Stormdancer

by Jay Kristoff

  “Masaru-san.” Confusion in the Shōgun’s voice, tinged by faint suspicion. “And Captain Yamagata.”

  “Your humble servant, Seii Taishōgun.”

  Yamagata’s clothing was worn and travel-stained, his skin filthy, his hair a bedraggled mess shoved back into a rough tail. He still wore his custom Shigisen goggles, but appeared to have lost his breather, mouth covered instead with a torn strip of gray rag. Masaru was in a similar state, hair and clothing disheveled, his skin smeared with chi smoke and grime. The right lens of his goggles was smashed, cracks spreading out across the glass like a spider web, the kerchief around his mouth drenched in sweat. Both men knelt on the ground, pressed their foreheads into the dying grass at the edge of the path.

  Yoritomo pulled off his breather with a wet, sucking sound.

  “I was not informed that you had set sail back to Kigen.”

  The statement was aimed at the huntsman and cloudwalker, but the Shōgun’s glare was fixed firmly on his chief minister.

  “They informed no one, great Lord.” Hideo’s long, narrowed eyes roamed the backs of the two kneeling men, blue-black smoke drifting from his lips. “They arrived late this afternoon by heavy rail direct from Yama, presented themselves at the palace gates and begged for audience. I brought them here immediately.”

  “By rail?” Yoritomo glanced down at Yamagata, cold and iron-hard. “Where is your ship, Captain-san?”

  “Destroyed, great Lord.” Yamagata’s voice was muffled against the ground. “Lightning struck us in the Iishi. Our inflatable was set ablaze. The Thunder Child fell to her death in the accursed mountains.”

  Yoritomo’s face darkened, muscles at his jaw clenched. He licked once at his lips. A servant materialized at his side as if conjured from the spirit realms, offering a mug of tepid water on cupped palms. The man faded into the background just as quickly when he caught the gleam in his Lord’s eye.

  “You failed to find the beast.” A statement, not a question. “Undone by misadventure before the hunt even began. And now you wish to beg for mercy.”

  “All respect, great Lord,” Masaru kept his tone steady, his fingers pressed into fists. “We did not fail. The beast was found, exactly as you commanded.”

  “You saw it?” Yoritomo’s eyes widened. “It exists?”

  “Hai, great Lord.” Masaru dared a glance up from the ground, pulled the grubby kerchief down around his throat. “I swear it on the souls of my ancestors. The beast exists. And moreover, great Lord, we captured it.”

  A strangled snatch of laughter spilled from the Shōgun’s mouth, spittle flecked on his lips. He stared at Hideo, a bright, brittle joy shining in his eyes, the corners of his mouth drawing upward as if pulled by hooks in his cheeks. He took a step forward, cast his gaze among the courtiers, to his sister, dragging shaking fingers across his lips.

  “It exists.” Another gasp of strangled laughter, longer than before. “Hachiman be praised, it exists!”

  Yoritomo roared, veins standing taut on the flesh of his throat, a triumphant, wordless challenge to the sun sinking toward the horizon. He stomped about in a small circle, grabbed a nearby servant by the cloth at his throat, shaking the little man back and forth until the umbrella dropped from his hands.

  “It exists, you beautiful little whoreson!”

  The Shōgun shoved the servant away, the man tumbling across dead grass and smooth stones, one sandal flying from his foot. Yoritomo seized hold of Masaru’s uwagi, dragged him to his feet, pulling his face close enough that the Hunt Master could see the veins scrawled across his Lord’s eyes. The Shōgun tore the broken goggles from Masaru’s face, chest heaving, laughter caught in his teeth.

  “Where?” Yoritomo’s grin stretched his lips to splitting. “Where is my arashitora, Masaru-san?”

  Masaru took a deep breath, swallowed hard. A bead of perspiration trickled down pale skin. There was pain in his eyes, distant and clouded by lotus smoke.

  “It is dead, great Lord.” His voice was tiny, choked. “The beast is dead. And my daughter with it.”

  The garden was as still as the portraits hanging in the palace halls, as the ancient statues standing among the trees, gray leaves frozen, not a breath of wind. Only Lady Aisha moved, rising up from her seat into a half-crouch, one hand stretching ever so slowly in the direction of her brother. The fire in Yoritomo’s eyes flared and died, breath dragged over a fading smile into strangled lungs. The grip on Masaru’s collar slackened as the Shōgun exhaled, long and ragged, moving his lips at the terminus of breath to frame one trembling word.

