by Jay Kristoff
… not understand …
You don’t need to. If she asks, don’t say anything at all.
… how long will that work …
Yoshi peered through the tiny window, out into the swelling shift and roll of the city beyond. He could hear Jurou counting coin, feel the prickle of Hana’s glare on his skin. The weight of a fistful of iron in the small of his back. The tingling promise of coin in the palms of his hands.
Freedom.
Long enough, my friend.
He closed the bedroom door.
Long enough.
16
UNDERTOW
Three days.
Three days of screaming gales and blinding rain. Of aching muscle and bitter-sharp cold. Of red water and black fear and snow-white knuckles. Three days long. And in the midst of those endless dark hours, there came a single, awful moment that threatened to break Yukiko entirely.
Not the moment she swallowed her last morsels of food, her final mouthful of water. Not tying her hands around Buruu’s neck for fear she might fall asleep and tumble into the void. Not in the wind whipping her across his back like a doll of rags. Not even the complete absence of anything but clouded sky and blood-red ocean, stretching to the brink of every horizon.
It was the moment she realized her best friend in the world was a complete stranger.
She begged him. Pleaded. Screamed into his mind until her nose bled and her head split. He could barely manage monosyllabic replies beneath the rush of blood in his veins, the arousal that spilled into her mind if she lingered more than a moment in his. He was an imposter wearing an all-too-familiar skin, like one of those automated Guild criers, set to a single series of functions.
Storm clouds mustered to the north, glowering black, and as they’d drawn closer, the need inside him had grown worse. The scent was a drug; a curling heat spreading through his system, rushing toward a terrifying high. Yukiko felt some tiny spark of him behind the thunder in his veins, almost extinguished by the absolute need filling every other part of him. And as hours stretched into days, and she hunched shivering and miserable on his back, she’d realized there was a part of Buruu she didn’t know at all.
In days past, she’d only caught glimpses of the animal inside him. Her humanity had leaked through the Kenning from the first time she’d shared his eyes, changing what he was. Even in the darkest hours of their imprisonment, it had tempered the pure, primal edge of him. But now that veil was torn away, ripped to shreds and left drifting in the storm, wings pounding at the air, muscles taut, eyes bright, lungs straining as his heart thrashed against its moorings.
She remembered his promise sailing above the Iishi, the words that warmed her soul.
“I will never leave you. Never forsake you. For you are the heart of me.”
It terrified her, how easily she’d been cast aside. But if the thought made her cry, for its part, the rain did its best to hide her tears.
In the gray, blurry dawn of the third day, she spotted jagged islands in the swell beneath them. Some as big as houses, others no more than slivers. It was as if some great beast lurked beneath the water, mouth open to the sky, baring teeth of dark stone. Toward noon, she spied wreckage; a sky-ship’s remains bent and broken over a small island, Guild kanji on the inflatable. Later, as the sun slunk below the horizon like a kicked hound, she could have sworn she saw the ruins of another sky-ship; heavier, armed for war, more Guild markings scrawled across her balloon. She couldn’t tell if either were the ship they’d followed into the tempest.
These storms would mean death for any cloudwalker crew, Guild or not. What madness drove them up here over and over again?
The wind was a pack of snarling wolves, howls of thunder and teeth of frost. Sleep came in fitful moments—no sooner would she doze off than it would snatch her like a child’s toy, fear flooding her insides as she clung to Buruu for dear life. Lightning intensifying as they flew farther north; dazzling, carpet-bomb barrages that left her comatose, black streaks in her vision, ears ringing in the aftershocks. The rain was a numbing deluge, soaking her lips blue.
On the morning of the fourth day she’d woken from dreams of falling to the sight of islands in the distance. Some were towers, higher than any building, twisting at impossible angles like fingers broken back and forth at every knuckle. Others were flat, squat, as if beheaded by the sword of an angry god. They were made of what seemed to be black glass, glittering like razors as the lightning kissed their edges, veiled in rain and mist.
Buruu, can you hear me? Are these the Razor Isles?
