Chapter 13: Slicing & Dicing
Misha didn’t know what Bran was planning to do, but he knew it wouldn’t look all that nice given the sword through the gu-huo-niao’s middle, so he turned and angled the little girl’s field of view in the opposite direction. To draw her attention even more, he even stuck out his forked tongue and let her play catch with it.
Had the gu-huo-niao been human or even a normal, non-magical animal, she would have been outright killed by the impaling, no questions asked, but given she was what she was, she was still alive, though bleeding profusely.
Bran stopped in front of her and crouched. The creature spat at him, though this didn’t seem to bother him in the slightest. Instead, he pulled a piece of yellow paper from his pocket and tapped it to the creature’s bird-like forehead.
The gu-huo-niao gave a shudder then seemed to fall into a kind of trance with the piece of paper still stuck to her forehead.
Bran stood, walked behind her, then began to pull the sword from her body.
Misha, who was watching intently, flinched then had to use his tail to shield the little girl’s eyes and give her something new to play with.
Blood spurted from the gu-huo-niao’s back and poured from her front, but Bran kept going with the grissly task until the blade finally left the creature’s body. To Misha’s surprise, instead of collapse or scream, the creature merely gave a sigh, seemingly of relief, then began to transform back into a woman’s visage.
Bran took the instrument case from his back, replaced the sword back inside it, and locked it again, all without cleaning the blood from the blade. Misha didn’t know much about swords, but he was pretty sure leaving a liquid on metal was a good way to grow rust. Had to be a special blade.
The gu-huo-niao, now fully human again, sat cross-legged on the ground and closed her eyes as if she were meditating.
Seemingly satisfied, Bran came back over to Misha and the little girl. He put his first and second fingers to the little girl’s forehead. There was a brief glow of light then the girl lay limp in his arms. At the same time, the red, weeping walls around them seemed to melt and peel slowly away.
"She’s asleep," he told Misha, "Now we just need to return this little one to her grandfather..."