The long night will come.

  Like clarifying silver, Grandfather’s words pierced the silted pool of Hino’s consciousness, as quiet and cold in her memories as when he had spoken them. They should have been muffled amidst her swirling thoughts, drowned away by the persistent ripple of pain high on her temple. Yet even now, disoriented and floating in her own head, Grandfather managed to be heard.

  It always comes. And when it does, the Kōmyō cannot fail.

  Hino stirred with a sudden, aching awareness. Her body hurt. Her head hurt. Her eyes fluttered open but would not focus. Instead, spots of black popped and spun upon shades of smoke and pearl, as if the inside of her still tumbled down the mountain even though the outside had come to a rest.

  She had fallen—she remembered that.

  Panic sparked in the murk of her mind, chin rolling toward her collarbone. The Blessing! Hino jerked, but her arm did not answer, bouncing uselessly as if pinned in place. Uncomprehending, she tried again, ignoring the pain that spasmed through her, and again—to no avail.

  Neither of her arms moved.

  But something else did. Something on top of her. Something alive.

  A strangled cry burst from Hino’s lips. Her eyes came clear, catching glimpses of glowing ivory against her chest. Instinctively, she began to struggle and squirm, her horror mounting as the thing roused further—a slow but sure tightening she felt all across her body. It was not heavy, but it was strong. Tensing beneath her lower back, constricting over and around her torso. Her arms were bound to her sides with a body like thick, muscled rope.

  Worst of all, she could feel it shifting behind her neck—a smooth, cool slither, twisting up alongside her ear.

  And then, it was looking at her.

  She froze—unblinking, unbreathing, unable to look away. A luminous, golden eye held her gaze, the thin line of its pupil leisurely dilating. For an instant, she could see her reflection; face white with terror, the side of her head bruised and crusted with black-red blood. The eye closed. The mouth opened—impossibly large for its narrow, serpentine head—revealing a forked tongue and countless needle-sharp teeth.

  A gurgle of fear accompanied a full body convulsion—Hino’s final, desperate attempt to escape, wrought more of instinct than intent.

  And with a gentle rumble, the creature’s yawn ended; long, coiled body relaxing as its jaws eased shut. Unsteadily, it lowered its head once again, nestling itself just out of sight in the crook of Hino’s neck.

  Hino remained still as stone, eyes wide as full moons—terrified and incredulous in equal parts. Her lungs burned before she remembered to breathe again, drawing in a ragged mouthful of air. The pain in her head had intensified in her fright, throbbing against her skull with every hammering beat of her heart. Somehow, she hadn’t been eaten. That didn’t mean she wasn’t in danger.

  She had to get away. But how?

  There was chalky stone above her; an arched ceiling not high enough for her to stand beneath. All around was hard-packed dirt and stone. Pebbles and debris dug into the bits of her not cushioned by her captor. She was in a cave, she decided, or maybe a den of some sort; deep enough to keep the wind at bay, but still small enough for her to see the shadowy entrance she must have been dragged through.

  So close. A dash away and she would be outside.

  Hino swallowed, her tongue leaden in her mouth. Carefully, she lifted her head to get a better look at the body winding about her. White scales glimmered faintly, even breaths moving like waves down its sinuous length. She could not see the end of it, but its trunk alone was the width of her forearm. Her head dropped back to the floor with a quiet thud of defeat.

  The golden eye had confused her at first, but now that she had calmed, she had little doubt. It was a shirohebi. Even without the red eyes usually ascribed to them, it could be nothing else. And with the situation as it was, she could not so much as attempt a crawl without waking it—let alone a dash.

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  Hino did not know what to do. Neither Father’s tales nor Grandfather’s lessons had spoken of shirohebi on Mount Tsukigami, and so she had little knowledge to rely on. From the few stories she had heard, they were the serpent guardians of water; said to watch over rivers and ponds, sometimes even rice paddies and well-watered fields. But there was no water here—not even the distant drip of a mountain spring.

  Laying tense and uncertain in the soft gleam of the shirohebi’s scales, Hino pored over the pieces of her predicament—turning what she had assembled this way and that, straining to find the solution that must be there. Not unlike the kumiki puzzles she and Teru had played with as children, the more she pushed at it, the less it refused to yield.

