Takeo's Chronicles, page 27
Then, the tunnel filled with Hyun’s laughter.
Chapter 1
Takeo Karaoshi sat cross-legged in the sand precisely five paces from his family’s sword. The blade was rammed into the ground, point down with the sun rising behind it and the wind rushing along. Takeo watched his katana carefully, squinting whenever handfuls of sand were blown in his face, while he held the black sheath made of treantwood in both hands over his lap. He scrutinized the blade as best he could, inspecting the way it cut the wind with ease and never faltered in its purpose. He saw a weapon designed to kill, a tool with no other purpose than to cut down those who stood in its path.
Just five paces away, Takeo saw an effigy of himself.
Six months had passed since he’d spoken to the sennin and decided that his fate was to end the eternal wars that plagued this world. That was six long months of climbing down the king of mountains, traversing Juatwa to the sea, sailing to Savara, and seeking out the samurai named Hyun Jee. He had yet to complete the last part, unfortunately, but Takeo was waiting outside this particular Savara town for just that purpose. His immediate goal was to intercept the next messenger Hyun would send to his mistress, the shogun, Lady Xuan Nguyen. That messenger would know Hyun’s last location and thus could direct Takeo to the samurai.
He’d been waiting for weeks now, and in all that time, Takeo had spent the vast majority of it exactly five paces away from his family’s sword, staring at its efficient yet simple design, its black handle, and reflecting quietly on all that had led him to this point and all that he planned to accomplish.
Nearly five years ago, the love of Takeo’s life, Emily Stout, had both killed and died to a rakshasa named Jabbar, and the world had trembled at both their passings. Jabbar’s death had left a power void, while Emily’s death had left an opening in the rank of heroes. In the passing of a single battle, half the world was up for grabs on either side of the spectrum, ripe for the taking of anyone clever, bold, and strong enough to take it. Everyone and everything capable of holding a sword or hammer had taken up the lifestyle of marauder or vigilante. Homes burned, blood spilled, and wars started across all lands. The North raged against itself. Juatwa fought its bitter wars. Savara was supposedly a hotbed of activity, being a rugged cesspool of brutality and chaos where only the strong could survive. Takeo had seen these things all his life but never to such a degree. It shocked him that the skies above were not permanently stained black with smoke and that there were still towns left to pillage. Wars had quickly consumed the eastern half of the world, and five years had passed without a clear winner reigning supreme. It seemed the problem was there was no one clever, bold, or strong enough to assume the mantle left by Jabbar and Emily. It seemed the world was doomed to die slowly in a pillar of fire, and in the middle of it all, the innocents who wanted nothing more than to live their lives in peace would die, too.
Without Emily, without the woman they called the Angels’ Vassal, there was no one to protect them. Takeo wanted to, as grand and impossible as that seemed. To do this, he would need to join and assist the winning side and help them conquer the world. It truly did not matter to him which side that was, whether they be saints or tyrants, just so long as the chaos stopped. Takeo already had a short list of rulers he considered joining.
The most prominent was Lady Xuan. She was the woman who had sent Takeo to Savara, offering Takeo knowledge of his obscure past and also a place at her side if only he could capture two rakshasas for her—one male and one female. He had accepted because he desperately sought the knowledge of his family, but he wasn’t certain he would accept the second offer to join her. Truth be told, Lady Xuan was an ancient human, nicknamed the Old Woman of the Mountain, and Takeo doubted she would live much longer. This wasn’t such a bad thing were it not that Lady Xuan’s successor, her eldest son Pircha, was a man Takeo did not trust to lead the world out of these dark ages. Takeo thought Pircha both pretentious and inept, and assumed that the moment Pircha took over, the family name of Nguyen would have its days numbered.
There were two other shogun in Juatwa Takeo could join. There were the Katsu cousins and Zhenzhen Hanu, wife of the deceased Jiro Hanu. Takeo knew next to nothing about any of these people, so he held judgement in reserve, but he did know their forces were considerably smaller than Lady Xuan’s. All this meant to Takeo was that their chances of conquering the world and stopping the chaos were less than that of the Lady Xuan.
