by Rick Scott
His words cut short as one of the Dao blades slashed through the back of his neck. A second later, his head fell to the ground.
Chief Wu…
“Please stop! It’s him you want!”
Kenji looked to see Chet Fai shouting and pointing at him.
“You said you wanted the one the demon attacked. He’s the one! He’s the one the demon came for!”
“Chet Fai!” his father shouted, but the words were already spoken.
The man with the claws looked to Chet Fai and then to Kenji. “Is what he says true, boy? Did that demon attack you?”
Kenji’s heart raced. He had no idea why these men would be looking for him. Or why it was important that the demon had come for him. But in the end, it was all the same. He truly had brought this upon the village somehow. His mind reeled, refusing to accept it, even as the grief and guilt of it all swelled within his heart. It was true. By the heavens, it was all true! His village was destroyed. His father dead. He looked to Shinoto and her family…the only ones left to save.
He steeled himself, bitterness in his heart.
“If I’m the one you want, then take me,” Kenji said with an iron resolve. “Just leave the rest of our people alone.”
The man with the claws grinned, his dark eyes flashing. With a leap, he launched himself across the distance, moving with unnatural speed. A sharp pain entered Kenji’s stomach as the man slammed into him, lifting him right off the ground. Blood filled his lungs.
“I don’t need to take you anywhere,” the man said as he withdrew the claws, dropping Kenji painfully to the ground. “In fact…I don’t even need you alive.”
Kenji choked and gurgled, the sharp taste of blood filling his mouth.
“Kenji!” Shinoto cried, rushing towards him.
He raised a hand to stop her, but the barrel-chested man spun about with his blades, catching Shinoto across the throat. Her eyes opened wide with shock as blood spilled from her neck.
Shinoto…!
Kenji’s heart sundered in two, his mind unable to accept what he was seeing. His entire world fell apart as she crashed to the ground next to him, bright crimson flowing from her throat.
Shinoto’s mother screamed and Ben Fai launched forward along with his son. They barely moved a foot before a column of flame engulfed them with a sharp crackle of fire. They cried out hysterically as they burned, their screams rising to a fever pitch before cutting short abruptly as they fell to the ground and died.
The witch then stepped forward, her hands now free of the binding rope. She leered at her handiwork and then looked directly at him. “So this is what all the trouble was about? Doesn’t look like much. Pretty face though.”
Kenji glanced to his side to where Shinoto now lay.
She was still breathing, or trying to, her eyes desperate pools of shock and disbelief. In that moment he saw all hope fade from her soul. She looked every bit the terrified little girl that she was, the headstrong and fearless Shinoto no more. Tears stung his own eyes as the only thing he cared for in the world slowly slipped from his grasp.
Shinoto… How did I cause all this? Why?
His vision darkened.
Movement caught his eye—a small figure running towards him. Xian Lu emerged, weaving between the legs of the barrel-chested man, clutching a length of white rope in his hand. With a blinding flash of Qi, he looped the rope around Kenji and himself.
And then the entire world stood still.
* * *
Kenji stared in bewilderment. Flames twisted and froze as if in a painting. The claws of the barrel-chested man hovered just inches from his father’s head. He looked to Shinoto again and her eyes were fixed staring back at him, frozen in time just like the flames.
Kenji struggled to speak, blood filling his lungs. “Father… h–how?”
“Do not waste your breath with words, Kenji,” his father said in a labored whisper, clutching his side now covered in blood. “There is precious little time for us both.”
Kenji then saw the rope looped around them slowly turning to ash.
Withdrawing a piece of parchment from his robes, Xian Lu began to trace upon it with his finger, creating a glyph with his own blood. Kenji had never seen a script like it before. He recognized the symbol for time but nothing else.
“What’s happening, Father?” Kenji hissed through the pain. “These men—”
“They’re here for you, Kenji,” Xian Lu said without looking up from his script. “The same as that demon.”
“But… why?”
