The Disfavored Hero by Jessica Amanda Salmonson Page A

of a fine warrior, a sword could fell a tree, or carve entirely through a human torso. The ground was therefore littered with halved and quartered men, the victims of Ushii.
    Ghouls began to tear at the back of those samurai Ushii had failed to beat back or carve down on his own. He had lost his helm; his hair had come untied. He looked more like an Ainu wildman than samurai as he snarled and fought and killed.
    Finally there was only one samurai standing before him, and Ushii took careful measure of this imposing opponent. Ushii knew every strength and weakness of Madoka Kawayama, with whom he had trained and shared love since boyhood, at whose side he had fought many times until the last night of service under Lord Shigeno. Madoka knew Ushii’s fighting methods as well, so was able to avoid Ushii’s first rushing attack.
    â€œStop, Ushii!” Madoka shouted. “This need not be!”
    He guarded against Ushii’s insistent blows, but launched no counter attack. He tried to reason with the madman, not believing his boyhood friend could kill him. “USHII!” he pleaded, but Ushii’s face only twisted with greater rage. Madoka wept and knew what he must do; he raised his sword to deal Ushii a killing blow. He struck too slowly. Ushii’s sword moved so fast none could have seen how he had delivered the slender wound. There was no blood until after Madoka fell. Only then did the thinnest red line appear along his throat.
    Ushii had no remorse. He turned to fight another.
    Tomoe had ridden near enough to see this brief drama, though it had not fully registered with importance. She had a vague image of Ushii not as the magnificent-though-maddened warrior, but as a hunched and drained monster, not much different than the ghouls he fought beside. She remembered that image also from the moment she opened her eyes after leaving hell’s highway; then, an ugly, hunch-backed Ushii had jerked away from the sight of her darkened eyes.
    There was no time to consider these impressions more fully, for she was kept busy cutting down samurai. Arrows took Tomoe’s steed in the sides and chest, but she urged the poor animal on for a long while before it had lost so much blood that it staggered and was more burden than help. The horse blew in angry pain, and the rider leapt off before it died. She spun her weapons through the encroaching mass of flesh. Samurai died as she walked slowly, deeper into the thickening quarrel.

    She worked her way further from Ushii, who presently fought shoulder to shoulder with a fierce two-headed ghoul more skillful than the rest. One head had been severed halfway through, and hung limp and scowling. Then from the jostling and new blows the head fell away altogether. It went bumping down the hillside biting at shins and ankles as it rolled. The former bearer of that head fought on, unperturbed.
    The samurai Tomoe confronted moved with grace, but could not equal her. They wielded the traditional, single daito ; when they met Tomoe, they were dueling two fencers at once. She would let them, one by one, break the guard of her left sword, while her right moved to puncture the spleen. She had become an automaton, leaving a trail of dead.
    A mounted warlord of profound beauty bore down on Tomoe. She whirled. Her right sword completely severed the head of the horse, its blood showering her armor. Her left sword took the life of the warlord. The beheaded stallion ran blindly by, then fell, spilling its load. Only when the warlord lay at her feet did she know she had killed Lord Shigeno. But she could not mourn; she could not feel. She could only slay; and so she trod upon the dead, and went about her task of raising the tally.
    The magician-ninja had throughout the battle fought near Shigeno. Now they rode their ethereal mounts toward Tomoe Gozen. Their supply of exploding darts seemed unending and they dealt hideous random wounds to the ghouls around them. Tomoe’s two blades