A Father-Daughter Chat

“Why, after all this time, do you show up now?” Midoriko asked, hands shaking. She wanted to cry, but couldn’t tell if it was from shock, anger, or joy. “I thought you were dead!”

“So that’s how it was?” he murmured. Her father gestured to the place setting across from him for Midoriko to sit down.

She looked around the room once more at the men lined up against the shoji screen walls. They were like statues—completely still with stoic expressions. All of them were clearly accompanying her father… But why? Just what kind of man is he?

Midoriko stepped over to the table and lowered herself to the floor. She had so many questions for her father.

“Why did you leave my mother and me?”

“It was your mother who left me,” he answered curtly.

Midoriko opened her mouth to ask why, but was interrupted by a waitress bringing in trays of food and setting them down at the table. The tray contained miso soup, a small salad, a dish with several garnishes, and a bowl of chopped grilled eel over rice—hitsumabushi, a Nagoya specialty.

“I didn’t know they made this here,” she commented, picking up her chopsticks.

“They don’t. It’s a special request from me,” he explained. A smirk tugged at the corner of Shishiba’s mouth. “Think of it as a little taste of our hometown.”

Midoriko choked down the bite of eel she’d taken. Evidently, her composure was waning because her father took notice of it.

“You didn’t know?” he scoffed. “Well, I never had a clue either.”

Maybe this was a mistake, Midoriko thought. There was clearly bad blood between her mother and father.

“Midoriko, your mother was a far more clever woman than I ever gave her credit for. Not only did she hide you right under my nose, but who knew just dropping one character from her family name would make it so hard to find you…”

“What…do you mean…?” Was he saying Suwa wasn’t her mother’s real name? Midoriko knew the location of the family gravesite from visiting it with her mother, but she distinctly remembered the grave marker saying “Suwa.” Unless that meant her mother also had that altered…

“Suwazono is your mother’s original family name.” He continued eating like all of this was just polite dinner-time banter. “Didn’t you ever try looking into the fire that killed them all?”

“I did…” she mumbled. Midoriko set down her chopsticks—her appetite was completely gone now.

She had, in fact, first looked into the fire when she was a teenager, then once again as a college student, but struggled to find information online. Midoriko even once made a trip to her mother’s hometown in Gifu, but when she asked about the Suwa family, people didn’t seem to know who she was talking about. Now it made sense.

“I imagine it was hard to find information when you were chasing after shadows,” he said.

Midoriko bit her lip and nodded.

“Well, I know what happened that night. Would you like me to tell you?”

Her eyes widened. Was he saying he was there?!

RINGALINGALING~

Midoriko jumped at the sound of her cell phone ringing. She didn’t even check to see who was calling and flicked her finger to reject it.

“I’m s-so s-sorry! P-please continue,” she stammered, bowing slightly.

Her father cleared his throat and adjusted his tie. As he opened his mouth to speak, it happened again.

RINGALINGALING~

“S-sorry! I don’t know why someone is calling me right now!” Midoriko rejected the call and put the phone on silent.

“As I was saying, I was there that night to ask for your mother’s hand in marriage.”

“Marriage?!”

BZZ BZZ BZZ

Her phone vibrated on the floor beside her, and she rejected the call. Whoever it was would have to wait. This was far more important.

“Yes, but her family didn’t approve,” he spat. He was beginning to look irritated.

“Wh-why was that…?” This was the first time Midoriko heard anything about that.

“Because–”

BZZ BZZ BZZ

Midoriko flinched at the sound of the phone vibrating once again.

“I…I really am sorry about this…” She picked up the phone to fully silence it. Shishiba let out an exasperated sigh and raised a hand to signal one of his men.

One of the men standing against the wall moved with incredible speed, appearing next to Midoriko before she realized it. He snatched the phone out of her hands.

“H-hey!” she cried, reaching for the phone.

“Midoriko! That’s enough!” barked her father. The phone started buzzing again, and he shot a venomous look at the man holding the phone.

“Who is calling my daughter?”

The man holding Midoriko’s phone raised an eyebrow in confusion and scratched his head.

“Um…The contact name says ‘Shithead,’ sir.”

Midoriko put her face in her hands in shame. When Ryouma first gave her the phone, he’d taken the liberty of entering his own contact info. At that time, Midoriko had renamed the contact to “Shithead” and just forgot to change it.

“Turn the phone off. Break it. I don’t care,” Shishiba muttered, removing his glasses and rubbing his eyes.

“Yes, sir.”

“No…!” Midoriko watched helplessly as the man melted the phone in his hands. A sorcerer…!

“Did your mother ever tell you how that fire started?” her father asked, adjusting his glasses. Shishiba rested his elbows on the table and steepled his fingers, causing his shirt sleeves to ride up just slightly. The distinct outline of his irezumi peeked out, cut off in a clean line just below the wrist.

Midoriko shook her head and swallowed hard.

Shishiba held out his palm and produced a small flame. He held his hand over the leftover eel in Midoriko’s bowl and dropped the flame onto the eel.

He’s a sorcerer too?! The cryptic things Midoriko’s mother always said about her father and the fire were starting to make sense now.

The smell of cooked eel began to fill the room as it started to blacken. Shishiba just stared at it emotionlessly.

