Title: Fragments of Good Fortune
Fandom: かくりよの宿飯 | Kakuriyo no Yadomeshi | Kakuriyo: Bed & Breakfast for Spirits
Rating: G
Summary: While cleaning out the annex in preparation for her new restaurant's opening night, Aoi finds some old discarded kitchen objects, relics of the building's past uses. But on the grounds of Tenjin'ya, even broken bits of crockery and worn-out cookware can have a life of their own... and after having been abandoned and forgotten for so long, they may not be particularly friendly towards a newcomer, let alone a human one.
Notes: Written for![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
kalloway for Parallels 2020. Set around EP 6 of the anime, before the big opening night party at Moonflower. Additional notes are at the end. (Also on AO3.)
Fragments of Good Fortune
When she'd returned to Tenjin-ya, after her brief outing in the apparent realm with Suzuran, Aoi knew that she had to start thinking about her proposed restaurant in earnest.
The menu was perhaps the most enjoyable, creative place to begin, though she knew that the biggest hurdle to overcome in that regard would was less about quality and more about quantity. The meals she'd made in the annex kitchen so far had been small affairs, meant for herself or one or two others. The portions weren't any larger than she might have cooked for herself or her grandfather -- enough food to eat then and there, and enough to box up as leftovers for bento over the next few days. Nothing had run out, and nothing had gone to waste. But if she really were going to run a restaurant that would tempt patrons away from the grand kaiseki banquets of Tenjin-ya, or even encourage visits from curious customers who weren't staying at the inn, then she would have to think in much larger amounts from a far broader menu. It wasn't as if she could make a giant pot of curry rice night after night and expect every guest to eat a single bowl of that and nothing else, after all.
But even before she could plan her menus, she had to take stock of what she had to work with in the kitchen itself -- and, for that matter, in the annex building as a whole. To do that, she would have to roll up her sleeves, don the most voluminous apron she could find, and clean out the whole place from top to bottom.
Right from the start, it was obvious that the annex had received little of the care and attention that she had seen in the impeccable service found in the main Tenjin-ya rooms. The building as a whole, from the thatched roof to the stone lintel, appeared to be sound, but the interior showed definite signs of neglect. The wooden floors badly needed a good scrubbing to remove layers of dirt and grime, and some nails to secure boards that creaked when stepped on. Several of the shoji screens had holes in the rice paper or breaks in the latticework, often in awkward places that likely would be difficult to patch. When Aoi gingerly ran a fingertip down the middle of one of the dining tables, she grimaced at the greasy smear left behind on the surface. (She didn't even look at her finger, but wiped her hands on her apron and went straight to the sink for soap and water.)
There was no getting around it. A true deep cleaning would have to come first.
Ginji had told her of his multiple attempts at using the annex as the home of a profitable side business, and Aoi soon found evidence of his previous ventures stowed away in all sorts of odd corners. It seemed that everywhere she turned, she stumbled across another dusty box or dilapidated wooden crate, each one full of a miscellaneous assortment of objects. Some of the items inside seemed serviceable, and even convenient for her purposes. One box, for instance, had nothing but perfectly folded stacks of new cloth hand towels embroidered in one corner with the calligraphy of Tenjin-ya's name, obvious remnants of the failed souvenir shop. Aoi set that carton aside, near the main doorway; if she didn't want to use the towels purely for wiping up spills, it wouldn't hurt to try to sell them herself, perhaps on a little display with some other local knick-knacks. Other boxes, however, were crammed with undeniable junk: fragments of broken cups and bowls, dull knives and tarnished cookware, items so ragged or rusted that their true identity was hard to determine at first glance. Whatever the boxes contained, Aoi had to haul out every single one of them and set them somewhere out of the way so she could sweep away cobwebs and wipe down walls.
By the end of her first day of cleaning, her arms and back ached so much that she could barely lift a pot of water onto the cooktop to boil. Her throat felt raw from breathing in all the dust her cleaning had kicked up, and she was so hungry that the thought of eating anything more than a simple bowl of noodles, mixed with hot tsuyu and a raw egg, actually made her feel a little sick. She'd made progress on the cleaning, but there was still a lot to do. The main dining area was a sea of tattered boxes, and tomorrow morning she would have to start going through all of them to see what, if anything, she ought to keep.
The water was just starting to simmer when Aoi heard a soft knock on the wooden door frame. She looked up, blinking blearily, and it took a moment for her eyes to focus on the shadowy figure blocking the last of the daylight that was streaming in through the entryway.
It was Ginji, carrying a basket covered in cloth. 'Aoi-san?' he said, a little uncertainly. 'Is everything all right?'
Aoi managed a tired smile. 'It's fine, Ginji-san. Please, come in.' She slipped off her soiled apron as Ginji crossed the room, and automatically reached for the basket in his arms. 'Is this for the kitchen?'
'Some extra soy sauce and a few jars of pickles. This batch was made a little while ago, but none of the jars have ever been opened, so they all should still be good.' He set the basket in front of her on the countertop, and his brow furrowed as he looked her up and down. 'Are you sure you're all right? You look...what have you been doing all day?'
'Just some cleaning.' Aoi lifted the cloth covering to peek at the basket's contents. She did need both soy sauce and pickles, but right now there was no immediate space for her to store them in her torn-apart cupboards. 'Do you mind if I leave these in the basket for now? I wanted to do a proper inventory of all my equipment and supplies before I started thinking about a menu, and to do an inventory, I needed to clean everything up.'
Ginji glanced around the dining room, taking in the piles of boxes everywhere. 'I suppose most of this is my fault,' he said. 'I really wasn't very good at cleaning up after myself, was I? After all the things I tried here...I'm sorry you've had to go through so much trouble here because of me.' As he spoke, the tips of his ears drooped in shame.
'No, really, it's not so bad!' Aoi said. 'I would've wanted to do a good deep cleaning regardless.' A clatter from the stovetop told her that her water was at a rolling boil, so she left Ginji's gifts behind and went to add the noodles to the pot. A small saucepan of tsuyu was heating up beside the noodles, waiting to reach the right temperature. 'Besides,' she added, 'it's only fair that I put in the work to tidy up around here, since Odanna-sama was kind enough to permit me to use the space for my restaurant.'
'Still,' Ginji said, unconvinced, 'I should at least be out here helping you clean. I can come over first thing tomorrow morning and -- '
'That won't be necessary.' This time, Aoi's smile was much firmer, and her voice was polite but determined. 'Perhaps in a day or two, I might want help with some repairs, but right now I still need to see for myself what has to be done around here.' The noodles were ready, and she poured them out into the bamboo strainer to shake off the water. With swift, practised movements, she transferred the steaming noodles to a bowl, poured the heated tsuyu over them, and cracked the egg to drop directly into the hot liquid.
(This was her restaurant. No matter how kind Ginji or any other ayakashi might be, she alone would be responsible for its success or failure.)
