Chapter 1

It was a sunny day, but the clouds and wind made the grassy hill pleasant enough. Halfway between asleep and awake, a man of indeterminate age chewed on a long reed and contemplated absolutely nothing. That was when his view was interrupted by a sheet of parchment with a drawing of five men held taut directly above his face.

The man closed his eyes as if to wonder if this were really happening. "If this is a prank, you picked the wrong target, kid."

The voice of his invisible assailant, because all he could see was a picture in front of his eyes, wasn't a bratty boy's, though. It was worse. It was the sound of a very serious, very impassioned girl.

"I want to hire you for a hit job on these five men."

"And why is that?" The man sighed, studying the faces of the five perpetrators. He didn't recognize any of them. But then, he didn't know a lot of people.

"Because I can't forgive them."

"Heh. That's a good reason." The man admitted, a smile creeping over his face despite himself. "And? How do you expect to pay me for this 'hit job'?"

"I have five hundred olon." The girl said tautly.

"Give it up. You couldn't hire the town drunk for something like that." The man pushed the paper away, shoving her halfway down the hill until she caught her balance along with it.

The girl gave him a frustrated look. Apparently to her, five hundred olon was a lot of money. "Then. . ." She unloosed the obi of her kimono, her face gradually growing redder as she closed her eyes and slowly lowered her loosened robe down her shoulders, exposing her breasts on down to her waist. "My body. . ." The girl suggested, her arms trembling with the wish to cover up again.

"No good." The man waved his hand in annoyance. "I've had dozens, three of them prettier than yours. I can have a dozen more just by walking into town and asking, which certainly sounds a lot better than going on some long hard death defying journey, so you may as well put your clothes back on."

The girl teared up as she pulled her kimono back over her shoulders and tightened her sash, giving out half a sob.

"Then what is it you want? What else can you ask of me?"

The man wondered about that, nibbling on a stalk of hay while looking up at the clouds. "You know, you're right. What else is there, really?" The man thought about it for a brief moment, happily taking in the view again, before coming to a conclusion.

"How about a reason for being? Give me that, and I will hunt these men to the ends of the Earth."

"A reason for being?" The girl asked, sniffing as she looked down with flushed cheeks full of confusion and humiliation. "But how could I possibly give you that?"

"Use your imagination." The man suggested cheerfully.

"God?" The girl suggested hopefully.

"No good. I don't believe in any, singular or plural."

"Love?" The girl asked.

"Are you volunteering?" The man tilted his head forward to look at her face down the hill quizzically.

"I can try. . ." The girl said bravely, looking back into his merchandising eyes.

"Try, you say. But what if you fail? What do I get out of it then?" The guy complained.

"If I fail to love you, or if you fail to accept my love as a sufficient reason for being?" The girl asked.

"Wouldn't either equally be a failure on your part?" The swordsman asked.

"Suppose I combined it with other things." The girl struggled to stay above water.

"Like what?" The man asked, finding the girl amazingly resourceful.

"Pride, honor, justice, victory, a sense of accomplishment. . .down this path, I could provide it. If you'd just accompany me to the end, I'm sure many reasons for being will pop up." The girl said excitedly, putting her hands together in prayerful enthusiasm.

"'You're sure', huh? I guess that's better than 'you'll try'." The man sighed, closing his eyes.

"Isn't it?" The girl asked. "I will definitely give it to you, your reason for being. Definitely, absolutely, down this path!"

"And if it is your love?" The man asked, just to be sure there wasn't a catch.

"I will definitely give it to you, everything I can give, for as long as I live." The girl promised.

"Are you sure you don't want to just hire another hitman for a lower price?" The man asked quizzically, not especially wanting to take on such a long and difficult road if he could avoid it.

"You're the only one that would stand a chance." The girl bit her cheek angrily.

"I don't know about that. Why, Kuro must be ten times as strong as I am." The swordsman offered blithely, not seemingly offended at his own incompetence.

"They got him already." The girl sighed.

"Are you kidding? And you want me to beat them when he couldn't? Wait, did you already go through this whole production with him and now you're trying again?" The swordsman sat up, glaring.

"No, no, it seems he picked a fight with them just to show off, but he couldn't even beat Vaj. . .the pubs. . .I served as a waitress at the pubs in town and talked to all the customers about your types, the wandering types. . .and it's just public knowledge. . .you're also public knowledge, that's how I found you. . ." The girl looked away, trying to avoid his wrath.