No reply, save the swell of the lust in his mind, the poison of weariness mirroring her own desperate fatigue. The female was close—so close he could taste her. But he could feel her mating time was almost done, scent fading like flowers at the end of spring, and the desperation to find her before she cooled filled every vein, every muscle, every corner of his mind.
Long, cold hours swept by, flying low through the salt-spray sting. At first she thought them a mirage; a fever vision brought on by sleep deprivation and the storm’s relentless assault. But as Yukiko squinted into the blood-red water beneath them, she realized things were pursuing them below the ocean’s surface. Serpentine tails slicing the swell, mouths full of needles gnashing at the waves, spines down their backs like the dorsal fins of deep tuna. Eyes as big as her fist, yellow and slitted like a cat’s.
She’d seen their pictures painted on drinking-house walls, the backs of playing cards, tattooed down the arms of her countrymen. She’d thought them long dead and gone. But then, she’d thought the same of thunder tigers.
Sea dragons.
The beasts were infants by the look, only twice as long as a man was tall. Bright scales, rolling eyes and serrated grins. And though they couldn’t keep pace with Buruu, falling behind and whipping the ocean into angry foam, the very sight of them filled Yukiko with cold terror, enough for her to open up the Kenning and scream into his mind until her nose bled and her whole body shook. And in the end, when he ignored her, when every cry fell on deaf ears, she found herself taking hold of him and squeezing tight, chin and lips slicked with blood at the effort, eyes screwed shut, heart hammering, skull creaking, forcing him to pull away from the surface and the monstrosities lurking beneath it.
Shaking with fear and exhaustion. Sick to her stomach, wind clawing her skin. Obsidian hands reached toward them, looming out of the mist like shadows of the hungry dead. Her throat was parched, teeth chattering as she opened her mouth to the rain. Closing her eyes, she saw lightning flash beyond her skin. And beneath the roaring storm, wind howling between jagged black glass, she heard it.
The faint thunder of beating wings.
Buruu whined; a long, grating ululation, like no sound she’d ever heard him make. Yukiko opened her eyes and caught a glimpse of pearlescence between spires of black glass, off through the lightning-flecked gloom. And for a second all the fear and fatigue and sadness melted away, and all she felt was wonder that the world could make something so magnificent.
Arashitora.
She was like Buruu, but not like him at all. Smaller, sleeker, like an edge of folded steel. A hooked beak, black as the stone around them, eyes of molten honey, ringed with charcoal. Her head was the white of Iishi snow, plumage like a fan of knives running down her throat, wings as broad as houses. They cut the air, blade-sharp, feathers spread like vast, white hands, cupping the tempest as if a summer breeze. She was muscle and fur, light and hard, razored talons as black as night, hindquarters and long tail slashed with thick bands of ebony.
My gods, she’s beautiful.
Buruu roared, but the female seemed already aware of his presence, spiraling up through a thicket of glass. He followed like an iron filing drawn to starmetal, mind alight with her scent, so overpowering Yukiko broke off the tenuous link between them, thrust herself out into cold air and clean rain, her insides shivering with the
strength of his desire.
They twisted through the stone forest, diving and rolling across fangs of gleaming obsidian. She was smaller, faster, and Buruu struggled to keep pace or follow her through the impossible gaps between broken black towers. She led them west, west toward the muted sunset, and Yukiko reached between the rain with the smallest sliver of herself, narrowing her eyes with the effort, almost blinded by the female’s spark.
Hello?
A flash of aggression. Confusion.
Can you hear me?
—WHO?—
Her voice was loud as a thunderclap, honey-warm, edged with a softness like wreaths of blue-black smoke from her father’s pipe.
—WHAT ARE YOU?—
I’m the yōkai-kin on the back of the sex-crazed thunder tiger behind you.
The female banked right, swooping up between two fangs of stone. She shot a quick glance over her shoulder, and Yukiko felt curiosity swell inside her. Beneath it, contempt. Anger. Something approaching hatred.
—YOU RIDE THE KINSLAYER?—
Kinslayer?