  “Dead?”

  A blink, wiping the confusion from his eyes, rage in its wake. Yoritomo hissed through clenched teeth, “How?”

  “The crash, great Lord.” Masaru hung his head, lotus ash caked on dry cheeks, tears swimming in his voice. “They both died in the crash.”

  “We were laid low by the might of the heavens themselves, great Lord.” Yamagata rose to stand beside Masaru, keeping his gaze on the floor, hands clasped behind his back. “The Black Fox brought the arashitora to its knees, chained in a cage of iron on the deck. But Raijin…” The captain shook his head. “The Thunder God grew angry at the conquest of his offspring. Hurled lightning from the clouds to strike the Child’s inflatable. It was an inferno, spreading like we were made of tinder. I ordered the crew to abandon ship. There was no time to save the arashitora.”

  Yoritomo’s glare slipped sideways, over Masaru’s downturned face, coming to rest on the captain. His voice was a whisper.

  “Say that again.”

  A tiny frown creased Yamagata’s brow. “Great Lord?”

  “Say it again.” Yoritomo took one step closer to the cloudwalker. “You ordered the crew…”

  “I ordered the crew to abandon ship.” Yamagata swallowed, pawed beneath his goggles at the sweat burning his eyes. “There was no time to—”

  A hollow boom, thunderous, too close. A rush of air, the brittle crackling of tiny sparks. A sound Masaru would never forget. Yamagata’s head rocked back on his shoulders, the back of his skull popping like an overfull balloon, full of bright red sweets. Masaru flinched away, spattered in something warm and wet. The captain’s body seized tight, rose up on the balls of his feet and tumbled backward like a marionette as the music died. Somewhere in the distance there was a shriek, painted lips muffled by pale, grasping hands. The cloudwalker’s body hit the path, stones washed smooth by the hands of ancient rivers, now washed again in a flood of sticky gray and scarlet. Heels beat a staccato rhythm against the rock, a thin, broken-finger wisp of smoke rising from the shattered lens and bloody mess where Yamagata’s right eye used to be, another drifting from the barrel of the iron-thrower in Yoritomo’s outstretched hand.

  Soft sobbing from the direction of the maple trees. Aisha’s hissed command for silence.

  Masaru swallowed thickly, eyes still downturned, refusing to look at the shattered lump of carrion bleeding on the stones beside him. In the distance, he could hear the sounds of the bay, the Market Square. The churn and growl of sky-ship motors, the reverb of a thousand voices, the song of life swelling beyond these walls. He looked up at the sky, eyes narrowed against Lady Amaterasu’s light burning on the horizon. He thought of his wife.

  His son.

  His daughter.

  The years that had flown by so quickly, the span of days and nights that now seemed only a heartbeat long, just one more heartbeat remaining until it was all over.

  He almost welcomed the thought.

  Yoritomo raised the iron-thrower, leveled it at Masaru’s head.

  “Failure,” he hissed.

  And Masaru closed his eyes.

  22

  DAIYAKAWA

  “Come out here, you lying whore!”

  Yukiko sat upright, blinked in the steam. The candles had burned low, dim shadows playing on the bathhouse walls, pale wax pooled at their feet. The shout had come from outside, Kaori’s voice, shattering the evening hush. Had it been aimed a
t her?

  Buruu?

  MONKEYS ANGRY. CARRYING STEEL.

  She closed her eyes and looked through Buruu’s, feeling their muscles tense, their claws digging into the branch below, aggression flaring out along their veins. Kaori stood before them, a cadre of twenty men behind, Isao holding a struggling Kin. The boy looked sickly pale and terrified: eyes bruised, flesh blistered, unsure of where he was, or who these people were. Only certain of the blade at his throat.

  Yukiko leaped from the bath and threw on her clothes, hair clinging to her skin like seaweed. She drew her tantō and dashed barefoot into the muted evening light. Buruu was on his feet, wings spread in a show of threat, broken sparks of electricity skirting his feathers and making the shadows dance. Yukiko took position beside him, his wings at her back. Arms spread, knife in hand, wisteria perfume strung across the twilight. She could feel the anger in him, the rumbling deep inside his chest. When she spoke, the word almost emerged as a growl.

