Page 33 of Outfoxed

Before being put into storage, someone had oiled the blade, polishing the metal to a high shine. The sharpened edge caught the light, and I whistled at my find.

If the rest of the blades came close, I could sell off the weapons and have enough to live comfortably in the East without worrying about a damned thing for years. If I built a cabin out in the woods, I wouldn’t need to worry about the bounty, either.

I could just be.

One by one, I checked the weapons, admiring the eclectic collection of short swords, rapiers, sabers, bastard swords, daggers, hunting knives, and even a stiletto, which I debated keeping for myself. At the bottom, I discovered a katana, and I lifted it out, easing the canvas off its sheath.

Unlike the other weapons, all of which possessed black, utilitarian sheaths, golden thread stitched into blue leather depicted a running kitsune, its nine tails cascading behind it. I sucked in a breath, marveling at the careful stitching and the artistry of even the leather-wrapped hilt, which braided black and gold together in a marriage of darkness and light.

It pained me such a beautiful thing had been hidden away in a cellar in a dying land.

Aware my magic might waken at its will rather than mine, I inhaled, curled my fingers around the hilt, and drew the blade.

The rippled pattern to the steel, as though the blade had been folded thousands upon thousands of times in its forging, enthralled me as no other weapon had in the past. I’d considered the other weapons to be beautiful, but I learned an important lesson: I’d known nothing of a sword’s beauty until beholding the katana.

Wide eyed with wonder, I trailed my fingers along the blade’s length, marveling at how the sheath, a piece of art by right, failed to match the wonders held within its embrace.

I closed my eyes, and my magic took hold of me in its gentle but relentless grip.

Wednesday, January 26, 1502.

Kyoto, Japan.

My magic hated me. Why else would it dump me in the past, offering crystal-clear clarity of how many years, days, and minutes stretched between me and the past? On a good day, it offered the knowledge in a way I understood rather than a vast, sickening number.

On a bad one, its precision slammed me into a pulp, overwhelming me with information about where I was, when I was, and why I was there.

Today was a bad day.

My magic neglected to tell me whereabouts in Kyoto I’d been unceremoniously dumped, but with over five hundred years spanning between the present and the Japan I ventured into, I expected to recognize little of the world around me. As always, I hung in darkness for a few moments before my magic settled and I became aware of my surroundings.

One day, I might understand how my magic fucked with my head, allowing me to perceive the past with all of my senses. The air reeked of smoke, my non-existent eyes burned, and a biting cold tore at me. Patches of snow clung to the ground, and blood stained it. In the distance, a mountain rose, shrouded with snow and mist. The blood led to the body, that of a man dressed in robes similar to what Batbayar wore when he missed Japan and felt ceremonious.

The rich blue trimmed with purple screamed wealth, not that wealth did a corpse any good.

The man held the sheath of the katana in his hand, where it remained buckled around his waist. While I’d heard of the foolish or unwary being killed with their own swords before, I’d never seen it actually happen. The man’s killer, dressed in the equivalent of rags, used the katana to slice through his victim’s throat, a rather unnecessary gesture in my opinion. Did he not realize he stabbed a corpse?

Once certain of his kill, he went to work stripping the body of anything of use, including the sheath, which he secured around his hips and belted into place. Using a dagger with a chipped edge, the killer cut the string of a small, jingling bag, tucking it into his clothes. I’d have to ask Batbayar what he wore; it reminded me of a mix between our dojo attire and something more like a kimono, made of rough linen stained from heavy use.

Using the fallen man’s clothes, the killer cleaned off the blade.

The katana mourned, and my magic told me a sad truth of its name: Peace.

Friday, October 12, 1501.

Kyoto, Japan.

A spark of magic lurked within the forge, and I recognized the face of the man hammering and folding the unfinished steel of the katana he’d one day name Peace. In its cruel way, my magic forced me to observe and nothing more. Had I been given the chance, I would have warned him about his fate so he could change it.

Then, as always, I wondered how the present would change if I could alter the past.

Would the sword have found its way into my cellar had it not been stolen and used to kill the man who’d forged it?

I expected my magic to leave me waiting, observing the world go by at its pace rather than mine, but the blacksmith finished his work, quenched the blade a final time, installed the hilt, which he’d wrapped with dark blue leather, and went to work sharpening its lethal edge.

I wondered at the choice of blue; Batbayar had taught a few lessons about the importance of colors in varying Asian cultures, with his beloved Japanese borrowing elements from the Chinese to create a system of values assigned colors. Dark blue meant something, and I concentrated, struggling to summon the memories of his lessons.

My magic focused on the hilt more than the blade itself, taking on a life of its own as it struggled to communicate something to me, something important. As touching the katana had brought my magic to life, I could only assume the spark of magic lurking within the forge had given the katana some form of life, despite being cold steel a warm hand lovingly crafted.