  Tears bubbled up in the corner of her eyes, tracing down her temple and into her hair. Back then, she had been so sure she would uncover just the right angle, just the right order to make the wooden blocks come apart. Sometimes, she had even hidden the puzzle from Teru, determined to unravel it first.

  A shaky sob left her. She was hungry, and thirsty, and her head still hurt. In the end, Teru had always been the one to solve the kumiki puzzles.

  For a time, Hino cried—noiseless and restrained. The shirohebi slept on.

  No one could help her here—not Teru, not Father, not Grandfather. Hino was alone; injured, lost, and trapped with a spirit she had little understanding of. All of this, she accepted. Yet none of it changed what she had set out to do. None of it changed what had to be done.

  Eventually, Hino mustered enough courage to try moving again.

  Little by little, she worked one hand out from under the shirohebi’s looping form. It was, for the most part, like brushing along silk; its scaled body offering little resistance other than the slight and rhythmic pressure of its breath. Once, only once, her wrist caught on something; a strange, limp protrusion with three, perhaps four points. But with careful maneuvering—holding her breath all the while—Hino pulled free.

  The serpent did not stir. Hino stifled a sigh of relief. It was too early to relax.

  Next, and with the same painstaking care, Hino eased her hand up and across her chest, shuffling fingers beneath the collar of her yukata to find the Dawn Dragon’s Blessing. It was there—in one piece! But what little consolation that granted was swiftly tempered. The Blessing was different, somehow. Hino frowned worriedly, a spike of dread burying itself in her stomach. As slowly as she could, she thumbed bead after bead, trying to comprehend what she felt but could not see.

  Abruptly, the necklace quivered, dipping out of reach down one side of her neck. Hino stilled immediately, muscles seizing with alarm, but the quiver did not stop. It seemed to give way to a landslide as the Blessing slipped under its own weight, coming taut against her skin to rest between her neck and shoulder.

  Where the shirohebi’s head lay. A whimper escaped her.

  And the serpent woke, like placid water revived by a tide. It streamed around Hino’s body, flowing over her all at once—current strengthening as it went, but never pressing in to drown her. Within moments, it had extricated itself. Petrified, Hino could only listen to the quiet scrape of its body against the ground, the languid hiss of it arranging itself beyond her sight.

  And then, all was silent.

  No matter how long Hino waited, the strike she expected did not come. The tiniest, most reluctant trickle of hope passed through her. Had the shirohebi gone back to sleep? Cautiously, Hino pushed herself to a seat, sore muscles and stiff joints creaking as she turned to look.

  That large, golden eye watched her—fixated.

  Hino yelped and scrambled away. Her back hit the cave wall with an uncomfortable thump. There she stayed, crouched in terror—acutely aware that she was not safe even at this distance. Trembling, her eyes flitted to the exit, her earlier hope dissipating. Nowhere within the cave was outside of the creature’s reach.

  Yet, through it all, the shirohebi only watched. It did not bare its fangs or draw back to attack. It remained where it had settled, folded in upon itself. Only that eye of bright and polished gold acknowledged her at all.

  And gradually, almost against her will, Hino began to notice that something was wrong. Eyes still searching for escape caught upon the creature’s pearlescent scales, on the places where they had been torn away in long gashes. Ever anticipating its strike, she scanned its serpentine face—the slender, crimson horn over one brow, and the broken stub over the other. And, yet hesitating to meet its one-eyed gaze, she saw its other eye squeezed shut—weeping golden liquid.

  “You’re hurt,” Hino murmured without thinking.

  As if in response, the shirohebi’s head tilted. After a moment, its eye glided closed. There was a pause, heavy and effortful—as though something were being gathered, as though the creature braced itself. And then, a deep hum emerged, so low that Hino did not hear it so much as feel it in her bones.

  A memory came to Hino then, though she knew instinctively that it did not belong to her. For no longer than a breath, she saw the sky as she had never seen it before, as she had never even imagined it. Her breath caught. She was flashing through an endless blackness—hurtling downward at a pace so terrifying that the stars were nothing but bands of light.

  Abruptly, the shirohebi’s head sagged with exhaustion, falling slack against its body. The humming ceased, and the vision vanished.

  Yet somehow, Hino understood. After all, she could remember the last thing she’d seen while falling—a star as gold as this creature’s surviving eye. Barely above a whisper, she asked, “You protected me, didn’t you?”

  A sliver of gold, and a measured blink.

  In Hino’s head, the first block of the kumiki puzzle shifted.