fic for augustfai (8/8)

[nino-mod.livejournal.com]

For: augustfai
From: astrangerenters

Part 7


Lord Shingo’s bodyguards had already turned around to head home. It was an impossible journey, but they’d refused to leave him there. Their destination was Sanyo, and nothing - not Tsumi, not the Tamagawa Plain - was about to keep them from bringing him home to rest.

That left plenty of rooms for their party, but in the end they took only three. A reenactment of Hakone that had not required any janken this time. They bathed, they napped. The priests used their own potion stores to restore their health, their vigor, but the potions could do very little to restore their cheer.

Lord Shingo had made it to Kawasaki. He’d had only ten miles to go, and the harshness of that, the cruelty of that, had left all seven of them in a melancholy Nino feared they wouldn’t be able to shake. They’d have to, though, and sooner rather than later. Wakoku needed them, now more than ever. When they picked at their dinner on that first night, sitting together in the dimly lit hall, Nino had asked about the other Sin Eaters. He’d seen so many leave Heiankyo, months ago already. And he knew that Odawara had sent plenty more.

But the priests could only shake their heads. They were the first in this cycle, the priest said to them. The Tamagawa Plain had probably taken the majority of them. Any others had most likely fallen elsewhere or had abandoned their pilgrimages, fleeing behind the walls of Odawara.

“How can we be the first?” Sho asked in surprise. “Of all those Sin Eaters, how has it come to this?”

“Perhaps you have a strength none can match,” the head priest said. “In my time, I have seen my share of Sin Eaters cross the river. It is not always the physically strongest or the wealthiest that make it to our halls. It is the bond between Sin Eater and guardian, between family and friends, that brings them here.”

After dinner, Sho and Becky were asked to visit with the head priest alone. Jun, restored to health but not to his preferred strength, was out in the courtyard. There were straw targets one of the priests had set up for him, and Nino knew that he’d be attacking them until sleep or Ohno brought him inside. Aiba had been truly shaken by Lord Shingo’s loss, and Keiko was with him, praying for his soul in the heart of the temple.

That left Nino to explore the grounds alone. The temple was sacred ground, and it seemed that the unabsolved largely stayed away. All others were taken out by the temple’s own protectors. So he felt safe heading down the riverbank to the simple wooden dock. Lantern-lit and calm, the river flowed so gently it was startling when he realized that they were so close to the land of the dead.

He listened to the creak of the boards as he walked to the end of the dock and sat down, letting his legs dangle over the edge. There were rafts that the priests stored up at the temple. They would be brought down when the party was ready to depart, and the priests would row back across. It was a two-way trip only for them.

Nino bit his lip, amazed that he had come this far. A few months back, he’d been seemingly content in his life, making his complaints about the shop, about Tsumi’s return and the money it was costing him. In those days, the word “retirement” had been not just a dream but an achievable goal. And now here he was, ten miles from the Nihonbashi.

He crossed his arms, shivering a bit in the night chill. His father had been here. Maybe his father had even come down to the dock, had sat here looking out across the dark water and the unknown that lay ahead. His father had crossed the river. If he hadn’t, they would never have sent his name to Odawara with Lord Takuya’s and the others. His father, the simple shopkeep, had crossed the Tama River and then the Nihonbashi. He’d become a hero.

And whenever they chose to cross, Nino’s own name would be sent west. His mother would be proud, at least, for maybe a moment. But then she would know that just like his father, he was gone. That with the coins she’d saved for eight years, she had paid his toll across the Nihonbashi.

As they’d moved through the Tamagawa Plain, day after day of struggle, Nino’s mortality had stared him in the face over and over. He could easily remember the feeling of his throat closing up, how he couldn’t breathe until the potion had saved his life. He could remember the pain of his hurt shoulder. He could remember the agonies his friends endured, one right after the other. Was that all that awaited them on the other side of the river? How would it happen? Who would be first? And who would be last, the one to see all the others fall before them?

He wanted to live. Deep down that feeling was screaming at him, begging to be heard. He knew, also, that he traveled with six people who wanted that just as much as he did. As they fought for each other, saved one another again and again, he knew just how much they didn’t want to die. And yet they still would. They had survived for this one last push. They had survived so they could come this far, to meet their deaths in the manner they had agreed to from the start.

But still.

He wanted to live.

He wanted Sho to pull some obscure fact from his head, some way it might be accomplished. Something more than a vow he’d made to Ohno when they were kids, when a ten year old Sakurai Sho had pulled his friend aside to say that his pilgrimage would be the one that changed the world forever. He wanted the priest in there, the old man, to surprise Becky and Sho with a secret that nobody else knew - how to fight Tsumi and live. He wanted Becky to simply change her mind. To let someone else make it to the Tama River and cross over in her place.

She found him a while later, resting a gentle hand on top of his head. “Come on,” she said quietly, his orange and pineapple girl. “Let’s go inside.”

When they were inside the small room, barely wide enough for two futons to fit, he pulled her to him with a forcefulness that made her gasp. I want to live, he thought as he kissed her, could taste the salt of her tears as they slid down her face and reached her mouth. I want to live. She didn’t push him away when his fingers moved between them to the sash holding her yukata closed.

