FSE

Furry search engine

formerly SoFurry search engine

Fox tails fan out before me, shielding me from the glare of blazing blue flames.

Fire sails into the trees, shifting shadows and narrowly missing a black shape that drops to a lower branch. The kitsune strikes, arm snapping and metal thumping in chase of the shape scurrying down the tree trunk. Saki's iron needles miss, that thing still chewing a dead hare landing in the dried brush. It scurries behind a tree before either of us can throw more sharp steel and iron.

Fire shrinks instead of spreading, giving me just enough light to make out Saki and the trees all around us. The forest's shadows stretch long and deep among roots and stones, whilst the branches above could hide anything. I can only hope we're far enough from the village that no one can notice the light.

My sword hisses clear of its scabbard and Saki's arm comes through her tails, open hand asking for the blade. Without a thought, I pass it over by the pommel then draw my daggers.

I hear the swirl of Saki's dagger on a rope spinning overhead as she lifts my sword.

"Oh come now," a sultry voice says, bouncing all around the forest as if there are twenty women speaking in turn, "you little fox. Am I your enemy?"

"Silence," Saki snaps, borrowed sword pointing at the tree the shape vanished behind. "Your strength bound me."

Is this what I freed when breaking the spell, the nekomata?

"Bound you? You poor, pathetic little fox," the voice coos, "that strength was stolen from me because the monks sealed me. They didn't know how to restrain an elderly hag like you without stealing from me."

"Leave this mountain," Saki commands.

"Leave?" the voice asks, coming from right behind the tree I brace against.

I hobble forward on an aching ankle, barely steady on my feet once my back rests against Saki's. She keeps swirling that dagger on a rope above her head and pointing the sword at the same tree, as if she knows where the voice truly comes from. I take no chances and watch behind us as the voice laughs, the sound crawling all over my skin before the shifting voices rise to the branches above.

"Why would I leave, little fox? I must give gratitude to my benefactor, then I must enjoy the hunt of those wretched monks."

Saki's dagger flings into the branches above, a hiss of rage and dark fur leaping to another tree. Wood cracks under iron, the weapon yanking out of the tree trunk and leaping back into her waiting hand.

"Leave, nekomata," she commands again, starting to turn.

I move with her, wincing every time I put weight on the foot I twisted. It doesn't feel broken, but I won't be running again tonight. We've either got to fight or talk our way out of this. Saki can see the nekomata better than my eyes straining in the moonlight and the wispy glow of blue fire on a tree. Injured as I am, I'm only good for protecting her back if that thing in the trees attacks.

A growl rumbles among the tree branches, the voice dripping with fury. "I go wherever I please, little fox."

"If she asks you to leave again," I speak up, giving words a chance even after the monks, "and you refuse thrice, then you are our foe."

"Ah!" The growl stops, the ever shifting voice giddy with glee instead of rage. "My benefactor! Oh how I have been looking for you, you fierce, bold man! Wait right there, I will free you from whatever tricks this nasty little fox has put you under."

"Down!" Saki shouts, two tails pushing at my shoulders.

My knees bend, and I collapse onto one when my hurt ankle and sore shins can't take the strain. I should've killed those monks instead of beating them, but it's too late for regrets or deadly distractions. Saki rolls over my unbending back, sword swiping through flesh. Memories of that solid sound ring up my wrist. She lands, tails stretching over top of me protectively, and two bloody chunks thump nearby.

Claws scrabble up a tree, the thunk of the chasing dagger biting into wood once more.

Saki stalks around me as I struggle back to my feet, glad I didn't stab myself when I half fell. While I get up, her dagger lashes out again and again to keep the nekomata back. The fourth time, there's a hiss and trickle of fresh blood on the blade when Saki yanks it back.

A clump of dark fur drifts off the sharp hook where a hilt would normally be.

"Wretched, man stealing fox," snarls the voice, bristling with hate from a dozen new directions. "Get away from my benefactor! Do not let her trick you, she's with the oni, leading you right to his cooking fire!"

