Kuroba Asashin's Arc

Chapter 31 of 44

Kuroba left the palace on foot before the moon set. Ona caught up to him at the pass, her horse steaming in the cold. She did not ask why he had gone. She fell in beside him and rode at a walk. They reached the dojo an hour before dawn. The stone path was wet. The kanji above the door had darkened in the damp. Jasmine climbed the porch rail where it had always climbed. Kuroba pushed the door open and set his staff against the wall. Ona followed him in and shut the door. "You gave Jackie the gate," she said. "You should have given it to me." Kuroba turned to face her. He said nothing. "I held the wall," Ona said. "I killed 15 of the twenty. I stood beside you at the steps when you named her. You put a boy with cracked ribs at her door instead." She did not raise her voice. She did not need to. "Say it." Kuroba pulled the mask down off his face. "I need you close," he said. "Not there. Here." Ona watched him a long moment. Her hand moved to the knife on her left hip and rested there, then dropped. "That is a poor reason," she said. "Say it again anyway." "I need you close," he said. She stepped into him and took his collar in both hands and kissed him. He caught her at the waist. The bow slid off her shoulder and hit the boards. They did not sleep. When the sky grayed, Ona lay against his chest and traced the old scar along his ribs with one finger. "I’ll do anything you ask" she said. But do not lie to me about why." "I did not lie," Kuroba said. "You chose," she said. "That is different. I can live with a choice." She sat up and pulled her shirt over her head and buckled the belt with the twelve blades. The short knife went on last. Kuroba watched her dress in the gray light and understood that the dojo was hers now in a way it had not been yesterday. He had a knight at the palace and a master at the hall, and he stood between them with a staff that had belonged to a dead man. Outside, a bird started in the eucalyptus. Ona opened the door to the porch and looked at the empty square where the students would stand at dawn.