Magical Things Always Happen in Markets

“Roku-kun, you’re still planning to go by the enlistment station?”

Lachlan paused in rummaging through his things, glancing up at Oji’s shadow outside the open doorway to his cramped little room on the rickety second floor. “Thought I might as well since they’re open again. Millionth time’s the charm, eh?”

“Hm. Well, I have something that might help you.”

He straightened, something in the old man’s gruff voice piquing his curiosity. Poking his head out the door, he found a talisman sitting in Oji’s calloused palm—an old scuffed thing made of... jade? That’s unusual. He picked it up, inspecting the carved kanji. “Warrior of the Emperor?”

“It was an old talisman used during the time of the samurai, granted to anyone favoured by His Majesty, even to gaijin.” Oji fingered his moustache. “It might make them listen to you. The Imperial Majesty’s seal is still respected, even by these fools who govern us now.”

Turning it over, he traced the seal designating the sun setting into the sea, land and sky hemming them in. “Where did you even get this?”

He glanced up to see an enigmatic smile playing on Oji’s lips. “I don’t always lose at chou-han.”

A lopsided smile quirked at his own mouth, and he bowed deeply. “Thank you, Oji-san. Maybe I can appreciate your bad habits, this once.”

“Your respect is a double-edged sword.” Oji sniffed, moving off again with a dismissive wave. “Just be sure not to leave immediately. I need you for one last fishing trip, and Tsuma and the children need to spoil you before you go.”

“Hai, senpai.” He watched him go with a smile, the jade talisman warm in his hand. Tucking it in next to his document, he turned back to snag a wide-brimmed woven hat and his gloves, tugging them on firmly. Best not to draw attention in town.

Town proved less fruitful than he'd hoped. As he plonked the fish-basket down on Erika's bench with a grunt, her expression made him pause.

“I’m sorry, I’m not taking any today. I have too many fish already.”

He straightened slowly. This was... different. “Excuse me?”

“Business is not good today.” Her face seemed oddly pinched. “I can’t buy these, I’m sorry.”

Something wasn’t right here. They were regulars. They sold to her because she gave them a good price, and she’d never turned them away before without even looking at the catch. Besides, a glance at the griller showed it had plenty on the racks, and plenty coming out. Taking the lid of the basket off, he gestured to the ice-bagged fish. “Are you sure? It was a good catch.”

“No, we have too many.” She shook her head. “I’m deeply sorry.”

He hesitated. “What about half?”

He could hear Oji’s voice in the back of his head: “Roku-kun, you are a terrible fish salesman.” In all fairness, he only caught the things, and he’d never had to try and convince anyone to take them before. He was starting to get the bizarre feeling of being stuck in a too-realistic stress dream. If Oji couldn’t get the money from this....

She looked them over, that tight look still hounding her. That wasn’t the look of an apologetic woman turning away surplus, unless she had as many money issues as the old man tucked away in her back pocket. “Perhaps a quarter.”

“Quarter and a half,” he offered, bizarreness starting to compound.

“No, only a quarter. Five of these fish for the usual price.”

He pressed his lips together. The usual for five and what little he could get from selling the rest to the merchant would barely make up a regular catch.

“Why is Erika-san not buying Otou-chan’s fish? Is there something wrong with it?” Aiko piped up before he could open his mouth, innocently looking up at the older lady.

Well, it looked like he had a secret weapon. Erika glanced down at the girl and back to him, a flash of almost-sorrow in her eyes, and he gave her an even look. “You’ll have enough customers for eight extra.”

"I...." She looked down into Aiko and Tobira's little faces, and he saw her cave. "Yes, alright. For the usual price."

She counted out the money, he counted out the fish, and as he accepted the fruits of his haggling, she leaned in and murmured, "You should tell that man not to deal with yakuza. Whatever he did, it won't end well for you if he doesn't appease them."

He stiffened. "What?"

The money pressed into his gloved hand. "Go. Use what you can of this. I don't want to see his children suffer for his sins. I'll say no more."

He stared at her for a long moment as she gave him a nod and turned back to her work, his fingers closing around the coins.

