Winter Raven

by Adam Baker

  Soldiers shouted and pounded the library door. Iron hinges creaked. The restraining bar rattled in its bracket with each impact. Motohide turned to face his wife.

  ‘Go to the back of the room,’ he said quietly.

  Asaji shook her head.

  ‘Go to the back of the room,’ he insisted. He pointed at his son. ‘He shouldn’t see this.’ Motohide stroked Asaji’s face. ‘Go on. You’ll be safe. He’s here for me. He won’t harm you.’

  Asaji hustled her son to the back of the room so he wouldn’t see the fight unfold. She hid behind shelves. She knelt with her son, held him close and sang a lullaby.

  The general turned to face the samurai and drew his sword.

  ‘I am General Motohide of the Takeda clan, son of Makoto, grandson of Mochizane.’

  The samurai didn’t reply. He was nothing. He was the room: the boards, the scrolls, the candlelight, the shadows, the air itself.

  The general and the samurai saluted each other. They lowered their swords until the tips almost touched and ignored the soldiers battering the library door. They shifted foot to foot. A lethal dance. Their movements slowing to a moment of absolute stillness as they each settled into the perfect posture to strike. They stood facing each other. The moment lasted an eternity.

  * * *

  Soldiers kicked at the library door.

  ‘Archers,’ bellowed Raku, addressing the squad of guards that had run to their aid. ‘The assassin is wearing armour. When we get inside, aim for his head.’

  They continued to kick at the door.

  ‘Wait,’ shouted Raku. He inspected the hinges. ‘Again. Together.’

  He gave a three-count. The soldiers threw themselves against the library door in unison. Wood began to splinter.

  ‘Again.’

  The soldiers hurled themselves forward. Hinge screws were wrenched from oak. The doors split from the frame and slewed open.

  The guards ran into the room. Raku pushed the troops aside and stood at their head. A team of archers followed and fanned. The samurai stood over Motohide’s body, sword in hand. The general lay on his back in a spreading pool of blood. His eyes were half open and there was a deep hack in his neck. Raku pushed back his mask and threw it aside. He stood a while looking down at the dead man and contemplated his absolute failure to protect his master. Archers took aim at the samurai and pulled their strings taut. They waited for the signal to fire.

  ‘The Emperor’s mother gave the order,’ said the samurai.

  ‘What?’ said Raku. He looked up distractedly.

  ‘The nun. She gave the order for the general’s death. Find her. Avenge your master.’

  The samurai locked gaze with Raku until he was sure the man comprehended what he was saying.

  ‘Your duty. Find her. Kill her.’

  Raku nodded. The samurai sighed. His work was done. He and Raku smiled at each other. Warriors wryly amused at their wretched state, one good arm between them. It was quiet in the library. No sound but the distant shouts of soldiers fighting flames in the courtyard and the subtle creak of bowstrings held at full tension.

  The samurai raised his sword in a salute and closed his eyes. Raku gave the signal and the archers fired. The samurai convulsed as a half dozen arrows punched deep into his face. He dropped his sword. It speared a floorboard and stood quivering. He toppled backward and sprawled dead by the general’s side.

  Something rolled across the floorboards and came to rest against Raku’s boot. He crouched and studied the object. He prodded it with a stump. A smooth, black pebble. The ceiling groaned like it was in pain. Raku straightened up.

  ‘Get the general’s wife and son out of here.’

  Soldiers escorted Asaji and the child from the room. A splintering crack from roof beams above their heads. The air was hazed blue.

  ‘Remove the general’s body.’

  ‘What about the assassin?’

  Raku looked down at the samurai’s body. The conflagration engulfing the tower would be a fitting pyre for the warrior.

  ‘Let him burn.’

  The girl hauled herself up the ice-glazed rock face. The crags and crevices of the mountainside were lit red by flame-light. Smoke stung her eyes. Ariyo sat on a ledge above, reached down and helped haul her up onto the plateau. Her fingers were numb. She rubbed her hands and tried to restore circulation.

