Genpei
Page 58
“Perhaps.” Munemori sighed softly. In a more lucid tone, he went on, “The Shin-In once said that he had no power save that which men’s hatreds permit him. Perhaps it is only that.”
“Truly,” said Yoshitsune. “The evils that men conjure in their hearts are as great as any demons that we conjure in our dreams.”
“Truly,” agreed Munemori. Then his voice became dreamy again. “A tonsure … a barren place to pray. Please let me become a monk. To copy sutras. To pray.”
Yoshitsune knew the former Taira lord was lost to the world again. Gently, he said, “Show me how you would pray, Munemori-san. Recite for me a sutra.”
As Munemori bowed his head and began to murmur the Lotus Sutra, Yoshitsune gestured to a swordsman waiting in the shadows. Silently, Yoshitsune stood and backed away. The swordsman waited until Munemori had uttered the sacred name of the Amida Buddha, and with a swift stroke removed the former Taira lord’s head from his body.
The blood flowed across the matted floor, the last red banner of the Taira.
A final Meeting
The nun, now simply called the Imperial Lady, formerly known as Kenreimon’in, walked along the forest path, holding a basket full of rock azaleas. It was late in the Fourth Month in the second year of the era of Bunji. A full year had passed since the tragedy of Dan-no-ura. And yet her mind was full of prayers for the fallen, never able to forget.
The forest was beginning to blossom with the arrival of spring. Cuckoos and uguisu sang in the pine boughs overhead. Deer pranced at a cautious distance. The brooks gurgled with fresh water from melting snows. The crisp, cool mountain air sang with a purity unknown in Heian Kyō.
But the Imperial Lady felt an alien in this land, though it was not terribly far from the old capital. It seemed a world apart. It was a place that had never known elegant kichō curtains, poetry readings to the summer moon, koto and flute concerts, no dragon boats on Imperial ponds, no wisteria gardens, no readings of monogatari by candlelight. It was a wilderness and, as such, it suited the Imperial Lady’s heart very well.
She came around a bend in the forest path, nearing the hermitage known as the Jakkoin, when she stopped. There were people, men, gathered on the verandah of her hermitage.
Her handmaiden, who had been walking with her, stopped, too.
Another nun came running up the path to her. “My Lady, you will never guess who has come to visit!”
The Imperial Lady tried to cover up her face with her drab black sleeves and turn away. “Please, send them away. Whoever they are, they must not see me like this.”
“You are in perfectly proper garb for one who has left the world. There is no shame in it. Besides, your visitor is none other than the Retired Cloistered Emperor Go-Shirakawa, come all this way from Heian Kyō. It would be utter rudeness to send him away without a word from you. Come, come.”
Reluctantly, the Imperial Lady let herself be led down the path to the hermitage. She was suddenly ashamed of the overgrown weeds, the poorly patched roof, the worn wooden planks, the tiny flooded rice paddy, even though these things had suited her when she moved in. To her shock, the Retired Emperor sat right out in the open, surrounded by only a few retainers, and she could see him, face-to-face. He was older than she imagined, in his late sixties perhaps, and tired-looking, though still impressive in his gray monk’s robes.
The Imperial Lady bowed to him and sat on a rock nearby, not daring to speak.
“Ah, Kenreimon’in,” said Go-Shirakawa, his eyes wet with withheld tears. “How strange it is to see you like this, a former Imperial jewel, but out of her setting. Though I will add your holy garb has not diminished your legendary beauty.”
The Imperial Lady blushed and hid farther behind her sleeves. “Your Majesty is too kind. Though each day I expect to see a vision of the Buddha at my window, summoning me to the world beyond, never did I expect this visit. As for me, I have found my way to this desolate place because of the sins of my family, and my own. It is only right that this should be my setting now.”
Go-Shirakawa nodded. “It is best, yes. The world is no longer a place for such tender hearts as yours. It has changed. We had hoped that the loss of the little Emperor would bring the world to its senses and bring peace. But I fear what peace we have will not last long. The Lord of Kamakura is a powerful man, but a spiteful one. He has targeted his brothers one by one and seeks their death. He plans to move the capital to Kamakura, a most inelegant place, I understand. He puts greater and greater restraints upon the Imperial Throne. His samurai swagger with greater and greater power. I must tell you, in truth, the world has truly ended, for the world we knew is gone and shall never return.”
“Then I am even more glad I have devoted my life to prayer,” said the Imperial Lady. “For I do not think my heart can bear more sorrows.”
“Come, then. Sit beside me a while. Let us listen to the birds sing, and remember all the beauty that has passed.”
Epilogue
The bell of Gion Temple sings….
And so the Taira fortunes passed away, like fallen leaves hidden beneath the snow, remembered but not to be seen in their glory again. Perhaps the Dragon King was regretful at his part in their downfall, for he left a curious gift. Ever after, in the Inland Sea, fishermen have found a kind of crab they called the Heike or Taira crab. For on the back of every crab is the scowling face of a samurai, etched for eternity. Fishermen are careful to throw these crab back into the sea, rather than incur bad fortune.
As for Kusanagi, it is still not known whether the sword that was taken to the bottom of the sea was the true Sacred Sword or the copy, or whether it is the true sword that now hangs in the Shrine at Ise. It could be said that because the centuries that followed Dan-no-ura brought only more war, setting province against province, lord against lord, that it was not Kusanagi returned to the sea, and the Dragon King was not appeased. Or perhaps it was, but it did not matter. Perhaps it is as the Shin-In said, that the hearts of men hold the key to Fate, with greater power than any magic, prayer, or curse.
About the Author
KARA DALKEY is the author of The Nightingale, as well as of the Blood of the Goddess trilogy: Goa, Bijapur, and Bhagavati. She lives in Colorado. You can sign up for email updates here.
Other Tor Books by Kara Dalkey
BLOOD OF THE GODDESS
Goa
Bijapur
Bagavati
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Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright Notice
Dedication
Author’s Note
Family Trees
Prologue
Scroll 1: Beginnings
Scroll 2: Hōgen and Heiji
Scroll 3: Genpei
Epilogue
About the Author
Other Tor Books by Kara Dalkey
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Copyright
This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events
portrayed in this novel are either fictitious or are used fictitiously.
GENPEI
Copyright © 2000 by Kara Dalkey
All rights reserved, including the right to reproduce this book, or portions thereof, in any form.
A Tor Book
Published by Tom Doherty Associates, LLC
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New York, NY 10010
www.tor.com
Tor® is a registered trademark of Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.
eBooks may be purchased for business or promotional use. For information on bulk purchases, please contact Macmillan Corporate and
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Dalkey, Kara.
Genpei / Kara Dalkey—1st ed.
p. cm.
“A Tom Doherty Associates book.”
eISBN: 978-0-7653-8635-9
1. Japan—History—Genpei Wars, 1180-1185—Fiction. I. Title.
PS3554.A433 G4 2000
813’.54—dc21
00-042585
Map by Mark Stein Studios
Family tree art by Tim Hall
First Edition: January 2001