What the hell had Oji done?

Later, he turned it over in his head as he trailed after the children obliviously skipping ahead for their last stop, his hands in his pockets. Yakuza? What'd he done that'd catch the eye of the local group in town? Fingers spinning the talisman in his pocket, he slipped the top out briefly, the jade glinting. No doubt gambling was to blame.

"I'm taking his money out back and burying it in a casket," he muttered to himself, blowing a lock of hair out of his face with an exasperated breath. What the hell was the old man thinking, gambling with yakuza?

A wisp of light caught the corner of his eye, just as Aiko yelled and Tobira shrieked. “Yokai! Look, Onii-san!”

He looked up, catching sight of the bobbing lights drifting in the artificial twilight cast by the two-story, tight-knit buildings around them. They weren’t as bright as they would be in the full dark, but they floated around like giant fireflies between and above pedestrians, the glimmer-fuelled paper lanterns hung from the traditional-style roofs catching one in its light and turning it from a wisp into a watery shape that almost looked like an amikiri. It didn’t go close enough to take the full appearance, though.

His charges, of course, immediately sprinted full-tilt straight down the street yelling “yokai!”

Well, it'd be a brief distraction from his troubles. He blew a stray strand of hair out of his face with a sigh, smiling wryly to himself.

By the time he caught up to them in the local "yokai garden", they’d found their beloved glimmer-seller, Yuka, and were already offering spirit cucumbers to a pair of kappa swimming in the little pond lit by floating lanterns.

“Yuka-san,” he greeted the wizened old lady, bowing.

She gave him a gap-toothed smile. “Oni-kun—come, come! Take some kasukana!”

Weird old lady. He smiled crookedly, folding his arms and watching Aiko and Tobira for a moment. “Are you offering it for free, now?”

Aiko blinked up at him. “We told Yuka-sama that you couldn’t sell the fish and we don’t have any money.”

Tobira nodded vigorously. “We don’t have to pay!”

...

...Had they gotten the bad habits from their dad, or...?

Yuka cackled, patting the ground next to bowls full of glowing liquid. “You only have to pay if you empty a bowl, boy. Though you look like you might need it!”

Because foreigners crawled up out of the sea and required fairy-water to live, obviously. He wasn’t actually a leprechaun, whatever everyone outside of the Emerald Isles seemed to think about his people.

“Can you make a dragon?” Tobira leaned back, looking up at him.

Aiko poked him. “Yokai don’t eat dragons!”

“But I want to see a dragon! Please?”

“Guess I did promise.” Blowing out a breath, he sat down to gather a handful of glimmer, a couple of glowing droplets dripping onto the pebbles, and carefully smeared it across his face, flicking the excess away and blinking as the sting made his eyes water.

Aiko giggled. “Your face is all scrunched up.”

He swiped playfully at her head, making her giggle louder. “I have sensitive skin.”

Swirling his hands through the air, he gathered the form of a long, snake-like Nihon-style dragon and drew it out, swiping it across to whirl around Tobira. The little boy shrieked a laugh, trying to catch it only for it to slip through his hands, and Lachlan smiled, directing his creation to coil loosely around the child’s arm.

He took the opportunity to take a look around the rest of the garden, his gaze drifting over the water to a little family of five, the two youngest giggling and trying to reach for one of the paper lanterns bobbing on the surface, their father pulling one of them back before she could overbalance and fall in.

There wasn’t a hint of a shadow here. He flexed his hand lightly. Nothing but peace.

The corner of his mouth pulled up. Makes me feel out of place.

“Onii-sannnn.” Tobira’s voice pulled him out of his thoughts and back to the boy looking up at him with wide, wet eyes. The dragon was gone, a few last light motes winking out. “It broke....”

“You weren’t gentle with it!” Aiko scolded him. “You need to be gentle or it breaks.”

Tobira twisted his shirt and ducked his head, but Lachlan could see the wobbling lip. Ah, kids. “I didn’t mean to! I just wanted to hold it!”

“Ai, ai,” he interrupted before Aiko could make her brother really start crying. “It’s just a dragon, don’t make an oni out of it.”