Her little production of efficiency had the desired effect. Ginji smiled in return, and held up his hands in mock-surrender. 'If you say so, Aoi-san,' he said. 'I'd be happy to help with any repairs, though. Just let me know what needs fixing, and I'll bring over the tools for it right away.'
'Thank you.' Aoi picked up her chopsticks and stirred the egg in the broth. 'I'm sorry I didn't make much more than this to share tonight -- I wasn't expecting visitors.'
'I've eaten already,' Ginji said. His smile widened into a grin. 'But I look forward to coming here as a paying customer, whenever you feel you're ready to open.'
'Mm.' For Aoi, it was difficult to tell whether the sudden tightness in her stomach was more from hunger or nervousness at the thought of all the work she still had in front of her. Either way, she slurped her noodles with much more enthusiasm than she really felt.
* * * *
The next morning, Aoi wanted nothing more than to cling to her pillow and hide under the warmth of the covers, even though she knew full well that soon enough she wouldn't have the luxury of staying in bed all day. For the sake of her sore muscles, however, she decided to take it easy in the morning by sweeping and mopping the entryway and the space behind the counter, before making a light lunch and tackling the daunting task of going through all of those boxes.
A quick but hearty breakfast of miso soup with potatoes and tofu would give her the energy to get to work. From the half-dozen jars of pickles that Ginji had brought the night before, she selected one that held a deep reddish mix of eggplant and cucumber. It made a crunchy and delicious topping for the rice she had along with the soup. Once the breakfast dishes were washed and set to dry, it was time to roll up her sleeves again, get out the mop and broom, and start the morning chores.
Aoi hummed quietly to herself in time with the soft swiffs of the broom. It was easy to fall into a rhythm as she worked, since she'd done this same chore many times on a quiet weekend morning at home with her grandfather. Most of the time, he had slept late on Sundays after yet another late Saturday night out -- probably right here at Tenjin-ya, she suddenly realised -- which had given her time to tidy the house and start preparing lunch for both of them. How funny it was to think that now she would be the one to stay up late every night, serving the dishes he'd taught her to make for the very same ayakashi that he'd --
A loud clatter from behind jolted her out of her daydreams. She spun around, and saw that the mop she'd set out had fallen over, tipping over the empty water bucket next to it.
Aoi frowned. How strange. She could have sworn that the mop hadn't been so close to the bucket when she last looked at it.
Giving a faint hmph under her breath, she leaned the broom against the wall near the entryway and went over to collect both the bucket and the mop. One of the more unpleasant tasks she'd finished late the previous afternoon had involved a half-hour stint on her hands and knees, using a stiff-bristled brush to scrape out untold years' worth of dirt that had been ground into the crevices of the floorboards. Thankfully, after her scrubbing last night and her sweeping this morning, the floor needed only a quick swipe of the mop to remove any last traces left behind.
She filled the bucket with a few inches of cold clean water, and set it on the floor at the edge of her work area. But no sooner had she started to run the wet mop over the wood than she heard another clatter, and glanced over her shoulder to see that it had been the broom's turn to fall over onto the floor.
Aoi sighed. 'Honestly....' It wasn't as if there was a breeze that could be blowing things around; the front door was still closed, and none of the windows were open. If there was a draft coming in from somewhere, like a gap in the roof thatching, she'd definitely need Ginji's help to fix it.
With her mop still in hand, she moved to set the broom upright again. Yet as she turned around to go back to her mopping, her foot struck something hard, and suddenly a pool of water was spreading across the floor...
...from the bucket of mop water that absolutely had not been right under her feet two seconds before. It was only by catching herself against the edge of the countertop that she managed to avoid slipping and landing right in the middle of the puddle as it spread.
'Ouch!' A stubbed toe, a soaking wet foot -- and then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw something moving in the shadow of one of the boxes.
Ever since she'd been attacked on her shopping expedition, the tengu fan had never been out of her reach. She wasn't wearing a kimono and obi today, but she'd managed to wedge it into the back of her tied apron strings. In a flash, she whirled around, brandishing the fan, and the gust of wind it created picked up the moving object and sent it sailing across the room. It hit the wall and fell to the floor with a clatter -- and when Aoi peered at it, she saw that it was a small piece of metal not much bigger than the palm of her hand, flat and rectangular, topped with dozens of tiny metal spikes.
'A vegetable grater?' Aoi said aloud, baffled.
She started to step towards it, but before she could put one foot forward, she heard a high-pitched shriek, and something wet and foul-smelling struck the side of her face. She let out a cry of her own and clapped her free hand to her cheek, while her other hand swung the fan wildly in all directions. The wind whipped at her hair, but the awful smell didn't go away -- it was a pungent, cloying stench, sour and rotting like mouldy cloth, and it filled her nostrils and nearly made her choke. Then, to her horror, she felt that same dampness start to slither behind her ear, as if some sort of living scarf was trying to wind itself around her neck. Desperately, she clawed at her throat, and her fingers caught hold of something that squelched in her grip.
'Let go of me!' she shouted, and flung the nasty wet thing away from her as hard as she could throw it. Something greyish-white flew from her hand, falling to land with a squashy sound on the floor near the wall, beside the vegetable grater. Aoi caught a glimpse of what looked like a bit of dirty cloth, but then it moved, twitching and flopping like a small landed fish. Still holding the tengu fan in front of her, she crept forward to get a closer look at her two would-be assailants.
The one that had attacked her first definitely had the shape of a vegetable grater, the old traditional kind with a flat grating surface for root vegetables like wasabi and mountain yam. But this creature also had what looked like four little legs and a pair of beady eyes down near the blunt end of the handle, which poked out like an animal's snout. In fact, the whole thing looked oddly like a misshapen metal hedgehog. It had gotten to its feet, but when it moved it mostly staggered to one side, as if one of its four legs had been injured by the impact. It blinked up at Aoi, then scuttled back a few inches until it was braced against the wall, hunkered down and seemingly prepared to hold its ground against another attack.
The second creature, the one that looked like a old dishrag, had rolled around enough to put itself right way up. To Aoi's amazement, as it twisted and coiled, it seemed to take on the shape of a tiny dirty-grey dragon, thin and snakelike with a long, fraying tail. It didn't move to attack her again, but like the other creature it bristled with a defensive posture, trying to gauge its changes for either fight or flight.
'Who are you?' Aoi said, tightening her grip on the fan. 'Are you from Tenjin-ya?'
The hedgehog-looking creature growled, scrabbling its claws on the wood beneath it, and the dragon-looking creature reared up on its hind legs and hissed with pure fury. But just then, a commanding shout cut through the tense moment, startling both Aoi and her would-be assailants:
'Soldiers! Stand down!'
