Inside the Shirakawa Palace, the compound was complete chaos. Fleeing women and children cried and screamed in fear. Officers tried to direct the mobs fleeing Go-Shirakawa’s armies. The bushi mustered in their units, preparing to meet the emperor’s forces.

“Do you know where Kamo is going to perform the ritual?” I shouted to Surei over the hubbub.

“Yes, Grandmother told me. I danced for Senior Retired Emperor Toba several times here, so I am familiar with the grounds.” She pointed to our left. “We need to climb that hill to the garden.”

We pushed our way through the crowd. As we approached the garden. Surei stopped so abruptly I ran into her. She grabbed my arm. Just ahead of us, two figures walked towards the isolated building where the ritual was to take place. One of them was Ikeda Minbukyou.

“This is our chance, we could kill him now,” she whispered, drawing her yumi off her shoulder.

I put my hand on her wrist, stopping her. “What are we going to do about the bushi with him? Unless you want him raising the alarm, we are going to have to kill him too. Also, Kamo might plan to use Ikeda to draw Akiko to him. If we kill Ikeda, there may be no way of reaching her. Would it be worth it?”

She growled and tore my hand away. But she returned the yumi to her shoulder.

We followed at a distance as Ikeda and his bushi escort went through the garden and then passed into the building at the far side. Keeping the trees of the garden between us and the building, we moved closer. The bushi left by himself. I gasped as he went by and whispered, “Surei, do you recognize him?”

She looked at me strangely for a moment then studied his face in the moonlight. Recognition dawned. “Isn’t that Naoto, your oldest brother’s son?”

“I think so, yes. I am surprised to see him here, but I should have expected it. He was too young to come with us on the expedition. He must have been seconded to another bushi family after his father died.” I felt queasy. “We almost killed him…”

Surei looked away for a moment. “I am glad we let Ikeda go. It would have been horrible to have killed your nephew.”

We edged closer to the building. Loud chanting came from inside. Surei leaned over and said, “That is the rite of control. Kamo has already begun. We will need to stop him soon.”

I was worried about the mujina, so I said, “Let me see if I can find where Jushichin is, first.”

“All right, but we don’t have a lot of time.”

I snuck a quick look inside the building. Kamo, surrounded by mystical symbols, chanted in front of a large seiman with Ikeda Minbukyou inside. Ikeda’s appearance was shocking. His complexion was gray and the skin hung off his body like a poorly draped cloak. He looked like he was centuries old, although I knew he had not yet reached the age of forty. His movements were slow and painful, as if something was wrong with his joints. It was hard to tell from this distance, but I got the impression his eyes were haunted.

I began moving in a circular pattern out from the building, looking for any signs of the mujina. By the time I traveled far enough out that the building was invisible in the foliage of the garden, I still hadn’t seen any signs of him, so I gave up.

“I can’t find him. I don’t think he is here,” I whispered to Surei, who was drawing characters on the ground. “What are you doing?”

“Using Ikeda as a lure, Kamo has captured Akiko and lulled her into inactivity so he can perform his magic unimpeded. I am going to try and strengthen Akiko so she is more resistant to his spell. Perhaps then, she can break through his restraints and escape. If she can get away, then we can do another exorcism. I am confident I can lay her to rest this time.”

She began her spell. My vision blurred, and when it cleared, something inside of the building spilled a bright red glow onto the garden outside. Kamo’s chanting was interrupted by a scream of “No!” accompanied by a brightening of the red aura from the building.

He faltered for a moment, then resumed, chanting faster and louder.

Surei continued her spell. The red glow brightened, taking on a yellow cast. Kamo’s chanting lost its rhythmic, smooth delivery. Instead, it was punctuated by Akiko’s screams of “No!” and “Justice!” His recital became irregular and jerky. Surei’s spell was working and Akiko had awakened.

Kamo stopped the spell for a moment, looked around, then yelled, “Dammit, how did you get here?”

