Soul of the Sword (Shadow of the Fox #2) - Julie Kagawa Page 0,53

were demons themselves and fairly powerful, even appearing in a few legends throughout the mortal world. But within the Forest of a Thousand Eyes were things even demons were afraid of. Old, angry things, driven mad with corruption, who cared nothing for legends and who would challenge even an oni. A thousand years ago I was the strongest demon general of Jigoku, and nothing dared to stand against me, but right now I was the size of a mortal and very edible-looking.

We continued deeper into the forest, which grew even darker and more tangled the farther we went. The leaves themselves began to drip with malevolence, mist coiled around our legs, and the ground turned spongy and disturbingly warm, as if the blood of thousands was still steeped into the very earth. I curled my claws around Kamigoroshi, aware that something was about to happen.

There was a flash of movement in the branches, as something large and bulbous flew at the back of the blue ogress. A human head, pale, disembodied and glowing with sickly red light, swooped through the trees, its gaping mouth showing serrated, sharklike teeth. It shrieked as it came in, and the hag whirled, throwing up her arm to slash it out of the air. But the head clamped its jaws around her forearm, and a second later there was a wet, tearing sound, the smell of blood, and the hag screamed. Fascinated, I watched the head rise into the air, the hag’s spindly arm clutched between fang-filled jaws, streaming blood behind it. Its jaws worked, smacking greedily, and the ogress’s limb vanished down its gullet in a crunching of bones and flesh. Gazing down at its victim, the head’s colorless lips curved in a wide, bloody grin as it licked its teeth and the hag shrieked in rage.

There were more flashes in the trees, and nearly a dozen heads came swarming from the branches. Jaws gaping, they descended on us, teeth like broken bits of steel aiming for whatever flesh they could reach. A woman’s head, trailing a ragged curtain of hair, swooped at me with a howl, and I split the skull down the middle. The head erupted into reddish-black mist and disappeared.

At the first apparition’s death, the rest of the swarm paused and gazed at me in what looked like stunned surprise, then baleful fury. I raised Kamigoroshi and stepped forward.

“What’s the matter?” I taunted, flourishing the bloody sword. “Bit off more than you could chew?” The heads didn’t answer, but the way their lips pulled back to show jagged fangs indicated they understood every word I said.

With earsplitting screeches, the swarm rushed me, sending a jolt of adrenaline through my veins. I snarled a battle cry of my own and leaped forward to meet them. The first monster lunged at my face, jaws unhinged like a serpent, gaping wide to bite off my head. I swept Kamigoroshi between its teeth, splitting the head in two, and immediately turned to slash another darting in from the left. The blade sliced a bloody ribbon down its forehead to its chin, and the apparition reeled away with a scream. Turning, I flung out my empty claw as another head lunged, slamming my palm into the pale forehead and curling my talons into soft, rotting flesh. Dragging it from the air as it growled and shrieked and snapped at my arm, I raised the sword and plunged the blade between the eyes, pinning it to the earth.

As the head wailed and disappeared, the rest of the swarm hesitated again and floated back to glare at me. From the corner of my eye, I could see the hag trio, the red and the green standing protectively over the body of their moaning sister. Their claws were raised, and they appeared to be chanting something.

I glanced at the swarm, which had drawn into a cluster of hovering faces, still glaring at me with sullen hunger and rage. They seemed reluctant to approach Kamigoroshi now, and for a moment, I thought they would turn and flee.

With frenzied hisses and snarls, the swarm rose higher and began to congeal. One head turned and latched on to the side of another’s skull, clinging like a leech, as its victim did the same to a third. As I stared in bemused fascination, the roiling cluster of faces each turned and clamped down on their neighbor, and as they did, their features began to blur and melt together. Eyes shifted and ran into