Raven's Sword

by Raven's Sword (retail) (epub)

  ‘This is their home. They can’t abandon their ancestors.’

  They continued down the path and saw dirt hovels dug into the hillside.

  ‘There’s something bad about this place,’ said Tengu. ‘If I were born in a dump like this, I would have filled my pockets with rice and headed down the road to the city as soon as I was able to walk.’

  ‘Kyoto doesn’t exist for them. They’ve heard descriptions of the great temples and palaces, the teeming markets and fabulous gardens, but it seems impossibly remote. They don’t think of it as a place a person can visit, a place that lies over the hill. For them, it belongs to the realm of myth. It can only be visited in dreams.’

  ‘This isn’t some ordinary backwater. There’s evil here. Something old and festering.’

  They walked through a graveyard and past a small shrine. Tengu adjusted her posture as they entered the village. She straightened her back and tried to walk with a manly swagger.

  They reached the village itself. A cluster of houses surrounding a quarter-acre of dirt that served as a square. The place was as wretched as a leper colony. They glimpsed women picking up their children and running back to their huts. The villagers were lean and short, and bore the hallmark of lifelong malnutrition. Tengu and the Monk seemed muscular giants in comparison. She glimpsed bad teeth and bowed legs. The village was surrounded by woodland but the soil was thin and rocky, and evidently made it hard to cultivate crops. Evidently the community was perpetually on the brink of starvation, collectively too weak and hopeless to search out better land and resettle elsewhere. One hard winter, one major outbreak of disease, and the population would be wiped out. There would be nothing left of the village but silent huts gradually succumbing to the rains.

  A sheet of leather hung stretched on a frame outside one of the huts.

  ‘Tanners,’ said the girl. ‘This is a community of outcasts.’

  The Monk looked up at the tea fields which tiered the upper walls of the valley.

  ‘Most of the menfolk must be working the fields. The men that survived the wars, that is.’

  They approached a shack which evidently served as a tea house and meeting room. Tengu helped the Monk climb the tea house steps and lie down on the veranda. She balled his cloak and used it to pillow his head. He lay with his eyes closed for a few minutes then his face slowly relaxed as the pain in his back diminished. She poured a sip of water into his mouth from a clay flask. She could see an old woman pulling weeds in the graveyard at the edge of the village.

  ‘Will you be all right here?’ Tengu asked. The Monk nodded. She crossed the dirt square and approached the old woman. She strode with a hand gripped on her sword hilt, spat and bowed low. The woman was clearly intimidated to find herself confronted by a strange boy with a blade at his hip.

  ‘Forgive me, Mother, I didn’t mean to disturb you,’ said Tengu, pitching her voice low and gruff. The woman grovelled. ‘Please, I mean you no harm. We are here for the tournament.’

  The woman backed away and ran. Tengu returned to the tea house.

  ‘I don’t think this place gets many visitors.’

  She knocked on the doorframe of the tea house.

  ‘Hello?’

  The tea master emerged from the dark interior of the hut. He had a fresh scar on his cheek and a ladle gripped in his hand like he was expecting trouble. He looked at Tengu with distrust, observed the sword at her side, but relaxed when he saw the Monk’s yellow robes.

  ‘Forgive our intrusion,’ said Tengu. ‘We are travellers looking for a place to stay.’

  ‘Please come in. I’ll light the fire.’

  He hurriedly swept the floor with a twig broom and helped Tengu bring the Monk inside, blessed to have a holy man under his roof.

  ‘May I ask how long you will be honouring us with your presence?’ he said, bowing to the prone Monk.

  ‘A few days. We are here for the tournament.’

  The man glanced doubtfully at the stricken Monk, a man so obviously wracked with pain he could barely hold himself upright, but he kept his thoughts to himself.

  ‘The tournament takes place in a few days,’ said the tea master. ‘Some swordsmen have already arrived. I’m sure you will see them tomorrow.’

  ‘What’s this hamlet called?’ asked Tengu.

  ‘Did you see that outcrop protruding from the valley wall? People call this the Village by the Rock.’

  Tengu’s eyes adjusted to the shadows and she saw the prisoner sitting in his cage flanked by two peasants armed with axes.

