Although there was a huge commotion in the courtyard, when Jinshi, the most important person, said, “Break up”, everyone immediately returned to their posts. When all the people were gone, they checked the inside of the net.
“What’s this…”
Jinshi and Basen widened their eyes. From Basen’s reaction, it seems the bird had slipped away from him before he got a proper look.
The bird Chue caught was an owl about one shaku(30cm) in length. However, it had a fairly eerie face for an owl. They were taken aback.
It looked like it was wearing a mask with a round white face. And the feathers around its face were dark. If it were in the darkness and it didn’t spread its wings, it would look like a floating mask.
However…
“It’s rather small,” Tenyuu remarked indifferently. He was unreserved even though Jinshi, the Prince of the Moon, was before him.
Maomao elbowed Tenyuu.
“Oh, my sincere apologies. I didn’t realise that I was in the Prince of the Moon’s presence.”
How rude, Maomao thought. Of course, she placed herself in a different position.
Jinshi’s expression was a little stiff. On the surface, he was wearing his heavenly smile though. “With a racket this loud, it would be odd for me to not notice. But what were you doing?”
(How shameless.)
This guy even sent Basen over to do the job. What was he on about?
Tenyuu had no idea what to say, so Maomao stepped forward.
“Yes. There have been rumours recently about an eerie oddity around this residence. A servant had consulted the military official assigned to a court physician about this matter, so he had been investigating while on patrol around the estate. That servant inquired this morning, however, the military official, who had finished his night round, had misgivings about holding an investigation for them. Since it would be an odd job for someone who is originally a court physician’s bodyguard.”
(Let’s slide in a snide remark.)
“As a result, he went to ask me, a court lady assigned to a court physician.”
“Hm, then what about the court physician next to you? He would have other things to do, right?” Jinshi’s eyes were piercing.
(Ahh…)
So it turns out she wasn’t allowed to involve Tenyuu as well.
“My sincere apologies. I was being unreasonable and came along. This Maomao is more experienced in prescribing medicine compared to a novice court physician like me, so she is currently in the middle of teaching me a couple of things. When I heard that Maomao will be visiting the courtyard, I was certain that she was going to look for ingredients for herbal medicines, so I followed her.”
(This bastard…)
Tenyuu was speaking humbly. And he also really did purposely change her name.
She felt Jinshi’s eyes were a lot sterner.
“Hohoh. I have a grasp of the situation. So am I correct in thinking that the identity of the oddity in question, be this bird?” Jinshi said.
“Yes. Half of it.” Maomao looked at the owl.
“There could be prying eyes here. Shall we change locations to talk in more detail?”
“Understood.”
Maomao accepted Jinshi’s request.
.
.
.
“This is the first time I’ve seen a bird with a face like this.”
Jinshi took a long hard look at the bird in the cage.
They were guided from the courtyard into the guest room that Jinshi used. With that said, he had many rooms, which could be used to hold a casual tea party.
Jinshi was sitting down as the host. And around him were the usual Suiren, Taomei, Chue and Basen the bodyguard. Basen’s older brother Baryou was probably close by, but that man couldn’t show his face.
For some reason, Tenyuu was in the same room, smiling widely.
(Say that you have work to do and decline.)
If there’s an amusing situation, he’ll come along. That was Tenyuu.
“Why do you think this bird is the identity of the oddity ‘Hitouban’?”
Maomao closed her eyes at Jinshi’s question. She had to take extra care so Tenyuu didn’t get any weird ideas.
“Yes. What I found strange in the beginning was the word “mask”. I heard stories about seeing a mask on a tree and on top of the building, so I first went around the tree.”
In doing so, she found bird droppings. Not from a small bird, but a large carnivorous bird.
“Small birds fly about in daylight, so I considered that if there is a carnivorous bird it would have to be nocturnal, and I was right on the mark.”
“Hm. What is your basis on thinking that the identity of the oddity is a bird at the time?” he asked.
