Eight Million Gods-eARC (35 page)

* * *

Nikki stared at her careful neat handwriting in confusion. She’d written several scenes from Kayo’s point of view, mystified how the events of World War II were going to affect her novel. The bombing had happened on August 6, 1945. Kayo’s father had been an elderly man in his seventies, having outlived his wife and various younger siblings.

How could this be the Sato that Nikki had met? It had been impossible to judge the age of the man at Izushi. He could have been anywhere from his early thirties to a wel-preserved late forties, but he certainly hadn’t been in his seventies, or nearly a hundred and forty.

But what if he somehow reversed his age in his desperate attempt to heal himself so he could save his daughter? What if he was the same man who had lost everything that day? Daughter. Grandchildren. Home. Business.

The entire city blasted away in a blink of an eye.

She had wanted to know what Sato planned. It was terrifying to think that this was the answer.

She had to contact Shiva and let them know that Leo hadn’t killed Chevalier and that Sato was planning something awful.

30

Needle in a Haystack

Simon was younger than Nikki had expected. Even with his face pale and etched with exhaustion, he seemed only in his mid-thirties. He must have been only in his early twenties when he’d adopted Leo. He was tall, lean, and fair-haired with laugh lines at the corners of his mouth and eyes. Despite weeks of imprisonment, he was clean-shaven and well-groomed. Iwanaga apparently did not want to appear disheveled when she was hosted in his body.

Nikki shifted the
katana
to one side and knelt beside the sleeping man. She had never seen anyone look so fragile before. The hotel room and the garage had been full of shadows and fear, otherwise she would have never been so cavalier about sticking him into the trunk of the sports car. If she had seen him clearly, she would have taken him straight to the hospital.

But then Shiva would have been alerted and Sato’s people might have arrived first. Trying hard to believe she was doing the right thing, she tentatively shook Simon by the shoulder. “Simon. Simon. Wake up.”

His eyes flickered as he awakened. He shifted, moving as if he was trying to sit up.

Atsumori flooded into her, snatched up his
katana,
and had the blade to Simon’s throat.

“What are you doing?” Nikki cried. “Stop that!”

“He was going to hurt you,” Atsumori said.

“I don’t care. What the hell would I tell Leo? Good news is I found your dad, the bad news is I killed him?” She struggled a moment to lower her hand. “Atsumori, back off!”

“You’re greatly overestimating my ability at the moment,” Simon said quietly. “I might have planned on attacking, but I don’t think I can move.”

Atsumori eased back cautiously and then loosed his hold on her body.

“I told you not to do that,” Nikki growled, shaking away the feel of him on her.

“I am sorry, Nikki-chan,” Atsumori’s voice murmured from somewhere behind her.

Simon gazed over her shoulder, eyes narrowing. “I don’t know you.” He shifted his gaze to Nikki. “Either of you.”

She glanced behind her. Atsumori stood watching tensely, fully visible and not looking apologetic at all. She glared at him and turned back to Simon. “Yeah, we got into this game late. Long, complicated story, but here are the important parts: Sato is working with Iwanaga Hime. She’s the goddess that has been holding you captive. He killed Chevalier and framed Leo. Shiva hit Leo with a car and locked him in a cage—somewhere. Sato and Iwanaga are planning something really, really big, and it’s going to be bad.”

“Sato.” Simon gasped as if he’d been handed a piece of a puzzle. “Of course.”

“Huh?”

Simon lifted his hand as if it weighed a hundred pounds and dragged it over his face. “He’s been drifting on the edge of my awareness. I knew there was something tugging at me, like a song played so faintly that you can barely hear it, and yet the chords are so familiar that you still recognize it. Sato has been meeting with Iwanaga. I think he’s the reason I’m still alive; she would have worn me out weeks ago otherwise.”

Apparently Sato could extend his ability to heal.

Simon’s eyes drifted shut, and his breathing deepened.

“No! No!” she cried, shaking him again. “Don’t go back to sleep!”

Across the room, Miriam bolted into a sitting position with a gasp. She looked around, confused by her surroundings. “Where the hell . . .? Oh, Pixii’s place.”

Nikki waved her to silence as Simon’s eyes fluttered open. “Simon, we need to save Leo, but I don’t know how.”

