Tethered Fates (Soulmates Suck #3)

Prologue

Blood flows from the neck of the bandit.

I kick the flailing man away, the sharp edge of my katana already swinging as another comes at me with a rusty kitchen knife. A single slice is all it takes to open his throat, his broken and dirty nails clawing at his gushing wound as he collapses to the ground.

Once his wet gargling has ceased, and the only noise is the rustling trees and the trickling river over rocks, I turn to face the stranger at my back. The ten paces and eight corpses littering the forest floor are all that separate us.

“You’re a good warrior,” the man calls, casually cleaning his blade with a rag.He’s oddly pale, larger than a bear, and he wandered into my declining village as the sunset bathed the pitted roads in the same shade of red soaking into my sandals.

And despite the cold night, he was clothed in little but an air of mystery.

“As are you,” I reply, my panting breaths turning into clouds.

The trees overhead sway through the moonlight, creating shifting patterns that dance across the stranger’s broad face. His sword, like his strangely accented Japanese, feels familiar yet foreign. It’s like a Chokutō, but broader and heavier—his accent, too.

As always, curiosity tugs at me. Who is this man, and why, though he breathes as heavily as I do, do no clouds leave his mouth?

“You called yourself a traveller in search of something, stranger,” I say, standing straight, the breeze sweeping up the orange leaves between us. “And I said I’d help if you helped me end the bandits killing my former master’s peasants.”

“And now they’re dead,” he replies, his confidence unshakable.

I nod, weary. Intrigued. “They are.”

His answering grin is a vicious slice of his lips, intimidating but not on purpose. Like a wolf in tall grass, it seems simply his nature. “You have no master then?”

My master, like his family, guard, and most everyone else, succumbed to a fever. They died shitting themselves and coughing up chunks of lung. But this man doesn’t need to know that. “The remaining few will move somewhere else now that the bandits are cleared.”

“Not you?” He swings up his heavy sword, resting it flat on his wide shoulders.

A mile from where he stands is the tree where I held my first katana.

By the river is the spot where I kissed my first boy.

Three miles from the bridge leading into our village is where I first took a life.

I know every hovel the peasants lived in, the crumbling castle my former master prided over, and the shrine where the priests were murdered.

Every inch of my home is a well-documented memory collecting dust, and even before this trouble, thinking about it bored me.

“Where are you from?” I ask instead.

“Far across the sea.” And like the hungry wolf, he stalks closer. Sniffing out the nearly dead thing my parents, master, and mentors tried to beat out of me—curiosity.

“From a place called Norevegr.”

I try to say the name, and he laughs. I laughed at him when he attempted to pronounce the name of my village, so it’s only fair.

“I always knew my village was small, but now I’ve met you, and I’m learning just how small my life really is,” I comment. He may see prey within me, but within him I spy… possibility.

He may be the hungry wolf, but I’ve been starving for so much longer.

The stranger nods, like he’s had the same thought before. “My name’s Vidar.”

“An odd name for an odd man.”

He laughs, deep as rolling thunder. “I’m looking for a companion.”

“I don’t fuck men like you. I prefer someone with a…” I tilt my head. “Softer soul.”

Vidar grins. This man is neither a cultivated noble nor a desperate bandit. He’s a warrior, and perhaps one that’s always been without a master.

“And I only fuck women, so that’s perfect. I’m looking for someone who wants an adventure.”

“We’re friends now?” I throw back, having more fun in this one conversation than in…

Have I ever had fun?

“We fought side by side, we’re practically brothers,” he answers with a smirk. “I want to give you a gift that’ll allow us to travel the world and see its wonders. You’ll forever fuck your soft-souled men, and drink and fight. How does that sound?”

I shake my head, lips quirking up. “So I’ve stumbled upon a fool who can fight, huh?”

“A fool, maybe.” His canines elongate into fangs that glint as keenly in the moonlight as his freshly cleaned blade. “But it’s all true.”

A cloud of shocked air leaves me as I ready my katana. “What are you? An Oni? Some kind of spirit?”

Vidar pounds his chest. “Flesh and blood like you, friend. You can take my offer, or you can stay here, and I’ll find another samurai.”

“I’m not a samurai anymore,” I shoot back. As if it even matters now.

“Even more reason to come and see the world with me. Only a few years ago, I lived in a small village like yours. Now I get to meet a man who looks like you, and you get to meet a man who looks like me. Just think of all the new wonders we can discover.”

I keep my guard up, that nearly dead curiosity in my soul rising, and after a beat, I lower my weapon and wonder if I’m a bigger fool than this stranger. Vidar seems to understand. Perhaps warriors like us will always be able to understand each other.

“Do you have coin?” My voice comes out steady, even as my pulse thrums.

He nods.

“Give it to the last of the villagers. That’ll be my last act as their protector. Then show me this world.”

Vidar grins, dry leaves crunching underfoot as he stops before me. “What’s your name?”

I meet the unusual grey of his gaze as if it were a challenge; perhaps I should be scared. But all I feel is unabashed excitement. What would those who tried to kill my curiosity think of me now?

“Kurosawa Sen,” I reply, because they’re all dead, and for once, I intend to live.

As the night darkens, and blood flows from my pierced throat, and into Vidar’s hungry mouth, for once I’m not bored by the prospect of what’ll happen when I wake.

“Welcome to the Haraldsson Vampire family, Kurosawa Sen.”