Page 19

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Screams rang out. The older samurai rode toward the dragon, intending to slay it.

From the shadows, Ryuichi knew better. “It’s a decoy!” The words had barely left his lips before he felt cold hands on his limbs. They sought to drag him from his horse.

The tengu that had attacked the school were here. En masse.

The sky darkened as lightning flashed.

“What do we do?” Kato turned in his saddle as he looked around at all the creatures coming for them.

With Haruki shouting in protest, Koichi unsheathed his sword. “We fight.” Digging his heels into the flanks of his horse, he headed for the monsters.

Ryuichi wanted that kind of courage, but no matter what he tried, he couldn’t muster it. There was something deep inside that kept him where he was.

Not to mention the cold things holding him in place.

Drums began to beat in the distance.

Haruki cackled as she fought Koichi.

“That can’t be good.” Takara scowled at her in the distance. “Shut up, witch!”

“You’re all dead! All of you!”

That didn’t make him warm and fuzzy. He agreed with Takara. Shut up, witch!

With a breath for courage, Ryuichi braced himself as he kicked at the vicious cold hands that had assaulted him. “Give me strength.”

Those hands were cold, grasping things that sought to drag him down. To pull him where he didn’t want to go.

Ryuichi would have had a better chance of pocketing a hurricane than escaping their unholy grasp.

Then he heard it. Another voice.

Did you think your father was the only one with designs on you?

What?

It was the twins joining the fray—one of them, anyway. Mizuki. But where was her brother? They were never apart.

Be a good little boy and stay put.

Ah, there he was. Tsukiya couldn’t resist speaking up.

Ryuichi sat paralyzed, held in place by those hands that he now suspected belonged to one of the twins. Who else would interfere? Render him a hapless bystander in a fight that was definitely his?

Takara dismounted from her own horse and joined the fight on foot.

“Wait.” His shout came out as a whisper. For some unknown reason, he couldn’t yell. His voice was stifled and quiet.

Suddenly, a new voice overtook the screams in his head that were angry over the fact he couldn’t speak. A voice that was his own, even though the words were not.

Dishonorable. Despicable! No good. Conniving bottom-feeders. Begone, you miserable gods.

Ryuichi froze. Those words came from his own shadow.

Ryuichi-kage snarled in his head as he felt something inside him commanding the hands that held him in place. Their grip loosened.

Which only aggravated Tsukiya to an extreme level. Obey us, worthless shadow. You who are made from our flesh and blood. We are your king and queen... your rightful sovereigns.

His shadow answered their call. You are no sovereign of mine! I am samurai. I will never serve anyone who is unworthy of my loyalty . Ryuichi-kage loosened their grip even more. This flesh-puppet I’m forced to endure is soft, weak, stupid, and frail.

Offended to the core of his being, Ryuichi gaped at his shadow’s assessment of him. “I’m not the puppet here. You’re the one I made talk on walls at night.”

His shadow ignored him as it continued to taunt the twins. You are conniving snakes who crawl upon the dirt, deserving only to be stomped underfoot. You have no authority here. I banish you. Begone from this place. Crawl back to your holes.

Against all known reasons, the hands began to recede from his legs.

Who knew they had ears? Or that they’d listen to his shadow self. He was impressed.

Not just with the hands but with the fact that his shadow was helping.

It was actually kind of comforting to know that while his shadow harbored no love of him, it hated his enemies as much as he did.

Or at least it hated him less than the twins.

And now that Ryuichi-kage had broken the hold of those creepy hands, Ryuichi was free to join the fight.

Instead of heading for the swarm of tengu or the dragon, Ryuichi turned his horse toward the sound of the drums.

The second heartbeat.

Maybe it was another decoy, like the dragon. After all, his father’s minions were tricky. Who knew what they had planned?

Especially given the fact that Haruki seemed overjoyed by the coming sound of their destruction. One couldn’t fake her kind of genuine glee.

Which meant that the drums signaled something.

But what?

Surely it couldn’t be worse than a dragon.

Could it?

That was a sobering thought that terrified him. One that made the sweat bead on his forehead. He spurred his horse to run even faster toward the sound, leaving his friends behind to battle the demons and shadows his father had unleashed.

And when Ryuichi topped the hill to investigate the drums, he laid eyes on his worst nightmare.

