The Golden Naginata

by Jessica Amanda Salmonson

  “You have lived in seclusion a long time,” said Tomoe. “You would not know me in such a case, nor the Rising Sun General. But we are famous, yes; and you are famous, too, although no one has known where you retired.”

  “Okumi is famous?” The lips parted in a toothless smile.

  “You are,” said Tomoe. “You were the fiercest on the shores of an alien invasion; you helped repulse the foe most admirably, with a weapon charged by magic. That is what they say in the kodan houses; the minstrels and puppeteers say it, too. Your deeds are told throughout Naipon.”

  Okumi seemed to think this over very carefully. Then she said, “I did not know that. I was asked to retire by enemies of my husband, or else submit to concubinage … that was long ago. I have lived here since then, and prayed for the well-being of my husband’s spirit.”

  “If anyone had known where you were,” said Tomoe, “they would have set you free. The world has changed a little, Okumi. You have outlived your antagonists. Now you can walk from this place into the world anytime you desire.”

  “There have never been locks on my room,” said Okumi. “I am held here only by my own promise, given sixty years ago. I cannot break the promise even now; ‘the word of the samurai’ was given. My whole world is like this anyway …” She indicated the shadowed perimeter of the room. “Everything is darkness. I have been treated well. I have been resigned.”

  Tomoe held back tears. This, she knew, was the fate of many women warriors, if they were unfortunate enough to survive a losing husband.

  “You are unhappy for me?” asked Okumi, sensitive to what others felt although she could not see their faces.

  “I am more selfish than that,” said Tomoe. “I am thinking that someday I may be sitting in a room like yours.”

  “You would rather be a ‘Yamato hero’?” Okumi asked, being ironic; for Yamato referred not only to Naipon’s chief race, but also to a famous hero of the most ancient times, who died young. There had been many like him since.

  “I would rather be a Yamato hero,” Tomoe easily admitted.

  Okumi laughed very gently. “Either you will have your wish,” she said, “or you will change your mind. It is no trouble being old. There is time to thank the ancestors and the Buddhas. There is time for peaceful sensations and meditation.”

  “I rarely talk to Buddhas,” said Tomoe. “The sutras are unknown to me.”

  “Then you will have time to thank the Billions of Myriads,” the old woman said. “There are even more of them than Buddhas! But you did not come to find out what it is like to live secluded. Someone told you where I was.”

  “It was Shan On of Shigeno Valley Cemetery. You would not know the place, for it was recently made on the site of a terrible war.”

  “But I do know the place,” said Okumi. “Although I do not have much news of the outside world, Shan On happens to be my daughter.”

  Tomoe was surprised. “I could not guess her age. I did not think she was so old as sixty.”

  “She is not my husband’s child, but was born three years after he was killed; Shan On is not quite sixty. For a time I had a lover who was a man of the Celestial Kingdoms, a renegade who loved Naipon better. He was executed under false charges of being a spy. As a result of my affair, or because it made a good excuse, my husband’s old enemies ‘asked’ that I retire. I complied to save my daughter. We were separated by force, and Shan On was raised by a Shinto priestess so that even the nuns could not get word to me through Buddhist routes. I knew nothing of her for many years, except that she was alive. After the Shinto priestess died, Shan On visited me here; it was a happy reunion. She took a Buddhist habit to add to her Shinto robes, this to honor my own sutras. I have word from her now and then, although I have been denied other contacts.”

  “The reason she has sent me,” said Tomoe, “is for your aid. I bear a sword haunted by a vengeful ghost, as does my husband.” Tomoe unwrapped her bundle which contained her better clothing and a sword. She set the sword on the floor between herself and the large, old woman. Thick-fingered hands reached for the weapon, touched the handle, drew away. “An evil thing!” she exclaimed. Tomoe said, “I feared it.” The blind nun said,

  “You must leave the sword with the priests of Yuwe-ji. I would keep it myself, but I may not live as long as it will take to appease the angry spirit. The sword will require regular services, perhaps for many years if not for generations; only then can it be made pure. The priests can do that, although you will have to make some other donation as well.”

