The Mark (Chi Warriors Book 1) Read online

  Tae laughed. “He’s so excited.”

  “And you?” Han inquired.

  “I’m excited too,” she said cheerfully. Her head snapped in Kai’s direction. “Kai, don’t fall over the edge, now.”

  Kai peered up from the ledge and shot her a look as if she was crazy. Tae laughed and took in the moment.

  “This is a nice way to travel. Have you done it often?”

  “From time to time. I don’t like to leave Guilin that often. But the brothers have.”

  “You have?” Tae said to Wong.

  “Huh?” He was only half-paying attention. “Oh yeah. One of the perks of saving the world all the time.”

  “Is that why you guys seem so indifferent about it?”

  “Yeah,” he said after a brief pause, unconvincingly.

  His face was fixed steadily ahead of them, unmoved by the wonder of their travel with thoughts of Elder Woo’s parting warning still fresh in his mind. The truth was that since leaving the confines of Yaje Piau, his invisible warrior mask had come down, leaving little room for sightseeing and enjoyment. While the others may have seen the carriage ride as a magical experience, he saw it as a necessary evil—a risk they had to take to avoid even more dangerous travel.

  He stared longer into the mist when a dark shadow appeared. He said nothing but watched as it grew and gained form. Though he had anticipated trouble, he thought it would have at least waited until they reached Yaje Zhi.

  By now Li spotted it too, causing him to draw his sword. The high-pitched ring of his weapon against its scabbard broke the silence and alerted the rest of the crew.

  Wong quietly commented. “Another carriage in our direction.”

  “Monks perhaps? From Yaje Zhi?” Li said.

  They waited in silence as the carriage drew closer, with anxiety growing each passing moment. The squeal of the carriage rollers, once charming and comforting, now grated at their senses. Tae and Genji strung arrows, Kai’s hand subconsciously reached for his needle gauntlet, and suddenly the wonder of their carriage ride was lost.

  Slowly the outlines of numerous figures could be seen.

  “There are many,” Han said anxiously. He reached for his war mace and looked at the delicate vessel they stood in, hanging midair from delicate cables. He gulped.

  Seconds passed.

  “Dagwai,” Genji identified sharply, before anyone else could see, sending a wave of panic through the vessel.

  Arrows instantly filled the air in a high-arching path through the mist, launched from Genji’s fingertips. Tae joined his attack, with the twang of their bows followed by the high pitched shrieks of the devil lizards.

  Arrows flew back in turn and the forward crew ducked behind the barrier walls of the vessel. Zhozang thwacked a couple arrows out of the sky with his heavy blade, while Han caught one midair and snapped it in half.

  One of the arrows landed next to Wong.

  “This is not a good place for battle,” he said in an unusually anxious voice. “Take her back!”

  But before they could shift the driving lever in reverse, Li leapt atop the right suspension cable and began running down it.

  “What’s he doing?” Han blurted.

  “He’s insane,” Tae said.

  Wong grumbled in disapproval. “Usually I’m the stupid one.”

  He moved to the rear of the carriage while dagwai arrows targeted Li.

  “Watch him,” he barked, referring to Kai.

  At this, he turned and sprinted toward the front. Before the confused passengers could say a word, he catapulted high off the top ledge, causing the vacated carriage to sway in his wake.

  “Wong!” Han shouted, instinctively reaching forward as though he would catch him.

  “Whoa!” Genji gasped.

  Confusion turned to shock as the rocking passengers looked on incredulously. Wong soon began losing height and speed, and seemed destined for a watery death. But just as he began his perilous descent, a newly improved cutting disc flew from his hand into the wooden flesh of the enemy carriage, bridging the distance.

  Zhozang gaped into the abyss, astounded. “I can’t believe he did that.”

  “I guess they really are brothers,” Tae said.

  Li reached the dagwai vessel and leapt aboard. A dagwai that had just fired off an arrow became his first victim. His sword pulsed brightly before powering through the lizard’s bow, severing it in half and slicing the dagwai across the abdomen.

