Useless to Kanako.
Months ago, she’d put this plan into motion. She’d thought to have Mariko murdered on the way to marry her son. With great care, Kanako had planted the seeds of this desire into the mind of her lover, the emperor, until he, too, believed it to be the best course of action. They would blame the Black Clan for the girl’s murder. It would unite the nobles against the last vestiges of insurrection. After Mariko’s death—the murder of an innocent young daughter of an esteemed daimyō—there would be no objections about sending soldiers into the forest to root out the sons of Takeda Shingen and Asano Naganori. To give her warrior son the chance he needed to prove how much more suited he was to the role of emperor, rather than his infantile younger brother. All the while Kanako had concealed a darker plan beneath this simple one. The plan to secretly blame the girl’s murder on the empress and the crown prince. To once and for all sever any ties of loyalty between her son and his younger brother.
And then Hattori Mariko had survived.
Inconvenient, to say the least. But Kanako had been quick to formulate a new way to ensure Raiden’s path as the next emperor of Wa. It was not as simple as using magic to orchestrate a death, for it could not seem in any way as though Kanako had shaped these outcomes.
She needed to appear untouchable, at all times.
When Kenshin staggered into sight—his garments muddy from an apparent stumble—Kanako moved from the shadows into his path. Quirked her head at him, letting a ghostly mist take shape around her, glistening of moonlit magic.
Kenshin stopped in his tracks. Teetered to one side, recognition catching his notice. He shook his head as though to clear his thoughts. Kanako smiled at him, her black lips curling upward, beckoning him closer. She knew he would identify her as the fox from his memory, just as she’d intended.
It had been so easy that time in the forest, beside the watering hole. So easy to infiltrate his trusting mind and test its bounds for her purpose. Lord Kenshin was the kind of young man who’d lived a life without question. What he saw was what he believed; what he heard became his truth; what he felt became fact.
Simpleminded fool.
In a way, he resembled the late emperor as a young man. When Kanako and Masaru first met as children, it had been his malleable mind that had drawn her to him. He’d been entranced by her magic, enthralled by her beauty.
At the thought of him now, storm clouds darkened Kanako’s view.
He’d loved her. And she’d loved him, in her own way.
But Death always collected its due.
Now it was time to use her skills of persuasion once again. As Kanako could conjure shapes from nothingness, she would conjure outcomes from ideas. She smiled once more at Kenshin. He stepped toward her, his motions clouded by drink. Her long tail swishing through the air, she loped before him and gazed upward expectantly.
“What do you want?” Kenshin murmured, his words slurring.
She winked at him, then glided toward the vine-covered entrance of the enchanted maru. As she drew closer, the plants near her paws curled toward her. Kanako whispered to them, and they began changing their colors, the glittering mist coiling around their waxen leaves.
She glanced over her shoulder.
Hattori Kenshin watched her, mesmerized, just as the emperor had been many years before.
But he didn’t trust her. Not anymore. In his suffering, doubt had begun to take root. Doubt in himself. Doubt in others. It was clear he did not trust her as he had that day in the forest, when Kanako had first taken hold of his mind. When she’d found the rage he’d kept locked away and used it as kindling to serve her designs. It had been so easy for Kanako to infiltrate his thoughts then.
He’d wanted to kill the old man that day in the clearing, for defying him. He’d wanted to slash his swords across the girl, who’d tried to defend her grandfather, and the boy, who’d attacked him in a fit of rage. Kanako had simply made it easier for him. She’d removed the obstacles he’d placed before his own desires.
Just as she intended to do now.
She resumed the slow infiltration of his mind. He continued pushing back at her intrusion. Kanako gritted her teeth, the wound in her side burning bright. The pain momentarily blinded her, but she felt Hattori Kenshin’s resistance fade with her efforts.
