by Jay Kristoff
“I said get out. Go! Take No One with you!”
“Are you mad?” the Huntsman growled. “I’m not taking her anywhere.”
“Wait, you think I sold you out?” No One was incredulous.
“This raid is coincidence, then?”
“If I wanted to give away the safe house, I could have just told the bushi’ where you were! I’d have to be an idiot to come here on the day they raided you!”
“Maybe you are an idiot,” the big man said.
A defiant scowl. “Pardon me, Huntsman-sama, but maybe you can kiss my—”
A cry of pain from upstairs, the percussion of running feet. Blades being drawn. Steel on steel. Roared commands to halt in the Daimyo’s name. A flurry of multicolored profanity from Butcher. Gray Wolf slapped the big man on the arm.
“I said get out right now!”
“What about you?”
“I can take care of myself,” the old woman said. “This girl is our only road into the palace. We need her. Make sure she gets away safely, Huntsman.”
The big man cursed, glancing up at the crash of splintering wood, heavy footsteps on the floorboards. Struggling bodies and defiant curses. “All right, come on.”
He grabbed her hand before she could protest, dragged her up the left-hand stairwell and into an abandoned warehouse. Hauling her fast as his limp could take him, through the back door and out into the glare of a rear squeezeway. No One heard breaking glass behind, hoarse screams, a flare of sunburnt light. She felt Daken in her mind, flitting across the rooftops, closing her eye and seeing through his. Bushimen closing in from all directions. Bodies prostrate in the street outside; some lying obediently with their hands on their heads, others bleeding quietly onto broken cobbles. The Huntsman dragged her west along the squeezeway, but she pulled back sharply, shaking her head.
“Not that way.”
“What?”
“There’s too many. Come on.”
The big man paused, reluctant and glacial. But pulling insistently on his wrist, she tugged him back along the thin alley, shrouded in the stink of rat urine. Sleek, furred shapes slunk away at their approach. Empty bottles, human waste, crumpled newssheets. They cut down the crowded brickway, the Huntsman limping hard, No One’s heart slapping the inside of her rib cage as she pulled up her goggles against spears of rusted daylight. Army recruitment posters smeared with white paint; a defiant warning in tall, bold kanji.
ARASHI-NO-ODORIKO COMES.
Out onto a main street, a limping dash across open ground into another alley. Squeezing through the narrow space, knee-deep in refuse, her grip on the Huntsman’s fingers slippery with sweat. Distant shouts. The tune of clashing steel, the thunder of iron-shod boots.
“How do you know where you’re going?” he gasped.
“Trust me.”
On they ran, or ran as best they could with the big man’s limp. His face was twisted, sweat-slick. One hand wrapped in hers, the other pressed to his right thigh, blood seeping through his pants leg. Two blocks later, No One was beginning to think they were in the clear when she heard Daken whisper a warning from above. Moments later, shouts echoed up the street, heavy tread ringing on the cobbles, citizens around them scattering. Two bushimen were charging, naginata spears outthrust, roaring “Halt in the Daimyo’s name!”
The Huntsman cursed, shoulders slumping, pulling his hand from her grip.
“This bastard leg…” he sighed. Unslinging the kusarigama from his waist, he hefted the sickle-shaped blade in one massive fist and nodded to her. “Go on, girl. Best keep running. If you’re the one who sold us out, I pray that Enma-ō feeds you to the hungry dead when you die.”
The big man turned to face the charging soldiers, letting his kusarigama’s chain slip through his fingers, swinging it around his head. With luck he’d take down one soldier before the second skewered him—but there was no chance he’d be walking away alive. No One blinked away the sweat, saw the inevitable outcome in her mind’s eye. The Huntsman sinking to the floor, chest punctured, ribs broken. Running back to her little hovel and little life, cut off from the Kagé as events spiraled out of control …
She squinted at the oncoming soldiers, realized they were raw recruits only a few years older than she. Scarlet tabards over banded breastplates, embroidered tigers, new kerchiefs. Young men, probably brought up on these same narrow streets, drafted into the military with the promise of regular meals and a place to belong.