"So these five are real big shots? And Kuro was no match for their weakest member?" The man chewed on his grass stem angrily. In fifty duels he had never bested Kuro once, and now he never would.

The girl clapped her hands together excitedly, her resourcefulness finding a silver lining to everything. "That can be your first reason for being! If you beat Vaj, you can finally surpass Kuro!"

"Oh, well, gee." The guy sighed. "When you put it that way."

"When I put it that way?" The girl repeated, nodding hopefully, leaning halfway over to hear his voice better.

"Oh, hell. I guess it doesn't matter either way. If I already had a reason to stay alive, I wouldn't be sitting here staring at the clouds. Guess it wouldn't hurt to try my sword against someone who beat that Kuro. The name's Jin. Ukizake Jin." The man sighed, standing up and brushing the dirt and grass off his back.

"In that case, my name's Harukaze. Ukizake Harukaze. Pleased to meet you, Jin, I'll be under your care from here on." The girl bowed back at him. Jin's stalk of grass fell forgotten to the earth. The girl had guts. He'd give her that.

* * *

"So? Do I get to know what these men did to you?" Jin asked curiously as they left town together, a bundle of belongings on both their backs. Apparently 'Vaj' operated in Hoai province, around two hundred spans from here. Jin didn't really care about long walks. He'd been wandering the country most of his life, and had taken about every major road to every major town along the way. He stayed in inns when he had money, and under haystacks or trees when he didn't. It was a living. Anyone good with a sword could always make a living. That was the sort of world they lived in. But this was the first time a girl had chosen to walk alongside him. He wondered how ready she was for the long days ahead.

It wasn't the hardship, though it was hard on anyone. It was the isolation and the tedium. Girls simply couldn't stand it. It was a lifestyle that winnowed out women rather quickly and efficiently. If they couldn't gossip with their neighbors, women weren't interested, period. This girl was going to learn quickly and brutally how little gossip he had to offer. And then what? Would she run back home to her bar, her steady source of employment, her normal life that offered everything a normal life could? Or was she different from the rest? Did she really intend to see this through? He couldn't tell. He had never been a good judge of character, but she wasn't like anyone he had ever met before, so there was nothing he could compare her to anyway.

"Would a loving girl share all her secrets with a man?" Harukaze wondered out loud, looking up into the sky.

"Sure she would." Jin said, though his answer was solely for his own satisfaction.

"I guess it can't be helped then. Technically I love you with all my heart and soul." Harukaze's brows furrowed as she dwelled on that.

"That's right you do." Jin agreed, pleased to see she understood her position. Could this slip of a girl understand a real concept like keeping her word in the fullness of its spirit as well as its letter? Well, it was early yet. There was no need to praise her that much.

"I guess you could say they never did a thing to me." Harukaze admitted.

"That's quite a grudge." Jin laughed. This girl was something else.

"Don't look down on me. I'm still explaining!" Harukaze gave a pouty glare at her husband. "My family ran up a humongous debt with these guys, gambling. In the end they came to collect the hard way. I was twelve at the time, so I didn't merit their attention. My big sister was sixteen though, so they took her."

"And this was?" Jin asked, eager to know his new wife's age.

"Four years ago." Harukaze said. "Of course my parents tried to stop them. We're actually from the bushi class. Father owned a dojo and was still very skilled. But they killed both my parents in a flash and dragged Akikaze to the brothels. They also took everything of worth from the house. Our clothes, our weapons and armor, some vases from Qin. No amount was enough to pay back our debts."

"And the government looked the other way?" Jin asked. "If you're from the bushi class, just go complain to the Emperor."

"Some of them are bushi too. Besides, when it comes to debt collections or the like, the government just assumes a 'reap what you sow' attitude. They don't take any pity on people indebted to the government, after all." Harukaze shrugged helplessly.

"So am I supposed to cut down the entire Imperial Army and Police force while I'm at it?" Jin asked.

"No, the government has a 'reap what you sow' policy for debt collectors too. They figure if you want to deal in drugs, gambling, prostitution, usury, smuggling, piracy or whatever, you can deal with the consequences yourself." Harukaze says.

"So it cuts both ways." Jin whistled, slightly relieved. At least he wouldn't have to wage a revolutionary war just to put himself in a position to kill his men.

