by Steve Bein
“Is he?” Shichio found himself unable to keep the glee from his voice. It caused the boy such obvious pain simply to be standing on his own two feet. He so plainly wanted to rest that Shichio resolved to keep him standing and talking for as long as possible. Taunting him was just a garnish on a plate that was already beautifully overfull. “I shall add his murder to the list of charges against you.”
“Why stop with one murder?” said the whelp. “Make it fifty.”
“Fifty? That’s the second time I’ve heard that number, neh? Yes, it is. You’ve become quite the little brigand, haven’t you? Perhaps the lord regent and I should have you crucified now, and get to the wedding later.”
Shichio saw Hashiba’s eyes light up at the mention of crucifixion, but on the face of that despicable boy he saw an insufferable little smile—a tiny thing, so small it was barely there, yet it seemed to hold back a torrent of derisive laughter. Shichio had seen that smile many times as a child, stabbing at him like a dagger from the faces of countless village boys, and in fact he’d made a point of riding in the vanguard when, during the bitterest of the war years, he and Hashiba demolished the tiny hamlet where Shichio had grown up. Seeing that wicked, happy smile on the face of the Bear Cub was more than he could stomach.
“That’s quite enough,” he said, striding angrily across the road until he stood chest to chest with the boy. Daigoro stood just inside the threshold of the Okuma compound, Shichio just outside of it, each one matching the other’s stare. “I’ll string you up on the gates of your own house,” he said, his voice so low that only the Bear Cub could hear him. “Your wife, your child, your servants, they’ll walk past you for days. I’ll nail your bones to the wood. I’ll have you fed and watered, keep you alive for as long as I can. And then, right before you die, I’ll kill your mother—my wife—right in front of you. I’ll flay her with your own sword. Your wife too, and then your little boy. And then I’ll drive that big sword of yours right through your—”
“My little boy?”
Shichio’s heart pounded in his ears. A sweat broke out on his upper lip. “Yes, your boy, you little runt, that newborn son of yours. He’s going to—”
“That’s not my son.”
“What?”
There was that smile again, that smallest, sharpest, wickedest of grins.
• • •
“That’s not my son,” Daigoro said again, desperately restraining a triumphant laugh. He’d never seen anyone look so baffled while trying to look malicious before. He wished he had a mirror, so Shichio could see what it looked like.
“My lords,” he said, taking a step back into his family’s courtyard—a step away from Shichio and toward Hideyoshi. “Your presence on this wedding day honors us all. Please accept my heartfelt thanks, and allow me to thank you on behalf of House Okuma as well.”
“Thanks? Honor?” Shichio spat the words. “Of course I’m here. It’s my wedding. You’re the one who shouldn’t be here.”
“Oh, because of your garrison? You may want to have words with them. It seems they don’t know about all the little lanes we’ve got crisscrossing the estate.”
“What?”
“Of course,” Daigoro said, enjoying himself every bit as much as Shichio had been a few moments before. “Connecting the orchard, the bathhouse, that sort of thing. You’ll understand when you have property of your own.”
“This is my property—or it will be, as soon as you step aside and let me get on with my wedding.”
“I’m afraid there’s been some misunderstanding. Unless . . . did you bring a bride of your own? I’m afraid all the ladies present are already married.”
“I’m here to marry your mother, you impudent little cur, and you know that damn well.”
“But my mother’s already got a husband,” Daigoro said. “Allow me to present to you the newly married Lord and Lady Yasuda.”
He stretched out his arm as grandly as Hideyoshi might have done it, and from the heart of the assembly his mother walked forward, positively glowing. Her steps were tiny—a bridal kimono did not allow the legs much movement—and so it took a delightfully long time for her to approach. Shichio fumed all the while. “This,” Daigoro said, touching his mother’s silken shoulder, “is Lady Yasuda Yumiko, and this”—he gingerly took the baby in his green swaddling clothes from his mother’s arms—“is Lord Yasuda Gorobei, her new husband.”
Shichio opened his mouth to speak; only a strangulated gurgle came out. Daigoro’s mother blushed and looked with adoration and pride at her son, then at her rosy-cheeked husband in the crook of Daigoro’s arm. Hideyoshi let out a howl, laughing so hard he had to cling to a bodyguard’s shoulder to stay standing.
