The Golden Naginata

by Jessica Amanda Salmonson

  Kirin is fierce.

  The monster began to dissipate. Tomoe held her sword aloft, watching the kirin until the last possible moment, and was sad when it was gone. When it had vanished into colorful mists, Tomoe sheathed her sword, and tied the scarf around her eyes.

  She climbed into the crater.

  No further, warned the soft voice. Go back.

  “I am resolved!” Tomoe shouted, running blindly over the flat ground of the crater’s interior. She had memorized the position of every rock along the way and so was able to dodge obstacles although unable to see them through the cloth. She made it halfway to the upright weapon when a swirling mist threw her to one side. She was not sure how far she had been tossed from her intended route.

  So it must be, the kirin’s voice said sadly, and Tomoe envisioned in her mind’s eye how the creature coalesced again. She sensed it becoming more tangible, knew that in a moment it would be solid and attack. She turned her blindfolded face until, even through the cloth, she could see the bright light of the Golden Naginata like a half-moon behind gauzy clouds. Immediately, she was on her feet and running toward it. She no longer knew where the obstacles were and so caught her foot in a depression; she went sprawling into a foolish posture. The kirin roared tigerishly and stomped the ground with its iron-hard hooves. Tomoe rolled away from the place where the hooves stomped, and carved upward with her sword, striking the neck to small avail. Common steel could not cut any part of the kirin.

  Tomoe ignored the feminine laughter which answered her feeble attack. That laughter might have unnerved another. She lunged toward the handle beneath the light, pulled upward so that the Golden Naginata was in her hands. She now stood with the long-handled weapon above her head, its balde pointing toward the kirin. Its snaky neck moved right and left trying to find an entrance to bite Tomoe; but the samurai’s senses were at their keenest, and the blade of the naginata was able to follow the kirin’s motions.

  I cannot be killed, the voice of the kirin whispered in Tomoe’s mind.

  “But you can be injured,” Tomoe countered, and leapt toward the sound of the kirin’s breath. It snaked its neck backward, the blade passing between its jaws. It made again the sound of quiet laughter, which Tomoe heard both inside her head and in the ordinary way, with her ears. She leapt at the sound of laughter, and the kirin was forced to give ground. Tomoe pressed the attack, but the kirin had tricked her into doing this. It grabbed the upper part of the naginata’s handle below the blade and tore it from Tomoe’s grasp! Again, the laughter. Tomoe was surprised, but more angered than upset, and she surprised the kirin in turn. She leapt blindly for its head, and it could not bite her without letting go of the naginata. She clung to the monster’s gorgeous mane which was softer than silk and hundreds of times stronger. She was lifted up and up and shaken madly, but would not let go of her grip.

  One hand knotted in the mane, Tomoe grasped with her other hand until she caught hold of the bottom part of the naginata’s handle. She hung on while the kirin threw its neck around and tried to make her let go of mane, or naginata, or both. She did let go of the mane, only to hang from the naginata with both hands. The huge molars of the kirin were occupied on the handle so that Tomoe could be close to the mouth and not fear being bitten.

  A split hoof of iron tried to kick at her, but the creature was not good at kicking toward its own face. Tomoe rolled over the handle of the naginata as though it were a mounted exercise bar, and with her sandaled foot, gave the kirin a blow to one huge eye. It roared a response, no longer laughing, opening its jaw in complaint. Tomoe landed on her feet, the Golden Naginata ready.

  She wheeled around, sweeping with the weapon, but the kirin reared and an iron hoof kicked the side of the blade. Tomoe listened for every coil of neck, every movement of hoof. She knew the kirin was turning about, planning to kick with both rear legs. Logically she should leap backward, but she was not sure what the ground was like, did not know what she might trip over, and her mind was quick enough to suppose the kirin expected her to leap backward and fall. Instead, she leapt forward, the iron-hoofed legs missing her underneath, and she landed high on the back of the kirin.

  You would ride? the feminine voice asked in disbelief.

  The naginata was so long that, astride, it was difficult to cut the monster with the blade at handle’s length. The kirin bucked like a wild, long-legged horse, twisted its neck to try to bite its rider. Tomoe pressed the butt of the naginata against the kirin’s horns, pushed the head back. Then she let herself fall off in such a way that the kirin would think it had been an accident. As it reared to stomp her where she lay upon her back, the Golden Naginata swept quickly upward, catching the kirin in the breast.

