Brave Story

There hung a pinpoint of sharp red light. It had been there for weeks. For Meena, sometimes it had seemed even more evil than the demonkin.

  But now the Blood Star’s light was fading. Even as she watched, it was absorbed into the night sky.

  Halnera was ending.

  The next thousand years for Vision were beginning.

  At the edge of the Swamp of Grief, Shin Suxin took off his glasses and began to massage his knotted shoulders with the palm of his hand. While in Tearsheaven, the gatekeeper stopped sweeping up the remains of the demonkin for a moment and looked up into the sky. By her mother Satami’s bed, Sara put a hand on the window.

  The dragons were returning to their island. The wounded Jozo sat nestled between his parents, looking up through a crack in the rocks.

  Lady Zophie, reunited at last with General Adja’s troops, lifted the heavy canvas flap of her pavilion and watched the sky. In her mind’s eye, she could still see Mitsuru’s profile as he stood in the Crystal Palace.

  In the remains of the sula woods where the Triankha Hospital had once stood, a quiet wind blew. Small animals ran over and under the fallen branches. Nearby, a waterkin looked up at the twilight sky from the driver’s seat of his darbaba cart.

  Halnera had ended.

  The Great Barrier of Light was remade anew. May the Goddess reign in eternity.

  “Meena, Meena!” It was Puck calling her. She looked around to see him jumping to and fro by the side of the great circus tent. Kee Keema was with him, his face looking sad and tired, and his shoulders sagging more than she had ever seen them before.

  “Puck, what is it?”

  “A white bird just flew by!”

  “A white bird?”

  “Yep! He stopped right on my shoulder. And then when I looked, he was gone! But guess what, he left something!”

  Puck held out his hand. There, in the middle of his palm rested a firewyrm band.

  Wataru’s armband. Meena put a hand to her mouth.

  “This belongs to your friend, didn’t it? It’s a Highlander band, isn’t it?”

  “It’s Wataru’s,” Kee Keema said. “He is saying goodbye to us. He’s saying he made it to the Tower of Destiny, met the Goddess, and saved Vision for us. And then he left—back to his own world. That’s what it means.”

  I know it, and it’s a great thing, so why do I feel so sad, Kee Keema’s eyes seemed to ask. He wiped his face with the back of one hand.

  Meena took the armband in her fingers and held it to her cheek. She was crying.

  “Meena, what’s wrong? Why are you crying?” Puck asked, flustered. Meena slowly knelt on the ground, hiding her face in her hands.

  Wataru had left. He was gone from Vision.

  His journey was over.

  “We didn’t even say goodbye, did we?” Kee Keema mumbled, his eyes swimming in tears.

  Meena gave him a great big hug.

  “You don’t say goodbye!” Puck shouted, doing another flip. “Meena, weren’t you the one who told us not to say goodbye?”

  Meena wiped away her tears and looked up. “Did I say that? What did I teach you to say, Puck?”

  Puck beamed with pride, sticking out his chest. “Be well, you said! Be well!”

  Meena looked at Kee Keema, and the two smiled. “Yes. Those are just the words, I think.”

  The Blood Star had now completely disappeared from the darkening sky above Gasara. As night’s curtain was drawn, the stars began to shine. They began in the darkest point near the top then fell down to the horizon, painting the sky, leading Vision into gentle sleep.

  Meena and Kee Keema hugged each other close and looked up. In their hearts they whispered to Wataru, knowing he would hear them.

  Our Traveler, and our traveling companion: we wish for your happiness, as you wished for ours.

  Be well.

  Epilogue

  The smell of gas.

  He came running from somewhere far away, flying across incredible distances home. Wataru shot up from bed with the momentum of his arrival.

  I’m in my room!

  School notes and textbooks piled up on the desk. Mom’s hand-knit cushion on the seat of the chair. Dictionaries and an encyclopedia set on the bookshelf. Behind the encyclopedias: game strategy guides, a row of comic books, and a secret piggybank with money to buy Eldritch Stone Saga III.

  My room. My home. But why does it smell like gas?

  The air conditioner was turned off. An unpleasant, dangerous stench hung in the air.

