Soul of the Sword (Shadow of the Fox #2) - Julie Kagawa Page 0,3
it will not only be discovered, but to a person who will unfailingly summon the Dragon and make a wish.” The miko’s eyes narrowed. “The scroll wants to be found, Okame-san. That’s why it’s so dangerous. If we destroy it now, it could reappear in the hands of the very people we are trying to keep it away from.”
Okame grunted. “This is why I don’t trust magic,” he muttered, leaning back against the tree. “Inanimate objects like swords and scrolls should not want to be found. They should not want anything. How annoying would it be if my sandals decided they didn’t want to carry me anymore and wandered off into the woods?” His sharp black eyes flicked to me. “Don’t get any ideas, Yumeko-chan.”
I giggled at the image, but sobered quickly. “What happened to Hirotaka?” I wondered, looking at Master Jiro. “Did he ever regain control of Hakaimono?”
The priest shook his head. “Kage Hirotaka was captured and executed by his clan, long before the end of the war,” he replied. “By then, he was far too gone, and his crimes too great, to have any hope of redemption. Kamigoroshi, or the Cursed Blade of the Kage, as it would come to be known, was sealed away and vanished from history for six centuries. But such artifacts of evil cannot stay hidden forever. Four hundred years ago, it reemerged alongside the coming of Genno, the Master of Demons, when Hakaimono escaped the sword to possess its bearer. It is unclear whether Genno orchestrated the demon’s release, or if Hakaimono simply took advantage of the chaos that came with the uprising, but Kamigoroshi once again carved a bloody path through history until the blood mage and his rebellion were put down.
“After Genno’s death,” Master Jiro continued, “his army of demons and yokai scattered to the wind, and the land was left in chaos. Kamigoroshi disappeared again for a time, but then, the first Kage demonslayer emerged, able to wield the Cursed Blade without immediately falling victim to Hakaimono.” He shook his head, puffing out a cloud of white smoke. “How the Shadow Clan trained their demonslayers to guard their souls against the demon’s influence is unknown, but the Kage have always walked the very edge of darkness, knowing they flirt with disaster. And now they have fallen to it once more. Hakaimono has been released, and the land will not be safe until Kage Tatsumi is killed and the demon returned to the sword.”
I straightened, my stomach twisting as I stared at him over the fire. “Killed?” I repeated, as the priest’s sad gaze met mine. “But…what about Tatsumi-san? I know he must be fighting this. Is there no way to save him, to bring him back?”
I felt sick, like a millstone was pressing down on my insides. I’d met the cold, emotionless demonslayer when a horde of demons led by the terrible oni Yaburama had attacked my home, the Silent Winds temple, and I was forced to flee while they massacred everyone there. I’d convinced Tatsumi to accompany me to the capital to find Master Jiro, the only person who knew the location of the hidden Steel Feather temple, because the temple held one piece of the object everyone was looking for.
The Dragon scroll. The thing that could summon the Great Kami into the world to grant the bearer’s heart’s desire. The item everyone was desperately searching for, was willing to kill for. Including Tatsumi. His clan leader had sent him to retrieve the scroll, and he would have stopped at nothing to acquire it.
When we’d met, I’d told the demonslayer a tiny white lie: I said I didn’t have the scroll, but I could take him to where one piece of it had been sent—the Steel Feather temple. What Tatsumi didn’t know was that I had that piece of the scroll hidden in the furoshiki cloth tied around my shoulders. And maybe that had been terribly deceitful, but if Tatsumi had known I possessed a fragment of the scroll back then, he would have killed me and taken it to his daimyo. And I’d promised Master Isao I would protect that piece of the prayer at all costs. It was my greatest secret, well…aside from being half-kitsune.
But, Kage Tatsumi had his secrets, too. The greatest one being Hakaimono, the oni spirit that lived in his sword and was constantly fighting him for control. During the final battle with Yaburama, the demon in the sword had finally overwhelmed the demonslayer,