There was no sign of Remo Williams when the Master of Sinanju reached the shoreline.
The water lay still, regathering at one spot. Chiun drifted down and noticed footprints.
Momentarily he frowned. This was inexcusable. Leaving tracks. Even in loose sand, it was not permitted.
Then Chiun noticed the footprints were pointed in the wrong direction.
Whoever had made them had come out of the water.
Eyes narrowing, he examined them briefly.
The prints lacked heels but were sharply outlined. Shod feet. Not Remo's footprints. He insisted upon Western shoes with heels.
The prints were wet. But just barely.
A person had emerged from the sea. He should have dripped pools of water. There was no sign of such drippings. Only the footprints, which were hollows clotted with shadow.
Turning in place, the Master of Sinanju studied the line of prints. His face frowned, wrinkles bunching.
"Sandal prints," he hissed.
Curiously he followed them with his eyes.
They led into the evergreens. Chiun followed them. Remo could fend for himself. For now.
The trail of shod tracks led into a wild forest, where old trees stood naked and dead, their bark long gone, their knobby boles hard and dry to the touch. They might have been the skeletons of trees, but trees did not have skeletons. Only dead old wood that insects riddled for shelter.
The footprints led into the carpet of fir needles, and Chiun followed them.
They passed a fir tree that was scarred by a fresh notch. Sap was seeping from it. Chiun studied the notch. His face frowned more deeply.
Emboldened, he followed the prints, hands tight to his waist, sandaled feet padding softly. As he walked, he stepped into the very imprints he followed. His sandals fit, nearly perfect. His natural gait followed smoothly. This told him that he pursued a man of roughly his own height and leg length. This made his eyes narrow in quiet anticipation.
Chiun quickened his pace.
Moonlight filtering through interlacing branches made webby patterns on the ground. Chiun avoided the light where he could. It was as instinctive as breathing.
The figure ahead of him made no such effort, Chiun saw as he closed in on it.
The figure was short and thick, his body black and shiny. As he moved, square plates of black material shook and flapped with every step. A helmet covered his squat head, flaring at the back to cover the nape of the neck.
The man strode on with an arrogant purposefulness that the Master of Sinanju recognized.
Chiun decided the proper course of action.
Lifting his voice, he cried, "Nihonjin!"
The figure whirled, setting its black skin plates flapping.
In its hand was a long ebony sword. And under its black helmet, his face lay in deep shadow. Even Chiun's keen vision, amplifying the moonbeams, could not make out the hidden features.
"Chosenjin!" the figure hissed back.
And taking the haft of his sword in both hands, he struck a defensive position, blade held before his face.
Confidently the Master of Sinanju advanced, fists opening, fingernails splaying.
One blade against ten. A sword forged by man against the Knives of Eternity that grew from the deadliest fingers on earth.
It would be no contest.
The sword started forward. It turned to the right, the wrists twisting. A Wheel Stroke. Easily parried.
"Come meet your doom, Nihonjinwa," Chiun hissed.
The sword descended, and the Master of Sinanju stepped in to parry it.
The blade sliced down in a chopping stroke. Chiun's index nail rose to meet it. They clashed, metal encountering horn.
The big black blade was arrested.
His adversary, grunting in surprise and anger, exerted all his strength to force downward the fraillooking nail with its thin supporting finger.
Calmly Chiun lifted his finger as if toying with a great black feather, and the sword, clasped in trembling hands, was forced to relent.
An explosive curse came from the helmeted one.
"You may relinquish your blade when you wish, ronin," Chiun said without concern.
At that, the armored figure jerked back, reclaiming his sword. The blade lifted and swooped down again. It hummed in the air as a fine blade should. But midway though its fall, it went silent.
Chiun's keen ears detected this even as his fingernail rose to block the slicing thrust.
Blade met nail-and passed through!
Chiun recoiled from the contact. It was pure instinct. He feared no blade that he could see. The blade had not been forged that could not be deflected by Sinanju nail.