Takeo didn’t like those odds.
Were he a desperate man, he might join up with one of the countless warlords in Savara, or maybe a jarl from The North. However, none of those men or women stood much chance of expanding beyond their immediate borders. The plan Takeo had was to fight for unity under one name, one banner, and one purpose, to bring an end to the perpetual violence that plagued this era. He’d do the deed himself were that possible.
The overriding problem was that Takeo was just one man, armed with just one sword.
He had friends and allies, of course. His immediate traveling companions were the gallant Sir Gavin Shaw, an ex-knight with a charming smile, self-depreciating humor, and a wicked good shield-arm; the overly confident Nicholas Stout, a huge viking with a death wish and an insatiable appetite for fame who was Emily’s younger brother; and finally there was Krunk, a simple-minded ogre who’d just turned ten years old and yet was stronger than all of them. Beyond them, Takeo felt he could count on the amazons of Themiscyra as his allies although they were over a year’s travel away. He could also count himself a welcome guest in the city of Lucifan, which was ruled by the vampire Sir Mark O’Conner and kept civil by the Knights’ Order. In the Great Plains, Takeo had a gunslinger friend who was Nicholas’ older brother. There were a few viking clans who thought highly of Takeo in The North, and he even had a werewolf contact in the Forest of Angor. Unfortunately, none of those legions were in any position to help him, nor should they feel inclined to. Besides Gavin, Nicholas, and Krunk, Takeo was still only one man with only one sword.
And that sword was just five paces away, cutting the air and sand as it swept by.
I need power, he thought.
“I’m a fool, that’s what I am,” Takeo muttered. “I’m an exceptionally skilled fool. How can I possibly shift the tides that sweep over this world? What possible difference can I make?”
And yet he would; it was foretold. Six months ago, atop the king of mountains, Takeo and Gavin had been told that so long as they sought to conquer the darkness that plagued this land, they would be successful. The only price they would pay was that one of them would die, and it would be the other who killed him.
A terrible price to pay for two people who’d grown close.
“We’ll see,” Takeo muttered again, lips hardly parting. “If that’s the path we must travel, so be it, but I will ride this night out as long as I can.”
Gavin had sworn he would never kill Takeo, and Takeo felt strongly that he could not foresee a situation in which he would kill Gavin. Yet the sennin had said they would, and the sennin were never wrong.
“Yet they can lie,” Takeo whispered.
Just ahead, his sword whistled as the wind rushed by it. Takeo watched it carefully, waiting to see if it faltered, and then sighed in relief when it held true. It did not even tremble, and Takeo drew strength from that. He used the sword as a focal point, trying to come to grips with the colossal task he had chosen to undertake.
It’s not impossible, he thought, and he knew of one who’d done it before. Emily had been just one woman, and yet she’d managed to alter the course of history. She had even managed to do it in a short time.
“Yes, but she had a colossus at her command,” Takeo’s heart answered, “basilisk poison in her veins, and an angel that sacrificed himself so that she might live. People loved her, too. You, though? You’re just a heartless ronin.”
Thinking of Emily didn’t hurt like it used to. Five years ago, Takeo’s heart would seize in his chest at every breath, and he’d felt numb to everything around him. Tears came easily, sleep came hard, and nightmares infested him. It’d been difficult to function as a normal human until he’d tracked down Gavin and recruited the knight.
Takeo had thought of his older brother, Okamoto, a lot during those times. Like Emily, Okamoto had died fighting a wretched creature, but the similarities between them stopped there. While Emily had been a source of light and warmth in Takeo’s life, teaching him to love and feel, Okamoto had been his night, hardening and emptying his body so that he might become the perfect samurai.
Both of them had nearly succeeded.
