He stood a long while, wobbling, only his eyes and lips showing from his cloth mask. He fought the poison and the wound, raised the blowgun to his lips. But blood had seeped into his lungs, the shuriken had struck so deep, and when he blew the dart it went only a little ways, held back by the blood which shot through the tube.
Above Tomoe, who still lay on the street almost as if relaxing, the mounted samurai hovered. He looked down with a pleasant face; with, perhaps, some sadness or emptiness behind the gaze. He appeared to be wealthy. “I am impressed,” he said. “I had expected you to die.”
Tomoe stood, brushed herself. A nearby peasant took the liberty of brushing off her back, wishing to touch a hero, whoever she might be. The mounted samurai continued, “If you need a friend, or good employment, follow me.” He reined his horse around and looked back, expecting to be followed. She did not move. “Come along,” he said, a lordly air about him, not expecting to be refused by a ronin.
Forsooth, Tomoe could use good employment, but she said, “I need no friend who would sit, expecting me to die.” She walked the other way.
It did not take long before the attentions of overly solicitous folk grated. She was the talk, and the mystery, of the festival. To escape, she slipped into a kodan house.
The kodan stories, war stories, had already begun when Tomoe slipped in, fleeing the raucous, attentive crowd. She came without notice, for the various young samurai, who made up the largest percent of the small audience, were enamored of the elderly samurai’s story.
This was one of the oldest tales, about the twelfth Mikado’s son. But Tomoe was surprised by the manner of its present interpretation, more sensual than expected.
She sat near the wall in back, upon her knees. With hat shadowing her face and loose, colorful garb somewhat disguising her figure, she looked little different from the male samurai, who were a young and beardless lot; although anyone who looked carefully would know at once that here was someone older, well tested, and of greater dignity. Also, the garb did not completely disguise her sex, was not meant to. Still, the audience was distracted by what they came to hear.
The old storytelling samurai was strong for his years. Although he moved slowly as if his bones might ache, he moved also with grace, punctuating his tale with pertinent movements of his hands, to indicate a dancer, a sword-thrust, someone in their bed. The young, sexually unlearned samurai were especially fascinated by the ribald nature of portions of the recitation, and doubtless some preferred this kodan house for no other reason. Yet the teller was good on other levels too, his lined face wrinkling up or stretching apart to make any number of distinctive characters in the story.
“So Yamato-dake came alone to the island of Kiushiu,” he continued, “and saw that it would be difficult to breech the walls of the guarded castle. The rebellious conspirators were many, and he but one, and the question was how to get to the central palace and slay the Mikado’s sworn enemy, Nomonaka.
“Yamato-dake decided on a disguise—a disguise which even the wary Nomonaka would not suspect.
“The young prince was not yet in his seventeenth year when he undertook to avenge the insult to his father, and already a renowned hero. His was the body of nubile youth, very slender but more round-cornered than angular. He was still without beard, and much envied by the women of his parents’ court for his fairness and grace.
“Thus he went to the pleasure house of the nearby village, where the skillful ladies fawned upon and admired him and vied for his attentions. Modestly, he told them, ‘Beauties supreme, I am unworthy of your observance, and, alas, am sworn to a fortnight of celibacy for my patron deity. I would beg a boon, however.’
“The young women were very eager. ‘The boon,’ said Yamato-dake, ‘is to possess one outfit from among your store of pleasurable clothes.’
“The ladies all giggled tremendously, but were not surprised, for they had thought right away that Yamato-dake would have been as pretty a girl as he was a boy. They found the most daring dancer’s costume for him, and painted him nicely, and Yamato-dake enjoyed this very much. Then he went away from the laughing ladies, who begged him to return when his fortnight was over, so they could show him pleasures such as geishas show other geishas. They begged him thus, it may be supposed, because they desired his beauty. But also they must have been extremely curious what kinds of conquests the temporarily womanly prince could make, being as he was celibate and looking as he did so virginal and sweet.
