* * *
—
HER FATHER did return just after lunch, in time to take them to the neighborhood shrine he’d been talking up, someplace he and Ojīsan used to stop at on their walks to the vegetable stands along the back roads where the farmers lived. The stands were still there, rickety and weather-beaten, piled with seconds, a slotted box nailed to the wooden pillar to collect the proceeds. Luna loved feeding the box, the sound of the coins working their way down the obstacle course of paper bills, but she’d never noticed a shrine. Her father explained that this was because it was on a different road, a footpath, and unlike the popular shrines in the region, this one was local, shabby and small, dating back a thousand years or more, which might sound old but was in fact nothing compared to the sacred tree that stood beside it, its trunk so wide it took at least five adults to encircle it. The tree was the reason the shrine was there; its majesty had caught the eye of a traveling priest.
“Is it open to the public? Is it safe?” her mother asked.
Even a month ago, her father would’ve laughed—the conscientious tourist—but now he replied that all shrines were open to the public, and if it was safe for their neighbors it was safe for them.
“Do spirits live there?” Luna asked. Her father had told them many stories about the mountain fox and raccoon spirits who liked to venture into town to prank people.
Her father nodded gravely. “There’s a rumor that an actual god lives there. Jurōjin.” He stretched out the syllable for Luna and Katy. “Jurōjin is one of the Shichifukujin, the seven gods of fortune. Remember?”
They nodded dubiously.
“Jurōjin’s superpower is longevity,” he went on. “We’re lucky he’s the one who lives here.”
“He can cure Ojīsan?” Luna asked, eyes shining.
“We’ll see.” He smiled. Then he told them a secret: Jurōjin was actually not Japanese but Chinese, and long ago, before he became a proper god, he’d been a gambling pirate who lost all his treasures to Sinbad. Luna was astounded. “He knew Sinbad?” Katy was convinced their father was making it up, but Luna could tell she was excited. They jumped into action, Katy dashing for the sunscreen, Luna for their fugitive hats.
* * *
—
THEY PARKED in the carport attached to Ojīsan’s house. Usually when Obāsan heard the car she came to the door to invite them for snacks, but today they were greeted with sweet and savory aromas, the door closed to company. In the heat it was impossible not to feel cheated, and Luna’s ear itched, the lobe oversoft like microwaved gummy bears. She plodded on, lagging behind Katy and her parents, and followed the wrong turn at the split, veering onto a dirt path that vanished into the backwoods. She was halfway down the path, kicking up dust, when her father called to her. She trudged back, and though it was muggy he squeezed her close, leaning her this way and that as the road narrowed, ambushed by a bamboo grove. When Luna asked how much longer, he told her that if they were home in Urbana, it would be like going from their house to the playground.
They emerged onto a proper road, regulated by traffic lights and flanked by small businesses, one jammed with stationery, another displaying mannequins and posters of makeup and beauty creams. There was a pharmacy, a salon, then a shelter of rice vending machines. Katy ran to investigate them. “What do they say?” she demanded, pressing all the buttons. Their father read her the options, from the type (short, long, sticky) to the quality (premium to regular) to the level of processing (whole to brown to polished). “Some people take the husks, too,” he said. Luna pictured bowls of husks appearing in the morning. Katy wondered if she could make a mattress out of them. Their father laughed. “At this rate, we’ll need an extra suitcase to bring the husks home.” Their mother, quiet since the morning, turned away.
They passed a boutique, a noodle shop, then a field, metal baseball bats clanging in the distance, the sky winking with summer kites. Their mother dabbed their faces and passed around the water bottle.
“Are we there yet?” Katy asked, but her father, lost in thought, kept marching, his neck darkening in the sun.
At last the blinding road began to dapple again, the mown field bursting into tall weeds, which thickened into brush, interspersed with spindly trees that soon broadened into real trees that sifted the sun. Their father finally stopped and pointed at a hill, a dark mouth gaping at the base.
“I thought we were going to the shrine,” Katy said.
“We are. We’re just taking a detour—a special one,” he said.
The heat rose, the cicadas buzzed; no one said anything.
* * *
—
THE TUNNEL was old, with a scraggly beard and a mossy forehead that sprouted a forest before vanishing up the hill. From above—a plane, say, or a parachute—the tunnel was invisible. Their father told them that for centuries it had been a vital pass linking the surrounding villages. During the war, though, it took on a different function. “Do you know what it was?”
The girls frowned, wary of the chilly mouth, the dot of light on the other end forbiddingly far. Their mother said, “Masa, it’s hot.”
“Well, you’ll just have to see for yourself, then,” he said.
“Luna loves seeing for herself,” Katy said.
This was true, but Luna was apprehensive of this tunnel, the seeping darkness that swallowed the sunlight and returned nothing. “I want to go back,” she said.
Her father wiped her hair off her face. “Let’s give things a chance.”
But the tunnel was dark, the ground wet, its mineral breath furring the wall. Luna clutched her sister’s arm, and Katy let her, the two of them stepping cautiously, the wet crunch of their footsteps echoing like a cacophony of bats. Luna wiggled her ear; the tunnel’s clammy pressure had a plugging effect, darkening the dark on that side of her head, throwing off her balance. Katy pulled her closer and whispered, “It’s a dungeon.”
Sure enough, Luna could see the outlines along the wall, the row of roughly filled passages, some streaked with slivers of what looked like metal. Then, astonishingly, an open mouth, fanged with bars.
“Is it really a dungeon?” Luna asked, feeling the suck of air, the eternal inhalation.
Her father palmed her head. “Good guess, but no. It’s a decommissioned bomb shelter. Bōkūgo. They’re filled now”—he reached to trace a seam—“but they used to extend pretty far into these hills.”
“What are the bars for, then?” Katy asked.
Luna edged behind her sister and felt the press of her mother’s hand on her back. “Masa, you’re scaring them.”