In that split second of contact, his senses told him this blade had sliced through his nail.
Recoiling, he spun, shifted left, then right, putting distance between his foe and himself.
And lifting his out-thrust finger to the moonlight, he saw that his nail was whole.
It was impossible.
With his own eyes he had seen the blade bite into his precious nail.
But it was whole. Lifting his eyes, Chiun saw that the opponent's blade, too, was whole.
Chiun made a tight face. "Who are you, ronin?"
The foe said nothing.
As he zeroed in on the apparition with all of his senses, the Master of Sinanju realized that his opponent's heart wasn't beating. There was no sound coming from him. No labor of lungs. No gurgle of blood.
Was this a phantom?
Chiun decided to find out.
Placing the toe of one black sandal behind him, he made as if to retreat.
The black plated warrior advanced, naturally assuming timidity on the part of the Master of Sinanju.
Then with a twist of his firmly planted ankle, Chiun sent his silken skirts spinning. His body whirled up in slow spirals whose speed was deceptive.
The retreating toe snapped forward, seeking the helmeted head.
And passed through!
Landing awkwardly because he had anticipated using the recoil of the death blow to land correctly, the Master of Sinanju ducked, feinted and neither felt nor heard the swish of the descending blade.
But the blade did descend.
He saw it as he spun around, hands coming up in a defensive posture. One hand made a fist. The other was crooked like a hawk's talons. He stood ready for anything.
The foe assumed another fighting stance. Chiun recognized that a disemboweling thrust was contemplated. But if the blade had no bite, how could it disembowel?
Chiun struck first.
Tucking his elbow in his ribs, he expelled a gusty breath of air and a perfect punch simultaneously.
The blow drove in true, landing on the chest of the ronin. The defending blade was too slow to parry it. The fist sank into the blackness of the breastplate, and Chiun followed it through, as if through a blackbeaded curtain and not a solid man.
Stepping around on the other side of his foe, the Master of Sinanju whirled to see him slashing empty air with furious strokes. He attacked the spot where his slow senses were telling him the Master of Sinanju should have stood-but where he stood no longer.
Chiun kicked high. His sandals touched but air. He aimed for the boots. They moved, oblivious to his blows. He struck for the backs of the knees to collapse the legs. First the right, then the left, so quickly the blows would land as one.
The foe felt those blows not, and a cold unease grew in the Master of Sinanju's determined breast.
Here was a foe unlike any other. He was a foe Sinanju couldn't vanquish.
Chiun retreated three steps.
The black figure hunkered down to peer all about. His movements were clumsy, for every inch of his body was armored. But he wasn't slow. The speed of his ghostly blade spoke that fact loudly.
"I am here, ronin, " Chiun taunted.
His foe turned, one foot following the other.
The head tilted back, and the face was exposed.
Chi
un almost gasped. There was no face under the samurai helmet. Only a black void in which it seemed alien stars twinkled. The face was flat and featureless and gleamed like polished obsidian.
"I challenged you to a fair fight, ronin," proclaimed the Master of Sinanju.
The adversary seemed to understand. Two-handed, he drew back his ebony blade, cocking it so that the blade lay across-his right shoulder. It was a preliminary movement Chiun didn't recognize. The ronin swung it outward once, twice, slowly, with a measured confidence.
Did he expect Chiun to walk into a swinging twohanded blow? Even if his blade possessed no bite?
Chiun waited warily.
Abruptly the armored arms swung forward. The blade left the mailed fingers. It sailed toward the Master of Sinanju, moving silently, neither cleaving the air nor displacing it.
"You seek to frighten me with your ghost tricks, ronin, " said Chiun, calmly lifting his index finger to block the blow with his nail just in case.
The blade turned twice in the air as it spiraled toward him. Chiun saw it as if in slow motion. There was no threat in this ghostly blade. It held no more substance than a moonbeam.
The blade swung into its third silent arc and intersected with Chiun's upraised nail.
