Scott McGough: Outlaw:Champions of Kamigawa

Toshi grinned and tapped his ear. "Didn't catch any of that, actually," he said. "Michiko, say something."

"What?" She looked in helpless confusion from Mochi to Toshi. "What can I say that will make sense of this madness?"

"I heard that," Toshi said. "You may have been right, fat boy. This kami blessing stuff is a real boon."

Mochi smiled again, but his eyes were cold and challenging.

Toshi drew his jitte and gave the pile of hay figures a stir.

"Rise up, my beauties," he said. "It's time to play."

Held fast in the forest kami's grip, Toshi reopened his eyes. He felt something cold and vast piling up behind him, like a stiff wind on a winter night. Mochi had been correct about one thing at least: calling on the spirits' power directly was more intense and exhilarating than channeling it through kanji. He could see why so many people were so devout in their prayers. It felt too good-addictively so.

He actually felt the quiet building up inside him as if it were a totally new thing instead of the absence of one. It was like pressure in his ears and throat, pressure that threatened to spill out of his head from every orifice.

Toshi saw the manifest spirit of the forest before him. He imagined the orochi stronghold where he'd been held, picturing the large, ritual clearing in his mind. Like the akki, these forest dwellers were chanters, and they were probably gathered there by the score to combine their prayers, to call upon their patron spirit and focus its power.

A vine lashed out from the forest spirit's body and coiled around Toshi's neck. It choked him only slightly as it forced his face up.

Now you die, the forest kami said. And all those that stand with you. The balance must be restored.

"Milady," Toshi croaked. "Grant me your blessing. I call… for silence."

Then the power did explode from him, a black stream of liquid light that gushed from his eyes, nose, and mouth. Blind, deaf, and dumb at the epicenter of this storm, Toshi nonetheless saw the countless thousands of pale white hands grasping in the black river that rushed from his face to the great forest kami's.

Then Toshi's mind seized up and the world disappeared from his senses. He lost all sensation of time and place, not drifting in a void but part of that void, indistinguishable from it. His body was a portal, a lens through which the great patron spirit of the Takenuma Swamp now focused its power.

Unsure if he were alive or dead, unconcerned in either case, Toshi laughed. It was a huge, rolling blast of joy, but it came with no sound. Not even Toshi heard his own throaty roar as the geyser of black force slammed into the Myojin of Life's Web, obscuring her under a tide of darkness.

Far to the north, in the ritual clearing of the orochi-bito, the frenzied rite continued. The priests and snakes had been chanting for days without interruption, and the figure of their patron kami had grown almost as large as the clearing itself. Her smooth wooden face had dried and fallen like an autumn leaf, signifying her mind had traveled elsewhere.

This did nothing to diminish the supplicant's fervor, for they knew where she had gone. Soon, the child of blasphemy would be excised and the proper order of things could be restored.

Here, she was supreme. From here, she could go anywhere in the Jukai, perhaps anywhere in the world. She was Nature, unrestrained and rampant. She was Life itself, vast and complex. Her ultimate designs were inscrutable, and her full power was irresistible. There was no denying her grandeur, no escaping her influence. All hail the Myojin of Life's Web.

A strange new sound rose over the ruckus. The revelers' noise dimmed for a moment but then rose again, louder than before, determined to drown out the competing voice. It was a male voice, a human voice. It was laughing.

A dark shadow formed on the kami's body at the point where her face had been. The shadow became a cloud, and the cloud spread out across the living wooden mass, groping and testing the air like a spider in the dark. The kami's body shuddered as if struck and then groaned as it tried to contain an awesome force that swelled it like an overfull wineskin.

A sheet of black light streamed out from the center of the kami, covering the entire clearing and everything in it. As the veneer of shadow touched the kannushi and the orochi-bito gathered there, their voices stilled. Ponderous, palpable silence descended on the clearing as every shout, hiss, and prayer died in the throats that uttered them.

Deprived of its spiritual sustenance, the kami's form began to dry and crack. The thinnest branches on its outer layers split and fell away; the broad trunks that looped and curved around the central mass now sloughed bark, littering the ground with brittle wooden flakes. The wood under that bark was not live, fragrant cedar, but cold, gray deadwood. More of the kami's body collapsed in on itself, and the central tree began to sway.

The black sheet vanished from the revelers, but they were still struck dumb. Some fled, while others simply watched, but none of them could stop the horror as their patron spirit, their god, was diminished before their very eyes.

The vines around Toshi's body went slack. He gulped air and wrenched his hands and feet free. The tendrils creaked as they tried to hold on, but their force was spent and they would grow no more.

Toshi stepped clear of the disintegrating wood and locked eyes with the kami's wooden mask. For once, he offered no barb, jibe, or taunt. He simply watched as the great forest spirit withered, dying as quickly as it had grown.

It was as if the seasons were passing in a matter of moments. The summertime vitality of a healthy tree faded into the muted colors and dormancy of autumn, then declined into the dry and apparent lifelessness of winter. Leaves fell, shriveled, and vanished on the wind. The branches sagged and cracked, and when they broke they shattered into splinters and dust.

Behind the dying form of the kami, her monks continued to chant with their hands locked. No sound passed their lips, but they refused to stop.

Their orochi associates were either smarter or more superstitious. The snakes screamed when they saw what Toshi had done. Alone or in small groups, the orochi-bito turned and ran, fleeing the horror outside the cave.

Toshi waited until the kami's body looked more like an ancient, fragile deadfall than a hearty forest grove. Then, he turned back to the mouth of the cave, put his fingers to his lips, and blew a shrill whistle.

The razor birds responded instantly. They rushed from the cave and swarmed around the collapsing pile of dry wood, accelerating its demise by chopping it into tiny pieces. The cloud of savage creatures buzzed and completely enveloped the kami's remains. They continued to swoop and strike until there was nothing left but a wide pile of what appeared to be mulch mixed with ashes.

Toshi whistled again. He pointed over the hill where the kannushi priests still stood.

"Snakes and monks," Toshi called. "Chase them home and kill any who stop to rest."

The flock flew faster and faster in a circle over the fallen kami. Then, pairs and trios began to peel off, surging north through the forest. Some descended on the hilltop, and as they raised bleeding slashes on the monks' exposed arms, the staid priests at last abandoning their ritual and running for cover among the trees. The razor birds followed, whirring and clattering as they flew.

Toshi looked at his jitte as the power of the kami faded from him. He hadn't even needed to carve a kanji. Smiling, he twirled his weapon and sheathed it on his hip.

He turned in time to see the backs of Lady Pearl-Ear, the wizard girl, and the smallest kitsune male hurrying into the cave. His smile faded and he cocked his head.