Across endless battlefields stride

Those Who Bring the Storm

Always two

Shura the Master and Raksha the apprentice

When the Master withers so shall the apprentice die

And Shura will be reborn to eternal war

—Qian Yan the Desecrated, once of Wu Dang

Raksha panicked briefly when Ko’ais shoved him into what appeared to be an upright steel cage. When she got in herself, she stood extremely close, the tip of her nose inches from his. Her eyes were a soft hazel hue, tinged with red from the tears she’d tried to wipe away without him noticing.

“It’s an elevator, silly,” she said, reaching past him to push a glowing button on a panel within the cage. Her battle harness, an armored suit of black leather and steel with tactical webbing, brushed across his chest, and he had to force himself not to flinch.

The effort didn’t go unnoticed. She winked at him. “Calm down.”

Ko’ais wore her straight, dark hair cut just below her shoulders. Stray locks would drift past her pale, heart-shaped face every once in a while. She noticed him staring then, and she met his gaze. There was a strange, challenging light in her eyes. Raksha looked away, feeling heat rush to his cheeks and wondering why. It wasn’t like he’d never been around women before.

Just then, the steel cage lurched. Raksha braced his feet and reached for his blade, but Ko’ais caught his wrist.

“You’ll wreck the elevator if you put on your aegis now. I don’t know about you, but I really don’t feel like climbing eighty-five flights of stairs. There’s nothing to worry about. Don’t you know what an elevator is?”

Gears clanked and metal cables squealed. The cage began to ascend. Raksha blinked.

“Some device that brings us up a building, it seems. This city is filled with fascinating things.”

“You’ve never been in a megapolis?”

“No. This is my first time.” Raksha tried to peer past the bars of the elevator doors as the floors flashed past. His cheek brushed hers as he did so, and he was abruptly reminded of how close they were again. Infuriatingly, Ko’ais somehow managed to lean in even closer as he backed away as best as he could.

“Where did you live before?” she asked.

“In army camps, mostly, depending on the Hegemonic Lord hiring my Master at the time.”

“You’re a mercenary.”

“My Master is. I just follow him wherever he goes.” Raksha felt a sudden lump in his throat. He’d never spent more than a day away from his Master. “Well, at least I used to. I fell off a cliff when some people from Wu Dang attacked us. When I came to, they were dead, and my Master was standing on top of the cliff. He told me to travel by myself and to find him again when I’m ready.”

“Wu Dang? Why would martial scientists from an Orthodox Order attack your Master? Who is he?”

Raksha shrugged. “Shura.”

“Shura? Wait!” Ko’ais’s eyes were wide. “Your Master is Shura the Destroyer?”

“That’s what people call him. He gets really grumpy about it sometimes.”

“The Stormbringer! Of course! You’re the Destroyer’s apprentice! No wonder you handled Xi’ruo so easily.”

“She wasn’t very strong. Quite sloppy too. I think you’d have beaten her very handily. I saw how you defeated the other one. Nice application of your aegis there. I also like your blade Form. Graceful yet decisive.”

“Such a sweet talker.” Ko’ais smiled again, like she’d done when they were running. She patted his cheek. Her smile, which quirked up on the left side of her face more than it did on the right, made him feel warm and uncomfortable.

She was very pretty. But not in the same way the comfort women in army camps were. She wore no rouge, powders, or face-paint. More strikingly, if he wasn’t mistaken, her aegis was slightly stronger than his. What Path did she practice? Whatever it was, her Path’s aegis had melded seamlessly— no, perfectly—with the Stormbringer’s. No, that wasn’t quite right. Her aegis had melded with his. He’d never even thought such a thing was possible. Perhaps—

The panel chimed. The elevator halted, and its doors slid open. Raksha sighed inwardly with relief.

“We’re here,” Ko’ais said, her voice wavering.

Raksha thought he saw moisture well up in the corners of her eyes again before she turned away.

A boy leaned against the railing, staring out into the neon smog-haze of Neo-Shangzhen’s skyline. His misshapen features were thick and flat, and his eyes were slanted upwards at a slight angle. He wore a tattered tie-dyed shirt.

It’s him. It’s got to be.

Ko’ais leaped forward and embraced Ko’shin tightly. Her brother blinked in surprise. He looked at her and asked, “Ma…?”

“No, silly,” Ko’ais said. Tears ran down her cheeks, but she didn’t care. She was home at last. “It’s me, Ko’ais. Remember? Big sis?”

