by Rypel, T. C.
Table of Contents
Borgo Press Books by T. C. Rypel
COPYRIGHT INFORMATION
DEDICATION
EPIGRAM
PROLOGUE
PART ONE
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
PART TWO
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
THE DEATHWIND TRILOGY CHARACTER INDEX
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Borgo Press Books by T. C. RYPEL
THE DEATHWIND TRILOGY
1. Gonji: Red Blade from the East
2. Gonji: The Soul Within the Steel
3. Gonji: Deathwind of Vedun
COPYRIGHT INFORMATION
Copyright © 1982, 2013 by T. C. Rypel
Previously published under the title, Deathwind of Vedun
Published by Wildside Press LLC
www.wildsidebooks.com
DEDICATION
For
My wife, CHRISTINE, and children JENNIFER, MICHAEL, and ELIZABETH—who lived through it
And for son JOHN—whose time would come
EPIGRAM
Thou almost makest me waver in my faith
To hold opinion with Pythagoras,
That souls of animals infuse themselves
Into the trunks of men: thy currish spirit
Govern’d a wolf, who, hang’d for human
slaughter
Even from the gallows did his fell soul fleet,
And, whilst thou lay’st in thy unhallow’d dam,
Infused itself in thee; for thy desires
Are wolvish, bloody, starved and
ravenous
—William Shakespeare,
The Merchant of Venice
PROLOGUE
Centuries ago, a Central European mountain range, haunted in legend and in fact....
Night, in the walled city of Vedun, manifested itself in exotic mist and shadow. The southern third of the girdling wall abutted the steep precipice of the plateau on which the ancient city had been built, and the sprawling valley below served up a carpet of steaming vapor as the sun set.
To the north, where forested foothills sloped upward to the castle of the Lord Protector, the shadows of clouds danced in the moonlight along treetops and verdant pasture, mingling with forest murmurs to evoke a multitude of unearthly images. One could not help but wonder what interpretations were wrung from these by the forgotten race that had hewn the stonework of Vedun.
But on this night, as the gaping disc of the full moon glowered through threatening cloud cover and down upon the whispering knots of frightened people gathered on the rooftops of the city, a terrible stillness gripped the elements. Time itself was held in abeyance in deference to the awesome drama unfolding at the castle of Baron Rorka.
The chill air amplified and echoed the din of clashing metal and the cries of dying men. Rorka’s city guards banded together on the walls in tight groups of two and three, muttering and gesturing animatedly as the storm suddenly broke.
Flavio, the city council Elder, was the first to spot the prophetess Tralayn on the now rain-slicked wall near the north gate. He pointed her out to Garth, Michael, and Lydia, as the mysterious holy woman spread her arms and gazed into the roiling heavens. The whispering on the rooftops ceased as the populace paused to scrutinize Tralayn’s actions. Her appeal to the Lord for insight and guidance had evidently been intercepted. The answer was instantaneous and perverse.
Tralayn stood in defiance of the shimmering visage that blotted out the sky above the castle and leered obscenely at the city of Vedun. People screamed and scurried off the roofs as if they might be singled out by those fathomless eyes. Domesticated animals snapped their tethers and attacked one another with strident, frenzied cries.
Soon Tralayn alone glared upward into the naked face of Satan.
PART ONE
BUSHIDO
CHAPTER ONE
To be alone among companions is the most dreadful sort of loneliness.
Yes, that is so.
The rider clopped along the dusty street as he thought on these things, the nagging itch of heat rash in his privates and a saddle kink in his spine. The chestnut stallion’s hooves kicked up swirling eddies of dust, and the animal’s ears flicked back to ward off the buzzing flies.
Man and beast alike sweltered under an unmerciful late afternoon sun. The horse’s sauntering gait attracted a yapping dog, which quickly darted away in obedience to its master’s harsh reprimand. Somewhere behind, mutton was being roasted. Probably at the village’s sorry excuse for an inn.
The warrior snorted, his lip curling in disgust.
Stupid fools. He had had to eat stale dried beef.
The road widened at the edge of town, and he could see the track ahead, meandering through the thickening larches until it disappeared into the forest in a sloping curve. Ahead, the pine-blanketed foothills that rose upward, ever upward. Another world seemed to beckon from beyond the mist on the lofty horizon.
Passing the last of the humble village dwellings, the warrior glanced lazily to right and left. Sullen eyes, fearful faces. He spurred Tora onward at a bit faster pace, suppressing an urge to wheel around and snarl at the ignorant peasants, just to see them scramble for cover.
What was the sense?
That would mark him for a lesser man. Instead he pulled himself erect in the saddle and shifted his swords to a more comfortable position. He spoke affectionately to his mount and urged him forward under a lush green umbrella of shade-dappled forest, the hot sun at his back only slightly more searing than the hostile eyes that burned into him like brands. He could imagine them crossing themselves in their superstitious way—but not out of concern for him, he was sure; more likely in gratitude that he was on his way.
Stale beef. What ignoble fare. No doubt the Englishmen were eating better right now.
Ah, but the few hours he had spent with them had been enjoyable. For the short span until they had ridden into town it had been the same old thing; another village of ignorant peasants, another impossible dialect, more suspicious stares and mutterings.
