by Renee Ahdieh
But the horror did not stop there.
When the thud of her pulse lessened, Mariko heard a slurping sound emit from the vines, followed by the rustle of dark leaves bursting to life in its skeletal branches.
The vines—the tree itself—was feeding on the boy.
The tree was draining him of blood.
He screamed again, the sound amplified by raw anguish.
Ranmaru and Ōkami stood before him, watching.
Mariko wanted to plead for mercy. Surely they could cut the boy away from the branches. Save him from such a slow, horrific death. She reached for a thorny branch, with a mind to rip it from the ground itself.
Quicker than a spark, Ōkami seized her by the elbow. “Don’t touch it.”
She blinked, the warmth of his hand searing through the thin hemp of her stolen kosode. He looked strangely severe. Much more so than ever before. His dark eyes roved across her face. Whatever he saw there briefly softened his expression.
“If you touch it, the jubokko will snare you, too,” he said.
Horrified by this revelation, Mariko’s jaw fell slack. Her eyes widened at the dying boy before her.
Ranmaru glanced her way. “Don’t look on him with pity.” The boy screamed again. His cries were becoming weaker with each passing moment. “He was sent to find our camp. To find it and murder us in our sleep, like a treacherous snake.”
“Even the most treacherous of snakes doesn’t deserve to die this way,” Mariko said hoarsely.
Ren started at her words. His glazed eyes flickered toward her, his expression unnerving even in the darkness.
“He is not a snake. He is something far worse.” One of Ōkami’s fists clenched around a piece of stained cloth. Mariko caught the edge of a white crest in its folds, but she could not make out the family. Nor could she make out anything of note.
The young man’s screams had become soundless. His mouth hung open for a beat, only to shudder shut, his teeth chattering like insects scuttling across stone. The tree slurped again, and a sundry of black flowers burst into bloom.
Her horror abounded with each passing moment. Mariko wanted to tear her eyes away from the sight. Tear them away from the truth. She briefly considered asking Ren why he had brought her here.
Why they had forced her to witness this horror.
“You could end it.” Mariko looked toward Ranmaru. As she struggled to keep her voice level, her eyes drifted to Ōkami’s face. To the torchlight wavering around its carved hollows.
“You could end his suffering,” she said to him, drawn to a sudden need for goodness in the ghastliness around her. “Don’t leave him to die like this. He’s just a boy.” Mariko chewed her lower lip. “A boy . . . like me.” As soon as she uttered the words, understanding dawned on her.
Understanding of why she had been brought to witness this horror.
Ōkami’s gaze remained level and clear. His eyes—so focused, even amidst such suffering—locked on hers. Black and shining, like the onyx embedded in the hilt of her father’s sword. “We are what we do.” Though Ōkami’s words sounded fierce, weariness tinged their edges. “This boy came to our home, intent on murdering us. He and his kind must pay.” Again his fist tightened around the stained cloth and its obscured crest.
“We are so much more than what we do!” Mariko drew closer, as if nearness could invoke a sense of truth. “We are . . .” She searched her mind for the right things to say. “Our thoughts, our memories, our beliefs!” Her eyes dropped to the dying boy. To the evil tree, slowly draining him of life.
“This tree is not the forest,” she said softly. “It is but one part.”
“No. A murderer is a murderer. A thief is a thief.” Ōkami bent his head toward hers, equally firm in his conviction. “In this life, believe in action and action alone.”
Mariko’s fingernails dug into her palms. She resisted the urge to grab Ōkami by the shoulders and shake him into reason.
He did not balk. Nor did he move to help.
It was Ranmaru who finally crouched before the dying boy. When the leader of the Black Clan spoke, his voice was gentle. Almost soothing. “Many years ago, there were three young men who grew up together near a forest not so dissimilar to this one.” He mopped the sweat from the boy’s brow with a clean piece of muslin.
The boy gasped. Mariko’s chest pulled tight.
