Spirit of the Ronin

by Travis Heermann

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright © 2015 by Travis Heermann

  Acknowledgments and Thanks

  Dedication

  Kai-awase

  Part I: The Sixth Scroll

  Noh Masks

  Part II: The Seventh Scroll

  Yurei

  Part III: The Eighth Scroll

  War

  Part IV: The Final Scroll

  Afterword

  Glossary

  Bibliography

  Contributors

  Permissions

  About the Author

  SPIRIT OF THE RONIN

  THE RONIN TRILOGY: VOLUME III

  by

  Travis Heermann

  Bear Paw Publishing

  Denver, Colorado

  Copyright © 2015 by Travis Heermann

  The Permissions at the end of this book constitute an extension of the copyright page.

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  This novel is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination, or, if real, used fictitiously.

  No part of this work covered by the copyright herein may be reproduced, transmitted, stored, or used in any form or by any means graphic, electronic, or mechanical, including but not limited to photocopying, recording, scanning, digitizing, taping, Web distribution, information networks, or information storage and retrieval systems, except as permitted under Section 107 or 108 of the 1976 United States Copyright Act, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

  Illustrators: Alan M. Clark and Drew Baker

  Calligrapher: Naoko Ikeda

  Cover Designer: jim pinto

  E-BOOK EDITION

  ISBN 978-1-62225-412-5

  Bear Paw Publishing

  Denver, Colorado, USA

  www.bearpawpublishing.com

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS AND THANKS

  The author wishes to thank all the folks who made this book possible. In particular, the Pearl Street Gang as early readers: Mario Acevedo, Warren Hammond, Angie Hodapp, Aaron Michael Ritchey, and Jeanne Stein. Thanks also to John Helfers and Colleen Kuehne for their enormous help during the editing process.

  I am also incredibly thankful to Chanel for her tremendous support in the dark hours of bringing this behemoth into existence, as well as to Kaya for her helpfulness and for putting up with all the missed nights of Harry Potter when deadlines were looking scary.

  I am grateful as well to master calligrapher Naoko Ikeda for gracing this volume with her art.

  Any omissions are purely the author’s fault. Grievances may be filed in person or with the gods.

  DEDICATION

  For these artists whose work still inspires me

  Akira Kurosawa

  Toshiro Mifune

  Hayao Miyazaki

  Eiji Yoshikawa

  Takashi Miike

  Yukio Mishima

  Sonny Chiba

  Takeshi Kitano

  And all the haiku poets whose work is an endless source of insight and delight.

  PART I: THE SIXTH SCROLL

  Deftly the new moon

  Brushes a silver haiku

  On the tips of the waves

  —Kyoshi

  Ken’ishi’s first view of the castle of Lord Otomo no Tsunetomo brought his weary feet to a halt on the road. The roofs of its two keeps, one taller than the other, rose majestically over the skirts of the surrounding town. Something swelled behind his ribs, driving out an incoherent sound overcome with profound joy.

  His previous visit here, with the itinerant merchant Shirohige, felt like another life, or the account of another’s life, so much had changed. A bolt of his life’s cloth had been woven with people and experiences and then ripped asunder, leaving only disparate shreds.

  Now, the castle was his destination, a place for him to belong, to fulfill his destiny as a warrior. Service with a great lord had been his fondest wish since the day Kaa had set him free to walk the earth with Silver Crane at his hip. For the first time in his life, he would belong somewhere, and that belonging would not be clouded by deceit.

  He adjusted his pack, hitched up his trousers, torn and stained as they were from his trek through the forest, and ran down the hill toward the town like an exuberant child. His heaving breath tugged at the stitches of the still healing wound over his heart. As he ran, Ken’ishi marveled again at the majesty of the castle on its hilltop, its stone walls that swept up for five stories, its white-plastered sides, its sweeping roofs, its dark, heavy shutters.