Then the two Englishers, merchants traveling to Turk-held Buda and Pest, had clattered into town with many a hearty laugh and trifling concern over dirt and discomfort. The affable, red-raced Goodwin, with his ready horselaugh, riding a splendid Arabian charger on which he looked positively ridiculous; the somber walking-stick Lancaster, with his bloodhound eyes and ironic wit; their three dourly officious bodyguards, grimly sizing up the onlookers with darting eyes, rapiers bouncing comically on their hips like clinging waifs.
They had spoken French—loathsome, twisted language!—and the warrior had found them eager to exchange tales of adventure. They had tipped many a flagon of wine and ale to each other’s good fortune and to surcease of evil and all manner of mortal terror. The merchants had been intrigued by the strange warrior who had mastered tongues so alien to him, eagerly drawing from him the endless tales of a life of high adventure, of bone-shattering clashes of men and steel; of fragile love, won, lost, and squandered; of monsters and magicks and valiant death. And the warrior had found companions.
; But then he had pressed matters too far.
When they announced their intention of riding on into the nighted hills on a course matching his own for a time, he had thrust forward his sloshing flagon in a grinning toast to their continued fellowship on the road.
No cup was proffered in return. The smiles melted. Undisguised glances passed from one Englisher to the next. Nervous throat clearing, followed by all manner of illogical arguments to the contrary. They began excusing themselves from the table.
The clown had finished with his entertainment.
What had it been this time? The hair tied off in its peculiar topknot? The narrow, angular eyes? (anxious whispers) Did he wear his swords too confidently? (nervous hilt-clenching by the bodyguards)
Damned ignorant fools! Snobbish, money-grubbing merchants! I’m no highwayman. If so I could have hefted their burden of gold with little trouble. I’m not some hell-spawned satyr come to ravage the countryside. Let them stumble along their course, then. Let them trust to those three dolts with the dangling rapiers—probably each with a virgin edge, neh? They’ll be fair game for bandits and night fiends before long. I need no puffy-faced riding companions with sagging behinds. They’re a burden, worthless in a fight—a bane on all of them! Friends often turn traitor. More often turn up dead. If I’m to ride alone, then that’s my course. Chosen. Ordained. That is karma. Am I not my father’s son? Above them all in the scheme of things, firstborn of the great daimyo of the Sadowara clan, birthed of the womb of the storied golden she-wolf of the northern ice lands?
I am Sabatake Gonji-no-Sadowara....
...and I am samurai.
He had sat alone for a time, feeling the tension grow thick at the inn, staring into his sullen reflection in the pale wine. Guarded whispers wafted over to him through the musty smell of rotting floorboards. The fat innkeeper fluttered about the Englishmen like a wet nurse, jabbering in mixed French and Slovak: “Pan Goodwin! Pan Lancaster! Let me put you up for the night. Do not venture into the hills after sunset. It is not safe, good sirs!”
More toadying, more simpering. (The clink of their coins was truer than his.) Then a snatch of something barely whispered:
“—the Weeping Sisters—”
A pang.
He had risen with an appropriate flourish, cast some coins noisily on the table, (hearts skipping a beat) and strode out of the squalid inn with a pride born of his noble heritage.
Done with them. And glad to be alone.
* * * *
They tracked upward into the mountain foothills, the samurai lost in his thoughts, the sturdy animal sure-footed even in the increasingly rugged terrain. Long shadows pointed the way before them. Cool draughts of pine-tinged breeze washed down over them, but the heat of the dying sun held fast at their backs.
A mile or so into a sloping stand of timber Gonji reined in and swung lightly to the ground, patting Tora’s shuddering haunches. The horse shuffled and nodded with relief, poked at the wild grass. Unhitching his swords, Gonji removed his damp kimono with a grimace that evinced aching muscles. He stretched elaborately a few times, then replaced the swords at his waist.
He paced laterally along the banked earth a few yards, sniffing at the fragrant air, the rugged sandals laced about his thick tabi crunching sharply in the stillness.
He froze.
Both hands shot to the hilt of the killing sword as he crouched slightly in a defensive posture. He fixed the target in his vision. The Sagami sang free, scarcely touching wood, and cleft center of the object.
The samurai snatched the blade back into its sheath with an efficient two-step sliding motion, then set himself. Again. Off a bit this time. A third time—quicker, sharper. Again—better still. Several more—real time was all but forgotten. A final blurring pass—
Excellent.
Silver death in a mote of time.
He executed a leaping full turn, drawing and slashing in midair, a growling kiyai roaring from deep in his chest, echoing through the hills. He had landed with feline grace and splendid form, breath held in check, his mighty challenge unanswered.
Tora kept nibbling and paid him no heed.
Gonji picked up the heaped kimono and returned to his mount, breathing deeply, feeling the tension flow out of him, the light rippling of his well-toned muscles. A mild breeze feathered his damp armpits, causing a brief outcropping of gooseflesh. He tied the kimono around the spare killing sword lashed to the saddle and tugged loose a square of white cloth. He rubbed his face on a tunic sleeve.
