It was happening all over again—he pursuing her while she runs, her exhaustion building. Haku The White Feather could not defeat her opponent.

I have to find a way. There has to be a way.

She jumped, glided over a roof and landed in an adjacent street. The battle was happening nearby. Two samurai and a group of bowmen passed the cross street. She turned, looked for her pursuer.

There he was, in the air in mid jump, his arms outspread and his katana in hand. He landed in the street a few paces from her. “Stop this and face me. I do not wish to defeat you tired and unable to swing a blade.”

She raised her katana defensively, thinking he might lunge in an attempt to kill her before she tired herself out. It would take more time, much more time, since Haku had her arts to draw on for aid.

“Let us end this.”

Haku grit her teeth. She wouldn’t be another trophy of his ambitious bloodlust—his insatiable need to be a renowned duelist, of which he already was!

“The Sword of a Thousand Bloody Suns,” she said.

“What did you say?”

“Your title is well earned.”

“That’s not my title. How dare you insult me!”

“No,” she said calmly. “How dare you? I’m caught up in a conflict for the future of my country and you ambush me with your need for this duel, like a child who can’t wait—surely you could have challenged me at any time, but yet you wait, until my composure is off kilter, while my mind is distracted by things far larger than this petty confrontation you seem so eager to finish with me.”

She couldn’t see his face, though by his change in posture alone, she could tell that he was enraged. He said nothing, adding to her knowledge that he was indeed incensed at what she had said.

“It’s easy to call out in anger,” she said, “but I can see you can hardly control your own temper.”

“I’m well composed.”

“Are you?”

“Indeed.”

She sensed it—jumped out of the way just in time. He screamed past her, his blade missing her by mere inches as she dove—ungracefully for The White Feather—for the cobbled road.

A crash broke out behind her. Haku glanced at the road where several strands of her hair, perfectly cut, lay. She was on her feet before The Sword of a Thousand Suns could return from his rampage.

There was magic behind that attack!

Where was he? She looked into the machiya, a mess of broken wood and shredded paper sliders. “As I said,” she muttered. “You cannot control your temper.”

Wood and debris from inside the dwelling exploded out at her, her opponent streaking toward her with blue magic wisping off his back.

With a pirouette, she dodged his attack again, but the force of his presence knocked her off balance and she fell to one knee.

Before she could turn, she jumped for the roof.

Where was he now? He had crashed again through the machiya behind her in the street. I barely dodged his him, she thought. His speed, and the force of his attack can’t be withstood—not by me.

Evasion was her only defense against such an attack. Though it was a magical charge, which ended in destruction of the environment at its path’s end, she knew that his agility during that charge, at least with his blade, was not encumbered.

The White Feather would not attempt to cross blades with him during those magical charges. Not if she wanted to win this duel.

Her cheek itched. Brushing it, she discovered that a sliver of wood was sticking out of her face.

“Ngh!” she pulled it free, blood beginning to come forth. The White feather glanced about.

Haku found no sign of her attacker.

Where is he?

An explosion broke forth under her feet and she found herself spinning through the air. If not for her magical arts, she would have been completely disoriented, but for her reflexes, it was as if she could almost see what was happening in a slower state as The Sword of a Thousand Suns broke through the tiled roof in a rage, his magic a fury about his body as the shattered tiles and wood breaking outward followed his trajectory toward her.

Acting simultaneously, The White Feather changed her trajectory of forced flight as she raised her katana in a defensive action.

She flew. Not in the new trajectory she had set, but in the one her opponent, for the second time, had set, when his blade came in for the kill.

Her blade had met his, but the sheer force of his attack sent her flying, her arm and shoulder a screaming voice of pain as she crashed through a slider and landing in a heap inside of one of the machiyas two roads back from where she had been standing.

As she lay there, an unbidden noise came out of her. “Hngh!” It had happened so fast that she hadn’t been able to take full stock of her injuries. Her body hadn’t reacted to the various injuries she had just sustained, but from the noise, she knew.

The White Feather had been defeated.