—FALSE WINGS?—
Yukiko shrieked and pressed herself to Buruu’s neck as he banked 90 degrees, streaking between two obsidian knuckles. She felt the stone pass inches from her spine, gravity clutching her, praying the knotted obi around Buruu’s neck would hold. She was seconds from slipping off his back when he righted himself, swooped beneath a crooked overhang.
The female was a flash of white through the rain ahead.
Listen, I know it’s probably expected of you to make him work for his supper, but if you could skip the foreplay and let him catch you, I’d really appreciate it. We’ve been flying for four days and he’s about to have a heart attack.
—DID NOT COME HERE TO FIND MALE, MONKEY-CHILD. LEAST OF ALL HIM.—
What’s so bad about him?
—FOOL. KNOW NOTHING. GO HOME.—
Izanagi’s balls, that’s what I’m trying to do!
—TRY HARDER.—
They raced amongst the islands, still weaving west. Yukiko could have sworn the female was toying with Buruu, slowing her pace, letting him creep closer before putting on a burst of speed or maneuvering where he couldn’t follow. She could sense grim amusement flickering across the female’s mind, screeching as they fell behind yet again, but Yukiko worried about Buruu’s metal wings—if Kin’s workmanship would hold up under this kind of punishment.
Across miles of red ocean and black glass. Glittering spray and snarling waves. Nature unleashed in all its callous beauty. And there, with Buruu’s heart straining to its limits, as Raijin thundered his drums, she saw it—an enormous lopsided structure of metal and stone, rising from the ocean on iron legs, crowned with spires of winding copper. Its roof was covered by an impossible machine, all glass tubes and snarled pipes and thick cable, shuddering and pulsing with a glow that wore the color of new lightning. A smaller machine resembling a giant dragonfly with three sets of propeller wings was chained on the ceiling. And running about it, swathed in slick yellow oilcloths, Yukiko saw the tiny figures of men.
Of men.
They were calling. Pointing at her.
What in the name of the gods?
She heard a sudden roar—nothing like stormsong—the shadow of broad wings falling over them both. Tearing her mind from the female’s, Yukiko caught the barest glimpse of burning heat in the Kenning before they were hit; a terrifying impact rattling the teeth in her skull. She felt a flash of pain from Buruu, screamed as she was flung from his neck, clawing the air as she plummeted down through the rain. The water rushed up to meet her, a long-neglected lover with open, bloody arms. She hit the surface like a comet, breath driven from her lungs as a deathly chill reached toward the marrow in her bones.
Akihito had taught her to swim when she was a child; she and her brother Satoru paddling in the stream running by their little bamboo house. But the water there was smooth as crow’s eyes, not cresting in waves as tall as a chapterhouse. Foaming white hammers crashed upon her head, clothes dragging her down, katana on her back heavy as lead. The current drove her toward the crooked building’s iron legs, but it was all she could do to stay afloat, let alone choose a direction. Finally she couldn’t even manage that. The water closed over her head, a suffocating, frozen blanket, driving her below, her last sight the silhouettes of two arashitora clashing in the lightning-bright skies above.
Buruu! Help me!
The current dragged her through an underwater forest as her lungs began to burn; towers of cruel reef snarled with rubbery kelp.
BURUU!
No answer save the roaring surf, the undertow swelling in her ears. She struggled to the last, unwilling to end, clawing dark water in a futile attempt to make the surface. But she didn’t even know which way was up. The ocean pushed into her lungs, salt and cold and black, and as the light died and all became nothing, she felt the grip of water kami come to claim her spirit and drag her before the Judge of the Nine Hells.
Would he weigh her fair? With no one to burn offerings and no ashes on her face?
Would Buruu miss her?
Would Kin?
17
THE SWEETEST POISON
Her lips tasted of strawberries and sweat, warm as spring and soft as Kitsune silk. Wet beneath his fingertips, thighs smooth as glass, a river of glossy black spilling around her face and clinging to dripping breasts. She swayed above him; a long, slow dance in the lamplight, spilling across her contours, down into soft curves and sodden furrows. Soaking all around him, slick and scalding to the touch. She took his hands, pressed them against her, biting her lip and sawing back and forth atop him. Her sighs were the only sound in his world, her heat soaking through to his center. Her hips moved like a summer haze over lotus fields, climbing the mountain as she moaned his name over and over again.
