by Maya Snow
“That’s all right,” I said, and quickly told him that the fisherman wanted to give us bowls of soup.
Manabu nodded approvingly, and used his good hand to usher us all ahead of him. Ducking our heads, we stepped through the screen door and entered the fisherman’s hut. The place smelled strongly of fish and looked as if it had been built from bits of timber found on the shore. Inside, a little girl of about Moriyasu’s age was stirring an iron pot. A woman was tucked into a low futon bed in one corner. She looked thin and pale, and I guessed she was the fisherman’s wife. Two tiny children huddled at the foot of the bed. They stared at us as we came in, their eyes huge and round.
At a word from the fisherman, the little girl scooped watery soup into roughly carved wooden bowls and handed it around. Watched by the fisherman, his wife, and their children, we sipped at the soup. It was mostly water, with a few ragged pieces of fish skin floating in it.
My soul ached to see how generous and dignified these people were, even though they were dressed in rags and had nothing but wooden bowls to eat from. Silently I swore that when Uncle’s reign came to an end I would make sure that these people were treated fairly, as they had been when my father had been Jito.
Anger burned in my heart at the thought of Uncle so quickly destroying Father’s work. Until now I had been consumed with the desire for vengeance and a desperate need to restore the honor of my family name. But standing in that tiny hovel with a shaft of early-morning light slanting through a gap in the timbers, I realized there was more to it than that. It wasn’t just Father and my brothers that I must avenge. It was every starving fisherman and every poor rice farmer, too.
When we had finished eating, we said good-bye to the wife and children and made our way back to the shoreline. I kneeled beside Hana in the bottom of the boat and tried to contain my excitement. We were so nearly there! As Manabu and Tatsuya settled opposite us, I caught Hana’s eye.
“I can’t wait to see Moriyasu,” I said.
“And Mother,” she said, taking a deep, calming breath. “We have come so far, Kimi.”
“But there’s even farther to go,” I murmured. “Mother will want to gather the rebels together. Raise an army. Fight against Uncle!”
Manabu nodded and gave us a beaming look, but Tatsuya avoided my eye. He seemed thoughtful. What was going on with him? As the boat pulled away from the shore, he kept looking behind him, scanning the hovels.
“I hope we don’t have to start fighting just yet,” Hana said. “I want to spend time with Mother, just being a family again.”
We were both quiet for a while, listening to the plopping of the sculling pole dipping in and out of the water.
As soon as we reached the other side, the fisherman lashed the boat to a wooden post sticking up out of the water.
“I will bid you farewell,” he said, bowing to each of us in turn. “I hope that one day we meet again, when the tide has turned and the land is once more what it was under Lord Yoshijiro.”
Hana and I bowed low to hide our emotion at the sound of Father’s name. “Thank you,” I said. “I hope you find a trader to give you a good price for the box.”
We watched him hurry away, and then I turned to take stock of the little town.
There were little more than two dozen houses huddled beside the shoreline where the mouth of the river met the lake. A few boats had been pulled up on the mud, and a skinny dog sniffed a pile of fishing nets. It was still early, and the main street was deserted as we made our way along it.
“Where is everyone?” Hana asked in a puzzled voice. “I expected Mother to be in hiding—but it seems as if the whole town has gone underground.”
“Perhaps the people are frightened,” I said, catching a glimpse of a pale face in a doorway that quickly disappeared as we drew closer. “Maybe they think we’ve been sent by Uncle?”
We came to the outskirts of the town. A spreading maple tree shaded the road that curved away along the riverbank. Nearby was a small hut with a few dusty-looking horses tied up at the rear.
Hana suddenly quickened her pace and went ahead a few steps. “Look,” she said in a hushed voice, pointing at the bamboo-screened door of the hut. Something was nailed to the door frame. “Kimi, it’s a cherry branch.”
My heart skipped a beat and then began to race with excitement. “Mother!” I said breathlessly.
“Be careful,” Tatsuya said in a warning voice. “We don’t know that it’s safe here.”