I stare down at the chunks of flesh on the ground and make out the bloody half of a hare. A clean cut severed it at the ribs, while the neck is bloodied and ripped, bone sticking out where sharp teeth bit through the spine. Aside from the scent of gore, the forest, and the faint tingle of oiled steel, I don't notice anything else.

If we're not facing a man-eater, and only if, then perhaps I can get it to leave without a fight.

"If I'm your benefactor," I say, daggers held defensively as I glance up at the branches, "then stop lying about the kitsune and leave us be."

"I am not lying," croons the voice, and I can hear a girlish pout as if it's right beside my head. "Foxes trick men, steal you away from your wives, and bring nothing but ruin to good men. I'm helping you, benefactor, for all that you've done for me."

"By throwing a chewed hare at him?" Saki utters in a voice that could freeze fire.

"It was meant to land between your hideous ears you whore fox," the voice spits. Then it hisses and growls in rage, leaping away from Saki's dagger whipping up to the branches. "Loose legged, lying foxes, all of you! This one wants to gift you to the oni, benefactor! Hide yourself behind a tree, throw yourself to the ground, anything to get you away from her so I might free you from her deceit!"

"She's not the kitsune the monks thought," I say, boots scraping across dirt and leaves as I shift with Saki. I hate fighting things hiding in trees even when I'm not wounded. "Don't make their mistake."

"They're all with the oni in these mountains," the voice pleads with me, "you cannot trust a fox nor her words. Eighty years they've kept it trapped. Eighty years! Not once have they gathered warriors to raid its lair. No, they've rejected tens of offers of aid from the tengu and even a kawauso clan! They will lead you to your death benefactor, do not trust them!"

"Is that what you heard from the monks?" I ask, hoping to make it stay in one spot so Saki can get a solid hit. Just because I can barely fight doesn't mean we're helpless, or that I'm unwilling to see this nekomata killed. "Have you been here before?"

"We have all heard of these foxes," scoffs the shifting voice. "It's all anyone near these mountains hears about these days!"

"So you haven't been to this mountain before," I say, feeling the sweat of pain start to stick my clothes to my back. "You don't truly know the kitsune."

If the monks notice the light or hear any of this noise, then it will only get worse for us. But there's nothing to do about that now. If they come, maybe this nekomata will chase them off while we flee farther up the mountain.

"Oh my benefactor," the voice purrs, branches shaking out of reach of Saki's rope, "you are too trusting of foxes. Look at how this savage, bloodthirsty one won't let me come down and speak with you."

"Don't trust her," Saki murmurs under her breath.

I'd be dead years ago if I were that much of a fool. But this nekomata doesn't know that.

"If you want me to believe there is peace between us," I say, "come down. Behind a tree."

Two of Saki's tails curl around my waist, as if to stop me from being suddenly taken or running off into glamours.

"What could a warrior like you be doing upon this mountain, my benefactor?" the voice says, each word climbing down a different tree.

"Hunting."

"What hunter carries a sword quenched in terror?" the voice asks. "Or a stone of the purest fire, and stones of," the shudder rustles in the branches of three different trees, "frightful forgetting."

The nekomata is still in the branches.

"I'm a man that's walked as many lands as there are realms. I've received many a gift and burden along the way."

"How little greed you carry as well. The monks must despise you."

I grunt, unsure of where it's gone. Saki shows no sign either, but I suspect she's hiding her knowledge to make a perfect strike.

"So what is it," the voice speaks from behind two trees, "such a far traveled man hunts?"

I've been breathing deep and slow, in through my nose and out my mouth, to try and catch whiff of any of the sickly sweet rot on the wind. There's nothing so far, for how little that means in bad wind. Some man-eaters have subtler stenches than others. "I hunt those that feast upon flesh they shouldn't."

"Is my benefactor," the voice asks, wary for the first time, "a monk? A rival of those that sealed me, or perhaps a yamabushi that wandered from his mountain to another?"

I haven't been called a 'yamabushi' in a while, a pang of tired longing coming with it. I miss Rin, but I'll never see her again if I cannot convince this nekomata to go away or draw it out for Saki to slay.

