“Yoshi you can’t leave me. Gods, not now…”
“Akihito will look to you. He’s fine people. I like him, sis.”
“You can’t go!”
She threw her arms around his waist, digging her fingers in like the world was collapsing. Her entire life, he’d been at her side. The only one who knew what they’d been through, knew what it was to be clanless half-blooded gaijin filth. She’d noticed him drifting away over the last few weeks. But to leave entirely? Gods, she couldn’t bear the thought …
“Got to stand tall now, Hana.” Yoshi hugged her back. “Taller than most, on that arashitora’s back. You’re somebody special now. You don’t need me.”
“You don’t have to do this alone. Just wait. When the war is over, we can—”
Yoshi pulled away, pressed his palms to her cheeks and looked her in the eye.
“Not later. Every day that motherfucker breathes, every mouthful, every moment, he stole. He doesn’t deserve the dregs of it. And Jurou didn’t deserve to go out like that. That boy was my beauty, Hana. That boy was my dawning and dusk. And they wrecked him with hammers and pliers and every time I spend a second in it, it grips me so tight I can’t breathe. I can’t see for the red in my eyes. And I just can’t do it anymore.”
She blinked at him in the dark, cupped the hand that cupped her cheek.
“You understand, don’t you, sis? That this is about him, not us?”
A thick sniffle. “I understand.”
“And you know I love you?”
She kissed his hand, tears coming in floods again. “I love you too, big brother.”
“Hush now, girl, don’t cry.” He folded her in his arms again as she wept, great wracking sobs that shook her whole body. “Don’t cry, sis. It’ll be all right.”
“It won’t. You know it won’t.”
“You stand tall, you hear me?”
“… I will.”
Yoshi touched the golden pendant hanging around Hana’s throat. The only thing they had left of their mother besides memories of sad blue eyes and the blond hair they both kept hidden. The stag embossed into the metal stared back at them, three sickle horns on his head. If the beast held any secrets, he kept them to himself.
“Stick with Akihito. Talk with that round-eye if you can make any godsdamned sense of him. He knows better than anyone what all this means. Ma. Your eye. All of it. You find out your truth, you hear? You tell me about it when I get back.”
“All right,” she sniffed. “I will.”
“I’ve got to go.”
“Don’t,” she whispered.
But he didn’t listen.
16
BLOOD AND THUNDER
NO.
- NO. -
No?
Yukiko looked back and forth between Buruu and Kaiah, lightning ripping the clouds to ribbons overhead. Freezing cold in the Daimyo’s garden, wind whipping amidst the cedars, thunder rolling between both arashitora and setting them apurr. But their eyes were flint hard, claws piercing the earth, feet apart as if bracing for onslaught.
What do you mean no, Buruu?
THE OPPOSITE OF YES?
Gods, I should’ve never taught you to sarcasm …
- FOOLISH PLAN. WILL NOT WORK. -
Yukiko turned on Kaiah.
And why the hells not? We need an army to fight the gaijin and the Guild. And there’s an army of arashitora in the Everstorm.
- NO ARMY. A SCATTERED FEW. -
A few thunder tigers are worth a thousand sky-ships. Ten thousand men.
NO, YUKIKO.
You said that already, Buruu. You still haven’t said why.
IS IT NOT ENOUGH THAT I SAY NO? DO YOU NOT TRUST ME?
- SHE LEARNS WISDOM AT LAST, KINSLAYER. -
AH, YOU SPEAK TO ME NOW?
- ONLY TO SPIT. -
Kaiah, you’re not helping.
- IN THIS MADNESS YOU SPEAK? NO, I AM NOT. KINSLAYER CANNOT RETURN TO EVERSTORM. HE EXILED. MARKED FOR DEATH. -
And what about you? Why can’t you go back?
- NOT CAN’T. WON’T. -
Why won’t you, then?
- TORR. -
Who is that?
HE IS KHAN.
- FALSE KHAN. WILL NEVER BOW TO HIM. NEVER. -
What the hells does that mean? Izanagi’s balls, Buruu, will you just speak to me?
- CANNOT SPEAK. EXILED BEFORE TORR CAME. REVILED. ACCURSED. -
All right, Gods, I don’t care who tells me, as long as somebody does!
Kaiah growled low, tossed her head.
- KHAN RULES EVERSTORM. MIGHTIEST MALE. FIERCEST WARRIOR. TORR CLAIMED KHAN, THOUGH HE HAD NO RIGHT. -
No right? Why?
- NOT EVERSTORM BORN. TORR AND HIS PACK CAME FROM EAST. BLACK FEATHERS AND BLACK HEARTS. SEIZING EVERSTORM. KILLING MALES WHO STOOD DEFIANT. THEIR CUBS ALSO. BECAUSE OF HIM. -
Kaiah stepped toward Buruu with a snarl, hackles raised, wings unfurling.
- BECAUSE OF YOU. -
I AM SORRY.
- MY MATE AND HIS BROTHER STOOD ALONE, THE OTHERS TOO OLD, OR TOO AFRAID. AND WHERE WAS OUR KHAN WHEN USURPER CAME? -
THE LAW IS THE LAW. THE KHAN IS NO EXCEPTION.
- LAW WAS ALREADY BROKEN. KHAN MAKES LAW. -
SOME LAWS ARE WRIT IN STONE. IN THE BLOOD AND BONES OF OUR ANCESTORS. ARASHITORA DO NOT KILL OTHER ARASHITORA.
- PITY TORR DID NOT FEEL THE SAME. -