Page 2 of Caught in the Devil’s Hand

The local priests taught that those with hair the color of the earth had been molded for the task of working with it, so most members of the village with brown hair tended the fields, save a few like the miller and huntsman.

However, those with hair the color of night were believed to have been tainted by the Damned One, also known as the Foul One. Her people’s god had infinite forgiveness and patience, so those with black hair were forgiven for their nearness to evil. Forgiven, but not accepted. Not even when the brother and son to women with black hair had been blessed with blond locks.

Shumei had adored her brother from the day he’d been born, but the atmosphere around her had quickly grown hostile. The comments whispered near her had grown viler with each passing day.

Then one afternoon, her father’s body had been found in the medicine field, and the cause of his death had been unknown. Sudden deaths weren’t uncommon, but the villagers had gleefully shared various cruel theories with Shumei and her mother, the worst being that her father had ingested a poisonous plant on purpose. Never mind the fact that the only plant in the field that could kill if one ate too much of it would leave behind telltale signs.

Thus, the last four years since his death had seen a change in her. Once, she had been cheerful, talkative, and outgoing, but now she was quiet and reserved. Without her father to protect her from the villagers’ contempt, their cruelty had grown exponentially. Their malice had forced her to close herself off and hide her emotions. Seeing any friendly expression on her face, let alone a smile, was now rare. Her eyes were always downcast, and she held herself closely, as if awaiting the blow of someone’s fist.

With Oka, she spoke in a calm, gentle tone, though never with a smile. She could no longer bring herself to act the cheerful older sister, even for him. As a result, Oka had taken to being nearly as soft-spoken as she was, though much more physically active. He greatly enjoyed swordfights with imaginary enemies while she and their mother worked in the medicine field.

Their poor mother. Father’s absence and the village’s ostracism had aged her incredibly over those four years. Her youth had disappeared with her happiness, and though she was yet forty-one, she looked well past fifty, hair almost completely gray.

Shumei scratched an itch on her exposed lower shin, which poked out from the much-too-short dress she hadn’t replaced since her father had died. Today was delivery day for the medicines they sold. Seeing as how both her mother and brother were sick, she knew the task of preparing and delivering the medicines to the households that had ordered them was up to her.

Selling herbal remedies was how her family made ends meet—the only way they were allowed to earn a living, scraping together enough money for food, clothes, and wood for the fire, but not much else. Even then, their food was always the cheapest and least nutritious, the bolts of cloth they purchased were of the lowest quality, and kindling was used sparingly.

The priests considered the medical arts to be “less holy” because only the Divine One could grant true salvation from injury and disease. But the benefit of properly prepared medicines could not be ignored, so they were declared a gift from the Divine One, who made his people from the same earth from which the medicinal plants sprang.

Shumei had never understood how something “less holy” was also a “divine gift.” Then again, many things about how she and her mother were treated made no sense. But tradition demanded that crows and their families tend the fields. For generations, her ancestors had provided the village with medicines for a fee almost too meager to live upon.

Many times, she had wished for a different lot. Surely, she thought, life had more to offer somewhere else. She could make friends, find better work, and walk among other people without seeing disgust on their faces when they saw her hair. She wished to live in a place that didn’t adhere to the caste system in which she found herself at the bottom, a place where she could find adventure, see new sights, and perhaps even experience love.

Even if she were attracted to any men in the village, which she wasn’t, none of them would have her, save one—and she’d rather go unmarried than tie herself to him. Lately, she’d taken to nighttime fantasies of a handsome stranger, such as a traveling merchant or perhaps even a mercenary, who would pluck her and her family out of this miserable village. He’d look past her faded, worn-out dress and her tangled mop of black hair, and he’d see a kindred soul, one ready for life and passion.

More than once, such musings late at night had resulted in heady dreams, but in the morning, she’d always wake to find nothing had changed.