“When they were children, they played together. Studied together. Challenged each other as only friends can do. When they became older, one turned toward justice, another toward honor.” Ranmaru’s voice lowered. “The last toward ambition.
“In time, the three young men became warriors in their own right, each with sons of their own. As they settled into age and influence, the ambitious man realized his friend who valued honor above all else would never compromise on anything, even for the sake of those dearest to him.”
With quiet solemnity, Ranmaru reached for the glittering hilt of the katana at his side. “So the ambitious man manipulated his remaining friend—the one who valued justice above all. With the skill of a tailor, the ambitious man threaded lies into truth. Planted seeds of doubt. He made the man who valued justice believe their honorable friend would undermine all they tried to achieve.”
The boy’s gaze was riveted on the leader of the Black Clan. As Ranmaru unsheathed his katana, he inhaled through his nose. Understanding softened the lines on the dying boy’s face. He nodded feebly.
“When their honorable friend was accused of treason, the ambitious man turned to the last of their trio, hearkening to that same, pervasive sense of justice.” Ranmaru stopped in his speech. Wordlessly asking for permission. The dying boy’s eyes darted from the sword to Ranmaru. He nodded once more. Gratefully.
With a gentle nod of his own, Ranmaru pressed the tip of his katana above the boy’s heart. “And so the friend who valued justice above all else executed his honorable friend . . . in front of his friend’s only son. But when he realized what he had done—the mistake he had made—he tried to balance the scales. To right this terrible wrong and bring about renewed justice.”
From where he stood before her, Mariko watched Ōkami’s jaw harden. The sound of a blade slicing through skin rose into the night as Ranmaru pushed forward. Swift. And sure. A thankful smile upon his lips, the boy’s eyelids opened sluggishly one last time as the life fled from his body.
“For his efforts to right this wrong, the man who valued justice was hung by his feet in Yedo Bay. Drowned before his family.” Ranmaru slanted his head. As though he wished to speak directly to Ōkami. But could not. “In the dead of night, the son of this drowned man—a wolf in his own right—set fire to the tent of his father’s accuser and fled into the mountains.”
The air around them churned with unspoken thoughts. Countless unuttered sentiments, across years and generations.
Yet Mariko understood, all the same.
The tale Ranmaru told was of him and Ōkami. A tale of two boys who had lost their fathers to an ambitious man. A man who had once been their dearest friend.
Ōkami’s father had betrayed Ranmaru’s father. This was the reason Ōkami served Ranmaru. The reason he held such unswerving allegiance to the Black Clan. These two boys were inextricably linked by this betrayal. Linked by life and death.
A friendship forged in blood and fire.
As Ranmaru’s story faded like a ghost into the night, the image from several days past—the memory of the boy standing in a courtyard, staring at stones stained red with his father’s blood—formed in Mariko’s mind.
As she’d first thought, this boy was Takeda Ranmaru.
Not a boy anymore. Now a young man, imbued with a shadowed purpose. One Mariko had only begun to grasp. Against her will, her curiosity abated, like a tide pulling from a desolate shore. In its place rose a tentative sadness—a halting kind of sympathy. She could not
imagine what it would be to lose her family right before her eyes. To lose all she held dear, in an instant. Her mother. Her father. Kenshin . . .
But it could happen.
This forest had taught her that, even in a few short days.
As Mariko considered the possibility of such loss, a heaviness settled onto her skin. A burn began to rise in her throat.
The burn of injustice.
Ranmaru had killed her father’s men. And Chiyo.
He’d tried to kill Mariko.
And she would never forget it.
Follow orders. Engender trust.
Strike when they least expect it.
“Watch closely, Sanada Takeo.” Ranmaru slid his sword from the dead boy’s slumped body and stood tall. “This forest protects us. These trees—the jubokko—are everywhere. Our forest is guarded by yōkai, and they will not look kindly on you, should you attempt to run. Should you attempt to betray us in any way.” He turned to face her. “But if you stay true, one day Jukai forest may serve you as well.”