Three small pieces of paper flew through the door of the building and landed on the veranda near the steps down into the garden. On striking the ground, they changed into tigers. The spirit animals roared their defiance. Two of the tigers sauntered in my direction and one padded towards Surei. Their movements were slow, graceful, and deadly. They seemed in no hurry.

On the off-chance she hadn’t noticed their roars, I shouted, “Surei! Tigers!” I cut myself to blood my weapon. The moment I raised the naginata into position to attack, energy flowed through me. I felt lighter, stronger, and faster.

Tigers? Who cares about tigers?

Instead of waiting for the felines to reach me, I rushed to meet them. I took two long strides and jumped for them. At the same moment, both of them launched themselves at me. I collided in mid-air with the rightmost tiger.

We landed in a pile with the tiger on top. It fastened its teeth into my left shoulder. The impact knocked my naginata out of my hands. Infuriated that it couldn’t reach my flesh through the sode protecting my shoulders, the animal bore down on its bite. I felt as if my shoulder had been placed into a giant vise and the jaws tightened. I could hear my armor groaning in protest at the extreme pressures it was absorbing. I tried reaching for my naginata, but it was out of reach.

In a fit of frustration, the cat lifted its head and shook me like a small boy tormenting his little sister’s favorite doll. As I flopped back and forth, I raised my left hand and grabbed on to the scruff of the tiger’s neck to give me a little stability. Then, I reached for my kodachi at my belt.

I screamed as a jolt of agony shot up my right leg. Without letting go of the tiger’s head, I peered down at my feet. The second tiger had seized my right ankle between his jaws and was pulling. Between the two creatures, it felt like they were trying to tear me apart.

I desperately kicked at the second tiger to get him to release my foot, but my kick just slid past his ear. I forced myself to focus and take my time, and the next blow landed on the center of his muzzle, causing him to release my leg.

Returning my hand to my kodachi, I drew it with my right arm. A quick cut across the back of my left hand blooded the weapon. Taking a deep breath and carefully positioning the blade, I drove the kodachi deep behind the right shoulder of the tiger.

With an almost-human scream of pain, the animal began thrashing around in agony. He released his hold on my shoulder, but the force of his convulsions tore the kodachi from my hand. In just a few moments, the tiger lay still. The body faded into mist and disappeared.

The second animal leapt at me. Still on my back, I levered my legs straight up off the ground, catching the tiger in the middle of the chest with my upraised feet. I let my knees bend slightly under the weight of the animal, then violently straightened them out, flinging the tiger somersaulting into the air.

I seized my naginata and rolled to my feet as the tiger twisted violently in mid-air and landed on its feet facing me.

We circled each other. With a primal scream, the tiger launched himself at me once more. The speed of the animal barely gave me time to raise my naginata before the animal impaled itself, knocking me backwards as the naginata was torn from my grasp.

The tiger landed on the ground and lay still. The body misted up and blew away.

I turned back to help Surei. She had the third animal contained within a blazing seiman pattern. When she saw me, she shouted, “It will take a few moments to banish this thing and Kamo is almost finished. Go stop him!”

I looked down at my leg where the tiger had held me. It was scratched and bloody, but not nearly as damaged as it should have been. Surei’s protection spell was effective beyond my wildest hopes.

In just the short time the tigers had occupied my attention, the tenor of the chanting had changed yet again. Kamo sounded harried, almost desperate as he forced out the words of the ritual. Akiko’s screaming was now a continuous, wordless howl of rage and hate.

I stepped into the building. Akiko blazed so brightly with power it was painful to look at her. Kamo waved his arms in mystical gestures as he worked to complete his spell.

Ikeda stood outside the seiman shouting, his words almost drowned out by Kamo’s chanting and Akiko’s screaming. “What are you doing? You said you would lay her to rest, not drive her to madness!” Kamo, intent on his casting, ignored him.

I leapt forward, intending to skewer Kamo with my naginata. He would have difficulty casting any spells with two hands-breadth of steel protruding from his chest.