Sighing in resignation, she tucked the blanket more securely around her brother’s feet and stood. She wiped his hand of spider guts, then prepared a variety of medicines in the corner of their hut, grinding together different mixtures of herbs and carefully packaging the results into small cloth bags. Her mother coughed a few more times but was otherwise still. Oka slept fitfully.

Upon confirming her list of orders matched her array of medicine bags, she packed everything into her delivery pouch and slung it over her shoulder. Before leaving, she knelt by her mother.

“Mama? I’m going out to deliver the week’s medicine,” she softly called. Nodding, her mother groaned a farewell. Shumei planned to make her deliveries as quickly as possible, purchase some meat to strengthen her ailing mother and brother, and return home to care for them. They were both at critical stages, and she couldn’t stay away from them for too long. Pushing aside the reed door, she ducked out of the hut and surveyed the morning scene.

The day seemed destined to be gray and chilly. No doubt her shabby clothing would do little to keep her warm. One of her neighbors, a married man by the name of Akito, was just now leaving his home to go to the fields, but no one else was about. She waited until he had gone some distance before heading to her first and most hated destination.

The village leader’s wife had been suffering stiff, achy joints ever since the onset of winter, and her condition was especially bad on days like today. She was taking a daily dose of white willow powder. Though Shumei was begrudgingly grateful the leader and his wife always paid for the medicine on time and in full, it was the same paltry fee everyone else in the village paid. The same medicines, she had heard, fetched ten times as much in the plains cities.

Of course, some villages had no crows to tend their medicine fields, so the task went to brown-haired farmers. Paying a brownie more for the same task was somehow equal to paying a pittance to a crow. Had her family known of this inequality before her father had passed, they would’ve asked for more money for his sake.

She hated delivering medicine to the leader and his wife. While other villagers openly displayed their contempt of her with sneers and rude remarks, the two blondies preferred to be condescending, lobbing insults at her from behind fake smiles. They always tried to make her stay and have tea so they could poke at her with their sharp tongues, but she wouldn’t let them today. She had an excuse to escape them, one even they couldn’t brush aside.

Walking quickly, head down, she took a path to the other side of the village that gave her the best chance of avoiding running into anyone. For once, luck was with her, and except for an elderly woman who simply turned her face away at Shumei’s passing, she made it to the other side of the village without incident.

Cautiously, she approached the leader’s front gate, two wood-paneled doors made of intricately carved whispering ash, and pushed open the left one because its hinges didn’t squeak. After slipping inside, she mounted the worn stone steps leading to the leader’s home.

While her family’s cramped, drafty hut had a reed door, a partial wooden floor made of the cheapest and poorest wood, and a leaky, thatched roof, the leader’s home was constructed of crimson cedar, cut and bundled in the famed city of Houfu in the plains to the west. It also had three glass windows, a finished wooden floor, and a solid front door made of stone oak. They never wanted for anything while Shumei and her family barely survived.

She wasn’t allowed to use the knocker, so she rapped on the door. The unforgiving hardness of the wood stung her knuckles, and she sucked on them while she waited. A moment passed before she heard the shuffle of feet. She took a calming breath, schooled her face to look as blank as possible, and let her head hang low enough to show the one answering the door that she was being respectful.

But beneath the folds of her delivery pouch, she made a vulgar sign with her right hand, curling the third and fourth fingers.

The door slid open, quietly and smoothly riding its track.

“Ah, Shumei. Come in, child.” Leader Kimen beckoned. His wife was nowhere to be seen.

“Thank you, Leader Kimen,” she answered in a clear voice, hoping to alert Akki. She hated the woman, but Akki was the only person Kimen feared, and Shumei loathed being alone with the man.

Nearing fifty, Kimen was lanky in his limbs and sported a heavy gut from his drinking. His mottled complexion looked especially sickly when the light hit his blond hair just right, hair that was thinning and streaked with gray. His deep-set eyes were spaced wide, and his equally wide mouth sat under a long nose that was too big for his face. Every time she saw him, she likened him to a frog and often imagined him eating flies.