Mei-Ling and Xiao Ru

In the aftermath, we were meant to find a new sense of normalcy, though I had begun to suspect the word no longer held any meaning. The Empress’s "wedding gift" had been a strange, binding dream from which I had not yet awoken. Mei-Ling, a bride. The thought was a foreign country. We took what she called a honeymoon—a period of quiet recuperation in the kitsune village, a place nestled in a perpetual, gentle dusk where paper lanterns cast a warm, honeyed glow on soft moss and ancient wood. At Lalika's gentle insistence, a proper ceremony was being prepared.

On the night before, she gathered us for a photograph, a memento of the impossible. The entire, strange cast of our shared ordeal assembled in the lantern light. Yoko, her tail regrown but still new, leaned against Ami, whose spectral form seemed to solidify in the gentle light. Remi hovered nearby, her backwards mutterings now holding a strange, almost tender cadence whenever her gaze fell upon the ghostly violinist. Serena stood with Ashley, their hands discreetly intertwined—a silent, possessive gesture I had come to understand. Even Lady Kageyama watched from a veranda, her court of gossamer-winged tengu like a cloud of living jewels. The mother had scolded her daughter for dying so… impetuously, but she kissed her ghostly cheek, and the two seemed on good terms.

The most surprising additions stood at the edge of the group. A former Royal Guard, now a sentient, ancient tree, its branches gnarled like arthritic fingers, rested in a wagon brought by the Lamb-in-Boots, Marilamba. She had questioned me earlier, her eyes wary of a creature from another world, but when I spoke of my last case—a failed attempt to save a flock of her kind—a quiet approval had passed between us. And there, a wraith with a hand of bone, Marissa lurked at the edge of the forest's gloom, an uninvited but seemingly expected guest. I could only smile, despite the memories of her trying to kill me.

We all bundled together, a strange and fractured family. We stood for a photo, and even still there in the back both Marissa and Melody stood, their backs to trees, as if they shared a mutual understanding about the world now. As the camera's lens prepared to capture the moment, Ruru surprised me, her lips pressing against my cheek. The sudden warmth, the scent of cherry blossoms in her hair, caused me to turn just as the light flashed.

New adventures were no doubt waiting for us on some distant, unseen horizon. But for now, there was this. A reprieve. A single, perfect frame of impossible, beautiful peace.