by John Norman
I recalled that Tajima, suspecting, and I would suppose correctly, that he might more likely survive as a fugitive in the mountains than Ichiro, had, in the midst of the storming of the first encampment, turned his tarn over to Ichiro and ordered him to flee. I had subsequently feared, had Tajima perished in the mountains, that Ichiro might have had recourse to the ritual knife. To be sure, Tajima survived, and, as nearly as I could tell, was doing well, though I would have still been hesitant to send him forth to meet an enemy. I found it difficult to understand Ichiro, and his sort. He had been ordered away, and thus, in the light of discipline, had had no choice other than to obey his superior, Tajima. If one were to think of the ritual knife, it seemed to me a more plausible occasion for its employment would have been upon the failure to obey the order. From my point of view, of course, living was a more plausible route to honor than death. I was never an enthusiast for leaping on one’s sword, and such. Better to die with it in one’s hand, facing the enemy. On the other hand, who am I, who once abandoned honor, long ago, in the delta of the Vosk, to speak of it to others? Paths are many; let each seek his own.
“Tajima, I fear,” I said, “has an eye for Sumomo.”
“Most unwise,” said Ichiro.
“He used to watch her in Tarncamp,” I said.
“And now in the holding I fear,” said Ichiro.
“Most unwise,” I said.
“I think so, Captain san,” he said.
“That is a joke,” I said.
“Yes, Captain san,” said Ichiro.
“We are loading panniers with rice,” I said. “Rest now. After dark we will deliver these stores to the holding.”
“Yes, Captain san,” said Ichiro.
Ichiro withdrew, hopefully to secure some Ehn of sleep.
I went to the small shed, to the stores of which we were helping ourselves. “How goes it?” I asked Torgus.
“There will be little left here,” said Torgus.
Of the fifty-one tarns which had survived the raid on the first encampment, we were utilizing forty. Each would carry two bulging panniers of rice, one on each side of the saddle. Of the other eleven tarns, six were charged with keeping lines of communication open between the holding, the new encampment, and our storage depot, so to speak, which changed, day by day. The other five were used for reconnaissance and mapping. As yet, I did not think the pavilion of Yamada was aware of our activities. And, even should they be detected, it would take time for word of them to reach his pavilion, as the swiftness of tarns was ours, and he, as kaiila were unknown in the islands, was limited to posts of runners, used to communicate between his camp, his towns, and capital.
“The panniers are ready,” said Torgus.
“We leave after dark,” I said.
I looked at a brace of panniers.
“The slaves were bartered for one or two fukuros of rice each,” I said.
“The garrison was starving,” said Torgus.
“Each of these panniers,” I said, “would hold several fukuros of rice.”
“Who would know that slaves were so cheap,” said Lysander.
“A starving man would give a Brundisium stater, a tarn disk of Ar, for a cup of rice,” said Torgus.
“Where are the slaves?” I said. “What was done with them?”
“Such things are not known,” said Lysander.
“You have scouts out,” said Torgus. “Perhaps they will note cages, a pen, a slave yard, a coffle.”
“One or two fukuros of rice,” I said.
“Most for one, I understand,” said Torgus.
“Do you object?” asked Lysander.
“Not to the selling,” I said, “it is fitting that they be bought and sold. They are merchandise.”
“But so cheaply,” said Torgus.
“Yes,” I said.
“Lord Temmu had little choice in the matter,” said Lysander.
“I understand,” I said.
“But you are annoyed,” said Lysander.
“Yes,” I said.
“Most would be annoyed,” said Torgus.
“Yes, I suppose so, most,” said Lysander.
Even a pot girl, a kettle-and-mat girl, would most likely bring between twenty and thirty copper tarsks in most markets. And, in better times, one might buy the common fukuro of rice, to its usual measure, for as little as one or two tarsk-bits.
“It will be dark soon,” said Torgus.
