Flame in the Mist (Flame in the Mist #1)(71)

Mariko almost groaned when she heard the unmistakable click of ōkami’s tongue at her side. He slowed his warhorse to match the pace of hers. And leaned close.

“Are you not interested in the song, Takeo?” he teased. The Wolf looked to be in a fine mood on this late afternoon. Briefly Mariko wondered what his angle might be. What this ploy might cost her.

Then decided it didn’t matter.

“I should think you would be far more interested in this sort of song than I, Tsuneoki.” She grinned.

From the corner of her eye, Mariko caught the curve of his lip. A sly, scarred smile.

“Is that meant to be a testament to my prowess?” ōkami spoke in low tones, his eyes gleaming. The suggestiveness in his words caused the blood to rise in her neck. Behind them, the sun was starting its slow descent, the darkness reaching for it from beyond the horizon. And Mariko was suddenly reminded. How a night sky darkened words as well. Imbued them with shadowed meaning.

What once was innocent became illicit with nothing but a glance.

The searing warmth of ōkami’s touch that night beside the hot springs. The fire that had burned through her veins.

Mariko shook her head quickly. “It’s rather a testament to your ridiculousness.”

“Such cruelty.” He tsked. “When all I strive for each day is to convince my shadow I’m someone worth following.”

She glanced down at the long, thin silhouette trailing at his back. It looked jagged and uncertain. Appropriate. “Perhaps you should try harder.”

“Would it be so hard to say something nice? Just once.”

“I shall,” she said simply. “After you show me how.”

He laughed.

They were far in front of the other men now. Riding side by side.

The rōnin and the warrior girl in disguise.

Mariko wanted to hate ōkami. But the memory of his hands sifting through her hair. Of the way his eyes turned up when he smiled. The way his entire demeanor softened when he meant it. When he was true.

ōkami was such an enigma. A boy without honor, who nevertheless did honorable things. Like save Mariko when he could have left her to fend for herself. Or stop to leave money for an elderly woman when he should have been fleeing the imperial city. Like when he kept her secret. Despite the fact that his loyalties remained elsewhere.

Mariko glanced at him furtively. Saw the way his strong fingers lightly grasped the crimson fabric of his reins. Remembered the way his lips shaped his words. ōkami did everything with the natural grace of a boy absent care. He was not calculating. He was instinctual.

And he really did possess some of the finest hands Mariko had ever seen.

Just as she thought to say something nice—about how well he sat in his saddle—ōkami cut his warhorse across her path, halting her, his right fist in the air.

The nostrils of his horse flared. Mariko’s steed whickered.

Before them was a familiar line of maple trees along the westernmost edge of the forest. The outskirts near the watering hole.

Several wisps of dark smoke curled into the air beyond the tree line. Not the single steady stream they were expecting. Not the smoke from the crumbling chimney of the lean-to. A strange scent suffused the sky.

Burning meat. Mingled with a hint of decay.

“Stay here,” ōkami said harshly, kicking his horse into a gallop.

Without a second thought, Mariko followed after him.

“Stay with the men,” he shouted over his shoulder, his brows gathering together.

Anger unfurled in her chest. “You can’t possibly be talking to me,” she said as she drew alongside him. “Nor can you expect me to follow such an insulting order.”

“You idiot,” ōkami said, reining his horse in as they neared the clearing. “I ordered you to stay with Ranmaru because you have a keen eye and a sharp mind.”

They stopped at the edge of the clearing, and Mariko’s throat caught at the sight.

Akira-san’s lean-to was smoldering. As were the rickety tables surrounding it. Across the stretch of cleared land, splatters of blood and patches of scorched earth stained the trampled ground.

A massacre had taken place here.

Several unfortunate patrons were slumped over the tables, long since dead. Some of their bodies had burned in the brushfire.

ōkami dropped from his saddle. Mariko walked after him, taking stock of their surroundings, even though she could see ōkami slowly memorizing every detail in sight.

Mariko knew what it looked like to travel alongside a tracker.

If Kenshin were here, he would be doing exactly the same thing.

Beside the smoldering lean-to, they discovered the bodies of the boy and girl who’d served them the last time. The boy had been slashed across his chest. A clean, unbroken line that had nevertheless caused him immense pain. Mariko knew he had not died quickly. The crimson stain circling his body was wide. Dried at the edges. Mercifully the girl had died instantly, a deep wound across her throat.

Mariko and ōkami paused before the bodies of the girl and the boy, silently grieving their youth. Grieving the loss of life stolen before it could be lived.

A broken voice cut through the silence. A halting cadence crying out into the sky.

“Akira-san,” ōkami said as he began moving past the bodies, his steps urgent.

They found the elderly man with the weathered face behind the lean-to. When they saw him lift a trembling hand, they rushed to his side. He’d been stabbed through the stomach. Was slowly bleeding into his body.