“How long until its feathers grow back?”
Yukiko took a moment to realize the Shōgun was addressing her. “Ah . . .” She stammered, staring at the floor, hands clasped before her.
“Forgive me. I do not know, great Lord.”
“Ask it.”
Yukiko dared a glance at the Shōgun’s face. He was studying her intently,
dark eyes glinting like star metal, smile like a razor. His long jin-haori tabard writhed in the warm, cancer wind, golden tigers prowling across scarlet silk. “Great Lord?”
“The Lady Aisha changed her perfume after our meeting at the sky-docks. Her dog has seemed quite content ever since. Strange that you guessed the root of its misbehavior in a handful of seconds. Almost as if you knew its mind . . .”
Yukiko glanced between Yoritomo and his bodyguards, hands on their chainkatana hilts. A tiny, childish part of her realized that the samurai to Yoritomo’s left had green eyes.
“I . . . I have a way with beasts, my Lord.” She swallowed, turned her eyes back to the ground, squeezing her hands into fists to stop the shakes. “You are yōkai-kin.”
“No, Lord, I—”
Yoritomo’s raised hand was as good as a slap, cutting her sentence in half. Buruu edged closer, eyes on the Iron Samurai, hackles rippling.
“You have nothing to fear, Kitsune Yukiko.” The Shōgun’s smile never reached his eyes. “I have no interest in revealing your secret to the Guild. I do not care for their zealotry, their crusade for ‘purity.’ The Book of Ten Thousand Days has many interpretations, and theirs is only one.” He motioned to Buruu. “This beast will accept me as his master quicker with you telling me his thoughts, and conveying mine to him. That is all that matters to me.”
The Shōgun ran one hand across the thunder tiger’s flank, fingers spread into claws, buried deep in the thick fur. He inhaled the arashitora’s scent, the heady mix of musk and ozone, tracing the line of one thick black stripe over Buruu’s spine.
“Magnificent. My vision was true. Do you see, Hideo-san?”
He turned to glare at the minister.
“I see, great Lord.” Hideo bowed deep, voice distorted by his pulsing breather-helm. “Truly, the God of War has spoken to you. None can now doubt that you are Hachiman’s chosen. Astride this creature’s back, you will become the greatest general in the history of Shima. The gaijin will quail before you. After twenty years of war, your hand will bring an ending, and the barbarian hordes will hail you rightly as conqueror, and sovereign Lord.”
Yukiko scowled at the minister, despising him for his sycophantic little liturgy. Yoritomo seemed too intent on Buruu to notice, running his fingers along the arashitora’s wing. Buruu rankled at the touch but kept himself calm, still as the stone beneath their feet. The Shōgun grinned, bloodless lips across perfect teeth.
“So.” A glance at Yukiko. “How long?”
Yukiko remained mute, terrified beneath that iron stare. For her to admit her gift here in front of the Shōgun was to place herself in mortal danger. She recalled her mother’s words, urging her and Satoru never to risk death by revealing the secret. To admit it now would be to invite the executioner’s blade, or worse, a screaming death chained to the Burning Stones in the Market Square.
And then, glancing at the Iron Samurai, she realized her life was in danger anyway. Regardless of what he knew or what he didn’t, Yoritomo had the power of life and death over every man, woman and child in Shima. If he wanted her dead, she’d be dead; he didn’t need a reason. He certainly didn’t need a confession. One snap of his fingers would be all it took.
So to the hells with being afraid.
Be clever instead.
“The beast has a simple mind, great Lord,” she said. “It thinks in scent and sight, not words. I would measure it no smarter than a dog. It understands concepts that any hound might; only day and night, not months or years. But I believe it will moult at the end of autumn, when it grows its winter coat.”
“That is nearly four months away,” the Shōgun hissed.
“It may be sooner, Lord.” She kept her eyes on the ground. “But it is looking forward to winter. I do not think it will fly before then.”
NO SMARTER THAN A DOG . . .
Shhh.