long time—it scratches me when I try to put a leaf on its head. But...” I shivered, clutching at my arms. The sun-warmed rock suddenly felt cold. “Denga-san was angry,” I told her. “More than I’ve ever seen before. He said I was more yokai than human, and that Master Isao should put a binding on me. What if Master Isao listens to him? What if he really does seal off my magic? I...” I faltered, feeling my stomach twist at the thought losing my power. “I can’t imagine having no magic. It would be worse than cutting off my fingers or plucking out my eyes. If that happens, what will I do?”
Tanuki-baba snorted. “Come,” she said, gesturing down the trail with the end of her bamboo rod. “I’ll make you some tea.”
I hopped down and followed the hunched form away from the pond, onto the narrow winding path through the bamboo forest. Her pole bobbed as she walked, and the tip of a bushy brown tail peeked from beneath the hem of her robe. I pretended not to notice, just as I knew she pretended not to see my ears and tail. It was an unspoken rule among yokai; one did not call attention to their...yokai-ness if one did not want be haunted, harassed, or cursed with extremely bad luck. Not that I was afraid Tanuki-baba would do so. To me she had always been a grandmotherly old yokai, and the stories of the tricks she used to play on humans when she was a young tanuki were always entertaining, if sometimes scary.
We emerged from the bamboo into a deeper, darker part of the forest. Here, ancient trees grew close together, intertwining branches nearly shutting out the sun. Thin streams of light cut weakly through the leaves, dappling the forest floor, and the air had a still, almost reverent feel. Curious kodama, the tree spirits of the forest, peered at us from behind leaves or followed us down the trail, their ethereal green bodies no larger than my finger.
Tanuki-baba led me along a familiar babbling brook, over a tiny arched bridge that was being eaten by toadstools and fungi, and toward a wooden hut that had been completely swallowed by moss. Long, long ago, she’d said, it had belonged to a yamabushi, a wandering priest who sought harmony and balance within nature, who could see and communicate directly with the kami. But that mortal had moved on or died, and the hut was now hers. Part of the thatched roof had fallen in and trees and brush surrounded it; if you didn’t know there was a dwelling there, you might miss it in the vegetation. The interior, as always, was a mess, with junk piled in every corner and along every wall.
“Sit,” Tanuki-baba gruffed, gesturing to a low wooden table in the center of the floor, the only clear space in the room. “I’ll make us some tea—assuming I can find the pot, that is.”
There were two or three teapots resting in different places throughout the clutter. I didn’t say anything, because my suggestions were always met with refusal. That teapot was cracked, or dirty, or had a family of birds living in it. No, the right teapot was here, somewhere, and only she could find it. I knelt at the wooden table until Tanuki-baba finally stumbled upon what she was looking for, an ancient and dinged iron pot, and yanked it out of the pile.
“Empty,” she sighed, peering in the top. “That’s good, I suppose. No mice this time. Means I have to fill it up, though. I’ll be right back,” she told me, waddling out again. “Don’t touch anything.”
I waited patiently, rolling little flames of kitsune-bi across the table surface, while Tanuki-baba filled the teapot, set it on the brazier and lit the coals at the bottom. She then bustled about the room, taking things from the clutter along the walls and muttering to herself. Finally, she returned to the table with the teapot, two chipped cups and a tray bearing the fish she had caught, still raw and unscaled, laid out in a row.
“Ahhh,” she sighed, settling onto the threadbare pillow opposite me. After several moments of shifting around and making herself comfortable, she took off her hat and tossed it in a corner, where it blended into the clutter. Politely, I dropped my gaze, careful not to glance at the round, furry ears that poked up from the top of her gray head. “Go on