Silver Strings

Fujiwara Takako watched the fog swallow the gardens. Delicate cherry blossoms and lush gardenia disappeared in spurts, vivid colors leeching out to gray. Takako pressed her face to the shoji, close enough to touch the wooden frame with her lips. The screen was parted the barest amount. Takako did not dare open it further. Lady Fujiwara herself had ordered the house blinded, in accordance to an ill omen divined by an Onmyōji in her acquaintance.

Takako let out a quiet sigh. The isolation was certainly ill-timed, coinciding as it did with the height of the cherry blossom season. It seemed that every noble house was holding a celebration this year. Lady Fujiwara spent long hours secluded in her rooms, her mood growing darker with each invitation their forced isolation demanded she decline. Takako would not have thought her mother capable of such restraint. Had misfortune been predicted by one of the Yin Yang Bureau's stiff-robbed officials, Lady Fujiwara would have likely disregarded dreams of catastrophe in favor of more immediate and pleasant pursuits.

The warning had come from Abe no Seimei, and his words were not leaves to be carried upon the winds of fancy.

Takako knew little of Lord Seimei. The Onmyōji visited the compound only rarely, and held himself with the least amount of ritual Takako had ever observed in a man of his station. Takako found his easygoing nature agreeable. Lady Fujiwara certainly held the man in high regard, and did not stand to hear an ill word spoken about him.

Of those, there were many. The servants whispered whenever Lord Seimei visited. Sometimes, Takako listened. Stories concerning Abe no Seimei were outlandish and far from kind, painting the man everything from a charlatan to a demon's child. Takako well knew the kind of bitterness natural talent and skill born through diligence inspired in lesser men. Nonetheless, she was enthralled by the possibility that someone in her acquaintance was more than he seemed.

A soft rumble had Takako backing away from the parted screen in a hurry. She glanced around the room, cheeks flushed with guilt. The notion that Lord Seimei had heard her needled into her thoughts and would not leave, ridiculous as it were. The outer hall was empty. Silence reigned over the house, as complete as it was in the dead of night.

The rumbling sound repeated. Takako turned toward the screen, her heart beating like a trapped butterfly in her chest. She braced herself on her knees and leaned forward.

The shoji snapped open.

Takako fell. The house shook around her - BAM! something went, BAM! Takako tried to stand, but found her legs tangled in the skirts of her kimono. She could not see. She could not hear, ears filled with a resounding bam-bam-ta-ta-tam.

A drum, Takako thought.

"Is someone there?" she called out. Her voice was snatched away as soon as it left her lips, the sound melting into the fog.

The drum fell silent. Bam, it started again, quieter; bam-bam-ta-ta-tam. Takako pushed to her knees. She had fallen out of the main hall, so she must be on the veranda just outside it. All she needed to do was take a step, two at most, and she would be back inside the house.

"Do you need help, miss?"

Takako looked up. A man had appeared in the fog. His dress was foreign, heavy brocade and soft satin that lent him a noble air. Long black hair fell in neat lines around his handsome face. He smiled at Takako and offered his hand. Takako hid her face behind the sleeve of her kimono, flustered beyond speech. She had never been alone with a stranger before, let alone a man.

"There is no need for that. We have already seen each other, have we not?" the man bid, not unkindly.

The sharp whistle of a flute cut through the silence between them. Takako turned toward the sound, wishing to hear it more clearly.