preventing his fall. Fingers wrapped in his now, pulling him in, feeling her burning gaze searching his face.
“Surely you know you are beautiful, Jun?” she said. “Strong and fierce and proud and young. Surely you know how you must look, to someone like me?”
“I fear you see a trinket, Lady. A plaything, perhaps. One to be used and discarded.”
“Used? You think I do not see the want in you, too?”
“Your husband…” he floundered. “Your vows…”
“My husband has not touched me in three years, Jun-san.” Bitterness crept into her voice. The anger grown in the wake of a long-dead sorrow. “And in the two years before that, there was never anything of love in it. Our marriage was arranged by our parents. You are older now than I was when they made me a bride. And as for my Lord Tatsuya’s vows … well, he breaks those nightly with my ladies. Under my very nose.”
“Lady, you do not think clearly. You see a childhood friend and think it more than what it is. Simple shock. Relief after a day of trauma. You are beautiful, surely. But I do not know you.”
“You do not need to know me to love me, Stormdancer.” Jun felt the gentle touch of her fingertips across his cheek. “I do not ask for forever.”
He felt her close, lips brushing against his with every word. He could feel warmth radiating from her body. Her fingertips trailing static electricity across his skin. Down his throat. Along his chest. His breath trembling, quick as hummingbirds as she pressed her body against him, melting all that was left of his will.
“Only tonight,” she breathed.
She stepped away from him, back toward the fire, soft footsteps and the sound of her gown falling layer by layer to the ground. Her voice calling to him in the dark, the oldest, deepest tune, barely audible over the bloodrush of his pulse in his ears.
“Come here, Stormdancer.”
“I cannot see you, Lady…”
“You have hands, do you not? Let them find your way.”
I returned as the Lady Sun cleared the horizon, turning all to blood and fire. The blooms in the fields below unfurling, slow and soft, turning their heads toward the light and opening wide. Jun was waiting for me outside the silo, standing there in the brightening light with his face upturned toward me. I felt his touch in my mind, the strange sensation of returning home, though in truth I had just left the place of my birth.
The Lady Ami emerged from the silo, hair mussed by sleep, the faint remnants of paint upon her face. She looked at the boy, smiling, her eyes shining. The boy saw her stare through mine, smiling broader still, the tremblings of new affection in his thoughts.
“Good morning to you, Lady Ami,” he said, bowing.
“And to you, Stormdancer Jun,” she replied. “The mighty Koh has returned, I see.”
“She spied two armies on her flight back here, Lady. Gathering at the feet of the Four Sisters. It seems your husband and his brother clash there today.”
The smile faded from her face, the color beside it. Whatever peace their brief respite had bought now evaporated in the light of the waking day.
“Then let us waste no time. The fate of our nation is decided this day.”
Jun climbed aboard my back, offered his hand to Ami. Her smile returned—only a brief glimmer, yet enough to set the boy’s heart racing. As their fingers touched, I felt electricity arcing across his skin, the press of warm and sweet summer winds. The Lady climbed onto my shoulders, sitting in front of the boy now, I noted with interest, his arms about her waist.
No time to wonder. No time to ponder.
And fly we did.
Lord Tatsuya stood atop a rugged foothill, surveying the forces arrayed against him. His brother’s armies were arranged in orderly phalanxes, Tiger banners blowing in the breeze, tabards dipped in the same bloody hues; seeming for all the world like a lotus field in bloom. It briefly occurred to the Bull that either he or his brother should have changed their colors so their armies might tell each other apart. Some few of Riku’s men had painted their banners with the sigil of the Bear alongside the Tiger clan, but as it stood, almost every one of the rank-and- file troopers on either side was arrayed in the traditional clan scarlet, roaring Tigers emblazoned on their chests.
Tatsuya’s reserves had arrived from the south, bolstering his numbers, but from the look, Riku still outnumbered him two to one. The high ground would normally offer advantage, but those accursed Guild sky-ships hovering in smoke-stained skies above Riku’s army all but neutralized their gains. The Bear’s attack would almost certainly commence with another aerial bombardment, so Tatsuya had his men sheltering in the caves around him. Yet sooner or later, they would have to venture out to meet Riku’s charge or be hemmed inside the caves.
“And then those bastard ships will blast us to pieces…” Tatsuya muttered.
The Bull looked at the majestic mountains rising up behind him, snow-clad and beautiful. A spring storm was gathering at their summits; cruel Raijin no doubt watching the proceedings from above, the Thunder God delighting in the thought of the slaughter to come. The hills about him were old and strong, roots running deep, the surrounding fields rippling with the chill press of mountain winds. Cool in his lungs. Gentle kisses on his eyelids.
A cry went up from his men, fingers pointed skyward. Tatsuya looked up and saw the silhouette of an arashitora circling above; wingspan of twenty feet, silvered and graceful. Raijin had sent one of his children to give his blessing on the battle to come, it seemed. The Bull raised his hand, palm upturned, asking fortune from the beast and its father—fortune he might live long enough to meet his brother in single—
Soldiers emerged from the caves, murmurs of wonder and astonishment sweeping through their number. Tatsuya blinked, jaw slackening as the beast circled lower, and he finally caught sight of the figures on the arashitora’s back.
“Lady Ami!” came the cry amongst the men.
Tatsuya hurried down his hill, shale and pebbles skittering about his feet, watching the arashitora sweep in to land. Dust and pollen stung his eyes, thunder cracking overhead as the beast touched down, wings pounding, talons spread and gleaming. He saw a boy seated behind his wife, hands upon her waist. As the thunder tiger touched down, the lad leaped off the beast’s back, covered his fist and bowed low to Tatsuya. He looked a scrawny peasant-child; dirty black cloth and ragged shoes, a thin cane of polished pinewood in his hands, milk- white eyes. But Tatsuya spared him only a moment’s glace, instead focused on the wife he had left in Kigen city. Her hair flowing free, wind-tossed and knotted. Her face bereft of paint, her dress torn. Anger flared in his chest along with the disbelief, a frown darkening his brow.
“Ami-chan, what in the Maker’s name goes on here?”
Ami climbed down off the thunder tiger’s back, bowed from the knees.
“I am pleased to see you also, my husband.”
“Hang the pleasantries, woman. What are you doing here? Who is this scrap of a boy who dares lay hands upon you? I should have his head!”
I glared at the Tiger Lord, his words spilling through Jun’s head into mine. A growl seethed in my chest,
