The Disfavored Hero

by Jessica Amanda Salmonson

  “I said no!” The young prince had the commanding posture and tone of his class, but lacked years and experience. It took more than blood to be a strong leader to samurai as willful as these. He could only plead to their sense of duty: “If you must fight, do so with boken. A wooden sword won’t ruin our chance of seeing our task completed.”

  Tomoe had pushed her sword out the length of her thumb. The sword was not yet drawn. Ich ’yama looked terribly burdened and upset. He said,

  “I will agree to what Shuzo Tahara says, Tomoe! We will test each other with sticks!”

  Prince Tahara decided the terms: “It will be at dusk, in the gardens where we already agreed to meet. The bonze can be a witness too.”

  Tomoe said, “It is dusk now.”

  “Then we’ll repair to the gardens,” said the prince. “Hidemi, please run ahead and find a pair of strong bokens.” Tomoe pushed her sword tight into the scabbard, saying,

  “Good.”

  Hidemi Hirota was sweaty from having raced in search of wooden swords. He rested on his knees near the monk. Shindo sat in the gardens with his pilgrim’s staff at his side, his sword next to that. He did not look pleased. Tomoe was not unaffected by Shindo’s stern expression. Despite the gloomy circumstances which brought the five together, Shindo had been of bright humor. Now his humor was spent. The prospect of two in their group fighting against each other rather than a common enemy had completely overwhelmed his cheerfulness. Tomoe’s guilty feelings caused her to feel defensive. When she, Prince Tahara and the ronin came into the garden, she asked the bonze coldly:

  “Why wrap the sticks in straw!”

  He set the padded bokens on the ground in front of him and denied Tomoe the courtesy of reply. He addressed the entire situation instead: “I will not consider either of you good warriors if you cause so much as a bruise. No, do not argue! The test of skill is not whether one of you can hurt the other. If you can control your blows so well as to cause no injury, that is the measure of supreme understanding of your weapons’ merits and limitations. Bokens are not swords, yet they are deadly weapons; therefore I have wrapped these in straw. If one of you kills the other by accident or intent, then both of you will have shown yourselves poor samurai. Your present duty is to Okio’s vengeance. When that is done, you may kill each other at leisure. I won’t say more. Nor will I be a witness.” Finishing his lecture, Shindo took up his sword and placed it in his sash. Then, with staff in hand, he stood and went into the house, not looking back.

  Hidemi Hirota took up the straw-wrapped bokens. He said, “The bonze was ill tempered the instant I informed him of the match. I don’t understand his complaint.” He let Tomoe choose first between the bokens. They were identical, but she weighed them both before choosing.

  Prince Tahara said to the fighters,

  “It is unfortunate that Ich ’yama has alienated half his fellows. It is more unfortunate that Tomoe Gozen’s temper leads to this. It is almost as unfortunate that Hidemi encourages the fight and wants so badly for the ronin to be killed. Do as the bonze directed. Do not let there be a fourth unfortunate item for my list.”

  Hidemi gave Ich ’yama the remaining boken with far less ceremony. He said to the ronin, “Tomoe is famous! My own Lord has mentioned her merit with reverence and awe. There are perhaps five fencers anywhere in Naipon who could begin to stand against her. Think of that when she holds back and does not bruise you.”

  Ich ’yama took a stance facing Tomoe Gozen. Tomoe held her boken straight before, the hilt gripped firmly in both hands. She dug her toes into the soil of the garden. Ich ’yama slid his right foot closer.

  They clashed.

  Fell away.

  Bits of straw scattered in the air. Hidemi looked disappointed that the ronin was not touched. Prince Tahara looked surprised and began to watch more closely. Neither of the mock-fencers revealed their feelings.

  They circled one another. Ich ’yama gave ground, moving backward through a thicket. Unexpectedly, he moved forward, a blow aimed for the head. Tomoe went to one knee and blocked the cut, slipped out from under the boken and struck for Ich ’yama’s arm as she came back to both feet. A twist of the hand and he had stopped her counter cut. Again, they backed away from one another, bokens pointing outward from their centers.

  Already their brows were sweaty. It was a strain for them to hide their feelings. Neither had expected a close match. Both had thought to win instantly.

