The Adventures of Master Kaku and Blessed Bell

A Touhou Project Fanfic by Achariyth


Chapter 4: The Onmyo Sorceress

"All things have a root and a top, all events an end and a beginning. Whoever understands correctly what comes first and what follows draws nearer to Tao."–The Great Learning, by the Great Master Kong


Every room of the Scarlet Devil Mansion held its own story and Sakuya led her guests through its silver-studded halls in pursuit of each one. With an ease honed from thousands of bedtime tales, the maid recited story after story, spurred on by each laugh, gasp, and shriek from Chen, Akane, and Youmu. Sakuya even coaxed Ran, Lady Yuyuko, and Yukari away from their quiet debate with Master Kaku.

Trailing behind the tour, Meiling ground out her penance one mutter at a time.

"You're so inconsiderate, toying with me like this. Do you know how thirsty I am?" Remilia tugged on Meiling's arm. "Blood, blood everywhere, and not a drop to drink."

Her teeth on edge, Meiling waved frantically at Sakuya. But a wall of golden fur stepped in front of the maid as Ran moved to scold her Doomkitten.

"Look at her." Licking her lips, Remilia pointed at Youmu. The phantom swordswoman hung on Master Kaku's every word. "So pale, so pretty, but not pale enough for the current fashion. One little nip would do her and I both a kindness."

As Remilia bared her fangs, Meiling drew in a deep breath, ready to bellow the warning all residents of the Scarlet Devil Mansion feared.

"Relax, I'll settle for black pudding and blutwurst, just like Sakuya wants. But can't you see the feast you've laid before me?" Remilia cast a moue before beaming at Meiling with a toothy smile. "Except for the rat. A vampiress must have standards."

"Normally you aren't hungry after a hunt." Meiling slowed, letting the tour pull farther away.

"How was I supposed to know about the soybean harvest?" Remilia shuddered and drew her wings around her body like a cloak. Since arriving in Gensokyo, Remilia had collected odd weaknesses foreign to her European roots.

Meiling chewed her lip as Sakuya led her tour group around a corner. "You make it sound like it's my fault."

The vampiress fixed her cat-like eyes on Meiling. "You ran away," mewed Remilia.

"I went for help."

"Busybodies and vermin infest my home. How is this 'help'?" Remilia scowled at an empty jewelry bezel tacked to the wall. "Remind me to ask Sakuya count the silver after they leave. And don't think that you won't be helping her."

Meiling struggled not to grimace. "Who will watch over the fairies while we are working?"

"Hopefully no one. Patchouli's almost finished distilling her ginseng tincture." Remilia darted ahead of Meiling and twirled about. "The earlier your guests leave, the sooner your count will end. Better hurry."

As the vampires skipped backwards through the hall, the walls around Meiling groaned, warping as Sakuya's power ebbed away. The guardswoman darted after Remilia. "Wait up!"

She caught up with Remilia and Sakuya's tour in front of the gilded doors of the mansion's library and breathed a sigh of relief. Traditionally, her library was the final step on Sakuya's tours of the mansion, and no tour was complete without a visit.

Sakuya clapped her hands, drawing all eyes to herself. With a sweep of her outstretched arm, the library's double doors swung open on their own. After years of watching the maid's parlor tricks, Meiling noticed the flicker in Sakuya's pose that betrayed the methods of her showmanship–and how the maid's gestures drew her audience's gaze away from the now open dumbwaiter behind her. Meiling half-expected a petite but daring blond witch to dive inside the cupboard.

Meiling pursed her lips and beckoned the chief maid to hurry. Not only did Sakuya's showmanship keep her audience's attention focused on her, it prolonged the tour. Those silver coins lining the walls could not count themselves.

Akane cooed at the vast hedge maze of books. "How many books are here?" The mouseling's soft-spoken words cut through Meiling's reverie. Behind the mouseling, the Doomkitten struggled to keep a straight face.

Sakuya mulled over the question "I lost track after Patchouli bought her first hundred thousand. Perhaps Koakuma will have a better count."

"She won't miss one, then." The mouseling clutched a cozy mystery to her chest.

Sakuya struggled not to smile. "We can make arrangements with Patchouli if you fancy a specific title. And even if you don't, I can offer a suggestion or two." The mouseling glowed as she ran her hand across the spines of a bookshelf.

"Later, Akane," Yukari dragged Akane away from the bookshelves by her tail. "We came here to see the fairies."

Meiling winced as Sakuya beamed at the suggestion. Give Sakuya a chance to show off, and all common sense fled the normally elegant maid. Instead of ending the tour, Sakuya range a brass hand bell.

Six fairy maids bustled out of the bookshelves and lined the aisle. Ruby-lipped Silk stood ramrod straight while her sisters shifted around her. Meiling nodded in approval. She demanded greater precision from raw recruits, but for fairies, this was parade ground discipline. Sakuya glowed with pride.

"This is not what I meant." Ran's sudden sneezing fit interrupted Yukari. The onmyo sorceress snapped open her fan and shielded her face. Ran shrank away from Yukari, sniffling as she covered her face and ducked behind a bookshelf.

Sakuya bobbed a quick curtsy. "Please forgive me, but it's rare that my staff here can attend to a party of your esteem."

"Other that your monthly soirees?" Lady Yuyuko said from behind her fan. Thin wisps of mist coiled around her feet.

"These are library maids." Sakuya turned away before she could see Meiling's motions to hurry and Remilia's scowl. "Patchouli keeps them too busy to join our fun."

Ran swayed out into the aisle. She steadied herself against the bookshelf and hid a handkerchief up her voluminous sleeves. With a wan grin, she rubbed her bloodshot eyes. "Please excuse me. If I didn't know better, I'd swear I'm coming down with the spider's flu."

