Kae let Takeda pass.
“Fukuchou, what have you decided?” Takeda asked as he approached his commander.
Hijikata handed Takeda the two iron candle spikes he’d brought in. “Turn Furutaka so he’s hanging head down and pound these into the soles of his feet. Then light them.”
The vice-commander turned to Kae and smirked. “That will loosen his tongue, ne?”
Kae ignored the derisive gleam in Hijikata’s eyes when he turned to leave the building. As he left, Furutaka’s screams echoed through the storehouse.
“Desperate times call for desperate measures, or so Hijikata-san says.”
Looking over to the other vice-commander who’d approached him, Kae nodded. “I suppose so, Yamanami-san, but that doesn’t make it any more palatable to men of decency and reason.”
“But if it saves lives and serves the emperor…”
Kae nodded again, sensing that although Yamanami said “the right thing” he too felt disgusted by it all.
He walked with Yamanami around the outside of the storehouse. The traitor’s cries from inside followed them with each step.
The afternoon was drawing to its end when the man finally broke. Kae’s blood ran cold when Hijikata relayed the information they had gotten.
“The weapons we found were only part of it. They have banners and lanterns decorated with the crest of the Aizu clan. They plan to raise an army of the ronin in and near Kyoto, execute Matsudaira-sama and march on the Imperial Palace in the guise of Matsudaira’s forces.” He paused and looked hard at Kae. “They want to burn Kyoto to the ground, abduct the emperor and take him back to the Choshu han. They’re meeting to decide it all tonight. Somewhere in Gion.”
Rage boiled up inside Kae. “Let me get word to the palace and have someone watch over those nobles we’ve had suspicions about. They’d need someone on the inside to get away with such insanity.”
“Exactly,” Hijikata said with a cold look.
Kae dismissed the suspicious look in the vice-commander’s narrow eyes. He had far more to worry about than the petty jealousies of a farmer turned self-proclaimed samurai.
Hurrying away from the Shinsengumi headquarters, Kae tried to think of which nobles were the most likely to be involved. Kojima Toshimasa topped the list. It certainly would explain his fawning interest in Emiko. Clearly Kojima was hoping to get her to share whatever information she could regarding those suspicions Kae and his father had.
Luckily, he hadn’t had a chance to tell Emmi anything of importance. In fact, he hadn’t had much of a chance to speak with her at all.
Oh, but he wanted to. He wanted to walk in the moonlit gardens, sit on the engawa or beside the lake and simply talk. He wanted to know so much more about her and her world. He wanted to know what the future held for not only Japan but also for himself.
He wondered if he would be able to live a tranquil life without her to share it. Kae shook off those thoughts. This was no time to think of himself. He had to think of the safety of the emperor and Japan.
Cursing under his breath, he tried to hurry through the crowded streets. If the rebels were anything, they were clever. They couldn’t have picked a better time for their deadly game than during the festival. With this much congestion in the streets, it would be impossible to relay messages quickly or summon help from the local patrol groups without losing precious time. With so many peasants coming in from the outskirts of Kyoto, the rebel ronin could easily blend in with the crowds.
The one saving grace was that the emperor and his family were safely sequestered inside the Gosho. Though the real faction may have their inside sources helping, they were not going to get close enough to—
Kaemon froze in his tracks.
It couldn’t be.
He couldn’t be seeing what he thought he saw across the way. He was not seeing his wife abducting the emperor’s only son. Oh, gods. There was only one thing he could do. He had to save Prince Mutsuhito at all cost.
Even if the cost was Emmi’s life.
* * * *
“Look, Sachi, you’re really starting to piss—” Emmi stopped herself. She was not going to let an eleven year old get to her. “Sachi. I need to find Kae. It’s important. He might be in danger.”
“Why? Who would dare to threaten him?”
“A bunch of guys who—” She figured she shouldn’t spill her guts to the kid and risk doing any kind of time warp damage. She knelt down and tried to put her hands on his shoulders, but he pulled back as though she had the plague. “Trust me. He might be in real danger, and we have to find him before it’s too late. So just be quiet and follow me. Please.”