“Because of what you are…”
Kenji’s skin grew numb.
“There is no time to explain. This rope will burn away soon. Whatever you do, you must not let them kill you this time. Do you understand?”
This time? “What do you mean?”
“I cannot change this from happening, Kenji. Time cannot control fate. But I can give a second chance.”
Xian Lu pressed the talisman to Kenji’s chest and began infusing it with Qi. “I can send you back to a few moments before this all occurs.”
Send me back…? “How? How much sooner?”
“I don’t know… a few… minutes perhaps.” Xian Lu hacked loudly, blood spewing from his mouth. “Do not come to the square. Do not try to save us. These men are powerful. They’ll kill you and anyone else who tries to stop them.”
“What do I do?”
“Go back to the house. Take the sacred tomes and destroy everything else. Burn it. The Han arts are unknown outside the Zhou region. You cannot let the Tsu possess them.”
“But how—?”
“You said the Xjian woman protected you and warned you of this attack,” Xian Lu said with a labored wheeze. “I know not who she is or why she came, but she is strong enough to protect you from the ones here. Flee before this occurs and get her to Amatsu. Reviving her is your best hope to survive.”
“But…can’t I save you still? Save everyone?”
“Only as time permits… Go now. Use all I’ve taught you. Take what you can to survive. You must grow strong now, Kenji. The ones that seek you will be more powerful than you can imagine. But always remember who you are…never who you were…”
Were?
“I love you, my son.”
With that, the glyph flashed and Kenji found himself standing upon the boat once more.
Chapter 15 – Second Chance
Kenji blinked. He was on the boat next to Shinoto, Chet Fai standing on the jetty. His knees went weak, his mind reeling to comprehend what had just transpired. Images of the massacre played through his mind. The fire witch, the Dao master, and the man with the iron claws. It all seemed surreal, yet it happened…didn’t it?
He looked towards the village in the distance. There was no smoke rising into the dusk sky. Was he really back? Did his father truly send him back through time?
“Oh,” Shinoto said. “I think I left something, as well.”
Kenji looked to Shinoto as if seeing her for the first time. She was alive. She’s still alive! Relief and joy filled his heart. Images of her dying before his eyes flashed through his mind and he nearly hugged her, but he stopped himself.
If he truly was back, he’d have to think carefully of what to do and say.
He had an opportunity like no other.
A second chance…
“What?” Chet Fai said.
“My rebirthing gift.”
“The apple?” Chet Fai said incredulously.
Shinoto looked to her brother as history replayed itself before Kenji’s eyes. “Can you please get it for me, Chet Fai?”
“How could you be so irresponsible, Shinoto?” Chet Fai said. “Do you have any idea how much that is worth?”
Kenji was beside himself yet again…the words of his father coming back to him. Don’t try to save them. As much as he wanted to… everyone in that square was already dead. He’d witnessed it for himself. Even Chief Wu, a man fabled as the most powerful practitioner in
the village, was slaughtered like an animal.
Shinoto reddened. “I know. Father would probably force me to stay at home if he knew I’d left it. Can you please go for me? Just tell them you came back for something of yours. Please! Don’t let them know I forgot it.”
Chet Fai scowled, but then his eyes shifted with a smirk upon his lips.
“Sure,” he said. “I’ll go get it for you.”
“No, wait,” Kenji said. “I’ll go get it.”
Shinoto glared up at him. “Um… no, Kenji… Chet Fai needs to go.”
She then tried to relay the hidden message to him with her shifting eyes: Stay…Let him go. Get rid of him so we can talk. But she didn’t know where that would lead. That it would lead to getting rid of Chet Fai for good. Kenji had no love for Chet Fai, but he didn’t deserve death. Even if the coward had been willing to give him up to those warriors just moments ago…or moments from now rather. But if he could save him, then at least Shinoto would have part of her family still alive.
More unsettling thoughts plagued him as both Shinoto and Chet Fai stared on.
