Shadow Of The Fox

Hakaimono howled with approval in my mind, reveling in the violence, urging me to fully release its power. I kept a tight grip on my self-control, even as I dodged the jorogumo’s furious reprisal, her long legs scything down at me as she charged. Backed into a corner, I whispered a quick incantation in the language of Shadow, and another Tatsumi split away from me as we darted in opposite directions.

The jorogumo hesitated, confused with the appearance of my reflection, giving us enough time to circle around her. Hissing, she whirled toward the Tatsumi on her left and slashed down with a leg. It passed through the reflection without pause and crashed into a pillar, and the mirror image dissolved into writhing darkness and vanished. Now behind the huge yokai, I raised Kamigoroshi and slashed it across the bulging abdomen.

Yellow ichor spattered, hissing to the floor, and the jorogumo’s scream vibrated the webs around us. “Evil human!” she shrieked, spinning to face me, leaving a dripping trail of ooze behind her. “How dare you touch my beautiful body?” She staggered, legs scrabbling for purchase, and I lunged, aiming for the spot where human and spider fused together, intending to split them in half once and for all.

The jorogumo bared her teeth as I came at her. “Curse your eyes!” she hissed, and a spray of green liquid shot from her jaws and misted into the air. I twisted aside to avoid it, but felt a spiderweb mist settle on my face, a second before my eyes started to burn. Blinking rapidly, I staggered away, keeping Kamigoroshi raised as I scrubbed at my face with a sleeve. Through streaming tears, I saw a blur of yellow and black fill my vision, and slashed at it blindly. The sword edge bit into something large as the chitonous leg struck me like a mallet blow, smashing me aside. I felt Kamigoroshi tear from my grasp as I rolled over the floor, tangling myself in sticky webs before I hit the wall.

Dazed, still half-blind, with Hakaimono snarling in my head in frustration, I pushed myself upright and searched desperately for my sword, but my feet were abruptly yanked from beneath me. I hit the floor on my stomach and looked back to see thick strands of webbing wrapped around my legs, the ropes stretching back to the jorogumo’s abdomen. The huge yokai smiled, baring black fangs, and began reeling me in like a fish.

“Come to me, tasty little man bug,” she crooned, as I began the inescapable slide toward her. Flipping to my back, I tried tearing the webs from my legs, but they were as strong as silk ropes and wouldn’t budge. Desperately, I cast about for something to free my limbs, furious with myself and my mistake, imagining what Ichiro would say if I let myself get eaten by a jorogumo. I searched the floor for a sharp bone or discarded blade, but except for dust and a few finger bones trapped in webbing, there was nothing close.

“I have a special treat for you, human,” the yokai continued, still reeling me across the floor. “You can be the host for my next batch of children. I will lay a hundred eggs in your stomach and keep you alive until the day they hatch and devour you from the inside.” She giggled through her fangs, continuing to pull me across the floor with unnatural strength. “I wonder if my babies will be stronger than any before them,” she mused, “because they feasted on the Kage demonslayer?”

I was now only a few yards from the huge yokai, close enough to see the triumph in her black eyes, the venom dripping from her smile, and my stomach recoiled in disgust. There was no other choice. Slumping to my back, I relaxed, closed my eyes and opened my mind to the demon in the sword.

It responded instantly, a bright flare in the darkness, filling me with rage. I felt the sword hilt bite into my palm as I clenched my fist and opened my eyes.

The jorogumo’s face was above me, jaws gaping and curved black fangs descending toward my throat. I saw my own reflection in her gaze, eyes blazing crimson, and caught the split-second fear as she realized too late what she’d really caught. Kamigoroshi flashed, cutting across her face, and she reeled back with a scream, hands going to her eyes.

I sliced through the webs on my legs, leaped upright and shoved the blade into the bulbous body of the yokai directly overhead, sinking it to the hilt. Before the jorogumo could move, I sprinted beneath her, continuing to carve the sword through the bulging abdomen, until I came out the other side.

Panting, I lowered Kamigoroshi, flinging yellow ichor to the ground, as the jorogumo behind me collapsed with a scream, segmented limbs clattering against the floor as she flailed. She flipped to her back, thrashing, strangled choking sounds coming from her mouth, until her legs curled over her split stomach and were finally still.