With a nod at me to go ahead, Manabu put his hand on the scabbard of his sword.
Together, Hana and I hurried to the hut and I knocked on the door frame. There was no response. I shifted my weight from one foot to the other, feeling impatient. We were so close! Mother and Moriyasu could be just beyond this bamboo screen.
I turned to Hana. “Shall we go in?” I whispered.
She nodded, her face shining with joy. “Mother’s here,” she said. “I can almost smell her perfume. Come on, Kimi….”
Heart racing, I slid back the screen door and stepped into the hut.
It was almost dark inside, smoky and dimly lit. There was a charcoal brazier in one corner, and a long, low wooden table in the center of the room. Chopsticks and dirty wooden bowls were littered across the surface. The room smelled of stale rice and vinegar.
At the far end of the table, two figures kneeled silently in the seiza position on rough straw mats. Their hands rested lightly on their thighs and their backs were straight. One was a woman, her long hair hanging loose over her shoulder like a rope of exquisite black silk. The other was a little boy with round cheeks.
“Mother! Moriyasu!” I cried joyfully.
Suddenly the days and weeks of tension seemed to flood out of my body, leaving me free to rush forward, pulling Hana with me. We were reunited at last!
Too late, I saw the look of warning flash across my mother’s face as five fierce-looking samurai stepped out of the shadows.
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
My heart plunged into the pit of my stomach.
“No!” I cried in desperation, drawing my sword in a sweep of silver steel. Hana was right beside me, her nihonto flowing into her hand.
I could hear Tatsuya in the doorway behind us, rounding on Manabu. “Traitor!” He spat the word through gritted teeth. “You’re the only one who could have told those soldiers where to look.”
Shocked, I twisted around to see that Tatsuya had grabbed Manabu by the front of his kimono and was shaking him like a rat. Everything seemed to be happening in slow motion.
“You sneaked off when you went to find food at the other village,” Tatsuya said accusingly. “It must have been a stroke of luck for you when we were all inside that fisherman’s hut, and your friends could slip away.”
Tatsuya shoved Manabu out through the doorway and I instinctively took a step to follow. The manservant staggered backward, lost his balance, and fell into the mud outside.
“Tatsuya!” I cried, hardly able to believe what my friend was doing.
Flushing red with fury, Manabu scrambled back up onto his knees. His good hand flashed to the hilt of his short sword and I thought he was going to attack Tatsuya—
But instead he reached across the front of his own body and slashed through the folded cloth where his left arm should have been. As I watched, an arm uncurled from beneath the fabric. I gasped. The world seemed to tilt around me.
For as long as I had known him, our servant had only had one arm. But there he sat, with two arms, one clutching a shining sword.
Manabu held my shocked gaze, his eyes narrow and black. An evil smile curved across his thin mouth. He had kept his left arm hidden all this time, strapped to his side. For how many moons…? My mind whirled.
Tatsuya turned to me, his face red with anger. “That man is a traitor,” he said in a hard voice. “We should have left him to drown in the quicksand.”
Behind him, Manabu sprang nimbly to his feet and leaped at Tatsuya, sword raised.
“Look out,” I yelled.
Tatsuya twisted toward the glinting blade, but it was too late. The manservant grabbed him, thrust the sword to his throat, and shoved him forward so that he stumbled into Hana and me. Hana’s nihonto went spinning away on the ground. I struggled to raise my sword, but Manabu saw me and brought the edge of one fist down across my knuckles. His hand was as hard as steel and I cried out in pain.
With brute strength, Manabu bundled us all completely into the hut. I saw that the samurai had their swords in their hands and were grouped around Mother and Moriyasu, their eyes glittering dangerously in the half light.
Mother looked desperate, her agonized gaze darting from my face to Hana’s and back again. Moriyasu was trembling, his little hands folded so tightly in his lap that his knuckles gleamed white. A samurai stood over him.
Leave him alone! I wanted to shout.
Manabu snapped the bamboo screen door shut behind him, and then gestured to two of the samurai. “Strip them of their weapons,” he said in a hard, unfamiliar voice.