“I’m sorry....” Tobira sniffled. “Can you... can you make me a new one...?”

He hummed. "I don't know... we oni are bound by magic words."

"Pleeeeease, Onii-san?"

"Hmmm." He tilted his head one way and then another, tapping his chin and contemplating the depths of the pond. "Alright. That's acceptable."

Tobira cheered as he leaned back again and gathered more of the stuff than before, working it up under his sleeves, careful not to let his scars peek out. He ignored the tingle as best he could, huffing in half a breath before smearing the rest across his face and down his neck as he pushed himself upright again, phantom children playing by the pond flitting around him. Just hallucinations.

It'd only be for a little while. Mngh. He screwed his face up, smearing a last bit over his nose and valiantly ignoring the smell of literally everything assaulting him.

“You look even more pale!” Aiko giggled, and ducked back with a yelp as he sneezed violently, blinking and shaking his head to clear the glowing spots dancing like fairies. “And you sneeze like Wanchan.”

“Ghuh.” He wiped at his nose, pulling the light from his skin before the pointy-eared shadow nosing curiously at the nervous kappa in the water could do anything weird. Almost instantly, the world darkened, a more solid dragon lifting away to whirl around him, all red and gold.

First thing he did was send it to bop Tobira’s open-mouthed face right in the nose.

He smiled, leaning back on his hands as the little boy shrieked and tried to catch it in a hug, its scales slipping out of his arms and ruffling over his hair.

Aiko giggled, leaning over to try and catch at its tail, too, and he let it flick her nose, making her yelp.

"Onii-sannnn," she complained, poking at his arm with a grin of a pout. "You're making it do that!"

"Don't know what you're talking about," he hummed, its jaws snapping playfully a centimetre from her ear. "I'm not lifting a finger. Must really be a rogue yokai—an akuma out to get you."

"Nooooo!" She ducked, giggling and grabbing his arm in what felt like more of a threat than for safety. "Save meee!"

"I got it!" Tobira pounced, actually managing to catch onto its tail.

Well that wouldn't do. Immediately, Lachlan sent it to skim its head along the water, shooting out a thin jet straight into the boy's ear, making him let go with a shriek that could've broken windows.

Lachlan laughed, Aiko chastising him and chirping threats on behalf of her brother with his arm as her prisoner while Tobira let out a warcry, launching up on his chubby legs and chasing it.

"No, we need to get the oni that's its master!" Aiko attempted to pull him over by yanking on his arm, her efforts failing miserably. "He's an evil fairy!"

He clucked his tongue, poking her in the forehead. "I think I'm a little big to be a fairy. I'm more of an elf."

"An... elf?" Her way of pronouncing it sounded more like "erhfu", and he had to grin.

"That's right. One of the evil Fomorians."

"Fonorian?" Her face screwed up, still holding his arm captive though she'd stopped pulling. "Are those the yokai you see in Wirindu?"

"Wilind," he corrected her, keeping half an eye on the dragon. "I used to see them here, too, until I learned how you saw them."

"Ohhh, like Otou-chan said! They change how they look, like a mirror."

Well, she wasn't that far off. "Yeah, like a reflection showing what you expect to see." He ruffled her head, and she practically glowed. "You're pretty smart."

Tobira chose that moment to dive on the dragon while it was out of his line of sight and wrestle it to the ground, crowing over his victory.

Lachlan groaned dramatically, Aiko giggling. "My dragon's been defeated."

With a sigh, he extricated his arm, picking himself up off the ground. “Well, now that I've been defeated, I should head off. You two stay here and guard that dragon to make sure it doesn't escape while I'm gone, alright?"

Tobira grinned, squeezing the dragon tighter with a nod, and Lachlan ruffled his hair, before levelling a finger at Aiko. “Look after your otouto. No getting eaten.”

“Hai, Onii-san!”

He left the yokai garden behind, Yuka watching him go with her shrewd old eyes. Frankly, she was a bit disturbing, but she wouldn’t hurt the children, and stopping by the enlistment station wouldn’t take long.

And with luck, things might just be different this time.