“Emiko. Move away. Immediately.”
Emmi whipped her head around. She was about to jump up and hug Kae, but his expression stopped her dead and made her stomach twist.
His hand was on his sword.
And he had that look in his eye—the look he’d had when he drew on Kojima-san, the look he’d had when he killed those men at the teahouse, the look he’d had when he’d dispatched those who’d attacked them at Nijo Castle that night.
What was happening? What had she done?
“Emiko,” he said again, his tone colder.
Emmi stood up and backed away. She tried not to notice the people stopping to look at what was happening.
Kae went down on his knees and bowed his head at Sachi, and the sick feeling in Emmi’s stomach grew. This was bad. It had to be.
“I will welcome whatever punishment you choose to hand down for myself and my unworthy wife,” Kae said quietly. “But I beg you, let me take you home at once.”
Unworthy wife? Punishment? This was worse than bad… But what exactly was it?
“I do not like it out here. I will go.”
Kae barked an order for a man nearby to secure a palanquin at once. After it arrived and Sachi was safely deposited inside, Kae ordered the guys carrying it to head north on the double. They took off at a fast clip with the small boy inside. Kae seized her by the wrist and dragged her as he ran behind the palanquin.
“What happened? What did I do?”
He shot her a look of pure hatred that she would never forget.
“You have issued both of our death warrants.”
Chapter Thirty
Icy fear replaced the blood in Emmi’s veins, and a sickening shiver ran through her as Kae dragged her along. Tears blurred her vision and she stumbled more than once. Kae didn’t care. He jerked her back to her feet and dragged her harder.
They weren’t too far from the palace when they came upon Kae’s father, Prince Asahiko, who was at the head of a small army of palace guards. Kae ordered the carriage bearers to stop.
Emmi was crying hard by the time the elder prince knelt before the palanquin and also offered to accept whatever punishment Sachi chose to have his own father hand down. He ordered the palanquin bearers to head off again.
They were running again toward the palace. Guards now ran behind as well as in front of them, and Emmi started babbling to herself, mostly in Japanese, partly in English. “Who is that boy?”
Kae jerked her to him, and she tripped again. He pulled her up and hit her with that look again. That look that said he wouldn’t have a problem watching the whole “death warrant” thing be handed down upon her.
“That is the emperor’s only son,” he hissed in her ear.
“Oh, shit!” barely described the dread that settled over her. Emmi was so caught up in fear over what she’d done that she never saw the band of rebel ronin until they were on them.
The clang of swords, angry shouts and screams filled her ears. Blood splattered her face and hands. Shock and fear paralyzed her, until Kae’s father slumped to one knee behind the palanquin, now on the ground not far from her.
She didn’t know what she was thinking. In fact, she wasn’t thinking, she simply reacted. She launched herself at the rebel and kicked his knee. He fell. Asahiko seized the fallen sword and slashed his attacker’s t
hroat.
Behind Emmi, Sachi screamed. A ronin tried to reach through the flaps of the carriage. Kae stabbed him from behind. Running toward them, Emmi evaded Kae’s attempt to grab her. Before he could reach for her again, another attacker came at him. She made it to the palanquin and looked in.
Sachi may have been the ‘son of a living god’ but right now, he looked like any other scared little kid. Emmi scrambled into the palanquin and held him, covered him so that if anyone tried to attack him they’d get her instead.
“It’ll be all right. It’ll be all right. I promise. I won’t let anyone hurt you.”
Hands seized her shoulders. She fought. Digging her nails into their arm, the other, braced to keep her body covering the young prince. “Stay away from him!” The attacker punched her head.
Sachi screamed and so did Emmi. She was thrown backward and hit the ground hard enough to make the world go gray and fuzzy.
Palace guards took up the palanquin and took off. She was yanked up and pulled forward. It was Kae. He held his sword to her throat for what seemed an eternity, but then lowered it and dragged her into a run once more.