Meiling froze, gathering her chi. Just the day before, she fought a clutch of spider youkai in their underground lair. Next to her, Master Kaku tensed, palming a spellcard. So did Silk.

"I keep a proper household," protested Remilia. The vampiress's wings fluttered enough to lift her a meter over the library floor.

Ran clenched her eyes and sniffed the air. "Really? This library is full of their scent." The fox maiden doubled over, sneezing.

"Oh, my, and Patchouli just had the library fumigated." Sakuya plucked a cozy mystery from a shelf and handed it to Akane.

Books crashed to the floor. Meiling whirled around into a ready stance. Below an empty set of shelves, Silk cowered in the center of a pile of hardbacks, shielding her blond head with her arms. After one last book fell, the tall fairy maid breathed a sigh of relief and stood, fussing with the crown of braids in her hair.

Meiling's eyes narrowed. Her spiderette nemesis had worn a similar crown during their underground fight the day before. The guardswoman's hands balled into fists. "Where were you yesterday?" she demanded.

"Meiling!" Sakuya scolded. Silver filled the maid's hand.

Silk met the guardswoman's eye and flashed her fangs. She grabbed her silk wings. Tearing them free, the spiderette threw the four webs at the tour group. Meiling grazed past the webs, which wrapped Youmu, Lady Yuyuko, Yukari, and Sakuya in silk cocoons. Fairy maids screamed, scrambling out of Meiling's path as the guardswoman lunged at the spy. The spiderette ducked out of Meiling's grasp and dashed into the library maze, flinging danmaku behind her.

Meiling bounced off the bookshelf. Grazing through the danmaku spray, the guardswoman chased Silk through the web the spiderette wove through the library's shelves. Magic circles appeared on the shelves around Meiling, absorbing danmaku before the shot could scorch Patchouli's books.

An orange and green streak bounded past Meiling. Laughing, Chen flung icicles and hexes at the fleeing spiderette. Actinic light bathed the library as wards protected the books. The floor, however, froze over, sparkling with imbued curses. Meiling soared over a spreading patch of ice and ducked down an aisle untouched by danmaku and spells.

Leaving the chase to Chen, Meiling relied on her knowledge of the library–and no small amount of luck–to herd Silk towards the far corner of the library. Every time the spiderette spun another loop in her web of turns and switchbacks through the bookshelf maze, she found Meiling running towards her, blocking off paths that led toward the exit. Finally, Meiling and Chen trapped Silk against a back wall.

The spiderette pressed up against a nearby bookshelf, flinging whorls of danmaku with one hand while she fiddled with a cupboard.

Meiling lunged at Silk, hurling spell cards at the spiderette. Magic flared from the detonating cards, erasing rings and shells of danmaku shot with every pulse.

The cupboard slid open. Silk threw herself into the dumbwaiter's maze of ductwork.

Meiling rebounded off the wall, spilling books from the shelves. The guardswoman pursed her lips as she studied the dumbwaiter. A thousand games of hide-and-seek with the Scarlet sisters had taught her the futility of squeezing through the cupboard door. Only little girls, snake-hipped witches, and now trap-door spiders could crawl through the dumbwaiter's shaft.

With a yowl, the Doomkitten dove into the spiderette's bolthole. Books cascaded off the shelves as thumps and crashes hammered the wall from within. A metallic twang, like an overstretched spring snapping, echoed from the open cupboard.

A lull in the cacophony settled over the library. Chen tumbled out of the dumbwaiter, tangled in a net of cobwebs. She sprawled out in the center of the aisle and stared up at the library's lights. "She got away," the Doomkitten cried.


Hidden in the heart of her bedroom's sofa cushion fortress, Flandre huddled at the head of her casket bed, clutching her pillow. While Meiling swept through the nooks and crannies of the mansion for Silk, the littlest vampiress had braved the tumult long enough to drag the cushions off the nearest furniture and into her room. But now, whenever Meiling bumped into the pillow barricade, Flandre squirmed, squeezing her pillow until stuffing poked out of the seams. "Did you check under the bed?"

Forcing a smile, Meiling reached over the waist high wall and squeezed Flandre's shoulder. "I even checked it three times."

"Could you check again?"

"Sure." Meiling closed her eyes as she slid open a path through the fortress's wall. Her heart fell as Flandre whimpered. The guardswoman knelt and flipped up the bed's skirt. If Silk was foolish enough to secret herself in the last hiding place in Flandre's bedroom, Meiling would squash the spiderette under her boot. "There are no monsters under the bed, just the one on top."

At first, Flandre flinched, but her eyes lit up. The littlest vampires stood on her bed and belted out her best wolfman growl. Awed by Flandre's sudden courage, Meiling gave her best Fay Wray shriek.

As laughter filled the room, Meiling wrapped her arms around Flandre. "I have to go." Meiling's heart fell as Flandre squeezed her tighter. "Someone has to check under Remilia's bed."

"Send Sakuya to do it," Flandre whispered.

"She's checking the fairies' rooms." Meiling gave her one last hug and stood. "I'll ask her to tuck you in for your nap, though."

Flandre crushed the pillow in her arms. "Promise?"

"Of course." Meiling slid the standing cushion back into place. Flandre's fortress stood unbroken. "I'll even ask her to read you a story."

The casket creaked as Flandre stretched out and wrapped a blanket around herself. "Could you tell her to hurry?"

"I'll try." Meiling stepped aside and closed the door behind her. Slumping against the wall, she wiped her eyes. As goosebumps prickled up the guardswoman's arms, her breath hung in clouds before her. Meiling breathed warmth into her hands. "Did you find Silk?"

"Not yet." Youmu loomed near the guardswoman. The vapors around the phantom gardener gathered into a thunderhead. She licked her lips. "Chen found Silk's nest."

"Show me."