“Prince Yamato came to the front gate, where the sentry was alert and made threatening challenges to the dark. Yamato-dake stepped into torchlight and stamped his foot, saying in a haughty girl’s voice, ‘I want to see your boss!’
“The sentry espied the girl and judged her comely. Yamato-dake was of exceeding beauty, it cannot be over said. The sentry asked the seeming-girl what business she had out so late and all alone.
“‘I am a dancing girl from Kuji,’ Yamato-dake said, for the dancing girls of Kuji were famous even then, ‘and I am on a Wandering for the love of my patron deity. I have walked a long way, and desire to sleep in the richest house of this country.’
“The sentry laughed at this audacity. The disguised prince said, ‘I can earn my night of lodge by dancing.’ Then Prince Yamato began to dance a little bit, to show the guard. He was impressed a lot, and thought to himself: ‘My boss will like this girl for his sport.’
“So the sentry took the dancer to the innermost part of the castle. There, young geishas were serving sake and playing samisen. Yamatodake saw also that enemy chiefs had gathered from various smaller islands.
“The sentry groveled before his boss, begging a reward for delivering the gentlest flower of Kuji. The boss was swayed indeed, for the Kuji dancer looked very nice to him. He rewarded the sentry with all the other geishas, who went away with him to another place in the castle.
“‘Dance for us,’ boss Nomonaka commanded, and the prince danced with the gracefulness of a sweet girl. Dancing was not so different from swordplay, and Yamato-dake had happened to learn both, the latter from his father and the former from his mother.
“So well did Yamato-dake dance, he captured the hearts of half the chiefs but especially of Nomonaka. The flames of desire were high in the heart of the boss, so that when Yamato-dake was through with dancing, Nomonaka pulled the beauty harshly to his chest.
“‘Come with me now!’ he demanded. The dancer giggled and blushed and struggled meekly, saying, ‘I cannot. I have never.’
“Hearing these words of innocence, the flames burned higher in Nomonaka, and he dismissed his envious visitors, dragging the dancer into private chambers. There, he urged his prize to a soft grass mat, put his arms about the lithe beauty, and held tightly. He demanded the dancer hold him similarly. Yamato-dake obeyed, wrapping strong arms around Nomonaka. The seeming-girl began to squeeze.
“At first the boss laughed at the surprising bear-hug of the dancer. But then he could not breathe and began to struggle. He squeezed in turn, and it became a kind of contest which boss Nomonaka was not winning.
“There was terror on Nomonaka’s face, his face which was red with blood squeezed still within his veins. He felt his own heart stop and the life go from him.
“Presently Yamato-dake went to the chambers of the guests, these being chiefs who conspired against the twelfth Mikado. They gathered about and welcomed who they thought a girl; who was in tears; who said she had been much abused by the cruel Nomonaka, and she had therefore batted him on top of the head with a pot and rendered him incogitant.
“One of the chiefs ran to see, and returned quickly to say, ‘It is true, he lies unconscious on his mat. He will be angry with this beautiful girl and have her slain, and that will be a waste.’
“The beauty fell upon the floor wailing for aid, and the chiefs, taking pity, put Yamato-dake in a sack which they carried with them to the outer gates. The sentries were surprised to see the chiefs leaving so soon, but dared not bar the way. A certain g
uard, suspecting some conspiracy, ran to tell his boss that the chiefs were leaving under cloak of darkness.
“Though unmarked by any wound, boss Nomonaka could not be roused, and so the sentry gathered that his boss was not asleep, but dead. He called the alarm.
“Nomonaka’s faithful retainers were after the chiefs, and there was a battle at the crossroads which Yamato-dake heard from inside the sack.
“When the battle was over, someone opened the sack, and it was a chief. They had killed all the men from the castle, and lost only one of their own number. But they were angry, having learned during the battle that Nomonaka had been killed.
“‘They thought we killed him,’ complained the chief who opened the bag. ‘But it was you, and we no longer believe it was an accident. Yet we will let you go if you pay us well, here upon the road, for having saved the life of a murderess!’
