by Jay Kristoff
Buruu’s eyes were locked on the snarling nomad, circling to attack again, but he risked a quick, desperate glance as she kicked aside her oversized boots, sloughed off the rainskin. The rope was wrapped around her waist, the knot looped through copper coils as tight as she could make it.
YOU CANNOT DO THIS.
He did the same for me!
I WILL NOT LET—
He saved my life, Buruu! When you couldn’t even hear me screaming for help. I’d have drowned if not for him.
Without looking over her shoulder, Yukiko dove arrow-straight into the seething black. She could feel them in the water around her, spiraling upward in broad, lazy circles, nowhere for their prey to run. Gleaming and slick, eyes of slitted gold, ribbon fins along their flanks and spines undulating in the water at the whim of the thrashing swell.
Forked tongues and razors.
She struggled through the waves, barely able to swim herself. But her dive had taken her most of the way, and a crashing wave got her close enough to throw her arms about Ilyitch’s neck before he sank again. Buruu glanced over his shoulder, roared a warning as a long, serpentine head broke the surface, slowly rising from the water just five feet away. It moved like a cobra, rearing back and spreading the fins at its throat in a broad, shivering fan, dripping salt water and venom. A long, chattering hiss spilled from its needle-lined maw.
BEHIND!
A second dragon rose from the depths, echoing its cousin’s rasp, cutting off retreat. A third dorsal fin sliced in a broad arc around them, all spines and scales and long, smooth lines. Buruu gathered himself on the jagged shore, ready to dive into the waves and stain the ocean a deeper red. But the nomad crashed onto him from behind, the pair falling into a snarling, screaming heap, clumsy as children fighting over a new toy. Buruu bellowed with rage, lashing out with all his strength, tearing and biting in a desperate attempt to break loose from the nomad’s grasp. Knowing he was too far away to help. That it was already too late.
NO! YUKIKO!
Six cold reptilian eyes peered down at Yukiko and Ilyitch, angry hisses spilling through bared fangs. Thunder rocked the heavens, wind shrieking like a wounded oni. Ilyitch closed his eyes, muttering what sounded like a prayer, struggling to remain above the rolling, crashing swell. A blinding arc of lightning reached out across the sky. The largest dragon snarled and swayed, spines at its throat rattling, drawing back and opening its jaws for the death strike.
And Yukiko held up her hand.
Water sparkled on her skin; tiny droplets pooling along the underside of each fingertip before falling back into the ocean around them. The storm held its breath. The rain became a hushed whisper between loving cloud and gentle earth, Raijin stilling his drums with broad, flat hands, time crawling upon its belly for the sheer wonder of it all.
And the sea dragons fell still.
Breath hissing in the caverns of their lungs, venom dripping between translucent katana teeth. They narrowed their eyes, heads tilted, leaning so close she could smell the poison and salt upon their breath, see tiny silver shards amongst the smooth gold in their eyes. They watched her watching them. And they wondered.
Ilyitch clutched the rope connecting Yukiko to the lightning tower. Wrapping his legs around the girl’s waist, he hauled them both toward the shore, desperate, half-mad with fear. The dragons watched them go, snakes before the charmer, swaying to the ocean’s pulse and the music of her mind. Ilyitch reached the island, bellowed at Yukiko. The girl slung her arm about his neck, one hand still extended toward the dragons, staring at them through half-closed eyes. Towering waves crashed against them, battering them on the stone, threatening to drag them down into cold and empty black. And with her holding tight, Ilyitch climbed the sodden rope, teeth gritted, muscle and tendon stretched to tearing, dragging them both from the sea.
The arashitora were still locked together in a screaming, tumbling frenzy. Buruu managed to finally break loose, kicking the younger thunder tiger away with his hind legs. The nomad rolled backward, landing skull first upon shattered stone. Buruu was on his feet in an instant, pounding back toward the island’s rim, eyes alight with panic. He saw Yukiko’s rope taut with weight, sawing across razored shale, coming apart strand by strand.
Two tons of blindside crashed against his ribs, spinning him up onto a sharp outcropping. Shards splintered in the impact, iridescent metal screeching beneath his furious roar. The nomad was on him in a blink, foot planted on his wing. Beak descending toward his exposed throat, shrieking like an oni fresh from the gates of the Nine Hells.
“Stop!”
