Chapter Two

Let me introduce Marisa Kirisame. Here we have a girl who’s almost my age, but both looks and acts three younger. To see her is to think, Why isn’t this girl in school?

It’s unacceptable, because she’s prettier than me. She has messy blonde hair gathered in a thick braid, tied with a bow and hanging over her chest. Her eyes are a shade of brown so light that they’re near-golden. She wears clothes that would only make sense on a woman twice her age: a black dress covered in a white apron, a white blouse done up with a black button-up vest, and a huge wide-brimmed black hat with white under-lining and a white bow on the front.

All told, she looks like a girl dressing up as a witch for a costume party. This fits, because Marisa is a witch.

That’s not all. I’m not sure if it’s a speech impediment or an accent, but she talks as if she has no concept of plurals. I never hear from her, Hello Reimu. How are you doing today? Instead I get, Hiya, Reimus! How’s hangins and bangins? Gots any more of that mint teas? Good stuffs!

The closest I can get to writing her speech is putting an s at the end of her words, but that’s not quite how she sounds. It’s more like she says zey as a whispered syllable. Came-zey over so could have benefits-zey of company-zey! Least can do-zey, make cakes and act-zey like good hostess-zeys!

It’s pretty annoying.

---

We salvaged the remainder of my groceries and went inside. I checked around the house, made sure all windows and doors were shut. It had been getting dark earlier since the mist came, and I didn’t want any fairies wandering in.

When I came back to the front room, Marisa was sitting at the kotatsu. She had hung her hat at the door, so her canary-colored hair was the brightest thing in the room. I shook my head at her.

“Are you expecting dinner already?” I said. “I just got home myself.”

“Youkai getting nastiers,” she said. “Never needed to beats them with brooms in daytimes. Maybe Reimus made mistakes and fed thems.”

“I never feed them on purpose,” I said, sitting down across from her. “They’re vermin with opposable thumbs, pests of the worst kind. By the way, what was that spell you nearly murdered me with?”

Marisa grinned. She loved to talk about magic. A farmer will explain how to raise livestock. A smith could lecture you on how to pound out nails. A soldier would show you how to handle a sword. Magic was Marisa’s trade.

“That’s what came to shows.” She pulled a rectangular leather pouch from her apron. She undid the flap and shook the contents onto my table, seven paper cards. A wipe of her hand spread them out, face up. Each card was covered on one side with the intricate characters of the old language, black ink drawn in careful calligraphic strokes.

“Spellcards?” I said. “Is that all?”

“Not just any spellcards,” she said. “New spellcards. Reads.”

Looking at the cards closely, I noticed they were all inscribed with the same spell. It wasn’t obvious at first, since Marisa’s handwriting isn’t perfect. The old language is especially difficult; it’s full of loops, lines, dashes, hashes and crossbars. Most people today can’t read the archaic characters. I can only because my miko upbringing included a strict education.

“Love sign,” I read from the card. “Master Spark. Concentrate. Accept heavenly power. Look for an enemy and…” I trailed off. “I don’t get the last part. Lovely destruction?”

“Master Sparks,” said Marisa. “Focus your minds / Using powers aboves / If bad guys you finds / Unleash annihilation of loves!”

I laughed. That was the stupidest incantation I’ve ever heard. Marisa didn’t share my humor. Her smile left, replaced with a pouting scowl.

“Scoff if wants,” she said. “But Master Sparks just saved miko-lives. Used a prototypes saving butts from weakling fairies. Maybes should makes some spellcards for y—”

“No need!” I cut her off before got any closer to collateral damage and loss of limb. “Instead, let’s have dinner. Might as well eat it up before the fairies get mean enough to break in.”

“Good ideas,” said Marisa. “What’s for eats?”

“Pork and rice, probably.”

“When is it readies?”

“As soon as you’re done cooking it.”

The look on Marisa’s face brought me joy. She was crestfallen. Her mouth hung open and her eyebrows drooped, as if to say, What’s this? Came all the ways heres for a free meals and, make mees do the works! Reimu’s a ripoffs!

“Come on.” I stood up, went around the table to grab her by the collar, then dragged her to the kitchen. “I’ll help. Just get your yellow head in here and put some water on to boil.”