Time was rumored to heal all things, and although Takeo disagreed, he did concede that time faded all things. The loss of his lover and his brother were nothing more than dull aches in his chest these days. Their memory and faces didn’t summon themselves to his mind as readily as they used to. This was both a blessing and a curse, for although Takeo had drunk his fair share of pain, he dreaded the day when he wouldn’t think about Emily at all. On that day, Takeo would surely lose his humanity.
“She was a great person,” he said to his sword. “You are no replacement for her. You are not a colossus, nor are you basilisk poison. Worst of all, you are neither a guiding angel, nor are you the fiery determination I will need. You are just a sword, and I am just a man. I must accept that I cannot accomplish this task alone. The world will not bend to my will simply because that is what’s best for it. I must become worthy of such a thing. I must rise above my station—above every station of every being that has come before me.”
He could handle that responsibility, he hoped. Still, that did not answer the question. How?
The crunch of sand under heavy boots rumbled through the Savara winds. The sound came from behind him, but he did not turn, preferring to listen carefully. He counted the pacing, and within a few steps, he knew who approached him. A touch of warmth reached into his heart, and all of Takeo’s feelings of loneliness were banished in an instant.
“Out here again, are you?” Gavin asked. “You know, if I had known you’d spend so much time here, I wouldn’t have rented a room. We could have saved the money.”
“I’m meditating,” Takeo replied. “They say life’s greatest answers are always whispering. One need only listen.”
The sands shifted as Gavin took a seat next to Takeo, plopping down into the grains and stretching his legs out before him. Gavin sputtered as a gust of wind slapped a handful of Savara sand in his face, and he brushed a hand through his yellow, short beard before sighing.
“If your sword is the one that’s talking to you, I want you to tell me,” Gavin said, “because I might have to kill you a lot sooner than I expected.”
“I’ll call that bluff. You already played your hand, remember? You admitted you don’t have what it takes to end me.”
“But was I bluffing?” Gavin smiled, showing off his winning features, which always seemed to drive women mad.
Takeo looked sidelong at him and, unable to help himself, matched the smile. Gavin’s light-hearted nature was too infectious for his own good, and the knight knew it. They shared a chuckle and instantly regretted the action as another gust of hot Savara wind swept by then, flicking kernels into their eyes, ears, and teeth. Gavin coughed and spit.
“Damn this miserable place!” he said. “It’s like Savara is intentionally trying to aggravate me. Nothing but sand dunes in all directions, a sun that just won’t quit, and talk about that wind! I’ve eaten pies that were baked at cooler temperatures. Not to mention the amount of sand I’ve accumulated in my boots and clothes. I think my skin has rubbed raw just about everywhere except the top of my head. No wonder everyone is so bloodthirsty out here. They must be in a constant rage from the day they’re born. Why, of all the places in the world, do rakshasas have to live here?”
“Maybe they like the heat?” Takeo shrugged. “You know, it wouldn’t bother you so much if you wore something looser.”
“What are you suggesting? Trade my tunic and leather pants for a dress?”
Gavin paused, but Takeo didn’t take the bait. They both knew full well that what Takeo wore was a white kimono, not a woman’s dress from Lucifan.
“You could wear what the locals do,” Takeo offered. “Some loose clothing wrapped around the body. It keeps the sun off while allowing the wind and sand to move about freely. It will keep the rashes away, too.”
“Eh, maybe,” Gavin said. “I’ll suffer for now, though. I’m too attached to this outfit. When Ephron told me I was still a knight, I believed him, and so it just seems wrong to abandon the clothing. Besides, it keeps things interesting. I never know where I’m going to itch next. Anyway, back to the sword. Tell me, does it speak to you?”
He nodded in the direction of the Karaoshi family blade, where the wind was still trying tirelessly to push it over. Takeo once again saw a good omen in the way his sword held true and searched for a metaphor. Perhaps the wind represented the power of the world, and his sword was a tool that could stand against it. In this way, the sword once again represented himself.
Takeo dashed that thought from his mind and cringed. That was weak. Okamoto would have beaten me for that.
“It doesn’t speak,” he answered. “That would be absurd.”
