The Beast Warrior

by Nahoko Uehashi

  Fear stabbed Ialu’s heart like an icy blade.

  Elin …

  He took a quick glance at the Royal Beasts, swooping and soaring between earth and sky, then leaped from his Toda and whacked it on the back to turn it toward the river. Running over to the horseman, he shouted, “Lend me your horse! And tell the commander over there everything that happened!”

  The man tumbled to the ground. Ialu leaped into the saddle and took the reins. Squeezing his thighs against the horse’s flanks, he pressed his body against its neck and spurred it to a gallop.

  It was a swift steed, and the autumn fields raced by. Speeding across pastures churned into mud and littered with the splintered fragments of shattered farmhouses, Ialu closed in on the horde of Toda. It looked like an enormous, shapeless lump. As he approached, the scent of Toda mingled with the stench of blood and offal. Particles of fine dust pricked Ialu’s throat, and he coughed. His horse balked and reared, rolling its eyes. Ialu pulled back on the reins and retreated a few steps to survey the scene before him.

  The city’s outer wall trembled, and smoke rose above it. The main gate had burst inward, and Toda were flooding through the opening. Those still outside were being pushed along, and their Riders, both friend and foe, were trapped within the seething mass, their faces raised in agony. Within the walls, Royal Beasts swooped down again and again to attack the Toda, while high above them hovered a single Beast.

  Ialu leaped from his rearing horse and broke into a run, the howling, stabbing wind at his back. A strange odor pricked his nostrils as he neared the wall. He held his breath and climbed over the fallen Toda, slipping through the gate into the city.

  At that moment, all sound ceased.

  Shadows plummeted to the ground. Looking up, Ialu saw the enormous winged beasts fall from the heavens like stone. On the back of one fluttered a familiar robe. Then the Beast collided with the ground.

  “Elin!” he screamed. He ran toward the spot where he had seen her fall, her hair flying in the wind.

  * * *

  Wails of mourning rose into the sky, like wind whistling through broken pipes. The surviving Toda raised their heads to the heavens and cried as one.

  Alu had alighted on top of a tall building. She stared motionless at the ground, without raising her voice in answer. Jesse stood in the saddle gazing down, his breath coming in shallow gasps.

  Mom!

  She had to be down there somewhere among the broken bodies of the Toda and the Royal Beasts. But if he flew Alu there, she might drive the remaining Toda crazy again. Making up his mind, he slipped off her back. “Stay here, Alu,” he whispered, his voice shaking.

  He ran along the roof, searching for a staircase. The only one he found was broken in places. He climbed down it gingerly, clinging to the wall, occasionally sinking to his hands and knees as he searched for a foothold. At the bottom, people milled about fearfully inside the entranceway, but Jesse ignored them and ran outside.

  The wind was so strong, he could barely stand. Fine dust stung his face, and when he tried to breathe, it stabbed his throat. Hacking violently, he staggered and flailed his way through the dust toward where the Toda raised their mournful cry. Blood-drenched Toda lay with their bellies pressed against the ground. Those that were still alive didn’t even glance at him when he passed. On their backs, bodies drooped like rag dolls, their arms and necks contorted into impossible positions. This scene stretched on and on, all the way to the main gate.

  In the ash-colored landscape something moved. Someone was striding toward him, pushed by the strong wind as he climbed over Toda carcasses. Jesse stood wide-eyed, gazing at his father. In his arms was Jesse’s mother. Her body hung limply. Jesse stared at her pale skin and at his father’s face.

  The wail of the Toda ceased abruptly. Silence enveloped the city along with the gray dust.

  ELIN’S TREE

  “My mother lived for four more days,” Jesse said, resting his hands on the desk as he looked at his students. They were all in their final year. The spring sun shone through the window, softly lighting their faces as they listened intently.