Who else could he save?
His father said not to go back to the square, that it would be futile. And perhaps so, but he had to try. “No, I’ll get it. I’ll be back quickly.”
Kenji left before Shinoto or Chet Fai could say anything else. Part of him felt guilty as he ran down the path as fast as he could. Did they have the right to know what was about to happen? To know that he knew even? But if he told them, surely they’d want to try and stop it, the same as he wanted to now. Would that only cause history to repeat itself?
But they would find out eventually.
They would find out he knew.
Then how would they react?
Kenji ran faster, as if trying to outrun the thoughts racing through his mind. Perhaps he was making a mistake. Or perhaps it was more an act of mercy. He recalled the way the hope faded from Shinoto’s eyes as she bled out before him. Perhaps he’d be sparing her from the pain of that massacre, of seeing her parents killed. Even now thoughts of it caused his skin to prickle and his stomach to lurch.
Either way, it was too late now. He’d made his decision and time was not on his side.
Kenji reached the fork in the road and found he had another decision to make. In one direction was his home, the other the village. How long ago had Waru left ahead of him? Could he still catch him in time before he reached the square? As he looked to the village, his heart sank. Smoke was already rising into the twilight sky.
He was too late. It had already started.
Curse the fates…
It would truly be only the three of them now—the last of the Han clan. But that was only if he could make it back to the boat in time. Kenji started towards his home to fulfill his father’s final wish. He grabbed a small sack as he entered the kitchen and feverishly went through the books in Xian Lu’s study. Each one was a treasure. History, poetry, lore. But he had to choose quickly and wisely. He could not carry them all. Desperate seconds passed as he quickly read the spine of each book. He secured the three small tomes containing the sacred Han techniques.
Whoever those Tsu men were, they clearly had no idea what secrets this village truly held. Even the Dao wielder mistook Chief Wu and his father for prodigies rather than rebirthed. If rebirthing truly was a secret known only to the Zhou region, then these books were invaluable indeed.
After a few more precious moments of selection, Kenji stuffed two additional books into his sack: Spirit Beasts and Sacred Trees of the Artisan Valley and Record of Tsu Wars. Kenji hadn’t given much thought to the Tsu. But now that he’d encountered them, he needed to know as much about them as possible.
The last book he picked had no title, but within was his father’s handwriting.
A diary…?
Kenji had never known him to keep one. Perhaps it was something else. But just knowing it was something Xian Lu had produced, made it all the more valuable to him. Whatever it might be.
Returning to the kitchen, Kenji retrieved a smoldering coal from the hearth and threw it upon the deerskin rug on the floor. It caught alight and then he left the house quickly, running to the shed. Choosing what to take here was far easier.
He would take everything he could.
Starting with the ropes, Kenji cut a healthy length of each color, around ten feet each. He then secured some of the rarer dye materials: dragon’s blood, Campher fruit seeds, and lamia scales. Finally he filled the sack with as much rebirthed fruit as he could find: three small pears and two oranges. Not as much as he’d hoped. The bulk of the harvest was already surrendered to the grey robes, but this would at least give them a means to barter wherever they would go. He was about to leave the shed to set it alight from the outside when he remembered something else.
The golden rope…
He climbed to the top shelf and secured the small spool in his sack. He still didn’t know what it was for, but its value was undeniable. Remorse then filled him as he pulled a burning piece of lumber from his home and set the shed alight.
“What the blazes have you done, lad?”
Kenji’s heart jumped.
“Waru?” he turned about, overjoyed to see the old man standing behind him. “You’re here!”
Waru looked at him as if he were mad. “Did you burn down the house?”
Kenji ignored him and crushed the old man in his arms. “I can’t believe it’s you! You came back!”
“I saw fire,” he said, returning the embrace awkwardly.
Thank the heavens…He had made the right choice, after all. He would have perhaps never caught up with Waru, but he’d seen the flames instead.
