Genpei

by Kara Dalkey

  The few rogues on the highway who eyed the rich caravan with gleams of greed in their eyes quickly lost interest when they locked gazes with the fierce-looking Benkei.

  The caravan went over the mountains to the east of the capital, past the Ōtsu Shore at the southernmost tip of Lake Biwa. By the evening of the second day, they reached the post station at Kagami. The following day they passed through Ono-no-suribari, Bamba, and Samegai, and finally stopped for the night at Aohaka post station.

  As Kichiji was a wealthy merchant, and well-known along the Tōkaidō, he was able to secure lodgings at the most reputable inn at Aohaka. The caravanners were welcomed, and the mistress of the inn, who was well acquainted with Kichigi, brought forth her most beautiful and skilled girls to entertain them.

  When Ushiwaka removed his conical hat and raincoat, the mistress of the inn looked at him and turned pale a moment, then studied his face. “Are you certain, Kichiji, that you have never brought this fellow with you before?”

  “Quite certain,” the gold merchant replied. “He’s a new servant I’m trying out. Although with his sloppy service so far, I’m not sure I’ll be keeping him.”

  “He’s such a lovely young man,” said the mistress of the inn. “Still, I cannot help thinking he looks familiar. Like someone I had met before … someone who met an unfortunate fate here. It was so long ago, but perhaps he is a relation.”

  “I do not think that is possible,” said Ushiwaka with a polite bow, wondering whom the mistress might mean.

  The caravanners were well fed with plentiful rice and plum wine, and the girls did their best to be entertaining. Thus Ushiwaka and Benkei spent a most enlightening evening, and the girls were quite enchanted with the handsome young sword-bearer who was so accomplished with the flute. They giggled when Ushiwaka mentioned his name, however, and allowed as to how, after that night, surely he deserved a man’s name.

  Although the night’s entertainments had been rather tiring, still Ushiwaka found himself woken up, in a dark inn side room, at the Hour of the Tiger, just before dawn. He had the sense that there was someone else in the room. Slowly, he reached for his long sword.

  “Peace, brother,” said a gentle voice softly. “You need not fear me.”

  Ushiwaka sat up and saw a pale young man dressed in ragged finery and the breastplate and greaves of a noble warrior. The young man’s head was not quite attached to his shoulders. “Who are you?”

  “I am your half brother Tomonaga. We fled here, Yoshitomo and my brothers, after the failure of the Heiji, fifteen years ago. Alas, I was wounded in the leg by an arrow. By the time we reached this place, my leg was so swollen that I could not continue. So I asked our father to cut off my head, so that I might not be captured by the Taira. Father had to flee, and so he could not bury me. I am afraid the mistress of the inn received a most unpleasant surprise and unhappy burden when I was found the next morning.”

  “Yes. That must be why the mistress thought I looked familiar. But why are you still here? Why have you not passed on to the Pure Land, as our father has?”

  “I do not know. I think I have been waiting for something. Waiting for some proof that our father and clan will be avenged. Perhaps I was waiting for you.”

  “I have sworn that I will avenge the Minomoto,” said Ushiwaka. “I have studied swordsmanship with the tengu for seven years for this.”

  “I am pleased to hear it,” said the ghost of Tomonaga. “But we spirits are given some small ability to see into the future, and I have appeared before you to give you two warnings.”

  “What are they?”

  “The first: you must use caution when dealing with our brother, Yoritomo. He is the chosen of Hachiman. You must remember this.”

  “So I have been told,” said Ushiwaka. “It is my sole intention to be of service to him.” This was not quite the truth, for Ushiwaka dreamed of being a great general of the Minomoto someday, but he was aware that an elder brother was to be respected.

  “That is good. But be warned. There are supernatural forces that are allied against humankind and who use the greed of men to bend their will. Yoritomo may be listening to the advice of untrustworthy … persons. Be careful.”

  “I will. What is the second warning?”

  The ghost of Tomonaga raised his head and stared toward the shōji. “There are bandits in the garden of the inn. They have come to steal the caravan’s gold. I understand you are traveling in secret. You may need to reveal yourself in order to drive them away.”