  “Thanks to the strong wind, the poisonous mist didn’t kill me or my father. As for my mother, she lived a little longer because my father ran to her rescue as soon as she fell. Of course, he hoped to save her life, but that was impossible. You’ve already learned that when someone’s limb has been crushed, they may live for several days fully conscious, only to take a sudden turn for the worse and die. That’s what happened to my mother. When Leelan fell, she was thrown from her back, and her thigh was pinned beneath Leelan’s body. Even so, thanks to my father’s quick action, we had those four precious days.”

  Jesse’s expression softened. “When she opened her eyes in the infirmary, my mother stared at us for a very long time, as if trying to decide if she was dreaming. Then she asked what happened to Leelan.”

  Jesse had been tasked with telling the oldest students this story every year. With each telling, the scene came back to life. His mother, lying silently on the bed in the large, dimly lit room, tears sliding down her face as she learned that Leelan, who had been almost a part of her, was dead.

  “My mother closed her eyes,” he continued. “Then she opened them and told us to call a scribe. I can still see her bloodless face and hear her voice. She spoke of the Toda, and of the Royal Beasts. She told us why they went mad when faced with a situation that would never have occurred in nature.”

  The Yojeh had compiled the record taken at that time into a book and made it compulsory reading for every teacher responsible for training those involved in running the country and for every person who aspired to become a beast doctor. It had already gone through many printings.

  After the scribe had left, Jesse had clung to his mother. She had wrapped him in her trembling arms and held him tight. “It was thanks to you, Jesse,” she had said. “Because of you, I could achieve what I set out to do.”

  He had longed for time to stop right then. In that dark room, with his head pressed against his mother’s chest, he had learned for the first time that some things can’t be changed, no matter how desperately he might wish otherwise. Maybe that’s why not just the pain, but also the brilliance of those last four days remained engraved on his mind.

  His father never left her side, even though his body was wracked by tremors. Although the fallen Toda discharged no more toxins, he’d still been exposed to some when he climbed over them. His life had been saved through repeated application of shilan solution, which neutralized the poison. It was in that state that he had come and stayed with Elin. She didn’t let go of his hand, or of Jesse’s, until her last breath.

  * * *

  Although the story of how the first handlers of Royal Beasts and Toda came to this country remained unknown and so was never recorded in her book, Elin did get to meet the Kalenta Loh before she died. The woman with one green eye and one golden, along with her son, Lyoza, spoke with the green-eyed Elin, the golden-eyed Seimiya, and Yohalu. Shunan, Esalu, Jesse, and Ialu sat nearby and listened. Jesse could still hear his mother’s voice as she asked, “Are there any handlers of Royal Beasts and Toda in your valley now?”

  The woman had smiled and shaken her head. “No. There are none left,” she had said. “They remain only in our books along with the memories of our distant ancestors.”

  The smile that had lit his mother’s face, and Seimiya’s tears, remained etched on Jesse’s mind. His mother was tormented by remorse for having opened the door to a disaster that claimed so many lives. By breaking the chain of fear and madness, she had saved the people of Amasulu. But no matter how many times she was told this, her burden never eased. Remorse for sending so many men to such a horrible death weighed even more heavily on the Yojeh, the Aluhan, and Yohalu, because they were the ones who had chosen to wage war and forced Elin to use the Royal Beasts as weapons.

  Seimiya prostrated herself before Elin and vowed to set the Royal Beasts free. Never again, she pro
mised, would they be raised as symbols of royal power. She wasn’t the only one chastened by the horror caused by a pack of Royal Beasts falling upon Toda hordes. That terror had been carved into the bones of the Lahza as well. Those who survived were sent back to their homeland with the bodies of some of the Toda and their Riders preserved in salt. These bore far more eloquent testimony to the terrible disaster than any words.

  To her last breath, Jesse’s mother grieved that she had killed Leelan, Kalu, Lesseh, Osseh, and Fuseh, Royal Beasts she had raised with care and affection. But in the end, she had succeeded in freeing the others.

  As his mother had said, war never ended, and conflicts still continued. Yet this kingdom was changing little by little. The bond created by the Aluhan’s younger sister’s marriage had paved the way for prosperous trade with countries to the south, the disparity between the territories of the Aluhan and the Yojeh had been erased, and the possibility of negotiating with the Lahza was being explored.