  The other passengers converged on him.

  The Weapons Master swung from the cutting cable underneath the carriage, using his momentum to carry him up over the other end. When he reappeared, his samurai blade materialized in his right hand, his left hand still grasping the cable.

  He landed in the carriage, much to the dismay of the dagwais whose attention had been focused on Li up front. Two of the lizards nearest him were killed before the others were even aware of his presence. When they spotted Wong, they pushed him back until he was cornered.

  The carriage swayed.

  Li slashed at a dagwai and tightened his stance to adjust for the lack of fighting room. From his defensive crouch, he back-cut his enemy and whirled his blade in the air, sending out a shrill noise that halted his enemies’ attack. He rushed the center of the carriage and managed to kick the cart’s clamp lever up from its locked position, disengaging the vessel’s forward progress.

  Immediately the lizards were upon him. He sprang away and back flipped onto the rim of the carriage to avoid being overwhelmed, but his new position was more precarious then the last.

  Wong backed his brother by leaping off his side of the carriage and swinging back underneath it to where Li stood. On his way up, he freed his cutting disc from the side of the vessel and landed, immediately attacking.

  Kai’s carriage continued moving forward.

  At first, the passengers thought to turn back and distance Kai from the danger, but after seeing Wong and Li overwhelmed, they decided to press on. They also saw in the distance what the brothers did not—a third carriage closing in.

  Han and Zhozang stood at the front of the platform with their weapons poised, forming a formidable frontline. The carriage pulled closer and when they were finally within reach, a dagwai lunged at the ship. Han waited, wound, and batted the dagwai away to its death.

  Tae disengaged the towing clamp and the carriage slowly slid into the enemy vessel. Kai tried to move toward the front of the craft to line up a target with his gauntlet, but Tae held him back. Genji fired off several rounds in rapid succession.

  A slew of dagwais leapt aboard, past Han and Zhozang.

  “No Han! Pull away!” Li yelled.

  He moved into position and tried to prevent the rest of the dagwais from jumping across.

  Wong rushed for the control lever and re-engaged the towing clamp in the opposite direction, pulling the enemy vessel back toward Yaje Zhi, but not before Zhozang jumped aboard.

  Han watched the carriage pull away and grunted in disapproval. A dagwai came at him with a sword attack, while several more made for Kai, who moved to the rear of the vessel according to instruction.

  Han blocked his attacker repeatedly with his mace, unable to pursue those that got around him. The dagwai lunged and thrust its sword forward, which he parried and sidestepped, causing the lizard to fall toward him. He reached out and grabbed it by the neck with his left hand, lifted it off its feet, and tossed it overboard.

  After picking off several targets, Genji held his position as a dagwai approached. He pulled back on his bow, leaned back, and released at point-blank range into its chest. Another followed behind which he immediately dispatched of with a well-placed throwing knife to the neck. But without much time to react, he flicked a knife defensively at a third, wounding it superficially on the side. The dagwai swung across his body with its
sword, but he swiftly skirted the attack and moved in with a lethal thrust of his knife under its chin.

  Tae jumped into the path of the dagwais that pursued Kai. While she traded blows with one dagwai, two more threatened to skirt around her. She impeded one’s path with a slash, but the other got around and targeted Kai. Having already triple-pumped his needle gauntlet, Kai fired directly into its chest. The lizard’s momentum kept it moving forward, so he fired again at its face, causing it to crash headfirst to the floor.

  Tae’s concern for Kai left her distracted and vulnerable. A dagwai rushed forward and swept her feet with its tail. She stumbled back into the side of the carriage, and when the dagwai followed up with a lethal blow from its spiked mace, she flipped over the side to avoid it. The dagwai’s weapon missed and smashed through the bamboo wall, but the end result was all that mattered—Tae was gone.

  “Noooo!” Han yelled.