  The straw hung loose from the bokens, sad padding indeed. The pair engaged in another set of exchanges which proved neither one superior.

  “It could go on all night!” said Hidemi Hirota. “How can a ronin be so good?”

  “Shush!” the prince reprimanded. He and Hidemi followed the fighters through the large gardens, along paths or trampling through beds of flowers. There were no lanterns lit. As twilight became night, it was harder to see what was going on. Outside the garden, a koto played love melodies. Stars winked as darkness deepened.

  Tomoe stepped into a narrow brook which ran through the grounds. Ich ’yama rushed her with his sword held high and his trunk entirely exposed to a sideways cut. She tried for the swift strike, but slipped on algae in the rocky brook, as Ich ’yama must have expected. She started to block his blow but decided to let herself fall away instead, though it meant landing on her side in the shallow waters. Ich ’yama had not expected her to perform an undignified defense. As a result, he fell forward on the momentum of his own thrust and landed face down in pepper bushes. Where the pepper scratched him, it itched.

  Neither warrior looked very glamorous now, one soaked and the other scratched. Prince Shuzo called out, “Draw!”

  The two had regained their feet and faced one another again. Ich ’yama said, “We should accept Shuzo’s declaration, Tomoe! We are evenly matched!”

  She said, “I could kill you any time.”

  Ich ’yama was indignant. “How can you say so? Admit I fight as well as you!”

  “I have tested out your weak spots,” said Tomoe. “I know how to land a cut. If this were true steel, I could kill you right now.”

  “You are too boastful!” said Ich ’yama. “I will not consider Prince Tahara’s decision any longer!”

  Tomoe’s teeth shined in the darkness. It was a smile. She said, “Good,” then moved forward.

  She waited for his attack. Instead of blocking, she placed her wooden sword against his neck, hard enough to surprise him but not hard enough to bruise.

  “I’ve killed you,” said Tomoe.

  Ich ’yama’s boken was held firmly against the side of Tomoe’s ribs. A real sword would have continued to her breast bone and exposed her heart.

  Prince Tahara said, “Tomoe has won the match.”

  Ich ’yama jerked around furiously and faced Shuzo. “It was a draw! We killed each other at the same instant!”

  “Victory for a samurai is more than coming away alive,” said Shuzo Tahara. “Tomoe was more prepared to die. That is how she won.”

  The ronin’s face was hot with anger. He threw the scarred and dented boken on the ground and said, “I accept defeat!” As he stomped into the house to find a place to sleep, bonze Shindo came out into the yard. He had been listening out of curiosity, though by his own oath he was not allowed to watch.

  “A good night for moon gazing!” said Shindo, his positive disposition regained. But nobody listened, nor looked into the sky.

  The samurai was disappointed in her behavior. She’d won the bout with the ronin, but not with herself. It was unlike her to be temperamental, to insist on a fight when one was unnecessary. Now that her anger was assuaged, her guilt was heightened. When the broad-shouldered Hidemi and child-faced Prince Shuzo suggested turning in for the night, Tomoe decided on the monk’s occupation instead: moon-gazing. Shindo sat on smooth moss near a large, artificially made pond in the middle of the gardens. The rising moon reflected in the pond.

  “Would I interrupt your meditation,” asked Tomoe, “if
I sat beside you?”

  Shindo showed her his homely, pleasant face, round as the moon. He smiled welcome. They sat together. Tomoe said,

  “You are a novice of the yamahoshi? I’ve met mountain men before. They’re usually less pleasant that you.”

  The bonze was unoffended. “As you are different from many women of samurai caste, so am I different from many of my sect.”

  Tomoe’s awkward attempt to start a conversation ended there. They were silent for a long while, listening to the night birds and insects. A frog swam through the moon’s reflection, carving a transitory wedge. After a while, Shindo said,

  “It’s odd that no one spied a single man of the fifty today. I suspect they repaired to a shrine or hot springs to purify themselves after they completed their unholy commission. If that is true, they will be cleansed by now. They’ll return to Isso tomorrow and celebrate the last day of Star Festival with abandon. We must arrange the revenge-taking in darkness, so that Okio’s ghost can come up from the Land of Gloom and watch us.”

