by Steve Bein
“I know about single-mindedness. That sword was crafted with the utmost concentration. I should think anyone could see that. It is a work of art. But too big for you, I think.”
“Then you understand not only swords but swordsmanship. Tell me how.”
“I know you struggle to retain your footing when you swing it,” said the abbot. His hand, oddly smooth for a man his age, stroked the chestnut flank of Daigoro’s mare. “I am only observing what anyone could see.”
“You see more than most, or else my balance is worse than I’d thought.” After a moment, Daigoro added, “I suppose it would be too much to think it’s the former and not the latter.”
“Ah, well,” said the abbot, giving the mare a final pat before turning to march up the hill. “It’s the best kind of problem to have.”
“Why?” Daigoro limped after the old man, but he knew from the beginning that he could not keep pace with him, especially not uphill. “Wait! What do you mean?”
“Your problem is the best kind,” the abbot called over his shoulder, “because it contains its own solution. Farewell.”
Daigoro spent the rest of the morning puzzling over what that might have meant. His initial instinct was that some lesson in Buddhism was hidden in the abbot’s advice, but the more he thought about it, the more he convinced himself it really was a lesson in sword fighting. The uncanny grace in the abbot’s steps, even the fact that he must have observed Daigoro for some time before announcing his presence: it bespoke a man well versed in swordsmanship. It made no sense—every Zen monk took a vow of nonviolence—but for all of that Daigoro was no less certain.
This certainty did nothing toward solving the riddle, though. Daigoro could only see how his problem contained other problems. An off-balance swing could expose his vitals to the enemy, and once dead he’d no longer have the problem of managing so heavy a sword, but that hardly constituted a solution in Daigoro’s eyes.
But he’d run out of time to figure it out. From the mountain of Kattō-ji a green ridge concealed the coastal road approaching the Okuma compound, but Daigoro could make out dust rising above the ridge. Someone was riding toward his home, and riding fast. Daigoro had a sneaking suspicion who it might be.
36
When Daigoro reached the main gate, he saw a familiar horse, its tack dyed a familiar green like dry moss. Daigoro rode into the courtyard just in time to see his brother chop Yasuda Eijun in the throat with his own bokken.
Eijun collapsed, weaponless, in a cloud of sandy dust. Ichirō stood above him with a bokken in either hand; the one in his right hand was spattered with blood.
Daigoro muscled his horse between the two fighters. Cursing his right leg for slowing him, he dropped to Eijun’s side and looked for signs of life. Eijun was barely breathing. His face was a gritty red mask of sand glued in place by blood. The nose was broken, both lips bleeding, at least four teeth hanging loosely in their sockets.
Daigoro glared up at his brother. “He was a simpleton! There was no need to fight!”
“He asked for a duel. I gave it to him.”
“Gods and demons, Ichirō, did you break his wrists?”
“I had to disarm him somehow.”
“Had to? And then you had to bash him in the throat? How many times did you have to hit him in the face?”
Daigoro probed Eijun’s throat with light fingers, hoping to find the airway intact. With some effort he stood up. “He’ll live. At least we can be thankful for that. By the gods, he’s a Yasuda, Ichirō. Could you not beat him without embarrassing the whole clan?”
Ichirō let the bokken fall from his left hand. It bounced listlessly and settled among the red tears dripping from his other weapon. “Maybe you should have been here,” he said. “He said he came to challenge the sword of Okuma.”
“I wish I had been here! I could have talked him out of it, as I did before. Do you understand nothing about alliances, Ichirō?”
“I understand more than you,” Ichirō replied, advancing a step and glaring down into Daigoro’s eyes. “This is a time of war, little brother. Toyotomi is defeating everyone who faces him, and we should be fighting alongside him!”
“There is no need for fighting. Father’s last act was to treat with Toyotomi.”
“Yes,” said Ichirō, “but now Father is gone, and a new treaty must be made. We can negotiate our way to the highest levels of power, but not by avoiding every fight that comes our way. Your method is weak, Daigoro. We should be taking all comers, and fighting our way to supremacy!”
