Chūgo glared at the foul, filthy creature to whom fate and blood so disgracefully bound him. Then he sighed. He lifted his cup and drank, swallowing his anger, hatred, and fear along with Matsui’s excellent sake.

From the promenade outside Edo Castle, Sano watched Chūgo Gichin enter the main gate. Defeat dragged heavily at his spirits as he waited a safe interval, then followed.

He and Hirata hadn’t found a way to see or hear what was going on in the shop, so they’d waited outside and resumed pursuit when Chūgo and Matsui emerged. But the imminent closing of the gates left the suspects insufficient time to kill. Chūgo had ridden straight back to the castle, and Sano expected that Matsui, too, had gone home. Now Sano returned to his mansion, but only to leave his horse before setting forth on the night’s second mission.

As he walked through the dim, quiet passageways, physical exhaustion hit full force. He hadn’t slept for two days, or eaten since afternoon; his head ached, and his empty stomach burned; his chin hurt where Hirata had hit him. Therefore he found great relief in being safe inside the castle’s walls, where no assassin could reach him. However, survival seemed his only victory in a day fraught with failure.

He’d seen his hopes for a distinguished marriage destroyed. He hadn’t eliminated Chūgo or Matsui as suspects, but had failed to gather evidence against them. Tonight’s fiasco had merely tipped the balance more heavily toward Yanagisawa’s guilt.

As Sano made his way toward the Tokugawa ancestral shrine, submerged anger burned through his unhappiness. His upbringing forbade him to rage against the code that formed the parameters of his soul, so he turned his anger on a convenient target: Aoi. Tonight he would find out whether his suspicions about her were valid-and make her pay for misleading him. Unwillingly he remembered their last meeting: her beauty; the yearning he’d experienced and knew she had too. Now fresh desire heated his blood and turned his anger to raw fury at the betrayal of what they’d shared.

Focused inward, Sano belatedly registered the sound of footsteps following him through the passage. They synchronized with his own almost perfectly. When he paused, they ceased until he resumed walking. His extra sense flooded him with alarm that he at first dismissed. Inside the castle, he was safe. He was simply reacting to two days and nights on the alert for an assassin by imagining threats where none existed. Still, his skin tightened; his bones vibrated in unmistakable response to approaching danger. Quickening his pace, Sano glanced over his shoulder. A curve in the stone wall blocked his view. He couldn’t make himself stop and let his follower pass, or turn back and challenge him. He couldn’t overcome the defensive instinct instilled in him by a lifetime of training.

Sano broke into a run. As he tore through around the passage’s winding curves, he heard his pursuers panting between his own labored breaths. Once the hunter himself, he was now the prey. Was this a game of idle castle samurai who sought entertainment by ganging up on a convenient victim whose humiliation-or injury-would bring them no punishment? Or was it connected with his investigation, and the earlier attack on him? He could sense the pursuers’ malice like a pressure current along his nerves.

A checkpoint loomed ahead of him. All hope of aid died when he saw the abandoned gate standing open. Where were the guards? Once past the gate, with his pursuers hard on his heels, Sano made an even more disturbing discovery. The guardhouses that ran along the tops of the walls were dark, vacant. No troops patrolled the passage. He was unprotected, alone with his pursuers.

Sano shot past more deserted checkpoints and open gates, endless lines of empty guardhouses and towers. Soon he began to tire. His heart felt ready to explode; his lungs heaved painfully; his body grew slick with sweat; his legs heavy as stone. An ache stabbed his side. And still the footsteps pursued him, forcing him higher into the castle’s upper northwest reaches, farther from home, the palace, the guard compound, and other populated areas lower on the hill.

His cramp worsened as he pounded through the gate that led to the martial arts training ground. He heard the men closing on him while he skirted the pond and swerved around archery targets. He dashed past sheds and stables, then across a road, into the Fukiage, the castle’s forest preserve, where he could surely lose his pursuers.

The towering pines enclosed him in their dark, whispering hush. Spurning the gravel paths that led to gardens and picnic grounds, Sano wove his way between trees, trying to run softly on ground carpeted with pine needles. He’d reached the limit of his endurance; he must rest, or collapse entirely. Sagging against a tree trunk, he gasped for breath. Blood roared in his ears. He looked back toward the forest’s edge. His runaway heartbeat accelerated. Fresh panic seized him.

Moving toward him through the trees came two wavery spots of light. As he watched, three more joined them, then fanned out to his right and left. The men had brought torches to hunt him. He’d lost the protection of darkness.

With a groan, Sano pushed himself away from the tree. Urgency won out over his need to keep quiet. Low branches whipped his chest as he ran; gravel crunched loudly underfoot when he crossed paths. A torch flame appeared to his right, and he darted away, only to spy another coming straight toward him. Soon he lost all sense of direction. He could only hope he was moving toward the gate at the forest’s far side, through which he might escape.

Then, without warning, a small clearing opened before Sano- a woodland retreat furnished with two stone benches. He knew he should stay hidden in the woods, away from exposed spaces, but his lungs could no longer suck in enough air. The cramp bit him like iron spikes. As he tried to flee the clearing, he stumbled and fell to the ground.

Leaves rustled; branches snapped. Now the torches drew a tightening circle around Sano. Their fitful light and acrid smoke filled the clearing as the men’s shadowy figures emerged from the forest. Sano realized that they’d deliberately driven him into the Fukiage, to corner him here. With the last of his strength, he managed to stand, but too late. The pursuers emerged into the clearing, and unknown terror took on solid form at last.

The five tall, strapping men all wore armor tunics, with dark kimonos tucked into leather shin guards: the uniform of low-ranking castle guards. Swords hung at the left of their waists, stout wooden clubs at the right. Instead of helmets, they wore black hoods that covered the lower halves of their faces.

“What do you want with me?” Swaying on legs gone weak from exertion, Sano looked from one man to the next. His heart fell when he saw the rapacious gleam in their eyes. “Why did you chase me?”

Silence, except for the crackling torches, the restless wind, and his captors’ eager breaths. Then the leader, whose more elaborate armor marked his higher rank, spoke.

“You will stop hunting the Bundori Killer,” he said, his voice muffled by the hood that didn’t conceal its deadly seriousness.

Sano felt a trickle of cautious relief. Had they only run him down in order to deliver a warning?

Then the leader flung down his torch and advanced on Sano, unhooking the club from his sash. The others followed suit. There was no mistaking their intent: to maim, cripple, or kill him to prevent future inquiries. A rush of fresh energy readied Sano’s body for combat; his hand sought his sword. Then he remembered the law against drawing a sword within the castle grounds. He hesitated before following his natural impulse to defend himself.