The Name of the Blade, Book Two: Darkness Hidden (2 page)

“Hiya, She-Ra!” Jack called cheerily, dodging around a couple of giggling Kitsune.

“Hey!” I ran to meet them. “How are you—”

The words choked off as the sight of Rachel’s neck hit me like a hammer to the gut.

The Kitsune had given her some dark trousers and a clean white shirt. The last time I saw her, the shirt had been buttoned up to her throat – but Rachel had undone some of the buttons now, and the open collar revealed a horrifying wound on her neck. A ragged circle of deep puncture marks and torn, puffy skin. It was the size of a dinner plate.

A bite.

A Nekomata bite.

Nekomata were blood drinkers – that was how they stole people’s shapes and memories. The monster had Rachel all to itself in its lair for hours before we finally turned up to rescue her. It had used her like a cat toy in its sick game.

“What?” Rachel’s tentative smile disappeared and she grabbed the collar of her shirt, clutching it together.
“What?”

Jack aimed a glare at me over her sister’s shoulder.
This is not about you, Mio. Get it together!

“No – um – nothing,” I said, stumbling over the words. “Sorry, practically asleep on my feet. How are you both doing?”

Rachel started buttoning her shirt up again with jerky movements. “I’ll be better when we can get out of here and go home. I don’t know why we even had to come to weirdsville in the first place. It’s not like we don’t have clean clothes and antiseptic in the flat.”

“We could all probably use some real sleep,” Jack said, a shade too loudly. She gave Hikaru an apologetic look.

He shrugged, flashing his fey smile at her. “No biggie. They’re readying a way back to the mortal realm for you now. It shouldn’t be long.” He hesitated, his tail swishing through the air in a wide circle. “So – um – maybe I could – you know, after you’re settled back in, I could come and visit … check in, just to see how things are going?”

“Yeah. Right.” Jack nodded. “Yeah. We … we need to talk, don’t we?”

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Rachel muttered.

She turned away in apparent disgust, but the vulnerable shape of her back as she hunched over her folded arms sent a sharp stab of guilt and sadness through me. I stepped towards her – not sure if I could repair the damage I’d already caused, but determined to try – and bumped into Shinobu.

“Sorry, I didn’t—”

He backed away hastily. “It was my fault, Mio-dono.”

We both stared awkwardly at the space between us.

This kept happening. It was like we’d forgotten how to be easy with each other. Every time I thought we’d got that sense of – of
rightness
back, it vanished and left me closing my hands on smoke.

Before I could reach out to either Rachel or Shinobu, or just fall on the floor and have a screaming tantrum – which was pretty tempting at that point – a familiar voice said my name. It was Araki, the king’s archer and personal servant. She stood beckoning to us at the base of the king’s throne in her human form. The king himself was still nowhere to be seen.

“I think that’s our cue,” I said to the others with my best attempt at lightness. “Ready to blow this popsicle stand?”

“I was ready an hour ago,” Rachel said as she stomped forward.

Jack moved past me with Hikaru. They weren’t looking at each other, and Hikaru’s expression was forlorn. Shinobu and I followed, walking side by side but with a careful distance between us.

We’re all pathetic
.

I could see the rift into the mortal realm taking shape on the grassy side of the little hill. Long streamers of blue lightning blew out of the earth, dancing in the air and then catching hold of others as they emerged, entwining to form a glowing wreath. When the ring of electricity was complete, the grass it encircled faded out of existence, leaving a gaping black hole in the slope.

Rachel walked right into the rift, leaving the bright light of the spirit realm for the darkness of Between without a backward glance.

Jack bit her lip. “This never gets any easier. I wish I could make my own fox lights.”

“You’re not the only one,” Hikaru whispered, so low that I thought only I heard him.

Did he mean that he wished Jack was a fox spirit, like him? Or just that he wished he were older and more powerful, able to control his lightning the way the others did? I had no way of knowing, and somehow I didn’t think he’d appreciate being asked.

Jack nodded a respectful goodbye to Araki, squared her shoulders, and stepped after Rachel. I moved forward, hyper-conscious of Shinobu silently shadowing me. My instincts were begging me to sneak a quick look at his expression, but the rest of me shied away in sheer embarrassment. I couldn’t understand why this was so hard.