  ‘Here,’ said Ariyo, tearing strips from the hem of her kimono. ‘Best bind your hands.’ He helped bandage her fingers with linen.

  The girl looked out over the castle rooftops. The tower was well alight. It had begun to list and collapse into itself. They could hear the distant crack of splintering beams and then a muffled crash as the internal structure, the floors and stairwell, gave way. The storehouse was an inferno. Fireballs unfurled into the air as barrels of oil combusted. Soldiers retreated across the courtyard as burning liquid washed across the cobbles. Most of the horses were dead in their stalls. Rats scurried from the blazing stables and ran in circles as they searched for refuge. The girl watched soldiers work in a chain to throw buckets of water onto the burning barracks – a hopeless task. There would be nothing left of the castle by morning but scorched foundations, but she imagined the troops would fight the fire all night. Their commanding officers wouldn’t have the courage to call a halt to the salvage effort and declare the stronghold lost.

  She saw Asaji and her son hustled from the collapsing tower. Soldiers helped the stricken woman climb into a hastily hitched hay cart. The castle gates were hauled open. The driver flicked the reins and the cart set out. It wove through the debris-strewn yard, out of the castle precincts and headed down the mountain road. Hard to guess what would become of the woman. Maybe she had relatives in Sekino, someone that would give her shelter, someone who could protect her son from whichever ambitious warlord replaced Motohide as ruler of Etchū. The child was now a fugitive.

  ‘We should go,’ said Ariyo. ‘We need to get as high as we can while we still have light.’

  They resumed their climb.

  * * *

  The girl and Ariyo huddled high on the mountainside and waited for daylight. They sheltered as best they could from a harsh night wind. Particles of snow stung their faces.

  ‘Don’t sleep,’ advised Ariyo. ‘Tameyo slept. He never woke.’

  The castle fires had burned out. The stables and kitchens were nothing more than charred beams. The tower was a mound of smouldering rubble. And somewhere at the heart of the debris lay the ashes of the samurai.

  ‘He was a brave man,’ said Ariyo. ‘I heard about men like him all my life. Warrior monks. Men of The Way. The stuff of legend. Never thought I’d meet one face-to-face. It has been a privilege to walk at his side.’

  He looked at the girl. She was crying.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘He was a good father. He prepared you for the world. As much as any parent can do.’

  The girl dried her eyes with her sleeve. She dug a folded paper from her obi, the scrap the samurai had passed to her as he said farewell. She read it by weak flamelight.

  Had I not known

  That I was dead

  Already

  I would have mourned

  My loss of life.

  She refolded the paper and carefully tucked it in her waistband.

  ‘No need to climb the summit of the mountain,’ said Ariyo, tactfully changing the subject. ‘We should get high enough to be out of sight of the soldiers then head for the western side. We’ll wait until sunrise then descend and head into the woods. The trees will give us good cover as we make for the river. They’ll keep us hidden. Help ensure we have an uncomplicated journey.’

  ‘Do you think we can outrun the general’s men?’

  ‘There won’t be many to outrun. The general is dead. The battle is over. Motohide’s troops just lost their Daimyō, their paymaster. Today they were samurai. Sunrise tomorrow they will be ronin. They’ll loot the ruins and head out at first light in search of another master.’


  ‘So we could stay here for the night then go back to the castle tomorrow.’

  ‘Yes. The place will be deserted. Nobody left but the ghosts of the dead. We could walk around the precincts at our leisure. But the place will have been stripped. No food. No equipment. Just ashes. Best if we moved on.’

  The girl dug into the hem of her sleeve and removed a black stone. She turned it in her hand for a moment then hurled it into the night. She listened to the pebble strike and skitter.

  ‘My father was a soldier,’ said Ariyo. ‘He farmed, most of the time. But every couple of years he was called to action. He brushed the rust from his helmet, kissed us goodbye and marched down the road with a bunch of village men. I asked him once what it was like. Battle. He said the toughest time came afterward. Returning home after all he’d seen and done. Picking up where he left off. Fixing fences. Feeding pigs. That was the hardest. Living. Just living.’