"I'm none of those," I say, putting a laugh into my voice. "I was a guest of those insufferable, lying monks once, but I am a man of no home or clan."

"He is our honored guest," Saki adds, "with skills that would shame yamabushi."

"I did not speak to you, hateful little fox," the voice snarls. Only to soften towards me, "I have no home to give you hospitality, my benefactor, but I can speed your escape from this mountain. Or, if you would join me in my chase and aid me once more, we might drive these monks away. But I plead with you, whatever your prey upon this mountain, it is not worth believing the lies of foxes to join their chase."

I ignore its disdain for Saki, for now, and ask, "Why do you hate the monks?"

A womanly scoff of disgust comes from behind a nearby tree. My fingers loosen upon dagger hilts, readying for throws or thrusts. "Why do you, my benefactor? Because of that bewitching, cursed fox besides you?"

"When I came offering peace, the monks gave me deceit and bruises."

"Who that knows them doesn't hate them?" the voice growls. "They steal more riches from nobles than bandits ever could, all while lecturing of abandoning the world and how every want and desire twists the spirit in the direction of suffering, even as they take and take," the voice rants on, only bouncing every other word. "Those 'enlightened' monks destroy shrines left for kami so the offerings will go to their temples. They forbid eating of meat, drinking of wine, lecture on the evils of women, yet every pleasure house is left exhausted, drunk dry, and larders emptied when they visit a city. For it's righteous when their monks partake, and it's the fault of those who tempt them!"

Saki, who has been circling this entire time, finally settles with my borrowed sword pointing at a tree while I face the one with her fire lighting it. A nudge from her against my leg makes me guess the nekomata is behind the tree I face, making it downwind from us. Saki loosely twirls her rope dagger; I don't doubt she can throw it over her shoulder just as easily as ahead.

"But you, my benefactor," the shifting, womanly voice is too friendly to ever be trusted, "you are nothing like the monks, are you? Coming to this mountain for what, the rumors of the oni? He has devoured the flesh of men, it's true. Do those still spread among the villages and towns, or do they talk of the lost travellers, never seen again?"

This thing must like the sound of its own voice. Then again, I don't know how long it was sealed by the monks.

"We all hold the monks in disdain. Come, stand before us and we'll have no quarrel," I offer the voice, "unless you make one."

Saki's tails squeeze me protectively, if not possessively.

"A quarrel? I have none with you benefactor, only that whore fox that's cursed and bewitched you. I can feel it upon you, my benefactor, the greedy curse clinging to you and your clothes. How do you not sense it? You mustn't let them sway you."

First the monks believe I'm bewitched and now this nekomata insists the same. Maybe I am, though not how they all believe.

This has been an exhausting day that just won't end.

"I trust her with my life. You'll have more than a quarrel with me if you attack her again."

One of Saki's tails curls tighter around me. I'd pat her affectionately if I had a free hand. Instead I back up against her just a little more. Hopefully she understands my trust for her and Rin is stronger than any claims by monks or monsters in the dark.

"Oh, my benefactor, how can I help you? If I step out from behind this tree," the voice bounces between several trunks, "she'll throw that dagger at my throat. Yet if I leave she'll hand you to that oni."

"If you stand by the tree, we'll talk," I tell the voice. "But rush towards us and her blade will fly for your neck."

And if I catch a whiff of man-eater then I'll throw a blade and rush, bad ankle or not.

What I say and think doesn't please Saki, I can sense it through her stiffened tails. Or she might know what I'll do if that's a man-eater. Regardless, she stops twirling her dagger on its rope, snapping it back into her hand.

"I take this great risk only for you, benefactor," the shifting voice sighs as if shouldering a terrible burden.

Leaves rustle, glowing yellow eyes peeking out from behind a nearby tree. It - she, that's certainly a woman - slinks out from behind a different tree than I expected. She's a slight woman, bare skin pale as porcelain without flaw.

No. That's what she wants me to see, a blink of my eyes revealing the cat like nekomata.

