tilted my head up to look at my eyes, while the other prodded my side, eliciting a sharp twinge of pain.
“Hmm,” he muttered, digging his fingers into my skin, poking and pinching. I set my jaw and didn’t make a sound. “One cracked rib, and several deep bruises along his side, nothing broken.”
The other pulled down my eyelid, wrenching my head toward the light. “Traces of venom in his eyes, not enough to blind, fortunately. Did the jorogumo bite you?” he asked me.
“No.”
“So your innards aren’t turning to soup as we speak, good to hear. And you managed to keep most of your blood on the inside this time, well done. It becomes very tiresome when you continuously show up half-dead in the middle of the night.” He released my chin and turned to gesture to the servant. “We’re done here. Bathe him, bandage the cuts and send him to Master Ichiro when you’re finished.”
The servant bowed silently as the healers left the room, then picked up the bucket sitting beside the stool and dumped it over my head. The frigid water drenched my hair and seemed to rake talons of ice over my skin, but I didn’t move as the servant sluiced the dirt and grime from my body, scrubbing my wounds until the flesh around them turned pink. When I was clean, he sloshed another bucket of water over my head, bandaged the cuts and left without a word.
Standing, I gazed around and saw that another servant had left a change of clothes on the edge of the tub: a pair of hakama trousers, a dove-gray obi sash and a black haori jacket bearing a white crescent eclipsed by a dark moon—the crest of the Shadow Clan—on the back.
Ichiro and Masao waited for me in the next room, speaking quietly with a pair of sake cups between them. I didn’t see Ayame, but I knew she was close. My sensei only grunted as I knelt on tatami mats and bowed low, but I could feel Kage Masao watching me with an almost predatory smile as I touched my forehead to the floor.
“There you are,” Ichiro remarked as I raised my head. “Well, you look like a dog chewed on you, but at least you no longer resemble a drowned rat. Masao-san has a pair of kago waiting outside to take you across town. Are you ready?”
“Yes, sensei.”
“Excellent!” Masao-san rose in a fluttering of robes and fan. “Come then, little demonslayer. We mustn’t keep Hanshou-sama waiting.”
He swept out of the room. I rose to follow, but Ichiro grabbed my arm as I passed him, rough fingers digging into my flesh as he leaned close.
“Listen to me, boy,” he growled, as I went still in the grip of my sensei. “You are about to meet the most important person in the Kage, the leader of the Shadow Clan herself. Do not embarrass me. If you dishonor me in front of the lady, I assure you, the beating you took tonight will feel like a massage compared to what I will do to you. Do you understand?”
“Yes, Master Ichiro.”
“Remember what we taught you. Repeat it to me, now.”
“I am nothing,” I said automatically. “I am a weapon in the hands of the Kage. My life exists only to be the bearer of Kamigoroshi and to obey the orders of the Shadow Clan.”
“Good.” He nodded and released me. “See that you remember when speaking to the lady. Now go.”
Kage Masao stood on the covered veranda, gazing distastefully at the rain, a colorful parasol held over his head. A pair of kago—individual palanquins made of lacquered wood and carried by four trained bearers—waited at the bottom of the steps. I had never ridden in a kago; they were usually reserved for nobles and important individuals, not lowly assassins. But, glancing at Kage Masao and his flowing robes, I realized he had not traveled here by horse and certainly not on foot.
“What horrible weather.” He sighed, bringing his fan to his face, as if the rain itself offended him. “Fitting for this backwater little town. I shall be glad to be done with it.” Glancing at me, he offered a bright smile and gestured to a kago. “Well, Tatsumi-san? Shall we be off?”
The ride was fairly short, as the town wasn’t large, and soon the servants were sliding back the door of the kago, revealing a large, two-story ryokan—an inn—looming at the edge of the muddy road. Inside, I followed Masao up the stairs to a room at the end of a corridor and waited in the hall while he entered. A moment later, a servant slid back the door, releasing a few wisps of gray smoke, and beckoned me inside. The room beyond was cloaked in shadow and smelled of incense and tobacco. Cautiously, I stepped through the door and as it slid shut behind me, I dropped to my knees and pressed my forehead to the tatami mats.
“Kage Tatsumi,” Masao purred. “The demonslayer.”
“Come forward, boy,” a voice rasped, startling me with its harshness. “Come into the light. Let me see the bearer of the legendary Kamigoroshi.”
Blinking away smoke, I raised my head and inched forward on my knees, squinting to see past the lamp that burned on the edge of a low table. Sake bottles lined the polished surface like ranks of warriors protecting their general, and incense hung thick in the air, smelling of smoke and sandalwood.
Peering past the haze and the bottles, I caught a glimpse of the speaker and clenched my jaw to stop the sharp inhalation of breath. Only years of training and practice kept my features expressionless. It seemed as if Lady Hanshou’s face had been flayed, beaten and left out in the sun to burn before being set back on her sunken neck. Folds of skin hung from her sticklike arms; her hands were wizened bird’s claws, one of them clutching a long-handled pipe as if it was her lifeline to the living world. A few wispy white threads were still attached to her scalp, floating on the air like spider silk. One milky eye was half-shut, the other burned with such intensity that it bordered on madness.
Lady Hanshou smiled a wide, toothless grin at my silence. “Not quite what you were expecting, eh, demonslayer?” she cackled. “Keep staring, but this face isn’t going to get any prettier.” Immediately, I pressed my face to the tatami mats again, but Lady Hanshou let out a snort. “Oh, get up, boy,” she snapped, sounding impatient. “Let me look you in the eyes. Merciful Kami, you’re young,” she exclaimed as I rose. “How old are you, boy? Fourteen?” Without waiting for an answer, she swatted Kage Masao’s leg with the back of her hand. “Masao-san! How old is he now?”
“He is seventeen, my lady.”
“Is he?” Hanshou’s face took on an expression that could have passed for surprise. “He looks younger than that. Ah, but you all look like babies to me.” She groped for a sake bottle, somehow managing to leave the empty ones undisturbed. Masao took the bottle and poured her a cup of the rice wine, which she downed in a single gulp, then held the cup out for more.
“You hide your disgust well.” With a start, I realized she was speaking to me. Her unclouded eye rolled up to fix me with a bright, intense stare. “Better than Ichiro-san, his lurking little pupil, or even Masao-san here. I was not always like this, you know.” She sniffed and blew out a cloud of smoke, which curled around me like grasping tendrils. “Once, I was so beautiful Emperor Taiyo no Gintaro himself wished to make me his bride, and pined after me when I refused.”
I did not know that emperor’s name. Taiyo no Genjiro was the current emperor ruling from the Golden Palace, and Taiyo no Eiichi was the emperor before him. Not knowing what to say, I remained silent. Hanshou eyed me, her voice turning sly, her lips twisted into a leer. “I could have stolen even your affection, demonslayer,” she stated in a raspy voice. “Made you lust after me as the demon in your sword lusts for battle.
