We arrived at the Spring Palace to find bushi everywhere. The property was surrounded by a military force, the entire manor cordoned off. We watched from a nearby building, hidden in the deep shadow cast by the bright moonlight.
“Why are bushi here at the saké house?” Surei whispered. “What do they want?”
“This is an organized company, officers and all. These aren’t random looters. Someone ordered this attack.”
She said harshly, “Kamo must have something to do with it.”
While we watched, forces attacked each of the east and west gates simultaneously. This was an elementary strategy to force the defender to divide his forces so each defending force could be defeated in detail. Professor was experienced enough to recognize what was going on, and didn’t take the bait. Instead, he concentrated his forces at the east gate, where archers behind the saké house walls were doing a deadly work with their yumi.
Another volley of arrows flew from shielded positions and swept across the attackers, leaving a number of dead and wounded bushi in its wake. The assaulting force retreated to cover down some side streets and made a weak attempt to return fire.
Surei couldn’t stand it any longer. “We have to get in there and help them,” she said. “I can’t let them fight without me.” She snatched her yumi off her shoulder and started letting fly with arrows.
The attack on the east gate had mostly stalled due to the toll of the arrows from the archers inside the Spring Palace. Still, the attackers were trying to move forward under cover and approach the gate. When Surei’s arrows started dropping men to the back, bushi at the rear turned to see what was happening. A rift opened in the ranks of the bushi as the front kept pressing forward.
Three bushi spotted Surei and rushed her. The rest looked around in confusion, still trying to find the source of the attack.
Fixated on reaching Surei, the three didn’t notice me standing in the shadows nearby. I unsheathed my naginata, then saw motion on the roof across from us. Mouse stood atop the building holding a small object in his palm. He covered his eyes.
Reaching Surei, I grabbed her right hand. “Close your eyes,” I told her.
She tried to pull away. “What?”
I heard something hit the ground behind me. I grabbed her by the shoulders and pulled her head into my chest as I screwed my eyes shut.
She said, “Yosh—” before her face was buried in the folds of my robe, muffling her comment.
Even with my eyes closed and my back to Mouse, I saw the bright flash through my eyelids. I let go of Surei and dragged her back into the shadows. “Come on, we have to go.”
I led us away from where we had been standing. I didn’t want to be anywhere near there. Before long, it would be swarming with bushi trying to find their “attackers.” After a short time, Mouse dropped noiselessly from a roof and joined us. There was a lot of confusion and yelling behind us.
“Nice work,” I told Mouse.
He gave me a gap-toothed grin. “I been picking off stragglers, but this group is too disciplined to give me many targets.”
The flash bomb had gotten everyone’s attention. From the tenor of the commands we could hear, it sounded like they were afraid they were going to be attacked from the rear, so they were breaking off their assault on the gate.
Surei smiled in satisfaction. “Well, at least we stopped that.” Her face grew troubled. “What now? I’m not going to stand around outside and watch the Spring Palace be attacked. We need to get inside.”
“All right, we obviously can’t go through the gates, but there is one other way we might be able to get in. We’ll need to get to the north wall, though.”
We snuck around the outside of the Spring Palace, looking for a spot on the north side where the bushi surrounding the property were out of sight of their comrades. They had taken cover on far sides of the roads surrounding the Spring Palace, but were able to see the wall.
At the north end of the property, there was some foliage growing on the side of the road across from the wall. The bushi who were manning that section of the cordon had taken advantage of the concealment provided by the undergrowth to hide themselves from anyone on top of the wall. Unfortunately for them, they also hid themselves from their fellow troops.
I picked a spot where three bushi stood almost directly across from our destination, and we snuck up on them. I signaled for Surei to take the one on the right, Mouse the one on the left. They nodded their understanding.
The naginata was too unwieldy for this kind of close-in work, so I laid it on the ground and silently drew my kodachi. Giving the signal to “go,” I stepped forward, grabbed my bushi by the hair, yanked his head back, and cut his throat. The only sound he made was a soft sigh as he collapsed.
Surei put her hand over her man’s mouth; then she drove her black tantou up from under his chin into his brain. He made even less noise dying than mine did.
Mouse stood over the collapsed form of his man.
