The Way of the Fox (19 page)

Patrols returned – the foot soldiers came back from day of field drills. Horses were led back to their stables, soothed by the quiet sound of the distant monk’s bell. Still Sura inspected the pile of items taken from the room. Kuno fidgeted, growing ever conscious of the time. He cleared his throat, hoping that the fox might speed up her investigations.

“What exactly is this supposed to achieve?”

The fox shot a brief glower in the man’s direction. “Back off, man! I’m an exorcist!”

Two castle guardsmen arrived
on the porch – the tall man and thin man yet again. They carried buckets and an old grimy wash cloth for Sura to inspect. She eagerly took hold of the items, and gestured for the men to sit their armoured hides down beside her.

“Guys! Guys – sit!” She shuffled aside to make space. “So you guys
. You said you were the last to see Hamada Bunji alive?”

“Yes, Spirit Hunter!” The more portly of the two guards then corrected himself. “As we said
. We did not see him – we spoke to him through the door.”

“And was it definitely
him
that answered back?” Sura tilted forward, looking carefully from man to man. “Did you recognise the voice?”

The taller man seemed thoughtful.

“No, Spirit Hunter. There was a grunt in reply.”

“So he never answered in words?”

“No, Spirit Hunter.”

The fox looked from man to man. “And before then – everything was quiet. That monk guy was in his place. You saw Yoshikiyo in his room. Maids moving about… you
definitely
recognised the maids?”

“Yes, Spirit Hunter!”

Tonbo stood leaning upon his tetsubo. “We questioned the senior maids. They claim two of their number were on duty. The rest were all asleep.”

The two guards looked about themselves. They clearly had no
thing more to add.
Taking their leave, they bowed to the investigators, then walked off into the gardens.

Kuno, Chiri, Tonbo and Sura – joined by the two elementals – sat down together in conference. Sura was feeling decidedly at a dead end.
She leaned back against the wall, fidgeting with the old wash bucket.

“He didn’t speak. And his robes hadn’t
been changed since the rainstorm. I think he was dead before those guards arrived.” She scratched at her neck. “That means the killer was inside the room as the guards went past.”

Kuno agreed.
“Which means the killer cannot have been the duty maids, Yoshikiyo, nor the monk. They were all present at the time.” He folded his arms and scowled. “So who else was at large?”

“Well –
you
, me, Chiri, Tonbo… And the head of the sword school. Then there’s Sano Moko…”

Tonbo gave a scowl. “Sano Moko…
Angry and impulsive.”

Chiri seemed pained. “But such an action does not match her character, Tonbo san. Had she wanted Hamada san slain, she would have challenged
him to an honourable duel.”

Tonbo scratched at his stubble. “Then who does that leave?

The rat paced the porch, deep in thought.

“The deaths range about this area – and there may have been other murders in previous years. So we are seeking someone who travels…”

Sura ignored the entire discussion, choosing instead to poke her head right into the old wash bucket. Suddenly she made a noise of triumph. She held aloft the filthy floor cloth, catching a glint in the light.

There was a smear in the cloth – a sticky, silvery substance –
transparent, and reeking horribly. Sura swiftly showed the cloth to Tonbo. “This is like the slime we found on the sword of the dead man up in that watchtower. That wasn’t rain we saw on the floor beside the corpse. It was slime!”

She held the slim
e into the slanting daylight so that the others might see. But the instant sunlight fell upon the slime, the substance suddenly boiled and seared away into a wisp of smoke. It left nothing but a fine grey dust behind.

Everyone looked to the windowsill. The ash from the dishcloth was an exact match for the substance all over the sill.

Sura blinked.

“In through the window! It doesn’t have to be human!”

She arched backward, one hand over her eyes. “Blood! It was hungry!”

Kuno stared, feeling quite confused.

“What was hungry?”

“Someone at both scenes! Someone who keeps away from direct sunlight.”

Asodo Kuno felt enlightenment hit him hard.

“The monk! The basket-headed monk!” He leapt to his feet. “Where is he?”

Tonbo hefted his club. “He was walking to the pagoda.”

The narrow pagoda soared almost as high as the keep – roof after roof, rising far above the valley floor. Already
it had become a dark silhouette, casting a long shadow across the castle lawns.

Sunset was spreading across
the sky. Sura seized her spear.

“We have to find
him before it gets too dark!” The fox bounded away. “Quickly!”

