by David Kirk
Then he simply looked about, and listened.
There was silence, or what seemed like it. Musashi’s hands grew tight on his scabbard, longsword clutched before him on the ground with both fists. Hadn’t had time to reset it in his belt, could not do so now. Somewhere on the slope opposite a pine cone fell, rattled its way to the ground. Akiyama turned instantly, peered up at where it had fallen until he had ascertained it was nothing of interest. The samurai was astute, honed. Musashi knew he would make far more noise trying to push through the undergrowth that abounded. He dared not move.
He was caught here for the moment.
For the first time Musashi could recall, Akiyama seemed to grow impatient. His hand began to rattle against the pommel of his saddle, and then he called out. ‘Miyamoto,’ he said, ‘reveal yourself. Face me.’
He addressed either slope of the gorge, head turning from one to the other, and Musashi watched him and remained motionless, silent.
‘I know you are here, somewhere. Reveal yourself! I will not slay you running through the woods, caught and cramped by branches. I offer you the chance to step out here into the open, sword in hand, and face what must be with dignity.’
Wind blew and leaves scattered across the gorge.
‘What is this?’ cried Akiyama, and the first hint of anger entered his voice. ‘Again and again you venture out into society solely in pursuit of violence, but when I offer fair combat you refuse? Is your heart crazed?’
Musashi bit down on the knuckle of his thumb.
‘Very well,’ said Akiyama to the silent forest all around him. ‘At your leisure, then. I have my duty, and my duty holds me here. I await you.’
He dismounted from his horse, took a bamboo flask from his saddlebags and took a long drink of whatever liquid was inside.
Musashi watched him, and how dry was his own throat, how empty his stomach.
The Yoshioka samurai did not relent. He stayed close to his horse through the hours until night fell and he was finally stolen from Musashi’s vision by the dark. Only then did Musashi dare to move. Akiyama would hear him, of course, but he would not be able to spot, to pursue. This, the only recourse available to him. Hopefully he could put some distance, any distance between them through the night, and that was better than waiting pinned where we was, hoping futilely that Akiyama might have grown bored by the dawn and departed.
There was no chance of that, Musashi knew. He had studied the man’s face well, seen the determination there.
Musashi began to rise. His body had grown cold as the earth against which it had been huddled, and after being held in tense contortion for such a long time his muscles ached. He brushed the debris he had hidden beneath from his back, and then made to head along the route he had plotted in the light. It was up and to his side, what appeared the least impeded path from his poor vantage, but whether he found it or not he could not tell. Dead branches cracked beneath his feet, his knees and hands grazed against trees, and each noise seemed to resonate in the quiet of the night.
He heard noise behind and below him also. Akiyama, perhaps, knowing he was on the move, probing his own blind path.
Progress was impossible to judge. He did not think he was moving far. The slope seemed to shift beneath him. One time his foot did not find purchase where he expected it, and he fell forwards. He cried out in shock, a yelp stolen by the impact of something blunt and hard on his chest, and he lay there listening, ruing the clamour. When he had purged himself of the stupid, instinctive notion that Akiyama was swooping in immediately upon the sound, he rose, entirely disorientated. He chose a direction, and on he stubbornly pushed through the night.
Where was his scarlet moon to light his path, to assure him all was well?
With every further graze, every twist of his ankle, every moment he was caught perilously balanced between two footholds he could not discern, he began to curse Akiyama silently. Began to hate him, his persistence through this entire year. He was a thrall to the Way, perhaps its perfect embodiment even. Nothing to him but duty. Nothing to him but killing. He questioned why it was he was running. Why not oblige what the samurai demanded, fight him with steel? End it?
Every time he asked himself these things, he forced himself to think of how Dorinbo would answer.
But it was difficult to remain faithful when all about you was blackness and exertion. He could not tell if time passed quickly or slowly, but eventually the sky began to lighten in the east. All assumed tinges of blues, and he could see the forms of trees around him now. Saw that there were not many above him, that the forest seemed to end abruptly, that he had put most of the hill behind him. Sighted, he advanced quickly, and soon he achieved the crest. He looked down upon the opposite side, and found the hill entirely bared. Nothing but churned mud and earth before him.