  “Kaori?”

  “You must think us idiots, eh? Troublesome little firebugs without a brain between us?”

  “Kaori, what are you talking about?”

  “Just deckhands on a sky-ship, hai?” Kaori’s lips were peeled back from her teeth. “You and your little friend here?”

  “I never said he was a deckhand.” Yukiko frowned, narrowed her eyes.

  “You never said you served the Shōgun, either,” Kaori hissed, spittle on her lips. “And yet you wear the imperial sun on your shoulder. Is Yoritomo so arrogant that he brands his infiltrators before sending them up here to spin their little webs?”

  Yukiko swallowed, instinct bringing her hand up to her tattoo.

  Oh, no.

  WE SHOULD KILL THEM.

  They’d cut Kin’s throat.

  ACCEPTABLE.

  “Yukiko, who are these people?” Kin asked, voice feeble, face twisted in pain.

  “Let him go, Kaori.” Yukiko took a step forward, white knuckles around the grip of her tantō, bloodless cheeks and flashing eyes.

  “You really think me an idiot, don’t you?” Kaori laughed. “I let this boy go, your beast tears us to pieces. How did you pressgang it into Yoritomo’s service? Its kind is almost extinct because of your Shōgun. Is it blind, or merely stupid?”

  “He doesn’t serve the Shōgun.”

  “It serves you,” spat Isao. “And you serve Yoritomo.”

  “I’ve had this tattoo since I was nine years old. That doesn’t make me a spy.” She raised the knife, Buruu’s growl filling the air. “Now, let my friend go.”

  “Your friend, eh? Then perhaps you can explain this?”

  Kaori tore away the fluid-soaked bandages around Kin’s chest and throat, exposing the black bayonet fixtures studding his skin. The boy moaned in agony, his face pale as death.

  “What the hells are these? They reek of the Guild’s hand.”

  Yukiko sighed inwardly, licking her lips.

  Be ready for anything, Buruu.

  “He’s an Artificer.”

  There was a murmur of outrage among the assembled men. Kaori drew her wakizashi, the sharp sound of polished steel ringing out across the treetops. Isao grabbed Kin by the neck and delivered a savage kick to the back of his legs, forcing him to his knees. The long, razored knife sat poised above the boy’s throat.

  “Say the word, Kaori. I’ll gut this pig right here.”

  “No, don’t!”

  Yukiko took another step forward, and several of the men turned on her, weapons ready. The arashitora stood up on his hind legs and bellowed, wings cracking at the air. The atmosphere became tinged with a faint static electricity, the hairs on everyone’s flesh standing rigid. A flock of groggy sparrows spilled from the leaves and tumbled off into the night, squawking an angry protest. The men backed off a few steps, palms sweating on the hafts of their weapons. Nestled inside Buruu’s mind, Yukiko could feel the power radiating across their shoulders, the electricity crackling down their spine and reaching out along their feathers.

  They growled with her voice.

  “Hurt him and we will kill you all.”

  “What goes on here?”

  The question rang out high and clear across the throng, snow-white wisteria petals falling loose and tumbling into the empty spaces between the cedars. Daichi walked slowly across the footbridge, hands clasped behind his back, Eiko several paces behind. His katana was tucked into his obi, still sheathed, gilt cranes taking wing across gleaming black lacquer. The crowd parted before him, respectful, heads bowed. He drifted between the men and placed a restraining hand on Isao’s shoulder. The boy loosened his grip, but still pressed his blade to Kin’s throat.

  “Daughter, why are there blades drawn among our guests?”

  “Father, this girl is a spy.” Kaori never took her eyes off Yukiko, sword still clutched in her hand. “She wears the Shōgun’s irezumi on her shoulder.”

  Daichi raised his eyebrow and looked at Yukiko, stroking his mustache.

  “A deceiver…”

  Buruu growled again, the report rolling down their spines and landing in each man’s gut.

  “Daichi-sama, Kaori is mistaken.” Yukiko’s words tumbled over each other in their haste to escape. “My father serves the Shōgun, and I wear the imperial mark. But I’m not here to spy on any of you. We crashed in a sky-ship, just like I said. This boy was the Guildsman on board. We had no idea anyone lived up here. Please believe me.”

