by Zoe Marriott
When I reached the ground, a tear-stained Jack and a pale, tottery Rachel were waiting. They enveloped me in hugs, stroking my hair, patting my back, whispering thanks and comforting words.
After I’d waited long enough to let them feel better, I shrugged them off and dropped the demon’s head and the katana into a pile of rubbish. Then I went to Shinobu.
It was just like my dream. The dream that had shown me his face for the first time.
Blood on his chest. Arms lying outstretched, hands palm up, as if he was waiting for someone to take them. But his eyes no longer reflected the sky. His lips no longer framed my name. He was gone.
I didn’t hold on tight enough. I let him go.
Gently, gently, gently, I eased him off the pole that had gone through his body, wanting him away from the ugly pile of metal wreckage. I fumbled as I tried to lift him. He flopped to the ground and I fell with him, unable to let go.
I clutched his face to my shoulder, burying my nose in his soft, smoke- and pine-scented hair. My body locked into silent, shaking sobs. Tears poured down my face. They made tiny, pattering noises as they landed in his hair and on his neck.
Shinobu. Shinobu. My Shinobu.
The grief was too intense. Too extreme. I knew that. In many ways Shinobu was still a stranger. I had met this man, this boy, less than twenty-four hours ago.
But I had always known him. I had been waiting for him every day of my life. That was why I had dreamed about him before I even realized who he was. Why I had been compelled to take the sword. I had needed to find him and set him free. That was what I had been born to do.
For five hundred years he had been trapped, waiting for me. Now, before he had tasted freedom for a single day, he was dead. He had died saving Rachel, a girl he had never even met. He died because he didn’t want me to have to make that choice, the choice that would have broken my heart.
He died for me.
I would never know how it felt to kiss him. I would never get to work out all the strange, conflicted, frightening things he made me think and imagine and feel. Never hear about his family and help him grieve; never help him build a new life. I had let him slip through my fingers. He was lost in the darkness again. This time for ever.
I didn’t hold on tight enough. I should never have let him go.
Jack and Rachel sat one on either side of me, shocked and upset. I had to move. They needed me. I couldn’t sit like this all night, mourning for this boy, this beautiful boy I’d barely begun to know. Dawn was coming. People would be coming.
I breathed in Shinobu’s smell, rubbed my wet cheek against his hair. Just a moment more. One moment more.
“Mio,” Jack said softly. “Mio, please…”
A tiny, hurt whimper choked from my mouth as I forced myself to loosen my grip on his body. He slumped over my arm. I kept our chests pressed together, hiding the wound that had killed him.
My hand slid round to cup his neck under the heavy fall of his hair. The skin of his nape was soft and vulnerable. My other hand crept up to cover his eyes. I was sure if I tried to close them, they would snap open again on their own. I couldn’t bear to see that.
I pressed my lips gently against Shinobu’s. I was shivering with cold, my mouth wet with tears – but his skin still felt faintly warm. I could imagine, almost, that he was only sleeping. That I could feel breath heaving in his chest. That the thick lashes brushing my palm fluttered.
Fingers stroked gently across my check, tucking my hair back behind my ear. Warm, long fingers. Too long, far too long, to belong to Rachel or Jack, who would never have touched me that way anyhow.
Shinobu’s lips opened under mine.
“Is this the afterlife?” he whispered.
I let my hand fall from his face and stared down into his deep, smoky eyes.
This isn’t real.
“No…” I managed to say, my voice breaking. “This isn’t heaven.”
He smiled up at me, a crooked smile of shock and joy and disbelief. There was no filter there, nothing between me and his feelings as he said, “I beg to differ.”
His arms lifted and wrapped around me, clutching me as tightly as I’d held him moments before. He brought our mouths together again. My sobs shook him.
His lips were so warm – so warm as they parted mine. His breath set my cold cheek on fire. Trails of sparks flowed gently down my back in the wake of his hands as they moved to clasp my waist.
Sobs turned into gasps. He drank them from my mouth.
“Shinobu.”
“Don’t cry,” he whispered against my lips. “Don’t cry, my love. My Mio. Always mine…”
He’d never called me that before. Oh God, it was real. It was real.
He was alive.
He was mine.
“I don’t understand.”
Rachel’s bewildered voice broke in like a hammer shattering a window pane. I jolted, and Shinobu reluctantly let me ease back as we both remembered that we weren’t alone. Jack, speechless for once, stared at us in wonder and disbelief. Rachel was so pale that the bruise-like shadows under her eyes looked black.
“I don’t understand,” she repeated. “He died. He was dead. It went right through him.”
It went right through him.
I reached apprehensively for the front of Shinobu’s kendogi. It was soaked with blood with a great ragged hole in the centre, just under his breastbone. But the skin beneath it was smooth and golden, without a scratch.
Something flickered in Shinobu’s eyes and was gone before I could make sense of it. “Well,” he said dryly. “It seems I am not quite human after all.”
