The Twelve Kingdoms: The Shore in Twilight

turned up.
    Unable to sleep, Risai got out of bed and walked to the visitor's palace. A large garden surrounded the palace. The guest quarters were located in Seikou Manor. Seikou Manor was connected to a library called Ransetsu Hall. Ransetsu Hall had been turned into the command center for Taiki's search.
    Stopping in several times every day had become something of a compulsion for her. And though her visits were always met with disappointment, it nevertheless quenched her unbearable thirst for the time being.
    This night as well she headed toward Ransetsu Hall in quest of spiritual water. Rokuta was there, slumped exhausted in a chair.
    "En Taiho," she said.
    "Yo," he replied and smiled. His face really did look haggard.
    "You haven't found him?"
    "Ah," Rokuta said in a low voice. As if sensing her despair over her sheer uselessness, he injected a note of cheer into his voice. "Well, you know, this is how these things tend to go. Something's bound to turn up sooner or later."
    "Yes," was the only thing Risai could think of to say. There wasn't a thing she could do to help. The best and the brightest in the Kingdom tended to her body and looked after her every need, and yet all she could do in turn was watch. For her to find fault with the slow pace of developments would be beyond presumptuous.
    "You in the mood for some tea? I was getting a hankering myself."
    Risai smiled. She lit the small hibachi on the desk, filled the cast iron pot with water and set it on the hibachi.
    "Maybe he's not in Yamato."
    Risai froze for a moment. "Then China?"
    "Hard to say. But the Royal Han was right. The problem remains why Taiki has not returned of his own accord."
    "And the circumstances that might prevent his return?"
    "Easy to say but hard to describe. What do you think?"
    "I'd have no way of knowing, but--"
    "Taiki caused a meishoku. Keiki insists that Taiki would not know how to cause a meishoku. Assuming that it did occur, something must have triggered it, something entirely instinctual. I can empathize with that. More than being swept away to there, I think it was more like Taiki fell off a cliff. He fell off a cliff here and landed there. "
    "Meaning what?"
    "Meaning that between the entrance and exit of the Gogou Gate is a path headed both nowhere and everywhere. Think of it as the Forbidden Gate or the Five Gates. It's not as if you can stand in the gate and ahead of you is the other world and behind you is this world. It's more like there is a tunnel between the entrance and the exit."
    "Ah," Risai said, nodding. An enchanted pathway. Like the enchanted staircases crisscrossing the Imperial Palace.
    "We know that Taiki is not here and that he did enter the gate. But there's no way of knowing whether Taiki left the gate and is there. "
    "That would mean--" Risai said, turning to face him. "That would mean being trapped within the gate?"
    "Hard to say. It is possible that Taiki never made it there. I traveled there using the Gogoukanda provided by Renrin, but while passing through I had to keep hold of Renrin's hand. Though it might be better to say I was holding onto the tail of the Gogoukanda. There are two tails going into two directions, and with Renrin's guidance I had to hold onto one. If I didn't, I'd end up chasing my own tail. Because once you've gone in, you can't turn around and go back."
    "So you're saying that Taiki might have gotten turned around like that."
    "I don't really know. Comparing the Gogoukanda to a meishoku may be completely inappropriate. I simply got to wondering whether Taiki made it through to the other side. Aside from that, there's no reason to get overly concerned. Taiki was swept away as a taika, was born over there and grew up a normal kid. He's got parents there and a home. I believe it was at his parents' home that I found him the last time. Unfortunately, I can't remember where that is. I remember the general vicinity. Yamato is a pretty big place, but I did remember what town it was adjacent to. Because he triggered the shoku and fled instinctually, he might well have gone back to his home town. But I could find no evidence of him there."
    "Probably because that's not where it was. Someplace else perhaps?"
    "I thought so too. I went through the place house by house starting in the middle of town and working north and then south. But couldn't find a trace of him anywhere. Well, it was pretty much a seat-of-the-pants once-over."
    His tone of voice suggested he'd added that last part