  “I will do as you advise,” said Tomoe. “But my husband is stubborn and may not agree to do the same with his.”

  “If he fails to retire the sword,” said Okumi, “it will undo him in the end.”

  “Shan On has told me the same thing,” said Tomoe. “But she informed me that it might be possible to meet with the ghost in his own country under the earth, and to beseech him to forgive my husband.”

  The old woman nodded slowly, pulled her face back into the shadows. “It would be a dangerous journey, without guarantees. The yamahoshi are responsible for guarding the gate to hell; you can enter only by their permission, and escape only by their aid. You will also need a better weapon than this sword would be, unhaunted. The weapon must be as capable of slaying creatures of the supernatural realm as of slaying mortal samurai.”

  “There is such a weapon?” urged Tomoe, who already knew the answer from the stories told in the kodan houses. Okumi had borne a magic weapon during the Wars with Ho. It had been a halberd-like naginata, a sword mounted on a pole. What became of it was part of Okumi’s mystery.

  “The Golden Naginata,” said Okumi, “rests in the crater of Kiji-san, a mountain in the north.” Tomoe knew the mountain, one of a pair of twins: Kijiyama on the right and Kujiyama on the left (from the southern approach), the latter being the abode of the yamahoshi monks, the former being the place where the yamabushi built their monastery. “The yamabushi make prayers to Kiji-san so that the peak will not explode, for it appears always on the verge of overflow. But they are misled. The mountain is at rest, and only the naginata inside its summit causes the terrifying glow. Unless the metal is coated with the blood of the monster kirin who guards it, to gaze upon the nagainata’s light means instant blindness!” Saying this, the old nun opened her eyes for the first time. They were shiny, black and vacant. She raised a fist and said, “But, oh!, it is a fine thing to have as one’s final vision! It etches itself onto the mind and stands forever in the darkness like a beacon!” Okumi’s breasts heaved excitedly, but slowly she calmed herself, lowered her quivering fist, and shut her unseeing eyes. “Until the blade is drenched in the kirin’s blood, you can only use it with eyes bound shut. Samurai practice many blind styles for the sake of nightfighting and for stalking the lightless corridors of castles; but the kirin will set an unusual test of blind battle which you may not survive.”

  “I do not fear it.”

  “You will need a certain sheath. The golden naginata is so sharp that no common sheath can hold it without being cut in two. I have kept the magic sheath these years as a memento; but as Shan On thinks it important, I will part with my keepsake for you, if you will make one promise.”

  “I will do any favor.”

  “The Golden Naginata cannot be held too long in mortal hands; for one thing, the blood of the kirin filters away the blinding brightness for the space of a single month, and it is difficult to fight such a monster on a monthly basis. You will have to return the weapon to Kiji-san by then, or the mountain might not rest longer. The sheath, however, is yours to keep … until some other hero comes to you and needs it for Naipon’s sake. That is how it has always been, and how it must always be.”

  “But if I become a Yamato hero,” said Tomoe, “how will I keep such a promise?”

  “In that case, the sheath will take care of itself; death will free you of the promise.”

  “Very well,” said Tomoe. “If I do not become a Yamato hero, I w
ill do as you say without fail.”

  The old woman stood and went through the dark of her room to a side wall, sliding a small door aside. Inside was her bedding, and hidden among the futons and blankets was the sheath. It was not an extraordinary sheath, seeming to be made of common wood, nicely carved but not lacquered, not gilded, no special attachments of any kind. Okumi said, “No doubt it looks plain to you. But to these old hands which know the feel of magic, this sheath is spectacular. It has pleased me to touch it lo these many years, so you must love it, too.”

  Tomoe held the plain sheath, letting her fingers trace the mystic carvings in the wood. “It has aji,” she said, aji being a special trait of simple things, a word applied to things which should be used and are not so nice if they look unworn. The word also implied much handling, as by Okumi’s loving hands throughout these sixty years.

  Okumi bowed slightly to Tomoe’s praise, and said, most simply, “Thank you.”