Youmu led Meiling through the silent halls. Even after Sakuya removed her power over time and space from the mansion, the Scarlet Devil Mansion still dwarfed any building found in the village. Yet the walls crowded around Meiling. Every shadow the guardswoman passed taunted her.

"What did you find there?" Meiling asked.

Youmu climbed a staircase. "I would rather you saw for yourself with fresh eyes."

The swordswoman scowled as she passed a suit of plate armor holding a kriegsmesser sword. At her side, her ever-present wisp darkened into a thundercloud. "Why would anyone add a cross-hilt to a perfectly good katana?"

Meiling shrugged. When she had worked in Europe, the Way of the Gun had long been ascendant. "Can't you just tell me what you found?"

Youmu walked in silence, flashes rippling through the cloud trailing behind her. She pushed open a pair of double doors.

Meiling stepped into the ballroom and shielded her eyes from the gleaming gilded walls. The empty ballroom was pristine, perhaps the only room in the Scarlet Devil Mansion that met Sakuya's exacting standards of cleanliness. At the far end, flanked by precise stacks of tiles, a wardrobe stood against the wall, the solitary piece of furniture in the ballroom.

Atop the wardrobe, the Doomkitten drank a bottle of milk, kicking her legs. "Check inside." Chen thumped her heels against the wooden door.

Meiling skirted a half-finished mosaic of Remilia on the floor and threw open the wardrobe. Like the ballroom, it was bare. She leaned inside, ducked under the Doomkitten's feet, and searched the corners for gaps. "This can't be what all the fuss is over."

The Doomkitten dropped from her perch. Before Meiling could whirled around, the Doomkitten shoved her into the wardrobe. Meiling threw her arms out to catch herself, but fell through a silkscreen curtain. She stumbled into a walk-in closet lined by an open cabinet. Silk linens draped the inside of the cupboard.

Youmu squeezed past Meiling. "How could anyone live here?"

"She slept inside, sitting upright. This is a bedstehe closet-bed. It's strange at first to sleep in, like you are a doll on display, but it's cozy on a cold night." Meiling drew in her stomach and shifted around Youmu until both women fit inside the closet.

"You actually fit inside one of these? I don't think I could, and you're taller than me." Youmu peered inside the cabinet and shuddered.

"Not one this small, and only when Remilia had business in Holland." Meiling rapped her knuckles against the frame. "Are you sure this was Silk's? This would be snug for Flandre."

"Humans," the Doomkitten mewed from outside the wardrobe. "Maybe if I rubbed your nose in the stink for once, you'd smell the spider."

"Scat, cat," Meiling called over her shoulder.

Laughing, the Doomkitten scurried up the wardrobe, stomping around until she dangled her head over the edge. Somehow, her green cap stayed on her head as she watched upside down from her new perch.

Rolling her eyes, Meiling knelt and ran her fingers along the molded trim beneath the bedstehe'sdoor. A chill grew inside the closet as Youmu shifted her feet. "Relax," Meiling ordered.

Youmu froze, but tendrils of mist wafted from the floor. "Sorry."

Meiling exhaled sharply, ignoring her clouding breath. Her fingers brushed against a hidden latch. A drawer sprang open, barking Meiling's shin.

"Dibs!" the Doomkitten mewed. "I called dibs. Whatever you found is mine."

"Remilia will disagree." Meiling rubbed her leg. Kneeling, she riffled through the drawer, setting aside folded clothes. A bundle of broadsheets laid underneath. Meiling whistled. "Patchouli's not going to be happy."

"Mine!" the Doomkitten called.

Youmu read over Meiling's shoulder. "I don't think you want these. The articles are all about Youkai Mountain." She waited while Meiling flipped through the stack. "Mining surveys, exploration reports, underground treaties; none of it is bedtime reading."

"Unless you're Patchouli." Meiling turned a page and stopped. "Have you heard of a Golden Room?"

Youmu shook her head. "Perhaps you should ask Lady Yuyuko."

With a shrug, Meiling handed the papers to Youmu and dug deeper. Inside a toiletry bag, she found a metal lipstick tube. Turning towards the light from the ballroom, she uncapped the tube, revealing a hauntingly familiar shade of ruby gloss. She held the makeup to her nose and sniffed. "I need to get this to Koakuma for testing."


Meiling stormed through the silver-studded halls, holding a tightly wound bundle of bandages at arm's length. Inside the bundle, a needle-thin glass pipette held a drop of kuu poison tar. Despite Koakuma's assurances of safety, Meiling wanted that sliver nowhere near her skin. Once she showed Remilia proof of the poisoner's identity, she would fling the pipette and the bandages into the incinerator with relish.

A living shadow blotted out the closest gas lamp, throwing the hallway into darkness. Meiling dropped into a combat stance, hiding the bundle behind her back. She gathered her chi into her dantian, the center point of her body. Moving her head side to side, Meiling relied on her peripheral vision as she sought the edges of the shadow in the darkness. The guardswoman clenched her fist, cracking her knuckles. "Let this be Silk," she begged her ancestors.

The shadow shrank away from the gaslight, splashing to the floor like a tarry drop of rain. Meiling shielded her eyes from the lamp's renewed brilliance, blinking away purple afterimages from her vision. The shadow drew in on itself, contracting as it resolved into a pillar the height of a child. Two bat wings poked out from the darkness, then Remilia swayed free.

The vampiress wobbled towards the wall, planting her hand near a tacked-up real coin. Recoiling from the silver, Remilia bared her fangs at the real. "I told you to get rid of your guests."

Meiling unwrapped the bandage bundle. Her chi dissipated from her belly, flooding her skin with warmth. "I found the hidden source of the kuu poison." She held out her hand. Nested within the wadded streamers of white linen and squeezed within a glass sliver, a drop of green goo gleamed in the gaslight. "The poison was in Silk's belongings."