Both the metal hedgehog and the ragged dragon went stiff, instantly coming to some sort of attention. At that moment, Aoi heard a noise like the sound of crunching gravel, and the lid of one of the half-full cardboard boxes flew open. Aoi gasped as a third small figure vaulted over the edge of the box and landed on the floor with an alarming crash. As it got to what appeared to be its feet, Aoi saw that it looked like a little human shape made entirely of broken bits of crockery and utensils. Its body appeared to be formed from many shards of shattered china, with twisted old spoons for arms and legs, and it was covered from top to bottom with flat pieces of porcelain layered over each other like the iron plate armor Aoi had seen in museum exhibits of samurai weapons. On its head, the broken-china creature wore a chipped sake cup like an old-fashioned helmet, and in one of its spoon hands it held a long, thin-bladed knife as if it were a naginata or some other spear-like weapon.
As Aoi stared, open-mouthed in shock, at the china soldier, the cloth dragon piped up in a tremulous voice, 'Ge-General Se-Seto! The enemy is armed and d-d-dangerous, sir!'
'General?' Aoi looked back and forth from the porcelain-clad creature to the hedgehog and dragon. 'Soldiers?'
The metal hedgehog raised one of its little forelegs in an unmistakable salute. 'Sir, my apologies, sir!' it said, ignoring Aoi's question. 'This soldier was unable to complete his mission, sir!'
The dragon, still standing at attention, flicked a bit of fringe in a similar fashion. 'Sir, I take full responsibility for my sergeant's failures, sir!'
The china soldier lifted his makeshift weapon, acknowledging their salutes. 'You carried out your orders to the best of your abilities,' it said gruffly. 'The fault is mine, for underestimating our enemy's strength.'
The whole situation, as far as Aoi was concerned, was fast slipping beyond her comprehension. 'Will you please tell me who you are?' She lowered the fan to her side, trying to look nonthreatening. 'I don't want to be your enemy. I only fought back because you attacked me. I don't want to hurt any of you.'
'Liar!' the dragon shrilled out, dropping its salute to face off with Aoi once again. 'You were going to throw us away! Just like the kitchen staff did!'
To Aoi's surprise, the china figure turned on the dragon. 'Hold your tongue, captain!' it snapped. 'I will deal with our adversary.'
The dragon cringed, clearly abashed. Even Aoi winced at the force of the reprimand. But in the next moment, the china figure had turned back to face her, and with a clinking of plates it gave Aoi the closest thing to a formal bow that it could manage in its porcelain-fragment armor.
'I am General Seto,' it declared. 'My subordinates here are Captain Ryuushi and Sergeant Oroya.' Its tone was stiffly formal, even a little archaic in speech, which left Aoi feeling as if she had fallen into some sort of bizarre bunraku performance with kitchenware instead of puppets. 'With whom do I have the honour of speaking?'
'I'm....' As absurd as the situation was, Aoi found herself responding to the china figure -- General Seto, as she would have to think of him -- with a relatively equal level of politeness. 'My name is Tsubaki. Tsukabi Aoi. It's a pleasure to meet you, General.'
General Seto bowed to her again, and Aoi dipped her head as well in automatic acknowledgement. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the dragon and the hedgehog give her jerky little nods of their own. 'The honour is entirely mine, Aoi-dono,' the general said. 'You will forgive the boldness of my enquiry, I hope, if I ask how you happen to possess a weapon of such great power?'
'A weapon?' Aoi blinked, then glanced down at the leaf-shaped fan in her hand. 'This was a gift from the tengu lord Matsuba,' she said. 'My grandfather saved his life many years ago.'
It was a little difficult to read General Seto's expression, considering that it was made entirely of china fragments, but from the way the porcelain soldier drew himself up it was evident that he was impressed by her response. 'It is indeed a privilege,' he said reverently, 'to be in the presence of the descendant of so great a warrior.'
'Well, that's....' Aoi hesitated; she had a feeling that there was nothing to be gained by explaining the circumstances of her grandfather's supposed heroism. 'At any rate,' she continued, 'I didn't mean to hurt your subordinates. I was only cleaning out some old boxes in this building. Were you living in these boxes?'
It was General Seto's turn to hesitate, but only for a moment. With a series of clicks and clanks, he sank down into a sort of seiza with his spoon legs tucked under him. His officers swiftly followed suit, sitting down as best they could manage, and when Aoi remained standing he gestured for her to do the same. Feeling a little foolish, but not wishing to offend any of them, Aoi ignored the screaming protests of her overworked leg muscles and sat down as well, trying to settle herself into a similar seiza position and hoping that her feet wouldn't fall asleep.
'We all used to work in the kitchens of Tenjin-ya,' General Seto said, once Aoi was seated as comfortably as she could manage. He nodded to the cloth dragon. 'Captain Ryuushi, for instance, was well on the way to becoming a senior manager of the dish linens, with special responsibility for work surface cleanliness.'
'That's right!' The metal hedgehog -- or rather, Sergeant Oroya -- let his enthusiasm run away with him. 'The captain was the best of the best! And I helped prepare the Chief Chef's famous Mountain Cloud Yamakake! No one could grate yams better than me!'
Captain Ryuushi's tail waved wildly. 'And General Seto,' he chimed in, 'was an integral part of one of the best full-service tea sets in the whole inn!'
General Seto held up a hand, and his officers fell silent. 'But then one day,' he said, with a note of deep sorrow in his voice, 'it appeared that some of us were no longer as...as useful to the kitchen staff as we had been. And so we were relegated to these containers, here in this remote outpost, with little or no recognition for our dedicated years of service.'
'"Some of us," you said?' Aoi glanced up, looking out over the sea of the boxes she had moved out into the dining area. 'Do you have any more, er, subordinates in these boxes here, General?' How many other creatures like the three in front of her might be listening to this conversation right now? Would she have to go through every single box to find them?
General Seto shifted his weapon from one hand to the other, a show of discomfited impatience. 'I have no tolerance for those without sufficient fighting spirit, Aoi-dono, or a sense of true purpose and drive in their profession,' he said. 'More than a few potential candidates had to be discharged as unfit for service. For that reason, the sergeant, the captain, and I are the only ones left.'
As Aoi listened to his explanation, nodding in sympathy, it didn't take much effort for her to hear the real story behind his bravado. These creatures -- all of them ayakashi, true, but with far less true spiritual power than even a tiny kappa like Chibi possessed -- were clinging desperately to what little strength was left in them. Years of repeated use in Tenjin-ya's kitchens had infused these once-inanimate objects with magic, lending them a strange gift of sentience, but now they were facing the end of their existence...both spiritually and physically. This might be the last time they would have even enough power to speak to her, let alone come to life and move about as they were now.
She had no use for a worn-down vegetable grater, a disintegrating scrap of dishcloth, or a motley collection of broken cups and plates. Cooking a meal for them wouldn't restore them to what they had been, and even if it could it seemed cruel to prolong the natural end of their existence. At the same time, however, she couldn't face the thought of relegating them to the ash heap while they were so determined to hold onto the last fleeting moments of remembered glory.