Shuffling and stumbling, we made our way out of the central chamber of the old power station and through the tiled outer room. By the time we reached the loading door where we had come in, a soft radiance, completely different from the blazing, unnatural glow of the moon, was beginning to filter in through the skylights. It made the metal barrier look extremely solid.
“Er. Any ideas?” I asked.
I was leaning on Shinobu heavily. At this point he was the fittest of us all. I was too grateful to point out the irony, especially since he was carrying the stone remnant of the Nekomata under his right arm and holding me up with the other. I had the sash back around my waist and the katana shoved firmly into it.
“I suppose I could try to climb up to one of the windows and see what’s going on out there,” Jack volunteered.
“No!” Rachel clutched at her sister’s arm. She hadn’t let go of Jack since we’d started moving.
If the pale light of approaching dawn made the door look solid and intimidating, it made Rachel look practically transparent. I couldn’t even imagine what she must have been through in the time that the monster had her all to itself. She had excellent reasons to want us all to stick together. But Jack was biting her lip, clearly torn.
I was torn too. I wanted out of here. Even more than that, I wanted – needed – to know what had happened to the Kitsune army who had risked their lives to help us.
“I’ll—” Shinobu began.
A deep, rumbling groan of metal cut him off.
The loading door was winching up, dust and dirt spiralling off it and turning to gold as the sunlight spilled into the opening. A slender form ducked under the barrier, a long, white sword in each hand.
Hikaru.
He stared at us all for a second, speechless. Then he grinned.
“Hello, honey,” he sang, putting the swords away. “Did you miss me?”
Jack let out a wobbly laugh. “Not in a million years, hairball.”
“Aw. You’re so mean to me. Did you turn the kitty into roadkill all by yourselves?”
“Mio did,” Jack said. “The rest of us just enjoyed the show.”
Rachel, her wide eyes taking in the white, leather outfit, the swords, guns, and most of all the tail, opened her mouth. But instead of the big-sisterly demand for information that I was expecting, all that came out was a little sigh.
She let go of Jack’s arm and dropped like a stone.
Hikaru darted forward and caught her before she hit the ground, swinging her up into his arms. That was the second time a hunky guy had grabbed her in a matter of hours and she hadn’t been able to enjoy it either time. Her life really sucked.
“Thanks,” Jack said.
“All in a day’s work.”
The door finally finished lurching upwards. On the other side, fifty bruised, bloodied and extremely worn-out-looking Kitsune peered anxiously in at us. At the front, Hiro and Araki – both of whom were sporting brightly coloured bandages which looked like they had come from someone’s fancy kimono – stepped forward into the opening and bowed.
“You have succeeded, Mio-dono. Our people are in your debt,” Araki said. “Name the favour you would ask of us.”
It took me a moment to remember what she was talking about. The king’s promise.
“Can I – um – think about that for a while? If that’s OK? There’s … something I really need to do right now.”
With Shinobu beside me, I picked my way stiffly outside, across the desolate, windswept plain that used to be Battersea’s car park, down to where the land dipped and the river lapped at the concrete barrier.
Wordlessly, Shinobu held out the demon’s head.
It felt a lot heavier now than it had up on the platform. I backed up a bit, took a run and threw the remains of the Nekomata as far out into the water as I could.
It was enough. With a huge splash – bigger than it should have been, really – the head sank.
I stared at the ripples it had left behind.
“And don’t come back.”
The foxes swiftly hustled us away from the site of the battle. In front of the Kitsune, I was determined to support myself on my own two feet, so Shinobu made do with holding my hand tightly. Every time I flicked a glance at him, I could see that beautiful, crooked little smile tugging at his mouth. That, and the occasional casual bump of our shoulders, was enough to keep me walking, despite aching muscles, bruised bones and muzzy head. We didn’t talk much, though.
I had a lot of thinking to do. Like … what was I going to wear? After everything we’d just been through it seemed a strange thing to worry about, but the fact was that I no longer owned any clothes or shoes that would fit me. That was going to be awkward to explain to my parents. And I had to come up with an explanation for the wreckage the Nekomata had made of our kitchen too. One they’d buy without grounding me for the rest of my natural days. Or at least until I was thirty.
Then there was Shinobu himself: a five-hundred-year-old warrior boy who had been plonked down here in twenty-first-century London just in time to save me. He was invisible to most people. He might even be immortal. And I’d fallen head over heels in love with him, and he with me, in less than twenty-four hours.
Finally – most worrying of all – there was this gnawing, bone-deep certainty which echoed through me with every step I took away from the scene of our bloody victory. The knowledge that the fight to keep the katana safe was definitely.
Not.
Over.
Luckily, once I’d laid out each of these unanswerable problems in my head, I realized I was too exhausted to do anything about any of it. So I just smiled back at Shinobu, and swung our joined hands between us, and marched beside him through the sleeping streets of London in the light of the rising sun.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
Usually when I get around to writing my acknowledgements I indulge myself with at least one paragraph in which I complain about everything. How long the book took to write, how the characters never listened to me, and how, yet again, I nearly gave up halfway through and went off to herd yaks instead.