Yukiko’s roar was louder than the storm above, echoing like thunder. The nomad froze, turned to the girl with a snarl. She lowered her chin, eyes narrowed, dripping floods of seawater onto the stone.
“Don’t you touch him.”
She spoke with lips and teeth and tongue, but her words echoed down the Kenning, swimming in their thoughts as burning, living things. Her hair was a smooth sheet of black draped over one half of her face, single eye glaring between closing curtains. The rain fell upon her skin as if she were stone, trickling down her cheek and beading in her lashes. Stepping forward, the boy splayed and coughing on the rocks behind her, she held up one bloody hand, the other curled into a fist. Trembling, pale and rigid, teeth clenched, a spray of rain from bloodless lips accompanying every word.
“Do you know what I am?”
The force of her bore down on the nomad like deep summer and a noonday sun. Raijin bent double and pounded his drums as if the world itself were ending. The Kenning fairly rippled with the heat of her, voice resounding in the umbra as she took another step forward. The nomad took one step back, cringing low to shattered stone, her words burning in his mind.
“I am a daughter of foxes. Slayer of Shōguns. Ender of empires. The greatest tempest Shima has ever known waits in the wings for me to call its name, and its coming will shake her foundations like the drums of the Thunder God.”
The clouds crashed above her, a halo of lightning playing in the sky over her head.
“I am a Stormdancer. And you will hear me now.”
35
CHILDREN OF THE GRAVE
The door to the apartment burst open, Hana almost screaming in fright. Akihito loomed to his feet as Jurou dragged Yoshi inside, kicked the door shut behind. Both boys were painted bloody, her brother leaning on Jurou’s shoulder, his face agony-pale.
“Gods, Yoshi!” Hana was on her feet, rushing to his side, helping him to his pile of cushions. “What happened?”
“Bar fight.” Wincing, Yoshi peeled back his bloody tunic and emptied a bottle of seppuku onto a vicious cut across his ribs. Hana tore off her kerchief, pressed it to the inch-deep slice, warm and sticky-slick beneath her fingers.
“A bar fight?”
Yoshi nodded, tipping the last of the rice wine into his mouth. “Drunken beggar monk came at me with his prayer beads. Those things are bloody sharp…”
Hana pulled back, hands on her hips. “Yoshi, can you be serious for once in your godsdamned life?”
“Now where’s the sense in that?” He took a moment to catch his breath, looked her new outfit up and down, smiled crookedly. “You scrub up prettier than springtime, sister-mine.”
Hana scowled at the flattery, fingers slick with Yoshi’s blood. She looked to Jurou, the boy obviously panicked, fresh scarlet on his hands, dark, dew-moist eyes wide with new fear. Akihito stood in the corner, silent as tombs, looking back and forth between the siblings. Finally, she turned to glare at Daken, curled atop his customary throne over the windowsill, unblinking.
“Someone tell me what the hells is going on…”
With no answers forthcoming, she reached out into the Kenning. Feeling amidst the local corpse-rats; a quick flight through a dozen sets of eyes within shouting distance of the tenement tower. And there in the distance …
… the distance …
.… a brood of six, gathered on the body of a dead beggar. Her si
blings scattering like lotusflies at the sound of approaching boots. She looked up from her meat, glittering black eyes, fur and whiskers slick with blood. Squealing in anger.
Soldiers. Polarized goggles. Naked steel. And her belly wasn’t even full.
A split-toed boot descended toward her head …
“The rats,” Hana breathed. “Oh shit…”
She looked to Yoshi, his eyes losing focus, growing wide as they met hers.
“Shit’s about the size of it.”
“There’s at least a dozen…”
“Out back maybe. Look in front.”
“What is it?” Jurou asked, glancing between the pair.
“Bushimen.” Yoshi pulled himself to his feet, wincing in pain. “Lots of them.”
“Who says they’re after us?”
“You fixing to wait and find out?”
Daken slipped out through the tiny window, darting across the eaves below and crawling up a downspout onto the roof. Jurou disappeared into their bedroom, returning with four bulging satchels of what could only be coin slung over his shoulders. No time for questions—Hana grabbed Akihito by the hand, and the four were slipping out the door without a backward glance.
Yoshi took the lead, bloody hand pressed to his side, the other on the iron-thrower at the small of his back. Jurou brought up the rear, Akihito second, Hana stumbling between them, eyelid fluttering as she rode Daken’s sight. They avoided the stairwell, padding to the broad rice-paper window at the end of the hall. Yoshi tugged at the swollen wood, and the window gave way with a rust-red groan, opening out onto the three-story drop between the ramshackle tenements. The sun’s scarlet glare was sharp on the cobbles and gutter below, shockingly bright.