  The surrounding lands were a well-tended patchwork of stubbled rice fields, terracing down toward orchards and gardens, all gray and brown and dormant with the onset of winter. In his excitement, even these dismal colors that covered the hibernating world felt as vibrant as the first blooms of sakura. He crossed the wooden bridge over the river and trotted into Hita town.

  Here in midafternoon, Hita town was alive with far more activity than during his previous visit. Men and oxen pulled carts of grain, timber, and tools. Women and boys toiled with sticks, feathers, and slivers of steel to fill barrels of arrows. The hot, sharp odor of forges and grindstones belched from the dark recesses of smithies. The Mongol invaders had been destroyed, but from the preparations for war going on here, it looked as if the enemy might return at any moment. None of the townsfolk paid Ken’ishi the slightest attention, not even the roving packs of children running bare-legged through patches of cold mud.

  His stomach roared at not having eaten yet today—he had wanted to push straight through the last distance to the castle—but he passed several food vendors without stopping. He would not tarry until he had presented himself for duty to Otomo no Tsunemori, brother of the great lord and captain of his forces, and returned to him the little kozuka blade he had given Ken’ishi in the aftermath of the Mongol attack. The blade represented an invitation to serve, one of the greatest gifts Ken’ishi had ever received.

  Up the cobblestone path terraced with steps toward the castle gates, his legs took on a surer step, each footfall purposeful, determined. His heart skipped a few occasional beats. The gates were open to admit lines of laborers hauling stores on their backs into the castle.

  Two guards stood at the gate with naginata, clad in armor and helm. They challenged him, but neither appeared surprised to see a ronin.

  “I am Ken’ishi. I fought with the defense forces against the barbarian invaders. I was told by Captain Otomo no Tsunemori to present myself for service to Lord Otomo. He gave me this.” Ken’ishi showed them the kozuka.

  They raised their eyebrows in surprise at the small blade, engraved with Tsunemori’s name.

  “Please take me to him,” Ken’ishi said.

  Both of them eyed him for a long moment, and Ken’ishi began to grow angry that they seemed to doubt his word. Finally, one said, “Follow me.”

  He led Ken’ishi through the gates, up through the ways between the castle’s concentric fortifications, to a practice yard. Battered striking posts, bales of straw serving as archery targets, and weapons racks surrounded the perimeter of the yard. Ten scruffy-looking warriors with wooden swords sparred in pairs, under the watchful eye of Captain Tsunemori, who sat on a chair upon a raised platform.

  Tsunemori was middle-aged, handsome, with eyes revealing a sharp intelligence. Astride his horse in the aftermath of the battle, when he had given Ken’ishi the kozuka, Tsunemori had been an imposing figure. Excitement coursed through Ken’ishi at meeting the man again.

  Flanking Tsunemori on either side were two other samurai in fine but serviceable attire, upright caps upon their heads like black coxcombs, their faces grim and discriminating. They watched the sparring matches
with intense scrutiny. The contestants struck and feinted, yelled fierce kiai and grunts of pain as blows struck home.

  The sparring warriors, ronin all, it seemed, wore various bits of battered armor and carried a wide variety of weapons, some types Ken’ishi had never seen. Chains and sickles, massive axes and hammers, strange, wickedly-spiked spears. Most looked ragged and unkempt. Some of them had crafty, predatory glints in their eyes. How many of them had been bandits? With that question, Ken’ishi felt the guilty weight of his own questionable deeds.

  A ronin was a unique sort of outsider: a samurai without a master; a man tossed by the waves of life, fitting nowhere—like a wild animal, not to be trusted. Warriors without direction and purpose often turned to banditry to support themselves. Sometimes a warrior became ronin because he lost his lord in battle or because he made some grievous error, resulting in banishment from the lord’s service. Sometimes a child was born to a ronin father, as Ken’ishi had been. Many of the men around him looked like long-time ronin, with unshaven pates and beards, threadbare clothing, and unpolished swords.

  The guard said, “Wait here until you’re called.”

