Then Toshi saw Sosuke halfway up the trunk of a massive cedar tree. The war-chief was accompanied by a smaller female orochi who had the similar features and coloring. Was this the sister he’d mentioned?

  The female orochi folded two of her arms in meditative prayer, clinging to the tree with the rest of her limbs. Other snakes perched in the trees echoed her rasping hiss, and a swirling tendril of green fog formed between them, linking the trees fifty feet up.

  The bark on the tree occupied by Sosuke and his sister shifted and rolled, reforming into a smooth brown mask of a human face. Toshi recognized the Myojin of Life’s Web before the powerful spirit completely manifested, and he faded away before she could in turn spot him. The last time he’d seen that wooden mask he had laughed merrily as he drove the myojin back to the spirit world. She was sure to remember something like that and still probably held a grudge.

  The orochi guards hissed angrily as their charge slipped through their grasp. They shouted at each other, each demanding to know what the others had seen. Still standing in the same spot, Toshi watched unnoticed as they spread out and began searching the surrounding woods with their heads stretched low and their tongues flicking the ground.

  There were plenty of shadows for Toshi to use on the ridge, but he stayed just to see the orochi’s gambit play out. He expected a wall of brambles or poisonous thorns to erupt beneath the soratami’s feet, or for Sosuke and other key warriors to acquire the strength of giants.

  Instead, the line of green fog thickened and became solid. It glowed faintly as it twisted itself into a burly braid of thick, green, woodlike material. A ripple of energy traveled along the braid’s surface and it tightened, drawing the giant cedars closer together. As the green, swirling band solidified, it took on the appearance of a huge, burly green dragon. The snakes all hissed the same name, “Jugan,” and Toshi dimly recalled it as the name of Jukai’s other powerful guardian spirit.

  Sosuke lunged, plucking his sister from the tree trunk and folding her up in two powerful arms. He slithered headfirst down the tree, traveling far faster than if he’d simply jumped. When his tongue touched the soil he sprang off the tree and cut through the underbrush, away from the valley.

  The dragon Jugan continued to swirl around the trees, encircling them in a green ring of energy and force. The linked cedars groaned again as the magical bond tightened. Trapped in the ring of trees, soratami and orochi both stopped fighting and cast worried eyes upward. On the largest and thickest trunk, the face of Life’s Web mouthed a series of silent words. In response, Jugan roared and began to move faster. The massive ring of cedars shuddered, and Toshi heard a deafening crack.

  Bending at the center as if jointed, the trees all seemed to bow toward the center of the ring. Together, they formed an organic enclosure, a huge drum-shaped cell with dirt floors, cedar-trunk walls, and a solid ceiling of leafy green boughs. Muted hissing and screams came from within the closed drum, but nothing else escaped from the unbroken wall of living lumber.

  All the bark on the exterior of the drum shifted and reshaped itself, forming a gargantuan mask for Life’s Web. The myojin’s face did not move, but her hollow eyes and mouth were wide open as she stared through the canopy into the sunlit sky. Then, the great enclosure contracted, sending shock waves rippling across the valley floor and almost shaking Toshi’s ridge to pieces. Safe in his phantom form, Toshi stepped back from the edge but still kept his eyes locked on the spectacle below.

  With Jugan circling ever faster around it, the enclosure collapsed in on itself like some great clenching fist. The noise of breaking wood drowned out any sounds from within the drum, which Toshi took as something of a blessing. His dreams had been troubling enough without more dying wails to haunt them. When it was half its original size, the cedar cell started to sink into the hard-packed forest floor. The ground broke and tumbled into an ever-deepening pit forming beneath the cell. Trees on the edge of the valley toppled into the pit as well, their roots robbed of their foundations.

  Toshi watched the incredible display until the top of the cell was only a few feet higher than the rim of the pit. He didn’t know if anyone was still alive inside, or how far down they’d burrow, but it was safe to say that these soratami would not make war on Jukai again.

  Toshi shook his head. He was no soldier and he had never gone to war, but even he knew you didn’t defeat an army by killing half your own in the process. If the snakes could harness the power of Jukai and make the land itself fight for them, they had a chance. Otherwise, the soratami would surely scour them away in a matter of weeks.