“The flames I create through magic cannot be doused,” he explained, picking up a pot of green tea and pouring it over the bowl. It sizzled and bubbled as the small flame raged on. “I control them completely. I can make them bigger or smaller, and they won’t go out until I extinguish them.”

He demonstrated by flicking his finger upward, causing the flame to shoot up. Then, he bent his fingers, bringing the flame down to an ember before clamping his hand shut and snuffing it out.

“I’m sure I don’t have to explain sorcery to you,” he said, staring her in the eyes. “You’re already acquainted with one.”

Chills ran down her spine. How did he know about Ryouma? No… How much did he know?

“The reason you and your mother survived that fire was because it was caused by my magic. The neutralizer abilities possessed by the two of you ensured the flames created by me couldn’t touch you. The rest of her family was not as fortunate.”

Midoriko’s mother often cried about how it was all her fault that the fire started. How she’d brought that misfortune onto her family and shrine. Now she understood what her mother meant—if she’d never met this man, it would have never happened. He set the fire.

“Why…?”

“Because your mother took you away from me,” Shishiba said, his face darkening. “But I’m here to take you back. It wasn’t an accident that I made a child with a neutralizer. I need your ability.”

Midoriko stared as her father poured green tea over his rice and finished his meal like the whole situation was nothing.

“You’ve barely touched your food. Aren’t you going to eat?” he remarked.

“It seems the chef overcooked my eel.” She shot daggers at him with her eyes.

“Hmph. Shall I have them bring you another?” Shishiba smirked as he dabbed at the corners of his mouth with a napkin.

“It’s fine. I’m not hungry anymore.” Midoriko placed her chopsticks over the bowl to signal she was done eating.

“Then we should depart for Nagoya soon.” He adjusted his glasses and nodded to a subordinate who left the room.

Her shock had worn off and was now replaced by determination. Midoriko cast sidelong glances at the remaining men around the room. How many of them were sorcerers? All of them or only a few?

Does that even matter? she thought, trying to fight a sly smile. She was a neutralizer, so what could they do to her?

Midoriko clenched her fists. “Who is this ‘we’? I don’t recall agreeing to anything.”

Shishiba was in the middle of getting to his feet when he stopped and raised an eyebrow.

Midoriko flipped the table and scrambled across the room. She almost made it to the door when she felt a sudden pressure pulling her down to the floor.

“Argh!” She could barely move. It was like all of her clothes now weighed a thousand kilos, keeping her stuck in place. “What’s…happening?!”

One of the men approached Midoriko and dragged her back to the cushion where she’d been seated a moment before. He pulled her upright and painfully forced her into a sitting position. At the same time, a different man, who had used his sorcery to freeze everything in mid-air after she flipped the table, was now setting it all back into place.

When the contents of the last bowl plopped into place, Midoriko’s father motioned with his hand, and she finally felt the weight dissipate from her body. Had he used magic on her…?

“How did you…?”

“Use magic on a neutralizer?” he scoffed. Her father poured green tea over his leftover rice after adding garnishes to it. “I simply targeted your clothing.”

Midoriko sat in shocked silence. Any strength and fight left in her was leaving her body in defeat.

“You haven’t once asked about me since I sat down,” she snapped. Maybe she could bargain with him. “Don’t you care about what your daughter is doing with her life?”

“Frankly, I don’t,” he said curtly, adjusting his cufflinks.

“I have a job! I am one semester away from completing my doctorate! You can’t just take me away from my life!”

“Midoriko, listen to me when I tell you to forget all of that. You don’t need any of it. If you do as I say, I’ll even allow you to continue pretending to be that little girl’s mother.”

“...!”

Midoriko felt a pain in her chest as her heart began to race. If he knows about her, all of them are in danger!

At that moment, Midoriko mourned the loss of her phone—she couldn’t warn any of them now. She’d never sent the message to Ryouma. He’d never know where she went or what happened to her.

If only that message had been sent... Midoriko wished and wished and wished that somehow the message made it through to him.

“Then let me ask you one more thing…” she said, tears of anger welling up in her eyes. At this point, she was just stalling. “Did you ever care about my mother? Or were you just using her like you’re trying to use me?”

Shishiba looked down at Midoriko and smiled. It wasn’t a warm, loving one between a father and daughter—it was cold, cruel, and mocking.

“Does an artisan not care for their tools?”

“I will say that not many sorcerers can pull off what I just did,” he added. Meaning, ‘Don’t think you can easily run away from me.’

He held out his hand and made a motion like he was pressing down. Midoriko felt the oppressive weight in her clothing return, pulling at her body and pinning her down. She gasped and strained against the pressure.

“I expected it from your mother, but it seems your sorcerer friend also taught you nothing. A skilled neutralizer would be able to break any spell at will,” he scoffed, releasing the enchantment on her clothing.

“...you’re not consciously controlling your ability, so it activates defensively…”

So that was what he meant back on the beach, Midoriko thought bitterly. She should have asked him to teach her.

“Well, maybe your toothlessness is to my benefit right now. I don’t need a dog that bites,” he chided.

Shishiba nodded in the direction of two of his men, who rushed Midoriko to physically bind her hands and feet. They were going to take her away, and she wasn’t going to be able to fight it.

Midoriko closed her eyes, squeezing out the tears that welled up. She wanted Ryouma to burst through the door at that moment more than anything. For him to show up, use his word magic on these men, and pull her through one of his magic doors to safety.

Please find me, Ryouma…!