Page 30

Chapter 30

Kaneko

A nother day and night passed as the endless sea rolled beneath me, and still my legs refused to find their balance. My stomach, loyal in all things until now, turned traitor with every lurch of the waves. Susanoo, god of storms, seemed intent on teaching me humility, as though the kidnapping hadn’t been lesson enough.

Kichi kept me confined to the cabin, but the taichou had also kept his word: No one laid a hand on me. Kazashita delivered my meals twice each day—a bowl of rice, a few slices of fruit, and a handful of nuts.

The food sat untouched more often than not; the waves saw to that.

Kazashita was civil enough, though he avoided my gaze and answered questions with practiced silence.

“Where are we headed? Why did the taichou say I wouldn’t be safe ashore? Why can’t I leave the ship?”

Nothing. Not a glance. Not a flicker.

On his next visit, I tried a different tack. “Where are you from? Do you have family? How did someone so well spoken end up—”

“I’m here to deliver food, Little Fox,” Kazashita interrupted, his voice softer than I expected, almost apologetic. Almost. “Nothing more.”

The door closed. The lock clicked. My hopes of befriending my guard clicked with it.

I curled into the corner of the bunk, knees to chest, as the walls of my wooden prison pressed inward. Every heave of the ship brought bile to my throat, and every unanswered question gnawed like rats on a rice sack. If I were a girl, they’d sell me to slavers or a geisha house. I’d heard of girls fetching more gold than Father’s fishing boat made in a year.

But a boy?

Manual labor, perhaps. I’d spent enough time on Father’s boat to know the work of sailing, but Kichi clearly had other plans for me. Of that, I was certain. And that certainty terrified me.

My mind drifted to the woman I’d glimpsed through the grate below deck.

Kuroki.

Back home, she was the heart of every gathering, laughter incarnate, warmth personified. I remembered her guiding a stubborn mare through the streets, coaxing the animal forward with soft whispers and gentle pats. Even the village’s surliest beast yielded to her sunlight.

The woman I’d seen in the hold was a shadow, her eyes vacant, her cheeks hollow. The brilliance of her spirit lay buried beneath a weight I dared not name.

How many more like her cowered in that darkness?

The ship jerked to a halt.

For the first time in days, the floor beneath me stopped its endless sway.

My pulse quickened. Had we arrived? Was I about to learn my fate?

A heavy knock rattled the door.

“Little Fox,” Ushi’s voice rumbled from the other side.

I barely had time to sit upright before the door slammed open and Ushi loomed in the frame, his hairy chest bare with muscles taut beneath tattoos that twisted like serpents. On his left breast was painted the crimson orb and triple golden crosses of the wakō . The design was so perfectly rendered I caught myself staring.

Ushi grinned. “Like what you see? I can show you more.”

“No!” The word leaped from my throat.

He laughed. “Suit yourself. Ushi’s mast is—”

“Enough.” Kazashita appeared behind him, voice sharp as steel. “See to the unloading.”

Ushi winked and shot me one last leer before lumbering away.

Kazashita stepped into the room, the weight of his presence somehow outmatching the brute he’d just dismissed.

“We are making a brief stop,” he said. “The men will unload the cargo and rest for the night. At dawn, we sail for the mainland.”

Mainland.

That word sent a shiver through me.

Mainland meant civilization. Cities. People. Potential allies.

“Where on the mainland?”

“Bara,” Kazashita said, surprising me with an actual answer to one of my many questions. “The Imperial capital.”

“Why take me to Bara? Why not just throw me overboard? Or keep me here?”

“Decisions above my station.” He hesitated. “Your fate will be decided in Bara.”

Relief mingled with dread. I would have a future, however uncertain.

Kazashita turned to go. “The door remains locked. Taichou ’s orders. Get some rest.”

I woke to the crack of thunder. The cabin pitched. The air was thick and suffocating.

Another crack, sharper than the first.

What the hells?

I strained, listening to the sounds of the ship, but couldn’t hear rain pelting the deck or the howling of a storm.

BOOM!

If it wasn’t thunder . . . oh, gods, it was cannon fire.

Smoke slithered under the door. I leaped up, fists pounding the wood.

“Help! Let me out! Please!” I banged my fists against the door.

