Scott McGough: Heretic, Betrayers of Kamigawa

He crouched now on a wide, flat shelf below a rocky point overlooking the path below. After making sure the nezumi would find him, he scaled the point to watch his game play out. He had spent most of the night setting the stage, and now he was ready to enjoy the show. The circular clearing below him was completely unremarkable, his efforts hidden under a light dusting of fresh snow. As he had with the wind shear kami at the base of the mountain, he had combined Night’s blessings with the practical and reliable tools he knew best. He was eager to see how effective this mixture could be.

Something whirred in the cold morning sky and Toshi leaned back against the rock. He shielded his eyes from the rising sun and saw a fluttering figure descending toward him. He mistook it for a bird at first, but then he saw it was a messenger kanji-a simple spell for communicating across great distances.

Toshi drew his jitte. He knew precious few people who used messengers and he didn’t want to hear from any of them. If the kanji didn’t attack, he was ready to nullify it before it could return to its master and report his location.

The kanji messenger fluttered down like a butterfly. It was a crude job, drawn with heavy bold strokes, and it did not seem to have cutting edges. Neither was it moving fast enough to inflict damage. Toshi kept his jitte handy as the messenger oriented on his shelf and then hovered just a few yards away, bobbing and rotating in the air.

“Well?” Toshi said. “Get on with it.”

The edges of the kanji began to vibrate. A dull, droning buzz rose, then a soft and throaty female voice said, “I have a new commission for him and his band of reckoners.

Toshi blinked. He recognized the voice, but he could not credit what it was saying. And when had the daimyo’s daughter learned to work messenger kanji?

“I am in my father’s tower. I am a prisoner. Rescue me, and his reward will stagger the greediest of hearts. Even his.”

Toshi shook his head in disbelief and muttered, “She really must be desperate.”

The kanji bobbed again, and Michiko’s voice said, “I will be waiting for him.”

The edges of the symbol began to flake away. A real beginner’s effort, Toshi thought. It isn’t going to wait for a reply or even return to its starting point. Michiko might as well have tied a note to a rock.

He had offered his services to Michiko-hime only to get them both out of a tight spot. He had thought she would keep him on retainer or just use him for information. In a pinch, she might have him spy on someone. She was too young and held no official offices for her to send him on missions that might endanger him. Now she wanted him to break her out of the most tightly guarded piece of property in Kamigawa.

Toshi sighted. This was the result of working with the noble classes. He thought about sending her a return messenger, but the only reply he could give her was, “I’m working on it.” Best to let her sit tight until he could figure out how to handle this new challenge. Right now, he had enough to worry about.

Down below, he saw his old friend Marrow and two more nezumi creeping toward the edge of the kanji circle he’d made. Trust Kiku to send in a sacrifice first. It was a smart move, but Toshi was unconcerned. His plan would work even if the nezumi were the only ones to break the circle of kanji that waited beneath the snow.

The rats were cautious, though, sniffing around the edges of the broad, flat section of the path. A hundred years ago, before the mountain was cursed, this spot would have been a perfect place to pitch a tent and ride out a storm. Now the nezumi crawled through the snow with only the tips of their noses poking out. They left dull gray furrows in as they spread out in a slow, careful formation. Marrow was taking no chances.

Toshi watched them explore. They were very close to the circle now. Just a few more moments …

Something else moved on the distant path, and the nezumi stopped where they were. Toshi peered through the midday glare and saw people coming up the path. Three men trying to be cautious and unseen but failing miserably.

Kiku’s second wave, obviously. The jushi wasn’t taking any chances, either, in case Toshi’s trap was powerful enough to keep killing after it had been triggered.

Smart girl, he thought. Of course it is. Then again, I didn’t tell you to follow me, did I? Each choice in life brings rewards and punishments. The choice to bring me back to Uramon just carries more of the latter.

Marrow-Gnawer had turned and lifted his head out of the snow. Seeing the hatchet men, he hissed a warning and motioned for them to drop lower to the ground. The thugs resisted at first, unwilling to take orders from a rat. Then they remembered Marrow was far sneakier than they were and they’d do well to follow his lead. Clumsily, they crouched and began to creep forward.

Toshi was so intent on tracking Marrow’s progress that he almost missed the sound. The soft scrape of a boot on frozen rock filtered through his brain. As he was beginning to wonder where Kiku was, he saw a flash of purple spinning gently toward him.

He barely got his short sword out in time to intercept the camellia. The delicate purple bloom fastened onto his weapon, green stems and brown roots wrapping tightly around the blade. Its subtle fragrance changed from perfume to poison in his nostrils and the flower bore down on him, pressing on the sword as if its weight had increased a thousand times. Toshi was forced back into the sheer rock behind him, all of the strength in his arms and legs now devoted to keeping the flower and its grasping tendrils away from his face.

Kiku pulled herself onto the shelf. Her cloak was tossed back, revealing one shapely silk-clad shoulder and another purple flower.

“Hello, Toshi,” she said. Her eyes were hard and bright.

Toshi struggled to keep the flower from pressing his sword into his own face. “Hello, Kiku. I … wasn’t expecting you. At least-” he grunted and took a step forward, but the flower pressed him back once more-“not this high up.”

“Yet here I am.” She casually sniffed the camellia on her shoulder and stepped to the edge of the shelf.

“I have him,” she said. “Marrow-Gnawer and you-” she pointed at the smallest hatchet man-“come help get him down.” She turned back to Toshi.

“You can call off the yuki-onna,” she said, “or you die here. Personally, I want you to come back and beg Uramon for mercy. I’d like to see that.” She smiled coldly.

Toshi sneered over his blade. “Can’t … call her off. But maybe …”

He turned his wrists so the blade’s edge bit into the camellia. The flower pressed on, slicing off a third of itself as it slid over the blade toward Toshi’s face.

Toshi sidestepped the lunging bloom and drew his jitte from his belt. The long, spiked truncheon was normally a defensive weapon, suited for blocking incoming swords and catching them in the metal tine that rose up from its handle. As the camellia flew by his face, Toshi thrust the sharpened end of his jitte through the bottom of the flower, spiking it against the cliff face. He pivoted around the pinned flower then slung it off the end of his weapon like a stone from a sling.

The ruined flower smacked against Kiku’s chest, but it did her no harm. Even if it weren’t crushed, impaled, and in pieces, she was the gardener who’d grown it … it could no more harm her than a snake could suffer from its own venom.

Toshi suddenly winced as an icy, stabbing pain lanced through his forearm. He glanced down past Kiku to the clearing below.

“We should talk,” Toshi said. He kept his sword and his jitte ready. “I think one of Uramon’s hatchet-heads just stepped inside my circle.”