  Without looking back, Toshi stepped forward into the shadow of a cedar sapling as the green dragon roared and the valley continued to swallow itself.

  Toshi emerged from a dark patch beneath an overhanging rock. He arrived at the edge of the glen near the moth, who was still securely tethered and happily slurping its food bricks. There was no sign of the orochi sentries who had stayed behind. Toshi didn’t wonder too deeply about their disappearance—it was enough for him that they were gone.

  He circled the largest tree to where he had left the Taken One. The stone disk hadn’t moved, but something about the scene made Toshi uneasy. The image on the disk was static, and he didn’t feel the gathering pressure of an impending kami attack, but the air around the Taken One felt different. All of Toshi’s exposed skin tingled.

  The ochimusha crouched beside the tree and peered at the clearing around the stone disk. All looked normal, except for three piles of what appeared to be white sand. Maybe salt, Toshi thought.

  Fine white dust swirled off each pile as a soft wind blew through the clearing. Toshi stood to his full height and paced around the stone disk. Three piles, three orochi sentries. The mounds of white grit were positioned fairly evenly around the Taken One. If three able-bodied warriors were attempting to lift something of this size, they could easily have taken these positions.

  “Hey,” Toshi said carefully to the disk. “They touched you, didn’t they?”

  The fetal serpent remained motionless and the only sound was of wind playing in the dust.

  “Look,” Toshi said. “I’ve got to move you, and I’ve got to do it quickly. With …” He paused, almost overwhelmed by the absurdity of what he was about to say. “… with your permission, I will carry you to the moth so he can carry us away.”

  Toshi felt even more foolish when the disk didn’t respond in any meaningful way. Had he dreamed that, too?

  He screwed up his courage and placed his hands on the Taken One. It felt just like ordinary stone. Pushing his questions aside, Toshi willed himself insubstantial and took the stone disk with him. Less than a minute later he had maneuvered it onto the moth’s back. The great insect sagged as the stone disk regained its mass, but it held the burden long enough for Toshi to lash it into the harness.

  They wouldn’t have to go far. The orochi would have their plates full with invading soratami, so he only needed to leave the immediate area. Between the invaders, the myojin, and the guardian dragon, there were far more important things to do than hunt down a mysterious stranger.

  Toshi figured he needed only a few more hours of rest before his ribs would be fully healed. He had slept more than enough the previous night. Right now he just wanted one medium-long period of not running for his life, if the spirits would allow such a thing. Then he’d be ready to look into the visions and voices he’d been experiencing.

  The great moth beat its wings and carried Toshi into the midday sky. Jukai was indeed impressive, but there were far too many plants for his liking. Too much dirt and not enough taverns. His mind began to wander as the cedar canopy rolled by beneath him, and he wondered why he had come this far east in the first place. The chances of finding Mochi were slim, and luring O-Kagachi and Mochi to the same place was even more unlikely. The best he could hope for was to re-create the confusion at Minamo and hope that either O-Kagachi or the daimyo took their toll on the moonfolk raiders.

  A surge of fatigue ran through him, and Toshi’s shoulders sagged. Everything had changed when the Taken One spoke. Toting the inert disk around was one thing, but if it were going to make demands and desiccate orochi all willy-nilly he’d have to make a new plan. He didn’t have what it took to deal with matters of this magnitude on a regular basis. The sooner he could consult someone with a better brain and a nobler heart than his, the better.

  Suddenly morose and sullen, Toshi urged the moth lower and redoubled his efforts to find a suitable spot.

  Once more, Toshi awoke on a barren field of gray stone.

  “Muck and mire,” he spat. He shielded his eyes against the glare and the wind-driven grit. “Haven’t we been through this?” he called. His mind seemed sharper in this dream than it had last time. He didn’t recall landing the moth or falling asleep. Wasn’t it still the middle of the day?

  Without preamble, a line of three burly figures appeared, marching toward Toshi through the haze. They were indistinct phantoms in the glare, but they were all significantly larger than Toshi. Perhaps he’d be pilloried now by bigger-than-life versions of the instructors, tutors, and constables he’d offended as a boy.

