“What good would that do? The Mists of Time do not reach that far.”
“I can still see things without them, you know. I have visions here all the time.”
“Then you can study them here, too. Just like you always have. I’m beginning to regret — ”
“I have to get back there!” she blurted out.
He put down the chopsticks, burped into his fist, and stared at her.
“What is it really about…?”
She averted his gaze. She didn’t want him to know that the real reason why she had insisted on repeating their journey to the Otherworld had nothing to do with Prince Shakushain’s training.
She was too overwhelmed with the new and alien surroundings to notice it on her first visit, but she had clearly felt it the second, and subsequent, times.
Bran.
He was there, somewhere. She sensed his presence, and his thoughts, the way she had sensed them a few times before in the real world, only stronger and more persistent. It was almost as if he was trying to contact her again, but could only do so in that strange world of red dust.
“I felt him too, you know,” Torishi said. She gaped at him in surprise. “Your instinct was right, after all. There is something strange going on. I didn’t believe for a moment that he was sent on any mission.”
“All the more reason to go back! You said you would do all that’s in your power to help me.”
“Out of the question. I can’t protect you alone and Dōraku-sama is not here to help us. Will you be eating those mushrooms?”
“No, you can have them,” Nagomi replied. She stood up from the table grumpily, bowed sharply, and left the room.
The tiny flame flickered in the draught coming through the thin paper walls. The dancing shadows writhed on the floor and the heated floor-boards under the charcoal pot whistled a quiet, wailing song.
Nagomi stuck the thin wooden slats into the ash inside the pot, and put a bowl of warm saké in front of it. She had stolen both from Torishi’s box earlier that day. She didn’t know the songs he sang to his Gods, but she had her own — and she was a priestess. That had to count for something.
She wished she still had her Spirit Light, but having lost two in such a brief time during her adventures, she couldn’t bear risking another one. She hoped the make-shift fire she managed to light up in the bronze pot was good enough.
She started whispering a long, improvised prayer. Last time she had checked, Torishi was fast asleep in his room, but she could never be too careful. She cast some leaves she had picked up in the courtyard onto the flames; the fire belched a mushroom-shaped cloud of dark smoke, and Nagomi erupted in a fit of coughing.
When she cleared her eyes from tears and soot, she saw that the flames had formed into the woman she knew from Torishi’s rituals. She gazed at the priestess inquisitively, and then looked around, as if searching for the bear-man.
“He is not here. Please…” Nagomi offered the bowl. The woman reached for the saké and took a sip. Her stare remained suspicious, but she raised her hands to the ceiling and then vanished. A portal of blue flame appeared in her place. It was small and dark, but large enough for Nagomi to pass through.
The black bear growled at Nagomi, forcing her to step back into the shadow of the torii gate. It would not let her pass any further.
It didn’t matter. She was in the Otherworld again, and again she could sense Bran’s beckoning call. Not knowing how else to respond, she put her hands to her mouth and cried into the air:
“Bran! I’m here! Come quickly!”
Nothing happened. She waited a while and then called him again. Again, the only response was the howling of the wind in the distance.
And then the air grew cooler and something moved in the dirt. The shadows. They appeared out of nowhere, sliding from all directions, surrounding the white shrine. The bear snarled and growled at them, but they would not stop.
Nagomi stepped back. She turned around only to see one of the shadows had bypassed the shrine’s wall and had now wrapped itself across the door. She was trapped outside, and there was no place to run. She ignored the heavy feeling in her stomach and rising panic and prayed to Spirits of this place to bring forward the light that had helped her in the past.
One shadow shot a dark tentacle at her. She cowed, but the missile bounced off the thick hide of the black bear that leapt to her defence. Another shadow crept up from the right, launching a second attack. The bear snapped its maw at it, but its teeth caught only air. The shadows moved too fast. A thin black feeler reached Nagomi’s shoulder; she felt icy cold pain and screamed. She jumped back and tripped. The tentacle wrapped around her leg; a slimy, crushing limb, pulling her beyond the shrine wall. There was nothing for her to grab onto; her fingers scratched at the red dirt in vain.
