The Oni, page 12
The rival must be challenged.
He pushed off from the rough mortar at his back, flying from his hiding-place—a crack between stones set below eye-level of most villagers. As he tumbled through the air, his body rapidly filled out, drawing mass from energy. Mud at the side of the path hardened, its water content freezing. The stone wall shone white with frost. His unshod feet cracked the hard, slick blacktop in the center of the tunnel, landing with all three toes of each extended for traction. Already he had as much height as when he was mortal.
Yet the one who’d entered this cave, bringing discord, was a head taller. These villagers had that edge over the peasants and warriors he’d known. No matter. He was not finished growing …
It took Richard Alexander Jones two long strides to react and halt. Lights along the Hudson melted before his eyes, as if a thick fog had suddenly poured down the river. His skin tingled with cold. His rubber soles braked hard on the asphalt, and he stood enveloped by the tunnel’s blackness. The only illumination came from the faint red dot that showed his ‘box’ was turned on, and that was worse than useless.
Another fucking blackout!
Then Jones grinned. The Broadway stores would be ripe for picking. He spun on one heel, eager not to miss out on the looting.
The lights along the path he’d walked down still shone.
Jones’s ears pricked up. Heavy panting, each exhalation a growl, came deep and harsh and loud enough to cut through the disco beat. Hot, fetid air stroked the back of his neck. Jones’s own breathing quickened. Sliding one foot after the other, he was out of the short tunnel before he realized it, before his head had fully turned back to the river … and whatever lay between.
What kind of animal could be loose in Riverside Park?
Sweat beaded on Jones’s forehead at the guttural howl that came next, a howl with an unmistakable tone of command.
A thousand years of absolute darkness developed one’s night vision enormously. The tunnel gloom was as daylight. A poor sort of oni this was! Skin burnt nearly black, that was all right, but the frame so thin, even with a padded tunic! This demon-lord would not make a respectable scarecrow!
He issued formal challenge. The common villagers had abandoned the Imperial tongue for a peculiarly unrhythmic speech pattern, but surely their ruler had not sunk so low!
Alas! After a moment’s hesitation, the dark-skinned demon did reply in that same gibberish.
He felt cheated. This was no contest. The other had not even understood the challenge.
Now that the other stood outside the tunnel, however, the cacophony no longer seemed to come from everywhere. Its source was a black-and-silver box that the dark one carried on one shoulder—a box which, though roomier, might serve the same purpose as the iron artifact from which he’d escaped but twenty-four hours earlier.
He snorted, annoyed at himself. A child could have seen the truth of it!
As the Ainu barbarians were paler than civilized folk, so too might there be darker races. Darker, but no less mortal. This one had captured his demon-kin, no doubt tricking the unfortunate as he himself had been unfairly deceived. Worse, the mortal displayed his catch in a thoroughly humiliating manner. Small wonder the prisoner roared!
Disrespect for one’s betters called for severe punishment.
The thing entered a bright circle cast by the vapor lamp. Jones’s jaw sagged. He recognized it! This creature had brick-red skin instead of blue, three fingers to a hand instead of four, and the face was rounder, with flatter features, than the familiar vulture-like profile. Yet the overall shape and overwhelming size were close enough for these minor discrepancies to be discounted.
Richard Alexander Jones’s grip on reality was flexible.
“Holy shit! The Thrasher!”
The creature towered over Jones. Fingers as thick as Jones’s arm wrenched the tape deck from him.
The thing stared at the box, mumbling at it, and then set it on the brown, patchy grass beside the path, speakers face down. Muffled, the noise level lowered, almost as if in approval.
Baleful ebon eyes locked on Jones’s terrified frame.
“Hey, Thrasher, I’m on your side! You want to smash someone? Hell, I know hundreds of people who deserve to be put down. Thousands. You and me, we’ll clean up this fucking city!”
An enormous hand wrapped around the lower half of Jones’s face, stifling his prattle as the nostrils pinched together. He gasped for air. The red flesh felt unnaturally hot; the three fingers seemed to burn his cheeks to the bone. Jones was spun around and forced to his knees, with no more effort than if he were a doll. The other massive hand pulled off the down jacket, ripping seams apart.