  Chill blood covered the blade. The kirin cried out in anguish—more for the loss of the treasured weapon than for the pain of any wound—and then returned to mist. Tomoe whipped off her blindfold but not soon enough to see the gorgeous kirin again. She saw only dawn-colored mists. She knew the holy monster would not reappear for a while, not until its wounds were healed.

  You have won, said the kirin, and the voice had become sad and sensual, seeming far away. Tomoe heard no more.

  She gazed upon the blade of the Golden Naginata, which glowed even through the filter of the kirin’s rosy blood. The temper pattern was shaped like lightning, and this lightning-temper shined with a greater radiance than the rest of the blade. Tomoe said to the weapon, as though it were a sentient being, “I will call you Inazuma-hime, and we will be friends for a while.” Inazuma-hime meant “Princess Lightning,” and it seemed an appropriate title. Tomoe turned her face to the cloud-streaked heaven and called out a last time to the kirin, “Do not pine so much for Inazuma! I will return her when your wound has healed and your blood has worn from her metal! Then you may guard your treasure once again!”

  Placing the miraculous weapon in the carved, unlacquered sheath, the light of Inazuma-hime was completely doused; and though the day was not near ending, Tomoe sensed a darkness about the crater which was psychic, a sort of melancholy caused by the light of the Golden Naginata being doused and taken away. Although moved to pity, Tomoe Gozen hardened herself to the temporary theft, and descended toward the yamabushi monastery for her planned meeting.

  On the third day after leaving Lost Shrine, Tomoe returned to see Oshina and Koshi. She was greeted on the bridge by the white dog. “How are our friends, Taro?” she asked, and scruffed the dog’s big head. The rooster was loose, picking and scratching in a weedy patch of ground. The place seemed cheerier than before, especially in contrast to the severe monastery she had stayed in the previous night.

  “Oshina!” Tomoe called. “I have come with a birthday gift for Koshi!”

  Oshina appeared in the dark doorway of the shrine-house, wiping hands on the towel which hung from the front of her obi. She bowed and greeted Tomoe and, while as usual the young mother did not smile, Tomoe thought the woman was glad to see her. “I worried for you,” said Oshina. “But I have made rice cakes so that we can celebrate your final visit.” There was sadness in the promise of the celebration, for it was evident from the beginning that once Tomoe had visited the second monastery in addition to the first, taking Taro with her, neither the samurai nor the friendly dog were liable to come to Lost Shrine anymore. All the same, a small party with good rice cakes sounded like just the thing for Tomoe, who said,

  “And to celebrate Koshi’s birthday!”

  Oshina nodded, and the faintest glimmer of a smile broke her melancholy expression. Tomoe entered the house, leaving the naginata named Inazuma-hime in the outer chamber, and leaving her longsword and sandals there as well. Lanterns lit the main room, and coals burned in a large ceramic pot, making the poor shrine-house modestly comfortable and homey. Koshi was propped up on a wicker back-basket so that he could see the affair, if he could see anything. His dark eyes still did not blink; his expression did not change; he did not turn his head when there was any motion. His little claw-like han
ds grasped the blanket which was wrapped around him. Oshina went into a dark, adjoining room to get the rice cakes. While she was out, Tomoe sat on her knees beside Koshi and whispered to him,

  “You must be brave like your mother. You must return your spirit to your flesh. Life is very hard, I know; but half your blood is that of the Rooster Clan, so you can be as strong as a samurai if you try a little harder.” She was going to say more even though Koshi seemed not to hear; but Oshina shuffled into the room with a large tray of rice cakes and pickles made from fernbrake. She sat the tray on the floor in front of Tomoe and Koshi. There was tea for everyone as well.

  Tomoe ate with her fingers. “It’s good,” she said. Oshina broke her cake to feed part of it to Koshi. When food entered his mouth, he began to chew and swallow in a mechanical way. Where his deformed mouth turned down, he tended to dribble as he ate, but Oshina kept his face clean with a towel.