A familiar whoosh rang out in her ears. A plume of bright fire poured from the sky and scorched the shadowy attacker into dust. Nagomi looked up to see the jade-green dragon circling above the shrine.
“Bran!” she cried. Her heart jumped with joy.
The dragon swooped down, spitting flame, destroying the shadows all around the shrine. Bran leapt off its back in mid-flight, rolled under a shooting tentacle and, rising, cut through the enemy with a lance of bright golden light. With each strike, one shadow perished in a noiseless explosion.
Finally, all the dark creatures were vanquished. Emrys landed on the ground beside the black bear, who growled at it in fear and anger.
She ran up to Bran and for a brief, too brief moment, she held him in her arms, feeling his warmth.
“It was you! I knew it!”
I waited so long for this…
“Yes,” he replied, his voice tired and weak. “I was trying to contact you for days. I almost gave up.”
“Are you hurt? What’s happened to you?”
She let him go and lead him to the shrine wall, where he sat down, breathing heavily. She knelt beside him.
“I am imprisoned by Mori-dono on a small island not far off the Chōfu shore. No, wait,” he raised his hand to stop her from interrupting. “I agreed to that. It doesn’t matter. Today I’m running away — and I suggest you and Satō do the same. If the daimyo learns I’m gone — ”
“Sacchan is no longer here,” she said, “she was sent to the north with the others, to fight some rebels.”
“The north?” He frowned.
“Iwakuni, I think. It’s just me and Torishi left.”
“Then take him and hide somewhere. Or better yet, flee, as soon as this storm ends — somewhere far from that daimyo. Maybe try to reach Satō. I might do the same. I haven’t decided yet.”
He stood up and studied the horizon. “The shadows are coming again. They never really die, just disappear here and reappear somewhere else.”
She stood by his side.
“What are they?”
“I don’t know. I’ve only started seeing them after… after my accident.”
Is it because of what Sacchan did to save him?
“I must go,” he said.
“But…” She caught hold of his hand. “I haven’t seen you in a month… There’s so much I want to — ”
Taking her by surprise, he drew her in, held her tight and planted a kiss on her cheek.
“A week from today,” he said, “I will come here again. Stay safe.”
“I’ll be waiting.”
Just as Bran had enough of waiting and prepared again to mount Emrys, the grey bulky shape of a tired horse emerged from the crashing waves onto the beach.
Dōraku dismounted and unbound a large bundle from the saddle.
“What’s wrong?” he asked, seeing Bran’s face. “You look worn.”
“Never mind that, what have you got there?”
“Yourself.”
He threw the bundle at Bran’s feet and unravelled it from a blanket. It was the body of a boy, roughly Bran’s size, naked and severely bruised. His face was battered out of all recognition.
“That’s your plan?”
“It’s good enough. The daimyo will not be too concerned with details. Now put your clothes on it.”
Bran choked on vomit as he wrapped his yukata around the boy’s slimy torso. As he leaned down to do so, he thought he smelled a faint stench of smoke and leather.
“Is he an Eta?” he asked, turning his head away.
“Probably.” Dōraku shrugged. “That way nobody will miss him.”
“What about his family?”
“An Eta family,” the Swordsman scoffed. “Give me that sword.”
He grabbed the short blade and thrust it into the boy’s belly, then wrapped his cold, stiff hands around the hilt.
“Now hurry up. Something tells me this is the last night of this storm.”
Bran washed his hands in the sea and mounted his dragon. He looked into the sky. The clouds were as dark and dense, and the rain lashed just as sharp against his face as before.
“Where will you go?” asked Dōraku.
“Find Satō, make sure she is safe and apologise for everything.”
