Prologue: Catalyst
It was a balmy summer evening. The cicadas were humming and a warm breeze shook the tree tops and swayed the wild grasses around them. The sisters, with a pouch of food, had found their spot to rest in a little glen; the forest to their backs and the western mountains unfurled before them. This place was their favorite to go after a hard day's work. Papa and mama had taken the wheat to market.
"Look at that sunset." Hiraya hummed biting into some salted fish.
Behind the mountains the brilliant sun was setting giving the peaks a fang-like appearance and painted the sky an orange burst holly berry color.
"Did sunsets look like this in your country?" Ayaka chirped around a plum.
Hiraya looked over at her little sister, "Oh…..I'd imagine so Ayaka. Although I can't remember much of that place-"Hiraya grabbed Akayas' neck, "-DUCK!" and flung both of them foreword into the dirt.
Seconds' later horse and rider, two of them, came sailing out of the forest; the steeds hooves grazed the air where the two girls heads would've been if they hadn't moved. The earth rumbled with their touch down. The sisters quickly sat up.
"Isn't that Oda Nobunaga!?" Ayaka gasped.
Sure as shit it was.
And he was in a bad spot.
The man pursuing the warlord shot an arrow striking Nobunagas' horse. With a sharp scream of pain the poor creature lurched forward disappearing into the sea of grass and his master with him.
"Ayaka get in a tree. Now." Hiraya got to her feet.
"Hiray-"
"Now I said!"
Ayaka squeaked at her big sisters bark but quickly disappeared into the forest to find safety. Hiraya faced the two men at the center of the glen. Nobunaga's pursuer dismounted and the fading light of the west highlighted the crest painted on his armor; the Tiger of Kai.
Hiraya inhaled shallowly feeling a familiar burn in her blood. Charging through the grass on bare feet her approach was mashed by the swishing sound the grass heads made when the breeze moved the stalks.
Nobunaga was pinned beneath his fallen horse; its neck snapped at a grotesque angle. The soldier of Kai lifted his katana for the killing blow-Hiraya ducked under the man's right elbow, grabbed the soldiers short sword, dropped to her knees and skid through the mud to about face.
Ting!
Steel clashed against steel. The Kai soldiers blade above, his own short sword in her hands, and the trapped warlord behind her. Both men were surprised by her abrupt appearance.
"Baka! Run!" Nobunaga hissed.
Hiraya's palm, the one holding up the sharp side, began to bleed as the assassin pushed down on her blade.
"Woman-"the soldier barked with bloodlust, "do not make the mistake thinking I will show mercy to you!" he finished with a grunt.
Hiraya tensed under the force of her opponent, "Oh, I'm not concerned."
Like coiled springs her legs launched her upwards. The sudden explosion caught the man off guard and he flinched. Hiraya ran her blade down the length of his making the two weapons sing shrilly. In one motion she righted her blade, shoved his aside, and –slush- partially decapitated the soldier. For a second he stood, frozen to the spot, with wide, unblinking eyes.
Then his head flopped back off his neck, the open wound began spurting blood, as his body fell back into the tall grass.