Page 60 of Drawn into Oblivion

Rosuke spotted Vallen by the bed, sword in hand. Vallen appeared uninjured but weary. Shumei slept behind him. After all the energy she’d spent keeping the artillery from hitting the city, he’d have expected her to look as exhausted as Vallen, but she appeared as radiant as he’d ever seen her. And the scent in the air… Magic. Sweet and sticky. The aroma reminded him instantly of Mai. But first—

“What happened in here?” he asked, closing the door.

“I don’t know for certain,” Vallen said, sheathing his sword. “I do know it’s the work of the Divine One, but it’s not sitting well with Shumei. I pray she wakes soon. What of the artillery?”

Rosuke walked closer, trying not to drag his feet. His body always felt heavy after a fight. “We met a force of about fifty of the enemy, half of them human. By the smell, they had opened a portal just outside the barrier.”

“The Foul One has already converted enough humans to populate half a troop?”

“Bastard has a new trick up his sleeve. They were still human—still alive—but the ones that swung at me weren’t even looking. And they fought as if…resisting the movement. I suspect their demon counterparts were controlling them, or perhaps they’d been possessed. In either case, our soldiers were confused and frightened.”

“Did any of the human enemy make it?”

“No. They fell dead the second I sent their leader back to Oblivion.”

Vallen winced and rubbed the back of his neck. “And only fifty were controlling all that artillery?”

“They’d brought only five mechanisms, but ones designed to be reloaded quickly. A conjurer had been infusing the missiles with magic, no doubt in an attempt to pierce Shumei’s barrier. The size of those blasts… It had to be a powerful demon to come so close to penetrating the shield. And it fought harder than the one barking orders. It was almost as deadly as you.”

Vallen gave a stiff nod, his gaze sliding to Shumei. Rosuke knew what the man was thinking: is the thing dead, and if so, how painfully did it die?

“I gutted it myself,” Rosuke said. Cruel satisfaction curled Vallen’s lip, and his hand on his sword relaxed. “Although taking the enemy down took longer than I’d have liked. We lost momentum when Minoru was badly injured, and rallying everyone was difficult.”

“He’s your direct subordinate, isn’t he? And popular. How serious was his injury?”

Rosuke sighed at the floor. “He lost his right arm at the elbow.” Vallen whispered an expletive and squeezed his eyes shut. “I did what I could in the moment for the bleeding, but he might not make it through the night.”

Tonight had been too soon for most of their soldiers to engage in real combat. Even the men in the elite force, despite their athleticism and skill, didn’t have enough training to handle the horror of a real battle, especially one where your enemies do not breathe and look as if they’ve been stitched together by a mad doll-maker.

“I stayed until the men were done piling the bodies for burning. A small detail will disassemble the artillery, and the rest have gone to help restore order.”

Vallen nodded once more before returning his attention to Shumei. She grimaced in her sleep, and a wave of the scent already permeating the room wafted up, thick enough that Rosuke thought it would stick to his clothes like pollen.

“He did it to scare everyone,” Vallen said, low and hard. “The first festival in centuries—a day to pay homage to the Divine One, for Shumei to enjoy time with her people… The Foul One sacrificed fifty of his force just to ruin it.”

“I’m sorry, my friend.” Rosuke was covered in too much mud, sweat, and blood to hug Vallen and instead gripped his shoulder in sympathy. Quickly, however, the combined smell of his exertion and ambient magic was becoming too much, so he went to the unlatched window and widened it for some fresh air.

A breeze blew past him and disturbed the few candles that hadn’t yet burned through. The night air softened the room’s scent enough that he longed to taste his favorite pair of lips. With that thought, he wondered where Mai had gone. She had been with Vallen a couple hours ago. Had she returned to her room?

“I am sorry as well,” Vallen said. Rosuke heard footsteps.

“For what?” He turned back just as Vallen came to a stop next to the table in the center of the room.

“I asked Mai to help me walk Shumei’s mind, which seems to have been a good idea. I failed, and she most likely succeeded.”

Rosuke stiffened, not liking the flat angle of Vallen’s mouth or his pained stance. “What do you mean, ‘most likely’?”

Vallen frowned. “When I woke, Mai was already up and about. I meant to ask whether she had walked Shumei’s mind, but then I saw what she’d found.”

“You speak as if she discovered some dark imperial secret.”

“She did, Rosuke. She found this,” he said and gestured at an open book on the table.

He looked down and froze. Everything froze. The air in his lungs, the blood in his veins. He hadn’t noticed, hadn’t seen it there. How hadn’t he…? The magic in the room, the recent battle, the cramp of hunger in his gut—all of it vanished, leaving only a faint, echoing scream inside his head.

“She knows,” Rosuke whispered.

He hurried over to the table and the Devil’s Hand, which was still open to the page Madam Muneoka had used to curse him, his brother, and Vallen. The most relevant details had been translated into Common, but Mai had communed with the Divine One more than once recently. Perhaps also just now. She could’ve understood every single word on the page.