Child of Vengeance

by David Kirk

  “No, my lords,” said Munisai. “May my actions today expunge all shame.”

  “As they surely shall,” said the courtier. “The ritual proceeds.”

  After bowing once more, Munisai surrendered his swords, which were placed upon a rest nearby. From behind a folding screen three small buckets were brought before him. One contained hot water, a second cold. Equal measures were ladled into the empty third, so that the temperature was a median. Munisai dunked his hands into it, and washed them. Then he brought a ladleful to his lips and swirled it around his mouth. A small bowl was held before him, and he let the water dribble out into it.

  Purified, he let his hair down from the top knot of living samurai that rested on the shaven pate of his head. Hair was worn in that manner to balance the helmet, but Munisai had no further need for armor now. Instead, out of consideration for those he would leave behind, he pulled the hair back, wound it over upon itself, and then tied it at the base of his skull so that it jutted outward like a curved, black baton. This was the style of those about to die, for it would allow the head to be handled easier.

  A length of white hemp was brought out and laid upon the floor. Munisai rose to his feet and slipped out of his overkimono, then knelt at the southern end of the hemp, facing north. A bunch of sacred flowers and herbs arranged carefully in a thin vase was placed opposite him.

  “Would the honorable Munisai Shinmen care to write a death poem?” asked the courtier.

  “It is proper for it to be so,” said Munisai.

  Water was mixed drop by drop with black powder to produce ink. A brush and a length of paper were placed before him. Into a small cup, a careful four measures of sake were poured. It was offered to Munisai, and he drank half in two sips. The cup was placed down, the brush taken up.

  He began to write. There was no deliberation; he had planned his words beforehand. Bennosuke watched—they all watched—his hand dance across the paper, enchanted.

  “Would the honorable Munisai care for the poem to be read aloud?” asked the courtier when the samurai had set the brush down.

  “It is proper for it to be so,” said Munisai.

  The paper was carried to the courtier reverentially. The man held it before him, careful not to let the ink run in ugly rivulets. He read it once silently so that there would be no mistake, thick lips working over his black teeth. Then he took a breath and began to intone somberly:

  Eight years hence from there I wandered,

  The break of seasons around me squandered.

  I am but a leaf, wilting, shrinking, passing on,

  Yet the tree beneath me: paragon.

  There was a rippling of silent heads as men nodded, thinking they understood the poem. Bennosuke knew otherwise; he knew that these words were meant for him alone. A paragon—one who understood and upheld the sanctity of things.

  Munisai finished the sake with another measured two sips. The cup was taken from him along with the writing tools, and placed behind the screen. A man returned. He had a raised wooden platter in his hand, the ceremonial dagger resting on it. It was placed before Munisai, and the blade glinted silver as he took it in his hands and tested the sharpness against the back of his hand. He nodded, satisfied, and handed it back to the man, who began to wrap the center of the blade in white silk a ritualized twenty-eight times.

  It took time. As he began to wind, the southern door was opened. Kazuteru entered and bowed to the gathered men.

  “My name is Kazuteru Murayama. It is both my honor and privilege to have been accepted by the most honorable Munisai Shinmen as his second,” he said.

  They bowed back to him, and the young samurai walked silently to stand by Munisai. He was not acknowledged; Munisai’s eyes were fixed, distant, as though they were seeing beyond the walls of the dojo.

  Kazuteru bound the sleeves of his kimono up around his shoulders, freeing his arms. He slid his longsword silently out of his scabbard and drizzled some of the holy water upon the curved blade. Holding the sword carefully before him, he took his place on the white hemp, placing his stockinged feet behind and to the left of Munisai. He readied himself to strike, holding the sword in the correct position—hilt close to his cheek, elbows high and level with his eyes—and then began to focus on the hairs on the back of Munisai’s neck. Kazuteru swallowed, concentrated on those dark lines, prayed to whatever might be listening to let his sword find its way cleanly to them.

  When the dagger was correctly wrapped, it was returned to the platter and placed before Munisai. He looked at it for a long while, eyes upon the point. The man to Bennosuke’s right bit the inside of his lip.