He laid her down and kissed her throat, the hollow between her breasts, the soft skin below her navel. She called him “Kazu” with a smile that didn’t reach her eyes. Her eyes were shouting the same thing his were: I want to live. I want to find a way. She clung tight to him, saying his name as he moved within her, repeating it as if he’d disappear if she didn’t. He kissed her when it was over, stroking her face until he could barely keep his eyes open.

“Stay with me,” she asked. “Until the end.”

—

They rested for a second day, and at dinner, the head priest again took Becky and Sho to a separate part of the temple. But this time, their meeting was a short one, and the seven of them gathered together in one of the empty rooms, the priests offering privacy.

Sho and Becky sat side by side, and she was holding his hand so tightly her knuckles were white. “The priests have told us that by tradition, only one Sin Eater crosses the Nihonbashi at a time,” Sho said. “Then there is no doubt who has proven victorious.”

The guardians, the five of them, stayed quiet.

“The priests have asked us to choose who goes first,” Becky said quietly. “It was the subject of our talk with the priest last night, and tonight we gave him our answer.”

He’d been with Becky the night before, and she hadn’t said a word about it. Panic surged within him. Who would it be? Would Becky go first? Would Sho? And how would they divide themselves? Keiko and Jun were sworn to Becky, and Nino and Aiba had given similar pledges. Ohno alone was pledged to Sho, but all along the five of them had protected him without hesitation. Jun was about to speak up when Sho held up his hand.

He looked at Becky briefly, and she nodded her agreement.

“As you know all too well, we’ve never been traditional Sin Eaters,” Sho said with a sad smile. “The priests do not necessarily approve, but they have agreed to ferry us across. Becky and I have decided to cross the Nihonbashi together. And it was our hope that you would guard us both until the end, all of you.”

“If you please,” Becky said quietly, releasing Sho’s hand and bowing low to them, her forehead touching the floor. Sho mirrored her gesture, asking the same.

It was Ohno who broke the silence, laughing. “Of course we’ll go,” he said. “Are you both stupid?”

Keiko, tears in her eyes, left her place and threw her arms around Becky, hugging her tight. “We’ll keep you safe. We’ll do everything to help you.”

Sho smiled weakly as Jun walked over and held out a hand, helping him to his feet. When Sho offered to shake hands in gratitude, Jun rolled his eyes, pulling the Sin Eater into a hug. Aiba was crying openly, but most likely from joy. Nobody had to choose. Nobody had to pick which Sin Eater they’d follow. Nobody was being left behind. They’d made it there together, and they’d go forward together. To hell with tradition, to hell with there being only one victor.

Despite having three rooms, they spent that night as they had spent so many, together. With Sho’s snoring, with Ohno falling asleep halfway through a conversation. With Becky and Keiko’s whispers and laughter, with Jun’s complaints to shut up already. With Aiba’s chatter and Nino’s irritated sighs when he couldn’t get comfortable.

They bathed in the Tama River the next day, all seven dressed in thin robes white as snow. A privilege that had been denied their Sin Eaters at every other temple along the way, the priests of Kawasaki granted them one last gesture of their faith and hope. As they floated in the cold water, the priests chanting solemnly and holding them to keep them from drifting away, Aiba burst into a fit of laughter that was contagious. Ohno caught it next, loud hiccuping laughs that made him thrash a bit in the water. It spread like wildfire, from Ohno to Becky to Keiko, from Sho to Nino to Jun. Even as they shivered, water in their ears and up their noses, their laughter drowned out the priests’ prayers for their courage and their strength.

The head priest was even smiling when they tromped back to the temple, dripping wet. He patted Becky on the sleeve, chuckling. “Everything about you, Lady Becky, is distinctly untraditional. You may just save us yet.”

Becky lay by his side that night, tracing his mouth with her fingers. “I’m scared, Nino.”

“You’re not the only one,” he teased gently. “And I don’t know how much I’m going to like that raft. Remember, I don’t do so well with boats.”

She kissed him before rolling over onto her side. He lay behind her, resting an arm around her middle. His hand lay against her stomach, and she held it there, their fingers entwined. “Maybe two Sin Eaters is the answer,” she said. “That’s what Sho-kun and I were thinking. It was always one-on-one before, however it went. And who says we have to play fair against Tsumi anyway? Together, we’ll get him.”

“You’ve been a good teacher. When I first met Sho, he freaked out about absolving a butterfly.”

She chuckled, taking a breath. “We’ve all gotten better. We’re going to put up a good fight. But I’m still just as scared.”

“We’ll be here, every step.” He squeezed her tight. “Especially me. I’ll be so close, it’ll annoy you.”

“That’s the spirit,” she whispered as they gave in to sleep.

—

The priests, generous beyond what they’d even dreamed, had restored their supplies. The potions they handed over, vial after vial as though they were water, cost enough to buy a home in Odawara. Nino thought they were never going to leave, with Becky and Sho falling over themselves to thank the men of Kawasaki for all their help. It was here at the end of all things that none of the city politics mattered. Whoever came this far still had their work cut out for them. Their victory depended on this simple kindness.

In two rafts the seven of them were brought across the Tama River. The priests helped them to unload the cart from the raft, to make sure they had everything. The head priest himself had crossed, apparently for the first time in years, so he could pray one last time for Sho and Becky. He shook everyone’s hands, whispered encouragement in their ear.