  Tomoe did not respond. Her thoughts were elsewhere. The bonze recognized her trouble. “Don’t treat yourself so harshly,” he said. “The fight with the ronin is done, and great harm was avoided.”

  “I try to make myself a little better every day,” said Tomoe. “How could I let a mere ronin ruffle my disposition?”

  Bonze Shindo grinned and looked another way.

  “You think it’s funny?” asked Tomoe.

  “I think we must each search our hearts from time to time. See over there among the reeds? There is a brown duck sleeping alone. Is it not sad?”

  Tomoe saw no duck. Ducks symbolized family love and faithfulness. Brown ducks were female. Tomoe said, “Do you suggest I’m fond of the ronin?”

  “Did I say so? No, I realize he is uncouth by your standards. But when you returned to the gardens at dusk, you looked more like someone who had lost her family than like someone desiring a fight.”

  “You are perceptive, bonze.” Tomoe looked unhappy. “My father has declared me dead because I refused a marriage meeting. It was bad timing for a ronin’s lust.”

  “You think it is lust?” asked the novice yamahoshi. “Don’t you believe in love?”

  “I believe in duty and circumstance,” said Tomoe. “Wives and husbands love each other because it is their duty. The circumstance is arranged by parents and go-betweens, not by love.”

  “You are cynical,” said the bonze. “The yamahoshi do not prescribe celibacy for their priests—only for novices.” Shindo laughed at himself. “So there is a saying among my sect: ‘Devils fall when yamahoshi raise their swords. Yamahoshi fall when women raise their eyes.’”

  “I’m not certain I like the saying,” said Tomoe.

  “The ronin might like it better!” The monk laughed again. “He is obviously very strong. Perhaps he has never been defeated before.”

  “He did not fall because of my eyes,” said Tomoe, her voice somewhat strained. “He fell to the skill of my weapon.”

  “Only that? I think he loves you besides!”

  “It annoys me that you say so. Monks forever give advice! How can you know what a ronin feels?”

  “To fight so well, he is more than a mere ronin. He takes the name ‘Number One Mountain,’ which is not a name at all, although it is very boastful to call himself that. I listened to the two of you fighting. By the sound of his footwork and strikes, I recognized the style. I’m certain he studied with Mountain Priests, perhaps at my own temple before I became a novice.”

  “So? It proves he’s from a mountain province and presently travels incognito. Yet he is too dirty to be anything but a well-trained man of bad fortune and worse manners.”

  “Even men of bad fortune have hearts, Tomoe.”

  “Do you suggest I have no heart?” asked Tomoe, her face turning red. She calmed herself immediately, breathing deeply, looking away from Shindo’s moon-face to the moon reflected in the pond. “My mind dwells always on the Way of the Warrior. I am forever prepared for death, not love.”

  “I won’t mention it again,” said the bonze, seeing her upset.

  “I would be grateful.”

  The moon’s path had taken it away from their vision. It peeped through the trees around Tomoe and Shindo, but no longer reflected on the water. The nightbirds and insects were silent, and that was strange.

  “Let’s move over there,” said Shindo, “so I can see the moon a while longer.” Tomoe followed the monk to a wooden deck built over a corner of the pond. The moon’s reflection was still not visible, but the moon itself shined brightly on their faces. Tomoe changed the topic of conversation:

  “I wonder if you know a man named Goro Maki. He shaved his head a long time ago to become a yamahoshi.”

  Shindo tried to remember. “If his head were still shaven, I would know him by that name. But once a new man in the monastery has proven his strength, he begins to grow a beard and wild mane of hair. He changes his name as well. The harrier the yamahoshi, the longer he has been a fighting monk; his beard symbolizes his strength. The change of name symbolizes the beginning of a new life, without desire for fame. If I have met your friend, it may have been by his newer name.”

  “He is unmistakable,” said Tomoe, anxious for news of the man. “He’s extraordinarily severe, yet kind in his heart. He was a samurai destined to be famous, except that he was forced to resign from the world because of circumstances beyond his control.”

  “You were part of his troubles?” asked Shindo, encouraging her to continue. “Today’s fight reminds you of a past error?”