The ship groaned as something massive collided with the hull. Heat blossomed from beyond the door. The smoke thickened, swirling like a living thing, clawing its way into my cramped cabin.

“Kazashita, Ushi, anyone! I’m in here!”

The door flew open.

Kazashita stood there, his face streaked with soot, hair in disarray. “Come with me! Now!”

His hand latched onto mine and yanked me into the corridor. We ran. Twice we turned back from walls of fire.

Smoke clawed at my throat as the deck beneath us tilted and seawater surged through shattered planks.

We reached the upper deck, and the night sky stretched above us, starry and still.

The ship was anything but.

Flames devoured the sails.

The splintered mast lay sprawled like a felled tree.

Bodies littered the deck, some groaning, most still.

The acrid tang of blood and burning pitch scorched my nose.

Kazashita dragged me toward the rail. “Can you swim?”

I nodded.

“Stay close.”

Without warning, he shoved me overboard, and the sea swallowed me whole. The cold shocked the breath from my lungs, but I kicked toward the surface and gasped for air. Kazashita appeared beside me, his eyes scanning the shore ahead.

“Swim!” he shouted.

The current tugged at my limbs. My sodden kimono tried to drag me down. I wriggled out of it, teeth chattering, and swam harder. Kazashita surged ahead but circled back each time I faltered.

Behind us, the ship groaned one final time.

Then I heard the roar of an impossibly large . . . something .

We turned in time to see monstrous limbs, slick and chitinous, rise from the depths. They wrapped around the burning hull like a child’s toy and pulled it beneath the surface. The sea hissed as the flames died.

“By the gods!” I whispered.

The limbs shot toward a nearby Imperial ship flying the golden chrysanthemum of the Emperor. The crew scrambled to fire their cannon, but the creature crushed the ship with ease.

Wood splintered. Men screamed. The chrysanthemum banner vanished beneath the waves.

Kazashita swore, but his strokes didn’t slow as he called to me. “To the shore, Little Fox. Now!”

We stumbled onto the sand, collapsing side by side.

Our chests heaved. The stars above blurred through salt-stung eyes.

“What was that?” I panted.

Kazashita didn’t answer. His gaze was fixed on the beach as shapes emerged from the surf: figures in dark clothing, moving with purpose.

“We need to move,” he said, helping me to my feet.

I hesitated.

“Kaneko,” he said softly. “Now is not the time to grow defiant. We have to move.”

The use of my name jolted me. I gripped his arm.

Together we fled toward the jungle.

We walked for over an hour, Kazashita hacking at the jungle’s undergrowth with his katana , clearing our path. My blood raged with so much fear that I barely registered how he used his sacred blade for such a menial task.

The vegetation gave way to a clearing and a camp unlike any I could have imagined. Ramshackle huts leaned drunkenly against each other. Empty barrels dotted the ground alongside broken crates and discarded fishing nets. A pack of dogs growled over a rotting carcass.

Kazashita crouched beside me. “This is one of the island’s perimeter camps. There are dozens of them scattered in a ring about the island to make the Imperial fleet think us unorganized. The real village is deeper inland.”

“Real village? A wakō village? You’re serious?” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. Wakō despised order. They detested living peacefully, even with their own kind. It was well known that all they cared for was gold and lust. There was no way they could manage the stability of a settlement. I briefly wondered if Kazashita had hit his head as we fled the ship.

A pirate stumbled from a hut, naked save for a nose ring and a tapestry of scars. He urinated on the ground, scratching his belly, as his massive manhood dangled before him.

“Gods,” I muttered, my face suddenly hot.

Kazashita’s eyes twinkled. “Don’t worry. Most of them eventually find pants.”

His humor evaporated when a scream shattered the night. A girl, no older than ten, was dragged into view by her hair. Blood streaked her face.

I lurched forward, but Kazashita caught my arm.

“We can’t fight them,” he hissed.

“We can’t leave her,” I shot back.

The pirate hurled the girl to the ground and raised a fist.

Another intervened.

The two squared off, fists flying.

The girl lay motionless.

Kazashita’s grip tightened. “We save her by surviving. Come.”

I wanted to resist, to fight, but the jungle called, and Kazashita’s hand anchored me as we slipped into the shadows.