Jones worked his lips against the confining hand. If only he could speak! He was clean tonight, but he always knew where to get good junk. That had to be what the Thrasher was looking for.
The jeans split, pooling around Jones’s knees. His penis shriveled in the dank air, and he realized his undershorts had been torn off in the same motion.
The Thrasher couldn’t be … could he?
Jones struggled, trying to crawl to the leafless bushes. If he could work loose and plunge into the undergrowth, maybe the Thrasher wouldn’t follow.
For a second, Jones thought he had a chance. The hand on his face seemed to slip. He sucked in a lungful of moist air. Then the grip retightened. Jones could not even exhale. He was forced down further. His forehead cracked against blacktop.
Paralysis engulfed him. He moaned as the creature’s searing flesh touched his buttocks. Jones’s sphincter muscles tensed. No use. His muffled scream came a moment later. Jones thought he was being ripped in half.
As lack of air ended his life, Jones felt a final wave of impotent anger. The fucking comics never said Thrasher was gay.
He let the corpse fall. It sprawled half on the path, half on hard brown soil. His lips twisted like mating worms.
Much more satisfying than last night! He’d always preferred male to female partners, though not to the exclusion of the latter. This time he’d remembered to shrink to human proportions before consummation and thereby prolonged the pleasure. This one still perished during the act, but since he’d controlled the event he was better able to enjoy the sensation of the death shudder.
He retied his loincloth and stifled a yawn. He felt drained, almost drowsy. Just like the night before. He was long unused to so much activity. A short nap would settle that, but not yet. His task was not complete. There remained the fellow demon captured by the dead one.
He picked up the box. The chaotic noise grew loud again. This prison seemed flimsy compared to his own. A weak colleague, to be held thus. Still, the box’s material was unfamiliar. Perhaps it had magical properties akin to that of his iron shell. Or the interior was thinly lined with iron. He was a poor judge of mass; nearly everything felt light to him.
He scowled. Tampering with magic was dangerous. Furthermore, he recalled his own overwhelming rage when he’d escaped. Could he expect gratitude from another like himself? Even tolerance?
No. He tired with disconcerting ease, for which the expenditure of his energies in sex might or might not be responsible. Contend with another for this village? It was his village now, his province, too. Why risk all in a gesture of kinship?
He could, and would, do this much: spare his fellow further public shame.
Ignoring the screeches, he carried the box through the underpass and to the edge of the black, swift-flowing river, north of the boat basin. The box sank quickly, with barely a splash. He could tell that the demon appreciated this small favor, for the protests ended abruptly.
In the sudden silence, he heard footsteps. He turned. An elderly man was scurrying southward, away from him. He cursed. The old fool had seen the hiding place. Increasing his mass once more, he snapped off a thick tree limb and followed, taking one step to every three of his quarry’s. Those rheumy eyes would spy out no more secrets, that tongue reveal none already seen.
That done, he sought out another underpass, climbed into another rugged niche, and slept.
Nihon (Ancient Japan)
649 A.D.
CHAPTER 23
Twelfth month. Tenth day.
The door to the audience chamber slides silently aside.
Here, the acrid odor permeating the residence is at its strongest. The assault on the senses is almost physical. Steeling himself, Monaga crosses the threshold. Retainers line both sides of the chamber. A wide, clear space remains for the priest to traverse.
Monaga stiffens when he sees the dark form sitting on the dais, in the place reserved for the lord of Imuri. He sinks to one knee—not out of respect, but in horror. His voice, a whisper, carries throughout the silent room.
“It is true, then. Yesterday’s rumors are not just the barkings of dogs. You have returned to plague Imuri, in the form of an oni, a demon out of Buddhist hell.” The priest rises, with an effort. “The shape seems apt punishment for your evil.”
Lord Uto throws back his horned head and laughs. His saffron-garbed retainers, disciplined warriors capable of slicing open their own bellies without a murmur, flinch at the grating crackle.