"Just so." Harukaze said wistfully. It's obvious she wished the government would get a little more involved in cases like hers. But then, however you looked at it, the government probably would have sided with the 'bad guys,' even if they had gotten involved. Honestly, Harukaze's grudge could have been the life of a million different families all across the country. And the villains were probably no more villainous than a million other men all across the country, either. What a bother. He had hoped for something a little more extraordinary, given her extraordinary determination to somehow avenge this crime.

"If they haven't done anything to you, there's no sense in going through so much pain and suffering yourself. Volunteering your body like that, and your life savings, don't you have any common sense? Cut your losses. Start your life over. Tomorrow's a bright new day and all. You're your own worst enemy. The debt collectors have probably forgotten all about you by now." Jin counseled.

"I haven't forgotten them though." Harukaze said sternly. Her face looked to have a very inflexible resolution about the issue, especially around her jaw. "More than a bright new tomorrow, I want to make them pay for what they did."

"People have forgiven far worse. Why go so far this time?" Jin asked.

"Because I care. I know other people don't care. But I don't understand them. I care like it happened yesterday. I care because I'm not some sort of lifeless corpse. Even if everyone around me somehow whisks their feelings away, even if no one else cares about words like 'justice' or 'honor,' I do. I just keep caring about it. It keeps boiling up from the depths of my soul and consuming every second of every minute of every hour of my day. I lived on my own for four years, saving up money from my jobs, searching for information about these men, every second of my life was just for this. For the chance to show them that someone, somewhere, actually cares about the things they've done. That not everyone could just forget their older sister like she was nothing. One younger sister actually cared in Niron. Maybe I'm the only one. Maybe I'm just crazy. But it hurt me to see her dragged away to a brothel, too weak to stop it, too young to even take her place. More than anything that could happen to me from here, the pain of ignoring those feelings is worse."

"I'm going to cheat on you as often as I like." Jin let her know ahead of time.

"Yes, husband. Actually, that isn't any different from a normal marriage in this country." Harukaze looked straight forward, erasing any emotions she could from her face.

"You're right about that." Jin laughed. "I guess most men have enough respect not to say it out loud though."

"Or so little respect they don't say it out loud." Harukaze replied woodenly.

"Ha! You might be right there too." Jin shook his head. He had never been interested in marriage before. He could die at any moment. He'd never be around his wife anyway. She would demand all his money for God knows what needs. She would nag him about meaningless things like sleeping around while he was on his journeys, or settling down and having a respectable business. Kids were all annoying brats. And he could get all the sex he wanted from reputation alone. Plenty of women were eager to have the son of Jin Ukizake. He was the finest swordsman in Ido, and all Niron knew him to one degree or another. But a wife who promised to love him so much she would become his reason for being? That was another story. A wife like that, who, rather than a torment, was a solace in this dark world, was such an original being, such a legendary myth akin to the phoenix or the nue, that she wasn't out of the question intolerable.

"Is it loving to offer myself now, or should I wait until we reach an inn?" Harukaze asked.

"You keep asking me what a girl's love is like. Don't tell me you haven't loved anyone before?" Jin sighed. Sixteen and she'd never met a man she liked? And a bar maid at that? Surely she wasn't actually a virgin. . .

"I don't know anything about love. All I know is hate. There are a lot of things I hate. I've fallen into hate many times. I'm theorizing love could be the opposite of that, but I don't really know." Harukaze confessed.

"You don't perchance hate me already, do you?" Jin asked, somewhat perturbed. She looked like such a nice girl, too.

"Now how could I possibly do that, when I love you with all my heart and soul?" Harukaze asked him, her eyes wide and admiring.

Jin nodded. He had demanded one thing from her, he couldn't go and demand the exact opposite at the same time. If he had wanted her to be honest, instead of loving, he should have made that his condition to go on this journey from the start.

"My apologies. My last question might have been out of line." Jin regretted.

"Apology accepted, Jin." Harukaze wrapped her hand over his and gave it a mild squeeze. "But about my question?"

"Before that, are you a virgin?" Jin asked.

"Yes. But I resolved something like that wouldn't matter when I began my mission, so don't let it worry you." Harukaze said quickly. "You don't have to feel guilty about deflowering someone like me."

