Chameleon by India Millar

Author:India Millar [Millar, India]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Red Empress Publishing
Published: 2019-11-11T16:00:00+00:00

Thirteen

On a very clear

Night, if I stand on tiptoe

I can reach the stars

I paused uncertainly before Ikeda’s open shoji. My hand clutched the frame for support as I wondered in disbelief how it was possible that we could have been so very wrong. I could barely begin to disentangle the surge of emotions that left me wordless. Anger, certainly, and deep embarrassment. And perhaps above all, total and utter despair. It was only the fact that my feet were rooted to the ground with shock that stopped me turning and walking—no, running—away.

Impossibly, the man who stood inside the shoji, bowing deeply in welcome, was not the Ikeda who had tried to buy me from Hana. The gods had been laughing at us all along. By some bizarre coincidence, the name was the same. But the man was not.

The Ikeda I had expected to meet had a rotting pit in the center of his face where his nose had been eaten by the baidoku. The hole had run constantly with mucous; I had a sudden memory of the slug-trail of snot that was obviously so ever-present that he often forgot to wipe it away. His skin had been severely disfigured as well, pitted with pustules that were worse than those left by smallpox. The man who stood in the subtly lighted room before me had a nose. And his skin, although muddy and rather coarse, was unmarked.

In spite of my horror, I moved forward stiffly as he stood back to allow me to enter. It was instinctive. From my first steps, I had been taught to be polite. Courtesy was instilled into me until it was as unthinking as breathing. I had been invited to this man’s house. I had accepted his invitation, so now that I was here nothing—short of a heart seizure—would prevent me from spending the evening in his company.

Whoever he was.

I was distracted for a moment by movement barely seen in my peripheral vision, shadows melting away into the deeper shadows around the house. Akira had been right yet again. The place was well guarded. If Akira had not convinced me that we had to plan carefully, we would have been taken easily. And for nothing.

My host straightened and smiled at me.

“My dear Keiko-san, I am delighted to welcome you to my humble home. Please, do come inside.”

He stepped back and my heart began beating faster and faster still. I had been shocked and deeply disappointed; now, I was confused as well. The man’s voice sounded as if he was speaking through a mouthful of food. Akira had told me that it was common in baidoku for the roof of the mouth to rot through just like the nose. Ikeda’s voice had sounded exactly like this man’s.

I entered with cautious, teetering footsteps and bowed in my turn. All my senses were on alert; I could hear a bat screaming to frighten its prey in the garden. Ikeda’s robes rustled as he moved back to allow me to enter and I knew without looking what colors he wore.

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