Mariko stared down at the lifeless young man. His skin had taken on a waxy hue.
To her left, Ōkami finally spoke, his words a whisper on a dying wind—
“Never forget, Sanada Takeo: in this forest, there is no place to hide.”
THE THROWING STAR
Over the course of the next four days, Mariko listened. Followed orders without complaint. She learned that many of the twenty or so members of the Black Clan left the camp at odd hours, often returning laden with small trunks of silk. With leather satchels of gold ryō and countless tins of copper pieces. Then they would leave again under a cloak of darkness, taking their stolen spoils deep beneath the trees. Disappearing from sight.
In this forest, there is no place to hide.
Ōkami’s words echoed through Mariko’s mind like a haunted refrain. They gave her leave to shudder when she thought no one was watching. To embrace her fears as she never had before.
Mariko discovered there was wisdom in facing her fears headlong. Acknowledging them made her cautious. Made her smarter. Perhaps these fears would help her obtain a shred of information. Something to warrant all this effort. Anything to justify the horrors she had witnessed four nights ago in Jukai forest.
She needed a way to earn the Black Clan’s trust. If not their trust, then at least a semblance of their admiration. With it, she could then begin digging her way to the truth, like an army of termites set to decimate a structure from within.
If the incident with the jubokko had taught her anything, it was that one way to gain Ranmaru’s confidence was through Ōkami. Their bond seemed unshakable. The kind of trust built over time. Alas, Mariko could not begin to understand how to earn the Wolf’s favor. He was not exactly the demonstrative sort.
Now she was left to fight for Ranmaru’s attention on her own.
So intent was she on devising the best way to impress the leader of the Black Clan that it had taken her five days to work up the courage. To take action.
And though she now possessed a plan, Mariko still remained uncertain. Whatever free time left to her had been spent mulling over the details. Considering the possibilities. All while putting aside the likelihood that—at any moment—her great secret might be revealed.
That a member of the Black Clan might learn she was not in fact a boy.
Fear again took hold of Mariko, leaving her immobile for a breath. Leaving her weakened. The only remedy was to return its cold embrace once more.
It fed her. This fear.
It gave her a sense of will.
Mariko straightened her shoulders. Reshaped her thoughts.
Ranmaru had paid her no attention today. As far as he was concerned, Mariko could be a single leaf among many. Ōkami was equally hopeless. An endless well, covered by years of neglect. Only two members of the Black Clan continued to pay Mariko mind—Ren and Yoshi. The former plagued her at every turn. The latter made it his duty to instruct her on the most inconsequential of lessons: how to light a fire, how to boil water, how to dig for edible roots. Ever since the night the jubokko had drained the young intruder of life, Mariko had been left to handle the most trivial tasks around the camp.
Washing pots. Plucking feathers.
And of course collecting firewood.
This lack of attention only hardened her resolve. Drove her toward a loftier goal. Now that she had successfully infiltrated the Black Clan’s ranks, Mariko endeavored to gain access to its inner circle. Only by doing so would she ever obtain any information of import.
And discover the truth of why they’d been sent to kill her.
The most valuable knowledge she’d gleaned in the last few days was learning that Ōkami left camp alone every other morning, armed with nothing but a bō.
And did not return until well after nightfall.
Not that his absence mattered much to her. The Wolf spent his time in camp hidden in his tent. But Mariko was not fool enough to think he wasted any effort. These repeated absences were definitely a matter of note.
Where was he going?
Was it possible he was meeting with those holding sway over the Black Clan? With those who wished her dead?
As Mariko delved through the countless possibilities before her, she continued to fight with a bundle of dirty hemp cloth that had been left by her feet while she slept. Gritting her teeth, she wrangled the rough bolt of fabric straight, struggling to anchor a length of it onto a bamboo pole. Someone—likely Yoshi—had left her the means with which to build her own tent.
Mariko had felt strangely elated to discover this gift.
