Page 7

My tails hurt.

That offended me most of all.

Eight magnificent tails should never hurt. They should sweep through the air like smoke. They should demand attention. They should remind every creature stupid enough to challenge me that the fox spirit before them had survived eight centuries.

Instead, mine lay bent and ragged behind my body.

It will take me more than thirty days to heal this time.

I released a low growl in annoyance. Pain immediately punished me.

Fuck.

I lowered my head onto my paws.

Water trickled nearby.

I could smell it.

Fresh.

Cold.

Close.

My tongue felt twice its proper size, and thirst burned through me, yet I lacked the strength to crawl the remaining distance to the stream.

Pathetic.

All I could do was remain on the abandoned shrine grounds and continue to let the land heal me.

Before there had been concrete beneath Tokyo, before bullet trains, skyscrapers, neon lights, organized crime syndicates, and aircraft cutting through the heavens, this mountain had known my paws. Even the trees and stones recognized my blood.

Magic moved through the soil in ancient currents. It entered my body and slowly repaired what modern weapons had destroyed, knitting muscle, fusing bone, and replenishing spiritual energy that I had nearly drained to nothing.

I closed my eyes.

Gunshots exploded inside my memory. Men screamed. Steel flashed. Blood splattered.

When will the curse end? I am done protecting this bloodline.

For generations, protecting his ancestors had been simple. For many decades I simply stayed hidden, observed, and interfered only when necessary.

A lot of his ancestors had lived, loved, reproduced, murdered, betrayed, accumulated wealth, and died without realizing that something followed their family through history.

Me.

A horse refusing to carry one of them toward an ambush.

An enemy becoming mysteriously confused and entering the wrong house.

A blade missing an artery by a fraction.

A fever breaking in the middle of the night.

They’d considered it luck, fate, or divine intervention.

Humans had endless explanations for what they did not understand. They never considered an eight-tailed kitsune.