L5r - scroll 04 - The Phoenix

by Stephen D. Sullivan

  "Killing Junzo would be worth it."

  "And you're so sure that you could kill him before a thousand of his minions descend on you? If you are, go ahead and do it. If your mission was to come here and die foolishly, I won't stop you." The mujina folded his arms across his red chest and hung quietly in the air, flapping his batlike wings.

  Tadaka lay silently against the escarpment. Slowly, his weariness slipped away, replaced once more by samurai determination.

  He put away his bow. "You're right," he said. "Getting killed is not my mission."

  He clenched his jaw and, through eyes narrow with anger, watched the great Shadowlands army march out of the gate and into a wide ravine at the castle's base. Ob uncrossed his arms and joined the Master of Earth's vigil.

  For nearly an hour the Shadowlands host streamed forth, a black plague upon a blighted landscape. Finally, the last of them exited the castle, and the great gates thundered shut, locking of their own accord.

  Tadaka and Ob watched grimly as the hind runners disappeared into the gloom of the wide ravine.

  "Hope your rat friend avoids that army," Ob said.

  "So do I," said Tadaka, the cloud of the enemy's evil filling his mind. "I pray the Fortunes will watch over her."

  "How about praying the Fortunes watch over us?"

  Tadaka looked at the mujina and smiled grimly, despite himself. "Your presence here proves the Fortunes are against me."

  "If you think that's funny, your sense of humor must have been corrupted by this place," Ob said. "So, do you have a plan for getting inside ... ?"

  "Not yet," Tadaka said.

  "... because if you don't, I do."

  "You have a plan?" Tadaka asked skeptically.

  "While you slept, I looked around a bit. You might be interested in what I found."

  "It's possible I might," Tadaka agreed. He turned to face his lloating companion.

  "So," Ob said, "do you want my help or not?" The mujina polished his long fingernails against his red chest.

  "Accursed imp!" Tadaka said, his eyes blazing angrily. "If you're here to aid me, do so. Otherwise, vanish back to whatever netherworld you came from. I don't have the time or energy for your games."

  "All right!" Ob said. "No need to shout. If you were thinking of going over the castle walls, forget it. They're guarded and filled with death traps besides."

  "You found a better way in?" "Yep," Ob said with a toothy grin.

  "Well?" Tadaka said. "Out with it!"

  "There's a crack in the cliff wall on the other side of the castle," Ob said. "It's a pretty tight squeeze for you, but it widens out once you get inside."

  "And what's inside?" Tadaka asked.

  "A passageway into the catacombs beneath the fortress."

  "If you're telling the truth, it could be of great help to me," Tadaka said.

  "Why would I lie?" Ob asked.

  "I have no idea," the Master of Earth replied. "I have no idea why you're following me in the first place."

  "A guy gets bored living in the Shadowlands," the mujina said. "In case you hadn't noticed, there's not a lot to do. Before you, I had no one to talk to."

  "Show me the way," Tadaka said.

  Ob flitted ahead, across the ridgeline. Tadaka followed as best he could, scrambling over the tainted rocks, trying to keep out of sight of the castle's guards. The mujina stayed ahead of the shugenja, looking annoyed if Tadaka fell behind.

  By the time they reached the gap in the cliff face, Tadaka was drenched with sweat, and his hands were covered with small nicks and cuts.

  The cleft lay hidden from the castle by a jutting escarpment of black stone. Tadaka frowned. The opening wasn't much wider than his chest.

  "Well?" Ob asked. "Are you waiting for some patrol to come find you? Go in!"

  "You first," the shugenja said.

  The mujina frowned and flitted into the hole. "Happy?"

  Tadaka smiled grimly. He took off his hat and thrust it into the opening ahead of him. Then he squeezed in himself. The cold stone pressed his chest, making it hard to breathe.

  For a moment, panic rose up in Tadaka's gut. Many times he had crawled within the bowels of the earth—but each time, the stone had been his ally. Here, the stone was his enemy. It might snap shut on him any minute, crushing his life out.

  Tadaka fought down the fear and pushed through. True to the mujina's word, the passage opened out a few paces beyond the entrance. Tadaka put his hat back on and inhaled deeply. A smell of decay hung in the atmosphere.

