The regal soratami did not answer. Her eyes were angry, but her face and demeanor were chillingly calm.
Toshi shrugged. “No matter. My myojin and I have something for you.”
The soratami seemed to be struggling, but the fog thickened around her and held her fast.
Don’t do this, ochimusha. The soratami’s lips did not move, but it was the same throaty voice that had hectored him before.
“Why?” Toshi sneered. “Is it a sin?” He drew his jitte and slashed it angrily through the fog. When he was through, the same symbol that adorned his waking forehead hung solidly in the air before him, the symbol of the yuki-onna and her lethal cold.
The soratami grimaced, clearly straining to escape. She was in Night’s grasp and Toshi’s mind, however, and they were not about to let her go.
The kanji floated forward, gathering speed as it approached the soratami.
“Tell Mochi he’s next,” Toshi called. The kanji punched through the layer of fog and disappeared into the soratami’s chest. She shivered and heaved but still could not move. The only sound that escaped her pale blue lips was a gentle wheeze, like the whisper that fails to awaken a sleeping child. Then the moonfolk matron’s body withdrew into itself, disappearing into the kanji inside her like water circling out from an unplugged basin. To her credit, she didn’t scream once, not even with her mind.
When the soratami was completely gone, Night released the constraining fog and said, Hurry now. You must finish what you began on the Heart of Frost and return to Jukai. The soratami armada and the orochi rangers are about to receive a vast and terrible guest.
Toshi paused, watching the stony landscape fade and disperse. If he waited long enough, the ground beneath his feet would soon crumble.
He sheathed his jitte and sat once more with his legs crossed. There was no need to wait and every reason to hurry. Toshi closed his eyes and let himself fall back toward his body.
Toshi awoke with a start. The sun was now fully visible overhead. The yuki-onna still stood transfixed where Toshi had left her. As he rose, Toshi felt the mark on his forehead fade. The glow emitting from the kanji ring also diminished. Slowly, menacingly, the yuki-onna’s head tilted forward until her terrible eyes were once more locked on Toshi.
“Thanks,” he said. “But we’re done now.” He got to his feet and dashed to each remaining kanji in turn, brutally marring and cracking the symbols with his jitte. With each lost character, the glow on those remaining receded more. With each lost character, the yuki-onna regained focus and vigor. She crossed the line of symbols and strode purposefully toward Toshi.
Toshi tried to ignore her and went to work on the last kanji. Sweat ran into his eyes and fell from his brow, melting the snow where it landed. He scraped his knuckles on the rough ground. The tip of his jitte was chipped and cracking. He hacked harder and faster, the snow-woman’s shadow almost upon him.
Toshi cried, “Ha!” as the last recognizable bit of the last kanji disappeared in a spray of sharp pebbles and grit. She would never reach him now. Toshi turned his face toward the yuki-onna and grinned.
The dread spirit kept coming. Toshi awkwardly threw himself back and skittered away from the yuki-onna on his hands and feet, still facing her. He quickly bumped up against the wall of the clearing and pressed himself against it as tightly as he could.
“It’s over,” he told the advancing figure. “The sun’s up, the kanji are gone. Why are you still here?”
If she heard him, she did not react. Standing over Toshi, she reached out with her pale fingers to caress his face.
Reflexively, Toshi made himself insubstantial. The yuki-onna’s hand passed through his forehead, and the pain seared him like ten year’s worth of frigid, skin-chapping wind. Toshi screamed in agony, struggling to press deeper into the rock behind him.
She held her hand in place for several seconds, and then withdrew. The yuki-onna turned away from Toshi and folded her arms into her sleeves. She took several steps toward the path that led to the Heart of Frost’s summit, fading as she walked. Before she cleared the ruined ring of kanji, the yuki-onna vanished into the cold, clear sunlight.
Toshi remained a phantom until his heart stopped pounding. He was alive. As he materialized, he felt melting snow seep into his clothing.
“Thank you, O Night.”
You have earned my blessings, acolyte. Now rise, and earn them once more.
“Right. Back to Jukai.” Toshi pushed himself up against the rock wall, slapped the snow from his legs, and slid into the shadow of the overhanging cliffs.
Mochi appeared in Uyo’s chambers on the soratami flagship. He had received an urgent thought-summons from Chiyo, and while her thoughts were jumbled and confused, he didn’t need her to inform him something had gone horribly wrong.
He found the moon-masked maiden pacing angrily around the room. Uyo sat half-sunk into the broad couch pillows in a meditative posture. The silent prophet’s eyes were open, but her mind was obviously far away.
Mochi floated up to Uyo and stared into her eyes. Then he turned to Chiyo and said, Has Toshi …
“Night’s Reach,” Chiyo seethed. In her fury, she was incapable of achieving the clarity of thought required for mind-to-mind contact. “We had him. He was in the yuki-onna’s hands. And he slipped through, as I warned you he would.”
Mochi’s cherubic face darkened and he floated toward Uyo’s student. Have a care, Chiyo. I am not your enemy.
The masked soratami bowed her head. She took two deep breaths and said, Forgive me, Mochi-sama. I have been trying to break through to my master, but her mind is closed to me. I cannot determine what was done to her, or the lasting effects. Will you help?
Of course. Mochi drifted back to Uyo until he was at eye level. He concentrated, reaching out to her with his thoughts.
Instead of responding, Uyo’s eyes flickered as if she were trying to focus them on something minute. She drew a long breath in through her nose. She parted her lips and sighed. The exhalation was white, frigid, and full of ice particles.
A coating of frost crept across Uyo’s open eyes. A single tear slid down her cheek, but it hardened and cracked on her blue-white skin. Then Uyo pitched forward, rigid as a statue, into Mochi’s arms.
The little blue kami caught Uyo’s body, but the sudden stop was too much for her. With a sickening crack, her head rolled off her brittle neck onto the low table in the center of the chamber. There was no blood, as the silent prophet’s body was frozen solid. The rest of her crumbled in Mochi’s arms as the head rolled to the floor and shattered like a fine glass globe.
Chiyo sobbed in fury. Seemingly stunned, Mochi carefully placed the pieces of Uyo he had caught back on the luxurious pillows. He folded his fingers over his belly and rose into the air, rotating to face Chiyo.
Toshi Umezawa is now your responsibility, he said. Do what you will. Take whatever and whomever you need to finish him once and for all. Report back to me when he is dead.
I need no one. Chiyo clenched an angry fist. It will be done.
Of that I have no doubt. Go now, Chiyo. We both have much to do. You have a reckoning to see to. Mochi smiled coldly. And I have a war to win.
CHAPTER 18
Konda’s moth-riders soared over the wilds of Jukai in perfect formation. The Daimyo himself rode at the front of the wedge suspended between two beams of magical force. He had left his horse on the ground long ago, unwilling to abandon the noble beast in the thickest and most dangerous part of the forest.