  Screaming, he rushed over and grabbed the nearest dagwai by the tail from behind. With all his strength, he whipped and spun the dagwai overhead, flinging it skyward.

  Meanwhile, the dagwai closest to Tae peered over the ledge to investigate. Two feet wrapped around its head and pulled it overboard.

  Tae flipped on-board again.

  Han turned with surprise. “I thought you fell.”

  Tae squinted to see Han’s latest victim still sailing away in the distance.

  “No,” she said with a warm smile. “I didn’t.”

  She rushed the towing lever and kicked it forward.

  “Now let’s get moving.”

  “Haaa!” Zhozang screamed as he barreled into the dagwais.

  His fighting style was aggressive and forceful, but not without skill. He rushed to the center of the action while Wong and Li fought on opposite ends.

  A dagwai hacked at him with a spiked mace. He first bounced it aside with his cleaver and followed through by lopping off its arm. He punched a second dagwai in the face to stun it, then grabbed it by the collar for a punishing headbutt.

  “Is this all the Koon Gee have to offer?” he shouted.

  His face went blank.

  The third carriage carrying Koon Gee pulled within range and disengaged its towing clamp. Dagwais stood at the forefront of the ship, skittish and eager for battle. A giant tarp hid its other occupants, which could only mean one thing—dark ninjas. The tarp was meant to protect them from the sunlight, but since it was still gray and misty within the valley, there was nothing to hold them back.

  Out came the dark ninjas in force.

  They leapt atop the suspension cables and skirted down the lines toward the embattled vessel. The dagwais, lacking such agility, did not follow but jumped on the towing strand instead; they hooked their tails over the line and hung upside-down with free arms, where they hitchhiked across with weapons in tow.

  Wong jumped on one of the cables to cut off a line of dark ninjas. They ran freely on the other side but there was nothing he could do to stop them all, so he concentrated on the ones at hand. He crossed sword blades with the first ninja for a stalemate, then simply swept its leg to knock it off the cable. When a second ninja came at him, he calmly stepped off the line to avoid it, grabbed the cable as he fell, and swung back up with both feet to knock it off its footing too. He sprang up to face a third, but the ninja jumped below onto Li and Zhozang’s carriage which had then pulled within reach.

  A dagwai hanging from the towing cable fired an arrow at him, which he narrowly ducked by leaning to the side and catching himself by a leg. Hanging upside-down to match the lizard, he flicked a handful of ninja stars in its direction and caused it to drop. More dagwais appeared behind it.

  Li and Zhozang fought back-to-back now as dark ninjas dropped from the cables and sprinkled around them. Their carriage slid into the enemy vessel and a new round of dagwais boarded.

  “Round two,” Zhozang quipped.

  “Three by my count,” Li said.

  Their enemies converged.

  Not all of the dark ninjas dropped onto Li and Zhozang’s carriage—many continued to run past them and toward the second. They caught up to the vessel quickly after being fired upon by Genji, Tae, and Kai.

  “Incoming!” Han growled.

  A rain of ninja stars caused the vessel’s occupants to scramble. The action became chaotic as the ninjas jumped onto their ship. Han stood in the forefront and tried to take on the bulk of the onslaught, while Tae hung back to protect Kai.

  Genji stood off to the side, holding two sai daggers while blocking repeated sword strokes by an oncoming foe. Tae assisted by rifling a ninja star into its head. Genji turned back to see a new ninja clash swords with her, so he returned the favor by whipping his sai into its back.

  “Thanks for the assist,” Genji said.

  “Likewise.”

  Suddenly the carriage tilted to one corner and rocked its occupants—a dark ninja had cut one of the cables supporting the vessel.

  Genji stumbled back and looked up to see the same ninja running across the suspension cable, attempting to sever another line. If successful, the carriage would be left hanging completely vertical, putting them all in terrible danger. He adjusted the grip on his remaining sai and took aim—he could not miss or they were all dead. Just as he flicked up the dagger in an attempt to thwart it, another ninja slammed into him and knocked him over the bamboo side, causing his weapon to fly astray.