  “It was unavoidable!” said Tomoe. “Goro and I served the same master, the father of Toshima-no-Shigeno. When the warlord died, it was my sword that killed him. I wanted to commit suicide to atone, but Toshima absolved me of guilt. Goro Maki, however, remained bound by samurai rules to fight me, despite our friendship. He was also bound to obey the warlord’s heir, Toshima. To prevent the fight, she commanded Goro to leave and become a monk, forsaking all samurai privileges. She then made me her chief vassal. To other people, this is old history. To me, it is sometimes as clear as this morning’s events. No one has seen Goro Maki since that terrible situation. I would like to know he bears me no animosity. It’s hard to lose friends.”

  “There are many stories like that one among the yamahoshi,” said Shindo. “My own instructor might have been a famous samurai, but circumstances drove him to cloister. He will never talk of it. My own history is less extreme, yet I might have been the priest of an important shrine but for family disputes. I volunteered for something with less prestige because I was least proud, and it ended jealousies. It was frightening at first, going to the yamahoshi monastery. I’d been told they were bitter men, for it is true that the Way of the Warrior is complex and arbitrary enough to cause many warriors to choose either harakiri or retiremen, through no cause of their own. Since then, I’ve grown fond of the yamahoshi. They are as honorable as famous men! They obey no government but their own. They practice martial skills by challenging demons such as oni and tengu. They banish evil with their swords but ask no thanks or fame. Because they understand the importance of attending supernatural events, my instructor quickly said, ‘Go!’ when I begged leave to avenge Okio. I’ll return to the mountain after this commission and not leave again until I’m a strong warrior-monk.”

  “I would like to see you then,” said Tomoe, “with your whiskers and long hair.”

  “It will hide my ugly face!” said Shindo happily.

  “Not so ugly,” said Tomoe. She was at ease for the first time that day. “It’s a face of large character.”

  Shindo looked pleased.

  The brown duck sleeping in the reeds was disturbed. She made frightened noises and burst from cover, flapping into the sky. Shindo stood up immediately and took a stout posture.

  “Evil spirit!” cried Shindo. He struck the ground with the bottom of his staff, and the three rings at the top jangled. “Ba
ck to the mountains with you!”

  Tomoe stood and looked in the direction of the reeds. She did not see anything, but realized something was amiss since it had been quiet for so long. Shindo struck the ground again. The sound of the rings was meant to frighten devils and ghosts away.

  “How do you know what it is?” asked Tomoe.

  “A yamahoshi knows!” he said. “Even a novice like me. Look!” He pointed with his staff. For a split second, the moon shone on the face of a hideously ugly, brilliant red oni.

  “Oni devil!” said Tomoe; but the specter slunk out of sight too fast for her to be certain.

  “You know them, too,” said Shindo.

  “I have fought them in the past,” said Tomoe. “They are fierce with weapons, but cannot speak.”

  Shindo struck the ground again. Something besides an oni devil appeared on the pond’s opposite bank. It was a woman dressed in red and wearing a large hat with veil and bells attached. The woman spoke, and her voice carried across the water in an eerie way:

  “You are mistaken, bonze. If I were an oni, how could I speak to you so easily?”

  The bonze struck the ground with his staff once more. The woman did not quail, reaffirming that she was not a devil disguised. She nodded her head to make the bells of her hat jingle, returning the bonze’s insult. She said,

  “You are a novice after all, unable to tell a sorceress from a devil. But you must be sensitive to recognize my occult aura.” The woman raised her walking staff above her head as she added, “I would like to match my staff to yours. We will see whose understanding of occult matters is better.”

  Shindo looked serious. He said, “The yamahoshi banish evil magic! We do not fight with spells, but with martial skill!”

  The woman laughed, and the laugh was devilish indeed. She set foot on the surface of the pond and did not sink. She began to walk toward Tomoe and the bonze. Her gait was broken and surreal, for one of her legs had once been broken and healed crookedly. Tomoe reached for her sword, but the bonze said, “Leave it to me!” He waded into the pond to meet the sorceress, but the waves from his legs made the woman vanish from the pond. Tomoe gasped. She said,