Risuko

by David Kudler

  Chiyome-sama gave her own mirthless chuckle. “Welcome back, gentlemen! Masugu has gotten rid of the rascals he was chasing, so we know about that. What’s the rest of the news from the valley?”

  The elder of the Little Brothers nodded deferentially. “We checked with most of the farms here in the center of the valley. All of them survived the blizzard intact, though a few animals wandered off into the snow.”

  “Their bodies will probably be found once the spring thaws come,” added the younger Little Brother, “so not too much was lost.”

  The elder pursed his lips, and the younger lapsed back into their habitual silence.

  Aimaru cleared his throat. “Masugu-san rode up as far as where the valley narrows. He said that he heard tell of some fighting down by the garrison.”

  Chiyome-sama grunted. “There is always fighting down by the garrison.”

  “It must be all of those soldiers,” said Mieko. If it had been anyone but she, I’d have sworn it was a joke. The other women chuckled, but they stopped when Chiyome-sama glared at them.

  The older Little Brother said, “Masugu-san was told that the garrison had caught and killed several more of the band of raiders that we met on the way in.”

  After pursing her lips for a moment, Lady Chiyome nodded at the Little Brother, and then walked toward Aimaru. “I like my food fresh,” she said, pointing to the caged chickens, “but I must say, I generally prefer not to eat it live.”

  “Er, no, my lady,” answered Aimaru. “The farmer said that he’d been told not to slaughter them.”

  “Told?” said Lady Chiyome, voice raised but grinning. Aimaru looked as if he might faint. “What an odd thing to tell the man. Who would do such a thing?”

  Again a giggle passed among the women; this time Chiyome did not stop it.

  Aimaru gulped. “I... I do not know, my lady.”

  I could see Emi across from me, still frowning down at the ground. Her lips were moving silently.

  Lady Chiyome gave her dry, rasping chuckle. “Well, I suppose someone will have to slaughter the things. Novices.”

  “Yes, Chiyome-sama,” we all three said together, far more in concert than we ever managed to be in Sachi-sensei’s music lessons.

  “Relieve this young gentlemen of his burden and get these chickens ready for Kee Sun.”

  “But—?” I found myself saying. After that morning, after watching the battle, after watching two men die, I couldn’t imagine plucking chickens.

  “Do it. Now.”

  “Yes, Chiyome-sama,” I said. Emi and Toumi echoed me. We all approached Aimaru; he seemed as if he were about to say something, but I shook my head. Emi and Toumi picked the pole up over his shoulders and we began to walk back toward the kitchen.

  “Oh, no,” said Lady Chiyome. “Kee Sun is very superstitious about never slaughtering anything in the kitchen. He always insists that it be killed outside. Something to do with the animals’ spirits cursing the food or some such silliness.”

  I looked at the other two girls. Toumi was grimly not looking at me—or at anyone else, I think. Her lips were pressed together so hard they were white.

  Emi nodded for a moment and then turned back to Lady Chiyome. “Should we slaughter them out here, my lady?”

  “An excellent idea,” said Chiyome. “Certainly no chance of some angry chicken spirit haunting the kitchens from here.”

  “Yes, my lady,” said Emi, her mouth bending downward.

  I looked into the closest of the cages, which was just below Emi’s fingers. The hen was glaring at me with reptilian, golden eyes. I thought of the blood that I had already seen that day. My stomach churned.

  “Do it, girls.” Lady Chiyome continued to smile. Her expression did not help. “Have you never killed a chicken before?”

  Once again we all answered with one thin voice. “No, my lady.”

  “Well, then,” she said with another chuckle, “this should be entertaining.”

  The women around us all laughed—even the initiates. Suddenly all eyes were on the three of us, standing there in the snowy courtyard, gawking uncertainly at a dozen chickens in cages.

  I don’t know about the other two, but I couldn’t tear my eyes away from that chicken’s gaze.

  With a snarl, Toumi dropped her end of the pole, setting the stack of suspended cages on the ground. She reached out and flicked the latch to the top cage.

