The Sword That Cut the Burning Grass

by Dorothy Hoobler

  Seikei obeyed.

  “Now take the others into the garden outside the lodge,” Reigen said. “I will see that Yabuta does no more harm.”

  The three young people left the lodge and found a stone garden that badly needed raking and cleaning. “Whenever I thought of this place, I remembered this garden,” Yasuhito said. “My mother would hold me on her lap and tell me stories. It was the last time I was happy.”

  Hato gave Seikei a look. “Tell him who you really are,” she said. “I’m tired of keeping your secret.”

  “Keeping my secret?” said Seikei. “What about the servant you sent to find me at Ponzu’s castle?”

  “Well, I had to tell her,” said Hato. “And it worked out all right. You found us, didn’t you?”

  Seikei had no answer for this. Which was just as well, for Reigen emerged from the house just then.

  “You must kneel,” he told Seikei and Hato. Seikei did so at once, but Hato was indignant and had to be coaxed.

  Then Reigen stood facing Yasuhito. “Grandson,” he said, “tell me about the night you spent in the hut at the ceremony when you were raised to the throne. When sunrise came, did you look in the mirror that is one of the three treasures of Amaterasu?”

  “The mirror? No, Grandfather, I was upset because I thought Amaterasu had failed to come visit me.”

  Reigen looked at the sky. Seikei followed his gaze. It was a clear, crisp day and the sun was almost overhead. It was so bright that it was impossible for Seikei to keep his eyes raised for long.

  When he looked down, he saw Reigen take a flat, shining object from his kimono. “Here,” he said to Yasuhito, “here is what you should have seen.” He tilted the sacred mirror until it reflected the rays of the sun directly into Yasuhito’s face.

  Yasuhito, who should have blinked, instead stared intently into the light. He reached forward to touch the mirror. “Grandfather!” he said. “I see her! She looks . . . like me.”

  “So she should,” said Reigen. “For you are her true descendant.”

  Having waited so long, Yasuhito seemed unable to take his eyes from what he saw in the mirror. Seikei watched the boy’s face. It changed—became more like Reigen’s, even though they were far apart in age. Before this, Yasuhito had seemed like just another boy, and not one Seikei would care to know well. Now it was clear who he was.

  When the ceremony was over, Reigen said to Seikei and Hato, “You may come and bow to the emperor.”

  Seikei did so, and felt it was an honor he would always remember. He took off his headband and laid it before the emperor. His task was accomplished.

  But Hato approached reluctantly. “I want to understand something,” she said. Pointing to Yasuhito, she said, “You really are the emperor?”

  Yasuhito nodded. “Grandfather has made me understand my error.”

  “Hmph,” she sniffed. “I wouldn’t think it was something you could be in any doubt about.” She turned her attention to Reigen. “And if you’re his grandfather, then you used to be the emperor.”

  “That is so,” Reigen responded. “When you asked me earlier if I was a kami, I could not truthfully answer no, because even though I am no longer emperor, I still carry the spirit of Amaterasu within me.”

  Hato finally turned to Seikei. She looked dismayed. “So you’re the only one who wasn’t the emperor?” she asked.

  “I’m sorry,” said Seikei. “I tried to tell you, but there was so much confusion . . .” He trailed off.

  Hato thought about it for a moment, then made her decision. “I think you’re still all trying to trick me,” she said.

  25

  SEIKEI’S ONLY MISTAKE

  It was a fine spring day, when the sun seemed to chase away the cold air that had hung over the earth all winter. Seikei and the judge stood in the gardens outside the imperial palace, waiting for the plowing ceremony to begin. The judge was there as the shogun’s official representative, and Seikei had received a personal invitation. He noticed that it had been signed by both the Ministers of the Right and of the Left. He wondered how they could have been persuaded to do such a thing together. If they realized who he was, they would probably not have sent it at all.

  In fact, Seikei had not really wanted to come. The entire affair had involved so much treachery that he didn’t want to revisit the scene. The judge, however, had told Seikei that no one could refuse an invitation from the imperial court.

  Months ago, when Seikei had returned to Edo and made his report, the shogun had been greatly disturbed. He pointed out that Seikei really had no proof that Yabuta had helped to plan the rebellion. “All you know,” he told Seikei, “is what the ronin Takanori told you. He may have been lying, and now he is dead.” The shogun sent samurai to find Yabuta, but they could not locate him anywhere.

  Seikei recalled the last time he had seen the spy chief, in the imperial lodge in the mountains. Reigen had sent the others out of the room and said he would make sure Yabuta did no more harm.

  There was no way to ask Reigen what he had done, because after returning the emperor to the palace, he had disappeared again. Seikei had been busy returning the Kusanagi to its place in the shrine and had no chance to say good-bye. At the shrine, the priests still thought Seikei was the emperor, making it easier for him to return the sword without explaining where it had been.

  “The shogun knows you did a good job,” the judge assured Seikei. “After all, the spring plowing ceremony will take place as scheduled. The shogun is only upset because he has to find a new chief for the Guards of the Inner Garden.”

  “He should not have a chief to do that kind of work,” said Seikei.

  “I am afraid that rulers always like to know what their subjects are up to,” said the judge.

  A murmur went through the crowd of invited guests. Two stable hands led a water buffalo into the garden and began to hitch it to a plow. Seikei looked at the animal with some doubt. “I hope the emperor can handle such a huge beast,” he said.