The Huntsman threw his kusarigama, the weapon wrapping itself around an oncoming spear. The big man jerked the chain, pulling the wielder off balance and into an elbow that landed like falling concrete, snapping the boy’s jaw loose. Swinging the sickle blade, the Huntsman buried it in the bushiman’s neck, sent the soldier spinning away in a spray of red. His comrade roared, furious, thrusting his blade straight toward the big man’s heart.
No One raised a fistful of iron.
The shot was impossibly loud, recoil kicking up her forearm, knocking a frightened cry from her lips. The bushiman clutched his neck, a sticky red flower blooming in his fingers as he spun on the spot, gasping, scarlet gushing as he collapsed on the road in ruins.
The Huntsman was staring at her dumbfounded, a thin wisp of smoke rising from the iron-thrower’s barrel into the breathless space between them.
“If the Great Judge sends the hungry dead anywhere near me,” she gasped, “I’ll kick his privates so hard his throat will have three lumps.”
“Where the hells did you get that?”
… more coming go go …
“Later,” she said. “We have to move.”
The giant stooped, pulled his blade loose with a grunt, wiped the spatter of red from his face on his sleeve.
… friend . .?
No One looked to the rooftop overhead. She could see Daken’s silhouette against the bloody sky, a black shadow upon the eave, peering down to the drenched cobbles below. He saw the dead bushimen and licked his jowls.
Maybe …
“Huntsman, we need to go…”
“I have a flat, north of Downside.” The big man wrapped his kusarigama back around his waist. “It’s a trek, but we can lay low there for a while.”
No One eyed his leg, the bloodstain seeping through the fabric of his hakama. “My place is much closer. Easier to get to.”
“Is it safe?”
“Safer than being out here in broad daylight.”
The Huntsman looked around the street, down at the cooling meat at his feet.
… they coming …
“We need to go,” she said. “If you still think I brought the bushi’ here, ask yourself why I just shot one of them right in front of you. Ask yourself why I don’t blow out your kneecaps now and wait for more to arrive.”
He licked the sweat from his lips. Stared into her eye. Nodded slow.
“All right, then.”
“My name is Hana,” she said. “My real name, I mean.”
In the distance, they could hear running feet. Cries of alarm. The ringing of an iron bell. The big man sniffed, pulled his hat farther down over his face.
“Akihito,” he said. “My friends called me Akihito.”
9
A HEART EXHAUSTED
There weren’t tears enough for her grief.
All around her, she could hear the voices of the bamboo kami, the spirits in the stalks swaying with the gentle wind. The little girl stood by her brother’s grave, bloodshot eyes and sodden cheeks, Lady Sun filling the clearing with hateful, dappled light. The spirit stone on his burial plot was marked with his name, the day of his death and the day of his birth—the same day as hers.
Nine years ago that day.
“Happy birthday, Satoru,” Yukiko whispered.
It had been three months since the snake-strike. Three months since her twin died in her arms. It felt as if a part of her was missing—as if the gods had broken off a piece of her and left it bleeding on the floor. Her mother was lost in grief. Her fa
ther in guilt. But Yukiko? She was lost in the enormity of it all. A world too vast and lonely now that her brother wasn’t there to share it. An emptiness never filled. A hand never held. A question never answered.
“Ichigo.”
Her father’s voice, behind her, calling her by his pet name. She did not turn, simply stared through the tears at the bed where her brother would lay forever.
He knelt beside her on the warm ground, his long hair caught in the breeze and tickling her tear-stained cheeks. He touched her hand, gentle as snowflakes. She turned to look at him then, this man she called father that in truth she barely knew. A tanned and weatherworn face, roguish and handsome. Long moustache and dark hair, just beginning to gray at the temples. Dark, sparkling eyes, always searching.
