Cara rested her hands on the scabbards of her long knives, ready to draw. We glanced at each other, nodded our readiness, then stepped around the corner.
The inside of the shrine was dim compared to the bright late morning sun that bathed the rest of the scene. We peered in together, not wanting to get too close. At first, I couldn’t see anything through the dimness, but as my eyes quickly adjusted, I became aware of figures in the dimness.
“Can you see anything?” whispered Cara, shielding her eyes.
“There are two... no, three people in there. They’re standing side by side, perfectly still, lined up against the back wall.”
I took a few steps closer, and Cara drew an arrow and fitted it to her light recurve bow. It felt good to know she had my back.
The overhanging roof of the shrine cast a cool shadow on the area of gravel directly in front of the entrance. As soon as I came under that shadow, I found that my vision of what was inside the shrine became clearer.
It was not a pleasant sight.
The three figures—a woman and two men—were suspended in the air with their backs to the rear wall. Their feet dangled above the ground, and their hands and arms hung limp at their sides. Around each one, black tentacles of Festering mist were weaving and playing, seeming to dip in and out of their chests, caressing their faces, and wrapping around their ankles, necks, and wrists. One of the figures was the yellow-robed man whom we’d seen being pulled into the shrine. He looked about fifty, with some gray hairs shot through his sleek black topknot and small pointed beard. The other two were older people with wrinkled, sun-darkened faces, and humbler clothing.
As we watched, the tentacles of the Festering thickened and darkened around the figures, taking their time as they explored their victims. For just a moment, a sudden awareness of the Festering flooded me, as if whatever effort it was making to shield itself from my senses had lapsed for a moment. The wave of dark energy caught me off-guard, flooding my senses, and in a horrible moment of awareness I realized what I was looking at.
“It’s feeding on them,” I breathed, and heard Cara’s sharp intake of breath beside me.
Suddenly, there was a crunching footstep on the gravel behind us. We both whirled, and Cara swung her bow up, but it was just a little old man, dressed in what looked like some kind of ceremonial robe. His robes had been a pure white, and must have been arranged in clean, sharp lines around his body, but now they were muddy and torn, and his face was bruised. As Cara raised her bow, with an arrow fitted, the little man held up both hands in a gesture of supplication. He was trembling.
I reached out and placed a hand on Cara’s arm, and she reluctantly lowered the bow.
“He has no signs of the influence of the Festering,” I said quietly to her. “I don’t think he’s a threat.”
“Please,” gasped the old man. “Please. You have to help me. In... in there...” he pointed one trembling finger toward the doorway of the temple.
“Yes, we’re here to help,” I said to him, and his face brightened with relief.
“Who are you?” asked Cara.
“I’m the priest of this Fox shrine,” he stammered. “The shrine is dedicated to the Kitsune, the fox-spirit of this land. I have been the priest here for ten years, and nothing like this has ever happened. Oh, please...”
“How long has this been happening?” Cara cut in over him.
“Oh, three days, maybe?” he said. “Three days ago I went to pay my morning respects to the Kitsune. Most of the time, the spirit does not appear, but I make my obeisance and light the incense anyway, and I leave out an offering of rice and milk. Sometimes, the Kitsune appears while I’m there, and I thought I’d been blessed with his presence three days ago. But it was... wrong. The Kitsune is white, fox-headed but with a body like a wreath of mist. This was not white. It was gray, and it had eyes that glowed. I fled. Then when Mr and Mrs Sato came from town yesterday, it... it took them. I tried to fight it, but it flung me back out of the shrine. Since then the fear that comes from the building has built, and I can barely approach it for the terror of the thing that’s taken over the shrine. An hour ago, I was in my house when I saw the man in yellow approaching. I tried to call out and warn him but I was too late.” He gestured toward the humble, grass-roofed building which we had observed earlier.
“Could you not go to the town for help?” asked Cara. The old man blinked twice, and looked at us as if we had both just sprouted extra heads.
“Uh, no,” he said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world. “I’m the priest of the shrine.” He looked insulted, and clearly felt he had explained himself fully. His fear had receded at the prospect of having others who might help him, and he crossed his arms on his chest and squinted at us. It was only then that I realized his vision must be poor.
“Where are you from?” he asked hesitantly. “You don’t look like you’re from Yamato...”
“Never mind where we’re from,” I said to him, glancing at Cara with a smile. “We’ll