---

It was dark outside when we sat down to eat. Looking out the window, we saw the strobes of fairies wandering around the shrine courtyard. They were attracted to the smell of cooked meat wafting from my house, but they weren’t smart enough to find something they couldn’t see. So they floated around, casting multicolored pools of light on the cobblestones. It was a pretty sight, until you remembered these youkai would eat your flesh if given a chance.

That thought made it hard to eat. To think about anything else, I took a closer look at Marisa’s spellcards.

In Gensokyo, using magic is easy. We’re flooded with the stuff. The wind swirls with it. The ground is saturated with it. The mountain streams sparkle with it. When these wild energies weave into living beings, we call them youkai. For a human, using magic is one’s control over natural power. The more control you have, the stronger a magician you are.

There’s a problem here. When I say wild energy, I mean it. Magic too easily goes haywire, possibly hurting the spell caster. This isn’t a worry for minor magic tricks, but for bigger spells, it becomes a worry very quickly.

This is where prerendered evocation foci come in handy. Marisa has always loved using lasers, and she insists a bigger one is a better one. Without a foci, that much power would go in all directions, searing her pretty little eyebrows off.

Marisa designed the spellcard Master Spark ahead of time. She meticulously wrote that incantation onto each card. She probably had several failures: crumpled up wads of paper on the floor of her atelier, one for each time she lost concentration or her hand slipped while writing.

The writing itself has nothing to do with magical power. Magic can’t read. The writing process helps the magician infuse the card with the spell, the set of instructions that channels energy in the desired way.

Once rendered, the spellcard keeps its spell until used, but each card can be used only once. Pumping that much power through paper is no different than tossing it into a fire, but paper is cheap and easier to infuse than more durable materials. This makes spellcards the common way to carry a pocketful of magic.

“Right to admires,” said Marisa, shoveling the last of her rice. “Master Sparks is the greatest creations. Didn’t evens see real things! Given more times, could blow half your shrine aways! But Reimus gets in lots of troubles, so what to doos? Had to worry abouts speed before finesses.”

“Don’t use the word finesse when you’re talking about destroying my home.” I considered taking another bite, but decided I was full and put my chopsticks down. “Why don’t you tell me why you’re really here?”

Marisa tilted her head, raised an eyebrow.

“You come up with new magic tricks all the time. When you visit, you’ve never given me a reason. You just come over because you want to. Showing up with an alibi makes me suspicious, so spill it.”

Marisa looked down, then nodded.

“All righties,” she said. “Here, show you somethings.”

She pulled another leather bundle from her apron. She unrolled it, dumping a small silver knife onto the table.

“What’s this?” I picked up the knife, careful to hold it by the flat. The edges looked deadly sharp. There was no handle or hilt; the blade’s base was rounded and heavy. Etched into the metal were decorative letters: S and I.

“A throwing knife,” I said. “This looks like a custom-made assassin’s weapon. Where did you get this?”

“Let mees tell a storys,” said Marisa. “Know island middles of the lakes?”

I nodded. “There’s some old abandoned manor there.”

“Peoples don’t think it’s abandoned anymores,” she said. “For about the last years, heard rumors about an assassins that stalks the roads. Some peoples walking ways home from the fields, killer jumps out of the woods and bambs!” She clapped her hands. “You’re never seen agains.”

“Um,” I said. “We don’t need a serial killer to explain late night disappearances. The youkai do that for us. Anyone stupid enough to be alone out in the dark—”

Marisa shook her head, spilling her braid off her shoulder. “Noes, not youkais. Few peoples saw the assassins. Say he’s tall and slims, got white hair like an old mans, but moves super fasts, can throws knives into your eyes from thirty paces.” She nodded to the blade in my hands. “That one cames from the chests of dead mans.”

“Ew!” I said, dropping the knife on the table. “Then how did you get it?”

“Assassin bit off mores than he could chew one nights, attacked whole family instead of a loners. Threw one knifes and got one kills, but others chased him offs. Heard about its the last time was in towns. Gave me that knives, said they didn’t wants to be reminded of their friend’s deaths.” Marisa shrugged. “Thought about selling its, but wanted to show Reimus firsts.”

“Why? Some people mistake a humanoid youkai for an actual human serial killer. They get scared and start spreading rumors. What’s that got to do with me?”

