“For what?”
“Failing Yoritomo-no-miya.” A lazy shrug. “Be thankful he is not executed as Captain Yamagata was.”
“My father didn’t fail.” She tried to keep the anger from her voice. She remembered Yamagata’s kindness, his strong hands on the Child’s wheel as the storm drove them toward the jagged rocks. “Nobody on that trip failed. We captured the impossible.”
“And then let it escape.” The Guildsman drummed heavy fingers across the table, leaving shallow impressions in the wood. “But it would seem the daughter succeeded where the father did not. No mean feat for one so young, to tame a beast such as that. I am wondering how you managed it.”
“Its spirit was broken after my father clipped its wings, sama.” She shrugged, tried to keep her voice casual. “It is a beast, like any other. I tamed it with a little patience, and the offer of food.”
“Remarkable.”
“I have a way with animals, sama.”
“So it would seem.”
The Guildsman’s faceted eyes glittered; a trick of the light that nevertheless sent butterflies tumbling across her stomach. She met his featureless stare with mute defiance, refusing to be afraid, to back down or beg. She would not think of the Market Square, of those charred stone pillars coated with ash. She could feel Buruu prowling behind her eyes, seized hold of his anger and held on tight. A long, silent moment passed, Nao’s fingers beating a slow rhythm upon the tabletop. Yukiko kept her breathing steady, felt the comforting weight of the tantō at the small of her back.
“We have taken the liberty of radioing ahead to inform the Shōgun of your success. He is most anxious to meet his prize. You will tell it to behave, hai?”
“I cannot tell it to do anything. It’s not a dog.”
The Guildsman’s disbelief hung almost palpable in the air. “It dotes on you like a loyal hound. Like the pup that bit Lady Aisha, hai?”
Yukiko swallowed, saying nothing.
“You have a measure of control over it,” Nao rasped. “Do not deny it.”
“Only the same that anybody does. The control it allows me to have.”
“I hope that is enough.” Nao shifted his immense bulk. “For the beast’s sake and yours. It will not take much to convince Yoritomo-no-miya to put you both to the pyre.”
Yukiko forced her eyes down again, studying the woven patterns beneath her feet. Black wings and claws and tails interwoven in a frozen dance across the long-lost color of the sky; the blessed spirit-beasts that had once been so much a part of this island that even foreign artisans knew their shapes by rote. All of them gone now. Gone because of men like this one, bloated with greed, a pig grown fat on the sweat from poor men’s backs. Gone into the mists of memory, obscured behind a rolling blanket of choking blue-black smoke, like a curtain falling after the last notes of music died.
She put her hand to her brow, headache pounding inside her skull.
I am thinking like a Kagé.
“I will do my best to serve the Shōgun’s wishes.” She kept her voice low and even. “As I have always done. As my father has always done.”
“Of course you will.” The Guildsman sniffed, waved her away like a troublesome insect. “You may go. Enjoy the rest of the journey. You may visit Kioshi-san if you wish, but you will seek my permission first.”
They call him by his father’s name.
Yukiko frowned, feigning confusion.
“Who is Kioshi-san?”
“Ah.” The Guildsman’s laugh was a short, humorless bark. “You had no chance to learn his name while ripping the skin from his flesh. Kioshi-san is the Artificer you rescued from the crash. I misunderstood. I presumed you two had become . . . close.”
“Oh.” Yukiko blinked. “I did not think any of you had names.”
“We do not.” Nao pointed toward the door. “The lotus must bloom.”
Yukiko covered her fist and bowed, backing away and slipping out quietly. The Guildsman hovering outside regarded her with those glowing, bloody eyes, clockwork and gears rippling down its chest. She nodded to it, and hurried up the stairs.
The noise of the mechabacus behind her sounded like a growl.
25 A Daughter of Foxes