  ‘A bandit,’ said the tea master, following the direction of her gaze. ‘A murderer.’

  ‘What will happen to him?’

  ‘He will die at her ladyship’s pleasure. His accomplices remain at large. I feel obliged to warn you there is a chance they may use the cover of darkness to rescue their friend.’

  The Monk laid a hand on the hilt of his sword.

  ‘They will be very welcome to try.’

  ‘Is there anything I can fetch for your comfort?’ asked the tea master.

  ‘We would like a little warmth from the fire. Nothing more.’

  ‘Shall I send word to the Shaman?’

  ‘The Shaman?’

  ‘The old Holy Man,’ said the tea master. ‘He arrived last week. He built himself a hut at the top of the graveyard, some kind of shack made out of branches. We offered him shelter, but he refused. Folk have been taking him offerings of food. I thought you might wish to seek his counsel.’

  ‘No. I’m here to fight.’

  The Monk lay by the fire and Tengu sat by his side. The tea master brought bowls of rice.

  ‘Rest easy,’ said their host. ‘We will watch over the bandit until dawn.’ They nodded thanks. The prisoner watched from the shadows as they ate, flame light reflected in his eyes.

  General Yukio travelled to Etchū with an entourage of a thousand samurai. He slept each night surrounded by four concentric cordons of bodyguards. Archers paced the perimeter of the camp, ready to loose an arrow into the shadows at the slightest sound. Additional watchmen patrolled the serried rows of tents, instructed to immediately cut down anyone who hesitated when challenged for a password. His tent was ringed with soldiers sworn to die rather than let an assailant pass. Finally, in the chambers of the great tent itself, trusted clansmen watched over him as he slept.

  The assassin made it through three layers of security before he was caught.

  * * *

  ‘Take me to him,’ said the General.

  ‘He is dangerous, General-dono. Undoubtedly trained by the assassin-monks at the Temple of Shadows. He is steeped in many dark arts.’

  ‘Show him to me.’

  Soldiers held back canvas partitions as the General strode through his tented headquarters. It was midnight. The chambers of his pavilion were lit by lamps.

  The assassin lay on a mat bound by his wrists and ankles. He wore simple peasant clothes. He was surrounded by a ring of praetorian guards ready to interpose themselves if he somehow got loose and lunged at the General. The assassin would be executed shortly, as would all of the sentries who let him through the perimeter.

  ‘Who sent you?’ asked General Yukio.

  The assassin ignored him and lay staring up at the tent ceiling with a smile on his face. He was in his early twenties, lean and lithe, as if he had trained his whole life to be dispatched on a mission such as his attempt to kill the General; succeed or fail, it would be the fulfilment of his life’s purpose.

  ‘You’re from Iga, aren’t you?’ said General Yukio. ‘You were sent from the temple.’

  The killer didn’t meet the General’s gaze.

  ‘Who sent you? The abbot of the Shadow Temple fired you like an arrow. Who persuaded him to dispatch one of his adepts? The Emperor? You don’t know, do you? You’ve thrown away your life and you don’t even know why.’

  ‘We have ways of making men talk,’ said Tookage, his second in command. ‘He will tell us everything he kno
ws.’

  ‘He doesn’t know a thing.’

  The General swept from the chamber and headed for the chart room. He and his men stood over a scrolled sketch of Etchū and contemplated its fragmented territory and local lords, each represented by a wooden figurine. The General himself was represented by a brass dragon positioned by a river gorge.

  ‘We should return to Kyoto,’ said Tookage. ‘Clearly the rivalry between the Shōgun and the Emperor has reached new heights. If the Imperial house have sent one shadow warrior, they will send more.’

  ‘I have a mission,’ said the General. ‘I must persuade every local lord to swear loyalty to the Shōgun and bring this fractured province under his rule. I will not allow vipers from the Shadow Temple to thwart me. So show me: which benighted stretch of dirt shall we visit next?’

  ‘This valley,’ said Tookage, tapping the chart. ‘A conglomeration of five villages. A miserable creature who claims to be their lord has presented himself. We are holding him outside the camp. Allow him a moment to bend his knee, General-dono, and he will leave happy, and spend the rest of his life reliving the fleeting moments he spent in the presence of nobility.’