"You took this long to figure that out? I knew as soon as she ran away." Remilia glared up at Meiling. "Meanwhile, you let Yukari set up a debating society in my home."

Meiling sighed. "I was with Flandre."

Remilia froze. "Oh." The vampiress bowed her head. "Is she—?"

Meiling crumpled the cloth bandages into a ball around the poisoned pipette. "She's fine. I talked her into taking a nap, but she wants Sakuya to tuck her in."

Remilia's shoulders fell. "Did she ask for me?"

"Flandre knows that her big sister will be fine, no matter what happens. After all, you can walk outside during the day." Meiling feigned a bright smile as she tied off the ends of her cloth bundle.

"Not just any vampire can survive the sun's light." Remilia preened as she boaster. Glass shattered down the hall, and Remilia jumped, wrapping her wings tight around her body. "But could even the Son of the Dragon handle Yukari?"

"Pardon?"

"Forget I said anything. All this silver is making me jumpy." Remilia pointed at the toned coins tacked to the walls.

Meiling changed the subject. "The ginseng cure is almost ready."

"Hopefully it will work. I want no one in Gensokyo to think we can't solve our own problems." Shuddering, Remilia cast a furtive glance down the hall. "I have a hard enough time keeping the tengu, the tanuki, the kappa, and the rabbits from playing their games around here as is. So your guests need to go. Just in case your ginseng does not work."

"Lady Yuyuko is a key part of Master Kaku's cure," Meiling cut in.

"Fine, she can stay, along with her delicious servant. At least get Yukari and her vermin out of my house." Remilia grabbed her wingtip and drew it in front of her face like a cape. The vampiress vanished in a swirl of shadow. "Do it, now."

Meiling pressed herself against the wall as the shadow billowed down the hall like smoke. If Remilia doubted that the Son of the Dragon could remove Yukari, how did she expect a daughter of a dragon to fare any better?

The guardswoman glanced at her hands and recoiled from the poisoned bundle she held. She bobbled the bandage ball between her hands until she finally caught hold of it. Meiling hurried through the silver-starred halls towards the incinerator. After a quick pitch of the bandages into the chute, the guardswoman brushed her hands clean against her pants and sighed. The incinerator's flames now licked at the last of the kuu poison in the Scarlet Devil Mansion, so Meiling no longer needed to worry that more girls might join Berry, Clover, and their sisters sleeping in the infirmary parlor.

"Please, keep that open," Sakuya said.

Meiling spun around. The elegant maid stood in front of her, holding a dustpan full of shattered glass. "Another training accident?" Not only did the fairy maids resemble young girls, they were just as uncoordinated.

Sakuya reached past Meiling, rose flooding her cheeks. "I did it."

"Are you feeling okay?" Meiling stared at the chief maid.

Sakuya emptied the dustpan into the chute. She glanced over at Meiling and cast a moue, slamming the chute shut. As Meiling flinched, a smile flashed across Sakuya's lips. "May Remilia forgive me, I dropped it on purpose."

Immediately, Meiling placed the back of her hand against Sakuya's forehead. The maid pulled away from her touch. "You don't feel feverish. Did you hit your head?" Meiling turned Sakuya's head towards the gaslight, checking the size of the maid's pupils. "That's not it. Is that darn cat flinging her hexes everywhere again?"

"Would you stop that?" Sakuya jerked her head free from Meiling's hand. "I'm fine. I just had to get away from Yukari and your Taoist master." The maid's placid elegance cracked as she shuddered.

"How bad is it? Remilia wants me to go in there after them." Meiling eyed the far end of the hall. A small flock of fairy maid burst out of a room, scattering throughout the mansion.

Sakuya brushed lint from her uniform, settling back into her practiced calm. "Remember when Reimu and Sanae both had their eye on the same boy?" That danmaku storm had swept across Gensokyo for a week, ending only when both shrine maidens walked in on Alice stealing a kiss.

A hand bell rang out, shrill and insistent. Meiling hung her head. "I promised Flandre that you would tuck her in before her nap."

Sakuya's eyes shone in the gaslight. "I'll take care of her right now." The maid vanished, and the ringing stopped.

"Don't take too long, I need your help," Meiling called down the hallway. The guardswoman stretched her arms over her head. Stifling a groan, she set off towards the Lucia Weston Ballroom, where Remilia usually entertained her guests.

As she wove through the groups of fairy maids bustling through the mansion, Meiling couldn't help but smile. Since Yukari and her familiars made themselves home after Silk's escape, the Scarlet Devil Mansion slowly returned to life. For the first time since Berry and her sisters fell ill, the mansion felt like normal, like home. It would be a shame if that assurance vanished as soon as Yukari stepped outside the mansion's gates. Perhaps Meiling should wait a little longer before asking them to leave.

Delayed duty is derelict duty.

As the ancient maxim echoed in her mind, Meiling set off towards the Weston Ballroom, weaving through the flocks of fairy maids crowding the hall. As she reached the gilded double doors of the ballroom, Meiling exhaled sharply and grabbed the ornate brass handles. Instead of opening the door, the guardswoman pulled herself against it, pressing her ear into the wood. Meiling held her breath and waited for her blood to stop pounding in her ear.

Ceramic pottery rattled by her elbow. Meiling leapt away from the door, spinning into a low tai chi crouch, one leg extended straight out in front of her. She stared up at a stern fairy maid fussing with a tea setting atop a folding tray.

"I know we taught you better than that." The maid's glower cracked, revealing a mischievous grin. "When spying, listen from the keyhole."

Fire crept into Meiling's cheeks. "Thank you, Autumn." The guardswoman knelt by the keyhole.

Autumn waved the thanks away. "Don't mention it. Just play with us more often. We'll make a proper fairy out of you yet." The fairy maid vented steam from a kettle and skipped away.