His features slackened. The light dulled from his eyes. He followed Kanako past the entrance of the enchanted maru into a world bereft of color. Tones of silver and black washed across Kanako’s vision. Along the boundary, the edges of the garden flashed as though every leaf were a tiny mirror. As though the world around them was constructed of nothing but mirrors.
With a furtive smile, she led her prey toward the flowering oak tree, its massive trunk wide and its branches rustling in an imaginary wind. She waited for his drink-addled mind to see past the first glance. To question the trick of the eyes and the blurring of the senses that so many failed to notice in this realm of magic.
Making them vulnerable.
For there—buried upright in the trunk of a mighty tree—slept a lovely young woman. One half of her face was terribly scarred, but she lay wrapped in the bark of the white oak, a soft haze of silver light around her. She looked like a resting spirit, enchanted from starlight.
Kanako watched his handsome face as he recognized the girl within.
“Amaya,” he whispered. Kenshin shook his head as though it could not be possible. As though he’d finally learned not to trust everything he saw.
Inconvenient that he would choose now to doubt his own eyesight.
Hattori Kenshin took a slow step closer to the tree. His right hand rose from his side, his fingers stretching toward Muramasa Amaya’s cheek. Shock took hold of Kenshin’s features as truth settled on him. With both hands, he reached for the bark encasing her, as though he meant to rip its cocoon from around Amaya’s body.
The cloud of light surrounding the sleeping girl flared, burning his fingers. The pain startled him into full awareness.
Kanako could have warned him, but she knewthe best trials were the ones by fire. He would know now that he would need to suffer in order to free Muramasa Amaya from her oaken prison. This was necessary to drive him to do her bidding.
Then—as the shock began to wane—a figure stepped from behind the tree.
Kanako smiled to herself and let the rest of her plan fall into place, without having to utter a single word.
The sake had addled his mind.
Or he’d struck his head and was now in the midst of a frenzied dream.
Those were the only two possible explanations for what Kenshin saw now.
This had been a night of impossibility, from beginning to end. Yumi—the maiko who captured his attention the past three nights—had been late to arrive at the teahouse. His frustration at her absence caused him to drink even more than usual and leave before he had a chance to lose his sorrows in her lovely grey eyes.
Upon his return to the castle, he’d thought to seek out his sister. To speak with her frankly and close the distance that had continued to develop between them.
Only to find Mariko’s chamber empty.
His suspicions had grown, despite his drink-addled mind. Kenshin made his way to the only place he felt certain his younger sister would venture in the dead of night: the cell of Takeda Ranmaru.
When he watched a lean figure clad in the clothing of a boy climb from the castle’s underbelly into the light, Kenshin had known it was Mariko. He followed her, uncertain of how best to confront her for her lies. For her treachery.
Only when he stumbled as he chased her—drawing the attention of patrolling imperial guards—could he make a decision. He should have sent the soldiers after Mariko. Should have forced her to admit her deception and accept her punishment.
But he’d made a spectacle of himself instead, granting Mariko a chance to conceal herself and escape. Kenshin—a samurai of the highest order—betrayed his sovereign to aid his traitorous younger sister. Sti
ll he did not know why he had done it.
He needed another drink. He needed to forget.
So Kenshin had followed the ghostly fox into a world between worlds. One limned in a delicate fog, with all its colors leached from sight. There—in the center of an immense silver tree trunk—rested the unmistakable face of Muramasa Amaya, the only girl he’d ever loved.
As his muddled mind latched on to her burned features, the images in his periphery had begun to spin. The leaves began turning in place like tiny mirrors throwing white light in all directions, as though he were in the center of a giant diamond caught in the rays of the sun.
The tree had burned him when Kenshin tried to rescue her, though it did not appear that Amaya was suffering. She looked as though she were asleep—merely blanketed by the rough bark of the ancient oak.
And now, his eyesight tricked him again.
Just like with Amaya, Kenshin had thought the man standing before him had perished. Kenshin had been certain of it.
“My lord,” the figure said in a low voice. Nobutada—his father’s most trusted samurai—bowed without hesitation.