  To Jesse, who had witnessed his mother’s struggle at close quarters, it was clear that the heroic actions of a single, clear-sighted person could not prevent war. Humans were herd creatures. Until each member of that herd understood their own actions and thought for themselves, major changes could never take place. Just as his mother had told him in the sun-dappled forest, some things could only be changed by passing on the torch from hand to hand to spread the light.

  For years, Jesse pondered what she had taught him. At the age of twenty-seven, he compiled his ideas into a plan and presented them to the Yojeh, asking her to establish schools of higher learning where every commoner could study. Although Seimiya knew full well the potential consequences for a ruler of giving commoners access to knowledge, she supported his proposal wholeheartedly.

  The first school was built in the capital where Jesse’s father and mother had lived. Graduates spread throughout the country so that now schools were beginning to spring up even in small farming and fishing villages. Jesse didn’t know if the small flame that had been passed on to them would one day become a great light. But he knew that through learning, people begin to think. Through repeated trial and error, the herd of creatures known as humans would keep passing life on like a vast river.

  * * *

  Hearing the chime that signaled the end of the day, Jesse tucked his books under his arm and stepped outside the school. The gentle spring breeze caressed his cheek. It smelled good.

  Just as he did every time he taught this lesson, Jesse walked to where the Royal Beast stables had once stood. The site of Leelan’s stable was now covered in grass, and beside it was the grave of Esalu, who had passed away at eighty-two years of age. The Royal Beasts that Jesse’s mother had raised and loved were all buried in this wide pasture: Leelan and Eku and their children, as well as those brought from the wild when they were still cubs: Ukalu, Tohba, Nola, Lesseh, Osseh, Kaseh, and Fuseh.

  Two trees rose tall and slender, nestling together at the edge of the pasture where the Royal Beasts lay. Beneath them slept Jesse’s father and mother. His father had lived for twenty-two more years after his mother’s death. Eight of these he had spent with the Blue Armor. After that, until his death from illness many years later, he had worked as a carpenter. Having finished raising Jesse, who could be quite a handful, he lived a simple, peaceful life, and enjoyed his grandchildren.

  Jesse sat under those two trees, their branches laden with white blossoms, and watched the sunlight dance and sparkle each time the petals trembled in the breeze. When the blossoms fell, young leaves would burst forth, and in the fall, the branches would bear small fruit—mountain apples for which his mother, Elin, was named. They were hardy trees that still bore fruit even after the frosts came.

  Squinting against the dappled light, Jesse picked up the blossoms’ faint fragrance on the breeze. At her bedside, as she lay dying, he had asked his mother how he could return Alu’s children to the wild. “Listen to Alu,” she had said. “If you try to understand her words, even though they seem incomprehensible, it will open the way.” Her face softened in a gentle smile.

  After repeated trial and error, he had finally succeeded. How he wished she could have been there to see the young Royal Beasts gliding off into the valley that day. After Alu and the others died, there were no more Royal Beasts at Kazalumu, and the students had never even seen one. The school now trained aspiring beast doctors and would continue to send out many more into the world.

  The sound of footsteps jolted Jesse from his reverie. A student came running up, red-cheeked and out of breath. “Professor Jesse, Yuma has gone into labor!”

  A smile lit up Jesse’s face, and he rose to his feet. “That mare has done well. For a horse, she’s pretty old to be having kids. Let’s make sure she gives birth to a healthy foal.”

  Jesse gave the student a light pat on the head, and together, they dashed off toward the barn.

  AFTERWORD

  When I wrote The Beast Player, I considered that tale to be finished. It is the tale of one who strives to communicate her feelings to a beast, the distant “other,” and when I reached the ending, I felt there was nothing more that could be said. Even now, this feeling hasn’t changed.

  But then Tadako Sato, an author I greatly admire, wrote to me. “I want to read more,” she said, “even if it detracts from the perfection of this perfect story.”