"She's right, you know." As Sakuya spoke, Meiling grit her teeth. "But then every proper maid knows how to eavesdrop discreetly."

"I'm better at catching eavesdroppers," Meiling whispered.

"Are you?" A smile graced Sakuya's lips. The maid spied the tea setting and sighed. "I wish I could wait out here longer."

The door swung outward, bowling Meiling over. The guardswoman tumbled once and rolled to her feet.

Lady Yuyuko stepped out of the ballroom. She spotted Sakuya by the tea setting and clapped her hands together. "Teatime, already?" Sakuya backed away as the ghost queen crowded the tray. Lady Yuyuko reached for a plate of sweet rolls. For an instant, Meiling saw in her mind's eye the flash of rending teeth.

"I should have left some for Yukari." Lady Yuyuko wiped her mouth with a napkin.

Meiling stared, mouth agape, at the tea setting. Not a single crumb remained on the tray.

Sakuya inched away from Lady Yuyuko. "I can get more."

"There's no need to do so, not on my account, anyway. I was about to check that Youmu and Akane weren't dragging Koakuma into even more trouble." As she walked away, Lady Yuyuko glanced into the ballroom. "Besides, they need tea more than I do."

Meiling tiptoed towards the open door and glanced around the jamb.

"Come on in, Bell, you aren't interrupting," Master Kaku said. Wincing, Meiling ducked back behind the wall. Switching over to classical Chinese, the Azurine Hermit snapped, "Don't even think of hiding. I saw you talking in the hall."

"You need to play with the fairies more." Sakuya poured water from the kettle into a circle or heavy ceramic mugs.

"You aren't helping." Meiling closed her eyes, gathering first her chi and then her calm. She stepped into the ballroom and shivered. A chill lingered in the room, and not from Lady Yuyuko's passing.

Yukari and Master Kaku sat at a round table, staring at Meiling like statues of marble and porcelain. The guardswoman stopped in her track and clasped her hands behind her back. Rather than meet either sage's eyes, Meiling counted the folds in the blackout curtains that sectioned off the rest of the ballroom. Drawing upon decades of dressing-downs, Meiling waited out the silence.

Yukari cleared her throat. "You must move their heads away from the northeast." Yukari tapped the placemat with the tip of her closed fan. Sakuya appeared with a steaming mug in each hand.

"Just because the word for the northeast gate, kimon, sounds like the word demon?" Master Kaku waved away Sakuya with her own fan, then covered her left ear with its paper leaves. Sakuya's eyes grew wide as she set the mugs on the table before backing away from the two sages.

Meiling pursed her lips as she followed the movements of Master Kaku's fan. It had been decades since Meiling last entertained callers from behind the paper leaves, however she remembered well the secret language of the fan. When Master Kaku hid her left ear with her fan, she told Yukari, I wish to be rid of you.

Yukari tittered behind her fan, letting it rest on her left cheek. No. The onmyo sorceress said, "Should I instead say we must shelter the fairies from the harsh influences of Genbu, the Black Tortoise of the North?"

"In my day, sages did not rely on short cuts." Master Kaku snapped her fan shut, cutting the sticks across her palm. "Do the math. The influences of the sun, the stars, and the moon must be accounted for."

Meiling unclasped her hands. Even the most carefree of fairies would recognize the challenge made by the Azurine Hermit's fan. Spellcards flew for less.

Yukari closed her fan and fenced the air with its point as though she conducted an unseen orchestra. Don't be rash. The sorceress threw back her head and laughed. "Tell me, are you familiar with Kepler and Brahe?"

Sakuya vanished and reappeared behind Meiling, sheltering in the guardswoman's shadow.

Master Kaku's eyes narrowed. "I was sealed away for a thousand years. My survey of the intervening Learned Masters of the Tao is not yet finished."

Yukari set aside her fan. After selecting a mug from the table, the sorceress reclined in her chair. "You won't find them there, yet they are the two most important of astrologers, both for your Taoist astrology and my onmyodo."

"I am aware of the two new planets, Uranus and Neptune, and the ring of shattered debris of a third between Mars and Jupiter," Master Kaku said.

"Yet you still cling to your old ways?" Yukari flashed her teeth at Master Kaku. Meiling backed into Sakuya, for she had seen similar smiles on cats stalking the plumpest of songbirds. Yukari licked her lips. "Have you ever stopped to consider what marvels have been discovered in other fields? Eirin Yagokoro's shelves overflow with powders and poultices unknown in your time, and Sumireko Usami brings more from the outside apothecaries with each new visit."

Shrugging, Master Kaku reached up and fiddled with the hairpins binding her coiffure. Meiling pursed her lips when she saw the card cupped in the Azurine Hermit's hand.

"I wish you were with me when the wisest Ming sages challenged the foreign disciples of Kepler to the most scholarly of duels. Both sage and disciple would consult their arts to determine the time and the length of the next eclipse.

"As Judge Xu Guangji waited, the sages consulted their analects, clacked their abacuses, and declared that a two hour eclipse would start at 10:30 on the following day. The disciples took longer, using their far-seeing glass to measure the positions of the sun and the moon. After consulting with tables of ephemerides sent from their master in the Germanies, they claimed the eclipse would begin at 11:30 and last for two minutes. Wouldn't you know it, the sky darkened at 11:30 the next day.

"It took thirty years of losing challenge after challenge for the sages to admit the virtue of Kepler's way." Yukari sat up and bored her brown eyes into Master Kaku. Her voice grew hard. "I won't let you wait that long. Once your tisane fails, I will take over the fairies' treatment."

The room fell silent as all eyes fell upon Master Kaku. The Azurine Hermit held Yukari's gaze without blinking. She folded her hands atop the table, one over the other, with a spell card hidden underneath.

"Say something," Meiling whispered to Sakuya.

The maid clung to Meiling's shoulders. "Why me?"