  Wataru threw off the covers and jumped out of bed. “Mom!” He shouted, running out into the living room. The door to his mother’s bedroom was open. A strong smell of gas came drifting from the kitchen.

  She left the door open so the gas could fill her room.

  Holding his breath, Wataru dashed into the kitchen and almost turned on the light, his hand stopping just before the switch.

  Stop, stupid! If the switch lets off a spark this whole place will blow.

  Wataru withdrew his hand, then, groping behind the oven, found the main gas valve and turned it off.

  Returning to the living room, he opened all of the windows. Nervously, he tiptoed into his mother’s room. She was lying there on her side, her face as pale as the moon. Her head was on her pillow and she was facing the ceiling. The summer coverlet on her bed was thin, but even so Wataru could barely see her form beneath it—that’s how much weight she lost in the short time since Dad left.

  But you don’t have to die. Please don’t die.

  The curtains in the bedroom were heavy and thick, and easily slid out of Wataru’s hands. He jumped up and grabbed them, but ended up in a heap on the floor when the whole curtain rod detached from the wall. Still, he let his heart give a cheer of victory. Wataru scrambled to his feet and opened the window.

  I made it in time! Mom’s going to be okay. I’ll save her! I can save her!

  He had returned from Vision to the real world at the same point he had left—when Mitsuru had come through the Corridor of Light to save him.

  The gas smell was thinning. Still, Wataru ran through the darkened rooms, down the hall, running into walls and furniture, until he was out the front door. He hoped the neighbors would wake up in time.

  “Can I borrow your phone?! Hello? This is Wataru Mitani, I live next door! I need to call an ambulance!”

  It was a dark night in the real world, with no moon. Only the gently flickering fluorescent lights in the apartment hallway watched over Wataru’s frantic struggle for help.

  Uncle Lou came right away, driving straight in from Chiba. The two sat side by side in the hallway outside the emergency room at the hospital. It was three in the morning.

  “You were lucky to have found her so quickly,” the doctor told Wataru. “We have to keep a close watch on her until she regains consciousness. But I have every reason to believe she’ll pull through just fine. You did well, son.”

  The doctor was young himself. He had come out to greet the ambulance with a sleepy look on his face when they arrived through the emergency entrance. But when the stretcher came out, he was all business. There was work to be done. Doctors are a bit like Highlanders in that way, Wataru thought.

  They checked out Wataru too. Spots in your eyes? No. Does it hurt to breathe? Not at all. Does your head hurt? I’m fine.

  I’m fine. Is it all right if I stay until Mom wakes up?

  So he had sat with his uncle waiting, just the two of them. The bench in the hallway was made for adults, and Wataru’s legs swung in the air when he sat up. He kicked them back and forth. I’m a full-fledged Highlander. Why am I sitting here like a little kid?

  Then he remembered. I’m not a Highlander, not anymore. I don’t have my Brave’s Sword. Or the power of the gemstones.

  I’m just Wataru Mitani.

  “Municipal gas won’t kill you, you know,” Uncle Lou muttered. His shoulders were sagging, and his large hands hung limp between his knees.

  Wataru had heard something like that
before. That’s right, Mitsuru. Municipal gas isn’t poisonous enough to be fatal. But if a spark catches it on fire…

  And Mitsuru’s gone. Or wait, maybe he’s not! What if he’s back here in the real world?

  “Aren’t you sleepy, Wataru?” Uncle Lou asked. He hadn’t shaved in a while, and his face was scratchy with stubble. His big eyes blinked sorrowfully.

  He looked just like Kee Keema when the big waterkin was in a sour mood. The same giant frame, the same gentle heart.

  “I’m fine, really.”

  “Well, if you get sleepy, my shoulder’s all yours.”

  “Thanks.”

  He wasn’t tired, but suddenly an uncontrollable wave of emotion rose up inside him, and Wataru clung to his uncle’s arm. Uncle Lou put his arm around Wataru’s shoulders.

  For a minute, nobody said anything.

  “I’m sorry,” Uncle Lou said at last. “You’ve been put through all this, and it’s not your fault at all. It’s really not fair. Not fair at all.”