  “It was carefully chosen for its gentleness,” the judge murmured. “The ground to be plowed has been loosened beforehand and all stones removed. I don’t think the work will strain the emperor’s abilities.”

  A priest rang a handbell, the signal for everyone to kneel. A moment later, the emperor appeared, with a minister on each side of him. The two officials were whispering in both his ears at once. Seikei was pretty sure their advice was worthless.

  Finally the emperor stepped forward, and a priest handed him the reins and a whip. The whip was unnecessary. As soon as the emperor jiggled the reins, the water buffalo took exactly six steps forward and then stopped. The animal was as well trained as the emperor—perhaps better.

  At any rate, a satisfactory furrow had now been cut into the ground. The emperor took some seeds from one of the priests and dropped them in, spaced equally apart.

  Now another priest handed him a small spade, sparkling clean. Yasuhito used it to cover the seeds. Seikei knew that once the seeds sprouted, they would be transplanted into a water-filled paddy, where they could grow till the harvest. The emperor would have other roles to fill then, but for today, he had done his job perfectly.

  The emperor knew it. Seikei thought he saw a smile pass over Yasuhito’s face as he stepped back from the furrow. And when the two ministers closed in to whisper additional instructions to him, he pushed them away. Not roughly—maybe no one but Seikei noticed it—but a very definite push. He knew he was emperor now.

  The guests bowed deeply as the emperor left the garden, and then got to their feet. In a little while, they would enter the palace for a banquet.

  Seikei saw Hato threading her way through the crowd. She wore the uniform of a palace servant. Seikei steeled himself, not knowing what she might say.

  But all she wanted was to ask if they were staying for the banquet. “I made the porridge,” she said. “The emperor won’t allow anyone but me to make it. Sometimes his personal servants wake me up at night to make it.”r />
  “So you finally accepted the fact that he is the emperor?” said Seikei.

  She nodded. “Well, he’s given me a good job, so I follow orders.” She looked around to see if anybody was listening. Fortunately the judge was talking to another guest.

  “But you would have made a better emperor,” Hato said with a wink. She disappeared into the crowd before Seikei could say anything.

  Later, when the porridge was served, Seikei tasted a spoonful. No doubt about it: Hato was a great cook, at least if you liked ginkgo porridge. He ate some more.

  The judge finished his own bowl and turned to Seikei. “You should be proud,” he said. “The success of this day is due to your efforts.”

  “I had a lot of help,” Seikei said modestly.

  “But I now have a criticism to offer.”

  Seikei cringed. He knew there were many things he had done wrong, but he had corrected most of them. He had even managed to redeem his swords from the pawn-broker. Would the judge think it had been too disrespectful for him to pawn them in the first place?

  “That young woman who spoke to you in the garden,” said the judge, showing once again that he missed nothing. “Was she the one who thought that you were the emperor?”

  Seikei nodded. “I know it was wrong of me to let her think that, but—”

  “And she made this porridge?” the Judge asked.

  “Yes. That was what she came to tell me.”

  “You should never have let her get away. I wish you had brought her home with you. She’s much too good to be cooking for the emperor.”

  AUTHORS’ NOTE

  The Japanese claim their nation has the longest continuous line of rulers in the world. The first emperor, according to tradition, was Jimmu, who reigned from 660 B.C. to 585 B.C., by the modern calendar. Official historians have listed each of the 126 emperors, down to the current one, Akihito, who was enthroned in 1989. Japanese emperors are not “crowned,” because the headgear they wear is not a crown.

  Japanese emperors are known by one name when they are alive, but another name is applied to them and their reign after they have left the throne. Thus, most Americans knew the 125th emperor by the name Hirohito, but after his death his reign name became Showa.

  The young emperor in our story, Yasuhito, ruled Japan in the early 1700s, coming to the throne at the age of eight. His grandfather Reigen had reigned from 1663 to 1687, when he retired. Reigen lived on for another forty-five years. Yasuhito’s reign name is Nakamikado, which is how you will find him on a list of Japanese emperors. All the events in our story concerning these two emperors are completely from the imaginations of the authors.

  The story of Amaterasu and Susanoo is part of Japanese mythology. Prince Yamato, who used the Kusanagi to conquer rebellious tribes, is supposed to have lived around A.D. 100. His formal name is Yamato-Dake, or Yamato the Warlike. The Kusanagi is still in the Atsuta Shrine at Nagoya today. However, though you may visit the shrine, the sword is never displayed to the public.

  There really were pawnbrokers, known as tamamakiya, in Japan in the 1700s. The Mitsui family, whose name can still be found on Japanese banks, insurance companies, and real estate interests, began as pawnbrokers in the early 1600s.

  We have simplified our description of the ceremonies at which a new emperor is enthroned. He does, however, spend a night in a hut waiting for his ancestor Amaterasu to visit. What happens during that night is known only to the emperor.

  As readers of The Ghost in the Tokaido Inn, The Demon in the Teahouse, and In Darkness, Death know, Judge Ooka was a real person whose reputation for wise and honest decisions won him promotion to high office. He served Yoshimune, the eighth shogun of the Tokugawa family, who ruled Japan between 1717 and 1744. Tales about Judge Ooka have remained popular, causing some to call him the Sherlock Holmes of Japan. The character of his stepson, Seikei, is the authors’ creation.