The cicadas screamed. Hidden in the tall grass that licked the ankles like a blade’s kiss, they thrummed like a sea of sirens just beneath the dust-cracked skin of the earth. The heat had sucked the color out of the sky, and even the horizon wavered, dancing drunkenly like a spirit lost in its own dream. The bamboo grove, once promising shade, only held more heat in its hollow stalks. No breeze passed there. Only the dry clatter of a leaf falling and sticking to the sweat on her back.

Mizu walked.

Behind her, hoofprints faded into fine powder—dust blooming where the horse had passed, dry and pale as bone. Ahead, a poor town. A village really—mura, no name on any map, forgotten or taken too often by hands that demanded too much. The rice fields were skeletal, cracked paddies gaping dry like mouths that had forgotten water.

The town had everything the capital did, but cheaper. More tired. A skinny boy with a shaved head chased after a pregnant dog who’d stolen a strip of dried fish. Children with stick limbs and sunburnt faces swarmed near the izakaya, where heat shimmered off old tile roofs. There was a brothel, of course—an unnecessary adornment in a town where no one smiled with their eyes anymore. It stood like a nesting box, hens in painted silk behind paper screens, cheaper than the sake but offering cooler shadows than any home could.

Her lips were cracked. Skin burned beneath her clothes. Even the calluses on her hands felt tender.

She stepped inside.

The okiya was quiet, air thick with the perfume of sandalwood and sweat. Women lounged like lazy cats, sprawled across cushions, their eyes half-lidded from heat and boredom. A shamisen rested in the corner, untouched.

One room. She sat.

The futon was rough. Worn at the seams. The sliding doors bore painted koi, light filtering through so that they swam across her bare forearms, red and gold, like she was submerged.

The sound of furin—wind bells—on the veranda whispered like ghosts.

Then, the shōji slid open.

You entered. Quiet, deliberate. You knelt, lowered yourself with care, the old tatami creaking beneath your weight. No questions. You poured the sake with both hands, the ceramic warm from the heat outside. You looked up.

She was already watching you.

Her blue eyes were narrow, unreadable. There was blood on her sleeve, dried now, like the land outside. She reached for the cup, voice hoarse, “…pour again.”