When he shook Nino’s hand, touching him for the first time, it was as though a shock had gone through him. He met Nino’s eyes in wonderment. Nino wanted to run, to grab the cart and race to the Nihonbashi. To put as much ground between himself and the understanding in the priest’s face, an understanding he remembered seeing so many years ago at Odawara Jingu.

But the priest held his hand tight, nodding strangely. “Have you told them?” the old man asked. None of the others seemed to notice their conversation, busy as they were with preparing the cart and plotting their route.

“She knows,” he said softly, gesturing to Becky. “She’s the only one.”

The priest studied him carefully. Most would have fled by now, the same as Nino wished to. “You can carry them.”

“Hmm? What do you mean?”

“Spirits,” the man replied. He brought his fingers to Nino’s temple, tapping gently. “You can carry them.”

Nino looked at his feet. “I don’t understand. What I have is wrong. Everything about me is wrong.”

“I wouldn’t say that.” The priest embraced him. “Remarkable.”

“I should go,” he mumbled. “Don’t want to keep them waiting.”

The priest was still in shock, whispering in his ear. “I know only rumors and the words of those in my dreams, the ones who float over the river and come to me.” Nino thought he was hearing the words of a senile old man, but he listened anyway. “You can carry them. And if they ask you to, then you must not be afraid.”

“But I don’t…”

“Do not be afraid,” the man repeated, letting him go and heading for the raft without looking back. Nino stared after him until Aiba came up, shoving his crossbow into his arms.

“Clock’s ticking,” Aiba said in his usual oblivious way. “Can’t back out now, that’s for damn sure.”

“I’m not backing out,” Nino murmured, putting his fingers to his temple where the priest had touched him. He could carry spirits? What did that even mean?

It was ten miles to go, and as the Tokaido came to its natural conclusion, Nino was consumed with what the priest had said to him. After a month on the Tamagawa Plain, the unabsolved that dwelled on this side of the river were easy targets. When a party of eleven was taken out, most likely the unabsolved spirits of a Sin Eater party felled at the very last moment of their journey, Nino’s curiosity was hard to ignore.

While Sho and Becky began the methodical process of absolving spirits, Nino had seen Keiko shoot one at quite a distance. “I’ll go make sure you got him,” he said, hoping he’d sounded casual in saying so.

“Don’t stray too far,” Jun called after him, following Becky around.

Nino crept through some bushes, remembering the path Keiko’s arrow had taken. It had struck true, and the thing that had once been a woman however long ago was lying there awaiting her final rest. Her spirit had already emerged, hovering over the body. That sick feeling in the pit of his stomach returned as he approached, and he remembered that night in the Nissaka Plains, out on the porch of that shop. The first man he’d killed, its spirit almost crawling to him.

He’d been frightened then, and he was frightened now. With Becky and Sho, the transfer was always so gentle, the spirit lifting and disappearing into their skin. Absorbed completely. Nino knew that wasn’t the case with what power he possessed. But this time he had to know.

He took a step closer, taking a deep breath before reaching out and making contact with the spirit. His trance hit in a wave, shutting out everything around him. It was the darkness he remembered, and the spirit was dancing. He saw it approach, somehow feeling like it was crawling up his legs, wrapping around his arms. It felt different than his grandmother’s had, not full of love but there was still a need there, a willingness.

“Take it,” an unfamiliar voice said. “Carry me with you.”

And when the spirit constricted around him, so tight he couldn’t breathe, his trance had ended. He was bleeding from the nose as he had then, quickly wiping it on his sleeve. He got shakily to his feet. The dead body was still there, unmoving, and the spirit he’d seen on his approach was gone.

“Carry me with you,” it had said in a woman’s voice. Maybe it was the voice of the woman who’d been killed so long ago. He brought his fingers to his temples, feeling only the dull ache that his trance had always caused. He stumbled out of the bushes, trying not to look conspicuous. Becky was absolving her last spirit, Sho resting against the cart as Ohno helped him sip water from a canteen.

“Find what you were looking for?” Jun asked.

“I always get my mark,” Keiko protested.

He shook his head, lying through his teeth. “Nothing off that way. Maybe you hit a bush, Kei-chan.”

Keiko, offended, turned bright red in anger, which made the others laugh. They ignored Nino’s quick disappearance, and they moved on. Nightfall was approaching when they arrived at the Nihonbashi. He wasn’t sure quite what to expect, the place where the world ended and the land of the dead began.

It was only a wooden bridge, crossing a river of muddy yellow water. Parts of it were painted, a deep red hue that reminded Nino of the torii gates outside of temples. But the Nihonbashi had stood here for centuries, a gateway mostly undisturbed. That it hadn’t rotted away but looked newly built was rather frightening. And the other side of it seemed to match the grass they stood on already.

But the priests had said not to cross until they were absolutely ready. As the sun started to set, they understood better. There was a shimmering light that sliced the bridge right down the middle. The sun had only to shine on it at the right angle to make it visible. It was some sort of illusion, mirroring the bank they stood on save for their own reflections. One would think the Tokaido continued on forever. But it didn’t. That shimmering gate was what they’d pass through. The gate that took some Sin Eaters days and other months. Was Tsumi lurking on the other side or would they wander until they found him? Or would their supplies run out before they could?

Nobody knew. Absolutely no one knew.