Slave girls are commonly quite vain. Not vain as are free women, arrogant in their freedom and smug in their supposed beauty, whom slave girls commonly look down on, though fear terribly, but vain as slaves. There is a Gorean expression, “slave beautiful,” or “beautiful enough to be a slave.” Even a free woman so described, feigning her outrage, would, I suspect, be secretly pleased with such an assessment. What woman would not wish to be ‘slave beautiful’ or ‘beautiful enough to be a slave’? The slave, taken and collared, has no doubt as to her attractiveness and desirability. Are such things not proclaimed by the mark on her thigh and the collar on her neck? These are badges of quality, proof that men have found her worthy of bondage, worthy of being put on the block and sold. So it is no wonder that the slave is vain, for she knows that she is a prize, that she is so desirable and exciting that men, in the way of nature, will be content with nothing less than her possession. And so the girls compete, boast of their prices, and the heat of the bidding which took them from the block. And now, I thought, will certain slaves regale their sisters in the pens with accounts of their value, how they were bartered for a measure or two of rice?
“We will gather food again tomorrow?” said Lysander.
“I think not,” I said.
“What then?” asked Torgus.
“I shall speak to Lord Okimoto,” I said, “who, I trust, will speak to Lord Temmu.”
“Why?” asked Torgus.
“It is my part of my plan,” I said.
Chapter Nine
What Occurred in the Courtyard of the Holding;
What Occurred Later at the New Encampment
The banner of Lord Temmu no longer flew over the castle.
From below there was no sign of life in the holding. The blades of no glaives were visible, borne by patrols.
There was no return fire, or cast stones, to the intrusions of the mighty arrows of the great bow.
Too, somehow, over the last two or three days, rumors had circulated in the camp of Yamada, rumors which, I supposed, only Pani would take seriously, but rumors which, indeed, they might take seriously.
As it was learned later, Lord Yamada, sitting cross-legged in his pavilion, being served tea by his contract women, listening to reports, was incredulous.
He was wary.
He even called forth readers of bones and shells, and, perhaps more judiciously, herbalists, physicians, and chemists.
Then, as the reports went, he rose up and cried out with rage, fearing perhaps in some obscure way that he may have been thwarted, or outdone.
Then, on the third day, word was brought to him that the great gate at the height of the wharf trail, leading upward from the sea to the holding, stood open.
Two or three Ashigaru, impressed from the fields, were sent to reconnoiter, and they climbed the long path to the gate, in trepidation, fearing much. How tentative they were, and furtive!
Crouching and hesitant, a step at a time, they crept, bit by bit, to the great threshold, and peered within. Moments later, crying out with fear, awed by what they had seen, they hurried back, down the trail, about the wharves, and to the plain, so far below the lofty walls of the holding, on which stood the pavilion of Lord Yamada.
They cast themselves prostrate before the shogun and, eyes on the lacquered boards, not daring to raise their heads, babbled out their report.
Men and officers were gathered about, and, in moments, surgent and uncontrolled, what had once been the scarcely audible stammerings of frightened Ashigaru were being proclaimed, shouted, broadcast throug
hout the entire camp of the shogun.
Lord Yamada was not pleased. His brow was clouded and his face was dark with fury. He looked from his pavilion to the heights of the holding so far above, almost lost in the clouds, and shook his fists in anger.
“Lord, Lord?” inquired a general.
“Yes, yes!” screamed the irate shogun. “Go, be done with it!”
The shogun then turned away, returning to his private quarters.
Orders scarcely needed be uttered.
The siege was done; gold lay in the clouds; officers sought to muster and organize men, but already hundreds of Ashigaru, and men, even of two swords, were hurrying up the long trail.
Little did it matter to them that a deed massive and potent in its might, a deed which might awe and shame better men, had been accomplished within their own lifetime, a deed the tale of which might be told for a thousand years.
* * *
I had returned to the holding and had spoken to Lord Okimoto, and he, in turn, shortly thereafter, had addressed himself to his cousin, the shogun, Lord Temmu.