“What, and risk being captured again? Why not fly straight back to Chōfu!”
“I’ll be discreet.”
“How will you even know where she is?”
“I know she was sent to a place called Iwakuni.”
That caught the Swordsman by surprise. He raised an eyebrow.
Yes, thought Bran with satisfaction, I don’t need to rely on you to tell me everything.
“And do you think that will not be the first place they will be looking for you?”
Bran rolled his eyes. “Fine, let’s hear your plan.”
“There’s only one place in Yamato where a foreigner can be safe for now, without involving himself in too much trouble.”
“Dejima,” Bran guessed.
“And you already know your way.”
He frowned. He knew Dōraku was playing him again; there was something going on in Kiyō, or in its vicinity, and the Swordsman needed Bran to be there for some mysterious reason. But he was making a convincing point, and if Bran ever decided to fly to Qin, Kiyō was a better starting place than most.
“Very well. I’ll try to make it to Dejima in one piece. I suppose I’ll be hearing from you sooner or later.”
“It’s likely,” Dōraku replied with a smile. “I’m guessing sooner rather than later. Things have begun to move fast in Yamato.”
“What makes you think I want to take part in any of it?”
“You’re here, aren’t you?”
To this Bran found no answer. He sent out a command and Emrys leapt up, struggling against the howling wind and pouring rain.
CHAPTER XIX
Gwen emerged from the wooden tub, water pouring down her naked body in glistening waterfalls. She walked across the grass, past a group of bathing, giggling Yamato women, and welcomed the towel that Dylan handed to her.
“You look… resplendent,” he said, dazzled by the view.
She laughed. “I don’t think that’s the word you wanted to use.”
“Maybe,” he agreed, “but it’s hard to think in these…conditions.”
“It’s nice, isn’t it,” she said, “all this…” She waved her arm at the surroundings.
She leaned back into his arms and looked at Kiyō. The women’s bath on Dejima was set up outside in a small garden next to the kitchens, and it commanded a grand view of the city’s white walls and blue roofs across the bay. She studied it in silence; Dylan noticed her nose wrinkle, as it would every time she was in deep thought.
“What are you thinking about?” he asked.
“How easy it would be to capture this city with our dragons,” she said. “You could control the entire air-space from that hill to the right, and then strike the ships at the harbour…”
He burst out laughing.
“Don’t tell me you haven’t been thinking the same,” she said.
“I have,” he admitted. “This place would make a fine new jewel in the Dragon Queen’s crown. If we brought it to her, she might even forgive us the desertion.”
“You know, I’m glad we came here. Even if it was all for nothing… even if it cost us our dragons.”
They kissed.
“Do you think he’ll come?” she asked when they stopped to catch a breath.
Dylan stroked her arm. “I hope so. Otherwise I’ll have to steal Li’s dragon, and that would really complicate matters.”
“How are they reacting to all this, I wonder?” she pointed to the haze-covered Kiyō. “They’re so cryptic, these Yamato. I can’t tell anything from their faces.”
“I hear the governor of the city tried to kill himself when Li arrived.”
“Kill himself?” she turned to him in surprise. “Why?”
“It’s his duty to protect this bay from foreigners. And he knows he can’t do it anymore. Not against dragons, not against those… underwater ships that the Khaganate had brought.”
And that we missed by just a few days, he remembered. I’d so love to see them. I’ve heard rumours, but the real thing must be amazing…
“So, why didn’t he?” Gwen interrupted his thoughts.
“I don’t know. Something’s changed. The old rules are being scrapped. The Overwizard says they’re going to let them move freely around the city any day now.”
“Oh! I’d love that. The city looks so nice from here.”
“I thought you were only admiring its lack of defences,” he said with a smile.
She sneezed in response; the Yamato women giggled even more. She pushed Dylan gently away and bowed to pick up her clothes, letting the towel slide gracefully to the ground.