  Ushiwaka leapt to his feet, drawing his katana from its scabbard. “Kichiji has only been kind to me. I will not let him be robbed, let people say what they will.”

  The ghost of Tomonaga bowed, head floating eerily above the body. “You are truly our father’s son. Go quickly.”

  Crying aloud, “Ai-yi-yi-yi!” Ushiwaka kicked open the shōji and jumped out onto the verandah. Three bandits, in the midst of climbing over the railing, looked up astonished. With three deft slashes, Ushiwaka separated their heads from their necks. Two bandits behind them cried out in fear and turned to run. But Ushiwaka was faster, and he leapt onto the railing and from there onto the bandits’ backs. He made quick work of them as well.

  By this time, Ushiwaka’s cry had awakened others, and Benkei came storming out of his room like a demon. Though there might have been fifty more bandits in the garden, Benkei and Ushiwaka charged into the thick of them and soon there were many fewer than fifty. Those bandits not felled by their slashing swords went screaming into the night, not to be seen again.

  “Surely,” the girls whispered to one another, “this is no ordinary sword-bearer. The mistress said he looked like a Minomoto who had died here long ago. Do you think … ?” Though they carefully inquired of Ushiwaka when the battle was over, he told them nothing but pleasant lies.

  The following morning Kichiji and his caravanners prepared to move on, as if nothing untoward had happened. Ushiwaka and Benkei spent a long time on farewells, and many of the girls were openly weeping into their sleeves. Benkei, in particular, had to disentangle one ardent young woman from his arm with sweet words and promises that he would one day return.

  Ushiwaka had found out by careful questioning of the mistress of the inn where his elder brother had been buried, and he left prayers upon the grave as they passed it. Toward the end of the day, they came to Atsuta Shrine, at which relatives of Yoshitomo served. Ushiwaka left the caravan, promising to catch up to them in a day, and, risking discovery asked the high priest of the shrine to conduct a capping ceremony for him.

  The priests of the shrine were most pleased to do so, and Ushiwaka was received with great honor. Ushiwaka purified himself to appear before the shrine gods, a cap of black silk was found for him, and he was asked to choose his adult name. As it was customary for a son to take part of the name of his father as his own, and as his father was Yoshitomo, Ushiwaka became Yoshitsune. And with that name he left the shrine as a grown man.

  A Messenger from Kuramadera

  Late at night, two weeks after arriving at Fukuhara, Lord Kiyomori sat in his favorite chamber on the east side of the mansion, the one that best caught the breeze from the sea. Not feeling tired, he spent the hours idly looking over letters he had received from supporters in Ise and Aki. He could hear the distant surf booming against the shore, regular as breathing, as if the ocean were one great living thing. He thought again how natural it was that the Dragon King had chosen the Taira to be his champions, an alliance of he who rules the sea below with those who dominate the sea above. He wondered, however, if it were deliberate on Ryujin’s part that his demands for the alliance might well cause the Taira’s downfall. And Shigemori willingly participates in this, Kiyomori thought. Is he blind, or simply the most disloyal man who ever lived?

  Kiyomori was no longer so upset about Shigemori, and instead of dwelling on him as a betraying son now considered him part of the puzzle, merely another obstacle to advancing the Taira fortunes. The days spent in Fuk
uhara had soothed his spirit. There, Kiyomori could play the great lord, receiving visitor after visitor as if he were Emperor of his own small kingdom.

  One such visitor had proclaimed that, given the shrines and stoneworks Kiyomori had built, surely he was the reincarnation of legendary Buddhist archbishop Jie, of Chang’an. Me, a former archbishop. Kiyomori chuckled to himself. If true, the ways of the Amida are stranger than I had thought.

  The pounding of the surf became overridden by another rumbling sound … the thunder of hoofbeats. A horse was being ridden into his courtyard, and Kiyomori heard excited voices. He waited with concern. What man rides so hard at night except one who is desperate?

  Shortly, a servant appeared at the shōji. “My lord, a monk has arrived from Kuramadera with, he says, urgent news for you.”

  Kiyomori frowned. Messages delivered late at night were generally bad news, he had learned. He could not remember any concerns he had with that northern temple, but given how Go-Shirakawa was offending temples left and right, he could not afford to turn the messenger away. “Very well, I will hear him.”