“We have got to come here more often,” Hideyoshi said. “You bastards are a riot.”
The little Lord Yasuda replied with a yawn, scrunched his eyes tight against the morning sun, and nestled himself deeper into Daigoro’s kimono. He had no more hair than his great-grandfather, Yasuda Jinbei, whose compound Daigoro had just departed some scant hours before. Whatever Hideyoshi had to say next was choked off by another fit of cackling, which he tried to restrain out of respect for the baby’s sleep. Shichio nearly choked too; apoplexy still had the better of him.
Daigoro decided to make the most of the opportunity. “Mother,” he said softly, “how are you feeling?”
“Better, now that we have you home.” She smiled at him, though he winced at the word home. Her face glowed with a radiance he hadn’t seen in her in more than a year. She stroked baby Gorobei’s fat cheek with the back of a finger. “What a beautiful little husband you found for me.”
“I had hoped to speak of it with you first,” Daigoro said. “It was not my intent to marry you off without your consent. This was the only way I could think of to—”
“It’s fine, Daigoro. It was very clever of you, in fact—a much better solution than that horrid letter we got from you. I’m your mother and Akiko is your wife, regardless of what you write in any official decrees.”
Daigoro felt his face flush. “I promise we’ll have a talk about that—but later, if you don’t mind. Do you know where Aki is?”
“I’m here,” Akiko said, wending her way through the armored ranks of Okuma warriors. She wore ruby red silk, her face pale and inscrutable. It was the first time he’d laid eyes on his wife since departing for Kyoto, for though he’d reached the Okuma estate in the earliest hours of the morning, there had been distractions of every kind: introductions to be made, wounds to clean and bind, to say nothing of the hastiest wedding preparations in history. On top of all that, morning sickness had invaded Akiko’s stomach like the Mongol hordes, waking her each day with a new incursion and showing no signs of decamping.
As such, Daigoro’s first thought was to attribute her pallor to nausea. But then she narrowed her eyes at him, her shoulders stiffened, and Daigoro feared he’d angered her. But of course, his conscience said. Running off without so much as a farewell, disappearing for nearly a month—one-third of their entire marriage—sending a decree almost as soon as he was out the door, declaring that he’d disowned her; what was she supposed to do? Welcome him with open arms? Had she even read the accompanying letter, the one that explained his decision and explained how much it pained him? Or had she pitched it into the fire pit? Torn it up? Tossed the scraps into the wind?
All these thoughts passed through his mind in the space of a heartbeat. Daigoro braced himself, fearing the worst. She would hate him. She would slap him in front of the entire gathering—and he would deserve it. Aki took another silent step toward him, finally emerging from the forest of motionless soldiers. Despite his dread and self-loathing, Daigoro could not help finding her beautiful. The thought that he’d hurt her wounded him to the quick. He loved her and he’d abandoned her. Whatever retribution she visited upon him could not compete with how harshly he would punish himself.
She stepped closer. Her shoulders tensed. Her chin drew back ever so slight
ly, as if she were a cobra preparing to strike. Then she grabbed both of his wrists, stretched up on her tiptoes, and pecked a kiss on his cheek. “Get inside,” she whispered, her lips tickling his ear, “as quick as you can. I want you to strip me naked.”
She settled herself back on the ground, and though she tried to hide it behind a coy smile, Daigoro could see she was near to bursting. She’d missed him after all, and she was angry, and love overwhelmed the anger, and worry threatened to overwhelm the love. It was all she could do to give his wrists a little squeeze instead of wrapping her arms around him, clutching him close so he could not wander again.
Behind him Daigoro heard the faint click of a sword slipping a thumb’s length out of its sheath.
“And who might this pretty girl be?” he heard Shichio say.
Stupid, stupid, stupid, Daigoro thought. He had a venomous snake in his courtyard and he’d brought his pregnant wife within striking range. He looked over his shoulder at Shichio, whose left hand gripped the mouth of his scabbard, the fingertips of his right hand stroking his katana’s cord-bound grip. The preening peacock’s hair had become disheveled, as if his shock and disgrace had struck him like a physical blow. Daigoro only wished they’d struck hard enough to knock him dead.