"Because you're better at calming people than I am."

The door creaked open. Meiling grimaced as Sakuya dug her fingers into her shoulders. The two sages, however, continued their staring contest.

Patchouli shuffled into the room, careful not to step on the hem of her floor-length lab coat. A brimstone stink rolled in with her. Meiling covered her nose with a handkerchief. The alchemist presented a stoppered Erlenmeyer flask. "It's finished—"

Patchouli frowned as the milky liquid inside the flask caught the chandelier's light. She twisted free its cork. She grabbed the salt shaker from the tea setting and poured it into the glass. By silent agreement, Master Kaku and Yukari set aside their contest of wills while the elemental alchemist worked.

"Won't that ruin it?" Sakuya stepped out from Meiling's shadow. She appeared next to Patchouli, pulling the alchemist's hand with the salt shaker away from the flask. A line of table salt spilled across the table.

"Let me be. I don't tell you how to sweep floors." Patchouli pulled her arm free from Sakuya's grasp and upended the salt shaker into the flask. After the last of the salt splashed into the slurry, the alchemist swirled the flask. To Meiling's surprise, the liquid settled into two layers, milky white above a film of clear water. Patchouli fished an eye-dropper from her coat. With practiced care, she drew off the clear layer of brine from the solution. "Now the cure is ready."


The flask that held the ginseng cure swung like a censer from Patchouli's hand as the alchemist led a silent procession towards the infirmary parlor. Meiling marched behind Patchouli at the head of the single file train snaking through the mansion. As the alchemist neared each throng of maids, the fairies hugged the walls, only to fall in at the end of the line when the procession passed. Even Remilia stood aside, but with an outstretched wing, the vampiress instead cut in front of Meiling and claimed the place of honor. After a long silent walk, Patchouli halted the procession before the fairies' infirmary parlor.

The door creaked open, but a mountain of golden fur walled the world out of the parlor. "Please wait a moment." Ran planted her hands against the doorjamb. Behind the fox maiden familiar, Youmu climbed a stepstool and hung the last of eight pine boughs from a clothesline stretched across the room. "We are not yet ready."

Meiling stumbled forward as the crush of visitors drove elbows into her back. "How much longer?" She winced as a bat wing slapped against her thigh will the force of a wooden staff.

"Just one moment." An onyx ornament featuring five bats in flight dangled from Youmu's fingers. The pale gardener hung it between the pine boughs. "Now we're ready."

"We only have room for seven. Please come in." Ran stepped away from the door and curtsied. Patchouli entered, glassware clinking from inside her long coat with each step.

Meiling's brow furled. Before she could ponder Ran's odd request, Sakuya and Remilia shoved her into the parlor. She skidded to a stop, crumpling to the floor before she crashed into the sleeping Clover's bed. A blast of wind chilled Meiling as Lady Yuyuko glided past.

"No more." Ran filled the doorway after Yukari and Master Kaku entered. Koakuma and a court of fairy maids pleaded with her. The fox familiar bared her fangs. "You can still watch from outside."

Meiling noticed groups of white beans and black-eyed peas set around the edge of the edge of Clover's cushioned bier. A shadow fell over the guardswoman.

Master Kaku poked one trio of beans with her hairpin. "I did not ask for your help."

Yukari shrugged, hiding her expression behind the flick of a cherry blossom fan. The numerologist's brown eyes peeked over the paper leaves, dancing with mirth.

Meiling rolled upright to a formal kneeling position. She rubbed her eyes and stared again at the beans. This time, she recognized the eight groups of three beans, set at each of the compass points around Clover. Black-eyed peas and white beans marked the yin and yang lines of the eight Ba Gua trigrams. Similar rings circled the other five fairies. "What custom is this? I haven't seen this in China or Japan."

"It's inspired by mountain magic from a land called Aux Arcs, the Land of the Arches." Yukari breathed a quiet sigh. She muttered, "Or at least that was its name on my first visit."

Remilia climbed Meiling's shoulders. Meiling winced as the vampires ground her feet into her muscles. The vampiress reached for an ornament of five bats set in jasper, a twin in all but color of the onyx bats in the center of the room. "Is this mine?"

"If you wish. Please let it stay for a moment. Bats are a charm for good health," Yukari said.

Meiling mulled over the combinations of numbers and colors. She found three other flocks of bats set in gold, pearl, and jade, matching the colors of Chinese alchemy. Her eyes grew wide. Whether bats, pine boughs, or plum blossoms, health charms filled the parlor in groups of three, five, and eight. "Lucky numbers," she whispered.

On a whim, Meiling counted the people in the parlor. Nine nurses attended the six fairies, or three threes of helpers, a number known to be an auspicious omen. Counting the sick and the hale together, there were also three fives of people in the room, another lucky grouping. Meiling's head spun. Was this how onmyouji and sages saw the world?

In the corner, Patchouli cleared space on an end table. "Sakuya, could you please bring tea?" The elegant maid flickered for an instant, reappearing with two full tea settings on stands. Patchouli took six cups and poured ginseng extract into each one. The master alchemist dropped a sugar cube into each cube, stirring each with a metal spoon until the sugar dissolved.

"What's the sugar for?" Remilia flew across the room. Meiling sighed and rubbed her shoulders.

"Medicine is bitter. That's how you know it works." Sakuya poured tea for Yukari and Lady Yuyuko.

"But all my medicines have been sweet."

"Would you have drank it otherwise?"

Remilia's eyes grew as big as saucers. "Oh!"

Patchouli tapped the spoon against a cup and set it on a napkin. Picking up the nearest teacup by its saucer, she walked towards Berry's bed. The cloud of nurses and sages parted before her.

"Why not use a syringe like Eirin and Reisen would?" Mist swirled around Youmu like a thick cloud.

