The peasant came to his palace and promised the emperor that he could see his beloved Lady Li again.
"Emperor Wu's advisers warned him not to involve himself with the summoning of spirits, but he ignored them. The peasant gave him an incense ball. The emperor lit the incense and focused on the thought of Lady Li. Soon he saw a form take shape within the smoke. At first it was nothing more than a cloud, but then colour and detail appeared – the spirit of Lady Li herself."
Seimei turned the box over again and frowned at it. "The emperor was overcome with joy at seeing his favourite. He called to her, but she seemed not to hear him. He begged her to speak to him, but she hid her face and wept. Anguished by her suffering, Emperor Wu rushed to comfort her – but when he seized the phantom in his arms, Lady Li vanished and became smoke once more."
"How sad!" Hiromasa's sympathies were more for the beautiful concubine than the grieving emperor.
"Emperor Wu rewarded the peasant with wealth, a title, and one of his daughters as a wife. The peasant handed over the entire cache of incense balls, and the emperor spent the rest of his days begging the spirit of Lady Li to return. After the emperor's death, palace officials confiscated the remaining incense and locked it away."
Seimei used his thumbs on the box, pressing down hard. Something clicked and a latch sprang out. "Ah, there it is."
Hiromasa backed away as Seimei opened the lid. When nothing leapt out of the box at them, he ventured closer and peered inside.
A crumbling black sphere the size of his palm nestled in layers of wadded silk. Unlike the incense balls he'd seen in braziers in his home or at the palace, this one sparkled as if it had starlight trapped inside it. A thin, barely discernible scent rose from it, the fragrance impossible for him to identify.
"This is from Xianyang, the former capital of China." Seimei gazed at the incense but did not touch it. "It was found in the ruins of the old palace, or so I was told."
The scent disturbed him on a level he didn't understand. Hiromasa shied away from it. "I've never seen incense look like that."
"I believe it was discovered in a brazier. The outer layers have burned away."
"You haven't tried it, have you?"
Seimei's lips parted but he made no reply. A strange expression crossed his face. It was gone so quickly Hiromasa thought he'd imagined it.
"I should shut this away again." Seimei closed the lid and drew the wrappings around the box.
Hiromasa watched him. Seimei hadn't answered his question, so he tried another: "Do you think Nose wants to steal this incense?"
"I think she wants to create her own." Seimei's expression darkened. "If she steals enough personal scents and uses them to take ki energy from each courtier, her life-power will be immense. If she then uses me, focuses all that energy into one single purpose, all the scents will combine into one to make spirit-summoning incense."
Hiromasa tried to imagine it. "What would happen to you?"
"I'd burn." Seimei's smile was brief. "Death in a blaze of scented glory."
Horror filled Hiromasa. "How can we stop her?"
Seimei finished re-tying the silk around the box. "By changing our scent."
"What?"
"It's the only possible course of action we can take without alerting Nose." Rising to his feet, Seimei carried the box into his study and set in on the floor. "Humans can alter their body scent if they change their diet and living habits; for example, bathing more often or…"
"But that's dangerous!" Hiromasa protested.
Seimei continued as if he hadn't spoken. "Or eating meat…"
"It's a sin!" Aghast, Hiromasa sank onto his knees.
"Whatever Nose plans, whether she's using those scents to steal from the palace or if she intends on creating spirit-summoning incense, scent is the key." Seimei opened a lacquer-wood cabinet and took out a series of scrolls. He deposited the box inside the cabinet and replaced the scrolls, then closed the door firmly.
"Since you managed to involve us both in this little drama, it's in our interests, as well as in the interests of those useless fools at court, to stop Nose from succeeding." Seimei sat back and retrieved his fan from where he'd tucked it into his sash. "The incense contest will be held at the end of next month. We have just over forty days to change our scent."
It didn't sound long enough. "Maybe she won't be able to replicate your scent," Hiromasa said hopefully. "After all, your under-robe carried my scent, too." He blushed.
Seimei chuckled. "Unfortunately we can't take the risk that Nose could make a mistake. She knows how to make your scent, and she managed that after only a brief meeting. Since she's smelled and tasted my scent, I have no doubt she's already working on copying it. Changing our scent is the only way we can avoid her intentions."
Hiromasa sighed. He didn't want to break the taboos on washing and eating meat, but he trusted his friend to know what he was doing. Resigned to his fate, he said, "Very well. I will do whatever you say."
Seimei gave him a glinting look. "What a novelty that will be."
"Seimei!" Hiromasa glared. He shifted his gaze to the lacquer-wood cabinet and thought of the box hidden inside. "By the way… why don't you use incense?"
"I do occasionally, but only outside. You've seen me use it in rituals at the shrine in the garden." Seimei relaxed, lounging on one elbow and tapping his fan on the floorboards. "I never use it indoors for two reasons. Mainly it's because the smoke attracts hordes of incense-eating scent-demons, and I can't be bothered dealing with the tiresome little creatures."
Hiromasa blinked. "Are scent-demons attracted to all types of incense?"
"Only those that smell sweetest, or are the most expensive. The demons are the spirits of those who sold bad incense during their lifetimes."
"And Nose is one of those demons?"
Seimei opened his fan and hid a yawn behind it. "I imagine so. A very powerful scent-demon, though, since she can take human shape."
"So when the servants burn incense in the brazier, when they hang my robes to perfume them… the incense-eating scent-demons are also present? In my home?"
"Yes. Unless you have a charm to banish them."
"I want a charm." Hiromasa crept closer to Seimei. "I don't want demons in my house. You never told me about these things before!"
"Most of the time they're not dangerous." Seimei played with his fan, examining the pattern on the paper. "Occasionally a scent-demon will become angry. It fights with the embers and rouses a spark that catches a length of silk and sets the whole house on fire."
Hiromasa stared at him, thinking of how many times the imperial palace had burned down. He thought of the fires that swept almost monthly through the districts of Heian-Kyo. Some were contained before the damage spread very far; other fires devastated large areas of the city.
He swallowed. "Are the great fires caused by angry scent-demons?"
Seimei snapped his fan shut. "Sometimes." He tilted his head, brushing his cheek with the fan. "Mostly it's human error. Not all demons seek to destroy mankind. Many are quite harmless."
"Harmless!" Hiromasa couldn't imagine such a thing as a harmless demon. He sat up. "Seimei. You said there were two reasons you didn't burn incense."
"So I did."
"Well?" Hiromasa waited for his reply. "What is the second reason?"
"The second reason is one of comfort. You see," Seimei paused and gave him a gleaming look, "foxes don't like smoke."