“Your father—?”
“Alive,” he spat as a bunch of soldiers from Aizu charged past to take care of the remaining injured rebels.
The only thing Emmi could think as they hurried the rest of the way back to the palace was that Kae had wanted to kill her.
Of course, they were both as good as dead, since her actions would be seen as a bad reflection on Kae. And—oh God—Kae’s father was doomed as well, since the son’s behavior would lead back to the father. They were all going to die because she’d been a total idiot.
Oh, no! She was a Maeda! They might even want to take it out on Takehito! Even the entire clan! She might have wiped out the entire Maeda family forever with her own stupidity!
Emmi was nearly hyperventilating by the time they rushed up those few broad steps and through the red-orange main gates of the palace compound. A swarm of guards and furious nobles surrounded them, and Emmi could barely see the palanquin as it stopped and a smaller, similar thing was brought forward to take Sachi the rest of the way to his father’s quarters.
Before getting in, the young heir looked back at Emmi, not angry nor scared, but confused.
“I’m sorry,” she whispered, knowing he couldn’t hear her.
“Shut your lying mouth, girl!” Kae’s father shouted. His deep voice rang through the open courtyard. “Get on your knees where you belong!” he ordered.
One of the guards shoved her down so hard she ended up face first in the dirt. Kae ran forward, but other guards with spears stopped him.
“Kill her now,” Asahiko ground out.
“No!” Kae shouted. “Emiko is innocent! She has been used. You must investigate first. I beg of you.”
Prince Asahiko glared at Emmi then looked to his son. His harsh expression softened just a fraction.
“She stays there until she is sent for,” Asahiko hissed. Guards posted themselves around her while others pulled Kae away. Emmi heard him trying to talk to his father, but Asahiko ignored him.
Emmi had no idea how long she was there. The sun shifted and began to go down. She was so thirsty. Her knees hurt so badly, and her ankles and feet were going numb. Finally she gave up kneeling and sat with her legs bent to the side. She tried to rub the circulation back into them, and winced as the pins and needles pain shot through her.
Darkness was falling over the palace grounds when a shadow crossed in front of Emmi, blocking out what little light remained. She looked up to see Kojima-san looking down. His expression was indescribable—his nasty, ugly thoughts were projected outward onto his face.
How could she ever have thought this guy was nice to be around?
“I never would have imagined an ill-bred thing like you could topple the mighty Nakagawa no miya and his insipid son.”
“Bastard,” Emmi muttered, returning his icy stare.
He said something to one of the guards, and Emmi was jerked to her feet and dragged toward a building that she’d never been in before. But they didn’t go in, they went around and into a small, enclosed courtyard. When she saw what waited there, she screamed.
It was Kae and his father. They were dressed in white ceremonial outfits that she’d only ever seen in the movies—the outfits that samurai wore when about to commit seppuku, ritual suicide. Before them were tiny wooden tables upon which lay sheets of rice paper and atop that, dagger blades removed from their hilts.
Emmi tried to break away from the guards and run to the old man who seemed to be overseeing it all. She’d forgotten his name but remembered he and Kae’s father didn’t get along. Kojima-san went and took his place beside the old noble.
“You can’t do this! They didn’t do anything wrong! It was a mistake! I didn’t know who the prince was! I swear I didn’t! I thought he was just a boy who lived here and wanted to go outside!”
“Silence!” Kojima-san shouted.
“No!” Emmi shrieked back. “I wasn’t trying to kidnap the prince or hurt him! I was trying to find Kae to make sure he was safe, and that he wasn’t caught up in the raid on the Choshu at the—”
Everybody’s head turned her way. She’d really done it this time. But what else could she do? She would not let Kae and his father die. She had to spill the history even if it hadn’t happened yet. She looked at each of the men assembled in turn and tried to figure out what to say to make them believe her. She noted the usually uber-cool Kojima-san was looking awfully uncomfortable all of a sudden.