  “Toumi, no—!” I said, but she was too quick—she flung open the door to the cage and went to reach in.

  What I’d been trying to say, as any girl not raised on city streets would know, was that quick as Toumi’s hands might have been, a chicken that senses escape is even quicker. It gave Toumi’s reaching palm a vicious peck with its beak, and when Toumi flinched back it exploded into the air, an irate fury of feathers and useless wings.

  I grabbed for it, but caught nothing but a couple of loose feathers.

  The assembled women—and even, I think, the Little Brothers—all burst into raucous laughter as the hen, newly liberated, decided to make the most of its newfound freedom and half-flew, half-scurried away from us and toward the stable.

  I ran after it, trying not to think what I was going to do with it if I caught it. Emi trotted off to my right; at first I couldn’t think what she was doing, but then I realized she was trying to keep the bird from moving toward the still-open gate or the storerooms.

  Our audience was calling out what sounded like what was meant to be encouragement. “Don’t let it get you! Vicious beasts, chickens!”

  I wanted to climb to the top of the hemlock tree and hide.

  Instead I kept on after the chicken, gaining on it. Trying not to think of Masugu riding down the white-cloaked rider. I lunged, trying to grab it by its tail, but it swerved away to the left.

  “The great hall,” panted Emi, and I could see that she meant that we should herd it toward the largest building in the compound, where it would have the hardest time escaping us. We sprinted after it, me to one side of the creature and Emi to the other.

  The chicken squawked madly as it tried to stay away from us, but eventually it ran out of room—the great hall loomed before it, blocking any flight in that direction, and Emi and I stood like hunting dogs, cutting off any escape back toward the courtyard. Poor chicken, I found myself thinking. If only you could fly. Mad eyes glared at us as it sought a fresh chance at freedom.

  Emi lunged, trying to grab the hen by its head—trying to keep from getting pecked as Toumi had—but of course that left it free to scratch with its feet, scoring Emi’s grasping fingers. Before the bird could get away, I pulled off the winter jacket that I was wearing and threw it over the bird, dropping my weight on top of it so that it couldn’t escape once more.

  A cheer went up among the watching crowd. “Well wrestled, Risuko!” shouted one of the women, and the rest hooted and cackled.

  I lay there panting. The bird was struggling beneath me, trying to find its way out of the jacket. I looked up at Emi, who was sucking at the cuts on her fingers. She didn’t seem to have any suggestions for what to do next. Picking up the bundle, holding it tightly, I looked for someone to give it to. It fought in my grasp, and its head poked out through the neck of the jacket, desperately looking for something to peck at.

  They all stood there, grinning and laughing, even the men.

  I stared down at the chicken, which was squawking again, loudly and furiously. This could be the soul of someone I know, I thought. At that moment, Toumi stepped up, grabbed the bird’s head, and twisted it so that the neck gave a dull snap.

  I dropped it; the chicken’s body struggled for a few moments, trying even then to run out from under the jacket, though its neck hung limp.

  I backed away until I slammed into the wall of the great hall. I turned, and emptied my stomach against the stone foundation.


  As I stood there, retching, I felt a hand touch my shoulder. Turning, I saw that Mieko was holding out a handkerchief. I took it and wiped my face.

  I tried to hand it back to her, but she stood there, her face still. “All that lives dies,” she said. “All that lives, lives on the living.”

  I gawked at her. Mieko-san smiled sadly, and walked away.

  —

  Once we had killed the remainder of the birds, we brought them to Kee Sun, who informed us that they should be prepared for him to grill them. As we cleaned the chickens, my hands trembled, and my gorge rose and rose again.

  I had been plucking and butchering chickens for long enough that I hardly noticed the mess or the smell. Why was this any different? The other animals had been just as dead.

  And yet their deaths had been somehow distant. Another person’s actions, another person’s dream.

  Perhaps it was watching those two men die. The blood. The shocked expressions.

  I looked up, swallowing back the bitter taste of my own discomfort.