A huge smile spread across Ko’shin’s face. He nodded and hugged her back. “Sis! Big sis! You back!”

“Yes, yes, I am.” She looked at her brother’s face. When she’d last seen it a decade ago, he’d only been four years old. She still recognized him: the scruffy dark hair, the flat and overly-wide facial features, and drooping, twitchy posture. “I’m never going to leave you again.”

Ko’shin squealed with joy, but then his gaze was drawn to something behind her. Raksha’s booted footsteps stopped several strides away, and when Ko’ais turned to him, he was shuffling awkwardly. She rolled her eyes. Looks like I’ve got two children to look after.

“Ko’shin, come meet my friend, Raksha,” she said.

Ko’shin skipped to the martial scientist and stuck out his hand.

“Hello!” he bellowed.

Raksha made a visible but ultimately futile effort to put on a convincing smile.

“Er… yes, hello.”

The two boys shook hands.

“Raksha needs shower!” Ko’shin declared. “Stink! Dirty!”

Raksha wore a look of profound misery on his face, and Ko’ais laughed.

“He’s right, you know,” she said.

“Big sis! You too!”

“What?”

Raksha chuckled. “He’s right, you know.”

“Shut up, Raksha.”

**

Unit 21 was just around the corner of the winding habitant block corridors. Ko’shin fumbled with the copper key tied to a cord around his neck, unlocked the plastiboard door, and opened it. He rushed in, bellowing loudly.

“Ma! Ma!” he cried.

Ko’ais stepped into the habitant unit she’d been taken from ten years ago, sinking into its familiar scents and feasting her eyes on the yellow light of the single flickering bulb that illuminated the living space. The ambient noise of thousands of residents going about their lives hummed through the thin walls of #451.

Home. I’m—

The sharp crack of a palm hitting flesh tore her from her reverie.

“Go away, you disgusting pig,” a man’s voice thundered from the bedroom. Ko’shin stumbled out, clutching his red cheek. “I thought you’d gotten rid of this… this thing, Ye’ais.”

“I told him to stay outside, Ha’bin, I did,” a woman’s voice said.

A man stormed out into the living room, doing up the buckles of his factory-issue trousers. “I’ve had enough. You can rot along with your diseased, retarded spawn!”

A woman followed him, clutching a tattered gown of synthetic silk around herself. “No, please don’t go! Please! I’ll get rid of him! I’ll…”

Their words trailed off as Ko’ais walked forward with an arm around Ko’shin’s shoulders. Her brother sobbed softly, his face buried in his hands.

“Ko’ais…?” the woman asked. She had the same features as her daughter, only older and worn by decades of despair and chem-abuse.

“Hello, Ma,” Ko’ais replied. She ushered Ko’shin to a stool and gently pushed him down onto it. Then she took a step toward the man called Ha’bin. He fell to his knees, his face going pale.

“Great… Great Lady! How may this lowly one serve you?” he stammered.

“You touched my brother,” Ko’ais growled. The Scarlet Thorn beckoned. Her vision reddened. She knew that black veins would be crawling across her cheeks.

Absolute horror bled from Ma and the man. Ko’ais could smell it oozing from the pores of their skin, see it in the lines on their faces, hear it in their rasping gasps.

Kill him! Eat his heart! The air began to hum in time with her heartbeat. She raised a hand, flexed its fingers into claws. Something seized her forearm, something strong enough to resist the Scarlet Thorn.

She tore herself free of the grasp and spun around, aching to kill everything in sight.

But Ko’ais found herself looking into Raksha’s dilated black irises. He was clad in his aegis as well, its energy field crackling and popping against hers. She’d touched the Stormbringer’s relentless, burning fury and knew its lust for glorious carnage—so similar it was to the Scarlet Thorn’s. Up close, she took note of his facial tics, the evident strain in his trembling jaw. Unlike her, Raksha didn’t embrace his Forbidden Path. He forced it down, crushed its fury beneath his will.

Ko’ais’s killing rage faltered, uncertain. She’d never once thought to resist the Scarlet Thorn’s siren call to slaughter.

“No,” Raksha said. He nodded in Ko’shin’s direction.

Her brother was curled up into a corner, whimpering in horror—at her.

At me.

The Scarlet Thorn fell away.

Raksha let go of the Stormbringer too, and the tortured air within Unit 21 fell silent.

“You’d better leave,” he told Ha’bin.

