Kuroba Asashin's Arc

Chapter 51 of 51

The dragon thinned to smoke and then to nothing. The air over the courtyard cooled. Kuroba sheathed the odachi and felt the ground settle. Soldiers began to drag the dead brutes into rows along the wall. Water still fell down the face of the tower, steady as a clock. He walked inside to find a bed. The room they had given him sat high in the complex, above the terraces. A narrow window looked out on the falling water. A pallet on the floor. A basin. He set the odachi against the wall and sat on the mat. For the first time in a week his hands were empty. His chest rose and fell without pain. He closed his eyes. A soft knock. He knew the step before the door opened. Kadi stood in the doorway with her small blade chained at her hip and flowers still bright in her hair. She had not changed her clothes since the gate. Blood had dried on the hem of her kimono. She did not come in. "May I sit," she said. He nodded to the mat across from him. She crossed the room and knelt the way a student kneels, not a princess. She kept her back straight. Her hands rested flat on her thighs. She looked at the floor before she looked at him. "My father holds the gate," she said. "He does not need me at his side. Not the way he did this morning." "He has his years back." "Some of them." She lifted her eyes. "Take me with you." Kuroba did not answer. "I want to train at your dojo," she said. "Not as a guest. As a student. Under your master of the hall. Under you." "You are the king's daughter." "I am the girl who rode to your door for help." Her voice stayed level. "I watched you hold two thousand at a gate. I want to be of use when the next Kazrik comes, and one will come." He studied how she held herself. Shoulders square. No shame in the line of her back. Her father had raised her without that weight. It would make her easier to teach. "My oath binds me to your safety," he said. "The safest place for you is this tower." "The safest place for me is beside the man who swore it." She did not blink. "Please." He thought of Ona at the dojo. Of Jackie at the palace. Of Vincent walking his valley without invitation. He thought of the hall he had built to teach exactly this kind of person. "Pack light," he said. "We’ll leave in the morning." She bowed her forehead to the mat and rose. At the door she stopped. "Thank you."