The Pillow Book of the Flower Samurai

by Barbara Lazar

  ‘This? What is “this”?’ Tokikazu’s feet took a defensive stance.

  ‘“This” is your encouraging the honourable Lord Taira no Michimori’s wife. Even he saw it tonight with that sword. You must stop. You,’ Akio turned to me, ‘and Kozaishō are in danger. Nearly dishonour and disloyalty.’ Akio eyed Tokikazu from his superior height. ‘He prevented your seppuku once, Tokikazu, when Kozaishō and he were married. Yes, I heard. That does not mean you are immune to his wrath. Stop this.’

  I did not realise Tokikazu’s attachment to me was so evident, but the sword and scabbard had announced it. Such a gift belonged only to a husband or lover. Akio, once again, had lit the Path of Right Action for me. Although I admired the sword and scabbard, and Tokikazu, I had not shown an attraction to him.

  ‘Should I return the sword and scabbard?’ I asked Akio later.

  ‘Perhaps that would be best. Or you may wish to ask your husband.’

  My husband said nothing about the sword or the quiver. I made sure to wear the armour for him, praising its every detail and his solicitude that evening, and ordered Misuki’s brush for a suitable poem in silver ink on indigo paper. He did not speak all night and sent me early to my apartments. Tokikazu’s gift had upset him. What was I to do? I valued Tokikazu’s friendship, but Akio’s admonishments indicated that I should change my behaviour.

  Many days later, Tokikazu sat beside me, but not as close as he had before, and motioned a servant away. ‘The great Tenjin came to me in a dream,’ he confided.

  Tenjin, the calligraphy deity, rode not a horse but a bull. His crest was the beautiful plum tree. My pilgrimage to Kitano, Tenjin’s shrine, had not improved my brush. I had grasped a plum branch in one hand while attempting to write, but it had not helped.

  ‘Tenjin wore many robes in alternating black and white. In one arm he carried a huge ink stone, with papers under it. In the other hand he carried a tachi – your sword! I recognised the scabbard with its tree design.

  ‘In my dream I asked, “Why do you carry Kozaishō’s sword?” He placed the ink stone on a small table, and put papers next to it. He unsheathed the sword, lifted it and, with the Torso Severer Stroke, broke the ink stone.

  ‘Then Tenjin said, “Teach the characters with sword movements, and she will learn.” He turned, left everything on the table, including the sword and its scabbard, and disappeared into a mist.’

  ‘I do not understand. Please explain what this means,’ Misuki begged.

  ‘I will teach Kozaishō characters as if it were swordplay, something at which she excels.’ He took my tachi and fought some invisible demon in the air in front of him.

  I was puzzled.

  He said, ‘Observe, and do as I do. Pretend I am teaching you a new stroke.’ I watched again as he fought an imaginary foe. I imitated with my sword, which was not difficult.

  ‘There! Do you not see? You have written “Taira” against the sky!’ He was delighted. ‘Try it again by yourself.’

  I did as I had been told. Several times, often with minor corrections, I rendered the sword strokes in the air. After many tries with Tokikazu, he signalled to a servant, standing nearby, who handed me the prepared brush.

  He thrust a piece of paper on to the bare ground and demanded I perform the same sword strokes on the paper. Reluctantly I did so. Although I had little hope of a fair result, I did not hesitate, because he seemed so enthusiastic.

  ‘But, first, close your eyes. Pretend you are doing it in the air.’

  I did so – and we gazed, astounded, at the work on the paper.

  Tokikazu was jubilant.

  After sufficient repetitions in the air, I composed several adequate characters. We worked on this every day. Over the next months I spent less and less time practising in the air before I could perfect the brush. From that first day, and every day, I gave thanks not only to Tenjin but also to Tokikazu who made my success possible.

  That first evening Tokikazu brought a poem to celebrate my success:

  Below azure sky

  Sword strokes cut through the breezes

  With bull and with plum

  Kozaishō writes on air and earth

  And then finally on paper

  Later, he gave me a little fan-shaped book with an extract from the Lotus Sutra. It was like those I had seen when I had first come to Rokuhara, lacquered over flakes of gold and silver, with drawings above the text.

