I held up a hand. “Stop, Koshu. I don’t think we have any choice. I have the three most powerful members of the party with me here; I’m not afraid of what the Festering will throw at us. You must take command of the rest of the party and wait for us. Test the barrier regularly to see if it is still in place—if it drops, come after us.”
One of Kai’s lieutenants came up to the barrier as well to talk to Kai. She instructed him that they should follow General Koshu’s orders until such time as we met again.
“And if we do not meet again?” the lieutenant asked, his brow furrowed and beads of sweat glistening on his forehead.
“Then the Broken Sword Company must pick a new leader from among the ranks.”
“I’m not happy with this at all,” Koshu protested.
“We have no choice, my friend,” I repeated. “Wait for us, and be ready to follow at a moment’s notice.”
I turned to my three companions. The air smelled foul, the daylight was clouded and hazy with the noxious fumes that accompanied the presence of the Festering.
“Come,” I said to my small group. “Let’s go on. If this is a trap, our only choice is to travel to the center of the Festering and find the source.”
“It has to be Yakuna,” Toshiro said. He winced, as though to say the words about his old friend was physically painful. “This is near the site of the rumors.”
“If it’s Yakuna, then he’s somehow using the Festering to create this invisible barrier around the area which is under his influence. The only way to break it will be to break him.”
Koshu and the others watched reluctantly as I led Cara, Kai, and Toshiro away from them, into the thick haze and polluted mist of the Festering.
“Can you locate its center?” Cara asked me after we had been walking for a little while.
I looked around. Behind us, there was no sign of our companions, only the corrupted brown of the Festered landscape fading in the dark mist. Undulating hills marched off into the haze in every direction, and twisted, rotten trees stood about in little copses. I concentrated on my sense of the Festering, seeing the waves of malignant energy pulsing through the air around us.
After a moment, I pointed up the valley. The land in that direction climbed slowly. A river ran toward us along the valley floor. In normal times, it would have been beautiful, no doubt. Now, the water was thick and foul-smelling even from here, and overlaid with a glistening, oily scum.
“That way.” I pointed upriver in the direction that the waves of energy were coming from. “The source of it is that way.”
“Toward the old Miru castle,” Toshiro whispered.
“Miru castle?” Cara asked.
He nodded. “Miru was an old watch castle back in the days when this was border country against the rebels. That was many years ago now. There was a big battle here. Many men died, rebels and Shogunate forces alike. After the battle, the castle was no longer needed. It was not repaired, and it fell into ruin.”
“How far is it?” Kai asked him.
“Not far. Perhaps an hour on foot.”
“Yakuna must be there,” I said with conviction. “The Festering is expanding from a central point, so it would be appropriate for it to come from a place that was the site of slaughter. We’ll set off in that direction without delay.”
We started walking, but it wasn’t easy going. The very landscape seemed to resist us, and frequently I or one of my companions felt something grapple at our feet and ankles out of the undergrowth. The third time it happened, Cara cried out and stumbled. Something chittered and scuttled away through the long grass.
We had made steady progress up the infested valley, and the soaring hills on either side climbed up into the thick haze and out of sight. The whole scene was eerily deserted and barren, and yet there was a presence in the place, like something watching us with malevolent intent.
The mist coalesced around us and thickened. Humanoid forms appeared, looming at us out of the gloom.
“What are they?” Cara cried. Her bow was in her hand, and her eyes were wide as she stared at the figures.
“They are the spirits of the warriors who died in this place,” Toshiro explained, drawing his sword and standing back-to-back with Kai.
“Wait a moment,” I said to my companions. “Look at them. They’re not attacking. They’re interested, but...” I took a bold step toward a cluster of the vague forms, and they drew back from me with a frightened hissing noise.
“Somehow, I don’t think they’re corrupted,” I continued. “I think they’re condemned to haunt this place. The Festering has disturbed them from their rest, but they are not possessed by it. I might almost say that they are glad of our presence, and would support us if they could.”
As I said it, the ghostly forms gave way to us, clustering behind us and moving as if urging us forward up the valley.
“I wish they’d let us get on with it,” Cara said. “Supportive or not, they’re rather terrifying.”
We all laughed at that, and the tension eased a little. The crowd of spirits hung back, watching and waiting.
“Let’s keep an eye on them,” I warned as we started forward again. “I think the Festering can be directed toward specific targets. For some reason whoever is controlling it in this valley has not directed it toward these ghosts. He may still be able to. Let’s be wary.”
“It has to be Yakuna,” Toshiro said, sounding sad for the plight of his old friend. “Somehow, he has become the controller of all the evil in this valley.”
“I’m afraid you’re almost certainly right,” I said. “The Festering has caught him and used him as a vector to spread into the valley, but I feel a strong will at work here, more than the unfocused evil