“Too bad,” Gavin said. “I had actually changed my mind. I figured that, with a talking sword, we could rally people to us fairly easy. Perhaps your katana is just lonely over there. Maybe it’s missing something to talk to. Want me to set my shield next to it?”
Takeo huffed and rolled his eyes, but he went along with it.
“Couldn’t hurt,” he muttered.
Gavin stood up and walked over to the katana. He unslung the kite shield from his back and rammed it into the sand. The shield wasn’t called a kite shield for nothing, and the moment he took his hands off, the wind pushed it over. Gavin frowned and tried once more, digging a small hole and then burying the shield halfway up. He stepped back, waited a moment, and then returned to sit next to Takeo.
“There,” the knight said and gestured to the sight of a katana and a shield erected side-by-side. “Now what do we do?”
“Think and listen.”
They sat in silence for a few moments, squinting at the rising sun, which was slowly bringing about the desert heat. They wouldn’t be able to sit here much longer without sweating, and Takeo was wary of too much sun exposure too soon. He’d grown up in Savara long ago, but his skin wasn’t quite as resilient as it once was. His lips chapped, his skin burned red, and his clothing chafed. Gavin was having it worse, being from the coastal city of Lucifan.
The wind kicked up a notch and scattered the sand around the shield. A few moments later and the shield blew over. The katana, however, stayed true.
“Was that the answer?” Gavin whispered. “You said meditating was supposed to give an answer.”
“I think it’s a sign for you to leave,” Takeo said. “Clearly, your presence isn’t wanted.”
“Well, obviously! I didn’t need to meditate to know that. This desert has been telling me to leave the moment I got here. Well, too bad! You hear me, you sack of dried dirt? I’ve wooed women ten times as rough as you, though never anyone half as ugly. You can kiss my arse, Savara. Sir Gavin Shaw isn’t intimidated.”
He stood up, walked over, and grabbed up his shield. After shaking the sand off, he slung it back on and adjusted the straps. Next, he drew out his longsword and rammed that into the ground. When he let go, the longsword didn’t budge.
“Ha!” He pointed and laughed. “I win.”
“You’re having a lot of fun with this, I see.”
“Well, I have to,” Gavin said and shrugged. “It’s either that or join Krunk and Nicholas in their wrestling matches. Otherwise, I’d die of boredom. When is this messenger coming, anyway? We’ve been waiting here for weeks and heard nothing. Are you sure this is the right town?”
Takeo nodded, tapped his breast where he kept the map Lady Xuan had given him, and said, “As sure as I can be. This is one of the few towns stable enough to survive the ceaseless wars. It’s also close to the sea and open to foreigners. This is where Hyun Jee sends his messengers so they can travel to Juatwa, and so it’s the best place to start. Lady Xuan said Hyun sends her messages as often as once every three months—apparently, he’s that diligent.”
“I’d say ardent.”
“Whatever his reasons, Lady Xuan was clear. We must meet up with Hyun first and then travel off to capture two rakshasas. If we want our payment, we have to complete the contract in full.”
“Two rakshasas.” Gavin sighed. “We must be insane.”
Takeo didn’t reply, but he agreed. He took a deep breath and let it out slowly. Meanwhile, he kept his eyes on his sword.
“Can you at least tell me what you’ve been thinking about?” Gavin said. “I promise not to share it with Nicholas or Krunk. What’s one more secret, right?”
“I can tell you, but you won’t like it.”
“I’ve given up liking anything that comes out of your mouth. Just say it.”
Takeo, understanding the weight of words, paused for effect before speaking.
“I’ve been thinking of Emily,” he said.
“No surprise there.”
“It’s not that,” Takeo continued. “What I’ve been thinking about isn’t her hair or her kiss. I’ve been thinking about her as the legends speak of her: as a girl who changed the world. She started out like us, sort of, just another human drifting along in time. Then there was a spark, fire, heat, and she burst onto the stage of life to reign over us all. If Jabbar hadn’t killed her, she would have risen further. I’m sure of it.”
“She didn’t do it alone, though.”