“Call Ananth,” Simon whispered. “Tell him that Iwanaga Hime is looking for Amenonuboko.”

Across the room, Miriam cried, “She’s what?”

Nikki waved harder as Simon closed his eyes again. “Oh shit! Simon!”

“He is very fragile still, Nikki-chan. It would be best to let him rest.”

Nikki wanted a pen.

No, she didn’t want a pen, she was afraid of whatever else she might write that was utterly, horrifically true. That she was way too late to change.

What she wanted was to grab Simon and shake him until he coughed up the location of all the Shiva strongholds. In the world. With detailed drawings of how to infiltrate them to the detention block.

She suspected that she’d kill the man if she shook him at this point.

She might be able to choose Ananth as a character and narrow down his phone number like she had with Leo, but the moment she dialed in, whatever mechanism Sato had in place would be screening the call and running interference. So much she didn’t know.

Miriam climbed out from under her blanket, blurry with sleep. She must have borrowed clothes from Pixii, as she was wearing a sleeping shirt that barely fit her. She stared a moment out the open door and then came to cuddle up to Nikki. It was very unlike her.

“Are you okay?” Nikki asked her.

She shook her head, face pressed to Nikki’s shoulder.

“What’s wrong?”

She took a deep breath and sighed it out. “Stupid dream. I think my subconscious hit me with every one of my insecurities in one majorly fucked-up nightmare. I was naked at a final exam in a class I forgot I had, and these sixty-foot ninja clown turtles were chasing me.”

“Ninja clown turtles?”

“I wake up and the road is gone and I’m at the house of a mountain god who likes to make pottery. Real life isn’t supposed to be weirder than your dreams.”

Right.

What exactly is Ame—Ame—” Nikki stumbled with the Japanese word. “Amenonuboko?”

“The heavenly jeweled spear,” Atsumori and Miriam both said.

Miriam added, “It’s the spear that Kenichi said was stolen. Why Iwanaga was punished. If she’s looking for it, it means that it’s real . . .”

“Of course it’s real,” the boy god said.

“Yes, I know,” Miriam whined. “I just didn’t get that until now. Somehow it stayed just mythical in my head up to this moment.”

“I take it that we’re talking a spear with jewels on it?” Nikki said. “Is it a
shintai
like your
katana
?”

Atsumori shook his head. “My
katana
is nothing but a hollow reed to the Amenonuboko.” He frowned a moment, and then started slowly to explain better. “In the beginning of all things, the universe was a sea of chaos, without shape, sunk in silence. Then there was sound, and with the sound, there was movement, and the particles that made up the universe separated.”

Atsumori lifted one hand above his head. “The pure, light particles created the heavens.” He held out his other hand at his waist. “The rest of the particles gathered into the dense and dark mass of the Earth. That is the difference between humans and
kami.
Why most humans cannot see the
kami
and your machines cannot register our existence. Why even the
yokai
see us as separate and above them. We are not of wholly of the Earth.”

“And this relates to the Amenonuboko how?” Nikki was still lost.

“My
katana
was made by humans and blessed by Inari, which is why I had you seek him out.”

“Wait. You met Inari?” Miriam asked.

“I—I’m not sure what we met.”

“We met Inari,” Atsumori stated firmly. “If you took a reed and dipped it into gold, while it shines brightly in the sun, it is still just a reed.”

It took her a moment to track back the conversation to what the reed represented. “Your
shintai
is made from common elements.” She followed that much. “And the spear is . . .?”

Atsumori thought a moment before answering. “When the first gods decided that Earth should be perfected, they called forth into existence Izanagi and Izanami. They gave the two the heavenly jeweled spear and commanded that they make the first land.

“Izanagi and Izanami took the spear to the bridge that floats between the heavens and Earth. Standing on the bridge, they stabbed the spear into the endless sea and churned the dark water. When they lifted up the spear, water dripped from its blade and became Onogoro Shima, which means the self-forming island. Izanagi and Izanami then crossed the bridge and made their home on the island.”

Nikki saw the point that Atsumori was trying to make. “The spear was created in heaven by the first gods. It’s not of the Earth.”

Atsumori nodded.

She considered the implications of something that was more like Atsumori than his
katana
. “Does that mean that most humans can’t see the spear? That cameras won’t register it?”