At that same moment, Kamo shouted a single syllable in a triumphant voice.

Akiko’s blaze was extinguished.

A moment later, Kamo lit up with the power that had been Akiko’s. He made a simple gesture and a force like a giant log hit me in the middle of the chest. I was stopped dead in the air and flung backwards by the blow. With a tremendous crash, I smashed against the wall and crumpled to the floor, the naginata flying from my grasp.

My head spun and the wind had been knocked out of me. I lay on the floor for a moment, stunned and gasping for breath. A blinding flash of light and burning agony in my hand forced me to my feet with a yell.

The back of my left hand had an angry red mark. Blisters were already forming where I had been burned. Kamo raised his arm and another blinding line of fire shot from his hand. It passed close enough to my head I smelt singed hair felt its intense heat on my cheek. Once my vision cleared from the flash, I still had to blink several times to banish the after-image from my sight.

He chuckled. “The first one was to get you moving, the second was to get your attention. The next one will kill you.”

Kamo gestured again in an off-handed manner, and I threw myself violently to the right to avoid his attack. The fire passed through where I had been standing, but I moved only a body-width or so before my shoulder ran into in an invisible barrier like a solid stone wall. My armor absorbed a bit of the impact, but my arm felt as if someone had cut it off at the shoulder.

He raised his hand again. Desperately, I threw myself to the left. This time, I got almost two body-widths before crashing to a halt against another invisible barrier. I stared at the empty space beside me and noted a faint shimmering in the air.

I licked my dry lips, tasting the salt of my sweat. My eyes watered from the flashes and from the bitter, acrid smell left behind in the fire’s wake.

I have to get to him before he kills me.

I lowered my head, allowing my body to slump forward in apparent despair. As my hands neared the naginata on the floor, I grabbed it. Convulsively straightening my legs, I launched myself directly at Kamo, swinging the naginata at his head with all my strength. I had barely gotten off the ground when, with a jarring force that seemed to rattle my skull, I collided head-first with another invisible barrier directly to my front.

The force of the impact threw me backward onto the floor, the naginata once again knocked from my grasp. I lay there, half-dazed, panting heavily with exertion and fear. I had bitten deeply into my tongue when I hit, and my mouth filled with the coppery taste of blood.

The bastard is just playing with me.

An evil smile spread lazily across Kamo’s face as he stared down at me. “Pathetic.” He shook his head in mock sorrow. “I vastly overestimated your skills at onmyoudou. A student halfway through his second year at the Imperial University could have taken down those walls. Goodbye, Inspector. I’d like to spend more time with you, but I have a prior engagement at the Spring Palace.”

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Time slowed to a crawl. Kamo raised his arm and, in my spiritual sight, his hand glowed like the blazing sun. A brilliant flash and this time, I knew I was going to die.

From seemingly nowhere, Surei threw herself between Kamo and me. The fire struck the center of the fans she held overlapping in front of her and splashed, scattering in a dozen directions like a jet of water meeting a solid wall.

“He’s not the onmyouji, I am,” she said.

Kamo, his face a mask of fury, turned to Surei. When he saw her face, he froze in surprise. “You!” he shouted. “You were at the university years ago. Abé no Seimei’s grandson!”

Surei pulled her headgear off, shaking her head to free her long, thick hair which cascaded down her back like a black waterfall. “Granddaughter, actually. But, it’s nice you remembered. Because I’ll never forget your tigers.”

“You are the one who has been causing all the trouble? You are the one with Seimei’s secret writings?” Kamo seemed unable to believe his own eyes.

Recovering from his shock, he launched three magical fire attacks at her, one after the other, but she batted each one away with a flick of her fan. The last one she reflected back at Kamo. He screamed in pain as the fire pierced his right shoulder, leaving a smoking hole in his robe. A smell like roasting boar meat filled the room.

Surei gestured at me and said something I didn’t understand.