Chiri
raced after her.

“How did a monk get through a window?”

“It’s him!”
Sura threw aside the sheath to her spear point as she ran.
“Trust me – I’m a fox!”

They rampaged through the gardens, racing for the pagoda. On a
mound beside the castle pond, Lord Ishigi, Lord Masura, upper ranking samurai and retainers were preparing to enjoy a banquet while watching the magnificent spring sunset. The Spirit Hunters raced past them, causing Magistrate Masura to rise from his place in concern.

The monk’s bell could be
heard ringing deep inside the great, tall pagoda. Spear in hand, Sura led the charge past the rock garden and into the dark space within.

A single grey rectangle of light stretched in through the door. Grim
wooden statues of gods loomed in the gloom.

The monk sat serenely before the
menacing statues – his basket hat shrouding him down to his shoulders. He told his rosary beads in one hand, while with the other, he solemnly rang his old bronze bell.

Sura raced up behind him and levelled her spear.

“Hey! You there!”

Chiri’s whiskers twitched in alarm.

“That smell!”

“Stinks like slime.”

Tonbo felt a cold shiver down his spine. He turned his head, flicking a glance at the shadows above.

“Get him outside.”

Sura gestured at the monk with her spear.

“You heard the man. Up!” She prodded the
man’s hat with her spear. “Come on – show your face!”

Sura prodded the monk’s great cylindrical straw hat – and the hat toppled clean away.

The monk had no head.

The body stayed erect, still calmly ringing its bell. There was only a hole where his neck should have been – a gaping wet, red hole that led into a huge hollow cavity. Sura
blinked in bemusement.

“
Ooh crap…!”

With a deafening scream, a black shape plummeted down from above.
Reeking tentacles whipped through the air. Sura ducked, and the others flung themselves flat as something came howling at them through the shadows.

“Look out! Penaggolan!”

Sura pulled Kuno into cover as tentacles lashed out and tried to tear his head clean from his neck.

Kuno looked wildly about the shrine.
“What’s a Penaggolan?”

“That!”

The monk’s head flew through the air. Beneath the neck there hung a gruesome set of organs – flaccid bags half filled with the blood of dead, drained men. More organs and great loops of reeking entrails whipped about the monster like hellish tentacles.

The monster came straight for
them, screaming out for blood.

Chapter 9

The
penaggolan plunged down, tentacles exploding out to engulf Kuno in a mass of dripping strands. His sword whipped at the limbs – and rebounded from the rubbery flesh. Tentacles entangled Kuno, wrapping hard about his throat and pinning his arms. With immense strength, the monster lifted Kuno clear off his feet.

The
monk’s head opened its mouth, and a vicious tongue speared forth – a tongue with a long, narrow bladed tip, like a kodzuka. Kuno twisted aside, and the tongue missed his neck by a fly’s width, slicing hairs from his head. Kuno tried to saw his sword across the tentacles that trapped him – but like the creature’s other victims, his blade failed to cut the monster’s flesh.

The stinking coils wrenched tight about his throat. Kuno choked – utterly unable to breathe. He felt his neck being crushed as the whole world
suddenly turned red.

Suddenly tentacles were sliced in two. Sura’s spear blade hacked through the
intestines that bound Kuno’s throat, then whipped back to sever the powerful coils that held him dangling in mid air. The penaggolan screamed and lashed out, a tentacle whip-cracking into Sura and sending her flying. Kuno dropped to the floor, and Chiri raced in to tear the tentacles away from his throat. Kuno sucked in breath in great ragged rasps, staggering back onto his feet.

The penaggolan made a snarling rush towards Sura, tentacles reaching all around. She hurtled an egg at the creature’s face, pepper bursting out in a choking cloud.
The monster flew aside in a great tumble of entrails – and blundered blindly into the sunlight streaming in low through the door. The flesh on the monster’s face and organs burned. Tonbo raged forward, tetsubo a blur as he struck for the monster’s head, but already the creature had jerked up into the air. With a screech of pain, it launched itself up, high into the black shadows of the ceiling above.

The creature thumped and flickered about in the jet black rafters.
Outside the pagoda, the sun sank ever lower. The outer walls of the castle were bathed in brilliant light, but long shadows stretched across the gardens. Shadows moved slowly across the pagoda doorway.

