by Fuyumi Ono
She laughed wistfully. "After I found out about the Royal Kei, I'd dream about what kind of person she was. I was sure that she must be homesick for Yamato, too. I'd imagine us getting together and talking together like we are now, me telling her all about my hometown."
And the Royal Kei would be so happy to have someone to talk to, and would tell her all about where she was from, too.
Suzu let out a breath. "But when I woke up, it was right back in the same place. Riyou was as unpleasant as ever, working us to the bone, and everybody was mean to me all the time."
Seishuu gave her an exasperated look. "Suzu, you do carry on like a little kid. What did you expect? You never do anything for yourself."
Suzu's eyes flew open in disbelief. Seishuu answered with a tired sigh. "Daydreams sure don't take any effort. Compared to the problems in front of your face and the things that have got to be done, daydreams are a lot easier. But all that time, you're just putting off till tomorrow the things you got to think about now, that you got to do now, right? Instead, nothing changes, nothing gets decided, nothing gets settled."
"That is true."
"Keep on like this, with your head stuck up in the clouds, you're never going to grow up, Suzu."
"You know, there are times when you really are a pain."
Bleah, said Seishuu, sticking his tongue out at her. He curled into a ball. "You're always so weepy, Suzu. I can't stand it."
"Sorry I'm such a crybaby. I think it's because when I was little, I never cried. I was a very patient kid." The man who bought her from her family and led her to the mountain pass said so, too. He said how he appreciated that she didn't get all teary-eyed. "But it was a lot of hard times that turned me into a crybaby."
Seishuu looked at her. "Our home in Kei got burned down, most of the people in our village killed. We had to leave. Before we left, we went to see the burned-down ruins of our house and everybody cried up a storm. It was so sad we couldn't stand it. Because we were kids, we cried all the time. It wasn't like normal crying. It was like we were never going to stop crying for the rest of our lives."
"Even you?"
"Even me. At least I thought so at the time. The way I see it, there's two kinds of crying. People cry because they feel so sorry for themselves, and they cry because they're sad. People who feel sorry for themselves are like children who want something done for them. They want their big brother or mother or next door neighbor to help them."
Suzu just looked at him.
"It's because, in situations like this, children don't have any way of protecting themselves. That's why I say they cry like children."
"Huh," Suzu replied. Seishuu didn't speak for a while, either. She said, "So, Seishuu, where did your family live in Kei?"
"In the south."
"When you're feeling better, why don't we go check it out?"
"Together?"
Seishuu uncurled himself. He had all of Suzu's clothes wrapped around him. The horse cart was cold, and he was covered up all the way to his nose. He peered at her with his eyes only.
She said, "You don't want to?"
"Going anywhere with you is such a pain in the ass, Suzu."
He grinned. Suzu laughed.
8-3
The town of Kokei was adjacent to the city of Hokui, appended to its northeast corner. The only government office was the town hall. The other buildings belonged to the twenty-five households, the smallest size of an incorporated city.
Youko and Rangyoku passed through the gate of the rike and onto the Main Street. Most towns were surrounded by a tall stockade a hundred yards in every direction. The small houses circled the inside the wall. The town hall, Rishi and rike were located in a row in the northern sector of the town. The Main Street ran east-to-west in front of them. The street running north-south from the Rishi to the main gate was the Center Street.
The town hall housed the government offices and the elementary school. The Rishi was the official town shrine where the riboku and the gods were enshrined. A common configuration was for the state shrines of the Gods of the Earth and Gods of Five Grains to be located along the western wall, and the ancestral shrines along the eastern wall. But the faith of the townspeople was focused on the riboku. Because it was through the riboku that children were bestowed and livestock were granted.
"Very interesting," Youko said to herself.
Rangyoku leaned toward her. "What is?"
"Oh, nothing, just thinking about the Rishi. It seems like the state and ancestral shrines were tossed in as an afterthought, a sort of consolation prize."
In fact, the state and ancestral shrines were small and mostly just sat there gathering dust.
Rangyoku giggled. "You do say the most curious things, Youshi."
"I do?"
"The riboku brings children. No matter how many offerings you bring, or how many prayers you pray, the harvest won't necessarily be plentiful and you won't necessarily be protected from calamities. So the riboku is always first in our minds. That's bound to be the case, no matter what, don't you think?"
"You're a very pragmatic people, that's for sure. But Tentei--Lord God of the Heavens--and Seioubo--Queen Mother of the West--are different."
Tentei and Seioubo were often enshrined together in the Rishi, but there were also districts in the town set aside for shrines dedicated to them.
"That's because they're the ones that give you children."
"Tentei and Seioubo?"
"Yes. A couple who wants a child prays to the riboku and ties a ribbon to a branch of the tree."
"And if you're not married, you can't?"
"Nope. The Amanuensis records the names of all the people who want a child and sends it to the Queen Mother of the West. She makes a request to the Tentei, who chooses the most suitable of them to receive a child. Then Seioubo commands the goddesses to create a ranka."
"Huh." It struck her as quite different from any of the old fairy tales she'd heard back in Japan. Not that she could remember them with any great detail.
