The Ronin’s Mistress si-15

by Laura Joh Rowland

  “Shut up!” Yanagisawa told Sano. “You’ve already caused enough trouble. I’ll handle this.” Turning to Kajikawa, he spoke with kindly concern. “It’s true that you’ve committed two capital offenses. But I can bend the rules. If you drop the sword and step away from His Excellency, I’ll grant you an official pardon. I’ll also pardon you for your role in the forty-seven ronin’s vendetta and the attack on Magistrate Ueda. You’ll walk away from this as if nothing had happened. I promise.” He smiled, focusing all his charm on Kajikawa. “Have we a deal?”

  It was the best performance Sano had ever seen from Yanagisawa. But Kajikawa reacted with a disdainful snort. “You’ll never pardon me. You’re just saying what you think I want to hear, so I’ll do what you want.”

  “My word is good.” Yanagisawa’s voice fairly dripped with sincerity. “I swear.”

  Kajikawa laughed, a bitter bark. “You’re forgetting, I’ve been in this court for a long time. I know what you are. How stupid do you think I am?”

  Sano winced.

  “Listen to the chamberlain,” Kato urged. “You need his help. Take the deal.”

  “It’s the best you’ll get,” Ihara said.

  Holding the shogun pinned to the platform with his sword, Kajikawa poked his finger at Yanagisawa. “If you expect me to believe you, then you’re not only a corrupt, lying cheat, you’re the one who’s stupid!”

  “Don’t talk to my father like that!” Yoritomo said.

  “I know you, too,” Kajikawa said with the relish of a man who has kept his opinions pent up for ages and finally lets them spill. “You bedded your way to the top of the regime, just like your father did. If I kill His Excellency, you’re both as good as dead, too. Just watch!”

  He moved his blade in a sawing motion a hair’s breadth above the shogun’s throat. The shogun flinched, moaning. Kajikawa let loose a hysterical giggle.

  “Your entire family will pay for this,” Ihara blustered.

  “They’ll all die with you,” Kato said.

  “Be quiet!” Kajikawa yelled. “I’ve had enough of you two!”

  “What are you going to do? Kill us?” mocked Kato.

  The elders were trying to divert Kajikawa’s ire toward themselves, Sano realized. They hoped he would charge at them, the guards would seize him, and the shogun would be saved.

  “I don’t have to kill you,” Kajikawa said with cunning born of desperation. “You’re going to do it for me.” He pointed at a guard.

  The guard looked startled to find himself singled out, then chuckled as if he thought Kajikawa was joking.

  “Kill the old monkey,” Kajikawa ordered. “Or I’ll kill the shogun.”

  Dismay crinkled Ihara’s simian features. “You’re not serious.”

  “Go ahead!” cried the shogun.

  Reluctant, yet unable to disobey the shogun’s order, the guard drew his sword. Yanagisawa, Yoritomo, and Kato looked on in horror. Sano said, “Think about this for a moment, Kajikawa-san,” but the shogun shrieked, “Do it!”

  As Ihara backed away, too dumbfounded to plead for his life, the guard slashed his paunchy middle. A huge, bleeding gash doubled him over. He gurgled blood from his mouth. His knees knocked and he collapsed dead.

  Cries of horror blared. The shogun retched and choked, vomiting. Horrified by the sudden carnage, Sano looked at Masahiro. The boy was as gray and rigid as a stone statue. He’d seen death before, but not a murder in Japan’s most secure, civilized place.

  “There!” Kajikawa laughed, triumphant. “I showed the monkey!”

  Kato shouted, “Ihara!” Yanagisawa was too stunned, and too appalled by the death of his ally, to speak. The guard let his bloody sword dangle. The gaze he cast around the room pleaded for absolution. Nobody offered any.

  “Masahiro! Leave the room!” Sano said, anticipating more violence.

  Masahiro hesitated, loath to abandon his father, then started toward the door. Servants and boys hurried after him. “Stay where you are, or the shogun is next!” Kajikawa said.

  The rush stopped. Detectives Marume and Fukida peered in the door. Kajikawa yelled at them, “Go away! Clear everybody out of the palace, or the shogun dies!”

  “Do as he says!” the shogun cried.

