Prologue #2
I tapped the table. "The clinic. Akiro will think it's important. He'll think we have doctors and medical staff there ready to heal the wounded. Put some of your people outside and make it look guarded. Have others hidden to bombard them.”
Yuki smiled. "A decoy?"
"A decoy that bleeds his men." I tapped a second spot on the table.
Behind Daisuke, another ghost appeared. This one was a young Scale who stood with half his face missing.
Riku.
The Yoshiwara blast had taken everything from Riku’s cheekbone up on the left side.
His right eye—the only one—remained focused on me.
He’d been a fisherman before Reo grabbed and trained him to be a top Scale.
He’d come to Kaoru and me days before Yoshiwara and asked for advice on proposing to his girlfriend.
I’d shrugged and given no answer.
Kaoru had smirked and provided way too much advice.
I still never knew if he asked her to marry him or not. I just knew that Reo had personally gone to her in their small villa on the island and delivered the sad news of his death.
Ignoring the ghost, I swallowed. "Toma, your people will be hidden around the bamboo garden. . ."
Riku disappeared.
“That's where the medical staff is now. The basement also holds the sick and elders that couldn’t race for the evacuation.
" I held up one finger. “Just be mindful that Rin's poisons are already in the ground around the sides.
Keep your people wide on the perimeter. Pick your best four.
Make sure they are patient ones that can sit still for hours and shoot without missing. "
Toma nodded. "Done."
In the corner of my vision, at the edge of the ammunition crate Toma had just opened, lay another ghost—a pregnant woman on her side.
One arm flung forward across the floor of the war room.
The other arm twisted wrong beneath her shoulder.
A knife in her round belly. The fabric of her scrub top torn around the handle.
Nao.
Sora's pregnant wife. She was part of the new crop of ghosts suddenly coming to haunt me. Slowly, she turned to me and smiled.
My vision swam.
I gripped the edge of the table.
"Hiro?"
I blinked and turned toward the voice. “Yeah.”
It was Aki. "Take a break."
“I’m not done.”
Aki gave me a sad smile. "We have the brief. We know what to do."
Yuki picked it up. "Take five minutes while you can."
Then, the other Claws jumped in.
Kaede shrugged. "Get some air."
Toma nodded. "We'll keep prepping."
Daisuke frowned. “And don’t take out another lollipop.”
Nao disappeared.
I nodded once and could not trust my voice.
Maybe. . .I should get some air. . .
Sighing, I walked away and did not look at the corridor where Hiroko had stood.
I have to clear my mind. This can’t happen to me during the battle.
I walked past my brother's table.
Kenji looked up.
For one second, his face was bare. The Dragon was gone. The hardness was gone. Whatever he had become over the years had slipped off his face and what was left was the brother who had carried me on his back when I was five.
The brother who had decided that he would always love and protect me.
Kenji leaned his head to the side. “Are you okay?”
“Of course.”
“Good.”
I paused. “And you?”
“I’ve got a call to make.”
“Hard one?”
“Yes.”
“To our Tiger.”
“I already called my Tiger.”
“Then, who will you call now?”
The Dragon mask came back, and he looked down at the phone again. “A monster.”
“A big one?”
“Yes.”
“Good. We need all the monsters we can get tonight.” I left the war room and stepped onto its rarely used balcony.
Cool air brushed over my skin, grounding me. The full moon hung high above the trees, silver-white and patient. Beyond the terrace railing, the island still moved.
A truck rumbled past on the gravel road below with men in the back loading magazines. A voice shouted in Japanese about ammunition counts. A child cried in a corridor far below. A woman screamed something that broke off mid-syllable.
A radio crackled.
Boots pounded.
A whistle blew somewhere down the south path.
But all this noise was still better than the smiling ghosts haunting me inside.
I walked to the far end of the balcony, where the moonlight could not reach. Then, I put my back against the cold stone of the mansion wall, raised my shaking hands to my new locket, and pulled it out from beneath my bulletproof vest.
How did Nyomi know I needed this?
I trembled.
My Tiger. . .
The locket pressed warm against my hand.
A boom rolled across the trees. The terrace railing rattled. Somewhere on the south path, a man yelled, and another man yelled back.
I slid down the wall until I crouched, and for several minutes. . .I stared at the locket.
The chain slid through my fingers. The gold oval rested against my palm. The Great Wave off Kanagawa was exquisitely painted across the front in foam and curling currents.
It had been created by the Japanese artist Katsushika Hokusai around 1831 during Japan’s Edo period. A gigantic wave towered over small boats, its claw-like foam reaching downward like white fingers toward the terrified fishermen beneath. Mount Fuji stood calmly in the distance.
Humanity facing inevitable forces.
Survival beneath overwhelming pressure.
Beauty existing beside danger.
I turned it over with shaking fingers. Koi swam upward across the back. Their scales had been etched one by one into the gold.
What was my Tiger thinking about when she asked the craftsman to do this for me?
I opened the locket.
The hinge released with a soft metallic click and I stared at Nura’s picture. She didn’t look at the camera. Instead, her focus was on something in front of her. Yet her dark brown skin glowed in the soft lighting, and a beautiful smile sat on her face.
My chest tightened and my throat burned.
I only knew you for a short amount of time, but I swear I’ll be grieving you for much longer. Why is that?
I thought of my brother, Kenji, who had decided to go to war against our father the night Nura died.
He loves me too much. . .
The accounting of the dead landed in my soul.
You died because of me, Nura. Then, Hiroko. . .Sora. . .Nao. . .more. . .
Kenji would argue that those were not my deaths. Perhaps that was why he was the Dragon. All I knew was that no matter what. . .my brother could not lose. . .not when he’d sacrificed so much for me and our Tiger.
I closed the locket. The hinge clicked soft against the night. I pressed my thumb against the koi on the back.
There is no other option tonight. Either the Fox dies, or I do.
I tucked the locket back inside my vest, rose, and stared at the moon.
And then after the war. . .whatever I am. . .a man. . .or oni. . .or nothing at all. . .I will just be. . .yet surely there will be more smiling ghosts or not. . .more sleepless hours. . .
I wiped my face with the back of my hand, even though no tears were there to wipe.
Or maybe. . .our Tiger can heal me one more time?
I crunched the lollipop into bits, let the candy melt on my tongue, and against all logic, cruelly smiled just like the ghosts that haunted me.
And deep in the corners of my dark soul. . .
I hoped the smile. . .
would stay on my face through the battle.