The Race to Volturnum by Ree Soesbee

The Shadowlands spread before them like a plague, stretching for ri after ri of broken, twisted terrain. Even salt could do no harm to the bitter ground of this wasted land. The earth here had died, long ago, at the hands of oni and other waste. The Shi-Khan Wastes were the lands of Akuma, of a thousand dead Kuni and a hundred tortured lives.

Here the shugenja of the Phoenix gathered, their once-elegant robes stained and torn. A whisper called them, and a voice that had no source murmured into their ears - soft at first, then louder as the wind from the south began to rise. Ten Phoenix bushi escorted the four shugenja, but there had been no battle. The war was being fought to the south, where Tsanuri's Lion held the line against a host of demonic monsters. Behind the Phoenix, samurai of the other clans fought back the rising tide of undead and oni hordes just within view. Tsukune looked back at their rising fires, seeing the silhouettes of warriors, bloodied and fallen, through the smoke. Though the fighting was within earshot of these fields - such as they were-the Shi-Khan Wastes had been considered "relatively safe" by the Unicorn scouts.

"Safe," that is, because neither side had any use for them. Acrid, wasted, filled with pits of acid and hollows of snaking marsh, the land here did not rest. Still, the fighting was close, and the shugenja would need to finish their spells with haste. At any minute, the lines could break, and the oni would be upon them.

"Can the other clans stand without us if we fail?" asked one of the bushi, his yari lowered as they walked cautiously forward, the formation of samurai encircling three robed shugenja, a woman in flame colored armor, and a boy.

"If this ritual works, Raigen-san, then they will not have to. We will be able to spirit entire legions across miles of land, through Akuma's armies. If the Elemental Masters can perform it without . . . " She paused, looking once more at the empty place in the circle of shugenja. Four, where there should be five. "They will have to succeed. Someone must clear the way."

The voice was that of his champion, and the bushi nodded. "And if it fails?" No fear, only preparation echoed in the bushi's tone.

Tsukune had no answer. The ritual itself was one of the most powerful spells of the Isawa libraries, thought destroyed when Isawa Tsuke burned the Phoenix lands. Lost . . . save to the Master of Fire, Hoichu. During the titanic battle with his father's ghost at Morikage long ago, he had wrested the lost knowledge from the mad spirit's mind. But how, when one Master of Fire had failed the clan, could the Phoenix bring themselves to trust another? Tsukune looked at Hoichu carefully, appraising his stance and movements. The young man was powerful, yes, but was he strong enough to bear the kansen of the Shadowlands and the drain they would place on his magic?

The Phoenix could only pray.

The others walked into a tremendous withered clearing, allowing a dark-haired young woman to step forward. She walked slowly, her pale hand reassuringly holding the hand of a boy no older than 10.

"Ningen ...."

The ten-year-old placed his arms on his sister's shoulders with his child's exuberance. "It will be all right, Tsukune-sama. I can hear him, too. And they need me." He looked at the gathering shugenja on the plain before them. "But when we call, you have to come. You have to."

"Of course we will. You're sure . . . ?"

"Ningen-san?" Isawa Hoichu's voice lingered on the stale air. "We are ready."

"I have to go, sister-mei."

"I know." Champion of her clan though she was, Shiba Tsukune could hardly restrain the choke in her voice as she said her goodbyes to the young boy who was too quickly turning into a man. She stood looking out at the desolate waste as Ningen raced forward to the waiting Master of Fire. A few words were exchanged, and the young boy nodded, straightened his gi, and bowed. Hoichu smiled, took Ningen by the hand, and led him into the circle. It was an incomplete circle: four stood in place of five - four where there should be legion.

"We come to the circle that we may guard the Empire," whispered Taeruko, beginning the ancient litany.

"We come to the circle that we may find wisdom in truth," said another man, older, with steely brown eyes.

Hoichu spoke, "We come to the circle that we may have weapons against our enemies."

A pause, and all was silent. Then Ningen chirped quietly, "We come to the circle that we may find balance."

Around them, the wind began to pick up, shifting aimlessly like a caged beast. A solemn chant began in the Master of Air's throat, thrumming softly against the sounds of the battle behind them.

Taeruko's thick blanket of hair moved gently as she lifted a stone from the ground, crushing it into paste between her fingers. As she opened her hand again, gravel - in an impossible volume, given the source - streamed from between her fingers and encircled the shugenja in a ring of floating, flying stones. Her gentle alto voice drifted in the sorcerous wind, echoing from the rocks around her as if the earth itself sang harmony with her chant.

Wisps of smoke drifted into the air, and spontaneous sparks began to cluster around the stones. Each one popped faintly, glowing with energy, until at last some barrier was breached and the stones burst into flame. Swirling flame surrounded the company, blocking the view of the bushi that stood outside.