  “The ritual shall be completed in its entirety,” said Munisai. Across and back, silently, and some of those watching were moved to nod their approval at his courage and his properness. “May this act earn your pardon, my lords.”

  Munisai picked the dagger up, right hand upon the tightly wound cloth. He forced his weak left hand under his right, clasping it tightly so it would not slip when it became slick with blood. He placed the point of the blade on the left side of his stomach, the sharpness cutting through the first layer of silk effortlessly …

  … There was a moment of euphoria, where everything seemed perfect—he could see forever, the sun high and golden, the son low and watching, herbs sweet in the air, all were part of him and he part of them …

  The dagger went up. Immediately Bennosuke could see the white silk of the kimono turn red. Save for one tiny exhalation of breath, Munisai made no sound. His eyes were open, the tendons on his neck ridging in agony. Blood began to drip upon the floor, and to that pattering beat Munisai began to wrench the blade across.

  Sharp though the dagger was it still required a fierce effort to cut across the belly. Munisai’s hands juddered as he slowly drew a ragged red line across himself. His teeth were gritted so tightly that Bennosuke thought they must shatter. Another hiss of breath escaped him, nothing more. A pink mass of entrails began to emerge.

  The soles of Kazuteru’s stockings began to grow damp with blood as the stain of red spread outward across the hemp like a flood-burst river over a plain. Even from behind he saw the extra effort Munisai needed to turn the blade, felt the savage spasm of Munisai’s body as he did so, heard the fresh, thicker spattering of darker blood upon the floor. Still he waited, sword tight in his hand, willing his commander onward, praying that at the rapidly approaching moment he would not fail him.

  Bennosuke too urged Munisai through the final terrible inches. He felt his heart beating in admiration, even as the intestines began looping out of Munisai’s stomach uncontrollably. This was bravery before him, silent and horrific and noble.

  Another two savage jerks, a last surge of horrible strength, and it was done. Munisai had made it, and still no noise had escaped him. Kazuteru saw Munisai’s shoulders sag in relief, and then the man leaned forward and stuck his neck out—perhaps subconsciously—inviting the blow. Kazuteru allowed himself a moment to check for the signal he knew Shinmen would give, but to his surprise the lord remained still. He waited, confused.

  Guts splattered upon the hemp. Munisai shuddered in silent agony. Bennosuke sensed something amiss. He too looked across to Lord Shinmen. The lord’s face was uncertain, worried, and the boy wondered what was troubling him. All it took was the simple wave of a hand to command the final blow, nothing more.

  But in looking over at the lord, the boy became aware of someone looking at him—the only other face not looking at Munisai—and it was then that he saw the Hayato Nakata he had expected to see today. The young lord’s eyes were malicious and triumphant and leering, and the one hand he had was resting a fan gently upon the wrist of Shinmen.

  Betrayal. Lord Shinmen had betrayed them.

  In those numb moments Bennosuke saw the plan unfurl itself before him—the Nakata didn’t want to merely kill Munisai, they wanted to ruin him utterly. They had persuaded Shinmen to withhold the killing signal until Munisai screamed, and so Munisai would
destroy himself in front of a countrywide room of witnesses.

  And what could Bennosuke do now? Nothing. He had no weapon, and if he acted he would definitely spoil Munisai’s death. He knew that the only chance Munisai had left of keeping his honor as he had planned was if he managed to endure in silence to the end. It was a small chance, for it took a long while to bleed to death, but it was all there was.

  Hayato turned backed to Munisai, now that he knew that Bennosuke knew. No one had noticed him look away, engrossed as they were in the spectacle before them. The burgundy lord awaited the damning scream, and Bennosuke could only watch helplessly also, praying for his father to have the strength to deny it to Hayato.

  Suddenly Munisai shuddered and the slightest of gasps escaped his lips, and then the man lurched forward. He put a hand out to catch himself, not dead yet. He remained on all fours, his insides spilling out of him, and still he did not make a sound. The dagger remained lodged in him, shaking and glimmering with the jerking of his body.

  Kazuteru looked imploringly at Lord Shinmen once more, but still he gave no signal. Kazuteru wanted to strike, imagined himself doing so, no longer worried about failure—but he could not disobey his lord. His hands grew tight on his sword.