She's a handspan or two shorter than me, so leanly muscled that it shows under black fur, and shamelessly baring herself in the night. Bosom, legs, everything - I ignore her shape and keep watch of her eyes and two tails flicking behind her. The sticky sight of blood on her face and clawed fingers would shatter anything alluring about her if I'd fallen for that. She's savage, trying to be seductive, and eyeing me with too much interest.

"Here I am, benefactor," she says, hips swaying as she crouches, tails constantly moving and her large chest pushing forward. "Come closer, I can break whatever curse they have put upon you. It is the least I can do for the man," she eyes me lustfully, "who set me free."

I almost throw a dagger at the flash of bloodied fangs. If I didn't have the soft fur of Saki's tails behind me and around my waist, the blade would be flying instead of my knuckles grinding white on the hilt.

I breathe deep, wishing the wind would pick back up. There's no hint of a man-eater's sweetened rot, not yet.

I shouldn't anger this nekomata until I know for sure what it is, but waiting won't help us when I know nothing of the cat's true intentions. Nor can I know how impatient it might be.

"How am I your benefactor? I didn't know you were held captive for that spell," I tell her, "I thought the monks were using dead grudges in their binding spell."

"They sealed me out of their own grudges," the nekomata hisses, twin tails poofing up as I feel Saki move to stand beside me. The eight-tail is poised to throw her dagger or lunge borrowed sword first, but without looking as if she is. The nekomata nods at her with a distasteful curl of her lip. "The monks wanted to do the same to that one once they found her fox jewel." The cat flicks her glowing gaze back to me. "You should have let them, benefactor, then taken the jewel for yourself."

"I wouldn't do that to a friend."

I can only hope Saki forgives me for not calling her my lover, as that might put more of the cat's ire upon her.

"Friend?" The nekomata cocks her head, gaze angrily flicking to Saki. That glare calms as it flicks back to me, strained concern draining her hate. "Oh, my poor benefactor, the foxes have utterly bewitched you."

"My winter wouldn't have been so complicated if they had," I sigh, trying not to get angry.

First the monks and now this. My tongue has grown rusty with the icy season.

"True," Saki agrees, but I know there's regret underneath her chill.

"The foxes' trickery will soon torment you, my benefactor. You must free yourself of it, and from them," the cat pleads. "A touch, benefactor, is all I need to break what they've put upon you - it's devious but weak, what they've done. A bewitchment delicate as a silkworm's first spinning instead of strong as woven rope."

I nearly believe the nekomata is sincere. Not right, but telling what she sees as the truth. However, her glowing eyes amid the gloom of night are too crazed to trust. This could all be a trick because she overhead, while sealed, what the monks said about me.

"Why offer now instead of when you were freed?" I ask, sounding patient to my own ears.

I don't feel it with how those fangs keep flashing.

The nekomata's eyes lower, crouched swaying slowing. "Those forgetful stones terrified me, benefactor. I couldn't see you past what you held, but I saw the monks. I thought you were one of them until I stopped running and looked at the pebble you left for me."

A tongue curls out between vicious fangs, cradling the warm pebble I'd been gifted on a day just as exhausting as this one. But, so far, today has gone better. I didn't have to charge up a hill bristling with bandits, only fight tenacious monks without slaughtering them. And now I'm only having to talk my way through a crazed cat person's delusions or deceit, not calm the rage of a being of fire that could've killed me with all the effort of waving its hand. Most importantly, Saki's tails curl tighter around me, along with the promise that I hadn't been too late for her - unlike my friend's kin.

The nekomata flits her tongue back behind fangs, disappearing the pebble. "I owe you twice over, my benefactor. This pebble undid the monks’ remaining seals upon my strength."

I only left the pebble out because it felt right while muddling my way through breaking magic. I'll have Rin tell me how much of a fool I was later, as I must've been breaking that which I didn't understand.

Once I find a way out of this, that is.

To that end, I decide to say something dangerous. "Then if you want to help me, distract the monks."

"Tell her to leave this mountain," Saki urges.

"Not until I have punished those monks, fox," the nekomata bares her reddened fangs.

"Don't kill them," I shout, fingers gripping my daggers too tightly.

