The Lotus War - Kinslayer Part 12

"She said she couldn't abandon-"

... beware ...

Daken's thoughts flared in the Kenning, dulled with distance, sharp with urgency. She could feel him prowling rooftops to the north, caught a glimpse of the jagged skyline through his eyes, the sun just beginning to crest the horizon as a cruel stink drifted in off the bay.

What's wrong?

... men coming iron clothes many ...

Soldiers?

... yes ...

"G.o.ds." No One glanced around the room, palms sweating. "We have to go."

"What?" Gray Wolf frowned. "What do you-"

"There are bushimen coming. Lots of them. We have to get out of here. Now."

"I didn't hear any lookout sig-"

A brief whistle sounded in the streets above, two notes, faint and sharp. The signal was repeated, closer, drifting down the narrow stairwell.

"Dawn raid..." the old woman whispered.

It seemed to No One the next moment stretched for an age. Gray Wolf and the Huntsman exchanging glances. Faces paling ever so slightly, eyes growing wide. Daken's urgent thoughts pressing on her own-the image of bushimen in blood-red tabards pouring through the alleyways toward the safe house. And all at once, everyone in the bas.e.m.e.nt was moving; s.n.a.t.c.hing up weapons and radio equipment, tearing maps from walls. The Huntsman grabbed No One's arm, looked her hard in the eye.

"Were you followed?"

"Of course not!"

"Are you certain?"

"My lookout saw them before yours did!"

Gray Wolf was directing the other Kage, the old woman's voice calm as a millpond, hard as folded steel. "You all know the protocols. Check your drop boxes for word, speak to n.o.body until you hear from us. Move, move!"

Kage were already scattering up the different stairwells into the neighboring buildings, a few casting baleful glares at No One as they left. The big man was still in her face, anger plain in his eyes. Gray Wolf poked him in the chest to get his attention.

"I said get out. Go! Take No One with you!"

"Are you mad?" the Huntsman growled. "I'm not taking her anywhere."

"Wait, you think I sold you out?" No One was incredulous.

"This raid is coincidence, then?"

"If I wanted to give away the safe house, I could have just told the bushi' where you were! I'd have to be an idiot to come here on the day they raided you!"

"Maybe you are an idiot," the big man said.

A defiant scowl. "Pardon me, Huntsman-sama, but maybe you can kiss my-"

A cry of pain from upstairs, the percussion of running feet. Blades being drawn. Steel on steel. Roared commands to halt in the Daimyo's name. A flurry of multicolored profanity from Butcher. Gray Wolf slapped the big man on the arm.

"I said get out right now!"

"What about you?"

"I can take care of myself," the old woman said. "This girl is our only road into the palace. We need her. Make sure she gets away safely, Huntsman."

The big man cursed, glancing up at the crash of splintering wood, heavy footsteps on the floorboards. Struggling bodies and defiant curses. "All right, come on."

He grabbed her hand before she could protest, dragged her up the left-hand stairwell and into an abandoned warehouse. Hauling her fast as his limp could take him, through the back door and out into the glare of a rear squeezeway. No One heard breaking gla.s.s behind, hoa.r.s.e screams, a flare of sunburnt light. She felt Daken in her mind, flitting across the rooftops, closing her eye and seeing through his. Bushimen closing in from all directions. Bodies prostrate in the street outside; some lying obediently with their hands on their heads, others bleeding quietly onto broken cobbles. The Huntsman dragged her west along the squeezeway, but she pulled back sharply, shaking her head.

"Not that way."

"What?"

"There's too many. Come on."

The big man paused, reluctant and glacial. But pulling insistently on his wrist, she tugged him back along the thin alley, shrouded in the stink of rat urine. Sleek, furred shapes slunk away at their approach. Empty bottles, human waste, crumpled newssheets. They cut down the crowded brickway, the Huntsman limping hard, No One's heart slapping the inside of her rib cage as she pulled up her goggles against spears of rusted daylight. Army recruitment posters smeared with white paint; a defiant warning in tall, bold kanji.

ARASHI-NO-ODORIKO COMES.

Out onto a main street, a limping dash across open ground into another alley. Squeezing through the narrow s.p.a.ce, knee-deep in refuse, her grip on the Huntsman's fingers slippery with sweat. Distant shouts. The tune of clashing steel, the thunder of iron-shod boots.

"How do you know where you're going?" he gasped.

"Trust me."

On they ran, or ran as best they could with the big man's limp. His face was twisted, sweat-slick. One hand wrapped in hers, the other pressed to his right thigh, blood seeping through his pants leg. Two blocks later, No One was beginning to think they were in the clear when she heard Daken whisper a warning from above. Moments later, shouts echoed up the street, heavy tread ringing on the cobbles, citizens around them scattering. Two bushimen were charging, naginata spears outthrust, roaring "Halt in the Daimyo's name!"

The Huntsman cursed, shoulders slumping, pulling his hand from her grip.

"This b.a.s.t.a.r.d leg..." he sighed. Unslinging the kusarigama from his waist, he hefted the sickle-shaped blade in one ma.s.sive fist and nodded to her. "Go on, girl. Best keep running. If you're the one who sold us out, I pray that Enma- feeds you to the hungry dead when you die."

The big man turned to face the charging soldiers, letting his kusarigama's chain slip through his fingers, swinging it around his head. With luck he'd take down one soldier before the second skewered him-but there was no chance he'd be walking away alive. No One blinked away the sweat, saw the inevitable outcome in her mind's eye. The Huntsman sinking to the floor, chest punctured, ribs broken. Running back to her little hovel and little life, cut off from the Kage as events spiraled out of control ...