  Annoyed, he folded his arms and waited. This must be some sort of side effect of the healing magic he used, or his proximity to the Taken One, or a combination of both. He was quite used to being accused of horrible crimes while awake, but it was beyond the pale to endure it while he slept.

  Toshi’s pique withered as Kobo emerged from the glare. The huge bald youth was as scarred and gnarled as he’d been in life, his crooked nose almost smeared across his face.

  “Oath-brother,” he said, “you left me to die. You let me take all the risk, stood back and let me do all the fighting. While I was being murdered, you didn’t even bother to wake up.”

  “I didn’t—” Toshi stammered. “That … that isn’t the way it happened.”

  Kobo bowed respectfully and strode past Toshi. Impulsively, the ochimusha reached out, but his hand passed through the ogre’s apprentice.

  “Well, my friend,” said a familiar voice behind him. “Where to begin?”

  Hidetsugu swelled to his full size as Toshi turned to face him. He towered over Toshi and smiled, his eyes empty, hissing holes.

  “I’m sorry,” Toshi said, cutting the ogre off before his first word. “But you were always too big, too powerful, and too smart. You scared me. I knew that if I wasn’t one step ahead of you, you’d find some way to punish me.”

  “And you were right.” The o-bakemono smiled. “In the end, you could never have beaten me. But you’re here, and I’m gone. How did that happen?” Without waiting for a reply, Hidetsugu snorted derisively and trod past Toshi. The stone plain shook beneath his heavy feet.

  “I’m sorry,” Toshi called again, but the words felt slimy and bitter in his mouth. Was Toshi truly hearing his own voice? Was it him saying these words?

  Sick and dizzy, Toshi stumbled and fell to his knees. Something was wrong, terribly wrong. He should not be feeling like this.

  The final figure came into focus through the glare. It was Godo the bandit king once more. This time he was pale, drawn, and shivering, but his chestnut eyes still burned with fury.

  Toshi’s throat hitched. “I’m sorry,” he said again. He felt like he was watching a terrible actor perform his innermost thoughts and getting most of the words wrong.

  Godo nodded and leaned down to whisper in Toshi’s ear.

  “It’s not too late,” he said. “You can undo what you did.”

  The bandit king pulled back. Toshi’s eyelids fluttered and he swayed on his knees.

  “What?” he managed. “Undo?”

  “I’m not dead yet,” the figure of Godo said. “But I am very close to crossing over. You can help me. You can make it right. You don’t have to come back here, Toshi. You don’t have to listen to us forever.”

  “How?” Toshi said. “What can I do?”

  Godo dropped to his knees and seized Toshi by the shoulders. “Return to the mountains,” the bandit king said. “Capture what you have unleashed. Cage the beast and you will be one step farther away from this.” Godo raised his eyes and spread his hands. Then he stood, placed a palm on Toshi’s shoulder, and walked into oblivion.

  A sharp, cold spasm creased through Toshi’s guts. He doubled over in pain. As he sat and waited for his muscles to unknot, two tears splattered on the gray stone.

  “Enough,” he said. He inhaled slowly, gently expanding his chest. “Enough.”

  Toshi awoke on the forest floor, grappling with a pile of cedar needles. His face was wet and his stomach ached.

  He staggered to his feet, confused to the point of panic. The sky was dark. He was in a wide gully between two hills. The moth sat nearby, its tether trailing in the evening breeze and the Taken One still lashed to its back. However and whenever he had gotten here, Toshi had made no attempt to conceal himself or his cargo.

  Wooden and unfocused, Toshi stumbled forward. He drew his jitte and started scratching symbols in the dirt. His hand shook and his eyesight was blurry, so he didn’t even know if the symbols he drew were the symbols he intended.

  Angrily, he scratched out the abortive kanji with his jitte and struggled back to a standing position. His wild eyes darted around the gully until he found a low-hanging branch with a fat shadow beneath it.

  Without hesitation, Toshi went toward the branch and slipped into the shadows like he was diving into a bottomless black pool.