Not enough. Hakaimono still raged through my mind, wanting more. More blood, more killing. Its rage wasn’t nearly satisfied, but it never was. Though only a small piece of my soul had been offered to the blade, the demon sank its claws in deep and struggled to maintain its grip. Taking a deep breath, I closed off my mind and my emotions, becoming a blank vessel with no weaknesses to latch on to. The demon fought me, loath to relinquish control, to return to the darkness, but I concentrated on feeling nothing, being nothing, and Hakaimono’s presence finally slipped away.

“What have you done?”

The horrified voice rang out behind me. I turned, gripping my sword hilt, to face a squat, middle-aged man standing in the doorway. His blue-and-gray kimono was very fine, and he had the soft, fleshy look of a man who ate well and sat on the softest cushions. His doughy face was pale as he gazed wildly around the room.

“You killed her,” he gasped, dark gaze falling on the twisted form of the dead jorogumo. “You killed her! Why? Do you realize what you’ve done?”

I didn’t answer. Of course I realized what I’d done—killed the yokai my clan sent me to destroy. The reasons didn’t matter. I was simply a weapon. A weapon did not question the intent of those who wielded it.

“How could you,” the man went on, moaning as he came forward. “That creature was the only thing that cared for me. The only living being that ever gave me love. My hateful wife only offered spite and condemnation. Even my men sneer and talk about me behind my back. This creature—” he gazed mournfully at the body on the floor “—freed me. She promised she could help me achieve my heart’s desire, my greatest wish.” His eyes hardened, jowly chins quivering as he set his jaw. “I would have gladly fed her appetites with a thousand men in gratitude for what she offered.”

Lord Hinotaka’s legs shook, and he sank to his knees, his gaze never leaving the corpse of the jorogumo behind me. “Whoever you are,” he said in a trembling voice, “depart my keep before I alert the guards. I assume you were sent to slaughter the monster of Usugurai castle, and you have done your duty. Now go, and may the curse of a thousand grudge spirits follow you for the rest of your days. You’ve killed your mark, now leave me to my misery.”

“Not yet,” I said softly, and raised Kamigoroshi once more. “There is one more monster I must kill, before my mission is complete.”

Hinotaka frowned, but then his eyes widened and he grabbed for the sword at his obi—too late. Kamigoroshi sliced through his neck in one smooth motion, and the man’s head toppled from his shoulders, bounced once and rolled to a stop beside the corpse of the jorogumo. The headless body hit the floor with a thump and soaked the carpet of webs in liquid crimson.

I flicked blood off Kamigoroshi and took a moment to watch the lord bleed out beside his monster. I took no pleasure in killing Hinotaka. The clan had demanded his death; I had simply been the instrument to carry it out. The lord of Usugurai castle had murdered his wife to placate the jorogumo and had sacrificed his men to her desires, but he was only a puppet. This jorogumo was a two-hundred-year-old yokai that had plagued Iwagoto for many years. She would claim a lonely part of a castle, seduce its lord with promises of love or power and then slowly consume all the men from the inside. When the time came, she would inevitably turn on the lord, paralyzing and hiding him away in her lair, before leaving the castle and vanishing into the dark. Her last victim would be found days later, hanging in the webs, his insides hollowed out and empty from the hundreds of baby spiders that had chewed their way free. For a time, the jorogumo would vanish, fading into rumor and legend, but about twenty years later she would reemerge, targeting another castle, and the cycle would begin anew.

No longer. The yokai was dead, and there would be no more humans sacrificed to her hunger. Hinotaka would be the last. How the Kage knew when and where she would emerge, and why I had been sent to kill her now, I did not know. It wasn’t my place to ask questions; all that mattered was completing the mission.

Gazing down at Hinotaka’s corpse, I felt a faint flicker of pity. He was just another casualty in the long line of the yokai’s victims, but what would drive a man to allow such a monster into his castle, much less his affections? I didn’t understand, but it didn’t matter. He was dead, and his end had been much cleaner than if the jorogumo had finished what she came to do.

Sheathing my blade, I left the room, slipped out a window onto the roof of the keep and disappeared into the night.

* * *

Sheets of rain pounded the road as I approached the edge of town, about a half mile from Usugurai castle. I crept along the roof of a two-story building that served as the rendezvous point for the mission, then dropped onto an overhang and slipped through an open window.