I looked across the street at our goal. “We have a problem.”
“What?”
“When we cross the road here, all the bushi on the north wall here are going to be able to see us. And shoot us with their yumi.”
Surei rolled her eyes. “Why didn’t you think of this before?”
“Too focused on getting across.”
“Fine, I’ll take care of that. How about a dust-devil?”
I thought about it. “Yes. That might work. A bunch of dust kicked up from the road by a momentary gust of wind. We can just run across then. Do it.”
Poking her head out from the bushes so she could see the road, Surei began moving her arms in the rhythmic motions of the dance, then she stopped and spoke a single word.
Immediately, a choking cloud of dust popped up in front of us. The three of us rushed across the street, instinctively hunching over as we ran.
Once safely across and out of sight among the trees and bushes growing along the north wall, Surei asked me, “Now what?”
“Simple,” I said, walking up to a nearby tree and pulling the rope to the treehouse down.
Surei stared at me. “This was your plan? To climb in through the treehouse?”
I was hurt. “Well, it will work, won’t it? It will get us inside the compound.”
She was muttering something under her breath as we climbed into the treehouse then let ourselves down on the other side of the wall. An arrow whizzed past my head and buried itself in the wall.
We dropped to the ground.
“Emiko, it’s me!” Surei shouted.
“Oh, mistress, I’m sorry. I didn’t recognize you.” Emiko started to climb down to apologize.
“Stay on the wall,” I ordered. “We’re all right.”
“We need to find Professor,” Surei said.
“He’s at the east gate,” Emiko called down.
We walked through the empty spaces of the Spring Palace. It was eerie, seeing the entire place deserted. Even at night, there had normally been people wandering around, but now, with every person on-duty and keeping watch for the invaders, there was no movement at all on the grounds. As we crossed the wall into the southern portion of the property, we finally saw people moving around.
We found Professor and Cook together when we reached the east gate. A relieved smile lit Professor’s face when he saw Surei. “You’re back!”
“What’s been happening?”
As Professor brought Surei up-to-date, I watched the activity around us. The defenders were taking the opportunity provided by the lull in the fighting to rest and refresh themselves. I saw children carrying bundles of arrows to the archers on the walls. Cook had her people setting up tables with water, saké and refreshments. Guards on duty were rotated out long enough to get a quick drink and a bite to eat, then sent back to the wall with some jugs of water to relieve their fellow watch-standers for the same purpose.
Dimples poked her head around the corner of a building and waved. I looked around to see who she was waving at, but she shook her head and pointed in my direction. When I pointed at myself, she nodded and motioned me to come over. I shrugged and went to see what she wanted.
“YOSHI!” Surei’s voice cut through the hubbub of all the activity and preparations for battle.
I peered back. She was pointing up on the wall above her. The archers manning the wall near her were peeking around the fortifications to see what Surei was yelling about. One of the four was Dimples, who stared past us with shocked expression on her face. I gaped at her in confusion for a moment, then turned around to look at “Dimples” motioning me to join her.
“Jushichin!” I shouted.
The girl disappeared around the side of the building. I rushed after the shape-shifting mujina, people pounding along behind me. Rounding the corner, I nearly collided with him. He had resumed his accustomed human form and stood ready, testubou in hand.
There was a sharp intake of breath when the people following me came around the side of the building and saw the mujina.
“Well, here we are,” Jushichin said, smiling. “I was hoping to get you alone so we could finish things quietly, but I can kill you with an audience.”
Dimples came sneaking around the other side of the building.
Focusing his gaze behind me, Jushichin continued, “You know, I don’t care about any mirrors or stupid writings. If you just give me the Scarlet Hyacinth, I’ll leave quietly. At my signal, the troops will abandon the attack and we can all go home.”
“I’ll see you in hell first,” I said, in a low tone.
As the mujina talked about taking Surei, Dimples became outraged. She approached him stealthily from the rear, drawing her tachi in a slow, completely silent pull. She raised the weapon above her and sprang forward, bringing it down on the mujina’s head.
With his fantastic speed, Jushichin ducked to one side, avoiding the blow, then backhanded Dimples across the face. Crying out in pain, the girl flew backwards and landed on her back. In a flash, he stood over her and raised his testubou to strike.
