by Leah Cutter
Iwao had to admit that Masato was a ferocious swordsman. He drove forward as fiercely as a hawk, with just as much subtlety as well. Iwao found himself backing up, adjusting his footing, forced to reckon with Masato and his blunt force.
The attack seemed to take Seiji by surprise. He led Iwao back, one step, then another.
Iwao decided to use his hesitation as another ploy.
Let Masato grow smug. Iwao would take his time.
Masato had underestimated Iwao before, to Iwao’s advantage.
Let it be to Iwao’s advantage again.
Ξ
Seiji whistled through the air as Iwao finally began his offensive attack. It didn’t take long. Only a few steps. Then Iwao was forcing his will on Masato, making the other step back.
Iwao felt Seiji’s joy bubbling up and through him. He maintained a scowl, though. It wouldn’t do to laugh in the face of his opponent.
But really, it was only a matter of time, now, before Masato was beaten.
Again Masato stepped back. Again Iwao pressed his advantage.
Gray clouds remained overhead, filled with rain. Those long summer tears that Masato and his men would cry. Iwao had to bite his tongue to prevent the poetry from spilling out, filled with the joy of the mountain despite the tears of blood that had been shed.
However, when Masato suddenly gave Iwao an opening, he hesitated.
It couldn’t be that easy, could it? Surely it was a trap.
Iwao followed through on his previous attack, following the forms he’d drilled in, not giving Seiji his head.
A laugh echoed over the field, distracting him. It sounded like Hikaru. But he’d left her safely behind, at the estate. Except she’d escaped, hadn’t she?
Iwao shook his head, suddenly confused by her sweet scent washing over him. Despite Seiji’s strength, he felt his own draining from him.
Masato made another mistake. Again, Iwao hesitated, despite Seiji pushing him to attack.
The next time, Iwao vowed. He’d finish this.
However, the next time Masato left his side open, Iwao slipped. His calves burned with the effort of keeping on his feet.
He’d never been that graceful.
Masato, however, didn’t hesitate. Two steps forward, and he was thrusting his sword into Iwao’s armor, at the side, where it was the weakest.
Iwao swung out wildly with Seiji, the blade sliding across Masato’s gloved hand but not biting into flesh.
“You’re mine,” Masato whispered.
Did his eyes have a strange glow? Or was that Iwao’s still fevered imagination?
Hikaru’s sweet laughter echoed through Iwao’s head again.
But strangely, his last thoughts weren’t of her. Instead, he thought of Kayoku, what a warm and steady presence she’d been through his entire life.
And how he’d failed her, as the darkness overtook him.
Eleven
Gleefully I Watched
Hikaru
Gleefully I watched Iwao fall, succumbing to Masato’s superior strength. Though I found the warlord repugnant, a hairy, smelly man without any grace, it was still good to see my lover’s killer fall.
My revenge was complete. Iwao’s estate was gone. The mountain would belong to Masato. Everything Iwao had dreamed of had ended.
I stayed cloaked in stillness and shadow. None could see me. But it was time to claim my prize.
Men fought and died all around me. I now understood why women were barred from such things. It was too awful. I had to remind myself more than once that they were just humans, they would die soon enough anyway.
It was still so unpleasant. The screams and curses. The ferocious way they attacked one another. The smell of blood and death.
I rose from my nest, but before I could take a single step, a man appeared in front of me.
Not an ordinary man. Not a soldier.
A sorcerer. The short, fat, tonsured man who had taken Norihiko’s soul, so long ago.
“Waru,” I declared him. Though he appeared human, his soul was tainted and corrupt. Evil.
He merely chuckled at me, a chilling sound that carried with it the echoes of the battle swirling around us. “Huli,” he declared me, a common enough insult. “It will be my pleasure to take your soul and use it as well.”
Icy fingers touched my shoulders, my knees, and my hands.
Suddenly, I couldn’t move.