“Because!” Marisa slapped her hands on the table. “We’re gonna stops whoever’s making that mist outsides!”

---

Silence. I stared at Marisa, trying to understand. This girl was master of talking much while saying little.

“That has nothing to do with what we were just—”

“Just about to make connections!” said Marisa. “Listens close. When saids locals, meant locals to the lake, not heres: peoples near that old mansions. Assassin-boys hasn’t shown anywheres else in Gensokyos.”

“Okay,” I said. “So you think the killer is hiding out in the building on the lake. But what does that have to do with—”

Marisa stood and headed for the door, grabbing my arm on the way.

“Come ons!” she said. “Something gotta sees.”

I let her pull me to my feet, but not to the door.

“What are you doing?” I said. “I’m not going outside.”

“No worries.” Marisa yanked my arm hard. “Mommy Marisa will protects. Come ons!”

So out we went. Marisa grabbed her hat, and I closed the door behind us. The few fairies wandering the courtyard were small and naked, not like the prettily dressed one I fought earlier. They looked at us as we stepped outside, but weren’t interested. Deciding we were neither a threat nor a convenient source of food, they resumed their random floating around my shrine.

“Can’t believes haven’t seen this yets,” said Marisa, dragging me across the courtyard. “Guess it’s somethings don’t sees until someones points it outs.”

“What are you talking about?” I said. “Would you please let go of my arm? You’re cutting off the circulation.”

“Just waits. This’ll stop circulations deads.”

We reached the far end of the courtyard, stopped under the entrance gate. Right here was another reason I liked living at my shrine. The view from my gate was the second best view in Gensokyo, right after staring at the Boundary during a full moon.

I couldn’t see the moon tonight, but some of its light made it through the dirty gunk hanging in the sky. The path from my shrine wound down the foothills and into the valley below. I could see the village where I had gone shopping earlier. From there paths snaked out across the valley floor. One path led off to the Forest of Magic, where Marisa lived. Another led off to the lake near the valley’s heart, circled all the way around it. There was a long land bridge that led out to the island on the lake, which technically made it a peninsula.

“I don’t see anything unusual,” I said. “Gensokyo at night always looks like this.”

“Because you’re looking downs,” said Marisa. “Look ups!”

She grabbed my hair and yanked down hard, craning my neck back and turning my face to the sky.

“Ow!” I yelped. “Let go of my hair! What are you do….”

I saw what Marisa wanted me to see, and my voice left me.

I hadn’t noticed it during the day. Sunlight was strong enough to make the sun itself seem like the center of the mist. Moonlight was a different story. I saw shapes in the mist, like the ugliest clouds in your nightmares: clawed hands grasping, elongated faces screaming in anger or agony. It was fluid, changing from one horrible image to the next. Long, ropy cords reached across the sky, starting at the horizons and shooting to the sky’s center, like an unfinished spider’s web of black cloud.

I looked down and saw what Marisa meant. The center of the web was directly above the island on the lake.

The mist was coming from the abandoned mansion.

Marisa nodded sadly. “Now you sees.”

---

I turned to her.

“And you want to go there?” I said, sticking a finger at her chest. “Just how insanely stupid are you?”

“Insane maybes,” she said, meeting my eyes, “but not stupids. Want to just sit heres, wait for things to get betters, then you’re stupid ones.”

“I’m not suicidal, unlike you. Think about it. A mage who could darken the sky would have to be powerful, strong enough to blow us both away without even breathing hard.”

She grinned. “Nonesenses. Blast with Master Sparks, solved problems.”

“You’re crazy.” I turned and headed back to my house. “If you want to get yourself killed, go ahead. As for me, I’m going to bed.”

“Fines!” Marisa yelled after me. “Go sleeps comfortable little shrines! Then wake up tomorrows and organize greats we’re all gonna die festivals!” She cleared her throat. “Oh waits, festivals? Meant fundraisers!”

That hit me. I was almost to my front door, but I stopped and turned to face her.

“A miko has to eat!” I yelled at her across the courtyard.

“Yeah sures!” Marisa yelled back. “Reimus wants money like every other humans. Take mees for instances. Don’t care if everyone in Gensokyo dies tomorrow. Just want to find magicians making mist and steal treasures. Can be honest abouts my motives! Why can’t yous?”