“Farewell, sword-bearer,” the king said, appearing again – OK, that was getting freaky – on the crown of the hill overhead. “I wish you good fortune, and offer a piece of advice. Keep a close eye on your friend’s sister. She may have trying times ahead of her.”

Before I could ask what he was getting at, the king’s head snapped up. A deep shudder worked through his body, making his vast fan of tails lash the air; their white tips blazed into jagged blue cones of lightning. Araki took a step back, one hand flying up to cover her mouth.

“Grandfather?” Hikaru began uncertainly.

My katana shrilled – a fierce, high-pitched tone that vibrated along my vertebrae. Without thinking, I reached back to grab the hilt, ready to draw the blade. My blood tingled and my heartbeat surged as my palm made contact with the silk wrappings. Then I froze.
What am I doing?
I whipped my hand away and stared at it for a moment as I flexed my fingers to confirm that they were under my control.

The ground jumped under my feet. Beyond Araki, the other side of the throne erupted with electricity. A new rupture. A small crowd of Kitsune – four of them, none older than a two-tails – stumbled out. They were ashen-faced and covered in dirt; one of them, splattered with blood, was clutching at her arm. She collapsed face-first into the grass and lay there, gasping for air and shaking with what looked like agony. The others hastily drew away from her.

Araki darted forward, falling to her knees beside the Kitsune girl. I saw with horror that the girl’s twin tails were withering, the lush reddish fur turning powdery grey and shredding off before our eyes. Horror turned to disbelief when the dignified Araki threw back her head and let out a terrible wail.

The Kitsune who had come through the rupture with the injured fox spirit picked up the note, their voices joining into a low, wavering keen of sorrow. The noise spread through the amphitheatre, celebrations dying away as the whole assembly of fox spirits fell still in the aching song of grief.

“What’s happening to her?” I cried out over the wailing. “Can’t someone help her?”

Hikaru didn’t even look at me. He lifted his face to the canopy of trees above and howled.

I felt Shinobu’s hand grasping mine, trying to pull me towards the rift. I shook my head, yanking free. I couldn’t leave. They needed help!

The king’s tails flicked in my direction. It was as if a massive hand had scooped me up and tossed me straight at the waiting blackness of the open rupture. I tumbled inside. Shinobu landed half on top of me with an “
Oof”
.

“Wait!” I shouted, struggling to get up.

It was too late. The light had vanished and the rupture closed.

The Kitsune Kingdom was gone.

Klara Wozniak pulled the little cloth cap off her head in a puff of flour and stuffed it into her locker with one hand, swiftly undoing her tight French plait with the other. Long, curling strands of dark hair fell around her face, and she shook them out, sighing with relief
.

“You think you’re in a shampoo advert or something?” Sharon, the other baker’s assistant, sneered as she walked into the back room
.

Sharon’s blonde hair was about three inches long, ragged-looking, and tipped with orange after an ill-fated home-dyeing attempt. Klara knew Sharon was just jealous – and in a bad mood because she had been scolded for messing up the iced buns – so she didn’t bother to reply
. No time for bad thoughts today,
she reminded herself, changing out of the white baker’s overalls and back into her usual uniform of jeans, T-shirt and jacket
.

Her boyfriend had managed to get a couple of days off from his job at the warehouse, and Klara had the next two days free too. She wanted to enjoy the time to the fullest. If she knew Stephen, he’d be making her breakfast in their tiny flat right now. She could feel the silly smile on her own face as she remembered her twenty-first birthday, when he’d presented her with scrambled eggs, toast and a pink rose in a jam-jar
.

She wrapped her scarf – a present her baba had sent from Poland for that same birthday – around her neck. She fingered the ends of the brightly coloured scarf for a moment, remembering the letter she had got from her grandmother the day before. The old lady was getting eccentric. Baba claimed to be having bad dreams about Klara, and actually begged her to come home, as if she really thought Klara was going to up and leave her whole life just because of one of Baba’s silly premonitions! Baba was famous in Klara’s village for her so-called sixth sense, but Klara and her father had never set any store by it. Especially since Baba claimed Klara had a little of the gift too. That always made her laugh. She’d never had a vision or seen a spirit in her life
.