"Deflowering your wife is considered pretty normal, however you look at it." Jin brushed that objection aside. He wasn't exactly troubled by that. It was something else. It was just that he'd never been with a woman who clearly felt she was infinitely superior to him. It didn't sit well in his mind, being looked down upon. Her pride. She acted like she didn't have any, so she could degrade herself in an instant. But that just hid an even greater pride. A pride as vast as the ocean, one that pitied him as a worthless cur, not even important enough to notice whether he took her or not. It didn't sit well. If a woman addressed him with pride like that, it didn't suit him to act like he didn't have any pride at all. It didn't suit him to fulfill her low expectations of him, to confirm this senseless superiority of her pristine grandeur over him. No, he wouldn't take her. Not now, and not tonight. Not until she begged him for it. And wasn't playacting, either. Only then could he satisfy his pride. A girl like her, who'd accomplished nothing in her life, a tavern mistress, looking down on Jin Ukizake? Ridiculous. Like he'd play along with her. There's no way he could let things proceed at her pace like this and escape a man.

"Are you worried I won't perform well enough?" The girl asked worriedly. "I thought men were satisfied with pretty much anything that moved. . . Or do you have a fetish for older women?"

"Stop with the hyperactive imagination!" Jin snapped, turning his focus back to this extremely irritating girl. Just earlier today he had been contentedly enjoying his meal of inedible greenery. Why did he have to put with this?

"Your proposal's denied. Categorically. I'll find another room, with another woman, tonight. And every other night too. And if no one offers, I'll use some of those savings of yours and hire a whore." Jin said.

"Why? I'm free. Plus, you said I was pretty. . ." Harukaze leaned back, her arms lifting up to her breasts, looking hurt.

"This conversation is over." Jin said flatly.

"Yes, husband." Harukaze looked meekly at the dirt road in front of her.

"Your father led a dojo. Does that mean you can fight, too?" Jin asked, changing the subject.

"A little. Not like you." Harukaze didn't sound like she was bragging or hiding anything.

"If bandits attacked could you hold your own?" Jin asked. Niron was full of bandits. Hell, from a certain point of view, he was one of them. There were always more second and third and fourth sons than there were rice plots of land to employ them on. Occasionally the government rounded them up and sent them to war against Qin just to clean up the roads again. It was a pretty hopeless endeavor considering Qin was at least ten times as populous as Niron, but that was precisely why the wars worked so well. The problem was the years in between where the second and third and fourth sons multiplied like flies again. The government hadn't found a solution to banditry in peaceful years. Jin doubted they ever would.

Harukaze let a knife slip down her kimono's sleeve from a hidden pocket into her hand, then whipped her arm in a practiced motion. The hilt of the knife quivered back and forth as the blade pierced the tree trunk in front of them dead center.

"I guess you'll do." Jin admitted.

"Would it have worked on you?" Harukaze asked.

"Buyer's remorse?" Jin smiled.

"No. Just an idle girl's hopes spoken aloud." Harukaze quickened her pace a bit to retrieve her dagger. Jin stopped and stood still until she had replaced the knife into her sheathe, surprised to see how far away he still was when she turned around.

"Try to kill me." Jin offered.

"Is that loving?" Harukaze asked dubiously, her eyes searching his out.

"Usually." Jin laughed. Truth to tell, only a few girls had ever said they loved him, and he was certain none of them had ever meant it. Oh, they might have meant it at the time. But that didn't mean they actually meant it. Not in a meaningful sense, which meant for all time. How a truly loving girl would act was as much his guess as hers. He was hoping she would finally answer that question for him, somewhere down the road.

Harukaze let a knife fall into her hand and threw it at his face full speed. Jin didn't have to think about it. He caught the knife by the hilt a few feet away from her desired target through pure instinct. A second later, his left hand had snapped out to catch a second knife out of the air, still vibrating against his palm with a thirst for his blood. Jin didn't have any time to be surprised. Harukaze had pulled back her kimono sleeves to reveal a needle-loaded crossbow and fired.

Jin dropped the dagger he was holding and seized the crossbow bolt out of the air. Her bow didn't have enough string to fire a truly dangerous strike. Harukaze's face became more annoyed as she pulled out a third stiletto from her obi and charged him.

He took five steps forward and grabbed her wrist on the far side of her stab, stopping her motion with infinitely greater strength. He heard a slight snick as a blade emerged out of a hole in her kimono at the knee as she struck for his crotch. He twirled around her knee to end up behind her back, still holding her right hand which was holding her knife in an extremely awkward position that bent her painfully into the dirt.

"Give. I giveeeee." Harukaze said in a squeakily strained voice.

Jin shook his head, studying this viper of a girl one more time. "Really? No more tricks?"

"This is how a girl fights. . ." Harukaze squeaked. "I only did what you asked."