  “A Guildsman?” Daichi looked down at the boy with hatred. Ice cold. Crystalline.

  “We are not spies!” Yukiko insisted.

  “As for you, I cannot say,” the old man growled. “But this boy is our enemy. His Guild is a rotten sore on the face of this land.”

  “Who are you people?” Kin moaned, voice taut with pain.

  Daichi knelt in front of Kin, glaring into the boy’s eyes. “We are the flame to cauterize your disease. Plant by plant, throat by throat, until you drown in ten times the blood you have spilled for your precious chi.” He hawked a mouthful of phlegm, spat into the boy’s face. “You say the lotus must bloom. We say it must burn.”

  “Burn.” The word was echoed by a dozen other voices. Not raised in anger, but soft with menace, rolling among the gathering like a prayer.

  “I knew it,” Yukiko breathed. “You’re the Kagé.”

  Daichi looked at her, eyes narrowed, as if weighing her on a scale inside his head. He glanced at Buruu, running finger and thumb down through the length of his mustache, his mouth a thin, hard line.

  “We are the Kagé,” he nodded. “We are the clenched fist. The raised voice. The fire to burn away the Lotus Guild, and free Shima from the grip of their wretched weed.”

  “You burn the fields,” Yukiko scowled.

  “We burn more than that.”

  “The refinery fire.” Yukiko searched their faces.

  “The first of many. The Guild’s propaganda machine calls it an accident. But their lies will not shield them much longer. We have infiltrated the airwaves. We have fists in every metropolis in Shima now. Shadows in the Kazumitsu court itself. Closer to the Shōgun than he could ever dream.”

  “People died in that fire.” Yukiko looked around at the crowd in disbelief. “Not just Guildsmen. Innocent people.”

  “Lotus is killing this country.” Daichi stood, hands still clasped behind him. “Choking land and sky, enslaving all it does not outright destroy. Absolute power over the state rests with a single man who rules by fiat, not merit, empowered by an elite that the common man can never join, nor understand. A regime of deception and murder, blood in the gutters, decades of war on foreign shores, all for the sake of more chi.”

  The evening air grew more oppressive, a cloying blanket of sticky tropical heat, slicking Yukiko with sweat. She began to feel very alone, and a long way from home.

  NOT ALONE. I AM HERE.

  “Innocent people,” she repeated.

  “Sacrifices must be made,” said Kaori. “The people of
Shima are addicted to chi. The system will not die willingly, it must be killed. Those enslaved will adapt or perish, like any addict denied his fix. But better to die on your feet than live on your knees.”

  “That’s not your decision to make!” Raised voice, Yukiko’s hands clenched into fists, eyes flashing. “People can decide for themselves!”

  “Can they?” Daichi’s tone was a counterpoint to her own, measured and soft. “Every word they read or hear is Guild controlled. There is no truth, only the reality that the Communications Ministry weaves. When was the last time you heard the wireless tell you about a farmer who went under? A daughter raped by a nobleman whom the law will not touch? A species that ceased to exist?”

  “Well, what about all of you?” she demanded. “You made up your own minds.”

  “Have you heard of the Daiyakawa riots?”

  “… No.”

  “Nor would you if this scum had his way.” Daichi kicked Kin in the stomach, the boy grunting and curling into a ball. “Ten years ago, the Prefect of Daiyakawa province allowed his farmers to stop growing foodstuffs and switch their crops to lotus. It was worth five times its weight in any other harvest, after all. The problem was, the government had designated Daiyakawa a breadbasket province—they had been commanded to grow nothing but rice, according to the administration’s grand design.” Daichi stroked his mustache, scowling. “Such is the state of affairs in the countryside of this nation. A man cannot even choose what he plants in the ground any more.

  “It did not matter to the Shōgun if Daiyakawa’s farmers were forced to tithe so much of their harvest that they could barely feed their families. No matter that their children starved to death surrounded by fields of food. And so, when the farmers saw that there was more money to be made in growing lotus, they decided to claim a slice of that profit for themselves. The Shōgun ordered them to desist, to sow their fields with food again. They rioted, burned the local guardhouse, killed the magistrate. So Shōgun Kaneda and Minister Hideo ordered in the army.