  After eating two cakes and accepting Oshina’s desire to refill the samurai’s teacup, Tomoe remembered, “The gift!” She reached into her baggy sleeve-pocket and came out with a colorful paper ball. “It is not, strictly speaking, a gift from me, but from a wandering temple-clown who was staying in the yamabushi temple while I visited there. He was despondent because the yamabushi are not a sect to warm up to a clown, and no one but me was interested in his juggling. To cheer him up, I told him I would like to buy one of his juggling-balls for a young friend’s birthday. He would take no payment, but gave the ball to me freely, saying he made new ones now and then in any case. So this small gift is from the temple-clown more than me.”

  Oshina took the light, round object in both of her hands, and held it before Koshi’s face. “Do you see?” she said to the motionless boy. “The paper has crane-designs on it, Koshi! It means long life and courage!” Oshina smiled most widely now, though tears were in her eyes, and Tomoe Gozen was moved by the mother’s happiness.

  Then Oshina began to shed her tears for the first time, whether from gladness or sorrow Tomoe was uncertain. The young mother bowed to Tomoe rigorously as she said, “Thank you! Thank you very much!” which was embarrassing to Tomoe in the circumstance. She held Oshina by her shoulders to keep her from bowing anymore. Oshina wiped her eyes and then, turning to the pot of warm coals, dropped Koshi’s paper ball within. Almost immediately, it caught fire, and Tomoe looked confused about the destruction of the gift. Oshina said,

  “Now the spirit of the ball will find Koshi’s spirit in the Dry River of the Hollow Land, where the souls of dead children live.” Finally, facing Tomoe in a formal position, hands upon her knees, the composed and again-melancholy mother expressed her gratitude in a few unemotional words. Tomoe rubbed her nose uncomfortably, then drank the rest of her tea, wishing it were saké. “It is nothing,” she insisted. “It is less than every child deserves.”

  The next morning she set out for the yamahoshi retreat on Mount Kuji. The eager dog ran ahead, up the mountain trail, chasing some bird or rodent Tomoe could not see. “Beware of foxes, Taro!” she scolded, laughing at him. They rose above the deciduous woods of the second mountain’s base, to the tremendous evergreen forests higher up.

  As she went, using the long handle of the Golden Naginata as a staff, Tomoe tried not to remember the contained, unebbing sorrow of Koshi’s mother, or the sad state of the boy himself. She reminded herself instead of the good fortune she had had, meeting with yamabushi two days earlier. The Zasu or chief abbot had agreed to send the priests in his command, along with as many bonzes as could be rallied from outlying temples, to a village near Kyoto on the date required, where Tomoe Gozen would meet them and serve as their general. In addition, a particularly strong group of warrior-monks from a temple in the hills above Kyoto would be sent in advance, to give religious authority to Yoshinake’s initial take-over. The Zasu further guaranteed that every animosity toward the rival yamahoshi would be set aside for the duration of their mutual service to Kiso Yoshinake. The head of the monastery had noticed that Kiji-san no longer glowed threateningly and, as Tomoe had predicted, this was taken as an omen in Yoshinake’s behalf. Today, Tomoe hoped for equal luck dealing with the stubborn yamahoshi.

  There was no quick emergency-route up Kuji-san, but neither was the regular path as winding and indirect as that which led to the other mountain’s monastery. Tomoe went with long strides and found evidence of monks’ activity well before nightfall. Before a grave-marking pole, several sticks of incense had been set in a pot, and none were yet burned more than halfway down.

  The evergreens were extraordinarily thick and overhanging, so everything had a dark, ghostly appearance even in the day. Here and there among the trees, there were small dwellings whose doors were shut; but through wooden bars Tomoe could see that they housed individual Bodhisattvas or similar deities and relics. From within these dwellings she heard the murmurings of prayers, but did not see the bonzes. She proceeded along shadowy paths and up mossy stairways, wary of every dark place, as though expecting a mountain oni to leap out at any time.

  It should not be dusk yet, but it was. The monastery was apparently situated in such a place that, during this season, the sun passed behind Kuji-san early in the day. Taro stayed close to Tomoe, as though he, too, worried about the forest’s eeriness, and would be near to protect his mistress without delay.

  Further up the way, acolytes with lanterns twinkling between the trees were going in a slow procession. They had silk cloths over their heads and were humming wordlessly as they went.