“No!” A voice screamed behind me. A knife flew past my head and buried itself in the middle of Jushichin’s back. Cook sprinted forward, another one of her ever-present knives in her hand as she threw herself between the mujina and her daughter.
Jushichin screamed in agony and struck out at Cook with his tetsubou, hitting her in the side of the chest. I could clearly hear the crunch of breaking bones. The strength of the blow threw her against the side of the nearest building, where she crumpled into a heap.
“Mama! Mama!” Dimples scrambled over to where her mother lay, unmoving, and cradled her head in her lap, crying softly and repeating “Mama.”
Raging at myself for not acting more quickly, I swung the naginata at Jushichin’s head, hoping to catch him off guard. His damnable reflexes protected him, and he ducked out of the way. At least he couldn’t do any more to Cook. He had to defend against my attack.
I could feel Surei working her magic. My vision went blurry for a moment, then cleared. I saw the spiritual auras of people and the mystical connections among them.
Surei gathered magical power into herself, and her brightening glow lit the entire area. Our connection practically hummed with energy. I looked one last time at Dimples cradling her mother’s broken body and crying, and I drew ruthlessly on the power Surei was feeding me. At the same time, I drew on the rage that filled me.
Jushichin must die.
He stood there in a guard position with that half-smirk he sported whenever we fought. Summoning all my rage and strength, I stepped forward and, before he could react to my boosted speed, I swung the weighted end of the naginata haft and smashed him in the chest.
With an explosive whoof, he flew back and hit the wall of a nearby building. He popped right back up to his feet. “What—” he sputtered.
He had lost the smirk.
I heard Professor calling people to the gate and the sound of the gongs. The assault must have resumed, but I could not leave my battle with Jushichin to help.
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I charged after him. He rushed me at the same time. We met, our weapons smashing together. We stood, toe-to-toe, hammering on each other, neither willing to retreat a single step.
There was no art, no style, and no skill in our combat. It was pure brute strength against naked force. The power in me demanded to be used, and not in a subtle or measured manner. After a bone-rattling exchange of blows, we separated to catch our breath.
“That idiot—Kamo—insisted you—were the—onmyouji—I’m going to—kill him,” Jushichin managed to get out between gasps.
“No need—we did that—already,” I answered, equally winded, but smugly certain it would shock the mujina.
We lifted our weapons to resume the fight. There came an ear-shattering BOOM and a huge flash of light. Both Jushichin and I involuntarily looked in the direction of the noise.
An entire section of the wall around the Spring Palace had been destroyed. In the light from the burning fragments of the wooden palisades, we could see at least two dozen figures carrying weapons and wearing armor. The white hair of the leading figure was easily visible in the moonlight.
The mujina suddenly laughed. “Are the people you ‘kill’ always this lively?”
I heard Professor, in a voice clear even above the noise of the battle, shout out, “Breach in the east wall, we have enemies inside the compound! Intruders coming through the east wall!”
Gongs sounded all around us.
Surei sprinted for Kamo.
Jushichin launched a relentless assault. His testubou was a blur. A flash of light from the direction of the breach in the wall briefly broke my concentration. The mujina took advantage of my lapse to land a solid blow to my ribs. The impact flung me against the wall of a nearby building.
His grin of satisfaction and triumph was wiped from his face as I rolled to my feet.
“You aren’t the only one who can recover quickly,” I growled at him.
Concerned about my loss of control during the battle at the Shirakawa Palace, I had vowed to myself to exercise restraint during the fight. Now, however, anger, hate, and a sort of savage glee roared through me like a river released from its confinement by a collapsed dam. I gave myself completely over to the wild forces raging within me and had only one thought in my mind.
KILL!
I jumped into the air and came down on Jushichin from above, swinging my naginata over my head with all my strength. Even braced as he was for the impact, the force of the blow on his tetsubou drove him to his knees.
Before he had a chance to regain his feet, I struck again. Then again. He was fast enough that he managed to block all my attacks, but he couldn’t move away or get to his feet. I thought I saw a bit of panic in his eyes.
Finally, he threw himself into a backward somersault and rolled to his feet.
I charged him.