“Ichizo.” Her lips on his own, breathing into his mouth. “Ichizo…”
He cried out as she finished him, arcs of lightning behind his eyes, every muscle afire. She collapsed atop him and lay there for a blissful forever, sweat mingling with his own, flesh slippery against his. He gasped for breath, the sheets beneath them a soaked and tangled mess.
“You…” Ichizo swallowed, “… will be the death of me, Michi-chan.”
A shy grin curled her lips as she rolled off him. Dragging a sheet around herself, Michi sat up on the futon’s edge, picked up the perspiring bottle of rice wine. He watched her profile in the dim light, throat shifting as she drank, a single droplet running down her chin, pooling in the groove at her clavicle. She tossed long hair back from her face, glanced at him with dark, smoky eyes and offered the bottle. He shook his head, collapsed back onto the pillows.
“Truthfully, are you looking to end me and escape?” His heart thundered behind his ribs. “I’m helpless after that, you should get it over with…”
She laughed, small voice husky with liquor.
“I fear I won’t have to lift a finger if you’re late for the council meeting, my Lord.” She slipped back into bed, rested her cheek against his chest. “Your cousin will have you commit seppuku to prove a point.”
“Gods.” Ichizo sat bolt upright. “What time is it?”
“It must be close to Snake Hour by now.”
“Izanagi’s balls!” Rolling from the ruins of the bed, he charged toward the washroom. He cracked a gong, and two serving girls scurried in from the hallway, heads bowed, eyes downturned. “Why didn’t you say something?”
“I did say something.” That same shy, delicate smile. “Ichizo. Ohhhh, Ichizo…”
“Demon woman.” His laughter carried over splashing water. “Two nights in your bed and you’ve bewitched me. I should send for a Purifier, have him cleanse me of your taint.”
“What would be the point, my Lord?” She pulled up the sheets to cover herself, curled beneath them. “When the next night you poison yourself anew?”
Ichizo emerged from the washroom shortly, scrubbed and smelling of lavender.
The servants had slicked his hair into a topknot, arranged a long scarlet kimono upon his shoulders. He sat in front of the looking glass as one of the girls slipped a tall, tasseled hat onto his head, pierced it with long, golden needles. His robe spoke of lavish wealth, the irezumi on his skin was the work of a master inksmith. He stood as the second girl wrapped a silken obi around his waist, and he slipped two ornate chainswords into the folds at his left hip. The daishō had the unmistakable gleam of weapons that had never seen battle, yet he wore them like a man who knew the art of the blade.
At a nod from Ichizo, the servants vanished without a sound.
“Well?” He turned to the girl curled on the bed. “How do I look?”
Michi pulled the sheet down from her shoulders to expose a few teasing inches of skin, staring up at him through kohl-smeared lashes.
“Still hungry…”
“Gods, you do want me dead. How would I court you from the underworld?”
“Court me?” A short laugh. “I believe it’s customary to do that before you bed me, my Lord Magistrate.”
He leaned close and kissed her, tasted salt on her lips, wine on her tongue.
It had seemed foolish at first, to be spending so much time in Michi’s room. But the memory of her kiss on the day they met lingered on his skin, and with all the turmoil at court recently, he supposed a few moments in her company would not be noticed. And so he’d visited each day, watched as she whisked and steeped his tea, eyes drifting up slowly to meet his, gift him with that small, shy smile. Questions about Lady Aisha and the Kitsune girl’s assault had given way to queries about her family, her childhood. And two evenings ago, as he bowed to take his leave, he’d straightened to find her standing only a breath away. Lips parted. Cheeks flushed. Shivering. She had breathed his name, just once, like a prayer.
And he had not been able to help himself.
He smoothed the damp hair from her cheek, caressing her skin softly as he may.