“Would you fight Toyotomi as well, then? The man who conquered all of Shikoku in a matter of weeks? The man who stands to bring every last warlord to heel? We are a small clan. If we are to survive this war and retain our lands, it will be by remembering who our friends are and making more powerful friends where we can.”
“Gah!” Ichirō stepped back and threw his bloody bokken at Eijun’s softly rising chest. “I draw more blood with a wooden sword than you do with an Inazuma! Go back up to your monastery and shave your head. Just leave the sword here before you go.”
Daigoro accompanied Eijun back to the house of Yasuda Jinbei, the two of them riding in the same palanquin that had borne his father’s body home. The Okuma clan’s best healers had done what they could for Eijun, binding his wrists to help the bones mend and removing the broken teeth as painlessly as they could. The young man could only speak awkwardly and hoarsely, the combined effect of a broken nose, missing teeth, and a throat so bruised it was black in places. As such, he could hardly pronounce his granduncle’s name when they reached their destination, and he seemed more slow-witted than ever.
Lord Yasuda did an admirable job of masking what could only have been furious anger. The samurai lining the hall in attendance were less successful; Daigoro could feel them behind him as a hare might feel the unseen presence of foxes stalking in a dark wood. He did not presume to relate what had happened; he left that to Eijun, whose recollection favored himself rather more than the actual events.
“And why have you come, then, young Master Okuma?” Lord Yasuda’s voice betrayed only the slightest tremor of his wrath.
“Twice Eijun-san rode a long way to challenge Glorious Victory. I thought he deserved the honor of seeing it.”
Daigoro withdrew the sheathed sword from his belt, all too aware of the swordsmen shifting in their armor behind him. Apart from the palanquin bearers, he’d come without escort, knowing in advance that his safe departure was in no way guaranteed. Now he moved with slow, careful precision as he laid the long, heavy weapon before Lord Yasuda. “I thought it should not be an Okuma who drew the blade before him,” said Daigoro, “lest he take it for another attack. With all respect, Yasuda-san, I hoped you might be the one to draw it and present it to him.”
Daigoro heard the intake of breath behind him, gasps cut short by the attending samurai. Glorious Victory was an heirloom worthy of greater respect than anything in the Yasudas’ possession. To allow a bested opponent to handle it showed him the highest honor.
Lord Yasuda inclined his silver-haired head, drew the Inazuma blade, and could not help but examine it for himself. After a long moment he bowed to Daigoro and then to his grandnephew. Eijun was unable to hold Glorious Victory himself—Ichirō had seen to that when he broke both of Eijun’s wrists—but he knelt before the weapon with the same reverence one might have shown in approaching the emperor’s newborn son. He studied it so closely that he seemed to be bowing before it. His breath misted on the ancient steel, momentarily clouding over the cloverleaf temper line that ran the length of the blade. Daigoro found himself wondering whether Eijun truly was the lackwit everyone thought him to be. Fools weren’t known to appreciate great artistry.
After Eijun was finished, Lord Yasuda called for a square of white paper to clean the blade, then returned it to its scabbard. “You have done us a great honor,” the old samurai told Daigoro. “Moreover, you have done it at no small risk to your own honor, and to you
r life as well. Whatever wounds existed between our families, all of us will consider them healed.”
Daigoro bowed, but the old man was not finished. “My grandnephew was not ready to challenge the house of Okuma, and he has paid the price for his impatience. I fear the price your brother pays will be worse, Okuma-sama. But that is not a price for you to pay. I shall send an escort of riders home with you, as a token of our esteem. Thank you for coming here.”
Daigoro bowed deeply, reclaimed Glorious Victory, and took his leave.
37
Yasuda Eijun was by no means the last of the challengers. Okuma Tetsurō’s renown as a swordsman was spoken of in every port in the islands, and of course some men would have come just to face one of the few remaining Inazumas.
The next to arrive had walked all the way from Kyoto. He was too poor to afford the passage by boat, and as he’d left some months before, he was surprised and dismayed to learn the man he’d come to duel was dead. His name was Katsushima Goemon, and he shook his bowed head when he heard the news. “What a shame,” he said. “A man like that, to die from such a cowardly attack. May the southern barbarians and all their muskets fall into the sea.”
