BOOK VI, CHAPTER 6 (Part 2)
19 Feb 2012 1 Comment
in 2nd Volume: Night and Day, Book VI: The Voice of the Dawn Tags: adventure, animal, anthro, drama, exile, fantasy, fiction, forest, furry, hanami, japanese culture, kemono, mammals, outcast, samurai, squirrel, Tasakeru, the voice of the dawn, web fiction, web serial novel, zero
CHAPTER 6, Part 2
Cold, wet, and disoriented… hardly a state in which to be facing arrest. Hanami huddled closer to Zero for warmth and whispered, “What should we do?”
The buck felt a pang of nostalgia as he helped her to her feet. Wasn’t this just like one of the hundreds of samurai stories he had read long ago? Cornered, hopelessly outnumbered, with a frightened damsel on the hero’s arm, looking to him for guidance. He even knew what someone like Hayao would do: he would flash the girl a confident smile and say, “We fight!” and then charge off into battle, managing to win against impossible odds.
Zero knew in his heart, though, that he was no Hayao, and this was no story. “I don’t know,” he admitted.
The doe swallowed audibly. That was not the answer she wanted to hear…
“There is no need for violence,” said Pearl. “You are outnumbered five to one, resisting us would be foolish…”
“All right, I think I have an idea,” whispered Hanami, clutching her Mage Flower and shifting position so that she faced the ferret.
“Put down your weapons…”
Zero leaned toward her. “Hanami, what are you up to?”
“Trust me!” she said, taking a deep breath.
“… and come with us. You will not be-”
Hanami shouted a battle cry and charged. Zero and the Knights watched in dumbfounded silence as she thundered across the rock, a large wooden shield springing into life on her arm. Pearl raised her hand in a casting gesture just a second too late; the doe put all her weight behind the shield and slammed into her. The wind was knocked out of the elderly ferret instantly. Gasping for breath, she stumbled backward, lost her footing, and fell over the edge of Campfire Rock… a second later they heard a muffled thud as she hit the frozen ground, the impact barely cushioned by the snow.
That sound broke the spell, and ten lanterns dropped to the surface of the rock as at once the Knights regained their senses and began the attack, splitting into two groups of five to battle Zero and Hanami separately. Blade clashed against blade, and hollow sounds echoed across the rock as wood met steel…
Zero slipped into the warrior mindset, obtaining the Centerpoint with an ease that would surprise him normally. At times like these there was no room to doubt or hesitate; his body moved on its own, disconnected from his mind. His sword lashed out like a living thing, finding gaps in armor plating, striking at vulnerable muscles and tendons, drawing blood. Instinct told him that despite their superior numbers, the Knights could still be beaten: their armor and broadswords rendered them slow and encumbered their movements; it was only a matter of dodging their blades and attacking whenever an opportunity presented itself.
Dimly, as if from far away, he heard cries of surprise from the second group of Knights. Vibrations shook the rock as a heavy body fell over, entangled in strong roots. The cold air whistled around vines that coiled and danced madly, seizing whatever they touched and throwing it with mighty force.
Zero smiled despite himself. Hanami was doing her best; he would have to do so as well. The Centerpoint guided him, bending and flexing his body out of the way of the broadswords, moving him faster than he thought possible. Two more Knights, one in front and one behind. They were angry now, forgetting strategy and teamwork in their rage at being beaten by one young buck. The first Knight brought his sword down for an overhead slice, it clanged against granite as Zero leapt straight up, his tail streaming behind him. One of the squirrel’s boots came down on the flat of the blade, the other slammed into the visor of the Knight’s helmet, knocking him senseless.
The Knight behind him roared and swung his broadsword in a half circle, a decapitating blow… Zero ducked, felt the blade’s edge slice through a few stray hairs and nick his ear, reversed his grip, and thrust the sword backwards underneath his right shoulder. A wet, slick sound told him that his sword had found its mark. The broadsword fell with a clatter to the stone as the Knight’s hands spasmed reflexively. Slowly Zero let out a breath he didn’t realize he had been holding, and withdrew his blade, hearing the Knight slump to the ground behind him.