The man scrambled out frantically.

Ko’ais watched him go, driving all thoughts of murder from her mind as she hugged Ko’shin.

“Hush, hush, everything is alright, everything is fine,” Ko’ais muttered again and again. Several minutes later, her brother recovered enough to look up at her.

“Monster’s gone …?” he asked.

“Yes, yes, she’s gone.” Ko’ais stroked Ko’shin’s hair. “She’ll never appear again. Never.”

“She makes me scared,” he said. “I think she’s bad.”

“I think so too, ‘Shin, I think so too.” Ko’ais bit her lower lip and shook her head. No, no more tears.

“Why… why are you here, Ko’ais?” Ma asked. Her voice trembled as she spoke. “They said you’d never come back. No one taken by the Temple does.”

“I ran away, Ma.”

“You what?” Ma clutched the sides of her face in her hands. “But they’ll come after you! They’ll come here! You’re going to bring the Razor Acolytes here! They’ll kill everyone!”

Sudden inspiration struck Ko’ais.

“Then I won’t be here. I’ll take Ko’shin, and we’ll go far away, somewhere far enough that they’ll never find us,” she said.

“But…”

“But what? You were so eager to get rid of him just now. With the both of us gone, you can whore around as much as you want.”

“You worthless little tramp!” Ma raised her hand, but Ko’ais was no longer the little girl she could beat, pinch, and burn at the end of a disappointing day. A single glare was all it took to freeze Ma in her tracks.

“Touch me and I’ll kill you,” Ko’ais snarled.

Ma sank down onto her haunches, the anger on her face slackening into the listless, hopeless resignation that Ko’ais remembered so clearly. She’s been like that since Pa died. She’s still like that. Nothing has changed. It’s been so long, but nothing has changed.

“When are you leaving?” Ma asked, her voice numb and toneless.

“In the morning. We’ll be gone before you wake up.” Ko’ais pulled Ko’shin to his feet and ruffled his hair. “Pack your things, ‘Shin. We’re going on an adventure.”

His flat features lit up. “Wow! I’ll wear my best shirt!”

She smiled and was about to speak when she heard the growling of an empty stomach.

Raksha coughed sheepishly as Ko’ais turned to him. Ko’shin laughed, walked over, and took Raksha by the forearm.

“Come! Make you some noodles!” Ko’shin said. He led Raksha to the stove in the corner. “Green onion’s good, yes?”

“Er… yes, that’d be fine.” Raksha looked at Ko’ais and then at Ko’shin. “What’s an onion?”

**

“It… it fits,” Raksha grunted.

He wore one of Ko’shin’s shirts and a pair of factory-issue trousers. The shirt was bright yellow, and it had a green star dyed across its front.

Raksha sighed. “Thanks for the clothes, but I really wish you hadn’t thrown my old ones out.”

“Those were stinking rags!” Ko’ais snapped. They were both sitting on the unit floor. Ko’shin snored on a foam mattress, and Ma was out, probably to score what chems she could. “Where did you even get those?”

“I took them off some corpses on a battlefield. I get all my clothes like this.”

“That’s disgusting.”

Raksha shrugged. “Master always said not to waste stuff.”

Ah, yes, The Destroyer. Ko’ais cupped her chin in her hands, resting her elbows on her knees. She’d changed into one of Ma’s drab gray gowns. The bracers, cuirass, and shoulder and shin guards of her battle harness were stacked in a corner, rinsed clean of gore. Her short sword and the spiked chain that’d belonged to Wo’rai lay in a pile beside her gear, along with Raksha’s weapon belt and Xi’ruo’s truncated halberd.

She turned back to Raksha. “Tell me about your Master.”

“He’s Shura of the Stormbringer.” Raksha gave her a curious look. “What else is there to say? He’s grumpy in the mornings. He’s a mercenary. He kills people if you pay him. That’s all there is, really.”

“Why did he tell you to leave?” Ko’ais reached out and straightened Raksha’s collar, earning an irritated—and flustered. That is so adorable—grunt for her efforts. Both of them smelled of shower disinfectant. “You can’t take care of yourself. How long have you been eating out of garbage heaps?”

“In Neo-Shangzhen? A week, I think? There’s so much smog in this city that it’s hard to see where the sun is in the sky. Also, people throw out so much stuff here. Such a waste.” Raksha frowned. “Ko’ais, I want to ask about your Path.”