They’d already come so far, so the decision was made to cross the Nihonbashi come morning. There was no point in going back. Becky and Sho were as strong as they could possibly be. Putting the entire group in any further danger, seeking out more spirits to absolve, was too risky. And the sooner they crossed, they knew without saying so, the sooner it would be over.

There was nothing more to say that night as they camped. They knew what they felt. They wanted to find a way and would if they could. And if they couldn’t, then there was nothing to be done about it. Jun attempted to craft a strategy, most of it involving one guardian after another taking a fatal blow to allow Sho and Becky to move forward. It was a depressing strategy, but a realistic one.

Before he drifted off to sleep that night, he confessed to Becky what he’d done, how he’d stolen the spirit of the unabsolved woman. He told her the priest’s mysterious words. “Do you think it means anything?” he asked her, wishing he wasn’t spending his last night on earth worrying about things he couldn’t change.

“I do,” she admitted. She rolled over, kissing him softly. “I think it could mean everything.”

“I love you,” he said, holding her close.

She made a little humming noise, a swooning sort of approval. Her whispered words wrapped around his heart and held on tight, the same as a spirit. “I love you, too.”

—

They’d experimented a handful of times, tossing rocks at the shimmering barrier at the center of the bridge. They’d watched each of them fly straight through, skittering across the wood as though nothing had impeded its path.

“It’ll be different for us,” Sho said, standing on the bridge with his arms crossed. “There’s more to us than rocks.”

“Except of course for Aiba-san,” Nino replied, earning himself a smack in the head.

“Oi,” Aiba chided him. “You can’t be making jokes now. Or at least you shouldn’t be making them at my expense.”

Nino hugged his friend, maybe for the last time. “But those are my favorite kind of jokes.”

Becky was standing face to face with the barrier as though she was trying to see through it. “Well, we won’t know until we try and…”

Ohno stepped right up, putting a hand on Becky’s shoulder to move her gently out of the way. He stuck his arm right through the portal, and unlike the rocks, his arm vanished all the way to the elbow. “Wow,” he said, smiling back at them. “Interesting.”

Jun was on him in seconds, yanking him back. “Idiot!”

Ohno just chuckled, examining his arm. It looked unchanged, and he held it up for Sho’s inspection. “See, Sho-kun, you’re right. We can come back.”

“Don’t be so sure,” Keiko warned him, nocking an arrow as they prepared to move the cart with them. “We go through together.”

Becky turned and bowed to them. Sho did the same. Without words, it was agreed that it was time. Jun had decided to go through first, the best and bravest guardian until the end. Sho and Becky would walk just behind him. Nino had the cart, and Aiba would walk beside him. Ohno and Keiko were bringing up the rear.

Jun pulled his katana from its scabbard, a swift and fluid movement as it always had been. “When you’re ready,” he said without looking back.

Sho looked at Becky beside him, giving her a quick nudge. He held out his hand and smiled. She smiled back and took it. The two strange Sin Eaters, crossing the Nihonbashi as one. “Let’s go,” Becky said.

Nino hoisted the cart, focusing on breathing even as he watched Jun vanish into thin air with Becky and Sho close behind. “Here goes nothing,” Aiba was mumbling beside him, drawing his own blade as he and Nino marched side by side across the bridge. Unable to help himself, Nino closed his eyes just before reaching the barrier, hearing his feet thunk against the wooden boards.

But when the sound of his footsteps changed, when he felt a strange lightness, he opened his eyes again and nearly screamed.

The cart was gone, and he was towing nothing behind him. He looked around, looked for the shimmering light that indicated the portal between the worlds, looked for where Keiko and Ohno ought to have come through right behind him.

He looked around desperately. “Masaki!” he shouted. He looked forward. “Becky! Becky, where are you?”

There was no bridge. There was no Tokaido, no sign of their campsite. No mountains in the distance. The world was gray. A barren landscape of gray rock, never-ending gray skies. All that remained to him were the clothes on his back. The cart, his friends…

“Becky!” he screamed, and his voice traveled so far that no echo returned.

It was a few minutes of this panic before he noticed the lights. They hovered in the distance like lanterns strung in the streets of Odawara, but they were moving. They weren’t lights, he realized. They were spirits. This was the land of the dead. Something came toward him moments later, but there was no light surrounding it. It wasn’t a spirit. It was something else entirely. Instinctively, Nino reached for the crossbow that was no longer there.

But as the figure approached, he realized it was a person. A face that Nino hadn’t seen in more than ten years. “Kazu,” the person said. “I heard you cry out. I’m here.”

He shrank back in confusion, not believing what he was seeing.

“Papa?”

—

“We don’t belong here,” his father was explaining as they started walking. Nino wasn’t sure what direction they were going, but he was too confused to question it. “The living don’t belong. Largely the other spirits avoid us.”

“I came here with other people, Papa. We came with supplies. We came to fight.”

His father chuckled warmly. “We did the very same, not knowing. Nobody could have known, so it only made sense to be trained to face a foe similar to those we’d already beaten back. To treat Tsumi itself as an unabsolved. I crossed the bridge and found myself here, all on my own. But you’ll find that you don’t need food here, you don’t need rest. I know I’ve been here a long while, Kazu, I’ve seen other Sin Eaters and their guardians come through. And seeing you before me, a man grown, I know that time has passed.”