He surprised me by making a mad leap into air, an impossible jump, and landing on the roof of a nearby building. Without thinking, I sprang up onto the roof beside him. He had used his momentary respite to position himself firmly on the sloped surface, while I landed with my feet awkwardly angled on the inclined surface.
Jushichin took a vicious swing at my head. In responding to his attack, I lost my footing and landed on my back on the roof. He raised his tetsubou over his head to cave my skull in. I desperately rolled out of the way as he smashed a giant hole in the roof where I had been lying.
With the gap in the roof between us, he had to carefully move around the damage to reach me. This gave me time to get to my feet and assume a stable position.
Jushichin approached me slowly. My newfound strength and speed had taught him a little caution. He tentatively tested my footing and defenses with a probing attack.
I was raging inside for his blood, and was in no mood for slow, deliberate combat. I swung my naginata in a killing blow at his head, which he effortlessly blocked. Aiming another strike at his left arm, at the last moment, I changed the direction of the attack and swept his feet out from beneath him. He tumbled off the roof down to the ground. His weapon clattered off the roof after him, falling some distance away.
Exulting at my success, I jumped down next to the prone mujina. I thrust my naginata with all my strength at the center of the chest of my foe. With lightning speed, he grabbed the weapon just below the junction where the blade met the haft, halting my strike. We stayed like that, frozen for one long moment, his face showing fear and desperation for the first time as he contemplated his coming death.
With a convulsive jerk, he thrust the blade to the side and pulled. Combined with my own efforts to drive the naginata through his body, the force rammed the blade of the naginata deep into the ground.
In the few moments it took me to free my weapon from the grip of the earth, Jushichin rolled to the side, got to his feet and raced over to recover his tetsubou.
I came up behind him and attacked again.
We resumed weapon play. He managed to avoid my strikes, but ventured no attacks of his own. He seemed to be distracted by something in the direction of the breach in the wall.
I heard him mutter an oath under his breath. Without warning, he took a step back and leapt up to the top of a nearby building, disappearing over the roof line.
I instantly followed, but when I reached the spot, he was nowhere to be seen. I was raging inside at my failure to kill my hated foe, but I forced myself to take a moment to scan the surroundings to see if I could see where he had gone.
The west gate of the Spring Palace was wide open, but the bodies of the six defenders and at least twice that many enemy bushi lying near was mute testimony to the cost to the attackers.
Enemy bushi lay dead and wounded in the midst the caltrops Professor and Mouse had placed between barricades they had erected inside the walls. Trying to go through the barricades was nearly impossible, so the bushi had gone between them, only to find their progress slowed by the iron spikes. While they tried to extricate themselves from the traps, archers placed on the roofs of the buildings cut them down.
At least one group of bushi had failed to notice the tripline running at ankle height in the narrow passage between two buildings and had triggered a deadfall, dumping rocks and dirt on them, burying them alive.
Everywhere I looked, small groups of defenders struggled with invading bushi. Professor held off three bushi all by himself. Two bodies lay at his feet.
A bushi ran down a corridor and was suddenly jerked back as a cord wrapped around his throat. A figure in black stepped out of the shadows. The bushi struggled mightily, but Mouse held the cord tight around his neck as he slowly strangled.
Some terrified serving girls in their fancy working clothes caught my eye. A group of bushi charged them while they just stood and screamed.
Why aren’t they dressed for battle? Have they forgotten their training?
The bushi tumbled into a pit filled with spikes that appeared in what had been solid ground a moment before. The serving girls disappeared.
Archers ran out on the verandas of the buildings on either side of the pit and quickly put an end to the trapped bushi. Kuzu-no-ha stood beside them. The ground reappeared and the “terrified servers” were once again at the end of the path as the kitsuné and archers hid back inside the buildings.
A flash of light caught my attention.
Near the breach in the wall, Kamo and Surei were locked in a furious magic battle.
Kamo’s robes were singed and bloodied. His face was blackened from Akiko’s exit. But he still glowed with the power he had stolen from Akiko.
There was a faint shimmer in the air I had learned to associate with Kamo’s invisible barriers. Arrows aimed at him bounced or veered away. Five Sureis anchored the points of a seiman made of pure power inscribed around him. Kamo cast bolts of fire at them, while they whirled in a wild dance of attack and avoidance. The seiman followed them precisely, careening crazily around Kamo as they moved.