  The detectives went. The atmosphere turned even more lethal now that the hope of rescue was gone. Everyone who remained seemed shrunken in size, diminished, except Kajikawa. The little man swelled with exhilaration and power over his superiors. The sword in his hand was steady over the shogun, who wept and cringed.

  “Guards,” Kajikawa said. “Take everybody’s weapons. Then get out. You go, too,” he told Kato. Sano realized that although Kajikawa had been acting on impulse, he now had some sort of plan. When the guards hesitated, he said, “Or shall I make you kill somebody else?”

  “Do as he says,” Yanagisawa told the guards, his voice tight with fury.

  The guards collected the swords from Yanagisawa, Yoritomo, and Sano. They even took Masahiro’s junior-sized weapons. They carried the swords out of the room. Kato beat a fast, cowardly retreat. Sano stood beside Masahiro while he thought as fast as he could.

  One wrong word could provoke another disaster.

  Kajikawa bobbled his head at Yanagisawa. “You thought I was weak. You thought you could beat me down. Well, you were wrong. I have the upper hand.” He tittered exultantly. “Fancy that!”

  “Please, please,” the shogun gasped out. “Have mercy!”

  “You’re a fool who’s lost the brains he was born with,” Yanagisawa said, too incensed to control his sharp tongue. “You should have been content to see that the privies are cleaned. But no-you meddled in business that wasn’t yours. You’ve gone too far. Not even I can save you now.”

  “Oh? Is that what the great chamberlain says?” Kajikawa’s glee turned to rage. “Then what have I got to lose by killing the shogun?”

  Sano realized that Yanagisawa was the one who’d gone too far. Aghast, Sano said, “Wait, Kajikawa-san-”

  Kajikawa pressed down on his blade. The edge sank into the shogun’s neck.

  36

  Reiko couldn’t bear to sit at home and wait for news. Leaving Akiko with the nurse, she strapped her dagger to her arm under her sleeve, threw on her cloak, and hurried to the palace. The passages were full of guards and officials rushing in the same direction. Everyone had heard about the trouble; everyone wanted to find out what it was. Reiko’s sandals slipped on the icy paving stones as she ran. People slid, collided, fell. She kicked off her sandals and forged onward. She barely felt the cold through her thin cotton socks. Reaching the palace, she found a huge, noisy crowd. The Tokugawa army milled through groups of officials and servants. Guards blocked the doors. People craned their necks, buzzed with speculation.

  Reiko looked around for Masahiro and Sano, in vain. Hearing her name called, she saw Detectives Marume and Fukida weave through the mob toward her. She greeted them eagerly. “What’s happened?”

  “Kajikawa is trapped in the shogun’s private chambers,” Fukida said.

  Marume’s usually cheerful face was grave. “He’s threatening to kill the shogun.”

  Reiko clutched her throat. “He wouldn’t, would he?”

  “He’s already killed Ihara from the Council of Elders,” Fukida said.

  “Or rather, he forced one of the guards to kill Ihara while he held the shogun at swordpoint,” Marume said. “He ordered us to clear the palace or the shogun dies.”

  The news was so disastrous that Reiko could hardly take it in. Fukida said, “There’s been no communication from Kajikawa since. So we don’t know what else has happened.”

  “Where’s my husband?” Reiko asked anxiously. “Where’s Masahiro?”

  “With Kajikawa and the shogun,” Marume said. “And Yanagisawa, Yoritomo, and a bunch of boys and servants.”

  Reiko’s blood went as cold as the ice that filmed the castle. She began to shake with terror. She trusted Sano to take care of himself, but he
r child was trapped in a volatile situation where at least one person had already been murdered. And they’d parted on bad terms, barely speaking to each other. “Can’t you do something?”

  Marume gestured toward the guards. “They won’t let anybody in.”

  Reiko gazed at the army, powerless against one fugitive.

  “You should go home, Lady Reiko,” Fukida said. “It’s cold out here, and there’s nothing you can do.”

  But something might happen, and Reiko wanted to be among the first to know. When Marume and Fukida turned to speak with some other men, she edged around the crowd, circling the palace. Nothing was visible except shuttered windows and blank walls. Reiko mingled with a crowd of women and girls, the shogun’s relatives and concubines and their attendants. They chattered and fretted. They didn’t notice Reiko sidling toward the building. Neither did the guards. As she swept her gaze over the palace, desperate for a hint of what was going on inside, she saw a gap in the latticework that covered the space under the palace. She hesitated, fighting temptation. Maternal instinct outweighed the risk. Reiko dropped to her knees and scuttled through the gap.