  His voice trembled and broke slightly, like the unshed tears he was holding inside.

  “Uncle Lou?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Do you remember us meeting?”

  His uncle turned and looked Wataru from head to toe. “What are you talking about?” His tired face had a look of honest confusion.

  Then Wataru remembered: it had been after he got the second gemstone and passed through the Corridor of Light that he had met his uncle. His mother was already in the hospital then, and Uncle Lou had come in just as Wataru was getting ready to leave. But she just got to the hospital now. That hasn’t happened yet.

  Then Wataru thought, I’m already here, back in the real world. Maybe it will never happen at all.

  Somehow, the time he’d spent in Vision hadn’t registered here in the real world. Finally, the full impact of it hit him. That’s what it meant to come back to an apartment filled with gas—the same apartment at the same time he had left it. While he had been running around Vision, here, back in the real world, nothing had happened.

  That raised a lot of questions. Where was Mitsuru Ashikawa? What about Kaori Daimatsu? And Kenji Ishioka, for that matter?

  Uncle Lou was rubbing his face with his well-worn hands. Wataru felt like he should comfort him somehow. Really I’m fine. In fact, I’m beyond fine in ways you couldn’t possibly imagine.

  But he didn’t know how to say it. If he wasn’t careful, he might end up crying himself. Not that he was sad—but if he started talking, all the emotion he’d been holding inside would burst out, and he would cry. Because I’m still a kid.

  Because I’m no longer Wataru, the Brave.

  Wataru leaned against his uncle, letting himself be supported by his arm. His uncle was warm and smelled of suntan lotion.

  “Uncle Lou?”

  “Hmm?”

  “I guess I am a little sleepy after all.”

  “Goodnight, Wataru.”

  Wataru closed his eyes. The instant he fell into a light sleep, he began to dream. He was riding on the darbaba cart. Kee Keema was sitting in the driver seat, spurring the beast with cheerful yelps.

  Finally, the tears came. His first tears back in the real world. They ran down his cheeks and over his lips. They tasted like home.

  They stayed at the hospital until morning, but his mother still wasn’t up yet, so Uncle Lou took Wataru back to the apartment.

  They ate breakfast at a pancake house. The place was empty in the early morning, except for a man in a suit sitting over in the smoking section reading a newspaper. The smoke from his cigarette drifted past Wataru, who was busily stuffing his cheeks with pancakes.

  “Wataru.”

  “What?”

  His uncle was looking at him curiously, a Styrofoam cup filled with steaming coffee in his hand.

  “What is it?”

  Wataru’s uncle put his cup on the tray. He furrowed his eyebrows. “You know, you…”

  “Yeah?”

  “You seem grown-up all of a sudden.” There was a hint of surprise in his quiet tone. Wataru realized his uncle had been observing him for some time.

  Wataru smiled. A nameless, warm feeling, one part gratitude and one part amusement spread through him. It wasn’t sudden at all. I’ve just come home from a long journey.

  “I’m just happy that Mom didn’t die,” Wataru said. “I don’t think that’s what she really wanted. I don’t think that was the right thing to do.”

  Uncle Lou nodded, unable to speak. His eyes glistened with tears.

  School was already out for summer vacation. Even if Wataru went, no one would be there. So, the first chance he had, he made straight for the apartment where Mitsuru’s aunt lived.

  It was morning, and the doorman was piling up garbage in the waste bin to the side of the apartment. When Wataru arrived, he paid him no notice. But when Wataru came out again, panting for air, he stopped what he was doing and came over, a suspicious look on his face.

  “What are you doing here, boy?”

  “Uh…I…” The nameplate for the Ashikawa apartment was gone. Right there, on the mailbox in the entrance foyer with the number for the apartment where Mitsuru’s aunt had lived was a new, blank nameplate. “Did Ms. Ashikawa move?”

  “Ashikawa?”

  “Yeah, a young lady, living with a boy about my age. He and I were friends.”

  The doorman put a hand to his forehead and thought. Then he grunted and rapped his knuckles on his bald spot. “Oh them! They moved.”

  “When?”

  “Just a while ago. Think it was the last day of school.”