“I can imagine it, once I know of this bird. This is my first time seeing the actual thing, but I know of a bird that looks like it’s wearing a mask. The animal was drawn in an illustrated book I obtained from a pharmacy I worked at in the past.”
Jinshi would know what the illustration books were. It was one of the volumes taken from the Shi clan fortress. It should currently be in Jinshi’s custody, so if he had brought it with him to the western capital, they would be able to take a look.
“It seems it’s called a ‘Monkey-faced owl*’. A normal owl wouldn’t remind people of a floating face and more importantly, the colouring of this owl is slightly unusual.”
(T/N: Barn owl, but its other name fit the situation more. The Japanese name is simply literally Mask/Face-owl.)
Dark feathers. An owl would normally have a white belly even if the feathers were black, but this was mostly brown aside from its face.
“May I ask a question?” Tenyuu raised his hand.
“Ask away.”
Jinshi’s speech was a little more high-handed than usual.
“Certainly, its face looks like a mask, but isn’t it a bit too small? It’s too cute to be a human face though.” Tenyuu looked at the owl in the cage. The owl wasn’t struggling. It looked sleepy. It might sleep if it hadn’t been taken from its nest.
“Human eyes are unreliable. Once you sense something white floating, you’ll think it’s large. Besides…” Maomao took out some paper from her bosom pocket. When she was about to ask for a brush, Chue immediately supplied her with one. The woman was truly swift. By the way, Chue was provoking Basen, who had failed to catch the owl, with an aggravating gaze every now and then.
Maomao drew four dots on the paper and showed it to Jinshi and Tenyuu. They were positioned right where the eyes, nose and mouth would be. “Human eyes would see the dots as a human face when arranged like so. It’s just like how you’d often see human faces on pillars.”
“Got it. I understand the identity of the face that was floating at night.”
Tenyuu put his hand through the cage and poked the owl. The bird made no move of resistance. Taomei came over with a small plate of raw chicken.
(How luxurious.)
Taomei presented the chicken meat using a pair of chopsticks and the owl smoothly ate it up. It made no resistance towards eating food presented to it by humans.
“I understand the identity of the mask. But what about the head?”
Tenyuu wasn’t a fool. He clearly remembered what Maomao said.
“Mask and head? What is this about?” Jinshi sought for an explanation.
Maomao decided to explain once more with some review. “There had been eyewitness reports from twenty days ago. They had been calling it a mask or a face during that period. However, from the last couple of days, there have been reports about a head. Moreover, it was floating and walking outside the residence.”
“So you’re saying that the mask and head are different things. Then, if this bird is the mask, what could the head be?”
“That’s the thing.” Maomao glanced at Chue.
“What is it? Do you have some business with Chue-san?”
“It’s not Chue-san, right?”
Maomao thought about the timeline. The eyewitness testimony of a head was from a couple of days ago. That coincided with the date when Maomao and the other’s returned to the Western Capital. And there was one person who seemed to be up to something strange.
“How rude. Chue-san has been together with Maomao-san for many days.”
That’s true. The woman had ploughed the fields with Maomao.
“This is nothing more than a hypothesis. But I feel that from seeing this owl, I realised something.” Maomao looked at the feet of the owl that was pecking at chicken meat. She saw a beautifully crafted metal band. “This is a possibility, but I think we’ll find out soon enough. We’d just have to set a trap.”
Maomao grinned and stroked the owl with the eerie face.
.
.
.
The next day, Chue came over with her characteristic footsteps.
Maomao was done with cleaning after breakfast and was prescribing medicine with the quack doctor.
“Is Maomao-san a prophet?” Chue said, blinking.
“Looks like you found it. You weren’t violent, right?”
“What are the two of you talking about? I have absolutely no idea.” The quack doctor had been kept in the dark from start to finish, but it was a pain to explain so she had him continue to calculate dosages. When he was done with prescribing medicine, he should prepare tea for her.
Chue acted like she owned the place, sitting on a chair and waiting for the quack to bring teacakes. The atmosphere was like, I’ll speak while we’re at it.
