Kitsu Sei shouted the last words of her prayer to the kami, and the oni screamed in agony as jade invaded its tainted body. It tossed the battered Crab into a patch of pus-fouled vegetation, and clubbed Sei's last yojimbo with its two misshapen arms, sending the young bushi reeling away. As its other arm reached out desperately to grab her, Sei stumbled backwards, bringing her wakizashi up against its charge. Sei felt the jolt in her arm as the blade slid into the monster's corpulent belly, followed by a much sharper snap of pain as its body mass drove her into the ground beneath it. A detached part of her mind informed her that her wrist was broken while she watched the first hairy-legged spider crawl out of the oni's stomach. Fighting off a wave of blackness, Sei twisted her hip over, dragging the wakizashi through layers of putrescent blubber. The oni screamed again, and Sei felt the tickling itch as dozens of crawling arachnids spilled out onto her. As the beast collapsed, its weight pinned her legs beneath it. She watched the spiders clamber across the fetid plain and up her body, unable to do more than shield her face with her broken arm. The first spider reached her after an eternity of seconds, its sixteen sooty eyes examining her like an expectant lover as it raised a bristly leg to climb her cheek. She felt her cheek go numb beneath its caress, and then, finally, saw the spider shimmer and turn to jade.

Sei counted the seconds off as she lay beneath the oni's petrified remains. Around her, the sounds of battle diminished quickly, and she felt the prickling bites of several smaller inhabitants of the Shadowlands as they crawled out of the earth to investigate her. A minute later, she heard the thump of a warrior's approach, and groaned in relief as strong arms heaved the oni's corpse off of her.She found herself staring into the face of a beaming, crazy- eyed Crab with bad teeth and a patchy beard. In spite of the pain, she grinned up at Hiruma Hikaze. "What took you so long?"

Hikaze laughed his donkey bray, and crushed several of the petrified spiders beneath his boots. "We were busy," he said, crooking a thumb across the battlefield. Sei looked over and saw a larger version of the beast lying in a heap, surrounded by a dozen Hida warriors in various states of injury. As Sei watched, she saw her apprentice Ikoma Akiko tending to their wounds.

Sei scowled at the Crab, "I suppose I can forgive you. That's the lord?"

"That's the lord," Hikaze answered, directing a look of unveiled disgust at her. Sei narrowed her eyes, but Hikaze cut off her biting comment by plucked a writhing ochre worm off of Sei's breastplate. He dropped it and crushed it beneath a booted foot.

"Got to watch out for those. They cause a nasty rash." Sei suppressed her shudder, a constant reflex within the Shadowlands.

"You should probably do something about that arm," Hikaze added. Sei looked down at her wrist and noticed its odd angle. "Oh, yes, I should." With her other hand, she jerked her wakizashi free from the petrified oni and resheathed it before turning her back on her friend and walking away.Hikaze watched her rouse her dazed yojimbo back to consciousness, and grinned as she dragged him over to Akiko. He laughed again, and hefted his tetsubo. After studying the oni corpse for a moment, he brought the tetsubo down upon it with the force of a thousand Crabs' fury. As the monster shattered into countless shards, he muttered, "I hate these things."

-///-

Three hours later Sei found herself seated in the tent of Kuni Utaga, the expedition's leader. As Utaga received the reports of his officers, Sei examined her arm. All traces of her injury were gone, banished by Akiko's healing prayer. She had not been the only one to benefit from a shugenja's magic; several of Utaga's men thanked Sei and Akiko for their recuperative magic. Finally, Utaga turned to her and spoke, "And you, Kitsu? How did your Lions fare against the oni's brood?"

Sei bowed to the old witch-hunter respectfully. "We have found that fighting the Shadowlands requires different tactics than facing our enemies within Rokugan. However, our commitment to our duty is strong and our blades are sharp. As my men come to understand what it means to face honorless abominations, they become the equal of a hundred shadow-spawn. Our blades and the honor of the Lion Clan are pledged to your cause, Utaga-sama."

Sei heard Hikaze and several other Crab samurai snort at her words, but stifled her irritation. Utaga nodded his head at her, and asked, "Well, then, Kitsu. And what do you think of your allies? Hiruma Hikaze here tells stories that you and your apprentices keep your hair long like Crane courtiers beneath your helms, and that you carry silk kimono into the Shadowlands in place of armor." To her ear, Utaga's voice sounded disapproving.