Jin let go of her arm and helped his witch to her feet. "If women could kill men with a few dumb tricks, men would never have been born. Remember that."

"I thought I could at least make you draw your sword." Harukaze sighed, rubbing her shoulder as she picked up her various lost hidden weapons.

"Aren't you glad you couldn't?" Jin smiled. Maybe now she'd realize he was better than her.

"Yes, husband." Harukaze said with a smile. "Though now I just want to see how you really fight even more. I'm doing this because even if there's one chance in a thousand you'll win, at least that's making some sort of gesture. But now I'm thinking you could beat Vaj one in a hundred times."

"Oh, well, gee." Jin sighed. Why she was boasting about how strong the people she hated were was beyond him. But she certainly knew how to put people back in their place quickly.

* * *

"Are you ready to go?" Jin asked, masking a long yawn with one hand. The inn they had stayed the night at was as good as they came. It included meals, women, and baths as well as futons to sleep in. All of this luxury was coming out of Harukaze's savings, which suited Jin just fine. She had offered them, after all, and he was the one putting his life on the line. But for some reason he had hurried to the second room they had rented out to see her while she was still asleep at the break of dawn. It was no good, she was wearing a light sleeping kimono she had apparently packed away for the journey, and was as covered up as she was on the road. She wasn't cute at all.

"Give me a minute." Harukaze spoke from under her covers. "What time is it?"

"Dawn. We travelers have to make use of every hour of light if we want to get anywhere." Jin said.

"Really? I'm sorry, I didn't realize we were in a rush." Harukaze yawned, and then sat up, rubbing her eyes. She crawled across the floor to her knapsack and pulled out an ivory comb to start brushing her long silky hair back into order. Jin stood at the doorway and watched, content as a man at the zoo.

"It will really just be a few minutes, so can you wait at the entrance?" Harukaze asked, looking over her shoulder as the light of dawn framed her face so brightly he couldn't see it.

"Sure." Jin shrugged. He walked back to his room and picked up his packed bag, checking to see that nothing was missing or had been moved, then sighed as he looked at his untouched futon. Lone swordsmen couldn't afford to sleep in beds, they were too easy targets for unscrupulous louts. For years his sensei had taught him the art of sleeping while sitting, his sword in hand, tucked against a corner of the wall, listening for anything untoward. It had saved his life twice. Once from a brat of a kid who had tried to avenge his father Jin had killed earlier that day, and once from a jilted girl who didn't like that he was leaving for the road next day. Strangely, not a single hired hand had ever tried to kill him in his sleep. Maybe it was some sort of gentlemen's code in the underworld: No explosives and no cheap shots. Everyone wanted to live and die by their skill, not chance, and everyone wanted a good night's rest. Too bad women and children hadn't signed in. A good night's rest was a foreign concept to his life.

The one other precaution he took during sleep was to always sleep in a different corner of the room, based on coin tosses, so they couldn't shoot an arrow through the rice-paper walls and stick him from afar. No one had tried that trick on him yet, but he wouldn't put it past an ingenuitive enemy.

He had lived a long time in this profession. He wasn’t about to get cheated out of all his hard work by an assassin’s arrow. Debt collectors he didn’t really care about, but Jin had a vituperous aversion to cowards.

Jin bowed to the innkeeper respectfully and complimented her on her establishment. He had come and gone across Niron so often that it was good to be in the good graces of any innkeeper anywhere, just in case. Then he sat on a log outside the inn used for outdoor diners and waited for his wife to emerge.

“Sorry to keep you waiting. I’ll wake up earlier tomorrow.” Harukaze promised, bowing to Jin as she emerged from the door.

“It was nothing.” Jin shrugged it off. Actually, it had been a cruel prank on his part, but he didn’t feel the need to admit that, now or ever, really. Sadly, just to maintain his innocence, he would have to be waking up at dawn for the rest of their travels together. Well, these things happened. Dawn was as good as any other hour, in the end.

“How are your feet?” Jin asked.

“I’ve trained my body for this day. I can carry a warrior’s load or walk a warrior’s march.” Harukaze reassured him.

“Where do you keep your muscles?” Jin asked, smiling. He certainly hadn’t seen any when she’d given him a peek yesterday.

“Huh?” Harukaze asked, her eyebrows coming together.