But this time around, I’m stunned to realize that I have nothing to whine about. Despite the fact that this was my first urban fantasy and my first exercise in writing a non-standalone book, The Night Itself was probably the most pure fun I’ve had writing since I left school. I’ve loved every minute of it. It feels like this story and these characters were a gift that the universe lobbed at me, and I was so lucky that my hands happened to be outstretched at the right moment, ready to catch them.
In order to encourage the universe to make a habit of random gift-lobbing, I feel honour bound now to mention all the people who lent their time and talents to unwrapping the present and making sure it got to you readers as swiftly and efficiently as it did.
First, a special thank-you to Nancy Miles, my wonderful agent, who has made being a writer – and making a living from being a writer – easier and less stressful in every way since I had the amazing good fortune to snare her for my own. I can’t imagine what I ever did without her.
Further thanks are owed to:
Annalie Grainger, Wonder Editor, who loved this project from the first, and as usual helped to improve everything I came up with in so many amazing ways that I would have to write another book in order to thank her adequately.
Dr Tina Rath, for quoting the poem The Bedpost by Robert Graves, which was the original spark of inspiration for The Name of the Blade, and Rachel Carthy, whose considerable expertise in Japanese myth and folklore helped me fill in all the puzzling blanks in my knowledge of Kami, Yokai and their mysterious ways. These ladies are both owed additional gratitude for putting up with all the questions from a non-Londoner on the nooks and crannies of their city. Any mistakes or inaccuracies or liberties I have taken with geography are my responsibility alone!
The Furtive Scribblers Club as a whole, who (as always) lent me their simply astonishing cumulative powers of mental acuity and allowed me to bounce ideas off them until they must have felt completely battered. I’m not going to name names this time because I always leave someone out! You know who you are.
The wonderful, wonderful team at Walker Books, including (but not limited to!) the delightful Hannah Love and Paul Black for their PR mojo, Maria Soler Canton for the spectacular cover of The Night Itself – and for putting up with me being a Nightmare Author from Hell throughout the whole process – and, of course, fiction publisher Gill Evans. It’s been an exciting year, hasn’t it?
My Twitter and blogging pals, who responded to the news of this trilogy with such excitement and offered me bags of encouragement, including sternly ordering me off Twitter and back to writing a time or two: Liz D. J., Emma D., Viv D., Lynsey, Sarah, Enna, Jenni, Laura H., Elizabeth May, Daph, Misty, Ashley, Kaz Mahoney, Lauren, Sophie R., Keris Stainton, Keren David, Rebecca J. Anderson, Jackie Dolamore, Lee Weatherly, Sarah Rees Brennan and many more! I wish there was room to list everyone, but even if you’re not named here, I hope you know how thankful I am. Special thanks to the Dear Readers of my blog, the most faithful and intelligent fans a writer could ever have.
Bel Downing, who generously bid in the Authors for Japan charity auction and won the right for her namesake to die horribly at the claws of one of the most evil villains I’ve ever dreamed up. I hope your demise was as satisfying for you to read as it was for me to write!
And, finally, to my own family, most especially my parents. Always, in every book, whether I say it or not.
Love The Night Itself?
Love Zoë Marriott’s other books!
The Name of the Blade, Book Two:
Darkness Hidden is coming summer 2014
Visit Zoë online at www.zoemarriott.com
and thezoe-trope.blogspot.com
Follow her on Twitter, @ZMarriott
PRAISE FOR
THE NIGHT ITSELF
“Japanese mythology meets urban awesomeness (and a swoon-worthy romance!). The Night Itself captivated me.”
L. A. Weatherly, author of the Angel trilogy
“Mio is a wonderful heroine who reminded me of some of my favourite superhero characters, and her connection with Shinobu is touching and believable. The Japanese mythology was refreshing, and I absolutely cannot wait for the next book in the series!”
Karen Mahoney, author of The Iron Witch Tril
ogy and Falling to Ash
“A beautiful, awe-inspiring ride through an iconic London landscape harbouring extremely dangerous secrets. The Night Itself is a fantastic blend of Japanese folk tale and twenty-first-century thriller, populated by characters you will be rooting for at every breathless step.”
Katy Moran, author of Hidden Among Us
“I fell in love with sassy, courageous, wise-cracking Mio from page one.”
Ruth Warburton, author of The Winter Trilogy
Books by the same author
The Swan Kingdom
Daughter of the Flames
Shadows on the Moon
FrostFire
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or, if real, are used fictitiously. All statements, activities, stunts, descriptions, information and material of any other kind contained herein are included for entertainment purposes only and should not be relied on for accuracy or replicated as they may result in injury.
First published 2013 by Walker Books Ltd
87 Vauxhall Walk, London SE11 5HJ
Text © 2013 Zoë Marriott
Cover illustration © 2013 Andrew Archer at début art
The right of Zoë Marriott to be identified as author of this work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, transmitted or stored in an information retrieval system in any form or by any means, graphic, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, taping and recording, without prior written permission from the publisher.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data:
a catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
ISBN 978-1-4063-4851-4 (ePub)