Eyes searching the spaces above, Sura moved back to back with her friends.
The group bristled with weapons as they tried to search the dark. Sura moved to block the door, her hook-bladed spear hunting at the air.

“Try and drag it into the light!”

Something flashed and clattered up above. The monster was leaping – racing around and around the rafters. Suddenly there was a wrenching
crack
, and one of the wooden god statues was torn free. The monster heaved the statue up into the air, and then hammered it down straight towards Sura.

The fox dove
and rolled aside, crashing into splintered railings by the altar. The penaggolan hoisted up the statue, whirled it in a massive arc, and flailed it down towards Sura’s head.

Tonbo lunged in, his tetsubo swirling. He met the statue with a crash of force, deflecting it away. He intercepted a second massive blow, and then a third: a back blow with his weapon hammered straight into the monster’s teeth, sending it reeling back
in pain. Sura scrabbled to her feet, reaching for the paper seals inside her robe.

“Keep it there! Keep it down low!”

Sunset stretched shadows through the door. Sura raced to plant a square of seals upon the chamber floor. She had almost placed the final seal, when suddenly tentacles seized hold of her from above. The fox was whipped up into the air, hanging by one foot. She swiped with her spear, but the weapon was struck out of her hands. The penaggolan dragged her higher and higher up into the air. She threw a knife hidden up one sleeve straight at the monster’s face, but the blade ricocheted clean away.

Chiri
dashed to the centre of the shrine, looking about herself in panic. She looked up at the tile rooves high above- at the rock garden outside the doors, and freed her hair.

The elegant little rat bowed her head, reached hands down towards the soil, and sw
irled slowly around. The entire floor bucked and shuddered underneath them all.

“Little brothers of the soil,

Earth below, great mountain’s seed!

I beg you, heed your playmate’s call!

Come now in my time of need!”

Earth
elementals burst up through the floorboards – fist sized rocks, trailing a haze of dirt. Other stones flew in from the gardens. With twenty flying rocks at her command, Chiri flung one hand upwards, and the elementals obeyed her, hurtling themselves straight up into the dark.

Led by
Daitanishi, the rocks flew up and burst straight through the pagoda roof, shattering the tiles. Light streamed in, slanting straight across the rafters. More and more tiles were smashed, with the rocks pounding and crashing through one level of the roof after another. Caught in the light, the penaggolan flailed in pain. Smoke burst from its blistering skin. The creature released its hold on Sura, and she fell plunging thirty feet towards the floor.

She changed into fox form as she fell, robes billowing around her. Tonbo r
aced and caught her in his arms before she could hit the ground. Her clothing and equipment cascaded down all around them – short sword, robes, knives and stolen peaches.

The rampaging earth elementals had spent themselves. They swirled past Chiri and plunged back into the ground. Somewhere in the stream of rocks, the penaggolan came racing down from above.

The evening shadows fully covered the pagoda’s door. The penaggolan lunged past Kuno and Chiri, almost bowling them over as it whipped out through the door and into the open air. Still in fox form, Sura struggled out of Tonbo’s arms and down to the floor. The lithe red fox snatched up paper seals in her fangs. Chiri raced forwards, changing into rat form and leaping up out of her clothes. As the fox ran past, the white rat leapt aboard and swung onto her back, riding her like a horse. Bifuuko and Daitanishi raced along on either side as they speared out into the sunset.

Seizing
Sura’s spear, Kuno raced off in pursuit. Tonbo thundered behind him, armour clanking. The rampaged out into the gardens, caught sight of the penaggolan, and charged hot on its tail.

Outside in the gardens, the castle walls were bloc
king the setting sunlight. Gold-red light bathed the outer battlements, casting long shadows all across the grounds. The penaggolan could not yet fly higher than a dozen feet into the air, but twilight was only minutes away. The monster flailed wildly through the gardens, with maids and servants fleeing screaming from its path. Close behind it raced the fox, with Chiri in rat form still tight upon her back. The little elementals swerved and zoomed beside them, dodging wildly through the flowers.

Two castle guards raced into the monster’s path with drawn swords. Tonbo thundered in chase behind the monster. He roared out to the guards as he ran
, trying to make them dive aside.

“Move! You don’t have the tools! Move!”

The guards struck at the penaggolan with swords. The weapons bounced uselessly aside from the creature’s flesh. The monster seized one man and flung him straight into the other, smashing both out of its way.