Here, in the world of the living, stood his father with a wide smile on his face.

No...

His father headed toward him. “Miss me?”

A chill went down his spine. “Like a stone in my shoe.” His gaze went past his father... to the drummers. Or rather, to where their bodies rested.

What he’d been hearing had nothing to do with those poor men who’d been slaughtered. The drummers had been replaced with tengu.

No wonder the sound had creeped him out.

Their laughter rang out as they stopped drumming and took flight, heading for his friends.

With a calmness he couldn’t even begin to understand, Ryuichi dismounted. He glared at his father as he saw all the wanton destruction around them. The pain that’d been so needlessly dealt to everyone he cared about. “You are a monster.”

His father, still in his dragon form, laughed. “Is that all you have to say? You think I’d do all of this if I felt anything other than absolute joy from it?”

Horrified, Ryuichi gripped his sword. How could they be related?

Ryukage snorted fire from his dragon’s nostrils. “Your friends are burning, Ryuichi. They’re screaming for you. ‘Help us. Help us.’ As if there’s any help for them.”

That burned through him and singed his very soul. How dare his father taunt him. The man who’d uprooted his entire life. Who’d taken his mother from him. The man who was supposed to love and protect him.

His own father.

Inside, he seethed with a raging fire that burned hotter than anything his father could throw at him or at Mahō-jō.

Even his shadow agreed.

All his life, Ryuichi had wanted to know who his parents were. Had been desperate to know they were important. That they had abandoned him for their duty.

He’d wanted to know that they loved him.

But this monster?

It was incapable of love. Clearly, the monster had never cared for his mother or for him.

Ryukage was a specter of a past he didn’t know. A ghost of a life he’d never had.

For so long he’d wanted to see his father. To know him.

Now?

Now, he wished nothing more than to kill him for all his crimes against him, his mother, and his friends. He regretted ever meeting this creature.

Ryukage had allowed evil to contaminate his heart. His soul. As much as Ryuichi had hoped his father retained a shred of humanity, he knew better.

I can’t hold back . The world depended on him.

He readied his battle stance.

This was for Mahō-jō. For Hanzō. Takara, Kato, Pim, Koichi, Keiko, the Kai-dan, Masaru, and everyone else who had helped him get this far.

For their sakes, he would not fail.

For his sake, he refused to falter.

His father pulled a blade of fine steel out of his shadow. Neat trick. He’d give him that, but a trick nonetheless. One even Ryuichi could do.

Before he could think another thought, his father rushed him.

Ryuichi’s first instinct was to run.

Don’t you dare! He would never allow himself to be a coward. Not for anything.

But that was easier said than done when a giant dragon was rushing toward him. One with bloodlust in its eyes.

One who appeared to have no paternal instinct at all.

“Masaru?”

He felt the demon awaken inside him as Masaru merged with him in order to fight.

That was a first.

Want some advice, kid?

“All I can get.”

Run!

Great. Now he had two voices screaming at him to run away.

Masaru and Ryuichi-kage.

Saddest part? He agreed with them and wanted to run.

“I can’t. We have to see this through.” Even if it ended with his entrails being used as a dragon sling.

So he held his blade at the ready.

One strike. One kill. Just as he was taught. Not a single ounce of energy wasted.

He could do this.

At least that was his thought until his father dealt him a stunning blow so hard that he swore he could feel it all the way to his soul. Rolling head over heels, he twisted and sprang to his feet.

Granted, he was a little wobbly, but he was standing. Shaking his head to clear it, Ryuichi lifted his sword and charged his father.

Unsurprisingly, Ryukage blocked his strike effortlessly. After all, he was a master swordsman who had been renowned all through the worlds before he’d been contaminated. Now he was stronger than ever.

Much stronger than Ryuichi.

I can do this...

Remove all doubt.

Battles were won or lost in the mind. He had to stay focused. Keep his thoughts on winning.

You’re an idiot.

Maybe, but his friends needed him. He couldn’t fail. And for once in his life... for a single moment, Ryuichi had no fears.

“I know I can do this.” With a deep breath and with the help of his yōkai, he struck true.

He wasn’t sure who was the most shocked.

Him...

Or his father.

But it would take more than surprises to win this battle.