I struggled to free myself. The sorcerer’s spell wasn’t complete, I still had some movement in my fingers and toes. If I hadn’t been using so much energy to maintain my human appearance, as well as hiding myself all day, it would have been enough to free myself instantly.
As it was, I would merely have to be patient. I could wiggle out of this trap without gnawing off one of my own feet, I was certain.
I still struggled, to make sure this sorcerer underestimated me.
Just over the sorcerer’s shoulder, Masato reached down and plucked Seiji from Iwao’s lifeless hand.
I howled, loud enough to break through the veils hiding me from those fighting on the hill, stirring them to pull back and leave us to our own battle. Masato seemed startled,
It filled my heart with glee, though, that Masato couldn’t raise Seiji, that the tip of the sword insisted on dragging on the ground.
My love had judged Masato unworthy.
In just a short while I’d free him.
The sorcerer chuckled again. “You killed an innocent man, you know.”
“It was you who killed my love,” I told him, rage filling me.
“True,” the sorcerer said. “But I didn’t create the sword at Iwao’s bidding. The poor, dead mortal. Such a shame that even so brief a life was cut short, unnecessarily.”
The words were spoken in such a mocking tone. They filled me with unease.
“I created the sword for its current wielder,” the sorcerer added. “And it was Lord Taiga who exchanged his life for the right to wield the sword. The son never knew how Seiji had been created.”
I didn’t want to believe this odious man. But his words didn’t have the taint of lies.
Had I been as rash and willful as Etsu always accused me of being? Had I caused an innocent man to be killed?
I couldn’t consider that now. I had to stay focused on my nemesis.
“Ah well,” the sorcerer said with a sigh when he saw Masato’s struggles. “Obviously I didn’t beat enough of the will from Seiji when I made him. No matter. I will use your soul instead, create another, better masterpiece.”
“You will not,” I told him. I couldn’t side step the hold the sorcerer had on me.
But my kind is wily.
I merely disappeared.
“Why…” The sorcerer spun around in place. “How did you do that?” he asked, plainly.
I laughed. I couldn’t help it. Maybe I wanted to show off a little as well. “You may be strong, sorcerer, but your magic is unnatural, like your long life. You’re still a mortal,” I added, touching on what I guessed was his sorest spot.
I hadn’t moved. I threw my voice around.
But that damned sorcerer turned his head directly toward where I still stood.
“I’ve still caught you,” he said, drawing closer.
I shrank away. The stench of limestone and ash clung to him. I wiggled harder. It really was just a matter of time before I’d be able to escape.
Time I no longer had.
The sorcerer pulled a box out of nowhere. It was square, wooden, and gave me chills.
I hadn’t been close to Norihiko when his soul had been stolen. But I somehow recognized this box. It had carried his soul.
And if I didn’t escape soon, it would carry mine as well.
Ξ
I struggled to free myself from the sorcerer’s spell. The battle had moved down the hill from us, the men frightened by my growls and hisses. Still it raged, the sounds of men dying all around us spurring me to greater struggles.
But the damned Taoi
st, Junichi, I’d learned, was a stronger magician than any I’d encountered. He had unnaturally lengthened his life with the souls of others. Now, those other souls fueled the trap I was caught in.
I could still wiggle my fingers. I was actually able to turn my wrists. However, that was all the movement I’d managed.
Plus, every time I thought I’d be able to break free, Junichi threw something at me. The arrows from a nearby attack suddenly whizzed out of the air, striking me. It wasn’t enough to damage me, not really, not with the magical protection I’d already set into place.
But I had to fight those. As well as get away. And keep an eye on Junichi, who was crafting a spell meant to steal my soul.
I was fortunate I had time. It wasn’t much, less than a quarter of an hour. Though it went against my very nature, I moved slowly, freeing one fingernail’s length of skin at a time. It was hard work, unraveling the tight web encasing me. I wished for a scraper, something I’d seen women using to clean cloth in the fields.
All I had was my wits.
I’d run out of time.