“How like you, priest, to see my transformation a penalty. In fact, I prefer this to my previous body. Much more powerful and intimidating!”
Uto towers over Ashika, his new chief bodyguard, who sits to the left of the lord in lieu of a sword-bearer. Uto has given up the sword. He favors the cruder elemental satisfaction of the wooden club. Ashika is there for show alone. Bodyguards normally hide behind a screen. Demons are not as easy to kill as men. Ashika fidgets; his left knee shifts the width of an eyebrow. For him, that is a major breach of personal discipline. He keeps his gaze fixed forward, unwilling to meet his lord’s awful ebon eyes.
Monaga urges his feet forward, shuffling along the hardwood floor. Lord Uto dominates the chamber as never before. The reborn nemesis has skin of scabrous red, rough as sand and deeply scored. His loincloth, his only garment, is fashioned from the kimono worn by Jiko at his funeral. The groin bulges obscenely.
“You may believe that now,” Monaga says, halting before the dais. “You’ll soon miss your human side.”
“Hai! Did you not call me the most inhuman of lords?”
“An expression.”
“Foolish priest!” roars Lord Uto. “You look at the heavens from the bottom of a well. Your aid made my reincarnation possible! You were the focus of my hatred, keeping the will alive when the flesh failed. I chose this! At my request, you arranged the ritual that freed my spirit for rebirth. With a customary burial, my body would have taken years to decompose. Years that even my deep hatred might not endure.”
Monaga cries in anguish. He falls to his knees. His hands cover his face. The truth of Uto’s words douses him like cold water. Certain Buddhists claim that evil personages can be reborn as oni. Monaga knew this and yet he had forgotten, so rare was the event, so profound his own distaste for the superstitions of the foreign religion.
Uto stands. Floor planks shiver beneath his weight. His hairless skull, topped by horns, scrapes the rafters. A tree branch crusted with gore appears in his right hand. The room remains as still as if sprinkled with water.
“You have served your purpose, priest. Time at last that you die.”
Seated on the oni’s right, previously hidden from Monaga’s view by the creature’s bulk, is Hoke the pillow boy. Hoke’s eyes widen at the unexpected death sentence. Since the day he was taken from his father’s house, the boy has been treated as an object by Lord Uto and his staff, and as a living corpse by the few villagers he encounters. Monaga alone treats Hoke as a human being, despite the unpleasant summons he delivered three days past, a summons which it now appears will lead to the priest’s execution. Unseen by Uto, the boy leans forward. His tongue darts over dry lips. Words of protest form a knot in his throat, threatening to spill out in an incomprehensible and unstoppable rush.
Yet Hoke has no real influence over Lord Uto, did not have before his transformation, and certainly does not now. He can speak, and Monaga will still die. He simply will not die alone. The protruding stake is always hammered down. The boy speaks only with his eyes. No one notices.
The club poises above the priest’s bowed head. Monaga lifts an arm before his angular face, an instinctive but futile attempt to ward off the death blow. Realizing this, he lets the arm fall. His body sags within his drab kimono.
“Yes, slay me. Life is too bitter to bear, knowing I am responsible for a monster.”
Uto clumsily checks his swing, knocking over a glowing brazier. Two retainers hasten to smother the flames.
“Eh? You wish to die?”
“I welcome death. I burn with shame for my foolishness.”
Uto growls indecisively. He stamps his foot. Paper panels jar loose from wall frames. The club drops, scarring the dais.
“Then I shall not deliver you.” Uto leans forward with his unpleasant grin. “You really suffer, priest?”
Monaga nods, avoiding the oni’s too-bright eyes. The priest speaks truly enough; if Uto the oni continues, Monaga takes no joy in living. Neither, though, is death desirable. Alive, Monaga can work to thwart Lord Uto’s evil, alleviate the villagers’ sufferings and, most important, seek a way to defeat the demon and restore the natural balance. Lord Uto will not find it easy to re-establish his old life. Monaga remembers enough of Buddhist legends to guess that certain aspects of demonic vitality will interfere. Already, the dull-wittedness for which oni are notorious is affecting the lord. The mortal Uto would not fall for the simple ploy of a condemned man begging for death. The club is another oni preference. Their propensity for cave-dwelling will soon make this residence unbearable to the demon Uto.