Hana crawled out first, clinging to a corroded downspout. She scrambled down spider-quick, Yoshi close behind. Slinging one leg over the sill, Akihito hauled himself out of the window, grasping the pipe with hands as broad as dinner plates. He descended using only his upper-body strength, his good leg scrabbling against the brick. Jurou had more trouble, slipping and cursing his way down the spout, doubled over like a monkey and shimmying down the last twelve feet.
Yoshi gave a soft wolf whistle, whispered up at the other boy.
“Fine view down here. But you might want to up with the hurry.”
“Shut up, you’ll make me fall.”
“I’ll catch you, Princess.”
Jurou managed to scramble low enough to drop to the ground, hitting the concrete and rolling to his feet with something approaching flair. Yoshi gave a small round of applause, pulled his kerchief up over his grin. Upstairs, they heard heavy boots in the stairwell, followed by splintering wood and angry shouts.
“Time to go.” Hana pulled on her goggles.
“Doubtless.”
Yoshi slipped down the exhaust-choked alley on the tips of his toes, the others following close behind. Hana reached out to the nearby corpse-rats again, mind awash with rich gutter-scent and maddening flea-itch. She could still sense a few rogues in the drains out front, but the pack at the building’s flank had scattered when the guards approached. Too few eyes. Too few breaths. Fright drawing her stomach tight, her gums chalk-dry, lips sticking to her teeth.
The quartet stole eastward along one crud-ridden alley, Akihito’s hand wrapped in hers. She glanced at the big man. His face was cold and hard, his kusarigama clutched in one fist, blade glinting in the scorching light.
Her voice was a whisper. “Do you think they’re—”
“Daken seeing anything, Hana?” Yoshi glanced over his shoulder.
“He’s up top.” Hana scanned the rooftops, voice cracking. “The way out front is no good, we’ll have to—”
Yoshi and the bushiman rounded the corner simultaneously, ran straight into each other at almost full tilt. Yoshi’s face bounced off the soldier’s breastplate and he staggered back, hand to nose, cursing up a storm. The bushiman fumbled for his naginata—a long spear with a three-foot blade—bringing the weapon to bear and adopting a front-foot battle stance.
“Halt in the Daimyo’s name!”
Yoshi blinked away tears, the red knuckles he wiped across his nose coming away bloodier. The bushiman was clad in scarlet and black iron, tigers embroidered on his tabard in gold thread. His jaw was set, stance fierce, naginata’s blade glittering and death-sharp.
“Against the wall!” A bark of command. “Now!”
“Corpsefucker, I think you broke my nose…”
“I have him!” the bushiman yelled over his shoulder. “He’s here!”
Hana heard the heavy drum of approaching boots. Metal on metal. Shrill whistles. More soldiers on the way, corpse-rats fleeing into the drains as the bushi’ thundered across the cracking concrete, beggars and lotusfiends scattering.
The bushi’ fixed his glare on Akihito, blade leveled at the big man’s chest.
“I said against the wall, Kagé scum!”
Yoshi blinked. Looked back and forth between the bushi’ and Akihito as Hana’s stomach dropped into her toes.
“Kagé?” A darkening frown. “Wait … you’re here for him?”
Akihito released her hand, stepped forward, a blur of movement, wrapping his kusarigama chain around the bushiman’s spear and dragging the boy off balance. Teeth bared in a silent snarl, he swung his sickle blade upward, burying it beneath the soldier’s chin, punching straight out through the top of his head. More soldiers were rounding the corner as Akihito tore his blade loose, the bushi’s lower jaw with it, and with a howl, the big man waded into the mob.
He slung his chain across one soldier’s face, cleaved a naginata off at the haft. Hana whirled as she heard soldiers behind, three more charging down the alleyway at their backs. The roar of flame above, the girl shielding her eye against the blast-furnace sun as she looked up and saw two Lotusmen alight on the eaves overhead, red eyes aglow, pointing with brass-clad fingers.
“Alive!” one cried with a cicada voice. “Take him alive!”