A subtle change in the air near me jolted me into movement. Grabbing my naginata again, I sat up and tested my surroundings. Looking carefully for the shimmer, I could see the invisible barriers were gone. I shakily got to my feet.

Surei stopped suddenly, her progress blocked by one of Kamo’s barriers. He gave a bitter laugh. “Now I have you.”

Making a quick sign with one hand, she continued on her way, the impediment gone. She gave a light laugh of her own, saying, “I don’t think so. You’ll have to do better than that to trap me.”

Inside her magical prison, Akiko had stopped moving. To my enhanced sight, she glowed a barely visible dull red, like the embers of a dying fire. Her screams of rage had been replaced by whimpers of agony. Each time Kamo cast a spell, she shrieked like a soul in torment. It was terrible to hear.

I wasn’t the only one who felt that way. Ikeda screamed at Kamo. “Stop! You are destroying her!”

Without looking in Ikeda’s direction, Kamo contemptuously motioned with his hand, sending Ikeda flying back into the wall. He lay there, stunned.

Aside from dealing with Ikeda, Surei occupied Kamo’s whole attention. He kept pressing her, forcing her to stay on the defensive. She dodged left and right to avoid his attacks, occasionally using the fan to send them back at him. Her frenzied movements and wild evasions had a frantic beauty all their own. Even desperately struggling for her life, her grace and elegance turned it into a macabre dance. To give herself more room to maneuver, Surei moved out into the garden. Kamo rushed out onto to the veranda surrounding the building to keep her in sight.

Feeling recovered a bit, I hobbled outside and lowered myself from the railing of the veranda to the ground.

Mouse’s words came back to me. Onmyouji ain’t so tough. You just got to hit them before they see you.

A frontal attack had failed, but I might get a chance to sneak up on Kamo and take him from behind while he focused on Surei.

Ikeda Minbukyou had also recovered. He stood next to where Akiko was trapped, her cries of agony echoing through the building and the garden beyond.

“I order you to cease this immediately!” he told Kamo.

Kamo said nothing.

“I will not be ignored,” Ikeda said.

Kamo moved out to the veranda to continue the battle against Surei.

I bent low and cautiously crept towards him.

Ikeda leaned down and reached for the markings on the floor.

Kamo, whipping around to face Ikeda, shouted, “Don’t touch the diagram—”

Ikeda wiped his hand through the complex magical symbol on the floor, erasing a section of the graphic.

Akiko gave a wordless shout of triumph and blazed like the sun.

Oh no, not again.

The flash of light and roar of sound were so overwhelming they seemed to have a physical presence to them. I must have been stunned, because the next thing I remember was lying on my back well clear of the building. I blinked my eyes and stared up at the stars. I couldn’t have been out for more than a moment, because pieces of the building were still falling out of the sky, burning wreckage landing all around me.

This time, the building was not just on fire, it had exploded. There was nothing remaining of the roof and precious little of the walls. The portion still standing was fully engulfed in flames.

I heard a groan near me. Surei sat up and cradled her head in her hands. After a short time, she shuddered and got to her feet.

We approached the burning building as nearly as the flames would allow. Inside, a charred and broken figure lay on the floor. What few scraps of burnt clothing were left identified it as the remains of Ikeda Minbukyou. There was no sign of Kamo.

There was no possibility of putting the fire out. We backed away from the conflagration. Surei bent and picked something up from the ground near where I fought the two tigers.

“What’s that?”

She showed me a torn and bloody folded paper in her hand. “The remains of Kamo’s tiger spell. I want to see if I can learn anything from it.”

My gaze involuntarily returned to the burning building. I shook my head in wonder. “What happened?”

“When Ikeda Minbukyou disrupted the bindings holding Akiko, she was able to break free and reassert her power. She took the opportunity to escape.”

“What about Kamo?”

“I have no idea. But we’re not finished yet. We have to get back. I want to know what he meant by ‘I have a prior engagement at the Spring Palace.’ I don’t like the sound of that.”

