お花を摘みに参ります？

Now this could be a bit troublesome.

As for what is troublesome, the flowers say "don't tell."

Though I really would rather return to the mansion, as one might expect, I'm afraid to go by myself, and it's some distance away.

Thinking it would be all right if I just walk a little ways away, and believing in the power of my bug spray, I part the tall grasses and proceed.

Maybe this...... is far enough......?

Creeping about restlessly, I find a good place for squatting down, where the grasses are settled, stop, and with an furtive glance, view my surroundings.

In the settled quiet of the night air, a *gasa gasa* sound of grasses tousles the silence. As if caught in those vibrations, my body quakes with a shudder.

What is that?------ It wasn't the light sound of the wind brushing the grasses together.

I don't feel the wind on my skin.

The sound edges closer.

The sound edges closer to where I stand.

I raise the waist I was about to lower, and peeking about, searching in the direction from which I hear the sound, I look about the area.

Now, of all times, the wind begins to blow.

In the sound of leaves brushed by wind, the nearing presence of whatever it might be is wiped away. Even in this midsummer night, the wind steals the warmth from my skin, leaving goose bumps in its place.

A cloud is moved to hide the moon.

The light of the moon is cut off.

My vision worsens.

Left alone in the sea of dark grasses, unsure whether I should face forward, back, left, right, I can only stand at my wit's end.

Each time the swaying tips of grass prick pettingly at my heels, another layer of stress is piled on.

What do I do... what do I do------

Before I know it, the wind has stopped.

The cloud has set its roots atop the moon.

The sound of my swallowed breath is louder than I expect. My heartbeat feels loud in my ears.

What surprises me such that my heart could leap from my chest, is the white baby fox - Obana-chan.

With a long sigh, I breathe out the unease that had coiled in my chest until a tiny lamp-like relief is all that's left.

As small as he might be, he comes through for me in many ways, a byakko-sama in place of a knight on a white horse.

His fluffy tail sways side to side.

I guess this and that *koku koku* nod is "YES," and turning away with a *pui!* means "NO."

I was given such an inordinate fright, I've forgotten why I even came out here alone in the first place.

Giving his tail one swift wave, Obana-chan turns his body to face the way we came.

With an even greater racket than before, there is a sound of crumpling grass.

Obana-chan thrusts his four legs straight out, and stands the hairs of his body straight on end to swell in size.

Something is there. It's coming closer.

At last, a wet wind begins to blow, setting the frozen clouds in motion, and the swaying edges of grass reflect the moonlight and shine.

The sound of crumpling grass sounds loudly.

And then, appearing before us------

---with black hair and black clothes, it is that person, with her impressive bearing.

The black about her is yet darker than the thin, blue darkness, and enclosed in that black, her white face and shirt collar seem to surface boldly in contrast.

And with an even more dazzling shine than that white... is the kinpukurin of the tachi sheath in her hands.