A sudden flicker of anxiety coursed through her. “What?” Your Path is Forbidden, too.

“You felt it too in the alley, didn’t you? It’s extremely compatible with the Stormbringer. That explains why we can merge our systems so easily and so… completely. I couldn’t do that even with Master, and we both follow the same Path.” Raksha scratched the back of his head, as if embarrassed with what he’d been about to say. “Hmmm. I wonder…”

Ko’ais was struck again by how clear, open, and devoid of loathing his gaze was. No one looks at me like that. She made up her mind. “I’ll tell you the Scarlet Thorn’s channeling patterns and meridian configurations.”

Raksha’s eyes widened at her offer. He had to be surprised, and Ko’ais knew why. Martial scientists, especially those in the Orthodox Orders, guarded the secrets of their Paths jealously. Initiates were taught the fundamentals by their masters, and if they were lucky, they would learn the Common Path of their Order. Only the most prized and gifted apprentices were chosen to follow their Order’s True Path.

As Mistress’s beloved prodigy, Ko’ais had learned the secrets of the Scarlet Thorn several years ago, though her mastery of the Path was far from complete. Since she’d already run away and killed several of her sect-sisters, there was no reason why she shouldn’t complete her betrayal. Rot in hell, Mistress.

“I’ll teach you the Stormbringer in return,” he said.

Ko’ais was surprised herself. “That’s very generous of you. What would your Master say?”

“I don’t think he’d care. He once sat down with a Dharumic monk and taught him everything about the Stormbringer. The monk didn’t even get past the initial channels before dying from an imploded nexus. Apparently, the Stormbringer is too difficult for most martial scientists. But I think you’ll manage. I’ve never met someone as gifted as you before,” Raksha said, leaning back in his seat.

“Sweet-talking me again, Raksha? You’re getting pretty good at this.” Ko’ais smiled at him. Predictably enough, Raksha fidgeted and looked away, much to her amusement.

“I suppose we’ll be traveling together then?” he asked. “Where will we go? We can easily join a warband and fight for a Hegemonic Lord. There’s bound to be a war happening nearby.”

“Away, far away. We need to leave Neo-Shangzhen.” Ko’ais glanced at Ko’shin. “And no, we’ll not join a warband. I’ve got to keep my brother safe.”

“Battleis the best place to hone our martial science.”

“No. No wars. No fighting. I’ll find an agri-village or somewhere else, some quiet place to hide in with Ko’shin. You can come along or not. If you want, you’re welcome to stick around until you’ve learned everything about the Scarlet Thorn. Or you can go to hell. I don’t care,” she snarled.

Raksha quirked an eyebrow.

“What?”

“Your aegis.”

To her dismay, Ko’ais found that she’d been seized by the Scarlet Thorn. With a tremendous effort, she released it before her aegis woke Ko’shin up with its humming. This wasn’t the first time it had crept upon her unbidden. And it was doing so more frequently too.

“The Stormbringer has the same problem. Master suffers greatly from it.” Raksha folded his arms across his chest.

Ko’ais studied his face closely, looking for any signs of fear and distrust, but his expression remained clear and unassuming. He… he saw that and he’s still… still…

“By studying other Paths, I hope to fix the Stormbringer and its degenerative side-effects. Perhaps I can do the same for the Scarlet Thorn,” Raksha continued.

It took a moment for his words to sink in, but when they did, Ko’ais laughed bitterly. “Fix the Stormbringer? The Scarlet Thorn? That’s insane, stupid, or both! Our Paths have been around for centuries, if not millennia, and you think you can just fix them?”

“Master thinks I can, and he’s told me to do so, so I will. I don’t care what you think,” Raksha said stubbornly.

He’s sad and worried about his Master. The Destroyer must be very different from Mistress. I wonder what he’s like.

“Whatever.” Ko’ais got to her feet and walked over to check on Ko’shin. His knapsack was beside his mattress. She smiled as she recalled how he’d squealed with joy as he packed it a few hours ago. He clutched her hand as she stroked his cheek.

“Don’t go, big sis,” Ko’shin mumbled in his sleep.

“I won’t,” she said.

Then she heard it. The rasp of steel against oiled leather. The thrumming of Scarlet Thorn aegises.

No. No. This can’t be happening. How did they find me so quickly?

“Ko’ais!” Raksha hissed, diving for his weapon belt. He snatched up his blade and tossed Ko’ais’s short sword to her, hilt-first.

She caught it.

The front door exploded.