  On it dragged, seconds marked only by the writhing of tubes and the falling of blood. Munisai’s hand bunched the hemp within his fist, white knuckles showing through the red. The blood grew slower, pumping from deep within, gushing out now in spurts to the time of his faltering heart. Each small eruption gave Bennosuke hope that Munisai could endure, that it would be the final one and his father would simply lay himself down and die.

  But seppuku was seppuku. Suddenly, inevitably, Munisai jerked as though he might be coughing, and then a moan escaped his lips. There was no intelligent voice in it, an instinctive gurgle, long, low, and guttural like a dead wind. The gathered witnesses recoiled in shock and surprise. As they did so, Lord Shinmen ripped his hand free of Nakata’s restraint and pointed to Kazuteru.

  Gratefully, the young samurai struck.

  He had hoped, hoped against hope, that Dorinbo had been wrong and that maybe the spirit of Yoshiko would be waiting for him. But she was not here.

  He had passed beyond sensation, so that although he was aware his body was hurting he no longer cared for it. What was hurt to him but a memory of meat? He thought his eyes saw this world and the next, but he knew that they did not see Yoshiko. He was alone. It made no sense. She had to forgive him. That was the way it was meant to be.

  Munisai became aware that he—his body, not his soul, for the two were rapidly splitting—was making a sound, and he could not stop it. There was a vague inkling that this was wrong, that somehow sound was bad, but then he found that he could no longer remember what sound was. That was attached to the living world, and to that he felt no more kinship.

  There was another sensation suddenly, a sharp sting on what he used to call his neck, and then the world started to spin. Colors and shapes swirled and bounced around him, but there was no Yoshiko, and then the darkness started to come. It swept over him, and he was so alone and there was no Yoshiko there was no Yoshiko there was no Yoshiko there was no …

  Dorinbo knelt before the temple. It was night. He was weaving the final bough by the light of a paper lantern. Wordlessly Bennosuke approached and knelt beside his uncle.

  The village was empty now, the visiting samurai departed. Bennosuke had been ignored, and as they had left he had heard words recurrent in their conversations—shame, coward, disgrace, Munisai. There were varying levels of skepticism, but then men with purses fat with Nakata gold had intervened. They insisted that Munisai had arrogantly arranged beforehand that he would signal his own decapitation and had failed miserably. Thus the Nakata had their victory. Even men not in allegiance with them would carry the news of the shaming far and wide, and Shinmen would not deny it for he had chosen the Nakata, and so the truth of the tale would become undoubted.

  Only one person had spoken to him directly. Hayato Nakata had addressed him from the awning of his palanquin, the dozens of men bearing him aloft looking on.

  “Are you samurai?” he asked, glee writ across his face. “Are you samurai, monk?”

  With those simple words, as Munisai had said he would, Bennosuke understood. He had watched the last of the samurai disappear in silence, and then slowly he had wandered up to the temple, where his father’s body had been taken.

  It lay inside the small shrine now. Dorinbo had taken the head and the body, cleaned them, and wrapped them in a shroud. Bennosuke could see the vague outline atop the boughs stacked inside. A pyre of prayers, hopes, and dreams for a damned man.

  Bennosuke watched his uncle’s hands as the monk worked. The bough was almost finished—he was weaving the penultimate prayer into it. It was Munisai’s death poem. He saw the characters of paragon once more, and then they were gone, swallowed into the mass of the bough. A single prayer remained, a folded piece of paper unworn by time. Dorinbo held it out to Bennosuke.

  “Do you remember this?” he said.

  “No,” said Bennosuke.

  “You gave it to me on the morning you left for Takeyama.”

  “Oh,” said Bennosuke. It seemed a long time ago. Dorinbo unfolded the paper.

  “I thought we weren’t supposed to look at the prayers,” said Bennosuke.

  “I think this one no longer holds any truth,” said the monk, and then he read from the prayer. “ ‘I, Bennosuke Shinmen, hope to be the finest samurai I could possibly be in the service of Lord Shinmen’ … I’m right, am I not?”