  Tomoe called to her brother: “Imai!” She hurried along a narrow hall in the castle. The word “castle” was barely apropos. Yuwe Castle was a fortified position surrounded by palisades; it had proven pitifully easy to win and scarcely worth having, except for its strategic location near Kyoto. Yet to Yoshinake, who began his career as a “tent general,” it was almost too fancy for comfort.

  Tomoe had changed into good clothing: hakama trousers and kosode blouse, her personal comma-pattern crest printed at the front of each shoulder and in the middle of her back. She said to Imai, catching up to him in the hall, “Sorry if you worried about my being late. After visiting with a nun, I was with the priests of Yuwe-ji longer than expected. Is my husband sleeping?”

  Imai said, “He is in a bad mood, Tomoe, Whatever you said in your letter makes him unhappy—with me, too, for delivering it. He says you walk about the country like an unlanded peasant, or a perverse lord who enjoys sneaking among the common people in disguise. He says you are troublesome and annoying, that …”

  “Good,” said Tomoe. “If he is upset, he must believe what I have told him.”

  “I don’t understand,” her brother said, screwing up his handsome face in a look of consternation.

  “Don’t worry about it. He is in his quarters?”

  He nodded. “Yes.” Tomoe started to hurry away and, as she did, her brother flicked a secreted pebble toward the crest printed on her back. She turned swiftly and caught the stone in her hand, grinning at the fellow who threw it. He said, “You are too quick for me, Tomoe.”

  “You are slow in your old age,” she teased, then hurried on. Momentarily she came to the rooms Yoshinake had selected for himself and his wife on the day the castle was taken. He sat against one wall with his elbow on a padded arm-table. He glowered into space, not seeming to notice who had entered. Tomoe came up to him and dropped to her knees, face tipped down a little, awaiting permission to speak. After an uncomfortable silence, Yoshinake removed the letter from his sleeve-pocket, waved it like a flag, and said with hoarse annoyance, “Why do you send such news as this in a letter? Are you afraid to speak to me in person?”

  “My apologies, Lord Kiso.” She bowed further, as might any cowed vassal.

  “You call me that? You were less formal before you left!”

  Challenged, she sat up tall, hands on knees, and admitted plainly, “Sometimes you are difficult to approach with a difficult matter, it is true.”

  “You should not feel like that with me! You come tonight like a vassal, not a wife; you sit there as though we are not intimate. You are my equal in everything and need not be overwhelmed by me. Haven’t I given you your own crest?”

  Tomoe said, “You have made me more solitary than independent. If you would command me more, perhaps it would not be true that I am less lonesome in a graveyard, and find it easier to converse with ghosts.”

  “I promised not to rule you!” stormed Yoshinake. “You require subjugation?”

  “You are subject to the Shogun,” she reminded. “Every samurai must serve.”

  “You serve me well!” he said. “You should think of liberty as your reward.”

  “I will do so,” she said, still formal. Yoshinake grumbled because she would not soften. Then he said more calmly,

  “Explain this letter to me. If it makes it easier, I command you to do so.”

  Tomoe looked toward her left, at the wall behind which three bodyguards were always sitting. She rose to her feet, went to the wall, and slid a panel aside. “Go away!” she snapped, her tone imitating that of her husband. They looked at Lord Kiso, who did not contradict Tomoe’s order. They stood, bowed, and shuffled away like a short parade. Tomoe shut the panel. To Yoshinake she said, “It is as I wrote you. Because Okio’s hungry ghost knows we killed three of his champions, he wishes us injury. The swords he made in life are the instruments of his vengeance, as you and I well know. The giant Uchida Ieoshi, vainly considering himself your rival in the Shogun’s esteem, will no doubt consider it his victory if we both take new swords, perhaps swords made by the smiths of his own clan. It cannot be helped. My sword is already placed in retirement. You must do the same with yours.”

  “Absurd!” Yoshinake looked agitated to the extreme.

  “Okio haunts you already,” said Tomoe. “He will twist your normal stubbornness into something not sincere, but unreasonable.”

  Yoshinake pulled his knees up under himself, taking a more formal position and sinking down like a child pouting.

  “I have talked to the priests, a priestess, and a nun,” said Tomoe. “Each says the sword will be your undoing.”