'I see,' she said at last. Pursing her lips in thought, she laid the tengu fan in her lap and folded her hands on top of it. 'Well, I have no intention of throwing anyone away. In fact, would you be willing to entertain a proposition?'
'A proposition?' General Seto tilted his head, causing his sake cup helmet to clink softly against the shard of china that formed part of his shoulders. 'Do please continue.'
With one hand, Aoi gestured to the half-cleaned room. 'I'm planning to turn this building into a restaurant, to cook special meals that my grandfather taught me to prepare.' It wouldn't hurt, she thought, to name-drop her grandfather in this instance, if her story about his so-called heroism had impressed General Seto so greatly. 'However, I'm very new at the whole business, and I'm sure there's a lot that I have yet to learn. Would the three of you be willing to stay on here and aid me in my work?'
General Seto said nothing at first -- and so Sergeant Oroya, already worked up with indignation, chose to cut in. 'Why should we help you?' he said.
The general bristled. 'Sergeant!' he barked. 'You forget your place here. You will receive a formal reprimand for speaking with such insubordination to Aoi-dono.'
The metal hedgehog, deeply chastised, hung its head. However, Aoi smiled, as calm and collected as if the sergeant hadn't spoken.
'Sergeant Oroya has a fair question, General,' she said. 'As you yourself remarked, you've been stationed out here at this, er, remote outpost for some time now. Now that I'm here to take over the place, you might think that I have no further use for your services. However, as I see it, every good restaurant needs someone to watch over it. And considering that I have been targeted by assailants very recently, I need all of the assistance that is available to me.' She straightened her shoulders, feeling like a noblewoman in an old television costume drama. 'Why, in that case, would I dream of throwing away very three well-trained sentinels?'
This time, all three creatures were silent and still. For the first time, Aoi had a moment of misgiving. Had she offended them? Did they think she was making fun of them? Would they refuse to cooperate? If they did refuse, and she tried to remove them with the rest of the unwanted boxes, would they come back to play more tricks on her? It would be difficult enough to run a restaurant and pay back her debt to Odanna-sama without worrying about dodging malicious pranks by a group of disgruntled sentient objects.
It felt like an unusually long pause before General Seto replied. 'If you feel that we may be of use to you, Aoi-dono, then I believe that such a proposition would be acceptable.' He laid his long knife beside him and placed both utensil hands flat on the floor to give her a deep formal bow. 'My officers and I are at your disposal for whatever tasks you see fit to assign to us, as your resident sentinels.'
With two fingers, Aoi touched the side of her forehead and sketched a little salute in return. 'Then if you would be so kind, General Seto, would you and Captain Ryuushi and Sergeant Oroya allow me to move to you the countertop while I finish my work here today? Once I have everything clean and tidy, we can discuss the full terms of your employment.'
* * * *
When Ginji showed up at the annex that evening, another covered basket in hand, there were three distinct piles of boxes set out on the dining floor, and Aoi was sitting at one of the counter stools, nodding off over a mostly cold cup of tea.
'It looks like you had a productive day,' he said, when Aoi waved a sleepy hand to him in welcome and greeting. 'I thought you might be too tired to cook, so I brought over some dinner for you, if that's all right.'
Aoi immediately perked up. 'Thank you so much!' she said, eyes widening as Ginji lifted the cloth to reveal an earthenware pot full of fragrant rice and crab topped with shredded cooked egg. 'Oh, this smells wonderful.'
As she dug in, Ginji looked around the room. 'You've definitely made a lot of progress. Do you need any help getting rid of these boxes?'
Aoi nodded as she chewed and swallowed the substantial amount of food she'd shoveled into her mouth with decidedly unladylike zest. 'Just the one set over there,' she said, indicating the smallest stack. 'Everything else I can probably use again somehow.'
'Did you find anything of particular interest?' A teasing light came into Ginji's eyes. 'Some long-lost treasure of great mystic power that got mixed in with everything else, perhaps?'
'Perhaps.' Aoi swirled her chopsticks above her bowl with what she hoped was a secretive, conspiratorial air. 'Though actually, I did find one or two old knives that just need a little sharpening. Do you think you could borrow a whetstone from the kitchen so I can fix them up?'
Ginji's brow furrowed. 'You don't need to be using Tenjin-ya's old knives, Aoi-san,' he said, all joking gone from his voice. 'I could take you shopping tomorrow for some new ones, or anything else that you need. I'm sure that Odanna-sama wouldn't want you to feel like we're forcing you to make do with our cast-offs and scraps.'
'You're not forcing me to do anything.' Aoi took another, much smaller bite of crab and rice. 'It's just that I don't like things to go to waste if they're still good enough to be used again. Especially kitchen things.' Her expression softened a little. 'In fact, I'm hoping that maybe a little bit of their accumulated good luck and cooking experience will rub off on me.'
'On you?' Ginji gave her a thoughtful look. 'Does it work that way for humans?'
Aoi thought of a little wooden tea crate stowed securely underneath the counter, and the collection of objects she'd carefully placed inside it. A dull, battered vegetable grater. A wad of worn-out cloth. A heap of pottery fragments.
All of them left behind, unneeded, unwanted.
Just like she had been, once upon a time -- until a kind ayakashi had given her the chance to keep living.
She smiled. 'I'm willing to try it and find out.'
Notes
One of the aspects of Japanese folklore that I love best is the tsukumogami (付喪神), an object that gains sentience after around a hundred years of existence and use. For the most part, they tend to be harmless youkai, more prone to playing pranks or tricks on humans than on acting with real maliciousness. But their existence is a reminder that objects should be cared for and disposed of properly when they are too old or worn-out to be of service...and on rewatching Kakuriyo, it seemed like a real possibility that Aoi might run into a few of these creatures when cleaning out the annex in preparation for her opening night.
With that in mind, I picked a handful of tsukumogami that she might have been most likely to encounter. General Seto (瀬戸大将, Seto-taishou) was an easy choice for the objects' leader -- a little soldier made up of fragments of broken crockery, with a tendency to be highly aggressive in its kitchen wars. Captain Ryuushi is a shiro-uneri (白溶裔), a ragged dishcloth that takes the form of a tiny dragon. Sergeant Oroya is a yamaoroshi (山颪), a broken metal grater that takes the shape of a hedgehog, and whose name is a pun on the word oroshi (vegetable grater) and yama-arashi (hedgehog). None of these would be especially powerful, and as Aoi tells herself, they likely wouldn't have enough strength to come to life again as they did in this first encounter. But at least she's given them a safe resting place, with proper respect and gratitude -- and that's really all they would have wanted to begin with.
Many thanks to Kalloway for the opportunity to write this fun little story!