“How do I find them? Where is Tsumi?”

His father nodded, and Nino realized that he hadn’t aged a day. Had he died? Was he in some strange place between life and death? The man walking at his side now seemed truly solid. “Tsumi knows when we cross over. Like we’re thieves breaking into a house. Depending on where it’s lurking in Wakoku, it’ll take time for him to return. To reunite body and spirit. It is this time you will need to locate your friends.”

“And you found Lord Takuya in time?”

“I did,” his father said. “Like attracts like in this world, even if it takes time. We can find each other. But it doesn’t matter.”

“It matters to me…”

His father stopped them abruptly, looking sad. “There’s something you need to know. Something you only learn when you come here. And it’s important.”

“And what is that?”

“Sin Eaters believe that it takes a prayer. They believe that with all the sin they’ve consumed, they will be stronger than sin itself. It doesn’t work that way.”

His heart sank. “We’ve come here for nothing?”

“Not for nothing, no, just…your Sin Eater will not have prepared for this.”

Nino started pacing, thinking of his friends. Somewhere in this gray nothingness, his friends were looking for each other. Becky was out here somewhere looking for him. If anyone was prepared for what was in store, it would be her. She could handle anything. And if she couldn’t, then certainly Sho-kun…

“They must offer themselves,” his father said.

“Right, right, I know that already,” Nino grumbled in frustration. “They give their lives to defeat Tsumi. And it sounds like they go right ahead and do that, and I’ll be stuck here forever like you. Sounds awful, Papa.”

“Kazu, listen to me,” his father said, and there was none of his former self there. None of the cynical man who’d thought of pilgrimages as stupid. None of the man who ran his store and his family in the same detached manner. “They must offer themselves. They arrive not to fight, but to be held in judgment. They become Tsumi’s replacement.”

Nino stopped cold. “What?”

“The Sin Eater’s body lives here and his polluted spirit goes forth into the world as Tsumi. The Sin Eaters don’t destroy him, they can’t. They’re buying time, but not the way we always thought. They offer themselves and hold out as long as they can. They give all of their strength by staying in trance, trying to keep the evil inside them at bay. And when they no longer can, Tsumi comes back. The Calm lasts only as long as the Sin Eater’s sanity can. They stay here waiting desperately for another to take their place while the sin they brought here, every spirit they’ve absolved, manifests in our world. That’s how it is. That’s how it has always been. The cycle repeating for eternity. It’s gotten shorter in recent years and why? Because the Sin Eaters arrive here and learn what they must do. They learn that for centuries, they’ve only kept the cycle going. They’re not saviors. They’re part of the problem.”

“There’s two of them,” Nino said quietly. “We came with two Sin Eaters.”

“Then it stands to reason that there will be two in this cycle. The Calm will last until one of them fails.”

Nino was shaken with the weight of this. All of the training Becky and Sho had endured had simply been fattening themselves up for slaughter - their own and Wakoku’s. “If the Sin Eaters stop coming, then won’t Tsumi just die? If there’s no one to replace him?”

“We don’t know,” his father admitted. “Because every Sin Eater that crosses that bridge has a target on them. They can’t just blend in and hide if they change their minds. And they can’t leave. They will be found. If they’re found wanting, they’re killed. If not, they play their role.”

“But why?”

“The Calm,” his father said simply. “It comes at such a high price, but they’re willing to pay it. They’d planned to pay it all along, and it’s the only way.”

“It can’t be the only way.” He thought of the earthworm, the lizard. The woman behind the bush. His grandmother. The man on the porch.

“Kazu, there’s nothing to be done. It’s best you find your Sin Eater and say your goodbyes. If you’ve come with other guardians, other friends, you will be able to be together and help those who follow you, just as I have…”

When realization struck, Nino laughed, wondering if it was as simple as all that. His grandmother’s words - you are not empty. The priest’s - you must not be afraid. And Becky’s - I think it could mean everything.

He looked to his father in amazement.

“Papa, I can carry them.”

—

He wasn’t sure how long it had been - hours or days or weeks - but he started to find them. It was Jun he found first, looking exhausted even in a place where he needed no rest. He could barely speak and had probably been screaming for Becky, for the others, since he’d arrived. Without his katana, his confidence, he seemed smaller. Like a little boy, frightened and alone.

Nino and his father found Jun, and they told him what truly awaited their Sin Eaters in the land of the dead. And then Nino confessed the truth of himself, the power he barely understood.

“What will you do, Nino?” Jun asked, eyes red from crying without ceasing. “What the hell can you even do?”

Nino smiled. “We’re going to wait him out.”

A Sin Eater absolved a finite number of sins, Nino knew. However many it had been before they crossed the Nihonbashi. To sustain the cycle, Tsumi needed a Sin Eater. In other words, Tsumi was powered by sin. The Sin Eater just served as a recharge. The Sin Eater just restarted the clock. But if there were no Sin Eaters, there was no power source.

As they traveled, the horizon gray and unchanging, they found Ohno. They found Keiko. It was Aiba who found them first, tackling Nino to the ground hard and kissing him right on the mouth.

“You’re real! Tell me you’re real!” Aiba was shouting, and Nino just smacked him in the head, shoving him off of him.

“Get off, you idiot! Of course I’m real!”