Formally, she replied, "Utaga-sama, I suggest you ask Hikaze-san how he obtained that information to better gauge his true opinion of my forces." She let the statement hang in the air long enough to hear Akiko's stifled protestation behind her.

Utaga turned to Hikaze with an inquisitive look, and said,"Oh, Hikaze-san?"

The veteran Crab snorted again, but inclined his head respectfully. "I like the Lion very much, Utaga-sama. I have no doubt of their ability to stand up for themselves." Utaga nodded, and turned back to Sei.

Sei suppressed her smile at her first meeting with a drunken Hikaze in her private tent. The sake-besotted clown had been rummaging through her possessions, supposedly searching for the 'furry hats' he swore every Lion owned. In Lion lands, such an offense would have earned him at least one duel and at least one death. Here, it earned him a black eye, a bruised rib, and ultimately a pair of friends.

She listened as Utaga asked his next question. "So, Kitsu, it appears you have the respect of the Crab. But what do you think of your other comrades-in-arms?" He indicated the corner, where a gray-furred nezumi jerked up suddenly, a bloody, unidentifiable bone still clutched in its jaws.

It dawned on Sei that she was being tested. "All of nature has lessons to teach, Utaga-sama. It is said that my brother, whose memory I honor more dearly than my life, learned swordplay from a kenku. It ill-behooves me to turn down the opportunity to learn...." She studied the red-mawed nezumi with disgust. It shrank underneath her gaze, and Sei turned away quickly. Despite her revulsion, she had no more desire to shame the ratling than any other samurai within the encampment. "To learn how to survive in a place as inhospitable as the Shadowlands." The answer appeared to satisfy Utaga, and the ratling ducked back down into the corner with obvious relief.

"Well, then," Utaga's tone of voice changed, and Sei sensed that she was about to understand the nature of the test before her. "I ask you this because we have received news from a Hiruma scout concerning you. A party of Lions has been sighted to the southeast of here. They bear the banner of Matsu Toki."

Sei felt her blood turn to ice. "Toki." A flood of memories washed over her at the name.

She remembered standing on the plains of Otosan-Uchi, watching the armies of Ikoma Tsanuri and Kitsu Motso form on opposite sides of the field. Although years had passed since the Day of Thunder, the image of thousands of golden-clad Lions prepared to shed each other's blood was as fresh as today's battle with the oni. Vividly, she recollected kneeling before Tsanuri and uttering her pledge to defend the Emperor, her heart cold with understanding of what her oath to honor would cost her. She recalled looking across the battlefield before the first charge, and turning from the ranks of Kitsu banners on Motso's side to see Matsu Toki's proud, unyielding visage at the forefront of Tsanuri's vanguard. His personal standard had fluttered in a wind that bore the scent of death.

She pushed the memory away with conscious effort, and lifted her head to meet Utaga's sharp scrutiny. Steadying her voice, she said, "Toki is no Lion. He abandoned all that made him a Lion when he chose to serve the darkness. If you go to fight his forces, I will pray that the kami grant me the chance to redeem him," Sei dropped her hand to the hilt of her wakizashi, "by ending his wayward life."

Utaga's eyebrows fell at Sei's pronouncement, and silence spread throughout the tent. Sei held her countenance impassive, but her mind raced at the Crabs' response to her words. Behind her, the Crab samurai shifted in place, and Akiko stiffened with a faint breath. Insight dawned suddenly, and she realized the nature of her mistake: her hand upon her blade's hilt in the presence of a greater lord than she. It was not a mistake she would have made while she lived in the lands of the Lion. Sei's ears strained as she listened for the sounds of their blades being drawn. For an instant, she considered removing her hand, but a thousand years of Lion courage screamed against the gesture of submission. Calming her mind, she held Utaga's gaze and stood, her body tensed and ready for his next words.

Utaga said, "Your words honor you. Perhaps your grandfather was a Crab." He smiled, and the samurai behind him laughed outright. Sei stared at the old witch-hunter, not for the first time disoriented by their incomprehensible behavior. Even after a year with the Crab armies, their disregard for formality and mercurial bluntness shocked her. Choosing to ignore the comment on her ancestry, she removed her hand from her wakizashi's hilt atlast.

When the laughter died away, Utaga spoke again. "I have been testing you, little lioness, as you may have guessed. However, it is not Toki that I wish you to fight, but something far worse." He looked over to his aide, and the scarred young Kuni passed Utaga a scroll. "We discussed this while you were recovering from your wound. It is news from the capital. Moreover, it is news that concerns your clan. Let me tell you of it."

