Samurai Son (18 page)

Chapter Thirty-Five

Akira sagged against the ropes and slowly sank back down to the cold ground.
 
By the gray, flat light, Akira guessed it was morning, but it brought him no comfort.
 
He did not know exactly what he had promised the forest spirit, but something had happened.
 
They weren’t going to kill him right now, which at this moment, was preferable.
 
Still, he had a dreadful feeling over what he had actually promised.

He looked over at Ikumi, who didn’t meet his gaze.
 
She was sniffling a bit as she lay on the ground.
 
Her face was muddied and turned into the dirt.
 
Her fine kimono had been torn, and he could see only a little of the blue fabric through the mud.
 
Had she lost her mind?
 
She looked fragile and broken, a woman who nearly had lost her son.

He had agreed to become Tengu.
 
But what did it mean for him to become Tengu?
 
Would he become like Windcatcher, half man and half bird?
 
Or would he stay in human form?
 
And why would they care that he was half Tengu, a product of a human-Tengu mating?
 
Why did they even bother capturing him if they were going to simply kill him?

His eyes strayed to Ikumi again.
 
She looked at him, her dark eyes red rimmed and wild.
 
“Mother?”

Ikumi blinked, her eyes crazed with fear.
 
She didn’t acknowledge his words.

Akira frowned.
 
“Why didn’t they just kill me?”

Silence ensued.
 
Akira looked down at his hands, bruised and bloodied from the fight.
 
“Maybe it was a test,” he muttered.

Maybe it was all a test.
 
Maybe he was going mad like Ikumi.
 
He looked at his mother.
 
She had always been strong.
 
How could she have lost her mind this quickly?
 
Even as he wondered, he knew the answer.
 
It was the Tengu’s magic.
 
It had to be.
 
It prickled all around him like goose bumps on the flesh.

Akira never thought of himself as a magical creature, certainly not as a samurai, growing up in Tsuitori.
 
He always knew he was different, even when he was younger.
 
He spent his time dreaming of the dark boreal forests, the bright blue skies, and the wind beneath his wings.
 
Even then, he probably knew he was Tengu, although he didn’t have a word for it.

The other children had sensed it too.
 
Akira didn’t make friends easily.
 
He had assumed it was because he was the daimyo’s son, but it was now obvious that they had sensed the otherworldliness about him as easily as he sensed the magic all around this place.
 
Without the adult inhibitions and controls in place, children could often see magic where adults could not.

Akira looked on Ikumi, his emotions roiling.
 
She recognized his Tengu nature while he grew up and fought to squelch it as much as possible.
 
Yet would it have hurt him if she had told him?
 
Akira wondered.
 
When he was younger, yes, he wouldn’t have understood.
 
But he was seventeen now and nearly of age.
 
He tried to think back on the conversations he had with her and Rokuro, but none sprang to mind.
 
It had been a long time since he had thought about flying or about magic.
 
Rokuro’s training had taken up a good portion of his day, pushing him to the point of exhaustion.

As he thought about Rokuro, Akira felt grief well up inside him.
 
The last time he had seen the old sensei, he lay motionless on the floor in a widening pool of blood.
 
He had to be dead.
 
Akira felt hot tears fill his eyes, and he choked back a sob.
 
Rokuro had been hard but fair.
 
He had done everything he could to save Akira and his mother and had paid with his life.

Akira knew he shouldn’t weep.
 
Rokuro had died honorably and in battle.
 
But Akira missed the old samurai.
 
He was angry that the Tengu had taken his sensei from him, just as they were taking Ikumi from him.

“Ikumi,” he whispered.
 
“Mother.”

Ikumi looked up at her name, but what caused him to quail was the feral look in her eyes.
 
As he stared into them, he realized they weren’t the right color.
 
No longer were they the dark brown he knew so well, but golden, like that of a hawk.

“Ikumi?” he said again, this time in alarm.

“Son,” Ikumi replied.
 
Her voice was high pitched, almost a screech.
 
“Find Tenko.”
 
Her words were nearly unintelligible.
 
She held out her hand, and he noticed the russet pinfeathers growing along her arms.

Akira gasped.
 
“Mother, what’s happening to you?”

He heard the beak clack, signaling Windcatcher’s return.
 
Akira whirled on the Tengu; the only thing holding back his murderous rage were the bonds.
 
She is being freed, as you requested,
said Windcatcher.

Akira turned back to his mother to see her writhing against the bonds.
 
The feathers grew and her body changed as some bones became longer and others shorter.
 
Her fingers curled tightly and became stubs as the arm bones lengthened and became thin and hollow.

“No, not like this,” Akira whispered.

“I’m sorry, my son,” she said in one final gasp.
 
In a flash of light, a large hawk flapped experimentally before taking off into the sky.

“Mother!” Akira shouted as he watched the hawk fly away.
 
For a moment, Ikumi was a reddish brown spot among the gray clouds; then she disappeared.

Akira stared into the dark, cloud-swept sky long after she had vanished.
 
He turned his head to the Tengu who stood nearby.
 
“Why?”