The soldiers hurried to do as he commanded, but I was ready. My knuckles still smarted from Manabu’s blow, but I held my blade in a steady two-handed grip. I was aware of Tatsuya to my left. Manabu’s sword was still trained on his throat, so there was nothing he could do.
It was all down to me, now.
For a moment there was a standoff. I held the black gaze of the nearest samurai, daring him to step closer. Then Hana’s voice cut through the haze of desperation in my mind.
“Kimi,” she said. “Put down your weapon.”
At first I thought I hadn’t heard her correctly. But then I saw her pale hand flash up, and she pointed toward our mother….
Mother was on her knees, head tilted back. One of the samurai had twisted his hand into her long black hair and was holding her tightly, exposing her throat to the razor-sharp edge of his long sword.
“No,” I whispered, my heart breaking.
“Put down your weapon, and your mother lives,” Manabu said sharply. “Do it now.”
I could barely breathe. My gaze was fixed on Mother as I slowly lowered my weapon and placed it on the floor at my feet. One of the samurai dodged forward and snatched it up.
“Search her,” Manabu snapped.
The soldier patted me down, checking my kimono for hidden blades. He hesitated when his fingers found the little bamboo bokken of Moriyasu that I wore tucked into my sash. “Nothing,” he said at last. “Just a harmless wooden toy.”
Then, with their hands tight on our shoulders, the soldiers forced Hana, Tatsuya, and me down onto our knees at the table.
The samurai still had his hand twisted in Mother’s hair.
“Let her go,” I begged. “I’ve put down my weapon.”
“I don’t think so.” Manabu looked from Mother to Tatsuya and back again, as if he was admiring the sword blades pointed at both their throats. “I think we might have some fun here instead. How about a little game, eh?”
I stared up at him, confused. “A game?” I whispered.
“Yes, a game, Kimi-gozen.” He sneered at me. “You were always fond of those. I want you to choose. One person in this room must die….” He shot a hard look at Tatsuya and pressed his blade a little tighter to his throat. “And Kimi-gozen must choose who it will be.”
“Wh-what?” I gaped at him. “I don’t understand.”
“It’s really not complicated,” Manabu said. “Either your friend dies…or your mother does.”
I stared up at the manservant in shock, my heart like a cold stone in my chest. “Wh-why must I choose?”
“I believe that now you are the eldest child,” Manabu said with an oily smile. “And of course, we must never forget that it is the eldest child who is superior.”
I knew this was an echo of the bitterness Uncle Hidehira felt about Father being chosen as Jito instead of him.
I stared at Manabu’s sallow face and felt a flash of hatred. How could I have been so blind? I had thought this man was our friend. I had trusted him. Only Tatsuya had seen the truth. I flushed with shame and looked at my friend, so noble and dignified despite the sword that glittered at his throat. I thought back to the mud patch on the other side of the lake. Tatsuya must have regretted saving Manabu’s life now.
“I can’t choose,” I said hoarsely.
“Oh, but you will choose,” Manabu said, his eyes glittering.
Hana shifted restlessly beside me. “Why are you doing this, Manabu?” she asked in anguish.
“Why do you think I’m doing it?” Manabu said roughly. “I serve Lord Hidehira, the true Jito.”
“My father was the true Jito,” Hana retorted. “You served him once—or were you pretending even then?”
Manabu’s lip curled in a sneer. “I wouldn’t serve Yoshijiro if my life depended on it,” he said. “That man refused to promote my father, Nagahira.”
My mother’s voice came out of the shadows on the far side of the table. “Nagahira? He was a traitor who did not deserve to be promoted,” she said. The samurai had let go of her hair, but the sword still hovered dangerously near her throat.
Manabu ignored her. “Lord Hidehira, however, recognized talent when he saw it. He promoted my father and made sure I got the best training.” He hammered his fist against his chest. “He knew how to inspire loyalty.”
Hana was gazing incredulously at Manabu. “Did Uncle Hidehira send you to serve Father all those moons ago?” she asked. “To spy?”