“I do not well understand the matter of the ritual knife,” I had said to Lord Okimoto, “but it is clear you are one who does. So I ask your view on what seems to me a simple matter. My question is this, is it appropriate to lift the ritual knife when success, survival, even victory, is still possible?”
“In such a case,” had said Lord Okimoto, “lifting the ritual knife would be not only premature, but would be an error of action; indeed, it would be improper, and thus forbidden.”
“The holding,” I said, “is strengthened. Supplies are abundant. The men rise up. They look about themselves. Their eyes are clear, their limbs are strong.”
“As things are,” he said, “one would not take the blade out of its case. There is no point in doing that now. It was different before.”
“Our renewed strength,” I said, “is not known below.”
“I do not think so,” he said.
“Excellent,” I had said. “Now let me speak more to you. I have a plan.”
* * *
I supposed that after the months of the siege, the inactivity, the waiting, the watching, the routine patrols, the endless drills, and such, the eagerness, the unruliness, the excitement, the greed of hundreds of the men of General Yamada, rushing as they could up the steep trail from the wharves to the holding, was understandable. At the edges of the encampment below officers sought to control their men, to marshal the platoons and companies as they could, but their success was not notable. At the height of the trail lay the holding with its wealth of gold, silver, silk, sake, vessels, jewels, screens, hangings, perfumes, weapons, robes, instruments, ointments, oils, and such, the treasure and loot of generations amassed by the house of Temmu. Who can discipline an army if it is the army itself which abandons discipline? In warfare, the salvation of the defeated is often contingent on the victors pausing to gather in the stores of the routed force, which delay commonly purchases the time necessary for an expeditious withdrawal. In theory one presses on against a fleeing enemy, denying him rest, precluding a regrouping and stand. In the field manuals the common lesson is to pursue an advantage to the end, to follow up on the victory, never to stop with an incomplete victory, but the field manuals are written with the care and leisure which might accompany kaissa. They are composed in tents by lamplight, after a day’s march or skirmishing, even in winter quarters, or even in exile, or retirement, as is thought to have been the case with the Field Diaries commonly attributed to Carl Commenius of Argentum. It is not difficult, in the quiet of the night, or the quiet of the study, to analyze with shrewdness, and compose with deliberation. But, unfortunately, those in the ranks are seldom familiar with the manuals, and would not care for them if they were, and many cannot read. And officers, familiar with the manuals, sweating in the midst of fighting, exhausted, hoarse, their arm weary, looking about themselves, discover they are now surrounded by disorganized, swarming men, innocent of, or forgetful of, codes, excited, frightened, violent, celebratory, reckless men who have survived battle, men who are not eager to renew war, to face again the blades of a desperate enemy, men who are now exhilarated to find themselves alive, and are intent on loot, without which the pittance of a common fee is negligible.
Whatever may be the case the trail upward was crowded with hurrying, jostling, panting men eager to make it through the gate at the summit of the wharf trail before it might be shut against them by their own officers. One might, in such a moment, be able to seize and carry away, even concealed in one’s garments, enough to purchase a tavern or farm.
Some men apparently died in the climb upward.
Those in the foremost ranks, gasping, legs aching, bracing themselves, pushed from behind, paused as had their predecessors, the timid peasants sent ahead to reconnoiter, at the large threshold.
An awesome sight met their eyes, hundreds of Pani warriors, in white garments, having seemingly performed ablutions and purified themselves, lay crumpled in the remains of what must have been a great number of serried ranks.
Apparently, at a common signal, well over two thousand Pani warriors had had recourse to the ritual knife.
Then there were cries from behind the paused, startled vanguard of looters, cries of wrath and impatience, and men began to force themselves past, at which point, with a great cry, hundreds of men, bent on plunder, burst through the opening.
They swarmed into the courtyard between the inner wall and the fronting of the castle.
