Chapter 5.3

My training accelerated after the rock incident. Natsuko walked me through more complex tasks. Starting fires. Freezing the river. Manipulating gravity.

“Now that you’ve discovered your abilities,” Natsuko said. “It’s time we learn everything you can do with them.”

“You couldn’t have just told me that all I had to do was open my eyes?”

“I did tell you. Multiple times in fact.”

“What am I doing exactly?” I asked.

“Instinct is your best friend right now,” Natsuko said. “Try to think less about the mechanics and more about how it feels. How does it feel when you command the water to freeze, for instance?”

“It’s like…” I muttered. “Like the river is submitting to me.”

“Stay with that feeling. Nurture it, and eventually, you’ll be able to command just about anything to happen.”

Just about anything, I thought. Her foreshadowing did not elude me.

Fang Fang joined us on occasion. I didn’t know much about her, but she seemed bizarrely interested in my development.

“Her progress is a lot slower than I anticipated,” she noted.

“She spent the first thirty days figuring out how to crush a rock,” Natsuko shrugged. “We’re getting there.”

“You don’t have that kind of time.”

“We have plenty of time.”

“Castle Gramarye arrives in three months,” Fang Fang sighed. “You’re running out of time, Natsuko.”

“What do you suggest we do then?”

Fang Fang’s hand disappeared behind a hazy curtain. When she withdrew it, she wielded a gleaming silver sword.

“I suggest we pick up the pace,” Fang Fang brought the sword to her face.

Training with Fang Fang proved brutal but effective. She never hesitated to give me cuts and bruises when she believed I deserved it.

With her, learning magic developed a morbid practicality. It was no longer playing with the elements, freezing the stream and marveling at the effects. It was either freezing her arm or receiving a gash in my stomach.

“Faster,” she would bark. “If I was being serious, you’d be dead.”

I would’ve been lying if I said I didn’t know why I put up with such harsh training, but it would also have been a lie to say that I didn’t enjoy it. Something felt exhilarating about combat. It was an exercise of sheer concentration, where questions about my origin and my past, that anxiety all evaporated before Fang Fang’s blade.

Natsuko, meanwhile, took over the job of tending to my wounds.

“You can’t use magic to heal me?” I asked as she pasted a bandaid over my knee.

“There are a lot of things magic can’t do,” Natsuko said. “Besides, even if I could do that, Fang Fang would just give you another one tomorrow.”

“What’s the rush, anyway?” I asked. “Is it because of this Castle… Grammar?”

“Gramarye,” Natsuko said. “It’s a castle that comes down from the sky, and it’ll bring the Egregore along with it.”

“Egregore?”

“Powerful witches,” Natsuko said. “You’ve already met one of them.”

“Fang Fang.”

“That’s right,” Natsuko nodded.

“Does that mean she’s more powerful than you?” I asked.

“She seems to think so,” Natsuko replied.

“And what about Reiko?”

“Reiko?” Natsuko blinked.

“I was eavesdropping that night, remember?” I said. “You said Reiko was an Egregore candidate. Does that mean she’s also stronger than you?”

“Reiko is strong in the places where I’m weakest,” Natsuko answered. “You’re full of questions today, Fujiko.”

“I think something’s going to happen when that castle arrives,” I reasoned. “You won’t tell me what it is, but you and Fang Fang need me prepared.”

“Wrong,” Natsuko chuckled. “I’ll tell you what it is.”

“So tell me.”

“Let me ask you something first,” Natsuko said. “Have you ever felt like you weren’t in control of your own destiny, like no matter what you did, you were forced into a path against your will?”

“...Are you seriously asking me that question right now?”

“Oh, you’re allowed to leave whenever you want,” Natsuko shrugged, “but this country is about to suffer something. Something terrible. There’s no escaping it, Fujiko, if you leave now, not unless we do something about it.”

“If neither you or Fang Fang can stop whatever it is you’re talking about,” I said, “what makes you think that I can?”