  Toumi was standing, still as the table against which she was leaning. Her face was white. She saw me looking at her, clenched her jaw, and went back to dismembering the carcass.

  I glanced over at Emi. She had been watching too. Her forehead was shiny with sweat. She nodded, and we both went back to cutting up the meat for that evening’s meal.

  Kee Sun announced that he was going “to visit the King,” and wandered out into the snow, which had begun falling heavily once again. No sooner had the door closed behind him than Toumi turned to me and pointed up.

  For once I didn’t feel like climbing, but when Emi too pointed up toward the grate, I sighed and scampered up into the rafters. I had no sooner started to tiptoe my way toward the grate, however, when I heard a howl of anger from the hall, and I leapt back down. Feeling as if I must have been caught, I tensed, ready to climb again.

  The howl sounded again, and Emi and Toumi were both staring at the door to the hall, their mouths open.

  “Get everyone, in here! RIGHT NOW!” shouted Chiyome-sama.

  A muffled voice answered her, but she didn’t wait for it to finish before bellowing, “I DON’T CARE! Someone get the three little wretches in here, and Mieko, stop simpering at me and tell the boys to get in here at once!”

  The three of us stood frozen, gawping at each other.

  “Did you let someone see you, Mouse?” hissed Toumi.

  I shook my head desperately.

  One of the women slid open the door. “Follow me,” she said to us all. “Your mistress commands it.”

  Gulping, we followed.

  The great hall had been transformed. The three long tables were pushed back to the wall opposite the front door. Beneath the shrine, where Lady Chiyome usually sat, stood a suit of battered bamboo armor stuffed with straw. From the chest protruded several slender blades.

  Chiyome-sama stood, arms knotted before her, halfway down the stairs from her apartment. She looked a very small thundercloud, and I didn’t want to be the first one struck by lightning.

  The older women looked just as nervous as I felt, all staring down at the floor, their loose hair hiding their faces.

  As soon as a blast of cold air announced the arrival of Masugu, Aimaru, and the Little Brothers, Lady Chiyome barked, “So.”

  She scanned the assembled crowd until her eyes met mine. “So,” she repeated, “someone has been visiting my room. Visiting my room and looking through my belongings.”

  Silence answered her. I couldn’t help but hold her gaze.

  “You are not welcome there,” she continued. “None of you. I will see to it that these gentlemen make your lives very, very unpleasant before they make it very, very short.” At last her gaze released me. I began to breathe again. “Do you understand me, girls?”

  “Yes, Chiyome-sama,” we all mumbled.

  “WHAT?”

  “YES, CHIYOME-sama!” we all shouted together.

  “You three!” she called to us. “Don’t just stand there. Get dinner ready!”

  With that, she stormed back up the stairs, and we scurried back to the kitchen.

  Kee Sun was back, wandering along the storage shelves, muttering in Korean.

  Still stunned, we watching him until he suddenly yelled something, and then turned to us, his cleaver in his hand. “None of yeh lot went and stole a bottle of the sake, now did yeh?” It sounded perhaps as if he might be joking. However, he growled the question again: “Did yeh?”

  We shook our heads and, twitching, returned to our work. What would one of us do with a bottle of wine?

  26—Climbing the Walls

  The cook was in an even fouler mood than usual, because one of the jars of rice wine had gone missing. He made it very clear that he suspected one of us.

  Emi had gone all but silent, though she would occasionally look my way, her perpetual frown lightening in a way that seemed to suggest a greeting.

  The blizzard descended again, and it felt like as much of an attack as the charge of the two horsemen. More of an attack.

  The other inhabitants of the Full Moon were clearly feeling the oppression of the weather as keenly as I was. Where the dining hall was usually alive with raucous conversation, only two people were talking there at all: Lady Chiyome and Fuyudori. Lady Chiyome was telling an elaborate joke at my expense—something about how most squirrels were supposed to hibernate during the winter, but some poor, silly ones clearly liked climbing icy trees instead.