Return to the Master List
Fandom: かくりよの宿飯 | Kakuriyo no Yadomeshi | Kakuriyo: Bed & Breakfast for Spirits
Rating: G
Summary: While cleaning out the annex in preparation for her new restaurant's opening night, Aoi finds some old discarded kitchen objects, relics of the building's past uses. But on the grounds of Tenjin'ya, even broken bits of crockery and worn-out cookware can have a life of their own... and after having been abandoned and forgotten for so long, they may not be particularly friendly towards a newcomer, let alone a human one.
Notes: Written for
kalloway for Parallels 2020. Set around EP 6 of the anime, before the big opening night party at Moonflower. Additional notes are at the end. (Also on AO3.)Fragments of Good Fortune
When she'd returned to Tenjin-ya, after her brief outing in the apparent realm with Suzuran, Aoi knew that she had to start thinking about her proposed restaurant in earnest.
The menu was perhaps the most enjoyable, creative place to begin, though she knew that the biggest hurdle to overcome in that regard would was less about quality and more about quantity. The meals she'd made in the annex kitchen so far had been small affairs, meant for herself or one or two others. The portions weren't any larger than she might have cooked for herself or her grandfather -- enough food to eat then and there, and enough to box up as leftovers for bento over the next few days. Nothing had run out, and nothing had gone to waste. But if she really were going to run a restaurant that would tempt patrons away from the grand kaiseki banquets of Tenjin-ya, or even encourage visits from curious customers who weren't staying at the inn, then she would have to think in much larger amounts from a far broader menu. It wasn't as if she could make a giant pot of curry rice night after night and expect every guest to eat a single bowl of that and nothing else, after all.
But even before she could plan her menus, she had to take stock of what she had to work with in the kitchen itself -- and, for that matter, in the annex building as a whole. To do that, she would have to roll up her sleeves, don the most voluminous apron she could find, and clean out the whole place from top to bottom.
Right from the start, it was obvious that the annex had received little of the care and attention that she had seen in the impeccable service found in the main Tenjin-ya rooms. The building as a whole, from the thatched roof to the stone lintel, appeared to be sound, but the interior showed definite signs of neglect. The wooden floors badly needed a good scrubbing to remove layers of dirt and grime, and some nails to secure boards that creaked when stepped on. Several of the shoji screens had holes in the rice paper or breaks in the latticework, often in awkward places that likely would be difficult to patch. When Aoi gingerly ran a fingertip down the middle of one of the dining tables, she grimaced at the greasy smear left behind on the surface. (She didn't even look at her finger, but wiped her hands on her apron and went straight to the sink for soap and water.)
There was no getting around it. A true deep cleaning would have to come first.
Ginji had told her of his multiple attempts at using the annex as the home of a profitable side business, and Aoi soon found evidence of his previous ventures stowed away in all sorts of odd corners. It seemed that everywhere she turned, she stumbled across another dusty box or dilapidated wooden crate, each one full of a miscellaneous assortment of objects. Some of the items inside seemed serviceable, and even convenient for her purposes. One box, for instance, had nothing but perfectly folded stacks of new cloth hand towels embroidered in one corner with the calligraphy of Tenjin-ya's name, obvious remnants of the failed souvenir shop. Aoi set that carton aside, near the main doorway; if she didn't want to use the towels purely for wiping up spills, it wouldn't hurt to try to sell them herself, perhaps on a little display with some other local knick-knacks. Other boxes, however, were crammed with undeniable junk: fragments of broken cups and bowls, dull knives and tarnished cookware, items so ragged or rusted that their true identity was hard to determine at first glance. Whatever the boxes contained, Aoi had to haul out every single one of them and set them somewhere out of the way so she could sweep away cobwebs and wipe down walls.
By the end of her first day of cleaning, her arms and back ached so much that she could barely lift a pot of water onto the cooktop to boil. Her throat felt raw from breathing in all the dust her cleaning had kicked up, and she was so hungry that the thought of eating anything more than a simple bowl of noodles, mixed with hot tsuyu and a raw egg, actually made her feel a little sick. She'd made progress on the cleaning, but there was still a lot to do. The main dining area was a sea of tattered boxes, and tomorrow morning she would have to start going through all of them to see what, if anything, she ought to keep.
The water was just starting to simmer when Aoi heard a soft knock on the wooden door frame. She looked up, blinking blearily, and it took a moment for her eyes to focus on the shadowy figure blocking the last of the daylight that was streaming in through the entryway.
It was Ginji, carrying a basket covered in cloth. 'Aoi-san?' he said, a little uncertainly. 'Is everything all right?'
Aoi managed a tired smile. 'It's fine, Ginji-san. Please, come in.' She slipped off her soiled apron as Ginji crossed the room, and automatically reached for the basket in his arms. 'Is this for the kitchen?'
'Some extra soy sauce and a few jars of pickles. This batch was made a little while ago, but none of the jars have ever been opened, so they all should still be good.' He set the basket in front of her on the countertop, and his brow furrowed as he looked her up and down. 'Are you sure you're all right? You look...what have you been doing all day?'
'Just some cleaning.' Aoi lifted the cloth covering to peek at the basket's contents. She did need both soy sauce and pickles, but right now there was no immediate space for her to store them in her torn-apart cupboards. 'Do you mind if I leave these in the basket for now? I wanted to do a proper inventory of all my equipment and supplies before I started thinking about a menu, and to do an inventory, I needed to clean everything up.'
Ginji glanced around the dining room, taking in the piles of boxes everywhere. 'I suppose most of this is my fault,' he said. 'I really wasn't very good at cleaning up after myself, was I? After all the things I tried here...I'm sorry you've had to go through so much trouble here because of me.' As he spoke, the tips of his ears drooped in shame.
'No, really, it's not so bad!' Aoi said. 'I would've wanted to do a good deep cleaning regardless.' A clatter from the stovetop told her that her water was at a rolling boil, so she left Ginji's gifts behind and went to add the noodles to the pot. A small saucepan of tsuyu was heating up beside the noodles, waiting to reach the right temperature. 'Besides,' she added, 'it's only fair that I put in the work to tidy up around here, since Odanna-sama was kind enough to permit me to use the space for my restaurant.'
'Still,' Ginji said, unconvinced, 'I should at least be out here helping you clean. I can come over first thing tomorrow morning and -- '
'That won't be necessary.' This time, Aoi's smile was much firmer, and her voice was polite but determined. 'Perhaps in a day or two, I might want help with some repairs, but right now I still need to see for myself what has to be done around here.' The noodles were ready, and she poured them out into the bamboo strainer to shake off the water. With swift, practised movements, she transferred the steaming noodles to a bowl, poured the heated tsuyu over them, and cracked the egg to drop directly into the hot liquid.
(This was her restaurant. No matter how kind Ginji or any other ayakashi might be, she alone would be responsible for its success or failure.)