  “I am stronger than any ghost,” he said. “There is no finer sword in Naipon. I will not part with it.”

  Silence was like death after he said this. Tomoe watched his face, but he would not look her in the eyes. She thought she saw something of madness behind his strict expression, as though the ghost of Okio were already firmly rooted in him, making the Rising Sun General act this way. Finally, Tomoe spoke:

  “I expected this. Therefore I have already made arrangements for a journey. Since, as you say, I have my liberty, I may undertake any mission I please, and be away however long I desire.”

  “It cannot be just now,” he said, looking at her at last. “There are no battles to be fought at the moment, it is true; but this is only the calm before the storm. While you were on your pilgrimage, the yamabushi and yamahoshi agreed to sign a treaty with each other and serve me. I mean to send you to the Karuga mountains to personally lead them on a march upon Kyoto. Our bid for ultimate power nears us, Tomoe! When the last leaves of autumn have fallen, the warlord Yoshinake will rise!”

  He was excited by the news he was giving her, but Tomoe was entirely composed. She said, “I had meant to go to Karuga anyway; for upon twin mountains there, my mission lies. In the last year, you and I have been busy settling revolts; so I have been unable to keep my promise to bonze Shindo, to return the shaku from the head of his staff to his teacher in the yamahoshi monastery.”

  “You have more than that in mind, I know; but as you do not wish that I ask what it is, I will not pursue it. Only, when the last leaves fall, you must begin your march with the martial Buddhists. My plan is for Kyoto to be already won when you arrive; for with those lords sworn to my service, plus my blood clan, and your own eastern relatives, we have army enough to secure a victory and possess the Mikado’s city. The Shogun will hear of it and send a strong army against me at once. They will not expect the reinforcements you will bring from the north. After the shogunate forces are defeated, we begin the fortnight’s march to Kamakura, with our multitudes of allies. If we travel as the wind, we may cut four days off that harsh trek, unseating the Shogun before he has news about our exact plan.”

  “Before marching on Kamakura,” said Tomoe, “you must win an imperial decree. Otherwise we cannot legitimize such action against the Shogun.”

  “The Mikado will make any decree I wish!” said Yoshinake. “He will be delighted that I free him from vir
tual imprisonment, and reward me with the commission I am seeking.”

  “If he does not?”

  Yoshinake fumed at the query. He said, “Then he will be obliged to act accordingly for the sake of his own life!”

  Tomoe registered no emotion, although inwardly she was sharply affected by her husband’s promise to threaten even the Mikado’s safety, all for personal gain. Very quietly, she asked,

  “Can you see true a threat against Amaterasu’s godchild?”

  There was no hesitation. “I can.”

  “I see.” She looked away from him a moment, then met his eyes until he was forced to look away from her. She said, “I will do as you say. It will be a month before the last leaves fall. I have that much time to complete my personal mission.” She did not say that her mission was to save him from this madness, from possession by the hungry ghost. She stood to leave, awaiting no permission, being as she was told “at liberty.” But he stopped her with an unexpected gentle voice. He said,

  “It is late. Surely your mission can wait for dawn.”

  She hesitated in the doorway. Yoshinake’s tone was plaintive. She had never heard him sound that way before. Perhaps something inside him recognized his own madness, causing him to beg for succor. Tomoe turned back to face him. With anger gone from his expression, Kiso Yoshinake was too beautiful to resist, and too much in need. She said, “Yes, it can wait that long.”

  In the night, Tomoe had a dream she didn’t like. She dreamed it was already morning and she had started out for the Karuga mountains. She was fully armored and rode a white horse. Behind her came a retinue of seven personal retainers, also on horses, also in armor; and there were at least a dozen servants on foot, carrying flags in their hands and boxes on their backs. Two were pounding drums. For a long time, in the dream, they went along like this, quite slowly.

  Up ahead, on the side of the road, a woman dressed in a red kimono sat next to a fat, rustic god carved in stone. The god’s face was pleasant. The woman wore the bell-rimmed hat of a fortuneteller. A veil hung from the hat so that it was not possible to see the woman’s face. Tomoe Gozen did not realize who this was, because, in dreams, things are often like that.