  Ken’ishi bowed, and the samurai departed. Shrugging off his pack, Ken’ishi noticed three other warriors sitting on the ground nearby, all of varying means, judging by their raiment, all of them sizing him up as well. He sat near them and waited, trying to contain the excitement coursing through him. For the first time in his life, he felt as if he had entered hallowed halls and joined the company of his martial fellows. Joining the defense forces in Dazaifu to stem the invasion, by contrast, had felt like transient good fortune, tinged with the desperation of impending annihilation.

  As the sparring matches continued, he surmised that all of these men were new recruits to Lord Otomo’s forces. They fought with a wide unevenness of skill and temperament. Some were little more than wild thugs with tenuous control of weapon or self. Others showed edges of sharp training.

  Captain Tsunemori scrutinized the matches with a stern, astute eye. Would Tsunemori remember Ken’ishi? Would Ken’ishi have to spar with these men? There was no man he feared in single combat, whether his sword was steel or wood, and he itched to show his powers.

  The officer to Tsunemori’s right raised a war fan and called a halt to the sparring. The men gathered themselves up, dusted themselves off, and knelt before the dais, pressing their foreheads to the earth.

  “Next group!” called the officer with the fan.

  Ken’ishi’s presence made the next group into four, two even matches.

  He stood, and a page boy brought each of them a fresh, white oak bokken. Ken’ishi tested its heft and balance.

  The officer with the fan gestured them into pairs. Ken’ishi took a deep breath and squared himself against his opponent. His opponent was a man in his thirties, with a vertical scar that twisted his bottom lip and hard-knuckled hands missing the two smallest fingers on his right.

  The officer said, “No blows to the head.” He raised the fan to commence the sparring, but Tsunemori interrupted him.

  “Is that you, Sir Ken’ishi?”

  Ken’ishi faced the dais and bowed deeply. Even though Ken’ishi was far below him in rank, Tsunemori had addressed him with respect. “It is, Lord Tsunemori.” His face flushed with pride.

  “Have you brought my kozuka?”

  Ken’ishi touched the pouch tied to his obi.

  “I have, my lord.”

  Tsunemori nodded. “You may commence.”

  The eyes of Ken’ishi’s opponent flashed with envy and fresh determination. Here was his chance to make his own favorable impression on these Otomo vassals. “You are too pretty to be a warrior,” he growled, the words twisting his scarred lip into a sneer.

  Ken’ishi faced him, bowed, and raised his bokken into the middle guard position. He felt Tsunemori’s cool gaze fixed upon him.

  Taking a deep breath, Ken’ishi settled into the Void, where there was no victory and no defeat, only the endless slices of moments where all possibilities of the universe remained quiescent, awaiting impetus to be given life.

  His opponent’s stance was unbalanced, his footwork unrooted in the power of the earth. He was at least ten years older than Ken’ishi, with a chest shrunken and cheeks hollowed by hunger. There was a deviousness in his eyes, calculations within schemes.

  They edged closer to one another, gauging distance, the points of their bokken inching closer.

  Ken’ishi switched to the stance his old sensei Kaa had taught him, that reminiscent of a crane’s beak, edge up, point extended toward his opponent over his left elbow, body turned sideways. In all his travels, he had never encountered a swordsman familiar with this technique. This bokken was not shaped precisely like Silver Crane, but the unfamiliar technique still confused his opponent. The man edged back, and Ken’ishi attacked.

  His thrusting point slipped past his opponent’s guard and struck his breastbone, as sharp as the blow of a mallet.

  The pain from such a blow would be blinding. The man dropped his sword and screamed, clutching his chest. He sank to his knees, gasping, and curled like a withering leaf.

  The noise distracted one of the warriors in the other match, giving his adversary the opportunity to drive the bokken out of his grip. Weaponless, the man submitted.

  The officer raised the war fan. “Stop.”

  The three standing faced the dais and bowed, and the man on the ground gathered himself up, cheeks wet with the sting of pain and shame. He bowed unsteadily, his eyes avoiding Ken’ishi.

  Tsunemori said, “A fine blow, Ken’ishi. You would be a fearsome opponent in a duel. But what about a melee? Say, three against one?”