Her little production of efficiency had the desired effect. Ginji smiled in return, and held up his hands in mock-surrender. 'If you say so, Aoi-san,' he said. 'I'd be happy to help with any repairs, though. Just let me know what needs fixing, and I'll bring over the tools for it right away.'
'Thank you.' Aoi picked up her chopsticks and stirred the egg in the broth. 'I'm sorry I didn't make much more than this to share tonight -- I wasn't expecting visitors.'
'I've eaten already,' Ginji said. His smile widened into a grin. 'But I look forward to coming here as a paying customer, whenever you feel you're ready to open.'
'Mm.' For Aoi, it was difficult to tell whether the sudden tightness in her stomach was more from hunger or nervousness at the thought of all the work she still had in front of her. Either way, she slurped her noodles with much more enthusiasm than she really felt.
The next morning, Aoi wanted nothing more than to cling to her pillow and hide under the warmth of the covers, even though she knew full well that soon enough she wouldn't have the luxury of staying in bed all day. For the sake of her sore muscles, however, she decided to take it easy in the morning by sweeping and mopping the entryway and the space behind the counter, before making a light lunch and tackling the daunting task of going through all of those boxes.
A quick but hearty breakfast of miso soup with potatoes and tofu would give her the energy to get to work. From the half-dozen jars of pickles that Ginji had brought the night before, she selected one that held a deep reddish mix of eggplant and cucumber. It made a crunchy and delicious topping for the rice she had along with the soup. Once the breakfast dishes were washed and set to dry, it was time to roll up her sleeves again, get out the mop and broom, and start the morning chores.
Aoi hummed quietly to herself in time with the soft swiffs of the broom. It was easy to fall into a rhythm as she worked, since she'd done this same chore many times on a quiet weekend morning at home with her grandfather. Most of the time, he had slept late on Sundays after yet another late Saturday night out -- probably right here at Tenjin-ya, she suddenly realised -- which had given her time to tidy the house and start preparing lunch for both of them. How funny it was to think that now she would be the one to stay up late every night, serving the dishes he'd taught her to make for the very same ayakashi that he'd --
A loud clatter from behind jolted her out of her daydreams. She spun around, and saw that the mop she'd set out had fallen over, tipping over the empty water bucket next to it.
Aoi frowned. How strange. She could have sworn that the mop hadn't been so close to the bucket when she last looked at it.
Giving a faint hmph under her breath, she leaned the broom against the wall near the entryway and went over to collect both the bucket and the mop. One of the more unpleasant tasks she'd finished late the previous afternoon had involved a half-hour stint on her hands and knees, using a stiff-bristled brush to scrape out untold years' worth of dirt that had been ground into the crevices of the floorboards. Thankfully, after her scrubbing last night and her sweeping this morning, the floor needed only a quick swipe of the mop to remove any last traces left behind.
She filled the bucket with a few inches of cold clean water, and set it on the floor at the edge of her work area. But no sooner had she started to run the wet mop over the wood than she heard another clatter, and glanced over her shoulder to see that it had been the broom's turn to fall over onto the floor.
Aoi sighed. 'Honestly....' It wasn't as if there was a breeze that could be blowing things around; the front door was still closed, and none of the windows were open. If there was a draft coming in from somewhere, like a gap in the roof thatching, she'd definitely need Ginji's help to fix it.
With her mop still in hand, she moved to set the broom upright again. Yet as she turned around to go back to her mopping, her foot struck something hard, and suddenly a pool of water was spreading across the floor...
...from the bucket of mop water that absolutely had not been right under her feet two seconds before. It was only by catching herself against the edge of the countertop that she managed to avoid slipping and landing right in the middle of the puddle as it spread.
'Ouch!' A stubbed toe, a soaking wet foot -- and then, out of the corner of her eye, she saw something moving in the shadow of one of the boxes.
Ever since she'd been attacked on her shopping expedition, the tengu fan had never been out of her reach. She wasn't wearing a kimono and obi today, but she'd managed to wedge it into the back of her tied apron strings. In a flash, she whirled around, brandishing the fan, and the gust of wind it created picked up the moving object and sent it sailing across the room. It hit the wall and fell to the floor with a clatter -- and when Aoi peered at it, she saw that it was a small piece of metal not much bigger than the palm of her hand, flat and rectangular, topped with dozens of tiny metal spikes.
'A vegetable grater?' Aoi said aloud, baffled.
She started to step towards it, but before she could put one foot forward, she heard a high-pitched shriek, and something wet and foul-smelling struck the side of her face. She let out a cry of her own and clapped her free hand to her cheek, while her other hand swung the fan wildly in all directions. The wind whipped at her hair, but the awful smell didn't go away -- it was a pungent, cloying stench, sour and rotting like mouldy cloth, and it filled her nostrils and nearly made her choke. Then, to her horror, she felt that same dampness start to slither behind her ear, as if some sort of living scarf was trying to wind itself around her neck. Desperately, she clawed at her throat, and her fingers caught hold of something that squelched in her grip.
'Let go of me!' she shouted, and flung the nasty wet thing away from her as hard as she could throw it. Something greyish-white flew from her hand, falling to land with a squashy sound on the floor near the wall, beside the vegetable grater. Aoi caught a glimpse of what looked like a bit of dirty cloth, but then it moved, twitching and flopping like a small landed fish. Still holding the tengu fan in front of her, she crept forward to get a closer look at her two would-be assailants.
The one that had attacked her first definitely had the shape of a vegetable grater, the old traditional kind with a flat grating surface for root vegetables like wasabi and mountain yam. But this creature also had what looked like four little legs and a pair of beady eyes down near the blunt end of the handle, which poked out like an animal's snout. In fact, the whole thing looked oddly like a misshapen metal hedgehog. It had gotten to its feet, but when it moved it mostly staggered to one side, as if one of its four legs had been injured by the impact. It blinked up at Aoi, then scuttled back a few inches until it was braced against the wall, hunkered down and seemingly prepared to hold its ground against another attack.
The second creature, the one that looked like a old dishrag, had rolled around enough to put itself right way up. To Aoi's amazement, as it twisted and coiled, it seemed to take on the shape of a tiny dirty-grey dragon, thin and snakelike with a long, fraying tail. It didn't move to attack her again, but like the other creature it bristled with a defensive posture, trying to gauge its changes for either fight or flight.
'Who are you?' Aoi said, tightening her grip on the fan. 'Are you from Tenjin-ya?'
The hedgehog-looking creature growled, scrabbling its claws on the wood beneath it, and the dragon-looking creature reared up on its hind legs and hissed with pure fury. But just then, a commanding shout cut through the tense moment, startling both Aoi and her would-be assailants:
'Soldiers! Stand down!'
