Purple light streaked past on either side, like bubbles seen while sinking rapidly through deep water.
Yaha's body was falling.
Fast. The laws of space wrapped around him and dragged him down, the dark purple passage walls racing past his sides. Wind poured into his collar, blowing his black haori upward.
He did not resist.
His right hand hung at his side, the dark red cracks on its back still seeping blood. Three fingers were numb. His ring finger and pinky had completely lost all response, while sensation in his middle finger came and went.
Her warmth still lingered in his palm.
The curved bloody scratches left by her nails had already begun to scab.
Yaha lowered his head and glanced at that hand. The scarlet in his dead-fish eyes was unnaturally calm, like a lake sealed beneath ice, with something bottomless lurking below.
He looked away.
The five fingers of his left hand tightened, locking around the sword hilt.
He was not gripping it. He was embedding his fingers in it. His knuckles melded with the cursed markings on the hilt, the bones at the heel of his palm pressed against the pommel, and everything from his wrist to his forearm went taut in a straight line.
Light appeared at the end of the passage.
The dark purple light brightened, and the walls writhed harder. The laws governing the teleportation were converging, preparing to drop him at the target coordinates.
Yaha flipped over.
His fall on his back became a headfirst dive. Legs together, sword extended in his left hand, he compressed himself into a vertical black speck aimed at the passage's exit.
He did not slow down. Cursed energy erupted from his soles, providing thrust.
Not to brake. To accelerate.
"You already opened the hole."
The words slipped