Page 47 of Night of the Dragon

“That name.” The demoness’s voice was flat. Curious, but wary. “I know that name.”

Slowly, I nodded. “Kiyomi-sama is the ruler of the Tsuki islands,” I whispered. “Long ago, she was betrayed by the man she loved, and her daughter was stolen from her. She spent years living with her anger and grief, and I think that, over time, those emotions took on a life of their own. They seeped into the land and, for whatever reason, became trapped here.”

“Daughter,” repeated the spirit of Kiyomi-sama. Her voice was low, hollow, as if trying to remember something painful. “Yes, I had a daughter. Once, a long time ago. She was...she was taken from me.” She began to shake, tendrils of black soot rising up to swirl around her. Her claws flexed, and the eyes behind the mask flickered red. “Stolen,” she whispered, the tenor of her voice beginning to slip into madness again. “Gone. All I have left are memories...memories and...” She glanced back toward the shrine, glowing black and purple against the cavern wall. “You will not take them.”

“Your daughter is alive!” I said, wincing as the demoness spun back, raising her claw. “She returned to the island and...” I trailed off, heart pounding, as those bright red talons hovered right over my head. “She’s...right here,” I whispered. “My...my name is Yumeko, Kiyomi-sama. I...was the child you lost. The daughter that was stolen.”

The demoness stared at me. “Yumeko,” she whispered. A tremor went through her, and the raised talon slowly dropped. “That...that was her name,” she whispered, as if in a daze. “The name I wanted to give her, the name I had chosen for my baby. Yumeko. Child of dreams.” She swayed, talons opening and closing, as if unsure of what to do. Behind the mask, her gaze shifted to me, eyes narrowing. “Why?” she asked, the faintest thread of anger nestled deep in her voice. “You were gone so long. I mourned you for so long. Why did you never come back?”

“I’m sorry,” I whispered. The reasons rose to my tongue—I didn’t know my past, I had been raised in isolation for years—but I bit them down. Excuses wouldn’t placate a spirit, not one so consumed with rage and despair. “I’m here now,” I told her, meeting the terrible gaze under the mask. “If it will bring you peace, take your vengeance on me, Kiyomi-sama, and release the curse on my friends. They’re not responsible for your pain.”

“Vengeance.” Slowly, one arm rose, crimson talons flaring wide a few inches from my head. I flinched, but the tips of the claws very gently touched my face, tracing my cheek and jaw. “I never wanted retribution,” the spirit of Kiyomi-sama murmured. “I only wanted to see her, to watch her grow, to share in all the blessings and trials life would give her.” Her other arm rose, both sets of talons framing my face, curling through my hair. “But she has grown up strong, beautiful. It is all a mother could hope for.”

My throat closed up. And even though my heart still pounded and my hands shook, I slowly reached out and touched the edges of the Noh mask covering the demon’s face. The porcelain was cold against my fingers as I met the stark gaze underneath.

“You’ve been in pain for too long, Kiyomi-sama,” I said softly. “It’s time to let go.”

Very gently, I pulled. The Noh mask came away easily in my hands, brittle and lifeless. The face beneath was Kiyomi-sama’s, human except for the horns still curling from her forehead, but ravaged with a lifetime of grief and despair. Her pupils were streaked with red, her gaunt cheekbones standing sharply against her skin, all her beauty worn away. But she gazed at me with eyes that, though they still held an eternity of sorrow, were clear.

“Home,” she whispered, and one talon rose to gently catch a strand of my hair. “You’ve come home.”

I swallowed hard as the spirit of Kiyomi-sama began to fray apart at the edges, black soot spiraling into the air and drifting away into the dark. The talon holding up the strand of my hair dissolved, as did the hand, and then the arm a moment later. From the corner of my eyes, I could see the carpet of flowers doing the same, black petals turning to dust and rising into the air until they vanished into the blackness overhead.