I felt like hell. Surei’s magic had miraculously prevented me from any serious injury, but now that it was gone, there wasn’t a single part of my body that didn’t hurt. My body ached like someone had beaten me with a stick.

As we made our way through the garden, we could see the rest of the Shirakawa Palace grounds were ablaze. “The Emperor’s troops are using fire arrows. This whole compound is burning.”

Surei shook her head. “That’s not it. Look at the flames. The buildings burning the hottest are in a line with where we fought Kamo. They’re burning too vigorously to have been started by fire arrows just since we arrived. This is Akiko’s work. Perhaps a last act of vengeance as she escaped.”

We hurried towards the gate. It was difficult not to be trampled by the panicked mobs. As we ran, ash and sparks rained down on us. Surei held her jacket over her head to protect her hair from flying embers. The smoke from the fires stung my eyes and made breathing difficult. Flames licked along the roofs of buildings and flying embers set other structures aflame. It looked like a scene from hell. The nightmares I had while Akiko possessed me returned. I remembered the feeling of burning skin and felt rising panic.

Focus. Stay with the present. The compound is falling to Go-Shirakawa’s troops. You are going to need your wits about you to get out of here alive. Surei is relying on you. Don’t think about the fire.

I heard screaming and crying ahead as we came around a corner to see a group of people huddled behind the wall of a building that had not yet caught fire. The building was the last structure before the courtyard that led to the gate.

It always ends like this.

“Oh, no.” I stopped Surei.

“What’s wrong?”

I pointed around the wall into the courtyard beyond. It was littered with the dead and dying. Men, women, and children lay on the ground, pierced with arrows. Yumi-carrying bushi stood at the gate and there were others stationed on the heights surrounding the palace.

Surei gasped. “Why are they killing everyone?”

“To make sure Retired Emperor Sutoku and his supporters don’t escape. They shoot everyone who tries to leave. After all, they might try to flee disguised as women.”

“And the children?”

I shrugged. “This is the way bushi wage war. Emperor Go-Shirakawa and Retired Emperor Sutoku should have thought about this before they resorted to using military forces to resolve a political disagreement.”

Surei’s face grew white. “This is horrible.”

I nodded. “It is. I wonder if the people who start these wars ever consider the fact that they or their families might be the ones to end up like this.”

I studied the people around us. They were mostly women and children, frightened and hopelessly trapped.

They don’t deserve this. We bushi are born and bred for battle. It is only fitting we come to a violent end. People whose only crime is serving the wrong lord shouldn’t have to face that.

There were a few bushi scattered among the crowd. One of them was my nephew, Naoto. Many of the bushi seemed as frightened as the civilians. A rough looking sergeant was trying to restore some discipline to the panicked troops.

“Stay down, fools. Do you want to catch an arrow? Wait for the smoke to hide us better. Then maybe we can make a break for it.”

One of the men lost his nerve and started running across the courtyard. The sergeant grabbed him as he passed and slugged him. “I’ll cut you down myself if you don’t hold your position,” he growled at the man.

I need to think of a way to get us out of here. The sergeant’s plan might work, but the casualties will be high.

Charging headlong into a volley of arrows didn’t sound like a particularly healthy idea. It would be a good way to get crippled or dead. It was an even worse idea for Surei, who wasn’t wearing any armor.

Over the sobbing and wailing, I heard a horse whinnying from beyond the building to our right.

“Is that the stable back there?” I demanded from a woman sitting next to me, her head cradled in her hands.

She raised her head and looked at me blankly. I repeated the question. Finally, she nodded her head.

I grabbed a barrel and raced in the direction I had heard the horse. As I dashed for the wall, an arrow skittered across the ground ahead of me.

The sergeant bellowed at me, “Get back here, you fool.”

I ducked down behind cover and set the barrel against the building. Jumping onto the barrel, I peered over the wall.