  "Lead on," Tadaka said to Ob.

  The mujina flinched. "To tell you the truth, I didn't intend on going farther. I thought I'd wait for you near the ravine."

  "You said there was a way into the castle," Tadaka said. "Show it to me."

  "I'd rather not, if it's all the same to you. Going farther is pretty dangerous."

  "You're a coward," Tadaka said.

  "And live to tell of it," Ob replied.

  "How do I know you haven't led me into a trap?"

  The mujina looked offended. "Hey! Would I come with you all this way just to see you killed?"

  "Would you?" Tadaka asked.

  "I see your point," Ob said. "I'll go with you a litde farther. Once we get in sight of the catacombs, though, I'm gone. There arc some things a mujina isn't meant to see."

  Tadaka nodded. "Agreed. Thank you."

  "Don't mention it," Ob said, "especially if you're caught."

  The course they followed burrowed wormlike into the tainted rock, twisting and turning, doubling back on itself. Green veins in the rock provided faint illumination. The walls had been worn smooth by water or heat. The unnatural aura of the place made the hair on his neck stand on end. The Master of liarth whispered sutras to calm his nerves.

  The tunnels had a disquieting effect on the mujina as well. Ob fell silent. He glanced about nervously and peered down each passage they came to. Finally he said, "This is it." He waved his small, red hand at an opening in the rock. A dripping sound came from beyond.

  "Best of luck to you," Ob said. "Good Fortunes, and all that, l ime for me to go. If you make it out, I'll meet you on the ridge above the front entrance. Don't expect me to wait forever, though."

  "I won't," said Tadaka. He adjusted his hat, pulled his black hood up tight over his nose, and walked through the opening.

  Ob shrugged and flitted out the way they'd come.

  The catacombs beneath the castle stank with death and decay. Even with his mouth and nose covered by silk, Tadaka had to resist the urge to gag. The stale air stung his eyes, making them water. Niches filled with rotting bodies—some human, some not—lined the walls. Translucent, greenish water dripped from the ceiling and splashed into oily puddles.

  Tadaka reached into the sleeves of his kimono and found some small pieces of jade. The scrapes on his palms burned where the green stone touched him. The Master of Earth ignored the pain and concentrated on his surroundings.

  No sounds came but the dripping of tainted water, no light save the pale green luminescence of the stone. Reaching out with his mind, Tadaka could not feel the good earth beneath his feet, no matter how long he tried. At this point, the taint stretched all the way to Rokugan's living heart.

  Tadaka added two more jade stones to those already in his hands. The gems could instantly become deadly missiles. He ran the stones through his fingers, feeling their smooth, cool surfaces. They calmed his soul.

  He reached out with his mind again. The black rock of the Shadowlands tasted like poison. The jade in his hands almost couldn't overcome it. Tadaka's mind pressed on through tainted rock, searching for the nexus of evil. Through stone and air and iron, he located it. He locked the location in his mind and returned his consciousness to his body. He shivered from the effort.

  He found a jade arrowhead in the folds of his robe. Putting his other stones in his left hand, he held the arrowhead in his right and raised it to his lips. Softly, he whispered instructions to the jade, and t
hen blew life into it.

  The arrowhead spun in his palm, indicating the direction he must travel to reach the evil heart of the fortress. Tadaka set off. The path was quiet and surprisingly free of defenders. Perhaps all the castle's denizens had ridden off to war.

  A sound from a passageway to his right belied that suspicion. Tadaka pressed against the wall and vanished into the shadows.

  A patrol of four heavily armored goblins passed right by him.

  They clattered off down the hall, chattering evilly in their debased language. An urge to kill the foul things welled up in Tadaka, but he forced it down. He consulted the enchanted arrowhead and crept into the passage the goblins had just left.

  It opened out into a wide hallway. The ceiling thrust up out of the rock, iron rafters supporting the black stone. The Master of Earth came to a winding stairway and ascended it. At the top, liis arrow pointed left, down a broad hall. Wary of guards, Tadaka proceeded. The hall passed a great set of double doors. Tadaka's arrow pointed at them.

