Blood Ninja by Nick Lake

stone. “I sent you for the boy,” shouted Oda. “And you return with nothing but excuses. He’s nothing but a child! Children are easy to kill. It is one of their advantages.”
    Then one of the other voices said, “The traitor ninja turned him, Lord Oda.”
    “Turned him?” said Oda, horrified .
    “Yes. It’s much harder to kill a vampire child than a human child.”
    There was the sound of a person sucking on their teeth, thoughtfully, then a sigh. “Still,” said Oda. “You failed, whether the boy was turned or not. You have shamed your clan, and my family name.” There was a loud slashing sound, then screams, then silence .
    Ito stood for a long time, worrying. He had been summoned; he was expected quickly. And yet Oda was clearly involved in some kind of dispute, perhaps with his retainers. Perhaps it would be best to come back later? No. His presence was requested. Ito swallowed, and found that his throat was constricted and dry. He raised his hand and knocked, lightly, on the door. A small part of his mind hoped that something was wrong, that he would be sent away and told that Oda was not available today. Then he could polish the sword a little more, work on the etching to the hand guard so that it caught the light just so .
    “Come in,” said Lord Oda .
    Ito entered, keeping his eyes low so as not to cause offense .
    “Look up,” said the lord .
    Ito looked up and saw, to his astonishment, that Lord Oda was smiling. The daimyo stood in front of a tall shoji window from which the paper had been ripped, so that he was lit by a shaft of light as sharp and narrow as the sword in Ito’s hands. Several retainers stood against the walls, watching. In the middle of the room was a shaven-headed man who stood with his hands bound behind his back, keeping his eyes fixed on the floor. He was trembling .
    Lying on the ground, curled in various attitudes of agony, were a number of men in black clothes, obviously dead, their faces obscured by black silk scarves and hoods. Smoke rose in lazy spirals from their bodies and hung in dark motes in the bright light .
    Ninjas .
    “Don’t look on them,” said Oda. “They are unworthy to be looked on, or remembered. They failed in their duty to me. I trust that will not be true of you. They say you are the best sword smith in the region. That had better be true.” He waved a hand, and retainers began dragging the bodies from the room .
    Oda held out his left hand to Ito, and for a moment the sword smith just stood there, mouth open, staring at the lord’s shriveled right arm, which hung uselessly at his side. Ito saw that the rumors were true: Lord Oda was lame. They said he had been struck in the shoulder with a sword while fighting in the glorious rout of Yoshimoto’s larger army. The wound had severed tendons and nerves; now the arm was thinner than the other and Nobunaga couldn’t use it .
    Someone had told Ito that it was a woman who had wounded Lord Oda—a ninja woman, at that. But he tried not even to think this idea, so blasphemous was the suggestion that a mere woman could inflict such harm on the great daimyo. Already, he had half-convinced himself that the report had been a dream .
    It was also said—and Ito still remembered this part—that the lord’s private physician had begun the preparations for an amputation, Oda himself being unconscious at the time. When the unfortunate doctor began to cut into the flesh of the damaged arm, Oda hadawoken suddenly and flown into one of his legendary rages. Taking his sword, with which he had killed so many sword masters in so many duels, granting him the title of sword saint, he had chopped off each of the physician’s limbs, leaving only his head and torso. Then he had cauterized the wounds with a brand from the fire, and instructed his servants to bring the doctor back to the castle, there to prop him on a seat behind a curtain and feed and water him whenever required. In this way, said Oda, he would have