  ‘Bring him to me.’

  Chikaaki was summoned from a tent outside the camp and led between soldiers waking themselves as dawn broke. The modest regiment struck him as an impossibly huge army. He was overwhelmed by the smell of oiled leather and the clatter of armour. More manpower and weaponry than he had ever seen.

  He was led to the tented compound. He quaked in fear as he approached a ring of sentries and flinched when one of the soldiers abruptly stepped aside.

  He was led to a reception chamber. General Yukio knelt on a dais in full armour with a war fan in his lap. Chikaaki threw himself to the floor and bowed over and over until his forehead bore the imprint of the mat.

  ‘Sit up,’ barked Tookage. Chikaaki didn’t dare look the emissary full in the face.

  ‘Do you know why I have summoned you, Lord Makoto-dono?’ asked Yukio. He disliked using the honorific dono when addressing a beast little better than a dog but knew the expression would secure the man’s loyalty for life. If the peasant returned to the squalid hovel he called home and let it be known a representative of the Shōgun called him dono his neighbours would treat him as nobility until the end of his days.

  ‘My name is Chikaaki, Excellency. The previous lord, Makoto-dono, has passed into the next world. I am here to swear allegiance to the Shōgun on behalf of the five villages. We dedicate our lives to his name. We are his, to use as he sees fit.’

  ‘Good,’ said Yukio.

  Tookage signalled for wine. An exquisite porcelain cup, eggshell blue and laced with delicate cracks in the glaze, was put in Chikaaki’s hand.

  ‘We will drink to this pact,’ said Yukio. They each took a sip of saké, and the cup was taken from Chikaaki’s hand. Evidently this briefest of interviews was drawing to a close. He summoned his courage.

  ‘Excellency, I bring a gift.’ He fumbled for a paper tucked in his belt and made as if to rise and pass it to the General.

  ‘Stop,’ bellowed Tookage. He snatched the paper and read it aloud.

  In this, the eighth summer of the Emperor’s reign, I, Chikaaki, Lord of the Five Villages, declare a contest of martial skill to find the greatest swordsman in Etchū. The contest will take place at the river tavern in the presence of his Excellency, the Shōgun’s emissary, at the next full moon.

  Participants will fight for glory.

  Participants will fight to the death.

  ‘You have arranged a contest in my honour?’

  ‘We have done our utmost to provide an entertainment befitting your Excellency’s legendary martial skill.’

  ‘You announced my attendance without securing my permission. I’ve executed men for less.’

  ‘Please, your Excellency, we meant no disrespect.’

  ‘I will not visit your valley. I have business elsewhere.’

  ‘Swordsmen from all over Etchū will fight,’ said Chikaaki, giddy at his own audacity, talking despite the clear disapproval of Tookage, angered that a peasant would dare converse with the General at length.

  ‘They will duel to the death?’ asked Yukio.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And the prize?’

  ‘The glory of victory.’

  ‘Have any swordsmen come forward?’

  ‘Four men with grave reputations have arrived in our valley and I hear more are on the way. If we may have your blessing on this endeavour, if the tournament may proceed in your name, the honour of victory will be immeasurably increased.’

  ‘The full moon,’ mused the General.

  ‘Yes, your Excellency.’

  ‘Perhaps I can spare some time to view this tournament.’

  ‘With respect, General-dono,’ interjected Tookage, ‘the lord of the northern coast awaits our arrival.’

  ‘Then let him wait. We are not lackeys, at his beck and call. We shall attend this tournament. Perhaps we will send our Champion to face these men and show them how a true warrior deports himself.’

  ‘There is the matter of your personal safety, sir.’

  ‘A great personage in Kyoto wishes me to hide away behind sentries and tremble in my bed. No. We shall attend this tournament. We will show his spies that we remain unafraid.’

  The General snapped his fan shut and brought the interview to a close. Tookage led Chikaaki from the General’s headquarters, through the tent rows to the edge of the camp.

  ‘You have done well for yourself today.’

