Breath of Earth (4 page)

Ingrid cackled. She won that round—a kitsune's magic could bewitch a chief. Mr. Sakaguchi's face twitched as they began the clapping again. This time, she positioned her hands as if on a rifle, with her right hand on a trigger and her left extended like the barrel of a gun. Mr. Sakaguchi made fox
ears. The hunter's gun could kill the kitsune. She won again.

“At least try,” she teased.

He did—the next round, he laid his hands on his lap again to symbolize the role of the chief, outranking Ingrid's hand motion of the hunter with a gun.

The twanged music played on as they continued. A regular game of kitsune-ken ended after a player won thrice, but Ingrid didn't care about the numbers. They found the rhythm. Ingrid made fox ears and stuck out her tongue. Mr. Sakaguchi burst out laughing.

His next motion of the rifle turned into wiggling fingers as if he threatened to tickle her like when she was a little girl—an act that used to make her screech and roll with giggles without a hand being laid on her.

Kitsune-ken had been played for centuries in Japan along with a number of other hand-gesture games. This one was their favorite, though, because it was about a fantastic. Kitsune were powerful fox spirits known for their wiles and shapeshifting. Something about the game—about play-acting a being of power—inspired Ingrid to puff her cheeks, blow raspberries, and turn her pointy fox ears into arm-long ears like a donkey.

Happy tears streamed down Mr. Sakaguchi's cheeks. He gasped for breath as he doubled over in deep laughter. Cozy warmth filled Ingrid's chest as she looked on him. This was how Mr. Sakaguchi should be—his spirit buoyant, eyes bright, a smile branded on his lips, even if it was to her aggravation.

A bell chimed in the hallway; time for the meeting to resume. She turned off the Graphophone.

Mr. Sakaguchi wiped his cheeks with his sleeve. A few final laughs wheezed from him as he stood. “Well. I believe you won, Ingrid.”

“I wasn't keeping score.”

“I wasn't either, but you still won.”

They entered the hallway as some adepts rushed by. She glanced back at him. “If you need another reason to cheer up, remember that
Lincoln
premieres the day after tomorrow.”

She was puzzled when his smile diminished. “I do hope I can still attend.”

“Of course you can attend! There's no reason for you to be called away. You'll even have protesters lined up outside the Damcyan Theatre.” At that reminder, he grinned.

Mr. Sakaguchi was a fiend for opera, and had been delighted that a company dared to perform
Lincoln
in San Francisco. It had outraged critics for a decade with the parallels it drew between Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation and his late-life work on behalf of the Chinese in America. The fact that Mr. Sakaguchi would attend such a pro-Chinese—and therefore anti-Japanese—work might raise a few eyebrows, but he had a reputation for attending every operatic performance in the city. He was also known to bring his secretary in tow so she could hold calling cards on his behalf.

Ingrid greatly enjoyed the outings. She could never dress like the other women in their furs, pearls, and masterful hats, but there was still something electric about the place. Plus, it was a delight to share in something that Mr. Sakaguchi adored.

Mr. Sakaguchi paused at the table outside the boardroom and picked up Ingrid's white pitcher.

“At least it's a small crack this time,” he said in a conspiratorial whisper. “Not like that Wedgwood you shattered. Your warfare on dishware continues.”

“Maybe I should do something more rewarding than handle dishes all day.”

“You shouldn't hold power like that. You'll make yourself sick.”

“I doubt I'm even running a fever.” A lie. A small one. But her fever was under a hundred.

“Don't you have kermanite?”

“I'm fine. I haven't held this power for long, just since this morning.” She noted the brief widening of his eyes as he took in that information. He hadn't felt the tremor at dawn, then. “And of course I have kermanite. I've been extra careful not to touch it.”

Mr. Sakaguchi pursed his lips in disapproval. Here came the lecture. “Now, Ingrid, you know better—”

She felt the sudden shift of matter beneath her. Pressure. Raw power. Surging upward. Heat. In that space of two seconds, she threw herself over Mr. Sakaguchi, catching the briefest glimpse of shock on his face as the hallway shattered around them.