The nekomata's ears flick and confusion tilts her head, fangs disappearing. "They're your enemies, benefactor, aren't they? And yours as well, little fox."

The nekomata's shadowy face is disgusted by having to address Saki.

"I'm sure they're my enemies now," I tell the nekomata, before the eight-tail can attack, "but I could have a use for them."

Dangerous yellow eyes narrow. "What use?"

"Against my prey," I answer, not wanting to tell the cat my loose beginnings of a plan.

"How?"

"I'll not speak it in the dark. But even they cannot refuse."

The nekomata grumbles, head rolling side to side and hips swaying more as if she's considering pouncing.

Saki starts twirling her dagger on its rope.

The cat growls, low and furious. I'm about to speak up when it hisses, then starts to relax. "To repay you for that stone of the purest fire, my benefactor, I will let the monks live." Eyes flash menacingly at Saki. "For now."

That could be the next few breaths or a few days. For now I'll treat it as if I'm speaking to a faerie, so I nod instead of prying further. Escape matters more than any use I could make of the monks.

"If I'm to trust you, come closer. Stand three steps away, and," I sheathe one of my daggers and put my hand on Saki's raised sword arm, "we won't attack unless you do."

"Why?" the nekomata asks, watching the kitsune's spinning dagger start to slow. But it doesn't cease its low woosh above our heads.

"We're not interested in a fight."

The taut muscles in Saki's arm say otherwise, yet only I notice that.

The nekomata sighs, exasperated not with me but the kitsune beside me. The cat slinks forward, one cautious step at a time.

I have to put my hand on Saki's elbow and push down to make the eight-tail lower my borrowed sword. The dagger doesn't stop spinning, but that will have to be enough.

"Little fox," the nekomata snarls at Saki, taking another step, "I will settle with you for the fur you took from my tail later."

The kitsune tenses beside me. I expect a dagger to swish out and catch the nekomata in the chest or neck. The eight-tail considers it as a paw-like foot slides forward half a span, preparing her for a swift strike.

Saki utters, "Touch him and I'll leave your entrails in the trees."

My ancestors must like her.

The nekomata doesn't. She comes closer, glowing eyes fixed on Saki's mask.

"There is far enough," I tell the cat before she can finish another step that would bring her within touching distance of me.

Of course she wiggles her hips and tries to draw my eye, blood soaked fangs grinning at me. Does the cat believe I don't see her as she truly is? Or does she care at all so long as I don't flinch back? I force myself to meet those greenish yellow eyes, tinged with the glimmer of blue flames above, and make my tongue form words.

"What is your name?" I ask.

"You may call me Shigeko, my benefactor," the crazed cat says, giving a bow that's meant to show off her curves.

There's nothing. Even this close, I still smell nothing upon her breath.

I'm not convinced.

Not yet.

"Why did the monks capture you?"

The cat huffs, the smell of raw meat and blood upon her breath reaching me. Savage and wild as any hunting tiger, yet not revoltingly tinged with rot.

"I'm their enemy. I'm a woman. I do not submit to their claims of righteousness," Shigeko bares her fangs. "And I attacked their benefactors, slaughtered them for what was done to my sisters. Of course they would hunt me."

Somehow I keep from slashing at the fangs in front of me. I stare at those eyes, trying to only see them.

New words start upon my tongue, but I swiftly kill the question. I'll not be asking the nekomata if the monks did anything to her when they captured her. Now that I'm certain the nekomata isn't a man-eater, I should stay out of whatever blood debt exists between her and the monks. I'm not quite a wanderer right now, as I have kitsune that want me to come back in one piece and oaths to keep with lovers I struggled to accept.

"Scare the monks if you want," I finally say. "The sarugami might help you hide, but only if you don't worsen their master's standing with the master of this mountain."

"How might I do that?" the nekomata smiles, as if not really listening.

"By causing me trouble by killing the monks I mean to use," I nod.

It's faint, but I can see the cat's brows scrunch closer together.

Whatever Shigeko is, the cat isn't a fool. She puts it together that I'm important to Rin, and if what she said about the 'bewitchment' upon me being delicate is true, then why would the master of the mountain make it so easily broken? I can see the question work through her thoughts to sow doubt. That, or the nekomata is more deceitful than I suspect.