  The servant departed, and a young monk appeared in the doorway, his head newly shaved. The monk knelt and bowed. “Kiyomori-sama, Abbot Tōkōbō has sent me to speak to you. I have sailed down the River Kamo and ridden from Daimotsu without rest, so that you may have this news at once.”

  The young monk seemed afraid, and Kiyomori felt a prickle like spiders crawling up his back. Very bad news, then. “Abbot Tōkōbō is very thoughtful,” he said to the monk.

  “The abbot wished me to say that it may be a small thing. Nothing at all, really. Only, he felt you should know.”

  Kiyomori had developed a healthy suspicion of seemingly small matters. “By all means, then, tell me of this oh-so-important nothing.”

  “Fifteen years ago, Kiyomori-sama, Kuramadera had the honor to receive a certain personage into its care.”

  Kiyomori scowled. So many “personages” had fled to the various temples surrounding Heian Kyo over the past decades. How should he remember them all? “Remind me. Of whom do we speak?”

  “Of a boy called Ushiwaka, who, you may recall, is the son of the late Minomoto general Yoshitomo.”

  “Ah. What of him?”

  “He has disappeared from the temple, my lord.”

  Kiyomori paused before asking, “And Abbot Tōkōbō feels that this news concerns me?”

  “My lord, for the past several years, Ushiwaka has paid little heed to his religious studies, refused to take the vows and tonsure and, it is rumored, he spent his nights studying swordsmanship. He has learned of his parentage, and some say he has vowed to kill you.”

  Kiyomori felt the spiders scuttle down his back again, bearing icicles this time. “How old is Ushiwaka now?”

  “Fifteen or so, my lord.”

  Kiyomori rubbed his chin. “Perhaps this Ushiwaka fell in with bad company or thieves and lies dead somewhere.”

  “That is, of course, an unfortunate possibility,” said the young monk, “but Ushiwaka was last seen in the company of a yamabushi named Shōmon. We have since learned that Shōmon has some sympathies with the Minomoto. It is feared that this holy man may have somehow helped Ushiwaka travel toward the East.”

  To the East, the base of Minomoto power and support. I had thought the Minomoto weakened beyond hope. But the Taira have many enemies, and if those foes find a Minomoto heir to rally around, if Go-Shirakawa decides to use the Minomoto once more as a check on Taira power … Kiyomori tried to hold his growing fear and rage in control. He could not let the visitor see he might be upset by the news of one delinquent boy. “I see. I trust all efforts are being made to find him?”

  “Messengers were sent to post stations and barrier gates as soon as Abbot Tōkōbō suspected he was gone for good. But no one has reported seeing a youth of Ushiwaka’s description.”

  “Then the boy may not have yet gotten far. I thank you for bringing this news. Please feel free to take lodging here tonight. When you return to Kuramadera, let Tōkōbō know that this Ushiwaka is to be brought to Rokuhara as soon as he is found. We cannot let the mercy of the Taira be flouted in this manner. If the boy will not observe the strictures of his exile, then he must be punished.”

  “Yes, of course, my lord. Er, Kiyomori-sama … ?”

  “Yes?”

  “Do you know of tengu?”

  “What, those fairy stories about bird-men? What of them?”

  The young monk paused and then shook his head. “Never mind, my lord. Forget I spoke of them. It is late, and I am weary.”

  “Huh. Then you had better go and rest.” Kiyomori called for a servant to escort the young monk to guest quarters and gave orders for preparations to return himself to the capital within a day. He gave orders to another servant to ride to Heian Kyō and alert his spies in the capital to watch for Ushiwaka. He managed to maintain his calm until they had all left.

  Then he grabbed the letters before him and tore them all savagely into little pieces.

  Hiraizumi

  For over twenty days, Yoshitsune, the former Ushiwaka, traveled, going ever eastward through Shinano Province, and Suruga. He had hoped to visit his brother, Yoritomo, who was also in exile at a monastery in Izu. But Yoshitsune was told that his brother was well guarded, so Yoshitsune had to content himself with sending a brief message:

  This fledgling white dove

  at last flies, hoping to catch

  butterflies in his beak

  He hopes that he may be

  a good omen to you.