“Oh, Fujiko,” Natsuko smiled. “Raw power will only ever get you so far. What you’ll soon realize, Fujiko, is that ten years of meticulous planning will get you much further than trying to overpower your enemy with magic.”

“But that’s all Fang Fang’s been teaching me,” I frowned. “How to try to overpower her with magic.”

“Hmm…” Natsuko mused. “Raw power never hurts either, I suppose.”

A few days later, I finally saw Reiko Nakamura for the first time.

Fang Fang let me off from practice early that afternoon, a rarity that only occurred because I had finally managed to bend her sword out of shape. Afterwards, Natsuko wasn’t in her usual spot watching in the shade beneath the gingko, so I wandered for a while through the park.

It was fall. I remember it was fall because the gingko trees brimmed with gold. Runners wore turtleneck sweaters that evening, and the sun sparkled on the riverbank.

Reiko mingled with Natsuko at the north end of the park, where in the reflection of the lake, a lone hotel rose behind a gradient of red to green trees. She looked different back then; she was dressed like fall. She grew her hair out longer and tied it with a yellow elastic band. She dressed more confidently. She liked brighter colors instead of ash gray outfits, fiery colors like mandarin jackets or sunset orange cardigans.

I hid behind a tree and watched the two of them.

They were different. Fang Fang and Natsuko. Reiko and Natsuko. Something felt different. I couldn’t explain it. Maybe Natsuko smiled more? Or maybe Fang Fang, who was often so placid, was replaced by Reiko, who looked like a sun about to burst.

With Reiko, unlike Fang Fang, there was an acute familiarity. Obviously, I had never met her before, but I felt drawn to her, the same way I was drawn to Natsuko when she asked me to follow her.

Something primeval almost?

“...You haven’t shown up to work, Natsuko,” I heard Reiko say.

“Kazuo approved a temporary leave. I’ve been busy with a little experiment,” Natsuko shrugged. “It’s a surprise. I don’t want to ruin it for you.”

“I’m not sure if I’ve ever liked one of your surprises.”

“Trust me, you’ll like this one.”

“...Does it have to do with that time, on Valentine’s Day, when you mixed our–”

“Ah!” Natsuko shushed. “Not now, and besides, don’t you have something to do? You’re still figuring out your Question, aren’t you? And where are we on the Brideskiller profile?”

“Shit!” Reiko cursed. “You’re right. I’ll see you later, Natsuko.”

After Reiko departed, Natsuko about-faced on her heels and looked at the tree where I was hiding.

“Is eavesdropping your favorite pastime, Fujiko?”

“You disappeared,” I said, “and I don’t have keys to the house. What else was I supposed to do?”

“Hmm…” Natsuko thought. “Good point.”

Natsuko snatched her keys from her pockets.

“Copy.” she commanded. One of the bronze keys split in two equal pieces. “There you go. Now you can go home without waiting for me every day. Though, you should probably learn how to just unlock doors with magic…”

“And who was that?” I asked.

“That was Reiko.”

“The Egregore candidate,” I said. “Am I going to meet her?”

“No,” Natsuko shook her head. “Not yet.”

“Then when?” I said.

“When?” Natsuko asked. “You’re drawn to her?”

I nodded.

“Good,” she smiled. “That’s very good.”

“When?” I repeated my question.

“It’ll be a while before you’re ready to meet her,” Natsuko said. “How about...how about ten years from now?”

“Is that supposed to be another one of your jokes?”

“I see Fang Fang hasn’t been training the one muscle that actually matters,” Natsuko murmured. “You know, Fujiko. One of these days, you’re going to learn that some people say exactly what they mean.”

“Really?” I raised my eyebrows. “So you mean I’ll meet Reiko literally ten years from now? You think I won’t try to seek her out myself? Can you see the future?

Natsuko laughed.

“See the future? No. Of course not.”