My words were cut off as the water beneath us lurched downward like someone had jerked the plug free in a full bathtub. The water began to swirl downward, and as it did, a cave in the cliff in front of us was slowlyrevealed.
Sharp outcroppings of stone clung to its mouth, making it appear like the maw of some great beast. As I stared, cool mist began to drift out from it. I shivered instinctively. Something inside felt dark and, well, evil. It was like staring at your closet at night when you were a kid and knowing there was a monster inside ready to eat you. But unlike then, there really was a monster waiting for us. Probably more than one monster, if Amatsu and Kai were summoningyokaito do theirbidding.
“In there!” I said, directing thetengutoward the cave. It nodded once and flapped its wings, lifting from the sea and moving toward the cave. As we breached the entryway, the temperature dropped twenty degrees. My breath came out in a cloud of dark mist as the light from outside faded to apinprick.
“Now where?” thetenguasked as it landed on a hard rock wall. We all looked around, but try as I might, I couldn’t seeanything.
“Maybe we need to make the water go back up?” I said, glancing at Raiden. He still had his eyes shut, and his face was taut withstrain.
“Try it,” he said, taking in a breath and opening his eyes. The stone in his hand stopped glowing, but the water didn’t rise either. “I guess you don’t have to maintain the spell. I thought if I stopped concentrating, the water might rise. That must be why there were twojewels.”
“Okay,” I said, gripping the jewel of rising tide and shutting my eyes. “I’ll try to make the water rise,then.”
As I concentrated on the stone in my hand, I felt its power just like it was anofuda. It made me instantly glad I’d learned how to use them—I was able to direct the water to rise almost effortlessly. My eyes snapped open a second later, and triumph filled me as I saw we were rising upward toward a cavern. As the water touched the stone inside our tunnel, it began to glow with effervescent algae that reminded me of Ryujin’s palace, illuminating a pathway that thetengufollowed.
A moment later, we found ourselves staring at a small cavern in a wall a few meters to ourleft.
“Guess that’s where we’re going,” Raiden said, hopping off thetenguand jumping onto the outcropping in front of the cave. He offered me hishand.
“Right.” I took Raiden’s hand and jumped onto the rock, Shota right behind me. “Whoa,” I said as we followed him into the cavern, thetengubringing up the rear. He’d shrunk into a smaller version of his natural form so he could fit through. “Check out thismural.”
I plucked one of the bamboo torches hanging on the wall and lifted it higher so I could see the painting better. It stretched all the way around the circular cavern room, a progression of scenes, and as I looked closer, I realized the woman who appeared most often was the same woman thekamiback at the café had been drawing. A princess who wore myface.
“It’s the story of Kai, Haruki, Kaga, and Fumiko,” thetengusaid. His gravelly voice was sad, and I turned around to see him gazing at the mural with a grave look on his face. “It looks like someone blacked out Haruki and Kaga’s faces on all ofthese.”
Shocked, I turned back. Sure enough, two of the four characters depicted in the murals had their faces completely blottedout.
“Why would someone do that?” I asked, moving closer to thepaintings.
“Because they’re trying to cover up history,” Raiden said tightly. His dark eyes blazed with anger, and he snatched a torch off the wall. “Come on, Aika. We already know thestory.”
“Raiden, I think there’s more here that the dragon king didn’t tell us!” Shota called. His eyes were shining with excitement as they scanned the mural. “Just wait amoment!”
But Raiden was already stalking off, and I didn’t want to stay here in the cavern withouthim.
Shota and I exchanged frustrated glances. “We’ll have to look at this later,” I said with a sigh, even though I agreed with Shota. “We can’t let him go on ahead byhimself.”
“Fine,” Shota grumbled. We hurried after Raiden, down a hall that split off the cavern entrance. I tried not to think about the way the narrow walls pressed in against us, leaving very little room to walk. I wasn’t claustrophobic, but the fact that we were miles and miles below the surface, with no real map, and the sure knowledge that an evil god and shaman were waiting up ahead, was enough to freak anyoneout.
No fear,I reminded myself, and lifted my chin a littlehigher.
We caught up with Raiden only a few steps away, just beyond a corner. He was standing stone-still and had one hand on the hilt of hiskatana. He took a deep breath and turned to look at me. Then he mouthed oneword.
“Run.”
21
Run.
The word echoed in my brain as Raiden took a step backward. As he did, his shoes squeaked on the tile floor, drawing the attention of two large shadows across the room. They stood before a massive ornate wooden shrine I instinctively recognized as abutsudan.
The shadows spun around, and I instantly realized they weren’t shadows at all. No, they were hideous, disgusting creatures with distended guts and skin like coal. Huge eyes burned in their heads, and as their long, black tongues licked hungrily over their yellowed teeth, saliva dripped from the corners of their mouths. As the left one took a lumbering step toward us, Shota stepped in front of me, one hand pulling hiskusarigamafree while the other grabbed a tablet from hiskeychain.
“Stay behind me,” he said, right before he invoked the tablet. “Mezame,Baiken!”
Ahitodamaexploded from the mortuary tablet, lighting up the interior of the cave with its blue glow. Shota snatched it out of the air, and as he shoved it into his chest, a fiery light exploded from his body. The outline of a samurai coalesced around him, and Shota’s eyes blazed with otherworldlylight.
“It’s about time you got a real weapon. Always playing with swords like a fool,” he said in a deep voice that was both Shota and the spirit he’d taken in. He hefted thekusarigama, a delighted grin on his face. “Let me show you how to put these flames to good use.” He spun on his heel and dashed toward one of the monsters, his hand swinging around in an arc as he spun the spiked ball on the end of the chain attached to the sickle. As flames crawled across the chain, Shota sent the spiked ball flying through the air with a flick of his wrist. The flaming steel ball smashed into the charging monster with a sickening thud, knocking it off its feet in a flurry ofsparks.