The council has agreed to let her go,
Windcatcher replied.

“But I didn’t want this.”

It was not your choice.

Akira stared at the creature, hatred and anger filling him.
 
“I can see why Ikumi left you.
 
You’re evil creatures.”

Windcatcher clacked his beak.
 
We have fulfilled our end of the bargain.
 
Now it is your turn.

Akira stared at the Tengu in horror.
 
“No, I never agreed to this.”

Windcatcher stepped forward and flapped his wings, causing a windstorm of dirt and debris.
 
Akira coughed then choked.
 
He tried to raise his bound hands to shield his face, but he couldn’t, just as he couldn’t breathe.

Darkness overtook him and he fell unconscious.

Chapter Thirty-Six

Kasumi stared at her half brother.
 
Never before had she been so angry with him.
 
Jiro’s dark eyes were expressionless as they met Kasumi’s defiant gaze.
 
His arms were crossed and there was a slight sneer across his features.

“Where are you going?” he asked again, his voice dripping with accusation.

“I’m going to do what you’re not man enough to do,” Kasumi said.

Jiro raised his hand as if to strike her, but Kasumi was quick.
 
She drew her tanto in a fluid movement, faster than the human eye could catch.
 
Her tanto less than an inch from his throat, Jiro’s eyes widened and he lowered his hand.

“That is better,” Kasumi said softly.
 
“Don’t you dare try that again.”

Jiro said nothing but looked at the woman samurai and her dagger.
 
The hardness in Kasumi’s eyes told him everything.
 
She would not hesitate to kill him, brother or not.

“Now I am going to find Takeshi Ikumi and Takeshi Akira,” she said.
 
“You will go back to Takeshi daimyo and tell him that the Tengu have taken his family.”

Jiro’s face hardened.
 
“This is not your fight.”

“No?
 
Then I have made it mine,” Kasumi said, her voice a dangerous growl.
 
“The Tengu have taken these honorable people and have cast a spell on us to make us sleep.
 
I won’t be taken unawares so easily again.”

“I should go with you.”

“No.”
 
Kasumi looked at her brother.
 
“You don’t know the Tengu as I do.”

Jiro nodded slowly.
 
Kasumi knew he had heard the idle chatter how her mother, Keiko Neko, was a sorceress and how she cast spells to woo their father.
 
He would no doubt assume that she, too, was a sorceress and would let it go.
 
“I will go find Takeshi daimyo,” he said softly.

“Good.
 
Do not fail me, my half brother,” she said.

He bowed once and left.

Kasumi did not return the bow.

#

Akira awoke to rough prodding.
 
His back, shoulders, and hips ached from lying on the cold, damp ground.
 
He groaned as the prodding became more insistent.

Wake up!
 
Wake up!
 
Windcatcher’s voice was unrelenting in his head.

Akira slapped what felt like a bo away from his sore side.
 
“Leave me alone.”

No.

Akira realized his hands were free of their ropes, and he opened his eyes.
 
He rubbed his wrists as the Tengu continued to prod him hard with a bo.

For a moment Akira stared at the bo as it thumped hard against his ribs.
 
His eyes narrowed and he waited for the staff to come back down on his bruised ribs.
 
He rolled at the last second, reaching out and grasping the bo as he did so and pulling the staff out of the Tengu’s hands.

Akira brought the bo around in a lightning-fast strike that even Rokuro sensei would’ve been proud of.
 
Yet just as the bo would have made contact, a staff appeared in the Tengu’s hands, and Windcatcher parried the blow.

Very good, young one.

Akira gasped.
 
“How?”
 
Had the Tengu made the bo appear from nowhere?
 
He didn’t think it likely, yet his won bo had been blocked by the Tengu’s staff.
 
But Akira had no time to ponder this.
 
The Tengu moved swiftly, bringing the bo around in a striking position.
 
Akira danced out of the way, bringing the bo up and parrying it.
 
Strike followed strike.
 
The Tengu drove Akira back toward the tree.

Akira went for a lunging strike, hoping to get through the Tengu’s defenses.
 
Windcatcher swung his bo around effortlessly and smacked Akira hard in the shoulder.
 
A large
whuff
noise came out of Akira’s mouth as the staff knocked the wind out of him.
 
He staggered backward, reeling from both surprise and pain.
 
More hits came.
 
Each caused more pain than Akira could possibly imagine.

Defend yourself,
Windcatcher said.

Akira tasted blood in his mouth.
 
He wondered if he had bitten his lip.
 
He brought up the bo and weakly tried to block, but he hurt so badly that he could barely parry.
 
Windcatcher brought the bo crashing down on Akira.

Staggering and half blind with pain, Akira dropped his bo.
 
He felt his knees buckle, and he collapsed into the mud.
 
Windcatcher prodded him incessantly with the bo.
 
Akira didn’t care.

He closed his eyes and let the blessed unconsciousness take him.

Before he fell unconscious, he thought he heard Windcatcher’s mocking laughter.
 
This is a Tengu?

“No,” he whispered weakly, though no sound escaped his lips.
 
“I am samurai.”