  The poem and the book remained in a secret place where Michimori would never see them. Akio’s threats of dishonour and disloyalty persisted in my thoughts. My friendship and attraction to Tokikazu could not be mistaken for the great sympathy I held for Michimori. Lighting candles and incense, I resolved to be wary of sharing this attraction with Tokikazu, lest I lose my husband. Having seen seppuku at Byōdōin, I did not delight in the thought of it, especially mine.

  BOOK 15

  I. Festivals and Famine

  More than a year of drought, famine and melancholy unfolded. By the Third Month of the new year, even our serving girls were grateful for the Festival of Iwashimizu – a change from the previous year’s mourning and solemn ceremonies for the deaths of Emperor Takakura and Chancellor Kiyomori, the unrelenting scrutiny of other wives and the rest of the court. Misuki’s ear for gossip about colours helped me avoid being the target of such chatter.

  To Emi, I explained, ‘We are going on a trip. There is to be a great procession. There will be dancers and singers at the shrine.’ I enjoyed her enthusiasm on such occasions. She lightened our spirits.

  The travel was not arduous. The Iwashimizu no Hachiman Shrine was west of Uji and a little south of where two rivers merged to form the Yodo river. As I stole glances from my curtained palanquin, Tokikazu approached its door repeatedly. ‘Is your dagger at the ready? A samurai is ever alert.’

  Akio’s eyebrows danced whenever Tokikazu drew close.

  I viewed evergreens, browning after a dry winter, dying large-leafed cypresses and pasania oaks. Emi loved to see ducks on the river. Geese were Misuki’s favourite. She said their flight was so graceful. I was enthralled by the cranes: their bodies, especially their necks, held such a splendid shape against the sky.

  The music and dancing at the shrine delighted me, despite my necessary wariness. Before returning, I asked Tokikazu and Akio for permission to follow the dancers and singers through Heian-kyō to Rokuhara to see more performances. Tokikazu agreed. He loved the music too, especially gagaku, formal courtly music. I preferred bagaku, with dancing and music.

  Tokikazu led us through the two-storeyed Main South Gate. Beside it beggars sat on the ground, hollow-cheeked men and women with their large-eyed, big-bellied children, huddled in tatters. Most of the babies lay motionless, not crying or babbling, only staring out to some event of which no one else was aware. Through the streets ubiquitous clusters of priests passed my palanquin. Each time, my pulse quickened and my hands closed on my dagger. My eyes focused on one face after another, searching for a broken nose. Akio’s eyes flicked this way and that. The priests without hoods appeared full-cheeked, and they all ignored the beggars.

  Inside the gate, next to the temples, more beggars amassed with street prostitutes. They presented an uncomfortable contrast to the temple’s red pillars and white walls. They wore tattered clothes and bore lesions on their bodies. Their hair had become thickened dirt mats. Emi wept at such sights. Misuki comforted her, but I was silent. I had never seen such desperation.

  Tokikazu guided us by way of a main street. Dogs and people collected there, more than I had seen together except in battle. Sick, shrunken women and children gazed out of spiritless eyes, their bones barely held together with mottled skin. I gave thanks to the Gods for my good karma. What could I do to assist? There were thousands, and we were so few. I wondered what these people had done in their past lives to deserve such wretchedness.

  Famine in the land

  Sickened peasants crowd the streets

  Like poisoned rats dying
>
  Flies hover above bodies

  Infants suckle dead mothers

  That night heavy winds, and cats mating, disrupted my sleep. I stepped over servants and wandered into my garden, lit by a three-quarters Spring Moon. I took respite from the day’s intense surveillance in Grand Room. The scent of peach and pear blossoms mixed with that of wisteria. Frogs provided an inharmonious drumming from their pond.

  Even under my umbrella, the draught carried a recognisable incense that aroused me. The combination of cinnamon, musk and sweet pine arrived on the breeze, but not from my garden. My hand fingered my dagger. I paced back to the azaleas, nearer to my apartments and protection.

  ‘Kozaishō.’

  The voice was as sweet as the scent. Tokikazu. I had heard it in my memory, like this wind – ever present and lingering on my armour’s leather. I had bathed in his incense, behind, beside and around me as I had travelled from the Uji Bridge to Rokuhara and on the training field, day after day after day since that time.

  ‘How did you evade the guards?’