“I might have guessed she’s your wife,” Shichio said with a smile, “but you don’t have a wife, do you? Not anymore. Not since you signed that decree.”
Daigoro did not take his eyes from Shichio’s face, but in his peripheral vision he noticed his enemy’s feet settling into the gravel, his thumb pushing that katana a little farther out of its scabbard.
Glorious Victory was sheathed across Daigoro’s back. She was too long to draw at this range. Shichio knew it. And if any Okuma stepped forward to his defense, the whole clan would be guilty of high treason against the regent’s adviser. Shichio knew that too.
“If she’s not your wife, then what is she?” said Shichio. “Just some girl you spilled your seed into, I suppose. But what does that make you? Certainly not a husband. Closer to the truth to call you an oath-breaker and a liar.”
It was more than any man should bear. Even as a ronin, Daigoro was ten times the samurai Shichio would ever be. The man was a viper. Deceit came as easily to him as breathing. And even if he were not, for a commoner to accuse a samurai of being a liar was more than provocation; in truth it was immoral for Daigoro not to kill him.
Shichio knew that too.
“You wouldn’t be trying to pick a fight, would you, Shichio-sama?” It was everything Daigoro could do to end that sentence with -sama and not you son of a bitch.
“I hardly need to. You’re a fugitive, aren’t you? Yes, you are. Come to think of it, the bare fact that you stand in this courtyard means the Okumas have harbored you. Ever so convenient, isn’t it? I have no need to marry your mother; I can kill her right after I kill you.”
“You might want to think twice about that,” said Daigoro.
Toyotomi samurai formed a rank behind Shichio, summoned as if they could hear his thoughts. “Seize the fugitive,” Shichio said, the very picture of nonchalance. “And his mother and girlfriend too while you’re at it.”
“Shichio!”
The shout came from Hideyoshi. “This is a wedding,” the regent barked. “By the gods, you idiot, you don’t threaten the bride.”
“Toyotomi-dono,” Shichio said, “she’s colluding with a fugitive—”
“And you’re violating every damned rule of civility ever written,” Hideyoshi said. “Have you forgotten the laws of hospitality?”
“I’m sure he hasn’t,” said Daigoro, “as your own General Mio cited them when last we met. The guest who instigates a fight under the roof of his host is to be punished with death.”
Shichio rammed his katana home with a loud snap. “Then face me in a duel,” he said, his voice dripping with acid. He stabbed one finger toward the open gate. “Outside the compound. Outside the bounds of your precious hospitality.”
Daigoro clenched his fists. Pain shot through them, broken bones in the right, deep cuts in the left. He hadn’t slept in three days. His right leg had twenty-nine fresh stitches in it. And yet he wanted nothing more in the world than to eviscerate this prideful peacock of a man.
Daigoro took a breath, eyeing the distance to the gate. It was not so far, perhaps twenty or thirty hobbling steps. In his current state, just walking there would leave him dizzy. He would have the advantage of reach, but with hands so battered that he could not hold his sword after the first exchange. His opponent was well rested and well fed. Daigoro had just enough strength to stand. And then there was Glorious Victory herself. She knew about his burning desire to kill Shichio; she could feel it in her steel. How much more satisfying would it be to kill him in front of Akiko, his mother, and his former clan? Daigoro’s mouth all but watered at the thought of such satisfaction. He would even seize glory and victory in front of the regent, who already held him in such high regard that he might well make Daigoro a general.
Indulging his need for vengeance was more than simple revenge. It would secure him victory and glory. And for that very reason his own sword would betray him.
Another breath, then another. He studied Shichio in every detail: the length of his sword, the hand he’d returned to its hilt, the tension in his forearm as if he were ready to strike.
Daigoro breathed again, trying to calm his racing heart. He knew he could not face Shichio with some other blade—or at least not face him and win. He was too accustomed to Glorious Victory’s weight and reach. Nor could he ask Katsushima to fight as his champion. If anything, Katsushima was even more exhausted than Daigoro; he was thirty years’ Daigoro’s senior, and he’d been riding day and night for a week, all the way from Kyoto.
