The illusion cracked.

“You’re not good at this, are you?” said the woman.

“I have other skills,” Raidou said, and got his hands up just before she lashed the wire around his throat. It bit into the reinforced material of his gloves and the back of his neck, but not—and this was important—into his larynx. She spat irritation and sent real, actual fire burning up the metal noose, but Raidou knew where she was now. He had her on a line.

And she expected him to jerk away.

He grabbed further down the wire with both hands, ignoring the hiss of smothering flames, and wrenched her forward. She staggered, caught by surprise. Raidou surged forward, let go of the wire, and in a move Katsuko was particularly fond of, unsheathed his sword in a single arc right across the woman’s ribs. Her flak-jacket peeled open under the black blade, and flesh pared away from bone. Blood washed down the flat plane of her stomach. She choke-gasped and drew two kunai, forcing him to block one with a quick reversal of his stroke and the other with his arm-guard. Clashing metal struck sparks. She was fast and light on her feet, like most genjutsu-artists. But she was close enough to grapple, and that was his playground—

Paper rustled.

An exploding tag flapped gently on the ring of her second kunai. She slammed it into the ground at Raidou’s feet with a thunk, and looked at him. “Three,” she said. “Two—”

He threw an arm up.

The explosion blew them both into the walls. Raidou hit hard enough to dent plaster and dropped to floor, head ringing. He fought his way back upright, shedding pieces of wood and bits of foam—the crib had been caught in the blast, though the little girl’s bed was remarkably untouched—and ripped the wire free, dropping it to the ground where it smoked and blackened. In the corner of the room, the nanny had been knocked out of the rocking chair; she fought dazedly with the wire he’d tied around her wrists, blood smearing her clothes from half a dozen wooden shrapnel injuries. Not a threat. The kunoichi was already up and scrambling towards the doorway, casting shimmering threads of genjutsu to cover her escape, but they were weak, visible. Raidou yanked the senbon out of his leg and flung it at the back of the her neck.

It struck, but missed the nerve cluster he’d been aiming for. She yelped, and vanished around the doorframe into a hallway that wavered with weird blue flames and—giant scorpions.

Raidou was ninety percent certain those weren’t real.

He could also feel Katsuko’s spark again, like a grounding beacon. He grabbed his sword and bolted after the kunoichi before he could lose the last shreds of his advantage to a new set of illusions. She met him with fresh kunai and the incredibly disturbing vision of all his skin spontaneously melting into blood, but he could see reality through it. Her gasp was definitely real when he broke her guard and kicked her in the ribs. She went down on one knee, cradling the mess he’d made of her stomach. Her uniform was shredded and scorched all over, but her eyes were still calm.

“They haven’t done anything,” she said.

“I know,” Raidou said, words smearing around blood, and cut her head off.