Killer Queen [Book 1]

Chapter 45

Kira, Scott, and I ran into the school with a jar, finding Noshiko over her choking husband's body.

    Noshiko looked up and saw us. "Kira, did you bring it?"

    I handed Kira the jar and she opened it up, having her mom take some weird looking mushroom. "You going to tell me what "it" is?"

    "Reishi." she answered.

    Kira looked at her mother. "You're not seriously giving Dad magic mushrooms?"

    Noshiko ignored her daughter, and fed the mushroom to her husband, having him straighten up and take in a deep breath of air. "Are you okay?"

    "Stiles did this?" Scott asked, moving a little closer to me.

    Noshiko nodded. "He wanted the last kaiken."

    "What's that?" I asked.

    Noshiko looked at me, then Scott. "This is Void's—"

    "I'm not Void's anything. Tell me what the hell he was looking for so we can get Stiles back!" I snapped.

    Scott looked impressed, placing a hand on my back to calm me down. "She's with us. You can trust her."

    Noshiko let out a sigh of relief and nodded, taking out a large book from in the desk and setting it out, opening it. "I've kept this near me ever since your friend disappeared."

    "Mom, you need to talk to us—about everything." Kira handed her mother the photo Scott and I found in the basement of Eichenhouse when we snuck in late late last night.

    "Where did you get this?" Noshiko asked, stunned, as she took the picture.

    "Is it Grandma?"

    She shook her head. "No...it's me."

  "If that's you, then you'd have to be, like, ninety years old..." Scott said.

    "Closer to nine hundred." Noshiko corrected.

    "Woah. Your skin is flawless for an old bone bag." I said.

    Noshiko looked at me, then a smile appeared. "Thank you, Parker."

    "Okay. Sure. Why not?" Kira looked to her dad. "Dad, how old are you?"

    "Forty-three. But, I've been told I look mid-thirties..."

    Noshiko took the broken katana I held in my hand, and spilled the pieces onto the desk. "The blade shattered the last time it was used."

    "When was that?" I asked.

    "1943...against a Nogitsune." she answered me.

    "All this—it's all happened before, hasn't it?" Scott asked.

    She nodded. "Yes."

    "Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it."

    "Where did it come from?" Kira asked.

    "It was an internment camp during World War II...in Oak Creek, not far from here." Noshiko replied.

    "Hold on—you told Allison and Isaac that there was no internment camp at Oak Creek." I said.

    "Allison's family has a certain history of violence. I didn't know if she could be trusted. There was a camp, yes...but all the records were erased."

    "They covered it up." Noshiko said.

    "When I was a grad student, my passion project—actually more like an obsession—was trying to dig up the truth on Oak Creek. It's how I met your mother, Kira."