The five guardians, reunited. But they had to find Becky and Sho before Tsumi returned. When Nino’s father explained it to the others, they all knew that given the choice, Becky and Sho would easily sacrifice themselves, one after the other, believing it was inevitable.

As they walked, Nino formulated his plan. “We’re going to build a wall. A spirit wall.”

“You’re crazy,” Keiko said.

“You four will guard them, and just leave the wall to me.” He looked to his father. “They’ve always come willingly. Do you think that will change on this side?”

His father shook his head. “I don’t know, Kazu, but all we can do is try.” He looked over at Nino’s friends, the other four guardians. “I’ll bring reinforcements.”

If his father was gone for minutes or a day, Nino didn’t know, but Ninomiya Hiroshi returned with a damn army. Hundreds of men and women marched behind him. Some of their clothes were strange, very old-fashioned, and Nino knew in a matter of moments just who he’d brought to help them.

“Ninomiya Kazunari,” his father said, grinning. “The guardians of Wakoku. Guardians of Wakoku, I’d like you to meet my son. The man who will save the world.”

—

The Sin Eater of the previous cycle, Lord Junichi of House Okada, was a merchandise goldmine in Wakoku. He’d been a handsome one, a typical Sin Eater trait, and his face was everywhere. Lord Junichi Takes On All Eight, a mural depicting the Sin Eater fighting the unabsolved with his spear on the Nissaka Plains, had been reproduced countless times already. There were cards and etchings sold in shops from Sanyo to Odawara. Even Nino had sold the cards.

In the land of the dead, Lord Junichi had fought a more deadly foe: himself. His trance had driven him mad, and after fighting for so long, he’d been unable to continue. Tsumi had returned, powered by all those spirits Lord Junichi originally thought he’d helped. The shell of him, the remnants of a once powerful man, remained in the heart of Yomi, the center of its power. Sho and Becky would have been drawn that way. Like attracted like.

It was where Tsumi would return too, having sensed the arrival of new Sin Eaters. Lord Junichi would crumble to dust, Nino’s father had explained, and Sho or Becky or both would be chained there by some invisible force, locked in their trance until they could bear it no more. Lost in their minds, who knew how long it would take?

But Nino had decided that they weren’t going to find out. With the guardians of the past leading the way, the five of them marched for Lord Junichi. Tsumi would return, but he wouldn’t be able to reach Sho or Becky. The two Sin Eaters would be protected on all sides. Keiko, Jun, Ohno, and Aiba would be the inner circle, their last line of defense. Before that, Tsumi would have to break through the wall of guardians, centuries’ worth who’d never been able to leave. Guardians without weapons but who bore nothing but anger towards Tsumi, the twisted thing that had torn their friend, their Sin Eater away. They’d fight with their hands, with their teeth if they had to. Hundreds of them.

And then there was Nino. He would be creating the outermost ring of defense. If Yomi had hundreds of undying guardians wandering its bleak landscape, then there had to have been millions of spirits wandering, lights in the dim gray nothingness. And he was the only one who could carry them.

As they marched to Lord Junichi, Nino started his collection afresh. Though they mostly avoided the human guardians who had invaded their lands, they were more hesitant to avoid Nino. Where before he’d been frightened of doing it, now he willingly held out his hand, opening himself to those soft tendrils of light. So many of those here who were dead had been killed by Tsumi or had lost someone precious. They came to Nino’s side with an eagerness that surprised him.

In and out of trance he went, entering the darkness and finding their light. “Take it,” they’d say, young and old. “Carry me with you.”

Nino was only empty because he needed all the room for them.

He grew dizzy as time passed, as they kept moving forward. He’d stumble and Ohno would pull him up. He’d fall and Aiba would carry him on his back. His nose bled, his vision clouded. But he knew somehow deep down that he wasn’t carrying them forever. When Tsumi came, Nino would release them, all of them. And they would build a wall for him with no hesitation. They would link hands, thousands of spirits. They would break before they would bend. Tsumi would exhaust the remainder of its energy trying to break through them. It would simply run out of power. The cycle would stop.

Even as his body weakened, his mind sharpened. How many spirits was he carrying by now? Thousands? They lined up along the path, waiting for him as if he was a Sin Eater leaving the temple. Their light shone bright and true, those who had been absolved and sent here to a place that wasn’t heaven and wasn’t hell. The spirits they gave him were clean and strong and willing. He could barely keep his eyes open, was convinced he was in trance more than he wasn’t.

But he wasn’t afraid. Not anymore.

He didn’t know how long it took them, but they found Sho and Becky together at the edge of a path lined by crumpled stones. They weren’t stones, Nino’s father said. They’d been Sin Eaters, each and every one.

The two Sin Eaters had seemed almost hypnotized, as if they’d been led to this place. But as soon as the party and the literal army behind them arrived, they were able to snap out of it. By this time, though, Nino couldn’t see and Aiba was having to narrate for him. Nino could only sense that she was there when Jun lowered him to the ground, having carried him for what seemed like years.

“What’s wrong with him? Keiko, what’s wrong with him?” Becky was saying, her hands stroking his face.

“I’m saving you, that’s what,” he mumbled, coughing.

“He’s dying!” Becky screamed, clinging tight to him, rocking him back and forth.

“Not so rough,” Ohno said quietly. “He’s got a plan, and he can’t exactly go through with it if you shake him to death first.”

