Now the next part gets tricky because now the dream takes over, and I just don’t know what’s what.

First, I’m in bed. Dream or reality: I can’t tell. My room is very dark, and I’m in the middle of that deep and dreamless sleep of childhood when something tugs me awake, reeling me to consciousness. I hear sounds. Quick. Angry.

Then a skip, like a faulty holovid. Now I’m moving toward a bar of yellow light cutting a diagonal into the darkness; now I’m peering into the kitchen where my parents aren’t speaking. It’s as if they’re frozen in time but tiny and very far away, the way things look when you use the wrong end of a telescope. My father, tall and proud, in a coal black skinsuit, his swords nestled in a ruby red obi, and his black eyes glittering with determination, the strong line of his jaw firm and utterly implacable; and my mother, still as a statue, her brown eyes smoldering, the muscles of her neck as taut as the strings of a tightly strung koto.

And then I’m outside, as silent as a shadow. I can barely make out my father; he’s like a creature scissored out of the fabric of night, as insubstantial as air. The air is just this side of chilly, and I’m shivering, gooseflesh stippling my arms. Gravel pricks the soles of my bare feet, and they hurt, and I wish I’d remembered my sandals, or even a pair of socks.

Another skip: cool, dewy grass that shushes under my feet, like slippers on carpet, and the tall, straighter forms of trees. I’m crouching behind …a rock? A wall? My fingers skid over something cold and hard; my knees are damp with dew.

Ahead, there are men: all in black skinsuits, faces obscured, each with the twin swords of the samurai. I know my father by his silhouette: square, solid. Proud. But I also remember (dream?) two others standing to either side of my father. I don’t know them, can’t see their faces. Yet a finger of fear pokes my chest.

Danger! That’s what my mind screams, and then a whispered afterthought: Blood and enemies.

The circle parts the way a curtain opens, and even though it’s night, everything’s clear as day. There, in the center, is a man in a loose white kimono. His silver hair’s done in the elaborate mitsu-ori topknot of the ancient samurai, and I recognize him at once: Uncle Kan. Not really related, but my father’s best friend; a man who followed Akira Tormark—O5P agent, lord, samurai—when my father left the Combine to pursue Devlin Stone’s dream. Uncle Kan kneels on a black tatami, and he beckons the rest to sit, sit. They kneel, and then they eat rice and pickles from ceramic bowls. I know with absolute certainty that their chopsticks are anise, just as I know that each of the men has three slices of pickle on his rice, mikire : three portions. Cut skin.

There’s a tray with a sake jug and one blue ceramic cup. My father carefully pours twice with his left hand from the left, filling Uncle Kan’s cup, which Uncle drains in two sips twice done. Two plus two makes shi. Death.

Another skip: There’s the sambo tray with Uncle Kan’s kazuka, the blade wrapped in paper but leaving the last two centimeters bare. Uncle reaches for the tray; his kimono falls open; the kazuka is in his hand…

And then—he’s cutting. No, not cutting. Slashing. Ripping. Grunting with the pain, the tip of his tongue clamped between white teeth. Left to right, unzipping his belly, and suddenly, there is black oil on his hands, his blade, his skin, his kimono. Only it’s not oil; I know it’s not oil. I open my mouth, but nothing comes out. I’m frozen in time, and the dream—memory?—slows to that nightmarish pace where the monster’s right behind, and you know that it’s only a matter of time.

Somehow, Uncle’s still conscious. Not screaming. Grunting, then hissing as his blade snags. My father stands at Uncle’s left side, as his kaishakunin, long blade drawn. He’s waiting for something, for Uncle to do something…

And then Uncle does it—jerks his kazuka free. Long, oily tongues of blood spill from Uncle’s belly. I see it all: pearls of sweat beading his forehead and upper lip, his face twisted in agony. But still he says nothing. Instead, he replaces his kazuka on the sambo tray and nods. Once.

Quick as lightning, my father brings his blade up and then down: a whip of light slashing through darkness—and Uncle’s neck. Two dark ropes of blood pulse in arcs; Uncle’s head flops forward, lolling on his breast the way a marionette goes limp when its strings are cut. But it doesn’t fall off. My father’s been a superb kaishakunin, slicing through bone and muscle until Uncle’s head is, literally, hanging by a thin flap of skin: the perfect daki-kubi.

And now… I scream. Loud. Long. Terrified. The men whirl; my father, horrified, blood dripping from his blade, reaches for me. But I’m screaming, flinching away. “You killed Uncle Kan, you killed Uncle Kan!”

Here’s what’s weird. One of the two men who’d flanked my father peers at me strangely, head cocked like an inquisitive spaniel. His visored face is totally black, but I feel his eyes, hot as lasers, raking my body. And then he asks my father, “Is that her?”

Three simple words: Is. That. Her. Question mark. But what the hell did that mean? I didn’t know then. I don’t know now.

The rest is memory, a little hazy but real. My parents talking, clipped, terse sentences shot in rapid-fire staccato. Mother was angry; her skin feverish and pale. But my father wasn’t. He was… sad. Not quite broken, but resigned. He laid Uncle’s katana and wakazashi upon the table, and then he said something to my mother I’ve never forgotten: “Kan chose the wrong master.”

Then my father reached down and touched my cheek; I remember that my cheek was wet with hot tears. I felt his rough, horny thumb on my skin, and I thought: He’s going away.

And he did. I didn’t see my father again until seven years had passed, when my mother died in a hovercar accident. By then, he was a stranger. We shared a house. I didn’t even pretend that he was necessary; I could take care of myself, thanks. We never really talked. Instead, we argued, flinging words that stung like the quick, lightning strikes of a perfectly honed blade. Ours was a relationship that died from a thousand small wounds. Then, two years later, I turned the tables, and I left him. I didn’t care what he did, where he went. Akira Tormark simply ceased being my concern—and now he’s gone. Probably dead; my God, he’d be past ninety by now. So he’s just like that dream now, a tissue-thin flap of memory like the flesh that held Uncle’s head to his lifeless body. Nearly severed, but not quite.

Okay, fine. Maybe I’m crazy. But here’s what I figured out. My father spent all his time extolling the virtues of The Republic, but when push came to shove? He went the way of the warrior—even if he tried to deny it with every fiber of his being.

And me? Hell, I don’t know. The Republic’s not my home, not really; and the coordinator is, what, indifferent? Incapable? I don’t know. There’s only silence, and that silence reminds me of that icy, hard, awful chasm between my parents, and my feeling that if I tried hard enough to please them, they’d stop, and we’d be a family again.

Whoa. I had to stop there, look away, then read that last bit again. What, I’m some snot-nosed kid demanding, “Notice me, notice me, I’m here?” I guess there are worse motives, but I’d kind of like to think there’s more to it than that. But I’m on my course now, claiming worlds for the Dragon. People might think I’m nuts, tempting a power as awesome as the coordinator’s.

And if Vincent Kurita demands my death? I’d do it. Gladly. Because then, finally, I’d belong. I’d be someone’s daughter, not a ghost’s or a memory’s, but a real, flesh-and-blood daughter: a Daughter of the Dragon.