  The face of Ken’ishi’s first opponent brightened with hope of redemption. He snatched up his bokken and sniffed, rolling up his sleeves.

  The three men surrounded him, but fear did not touch him. On the road, he had faced five iron-hard Mongols and killed them. In Hakozaki, he had slain scores of barbarian horsemen. Three years ago, he had faced the terrifying oni Hakamadare. In Hita town below, last year, with his bokken he had almost killed three of Green Tiger’s thugs, all of whom had steel weapons—he would have to be careful here not to cause such injuries to these men.

  Finding the Void here was easy, reflexive, so that when these three lunged at him in an uncoordinated attack, he thwarted them easily, counter-striking and gliding between the interstices of opportunity, parrying strikes, slashing them as they stumbled past, leaving stinging bruises and pain in his wake. In a few more heartbeats, it was over, and three men lay upon the ground: one senseless, one weaponless, and the last, Ken’ishi’s first opponent, doubled over again and whimpering in agony.

  Only in retrospect did Ken’ishi realize he had broken the rules of the match by striking one of them across the pate. Quickly he prostrated himself before the dais. “Please accept my apologies, Lords!”

  Tsunemori eased an elbow onto the arm of his chair, a faint smirk on his lips. “In combat, when an enemy offers a target, one strikes. And look, Yukiiye is already coming around. It is difficult to restrain oneself in the fog of battle. When good technique is so ingrained, it becomes as one’s very flesh. An admirable display of skill, Sir Ken’ishi. Was it not, Lieutenant Nagata?”

  The man with the fan nodded. “Admirable indeed. Have you just arrived, Sir Ken’ishi?”

  “Yes, Lords,” Ken’ishi said. “Lord Tsunemori, it is my honor to return to you your kozuka.” He withdrew it from a pouch attached to his obi and offered it up with both hands.

  Tsunemori gestured, and a steward standing beside the dais rushed forward to retrieve it.

  “I regret that there were no sword polishers along my journey,” Ken’ishi said.

  Tsunemori accepted it from the steward. “I thank you for keeping it safe.” Then he raised his voice. “All of you will be given the opportunity to serve as retainers to the powerful, glorious, and honorable Lord Otomo no Tsunetomo. Many of you were ronin
before the barbarians came, a few of you cast adrift by your masters’ deaths. But my brother needs men, and you fought the barbarians as befits true samurai. The life you led before you came to this is unimportant. What happens from this moment forward is important. After tonight, you will be the sworn servants of Otomo no Tsunetomo, and you are expected to behave as such. Our lord is fair and generous to those who serve with honor and distinction. Those men whose conduct shames his house will receive swift justice. If you dishonor yourself, you dishonor your lord.” His voice deepened, guttural. “If you disappoint him, you dishonor me, who chose you.”

  Ken’ishi knelt again. In spite of his controlled jubilation, however, the invisible, ethereal spirits of the wind and earth, the kami, buzzed at him like a mosquito behind his ear. There were eyes upon him that wished him harm. His awareness sharpened in that moment, and he stood, surveying each of the men around him. His first opponent fixed him with an expression of puzzled consternation and hostility. The other two dusted themselves off and regarded Ken’ishi with stunned respect.

  “Everyone, follow Captain Yoshimura to your quarters,” Tsunemori said. “Tonight, at the Hour of the Cock, you will report to the castle keep for your fealty ceremony.”

  The officer on Tsunemori’s left stepped down from the dais and gestured to them to follow.

  “[I]t can be said that bows and arrows, swords, and halberds are...instruments of bad fortune and ill-omen. The reason for this is that the Way of Heaven is a Way that brings life, while instruments that kill are, on the contrary, truly ill-omened. Thus they are considered repugnant because they are contrary to the Way of Heaven.... [However, there] are times when ten thousand people suffer because of the evil of one man. Therefore, in killing one man’s evil, you give ten thousand people life. In such ways, truly, the sword that kills one man will be the blade that gives others life.”

  —Yagyu Munenori, The Life Giving Sword