The bamboo-lined pathway hadn’t seemed that long when he’d started on it, but its winding course snaked and curved without end, and the distant hill stubbornly refused to get closer. Determined to be on time, Raidou kept walking, ignoring the growing flickers of doubt. He breathed relief when he finally spotted a clearing up ahead, surrounded by tall maple trees—

Which melted like an ending dream.

He did not, miraculously, fall on his face, but it was a near thing. The pathway was still in front of him. The clearing was gone. Bamboo waved in the breeze. The world looked exactly as real as it had a half-second ago, except for how the landscape had altered.

A tight, hot shiver clenched his stomach.

Genjutsu. He should have expected that. Obviously he should have expected that. He’d just assumed he’d actually get to meet the Crimson Eye of Konoha before she turned his brain inside out.

In retrospect, he was probably lucky it had just been trees.

He set his shoulders back and finished his trek — much shorter now — to the two women waiting on the porch. At first glance, Yuuhi Benihime could have been the matriarch to any old-blood clan. Iron-grey hair drawn back into a severe bun; a slight frame clothed in the traditional kimono, obi, and zori. She leaned on a dark wooden stick, which had been carved with a deliberate curve twisting down the shaft, like a polished root.

Since it was a poor ninja who stopped at the first glance, Raidou took a second, noting details. Her bun was studded with lethal wooden kanzashi, unadorned by flowers or ornaments. The kimono was black watered-silk, swirling with complex, unsettling patterns. Her obi and collar were crimson, the same color as Kurenai’s lipstick. The same color as both their eyes — fresh, arterial red. An edge of something fine and steely glimmered around her, like a warning: tread carefully.

At Benihime’s side, Kurenai stood almost half a head taller, wearing the same Intel-styled uniform he’d last seen her in. Her hair tumbled loose and dark around her shoulders. The family resemblance was obvious. Proud, classical bones and pale skin. What was young beauty on Kurenai had become elegant, weathered poise in her grandmother. Benihime looked like she might be approaching sixty; Raidou knew she was on the north side of eighty.

He bowed deeply. “Thank you for seeing me, Yuuhi-sama,” he said, trying for calm and polite.

Looking down at the leaf-strewn ground it occurred to him, belatedly, that this could still be a genjutsu. He’d never done his own kai.

If he started questioning everything, he’d never stop. And that way led to panic, which was a short, ugly trip back to broken ocean towns. He had to start with a seedling of faith, until Benihime — or sense — told him otherwise.

He straightened up to find her regarding him with pursed lips. “Well,” she said, after a cool silence. “You’re a well set-up young man. Spent all your time training that muscle, and none on your mind?”

He blinked, foundered, and offered a shrug. “I was encouraged to stick with my strengths, ma’am.”

“And pay no heed to your weaknesses. I see.” She surveyed him a moment longer, then allowed, “You may enter.”

She turned, slipped gracefully out of her zori, and slid open the door to pad inside the— tea house? The building was a small pavilion, wooden-walled and thatch-roofed. Perhaps converted to a private space for meditation. Or teaching.

Raidou unlaced his boots and followed her.