A landslide must have occurred here, back in the rainy season.
He could have laughed. A path, a clear path here laid for him and him alone. Gleefully he extracted himself from the last of the undergrowth, and he ran. Didn’t care for how much his legs hurt, how many times they had been cut, he skittered down the slope all but dancing in mad release, and the earth was soft and obliging, and in a matter of moments his descent had matched the distance of his arduous ascent, surpassed it, and he was at the foot of the hill, and he was gone. Ran unimpeded through spacious meadows, unseen, unknown, ran until his heart and his lungs could bear no more and he assured himself he was free of all pursuers, and there he found a spot to hide amidst soft grasses, and the sun was rising in the sky and all was warm, and like that he closed his eyes and slept.
When he awoke it was afternoon. The sun had apexed and the sky was pale. He peeled back his clothing, torn and thick with ochre clay from the hill, and examined his legs, counted the scrapes and cuts upon them. He had seen a leper once, and so many were his lesions that he was reminded of that blighted flesh, but none of the wounds were deep. Superficial grazes. He washed the dried blood away in a pond, splashed his face, and then from another spot drank until he was sated.
His escape from Akiyama had robbed him of any idea where he was. There was no mark of man around. He decided to head for high ground, that he might spy some road or hamlet, or failing that the coast. Looking around, he saw a bared slope some distance away, the grasses upon it short and tough and strawlike. Seemed the best compromise between vantage and ease of ascent, and he headed towards it.
Halfway up its slopes, with the sun now beginning to set and the sky turning golden, the wind blowing constant, something flickered in his peripheral vision. He turned and looked down, and there he saw, once again, Akiyama on his horse.
Musashi simply stared down for a moment in utter disbelief. At how he had managed to find him, at the fact the man persisted in even attempting to find him. Stared and felt his lip curl, and the Yoshioka samurai saw that Musashi had seen him, and now he kicked his horse into an open gallop, began to ascend the hill, and Musashi turned and ran.
He never really got going. There was nowhere to hide on this bared slope, and more than that the anger took him, the incredulity. He was cursing as he stopped, and he turned back to Akiyama, drew his longsword and spread his arms wide, waited. Akiyama did not come straight for him, but rather took his steed in a cautious berth to the gentle crest of the ridge and then came at Musashi from above.
‘Here!’ Musashi screamed at him. ‘Fine! Come as you will, you son of a whore!’
Akiyama did not charge. He cantered up and stopped some twenty paces shy. There he dismounted and slid his longsword from where it was hung upon his saddle. His jacket was a fine hybrid colour in the light, rich, gorgeous, and his eyes matched the shade of the grass at his horse’s feet.
‘Musashi Miyamoto,’ he said as he approached, ‘I am of the school—’
‘I know why you are here,’ said Musashi. ‘Spare me the pomp. If you want my head, out your sword and to my throat, and not a word more.’
Akiyama did not draw his sword, though. He
stood there looking at Musashi, straight at him, and in his eyes was what appeared to be curiosity. Musashi glared back, but the man would not be provoked. The longer he looked, the more the set of his own shoulders lessened, and eventually he lowered his longsword to his side. There they stood for some time, around them the last heat of autumn.
Slowly, their eyes were drawn to the landscape below them.
They saw the plains stretching away, and in every dry and empty field all remnant husk and haulm of the rice harvest had been knotted and stacked like cenotaphs and set alight. The sky was golden now, and rising into that great expanse were a hundred tendrils of smoke.
‘There,’ said Musashi. ‘Can you not see?’
Akiyama did not answer. The wind blew on.