“Zero…?” Hanami’s voice shook. Her group of Knights lay at her feet, still in the light of the broken lanterns, all either unconscious or hopelessly bound in vines. She had taken them all on, and won… somehow.
“I’m here,” he said, pushing back his own shudder as he cleaned his blade. There would be time for a post-battle crash later… at the moment there were far more pressing matters. He turned around and crouched down to face the Knight he had just struck through the middle. “You were trying to kill us, not just bring us in,” he said, his tone hard as iron. “Consider yourselves lucky that we only fought to disable you. Now tell me what the hell is going on! Why is Lily doing this?”
The Knight coughed, and a few red flecks fell to the stone beneath her. She was a floris, dark-eyed, with a line of bare fur on one cheek… evidence of an old scar. “Won’t tell you… anything…” she hissed.
“Zero, we should go,” said Hanami, gingerly stepping over to them. “Nothing I can grow will last long in this cold…”
“I understand,” said the buck, not taking his eyes off the injured Knight. “Look, we’re leaving you alive, we’ll even let you call for Healers. We’re not the monsters you think we are. All I want to know is what you’re after us for.”
She groaned and clutched her bleeding stomach with one hand. With the other she dug into a pouch on her belt, withdrawing a small round object. Zero recognized it as a medicine ball, made of bitter, strong-smelling herbal paste and coated with dried leaves. The Knight grimaced, popped it into her mouth, and bit down. She chewed for a moment, then swallowed. “You’re murderers,” she said, the edges of her lips curling into a smug smile. “We’ve been sent to bring you to justice.”
Zero stared at her. “What? No, you’re making a mistake. We haven’t killed anyone…”
Hanami brought her hands to her mouth in horror. “Why on earth would Lady Lily even think that?!”
The Knight laughed. She reached up and seized Zero’s jacket, and pulled him down to her eye level. Lights danced in her eyes, the reflections of the still-glowing spellstones that had fallen from the broken lanterns. The light also glinted off something on her wrist, a silver bracelet… “There’s no escape,” she said. “She’ll hunt you down. She’ll find you. And she’ll make you pay.”
Grimacing, Zero tried to pry her hand away, but her grip was too strong. “You’re not right… lie still and don’t talk.”
Suddenly, a change came over the Knight, as if someone had flipped a switch. The smugness vanished from her face, and she clutched at Zero’s jacket harder. She was terrified… a small, frightened whisper escaped her: “Help me.”
Zero stared at her, not sure he had heard correctly. Then he cried out in horror as froth built up at her lips, and her dark eyes dulled. The floris’s body trembled, her grip loosened, and her hand slipped away… she was dead in seconds.
“Oh Gods,” moaned Hanami, trembling where she stood and fighting the urge to be sick. “That medicine ball…!”
The buck tore himself away from the skunk’s sightless eyes, realization dawning. “Hanami, the others…!”
It was already too late. The Knights who hadn’t been knocked unconscious were already slumping over in their death throes, their mouths frothing…
Hanami fell to her knees in shock. “They k… they killed themselves,” she said, too stunned to cry. “Why…? Why did they do it, Zero?”
“It doesn’t make any sense.” Zero shook his head, unable to look away. “It doesn’t make any sense at all. They’re Silver Order, they would never just throw their lives away like that…” He swallowed the bile building up in his throat and tugged at Hanami’s limp arm. “Come on, Hanami. There’s… there’s nothing we can do for them now. We have to keep going… whatever’s going on, we have to find it and stop it, before… before something like this happens again.”
A light dusting of snow began to cover the bodies of the fallen Knights as Zero gently helped Hanami climb down the side of Campfire Rock… she was still trembling, but her grip was steady. Above them, the forest was cast into darkness once more as the spellstones from the broken lanterns dimmed and went out, one by one.