There was much shouting, and confusion. Inert bodies were kicked, and white garments trampled upon. Men milled about, their eyes wild, uncertain now where to begin, which buildings to breach, what portals to force. Where would be the deepest vaults and the mightiest chests? Where would lie the greatest treasures? They looked to the castle. “To the castle!” they cried.
Then suddenly, in their hundreds, they stood still, startled, unable to move, struck with surprise, astonished, for, before them, before the portal of the castle, there stood a single figure, this even as others continued to pour over the great threshold.
Lord Temmu was a large man. He was standing; his eyes were wild and fierce, and, over his head, clutched in two hands, he held his field sword.
“Death!” he cried.
In that moment there stood at his side, the short, thick figure of Nodachi, a sword in each hand.
He said nothing, he measured those about, selecting who would die.
Then, behind Lord Temmu on the right stood Lord Okimoto, and on the left, Lord Nishida. “Death!” they cried.
At this signal hundreds of hitherto prostrate Pani, armed, sprang up, and began to fall on the looters, many of whom had cast away weapons, that they not be encumbered in bearing away their booty.
At the same time more than a thousand mercenaries streamed forth from the barracks, sheds, ancillary buildings, and the castle itself, crying out a hundred war cries from a hundred cities.
For some moments looters, unapprised of what ensued on the level; continued to hurry upward, and enter the courtyard, but, momentarily, there was confusion at the threshold as terrified men turned to flee back through the opening. But a line of Pani interposed themselves and a dozen others cut men away from the threshold and swung shut the gate.
In moments hundreds of looters were encircled, crowded together, in the center of the courtyard.
Nodachi then, I am told, cleaned his swords and returned them to his sash, and went to the side, where he sat, cross-legged, and silent.
The tarn cavalry, less than a pasang north of the holding, was mounted, and waiting.
“The banner of Temmu is raised!” called Ichiro.
This, by prearrangement, was coordinated with the initiation of the attack on the looters.
“One-strap!” I cried.
I had requested that Tajima be the one to raise the banner, signaling the cavalry. This did not please him, but I did not wish to risk him against the enemy until I was confiden
t he was fully ready, fully recovered from the harrowing rigors and exposure of his isolation in the mountains. I did not doubt but what, the banner flying, he would race to the courtyard, with two swords, but the delay, I hoped, would be sufficient to reduce the numbers of, and the brunt of the resistance of, the enemy.
In moments the remnants of the tarn cavalry, limited now to fifty-one mounts, was streaking through the clouds over the holding, making its way, in formation, though without tarn drum, to the encampment of Yamada, to fire as many tents as possible.
We began with the tents farthest to the south, selecting tents in the kaissa-board fashion, to conserve our incendiary materials, fire jars lit in flight, as this approach is designed to capitalize on the likelihood that a fire consuming one tent may spread to another. We began with the farthest tents to confuse the enemy as to our mission, that he would merely see us pass overhead, and, more importantly, that the enemy in the fore would see fire behind him, and the mountain and holding before him. This is likely to have its effect on morale. What is behind him, and what does it mean? Too, I assumed General Yamada, from what I had learned of this mighty adversary, would more likely be at the front of his troops than in the rear. Accordingly, he would find himself removed from the immediate locus of the attack, this delaying a personal response to it, and, almost certainly, would assure a delay in his apprehension of the situation, its nature and gravity. Uncertainty and confusion are sometimes as effective as the blade and glaive. Action undertaken in such a situation may easily prove inopportune and unwise. On the other hand, in this situation, small purchase would be obtained. Any troubling lacuna in the intelligence available to the shogun would be brief.
“Ho!” I called to Ichiro, not yards from me, to whose supple, tem-wood lance was affixed the commander’s pennon, and about whose shoulder hung the war horn of command. “About!” I called. “The day is done. Two-strap! Into the clouds, to vanish! Home, Fellows, home!”