He felt no bite, no impact, no resistance. It would not even be necessary to duck this harmless blade, he told himself.
Just as it passed without cutting through his nail, Chiun sensed an abrupt change.
And in the firred forest of darkness, he screamed in unexpected pain.
Chapter 8
It was easier than Remo thought it would be.
He drifted along the shoreline until he came to the rescue site. Everyone was busy. No one had any time for a casually dressed man whose slim form seemed to melt into the shadows while avoiding the sweeping searchlights as if designed to repel all illumination.
They had a big yellow crane at the water's edge, where workmen were lashing lines to the last submerged car. The crane strained upward, and with a sucking sound the coach came up out of the water, gushing noisy strings of water from every joint and broken window.
They let it hang over the water until it finished draining. All eyes were on this scene. Lights were directed onto the coach, and it was possible to see the interior through the windows. See the tangle of humanity that floated in the sinking water as in a fishbowl that was leaking.
As the water level fell, the bodies settled down to the bottom, moving aimlessly and involuntarily like clumps of dead jellyfish.
Remo checked through the salvage debris that was stacked here and there. Piles of it lay unattended. Baggage. Briefcases. Purses. Knapsacks. Articles of clothing. Even toys.
Remo found Harold Smith's briefcase in the second pile he picked through. There was no mistaking it. Once it had been tan, but decades of wear had aged the skin and darkened it to the hue of an old saddle.
Remo claimed it, looked around to make sure he wasn't seen and, satisfied, started back for the Dragoon.
The case sloshed in his hands, drooling malodorous water. It was heavier than normal but grew lighter with each step.
Far ahead a sound pierced the night.
"Aiiee!"
Remo knew that sound. It was Chiun's familiar cry of anguish, only it had a weird, horror-struck quality now.
Clutching the briefcase, Remo broke into a run. His feet floated across the sand and into brush. From there, he sprinted through the trees. He had no eyes for anything along the way, counting on his ears to take him to the site of the anguished wail.
Whatever it was, Chiun was in trouble.
Deep trouble.
CHIUN BURST OUT of the trees before Remo could reach the exact spot.
The Master of Sinanju clutched one hand. It was wrapped tightly in the wide sleeve of his kimono as if injured.
"Chiun! What is it? What's going on?"
"I am wounded," he said in a thin, disbelieving voice.
Remo dropped the briefcase. "What!"
Chiun danced in place. "I am maimed. I am undone."
"Let me see it. Let me see it."
Chiun recoiled, one hand clutching his muffled wrist. "No, Remo. It is too horrible. The sight will drive you mad."
"I can take it, Chiun. Just let me see it."
Visions of a bleeding wrist stump jumped into Remo's head.
Chiun looked down at his feet. "Where is it?"
"Where is what?"
"We must find it. Perhaps the surgeons of this land can reattach it."
"God, no," said Remo, hearing his worst fears confirmed.
"Do not stand there like a dunderhead. Help me find it."
"Okay. Okay. Where did it fall?"
"Back there." Chiun pointed into the forest with his uninjured hand. The indicating nail gleamed like a blade of polished bone.
Remo swept past the Master of Sinanju, eyes scanning the fir needles. He spotted footprints that looked like Chiun's, but that couldn't be. The Master of Sinanju didn't leave footprints.
"I don't see it here," Remo called hack anxiously.
"Be careful where you step. Do not break it."
"Your hand?"
Chiun's voice grew querulous. "Hand? What are you babbling about, Remo?"
Remo looked up. "I'm looking for your hand-aren't I?"
"No. My hand is still attached to my wrist, as it should be."
And with a nervous flourish Chiun shook off the silk sleeve, exposing his right hand.
Remo looked. Chiun's right hand was a tense fist like a bony mallet carved from aged ivory.
"I don't get it. What happened to you?"
Chiun's face stiffened to a waxen mask. "I cannot bring myself to say."
"Come on," Remo said, approaching. "It can't be that bad. Let me see."
Chiun averted his face, offering his tightly closed fist to his pupil.