  They got to their feet and began to climb the rock face by the dying light of the castle fires.

  The soldiers found Masaie at dawn. A search team of twenty men fanned from the smouldering castle ruins, swords drawn. They scoured the lower mountainside looking for evidence of the assault party that attacked during the night. There was no strategic value in discovering the details of the assassination. Motohide was dead and his army was disbanding, but curiosity drove the men to unravel exactly what had happened the previous night.

  A couple of soldiers found Masaie by smell. The stench of his rotting leg drew them to where he lay against a tree. His eyes were closed. He had a bow in his hands with a pyrotechnic arrow strung ready to fire. The soldiers shouted for help and crept towards Masaie. Their sandaled feet scuffed stone. The man seemed dead. His face was white and his lips were blue.

  Masaie stirred and opened his eyes as they approached. He raised his head and gave them a broad smile like he was greeting friends. The soldiers were joined by a couple of archers. They drew their bows and took aim.

  ‘Better take him alive,’ advised the leader of the patrol. ‘Let’s see if we can find out who sent him.’ He unsheathed a knife and approached the prone man.

  Masaie had enough strength to draw a little tension on the bow-string. He loosed the arrow. The warhead hit the patrol leader in the chest and blew him to flaming offal. The archers fired. They put two arrows in Masaie’s heart. He slumped dead.

  The girl and Ariyo walked in silence through the wooded valley and then, as the afternoon drew on, they reached farmland and strolled through a vast grid of paddy fields. The girl stared dully ahead. The trek seemed unreal. She felt none of the urgency and oppressive threat that had marked their outward journey. Just a pervading sense of exhaustion and loss.

  They reached the river and walked the bank until they found the raft hidden beneath weeds. They tore away the weeds and pushed the raft into the water. Ariyo used a pole to steer the raft across the river and ferry the girl to the other side.

  ‘What will you do now?’ she asked.

  ‘Return to Kyoto. Try to find my mother.’

  ‘Be careful.’

  ‘I know the risks. But your samurai had his code and I have mine. Couldn’t live with myself if I left her to die.’

  He pulled three debt stones from his obi and rattled them in his fist.

  ‘Tameyo. Masaie. Their families will be there too. Maybe I can do something for them.’

  She nodded.

  ‘And what about you?’ he asked.

  ‘Make my way to Iga, I suppose. See if I can gain admittance to the ninja temples.’

  ‘Will they accept a girl?’

  ‘I’ll have to prove myself somehow. Find a way to demonstrate my skill.’

  They stood a while. Then Ariyo climbed on the raft and used the pole to push it clear of the bank. He nodded farewell then propelled the raft south against the sluggish current. He turned the corner and was gone.

  The nun sat in a palace garden and contemplated the denuded trees and bushes. Servants had brushed a marble bench free of snow and placed a cushion so she could sit in comfort. She wore a hooded cloak against the winter cold. Plain, as befitted her religious order. She tucked her hands in opposing sleeves to keep warm.

  The Emperor sat beside her, bored and cold. He understood his duty. He knew everyone from the lowliest peasant to the highest born aristocrat had a fated role. He was born to rule. A life of unending responsibility. But a treacherous voice at the back of his mind wanted to know why a living god couldn’t be master of his own time.

  The cloistered garden was an acre of artfully styled wilderness. Shrubs had been skilfully arranged to mimic untended countryside. Yet at the same time the configuration revealed the hand of a master gardener, someone able to exquisitely orchestrate space. In summer the garden was a green arbour, an oasis from the bustle of the Imperial court. In winter the garden was a maze of brittle branches frosted with ice.

  Servants had cleared snow from a marble table. A chart had been unrolled. A warrior statuette had been perched on each province so the nun could contemplate the fluid, interlocking balance of territorial power. She lifted a mounted soldier from Etchū and turned it in her hand.

  ‘So the general is gone. A brief rule. He will barely warrant a footnote in the chronicles.’ She set the toy soldier aside.

  ‘So what now?’ asked the Emperor.