  * * *

  Blood welled from the thin line that Kajikawa’s blade cut on the shogun’s neck. The shogun squealed like the pigs butchered at the wild game market. His eyes bulged so wide that the white rims showed all the way around his pupils. His mouth opened so far that Sano could see down his pinkish-gray gullet. His arms and legs shot out in an involuntary spasm. Sano was astounded as well as horrified.

  The shogun’s blood was red like everyone else’s! Sano had been conditioned to think of the shogun as a sort of god, even though he knew the shogun’s human failings all too well. The shogun, although weak and sickly, had been such a constant, dominating force in Sano’s life that Sano was shocked to realize he was mortal.

  The shogun touched his neck. He lifted his trembling hand in front of his face and saw the blood on his fingers. His breath sucked inward so fast that he choked. His complexion turned ghastly white. Groans poured from the other people in the room.

  Kajikawa posed by the shogun, his sword still holding the shogun captive. His features wavered between a grin like a skull’s rictus and an upside-down smile of tragic woe. He resembled an actor who’d thought he was the hero in the play and has just discovered he’s the villain.

  The shogun began to shake violently. He pressed himself against the platform as if he could sink through it and escape the blade that verged on slicing through his windpipe. He screamed, “Help!”

  “This is blasphemy!” Yanagisawa exclaimed.

  Kajikawa pointed at Yanagisawa and said, “That’s enough from you!” His head bobbled at Yoritomo. “Gag him!”

  Yoritomo stared in fresh shock. “What?”

  “Take off your sash,” Kajikawa ordered Yanagisawa. When Yanagisawa and Yoritomo started to protest, he said, “Or I’ll finish off the shogun!”

  The shogun began shrieking hysterically. He drummed his heels on the platform. Infuriated but cowed, Yanagisawa stripped off his sash, threw it to Yoritomo, and knelt.

  “I’m sorry, Father.” Yoritomo’s voice quavered as if he were about to cry. He tied the sash around Yanagisawa’s mouth.

  Yanagisawa glared above the red and black cloth that muffled his tongue, that separated his lips and teeth. Sano didn’t dare say a word, lest he be gagged and lose his speech, too. The other people in the room were silent while the shogun shrieked.

  “Tie his hands and feet, too,” Kajikawa said. “With your own sash.”

  His breath puffed and sweat glistened on his forehead, but he was calmer now. Sano wondered what on earth he thought could possibly save him. Yanagisawa extended his legs and hands. Yoritomo bound Yanagisawa’s ankles.

  “Tie his hands behind his back,” Kajikawa instructed.

  Until he knew what Kajikawa had planned, Sano couldn’t formulate a counterstrategy. Yanagisawa lay on his side on the platform while Yoritomo tied his hands. The sash connected them to his trussed ankles. Sano waited despite a fever of suspense that was almost as unbearable as the shogun’s screams. He braced himself with the thought that when the moment came for him to act, this was one time when Yanagisawa wouldn’t be able to interfere.

  “While you’re at it, tie everybody else up,” Kajikawa said.

  As Yoritomo trussed the servants and boys, he looked furious as well as despondent without his father to guide him. When he reached Sano, he tied the knots with vicious yanks, cruelly tight.

  “Loosen them,” Sano whispered. “So I can save the shogun.”

  Yoritomo uttered a breathy, scornful laugh. “Big talk.”

  He pulled the sash so tight between Sano’s ankles and wrists that Sano’s spine curved backward. Sano stifled a cry. He watched in helpless fury while Yoritomo tied up Masahiro, who bravely endured his pain. When Yoritomo was done, the scene resembled a tuna auction. Bodies lay scattered on the floor, as immobile as dead fish for sale. Mouths were open as if gasping last breaths. Sano couldn’t bear to look at Masahiro and see his son’s gaze begging him to do something. The time wasn’t right.

  Maybe it never would be.

  Kajikawa withdrew his sword from the shogun and said, “Get up.”

  The shogun’s screams dwindled into a whimper. He tried to rise, but he shook so hard that he fell back on the platform. “I can’t,” he wailed.

  “Get up.” Kajikawa jabbed the point of his sword at the shogun’s nose.