The world exploded. Bricks, wood, and heat—searing pain that unfurled from her heart and roared through her extremities. Death. Fire. Agony evoked the worst descriptions of the hellfire of Atlanta or Charleston, but in the space of a gasp, the pain was gone. The sudden cacophony silenced, darkness falling over them in a suffocating quilt. Ingrid's ragged breaths echoed. The solidness of Mr. Sakaguchi's shoulder pressed against her chest. That's when she noticed her arm lifted above, her palm braced against something. She wiggled her fingers, just a tiny bit. The surface felt like glass heated by afternoon sunshine.

Heat. The tingle of power had evaporated from her skin. That's what she had felt—she had used her reserves to do this. It had never poured from her before, not like this, but then it never had cause to.

“Are you hurt?” Mr. Sakaguchi's voice was muffled in their tight confines.

“No. I don't think so.” Her voice sounded raw and strange to her own ears. “You?”

“I'm unharmed.”

“What happened?”

“Pardon me while I reach into my pocket.” He shifted beneath her. Leave it to Mr. Sakaguchi to employ fine manners even in these circumstances.

Something clicked and a beam of soft blue light sliced the darkness and burned her eyes. He'd pulled out his pocket-sized kermanite lantern. The light angled upward to reveal sand of all shades pressed against a translucent bowl, along with larger debris—bricks, splintered boards, nails. An adult hand. Fingers limp and curled, as if reaching for a pencil. At the wrist a cuff link of kermanite glinted, still brilliant in its clarity, but there was only a scant inch of sleeve cloth. Where the forearm should be, white bone jabbed against a knob of brick. Ingrid stared, blinking, wondering if she could identify the hand's owner, and then realized anew that it was a hand. There. By itself.

“Oh God,” she whispered.

Whatever just happened had been nothing like a full earthquake that rippled and rolled through soil. It should have felt like tugging on a taut string and knowing it stretched far beyond sight.

“This was too immediate, too abrupt,” she said. “Like an explosion.”

“An explosion. Yes.”

The light aimed downward. The wooden floor was gone, replaced by gray tiles—the basement floor. They had fallen
and she didn't even remember the sensation. Her only thought had been to grab Mr. Sakaguchi and keep him safe.

His knuckles rapped on the ground beneath them. It echoed and clinked like glass, not sounding at all like tile. Sweat dribbled from the end of her nose and created a dark splotch on his suit.

“You seem to have created a bubble around us. Very nice work.”

“I try.” The tremble in her voice ruined the attempt at flippancy.

“I never even saw your father do anything like this.”

“I decided that if I'm going to do the impossible, I should make it unique. No copying.” She took in a rattling breath. Her lungs felt strained, tight. “The air . . . ?”

“We're trapped in here with a limited supply, it seems. I don't think it will last us long.”

“Oh.” A pause. “I suppose I should remedy that next time. Make a bigger bubble.”

“Yes.” He craned his head to look up, frowning all the while. “It's always good to plan ahead for the next time we're buried like this.”

Ingrid took in a shallower breath to calm herself. A hundred questions raced through her mind. How had she done this? What had exploded? Her power had always been such a fickle thing—as if its existence wasn't baffling enough. Very few geomancers could see the blue aura of the earth's power on the ground or in people, and no other geomancer could expel energy the way she could; not now, not in the histories. Everyone else took in the magic of the earth, could contain it for a time, and then poured it into kermanite.

Ingrid connected with the earth. That was the simplest way to state it. Now that connection had saved their lives, or at least extended them for a few minutes.

“You're going to have to open this bubble soon,” Mr. Sakaguchi said. His voice was mild as always. In all her life, Ingrid had seen his veneer completely break only once, when Mama died. Apparently, exploding buildings and disembodied hands weren't of that caliber. “And don't look at me that way, Ingchan. You made this field around us. You can unmake it.”

“I can't hear anyone or anything up there. We must have two floors' worth of debris over us. If that bubble's gone, we'll be crushed to death.”

And that hand would drop directly on her shoulder. Somehow, that seemed far worse than blades of wood and heavy bricks.

“Death by oxygen deprivation might be gentler, true, but sometimes you must take a risk. Sometimes you must fight.”