He had a hard time hitting his fast-moving targets. One of his bolts hit, but the target was just a duplicate. It vanished in a flash of light. The seiman briefly vanished only to appear again as a new duplicate appeared in its place.
Kamo launched an attack at an archer outside the seiman, but it splashed against the lines of power surrounding him. His next attack struck Surei herself, but she intercepted the bolt with her fans, angling it back at him. He dodged but had a look of growing desperation on his face.
Though Surei wasn’t doing much to hurt Kamo that I could see, she had him completely contained. It could have been my imagination, but it seemed to me as if the glow of his power was growing dimmer. If she could keep the pressure on him for a little longer, she would defeat him.
Jushichin is going after Surei!
The thought cut through the fog of my anger and bloodlust like lightning illuminating a darkened landscape.
I jumped down off the roof and raced towards the sorcerous struggle. I saw Kamo stumble, scream, then claw at his face with both hands. He had triggered one of Mouse’s metsubushi traps. The blinding powder completely broke his concentration.
Surei seized the opportunity. Suddenly, the five of her became still and the seiman blazed with power, the lines of the design sinking into the dirt around Kamo. Still clawing at his eyes, he slumped to the ground like a puppet with its strings cut. She had defeated and subdued him.
There was a movement in the shadows of a building near her.
Jushichin!
With a bloodcurdling scream, I launched myself at him. Though surprised by my sudden appearance, he still managed to avoid my attack. However, I had time to get between him and Surei. “You will not reach her without going through me.”
With a snarl, Jushichin ran at me as if to attack, leaping high over my head at the last possible moment. He left himself wide open and I landed a deep cut on his inner thigh.
Once past me, he headed straight for Surei. He fumbled inside his jacket.
Pulling out a slip of paper, he shouted a strange word and threw it. Instead of fluttering to the ground, it flew like a knife, striking Surei in the chest. Immediately, the four duplicates disappeared, the seiman vanished, and she collapsed in a heap.
My mind cleared. No more anger, no more overpowering urge to kill my foe. Unfortunately, no extra speed or power either.
What have I done? If I had used the slightest bit strategy, I could have easily beaten Jushichin. Instead, we fought like two bull elks. Now, it is too late.
He turned around, ready to resume our fight. Somehow, he sensed something was different. A savage grin spread across his face. “Oh, not so tough now with your onmyouji down, are you? That idiot Kamo managed to get something right.”
Without another word, he rushed me. I tried to block him with my naginata, but I no longer had the strength or speed to match him. He hit me in the chest with incredible force. I flew through the air and landed in a narrow gap between two of the buildings.
Still grinning, he stalked towards me. A thin shadow on the ground near my feet caught my attention. Trying hard not to stare at it, I began crawling backwards from Jushichin, saying “Please, please, don’t kill me. I’ll do anything you want.”
A look of contempt crossed his face. “You can’t even die well.”
He walked through the gap between the buildings, and in the process, snapped the tripline I had noticed a few moments before.
Instantly aware something was wrong, he tried to throw himself back out of the way, but the trap was too large. Rocks, dirt, logs, and gravel poured down on him from the roof, burying him beneath its weight.
I took a deep breath and got to my feet. Acting the coward had distracted him long enough to get him to walk into the trap.
I bent down and picked up my naginata. There was a sound behind me and I turned to see the mujina burrowing out from underneath the debris trapping him.
I can’t let him get out.
With a tremendous surge of effort, I brought the naginata around, striking the mujina just below the chin. Even with all my hysterical strength, I wasn’t able to cut through the neck.
He kept digging.
With frenzied power, I hacked at his neck twice more, finally severing his head completely from his body. He fell still.
The body shimmered and resumed the appearance of a huge badger. The head next to the body also assumed animal form.
Taking a deep breath, I turned to deal with Kamo.
He held Surei in front of him. One hand supported her body and the other held a knife against her throat. She hung limp in his grasp, her eyes closed. Other than blinking his watering eyes rapidly and squinting, he seemed none the worse for his exposure to the metsubushi.