Before she could say more, a weird intake of breath from everyone caught her attention, and Emmi looked around to find Sachi and a finely dressed, stately woman standing in the opened door of the building behind the courtyard. Could that be the empress?
Emmi suddenly realized everyone was on their knees and bowing with their foreheads to the ground. Everyone but her. She fell to her knees and did likewise. After what seemed like forever, the noble who’d been presiding over things spoke, and Emmi looked up. Sachi and the lady were gone, and the noble was folding whatever message they’d brought.
“Nakagawa no miya, you and your son are to be confined until further notice, pending an answer to the message his Divine Highness will be sending to Edo.”
You and your son…
“But what about me?” Emmi whispered.
She jumped when the old noble turned and stared at her. “You, girl, come with me.”
She couldn’t move. She was too scared. Two guards roughly pulled her to her feet. Kae tried to jump up, but his father stopped him. Tears were blurring Emmi’s vision, but she kept looking at Kae as the guards dragged her inside. She told herself it was her own tears clouding things and making her think that he was crying too.
Her mouth was dry, and fear shook her so thoroughly that if the guards hadn’t been pulling her along she wouldn’t have been able to stand.
She wasn’t sure how many buildings they went through, but when they finally came to a stop, she fully expected to find a samurai assassin waiting on the other side of the sliding door.
There was no assassin inside. There was no one at all. It was only a big, empty room with new tatami mats on the floor. A raised platform was at one end with a bamboo screen in front of it that almost touched the floor.
She heard another door slide open from somewhere behind the bamboo curtain, and when the noble bowed with his head to the floor, Emmi did the same and didn’t move until he poked her with the end of his fan.
When she looked up, someone was sitting behind the curtain. Oh no. She knew that silhouette. She’d seen it at her wedding to Kae. It was the emperor himself.
Her empty stomach cramped. He probably wanted to kill her personally for kidnapping his son, or at least watch while the old guy beside her carried out the execution.
“My son has said he ordered you to take him outside the palace walls. Is this true?”
Oh, Sachi, I could kiss you,
you princely little dork.
It would have been so easy to go along with the story, but she’d never been good at lying, and there was no point in trying to start now.
“He didn’t order me, Your Highness, Sir. I didn’t realize he was your son. I thought he was just a little boy who didn’t have any friends to go to the festival with. Sir, Your Highness. Please, this was all my mistake. Kae, my husband, and his father had nothing to do with it. I acted foolishly, without their knowledge or consent. Punish me if you need to, but let them go. Please spare them and my family.”
Emmi didn’t want to cry but found she couldn’t help it. She kept thinking of Kae and his dad and Takehito and Sadanori…and seppuku.
She bowed her head to the floor again. “Please let them all live. If someone has to die, take me in their place. Please.”
“Go now.”
Emmi looked up. The emperor was standing, leaving. Kae would die. His father, her relatives would all die. “Please believe me! I didn’t know he was your son! It was my mistake, no one else’s! Please spare them. Please!”
He left, and that was that. The old courtier poked her again, and the guards took her back outside.
Kae and his father were gone, but Kojima was there looking like the freaking Cheshire cat from Alice in Wonderland. She wanted to slap that smirk off his face. Someone rushed out and gave the old noble a letter. He read it and looked kind of cheesed off as he showed it to Kojima, who also looked upset.
Kojima walked past her. “You’ve all been spared for the moment. Enjoy it while it lasts, for it won’t last very long.”
Chapter Thirty-One
As far as jail cells went, Emmi decided hers wasn’t so bad. It wasn’t a real jail cell like the ones at the Shinsengumi compound but simply a small, unfurnished, dark room tucked in the back of one of the palace outbuildings that obviously no one ever came to.
Oh no.
Were they just going to leave her here to rot away and die?
Tears stung Emmi’s eyes when she realized they very well might, but she sniffed the tears away. Everyone back home probably thought she’d been killed in that weird storm that blew through the movie lot anyway, so it didn’t much matter to anyone.
Falling Through Glass Page 20