Instinctively, I ducked and rolled away as a shuriken embedded itself in the sill, the four-pointed metal star sinking into the wood. Springing into a defensive crouch, I put a hand on my sword hilt, as a snicker echoed out of the darkness and a shadow disengaged from the corner.

“Oh, sorry, Tatsumi-kun.” The female voice was an amused murmur, as Ayame came into view, grinning at me. Like myself, she was sheathed in black, wearing bracers and tabi boots, her long hair tied behind her. The hilt of a short sword poked over her shoulder, and a kusarigama—a chain with a sickle attached at the end—hung from her waist. “I thought you were a big wet rat, climbing in the window.”

“Ayame.” I straightened cautiously, watching as the other shinobi sauntered to the window and pried the shuriken from the wood. We had been raised together since we were young, had gone through basic shinobi training together. It was hard to remember now, but she might have been my best friend. That was before the circle of majutsushi, the mages of the Shadow Clan, had chosen me to be the new bearer of Kamigoroshi, and I had been taken away for private instruction. I hadn’t seen Ayame again until years down the road, and we had both changed. Now I was the Kage demonslayer, and she was a skilled shinobi. It made sense that she would be here now, watching and protecting from the shadows. “Where is Master Ichiro?”

“Here.”

The door slid open and a man came into the room, making no sound as he stepped across the threshold. He could be described as unremarkable, a short, middle-aged man with features one could easily forget. All deliberately crafted on his part. He moved with a fluid grace that belied his humble appearance, and his sharp black eyes were as keen as a hawk’s.

Ayame backed away, melting into the shadows once more. I sank to my knees and bowed, keeping my gaze on the floor as the man approached, feeling his stare on the back of my neck.

“Is it done?” he asked in a low voice.

“Yes, sensei,” I replied without looking up.

“Hinotaka as well?”

“All the targets have been eliminated, sensei.”

“Good.” I felt him nod. “The clan will be pleased. Were you injured?”

“The jorogumo spit venom in my eyes,” I answered, “but it’s cleared.”

He grunted. “You weren’t paying attention, then. I told you spiders will spit when they’re feeling cornered. Did you have to call on Hakaimono?”

“Yes.”

“Bakamono.” I felt a sharp, stinging blow upside my head, rocking me forward a bit. I had been expecting it and didn’t move as Ichiro made a sound of disgust. “That’s the second time in as many months, Tatsumi. You’re getting careless.”

I placed my hands on the floor and bowed even farther, touching my forehead to the tatami mats. “Forgive me, sensei. I’ll try harder next time.”

“Keep making mistakes and there won’t be a next time,” Ichiro growled. “Keep using the demon’s power and one day, you won’t be able to control it. One slipup, one death that the clan didn’t call for, and they will kill you, Tatsumi. And then I will have no choice but to commit seppuku for my failure in teaching you control.”

“Now, Ichiro-san,” came a new voice, high and breathy, and the sound of hakama trousers shushed into the room. “Don’t be too hard on the boy. We told him to kill a dangerous, two-hundred-year-old yokai who has been feeding on men for centuries, and the traitorous lord who was plotting against the Kage. He’s done his duty, and the clan is pleased.”

I lifted my head, blinking as lantern light spilled over me, illuminating the stranger who had come into the room. Tall and reed-thin, he wore a black robe with swarms of white sakura blossoms, and a white silk fan was clutched between long fingers. The faintest wisp of a goatee graced a delicate jaw, and he lifted an eyebrow as thin as a line of ink, regarding me as one would a curious insect on the floor.

“So, this is our little demonslayer, is it?” The stranger cocked his head, holding his fan before his nose. I could sense he was smirking at me behind the silk. “How very...intriguing. Well, Ichiro-san, don’t be rude. Aren’t you going to introduce me?”

Ichiro sighed. “Tatsumi, this is Kage Masao,” he said gruffly. “He honors us with his presence, as he is the chief advisor to Lady Hanshou herself.”

Lady Hanshou? The Kage family daimyo? A flicker of surprise went through me. Lady Hanshou was the elusive leader of the Shadow Clan, a mysterious woman shrouded in legend and rumor, rarely seen or spoken of, lest her personal spies hear and take action. She almost never left her chambers in Hakumei Castle, and very few people had ever laid eyes on what lay beyond the castle doors. It was said Hanshou was surrounded by the deadliest shinobi in the land, a group so loyal that they cut out their own tongues to make certain they never betrayed her secrets. As for Hanshou herself, the darkest rumors claimed she was immortal, but not even her own clan knew much about her, who she was, even what she looked like. Most were content to let the mystery be.