"How would you use those monks?" Shigeko asks me again.

"However I must." I let the dagger loosen in my grip so I can point a finger in the direction we came from. "But I need them alive. Whether they survive what I use them for, that's no concern of mine."

"Would you say that if I freed you from the curse the foxes put upon you?" the nekomata wonders aloud, eying Saki instead of me.

If I don't do something, the kitsune and cat will attack each other.

"They've helped me with terrors that kept me from sleeping," I hastily say, feeling one of Saki's tails lose strength. "That's what you're seeing upon me."

Concern softens Shigeko's bloodied visage. "My benefactor-"

I snap the dagger forward, point aimed at the nekomata as she stops mid shuffle, with steel touching her throat. Yellow eyes show fear for the first time in our encounter.

"A step closer," I utter heartlessly, "and we're foes."

"Do it," Saki encourages, intent clear as her cold tone.

"You are my benefactor," Shigeko spreads her hands out, sliding a foot back. "I'll not make you my enemy after you've brought ruin upon those monks. Even if it pains me to see the foxes bewitch and guide you without you wanting to accept it, I do not want your hate."

Tiny doubts I feel towards the kitsune I smother beneath the self made anguish we endured trying to accept the frightful thing called love. I made my choice. I'll not go back on that over the words of a bloodied cat nor the insistences of monks.

"If you're so convinced I'm cursed," I say, "come to their home in two days. You will be allowed in as a guest, so long as you behave as one."

Saki's tails bristle in anger. I know I've stepped too far as a guest, offering such a thing, but I mean to get us away from here and spoil any hunt the monks have for us. I'll accept any rebuke later, once we're safe, and explain why I offered at all. Rin should understand, I hope, and be willing to strike down the nekomata if Shigeko is truly dangerous.

The eight-tail makes a sound close to a growl. Shigeko and I both expect her to strike, the nekomata hunching down as if to leap away.

Saki shifts her borrowed sword and speaks, a tail brushing against my chest. "Walk as a visitor would, nekomata, and I shall meet you at the gates to settle our debt."

I never would have guessed Saki could speak half as venomously polite as Rin.

The nekomata grins cruelly. "Bring ruin to my benefactor and I will burn your home." Then, mood swinging to calm and apologetic as swiftly as her tails swish, Shigeko says to me, "I will worry for you, benefactor, but do as you say. May our next meeting be more bountiful."

Not wanting to see if Saki will attack her, the nekomata dashes away on all fours, tails lashing angrily. I forgot she's been trying to use her charm as a woman until I see her exposed backside disappear into the shadows.

Saki counts to eighty under her breath, then puts her dagger away.

Instantly, the blue flames lighting the area snuff out.

The kitsune grabs my belt and sheathes my sword, whispering, "She's going to kill the monks if she can. That's why she left."

"Who cares what she does," I mutter. "She's not a man-eater."

Surprise and curiosity tilt Saki's head, ears swiveling towards me. "What about your plan to use the monks?"

"I hardly have one," I shrug.

"What?"

"I wanted the nekomata gone," I tell Saki, touching her sleeve, then her arm when she doesn't pull away. "We'll figure out tomorrow if what I've done can give us a better plan for the oni. I may have a way to use the monks, but getting away without a fight was all I wanted."

"I thought that. Then I thought you were going to cut her throat," Saki whispers, the glint of her eyes beneath the mask glancing away for a moment. "So did she."

"If she'd gotten any closer I would've spilled blood."

Saki draws close to me, tails blocking the chill as her voice softens. "What she said about you, being cursed, that is-"

"Not now," I say, grabbing onto Saki for support.

All of my ignored pain is back with renewed fury, the leg that went into that hole hurting too bad to put even half my weight on.

"Later, then," the eight-tail decides, getting one of my arms around her and me leaning most of my weight against herself. "I need to get you off that foot and see if it's broken."

We set off again, wary of anything else hunting us.

I'll see if Saki is upset with me soon enough.