The shot rang out, shattering the air, bouncing off the narrow walls and making her wince. A bushiman fell with half his face missing, screaming, bloody gauntlets clutching the gaping wound. His comrades ducked for cover back around the corner, cursing as Yoshi fired again, blasting a star-shaped hole through the back of a fleeing soldier and dropping him like a stone amidst a spray of fine red mist.
“He’s got an iron-thrower!”
The acrid stink of burning chemicals filled her nose. Yoshi whirled on the spot and leveled the weapon at the bushi’ behind them, the Lotusmen above them, figures scattering like autumn leaves in a storm wind. Jurou was yelling something, screaming, but the echo of the shots was filling Hana’s head, the sight of the blood, boys no older than she lying dead on the ground, puddles of bright and sticky red, water-thin yellow, howling voices, Yoshi’s face, bloodless and snarling. She was thirteen years old again, the weight on her chest, broken glass pressed to her cheek as she screamed and screamed and screamed.
“I can get them out…”
“Hana, move!” Yoshi roared, pushing her toward Jurou. The boy had peeled back the storm drain cover in the alley’s gutter, was already disappearing down into the dark. She blinked, pulled herself together, Daken’s voice a whisper in her mind—gogogo—as she fell to her knees and crawled into the drain, down into a stinking rush of dark, ankle-deep slush, a pipe of black stone, ten feet wide. She heard her brother snarl a warning to the other soldiers as Akihito dropped down beside her, Yoshi tumbling on top of them a second later. A burst of high-pressure flame rushed in through the drain, Jurou dragging her down into the filth as the fire scorched the air above their heads, Lotusmen shouting, faint and distorted.
Heavy tread.
Ringing steel.
Blurred sunlight spilled down the grubby stone walls, the reek of smoke and shit and old death filling her nose. Jurou had her by the hand and was up and running, splashing, stumbling in the dark, the echoes of their footprints amplified tenfold in the bottomless g
loom. A pain-hoarse cry behind, the whistling song of Akihito’s kusarigama chain in the black. She reached out to the rats above and below, pulling Jurou left through a junction, straight at the next, footfalls and gasping and sweat in her eye, slick on her hands, stink making her gag. Running, running until her breath was fire and her legs shook, until her heart pumped oil and acid and her stomach rolled, cold and churning. Corpse-rats streaming about her, dark and sharp, shit-slicked, dead doll’s eyes piercing the murk ahead.
Footsteps behind them, dozens splashing through the filth, lantern light setting their shadows dancing on the moist black walls. Akihito’s heavy breath, limping tread, grunts of pain. Yoshi stumbling, hand pressed to his bloody ribs. The Lotusmen would have been too big in their suits to follow, but it sounded like half the Kigen army was still back there, metal-clad hounds running swift, fangs bared, tight tight tight on the rabbits’ trail.
She reached out into the Kenning, the tiny minds and tiny eyes and long yellow grins. Turning fear to anger, flooding them with it, the sleek broods and hulking rogues gathered in the quiet, lovely dark—their dark—now filled and fouled with the noise and the reek and the steel of these accursed men. Calling them to her, one by one, looking over her shoulder to her brother, his face pale and blood-spattered, eyes wide, loose tendrils of black hair scrawled like cracks upon his skin.
“Help me, Yoshi,” she gasped.
He swallowed, winced, nodded. Together, entwined, reaching out and calling, pulling, pleading. The flood began with one black droplet, streaking past them with dirty fangs bared. A handful more followed, then a dozen, heeding the call scritch-scratching at the backs of their minds, ringing in the empty behind their eyes, swelling, rising, all mangy fur and tails like lengths of old knotted rope, filth-encrusted claws and mouths bathed in death. Hana heard a soldier cry out, the clang of steel striking stone, more of the mongrel, gutter-born flood flowing past them as they ran on and on and on.
More shouts behind. Screams of pain. No time to stop and listen, to press or to fight. Just to run, to run when every new step seemed an impossibility, when the vomit rose scalding and boiling in the back of her throat to the edge of her teeth, when every muscle wept and screamed, drawn taut and tight and stretched to snapping. Turning blind at every junction, straight, left, left, right, the black stabbed through by occasional blinding light from the drain grilles overhead. Akihito finally gasped, fell against the wall and collapsed into the filth, hands pressed to the weeping wound at his thigh. Yoshi skidded to his knees, blood spilling thick and red and hot from his side down his fingers. Hana on all fours, retching, gasping, weeping, tears on her cheeks as the reek scored her throat.