Kurogane and Shibagaki

“For what it’s worth, I’m impressed it survived this long.” Kurogane leant back in her chair, tracing the line of the crack with a fingertip. “But the daifuku’s appreciated nonetheless.”

“What exactly do you mean by that?” Her nonchalant attitude already put Arata on footing he wasn't prepared for, the implied slight was almost able to tip him over. She seemed like a natural extension of her living room, the walls hung with swords she must have made when she was seven or eight whilst a three-part painting of tigers broke up the monotony of steel. Each of the cats were as bright as a sunrise and he knew her father would have demanded to take it down if he was still alive. That was probably why it was there in the first place.

“I just mean I don’t know why they let you into the ranks when that’s the way you use a sword.” She saw him rise to the joke and levelled the broken blade at him. “I’m joking, of course I’m joking. Anyway, do you have the other piece? Unless you just want me to sharpen this?”

Arata handed over the blade tip and she pretended to join the two halves together.

“You’re right, these are definitely both sides of your blade.” She grinned and Arata tried to shoot it down with a glare. It didn’t work. “It’s not as bad as I thought, I should be able to have this repaired by the evening.”

“Then I’ll meet you—”

“No, no!” Kurogane leant forward in her chair, pouring herself over the table between them. “Stay! You barely ever come around. The least you can do as payment is say what you’ve been doing lately.”

Arata knew it would be a slow day. “Were the daifuku not enough?”

“Fine, then I guess I won’t tell you everything the other witch hunters say about you when they come in.”

It was a hard bargain and Arata rolled his tongue between his teeth before coming to a conclusion. “Fine, I’ll help if you need me.”

***

Kurogane’s forge was clearly more of her father’s design than her own. Brick-built and utilitarian, even she wouldn’t invade this shrine of swords’ sanctity with her paintings of tigers. She filled the furnace with dried wood, added tinder, and stoked the flames. There was always a concern that the witches would target the smithies directly, it seemed like obvious prey to arson. The fire was already lit, a beast in the guts of the city. They needed a good cage. The first was their disguises, the furnaces themselves couldn't be seen from the street. Add to that repurposed fūsui gutters meant to keep in good luck now tasked with distributing the smoke through the half a dozen scattered chimneys, people don't even question where the steel came from. But the daimyo was a paranoid man and his father the same, so they limited knowledge it was deitetsu that was used to make the witch hunting swords.

It's the witch ash. It's the prayers of Giseizawa. It's the witch hunters themselves. All various answers parents gave when their children asked why only certain blades could kill witches. Even amongst Arata's rank, only the Shibagakis and Nagamis knew the truth: deitetsu blades came from the same place the witches did. Out there in the mire. After all these attacks, the smithies were still standing, so they must have been doing something correctly.

Hours passed with Kurogane squeezing out offcuts of what Arata did with his time. Work and personal investigation was the unfortunate truth, although he made an effort to sway the conversation away from anything more recent than their latest meeting. He didn’t want to risk anything slipping. On Kurogane’s side, she informed him of what he already knew. Arata was easy to work alongside and difficult to get along with. Different witch hunters had different methods of communicating it, Nagami was one of the harshest—no surprise there—whilst Aose gave a more diplomatic answer.

"Whenever we were paired up," She parodied his soft voice as she talked, "I always felt I could rely on him to find anything I didn't. I just didn't expect him to criticise afterwards."

As the sun sank further towards the horizon, the conversation became more stagnated. Kurogane focussed her attention on the blade like a tutor trying to control a rowdy pupil until—unlike what a tutor should do—she threw the blade tip to the workshop floor and stamped down on it hard. The metal shattered on impact.

“It’s ruined,” She gasped, wiping sweat-slick hair from her face with fireproof gloves, “There are splinters all the way up and down.”

A taste of ash filled Arata's mouth. “How long will it take to make a new one?”

“A few days but—” She groaned, slumping against exterior of the blast furnace, elbows on her aproned knees, “—I’m out of deitetsu.” She looked past Arata to the evening sky. “If I go collect some tomorrow…”

“How long would it take if I helped?” Arata didn’t have the time to wait.

“That would shorten it. I could have it done by tomorrow evening with your help." She paused before adding, "Definitely this time.”

“What about tonight? If I went with you to collect the deitetsu?”

Kurogane rubbed her shoulder with a gloved hand. “You’re really lost without your katana. Well... In that case we can go tonight, you’ll just have to take one of my practice swords.”

“Alright. That's a plan then.” Witch hunter blades differed from normal katanas in two ways: the deitetsu and ash from demon fire. The deitetsu let it deal permanent damage to witches whilst the ash was what deflected the fire. Without either, in the mire at night they would be blind rabbits to the foxes. It was a manageable risk. He caught the sword Kurogane threw at him when they passed through her house on the way to the street and tested the draw. It was definitely one of her earlier works.

“The deitetsu heart I have in mind should be close to restoring now,” She made conversation as she found her lantern, “My family’s been mining this patch ever since Giseizawa was founded.”

“And all that time, it’s been Shibagakis protecting you.” Arata responded, opening the door for her.

"Well tell me," She grinned as she passed, “Who are the ones asking us to mine it in the first place again?”

***

The night had rolled across the bog by the time they arrived at Kurogane’s mining spot and Giseizawa’s lights were just a glow between the trees. Despite how she described it, she didn’t bring any tools that would have been appropriate in the mountain tunnels. Instead, spades and turf knives rattled in her bag. After prodding at waterlogged grass and mud, she gave a satisfied hum and set to work parting the earth the way Arata had seen Hinoe do to human skin. He stood to the side, refusing to let his eyes adapt to the light, and scanned the tree line.

So deep into the wetlands and you were just a careless moment away from becoming a character from the hyakumonogatari, the one-hundred ghost stories. It felt like it too, the air was thick with mosquitoes, sourceless frogsongs, and the smell of wet earth. As Kurogane dug, Arata’s mind went back to the peat ash he unearthed in the ruined house that morning.

Shinutcha might have been hiding in Giseizawa but could a witch that big do the same? If it was trailing peat after it, could it have come from the—

“Found it!” Kurogane called over, snapping Arata from his thoughts. And he was glad she did as well, as that was the moment he saw the crow flying directly towards him, its feathers alight with blue flames.