Soul of the Sword (Shadow of the Fox #2) - Julie Kagawa Page 0,153

forward and threw my arms around him, pressing my face to his neck as I hugged him close.

I could feel his shock; for a moment he went rigid, frozen in the sudden embrace. Very gradually, his muscles uncoiled, his shoulders relaxed and his arms came up to wrap around me. Tentative at first, as if he was unsure of what to do. But then, he let out a breath, and it seemed to release all the fear, uncertainty, horror and doubt of the past nightmare. He crushed me to his chest, clinging to me like a lifeline, like I was his sanity and he was afraid I would abandon him.

“Arigatou,” he murmured in my ear, and his voice came out choked. I closed my eyes and savored the feel of him in my arms, his heartbeat against mine. “Yumeko…thank you. I won’t forget this.”

A deep chuckle, low and ominous, vibrated the air around us. “Well,” came the cold, amused voice of the First Oni, echoing through the dark and making the ground quake. “Wasn’t that entertaining. Congratulations, fox, you found Tatsumi, but there’s nowhere left to run. Now, he can watch as I tear your soul into little pieces and scatter it to the winds.”

I felt Tatsumi shudder as we pulled apart, his hands curling into fists. My insides twisted with fear, but I rose with the demonslayer and glared into the void, feeling the oni’s presence all around us.

A soul cannot be killed, the white fox had said. A soul cannot be permanently destroyed, but it can be weakened, sickened, injured. And, sometimes, it can be broken. If you want to drive Hakaimono back into the sword, you must weaken the First Oni enough for Kage Tatsumi to force him out by strength of will. But beware; souls are fragile things. If Hakaimono is too strong, if he breaks your spirit, it will flee back into its body, and from then on, you will not be the same.

“I’m not running anymore,” I called, my voice echoing through the emptiness. “On my life, I’m not leaving this place until Tatsumi is truly free and you are sealed back into the sword for good!”

Tatsumi moved beside me. He was glowing brightly now, the halo around him throwing back the darkness, though the look in his eyes made my skin prickle. “Come then, Hakaimono,” he said, his voice hard with determination. “There isn’t room in here for the both of us, and you’ve been using my body for far too long.” He raised a hand, and light swelled between his fingers, extending into a beam of luminance, before it flared into a sword. “I will not allow you to commit any more atrocities in my name. Show yourself, unless you’re afraid to face the true owner of what you’ve stolen.”

Hakaimono chuckled again, and it turned into a deep, terrible laugh that boomed through the void and caused the ice at our feet to crack and shake apart. “Very well, Tatsumi,” he rumbled, as I pressed close to the demonslayer, staring into the darkness to discern our enemy. “If you’re so eager to watch me shred your fox girl and beat you back into submission, I’ll be happy to comply. This time, your spirit will be so broken, you won’t even know who you are when I’m done with you. Are you ready for me, little mortals? Here I come.”

I felt his approach before I saw it; from the void above, something dropped toward us like a boulder, huge and dark, with eyes like glowing embers in the night. It hit the ground like the tetsubo of a god striking the earth, and the shock wave radiating out from the crater shattered the ice into millions of shards that swirled around us like a crystal blizzard. As the tremors faded and the earth stilled, I lowered my arm and stared up…and up…into the face of a demon.

The First Oni, the great demon general of Jigoku, towered over us, his mouth split into a shining grin that chilled the blood in my veins. He was huge, far bigger than Yaburama, the oni that had destroyed the Silent Winds temple and killed everyone there. His skin was as black as ink, with glowing red runes crawling up his arms, words and symbols I didn’t recognize. When I tried to read them, they burned my eyes, making me flinch and turn my gaze away. Ember horns, flickering and pulsing like they were on fire, sprouted from