  “Yes,” said Bennosuke, but he knew that his uncle was wrong: Dorinbo was thinking Bennosuke was not to be a samurai. That was not the part of the prayer he disagreed with.

  “Amaterasu need not hear it, then,” said Dorinbo, and then he folded it up once more and handed it to Bennosuke. The boy slipped it inside his robe.

  “In that case, it’s finished, then,” said Dorinbo. “Twenty years for this. Would you care to place the final bough?”

  “Should there not be others here? Pilgrims?” asked the boy.

  “I shall keep the fires stoked for a week. They will come then, and then they will pray,” said Dorinbo, and in the darkness Bennosuke became aware of the vague outlines of great piles of wood. How busy things must have been here, and in all the months he had spent with Munisai he had not noticed, had not cared.

  “It would be an honor,” said Bennosuke.

  “There’s space at Munisai’s feet,” said Dorinbo. Bennosuke rose, picked the bough up, and approached the temple.

  The small shrine was surrounded by boughs now, each crisp and dry and awaiting the flame. The cramped interior of the shrine was lined with boughs too, surrounding Munisai’s body. On his knees, he lifted his father’s legs and slotted the final bough beneath them. Then he pulled the shroud to one side and looked at the corpse.

  The blow to the neck had been swift and clean and had severed Munisai’s head neatly. Dorinbo had placed the head as though it had never been harmed, the cleaned wound a dark blue smear around his neck. A fresh kimono masked the terrible wound to his stomach. It appeared that the man was merely sleeping. There was no hint of the agony and humiliation he had suffered.

  Bennosuke bowed low and reverently, held it for several seconds, and then he rose and looked over Munisai’s body. It felt disrespectful, but he needed to do it. He spotted the shortsword easily, laid as it was beside Munisai’s right hand. But what he needed, he could not see.

  “It’s here, Bennosuke,” said Dorinbo calmly.

  Bennosuke turned to look at his uncle. The monk was holding Munisai’s longsword in both hands before him. Bennosuke slowly clambered down from the temple and then took the sword from Dorinbo’s hands. He was surprised, and he looked at his uncle.

  “We both know that you are not a monk. You are Munisai’s son, not mine,” the man said quietly.

  “I would have stayed, but …” said Bennosuke awkwardly
. “Nakata will return and kill me if I do.”

  “Is it that, or is it that you want to go and kill him?” said Dorinbo. Bennosuke remained silent. He wanted to explain himself to his uncle, but he knew it was futile, just as Dorinbo knew it was futile to try to force him to stay.

  The monk rose to his feet, and then removed the paper covering from the lantern exposing the naked candle. He picked a torch from the floor, and held the oil-soaked rag to the flame. It ignited, flaring bright, and the monk slowly walked to the temple pyre. He lowered the torch to the first bough, and then the burning had begun. As flame slowly erupted around the base, Dorinbo clapped twice, bowed, and then lifted his hands high in the gesture of Amaterasu’s prayer. Then he turned to look at Bennosuke, silhouetted by the rising flames behind him.

  “We are the children of Amaterasu, Bennosuke. We are born to burn to ash and then to rise again. Our bodies burn. Sometimes our cities burn. Someday even our mountains and our rivers may burn. But we always come back, and where we rise to after that is entirely our choice. That is Amaterasu’s gift to us,” said the monk. He gestured to the fire behind him, the first flames licking around Munisai.

  “This is the ash of your childhood. So go now, and raise yourself to where you want to be,” he said, and then bowed.

  Bennosuke thought of speaking, but realized he had no words. He looked at his uncle for a long time before he bowed back, and then he slid the longsword into the sash at his waist. It felt right. Then he turned and walked into the night, the hopes and prayers of twenty years rising into the sky behind him and the image of his father’s body as it withered in the flames burned into his eyes.

  Dorinbo watched him go, and then silently he started to pray.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Snow rarely fell in the south of Japan, save for on the peaks of mountains, but the chill of winter was bitter all the same. Men and women bundled themselves in layers of thick cloth, the children barely noticed or cared, and the elderly grumbled that this was a freeze harsher than any before and was thus irrevocable proof of the encroaching doom of the world.