Hitting the ground provided a nice distraction from the spiritual power biting his nerves. But the crunch of his bones lasted only a second.

Barriers were evil, evil things.

Kuro squeezed his eyes shut and swallowed. He wasn’t finished. There was something he needed… The whole world smelled of blood.

His blood.

That wasn’t his task. He needed to think. He needed to be clever.

The sword! Ren’s sword — he couldn’t think of the name right then.

He managed to drag his head to the side. Nothing but blackness. The moon had been eaten! No, wait, stupid fox, he had to open his eyes. He wrenched them open.

Steel glinted, bobbing side to side as the earth swung it like a mother cradling her babe. No, that was Kuro’s head too. The sword came into focus, three yards from him. The Shogun lay just a yard further. He’d missed a tree trunk by half a pace.

Kuro had to get up. He had to get the sword first. Kuro groaned as he rolled up to sitting. His chest hurt so much. Everything hurt. “Stop being so lazy,” he whispered to himself. Or perhaps just thought.

The Shogun groaned and pushed himself onto his knees. His armour had protected him, and he hadn’t had to fall through a barrier. If the Night Parade attacked then, the Shogun would be finished. But the Night Parade wasn’t coming. They didn’t know the Shogun had fallen outside the barrier. They floated on the other side of the castle, the useless jerks.

But Kuro could get the sword first. He wasn’t at that much of a disadvantage — all right, he was, but he was still worth ten Shoguns. He turned himself onto his knees, and propped himself up on his hands. Gravels pricked him like tiny knives.

“Crawl,” he whispered. He lifted his hand and set it down three inches ahead. Leaves crackled. He moved his opposite knee. He could do this. Keep moving forward.

The Shogun turned his head to Kuro. He laughed again, but instead of a raucous noise, his breath was husky. “Stupid fox. What can you do?”

Kuro was so close to the sword. He gloried in the Shogun’s laughter, in his stupidity. The sword was in reach. If he reached out his hand…

“You can’t touch the Kusanagi.” The Shogun shoved himself up to his feet, as if to prove his superiority over Kuro. Look at him, so much taller than the beast who could only crawl on all fours. “The Kusanagi won’t let you.”

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

Kuro grinned. He looked down at his hands, but somehow they were clean of everything but dirt. He swiped a hand across his bleeding chest and reached out for the sword.

The Shogun hissed in a breath, and grabbed up the sword out of Kuro’s reach. He held it aloft, where not even a single drop of Kuro’s blood could reach it.

“Not so stupid, I suppose,” the Shogun mused. “If you had touched it with your own blood, you’d have reclaimed it.”

Kuro’s hand still stretched forward. The Shogun sneered and stomped on it, crunching the bones under his sandal. Kuro yelped.

Taking his foot away, the Shogun pointed the Kusanagi at him. “But not clever enough. You will die here like a fox.”

“Exactly,” Kuro said, still grinning. He tightened his hand around a leaf and slapped it against his forehead. Didn’t the Shogun realise it yet?

Smoke plumed around Kuro, obscuring the Shogun’s puzzled expression at his comment. Paws replaced hands and feet. A muzzle and fangs replaced his face. The smoke cleared, leaving Kuro in his true form. The Dark Kitsune.

“Heh,” the Shogun laughed. “I can kill a fox as easily as a man.”

He moved to sweep the Kusanagi back, the same way he had on the rooftop facing the Night Parade.

Kuro jumped forward, snapping his jaws around the blade. The edge cut his tongue and his lips, but he held on tight.

“Pathetic!” the Shogun snarled, jerking on the sword. He kicked Kuro’s muzzle, but he kept biting.

He had to keep his hold on the sword. What the hell was taking them so long?

The Kusanagi creaked and groaned, screaming as only a sword could.

“Mongrel! Beast!”

He jerked the sword back and forth, but Kuro followed with his neck. He’d hold on. He’d hold on. He’d hold on…

The screams of demons split the air behind Kuro. The Shogun’s expression twitched from irritation, to confusion, to horror as the Night Parade swung around the castle to bear directly upon them.

Kuro would have grinned, if his fox muzzle had been capable of it. His fox form had provided the beacon for the attack on the Imperial Palace. The Shogun had taught him that. Now Kuro used it to pinpoint the Shogun’s behaviour.

“Your Excellency!” Damn it, samurai ran up behind the Shogun. Kuro had no idea where they’d come from. He kept his eyes trained on the Shogun.

“Let go, mongrel,” the Shogun snarled at Kuro.

“The demons are coming.”

And the Shogun had a choice. The sword, or his life. Perhaps he could get the sword back in time to kill the Night Parade. But more likely, the Night Parade would descend while Kuro held on tight.

Kuro’s vision grew darker as the Night Parade blocked the moon. Or perhaps that was his chest still bleeding, the pain from breaching the barrier, the sword burning against his mouth, or a thousand other wounds forcing Kuro into unconsciousness.

Not yet, not yet.

The first demons swooped down.

A clang split the air, and the Shogun no longer pulled on the sword. The world was too small for Kuro to see where he went. But no scream pierced through Kuro’s haze. The Shogun had retreated.

Didn’t matter. He was gone. Kuro had the sword. He’d done it. He’d retrieved Ren’s sword.

He collapsed, sword still clenched between his teeth. Black curled around his vision.

The last thing he saw was the transparent hem of an embroidered kimono.