“Yumeko-chan.” The spirit was almost gone now. Just her face and a bit of her robes remained, though they, too, were dissolving rapidly. “Do not be deceived,” she murmured. “The tainted one, the soul who opened the gates of Jigoku, he is but a pawn. Everything that has happened, all the trials you have faced, the failures and victories you have claimed, it all has come together byhisdesign. We are all pawns in hisgame, and he will be the one you must face at the very end.”

“Who, Kiyomi-sama?” I whispered, feeling as if a hole had opened up beneath me. The thought that Genno, the Master of Demons, was only a pawn, that there was yet another, even more powerful enemy I had to face...it made me a bit sick inside. I was still playing all of this by ear, using fortune and blind chance to get where I needed. I trusted my friends with my life, but I knew determination and luck could take us only so far. “If he is even stronger than Genno, how will I be able to beat him?”

The spirit of Kiyomi-sama smiled. “Be brave, daughter,” she said. “He is powerful, but do not underestimate yourself. He is part of you, after all.”

Blinking, I watched as the final bits of ash that had been Kiyomi-sama swirled around me for a moment, then scattered to the winds. Of the spirit, nothing remained; even her robes had faded into dust and vanished. The only item left behind was the cold porcelain mask I still held.

As the demoness vanished, the lights in the cavern flared once, then faded to darkness, the torches snuffed, the glow of the altar winking out. Shadows crept over the room, now eerily silent and empty. Only the faint, ethereal glow from a hovering hitodama kept the cavern from being plunged into utter blackness.

Someone groaned in the darkness, and my heart leaped. Tossing a ball of kitsune-bi into the air, I hurried back to where I had left my companions.

In the flickering foxfire, I could easily make out a dark form lying against the bare rock of the cavern floor. As I approached, it stirred, and Tatsumi slowly pushed himself to his knees, breathing hard. His shoulders were hunched, his muscles stiff, as if he was bracing himself for a sudden onslaught of agony. From somewhere in the darkness, I heard a rough, muttered curse, likely from Okame, followed by sounds of someone struggling to their feet.

“Tatsumi-san.” I knelt in front of the demonslayer, peering into his face. “Are you all right? Are you in any pain?”

He hesitated a moment, then slowly relaxed, muscles unclenching one by one. “I don’t think so,” he muttered. “The hex appears to have been broken...or lifted.” His gaze rose to mine, then to the cavern around us. “The kijo?”

“Gone,” I whispered. “I don’t think she’s coming back.”

He gave a painful nod. “Was it really the daimyo?”

I shook my head. “No,” I mused, trying to make sense of it all. “I don’t think so. I think this was a manifestation of Kiyomi-sama’s negative emotions. All her anger, all her grief and shock and despair when she realized her daughter was stolen away. For some reason, it was drawn down here and trapped, and has been festering ever since.” I took a deep breath, driving away the lingering heaviness around my heart, the last shreds of despair clinging stubbornly to my mind. “That’s what the Kirin warned me about,” I said. “The darkness haunting this island. The sadness infecting the Moon Clan. Why, even after all this time, Kiyomi-sama has been unable to move on. It was all because of that spirit.”

“You freed it, though,” Tatsumi said.

I blinked at the fresh, untainted stinging in my eyes. “It was so angry,” I whispered. “So much in pain. All it knew was betrayal and despair, grieving over what it had lost. Maybe now Kiyomi-sama will finally find peace.”

“Yes,” said a new voice, echoing through the cavern. We jerked up as silvery light flared overhead, illuminating the entire room. “I believe she will.”

A figure stepped from the shadows, coming to stand before the shrine against the far wall. My heart leaped to my throat as I recognized him. I’d only seen him once, in the narrow back alleys of Chochin Machi, but he was impossible to forget.

“Well done, Yumeko,” greeted Seigetsu-sama. He smiled at me, still stunning, breathtaking, even this time around. His yellow eyes glowed in the shadows, and his long silver hair glimmered like a waterfall in the moonlight. “I should not be surprised, given your bloodline. But you have done better than even I could have hoped.”

24

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