  They traveled through Ashigara Pass, through the provinces of Musashi and Shimotsuke. Kichiji did his trading as though it were his usual business, while Yoshitsune offered prayers at any temple they stopped near and tried to gather word on what supporters there might yet be for the Minomoto clan. What he learned was heartening, although he needed to use great caution.

  Farther north and eastward the caravan traveled, through the Shirakawa Barrier, past Asaka Marsh and Mount Atsukashi until they finally reached Kurihara Temple in the far reaches of Ōshū Province.

  Many tales are told of Yoshitsune on this journey, of women he wooed and left, of bandits he fought, of narrow escapes from suspicious Taira retainers and jealous husbands. He would not have had time for them all to be true, and surely had he made such an impression along the way, word of who he was and where he was going would easily have gotten back to Heian Kyō. But he was a young man on the first grand journey of his life, so let us assume that a few such tales are true and he arrived at Kurihara Temple a more seasoned young man than the one who had left Kuramadera.

  Yoshitsune was warmly received at Kurihara Temple and made a guest of the abbot, while Kichiji went on ahead to Hiraizumi to announce their arrival.

  When Kichiji returned the next day, he was accompanied by 350 mounted warriors to escort Yoshitsune into Hiraizumi.

  Yoshitsune was astonished when he saw the escort. “Do I need an army, Kichiji, for my protection even in this far province?”

  Kichiji laughed, “No, my young lordling. These are the household warriors of Fujiwara Hidehira, who sent them, as well as two of his sons, as a sign of his regard for your family. Hidehira would have come himself, but he suffers a slight cold. He has had an auspicious dream about you, however, and anticipates your arrival with great joy.”

  Benkei clapped a meaty hand on Yoshitsune’s shoulder. “Three hundred and fifty warriors, hmm? Not a mighty force, but it is a start, neh?”

  “It is a start,” Yoshitsune murmured as he stared out from the temple verandah at the assembled warriors. They raised their armored fists in salute, and cried, “Hail to the son of Yoshitomo! Hail to the great Minomoto!” Yoshitsune felt a warmth fill him, an expanding joy. This was where he was meant to be, a leader of warriors. He could not stop grinning as he was led to a fine, spirited black warhorse and helped into the saddle.

  “So,” Yoshitsune said to Kichiji, “I assume I will not be needing the st
raw raincoat today?”

  “You will not,” said Kichiji. “And the swords you bear will be your own. Please forgive any insult this humble servant has given you, for I am proud to have been able to escort you.”

  “All is forgiven, good Kichiji.”

  “Then shall we ride on to Hiraizumi, my lord?”

  “Let us ride!”

  A cheer roared out of the throats of the assembled warriors, and Yoshitsune happily let the horse have its head, riding to the front. He led the warriors, galloping, up the road to Hiraizumi.

  Yoshitsune was astonished as they entered the city gates, and slowed his horse to a walk. Hiraizumi was nearly the equal of Heian Kyō in size and beauty. Gold and silver and jewels of all sorts decorated the buildings, and an enormous temple called Chusonji dominated the city. Though it was still late summer in the capital, autumn was just beginning to arrive in this far northern province, and the tips of the gingko trees had begun to turn gold to match the gold on the building roof tiles.

  Crowds lined the streets in curiosity, waving and cheering at Yoshitsune as he passed. Yoshitsune felt like a prince arriving in some glorious fairy country to reclaim a throne that had always been his. He rode proudly up to the gates of the mansion of Fujiwara Hidehira, which was of course the largest, most elegant mansion in the city.

  Hidehira himself was waiting on the steps of the mansion as Yoshitsune and his escort rode into the Fujiwara compound. “Welcome! Welcome, son of Yoshitomo, to my house! It is a great honor to me that you have traveled all this way to be my guest. Your arrival brings a new era to the Two Provinces, and now we may act according to our hearts.”

  Yoshitsune dismounted and bowed. “It is my great honor, Hidehira-sama, to be welcomed into your esteemed house. Without your assistance, I would not have a hope of reclaiming the glory of the Minomoto. But with your help, we may again prove ourselves.”