  The ninja that crashed into him braced itself against the short carriage wall, its momentum carrying it forward. It looked down and an arrow shot straight through its neck. Falling, Genji reached for another arrow and took aim at the ninja atop the suspension cable who was still trying to slice through the remaining support cable on his side. He squinted and fired. The arrow whistled through the air and hit the ninja squarely in the chest.

  Han cracked the skull of his opponent and ran over to the edge where Genji had just fallen. He hoped that Genji would pop back up just as Tae had before, but no one came. He looked over the side and caught the gaze of his friend one last time in the eye.

  Genji winked once, twisted, and fell away into oblivion.

  Tae came over and the two looked on helplessly, shocked and dumbfounded.

  Wong, Li, and Zhozang finally slew the remaining Koon Gee on their carriage as it pulled toward Yaje Zhi. Everything grew quiet again except for the carriage rollers’ repeated squeal, so the passengers lowered their weapons, breathing heavily. They looked at each other triumphantly as carcasses could be seen all around them. When they peered behind them and saw their companions’ crooked ship, however, their enthusiasm soured.

  “Something’s wrong,” Wong said.

  “The ship is not right,” Li added.

  They disengaged their towing clamp and waited nervously for the vessel to catch up. Slowly, details came into focus.

  “They’re missing a support cable,” Zhozang said.

  “Genji’s gone,” Wong said after a pause.

  Zhozang’s jaw dropped. “How did that happen?”

  Wong hung his head. “We didn’t stop all the ninjas.”

  When the two ships finally came together, Tae raised the control lever and their carriages touched. They hung motionless in the air.

  “Genji went over,” Han said glumly.

  “We know,” Zhozang said.

  A moment of silence followed.

  “Climb over,” Li finally said. “Your craft is unstable.”

  Han complied. Tae lifted Kai over the ledge and followed behind, abandoning their vessel.

  They approached the side of their new craft together and peered down. Somewhere beneath the mist and haze rumbled the Yangtzhu’s turbulent waters. Wong instead looked ahead toward Yaje Zhi.

  “Do you think he could have survived?” Tae asked.

  “It’s a long way down,” Li said.

 
“I did say he was tough as steel,” Han added.

  They stared a while longer at the drop and their hearts sank. Reality set in as to the unlikeliness of survival.

  Kai leaned against the bamboo wall and pointed upstream. “He went into the water.”

  “Yes, Kai. He did,” Tae said. She leaned over and put a hand on him. “I wish we could search for him.”

  They spent another moment in silence and looked on helplessly, their aura of invincibility shaken.

  Zhozang finally spoke up. “He knew the risks when he took the mission. Let’s not dwell on his fate while there is still the mission.”

  “Zhozang’s right,” Wong said. “I don’t see any more carriages, but who knows what lies ahead of us in Yaje Zhi.”

  They looked forward into the expanse.

  “We can’t get caught up in the air like this again,” he continued. “Li and I will go on ahead. Everyone else follow after.”

  Li nodded. “Take the forward vessel with the tarp,” he said to the rest of them, referring to the adjacent Koon Gee ship. “It will hide you from the Koon Gee better—at least from their arrows. If you see a platform full of Koon Gee when you get there, turn back.”

  “What will you take?” Tae asked.

  “We’ll walk the cables.”

  Han looked like he wanted to object but didn’t. “Okay then. Good luck.”

  “Good luck to you. Watch for the ninjas. There may be more.”

  “We’ll be fine,” Zhozang said, crossing his blade in front of him.

  With a nod, they were off.

  Wong and Li jumped on opposite support cables and ran down the narrow line as if they were running on open ground. They were mirror images of each other in form and movement; their quick steps synchronously propelled them forward with their shiny swords grasped upward by the shoulders. But as alike as they were in movement, they contrasted greatly in appearance: the bright white of Li’s Shaolin attire stood out against the black of Wong’s.