Junichi finished his spell before I was prepared. The knife he held glowed with an evil yellow tint, as sickly as pus from a wound.
I struggled to move. Just a fingertip more! I didn’t even have the solace of joining my love, since his soul was still trapped here.
Junichi drew closer, gloating. “This will merely kill your body,” he explained, holding the awful instrument close enough for me to smell the rotten stench of it, like eggs long since gone bad. “Then I’ll extract your soul. I know what I did wrong last time, with your stupid mate. This time, you won’t drain me as much. Your soul will be a bit more broken than his.”
This gave me hope. Norihiko had fought the sorcerer, drained him. Junichi hadn’t made the perfect sword.
“Are you sure?” I taunted him, even as I increased my efforts to free myself. If I could have run my nails down my skin, scarring myself, I would have, in order to drag this net off myself. “While Norihiko was stubborn and strong, I may surprise you.”
“Your kind should be wiped from the face of the earth,” Junichi said, spitting the words at me.
It made me pause. Had he been enamored once, with one of the kitsune? And turned down? Or was he jealous of our immortality? Or perhaps both? That would explain his hatred.
It made me goad him more. I laughed at him. “You’re just jealous, aren’t you? Poor deluded man. Our lifetimes are natural. We’re born immortal. Something you can never achieve. Not ever.”
With a strangled cry, Junichi lurched forward, slashing down with the horrible knife.
I shrank away, pulling hard at the damned net that held me.
Junichi’s knife went thunk, as if striking wood. His hand bounced back, as if it had struck something and been thwarted.
The amulet my mother had given me throbbed at my neck. She’d said it would help keep body and soul together.
I didn’t know how long the magic would last. If Junichi’s attack had already drained it.
But it gave me another chance.
“Did you think I’d come unprepared?” I asked. I found I could move my shoulders now. With my hands free, I could finally shake myself out of Junichi’s spell. I pulled at it with clawed hands, frantic now. I had to be free.
Junichi stood there with the knife in his hand and a surprised look on his face. “How did you do that?” he asked.
I would have pitied him, given how forlorn he sounded. Obviously, he’d rarely had to struggle often to get what he wanted.
Every moment he paused gave me more freedom.
“I’ll never tell you,” I said simply. And I wouldn’t. Why share that kind of information with an enemy?
“You think you’re so special,” Junichi said calmly while he struck out wildly with his knife, seeking me, trying to destroy me. His hand bounced back again. “But you’re no different than I. Taking an innocent’s life.”
I knew he meant Iwao. “But I thought he’d killed my mate,” I said, trying to excuse myself, knowing I never could.
Not to myself.
“You knew he didn’t. You knew it had to be someone with sorcery,” Junichi accused me.
I knew what he was doing—trying to keep me there, so he could figure out the spell, kill me with his next blow.
What he didn’t realize was the grave danger he was in.
He’d killed my mate. With a snarling growl I finally freed myself from his web. I appeared before him, glowing with rage. I rushed at him, swiping at him with my claws, hoping to catch him.
Junichi slashed his blade at me, luckily missing, as he stumbled back.
It would be a simple matter, really, to drain all his lives from him, lives he’d obtained through unnatural means.
I just had to touch him long enough to do it.
“You will not escape me,” I growled at him. “Or my revenge.”
I couldn’t believe that he laughed at me. “The taking of a life is more complicated than you realize,” he said. “I doubt you, a mere woman, can do it.”
His words struck a chord with me that I hadn’t realized was there.
I’d dreamed of this day, of my revenge, for so long.
But I’d never dreamed of killing the killer myself. Of forcing the life from a body with my own two hands. It had always been by someone else’s blade, or by his own hand, that the dirty sorcerer met his end.
I hesitated.
Junichi surged forward, blade raised high.
I wasn’t about to find out if my mother’s amulet would protect me again. I sidestepped him, slipping into shadows.
Maybe I could get closer to Junichi now. Maybe I could touch him, drain him, if I stayed in the shadows.