“Well, Inspector, here we are. At least that fool mujina did one thing right. She’ll be no help to you. My spell has rendered her completely unconscious.” He hefted Surei higher, adjusting his grip to make it more secure. “Find me Abé no Seimei’s writings or I kill her. If I suspect any kind of trick, she dies and I’ll burn this place to the ground.”
I was in a panic. What could I do? Even if I tried to fight him, I wouldn’t have a chance. I was completely drained of energy. A five-year old boy could beat me two matches out of three. I tried to think of something, but kept coming up blank.
Yoshi.
A soft voice in my head. It seemed … familiar.
Yoshi.
I gasped in recognition.
Akiko?
Let me help, Yoshi.
It was if her presence surrounded and filled me. I felt a warmth spreading throughout my body and suddenly felt suffused with energy. I remembered how Surei had poured power through our connection to bring me back when I was dying. I tried to do the same for her. I felt a sudden weakness and her eyes fluttered open.
I need to buy us some time.
I couldn’t give Kamo what he wanted since I was ignorant of where Surei kept the writings. I had seen her studying them in her office and her quarters, but I didn’t know where she stored them. I decided on a radical plan. I would tell him the truth.
“I have no idea where she keeps them. She never confided in me.”
I was sure that the only reason that Surei never said anything to me was simply because I hadn’t asked but I decided to stretch the truth a little. I couldn’t imagine Kamo trusting anyone enough to share his secrets. He would probably believe everyone else felt the same way.
“She didn’t trust me. She thought I would steal her papers.”
“Then you had better start making some good guesses. I won’t wait here all night.”
I was distracted by another feeling of weakness. Surei was pulling energy through our connection, feeding off of my vitality. I started to panic until a wordless sense of assurance and affection came from Akiko. Again, her warmth spread throughout my body, restoring my strength.
Kamo raised Surei up higher and jabbed the knife into her throat, drawing a trickle of blood. “Move it, bushi!”
Surei’s body slumped forward, forcing Kamo to shift his grip to keep from losing hold. Without warning, she reached up and grabbed his hand holding the knife. She pulled it over her shoulder, straightened her legs, and threw Kamo to the ground. He landed on his back with a whoof.
Surei kept hold of his knife hand and knelt next to him. With her free hand, she struck him in the chest with her open palm and yelled, “Burn!”
For an instant, so much power poured into me that I felt as though my entire body were on fire. I sagged to my knees as a torrent of energy flowed through my connection to Surei.
Kamo screamed in agony as flames shot out of his mouth, his nostrils, and even from around his eyes. In moments, he was consumed from the inside out, leaving behind a charred body dressed in smoking robes. Surei stood and stepped away from the smoldering corpse.
Goodbye, Yoshi. Thank you.
Without warning, the energy filling me disappeared, leaving me weak and disoriented.
Surei staggered like one of her drunken customers. I stumbled forward to steady her. We collided and leaned on each other to prevent ourselves from falling.
Surei smiled at me and said, “I may not be Abé no Seimei, but the Dancer of the Scarlet Hyacinth is no one to trifle with.”
Professor looked grave as we approached. “We managed to shut the gate, but they are pressing the attack at the hole in the wall. We have done well so far, but I am not sure we can beat them.”
Surei pointed at the bodies of Jushichin and the onmyouji. “Throw that carrion over the wall. Inform the bushi Shirakawa Palace has fallen and Retired Emperor Sutoku has fled. They will likely lose interest in us after that.”
Professor started yelling orders.
The sight of the bodies of Kamo and Jushichin lying in the middle of the street had the desired effect. Our attackers had already lost too many men and now they discovered Emperor Go-Shirakawa’s troops would be coming soon. I heard the officers yelling commands to withdraw.
Professor called for people to stack some barrels of saké against the wall to plug the hole.
Surei and I looked at each other and began laughing in relief.
Kuzu-no-ha came striding up, poised and imperturbable as ever. “Granddaughter, there you are. I see you two finally dealt with Jushichin. Well done.”
Surei smiled. “Well, this is a day to remember. I have finally impressed my grandmother. And all we had to do was to kill a renegade onmyouji and a bloodthirsty mujina. If I had known it was that easy, I would have done it years ago.”
Even Kuzu-no-ha joined in the laughter.