They walked back down the narrow lanes of Dejima to their lodgings on the top floor of a pastel-blue house overlooking the vegetable garden. The colony reminded him of the Fragrant Harbour in its beginnings – only even more claustrophobic, if that was even possible.
Two hundred and fifty years of this? He boggled. The Bataavians were a tougher bunch than he had been giving them credit for. Or at least more stubborn.
He heard cries of awe and fear around him, and looked to the sky. The golden Qin dragon was weaving its coils in the air above the bay, glinting in the sun like the water trickling down Gwen’s back.
“Look, he’s flying again,” he said.
Li’s arrival had caused an enormous stir on the island, and, Dylan imagined, even greater on the mainland. As far as he knew, there had never been a dragon in Kiyō before, other than an odd fossil gifted to the local rulers by the Bataavians. Just like in Kagoshima before, hundreds of the city’s inhabitants had fled to the hills at the first sight of the monster — and they were only now slowly returning to their homes as the week moved on and not a tile was blown off the roof by the “vengeful” beast.
The golden dragon turned and swooped northwards, as if chasing something, and disappeared from sight.
“Show-off.”
“Lucky bastard.”
They said these two sentences in unison and laughed, but then Gwen’s face turned wistful.
“Oh, Dylan, I want to fly again.”
“Soon, I promise.”
“Why did you only ask for two extra mounts?”
“Even Edern wouldn’t manage to get more through the Sea Maze on his own. And I couldn’t risk getting anyone else involved.”
She pouted.
“We’ll take shifts,” he promised.
“What about Warwick?”
“Who do you think will fly Nariakira’s dragon?”
The other of the two dragons Edern was bringing had been promised to Shimazu Nariakira in Kagoshima — and Dylan decided he was still going to keep his part of the bargain after all. If his instincts were right — and they rarely weren’t — Shimazu’s friendship had the potential to be worth a lot more than one sm
all mount.
“You knew!”
“I wasn’t buying that ‘hunting trip’ excuse for a minute. And just as I expected, the boy stayed in Kagoshima after all. I guess he got a taste for those little oranges of theirs.”
“Do you think it’s wise to give these people a dragon…?”
“It’s only one mount, how much harm can it do? And I want to keep Nariakira close. He may be a rascal, but it would be great if he was our rascal. When Dracaland finally decides to turn its attention towards Yamato… what is it?”
“Your diplomat self is back,” Gwen smiled. “I haven’t seen him for ages.”
“Yes,” Dylan scratched the scar on his face distractedly, “it feels rather good, I must say. I missed that.”
They reached the pastel-blue house. A Corrie-like servant — a kabout, as the Bataavians called the diminutive race – showed his small, wrinkly face in the corridor.
“Diner word geserveert,” he screeched.
“That means food is ready,” said Dylan.
“I got that.” She walked towards the dining room. “Aren’t you coming?”
He looked to the second floor. He had an odd feeling about the house ever since they came in…
“In a minute, love. I need to get something from upstairs.”
He slowly climbed the rickety, squeaky stair. The door to the small room he had been using as his office was ajar.
Odd, he thought. I’m sure I locked it.
Carefully he creaked the door open, peering inside through True Sight.
Sitting in Dylan’s chair, by Dylan’s desk, was a Western boy, dressed in nothing but a Yamato loincloth, morbidly thin, deeply tanned, scarred, and dripping wet. His face, peering from under a layer of muck and seaweed, with deep green eyes and a sharp, straight nose, was strangely familiar. His name was at the tip of Dylan’s tongue…
“Welcome, Father,” the boy said. “Long time no see.”
THE END
APPENDIX: GLOSSARY
(Bat.) — Bataavian
(Yam.) — Yamato
(Pryd.) — Prydain
(Seax.) — Seaxe
aardse nor (Bat.) spell word, "Earth Tomb"
The Chrysanthemum Seal (The Year of the Dragon, Book 5) Page 30
