Linnear 03 - White Ninja by Eric Van Lustbader Page A

This cannot be happening. But it was, and a curious dread crept through him, a thief stealing his resolve.
    His knees grew weak, and he had to sit down. Slumped against the padded pole, Nicholas remembered the last battle as one does a spectacular but long gone lover, with an awe tinged by the suspicion that memory had distorted its import, magnifying its significance.
    He remembered the pain that Koten, the Japanese sumo, the Soviet agent who had cut off Lew Croaker's hand, had inflicted on him using the dai-katana, the Japanese longsword his father had given him on his thirteenth birthday.
    Nicholas feinted right, then came in beneath Koten's guard. But the sumo let go of the dai-katana with his left hand, slamming the forearm into Nicholas's chest. Nicholas hit the floor hard.
    Koten laughed. 7 didn't hear you scream that time, barbarian, but you will soon.' The dai-katana swooped down, its finely honed tip splintering the polished wooden boards at Nicholas's feet.
    Koten laughed again as Nicholas came at him, a human mountain attacked by an insect who possibly could sting, but nothing more.
    He countered Nicholas's oshi, using the hilt of the sword, instead of returning oshi for oshi as Nicholas had expected. He felt the crushing blow on the point of his shoulder, felt the resulting grinding of bone and
    the audible pop of dislocation. Pain ran like fire down his arm, rendering his right side totally useless.
    'This is what Musashi called Injuring the Corners, barbarian,' Koten gloated. 'I'll beat you down in small strokes. I'll make you scream yet.'
    He ran at Nicholas, feinting with the long sword, employing oshi now to throw Nicholas hard on to the floor. He knelt over him on one knee. The blade sizzled downwards, cutting a vicious arc through the air.
    Desperately Nicholas twisted, raising his left arm so that it broke inside Koten's upraised arm, deflecting the blow out and away from him. But because of the injury to his shoulder, he was unable to complete the suwari waza move.
    Instead he was obliged prematurely to release Koten's arm to deliver an atemi, a percussive strike, with his left elbow. He heard the answering crack as ribs caved in beneath the blow.
    Koten cried out, twisting his body up and away, at the same time slashing back towards Nicholas's body with the sword.
    The steel blade was Nicholas's first priority. He made contact with Koten's forearm, gliding his left hand along the flesh. At the bottom of the wrist, he broke inwards, twisting. The bone snapped.
    Now they were even in a way; Koten was obliged to drop the two-handed grip on the sword, his right arm hanging loose and ungainly at his side.
    But his second attack could not be stopped, and he used a shoulder throw to Nicholas's right side. This time Nicholas cried out. He rolled away, scrambling, directly into a powerful tsuki that forced all the air from his lungs. His head went down and he began to wheeze reflexively as his lungs tried desperately to regain the oxygen denied them.
    A second vicious tsuki to his sternum rocked him
    backwards. In an instant, Koten's massive bulk was over him, his weight pressing on Nicholas's chest, further denying him air. Bile rose into Nicholas's throat. This was the enormous danger in sumai - the form of battle sumo of which Koten was a master. Its territory was in bringing the superior weight to bear in an area close to the ground, increasing the strength of the sumai warrior exponentially.
    Koten brought-the bright bladepoint against Nicholas's black cotton &. Koten leaned forward, bringing pressure down on to Nicholas's chest. Beginning the first cut, skin rupturing, peeling back like the rind of a fruit. Blood welling, dark and hot.
    Nicholas's mind was screaming for surcease. Reaching back for the 'no mind' of the Void, he allowed the organism to work on its own. His left arm shot straight up, the fingers together and as rigid as any swordblade ever forged. Into the soft spot of flesh joining Koten's