my heart start to pound with anticipation. Most fox magic was illusion and trickery, just as Denga had said. Images laid over truth, making you see and hear things that weren’t there. Flawless copies, but no more substantial than a reflection in a mirror. But there was one form that I could shapeshift into for real, though I was forbidden from using it without permission.
Today seemed a good day to break all the rules.
My body grew warm, and I experienced the abrupt sensation of shrinking rapidly, along with the familiar cloud of white smoke. When I opened my eyes, I was much closer to the floor. Sounds were sharper, shadows nearly nonexistent, and the air was alive with new smells: the musty earth, the sharp tang of metal and the hint of candle smoke still in the air. In the blurred reflection in the statue’s pedestal, a pointed muzzle and golden eyes stared back at me, a bushy, white-tipped tail curled around its legs.
Master Isao did not approve of me being a fox. You are human, he’d told me on more than one occasion. Yes, you are kitsune, but being Yumeko is much harder than being a fox. If you spend too much time in that body, someday you might forget what it means to be mortal.
I wasn’t quite sure what he meant by that and right now, it didn’t matter. Ducking my head, I slipped easily into the hole, glided beneath the floorboards and came out beneath the veranda. After making sure no monks, and especially Master Isao, were nearby, I headed into the garden, to the old maple tree leaning against the temple walls. Fox paws were quick and nimble, and the wood was very rough; I scurried up the gnarled trunk, dropped to the other side and escaped into the cool stillness of the forest.
* * *
Later that evening, I was sitting on a flat rock beside my favorite quiet pond, dangling my bare feet in the water, as I pondered what to do next. Jewellike dragonflies zipped over the mirrorlike surface, and small whiskered fish swam lazily below my feet, eyeing my human-again toes. The sun had warmed the rock, and a breeze whispered through the bamboo grove surrounding the pond. It was a good place to forget your troubles, and I often came here when life at the temple got too dull, or when I was hiding from Denga. Normally, the water, the breeze and the fish could erase my worries in no time. But today, I couldn’t forget what had been said in the temple hall.
Seal away my magic? Just like that? Make it so I couldn’t weave illusions, change my shape, or call upon my foxfire? That seemed excessive. I’d never actually hurt anything with my pranks, except Denga’s pride. And maybe a sliding panel or two.
I glanced at my reflection in the water. A girl with pointed ears and yellow eyes stared back, bushy tail curled behind her. She is more fox than mortal, Denga had raged as he’d stormed out of the hall this evening. Her yokai nature is overshadowing her humanity.
“That’s not true,” I told the kitsune staring back at me. “I’m still mostly human. At least, I think I am.”
“Talking to yourself, little fox cub?”
I glanced up. A squat old woman was making her way slowly around the edge of the pond. She wore a ragged robe, a wide-brimmed straw hat and tall wooden sandals that sank into the grass as she minced along the bank. In one gnarled hand she held a bamboo pole, resting on a shoulder; the other gripped a cluster of tiny fish dangling from a string. Her eyes glimmered yellow beneath the brim of her hat as she looked up at me.
I smiled. “Good evening, Tanuki-baba,” I greeted politely. “What are you doing out here?”
The old woman snorted and raised the cluster of fish. “Planting flowers, what does it look like?”
I frowned in confusion. “But...those are fish. Why would you be planting flowers, Tanuki-baba? You don’t eat them.”
“Exactly. Some of us actually have to work for our food, unlike some spoiled, naive half foxes I won’t name.” She eyed me from under her hat, raising a thin gray eyebrow. “But what are you doing out so late, cub? Those humans of yours don’t like it when you wander off.” She chuckled, showing a flash of yellow teeth. “Is Denga-san on the warpath? Did you turn the cat into a teakettle again?”
“No, not in a