With a sudden, deadly whoosh of displaced air, the three assassins dropped from the ceiling, their curved blades glinting in the flickering candlelight.
They expected a terrified, weeping noblewoman. They expected me to cower, scream, and beg for my life.
Instead, I snapped my heavy iron Tessen open and swung upward with everything I had.
I didn't have formal dojo training. I didn't know elegant sword stances. But I had spent nine years dodging Uncle Kenji's flying sake bottles and swinging heavy wooden brooms at giant basement rats. I knew how to hit a moving target.
CRACK.
The solid iron edge of my war fan slammed directly into the jaw of the first assassin before his boots even touched the floorboards.
He didn't even make a sound. His eyes rolled back into his head, and he dropped like a sack of wet flour, his dagger clattering harmlessly against the wood.
The other two assassins hit the floor, freezing for a fraction of a second in pure shock.