Sei felt the mood in the tent grow dark again, and prepared herself for the worst news she could imagine. Her expectations paled before what she heard. Utaga said, "A great army has attacked the capital of Otosan Uchi, its goal the destruction of an avatar of Lord Moon himself. Many lives have been lost, but our messenger believes the avatar has fallen. But as the Moon's spawn died, another army came to the capital. Our watchers saw a horde of monsters lay siege to the western wall of the capital, and at its forefront stood a lord of your clan, Kitsu Sei, and at his side stood those of your family, their ranks swollen by the foulest oni. Your brothers seized the western wall of Otosan Uchi, Kitsu Sei, and have given it to darkness."

Once again, Sei felt the blood in her veins turn to ice, but this time the ice pierced her heart as well. She sank to the ground beneath the burden of Utaga's words. For a moment, her weakness overwhelmed her. Beneath her, she could feel the unholy rage of the Shadowlands, her only shield from it a thin tatami mat. Vast and implacable, it hungered for her spirit, promising to reunite her with her fallen brethren in an unending embrace.

Then, she saw Akiko's eyes upon her, and felt the girl's pain and fury at the traitors who had betrayed her mistress. Akiko's devotion to her burned like purifying fire. It drowned out the Shadowlands' call, and gave her the strength to spurn it. She rose, and faced Kuni Utaga once more. "Utaga-sama, as I am a sister to those who have turned to darkness, their crimes weigh upon me. If you wish me to give up my life for their monstrous acts, you needbut tell me."

"Lioness, I do believe I am about to ask you to do just that," Utaga answered her.

A sensation of detachment consumed Sei, an ocean of calm wholly at odds with the Shadowlands' fury, but before Utaga's words could fully register, he again surprised her. "Sei-san, I wish you to go back to your homeland and fight these monsters. You have learned all we have to teach you here in the Shadowlands. Your place now is in your lands, using what you have learned here to destroy your clan's own errors as we have purged ourselves of ours. I have heard that you have fought your family in the past. Now is your chance to do so again. This time, you will fight on the proper side."

Remembrances of standing against the Kitsu on the Day of Thunder whirling in her mind, Sei bowed deeply to Utaga. "I thank you for this opportunity, Utaga-sama. You are right. It may well cost me my life, but in selling it I will serve the cause of all I hold dear." She bowed again, murmuring her devout thanks to the kami for their gift to her.

When she rose, Utaga held a box before him. She watched as he opened it and drew forth a hollow cylinder of jade. He said, "Long ago, it was customary for those of my occupation to pledge themselves to purity by wearing a piercing of jade through their body. As you walk amidst your fallen brothers, I believe this tradition may serve you well. Draw nearer, Sei-san."

Sei approached Utaga carefully, studying the object he held in his hand. It resembled an ear cuff, its surface decorated with carved iris blossoms. However, the open slit along the length of the cylinder bore a tiny razor-sharp filament of metal. Sei looked up at Utaga, and asked, "One pushes it through one's ear, using the blade?"

Utaga nodded. "Yes. Once in place, it heals and leaves a permanent incision. Long ago, one could always find a witch- hunter, but a witch-hunter could never find a way to hide from his duty. Take it, Sei-san. I doubt it will prove to be a gift."

With great reverence, Sei lifted the cuff from Utaga's hand. It felt warm to her touch, a pleasant sensation that made her remember her childhood apprenticeship under the Kitsu masters. After a moment of contemplation, Sei lifted it to her right ear, and twisted the razored filament through her ear's cartilage. She felt a jolt of pain, and then only warmth. She looked up to see Utaga's expression of surprise.

"How interesting. The cuff has closed itself in your ear. Here, look," he reached out and touched the cuff, spinning it around within Sei's earlobe. "It favors you."

Startled, Sei looked at her hands, and found no trace of blood. She folded them before her, and bowed once more to the Kuni witch-hunter. "I thank you again, Utaga-sama, for this... offering, and for providing me with the guidance I need to begin my task. I will leave for my clan's lands at dawn." The formalities concluded, Sei rose and left the tent, Ikoma Akiko close behind her.

As she departed, Hiruma Hikaze stepped forward, clearinghis throat. "Father..."

Kuni Utaga nodded to the grizzled bushi, "Yes, son, you have leave to travel with her. In the dark places she will walk, she will need both the Lion's ferocity and the Crab's perseverance to survive. Guard her well, and pray that the kami speed her on her way."

Hikaze nodded to his father, and strode from the tent, hurrying to catch the two lionesses as they began their hunt.