  The iron doors stood nearly as high as the ceiling—taller than three men—and were carved with fell creatures and the leering faces of demons. No, not carved, formed. The eyes of the doors watched him. The faces studied the Master of Earth with narrowed eyes and sinister expressions. Fortunately, the leering mouths shouted no warning to the castle's master.

  Tadaka put his hands on the door and pushed. The doors didn't open; their iron chilled his hands. A metal serpent slithered down the door's surface and struck at the Master of Earth. Tadaka grabbed the serpent and crushed it against the jade in his hand. The unliving creature writhed a moment before Tadaka pinched it in two. The black metal fell to the floor and dissolved into a pool of noxious slime. A smile crept over the Master of Earth's stern lips.

  Other creatures in the door began to move. Pocketing his jade, he pressed his palms against the doors, one on each side. He spoke a word of power.

  The air sparked, and the doors flew open. Tadaka stepped inside, and the doors slammed shut behind him. The Master of Earth's eyes grew wide.

  The chamber he stood in rose high into the air, iron beams arching overhead like the ribs of a gigantic beast. The room was windowless, and no other doors led in or out. Iron lanterns hung about the chamber at regular intervals. Their red glass panes cast eerie, flickering light about the room.

  Grotesque, twisted statuary decorated the floor. The sculptures depicted people and animals tortured by unseen hands. Perhaps they were once living beings, turned to iron by the castle's evil enchantments. Some of the hideous sculptures had been formed into furniture: a short, black, stone-topped table, a low seat padded with human skin, an obscene chest of drawers .. .

  Niches and vaults lined the walls of the room. Some were filled with skulls, others with vials, still others with the preserved entrails of forgotten beasts. Some held scroll cases, the kanji on them whispering of dark magics.

  None of this attracted Tadaka's attention, though.

  What drew his eyes were the three scrolls on the far side of the room. Green, hellish light surrounded them as they hung in the air, unmoving, at chest height. No stands or pedestals supported them, only arcane magic. The scrolls lay open, ready for inspection by the master of the castle. Their surfaces were cracked and pitted—their heavy silk black, like old leather. Sickly green kanji burned on their surfaces.

  Even from across the room, Tadaka knew he had found Junzo's Black Scrolls.

  the way of air

  Isawa Uona sat on the mountain peak and gazed out over the cloud tops. Fluffy white billows shielded the world below from the Mistress of Air's pale brown eyes. From this height, all of Rokugan looked serene. No wars; no plague; no famine. Peace reigned across the land.

  Uona drank in the tranquillity. She had arrived at the mountain not long after leaving the bloodstained monastery. In her mind, she still saw the fire in Isawa Tsuke's eyes as he held his Black Scroll and bade her good-bye. His mission was complete, and he'd had a good fight. Tsuke took joy in battle. He was easily the most warlike of the Elemental Masters. Even Tadaka, with all his travails in the Shadow-lands, took less pleasure in fighting.

  Combat was a pleasure Isawa Uona didn't share. Yes, she reveled in her power; all of the Elemental Masters did. Yes, she could cause much havoc, but she preferred other avenues of

  expression: calming storms, creating gentle winds for sailing, and of course, flying.

  The Mistress of Air could travel very quickly. When she took flight, rivers, forests, and rough terrain didn't matter. She could not fly constantly, of course; even an Elemental Master's power had its limits. She'd expended quite a bit of energy in the fight at the monastery, and so she'd had to stop three times before reaching her destination, the towering pinnacle known as Narayama— "Mountain of the Ancient Ghosts."

  The mountain was unreachable by normal folk—a phantom seen only fleetingly above the clouds. The Mistress of Air located Narayama quickly on the fourth day of her journey. It lay deep within Rokugan's northern range, Seikitsu sano Yama no Oi. Narayama's icy peak thrust high into the air, its summit curving back down toward its lower slopes. It looked like the immense, beckoning finger of a frozen god.

  Uona soon discovered the hiding place of the Black Scroll she had been sent to fetch. The research she'd done in the Phoenix library gave her good directions. Yet she did not claim the artifact at once.

  Instead, she perched atop the sloping peak and drank in the world below. She sat there for days, perhaps longer, her powers shielding her from the elements and sustaining her through hunger and thirst.

  Though the quest for the scrolls was urgent, she had time before she needed to return home. She cherished that time. The other Elemental Masters would be able to reach her—just as they had on her last journey to a mountaintop. She did not expect any such message this time.