“Yamato-dake allowed the first chief to embrace him, and in that moment stole the big man’s two-edged sword and killed him. The other chiefs fought bravely and with skill, but fell before the sword wielded by the apparent damsel.
“The last chief died in agonizing slowness, but managed to say, ‘Lady, you are special! I would feel your cheek to mine before I die!’
“And granting this final wish, Yamato-dake placed his cheek against that of the dying man, and let him part this life with a lover’s passion in his heart.”
When this story was done, the young samurai were aroused, for they were yet pretty boys themselves, with dreams of valor, and more attached to one another than to any girl. They were full of praises for the old kodan teller, and begged him for another tale. He was flattered, a little bit inflated, and in an even greater ribald mood.
“Now I will tell you a story not unlike the first,” he said, “the story of Tomoe Gozen, who—akin to Prince Yamato who played a woman—became a warrior so that she might play the man and conquer all the geisha houses of Naipon.”
The young samurai hooted uproariously, but suddenly it ended. A samurai stood among them fierce and strong. Even had she not turned her jacket right-side out, revealing her crest; even had they not already speculated as to the identity of the mysterious samurai who earlier slew four ninja; even then, by her anger, they would have known who she must be.
The storyteller grew palest, for he was not a youth to be excused for prankish insults.
Favor was a fickle goddess, and the favored hero of last year’s tales became unfavored in the next. Ever since the death of eight thousand samurai at Shigeno Valley—many slain by Tomoe who served a foreign lord—Tomoe had become the brunt of disrespectful humors which poorly disguised underlying hostilities. But a samurai’s pride is strong, and even these youths knew they had erred in applauding the old man’s joke. They were not surprised that her sword should dash among them before they could take a breath—they were only surprised that they had not been killed by the many swift strokes which kissed their beardless faces with a breeze.
It took them a moment to realize, looking amongst themselves, that they had all been deprived of their proud queues of hair, lost to Tomoe’s strokes.
The storyteller’s hair was too thin to merit shaving, but she said to him, “Grandfather, you have a spider on your shoulder.” He looked quickly at his shoulder and saw lying there not a spider, but his own ear, cut so quick and clean that he had not seen her blow or felt its effect. He gasped and grabbed the bleeding side of his head, stanching the flow with his shirt sleeve.
Tomoe Gozen walked out into the street, which seemed even gloomier than before.
In the morning, she found Yabushi.
Shortly after leaving the kodan house, Tomoe had discovered a camp of four retainers to some lord whose crest she did not recognize, and who they would not name, though it seemed he must be rich for he clad his samurai well. Tomoe’s own crest was more famous and, now that she wore her shirt properly, the samurai whispered among themselves and avoided her.
Oddly, they all bore an ancient kind of double-edged sword, and carried them across their backs in heavy sheaths. It was so unusual that Tomoe could only suppose these men followed the man with whom she had had a brief exchange yesterday. He had not been a lord, but perhaps some lord’s favorite; and he too carried his sword across his back. If it too were two-edged, she had not seen.
These four were staying in the village primarily to display their abilities in an exhibition for the festival. Tomoe would have liked to see two-edged swords in use (the legended Yamato-dake used such a sword, though they were centuries outmoded since his day); but the bearers were so unfriendly she made no note to witness their exhibition.
With minimal words exchanged, they had let her spend the night at their camp; but with her identity known, she received only those cordialities which were absolutely expected, none extra. She might have shared their breakfast, as that also was minimal between samurai, but she chose not to impose herself further. Their entire manner had been less than inviting.
Rising earlier than the others, Tomoe exercised in darkness, upon a street which had been busy the day before and soon would be again. Banners flapped unseen in the darkness, while she stretched and forced her muscles, and practiced graceful assaults that none could see beneath the fading starlight. Near the time of sunrise, she smelled fresh fires in hibachis and fireplaces, and over them, pots of stews and rice; but hunger she put from her mind.