Remo took it carefully. He counted the fingers. All four looked intact. The thumb was still there, too.
Carefully Remo unbent them, opening the Master of Sinanju's fist.
"Tell me it is not as bad as it seemed in the first anguished moment of pain," Chiun moaned.
"I don't see anything," Remo said slowly.
"The longest finger. Tell me it is whole."
"It is."
"And the nail?"
"Yeah, it's- Wait a minute. It's gone."
Chiun threw a thin wrist across his forehead. "I am undone. I am shamed. I have been humiliated."
"What the hell happened?"
Chiun dragged his eyes back to his hand. They fell on the stump that was his fingernail. It projected slightly past the finger's tip, but at a slanting angle, not tapered to a point like the rest.
"It will take years to renew," he wailed.
"Well, months anyway," said Remo. "But what happened, Chiun?"
"I cannot say."
"Why not?"
"My humiliation is too great. Do not force the words from my lips. Just find the member that was once part of me."
"Okay," Remo said, relaxing slightly now that he knew Chiun hadn't really been maimed. "Give me a sec."
He found the nail easily enough now that he knew what he was looking for. It lay on the ground, clearly. visible to Remo's Sinanju-trained eyes. In the moonlight it looked strangely white, as if dead.
Remo brought it back to the Master of Sinanju, cupped in one hand.
"Now what?" he asked.
"Wrap in it warm milk," said Chiun.
"That only works with teeth," Remo said.
Chiun hovered over the cupped artifact. "Is there no hope for it, then?"
"Maybe it can be welded back on, but I doubt it."
"I cannot bear the sight of it, detached as it is."
"Maybe Super Glue would work," said Remo.
"I will not stoop to artificial nails to hide my shame. Remo, do the necessary duty for me. I beseech you."
"Do what?"
"Bury the poor thing."
"Bury a fingernail?"
"It is the only correct thing to do."
"We can do that later. Mind explaining how you managed to break this nail?"
"It is a sign that I am growing old and infirm. My Knives of Eternity have grown fragile. Never has this happened before. There is no other explanation. Not even a ronin could accomplish this on his own."
"A what?"
"If you had listened to me, this would not have happened."
"Don't blame this on me. I had to recover Smith's briefcase, okay? I didn't want a maimed rescue worker on my conscience."
"A maimed teacher is acceptable, however?"
"I didn't maim you."
"I told you Japanese were behind this tragedy, but you did not listen."
"Japanese! Where do you get that?"
In the distance a familiar rumble and growling shook the darkness.
Remo turned. "Isn't that-?"
Chiun puffed out his cheeks. "The fiend! To add insult to injury, he is stealing my dragon!"
Remo flashed toward the sound. He broke from the trees in time to see the scarlet Dragoon APC rumbling down the road.
He started after it but Chiun's voice stopped him like a cracking whip. "Remo. Come back. You do not know what you face."
"A car thief. Big freaking deal," said Remo.
Abruptly the Master of Sinanju was in front of him. He blocked the way, his face stiff and cold. "I will not risk your humiliation, too. Your honor must be unsullied if mine is to be avenged."
"What are you talking about?"
The Dragoon continued rumbling away. Remo tensed.
"Stay. I will explain."
His fists clenched tight, Remo wavered between obedience and pursuit. Ultimately obedience won. He let the air escape his lungs and followed Chiun's beckoning finger back into the dense forest of fir trees.
"You see these tracks?" Chiun said coldly.
"Looks like sandal prints."
"They are not," snapped Chiun, who then led him to a scarred fir tree.
"See this?" he asked, indicating a raw notch in the bark.
"Somebody chopped a hunk from that tree."
"It is the unmistakable bite of a katana. Study it well, Remo. For you have never before encountered its like."
In the darkness Remo looked at it from a couple of angles. "Looks like a sword chop."
"Yes. Some might call it a sword. But it is correctly called a katana. "
Remo's brow furrowed. "I don't know that word."
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