  ‘We will put our own man in his place.’

  ‘How do we ensure our next proxy doesn’t develop similar dynastic ambitions?’

  ‘Why ask me?’ said the nun. ‘I won’t always be here to guide you. Think for yourself. Tell me your plan.’

  The Emperor sighed and thought it over. ‘A balance of power.’

  ‘Yes,’ said the nun.

  ‘The general grew too strong. He had significant tracts of agricultural land. Then he seized coastal trade routes. He made his territory self-sufficient.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘We should replace him, not with one man, but two. The territory must be split. Keep the fiefdoms small and dependent.’

  The nun nodded approval.

  ‘This is how you will take Honshu back from the Shōgun,’ she said. ‘You will regain your birthright one small piece at a time. It will be your life’s work. Your great task in years to come. You will be revered for it. Your descendants will build temples, keep a thousand candles burning in your name.

  * * *

  The nun walked alone in the garden, her sandaled feet sinking ankle-deep in snow. Her toes were numb but she didn’t mind. She leaned close and inspected twigs crusted with ice crystals. A weak sun overhead. The ice began to melt. Water droplets dripped and punctured pristine snow. She ran a finger the length of a twig and watched ice crystals liquefy on her fingertips.

  She returned to the table intending to set the statuettes aside and roll up the chart. She noticed a black object sitting on Etchū. A pebble. It hadn’t been there a moment ago. She picked it up. It was wet like someone spat it out.

  She turned around. A hooded figure stood two paces away. He wore a heavy black cloak spattered with mud like he’d been travelling a long while. How had he circumvented the guards? It didn’t matter now. The stranger raised his head. He wore a white mask with red lips and black eye holes. The nun stared in detached fascination. The man raised his arms and sleeves slid back. He had no hands. Blades protruded from stitched leather cups jammed over each wrist stump.

  ‘So you’re here to kill me,’ she said, addressing the mask.

  The figure didn’t reply.

  ‘Who are you? Don’t you want to tell me? Don’t you want me to know?’

  The figure remained silent.

  She heard distant shouts. Her personal guard had raised the alarm. An intruder had breached the perimeter defences and had been seen within the grounds. They would be too late to save her. So this was it. The moment of her death. She looked around at snow smothered trees. A beautiful garden. A fine place to die. She expected to be scared. Instead she felt calm, co
ntent. She held her arms cruciform.

  ‘I am ready.’

  Shouts and approaching footsteps. Soldiers close by, drawing their swords. Troops sprinting through the nearby anterooms of the palace towards the cloister garden.

  The nun closed her eyes. A double knife thrust ripped into her belly. Excruciating, sense-obliterating pain robbed her of breath. The nun was lifted clean off her feet. A shrieking inhalation as blades drove further into her gut. She opened her eyes one last time to gaze up into grey skies.

  Spring. A young man walked down a country lane. His name was Zenjirou. He was a bugeisha, an itinerant warrior monk. His few possessions were carried in a bag slung over his shoulder. He owned a sword, a knife, a bowl and a blanket. He had no attachments, allowed nothing in his life that might distract from his pursuit of The Way.

  Zenjirou had been raised on a farm but he didn’t want to spend his life knee-deep in paddy water so one day, following an argument with his father, he walked out the house and never came back. Luckily it was summer. There was fruit on the trees and the nights were warm. He dreamed of becoming a warrior but he knew if he entered the service of the local lord he would be treated as a lowly foot soldier and assigned menial chores. He would be given a rusted iron helmet and spear, and be paid a subsistence stipend to guard a grain store someplace. He would stand all day propped up by a rusted naginata as he struggled to stay awake.

  Zenjirou wanted to fight. He wanted to become a master swordsman. So he took to the road and travelled place to place. He did a little manual labour in return for food and shelter on cold nights. He had no patron, no hope of formal training. So each day he practised alone in the woods. He trimmed a branch to the length of a sword and honed his speed and agility. After a summer spent meditating by the side of a lake, he decided he was ready to face his first contest.