“I’m not interested in treasure,” I said, turning back to my front door.

“Didn’t mean that, Reimus!”

“Go home, Marisa! Good night.”

I went inside, closed the door behind me. I felt bad leaving Marisa out in the dark, but I knew she would be fine. She still had seven spellcards left, so she could Master Spark her way home.

Trying my hardest not to think about her, I cleaned up after dinner. I gathered the dishes, washed them and set them up to dry. I didn’t know what do to with the killer’s knife, so I left it on the kotatsu.

After doing the dishes, I got ready for bed. The night was still young. I could stay up longer, maybe read for a while... but no, not tonight. I was tired from the long walk to and from town. A full night’s sleep would do me good.

I climbed into bed, pulled the covers up to my nose. The pillow was fluffy; my head sank into it. My mattress is full of the softest down a miko’s meager earnings can buy; it cushioned my body perfectly. My blankets are thick enough to keep me warm even on hard winter nights.

It’s a shame I couldn’t sleep.

I looked out the window, up to the hideous black mist in the sky. The longer I stared, the more detailed the shapes became. It started with screaming faces and clawed hands, but soon became full scenes. I saw a young girl suffocating in a locked room. She beat her little fists on the door, cried and screamed for someone to free her. I saw a matron beating children with a riding crop, with unrealistic amounts of blood and bone shown from each strike. I saw one man kill another, rip his enemy’s heart from his chest, then bring it to his mouth and tear off a strip of muscle with his front teeth.

The scenes came with words, huge letters made from different thicknesses in the mist. HELP ME HATE YOU KILL YOU COME HERE KILL YOU PLEASE, DIE DIE DIE KILL YOU PLEASE HELP ME DIE.

I couldn’t watch anymore. I sat up and yanked the blinds closed, then pulled the blankets over my head like a child scared of the youkai in her closet.

---

The sun didn’t rise in the morning. The sky brightened from nightmare black. The horrible depictions in the mist faded and disappeared. In a way, it was worse than last night, and much worse than the day before.

The sky mist had turned bright red, like blood sprayed from a fresh wound. That’s how I saw it, looking up to the sky while standing in courtyard of my shrine.

“It’s not getting better,” I said, feeling weak and ashamed. “It’ll just keep getting worse and worse—”

“Until we all dies,” said Marisa, stepping into the courtyard to my right. “Now Reimus get its.”

I turned to her, saw her clothes rumpled and her hat crooked on her head. She had dark circles under her eyes, like she had just woken up.

“How did you get here so early?” I said.

“Never lefts.” She took off her hat and rubbed her eyes. “Slept in fortune booths.”

“You what? Why?”

She shrugged, put her hat back on. “Too much works going homes. Don’t worrys, wasn’t cold last nights. Why carrying that arounds?”

I looked down and saw the killer’s knife in my right hand. I had the rounded base pinched between my thumb, index and middle fingers, as if I were ready to throw it at someone. I didn’t remember grabbing it. I held the blade up, looked at the stylized letters: S I.

“I don’t know,” I said. “I think I want to return this to its owner.”

“Oh reallys?” Marisa stepped up to me, grinning.

I shook my head. “I’m scared, Marisa. Nothing like this has ever happened to Gensokyo before. That it even could happen terrifies me.”

“Yeahs,” she said, her voice soft. It’s rare to hear her like that.

“So what do we do?” I looked back up to the sky. “Go find the person causing this and probably get killed? Or wait here and—”

“Get killed for sures,” she said. “Rather try to do something about its, if we’re gonna die anyways.”

“That’s a no-brainier, huh?”

“Kind ofs.”

Marisa took my hand in hers. The warmth of her palm felt good on mine.

“Listens,” she said. “Said to be honests last nights. Reimus doesn’t care about moneys, but yous care about Gensokyos. Want to helps, but afraid to trys.”

That was too much. My arms fell limp, and I let the knife go. It rang on the cobblestones a high pitched twing sound, as if indignant at being dropped.

Marisa hugged me. I hugged her back.

“I’m sorry,” I said.

“Nahs,” she said. “Don’t apologizes. Let’s just… ums. What’s that old words? Ganbarimasus?”

“Yeah. We’ll do our best.”