And I am crying.
There is movement beside me, and I know who it is. I do not bother to turn around, because I no longer care. But Hotoke Oimikado forces me to look at her. Her fingers are cold, but the magatama glows when she takes hold of it. Fog curls from its center, rising in formless wisps to take a more concrete shape, until the ghost of Kazuhiko Kino stands before me, no longer an old man, but the watchful, defiant boy of his youth. I recall his sunken corpse in the pit. Unlike the other villagers and the ghost-hunter crew, he had not been woven into a cocoon. The magatama might not have saved his life, but at the very least, it kept his soul intact.
The boy turns toward Kagura, who watches him, awestruck. He kneels before her, smiling, and then she starts to weep.
Around me, the cocoons wriggle. Their motions become frantic, desperate.
As we watch, fireflies burst out of their silken prisons, wings whirring, taking flight into the darkness. The tiny fireflies surround me. As one, they venture higher, and I reach out without thinking, my hand knowing what I want before my mind consciously does.
I catch one of the glowing insects in my palm, and Hotoke’s hand moves toward my forehead—
—I am no longer in a dark cave with a dead tree but in some nameless field on a bright morning. I am on my knees, and the silken threads of Okiku’s cocoon that once bound her to me are gone. Fireflies soar overhead. Some stop to nuzzle against blades of grass, bracing against a restless wind. Others bat wings against my cheeks, wiping away the tracks my tears have taken.
Okiku is beside me. She is no longer garbed in death. There is color in her cheeks and brightness in her eyes, and she wears a plain brown yukata. Her face is tilted up, examining the sky with wonder, as if seeing it for the first time and wondering why she never took the time to observe such beauty before.
“Okiku!” I take her hands, but I have a hard time holding on to them. They keep slipping from my grasp, her skin sliding against mine, though she does nothing to pull back, does nothing to push me away.
“It is beautiful here.” Her voice is hushed.
“Yes,” I agree, wishing I could stay with her forever. “Do you remember when I took you firefly hunting in DC? You always loved that.”
“I love any place where you are with me.”
Air fills my lungs—too quickly. I choke, finding the words to say, “Don’t leave me, Ki.”
“I’ve come,” Okiku says, “to say good-bye.”
“No!” Fireflies spin away, startled by my forcefulness. “Okiku, I can’t let you go!”
“I do not want to. But I must.” She’s happy and beautiful, but the regret she always wears about her lingers in her voice. “I cannot stay with you.”
“I won’t allow it. There has to be a way.”
“It is beyond my control.”
A small procession of people comes into view. I recognize them: Yukiko Uchiyama, no longer malicious but clothed in serenity and white. Like her, the other ghosts are in their bridal kimonos, and their betrothed stand by their sides. The old mother whose skeleton we unearthed in the Hirano house is with her daughter, both with joyous expressions.
Other villagers stream past us, talking and laughing. The burden of the Aitou curse has been thrown off their shoulders, and they are ready to ascend to something better. Hotoke and Kazuhiko trail behind them. They smile at me and Okiku, and then the fireflies surround them, wrapping them in frenzied flight, a hurricane of bright lights and promises that spins faster until their lights blur, a whirlpool of stars.
And then just as suddenly as they came, they slacken and fade.
“Tarquin.” Okiku’s soft, warm lips press against my forehead. She moves lower to kiss my nose, and somewhere in the space between us, my heart breaks.
“I lied,” she whispers. “I am sorry.”
“Lied about what?”
“I know why I do not like her. The girl. She is the life you should have led if I had not been selfish. But it is not too late.” She rests her forehead against mine. “Think of me sometimes—”
—on its knees, the dead body that once knew itself as Okiku weeps bitterly for what life demanded of her, for what she had been unprepared to give.
Something brushes against her forehead. A pulsing brightness streaks past her, and when she raises her head, she sees a multitude of fireflies. Their wings brush against her forehead in gratitude, spinning around her until she is at the center of their maelstrom. They are tiny souls that had been lost, and in their glow, she sees a purpose. She sees a glimpse of the future and the souls she could save. An endless tide of children and innocents, one with a shade of black hair and unusual blue eyes…
She has nothing here.
But for now, she is not alone and that is enough—
The meadow fades to black, until I am hugging the floor of the cave once more. My tears could fill these open spaces soon, for Okiku is gone.
Chapter Nineteen