  ‘I found a way.’ A form moved out of the shadows. Tokikazu’s face glowed in the moonlight.

  ‘Have you found Goro?’ I was ready. My hand clenched my sword, and my mind went to blood.

  ‘No. This is not about vengeance. This is about – I come to you because – because I could not remain away another . . . night.’ His voice lightened to the weight of a dried leaf. ‘I have tenderness for you, Kozaishō.’

  His words and presence moistened my Jade Gate, despite the lusty winds and the night. He said words I had not dared send into the air. Shivers crawled along my limbs and between my legs. My head buzzed with contradictory passions, my new, deeper sympathy for Michimori, my tenderness for Tokikazu and my struggles to uphold my honour, my honourable status, as wife of Commander Taira no Michimori, Governor of Echizen Province, Third Rank. I repeated my husband’s full name to myself. I tried to see his face, but all I could see was Tokikazu’s, right in front of me.

  ‘You are quiet. What do you say?’ He moved nearer and slipped under my umbrella, his musk and sweet pine crowding our windless space.

  My body heated. My knees released. Yet somehow I was able to say, ‘What can I honourably say? I am married. I am samurai. You are also samurai and married. Twice.’

  ‘No one is here.’ He placed my hand across his palm and lifted it to his cheek, stroking it along the side of his face. ‘We could, at least, have tonight.’

  I wanted to embrace the warmth and fragrance emanating from his vigorous body. The body I had touched and that had touched mine often, only in practice.

  ‘N-no.’ The word tumbled from my lips as if I were possessed. That was not my thought, not my hunger, not what I craved.

  He pushed his body closer, still holding my hand to his face. ‘You know I have great affection for you. I think you have the same for me.’

  Yes! I heard myself say. Yes! Yet again I murmured, ‘N-no.’

  ‘Your words disagree with your eyes.’ Tokikazu clicked his tongue.

  The sound reminded me of my mother. It jolted me into remembering my commitment to uphold my family’s honour. ‘I pledged my loyalty to Taira no Michimori, as you have. We are both married. Akio has taught me the Noble Eight-fold Path. If you care for me, and I know you do, will you not assist me to take the Right Action?’

  Tokikazu released my hand and clenched his into fists.

  ‘My adored one, if the Four Noble Truths of the Buddha are indeed true, then although we may ache with longing, our attraction is not real or permanent.’ I stepped away. ‘What is permanent? Honour, loyalty and obedience. When we obtain our release from this life, perhaps we may be together in the next.’

  ‘Kozaishō, with your eloquent speech, I am set again on the Noble Eight-fold Path, however reluctantly.’ He bent his neck and withdrew from my umbrella. ‘I pledge to you, on my honour and love for you and Michimori, I will not deviate again.’

  The winds had dispersed his tears, but not the stifled fervour in his voice.

  I was allowed but a moment. Voices and footsteps echoed behind us, quieting the frogs. Sadakokai and Misuki strolled into the garden. I lowered my umbrella to cover my streaked face. Tokikazu made a gestural bow and left.

  ‘Why are you out here in these winds so late? I thought you were asleep,’ Misuki said.

  She had forgotten herself.

  ‘How did Tokikazu enter this garden without m-m-my guards alerting me?’ Sadakokai said.

  ‘To what purpose are you here?’ I said.

  ‘You gave me permission, my Lady Kozaishō.’ Misuki used formal language, and her words forced icicles between us.

  ‘Even T-T-Tokikazu does not have authority to enter your garden, my lady, without the knowledge of the One-in-Charge-for-the-Hours, as I am t-t-tonight.’

  Trapped like a rabbit. The frogs started their tiny drums again. I returned to my apartments, but I wondered if others had overheard.

  II. Spiders

  Sunlight, a breeze, and the hototogisu’s songs, the Fifth Month, summer: the day of another Tango Festival had arrived. Horse-racing and archery contests were to take place later. Misuki sought these events after she had filled every room with iris and mugwort to push away evil spirits. She had also ordered servants to bring Great Luck Rice Cakes – mochi and mugwort stuffed with sweet azuki paste. They were ugly and green, and I did not want to eat them.

  Misuki grew stern. ‘Everyone must eat at least one of these. With no rain and little rice, we need all the luck we can attract.’

  Misuki was right and relentless.