Ingrid stared up at her hand where it was braced against the top of the bubble. If they were huddled on the basement floor, how would anyone find them?

Condensation beads formed across the top of the shield. Closing her eyes, she drew inward, searching for any remnants of energy. Heat fluttered through her chest, like the last swirl of water as it drained from a bathtub. Would that power be adequate? Sweat coursed along her arm.

Mr. Sakaguchi was right. They couldn't go out without a fight.

“I'm going to try something,” she said.

“You'll succeed.”

“Ojisan, no. Not the optimism like that, not now.” Not like when Mama was dying, when he insisted everything would be fine.

“You prefer I be a pessimist? Very well. We may die in the next few minutes, but since we should already be dead, I'm grateful for these extra minutes we've had together.”

“You're a lousy pessimist.”

“I've been accused of worse,” he said, then paused. “Ingrid, I know I'm not forthright with my emotions. Your mother's passing . . . I was never as open with her as I should have been. I regret that now. I regret many things.”

“Ojisan . . .”

“I love you, Ingrid. I never expected to have children or a family, not with my wandering life as a warden, but I've watched you grow from a young child to a beautiful young woman. You are, in all ways but blood, my daughter.”

Tears burned in her eyes. “I love you, too, Mr. Sakaguchi. I never knew Papa. I never needed to. I always had you.”

She heard the hitch in his breath, that rare sound that showed how close he was to losing all composure. “I fear I've been selfish in keeping you here with me. I should have sent you away.”

“Away? Where? I don't understand.”

“How is your skin feeling?”

“Mr. Sakaguchi! You can't change the subject like that! Why would you send me away?”

“Answer me, Ingrid. How much energy do you hold?”

Mr. Sakaguchi couldn't see the auras of geomancers who held magic. Very few had that knack—no others in the Cordilleran
Auxiliary, thank God. When any such wardens came to town, she had been housebound as a precaution.

She swallowed down her frustration. “I'm still holding some power, but it's dwindling.”

She felt his body move as he nodded slightly. “If we wait much longer, you'll succumb to hypothermia.”

The opposite extreme of what the students had endured earlier. Most geomancers only expelled the earth's energy into kermanite. A rare few—usually those who saw auras—poured out their very life force if they stayed in contact with large kermanite for too long. The consequences of that were the same as standard hypothermia, as if someone succumbed to snow or cold water: confusion, a drop in heart rate and body temperature, and death.

“Our options are suffocation, hypothermia, or to be crushed? Can we get a fourth, better choice?” she asked.

“If an earthquake strikes us down here, we won't have any means to disrupt contact, so we could both die of hyperthermia.”

Ingrid half choked on a laugh. Her lungs felt tight in the swampy air. “And then be crushed.”

“I think our need for oxygen is the most dire. Act now, Ingrid. You can do this.”

Whether she could or not, by God, she had to try. Taking a shallow but long breath, Ingrid stood with her hand still straight up. Heat flowed up her arm and burned through her fingertips. An airy sensation filled her skull as a sudden chill quaked through her. She ground her teeth together to prevent them from chattering.

Above, debris rattled and roared as it shifted. The shape of the bubble had changed with the contour of her body, creating a tall cone. Mr. Sakaguchi scrambled to his feet. They were of almost equal height. Tears burned in her eyes as he hugged her. She wrapped her free arm around him and squeezed.

“We're not dead yet,” she whispered.

“Maybe today is our lucky day.” He craned up his head. “Light.”

A pencil-thin beam of honest-to-goodness sunlight pierced the mound of debris over them. Seeing a sunbeam on a foggy spring day often felt as precious as encountering a unicorn, but at this moment it was like God ripped a hole through the clouds, just to shine down on them.

But they were still heavily buried by boards and pipes and what looked to be slats of the roof. The hand was gone, fallen to one side. Blood stained the glasslike sheen.

“Anyone there?” A male voice boomed from somewhere close.

She opened her mouth to yell back. Mr. Sakaguchi squeezed her forearm.

“You have to open the bubble now, before they find us.”

“What would really happen if they knew what I could do?”