He’d never been there when they were growing up, forever off on his grand hunts at the Shōgun’s behest. He would return to their little valley every once in a while, spoil them for a day or two, then disappear for months at a time. But he always brought the twins presents. He could always make her smile. And when he would lift her on his shoulders and carry her through the bamboo forest, it made her feel as tall as giants. Fierce as dragons.
“Have you finished packing your things?” he asked.
She blinked, avoided his gaze. She didn’t think it had been settled. She didn’t think her mother would ever agree to it. She thought maybe after her brother …
“We are still going to the Shōgun’s court then?”
“We must, Ichigo. My Lord commands and I obey.”
“But what about Satoru?” she whispered. “He’ll be all alo—”
The sentence cracked along with her voice and she turned her eyes to the grave at her feet. Tears swelled inside her, a choking ball of heat creeping up her throat. The empty yawned all about her, the world too big for her alone.
“I got you something,” her father said. “For your birthday.”
He held up a white box, tied with black ribbon. And if the sight of the sun gleaming on that dark silk made her heart beat a little faster, if thoughts of the countless mysteries that might lay within that box stilled the thoughts of her brother for a moment, she was only nine, after all.
She was only little.
She took the box in her hands, surprised at its weight.
“Open it,” he said.
She pulled at the ribbon, watching the bow fold in upon itself and fall open. Inside the box waited a gift so pretty it stole the breath from between her lips. A scabbard of lacquered wood, black as her father’s eyes, smooth as cat’s claws. Beside it, a six-inch length of folded steel, gleaming in the sun, so sharp it might cut the day in half.
“A knife?”
“A tantō,” he said. “All ladies of court carry one.”
“What do I need it for?”
“It will protect you.” He took the scabbard from the box, sheathed the blade and tucked it into her obi at the small of her back. “In the times when I cannot. And even when I’m not there, I will be with you.”
She felt strong arms around her then, lifting her off the ground, drawing her up into the sky. He said nothing at all, simply held her, rocked her back and forth and let her cry. She put her arms around his neck and held tight, as if he were the only thing to keep her from going under, falling away into the cold and black.
He pressed his lips against her cheek. His whiskers tickled her skin.
“I will be with you,” he said.
He could always make her smile.
* * *
A softness to her edges, satin weight on her eyelids. Her tongue too big for her mouth. The world swaying to a tune she couldn’t quite hear. The room spinning as she opened her eyes.
“You wake,” Daichi said.
Wind kami called down timeworn mountainsides, the spirits playing in the branches of the treetop village outside, bringing the brittle-crisp promise of winter to come. Yukiko sat up slowly, groaning and squeezing her eyes shut once more. The pulse of the entire world beat beneath her skin, the thoughts of every beast, man, woman and child around her, layered upon one another in a shapeless cacophony. She pawed blindly beside her bed, seized the half-empty saké jug, upending it into her mouth. Daichi murmured concern, tried to take the bottle from her hands but she pushed him away, molten fire pouring down her throat, rushing to fill the void inside her.
“Yukiko—”
“Stop, please,” she begged, curling into a ball with her fists to her temples. “Give me a minute. Just one minute.”
The old man sat in silence, legs crossed, palms upturned on his knees. He seemed a statue of some bygone warrior, katana slung across his back—a glacial stillness in contrast to the seething shift inside her head.
To even glance into the Kenning was to look at the sun. To make cinders of her eyes. But she could feel Buruu in there, rumbling beneath it all like thunder on a distant horizon. She reached for him, synapses ablaze—just a touch to let him know she was awake. The saké did its work; black velvet thrown over her head and smothering the noise and heat of the world. She felt it flow her to her edges, a beautiful gravity filling her to her fingernails, dragging the Kenning to some quiet corner in her mind and choking until it could barely breathe.
She didn’t know how long she lay there, curled like a babe in lightless, amniotic warmth. But finally she opened her eyes a sliver, saw the old man still seated at the edge of her bed, concern plain in those steel-gray eyes. He coughed once, twice, as if he’d been struggling to remain silent, wiping his knuckles across his lips. And finally he met her gaze.
