Sakura looked up into the sky, the cold rain pattering onto her face. It was pouring. She didn’t care about that.

She had to get away from that unnatural creature. Lawrence… are you all right?

She looked about to orient herself. Not far off the dancer could hear the sounds of that battle that had begun before she had been taken away.

Something made a noise behind her. Reflexively, she turned with a gasp, but the machiya there was empty, dark. A shiver ran across her body and she began to run. She needed to keep moving.

Orienting herself, she looked about for the harbor guard tower, but the tile roofs obscured her vision, as the dwellings were two and three stories high here. She grabbed her kimono, pulled it up above her ankles and continued to run in the general direction of the battle.

I would prefer to be in a battle than to be stuck with that creature. But she wanted to find Lawrence—to know if he was okay, and to heal him if he needed her. Her urge to go to him was overwhelming.

“I must get myself to safety first,” she muttered as she came to a cross street, but she stopped short as she saw a figure ahead.

She squinted, looking at the short man. She couldn’t make the person out through the rain, but when she heard the cackling and the arguing he seemed to constantly be doing with himself, she took two steps back, turned and ran.

He would catch her in the street. How had he caught up to her so fast? She wouldn’t lose him in these streets. She entered one of the many darkened machiyas. She could lose him out the back door, go into another, leave, change her course, and keep doing that.

Surely that would work. Yes.

The dancer was in the dwelling. It was dark and quiet, save for the thunder and rain, and the distant skirmish. She swallowed, gasping for breath for just one moment before moving again.

No one was occupying the house. They had been smart—got out of the city while they could. Her only other choice now to keep him from cutting her off was to make her way toward the waterfront—where Lawrence was.

She pulled at the backdoor slider, but it didn’t budge. She felt at the catch, released it, and pulled the shōji aside.

And then he dropped in front of her.

Sakura screamed, fell back on her behind. She reoriented herself to her knees and scrabbled away amidst his gleeful mutterings and cackling.

“Noo!” she screamed, as he grabbed her shoulders. She turned, tried to fight him, but despite his small size, he was still stronger than her—far stronger.

Taking her by the wrists, he put his face right up to hers, his eyes making direct contact. “I got you, little kitten.”

She kicked and squirmed, but it was useless, and she cried out as he squeezed her wrists. She thought he would break them, but when she stopped resisting, he finally loosened his steel grip on her.

“The game is over, little mage girl,” he said. “We win! We win!” He snarled. “That’s what I said!”

“You’re utterly mad,” she screeched. “You’re ill, or you’re damned by the gods!”

“Damned?” he asked, quirking his head to the side. “No. Not right. We’re not damned!” He smiled, a huge smile revealing his crooked and cracked teeth, though Sakura could barely see them in the darkness.

“We can still play the game,” she offered weakly. She didn’t think he would take her up on it again, but he seemed thoughtful.

“We want to! No! No more games! She dies. Heerrrrree!” He removed his wicked-looking knife. “Hold still, little kitten while I disembowel you.”

Sakura sucked in a lungful of air, her chin quivering. Her whole body was shaking. Her knees gave out. She tried to speak, tried to tell him they could continue the game, but the words wouldn’t come up.

“Hmm?” the freak noised. He looked over his shoulder for whatever that was. “Are we being watched? We hate—yes, I know. We hate watchersss.”

Sakura looked up at him. She wouldn’t be able to run. This man was wounded in the head. Perhaps his soul was tarnished as well—black and degraded.

“It’s nothing. Let us eat. Yes, yes we can eat now.”

His muttering made her shutter like a leaf in a storm, but as he turned, she shot to her feet and placed a hand on his head.

He looked at her quizzically.

And then bright light appeared under her palm. He looked up at it, a stupid look in his eyes as his curiosity, almost childish, seemed to overtake him.

Sakura watched the malefaction in his mind stir, and suddenly her would-be murderer cried out, shrieking horribly.

She jumped back as he swiped at her with his knife. She hit the wall, jumped to the side as is blade cut into the wood there.

He cried out, shrieking again, one hand to his head, the other warding with the blade.

What happened? I thought I healed him, but he doesn’t seem well. He seems worse.

Dropping the knife, he screamed louder, going to his knees. He rolled about, thrashing this way and that. Instead of running, Sakura took up the murderer’s knife to defend herself in case he decided to attack her.

“Where are you? I can’t hear you?” he muttered, quieting.

This was her chance to get away. Sakura ran for the back door, her feet sinking in the cold grass in the courtyard. She crossed the green and slipped on the wood as she left the niwa. He shin scrapes against the side, but she ignored the pain and hurried to the other door.

She had the shōji halfway open when he screamed. Sakura yelped, her hands close to her chest with the knife in her left. She jerked around and he crashed into her, hard enough to send them both through the washi paper.

Struggling to get the knife in a position to defend herself, she jerked her hand, but it wouldn’t budge.

He wasn’t moving.

She pushed at him, grunting as she rolled him off her. The knife handle, a smooth, carved bone of some kind, was the only visible part of that knife, as the blade was buried in the errant soul’s stomach. The hilt was sticking out at a downward angle, which meant the blade had penetrated his insides behind his ribs.

Sakura shuttered, her hands and midriff covered in blood as the man beside her twitched. She glanced at him again, knowing he was dead, and even if he wasn’t, she wouldn’t save him.

I… killed him.

She leaned back on the wall, breathing heavily, and began to cry silently with relief that she wouldn’t me murdered by this wicked, malcontent. All the fear and anger drained out of her as she sucked in large lungful’s of fresh air.

She could smell the rain again, her eyes blurring. “Kami-sama!” She clasped her hands together, pressed them to her lips. “Arigatou gozaimasu!”

From the noise at the door, she tore her gaze from the wooden floor. What was that? Her breathing stopped. The dancer listened for anymore of the sounds.

Someone was at the front shoji!

Her eyes darted to the knife, still in the body. Moving to take hold of the blade, the front door slid open. Sakura gasped when she recognized the faces of the young boy, Ishi, and the oni mage Hiun.

With relief, she cried out, slunk down on all fours. She met their eyes and smiled. “It’s you.”