“Again you ignore me, eh?” he spoke, stroking Tora’s neck. “What’s become of us? You used to find me so amusing!”
Tora nickered and shot his head from side to side, and Gonji chuckled, fishing a bag of oats from a pouch and sifting the last few handfuls. “See? Plenty for everyone, neh? Eat, proud fellow.”
The glowering orb of the sun pressed the western edge of the world.
“Do you know something?” Gonji said, sighing expansively. “We’re heading back the way we came again. Yes, that is so. Oh, not so far north this time. Through the mountains. This time we’re looking for a—how did he say?—‘stone sanctuary perched on a mountain aerie.’ Sanctuary...do you think it will be a sanctuary for us, Tora, eh? Do you think those mad Hungarians are still looking for us? Ahh, you don’t think at all, do you, dumb beast? Or you’d have slowed and let them catch us and you’d probably be in stud right now!
“Strange people. Strange. Bad as Mongols. Give them what they hire for and they try to kill you. For a while there I thought we had a home for a time....” He gazed wistfully into the distance, his face a mask of sadness.
“I’ll tell you something,” he said cheerfully, “if we meet in the next go-around, I’ll have a turn at the bit and you do all the thinking! How does that suit you, eh? You like that, don’t you? You like that....”
Gonji hopped backward a few merry paces and affected a passable imitation of the innkeeper’s bloated carriage. He waddled about Tora, bowing obsequiously and flapping his arms in mock solicitude.
“I go to get some food now, Pan Tora, yeh?” he mimicked, puffing his cheeks.
Taking the white cloth, he loped off to a nearby thicket in which he had spotted some wild berries. He ate a few handfuls to appease his grumbling belly while he filled the cloth, then scanned the hills ahead to determine the best shot at a stream near which he might make camp for the night. Perhaps there he might catch some fish.
A vague unease gradually cost him his interest in hunting for his dinner. Then with the graying shadows of hazy twilight came the dark and nameless fears he had known since the first night in this territory. The thought of another campfire shared with the things that rustled and coiled and stared from beyond the fringe of light brought a surge of bitterness that he fought to swallow back. Something was happening in these mountains. Something evil. And it was aware of the intruder.
Gonji’s eye caught a fallen limb.
Could it be that downed tree? Had he circled back to the same wretched spot—No. It wasn’t, he was sure. Days past. Miles away. There would be in that place a shriveled corpse, by now worried by the beasts that thrived on carrion.
A man. An ancient, withered hermit. Dying. The stench of death, ugly death. The horrid odor of some racking, consumptive disease. Leaning against a fallen limb, arms spread along the wood. Reclining in crucifixion.
Circle wide, circle cautiously, wear the scowl of distaste only a warrior knows at thoughts of such plague-ridden death. He stares, eyes bulging like rotted eggs. A sere hand trembles free of the supporting limb. Is it a twig or a lean brown finger that points (at me!) as the slack jaw works:
“Here there be...monsters!”
(vile wretch!) Draw and kill the ogre! How dare he? Step carefully forward and rend him (still pointing)—rend him.
A long rattling sigh.... His last. Already dead. You’ve been the fool. Stupid, fearful, mistrusting fool. Still he points, but not at you, no, not at you but at....
...the road you travel.
Gonji’s eyes refocused, and he shrugged off a sudden chill. Bounding up to Tora and swinging into the saddle he glanced about him in a wide arc.
“I am Sabatake Gonji-no-Sadowara,” he stormed to the mute hills. “Ride with me if you will, against me if you dare!”
And with a hearty laugh he spurred Tora onward at a gallop. Deep into the forest they rode, the wind in the trees whispering and murmuring at their passing.
* * * *
Night encroached.
The fire crackled in the tree-rimmed clearing, its lambent glow pulsing and ebbing at the encircling blackness, now parting the veil, now shrinking before it.
The samurai sat cross-legged in the radiant warmth, a sullen frown tugging at his lips, arms limp, elbows on knees. He waxed meditative in the flickering patterns of color, the charring twigs becoming dying memories he sought to quicken, to order, to understand.
Always the needs, the nagging aches in one’s head and heart. The needs and...the search, the search back and forth and up and down this angry continent....
The Sagami lay naked along his left side. To the right, two things he had crudely fashioned: a torch of dry grass tied to a sturdy limb; and the mystical implement made from his seppuku sword and the spare killing blade. A dirk was lashed to his thigh. Apart from these, there were none to call friend this night. Loneliness washed over and through him like waves lapping an eroding shore.
Tora snorted peevishly and stamped at the carpet of pine needles under his hooves. Although he had been unburdened of the saddle, he was unused to being tethered. But something else was making him skittish—something that had cost both horse and rider a good deal of sleep over the past few nights. Gonji could only guess at what the animal felt. But to him the sensation was of entrapment, the predator studying its prey from silent vantage.
Gonji yanked a slab of beef from its perch over the fire. No luck in the stream, and even the flame hadn’t helped the beef; it tasted like stropping leather. He tossed it aside with a scowl and munched the last few berries. Leaning back on his arms, he regarded the tattered patch of sky the jutting treetops allowed him.