  Reading Sato’s letter, I realized that Elin was still alive. So alive, in fact, that she inspired this kind of longing. The thought that readers wanted to read more, to know what happened next, not only made me very happy, it made me want to write that story.

  Still, it took me a long time to get started: In my mind, The Beast Player was like a beautiful, closed circle. I couldn’t bear to write something that seemed as if it had been tacked on. The spark I needed came in the summer of 2007 with the unexpected offer of turning The Beast Player into an animated series. As I worked with the director to dissect the story, I was hit with a jolt of revelation. It may seem odd to discover something about a story I wrote myself, but that’s what happened. I saw the road that led Elin to become the Beast Player, the road that led on from there, and the wide, inexorable flow of the herd of creatures we call humans.

  When the “history” of Elin’s world rose in my mind, I knew instantly that this was the tale I needed to write. As Elin began to breathe once again inside me, the cheeky little boy Jesse was born, and the story swiftly took shape.

  If The Beast Player is the tale of one human and a beast, then The Beast Warrior is a history of humans and beasts. The tale is now complete, this time for certain. But the sound of that great river flowing still murmurs in my ears.

  I am deeply grateful for the assistance of many people in writing this story. Seita Fujiwara of Fujiwara Apiary, which I visited for background research when making the animation, explained the nature of honey bees in such a way that it stimulated a wealth of ideas. Likewise, reading through and rethinking The Beast Player with the animation staff, including the director Takayuki Hamana and the scriptwriter Junichi Fujisaku, provided tremendous impetus, helping me complete this final volume. I cannot thank you all enough.

  To Joji Nishimaki, who shared his thoughts on Immanuel Kant’s educational theory over dinner so long ago. Looking back on it, I realize that what you told me then runs through this tale from start to finish. Thank you so much.

  My cousin, Takamichi Matsuki, a medical doctor to whom I often turn for advice, gave me valuable suggestions for the symptoms described in the last battle scene.

  Professor Shoichi Ishiura of the University of Tokyo provided much appreciated advice on heredity, while Professor Kentaro Nakamura of the Tokyo Institute of Technology instructed me in basic acoustics and provided careful and thorough descriptions of how sound changes in different situations for each scene. I am indebted to you both. I was also greatly influenced by the enjoyable episodes shared by Nanae Nishi from her own experience of observing creatures in the wild. Thank you.

 
Of course, this story is a fantasy, and any divergence from reality is solely my responsibility. But just as Elin was nurtured and grew through the many lessons she received from Sohyon, Joeun, and Esalu, this story also grew and developed through the precious lessons I received from so many professionals in a range of fields that encompassed animation, apiculture, philosophy, and acoustic engineering. I am deeply grateful to all of you.

  I must also express my appreciation to Etsuko Moriyama, the editor in charge of the Kodansha paperback edition, who gave me invaluable advice on the first draft; to Misa Mizumachi for her meticulous editing work; and to Naoyuki Kanoya for his careful proofreading.

  Last but not least, I am profoundly grateful to Kaori Nagaoka, my wonderful editor, who accompanied me on this journey and did everything possible to support this author—who never talks about the content of what she’s writing until she’s finished—during a horrendous slump. That Elin and I finally reached the end of this arduous journey is thanks to Nagaoka, who stuck by my side throughout and never stopped encouraging me.

  Because of all of you, I was able to write this book. Thank you!!!

  July 10, 2009 in Abiko

  Nahoko Uehashi

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  NAHOKO UEHASHI is a popular Japanese writer whose works are loved by young and adult readers alike. She has received numerous accolades, including the Hans Christian Andersen Award. Nahoko has studied indigenous peoples in Australia and worked for many years as a full-time professor of cultural anthropology, in which she earned a PhD. Recently, she has reduced her teaching responsibilities to devote more time to her writing. Nahoko lives near Tokyo, Japan.

  Visit her online at UEHASHI.COM/EN/, or sign up for email updates here.