"The Internuncio implants the seed that will become the child inside the ranka, and then bears the ranka to the riboku. Isn't that how they do it in Yamato?"
"Not at all." Youko said slyly, "Do you believe all of it, Rangyoku? What you just told me?"
Rangyoku laughed. "Not literally. But a ranka does appear. And if a ranka doesn't appear on the branch that you chose, you just can't go pick one from somewhere else. It won't come off. Amazing, isn't it? That's why it's got to be what God gave to you."
"Of course," Youko smiled. "Livestock are also born on the riboku, right?"
"Yes. From the first of the month to the seventh, petitions are made to the riboku. The first day is for birds like chickens and ducks. The second day is for dogs. The third day is for sheep and goats. The fourth day is for boars and pigs. The fifth day is for cattle, and the sixth for horses. The seventh day is for people."
"People? There are days designated for people?"
"Yeah. On the seventh or any day after the ninth. Children requested on the seventh are supposed to turn out the best. My mom said that Keikei was."
"I see."
"Livestock germinate in a month. You can tie many ribbons at once, but not all of them will necessarily grow a ranka. For people, it's always only one."
"So you don't have twins?"
"Twins?"
"When two children are born at the same time? In Yamato, as many as five children have been born at the same time."
"Wow, that's weird." Rangyoku looked back over her shoulder at the Rishi. "The eighth day is for crops. But only the empress can make such requests."
"You can grow the five grains [wheat, rice, beans, and kinds of millet] whenever you want yourself just by planting the seeds. When they bear fruit, you get more seeds, right?"
"That would seem to be the case."
"Plants and trees aren't animals. But not just anybody can make requests for new grain stocks. Only the empress can do that, and at a
tree in the Imperial Palace. When Heaven grants the request and the tree bears fruit, the next year, a ranka containing those seeds can grow on every riboku in the kingdom.
Youko opened her eyes wide with surprise. This certainly was news to her. She'd have to ask Enho to fill her in on the details.
"Yaboku, or wild riboku, grow animals other than livestock and domesticated birds. Did you know there are trees in the water, too?"
"I didn't. For fish, I imagine?"
Rangyoku smiled. "Exactly. And then yaboku for wild grasses and trees."
"Plants other than grains just grow on their own?"
"They do. Otherwise there wouldn't be any new plants and trees. So it seems like they can do it all by themselves. When and where new grasses are born nobody knows. So now and then people examine the base of yaboku to see if any unfamiliar plants are growing there. If there are, then bring them home and grow them. There are itinerants who do that for a living. They're called husbandry hunters. They go around searching for new ranka. It also seems to depend on the riboku. There are trees that produce a lot wild species, and those that don't at all. The ones that do are kept secret. No one will talk about them. Hunters will kill people who try to follow them."
"Huh."
"You can gather unusual medicines and herbs and saplings for new crops and sell them, but it sounds like a scary business."
Youko nodded in agreement. Of course, people were discriminated against in this world as well. There wasn't much discrimination based on occupation, because vocations weren't inherited along family lines. No matter what family a child came from, he would get a partition when he turned twenty. A big business or enterprise couldn't be passed on to your children. The disabled were also treated with compassion. But the world was closed off to hanjuu and itinerants.
"What is it?" Rangyoku asked.
Youko shook her head.
Her friend was a hanjuu. In gratefulness to him, she wished to repeal all the laws that held hanjuu back. The ministers refused to go along. She considered it for her Inaugural Rescript, but that didn't sit right with her. The Inaugural Rescript was supposed to make a statement. Without really being aware of it, she had become seized with the conviction that she should carry out her first official duties with all the self-confidence and gravity of an empress.
"Did I say something bad?"
"No, of course not. Just something that's been on my mind of late. Ah, here we are."
She and Rangyoku came to the town gate. Rangyoku had to leave for the grazing grounds. Youko had a task in Hokui.
"Well, cheer up, okay?"
Youko smiled. No doubt, Rangyoku assumed that her dolefulness was caused by thoughts of her homeland. Appreciative of such sentiments, Youko waved and headed west on the loop road.
Towns usually had only one main gate. Kokei had two. That's because Kokei had originally been a part of Hokui.
The town was definitely the nucleus of the city. The city offices were originally located in an extension of the town hall. When the city became a county seat, the tables were turned, and the government offices were moved to the city center, and the essential services of the town were relegated to a block in the northeast corner of the city. Hokui was pushing the town right out of the city. At this point, there was no more than a single gate connecting them.
Youko entered Hokui and headed straight for the city hall in the center of the city. She followed the loop road around the city center until she found herself facing the southeast quadrant of the city.
"Where is it?" she muttered to herself.
Amidst the hustle and bustle of the street, right at her heels, a small voice said, "Turn right at the next corner."
Youko followed the directions, moving deeper into the city, and arrived at a tiny house. Originally, the only homeowners were residents of the town who had been given the property by the kingdom. But the fact of the matter was that people sold their land and houses and moved around. One person sold his homestead and acquired property or a shop from the city comptroller. Another person bought the land and hired tenant farmers to work any number of homesteads. One way or another, an entire hamlet would end up as the private domain of a single owner. Not a few individuals sold out without even seeing their own land grants and went looking for housing in the city.