  Tsuke's mission was complete. Isawa Tomo had likely finished his task as well. She had utter confidence in the Master of Water. In fact, she quite liked him—though she would never admit it to his face. Tomo always seemed so happy. Necessity didn't drive him the way it did Tsuke, Tadaka, Kaede, and—yes—even herself. Of all of them, Tomo seemed best to understand the Tao of Shinsei.

  For a fleeting moment, Uona wished her heart held such enlightenment. She pushed the thought aside. Tomo's placidity could also be a weakness. Of them all, he was the one most likely to be content where the river of life took him. Uona did not like the river's current direction.

  The Black Scroll. In her mind, she saw it, encased in ice, in a cave just below the summit of Narayama. What secrets the scroll held! How it might help their people in the war against Yogo lunzo and his dark master! Yet...

  Yet she worried, in a way she could never admit to anyone, even—at times—herself. Did she deserve such knowledge? Could she control such dark power? Could any of them? A frown creased the Mistress of Air's pretty face.

  She felt suddenly ashamed. Surely she had put such doubts behind when she ascended to her lofty position. She was the Mistress of Air, one of the Council of Five—supreme commanders of the Phoenix and the best shugenja in all Rokugan. Such thoughts were unworthy of her.

  How the others would laugh if they suspected her doubts.

  Uona drew a sharp breath. The cold air bit into her lungs. The time had come.

  Standing, she put her foot on the slope and glided effortlessly down the icy peak. She slid along the frozen surface, arms extended to her sides, reveling in the sensation. Her red and gold kimono billowed out like a sail. The wind crept between the silk layers and caressed her body.

  She skidded to a stop, her feet kicking up a spray of ice crys-lals. The sun turned the frozen shards into a glittering rainbow. Before her loomed the ice cave, its depths tinted blue with frigid air. At the limits of her vision rose a sheer wall of ice. In that wall lurked a dark shape—the case of the third Black Scroll.

  Uona stepped into the cave. Her sandalled feet made small puffs of snow as she walked. She passe
d the threshold and entered the blue gloom. Huge icicles, like stalactites, depended from the ceiling; their stalagmite brothers thrust up from the lloor. Uona felt as if she were walking into the maw of some gigantic, frozen beast.

  She wound her way through the icicles to the translucent wall. The Mistress of Air put her hand against the frozen surface and chanted. The wall was riddled with small cracks, fissures that would make her job easier. Howling winds came to do their mistress' bidding.

  Uona manipulated the wailing breezes into the cracks, widening the fissures and pushing the ice apart.

  Suddenly, the wall shattered.

  Uona started, barely able to form a protective barrier around herself as shards of flew. An icy dagger ripped her kimono and traced a line across her hip where the winds hadn't surrounded her quickly enough. Uona bit her lip and ignored the pain. A thousand razor shards fell to the floor.

  Then, something strange happened. Before Uona's startled eyes, the shapes on the floor reformed. Soon a thousand tiny ice samurai surrounded the Mistress of Air. The samurai screamed, a sound like breaking glass, and charged.

  They were on her before Uona fully comprehended what was happening—climbing her kimono, cutting with their tiny swords. Uona shrieked with pain. She tried to brush the diminutive samurai away, but was cut deeply on her right palm.

  The discomfort brought her to her senses. She raised her arms above her head and calmed her mind. The samurai climbed steadily upward, scaling the Mistress of Air as if she were a mountain. Uona summoned the power of the air. Winds howled in anger and rushed to protect their mistress. They encircled her, thrusting the tiny invaders aside and embracing her.

  The small samurai flew away. Many fell to the ground; smashing when they hit. Some were blown out of the cave entirely. They toppled helplessly until they struck the mountain face far below. Those few that remained, Uona crushed under her sandals. She took some satisfaction in the crunching sound the samurai made when they died.

  Uona inhaled deeply and looked down. Her legs and hips were covered with tiny cuts, as if she'd scraped her body against a rocky hillside. The skirts of her beautiful red and gold kimono had been completely shredded. The silk hung in tatters from the obi at her waist. She frowned, wishing brieflythere had been more samurai to vent her anger on.