Both the metal hedgehog and the ragged dragon went stiff, instantly coming to some sort of attention. At that moment, Aoi heard a noise like the sound of crunching gravel, and the lid of one of the half-full cardboard boxes flew open. Aoi gasped as a third small figure vaulted over the edge of the box and landed on the floor with an alarming crash. As it got to what appeared to be its feet, Aoi saw that it looked like a little human shape made entirely of broken bits of crockery and utensils. Its body appeared to be formed from many shards of shattered china, with twisted old spoons for arms and legs, and it was covered from top to bottom with flat pieces of porcelain layered over each other like the iron plate armor Aoi had seen in museum exhibits of samurai weapons. On its head, the broken-china creature wore a chipped sake cup like an old-fashioned helmet, and in one of its spoon hands it held a long, thin-bladed knife as if it were a naginata or some other spear-like weapon.
As Aoi stared, open-mouthed in shock, at the china soldier, the cloth dragon piped up in a tremulous voice, 'Ge-General Se-Seto! The enemy is armed and d-d-dangerous, sir!'
'General?' Aoi looked back and forth from the porcelain-clad creature to the hedgehog and dragon. 'Soldiers?'
The metal hedgehog raised one of its little forelegs in an unmistakable salute. 'Sir, my apologies, sir!' it said, ignoring Aoi's question. 'This soldier was unable to complete his mission, sir!'
The dragon, still standing at attention, flicked a bit of fringe in a similar fashion. 'Sir, I take full responsibility for my sergeant's failures, sir!'
The china soldier lifted his makeshift weapon, acknowledging their salutes. 'You carried out your orders to the best of your abilities,' it said gruffly. 'The fault is mine, for underestimating our enemy's strength.'
The whole situation, as far as Aoi was concerned, was fast slipping beyond her comprehension. 'Will you please tell me who you are?' She lowered the fan to her side, trying to look nonthreatening. 'I don't want to be your enemy. I only fought back because you attacked me. I don't want to hurt any of you.'
'Liar!' the dragon shrilled out, dropping its salute to face off with Aoi once again. 'You were going to throw us away! Just like the kitchen staff did!'
To Aoi's surprise, the china figure turned on the dragon. 'Hold your tongue, captain!' it snapped. 'I will deal with our adversary.'
The dragon cringed, clearly abashed. Even Aoi winced at the force of the reprimand. But in the next moment, the china figure had turned back to face her, and with a clinking of plates it gave Aoi the closest thing to a formal bow that it could manage in its porcelain-fragment armor.
'I am General Seto,' it declared. 'My subordinates here are Captain Ryuushi and Sergeant Oroya.' Its tone was stiffly formal, even a little archaic in speech, which left Aoi feeling as if she had fallen into some sort of bizarre bunraku performance with kitchenware instead of puppets. 'With whom do I have the honour of speaking?'
'I'm....' As absurd as the situation was, Aoi found herself responding to the china figure -- General Seto, as she would have to think of him -- with a relatively equal level of politeness. 'My name is Tsubaki. Tsukabi Aoi. It's a pleasure to meet you, General.'
General Seto bowed to her again, and Aoi dipped her head as well in automatic acknowledgement. Out of the corner of her eye, she could see the dragon and the hedgehog give her jerky little nods of their own. 'The honour is entirely mine, Aoi-dono,' the general said. 'You will forgive the boldness of my enquiry, I hope, if I ask how you happen to possess a weapon of such great power?'
'A weapon?' Aoi blinked, then glanced down at the leaf-shaped fan in her hand. 'This was a gift from the tengu lord Matsuba,' she said. 'My grandfather saved his life many years ago.'
It was a little difficult to read General Seto's expression, considering that it was made entirely of china fragments, but from the way the porcelain soldier drew himself up it was evident that he was impressed by her response. 'It is indeed a privilege,' he said reverently, 'to be in the presence of the descendant of so great a warrior.'
'Well, that's....' Aoi hesitated; she had a feeling that there was nothing to be gained by explaining the circumstances of her grandfather's supposed heroism. 'At any rate,' she continued, 'I didn't mean to hurt your subordinates. I was only cleaning out some old boxes in this building. Were you living in these boxes?'
It was General Seto's turn to hesitate, but only for a moment. With a series of clicks and clanks, he sank down into a sort of seiza with his spoon legs tucked under him. His officers swiftly followed suit, sitting down as best they could manage, and when Aoi remained standing he gestured for her to do the same. Feeling a little foolish, but not wishing to offend any of them, Aoi ignored the screaming protests of her overworked leg muscles and sat down as well, trying to settle herself into a similar seiza position and hoping that her feet wouldn't fall asleep.
'We all used to work in the kitchens of Tenjin-ya,' General Seto said, once Aoi was seated as comfortably as she could manage. He nodded to the cloth dragon. 'Captain Ryuushi, for instance, was well on the way to becoming a senior manager of the dish linens, with special responsibility for work surface cleanliness.'
'That's right!' The metal hedgehog -- or rather, Sergeant Oroya -- let his enthusiasm run away with him. 'The captain was the best of the best! And I helped prepare the Chief Chef's famous Mountain Cloud Yamakake! No one could grate yams better than me!'
Captain Ryuushi's tail waved wildly. 'And General Seto,' he chimed in, 'was an integral part of one of the best full-service tea sets in the whole inn!'
General Seto held up a hand, and his officers fell silent. 'But then one day,' he said, with a note of deep sorrow in his voice, 'it appeared that some of us were no longer as...as useful to the kitchen staff as we had been. And so we were relegated to these containers, here in this remote outpost, with little or no recognition for our dedicated years of service.'
'"Some of us," you said?' Aoi glanced up, looking out over the sea of the boxes she had moved out into the dining area. 'Do you have any more, er, subordinates in these boxes here, General?' How many other creatures like the three in front of her might be listening to this conversation right now? Would she have to go through every single box to find them?
General Seto shifted his weapon from one hand to the other, a show of discomfited impatience. 'I have no tolerance for those without sufficient fighting spirit, Aoi-dono, or a sense of true purpose and drive in their profession,' he said. 'More than a few potential candidates had to be discharged as unfit for service. For that reason, the sergeant, the captain, and I are the only ones left.'
As Aoi listened to his explanation, nodding in sympathy, it didn't take much effort for her to hear the real story behind his bravado. These creatures -- all of them ayakashi, true, but with far less true spiritual power than even a tiny kappa like Chibi possessed -- were clinging desperately to what little strength was left in them. Years of repeated use in Tenjin-ya's kitchens had infused these once-inanimate objects with magic, lending them a strange gift of sentience, but now they were facing the end of their existence...both spiritually and physically. This might be the last time they would have even enough power to speak to her, let alone come to life and move about as they were now.
She had no use for a worn-down vegetable grater, a disintegrating scrap of dishcloth, or a motley collection of broken cups and plates. Cooking a meal for them wouldn't restore them to what they had been, and even if it could it seemed cruel to prolong the natural end of their existence. At the same time, however, she couldn't face the thought of relegating them to the ash heap while they were so determined to hold onto the last fleeting moments of remembered glory.