‘That is how it needs to be,’ said Musashi, and he felt a shudder as he spoke, as he realized that what was manifested here was as vibrant and as piercing as a scarlet moon. ‘Can you not see? There, it’s right there. There! See it – a necessary and complete destruction. All those husks, a million of them, a million worthless things eradicated and the ash of them buried in the earth to fertilize. The fields cleared and revitalized and what follows is a new growth, bounteous, and bounteous entirely because it is free of all that came before. Can you not see?’
Akiyama looked, but he said nothing.
‘It is that simple,’ said Musashi.
‘Something that cannot stand for itself,’ said Akiyama hesitantly, ‘should not stand?’
‘Yes!’ said Musashi excitedly. ‘Who was it that told you that?’
The samurai had a strange reaction to those words. It almost seemed as though there had been hope in his eyes prior to their being spoken, or longing, but that in hearing them this nascent emotion was slaughtered. That Musashi had slaughtered it, and now there was a personal disappointment that radiated from him.
The man’s face hardened and he made himself deaf. The strange moment and whatever it might have held had passed, and now he put his focus upon what he had come here to achieve. With ceremonial slowness and eyes never leaving those of Musashi, the samurai took a tasselled cord and wrapped it over his shoulders and under his arms, binding the sleeves of his jacket back and freeing his arms for movement. With equal care and precision he drew his longsword, blade bright in the warm light, and lowered it one-handed into a neutral position by his side with the tip resting a finger’s breadth above the ground.
Musashi watched him. The mad overriding urge to fight had passed. But he was caught here, and his sword was in his hand, and the horse was there, and he could not outrun that.
At his stillness, Akiyama put his free hand to his waist, and produced another length of tasselled cord, which he tossed to Musashi. Musashi caught it and, not having any choice, nodded his thanks and then bound his own sleeves up as Akiyama had done. The man made no move to attack as he did so, even with Musashi’s sword temporarily scabbarded once again, waiting with perfect formality. Then, with bare arms turning to gooseflesh, Musashi drew his longsword once more, dropped into a fighting stance and held the weapon before himself.
Musashi nodded. Akiyama nodded.
They began.
Chapter Eight
Immediately, Musashi was unsettled. Akiyama sank into a stance he had never seen before, turning his body so that his left shoulder faced towards Musashi with his legs spread in a wide crouch. His sword he held at his hip with the blade trailing behind his body, hidden almost and leaving the length of him seemingly open and vulnerable.
Not knowing what else to do, Musashi chose a neutral, defensive posture: facing straight towards Akiyama, shoulders broad, left foot braced perpendicular behind the right, sword in both hands out before him with the pommel pointing at his navel, the length of the blade marking the distance between them.
The great wait, then, both of them staring each other in the eye, judging. It was said that masters of the sword could see a man’s spirit, his ki, flowing out of him and from this discern weaknesses in his soul and technique. Musashi saw only a man a head smaller than he and utterly unafraid.
How long it took to start these duels, to summon the courage to step into the lethal range of the sword. To charge into battle was one thing, clad in iron and leather and wood and plunging into a chaos of chance and a maelstrom of sudden foe, but here two men with a definite enemy before them wearing only silk and rags and skin and flesh and muscle. That against steel, the fear innate in every mote of the body. Even for veterans like Akiyama a quailing, as though arms and legs and chest and head were creatures separate from the heart, each individually terrified of the risk.
A sickly feeling in Musashi’s muscles, his upper arms, the bottom of his thighs, hardening as if the blood within was congealing.
The earth soft beneath his soles, feet digging in, affixing himself.
The columns of smoke rising.
The feel of the grip upon his palms, ridges of the twisted cloth, ring finger and little finger tight, thumb, fore and middle loose, cradling.
The eternal seething of the wind.
The sun inert, the chill, the chill . . .
Akiyama lunged forward, and the path of his sword was concealed almost entirely by his body. Musashi saw it loop over the man’s head at the very last moment, where he had been expecting a low attack. Hands moved autovigilant, raised his own sword and caught the blade not flat but glancing. The two edges ran down each other hissing until the handguards of both swords met with a crack.