Or maybe he’d kill me instead.
I wanted him dead. I wanted the sorcerer who had killed my mate punished.
But the kitsune have never believed in acting in violence, not unless we were completely trapped.
I was free.
I found myself continuing to slide away, slipping from one shadow to the next, off the hill, away from the men still battling for a leader who was long since gone, away from the heavy clouds and rain soon to come, going deep into the forest on the mountain.
Junichi couldn’t follow me. I’m not even certain my own sisters would have been able to. I had a wild side, deeply in tune with nature.
I didn’t hide in shadows that everyone could see. Instead, I used the deep mysterious places that only the kami of the mountain could use. Those hidden holes of magic that weren’t of this world, but of that other place.
I drifted as the rain spattered the leaves, listening to the quiet birds and the winds singing to the rocks. How could I have failed? How could I have turned my back on the killer of my love?
No matter what hatred Junichi may have for women or my kind, he was not right. I knew my mother had killed one of her lovers, instantly, when he’d turned violent. Aunts, too, had killed before. I, possibly, would be able to kill in such a circumstance.
However, this wasn’t the same. It was a matter between me and my soul.
In the end, I knew that I could not kill. In the heat of passion, perhaps. But not deliberately, in cold blood.
My mother would be aghast. Perhaps Etsu would understand, not so Cho. Perhaps even my darling Norihiko would turn his back on me for having reached such a conclusion.
I would see the sorcerer dead. It just couldn’t be by my hand.
Ξ
Of course, I couldn’t stay hidden in the deep places of the mountain, adding my tears to the late spring rain.
I had to find my love. Norihiko, still encased in the sword. And steal the sword back from Masato.
It was easier than I expected to slip into Masato’s camp. The battle had finished maybe the day before, maybe two days. I didn’t know how long I’d been mourning.
Men were seeing to their wounds, or quietly celebrating. I think the spirits that had been compelling them to fight we
re now gone, leaving them unnaturally exhausted.
In addition, some men prepared for the next battle, sharpening swords, fletching arrows, testing bowstrings. Didn’t they realize they’d won? Or had their will been so sapped by Junichi that they knew no other life?
I pitied them more than any human I’d ever met.
Masato’s tent was nothing like Iwao’s. Gaudy red–and–orange banners flew above the black canvas tent, declaring its importance. It had more rooms than a peasant’s hut, though I suspected it just housed Masato. Guards encircled the tent, each standing within arm’s reach of one another.
Was Masato expecting me? Or an invading army?
A large, ornate wheel—one of the symbols of this Buddha—hung outside the tent. I understood the concept of rebirth. Weren’t flowers reborn every spring? But my soul would move on, past this plane, when it was my time to die, no matter what humans believed.
I waited until two of the guards began talking with each other—some kind of bet they had going with one another. Then I slipped through and under the tent, as quiet as a shadow.
Inside was all chaos. My eyes didn’t know what to rest on. Brightly colored pillows lay across every surface. Drapes hung down, dividing the tent rooms into more rooms, swaying with enchanting breezes. Candles and torches gave everything a glow that dazzled me.
It took me a few moments to realize that I’d been standing there, dazed, and unable to move.
Determined, I stepped forward, only to have my attention caught by a charm hanging down from the ceiling of the tent. It took a few more moments for me to shake my head, move away.
After taking a deep breath, I finally realized what was wrong: The inside of the tent was filled with charms, mainly created by Junichi, specifically designed to protect the humans from my kind.
I cursed the sorcerer’s name again, wishing that I was other than I was, and could have merely killed the man.
That wouldn’t have helped, however—his charms wouldn’t have suddenly lost their power. In fact, given the way the sorcerer worked, when he died, he might pour all his remaining power into them.
Before I could take another step into this awful place, Masato came into the room.
He was shorter than I’d thought he would be. Muscular, but with fat, sensual lips and a protruding brow—a lazy man. He wore comfortable, tan robes, the best quality. He’d obviously been relaxing.