The owner of this house had come to live there through a tangled series of events. At any rate, his name was Rou, and this was the house of the man who served Enho's strange visitor.
Hankyo had tailed him, and just as he had the first time, confirmed that the man had not gone to an inn but to the house of this Rou. The next day the man had left Hokui and headed north.
And now what?
Youko looked up at the house. If she called the man out and demanded to know who his guest was, she was unlikely to get an answer. She was watching from the opposite side of the street when suddenly the front gate opened. Youko averted her gaze and pretended like she was looking for something on the road.
"All right, then," a man's voice said.
"The package--" He stopped in mid-sentence, as if he had just noticed her there. A small, middle-aged man with calico hair. Next to him was a man as big as he was small, with a boulder-sized physique and ordinary, black hair. He looked at Youko and then away.
"It's up to you."
"I understand."
With that simple exchange, the two parted. The smaller man all but ran back inside the house. The big man started off down the avenue with quick steps.
Just an ordinary visitor, perhaps.
But she couldn't ignore the way the smaller man had suddenly stopped talking.
Youko walked away in the opposite direction from the big man. Under her breath she beckoned Hankyo.
"Does his presence concern you to such a degree?"
Youko nodded at the disembodied voice. "Sorry about this, but if you would. It may well be an ordinary visitor, but I'd like to get to the bottom his connection to Enho."
Just as Rangyoku predicted, Enho had been highly agitated after the visitor came and canceled their studies. And so with time on her hands, she'd come to see Rou's house for herself.
"By your command."
The small voice faded and disappeared.
That night, Hankyo returned past midnight and reported that man owned property in the city of Takuhou, Shisui Prefecture, just across the river in Wa Province.
"Takuhou?"
The city of Takuhou was to the east of Hokui. The man who had visited Enho had headed north. Was there even any connection between them?
Youko silently turned these facts over in her mind.
Part IX
9-1
He was born in Kou, Rakushun explained as they traveled along. "But in Kou, a hanjuu can't even get into elementary school. So I moved to En." A hanjuu couldn't be matriculated in Hou, either. When Shoukei pointed this out, he nodded.
"Itinerants and refugees aren't admitted either. If you aren't listed on the census, you're out of luck. A lot of kingdoms are that way. Kou used to be the only kingdom that didn't list hanjuu on the census. In the past, that was true everywhere. In Tai, the new king was apparently about to revise the census laws, but before he could get the job done, he was usurped by a pretender."
"Oh."
"In Hou and Kou, hanjuu can't become public servants and aren't admitted to university. And for the most part, Shun and Kei."
Rakushun's itinerary took him hither and yon, with no great design in mind. Going by suugu, it wouldn't take more than a day to get to Shisou, so they stopped at cities along the way. They often took detours to see cities in the opposite direction of Shisou. With the suugu, it was a trouble-free trip, but Shoukei couldn't help wondering what he was up to and what the whole purpose of the trip was.
"More kingdoms don't allow itinerants or refugees to become public servants or go to school. It's even tougher for sankyaku and kaikyaku. They're normally treated the same as itinerants, but in Kou they're treated even worse than th
at. At the other extreme, there are kingdoms that treat them very well, Sou and En and Ren. Sankyaku and kaikyaku can tell you fascinating things about paper making, ceramics, printing techniques, medicine."
"Sankyaku and kaikyaku actually exist?" Shoukei had never seen one.
"The first one to build a temple was in Hou."
"Really?"
"A sankyaku arrived during the reign of Hitsu-ou. He carved away the side of a mountain and built a temple. That was the first time the teachings of Buddhism were promulgated. That's why cremation is still practiced in Hou. Only Hou, En, Sou and Ren cremate the dead. In Hou, Rishi don't follow the same layout as the imperial court, but are built like temples. The arrangement of the buildings is different."
"Hitsu-ou?"
The twelfth or thirteenth dynasty of Hou, I believe."
Shoukei looked at the hanjuu in amazement. He knew more about Hou than the princess royal herself, a citizen of Hou. It was both mortifying and irritating.
"By the way, Shoukei, starting tomorrow, things are going to get a bit tougher."
They had left Shisou and traveled two more days on the suugu. They were about to enter the gates to a city. The road before the gate was quiet. It was still some time till sundown. Rakushun tied a small bamboo tube to the neck of the suugu. That morning, Shoukei had seen him place a letter into the tube.
"What's that for?"
"Starting tomorrow, we'll proceed on foot to En." She was about to protest, when Rakushun sent the suugu on its way. "Go on ahead of us and see that this letter gets to its destination."
With a cry, the suugu climbed into the air. It soared skyward like a kite, waved its long tail, swept over them like the wind, and disappeared.
"Well, what are we going to do now, with the suugu gone? It's still some ways to En!"
"About five days. Sorry. We won't be doing any more sightseeing."
"That's not the problem! Where are we going to stay tonight?"
Hanjuu weren't welcome in any city. Whenever he entered a high-class establishment, Rakushun was met with sour looks. But when they saw the suugu, their attitudes would change just like that. Without the suugu, they wouldn't hesitate to show him the door.