She squinted at the oncoming soldiers, realized they were raw recruits only a few years older than she. Scarlet tabards over banded breastplates, embroidered tigers, new kerchiefs. Young men, probably brought up on these same narrow streets, drafted into the military with the promise of regular meals and a place to belong.

The Huntsman threw his kusarigama, the weapon wrapping itself around an oncoming spear. The big man jerked the chain, pulling the wielder off balance and into an elbow that landed like falling concrete, snapping the boy's jaw loose. Swinging the sickle blade, the Huntsman buried it in the bushiman's neck, sent the soldier spinning away in a spray of red. His comrade roared, furious, thrusting his blade straight toward the big man's heart.

No One raised a fistful of iron.

The shot was impossibly loud, recoil kicking up her forearm, knocking a frightened cry from her lips. The bushiman clutched his neck, a sticky red flower blooming in his fingers as he spun on the spot, gasping, scarlet gushing as he collapsed on the road in ruins.

The Huntsman was staring at her dumbfounded, a thin wisp of smoke rising from the iron-thrower's barrel into the breathless s.p.a.ce between them.

"If the Great Judge sends the hungry dead anywhere near me," she gasped, "I'll kick his privates so hard his throat will have three lumps."

"Where the h.e.l.ls did you get that?"

... more coming go go ...

"Later," she said. "We have to move."

The giant stooped, pulled his blade loose with a grunt, wiped the spatter of red from his face on his sleeve.

... friend . .?

No One looked to the rooftop overhead. She could see Daken's silhouette against the b.l.o.o.d.y sky, a black shadow upon the eave, peering down to the drenched cobbles below. He saw the dead bushimen and licked his jowls.

Maybe ...

"Huntsman, we need to go..."

"I have a flat, north of Downside." The big man wrapped his kusarigama back around his waist. "It's a trek, but we can lay low there for a while."

No One eyed his leg, the bloodstain seeping through the fabric of his hakama. "My place is much closer. Easier to get to."

"Is it safe?"

"Safer than being out here in broad daylight."

The Huntsman looked around the street, down at the cooling meat at his feet.

... they coming ...

"We need to go," she said. "If you still think I brought the bushi' here, ask yourself why I just shot one of them right in front of you. Ask yourself why I don't blow out your kneecaps now and wait for more to arrive."

He licked the sweat from his lips. Stared into her eye. Nodded slow.

"All right, then."

"My name is Hana," she said. "My real name, I mean."

In the distance, they could hear running feet. Cries of alarm. The ringing of an iron bell. The big man sniffed, pulled his hat farther down over his face.

"Akihito," he said. "My friends called me Akihito."

9.

A HEART EXHAUSTED.

There weren't tears enough for her grief.

All around her, she could hear the voices of the bamboo kami, the spirits in the stalks swaying with the gentle wind. The little girl stood by her brother's grave, bloodshot eyes and sodden cheeks, Lady Sun filling the clearing with hateful, dappled light. The spirit stone on his burial plot was marked with his name, the day of his death and the day of his birth-the same day as hers.

Nine years ago that day.

"Happy birthday, Satoru," Yukiko whispered.

It had been three months since the snake-strike. Three months since her twin died in her arms. It felt as if a part of her was missing-as if the G.o.ds had broken off a piece of her and left it bleeding on the floor. Her mother was lost in grief. Her father in guilt. But Yukiko? She was lost in the enormity of it all. A world too vast and lonely now that her brother wasn't there to share it. An emptiness never filled. A hand never held. A question never answered.

"Ichigo."

Her father's voice, behind her, calling her by his pet name. She did not turn, simply stared through the tears at the bed where her brother would lay forever.

He knelt beside her on the warm ground, his long hair caught in the breeze and tickling her tear-stained cheeks. He touched her hand, gentle as snowflakes. She turned to look at him then, this man she called father that in truth she barely knew. A tanned and weatherworn face, roguish and handsome. Long moustache and dark hair, just beginning to gray at the temples. Dark, sparkling eyes, always searching.

He'd never been there when they were growing up, forever off on his grand hunts at the Shgun's behest. He would return to their little valley every once in a while, spoil them for a day or two, then disappear for months at a time. But he always brought the twins presents. He could always make her smile. And when he would lift her on his shoulders and carry her through the bamboo forest, it made her feel as tall as giants. Fierce as dragons.

"Have you finished packing your things?" he asked.

She blinked, avoided his gaze. She didn't think it had been settled. She didn't think her mother would ever agree to it. She thought maybe after her brother ...

"We are still going to the Shgun's court then?"

"We must, Ichigo. My Lord commands and I obey."

"But what about Satoru?" she whispered. "He'll be all alo-"

The sentence cracked along with her voice and she turned her eyes to the grave at her feet. Tears swelled inside her, a choking ball of heat creeping up her throat. The empty yawned all about her, the world too big for her alone.

"I got you something," her father said. "For your birthday."

He held up a white box, tied with black ribbon. And if the sight of the sun gleaming on that dark silk made her heart beat a little faster, if thoughts of the countless mysteries that might lay within that box stilled the thoughts of her brother for a moment, she was only nine, after all.

She was only little.

She took the box in her hands, surprised at its weight.

"Open it," he said.

She pulled at the ribbon, watching the bow fold in upon itself and fall open. Inside the box waited a gift so pretty it stole the breath from between her lips. A scabbard of lacquered wood, black as her father's eyes, smooth as cat's claws. Beside it, a six-inch length of folded steel, gleaming in the sun, so sharp it might cut the day in half.

"A knife?"

"A tant," he said. "All ladies of court carry one."

"What do I need it for?"