Kenshin did not know if it was wise to speak. “I—thought you died in Jukai forest.”
“No, my lord. I am not dead.” Nobutada glanced sidelong as though he was certain an eavesdropper lurked in the nearby branches, or perhaps waited in the neatly trimmed hedge of mirrored leaves. “I know you have many questions.”
Kenshin could not find the right words. His mind was too far gone—a persistent ache pounding in its center—the sake poured for him in Hanami continuing to fog his senses. “How—” he tried.
“There is no time for me to explain, my lord.”
“Help me, Nobutada-sama,” Kenshin began again, his voice coarse in its urgency. “I don’t know what foul play is afoot here, but we must free Amaya from this tree.”
“That is what I wish for us to discuss, my lord.”
“Speak quickly.” Kenshin closed the space between them, his temples hammering in time with his racing heart. “Then help me free her.”
Nobutada shook his head. “I’m afraid there is no way to free Muramasa Amaya, my lord. I have been trapped here, too, at the behest of the former emperor.”
“Am I trapped here, as well?” Kenshin backed away, the desire for self-preservation evident.
“No, my lord. You were not brought here as a prisoner. You entered this place of your own will, so you are free to leave.”
“Amaya was brought here as a prisoner?” Anger clouded Hattori Kenshin’s face.
Nobutada looked about, discomfort settling into his expression. “I cannot be certain.”
Kenshin pressed his palms into his eyes, as though it would force the drink from his head. Raking his fingers through his disheveled topknot, he gazed once more in disbelief at the very much alive samurai who’d been sent to keep his sister safe on her journey to Inako. “I thought you were dead. Tell me how you came to be here, Nobutada-sama. What is this place? And what must we do to free you both?”
Nobutada kept silent, his expression grim.
“Is the late emperor responsible for this as well?” Kenshin’s voice was a dangerous whisper.
“It is treason for me to speak of these things.”
Fury overcoming him at Nobutada’s reticence, Kenshin took hold of the wizened samurai’s collar. “Was it Minamoto Masaru?”
Wincing, Nobutada nodded once. He inhaled through his nostrils. “It was our former emperor, my lord.”
Kenshin’s fist tightened around his collar, his bloodshot eyes wide with rage.
His father’s best samurai put his hands in the air—palms facing out—in a gesture of peace. “The former emperor took me prisoner after he sent a band of thieves to murder your sister.”
A beat passed in silence. As Kenshin studied Nobutada for signs of artifice, he released his hold on the samurai. Forced his rage to die down to mere embers. “Why would he agree to Mariko’s marriage if he only wished to kill her?”
“I believe he wished to forge this connection with your father, and then thought better of it. Perhaps a better offer of marriage was already in the works.” Nobutada sighed with defeat. “There is no way to know for certain. But I do know he did not want his son to wed Lady Mariko.”
Kenshin nodded, his longstanding suspicions confirmed. He crossed his arms in an effort to stand straight, his feet still unsteady. “What must we do?”
“The key lies with … the new emperor.” Hesitancy marred the samurai’s words.
“I don’t understand what you—”
Nobutada interrupted Kenshin, his tone urgent. “He cannot be allowed to live, my lord. Not after what his father did to the Hattori clan. Not after what he plans to do now. He is neglecting his people. Tales of suffering are sprouting from the east. The people of Wa are being tormented by a plague, and the son of Minamoto Masaru has done nothing to address it.”
The world around Kenshin started to spin. “You are suggesting we commit treason. That I break every oath I have ever taken.”
“My lord, the emperor and his son have trapped me as their prisoner. They prevented me from saving Lady Mariko that day in Jukai forest. It is likely they have stolen away the daughter of Muramasa Sengo, for her to exist in this half world, to live a half life in slumber, buried in the center of an enchanted tree.”