"Tsukune-sama," Raigen said suddenly, raising his yari. "There are beasts - moving our way. They are headed directly for us; either they see the flames or they feel the magic."

It seems these plains are not so safe after all, thought Tsukune, drawing free her clan's ancestral sword.

Three Lion riders raced toward the plain, their steeds lathered and hot.

"Phoenix-sama!" Matsu Mori shouted, seeing Tsukune. "An oni heads your way. You must retreat back behind the lines!"

"By the Fortunes, we cannot retreat," Tsukune indicated the cluster of shugenja, stone-still in meditation as shining streams of starlight began to glow through the ring of flame and stone. "There is too much to lose."

Mori looked at the shugenja, their hands raised in prayer, and nodded. Signaling his troops to remain, he turned his steed in great leaping strides, bringing the tall bay to a halt. With surety, he drew his own sword. "Then we will stay with you, Shiba-sama."

Tsukune looked back at her brother. Ningen's solemn face - still, quiet with meditation as his elders began to reach into the center of the circle. As they did, strands of starlight, stone, and fire began to form, twisting with their motions, joining with their hands, and pulling at the fabric of the world. Gennai, the Master of Air, twisted the air into their pattern, weaving invisible cords of wind among the darker strands of night.

Side by side with the three Lion horsemen, the Phoenix fell back. At one side, Tsukune shouted orders to build a line and hold it, and, on the other, Mori arranged his two men into a mobile strike unit, harassing the oncoming horde as they drew closer to the small Phoenix stand. Farther off, behind the advancing line of Ugulu and mujina, a volley of sorcery pierced the clouds, falling in bloody rain on the distant Crane and Unicorn guards. The heart of the battle approached.

"The fight wasn't supposed to fall back to this point!" Tsukune cried to Mori as he swept past, her sword cutting down a stray Oni no Ugulu that approached too close. The Phoenix bushi began to move out, farther from the sorcery being performed behind them. Each step they could push the oni back from the ritual, the better. Tsukune wouldn't be satisfied until the chanting of the Elemental Masters was no more than a dull drone in her ears. Here. Here was the place to make their stand. Looking up at Mori on his yabanjin charger, Tsukune shouted, "What has given them the strength to break through the Crane lines?"

Mori smiled bitterly, turning his steed once more. "They must have seen your sorcery, Phoenix. That, and one more thing. The forces of the Shadow have gained strength since your bushi last took the field.

"Mirumoto Sukune has fallen."

Another troupe of oni charged their position, and, though her heart sank, Tsukune fought valiantly. Her sword felt like lead in her hands, but she would not cease her labors. Sukune, the ever-present old man - dead? How bitterly the Dragon would mourn. He had brought fifty soldiers to the wastes of the far south, seeking retribution for his lady's past. If he had died, it was certain that his troops fell beside him. Too many fallen... too many lost.

Behind Tsukune the chants of the Elemental Masters grew, and the wind rose. Soon they would complete their spell - but sooner, the main body of the Shadowlands horde would reach them, and their work would be for naught. Suddenly, a wash of blood magic swelled to the south, rushing like a river toward their position.

There, behind the oni - Goju shadowmancers.

The bloody tide swelled, turning the ground red with blood and washing aside the fumbling oni charge. Tsukune tried to scream, to warn the Elemental Masters before the wave of darkness and blood reached her, but it was too late.

The oni attack had been no more than a feint to cover the true assault. Tsukune saw the men who stood between her and the rolling arc begin to burn, flesh steaming and peeling back from suddenly blackened bones. In seconds, oni, bushi and all exploded into ash and char. The wave continued, and Tsukune felt her face scorch, her long hair burn, and the skin of her callused hands begin to crack with heat and shadow.

Charging from the right, Mori's massive bay steed appeared through a haze, as if the Fortunes themselves had granted him passage. Sweeping Tsukune onto the back of the charger, he urged the horse back toward the Elemental Masters.

"Take cover!" Mori howled to them, but Tsukune, clinging to consciousness, barely heard his roar. The last of the Phoenix bushi, seeing that their champion hung limply from Mori's horse, leapt between the swiftly approaching tide and the circle of shugenja. Their bodies would be the only cover that the Elemental Master would have from the shadowy force.

"You can't stay!" Mori shouted, stunned.

"We cannot leave," Raigen said firmly. "It is not what she would wish." Indicating Tsukune, the Shiba steadfastly stood his ground, positioning himself between the bloody swell and the chanting Master of Air. "We have not fought for the Isawa for a thousand years, given our lives and our honor, to fail them now. We stand with them, as we have promised."

"Damn your courage!" Mori snarled, tugging his horse's reins. He commanded the other two Lion horsemen to join him, and they, too, leapt to place themselves in the path of the death-laden crest. Four men, three horses, and courage were all that stood between the Phoenix Masters and the storm.

