The True Confessions of a Nine-Tailed Fox

Chapter 20: Back in Black Sand Creek

Flicker was right.

There was definitely something to be said for reincarnating without your mind, because being trapped inside a turtle egg could turn even Aurelia – er, I meant the purest, kindest, most even-tempered soul – into a ravening demon. It was even worse than being stuck in a catfish egg. At least those were translucent and I could observe my siblings and count the days while I waited to hatch – but this shell was opaque! I couldn't see anything besides a blurry white smear and the muddy green slicks of my slowly-forming skin.

Ugh! What a hideous color! I fumed in silence.

And why in the world had Aurelia come to mind when I needed an image of a saint anyway? I hadn't thought about the ex-empress in centuries. Plus it wasn't as if she'd been the purest, kindest, most even-tempered soul in existence – just the purest, kindest, most even-tempered one at Cassius' court. Which wasn't saying much. No one ever governed the Back Palace, the imperial family's personal quarters, by being nice.

It was Cassia Quarta's fault, I decided. Now that Flicker had reminded me of the little princess, I kept remembering her mother seething in the background while we played counting games with pearls (all in the name of math, nothing to worry about, Your Majesty). Aurelia had become the Star of Reflected Brightness long before her children died. Had she watched them from Heaven? Ground her teeth as they turned into pawns and fell, one by one, to assassination, disease, hunting accidents, childbirth, and war? How much did she blame me?

Probably a lot.

But wait, why was I still thinking about her? Unless she transferred to the Bureau of Reincarnation, which she almost certainly wouldn't given that her ex-husband worked there now, her opinion of me was irrelevant. If she couldn't affect my karma total or reincarnations, I didn't care. I tried to kick my eggshell to emphasize the point, but my leg muscles hadn't developed enough yet. That just made me angrier.

How long did it take softshell turtles to hatch? How many days had passed? How much longer did I have to wait?

I had no idea.

I had no idea.

I HAD NO IDEA!

Okay, next time I was up in Heaven, I was definitely going to look up gestation times before Flicker reincarnated me.

An interminable two moons later (as I learned from my curriculum vitae), I hatched.

Finally! What a relief to bite and snap and break my eggshell to bits that I could spit aside! Some pieces stuck wetly to the rocking, cracking eggs around me; others hit my siblings as they struggled out. Stepping on them, I pushed upward – only to get knocked sideways by a shower of the sand that Mommy Turtle had so thoughtfully piled over us.

Ugh, the sand! It was getting everywhere – in my face, my eyes, even the crack between my neck and carapace, where it itched horribly. My stubby forelegs couldn't reach far enough to scrape it out. Furious, I snapped at the sand – which only made things worse because now it was inside my mouth too.

All right, all right, calm down, Piri. The river is right there. All you have to do is walk into the water, and the sand will wash right off. You can do that.

Oh, but it was so hard. All my muscles were floppy, and my legs didn't want to work together. What was going on? I'd been a fox for a thousand years! I knew how to control four legs at the same time!

Grimly, I sent a command to first one leg, then the next, then the next, then the last. Move.

Lift. Step. Lift. Step. Lift. Step. Lift. Step.