Several high-ranking bushi wearing elaborate armor were holding horses for a group of elegantly dressed men as they mounted. Retired Emperor Sutoku was preparing to leave.

Just like the nobility to start a war and then, once things get dicey, run away leaving their supporters to burn.

I dashed back to the group. The sergeant came over and yelled at me. “What the hell do you think you are doing?”

Ignoring him, I said, “Surei, can you make us some cover?”

Surei looked around, “I could make smoke. Won’t they just start shooting into the cloud, though?”

“Not if they’re distracted. We need it, now.”

Surei looked at me questioningly, but I didn’t have time to explain. Shrugging her shoulders, she began a spell. Smoke started rolling across the courtyard and out the gate. The people near her edged away in fear.

The sergeant was watching her with wide eyes, his mouth open in amazement. I said, “Sergeant.” He seemed not to hear me. “Sergeant!” I barked, putting a note of command into my voice.

He snapped his face around and stood up straighter. “Yes, sir!” he responded.

“Get your men together. The Retired Emperor is about to flee the compound, and we are leaving just behind him.” I gestured at Surei. “Her smoke can provide cover from the archers on the hills, but we will have to fight our way through the gate.”

He glanced at Surei, then bowed. “Yes, sir. Better than burning to death or getting cut down like dogs.”

He started yelling at his men with new-found energy. “Come on, you worthless whoresons. Let’s see if you can earn your wages or if I should send you to the river boats to start peddling your cute little asses to bored noblemen.”

The men that didn’t respond quickly enough were cuffed and kicked to their feet. Naoto had been staring at me with a puzzled look, but he was one of the first ones up.

I heard galloping horses from the other side of the wall, and soon a group of mounted bushi appeared, charging a gate on the north wall. Retired Emperor Sutoku and his entourage rode in their wake.

Up on the hills, most of the archers abandoned their positions and chased after the fleeing nobles.

“More smoke, Surei. We need it in the courtyard.”

She nodded her head and the smoke started drifting into the open area in front of the west gate. I heard a few arrows striking the ground as archers shot blindly into the obscured area, but most of the bushi were chasing Sutoku, and many of the archers who remained held their fire, waiting for better targets.

“Everyone ready. We are moving out.”

The sergeant formed his men up and led the way. Women held their children. The able-bodied dragged the dazed members of the group behind them.

“Go! Move!” I plunged into the smoke and sprinted for the gate.

Our movement must have caught the eye of some of the archers. I heard the twang of a yumi ahead of me and the hum of arrows passing around us. Somewhere behind me, someone screamed.

“Keep moving!” roared the sergeant.

The wall loomed suddenly out of the smoke, directly ahead of me.

The gate should be to the right.

As I reached the edge of Surei’s obscuring murk, I could see several bushi were guarding the gate. I charged.

One guard had an arrow nocked and raised his weapon to let fly. With a bloodcurdling scream, I ran straight at him swinging the naginata. The blade cut his yumi in two and I buried the blade into his chest. By the time I disentangled my weapon from his corpse, the bushi accompanying our group had eliminated the rest of the guard detachment.

I plunged through the gate.

There were more bushi on the other side. I blocked an overhead strike from a bushi with a tachi and countered with a butt strike to the chin. Before I could follow up another man swung at me from the side. I ducked under the blow and rammed my shoulder into his chest. He fell back with a strangled oof.

The rest of our bushi poured through the gate and the fight was on. It was short and ugly, but when it was done, all of the enemy were dead and we had only lost one man.

Now the women came through the gate. I heard a yumi fire from the hills and one of our bushi screamed as he took an arrow through the knee.

“Keep going!” I shouted. “If we slow down, we will be overwhelmed.”

I heard the twang of a yumi next to me followed by a scream from ahead of us. I turned to see Surei putting her yumi back over her shoulder.

As the sergeant, Naoto, the remaining bushi, and the women and children streamed out the gate and over the hill to safety, Surei said, “Let’s go. We really need to get back.”