Kenshin’s eyes locked on the sleeping form of Amaya. Was it possible the emperor took her as a means of controlling him? To offer further insult to his family? Kenshin could not fathom attempting to kill the new emperor. No matter how much he might wish Roku’s death, Kenshin was a samurai who served at the grace of his sovereign. “I cannot forsake my oath to the emperor.”
“I understand your hesitation, my lord,” Nobutada said. “But if he and his father have committed such atrocities, perhaps it is time for their family to pay the ultimate price.”
Kenshin’s eyes narrowed. “If you’ve been trapped here since the attack on Mariko’s convoy, how is it you know what Minamoto Roku has failed to do?”
“The fox comes to visit, once in a while.” Nobutada inclined his head toward the animal sitting placidly beside him, as though it were his pet. “As a creature of magic, it is allowed in this colorless half world. A world the emperor used to conceal the worst of his atrocities. The fox took pity on me and brought me food. Often it brought me the information I sought, as well. Scraps of correspondence and the like.”
Though the ache in his head continued to grow, Kenshin glanced down at the fox. Something about its wily smile unnerved him, as though it were supremely pleased by this recent turn of events. But this same fox had helped Kenshin before, that wretched day in the clearing when he’d lost memories. The fox had led him to safety before anyone could see the terrible atrocities he had committed.
“I have sworn an oath to serve Minamoto Roku. It does not matter what his father did. I must remain steadfast in my loyalty,” Kenshin said. Bushidō dictated nothing else.
“And if I told you Minamoto Roku was responsible for the death of his father—that we serve a family of liars and murderers—where would your loyalties lie then?”
Kenshin said nothing, his eyes betraying his heart. He turned his back, tormented by a flood of thoughts and feelings.
“Do not look away from what you know to be true, my lord,” Nobutada said.
“How do I know you are not the one who killed the emperor?” Kenshin asked. “You disappeared on the day my sister most needed you. How do I know where your allegiances lie, Nobutada-sama?”
The elder samurai drew himself to his full height. “If you do not trust me after all my years of service to your family, my lord, then I am truly dead already.”
Frustrated by the tenor of their conversation, Kanako decided to step forward. She’d tried to press Kenshin to do her bidding—gentle nudges on his thoughts—but his mind was stronger than before. Far less pliant. His renewed resolve irritated her greatly. The sight of his trapped beloved
should have made his mind even more open to infiltration. Not less. He should be willing to do whatever it took to free Muramasa Amaya, without question. Perhaps Nobutada’s assertions had not worn Kenshin down as she’d hoped. Perhaps they’d only made him more resilient.
It was time for Kanako to take direct action.
She let her mind fade into nothingness, then barreled into Kenshin’s thoughts without warning. As she searched for the best way to wrest control, she paused to take in the full tumult there.
So many sources of discord. So many sources of heartache.
Kanako latched onto the thing causing him the most pain. Now was the time to use the memory of the girl he loved. Of Amaya, trapped within the enchanted oak.
“The demons of the forest wish for a reckoning, Lord Kenshin,” she whispered into his thoughts, her voice an indistinct growl. “Bring the spirit of the silver oak the head of the new emperor, and it will relinquish the girl you love from its grasp.”
Kenshin’s mind twitched. It pushed back with far more force than it ever had before. Frustratingly strange. Kanako surged on, taking root in his weaknesses, turning the spark of discord into a flame. She let the rising plume cloud the rest of his mind, like smoke in the sun.
With a groan, Kenshin gave in, his eyes turning white, his mouth hanging open in a soundless scream.
When he returned to himself, Kenshin did not appear to be addled by drink any longer. He looked focused and aware. Without a word, he turned on a heel and left the colorless maru, blood trickling from his eyes.
Once the Dragon of Kai left this world between worlds, Kanako let her magic glimmer over her fox body. It flowed through her, like the tremors of an earthquake beneath the soil. She uncoiled to her feet in a ripple of grace, letting her long hair stream behind her in a silken cloak.