that the dead girl never would have wanted.
But Sakura had tortured herself enough over her sister’s death. Kara wouldn’t make it worse by suggesting such a thing.
Sakura hesitated only a second before sprinting after them.
“Kara, stop,” she begged, in English.
“You helped create this thing, Sakura. You have to let go of your hate and grief or more people are going to die.” She stopped and spun to face Sakura, who nearly collided with her. “And I’m going to be one of them.”
Sakura only gaped at her, shaking her head in denial.
Kara swore in frustration and turned to run. The screaming had stopped and that frightened her. Hachiro and Miho had gotten ahead of her, and as she looked past her friends, down the slope toward the bay, she saw two moonlit figures at the water’s edge.
The ketsuki stood like a tiger on two legs, seven feet tall at least, even with its back arched. Its tail rose up from the bay, casting off diamond droplets of water as it dragged Ume along beside it, one clawed hand hooked through her clothes. It had the face of the Noh mask Miss Aritomo had shown them, but terrifyingly real.
The grief-forged thing threw back its head and cried out, and its voice reminded Kara of the terrible sounds she’d heard sometimes at night, when animals had fought in the woods behind her house. It was a scream, but nothing like Ume’s.
The air was thick with the scent of cherry blossoms.
“Do you smell it?” Kara called to Miho.
Wide-eyed, staring at the demon, the other girl only nodded.
“Be careful. Don’t all approach at once,” Hachiro said, waving her and Miho back with one hand as he raised the bat.
“We destroyed the shrine and that did nothing,” Miho said. “How do we fight it?”
As she spoke, Kara glanced over at the memorial the students had built for Akane. Her eyes widened. “Look.”
The shrine had been restored, but only partially. Bits of letters and photos had been carefully arranged. A single red candle burned in the center. Rain-soaked stuffed animals and moldy beanies sat together the way they might on a little girl’s pillow.
Kara shook her head. Had the ketsuki done that?
“Akane, it’s all right,” Sakura called, walking past them, headed for the revenant, the monster. “You can rest now.”
It yowled that terrible, spine-raking noise again and tossed Ume onto the shore. The girl lay there, unmoving, and Kara hated herself in that moment. They were too late. Sakura had slowed them just enough that it had cost Ume her life. The ketsuki had drowned her. Kara wondered if Ume had done the same to Akane.
And then it hit her.
The rebuilt shrine. The candles at the ancient prayer site.
“Jesus, Sakura, you did this!” Kara said. “We took its power away, and you gave it back, on purpose!”
Sakura ignored her, not even turning now. She kept walking toward the ketsuki, hands out as though the thing might embrace her. But Kara didn’t need a reply; she knew it was true. You can rest now, Sakura had said. She thought she was doing this for her sister.
“No more,” Miho said, running for the rearranged shrine. “It has to stop now.”
Kara bolted after her, knowing what she meant to do.
The ketsuki cocked its head, long ears perked up, and it hissed at them. In that moment, jaws wide, lips curled back from its gleaming red teeth, Kara thought it looked nothing like a cat, except for the green, feline eyes.
“It’s okay, sister,” Sakura said softly, in a small, little-girl voice. “She was the worst one, and she’s gone now.”
Kara and Miho tore into the shrine, first with their hands and then kicking and shouting and dragging their shoes through the wreckage of it. Miho cried out prayers to God and her ancestors and Kara could hear in her voice that she was weeping with fear and panic.
The ketsuki lunged across the ground, dropping onto all fours and springing toward them. Sakura shouted at it, tried to grab for its tail, but missed and was left staring at her empty hand.
“No, Akane, stop!” Sakura shouted. But she didn’t move, only stood there, such a strange figure in the moonlight, almost like a ghost herself.
It would have barreled into Kara, ripped her open like it had Mr. Matsui, but Hachiro took three sure, firm steps to intercept it, cocked his arms, and swung the bat with such force that he let out a yell. Kara could hear the aluminum whistling through the humid air.
The ketsuki tried to dodge, but not quickly enough. Hachiro struck it in the side of the head with a terrible crack and the dream-walker, the vampire, lost its footing. Its momentum drove it forward, tumbling into a mass of limbs and flashing claws.
Miho screamed, paused, and then kept kicking at the ruins of Akane’s shrine. If the ketsuki wanted to stop them, their instincts must have been correct. Kara felt something soft underfoot and looked down. There was the Hello Kitty she’d seen before. She picked it up and tugged at it, fingers searching for the seams.
Sakura still shouted for her sister. But if the beast had anything of Akane within it, she ignored Sakura’s pleas.
The ketsuki rose, shook its head, and hissed at Hachiro, stalking toward him.
Kara tore the head off the Hello Kitty beanie.
The ketsuki flinched, staggered, and turned to glare at her.
Kara blinked. The whole world seemed to tilt beneath her and she found herself looking not at the feline vampire but at a slender girl with long, silken hair and no face. Soft laughter came from the faceless girl.
Hachiro swung the bat.
When it struck, Kara blinked again, and the illusion had gone. The bat cracked into the thing’s shoulder and it staggered backward again.
The night wavered. The air shifted.
The ketsuki yowled again, but now a different sound came from its throat, a hiss like the breath of hell that made Kara remember all of the hurtful words she’d ever overheard, made her feel the pain and humiliation accumulated in a lifetime, and made her relive the crippling heartsickness that had destroyed her on the day her mother died and on so many days thereafter.
That, too, passed, and then her skin prickled with revulsion and fear and she could barely breathe. Tears slipped down her cheeks and a sliver of vision passed through her mind, an image of her imminent death, the ketsuki on top of her, fetid breath in her nostrils, its tongue darting into the cavity where her heart had been before it had torn open her chest and gnawed her bones.
She saw it so clearly.
Knew she’d join her mother in the grave.
And Kara screamed.
A shadow moved behind the ketsuki, in and around and enveloping it, much larger than the vampire-thing, the essence of its bloodlust and insidious heart.
The demon. Kara felt the truth of it, knew what she saw. Kyuketsuki.
“I see you,” Kara whispered to the night.
Down by the water, someone began to scream. At first she thought it was Sakura, but a quick glance revealed Ume, rising unsteadily to her feet. A choking cough interrupted her scream and she began to shake, walked two steps and collapsed. But she still lived.
The ketsuki turned toward her now, confused and torn by too many distractions. But vengeance had molded it from rage and pain and vengeance commanded it. It took a step toward Ume.
Sakura stood in the way, studying it, searching its cat eyes.
“Akane?” she asked, pleading and pitiful, hopeful and heartbroken.
Hachiro, breathing quick, terrified breaths, steadied himself and went after the dream-killer again. The ketsuki did not like to be hurt. It had learned. As he swung the bat, it shifted so that it seemed almost to flow around the bat, and then it leaped at him.