“Yes. As Maomao-san told me, I watched over the owl cage at night. And when the owl suddenly started to raise a fuss, I looked around, and well, it was rough. I didn’t think I would find a person clad in black with a strange mask.”
Chue spoke like she was having fun while drinking tea the quack doctor had offered her. The sweets were dried fruits as dry as the western capital.
“I can’t believe they would actually be like that.” Maomao was also surprised that she was this close to the mark. “So, is the suspicious person the one who raised the owl?”
“Correct.” Chue widened her eyes.
“Why did Maomao-san think the culprit for the oddity was the person who raised the owl?” Chue asked straightforwardly.
Maomao recalled the owl’s peculiarity. “The owl is clearly hand-raised. It has an accessory on its foot and it was eating chopped chicken without any sign of wariness or struggle in the cage. I don’t think it’s an animal that was caught to be a pet, but one that has been looked after for a long period of time.”
“Hohoh.”
“And there was one thing about the eyewitness reports that bothered me.”
The reports about the mask were from twenty days ago and the reports on the head, a couple of days. They had commonalities.
“Twenty days ago. Wasn’t that when Empress Gyokuyou’s niece set out for the capital?” Maomao said.
“Ah.”
Apparently, Chue also understood.
“The owl was supposed to be one of the gifts that were to be taken to the capital. What if it had somehow escaped?”
“Hohoh. Then, if they had tried to catch it now, were they thinking of presenting it again since there is royalty here? Was donning that weird mask a way to avoid people from seeing their face?”
Regarding that weird outfit, Maomao had an idea. However, it wasn’t a clear answer but merely conjecture that Maomao thought up.
“Maomao-san. Although Chue-san gets carried away easily, she isn’t a fool, so she won’t take Maomao-san’s opinion at face value.”
Chue was saying “Just say it already” in a roundabout way. In saying so, Maomao’s lips also loosened.
“I think the mask and black garb is an outfit to resemble the owl’s parents.”
Chue tilted her head at Maomao’s words.
“Do you know about imprinting?” Maomao asked.
“Yes. Chue-san knows. When a bird hatches from its egg, it would consider the first thing it sees as its parent.”
“Yes. The one who raised it would be intending to return that owl into the wild. I figured that it would be so that it wouldn’t learn human faces.”
As far as she saw with the owl’s droppings, it caught its own food.
“But, in the end, it seemed like it got used to getting chicken meat from people. If an owl with an interesting face got used to humans, the rich would buy it as a curiosity and it would be gifted as a tribute to noblemen.”
“Would it be that the one who raised it didn’t approve of that, so they escaped or let it escape?”
“That’s only a hypothesis.”
“And to think the owl that was believed to have escaped was, of all things, living at Gyoku’en-sama’s villa. And if royalty stayed there, it would be, let’s see, awful.”
“I said it’s a hypothesis.”
“So they came over in the outfit they raised the owl to summon it. In order to capture the owl and release it in a distant place.”
“Hypothesis.”
“I know.”
They must have blown a whistle or something to summon the owl. It reacted but didn’t come outside.
Whether Maomao’s hypothesis was true or not didn’t matter; there was one thing she gained from it.
“So I wasn’t wrong that they’re the person who raised the owl.”
“I guess so.”
Maomao and Chue grinned. The quack doctor, who was out of the loop, was scared of the two who were up to no good.
If they were the person who raised the bird from a chick as with Maomao’s hypothesis, a certain question gets closer to an answer.
The ‘Wind-reader Tribe’ that the former serf Nenjen had talked about. The tribe the Ih clan protected.
(I doubt they would live on just because of a mere ritual.)
Also, considering how they exterminated insects, she could deduce a single answer.
It was said the ‘Wind-reader Tribe’ handled birds. Maomao recalled a method that used birds.
The method of communication via pigeons.
If they used birds as a means of communication in the same manner, wouldn’t the Wind-reading Tribe be well-versed in intelligence rather than just rituals?
For the time being, Maomao decided to meet the suspicious person they caught.