“Don’t look so shocked, Tatsumi-san.” Masao closed his fan with a snap and steepled his long fingers together. “Lady Hanshou has been watching your exploits, and your continuous triumphs have gotten her attention. In fact, that is why I am here. She wishes to meet you in person, young demonslayer. I am to take you to her, tonight.”

“So stop gaping like a landed fish,” Ichiro snapped before I could say anything, “and go get yourself cleaned up. We can’t have you meeting the daimyo of the Shadow Clan looking like a drowned rat.”

I bowed to the two men and obeyed, slipping out of the room and down the steps to the first floor.

I am to meet the daimyo of Kage, the leader of the Shadow Clan. A ripple of what might’ve been apprehension went through my stomach. Immediately, Hakaimono stirred, intrigued by that flicker of emotion, and I coldly crushed it, telling myself to feel nothing. Intellectually, I knew this was a great honor; few were called into Lady Hanshou’s presence, fewer could claim that the daimyo of the Shadow Clan had spoken to them face-to-face. My missions were passed to me through Ichiro and the other sensei; there was no reason the leader of the Kage would assign them to me in person. I’d heard of samurai earning rewards, recognition and honor through great deeds and acts of valor, but such opportunities were not granted to one such as I. I killed demons, monsters and yokai because that was the purpose of my existence. A weapon needed no praise or recognition to do its job.

So, why would Lady Hanshou want to see me?

A servant waited for me at the foot of the stairs, and I followed him into the small bath where, per normal, I was met by a pair of Shadow Clan healers. Dressed in ash-gray robes, they greeted me with the same clinical detachment they showed at every post-mission examination.

“Remove your weapons and clothes,” one told me in a bored tone, pointing to a stool in the middle of the room, “then sit. Let’s get this over with quickly.”

I obeyed, disarming myself of weapons—shuriken, grappling hook and the kunai throwing knives hidden in my bracers—before setting Kamigoroshi in the corner. The servant, as well as the two healers, stayed far away from the sword as I laid it down, as if it were some terrible beast that would savage them if given a chance. I knew they regarded me in much the same way. All Kage were aware of Kamigoroshi’s curse and interacted with me as little as possible to avoid prodding the demon. When I was a child, it had been terribly lonely, the way everyone recoiled like I had the plague. Now, it meant nothing to me.

After peeling off my soaked black suit, I sat on the stool while the pair examined me. One tilted my head up to look at my eyes, while the other prodded my side, eliciting a sharp twinge of pain.

“Hmm,” he muttered, digging his fingers into my skin, poking and pinching. I set my jaw and didn’t make a sound. “One cracked rib, and several deep bruises along his side, nothing broken.”

The other pulled down my eyelid, wrenching my head toward the light. “Traces of venom in his eyes, not enough to blind, fortunately. Did the jorogumo bite you?” he asked me.

“No.”

“So your innards aren’t turning to soup as we speak, good to hear. And you managed to keep most of your blood on the inside this time, well done. It becomes very tiresome when you continuously show up half-dead in the middle of the night.” He released my chin and turned to gesture to the servant. “We’re done here. Bathe him, bandage the cuts and send him to Master Ichiro when you’re finished.”

The servant bowed silently as the healers left the room, then picked up the bucket sitting beside the stool and dumped it over my head. The frigid water drenched my hair and seemed to rake talons of ice over my skin, but I didn’t move as the servant sluiced the dirt and grime from my body, scrubbing my wounds until the flesh around them turned pink. When I was clean, he sloshed another bucket of water over my head, bandaged the cuts and left without a word.

Standing, I gazed around and saw that another servant had left a change of clothes on the edge of the tub: a pair of hakama trousers, a dove-gray obi sash and a black haori jacket bearing a white crescent eclipsed by a dark moon—the crest of the Shadow Clan—on the back.

Ichiro and Masao waited for me in the next room, speaking quietly with a pair of sake cups between them. I didn’t see Ayame, but I knew she was close. My sensei only grunted as I knelt on tatami mats and bowed low, but I could feel Kage Masao watching me with an almost predatory smile as I touched my forehead to the floor.