Manabu drew himself up proudly. “I am samurai!” he exclaimed. “I serve Lord Hidehira to the death, and I will do anything he asks of me. Yes, he sent me, dressed as a servant, to gather information. I did his bidding gladly because I knew that one day, when he was in power, his lordship would honor me with land and wealth.”
Hana shook her head. “So many moons have passed since you came,” she murmured. “Uncle Hidehira plotted against us all that time.”
I remembered what Manabu had told us about the uprising. How he had rushed to Mother’s room to save her and Moriyasu. “None of the story you told us about the night of the massacre was true, was it?” I said bitterly. “I bet you were furious when you learned that we had escaped.”
Manabu shrugged. “I told you part of the story,” he said. “I did rush to the mistress’s room, once Lord Hidehira had begun the killing. But it wasn’t to warn her.” He shot Mother a look of venom. “It was to kill her! The one who brings her to the Jito will be most rewarded.”
My heart twisted in my chest, and I felt Hana reach sideways to touch my fingertips with her own.
“Too bad she had already run away, like a coward,” Manabu went on, caressing the hilt of his sword as if he would like nothing more than to draw it and finish his mission now, by slicing Mother’s head from her shoulders. “That night I swore to Lord Hidehira that I would track down the woman and her brat. Now I have fulfilled my oath and earned my reward.”
“And we helped you,” Hana said bitterly. “Tatsuya tried to warn us, but we wouldn’t listen.”
“It was so easy to fool you,” Manabu said with a snigger. “You and your sister…rushing up to me at the temple just because you saw a paper scroll in my hands. I’ve never seen such foolish girls.”
“How did you get the letter?” I asked.
“Lord Hidehira sent me to the temple,” Manabu replied. “We hoped we would catch her, but she had delivered the scroll to one of the monks much earlier in the day. I showed the monk my orders from the Jito and he simply handed over the scroll.” His narrow eyes gleamed. “With a little help from the point of my sword, of course.”
“You killed a monk?” Mother cried in disbelief.
Manabu shrugged. “It wouldn’t be the first time.” He gave a brisk, mocking bow to me. “I ought to thank you, really. You led me straight to my target. Without you, I would never have found them. But as it is…well, I have all of you. A nice family reunion. My lord will be most appreciative.”
I clenched my fists. How could I have been so stupid? I cast a look at Mother and Moriyasu. Mother had her eyes closed. Beside her, my little brother sat bravely, his face deathly pale but his eyes blazing with defiance, as if he was willing himself not to cry. He looked different somehow—he had grown a little older in the time we had been apart.
I tried to smile at him. But he simply stared back at me, his expression unreadable. I bit my lip, wondering how to get through to him—then at last I remembered. His little wooden bokken. I’d carried it all this way, through the passing of many moons, praying that I would have a chance to give it back to him when we were reunited.
My heart felt lighter as I eased the bokken out of my sash and slid it across the table toward my little brother. His face lit up.
But all at once Manabu leaned over and knocked the bokken. His hand sent it spinning across the table. “You are past the age for toys, Kimi-gozen,” he said, emphasizing the “gozen” with a sneer. “You must choose, remember?” He twitched his blade against Tatsuya’s throat. The silvery steel length glittered, picking up the orange light cast by the smoldering charcoal brazier in the corner. “Your friend…or your mother. Who will you save?”
The samurai standing behind Mother was tense and ready. Mother opened her eyes and gazed across the table at me. Her face was pale, but her expression was brave and dignified.
I exchanged a horrified glance with Hana.
“Don’t look at your sister,” Manabu snarled at me. “You make this decision alone.”
Sickened, I stared down at the tabletop. My mother or my friend. How could I choose? How could anyone make such a choice? How I wished that Master Goku were here to guide me with his wisdom. What would he say? Empty your mind, Kimi. Let all your fears slip away until only the truth remains….
But what was the truth?
Surely I had to choose Mother.
But then Tatsuya would die, and that was wrong. He had been a loyal and true friend.