Waru placed a hand atop his head in disbelief as he started at the house now fully engulfed. Heat poured off of it like a furnace and Kenji could not help but think of his father once again. His childhood home…gone like everything else.
“What happened?” Waru said.
Kenji was about to speak when the village bell tolled in the distance. Waru turned about. Behind him, the flames from the village now licked into the sky as well.
“An attack!” Waru said.
Kenji caught his arm before he could go. “No, Waru. We need to leave the village…now.”
The old man furrowed his brows. “What?”
Movement caught Kenji’s eye and he looked up to see both Shinoto and Chet Fai sprinting towards them with Qinggong. Curse the fates… why did they follow me?
“Kenji, what happened?” Shinoto cried, staring up at the flames.
So his actions had caused them to come as well. Kenji thought back to what his father had told him. Time cannot control fate. Were they all destined to die no matter what he did?
“There’s a fire in the village too,” Chet Fai said. “We need to go help.”
“No, stop!” Kenji shouted. “You can’t go.”
Chet Fai scowled at him. “Who are you to tell me anything, you damn cripple? I bet you’re too scared, but I’m no coward like you.”
Kenji’s blood boiled. Thoughts of Chet Fai selling him out to those Tsu men reeled within his mind. The only coward here is you, he wanted to say. But that wouldn’t help things at the moment.
“If you go there, you’ll die…” he said. And then he looked to Shinoto and Waru. “We all die. I’ve seen it.”
“What do you mean?” Shinoto said, edging closer to him with concern in her eyes.
“This is hard to explain, but… I’ve lived this moment once before.”
Shinoto looked at him with even more incredulity. “What?”
He then explained as best he could the carnage he had seen. The Tsu warriors attacking the village…his family.
“They kill everyone,” Kenji said, his throat tightening. “I saw you die, Shinoto. We were all killed by them.”
The little girl looked pale.
“That’s a stupid lie,” Chet Fai said. “You expect me to believe that? You’re just a coward who can’t f
ight because you have no doma. We have to defend this village. It’s our duty. And we’re strong enough to do it.”
“Wait,” Waru said. “I too have no doma, but even I can fight far better than you. I would heed what Kenji says.”
“I can’t just stay here,” Shinoto said, backing away from him. “I have to try and save my parents!”
“Shinoto, wait!” Kenji called after her.
But she was already off and down the road, followed quickly by her brother.
“Curse the fates!” Kenji said. Perhaps what his father said was true, after all. Maybe he couldn’t change this outcome.
“Let’s get after them!” Waru said. “I believe you, lad. Don’t let them enter that square!”
Kenji nodded with a new sense of resolve. No matter what, he wouldn’t let her die again. Kenji took off in a sprint, his heart pounding in his chest for a second time, reliving the memories of the same trek towards the village square. Far ahead of him, Shinoto screamed just as she had before. She clung to Chet Fai’s sleeve, reeling from the headless bodies of Yushiro and his son. This time, Chet Fai was the one to vomit along with his sister.
The pause allowed him to catch up along with Waru.
“No…!” Shinoto cried. “This isn’t real…This can’t be real…”
“Please don’t go any further,” Kenji said, breathing heavily. “If they see you…”
He didn’t want to finish the sentence. Slowly, Shinoto looked towards the square. It was only just visible from where they were, but even from afar they could see the mayhem taking place. They watched for as long as they could. Or could endure perhaps. Kenji’s heart broke a second time as he watched his father slain by the Dao-wielding man, the sword stabbing him through the side. Then Shinoto and Chet Fai both cried out as they witnessed their parents being burned alive by the witch.
Even having seen it already, it was just as horrific, if not more so, to watch a second time. Kenji rested a hand on Shinoto’s shoulder and the little girl buried herself into his side. “My parents…!” She sobbed noisily. “Kenji, my parents!”
“I’m sorry, Shinoto.” He comforted her as best he could. He then looked to Chet Fai. “I’m sorry for the both of you.”
