tiny flicker of hurt. “They’re part of the natural order, just like the kami. Sometimes, you don’t know what they want until you talk to them.”
He didn’t say anything to that for several heartbeats, staring into the fire as if lost in thought. I tossed a few twigs into the flames and watched the fire consume them, and wondered what would’ve happened had the wind witch exposed me. Would Tatsumi be sitting here with me now? Would the fact that I’d saved his life have any impact on the revelation that I was kitsune? Or would he take his terrible glowing sword and try to cut off my head?
I’ve killed dozens of demons and yokai, he’d just told me. Did that mean he had killed kitsune, too? According to the monks, my full-blooded kin were tricksters and opportunists, but there were a few cases in which they were truly dangerous. Had Tatsumi’s clan ever sent him to kill a fox, and if they had, did he think all kitsune were wild, treacherous creatures that should be put down?
“There is something you should know about me,” Tatsumi said, startling me from my thoughts. I looked up to find him still brooding into the flames, his expression thoughtful. “Something that you should decide for yourself, before we go any farther.”
I straightened, surprised that he was volunteering information. In all our travels, Tatsumi had shied away from any questions about himself, his family, or his clan. After his tortured confession earlier today, I’d promised myself I wouldn’t press him further, that his secrets were his own. After all, I had my fair share of secrets, too.
“You can tell me,” I said. “It won’t scare me off, I promise. Well, unless you’re really a yurei who has been masquerading as a human all this time. Oh, but if that was the case, you wouldn’t know you were a ghost, would you?”
He continued to watch the fire. I sensed he was still struggling with himself, debating whether or not to say anything, before he bowed his head with a sigh.
“There is...a rather large price on my head,” Tatsumi admitted at last. “Not from the magistrates or clans or any human organization. From the demons, and yokai. From the spirit world. They want me dead. Or, technically, they want the bearer of Kamigoroshi dead.”
“Why?”
“Because Kamigoroshi was created to kill demons,” Tatsumi answered. “That’s the entire purpose of its existence. And not just demons—it also works on yokai, spirits, even kami. Creatures that can’t be slain with a normal blade.”
“Oh,” I said. I’d known Kamigoroshi wasn’t a normal sword, but I hadn’t known the entire demon and spirit world was aware of it and its bearer. “So, you’re saying that if a ghost came right through the wall and tried to grab you, you could kill it?”
“Yes.”
“What about fireball yokai? They have no bodies. Can Kamigoroshi kill them, too?”
“I’ve killed several.”
“Oni?”
“Yes, Yumeko.” Tatsumi nodded. “Even an oni, if it doesn’t kill me first. But that’s not the point I wanted to make. Within the blade...is the trapped spirit of a demon. Its name is Hakaimono, and it is old, powerful and very angry. Whoever wields Kamigoroshi is constantly in danger of having their soul possessed.”
I drew in a slow breath, trying to process what he’d told me. He carried a demon in his blade; that was why just looking at the sword could make my skin crawl. “What happens if your soul is possessed?” I asked in a small voice. Tatsumi gave me a cold stare.
“What do you think?”
Now it was I who gazed into the fire, watching it snap and curl. For a moment, I found it sadly ironic; this was the most I’d ever heard him talk, and it was about something I could really do without hearing. “Why are you telling me this now?”
“You saved my life,” Tatsumi said. “I want you to understand what staying with me really means.” He held the sheathed blade up to the light. “Kamigoroshi is a cursed sword, Yumeko. Its bearer is also cursed. Demons and yokai will constantly seek me out to destroy me, which means they’ll try to kill you, too. And I... I am not someone you should ever trust. In fact, it would be better if I’d never made that promise.”
I looked up quickly. “What are you trying to say, Tatsumi?”
He paused. My heart thumped in my chest, and my stomach knotted as I watched him. The firelight danced in his eyes and flickered