Then the tide was upon them.

The chant continued, held aloft by Gennai's experienced bass rumble, but the spell cast by the four Elemental Masters began to fragment under the sorcerous attack of the Goju shadowmancers. The threads of their ritual began to unweave, wrapping them - Masters, Shiba, Lions, all - in a tangled web of sorcery. Through the roar of the wind and the blood-drenched haze of the shinobi, Mori clung to Tsukune's half-conscious form, his body shielding the Phoenix Champion from wind and razor-sharp heat.

"Hoichu . . . no, we cannot . . . " The Master of Earth attempted to pull back on her strands, lacing the stone with fire, trying to end the ritual.

"We need water, Taeruko! The ritual - we must complete . . . " Their voices were lost in the whirlwind, and Mori felt his skin blackening, cracking like the flesh of an acrid desert waste. Around him, the other bushi began to detonate, their ashes scattering on the fierce winds as, one by one, they fell to the shinobi tide.

"My sword . . . ," Tsukune murmured, gathering herself through the agony of the burns she had suffered. With a heroic effort, she lifted the shining blade to the sky and whispered three words. "Shiba . . . help us."

Within her soul, a choir of voices answered the call.

Barely aware, Mori felt rather than saw a fierce glow emanate from Shiba Tsukune's weapon as the Ancestral Sword of the Phoenix sprang to life. Tapping the courage of Tsukune's heart and her dedication to her clan, the sword's glow spread around them, protecting them from the bitter wave of foul blood and shadow. All of the souls that had ever been part of Shiba - the spirits within her own - enshrouded them. Within the faint haven the glow produced, Mori clung to Tsukune, praying to the Fortunes that it would be enough.

Then all Jigoku broke loose around them. The ritual neared completion, bursting into starlight and flames of enchantment. Hoichu dominated the rebellious magic, and, with a fierce yank upon sorcerous strands, Mori felt the world began to spin. He heard Gennai chant, bringing the air to cushion the blow as best he could, but Hoichu's enthusiasm and drive spun the ritual out of control. Without the fifth Elemental Master, they were all lost. Just then, a whisper, barely heard, echoed through the ritual. "We come to the circle that we may find light in the darkness . . . "

The blood coalesced within the whirl of flames, stone and starlight. It shivered, as though some great force tugged at the very nature of its being, and then, with another burst of energy, the red of taint and foulness began to pale. It lightened not to diluted pink, but rather directly from foulness into clear purity. As though the red of all of the blood was changing through will, the redness swam and shrank within the liquid; the blood became water. And the water began to swirl, joining with the other four elements and opening a portal in the center of the Elemental Masters' circle. Mori watched as they winked out one by one, like stars into a morning sky. "It is time," murmured that strange, half-remembered voice, and Mori saw a man with a golden aura standing on the far side of the magical portal. Beyond him, the other Elemental Masters began to appear, the towering gates of Volturnum surrounding them with shadow and darkness.

"Sister, sister!" Ningen's voice echoed strangely though the portal as he clasped the hand of the man with the golden aura. Tsukune strained, but she still couldn't make out his face. Ningen continued to shout joyfully as the portal began to close. "He is here! We have found him! Hurry, oh, hurry! We will wait in Volturnum for you!

"Take care of her . . . !" Ningen screamed, but his voice was soft and pale. Though pain gnawed at Mori's flesh, he did not let go of the Shiba Champion; he watched through a haze of anguish and awe.

The Lion nodded, staring with respect and surprise at the solemn power hiding just behind the young child's eyes. "I will."

Far away, Ningen smiled, brown eyes crinkling within the starlight that surrounded them. Then, the shifting reality that linked distant Volturnum to the Shi-Khan Wastes began to fade.

Tsukune watched as the starlight swallowed them all and the earth began to cease its shaking movements. Seconds later the portal closed, and the images of Volturnum faded to nothingness. "Oh, Ningen." She smiled proudly, lowering her sword as the flames around them began to die. "You did it. All of you. Somehow, I do not know, but you did it."

"Where have they gone?" Mori asked somberly, staring as the last motes of light and flame sparkled in the air and died softly before the coming twilight. "And who have they found?"

"They will wait for us at Volturnum. When we arrive there, the Elemental Masters will be ready. As for the rest . . . " Tsukune shook her head, uncertain. "I do not know."

"Then let them clear the way, and we will not fail them" Mori nodded with a sharp, malicious grin. "Come, Shiba-sama. You are wounded, and there is still much to do."

Tsukune nodded, feeling the voices in her soul quiet and fade. To the far south, a star shone high in the sky, following the trail of the moon.

"Ningen," she whispered, knowing somehow that her brother could hear her, "We will come for you." With that, Mori turned his staggering horse and began the journey back to the encampment, leaving only ashes and smoke to tell the tale.

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