The tent proved that at least one member of the Black Clan found her useful. Wished for her to stay. She was reminded of Ren’s error in divulging Ranmaru’s plans to make her their newest recruit. Perhaps this was a sign she had made progress to that end. Though Ren’s nasty attitude indicated otherwise, it was obvious someone in the camp supported the notion. She’d even been given a place to call her own. Tonight would be the first night Mariko would not have to sleep on a pile of rocks and debris.
If she could ever put together the cursed thing.
Just before Mariko succumbed to the desire to fling the hemp fabric into the underbrush, a hand scored by numerous burns reached out, snatching the bundle from her grasp.
Yoshi loomed above her, his red face mottled by irritation.
“Are you still trying to put that tent together?” He sat on the ground, swinging his wooden limb into position before him. Mariko considered it for a spell. Many times in the last few days, she’d wanted to ask Yoshi how he’d lost his leg. But she was learning to expect two things from the surly cook: He did not reveal information without intention.
And he did not permit anyone to make excuses for anything.
“As you undoubtedly know by now, Yoshi-san, I have never been in possession of this skill. Likely because I have never been granted the opportunity,” she joked awkwardly. “But even so, I do feel as though I am missing something.”
Yoshi rummaged through the bamboo rods and the knotted ball of twine by their feet. “Who gave these to you?” His lower lip pouted in a frown.
“I thought you did.” She blinked. “But if it was not you, then perhaps it was Ren. His concern for my welfare has been nothing but consistent,” Mariko said bitterly.
The creases vanished from his blotchy brow as understanding settled on Yoshi. “You’re missing two key pieces of framing.”
Perhaps it was indeed Ren who had left her the tent. Only he would have enjoyed watching Mariko suffer through trying to accomplish such an impossible task. “That—that miserable little fiend.”
“Don’t be angry with him.” Yoshi sent half a smile her way. “Ren has led quite a difficult life. He’s less a fiend and more a wounded cat.”
Mariko mumbled, “Wounded cats still posses
s claws.”
“True.” He laughed. “I’ll retrieve the missing pieces.” Yoshi peered at her through one narrowed eye. “Have you shared your idea with Haruki yet?”
She shifted uncomfortably. “No.”
“Then tell him about it while I piece together your tent.” He spoke as though there was not even a question of Mariko following his directive.
A strange mix of comfort and concern rippled through her. Of course she disliked being told what to do. But she also appreciated someone—anyone—caring enough to try.
Despite the murmurings of her mind, Mariko’s heart would not permit her to dislike Yoshi. “Perhaps you shouldn’t help me,” she said. “Someone might steal your tent frame as punishment.”
“Someone?” He barked a laugh.
“I won’t disclose who.” Mariko smiled in return. “But a certain someone might seek retribution for you showing me this kindness.”
“No one would dare. Lest that certain someone find himself perishing of starvation. You idiot boys don’t even know how to cook rice properly, much less anything of substance.” With this final pronouncement, Yoshi pushed her in the direction of the hillock to her left. Then he rolled the bundle of hemp cloth and took to his feet once more, intent on finding Ren and the missing lengths of bamboo.
Distress flashed through Mariko. She briefly considered flouting Yoshi’s orders. Or perhaps even lying about it later. But the churlish cook would learn the truth, and he would not be pleased that she’d failed to meet with the metalsmith for yet another day. Not to mention the dishonor of unnecessary deceit. It wasn’t that deception by its very nature troubled her. Mariko realized its necessity, especially when paired alongside survival. But bald-faced lies were not the same thing. So, with a sigh, she began walking toward the small hill nearby, drawn to the feather of smoke rising from the fabric wall at its crest. One side of the hill was shaded by a looming stone protuberance—one of the many small outcroppings that eventually burgeoned into the snowcapped mountain in the distance. On her second day there, Mariko had realized how strategically positioned the camp of the Black Clan was. This collection of outcroppings offered them natural fortification, preventing anyone from attacking their flank.