“There you are,” Ichiro remarked as I raised my head. “Well, you look like a dog chewed on you, but at least you no longer resemble a drowned rat. Masao-san has a pair of kago waiting outside to take you across town. Are you ready?”

“Yes, sensei.”

“Excellent!” Masao-san rose in a fluttering of robes and fan. “Come then, little demonslayer. We mustn’t keep Hanshou-sama waiting.”

He swept out of the room. I rose to follow, but Ichiro grabbed my arm as I passed him, rough fingers digging into my flesh as he leaned close.

“Listen to me, boy,” he growled, as I went still in the grip of my sensei. “You are about to meet the most important person in the Kage, the leader of the Shadow Clan herself. Do not embarrass me. If you dishonor me in front of the lady, I assure you, the beating you took tonight will feel like a massage compared to what I will do to you. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Master Ichiro.”

“Remember what we taught you. Repeat it to me, now.”

“I am nothing,” I said automatically. “I am a weapon in the hands of the Kage. My life exists only to be the bearer of Kamigoroshi and to obey the orders of the Shadow Clan.”

“Good.” He nodded and released me. “See that you remember when speaking to the lady. Now go.”

Kage Masao stood on the covered veranda, gazing distastefully at the rain, a colorful parasol held over his head. A pair of kago—individual palanquins made of lacquered wood and carried by four trained bearers—waited at the bottom of the steps. I had never ridden in a kago; they were usually reserved for nobles and important individuals, not lowly assassins. But, glancing at Kage Masao and his flowing robes, I realized he had not traveled here by horse and certainly not on foot.

“What horrible weather.” He sighed, bringing his fan to his face, as if the rain itself offended him. “Fitting for this backwater little town. I shall be glad to be done with it.” Glancing at me, he offered a bright smile and gestured to a kago. “Well, Tatsumi-san? Shall we be off?”

The ride was fairly short, as the town wasn’t large, and soon the servants were sliding back the door of the kago, revealing a large, two-story ryokan—an inn—looming at the edge of the muddy road. Inside, I followed Masao up the stairs to a room at the end of a corridor and waited in the hall while he entered. A moment later, a servant slid back the door, releasing a few wisps of gray smoke, and beckoned me inside. The room beyond was cloaked in shadow and smelled of incense and tobacco. Cautiously, I stepped through the door and as it slid shut behind me, I dropped to my knees and pressed my forehead to the tatami mats.

“Kage Tatsumi,” Masao purred. “The demonslayer.”

“Come forward, boy,” a voice rasped, startling me with its harshness. “Come into the light. Let me see the bearer of the legendary Kamigoroshi.”

Blinking away smoke, I raised my head and inched forward on my knees, squinting to see past the lamp that burned on the edge of a low table. Sake bottles lined the polished surface like ranks of warriors protecting their general, and incense hung thick in the air, smelling of smoke and sandalwood.

Peering past the haze and the bottles, I caught a glimpse of the speaker and clenched my jaw to stop the sharp inhalation of breath. Only years of training and practice kept my features expressionless. It seemed as if Lady Hanshou’s face had been flayed, beaten and left out in the sun to burn before being set back on her sunken neck. Folds of skin hung from her sticklike arms; her hands were wizened bird’s claws, one of them clutching a long-handled pipe as if it was her lifeline to the living world. A few wispy white threads were still attached to her scalp, floating on the air like spider silk. One milky eye was half-shut, the other burned with such intensity that it bordered on madness.

Lady Hanshou smiled a wide, toothless grin at my silence. “Not quite what you were expecting, eh, demonslayer?” she cackled. “Keep staring, but this face isn’t going to get any prettier.” Immediately, I pressed my face to the tatami mats again, but Lady Hanshou let out a snort. “Oh, get up, boy,” she snapped, sounding impatient. “Let me look you in the eyes. Merciful Kami, you’re young,” she exclaimed as I rose. “How old are you, boy? Fourteen?” Without waiting for an answer, she swatted Kage Masao’s leg with the back of her hand. “Masao-san! How old is he now?”

“He is seventeen, my lady.”

“Is he?” Hanshou’s face took on an expression that could have passed for surprise. “He looks younger than that. Ah, but you all look like babies to me.” She groped for a sake bottle, somehow managing to leave the empty ones undisturbed. Masao took the bottle and poured her a cup of the rice wine, which she downed in a single gulp, then held the cup out for more.