"This is a vampire's house," Sakuya said. "By ancient decree, no blood is to be shed except for meals."

Patchouli knelt by Berry's shoulder, holding the ginseng tincture in both hands. The nine nurses ringed the fairy's bed. Ran crooned softly and pulled Youmu and Sakuya away from the circle. The fox maiden led the two servants towards the opposite side of the room, careful not to walk too close to any fairy. Even Meiling knew that three and one made four, the number of death. Six nurses remained around Berry, forming a group of seven, the number of perfection.

Meiling shook her head. She was a guardswoman; thinking like a sage made her head hurt. "Are you certain this will work?" she whispered to Master Kaku.

The Azurine Hermit hid her expression behind a fan of her namesake color and knelt by Berry's feet. Her hawk-like eyes narrowed as she waited.

Lady Yuyuko sat regally at the head of Berry's bed. A pale luminescence shone from the Ghost Queen's hands as she cradled the raven-haired fairy's head.

Remilia settled in Meiling's lap. "I feel like I should say something. Or, worse, pray," she whispered to her guardswoman, shuddering.

"Let Patchouli lead. It's her medicine," Meiling suggested.

"You mean it's hers." Remilia pointed at Master Kaku. The sage sat, serene and unmindful of the vampiress's whispers.

Patchouli cleared her throat. "Please prop Berry up." Yukari lifted the slight fairy by her shoulders so that Remilia could slide pillows beneath the girl until she sat nearly upright. Once the fairy settled again in her bed, Patchouli slipped two fingers behind Berry's jaw, opening her mouth. Patchouli held the teacup to Berry's lips and tipped the ginseng extract into her mouth.

Meiling drew in a deep breath and waited.

Color bloomed in Berry's face, turning porcelain cheeks into rosy flesh. The fairy maid gasped, and her skin burned scarlet before all color ebbed away, leaving only a greying pallor. Meiling covered her mouth, blinking back tears. Berry's wings wilted, curling inward like drying leaves until tiny wrinkled balls remained. With one final rasp, Berry grew still.

Tears welled up in Meiling's eyes as she prayed to the gods of the ten directions, to the fairy warriors, and to her honored ancestors.

Immediately, Lady Yuyuko slid her left hand over Berry's mouth, punching the fairy's nose shut with her thumb and forefinger. The Ghost Queen's right hand shot out, snatching a thin white wisp out of the air. Lady Yuyuko plunged that hand deep into Berry's chest and held the wisp in place. The Ghost Queen's eyes grew wide as white light flared from the fairy's chest. She jerked her hands away from Berry, shaking her now scarlet fingers.

Berry jerked upright as though waking from a nightmare. A coughing fit wracked her small frame. With each new breath, Berry's wings unfolded. Wherever wilt once creased Berry's wings, gold now shone like metal veins cast in crystal. Her eyes fluttered open. "Where am I?"

"Thank you, Meiling," Remilia whispered. "But next time, ask first."

Meiling cried as she crushed Remilia in a bear hug. The guardswoman wiped away the tears flowing down her cheeks.

Cheers filled the Scarlet Devil Mansion. A kaleidoscope of butterfly-winged maids swarmed Berry, tugging at her gold-streaked wings. Patchouli squeezed her way through the crowd towards her desk. Lady Yuyuko whistled, and the sea of fairies parted, letting the sages and the alchemist attend to Berry's five sisters.

As Master Kaku picked up the next dose of ginseng cure, she turned to Yukari. "I win."


Master Kaku dropped into a rock cell hewn out underneath heryaodong'sshrine room. She ran her fingers around a mural of the eight trigrams until she found three unbroken lines, the sign of heaven. Her hairpin's chisel point pierced the stone carving. The sign of heaven, along with the wall, vanished into the air, revealing a hidden vault.

"Why am I here?" A misty cloud rose from the mosaic floor, solidifying into the form of Lady Tojiko of the Soga clan.

Opening a wooden curio box inside the vault, Master Kaku removed two vials. As she examined one filled with a milky fluid, the Azurine Hermit smiled. "If this works, I can craft a new body for you."

"Don't bother. I'm happy just as I am." The specter floated into the air and twirled around. "But if your pretty new friend isn't careful, well, I always wanted to be a redhead."

"Bell's off limits. How about the Fujiwara girl?"

"I'd rather possess a frog. But if it would let me spit in her grandfather's eye one more time…" The air around Lady Tojiko sparked as the specter furled her brow. "It would take too long to groom her to an acceptable standard."

Master Kaku held vial of golden liqueur to the sunlight reflected from the shrine room above. She waved towards a bundle of fine jade-colored silk on a lacquered table near the specter. "Perhaps you might accept a more suitable gift?"

Lady Tojiko ran her hand along the cloth. "If I was serious about doing the job you're paying me for, I'd keep you away from Yoshika."

"There's no need to be unkind." Master Kaku slid her hairpin through her looped braids. The trigram of heaven appeared on the mural once more. "How is my darling, anyway?"

Lady Tojiko untied the bundle and wrapped the silk robe around her shoulders. "She's waiting. If I were her, I would have left you centuries ago." She grabbed Master Kaku under her arms and flew out of the underground chamber and through an open window, widened momentarily by the Azurine Hermit's hairpin treasure.

Master Kaku landed next to a bed and smiled down upon the body wrapped up in sheets and a paper charm.

Yoshika Miyako was not so much ageless as she was well-preserved. Her skin, stretched like parchment over her bones, held a greying necrotic pallor, yet the undead woman still radiated a smile. "Hello, master, will this hurt?"

Master Kaku choked back a grimace. "I don't know. Do you still"

Yoshika nodded and pointed a desiccated finger at Lady Tojiko. "As long as she didn't prepare the cure." Lady Tojiko crossed her arms and settled by Yoshika's head. "It's not more mercury, is it?"

