Curse of Honor: A Legend of the Five Rings Novel by David Annandale

Author:David Annandale [Annandale, David]
Language: eng
Format: azw3
Tags: mystery, Action & Adventure, epic fantasy, horror, samurai, Fiction, Fantasy, Epic, Media Tie-In
Publisher: Aconyte
Published: 2020-10-06T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter 14

During the hour of the rooster, there was only the storm. For Barako and everyone around her, it seemed as if there might never be anything again except the storm. It had consumed the world with finality.

Barako and Doreni made their way back to the guard tower’s staircase and descended, beginning their long walk back to their quarters to arm themselves. Even inside the tower, the wind found ways to get at them. It was so powerful, it found every chink in the walls of the tower. It keened mournfully down the stairs, caressing Barako, and rubbing freezing fangs against the back of her neck.

“I did not wake when Haru left for the city during the night,” said Doreni. “When the storm came then…”

“It did not hit like this,” Barako answered the suspended question. “It came quickly. Not unnaturally, though.”

“Or at least not visibly so.”

“Yes.”

And that storm had nothing of this one’s intensity. The first screaming blast of wind had blown out all the torches on the north wall. It caught the lantern hanging in the east tower and hurled it away into the night. The guards were still struggling to get and keep torches lit.

Barako and Doreni reached the bottom of the stairs. They opened the door and stared into a black limbo streaked with fine lines of silver.

“The storm then was never this dark,” said Doreni.

“All that tempest had to do was keep us behind the walls long enough for Haru to reach Night’s Hunger.”

“You think the earlier storm was unnatural too?”

“I didn’t then. Now I fear it might have been. And this one wants to knock the walls down. It wants to destroy us.”

“It may yet succeed,” said Doreni. “We could lose our way in that blackness and freeze to death long before we reached the castle.”

“We have no choice,” Barako told him.

“No, we don’t. Ancestors, watch over us and guide our way,” Doreni prayed.

They ran from the tower. Barako put her trust in her sense of direction. She knew where the castle was in relation to the gates. All she had to do was run in a straight line.

So thought every victim of a blizzard ever.

She had grabbed a lantern from the guard post. She lifted it before her and moved out of the tower. The lantern illuminated no more than a couple of feet in front of her. She would have to hope that would be enough to help her walk that straight line.

The wind tore through the courtyard with such force, it was as if the walls were already down. Barako leaned into the wind. The pain of cold dug into her cheeks and forehead. Her ears burned with the freezing bit. Ice formed on her lashes. When she breathed, the cold reached into her lungs and stole the warmth from her core.

She and Doreni staggered forward. She kept looking back before she took another step, trying to make sure she held the line. But she could never see more than a single footstep behind her, and the vague shape of Doreni.

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