Bone pops and he shouts, real pain ripping loose as the weapon clatters from his hand.
“Improvising now?” I ask breathlessly.
He snarls and backhands me, but it’s sloppy. I take it, then bury the short blade into his side, just beneath the ribs.
Not deep enough to end it.
Deep enough to matter.
Blood blooms dark and fast across his shirt. He stumbles back, breathing ragged now, eyes wild.
The rest of the marbles spill from his pocket and scatteruselessly across the floor, rolling away between broken glass and silk.
The calm is gone.
The certainty too.
And now he’s out of distance weapons.
Exactly where I want him.
Blood slicks his fingers as he staggers back.
Kenji’s eyes flick behind him, calculating. Reassessing. For the first time, he’s choosing exits instead of angles.
He snatches a handful of throwing knives from a shattered display and hurls the first one without breaking stride.
I tilt my shoulder.
It whistles past and embeds itself in a silk-backed wall.
He throws another.
This one goes wide enough that I don’t even bother dodging. It skitters uselessly across the floor, clattering to a stop at my feet.
His jaw tightens.
He keeps backing up, faster now, glancing over his shoulder again—and his heel catches the edge of the first stair.
Kenji stumbles, falling back hard onto the steps. Panic flashes sharp and ugly across his face as he flings another blade on instinct.
That one I have to move for.
I twist sharply, the knife tearing through the space where my throat was and feel the rush of air as it misses by inches.
He uses the moment.
Scrambling. Hands slipping in his own blood. He turns clumsily, finally getting his feet under him, andbolts up the stairs two at a time, breath breaking into something ragged and uneven.
I don’t rush. Just follow.
Measured and controlled.
Each step deliberate as I climb after him, listening to his uneven footfalls ahead of me, watching the trail of blood mark his path upward.
Teacher ahead.
Student behind.
