The paper bird had exceeded forty seconds. A white slip of paper traced an arc through the air of the Seimeido. Not three seconds. Not seven. Before the wall where Sanskrit characters of the five great elements were carved, drawn along threads of spiritual force, it continued its flight—slow, certain, unbroken. Itsumi Soichiro lowered the hand holding his record book. Akina pretended not to notice the change. She kept her gaze fixed on the paper bird, chasing only the sensation of spiritual force flowing through her fingertips. That feeling Gingetsu had spoken of—*thread it through*—lived still in the depths of her fingers this morning. Three nights in the Oboatei had altered the quality of her technique. Forty-three seconds. The paper bird grazed the beam of the Seimeido and descended quietly onto the rosewood floor. Silence fell. "The quality of your spiritual force has changed," Itsumi said. His words were brief, unadorned. In Akina's memory, this taciturn instructor had never once praised a student during training. For three years he had spent his days offering nothing but paper slips—neither reproach nor comfort—yet today alone he closed his record book and looked directly at her. Akina could not answer. To answer would invite questions about the reason for the change. To be questioned was to have no answer. "Continue," Itsumi said, offering the next spiritual talisman. That was enough. As Akina accepted it, she took care not to let her eyes drift toward the entrance of the Seimeido. Kageyamitsu stood there, leather-bound record book in hand, beside the doorway. Aindo Kageyamitsu—the cousin sent from the main Aindo house as her overseer—had watched her flight from the beginning. His short, deep indigo hair swept to the left, his face expressionless. Those cold silver eyes traced the trajectory of the paper bird. The silver ball earring in his left ear dully reflected the morning light of the Seimeido. His hand, which had been writing something in the record book, stopped. He was not looking at Akina. His brow moved—only slightly. Yet that single instant was clearly reflected in the corner of Akina's vision. During the break, as Akina sat on the veranda, Kageyamitsu appeared beside her without a sound. "The lamp oil in your room burns faster at night," he said. It was not a question. A confirmation, spoken in the flat tone befitting a monitor, his gaze on the pine tree in the garden. "Self-study of your training?" Akina's fingers stopped above her tea bowl. *(I will lie. Again, I will lie.)* "I am studying a little," she answered, choosing her words carefully so her voice would not waver. It was not entirely a lie—half of it was true. Under Gingetsu's instruction, she was indeed relearning the structure of spiritual talismans. But the other half lay heavy and murky in the depths of her chest. Kageyamitsu said simply, "I see." Something other than the gaze of a monitor mixed into his voice—something soft, close to body heat. Akina heard it. She could not help but hear it. *(It is nothing. It is the eye of surveillance. A natural confirmation from a cousin.)* She tried to dismiss it. But she could not. Even after Kageyamitsu left the veranda, the echo of that voice continued to ring on and on within her chest. Even as she returned to her training, the warmth of that voice clung to her fingertips as she gripped the talismans. ＊ That night, at the hour of the ox. Over her training clothes, Akina draped a haori and made her way toward the rear domain. The damp scent of decomposing leaves dissolved into the night air. The moss beneath her feet glowed faintly in the moonlight, and beyond it, the thicket of mixed trees opened its dark mouth. As Akina reached the entrance to the rear domain, her feet stopped. *(Spiritual presence.)* She felt it—or rather, she had become sensitive enough to perceive it. The spiritual presence of a human differs in quality from that of a yokai. It carried a clean, yet somehow tense density. With each night spent with Gingetsu, Akina's perception had grown sharper, and in this moment, it functioned for the first time in truth. Kageyamitsu was within the rear domain. Akina turned her feet in the opposite direction from the sealed shrine gate. Following the direction of the spiritual presence, she wove between the old trees. Moss-covered roots floated in the moonlight. At last, before the shadow of a thick zelkova, she saw a figure. Kageyamitsu waited without turning around. "At this hour," he said, turning to face her. His silver eyes captured her face directly. There was no reproach in them. Only sight. The honesty of that gaze tightened her chest all the more. "I felt a disturbance in the barrier," Akina said. The words came without thought. She knew they were lies. Kageyamitsu's eyes stopped for one second. As if searching the depths of her pupils. That one second felt eternal to Akina now. Kageyamitsu said nothing. "Do not come alone," he said simply, turning on his heel. "It is dangerous." As his back began to recede into the thicket—from the direction of the Oboatei, a faint ripple of spiritual force leaked out. A fragment of the presence of Gingetsu's shikigami. Akina coughed loudly without thinking. Kageyamitsu turned back. "It is nothing. Forgive me," Akina said. Kageyamitsu looked toward the dark thicket for several seconds. Finding nothing, he began to walk again. Until his footsteps faded completely, Akina remained pressed against the old tree, unable to move. *(My heart felt as though it would be crushed.)