  “Samurai!”

  Taro yelped and Tomoe looked back abruptly. She saw a bonze standing lower on the stairway, a coronet upon his shaven head, his rosary dangling from one hand, a pole-axe in his other. He was not in a threatening posture, but Tomoe was leery of him, for she was unused to the idea of someone stealthy enough to come up behind her unheard.

  “Did I startle you?” he asked. “I apologize.”

  He had a pleasant, handsome visage, and was young. Tomoe’s mistrust eased away. She said, “I am Tomoe Gozen of Heida, come for the final decision about my husband’s petition.”

  “My Buddhist name is Hagi-o,” said the bonze, bowing. “I know little of the temple’s politics, so cannot personally reply to you. Unfortunately, our Zasu has died in the night, and there are only a few novices such as myself guarding the premises, while those in authority are deep in mourning, meditation, and prayer. I do not know if anyone can speak with you tonight.”

  “I hope some meeting can be arranged,” she insisted. “There are other matters as well, each needing timely consideration.”

  The young bonze led Tomoe to the monastery and through its gates. The place was situated on a bluff which made it almost impervious to attack, and was so hemmed in by trees that it was nearly impossible to see from any distance. Beyond the gate were a number of paths. She followed through areas not much less wild than the forest itself, then by several small vegetable gardens in which no one had tilled that day. She was taken past the chapel which stood hunched against the rear wall of the huge, enclosed grounds, coming to a long, low building with almost no lanterns lit within. Taro was made to sit outside. The bonze lit one lantern for the room Tomoe was brought to. He said, “You may stay here for the night. Perhaps tomorrow someone will be able to see you.”

  The bonze started to leave, but Tomoe made a disgruntled noise. She said, “There must be someone I can impose upon at once. Forgive my insisting, but how could I sleep tonight? The Zasu I came to meet has died; I do not even know who has taken his place. The Knight of Kiso has made certain arrangements previously. How does this untimely parting from the world influence past negotiations?”

  “I know nothing of these matters,” the bonze said, looking upset that she would put him in such a position. “We do not ourselves know who next will master the temple.”

  “Another matter, then,” said Tomoe more calmly, taking the shaku from her obi. The bonze recognized it as soon as she removed the cloth. He exclaimed,

 
“That belonged to Shindo!” His expression at first looked puzzled. Then realization etched sorrow on his brow. “Has Shindo died also?”

  “He asked me to bring this shaku to his fight-instructor, to apologize in Shindo’s name for not returning as he had promised.”

  Young Hagi-o looked close to tears; and he made his handsome face quite ugly in his effort to hold back from crying. Tomoe could well imagine that there were not more than two such sensitive men in a place as severe as this, so that Hagi-o and Shindo would therefore have been close friends.

  “It’s been a sad day,” said Hagi-o. “Please wait here for a little while and I will see who is available.”

  Tomoe was left alone in the quiet, dimly lit interior. The paper windows were as thin as the filament of an egg, through which she was able to trace the rising of the moon. A long time passed and, to calm her impatience, Tomoe watched the shadows on the rice-paper doors. The moon was a brilliant painter, making a naked branch into a silhouette against the paper. Tomoe sat on her knees, looking up; she looked at the seeming-painting. A breeze passed through the temple yards, and so the moon’s brush-strokes were caused to shake.

  Some insect, in the warmth and light of a garden’s lantern, did not know it was time to sleep, and so was singing.

  For all its austerity, it was a beautiful place, Tomoe realized; even if it were haunted, she would think the same.

  The door behind her slid open. Hagi-o had returned so quietly that once again Tomoe had not heard him coming. “Shindo’s instructor, Makine Hei, who I have told about the shaku, would like to receive it from you himself, as was Shindo’s desire.”

  She followed Hagi-o past the main chapel, on the further side of which was a large building containing the dojo where bonzes were given martial training. It was dark within, and their shuffling footsteps echoed in the instruction hall.

  At the far end of the gymnasium was a raised platform on which a huge, heavy-bodied priest sat facing a reliquary. His wild mane covered broad shoulders and hung far down his back. He was praying to the funeral tablet inside the reliquary while incense trailed from the bowl in front of it. The bonze waited until the priest had offered a sutra for every bead of his rosary, and then said,