In they both followed, in tight, shoulder to shoulder, Akiyama and Musashi, knuckles rubbing against one another, the points of their blades waving over each other’s back. Immediately Musashi attempted to make it a matter of strength, barging forward, trying to unbalance the man. Akiyama simply rode the push, sliding backwards whilst maintaining his posture perfectly. Feet gouging trails in the earth. Like a pan of water shaken, fluid and then still as it was before. Twice more Musashi tried before he admitted the futility.
There they stood, locked, the guards of their swords as close as though they had been fused together in some forge. No growling or fighting or tussle, weapons resting light, simply checking the other. Musashi turned his blade and rolled the edge of it towards Akiyama with his foe’s sword as the fulcrum, once, twice, meeting the flesh of Akiyama’s biceps on the second try. A thin red line of blood appeared, the cut a mere razor kiss. Akiyama gave no sign of pain or worry. He knew that he could not be grievously wounded here.
Therein lay the predicament: close like this they could not be hurt, but if they yielded and retreated each would have to pass back through the cutting arc of the opponent. Where before they had to step in, now they had to summon the courage to step out. They circled on tense feet, blades entwined, Akiyama’s oiled bright and Musashi’s dulled and worn.
Akiyama was superb. Musashi felt fear, real fear, the wooden sword victories he had notched this year hollow and worthless now. He had no conception of how he had managed to counter the man’s opening attack, and now he could not unsettle him with his strength and his size.
It was Akiyama who made the first move outwards, withdrawing his sword slightly, taking the tiniest step back. Musashi consented, and in stuttering slivers they began to separate. Feet barely leaving the ground, never crossing, left behind right, always braced. Blades in constant contact, but the point of that contact slowly moving up the length of each. Twisting, each man turning his wrists, trying to keep his sword on top and watchful of a sudden thrust from the other, bit by bit until the points were circling around and around each other like swallow’s tails, and then . . .
Freedom of space, and the same challenge as before.
Akiyama resumed his original stance, the sword concealed behind him once more. His face was serene, his mouth thin, his eyes unwavering. The perfect swordsman, no hint given at all to his intentions. In turn Musashi’s mouth hung open, he unaware of it, his eyes roving, seeking, his sword now held horizontal at his waist, ultra-defensive, a turtle crawling into
its shell.
Perhaps invited by that stance, or emboldened by the knowledge of his superiority, Akiyama did not wait long to attack once more. His second strike came without warning, and this time the blade sliced from the side, seeking to cleave him at the waist. Again Musashi managed to parry, but before the blades had even met, Akiyama was moving into his next action: rolling his body around the fulcrum of the swords, pirouetting as though the block was entirely expected, and making to strike at Musashi’s exposed back.
This time brute strength and speed did save him. Musashi threw himself backwards before Akiyama’s blade could start its slashing arc, barrelling into the man whilst his sword was still rising over his shoulder and knocking him off balance. The pair of them scrambled to right themselves, clods of dirt flying, and then they whipped around to face one another once more.
Closer now, each sensing it, fear fading as they knew that into this they were inextricably caught and that it was nearing its end. Most duels ending in one move; all ending in under five. Breathing heavily, Musashi saw the man and saw his killer, and the liberating anger came, the warmth, the fatalistic warmth. If he was dead then he was dead, and there was no point defending a corpse, and what mad joy in that.
Musashi raised his sword above his head, pommel facing his enemy, the most aggressive stance he knew. Committed to one tremendous downwards blow, stomach and chest bared provocatively. Akiyama saw the change in him, and changed in turn. He rose out of his crouch, brought his sword to rest at shoulder height so that the blunt back of it rested along his collar bone with the point towards Musashi.
Twitching, each daring the other to go. Musashi towering, Akiyama poised. Breath heaving, blood racing. All things balanced. Mind unfettered, seeing all: unorthodox stances, where Akiyama’s true ability came from perhaps. Unorthodoxy. Musashi grasped at this, clutched it with wild and final passion.