  Cross-eyed as he gazed at the blade, the shogun levered himself up on his elbows and got his feet under him. Knees wobbling and arms windmilling, soiled with vomit, he looked like a drunk thrown out of a teahouse. Kajikawa caught him from behind, locking his left arm across the shogun’s chest.

  “We’re going to walk out of the palace.” He held his blade against the shogun’s blood-smeared throat.

  Kajikawa planned to use the shogun as a hostage and ensure his passage to freedom. Sano thought of everything that could go wrong and end up with the shogun killed. But he saw a glimmer of light, the opportunity he’d been waiting for.

  Kajikawa propelled the shogun off the platform. The shogun whimpered and stumbled, his legs as limp as noodles. Kajikawa held him up and urged him toward Yoritomo, who stood beside his trussed, gagged, and fuming father. Yoritomo wrung his hands. His chin trembled.

  “Walk ahead of us,” Kajikawa said. “Whoever we meet, tell them to get out of the way, or I’ll kill the shogun.”

  With an agonized glance at his father, Yoritomo fell into step. Sano called, “Kajikawa-san.” He squeezed his voice through the pain growing in his bent spine. He tried not to strain against his bonds and make it worse. “You won’t get away with this.”

  “Why not?” Kajikawa kept moving. “I’ve already gotten away with plenty that you never thought I would.” But his steps slowed as he neared the door.

  Sano hoped it meant he wanted to be stopped. “By now everybody knows what’s happened. The palace will be surrounded by troops.”

  “They won’t touch me as long as I’ve got His Excellency.”

  The shogun moaned. “Somebody help me!”

  Sano wriggled across the floor and blocked Kajikawa’s path. Agony shot through his spine. His muscles contracted. The sash pulled tighter. He gasped.

  “You can’t stop me.” Kajikawa edged around Sano.

  “Where do you think you’re going?” Sano asked.

  “Someplace. Anyplace away from Edo.” Kajikawa sounded forlorn.

  “You obviously haven’t thought it through. Let me tell you what will happen when you get outside.” The sash cut into Sano’s flesh. His fingers and toes were going numb. “The army will surround you and follow you wherever you go.”

  “I don’t want to die!” the shogun blubbered. “Please!”

  The other people in the room lay silent, listening. Sano felt them depending on him. The air stank with their fear of what would happen if he failed to save the shogun. Everyone present would sure
ly be punished. And then a war for control of the regime would begin. Yanagisawa’s gaze shot daggers of hatred, rage, and hope at Sano.

  “The army won’t touch me.” Kajikawa grunted with exertion as he pushed the shogun ahead. “As long as I’ve got His Excellency, I’m safe.”

  “You can’t hang on to him forever,” Sano pointed out. “You’ll have to rest sooner or later. And then it’ll be over. You should surrender now, while you can.”

  Kajikawa abruptly stopped a few paces from the door. Sarcasm, terror, and desperation played with his face like wicked ghosts. His eyes watered. “You’re such a know-it-all! So tell me: I’m doomed if I go through with this, but what good will it do me not to?”

  Even though Sano saw how badly Kajikawa wanted to be persuaded to surrender, he had nothing to offer Kajikawa in return. Kajikawa wouldn’t believe false promises; Yanagisawa had proved that. Sano ransacked his imagination.

  “You wanted to explain why you did what you did,” Sano said. “If you go out there, you’ll be too busy trying to fend off the army.” Muscle spasms tortured him. His back was breaking. “This might be your last chance. Why not take it? You have a captive audience.”

  Kajikawa hesitated. Sano heard the people on the floor draw their breath. He said, “When you die, it will be too late.”

  Kajikawa’s eyes revealed the inner battle between his urge to flee and his desire to justify himself.

  “Wouldn’t you rather talk while you can?” Sano coaxed. There was no feeling left in his hands or feet, and he knew Masahiro wasn’t any better off. A tremendous guilt crushed him. He was responsible for Masahiro being here. He’d done no better by his son than Yanagisawa had by Yoritomo or Oishi by Chikara. “Wouldn’t you like everybody to know what happened to your son?”

  Kajikawa’s rage flared. “Don’t drag Tsunamori into this.”

  “Tsunamori is already in the middle of it,” Sano said. “He’s the reason you manipulated Oishi into a vendetta against Kira.”