Yet Daigoro knew the simple truth: Shichio had insulted him more than honor could bear. Daigoro took a deep breath and released it slowly. It was his sixth breath since Shichio had laid down his challenge. Daigoro knew the old maxim well, for his father had quoted it many times: the good samurai makes every decision in the space of seven breaths.
A silence fell over the courtyard, so that Daigoro felt the whole gathering could hear his pounding heartbeat. He took in his seventh breath. “If the Lady Okuma will allow it,” he said, “I will face my challenger here, on the spot where I bested General Mio.”
Shichio’s face blanched. In an instant Daigoro could tell he’d read the man correctly. He remembered his last conversation with General Mio—not the exchange of scribbles and questions while Mio was on his deathbed, but their conversation in the Jurakudai before Daigoro had gone on the run and Shichio had somehow tied Mio down and cut out his tongue. No, our Shichio’s no swordsman, Mio had said. He did all his generalship with an ink brush.
Daigoro could only guess how many times Shichio had fantasized about killing the hated Bear Cub. No doubt he’d rehearsed it in his mind: the cuts, the parries, the vainglorious pronouncements of victory. But between his obsession over the Inazuma and his flights of fancy, he’d forgotten that in all his years of warfare he’d never done any fighting. He’d made the mistake so many opponents had made: he thought of Daigoro as a cripple, not a warrior.
And then Daigoro reminded him of Mio. Mio, who was Shichio’s superior in in every aspect of swordsmanship. Mio, the giant that lame little Daigoro defeated in single combat.
Daigoro put his hand to Glorious Victory Unsought, knowing that if he drew her he could not support her weight for long. His hands hurt too much. He’d asked too much of them in the fighting the night before. His forearm twinged just from the effort of wrapping his fingers around his weapon’s hilt.
“After you, General Shichio,” he said, filling his voice with every drop of confidence he could muster, hoping it was enough to patch over the exhaustion that made his voice sound like a rasp. He motioned toward the other end of the courtyard, and the dispersing crowd opened a corridor to the very spot where Daigoro had propped his foot on the mountainous General Mio. �
�I’m tired of your nonsense; let’s get this over with.”
Shichio’s eyes narrowed. He took a single step toward Daigoro, just enough to put him in striking range. His slender katana would be faster on the draw. A good samurai could cut Daigoro down before Glorious Victory even cleared her scabbard. A good samurai, or even just a fast peasant.
“You’re bluffing,” said Shichio.
“The fifty up the road thought so too,” said Daigoro.
Shichio’s eyes narrowed, scrutinizing him. No doubt they could read Daigoro’s exhaustion for what it was. No doubt they would note how heavily he favored his left foot, and therefore how badly hurt his right leg really was. But they would see more, too. Shichio was a liar and a cheat. That was how he thought, and men like him thought all other men were just as devious. More than once Daigoro had assumed Shichio would act like a samurai, but only because Daigoro himself thought and lived and breathed the code. Now, for the first time, Daigoro found the advantage in thinking like an ignoble backstabbing cur. Shichio thought everyone was a backstabber.
A muscle fluttered in Shichio’s cheek. He swallowed. A tiny tremor had settled into his right hand. Daigoro’s first instinct was to remain stone still. But that was samurai thinking. Instead, Daigoro said, “Do you plan to keep us waiting all day? Come on, make up your mind.”
He counted Shichio’s breaths, which came fast and shallow now. He wondered whether Shichio knew the old adage about the seven breaths.
“A duel to the death is too good for you,” Shichio said, loudly enough that everyone assembled could hear. He took a haughty step back and rammed his katana back home in its scabbard. Brushing the hair from his sweating brow, he said, “When I kill you, I’ll have you strung up like a common criminal.”
Daigoro heard Aki sigh with relief, and his mother too, and more than a few of the guests as well. Shichio snorted at him. “Be gone from this house by sundown,” the peacock said, proclaiming it as if it were an edict, “or I will have everyone here executed for treason.” On his way to the gate he spared a sneer for Daigoro’s mother, and for the infant Lord Yasuda in her arms. “My congratulations to the lucky couple. A lunatic and an infant! I’m sure you’ll be very happy together.”