'I see,' she said at last. Pursing her lips in thought, she laid the tengu fan in her lap and folded her hands on top of it. 'Well, I have no intention of throwing anyone away. In fact, would you be willing to entertain a proposition?'
'A proposition?' General Seto tilted his head, causing his sake cup helmet to clink softly against the shard of china that formed part of his shoulders. 'Do please continue.'
With one hand, Aoi gestured to the half-cleaned room. 'I'm planning to turn this building into a restaurant, to cook special meals that my grandfather taught me to prepare.' It wouldn't hurt, she thought, to name-drop her grandfather in this instance, if her story about his so-called heroism had impressed General Seto so greatly. 'However, I'm very new at the whole business, and I'm sure there's a lot that I have yet to learn. Would the three of you be willing to stay on here and aid me in my work?'
General Seto said nothing at first -- and so Sergeant Oroya, already worked up with indignation, chose to cut in. 'Why should we help you?' he said.
The general bristled. 'Sergeant!' he barked. 'You forget your place here. You will receive a formal reprimand for speaking with such insubordination to Aoi-dono.'
The metal hedgehog, deeply chastised, hung its head. However, Aoi smiled, as calm and collected as if the sergeant hadn't spoken.
'Sergeant Oroya has a fair question, General,' she said. 'As you yourself remarked, you've been stationed out here at this, er, remote outpost for some time now. Now that I'm here to take over the place, you might think that I have no further use for your services. However, as I see it, every good restaurant needs someone to watch over it. And considering that I have been targeted by assailants very recently, I need all of the assistance that is available to me.' She straightened her shoulders, feeling like a noblewoman in an old television costume drama. 'Why, in that case, would I dream of throwing away very three well-trained sentinels?'
This time, all three creatures were silent and still. For the first time, Aoi had a moment of misgiving. Had she offended them? Did they think she was making fun of them? Would they refuse to cooperate? If they did refuse, and she tried to remove them with the rest of the unwanted boxes, would they come back to play more tricks on her? It would be difficult enough to run a restaurant and pay back her debt to Odanna-sama without worrying about dodging malicious pranks by a group of disgruntled sentient objects.
It felt like an unusually long pause before General Seto replied. 'If you feel that we may be of use to you, Aoi-dono, then I believe that such a proposition would be acceptable.' He laid his long knife beside him and placed both utensil hands flat on the floor to give her a deep formal bow. 'My officers and I are at your disposal for whatever tasks you see fit to assign to us, as your resident sentinels.'
With two fingers, Aoi touched the side of her forehead and sketched a little salute in return. 'Then if you would be so kind, General Seto, would you and Captain Ryuushi and Sergeant Oroya allow me to move to you the countertop while I finish my work here today? Once I have everything clean and tidy, we can discuss the full terms of your employment.'
When Ginji showed up at the annex that evening, another covered basket in hand, there were three distinct piles of boxes set out on the dining floor, and Aoi was sitting at one of the counter stools, nodding off over a mostly cold cup of tea.
'It looks like you had a productive day,' he said, when Aoi waved a sleepy hand to him in welcome and greeting. 'I thought you might be too tired to cook, so I brought over some dinner for you, if that's all right.'
Aoi immediately perked up. 'Thank you so much!' she said, eyes widening as Ginji lifted the cloth to reveal an earthenware pot full of fragrant rice and crab topped with shredded cooked egg. 'Oh, this smells wonderful.'
As she dug in, Ginji looked around the room. 'You've definitely made a lot of progress. Do you need any help getting rid of these boxes?'
Aoi nodded as she chewed and swallowed the substantial amount of food she'd shoveled into her mouth with decidedly unladylike zest. 'Just the one set over there,' she said, indicating the smallest stack. 'Everything else I can probably use again somehow.'
'Did you find anything of particular interest?' A teasing light came into Ginji's eyes. 'Some long-lost treasure of great mystic power that got mixed in with everything else, perhaps?'
'Perhaps.' Aoi swirled her chopsticks above her bowl with what she hoped was a secretive, conspiratorial air. 'Though actually, I did find one or two old knives that just need a little sharpening. Do you think you could borrow a whetstone from the kitchen so I can fix them up?'
Ginji's brow furrowed. 'You don't need to be using Tenjin-ya's old knives, Aoi-san,' he said, all joking gone from his voice. 'I could take you shopping tomorrow for some new ones, or anything else that you need. I'm sure that Odanna-sama wouldn't want you to feel like we're forcing you to make do with our cast-offs and scraps.'
'You're not forcing me to do anything.' Aoi took another, much smaller bite of crab and rice. 'It's just that I don't like things to go to waste if they're still good enough to be used again. Especially kitchen things.' Her expression softened a little. 'In fact, I'm hoping that maybe a little bit of their accumulated good luck and cooking experience will rub off on me.'
'On you?' Ginji gave her a thoughtful look. 'Does it work that way for humans?'
Aoi thought of a little wooden tea crate stowed securely underneath the counter, and the collection of objects she'd carefully placed inside it. A dull, battered vegetable grater. A wad of worn-out cloth. A heap of pottery fragments.
All of them left behind, unneeded, unwanted.
Just like she had been, once upon a time -- until a kind ayakashi had given her the chance to keep living.
She smiled. 'I'm willing to try it and find out.'
Notes
One of the aspects of Japanese folklore that I love best is the tsukumogami (付喪神), an object that gains sentience after around a hundred years of existence and use. For the most part, they tend to be harmless youkai, more prone to playing pranks or tricks on humans than on acting with real maliciousness. But their existence is a reminder that objects should be cared for and disposed of properly when they are too old or worn-out to be of service...and on rewatching Kakuriyo, it seemed like a real possibility that Aoi might run into a few of these creatures when cleaning out the annex in preparation for her opening night.
With that in mind, I picked a handful of tsukumogami that she might have been most likely to encounter. General Seto (瀬戸大将, Seto-taishou) was an easy choice for the objects' leader -- a little soldier made up of fragments of broken crockery, with a tendency to be highly aggressive in its kitchen wars. Captain Ryuushi is a shiro-uneri (白溶裔), a ragged dishcloth that takes the form of a tiny dragon. Sergeant Oroya is a yamaoroshi (山颪), a broken metal grater that takes the shape of a hedgehog, and whose name is a pun on the word oroshi (vegetable grater) and yama-arashi (hedgehog). None of these would be especially powerful, and as Aoi tells herself, they likely wouldn't have enough strength to come to life again as they did in this first encounter. But at least she's given them a safe resting place, with proper respect and gratitude -- and that's really all they would have wanted to begin with.
Many thanks to Kalloway for the opportunity to write this fun little story!
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