  The only person who laughed was Fuyudori. She had managed to seat herself on one side of Masugu-san, where the elder of the Little Brothers usually sat. She tittered into her hand, her flashing eyes fastened to the lieutenant’s face. “Of course,” she said, “the wolf hunts all through the winter,” and tittered again.

  I had no idea what she was talking about, nor—judging from his expression—did Masugu.

  Mieko-san understood something. She slammed down the cup of sake that I had just refilled for her, splashing the rice wine onto the black lacquered table and into dead Kuniko’s rice. Then she stood, her usually pale face dark. She rose with a jerk. “Good evening, my lady,” she said, bowing stiffly to Chiyome-sama. “Gentlemen.” She bowed to the Little Brothers and to Aimaru, who blinked back.

  Turning in a flash of red-and-white silk, she strode out of the room.

  Mopping up the spilled sake and picking up the abandoned plate, I glanced toward Lady Chiyome, who was smirking at the lieutenant. He shook his head like a wet dog, and then he too stood and bowed to Lady Chiyome. “I believe that I should also retire for the night if I am to get out tomorrow morning for a patrol.”

  Then he too left the hall.

  Lady Chiyome gave her odd, dry chuckle and glanced sidelong at Fuyudori, who was beaming as if she had done something very clever. What it might have been I still couldn’t guess.

  Then, with a cluck of her tongue, Lady Chiyome returned to her meal. The rest of the remaining party silently followed her example.

  I picked up the nearly untouched plates to either side of Chiyome-sama’s and brought them back to the kitchen.

  When I returned with two nearly full plates, Kee Sun slammed his cleaver down into the table. “What’re those worthless lumps complaining about now!”

  “Mieko-san and Masugu-san... are... not feeling well,” I said. “They retired early.”

  “Retired early,” sneered Toumi.

  “I think they were unhappy with each other.” Emi had come in from the main hall after me.

  “For a change,” muttered Toumi.

  Kee Sun yanked his knife free, gave us a sour look, and then slammed the blade back into the table. Pointing to me he snapped, “Rubbish. Out.”

  “Hai, Kee Sun-san.” I grabbed the basket and strode toward the door.

  “Robes!” barked Ke
e Sun, but I was already through the door.

  “I will be right back, Kee Sun-san.” The fact of the matter is that I was happy to be away from everyone—not to have to think about who was talking about me, who was watching me, or who was trying to ignore me. The night was cold and the snow was barely falling—tiny flakes appearing out of the dark sky around me as swarming moths around a torch.

  Squirrels should be hibernating? I thought, stomping toward the door that led through the back wall to the rubbish pit. Ha!

  As I put down the steaming basket of bones and burnt rice to unbar the small rear gate, I heard a bang in the darkness—not from the great hall, but from the direction of the Retreat.

  I have no memory of making the decision to climb the wall in order to creep across to the other side of the compound and investigate. It was more as if the decision made me. I found myself atop the thick wall, stepping carefully between sharp spikes of bamboo, wondering what it was that I thought I was going to see, and what I could possibly say to whoever had made the sound if they caught me. The faint light of the great hall—spilling from the shuttered doors and windows of the opposite side—caused the ice and snow on the wall top to glisten very slightly, or I would have had no idea where to put my feet.

  A sound wafted through the falling snow, muffled and indistinct—a voice. Two? The same as the ones I’d heard in the woods?

  I made my way along the wall, lifting my feet carefully over the spikes and loose pebbles. The snow flurried, dancing in the wind, and I lost sight of the great hall, so that the whole world seemed to be bounded by snow: just the top of that wall and me.

  I heard the sound again, closer but still ahead of me. It was definitely two voices, but they were still too muffled for me to understand what they were saying, or even to know for certain to whom they belonged. Then the wind whipped across my face and I had to move forward even more cautiously, feeling my way with my hands.

  At the edge of the bubble of flake-filled air that bounded my vision, I made out two looming shapes: one to the right—a roof, the Retreat—and ahead of me the corner of the compound wall.