Daigoro guessed Katsushima was fifty years old, or close to it. He wore wide, wooly sideburns and his topknot was unkempt, perhaps the result of so long a trek. His brown clothes were faded, his sandals worn. Daigoro’s immediate instinct was to like the man; he had an air of grace about him that the dust of the road did nothing to tarnish. He arrived with his sleeves tied back and his pants bound about the knees; in short, he came ready to fight. He would not be taken by surprise, and clearly he was not overly concerned with appearance or comfort. Daigoro suspected the man had more than a few insights to share about the Bushido path.
“Yes, he’s dead,” Ichirō told Katsushima. “If you’ve come to fight an Okuma, you’ll fight me.”
“I came to challenge Okuma Tetsurō,” said Katsushima. “Now it sounds as if I’m the one being challenged.”
“All right,” said Ichirō. “I challenge you here and now. I would have you face my father’s sword, but sadly my brother would have it otherwise.”
“Wood or steel,” said Katsushima, “it makes no difference to me.”
“It makes a difference to me,” said Ichirō. “I would prefer the truest test, the test of steel on steel, but my brother refuses to let our illustrious weapon see the light of day. With bokken, then, and the first to fall loses.”
Katsushima shrugged, bowed, and set aside his katana. Ichirō did the same, and Daigoro braced himself for another embarrassment.
It went better than the fight with Yasuda Eijun, but not by much. Katsushima was a patient fighter, and smashed Ichirō’s hands twice as Ichirō lunged to land a solid blow. Ichirō feinted and chopped at Katsushima’s wrists much as he had in the last duel, but Katsushima neither cried out nor dropped his weapon. At last Ichirō proved the faster, slashing Katsushima’s knee out from under him. When his challenger hit the ground, Ichirō followed the blow with a vicious chop to the spine.
Katsushima conceded defeat and left without a word. Daigoro called after him, offering a meal and a bed for the night after such a long journey, but Katsushima would not even turn around to acknowledge the invitation.
“Let him go,” said Ichirō. “Obviously he doesn’t want our hospitality.”
“Can you blame him?” asked Daigoro. “You said to the fall, and then struck him after he’d fallen. Where is the honor in that?”
“Where is the honor in fighting with children’s toys? You should have let me face him with Glorious Victory.”
“You complain of fighting with a child’s toy, and then you conduct yourself like a little boy! That man was willing to fight you because you are the son of Okuma Tetsurō! Do you suppose Katsushima thinks Father only taught you swordsmanship? No! A man learns manners from his father, and virtue, and honor, and you’ve shown none of these!”
“Be careful, little brother—”
Daigoro scarcely heard him. “You’ve sent an honorable man to speak ill of our father all across the countryside! He’ll say the son of Okuma Tetsurō is an ill-mannered spoilsport who breaks his own rules and hits a man when he’s down.”
“I should slap your face, little brother. You’ll watch your mouth.”
With a deep breath, Daigoro clapped his mouth shut and took a shuffling step back. He’d lost his composure, and in doing so he’d behaved no better than Ichirō. Now both of them had disgraced their father’s memory. “I will watch my mouth,” he said through gritted teeth. “But Katsushima Goemon won’t. He’s going to walk all the way back to Kyoto, and in every village along the way, rumors will spread of what shameful conduct he saw here. The Tokaidō Road will be overrun with swordsmen looking to best you.”
Ichirō smirked. “Let them come.”
38
Daigoro,” his mother implored, “please reconsider.”
They stood alone outside Daigoro’s bedchamber, with moonlight making the floorboards seem black with a sheen of blue. A cool breeze raised chicken skin on the backs of Daigoro’s forearms and carried with it the smells of seaweed, salt, and camphor leaves. Their respective bodyguards watched them from across the courtyard, dark topknotted shadows in the blue light.
“I cannot, Mother.”
“What am I to do? Your brother asks me to intercede on his behalf, and you ask for nothing. How must you look to everyone else, if you will not even ask for my support? Why will you not speak to me about the sword?”
