#airisu — Public Fediverse posts

#Airisu: The Crow and the Witch

Dōken-shin (Airisu POV) Post 21
#Wss366 Concert #TimeTravelAuthors Whatever #Edo

“Is the beckoning-cat now the weasel’s master?” Arakawa-sama’s aura had calmed, but his eyes remained fierce.

I took exception to being called a cat and to my mistress being compared to a weasel. However, with the kami’s stew pot metaphor still fresh in my mind, I watched my tongue when I responded, “Neither cat nor vermin. I attend a spotted huntress. Your cord is not for her.”

Sumika watched our debate and remained silent. I dreaded what might happen if she entered the conversation. I doubted she’d mastered the complexities of Edo-era metaphorical sophistication, unlike an educated corvid I knew.

He responded with his fan pointed at me, cobalt sparks snapping along its edge. "I hear an owl in the forest, but does it know the kite has tasted my lure?"

Again with the insults, calling me an owl this time. Thankfully, he hadn’t escalated to physical violence, which would have been impossible for us to respond to. He wanted something from us, so I gave it to him.

“Kindness repaid, but we nest in the wild.”

He tapped his fan; the energy along it began flowing smoothly, mellowing to a soft sapphire, and then replied, “I have been answered.”

Reaching forward, he touched a finger to a trickle of blood from the wound on my mistress’s neck. “A token,” he said.

Sumika flinched, and I whispered, “Silence.”

She nodded assent.

"You may use my gift, little majo. Pay me my daily due until I require you."

The ginkgo spirits sounded their gongs, and the shrine faded away in a fog. When it lifted, we were back at the empty grove. After what we had been through, the lonely forest with its #concert of autumn cicadas was welcome.

“What just happened?” Sumika asked.

“I’ll explain at the car. And you, ‘little witch,’ have much to explain.”

#TootFic #MicroFiction #NMFic #Crows #Otherkin #Fantasy #UrbanFantasy #Serial #SlowBurn #Yuri

#Airisu: The Crow and the Witch

Dōken-sha (Airisu POV) Post 20
#Wss366 helm #MastoPrompt Unabashed #TimeTravelAuthors Whatever #Edo

Sumika’s fingers touched Arakawa's. It was the slow motion of someone half-asleep. Arakawa-sama, Owl-sama, had ensorcelled her.

In a moment of insanity, I plunged my beak into Sumika’s neck, screaming:

          Grain in hand
          Snare in the other
          A gilded bridle

Sumika’s hand jerked back as red and indigo sparks spat from the sacred #helm. Arakawa-sama’s leveled his fan at me, snapping it open. But something stayed his wrath, and he finished my renga instead:

          Crow at dawn
          The rooster struts
          Stew pot awaits

I didn’t need to analyze that verse. The threat was clear.

An unsustainable silence of suspense fell. #Unabashed, I stared back at his blazing eyes.

I wondered, though, why I wasn’t feathers scattered on the shrine’s floor.

#TootFic #MicroFiction #NMFic #Crows #Otherkin #Fantasy #UrbanFantasy #Serial #SlowBurn #Yuri

#Airisu: The Crow and the Witch

Dōken-sha (Airisu POV) Post 19
#Wss366 gauntlet #MastoPrompt Disposable #TimeTravelAuthors Whatever #Edo

He bowed with formal grace, though not as deeply as Sumika. “Welcome, I’m Arakawa Dōken.” He stopped and studied my mistress, who remained silent, bowed at a ninety-degree angle.

“I-I-I…” She finally responded, but couldn’t get anything further out.

“And you were one who wore bells at your waist and spoke the names of spirits without bowing,” the spirit said.

He paused again, waiting. But when there was only silence, he resumed. “Now you are soft, tainted with foreign magic. Still, you are the tool that is handy—you may rise samayō miko. Let me have your name.” Despite the disrespect embodied in his words, his tone was hypnotic.

Sumika straightened, and I struggled again not to topple over. Otherwise, I would have warned her not to give her name. Names have power.

“Yeung Su-sumika.”

That was an odd combination, but it explained why she used her given name. It can be quite the #gauntlet surviving in a Japanese school with a Chinese surname.

“Yeung-san, I see you bear my gift,” Arakawa-sama said.

“Gift?” Sumika said, swaying. Her voice fluttered.

“Not good,” I thought. “He is a hawk, and she is a dove.”

“The book. The book you gave me in times gone by, I have returned it to you.”

“What book?” I asked myself. I would have to ask about that later.

Arakawa continued. His voice was soothing. Not a hawk but a serpent weaving its hypnotic spell.

          Lo, seeker
          Mountain sought
          Before you the path

He paused, waiting for an answer. When none came, he recited his own response to the #renga.

          Owl call
          Stem the tides
          Stones smooth

The word "owl" hit me like an arrow, breaking the spell Arakawa-sama had woven, leaving me itching as if I had fleas.

Having escaped the weave of his voice, I thought about what he was saying. It’s an offer. The upper verse says my mistress had found what she sought, and the lower verse offers to change what has passed. How fitting that Arakawa-sama calls himself “owl,” a hunter in the night, and robber of nests in the dark. The tides he wishes to stem are those that have caught him up; those of a forgotten #disposable kami, not Sumika’s.

“Come, bind yourself to me.” He had now switched to prose. “Remember, Ban Zhao says, ‘Let a woman modestly yield to others.’ Yet, I will deliver all you dream of.”

“Pig,” I almost blurted out.

Then he returned to verse.

          Twaining weed
          Moon and Hawk fly
          Wild herb open

He held out his hand, and Sumika reached for it.

#TootFic #MicroFiction #NMFic #Crows #Otherkin #Fantasy #UrbanFantasy #Serial

#Airisu: The Crow and the Witch

Dōken-sha (Airisu POV) Post 18
#Wss366 threshold / Equinox #TimeTravelAuthors #Whatever #EdoEra

It was too late to turn back. Behind us, the trail no longer looked the same. We had crossed a #threshold into the Shadow Land, Kakuriyo.

The monks beckoned us forward. “Bake ichō no sei,” I cooed to Sumika. “Ginkgo kodama, spirits of the ginkgo trees.”

Sumika prepared to visit the shrine by washing her mouth and hands in the mountain spring. I hopped down. The darting of little fish fascinated me for a moment. Then I washed. The drops of water were cool on my back, but not unpleasant.

Cleansed, Sumika clapped and rang the bell, accompanied by the monk’s gongs.

Light gathered over the kabuto, folding inward until it took the shape of a young man, straight-backed, hawk-faced, as composed as Lord Confucius. His austere dark robes were bound with a simple corded sash. Indigo light seeped along the cord binding the ledger tucked under his arm. In his other hand, he held a closed black lacquer fan. Energy gathered there as well. A small handscroll rested at his waist, secured as neatly as a blade.

My first instinct was to fly to a safer distance. His stillness wasn’t of calm, but of judgment. He hadn’t been a man who scattered peanuts for idle birds. This had been a person who counted to the last grain of rice.

“Minor samurai, administrator, Confucian scholar,” I cooed to Sumika. She would owe so me many peanuts!

“Ack!” Sumika made a deep ninety-degree bow, taking me completely by surprise.

#TootFic #MicroFiction #NMFic #Crows #Otherkin #Fantasy #UrbanFantasy #Edo #Yokai