After exercises, having stressed her body an extra bit, she walked slowly to the village edge, letting her body cool. She stood apart from the festival gear and the transiently quiet town, and watched Amaterasu grow out of distant mountains and low clouds, as Naipon had grown out of the primeval ooze at the beginning of time.
When she started back along the street, early risers were about, preparing their exhibits and stalls, opening their businesses’ doors and shutters, carrying feed to horses, speeding here and there upon errands of unspecified urgency. Unwealthy comers who had camped outside the village in discomfort straggled back onto the festival street, theirs joints stiff, looking discouraged that nothing yet was happening on this the final day. It was not a busy street, but enough so that the seclusion Tomoe had savored before the sun arose was entirely dispelled.
And then she saw Yabushi, where he did not belong.
In an isolated yard, the samurai child was surrounded by six unwholesome men who were laughing. They looked to be themselves of samurai caste, but dirty and uncouth. They were sanzoku, well below ronin—bandits lost of their bushido. Such as these were bound to one another by their own misfortune and vileness. They soiled the name of samurai.
Little Bushi had his shortsword held high, threatening them to keep back. His eyes watched his field. His feet moved with swift, even ease. Always, he kept his back to a tree. His guard was perfect.
“Come now,” said one of the sanzoku, sounding coarse and wicked, leaning on his sword. “We heard you at the geisha house. You said you had gold to buy a girl. Hand it to us. You are too young to need a geisha, and we will put your money to better use.”
For answer, Yabushi dashed forward and then back to his tree. One of the six whooped and clutched his groin, for the small fencer’s overhead swing had reached as high as the crotch and unmanned the despised sanzoku. He fell on the ground and rolled about in pain, lamenting his best part.
The other five were swift to ready their swords, curses of vengeance on their lips and in their eyes, angered to learn the baby rooster had spurs.
At that moment Tomoe shouted some blasphemy, reviling those who ganged up on one small person. Suspecting a rear attack, the five sanzoku were unsettled long enough for Yabushi to escape from between them and run to Tomoe.
The five sanzoku left standing were less willing to attack, being cowards from the start and not liking the sword and face of Tomoe added to the child’s. But the sixth sanzoku, lying on his side and curled partly in a ball, looked up from his agony and cried, “One and a half to five! The odds are very good!”
Thus the ruthless brutes were encouraged to continue. Tomoe and Yabushi stood back to back. Doubtless, in this case two could handle five, for samurai did not become sanzoku because of their immense skill and courage. But Yabushi and Tomoe never had the chance to prove this.
A strolling nun, who Tomoe had never seen before, dashed into the fray with her staff. She wore a tabard inscribed with prayers over her kimono, yellow upon red, and went barefooted. Her staff served as bo, a fighting stick held horizontally in both hands. She smashed two of the sanzoku in the back of their heads before they knew someone came from behind, and they fell as one, unconscious. Two others turned on her at once, but the ends of her pole smote left and smote right, and the two sanzoku staggered back and ran away, their front teeth broken out. The fifth had fled to the side of the sanzoku Yabushi had previously cut, and helped him escape the Buddhist with her stick.
This done, the woman swelled with enormous pride in her work, stood with bare feet placed wide, and sported an almost foolish grin of good humor on her tough, tan, beautiful face. Her bo was once again only a walking staff, its tip upon the ground, and she looked innocent of violence.
Yabushi complained, “We did not need your help! We could have defeated them ourselves!” He kicked at one of the two unconscious sanzoku abandoned by their friends.
“I believe you,” said the nun, smiling more broadly at the boy. “But your swords would have killed the louts. My stick only punishes a little.”
Tomoe put a hand on Yabushi’s shoulder, for he was storming with anger. This intervention insulted his strength and the strength of his friend, Tomoe. It hurt his samurai pride. Children and women, he had noted, were often thought to be in need. But Tomoe said, “She did not help us, Little Bushi. She helped them.”
The Disfavored Hero (The Tomoe Gozen Saga Book 1) Page 10