Because I will not draw my own mother into a quarrel during her time of mourning. Because there should be no quarrel in the first place. Because Father’s will was clear, even if the reason behind it remains a mystery to all of us. Daigoro wanted to say all of these things, and he encapsulated them as best he could: “Because Bushido demands it.”
“Are you so sure? Is the path so clearly laid before your feet?”
Yes, Daigoro wanted to say. A true samurai would not bring discord into his home over a mere possession, not even if it was his sword. A samurai would uphold the will of his father, especially if his father had been the living embodiment of the code. But in truth he was not sure and might never be sure. Was it better to fulfill the wishes of a dead father or a living mother? Whom was it better to disappoint? Was there no way to satisfy both at once?
And why could Ichirō not follow the code as Daigoro sought to? Was the code like the moon, ever changing in its appearance yet always the selfsame moon? Could it appear differently to every samurai? Father, Daigoro thought, if ever I needed you, now is the time. Your sword is too big for me. Why could you not leave me guidance instead of the sword?
“Daigoro,” his mother said, and for a brief moment he feared she had mistaken pensive silence for petulance. “If you will say nothing, you leave me little choice. Do not force me to side with your brother. The whole clan will turn against you.”
“What else can I do, Mother? Do you remember what Father said about what to do when in a quandary?”
A smile touched her careworn face, and she nodded. “‘When torn between two choices, see which one is easier, then choose the other.’”
“This,” Daigoro said, touching her shoulder, “this is what I want: for you to smile when we speak of him. I want an end to the quarreling. But how many times did he give us that advice? Bushido admits of few laws that can never be broken, but when in doubt, the harder road is almost always Bushido’s road. I cannot invite you to join one side or the other in what stands between Ichirō and me. Nor can I give Ichirō the sword. Those are the easier roads. Please don’t make my road harder by making me disobey you too.”
39
By the time the moon waxed full again, a steady stream of challengers had begun to call at the Okuma compound gate. Though Daigoro had predicted as much, Ichirō refused to credit him for his foresight. Yet again Daigoro wondered whether Glorious Victory carried some kind of curse that estranged one brother from a
nother.
The duels had only increased in rancor since the defeat of Katsushima Goemon. If a clan champion came to fight using steel, Ichirō would insist loudly that he could not, then toy with the challenger before trouncing him. If the challenger came to duel with the bokken, Ichirō would mock him for not facing him with a live blade. Once goaded into a fight with steel, Ichirō would maim his opponent and then refuse to kill him. The opponent’s right arm was his favored target; more than once the house servants had to strew fresh sand after disposing of severed fingers or forearms. It seemed Ichirō had acquired a taste for blood, and no reasoned argument against it could get through to him.
For his part, Daigoro could only keep on training with Glorious Victory. He continued to struggle with the weight of it, with its extraordinary length and what that meant for wide cuts with the sword. He’d even begun to study the fighting styles of the rivals who came to challenge Ichirō, hoping for some insight on how to manage Glorious Victory’s great size. Daigoro hadn’t yet found a way to maintain his balance, but his ability to recover his balance was improving quickly, and he thought even his right leg might have been getting stronger.
One day just after sundown the gate guard announced a visitor. Ichirō took what was now his customary place in the courtyard, bokken in hand, with his now-customary glare at Daigoro and the huge sword at his hip. Daigoro limped to the gate, looked outside, and was shocked by what he saw.
The gleaming black palanquin was difficult to make out behind the ranks of horses and spearmen. Daigoro could not see the crest embossed on the palanquin itself, but he did not need to, for it was well displayed on the armor of the forty-odd samurai surrounding it and on the red banners hanging from their spears. The crest of the kiri flower was well-known, for it belonged to none other than Toyotomi Hideyoshi, the warlord poised to dominate all the Japanese islands.
Daigoro ordered the gates opened at once, and ordered an honor guard with his next breath. He, Ichirō, and their mother bowed deeply as the bearers set down the palanquin in the center of the courtyard. A small man emerged from it, his robes golden, his gray hair marked with a few lingering wisps of black. His topknot was immaculately kept and his pate closely shaved. “I am Shiramatsu Shōzaemon,” he said, “emissary of his eminence, the lord regent General Toyotomi. We shall sit in a cool place and we shall talk.”