“Nothing.” Jin laughed. Strength and muscle size weren’t highly correlated anyway, probably even less so among women. He had seen children carrying enormous loads on their heads of rice or water or cut grass with nothing but sticks for legs. People couldn’t be judged by appearances. Just take this girl in front of him. She was as evil as the darkest abyss, but he was the only one who knew it in Niron.

“As a girl who’s desperately in love with you, I find myself curious about your background.” Harukaze said as they stepped out onto the road. Jin wondered about breakfast, but since they were ostensibly ‘late’ already he really couldn’t say anything about going back inside for a bite.

“My background?” Jin asked, trying to think back on his life.

“For instance, are you bushi or nin?” Harukaze asked, eyeing his sword. It was a fine sword, but she had never seen it drawn. It was part of the bushi code not to ever fully draw a katana unless you meant to kill someone with it before it was sheathed again. For cutting meat and the like, there was always his wakizashi.

“I suppose I was bushi at one point. Certainly when father was still paying sensei to train us all up in the dojo. Kuro and I were sensei’s finest students. But neither of us lived up to his expectations. He offered Kuro the dojo, but we had already agreed to enjoy a meaningless life of women and sake instead. The government offered us positions in the next Qin expedition as officers, and the police had an open invitation to any graduates of the Kensui school, but, well . . . one drunken murder led to another, and suddenly my parents didn’t want anything to do with me, and then I got angry about that and killed some more people, people who thought they could charge me too much on my bills or gave me dirty looks like they were better than me. . .and suddenly the only jobs people were willing to offer me was to kill someone or other, which I’ve been doing to this day. I figure if you’ve managed to offend someone so much they’ll pay someone to kill you, then the people I’ve killed must have all been bad guys. I guess you could say it’s a life of no regrets.” Jin said. He hadn’t opened up so much with another woman in years, but Harukaze was his wife. He had to do his part, he figured, for their love to become a magnificent raging inferno of eternal passion and romance to be passed down through the ages.

“So that’s why your tongue is so nimble. Can you read and write?” Harukaze asked.

“As well as anyone else, I suppose. I do have one really good death poem saved up, when I meet my better.” Jin said.

“Oh? What is it?” Harukaze asked, leaning closer to share in his secret.

“Who knows. I’m sure it will come to me at the time. Death poems require inspiration. Inspiration is the key.” Jin said. As though he’d ever share his death poem with a woman. That was a world reserved solely for the warriors who put their lives on the line.

“And I was expecting something so good, too.” Harukaze pouted, slouching back away. “Well, at least I can give you a grocery list of things to buy and you won’t just stare at it and scratch your head.”

“When would we buy groceries? We’ve got 500 olun. More than enough to buy prepared meals along the whole way.” Jin complained.

“495. And four of that was for your woman.” Harukaze corrected primly.

“Hmm? So how many days does that give us?” Jin asked, taking a fine-looking stalk from a weed off the side of the road and chewing on it for breakfast.

“500 olun minus 5 a day. Are you a dunderhead? It’s one hundred days. One -- hundred -- days.” Harukaze repeated slowly in case he couldn’t understand Niron at normal speed.

“Don’t worry about it. Here, I’ll just kill some other people along the way and refill the coffers as we go.” Jin offered to calm her down.

“And what happens if you lose some dumb fight for money before you do a single thing for me? No thanks. Instead, we’re going to save on ingredients, since I can’t stop you from hiring women, even though there’s a perfectly nice girl at your side who’s perfectly willing. Honestly, unbelievable, to think I’m hiring a guy who’s part of the system that put my sister up for sale in the first place. For all I know he’s hired my sister, and he probably beat her too, it would be just like him, out of control murdering fool, to hit anyone who looked at him funny, and he’s supposed to be avenging her dishonor, maybe I should put his face on the drawing too and just sort of slink it in as the sixth. . .”

“What are you going on about?” Jin asked.

“Nothing, husband. Just a prayer to the gods for another day of good weather for our journey.” Harukaze squeezed his hand to relax any suspicions and gave him a bright smile.

“Well, okay then. But I’ll spend as much as I like, and we’re eating however I like. If you love me, it’s only sensible to let everything go my way. If we run out of money, I’ll get more in no time. I’ve done this all my life, there’s no way I would die out of the blue. Got it?” Jin asked.

“Yes, husband.” Harukaze nodded meekly, keeping her head fixed apologetically on the road ahead. Assuming they covered ten spans a day, Jin would fight Vaj in twenty days anyway. She could hire her next assassin with the remaining 400 olun.