“You don't want to know.” He said this with a strange tremble in his voice, as if he knew the answer all too well.

“If I drop this bubble, we could still be crushed or killed.”

“Yes, but we can stand now, and we're that much closer to the top. Ingrid . . .” He hesitated. “I don't want you to be hurt.”

“Mr. Sakaguchi, you and Mama have always fussed over me too much. I know you say I can't handle pain, but I can deal with—”

She screeched in shock as Mr. Sakaguchi grabbed her around the waist and heaved her toward the light. Her upheld arm shoved through more debris until her focus slipped. Everything slid inward with a horrible rumble. Her gasp cut short as dust and fibers clogged her throat. Pressure crushed her. Not the comforting waves that arose from the earth, but painful weight squeezing and stabbing her entire body.

“Help!” Her cry bounced and echoed back at her. “Help! Ojisan, are you okay?” She didn't care if anyone heard the familial term, not now.

She couldn't hear a reply, but his hand squeezed her leg.

“Help! Help!” Ingrid screamed with renewed vigor. Her right arm was still above her head, and she clawed at the slats. Grit burned her eyes and dusted her tongue. Raw pain radiated from her lower back, her thigh, her ribs. She still felt strangely cold, but from those points of agony, she recognized the heat of blood. The hole above opened a wee bit more. “Help! Down here!”

A small earthquake shivered through the wreckage. Blue flared around her for a scant second. Debris rumbled. She took in the heat as dread twisted her stomach. God, don't let a major earthquake hit now, not with the two of them and every other warden and student trapped in rubble.

“Hey! Hey!” The crunch of footsteps. A shadow, blocking the light. “We got one over here, alive! A woman!”

“Two of us!” Ingrid shouted. She could only see through slits; her eyes felt like they contained ground glass. Maybe they did. “Warden Sakaguchi's here, too! Alive!”

“Sakaguchi! Sir! Sakaguchi's over here!” the man yelled.

“They're coming,” she yelled down to him. “Hold on.” Her voice sounded so strange, her throat tight with pain.

More male voices, along with more crunches and clatter. Light dawned over her. Everything became a chaotic blur. Her lungs sucked in full breaths. Iron-strong hands gripped her arm.

“Don't pull me out yet! Everything will fall in on Mr. Sakaguchi,” she cried.

“Where is he?” someone asked.

“Down by my legs. We were standing together when—when everything happened. I . . . I managed to climb up.”

“Lieutenant, you and the rest move this beam. Start a line to carry this debris to the street. We need this warden alive.”

Ingrid waited, her shoulders exposed to the air. Reality seemed to waver around her like a heat mirage, and she wasn't quite sure of the passage of time. Bit by bit, the weight against her vanished. The bodies around her flashed like shadows behind a campfire, and then hands grabbed hold of her again, and this time they pulled her out. Reality clarified itself as a hot lance of pain seared her backside. Someone screamed. She lay atop the rubble, acutely aware of pebbles and chunks of bricks grinding into the softness of her palms.

The earth moved once more.

The pressure wave was small, almost gentle. She braced herself, wondering if the building would swallow her again. The ruins shifted, but not much. Maybe the debris had already compacted. She absorbed the lap of heat, the risk of hypothermia fully gone, and blinked the grit from her eyes.

“Get her to the doctor.” The commanding voice came from directly above.

“Mr. Sakaguchi?” she asked.

“We can see him. He's alive and almost out.”

“Thank you. Thank God,” Ingrid said. She looked up to see a pant leg of dark blue with gold trim down the calf.

They'd been rescued by the Unified Pacific's American Army & Airship Corps.

Located a block away from the auxiliary, Dr. Hatsumi's Reiki practice had been familiar to Ingrid for as long as she could remember. “You can't handle pain well,” Mama always said, and rushed Ingrid there for everything from sliced fingertips to digestive irregularities.

Never had a visit been as urgent as this, though, nor had soldiers ever stood guard outside the door. She lay on her belly, lip pinched between her teeth, as the doctor muttered in Japanese. He didn't seem to consider or care that she could understand his gripes about filthy American soldiers taking over his shop, but he always conducted his business with brusqueness.