Page 72 of Dragon 7

Then finally. . .her hands fell, and her body shuddered and then went still.

She was gone.

Yet. . .I just. . .couldn’t let go.

I had to make sure.

So. . .I stood right there. . .and continued to choke that lifeless body. . .

How long did I do that?

Surely, time passed.

I remembered hearing someone call my name.

Maybe, Deja.

Perhaps, Yoichi.

Tears spilled from my eyes and I thought of my baby girl and choked that bitch some more.

And Yoichi’s hands wrapped around mine and pulled me off of her utterly broken, purple neck. A vision hit me when we connected.

The room disappeared and I stood outside several feet behind Yoichi as he stood outside too. It was raining and Yoichi was staring in the window.

I walked over and saw that inside the house was a young woman singing to a baby as she rocked him.

And I knew that the woman was Kenji’s mother, and the baby was Kenji, and that Yoichi was looking at the next mission he had to complete to hopefully end his curse.

Then, the vision left and I finally let go.

Chapter eleven

Unreasonable Hope

Kenji

My dragon-shadow had roared, “WAR!”

He had torn the word from his chest and thrown it at the sky.

One syllable.

And I sat in the dirt of my mother's island with the sound vibrating through my ribs like a bell that had just been struck.

I felt pride.

Hot.

Animalistic.

Unreasonable pride.

The kind that arrived before sense could stop it. The kind that made men walk into fire believing the fire would respect them, instead of burn their flesh away.

Was it dangerous, feeling victory before Akiro and the Fox fell?

Probably.