“What is happening to you, Yukiko?”
His voice was graveled. Rusted. The muddy rasp of a pipe-fiend, so akin to her father’s for a moment she thought she was dreaming.
“I don’t know.” She shook her head, tongue numb. “I can hear everything. Animals. People. Everyone. Inside my head.”
The old man frowned. “Their thoughts?”
“Hai. But it’s like everyone shouting … all at once. It’s deafening.”
He stroked his moustache, slow and thoughtful. “The cause?”
“I don’t know. My father never told me about this. No one told me anything.”
“I do not mean to cause you alarm…” the old man paused, licked his lips, “but I think you caused an earthquake today.”
She stared at him, jaw slightly agape, blinking slow.
“Do you not remember the ground shaking?” Daichi asked. “Trees shivering like frightened children as you fell to your knees?”
“No.” A hollow whisper. “Gods…”
“Can you not hold it at bay? Control it?”
Yukiko fixed the old man in a bleary stare. The saké was heat in her veins and in her cheeks, pulling her eyelids closed. Legs trembling. Mouth dry. “My father … I think perhaps he smoked lotus to keep it quiet. Liquor seems to dull it, too.”
“That seems a dangerous road to walk. One that does not end in answers.”
“I know it,” she sighed, her tongue clumsy on her teeth. “Truly, I do. I don’t want to hide in the bottom of a bottle.”
“Kaori told me of the birds. The ones who killed themselves against your bedroom walls.”
“Buruu said it was because I was screaming. Inside their heads.”
“And now you say you can hear not just the thoughts of beasts, but of people too?”
Yukiko remained silent, awful certainty of Daichi’s destination building in her gut.
“Leave aside the earthquake for a moment,” he said. “The fact you may shake the very island beneath our feet when you get upset. Think for a moment what else might happen if you lose control again.”
“Are you saying—”
“I say nothing. I simply wonder if next time, it is not birds trying to silence your screams, but people.” The old man gestured around him. “Us.”
“Gods…”
“Indeed.”
Yukiko blinked, cold dread in her belly. She hadn’t even considered the thought �
��
“I don’t know what to do, Daichi,” she breathed, dragging her fingers through her hair. “I have nobody to ask how to control this thing. No teacher. No father. Nothing.”
Daichi steepled his hands beneath his chin, brows drawn together in thought. A long silence passed, his frown growing darker as moments turned to minutes.
“I did not wish to tell you this,” he finally said. “I should have spoken of it after the incident with the birds, but I hoped the matter not as grave as now I know it to be. And in truth, we cannot afford to lose you, Yukiko.”
“I don’t understand…”
“I know where you can find your answers. If answers exist to be found anywhere at all.” The old man coughed, wiped his mouth on his sleeve with a grimace. “A monastery on the isle of Shabishii, far north of here, near the Imperium’s edge. It was said the monks there kept the mysteries of the world inked on their flesh.”
“To keep them secret?”
“To keep them safe. Their order began with the rise of the Tenma Emperors, when the Imperial Censors first started burning ‘indecent’ literature. The monks tattooed themselves with ancient arts and the deepest secrets, that they would not be lost to the Imperium’s hubris. Much harder to kill a living man than incinerate a paper scroll.”
Yukiko raised an eyebrow. “But what happened when a monk died?”
“I do not know.” Daichi coughed again, rubbed at his throat as if pained. “I do not even know if the monastery still stands. I have heard rumor it was destroyed. Others say it is cursed.”
“People say the same about these mountains.”
“Precisely,” Daichi smiled. “I am hoping the Painted Brotherhood may encourage those rumors for the same reason we do. To keep away unwanted eyes.”
“Painted Brotherhood…”
“So they were named.”
Yukiko drew a deep, shivering breath, dragged her knuckles across her mouth. Beyond the saké blur, deep through the haze she’d plunged herself into, she could still hear it. The cacophony. The inferno waiting inside her head.