Her voice was closer then, right by his ear. “What have you done? Kazu, what have you done?”

“Somebody else explain it,” Nino said, feeling the distinct urge to fall asleep. Not that he could, surely there was still room. Surely he could still carry more. “Got things to do.”

At some point he felt her slip away, but he knew she’d understand. And Sho would too. When Jun and the others explained the plan to him, Sho had just started laughing.

“Of course,” Sho had chuckled. “After all this, of course it would be him.”

He took on more spirits, so many more that he couldn’t leave his trance at all now. He hoped on an aesthetic level that he didn’t look that scary, with eyes black as night and skin deathly pale. It was all for the best, wasn’t it? His father was with him, stroking his hair. “It should be any moment now. The skies are darkening. He is returning. Are you ready?”

“Don’t really know how it works, but hey, worth a shot.”

He felt a nudge to his shoulder, and then Aiba was speaking. “She’s here to wish you luck. Don’t worry, I’ll throw her over my shoulder and carry her out of here even if she’s kicking and screaming about it. I’ll keep her safe for you.”

“There’s a comforting thought,” Nino mumbled, hands fumbling in the darkness for her. But soon she was there, a kiss that probably topped all those that had come before it.

“I looked for you,” she whispered, cradling his face in her hands.

“So did I,” he replied, coughing. He knew it was blood she was wiping away with the sleeve of her yukata, but there wasn’t much Nino could do about that. “You know, I wonder what happened to that lump of gold.”

“Hmm?”

“From the shop,” he mumbled. “All I have left in the world. I bet that stupid lump of gold’s sitting in the middle of the Nihonbashi. I bet a fucking raccoon will come by and run off with it. Knew I should have melted it down sooner.”

“All you have left in the world, huh?” she teased, but her heart wasn’t in it.

“Becky,” Aiba was saying. “We have to go.”

Nino was dying.

Holding all the spirit energy was definitely going to kill him. He’d had a feeling it would happen the moment he’d started weakening. Releasing it, so much of it, at once was probably going to be it for him. But hey, he’d get his wall built. It would be higher than Odawara’s and ten times as strong. Tough luck for you, Tsumi, he thought with a grin.

She hugged him, and he felt her tears on his face. He sure made her cry a lot, what an awful guardian he was. “No statues,” he said, “unless you put my head on a statue of Jun-kun’s body. My final wish.”

“Shut up,” was the last thing she said to him before he felt her slip away. She was gone, as far as they could take her and Sho. His father left next, getting the guardians ready. It was just Nino here, left on the ground beside the crumpled remains of Sin Eaters. Poor Lord Junichi…had he lost those good looks?

When the ground started to rumble, Nino sighed, poking his temples. “Here he comes. I’m hoping all of you know how to get moving, because I’m certainly new to this. Let’s build a wall.”

Pain shot through every part of him, white hot and agonizing. There was a noisy wail piercing the air, and it was moments before he even realized it was coming from him. He still couldn’t see, but the light started to retreat. All the strands of light that had come surging to him were now reversing course. Even if he couldn’t see Tsumi, even if he couldn’t sense it, he watched the light as long as he could.

Higher and higher they climbed, the ribbons of light twining themselves together. Spirit upon spirit, joining to form a wire. The wires joined each other. He screamed, wishing they would just get the job done without him having to feel this. The darkness started to slowly disappear and light took its place. Up and up and up it went, all of the spirits he’d carried working together. It was the spirits that were really going to save them, Nino thought. He was just the courier. A funny thing, that. Before he’d been stuck with that stupid cart, towing it up and down hills, through the mud. Now he’d been a spirit towing service. Maybe he ought to have worked on those damn muscle exercises after all.

When he started to fade out, when the pain consumed him so totally, he just hoped it would be enough.

—

Somewhere in the remaining darkness he hears her voice. All the light has gone out, but he’s not empty. She’s still here, wrapped around his heart.

“Take it, Kazu,” she says. “Take mine, but don’t let it go.”

—

It was one of those Dazaifu songs he heard when he came to. When he opened his eyes, he wasn’t blind. He smiled when the first thing he saw was green.

“Good nap,” he said weakly, feeling like he’d been turned inside out. “How are you?”

Becky smiled. He was in a futon, and from the ceiling beams above his head, he recognized Kawasaki Temple. She was beside him, stroking his forehead. “I’m fine,” she replied. “Thanks for asking.”

He sighed, wanting to roll over and go back to sleep. “We’re dead then, huh? We died? Not so bad I guess…”

“We are most certainly alive,” she said, giving him a little pinch that made him grumble in complaint. “All thanks to the world’s most ridiculous plan.”

“That plan was what again? Kind of fuzzy here…”

“The plan, your selfish plan, was to wait for Tsumi to give up, and I’m happy to report that it worked.”

He chuckled, the action hurting him but not enough to make him stop. “No kidding? And I slept through the surrender? Did he raise a white flag? Did everyone clap?”

“Nino,” she complained, adjusting herself so she was lying alongside him. Sore as he was, he managed to get his arm under her, to keep her close. “It charged against that wall you made. And it never broke through. Three lines of defense, and it couldn’t even break the first. That was you…”

“That was the combined effort of many wonderful spirits, I’ll have you know. A team play of the highest order.” He let out a little sigh of contentment. “But I suppose as team manager, I should get some of the credit…”

“Do you want to know how long we were in Yomi?”

