Total pages in book: 104
Estimated words: 104141 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 521(@200wpm)___ 417(@250wpm)___ 347(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 104141 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 521(@200wpm)___ 417(@250wpm)___ 347(@300wpm)
The grief wouldn't leave, but the weed had done what the sake couldn't manage. It removed the heaviness and let me breathe around the sorrow.
For now.
For tonight.
We continued to smoke and the koto played through me.
I closed my eyes. “The weed makes the music deeper.”
Hiro chuckled.
“Don’t laugh. It’s true. The shakuhachi sounds like it is coming from inside the walls. From inside the floor. From somewhere beneath the island itself.”
“Alright. No more joint for my brother.”
Nyomi chuckled. “I thought I was bugging but. . .yeah it sounds like the music is playing on my skin.”
“And no more joint for the Tiger either.”
We laughed together.
I opened my eyes and put my view back on the cherry blossom and watched a single petal detach from a low branch and drift to the tatami.
There and then gone.
Hiro spoke, "Do you remember the Korean meeting, brother?"
“I do.”
"Do you think Reo took that cheese?"
I sank in utter comfort. "No one can prove it."
"Nyomi, you should have been there. At the end of the meeting, we all stood next to the table. The entire cheese wheel was there. Then it wasn't. Reo was the last one near the table."
"He was greeting the delegation."
"He was stealing cheese."
Nyomi looked at me. "How fast would he have had to move?"
“Pretty fast, Tora.”
Hiro dotted the air with the joint, making the smoke rise in waves. "That's what I'm saying. An entire wheel of cheese vanished in the time it took Kim to turn around and bow. Reo is either the fastest man alive or he has a portal to a cheese dimension. Either way, I want answers."
Nyomi chuckled. “I love his obsession with cheese. It’s everything.”
Hiro passed the joint to her. “That missing cheese wheel almost started a war between us and the Jeonha."
Nyomi took a drag, exhaled, and gave it to me. "What’s the Jeonha?"
Hiro replied, "South Korean syndicate, but not the kind you're thinking. Most syndicates want money, territory, and power."
"What do they want?"
"Punishment." I exhaled smoke at the ceiling. "They were founded on a specific ideology. The wealthy destroyed their families. So they sought to destroy the wealthy back. Ritually."
Nyomi went still. "What does ritualistic mean in that context."
Hiro and I exchanged a glance.
"It means they don't just kill their enemies." I looked at the joint. "They consume them."
Her lips parted. "Consume? Like. . .they eat them?"
"Exactly.”
The koto played three notes into the silence.
She widened her eyes. "They're cannibals."
Hiro grinned. "They were. We ended them a few years ago, but that’s not the point.”
Nyomi blinked. “I think a cannibal syndicate is a very important point one should make right at the beginning of any story.”
I snickered.
Hiro continued, “What I’m saying is that Kim—the head—brought that wheel of aged gouda as a gift to our meeting. Imported from the Netherlands. Pretty expensive and a gesture of good faith toward our new alliance."
Nyomi looked between us slowly. "And Reo stole the symbol of good faith from people who eat their enemies."
I held up one finger. "Allegedly."
"He absolutely stole it." Hiro grabbed the joint from me. “Reo doesn’t do anything by chance. He hated that syndicate and he loved the idea of eating that cheese.”
“Yeah. He probably did it.” I looked at the cherry blossom and another petal fell to the tatami.
The koto played on.
Hiro spoke and this time a deep sadness laced his words. “Brother. . .thank you for starting this war.”
I turned to him.
A serious expression covered his face. “You didn’t have to.”
“I did. Our father hurt you, so we hurt him.”
“People died today over my hurt feelings.”
“And more will die.”
“I don’t know if I can live with that.”
“It’s too late to turn back now. We’re almost there. His body and our brother’s are almost in the ground.”
“Maybe there’s another way to figure this out.”
“There isn’t.”
“I just. . .”
I leaned my head to the side. “What?”
“I just don’t know if my pain is worth the price of others’ deaths.”
“It is.” I held his gaze. “To me, it’s worth everyone’s deaths and more. My brother was shattered for no reason at all. As far as I’m concerned. . .let the fucking sky rain down with innocents' blood. Let the Fox and the whole world burn down to quiet ash. As long as you come out the other side of this healed. As long as you're happy again. That's all that matters.”
Hiro frowned. “You love me too much.”
Nyomi reached over and touched his arm, giving him a small squeeze. He looked at her hand, then at her face.
He nodded.
She let go.
I watched Hiro take the joint from Nyomi's fingers, bring it to his lips, and pull deep. And then. . .I saw the grief he carried folded behind his eyes.
We’ll kill the Fox because he took away your happy ever after with Nura.
Plus, if the Fox knew about Nyomi, she would be next. That was the war, stripped of everything else. We were battling for the ability to love who we chose in peace.