She didn’t know and, as usual, it was the lack of knowledge that scared her the most. Things did not look good. Still, she would give it her best. She wasn’t one to quit before she even began.
She rolled him on his side to let some of the water drain out of his lungs and then set to work. It had been a while since she’d had any formal CPR training, so she quickly found herself repeating the steps aloud to be sure she didn’t miss anything.
“Tilt the head, pinch the nose and breathe.”
His lips were cold and hard beneath her own. She could taste the brackishness of the pond water.
“Check for air.”
She put her ear in front of his nose, hoping for an exhale.
Nothing.
“Hands on the chest. Pump one, two, three, four,” Annja continued the count to fifteen.
Nothing.
“Come on, old man.”
She went back to breathing again.
Tears streamed down her face as she worked, afraid that for once she hadn’t been good enough, hadn’t been quick enough.
“Pump one, two, three…”
Roux couldn’t die like this. Not drowned while chained to a pole in a public park. Not sacrificed so that someone else could be the new bearer of Joan’s sword. Not because she had failed him when he needed her most.
“Breathe.”
She was crying so hard that she couldn’t even see. Not that she needed to. Her whole world had devolved down to three simple activities.
Breathe.
Pump.
Check for air.
“Don’t die on me, Roux. Not yet.”
In a way she was surprised at the depths of her grief. Roux could be an infuriating, stubborn, old-fashioned pain in the butt, but he was also her friend and her mentor and until now she really hadn’t understood what he meant to her.
She pumped harder.
“Breathe, damn you!” she said.
As if in response, Roux suddenly convulsed, coughing up what looked to her to be half the water in the pond behind them.
She quickly rolled him on his side and pounded his back, helping him evacuate the water from his lungs. He gasped for breath several times and then settled into a more normal rhythm.
After a moment, he opened his eyes and blinked up at her.
As always, he was direct and to the point.
“Did you kill her?” he croaked.
“Not yet,” she said, and the cold gleam of justice danced in her eyes. It wasn’t a question of if,but simply a question of when.She would not let this go unpunished.
Roux went through another fit of coughing, then said, “I heard them talking. Before they…”
He waved his hands vaguely at the water and Annja understood. Before they tried to drown me, he was saying. Continuing, he said, “The shrine is the rendezvous.”
“The one behind us here in the woods?”
He nodded, then turned his head and spent a few minutes spitting up more pond water.
When he had cleared his throat and realized she was still there, watching him, he asked, “Well, what are you waiting for?”
Annja nearly laughed. Save him from drowning, drag him out of a lake, pound on his chest until he starts breathing again and he wants to be critical of her choice in priorities?
“You sure you’ll be all right?” she asked.
“Fine,” he said, and then retched up more pond water.
She reached for him but he waved her off. In between coughs, he said, “Go. She has to be stopped.”
He was right.
Annja went.
The sun had set while she had been in the water with Roux and it was fully dark. The old-fashioned street lamps that lined the walkways had come on with the growing dark and now lit the path with a soft light. Yet despite their ambience, the calm, tranquil feeling she’d experienced earlier was gone, replaced by a sense of imbalance, a disruption in the flow, as if the landscape around her was reacting to the events playing out upon its surface.
She followed the path a short distance until she came to a fork in the road. A little sign stood nearby, with an arrow pointing down each arm of the fork. The first was directed to the right and the word Shrinehad been etched into its surface. The second pointed farther along in the direction she’d been traveling and read, Esplanade.
Annja chose the right-hand fork.
It didn’t take her long to spot the small structure set back in its own nook amid the white pines. It was made from wood and had a green tiled roof that made it seem as if the structure itself had simply grown out of the ground rather than having been built by human hands.
Leaving the pathway, Annja crept through the trees until she had a clear view of the front of the shrine. Four steps led up to the entrance. Beside the steps was a pair of stone foxes, symbols of Inari, god of the harvest. The Dragon was nowhere to be seen.
Annja moved forward.
When she reached the side of the shrine, she stopped and listened. She could hear the Dragon’s voice from inside the structure, though she couldn’t make out what was being said.
It didn’t really matter though, she’d found what she was looking for.
Annja walked to the front of the building, calmly climbed the steps and entered through the front door.
The interior of the shrine was lit by an entire wall of candles. By their light Annja could see the Dragon speaking to two men dressed in the uniforms of the park maintenance crew.
As one, they turned to look at her.
“You can’t have the sword,” Annja said, looking directly at Shizu.
The Dragon laughed. “Do you think you can take it from me?”
Annja smiled, and by the way the two men stepped back upon seeing it, she knew she had conveyed her intent clearly enough. “Oh, I think so,” she said.
Reaching into the otherwhere, she summoned her weapon.
The Dragon’s eyes fell on the sword and then on the wrapped bundle she had set aside several minutes before. Annja could almost see her playing it back in her mind, wondering how Annja could have managed to regain possession of the sword when it had been in the Dragon’s custody since she’d left the pavilion.
Chew on that one a bit, Annja thought, and now it was her turn to laugh.
Fury seized Shizu in its iron grip. “Kill her!” she screamed, even as she drew her own sword with a lightning quick maneuver.
The men were already in motion, rushing toward Annja with their own weapons drawn.
She didn’t wait for them to reach her, but moved to intercept instead. She was done running; it was time to stand and fight.
She would avenge what they had done to Roux and most likely Henshaw, as well.
She met the first of the Dragon’s henchmen in the center of the room. She knew right away he was no match for her; he held his blade poorly and relied on his brute strength to get him through. He came forward with clumsy, overhand attacks that Annja had no problem avoiding. Annja gave back a little ground, forcing him to move closer to keep her in range, and when he followed she made her move.
Annja deflected the swing of his sword and continued to turn, spinning around to bring her left elbow smashing upward toward his face. When she hammered him on the temple, he stumbled backward, dropping his sword in the process. Annja moved in on him, kicking his sword away as she did so. When he turned to run, she slashed her blade across the backs of his knees, cutting his hamstrings and effectively taking him out of the fight.
A knife whistled by her head, taking her attention away from the downed man at her feet. The other man was standing where he’d been originally, but rather than facing her with sword in hand, he was pulling knife after knife from slots on his belt and hurling them at her.
She used her sword to knock them out of the air as she advanced. Just like swatting a fly, she thought. When she reached him, he drew his own sword and put up an inspired defense, but the end result was the same.