“Hmm, a month?”

“A year.”

At that, he was stunned. He looked over at her in surprise. “Wait. Wait a moment…”

“We have no way of measuring it for certain, but you held that trance for the better part of a year. Well, a year in real world time. Just as you predicted, Tsumi ran out of fuel. It literally disintegrated before our eyes.”

“The cycle though…”

Becky shrugged. “There’s no way. Sho-kun and I came back. There was nothing to keep it going. We don’t think it’ll start up again.”

The overwhelming success of his plan was already going to his head. “I…saved the world.”

“Yes, and I expect you won’t let anyone ever forget it, will you?”

“How did we get out though?” He raised an eyebrow. “Was that all my doing too?”

“I’m afraid you’ll have to let Aiba-kun have this one,” Becky said. “When Tsumi disappeared, the portal back to the Nihonbashi opened. Aiba spotted it first.”

She explained that they’d been the only ones able to cross back over - the guardians who’d dwelled in the land of the dead for so long were unable to cross back, Nino’s father included. Nino nodded, accepting it. He was certain they’d meet again someday.

“Very well. Masaki can have a statue too. But mine will be the nicest.”

“Anything for you.”

He could feel tears pricking the corner of his eyes. Despite the odds, despite everything, it was the empty shell who’d broken the cycle. “I didn’t want you to die, Becky. I really didn’t.”

“You certainly proved that. I’d be foolish to let a man like you get away.”

He gestured down at his weakened body. “Oh yes, look at me go.”

She kissed him, and this time he knew it wouldn’t be for the last time.

—

It was another month before he was on his feet and moving again, and in that time, Wakoku was desperate to see him. Despite the dangers that still existed on the roads, delegations had already arrived from Odawara, from Heiankyo, hoping that Lord Kazunari of House Ninomiya (a most horrifying moniker, he thought) would bless their city with his presence. That the six who’d gone into darkness and returned unscathed would join him.

“All the glory I never wanted,” he grumbled, taking only one of the gifts from the disturbingly growing pile that had taken up residence in the Kawasaki Temple courtyard while he’d been healing. The gift he’d selected, a half-assed fruit basket tied with a red ribbon from Nagase Tomoya, was the only thing worth keeping. Even if the fruit had managed to rot on the long road from Mikawa, it was the thought that counted.

A ship was waiting in Odawara Harbor, captained by Sho’s sister and ready to take them all south. With every day closer to that horror, Nino continuously feigned illness, feigned weakness, until Jun finally had to bully him out of bed. “I don’t like boats,” he protested, but he supposed that of all the destinations that wanted to claim him, to rub his head for luck, to try and snatch a lock of his hair, this destination would be the most relaxing.

They had an embarrassingly large escort of 500 men from Kawasaki Temple back west through the Tamagawa Plain. Ohno had jokingly suggested that Nino be carried the entire way in a sedan chair with pretty women to fan him, but the wealthy families of Odawara hadn’t even realized the jest. The women were kindly asked to put the fans away and to travel with them normally.

With a little finagling on Becky’s part, they managed to sneak all the way to the harbor and boarded Sakurai Mai’s ship, The Cherry Blossom, without being accosted by Odawara well-wishers. Off they went south, the ship handling perfectly over the Inland Sea even as Nino repeatedly lost his lunch over the starboard side.

Preparations were already set when the Cherry Blossom docked a few weeks later in Dazaifu. Members of the Sakurai family, way overdressed for the weather in full kimono, were fanning themselves with palm leaves, trying not to complain audibly. Nino was just happy to be on solid land again, even if a lot of it was sandy and it was hot and he was already sick of everyone looking at him like he was a god walking the earth.

He was grateful when attentions were finally directed elsewhere, when the beautiful sunset in the distance cast the Dazaifu skies in burnt oranges and vibrant pinks. The ceremony was slow and beside him Becky kept tearing up in happiness. Finally they’d been purified, they’d said their vows, and they’d exchanged cups of sake. They could finally start the party.

The temple priest introduced the couple, Lord Sho of Heiankyo’s House Sakurai and his bride, the Lady Keiko. Despite the reverent atmosphere, Keiko was sticking her tongue out in the direction of the first row of seats where Jun, Ohno, and Aiba were obviously interfering with the solemnity of the occasion. Sho merely rolled his eyes.

Ignoring protocol, the seven of them sat together at one table during the wedding feast. Even with all the guests gathered around, it seemed that most knew to leave the group alone. There was Aiba making eyes at Captain Sakurai, her older brother fuming about it even on his wedding day. There was Keiko in her beautiful gown, arm linked through Sho’s and her head resting on his shoulder even as he threatened under his breath to drown Aiba in the ocean. There was Jun and Ohno, side by side and laughing into their cups of sake, their hands touching when they thought nobody was watching.

There was a woman in Wakoku’s ugliest yukata, the fabric dotted from shoulder to hem with oranges and pineapples. There was the man sitting next to her who’d never leave her side.

They’d set off as six from a burnt-down shop in the foothills over Heiankyo, had picked up another along the way. Their destination was the east, and their mission was to save the world.

Nino leaned over, surprising Becky with a quick kiss to the cheek.

Hmm, he thought. Mission accomplished.