"I've got something different. An aqueous solution of activated Philosopher's Stone, followed by concentrated ginseng extract. One to restore your body, the other to heal it. Be kind to Lady Tojiko; she will make sure your soul doesn't escape," Master Kaku said.

"I'm ready." Yoshika reached up and grabbed her master's hand.

Lady Tojiko held the undead woman's head in her hands while Master Kaku lifted the paper ward from Yoshika's forehead. The Azurine Hermit held the liqueur vial to her servant's lips and poured the golden liquid into her mouth.

Yoshika swallowed and shivered as a fever took her. For the first time since her death, she sweated, until she laid in a growing puddle of quicksilver.

"Is she ajiang shii or a metal golem?" Lady Tojiko said. The shade inched her hands away from the rolling beads of mercury.

"The Taoist masters sought immortality using cinnabar and mercury. Now I know that the metal only eliminates decay by making everything around it too toxic for life. I wish I learned this sooner." Master Kaku watched as Yoshika's flesh lost its papery texture. "If my darling is to live again, I have to purge the mercury from her."

As the hours passed, Master Kaku toweled away every liquid metal droplet that fell as the Elixir of Life perfected the balance of the elements inside Yoshika. Occasionally, Lady Tojiko lifted Yoshika off the bed so Master Kaku could strip away the quicksilver soiled bedding and replace the sheets.

With one last tremor, Yoshika fell still. Biting her lip, Master Kaku poured the milky ginseng into Yoshika's mouth and waited, watching for the first rosy bloom of life in her servant's cheeks.


Author's afterward:

To those who have helped edit and comment on the drafts of these four chapters, many of whom I have lamentably forgotten in the long delay, thank you. Your help has been appreciated.

To the readers who stuck with this story through the long wait, thank you and I hope this has been worth the wait.


Two months later…

Mr. Kirisame sat at the corner table of the Wandering Eye saloon and nursed a glass of water. With reverence, he placed a leather-bound journal on a placemat and opened it. A page of stationery tucked inside the book unfolded, revealing lines of flowery cursive letters. The widower smoothed the letter onto the table. As his throat dried, he sipped his drink. Beer would have been preferable, or any flavor besides sulfurous spring water, but he needed unclouded wits to translate Patchouli Knowledge's scholarly English into plainspoken Japanese.

He glanced through the bottom of his glass and paused. Blocky katakana characters appeared above each line of loops and whorls. Moving the glass away from the page made the translation vanish. The characters reappeared whenever the mug hovered over the letter. Mr. Kirisame turned to a blank page in his journal, and, with a pen pulled from a belt pouch, he copied the translation.

A dozen summarized accounts of European relic hunters spilled over into the margins and the back of the journal's page. He found the customs strangewhy would grown men shrink in terror from pork?–but civilized men half a world away trafficked in the bodies of dead saints. Fortunately, the accounts agreed on one key point: whenever disturbed, the bones of the holy gave off a sweet soothing fragrance that filled the surrounding countryside.

For a thousand years, the Star Lotus palanquin ship held the relics of Abbess Hijiri during her imprisonment under Youkai Mountain. Since the ship resurfaced, a hundred treasure hunters poured over the countryside in search of its gold. Let the others fuss over maps and dowsing rods, Mr. Kirisame would follow his nose to the missing treasure room of the Myouren Temple.

The merchant folded the letter and slipped it inside the journal as a bookmark. None of the relic hunters' writings mentioned what the holy perfume smelled like. However, all agreed that the scent was instantly identifiable, like temple incense or the sweet fragrances of the Celestial maidens sitting nearby.

The widower shook his head as a sudden waft of prickly pear stood out above the perfumes. The forwardness of cactus was unmistakable. Someone did not want to sleep alone tonight.

Fortunately for Mr. Kirisame's planning, the wedding band he still wore on his finger kept the fair haired Celestials with their flowing locks at bay. For all their desire to trade heavenly paradise for earthly comfort, none of the ethereal maidens willingly trampled the bonds of matrimony. Without the ring, a widower merchant of modest success and a glimmer of character would find himself paraded around town by the heavenly beauty who wrapped herself around his arm. While there were a myriad less pleasant ways to spend an evening, Mr. Kirisame chased another trophy.

He turned a page and scowled. Most of his travel checklist remained untouched by tally marks. Despite Moriya's booming popularity, its stores traded solely in pleasures, votives, and indulgences. To meet the demands of his schedule, Mr. Kirisame would need to scavenge supplies from abandoned mountain campsites along his route. Heading back home to the Human Village for cordage and other provisions would keep him away from his shop for too long.

An hourglass silhouette crossed in front of the kappa-wrought gas lamp. "Is this seat taken?" the woman purred.

Mr. Kirisame covered a coaster on the table with his left hand and drummed his ring finger against the corkwood square.

Adjusting her crown of braids, the straw blonde slid onto a stool across the table. Mr. Kirisame peered over the rims of his glasses. His merchant's eye settled upon the young woman's dress. Indigo cotton, hand sewn, although not in the running sashiko stitch ubiquitous throughout Gensokyo. Quality tailoring, but not near the same level as the simplest of Alice Margatroid's evening gowns. Too pricey for the Celestial maidens around him, but he could sell a fashion line of its like in the Human Village, if he could negotiate a deal with the seamstress.

"What are you reading?" She reached for the book in his hand.

"My travel journal." The book vanished into the rucksack at Mr. Kirisame's feet.

"Really?" The young woman dimpled prettily. She leaned over the table and lowered her voice. "The last treasure hunter that came through here caused quite a stir. But he wasn't as seasoned as you."

Mr. Kirisame rested his elbows on the table and folded his hands in front of his mouth. "What do you want?"

The blonde licked her lips. Flashing her fangs, Silk said, "I can get you past the tengu patrols and into Youkai Mountain."