  Aboard the soratami flagship, Mochi held another audience with Uyo and Chiyo.

  The war ebbs and flows, he said. The orochi are doomed. It will take time, but we have plenty of time. But now, I wish to hear better news, stories of more measurable progress.

  Uyo smiled enigmatically. I am delighted to accommodate you, Mochi-sama. We have been making the most splendid progress in that other matter you mentioned.

  Mochi beamed and rose into the air. As he began to rotate, he said, Tell me all.

  Though untrained, his mind protects itself remarkably well. If not for this so-called hyozan reckoner gang, we might never have found purchase.

  Go on.

  The charge of “oath-breaker” stung him the most. The images of his oath-brothers shook even his composure. Once we found this chink in his armor, he was ours.

  Outstanding. Your abilities continue to amaze even me. Mochi interrupted his rotation and spun to face Uyo directly. Where is he now?

  On the wings of Night’s Reach, bound for the Sokenzan hinterlands.

  And the prize?

  Abandoned. Left behind. He was not in possession of all his faculties when he left on this latest journey.

  Excellent. You see, Chiyo? Even a most despised foe can prove useful. Toshi has done us an immeasurable favor. All we need do now is herd the orochi into the general area of the Taken One. Anywhere nearby is fine … O-Kagachi will pulverize huge tracts of the forest when it comes for its offspring. We simply have to prepare to disengage and withdraw quickly so that the serpent doesn’t also pulverize us.

  The soratami in the crescent mask turned angrily away from her mentors.

  Ahh, I’ve offended you, my dear. Forgive me. Was it my playful tone? Or were you appalled by the inappropriate parental metaphor?

  Master, Chiyo said, Umezawa still lives. We have not punished him, only banished him. Do not leave his death to chance. Godo will not recognize Toshi as his enemy. And Toshi has escaped the yuki-onna before. We cannot rely on them alone.

  Mochi began to spin slowly once more, his eyes merry. My dear, he said, whatever made you think we would?

  Toshi stood on a crest of rock at the foothills of the Sokenzan Mountains. It was cold in this barren, dreary place, but the chill of winter that cut through his clothes had as much to do with magic as it did with the season.

  Icy wind whipped his sleeves against his wrists. The cold stung, but it did nothing to beat back the numb, haunted feeling that oppressed him.

  The jagged rocks below him were littered with bodies. He had seen far too many corpses lately, from the carmine remains of the Numai jushi to the bleached bones at Minamo.

  This killing ground was thick with the frozen bodies of Eiganjo soldiers and Sokenzan bandits. Each was fully dressed in cold-weather gear, but each was frozen solid, their faces twisted into masks of terror. Some were literally encased in sheaths of hard, transparent ice. One such display featured two of Konda’s soldiers locked in a desperate embrace to stave off death.

  The wind carried Toshi’s breath from his chapped lips in wisps of snowy white. This was his doing, his and the snow-woman’s. Toshi had hijacked her lethal cold and turned it to his own ends. He had also trapped her essence within a clay tablet that came down from her home in the Tendo Peaks and brought it here, to the northern border of bandit territory. As far as Toshi knew, Godo himself had broken the tablet, and soon afterward the curse of the yuki-onna had taken root, making this stretch of frozen rock her new hunting grounds.

  How many had she killed since then? How many lives ended in bitter cold and crippling terror? Two score? A hundred? Two hundred? All victims of Toshi’s careless pursuit of power.

  The ochimusha continued to stare at the frozen corpses. He cupped his hands and blew on them, the momentary blast of warmth bringing sensation back to his fingers.

  “You’ll need more than a puff of hot air to survive this night.”

  Toshi recognized the voice from his dreams. Trembling, he slowly turned and saw Godo the bandit king in the flesh for the first time.

  Godo was drawn and weary, as he had been in the second dream. He was still large enough to crush Toshi just by sitting down, and he led a massive mountain yak easily with one hand. The yak bore Godo’s gigantic spiked club strapped to its side.

  Godo wore heavy wool wraps over his bandit armor. His skin was pallid, gray and unhealthy, but his eyes were strong and alert. He stretched out his arm and offered a woven blanket to Toshi.