You’re not alone . He smiled at Masaru’s voice in his head.

Not anymore. So Ryuichi struck again and again. Each blow utterly perfect in its execution. The same attacks he’d struggled with in his training against Kato were now flowing seamlessly together.

He felt like Takara and Mikito. A master fighter.

I am the Kage-taro. Shadow Prince.

I will not be defeated!

In that moment, Ryuichi learned something important about himself. He’d never once struggled to learn because he was stupid. Or slow. Or unworthy.

He’d struggled because he’d called himself all those things. It had nothing to do with the bullies in his life or their insults.

It was his own willingness to believe in their insults. To make those things real that had kept him downtrodden. He was not any one single thing.

He was the sum of all the parts of himself that made him Ryuichi. The Kage-taro.

I am my mother’s son too.

Guardian of the Gates. There wasn’t anyone else in the entire world who could do what he did.

Not even his father. Not even with all the powers and strength his father had.

He was no match for Ryuichi.

I am not insignificant!

Without the lies clouding his vision, he saw clearer than he ever had before.

For the first time ever, he saw himself, and not the darkness he’d believed to be true.

Even as his father used shadow magic and tricks to clog Ryuichi’s vision, he saw his true worth.

His real heart.

What he’d feared was merely a reflection of his own soul. A glimpse in the mirror of his own heart.

He’d looked into the abyss, and the abyss had claimed him.

Rather than run or repel it, he embraced that darkness because he knew one truth. Only a soul in disharmony would fail.

With he and his shadow on the same side, working together, no one could stand against him. Not even his father, and all the powers and demented magic he wielded.

Ryuichi was the master now.

And his father knew it too. “I’m impressed, boy. I wonder what else you can do.”

Ryuichi readied another blow. “Me too. Let’s find out together, shall we?”

This time, he went for his father’s legs. If he could keep him from running away, then he’d have a chance to strike his evil heart and save the world.

But you’ll kill your father.

That was wrong and dishonorable. Family was family, even when they were bad.

Masaru growled at him. “You have no choice. Either you eat the dragon, or the dragon eats you.”

He was right, and he knew it, so Ryuichi attacked and kept his blows going.

Still, his father fought. Tirelessly. Fearlessly.

Scarily.

Do not falter!

Ryuichi focused on the sole task of striking down his father. Over and over.

He was so absorbed with his task that he didn’t even realize that the rest of his friends had caught up to them on top of the hill. All around, they were fighting too.

They kept the tengu occupied and away from him and his father.

Yet through the combatants, he saw his sensei.

* * *

Koichi stopped fighting as soon as he caught sight of Ryuichi and did a double take.

I’ll be...

The boy was still alive. He couldn’t believe his own eyes. Better yet, the little snot was holding his own.

I taught him that.

Well, no, he didn’t.

But he liked to pretend that he did. It made him feel better.

Striking at the demon in front of him, he wanted to get to Ryuichi’s side to help, but the tengu were too numerous. He had no clear way to get to his student.

He could only hope that the fight lasted long enough for him to finish the creature in front of him.

Then Koichi noticed something strange. Ryukage had stopped fighting.

Even as the two went endlessly back and forth, there wasn’t a single blow from Ryukage that would hurt Ryuichi. He wasn’t really fighting his son.

Stunned, Koichi dispatched his demon with a quick blow and started for them.

So intent on his task, Ryuichi appeared not to have noticed. He was too focused on the single purpose of finding a weakness in his father’s defenses.

Of surviving a battle he had yet to realize was one-sided.

The boy was fighting for honor and survival.

Two things he knew the boy wanted.

But something had changed in his father.

Cursing, Koichi rushed toward them. He had to tell the kid before he made a horrible mistake the kid wouldn’t be able to live with...

* * *

Ryuichi struggled to breathe. His ears rang as sweat blinded him. He could smell the sulfur from his father’s dragon fire. It permeated everything, even his father’s hot breath.

I have to end this.

For his friends, who his father threatened.

Closing his eyes, he felt his powers begin to hum. He could feel them work their way through his body.

In a bright flash, they surged, and he felt Masaru struggling to stay in place.

Yet, against both their best efforts, his body threw Masaru out.

Stunned, Ryuichi stared at the kitsune, who appeared as baffled as he felt.

Then everything went black.