  ‘Thank you, Excellency,’ said Chikaaki.

  ‘I am a samurai. I have no title.’

  Chikaaki was given food and sent on his way.

  ‘You promised his Excellency a grand spectacle,’ shouted Tookage as Chikaaki headed down a hill path. ‘It would be a mistake to disappoint him.’

  Tookage returned to the General’s pavilion. He found Yukio standing over the body of the assassin. The assassin had sightless eyes and blood on his lips.

  ‘He ate a piece of broken porcelain,’ said the General. ‘He must have kept it hidden about his person in case he got caught. He was searched, yes? Thoroughly searched?’

  Tookage knelt and offered his neck.

  ‘The shame is mine, Excellency.’

  ‘Get up,’ said the General in irritation. ‘It will be dawn soon. We will break camp and travel to that forsaken valley.’ He kicked the assassin. ‘Leave this carcass on the dung pile.’

  ‘Yes, General-dono. We will let the rats have him.’

  ‘The Shadow Temple take children and turn them into berserkers. It’s monstrous. One day there will be a reckoning, mark my words. One day that place will be burned and razed, and I’ll make sure I’m there to see it. Bring me food. I need a full belly to sleep.’

  Tookage clapped for a servant and said:

  ‘Meat.’

  Yukio retired to his chamber, knelt at his table and tore at a chicken. He ripped leg flesh with his teeth until he felt calm. He found the texture and taste reassuring, as if the sensations proved he was alive.

  * * *

  Iezane finished sentry duty and returned to his tent in the early hours of the morning. He unbuckled his armour, anxious to collapse onto his bedroll beside his four sleeping companions, but the tent flap was pulled back and Commander Tookage called him outside.

  ‘There is to be a contest of swordcraft in three days. Swordsmen from this province and beyond will converge on a river valley near here and test their skill in a fight to the death. The General has decreed that you are to be the regimental Champion. You will have the honour of representing him and securing victory in his name.’

  Iezane acknowledged the order with a curt bow, then Tookage returned to the General’s pavilion.

  Iezane returned to his tent, lay on his mat and stared into the dark. A duel to the death in three days. He let fear wash over him then silently mouthed the Lotus Sutra until he calmed himself. If
any of his companions were awake they might have overheard Commander Tookage issuing his order. It would be shameful if laboured breathing betrayed his heart-hammering fear.

  Iezane had been the Champion for three years. Sometimes he was pitted against a champion from a rival regiment. He had scarred arms and eight death notches on the hilt of his sword. Each time he won a contest he received no reward. Yukio watched him fight but Iezane doubted the General even knew his name. He was tired of killing, tired of mortal terror, but knew he would remain the Champion until his reactions failed and a sword slice ended his life. Then some other unfortunate would take his place.

  There was little he could do to prepare for the contest. He could hone his sword then oil his scabbard so the blade drew smoothly and cleanly. And he could eat quarter rations to purge his guts and ensure he didn’t feel sated and sluggish when he faced off against an adversary. He wanted his senses sharpened by hunger.

  There was no point worrying about death, he told himself. He had seen plenty of soldiers killed in mundane accidents, skilled warriors who survived countless battles only to meet their end flung from a rearing horse or crushed by a toppled cart. The length of a person’s life was in the hands of capricious gods. He turned on his side and willed sleep to come.

  Needle beams of sunlight stabbed through the bamboo weave of the tea house wall. The tea master stood beside the cage and looked down on the prisoner.

  ‘Your third night in a cage. It seems your friends aren’t coming for you. They must have fled for the border. We’ll find them, though. We’ve sent men in all directions to search. They’ll travel every road, question every farmer and tavern keeper along the way until they’ve picked up their trail. There will be a reckoning, but I don’t expect you will be alive to see it.’ He kicked a village lad awake. ‘Go to the mansion. It’s time we told her ladyship we have captured one of the bandits who killed her husband.’

  The boy nodded and left.

  ‘What do you reckon her ladyship will order done to you?’ asked the tea master. ‘It will be interesting to find out. I don’t imagine it will be a quick death. If we don’t capture your compatriots she will triple your suffering.’