At the foot of the rock, they found the unmoving body of Pearl, still lying in the shallow crater her body had made in the snow. For a terrifying moment they thought she was dead as well… but a slow, steady pulse throbbed under Zero’s thumb when he pressed it against her neck. Hanami searched her belt until she found a pouch bearing another medicine ball. She clutched it in her fist for a moment, as if she intended to crush it with her bare hand… then without a word, she turned and hurled it into the depths of the woods.
“Hanami, look…”
Less than a foot from Pearl’s resting place, an old tree stump jutted out defiantly from the snow bank. The ferret’s fall had jostled it, and the two Outcasts could just make out something irregular about its edge. It was a crack in the wood, as if its bark and center didn’t fit together as they should. Fascinated, Zero wedged a kunai into the crack and pressed down on its handle… and the top of the stump flipped upward on a hinge, revealing a crude handle nailed to its underside. The inside of the stump was hollow, with a ladder leading down into the darkness.
“What is it?” said Hanami in awe, leaning down into the hole.
“I don’t know, I’ve never seen it before. It looks like a passageway,” said Zero. “We might as well follow it, we may be able to give the Knights the slip.”
Squeezing down into the stump was a tight fight, but somehow the both of them managed it. Hanami descended first, with Zero following after her. Once his head was safely inside, he reached upward, grasped the handle, and closed the lid behind them. To an outside observer, there was no indication that it was anything other than an old stump.
Light flared in the darkness, as one of Hanami’s glow vines extended from the Mage Flower and coiled around her wrist. At the foot of the ladder, the passageway opened into a long, dark tunnel, its walls lined with ancient roots from the trees above. Strong wooden support beams formed an arch at its mouth.
Hanami made it three steps past the arch before her knees gave out, and she sank down the wall, trembling uncontrollably.
“Hanami! Are you all right, what’s the matter?” Zero was at her side in an instant.
“I…” Taking a deep breath, she curled her tail around herself and hugged it tight. “Oh, Zero… I don’t think I’m cut out for this warrior stuff,” she said with a shaking smile. “I’m sorry, I tried my best…”
Zero blinked. “I don’t understand.”
“I’ve been trying to learn how to fight and defend myself. I want to fight by your side, I’m tired of being weak… being helpless.”
“So that’s why you wanted to make the first move back at Woodhaven, and why you attacked the mage…”
She nodded miserably.
A smile played at the edge of Zero’s lip. “For what it’s worth, I hardly think you’re weak or helpless… just the opposite, in fact. Why on earth would you think you don’t know how to fight? You took out more of that squad than I did, and you saved us all back in N’Ktane’s lair, and in the forest when the Shroud attacked, remember?”
“But all of those times…” She sniffed, and forced herself not to wipe her eyes. “All those times… Everything I did was because I was afraid. How can I fight if I’m always scared that I’m going to die?” Hanami pierced him with her pale blue eyes. “Why can’t I be as brave as you are?”
“Hanami,” he whispered, laying his arm over her shoulders. For once, her beautiful eyes weren’t striking him dumb. “I’ll let you in on a secret, something from the samurai code. Bravery isn’t an absence of fear… anyone who says they aren’t afraid of anything is either lying or crazy. Bravery comes from managing your fear, not letting it overwhelm you. It’s not easy to learn, but you can… sort of push it away into the back of your mind, or ignore it until later.”
“Really?”
“Really. If you use it the right way, fear can even help you out if you’re in trouble. Being afraid can sharpen your senses and put you on edge, keep you from making stupid mistakes.”
She smiled at him, and his heart beat faster. “So will you teach me how to do it? How to manage fear?”
“Hanami, I don’t think there’s anything I can teach you. I’ve seen you ram someone through a wall when you were scared… if being afraid were really a problem for you, you never could have done that. You’re much, much braver than you think,” he said, returning her smile.
“You really think so?”
Zero leaned close, and touched his forehead to hers. “You’re the bravest sentient I know,” he said softly. “Just the fact that you’re still here and still fighting, after everything you’ve been through proves it.”
Her face grew very warm, and her ears turned flat in embarrassment. “Th-thank you…”
“Anytime. C’mon, let’s go.”
They rose to their feet and continued into the dark.
TO BE CONTINUED…
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