“I believe so,” Atsumori said.

“What about
yokai?
Can they see it?”

“I don’t know,” Atsumori admitted. “Before I was called into my
shintai
—I existed, and yet I did not. As Inari told you,
kami
are like water. We exist, we have substance, but we are not with form until we are given shape by human faith. I have faint memories of that time before the blessing, but it is like sunlight on water, shifting and bright and yet unsubstantial. I was what was desired—a noble warrior spirit—but I was without a name or sense of self until I found myself in the
shintai
. I am not Atsumori, and yet, I am.

“It means that what I know is limited and perhaps flawed. Yes, I am a
kami.
I have existed for hundreds of years. But in the grand flow of the universe, I am like a child, with a child’s knowledge of the greater gods.”

Miriam held up a finger and tapped it as if trying to pin down an elusive thought. “I—I don’t think
yokai
can see the spear.”

“Why not?” Nikki said.

“The most famous mythical weapon is Kusanagi,” Miriam said. “It’s like Excalibur. It’s the magical weapon of Japan. The name gets used in everything.”

Nikki shook her head. “I don’t get the connection.”

“According to legend, the god Susanoo found the sword in the tail of an eight-headed serpent. He gave it to his sister Amaterasu, goddess of the sun, as a gift, and she gave it to her grandson, the first emperor, to be part of the imperial regalia.”

“That’s the same guy that Iwanaga said stole the spear, Ninigi.”

“Yes. There’s dozens of stories about Kusanagi. According to legends it’s been copied, stolen, recovered, lost at sea, recovered again, yada yada yada. It’s stored at the Atsuta Shrine in Nagoya. Since the sixth century, it’s been part of the imperial enthronement ceremony. It was used as recently as 1989, when Emperor Akihito ascended the throne.”

“So it’s real?”

“Odds are good for it being real.”

Nikki felt as if someone were rewriting reality around her. The world had become a place with magical weapons. “Really?”

“No one actually saw it in 1989,” Miriam admitted. “It was shrouded during the ceremony.”

“Kusanagi is not wholly of the Earth,” Atsumori said. “Only the heavenly gifted would be able to see its true nature. It would appear to normal people as something quite different.”

“They would see a normal sword?” Miriam said.

Atsumori nodded and said firmly, “Yes. It is not wholly of the heavens.”

“And the
yokai
would see a regular sword?”

He gave an uncertain “Yes.” Obviously, he didn’t like being unsure. He shifted uneasily and added, “At least, I believe so.”

Miriam waved aside his doubt. “That’s why there’re so many legends about Kusanagi. Everyone can see something, even if it seems quite ordinary.”

Nikki and Atsumori looked at Miriam, unsure of the point she was making.

“The spear is only mentioned in the creation section of the
Kojiki
.” Miriam saved her from having to ask. “The
Kojiki
is a collection of songs and poems that tells the history of Japan. It was recorded in the eighth century, but it represented over a thousand years of the imperial rule. Or at least, it’s believed to cover that time period. There’s no way of telling myth from historical fact, and it’s possible that the first fourteen emperors were legendary. The fifteenth, Ojin, is reported to have been born three years after his father died.”

“I’m sure that’s a mistranslation,” Atsumori murmured. “He’s been deified as Hachiman Daimyojin. We could ask him. One of his major shrines is in Yawata in Kyoto Prefecture. It’s not that far.”

“No, we’re good,” Nikki said quickly. She had more than enough gods running through her life.

“That’s why I was so surprised that the spear is real and it’s in Japan. If all the
yokai
could see it, then eventually stories from them would have drifted into the main consciousness.”

Atsumori nodded slowly. “So only the heavenly gifted can gaze upon it.”

“That counts me out,” Nikki said.

“You would be able to see it. Your gifts are divine. You were born with a connection to the heavens.”

Nikki wasn’t sure if this was a good thing. Made her feel weirdly like Joan of Arc. Things did not end well for Joan. “But I can only see you when you will me to see you.”

“That is a failing within me, not of you,” Atsumori said. “I am kunitsu-kami, a god of the Earthly realm. It takes effort for me to manifest in a form that is visible to the divine gifted. Those who are not gifted could not see me no matter what.”