The lord sits heavily. He slaps his knee. Floorboards tremble. “I want a daily audience with you, priest. Let us say, at dawn. I will see the agony in your face as I describe my latest accomplishments and future plans. I will watch you age as I read the pain in your heart. Mark me, priest. From this moment, suicide is forbidden you. Slay yourself, and a hundred villagers die as well. That includes suspicious accidents, eh?” The oni chuckles. “To be certain, I will enact the penalty no matter what your manner of death. Watch your health, priest.”
Monaga’s fists shake in rage at his sides.
“Monster!”
“Demon,” Uto corrects. “You are dismissed.” He looks over the gathered retainers. With his bellow, it is hardly necessary to raise his voice. “All are dismissed. Today’s audience is done.”
Monaga takes a deep breath, lets it out slowly. He backs toward the door, between rows of warriors.
The oni turns to his right. “Come, Hoke. We still have to make up for time lost during my illness.”
Monaga stops in mid-stride. His face turns ashen.
“Lord Uto, I beg you! You’ll rip that child in half!”
Uto snarls at him.
“You were dismissed, priest! What I do or do not do is none of your concern. If Hoke is companionable, his safety is assured. For now.”
As he speaks, the oni seems to rapidly drift back, and for one impossible moment he seems to have moved further off than the rear of the chamber allows. Monaga’s mind suddenly deciphers the illusion. He remembers that an oni can change size at will, from no larger than a rice grain to more than double a warrior’s height. Lord Uto is a little taller than his mortal form when he takes Hoke’s proffered hand to lead the boy to his bedchamber.
Monaga wipes his forehead with a sleeve. The chamber is now uncomfortably warm.
Saffron-garbed retainers close about the priest and escort him to the gate. Their expressions seem too impassive. Veins protrude with the strain of maintaining discipline under these conditions. At the entrance to the residence, Monaga retrieves his priestly staff. He fingers it in thoughtful silence.
CHAPTER 24
Thirteenth day.
It is the hour of the rat.
In a small, screened area at the rear of the sake shop, six men wearing saffron kami-shimo sit with heels bracing haunches, so close that knee brushes trousered knee. The irori’s flame gives little light and less heat. Long swords rest in scabbards lying across their laps.
During Lord Uto’s mortal reign, these same men were feared and shunned by villagers. Tonight they are made welcome, even though discovery of their purpose means death to all who give them aid.
Two silhouettes flicker against one of the shoji screens, illuminated from behind by a paper lantern. None of the six move; they already face this panel, anticipating. Shadowed faces betray no emotion, though each man feels the tension in the tightening of his vertebrae. No one breathes until the screen moves aside. In its place stands Kujo, the shop’s new owner, and Ashika, Lord Uto’s bodyguard.
“Shall I heat sake?” asks the burly ex-farmer, now reluctant village headman.
Ashika notices that Kujo keeps his trembling hands hidden in his kimono sleeves. A brave man, for a peasant. The bodyguard presses a Chinese coin into a secreted palm.
“You have done too much already, Kujo. Go to your sleeping mat. For your sake, and your family’s, you should know as little as possible of this meeting.”
The headman bows, more grateful for the opportunity to leave than for the money, and backs away. Ashika watches narrowly as the screen is replaced. Beyond, the light from Kujo’s lantern fades as the shopkeeper makes his way to the living quarters. Still Ashika lets long moments pass in silence.
The bodyguard’s throat is dry, but sake will not quench that thirst. He will not indulge in ritual tonight. Nor is this amenity the least tradition he plans to violate.
“Is this all?” Ashika asks at last. “We seven?”
Bald Mateo answers. “We had to be circumspect. Some who might have joined us were baffled by over-subtle approaches.”
“Otomi wished to come,” adds young Ichiro, “but he had watch tonight. To change his duty would have aroused suspicion.”