  “Did you see them when they left? Was it both of them? Was the boy with her?”

  The doorman seemed flustered by this barrage of questions. He recovered quickly, though—the dour, worldly expression coming back to his frowning face. He glared at Wataru. “What do you want to know for? If you were really his friend, why didn’t he tell you?” Glancing back at the mailboxes, he continued, “Say, what did you really come here for? Haven’t I seen you around before?” But by that time, Wataru was already out the door and gone.

  Wataru wanted to see Katchan more than anyone else. Unfortunately, his good friend didn’t have any news about Mitsuru.

  But Yutaro! Yutaro Miyahara. He was friends with Mitsuru; they were the top students in the class. And they had even been in the same room. Now where did Yutaro live…?

  Yutaro was busy watering a row of morning glories and sunflowers with his little brother and sister in the small garden behind an old wooden house. His sister was tottering along, carrying a red watering can. Yutaro was busy using a dowel rod to prop up a sunflower stalk.

  Wataru put his hands on the steel wire fence around the garden and called out to him.

  “Good morning!”

  Yutaro jolted upright and whirled around. “Hey there, Wataru. Didn’t see you. Good morning. You’re up early for a summer vacation day!”

  Yutaro walked over to the fence. Wataru mumbled some hasty explanation for his visit. Yutaro’s brother and sister stayed in the garden, absorbed with counting the blooming morning glories.

  “Hey, Yutaro, you know that kid Mitsuru Ashikawa?”

  “Mitsuru? You mean the one in my class?” Yutaro asked without skipping a beat. “What about him?”

  Mitsuru does exist! He’s here! I didn’t just dream him up.

  “Do you…happen to know where he is?”

  “Where?” Yutaro blinked. “He moved.”

  This was the answer Wataru had expected. “He was a transfer student, wasn’t he? And he already moved away?”

  “Yeah. He was in and out of here in a hurry. But I guess with his home situation being what it is and all…”

  “Yeah. I was wondering—what was he like?”

  Yutaro stared at Wataru for a second. “What do you mean, ‘what was he like’?” Yutaro laughed. “Why are you so interested in him, anyway? He wasn’t even in your class.”

  “Well, we we
re in the same cram school.”

  “Really? But I never saw you talking to him. He was the silent type, that one.”

  Wataru nodded. He wanted to know more…but he couldn’t think of any questions that wouldn’t make Yutaro even more suspicious than he already was.

  Wataru was back in the real world now, and Mitsuru was gone. It’s like he was never here in the first place…

  “Wataru,” Yutaro called out. “You know…”

  “Yutaro!” came his little brother’s shout from behind him. “I’m trying to count the morning glories but Mayumi keeps gettin’ in the way!”

  Back in the garden, the little girl burst into tears. Yutaro hesitated, unsure for a moment whether to be the big brother to his siblings or the friend to Wataru.

  “Your sister’s crying,” Wataru said, letting him go.

  “Yeah.” Yutaro looked over the fence, and turned toward his sister. Then he stopped and turned back. “The moms at school, they talk too much,” he said quickly, as though he was in a rush to get the words out before he changed his mind.

  “Huh?”

  “There was a PTA meeting before summer break, and this one older lady there loves spreading rumors, and she told my mom…”

  Wataru already knew what Yutaro was going to say. For a second, he was afraid that news of his mother’s suicide attempt had already made the rounds, but that would have been much too fast. No, Yutaro’s mom had doubtlessly heard about the events leading up to that. A couple of kids in Wataru’s grade lived in the same apartment complex. They had probably heard something, or the families heard something, and word had gotten around.

  Grandma was shouting pretty loudly that night.

  “Things are pretty rough at your place, I guess?”

  “Yeah.” Wataru nodded. Yutaro was as safe a person to talk to about this as anybody. And somewhere along the line, Wataru found he had the strength to talk about it without getting too weepy.

  “I know what it’s like,” Yutaro said, rubbing his lip. “My dad’s remarried. Takes a while for things to settle down.”

  Behind him, his little sister had stopped crying. She and her brother were crouching down by the morning glory patch, digging up something in the soil.