  I ate one.

  On that particular day, as most days, my routine began with a walk through my garden before I met Tokikazu and Akio, who followed me, for drills on the fields or to Grand Room.

  At mid-morning, the Hour of the Sheep, after an arduous session with the bokken, I returned to my apartments to wash myself and dress. I was required to be behind the screens before Michimori presided over Grand Room. In the midst of these ministrations, Number Two Serving Girl came into the room, interrupting, and said Akio demanded an audience.

  ‘Did he say about what?’

  ‘No, my Lady Kozaishō.’

  I checked with Misuki, who nodded. She dressed me, and we went behind my curtain in the front room while I talked with Akio, as was correct. At first this curtain, kichō, had seemed extremely odd to me: when I was inside the house, I was allowed to see men, other than my family, even those I knew well, only behind this curtain on its little platform.

  ‘Please forgive the intrusion, but I must speak with you alone,’ Akio said to the curtain.

  Misuki stepped out from behind it, made a perfunctory bow, and left.

  ‘Please whisper, Akio. There are flowers and birds around us,’ I reminded him of our code, as I slipped on one robe after another until all ten were arranged.

  ‘Kozaishō, I come to save you.’

  ‘From what? From whom?’ Was this Goro? Or someone else? My fingers tensed, but I had not yet replaced my weapons. I glanced to see if Misuki had brought them. She had not.

  ‘I remind you of Fifth Daughter.’

  I did not move.

  ‘The one sold for land,’ he continued.

  My throat tightened, and I took a step away, dropping to my knees. Then I pushed back my shoulders. I had not thought of her in a great while. ‘I am no longer Fifth Daughter.’

  ‘I fear you have forgotten the honour of the family and the duty she owes her emperor, her clan, her husband and herself.’

  ‘After all I have done? You dare to question me?’

  ‘Please lower your voice. It was I who first put a bow into your hand. It was I who told you about honourable Hiroshi. It was I who followed you to the Village of Outcasts. Who more than I to remind you of honour and duty?’

  ‘Yes, Akio. I remember a little girl torn from her family. She wears the scars from Chiba’s floggings. She wears the scars from vicious men at the Village.
’

  ‘Kozaishō, I will tell you again. True happiness comes from the Noble Eight-fold Path.’ He spat out the list.

  I thought of my submission to Goro and was blinded by tears. ‘I do. I have. I am samurai. The Buddha has led me to this Right Livelihood. To what else could you refer?’

  He lowered his voice to the loudness of a cat’s lick. ‘Tokikazu. He is samurai, also. Why did you meet him alone in your garden?’

  ‘Did Misuki tell you?’

  ‘Sadakokai. Only in concern for your and his master’s honour.’

  ‘So he was the one.’

  ‘I want to talk about you. If you do not desist, I promise to follow you, stay close to you. I will confront Tokikazu if you do not stop.’

  Panic flashed through me. ‘You would not dare! I am loyal to Michimori.’

  A voice came from the back room. ‘Yes, Akio. She is. She has been honourable.’

  ‘Misuki?’ Akio and I said at the same time.

  ‘Yes, it is I.’ Misuki’s voice contained little of the humility she used when caught in the middle of suspicious or meddling actions.

  ‘You were dismissed. Why are you here?’ My tone was more severe than I had intended.

  ‘Because of my faithfulness to you. I could not allow Akio to falsely indict you. Akio, it is untrue! I was there!’

  ‘Sadakokai said you were, Misuki. I know.’

  ‘Then why are you condemning Kozaishō?’ Misuki’s voice was quiet and meek now.

  ‘Because to say “no” once in a garden is not enough. Because I know Tokikazu. Because I have seen you two training on the practice field when Lord Michimori is not present.’

  ‘There has been only Right Action on my part.’ I did not know if the trembling in my body or voice could be seen or heard.

  Misuki stood between Akio and my curtain. In her sternest manner she said, ‘That is true, Akio. I would know.’

  I parted the curtain and stared directly at Akio. ‘I deeply regret your suspicion of me. You have been father to me. I tell you the truth and am content with that.’

  ‘Well, please be assured, all I spoke out of respect and profound concern for you. But I will communicate with Tokikazu again, if necessary.’ Akio made a small bow and strode away.