* Her legs gave way, and she sank down at the tree's roots. It was not relief. Not exhaustion, nor fear. Only—the weight of the fact that she had lied to Kageyamitsu descended upon her entire body for the first time in earnest. She had layered lies upon someone she had known since childhood. And while looking into those eyes. Akina embraced her knees and remained there for a time. The night air was cold. Moonlight fell on the moss. At last she rose and made her way to the Oboatei. ＊ Gingetsu waited as always, gazing up at the moon. Leaning against the pillar of the crumbling pavilion—the Oboatei, overgrown with ivy and moss, a forgotten place—he let his silver-white hair drift in the night breeze. His deep crimson eyes captured Akina the moment she passed beneath the eaves. The usual quiet composure in those eyes was thin tonight. "That man followed you," Gingetsu said. His voice held a low, narrative quality, with a density resembling tension. Akina could not imagine this yokai, bearing three hundred years of time, capable of tension. Yet tonight his voice was unmistakably different. Akina's heart leaped at an unexpected pace. "You sensed it?" she asked. "Long ago," Gingetsu replied. He turned his gaze toward Akina. "To approach that man—" The words stopped midway. No continuation came. Gingetsu's gaze drifted toward the night sky. The moon blurred beyond thin clouds. The unfinished word dissolved into the cold air of the Oboatei and vanished. Yet Akina felt the missing part of that sentence reach her entire body. Heat gathered in her face. In the cold of the night air, only her cheeks burned with foolish honesty. "Before training tonight, there is something I wish to discuss," Gingetsu said, shifting his tone deliberately. "Regarding your sensitivity." Akina watched his profile as she adjusted the front of her haori. "In the onmyoji houses, sensitivity is treated as something innate," Gingetsu continued, his intellectual manner of speech returning. "But—there is a possibility that your sensitivity has been deliberately manipulated." "...Manipulated?" "Someone may be sealing your true sensitivity. Someone from within the house," Gingetsu said. Akina froze. The Aindo house sensitivity rating of "two"—she had always believed it to be the limit of her inborn nature. Itsumi, her sister Reika, everyone in the main house had treated it as a matter of course. She had never once considered the possibility that it might be manipulated. "I—" Akina began to speak. Something fell from above in that instant. Softly. With a light weight. The paper bird landed on Akina's head. The shikigami that had been flying along the Oboatei's beam moments before now folded its small wings on her black hair, spreading them as if intent on building a nest. "...Focus," Gingetsu said curtly. Akina hurriedly brought both hands to her head and brushed the bird away. The shikigami flew back to the beam in apparent displeasure. Akina patted her head and looked at Gingetsu. He had not changed his expression, but his gaze had softened slightly. The moon emerged from between the clouds. "Do you have any idea who might be sealing you?" Gingetsu asked, returning to the original topic. "...No," Akina shook her head. "But if it is true—why would someone in the house need to seal my sensitivity?" "That, I do not know," Gingetsu replied. "Then how can I learn the truth?" Gingetsu fell silent for a time. Moonlight fell softly on the moss of the Oboatei. "Do not ask beneath the moonlight," he said, his words poetic. "...You will not choose that man. Is that not so?" It was not a question. Not even a confirmation. He simply spoke it quietly, like a soliloquy. Akina could say nothing. She understood that his words sought no answer. Yet the weight of an unanswerable question descended upon her chest. Who was "that man"—Akina understood now. She could not help but understand. ＊ The veranda the next morning was touched by thin autumn light. The leaves of the garden trees were beginning to turn yellow, and that color seemed unusually vivid this morning. Akina sat with a practice book of spiritual talismans on her lap, her brush moving across the paper. Sanskrit characters accumulated stroke by stroke, a quiet passage of time. A presence made itself known. Not by sound, but by the shift of weight—a way of approaching that Akina could discern. Kageyamitsu sat beside her. The lie of last night stood between them like a transparent wall. Akina felt it with her entire being, yet did not stop her brush. The garden pine swayed in the wind. A bird called in the distance. The silence between them neither accused nor questioned—it simply existed. Kageyamitsu opened his mouth, still facing the garden. "I will protect you," he said. Akina's brush stopped. "Whatever happens, I am on your side," he said. His gaze remained on the garden. It was not the tone of a monitor. It was the voice of a cousin—or something more than that. A voice that entered through the ear and traveled straight to the depths of the chest. *(I cannot breathe—)* Akina could say nothing, brush still in hand. Fear of accepting his words and the desire to accept them rose simultaneously in her chest, both real, both binding her. "How close you two are," Yoshikawa Tatsu appeared on the veranda. The head servant in her fifties carried a tea tray, her smile oddly serene as she spoke, set down the cups before them, and departed. Akina and Kageyamitsu straightened their postures at the same moment. They both averted their gazes—to the garden, to the pine, to the sky. Only the steam of tea remained on the veranda. For several seconds, neither spoke. In that silence, Akina stifled a sensation that was both laughter and tears. "I may not be the sort of daughter who should be protected," Akina said slowly. It was not an excuse. She did not know if she had the right to accept Kageyamitsu's words while keeping Gingetsu hidden. That guilt distorted her words. "It is I who will decide that," Kageyamitsu replied. He said only that, then rose. His footsteps receded down the corridor. Akina watched his back disappear. *(My feelings for Gingetsu. My guilt toward Kageyamitsu. A warmth beyond description—)* Three layers rested quietly upon her chest. She did not know which was true. All of them were true, which made them all the heavier. Even when