Another guard raced onto the pond’s bridge and drew his
long bow. He fired an arrow, and the shaft flew true. The penaggolan caught the arrow in mid flight, then whipped out a tentacle and flung it straight back the way that it had come. The guard spun, the arrow piercing his shoulder armour and lancing deep into his arm.

Sura raced past the battle on one flank. She sped ahead of the monster, leaping high over the bushes in her path. Chiri held on for dear life, her two little elementals
whirring at her side. They burst out through the iris flowers, and saw Lord Masura’s sunset banquet spread out across the grass.

Lord Ishigi, Lord Masura, high ranking ladies and senior retainers sat upon tatami mats, being served refreshments. Commander Hijiya and several armoured guards were all stationed at hand.

Beyond them, the castle gates were finally in shadow.

The penaggolan burst out through the iris flowers. The banquet lay between the monster and the open
castle gates. It barrelled through the air, keeping low to the grass, rampaging straight towards Lord Masura.

Lord Ishigi and Lord Masura leapt to their feet, hands on their swords. Commander
Hijiya and the guards made a wall of steel between the monster and the lords. The penaggolan crashed straight into Hijiya Hoichi and wrapped its tentacles about his neck in rage.

Daitanishi
the rock elemental whipped through the air and crashed into the penaggolan’s skull. The rock attacked like an enraged wasp, smacking again and again into the monster’s eyes. Swatting at it in futile anger, the monster dropped Hijiya, who fell gasping to the ground.

A g
uard fired an arrow at the penaggolan. Once again, it caught the shaft – this time flinging the missile at Lord Ishigi. Chiri’s air elemental blurred out of the gloom and struck the arrow aside, sending it flickering past mere inches away from Lord Ishigi’s throat.

Suddenly Sura burst through the banquet. Chiri leapt from her
back, and the two animals planted four paper seals around the two lords and their ladies. Sura backed away.

“Shields!”

Weird walls of light sprang up between the paper seals, sealing off the lords. Sura snatched up the remaining papers. The penaggolan came screaming in blood lust and flung itself at Lord Masura. It struck the shields and rebounded away, stunned by the force of the ward. The creature flailed helplessly, while Sura and Chiri raced on ahead towards the castle gates.

Tonbo and Kuno sprinted through the banquet
, leaping high over the dishes. The penaggolan shook itself, saw the darkly shadowed castle gate, and swirled swiftly off, seeking escape. Once out the gate, it could plunge low into the castle ditch, streak through the shadows, break out into the forests and be gone.

The monster flowed over the grass,
almost at the gates. But once again a shield spell sprung up into brilliant life. Sura and Chiri had blocked the way, using the last of the paper seals

The monster gained height, swarming up to the crown of the walls,
wrenching guards aside. But the light outside was coming almost flat down the valley. Burned and blinded, the monster dropped back down. But minute by minute the light diminished. The monster spied a dense garden grove a few dozen yards away. It plunged off and down into the trees, while all around night came ever closer.

The two l
ords had come running towards the gates. As Kuno and Tonbo came racing to join them, Sura and Chiri gathered up the last few paper seals. The four Spirit Hunters plunged into the thicket, with Sura calling sternly to Magistrate Masura.

“My
lord! Stay here!”

The four S
pirit Hunters crashed through the iris flowers at the edge of the thicket, and found themselves in a place of jagged shadows. The penaggolan hid deep in the trees, but Kuno spied it out. A tentacle lashed at him, and he cut at it, his sword inevitably bouncing clear.

“Swords are useless! We need more magic weapons!”

Daitanishi and Bifuuko immediately swirled up. They plunged down, one merging with Kuno’s sword, and the other with Tonbo’s tetsubo. The weapons immediately shone and shimmered into life.

Kuno felt his sword vibrate with power. He turned to face the monster as it came lunging down
from the canopy. Tentacles speared towards Chiri just behind him. Kuno’s sword flashed as he spun through the blows. Tentacles flailed, severed clean through, and the penaggolan gave a scream of rage. Tonbo pounded at the monster’s skull, shattering a tree branch and crashing the monk’s head aside. The creature flipped and swirled back through the trees, hurtling broken branches as it blundered away.

Tonbo and Kuno surged forward together
, side by side, working as a perfect team. They ploughed ahead, cutting and parrying at the monster’s coils. The penaggolan lurched aside, unable to escape up through the densely woven branches overhead.