Still smiling, Klara slammed her locker shut and scooted out of the bakery’s rear door into the small back street the business shared with a book/coffee shop and a pub. It was frosty cold, but the sky Klara could see between the roofs was primrose yellow, tinged with baby blue. It was going to be a beautiful day. Even the strong smell of burning and rot in the air – probably from the skip – couldn’t ruin her mood
.

“Hey, Klara!” Sharon shouted, shoving the door open just as Klara was about to slip past the skip and out onto the main road. “You didn’t wipe down – it’s your turn.”

“No, it is not.” Klara turned back reluctantly. “It is yours. I did it yesterday.”

“You’re always skiving off,” Sharon whined – without, Klara noted, bothering to deny it
.

“You would get your own work done faster if you spent less time worrying about mine,” Klara said firmly. She was already reaching into her pocket for her mobile. Stephen would be waiting
.

Sharon muttered something nasty about immigrants under her breath. Klara hesitated just for a second, the urge to respond rising up like bile in the back of her throat. She bit it back
. She’s not worth it. She’s not worth it…

The alley went dark, as if a cloud had passed over the sun. A sudden gust of that awful rot-and-burning scent stirred Klara’s hair, filling her ears with the eerie sound of dead leaves scattering over concrete. But there were no leaves on the ground. Instinctively, she glanced up
.

A great misshapen
thing
was crouched on the roof above her, talons digging into the wall of the bakery. Its monstrous wings blocked out the sky
.

Klara’s knees gave way and she hit the ground next to the skip, hard. The mobile flew from her hand as she flung her arms up over her head
.

No. It was impossible. It couldn’t be real. There was no such thing as monsters. No such thing.

“What are you doing, freakshow?” Sharon demanded. “
Euw –
what’s that smell?”

Klara realized that the other woman hadn’t seen
it.
She was coming closer
. Idiota!

“Shut up!” Klara managed to choke out. The rising stench of death, singed hair and decaying flesh made her gag. “Get down! Get inside!”

It was already too late. Darkness and dry chittering filled the alley as the thing swooped. Sharon let out a shrill, terrified scream – then went silent
.

Klara didn’t have the chance to scream at all
.

CHAPTER 2

“W
e have to go back,” I said. I reached the living-room wall, spun around and paced back to the fireplace. “We have to. Something’s horribly wrong there.”

“The king sent us through the rift himself. I do not think they want our help,” Shinobu said, very gently, from his place in the corner by the bookshelf.

“Maybe not, but they’re our friends, and you don’t just … leave your friends to die.”

“Come on, Mimi,” Jack piped up from the sofa. “They’re Kitsune. They’re not that easy to kill.”

“Something was really wrong,” I insisted, hitting the fireplace with the flat of my hand and then pacing away again. “You didn’t see that girl just lying there. You didn’t hear the
noise
they were making—”

“No, but I’ve been listening to you rant about it for the past ten minutes,” she interrupted. “Look, don’t you think that I want to know what’s going on too? I care about them as much as you do. But they’re not answering. The only way to get back is if they open a rupture on their side and they’re not answering us. So what’s your plan? Start digging under the mulberry bush and hope you hit the spirit realm before you get to the earth’s core?”

I stopped pacing and stared down blankly at the carpet. “There has to be something we can do.”

There was a snort of muffled laughter from the window seat. I turned round to see Rachel slumped with folded arms in the glow of weak, wintery sunlight. One of her hands was playing with the end of the woolly scarf she’d wrapped around her neck.

“This isn’t funny,” I told her.

“No, but you are.”

“I’m sorry, what?”

“Here’s a newsflash: This isn’t Gotham City, and you are not Batman. You’re a fifteen-year-old girl with some kind of dangerous energy weapon that you have no idea how to control – and everywhere you go, you leave a trail of destruction behind you. Gee, what a shocker that your foxy pals don’t want you around.”

We all stared at her in shock. I sank slowly down onto the arm of the sofa. Jack knelt to put her hand on my shoulder.