A moment later a gigantic right hand clamped onto his shoulders and lifted him from the floor, and the left hand slammed into his solar plexus. Hegarty sucked in enough air to last him the rest of his life and blacked out with the pain. The sumotori turned to Tamenaga and waited for his orders. Sakura created a face for herself—flat, nebulous, asymmetrical, and even uglier than the wrestler’s—and looked up expectantly. Tamenaga nodded, and the sumotori broke Hegarty’s neck.
“Thank you, Yamada-san.” Yamada Kazafumi bowed, his forehead almost touching Tamenaga’s desk, then backed out of the room with the corpse over his shoulder, as silently as he’d entered. Sakura, sensing Tamenaga’s temper, concentrated on shaping her face into something more appealing.
“You left Takumo before he died.”
“The venom can take an hour or more, but there’s no cure. And it’s hard to detect. I thought that if it looked like natural causes—”
“You left before he died!”
“Magistrate had been there, seen me, and he had the focus. He suspected. And Takumo had weapons ready. The risks …”
Tamenaga listened, his face as impassive as Sakura’s Noh mask. He had long known that the mujina was a coward, but it had rarely mattered. Worse still, Sakura knew that she was invaluable—that was why she had refused to become pregnant, lest her child become her replacement. The only other mujina that the Sumiyoshi-rengo had been able to find him had been Sakura’s own mother, Oshima Zuiko: infertile (Tamenaga had offered the avaricious monster millions of yen for another child), nearly blind, cunning but slow-witted, and unwilling or unable to learn English. Sakura’s father, and his short-lived successors, had been human, ensnared by the mujina and all but mindless. Zuiko was known to her enemies as “Kamakiri” —the praying mantis.
Zuiko/Kamakiri claimed not to have seen another mujina since Sakura’s birth in 1944. Mujina children required years of practice to properly form human faces—Sakura had survived for years with a near-rigid mask of keloid skin, purportedly the result of radiation burns from the bombing of Nagasaki, before she learned to move her illusory lips—and hiding children was no longer easy.
By the turn of the century, Tamenaga estimated, bakemono might well be extinct. Those that could not pass for human had retreated to the remote mountains of mainland Asia, in groups too small to be viable. The shuten-doji, congenital idiot savants to whom every intersection was a fascinating maze, had also retreated to the dwindling countryside. Only Sakura seemed able to save her species (genus? order?), and she had shown no inclination to do so.
“Ah, yes, risks,” said Tamenaga as though that were adequate explanation, ostentatiously concentrating on winding the mankiri-gusari around his right wrist. “That reminds me. With Higuchi dead, the Sunrise will need a new manager, and Nakatani-san would be utterly unqualified even if he were not so busy elsewhere. My daughter is willing to try, but she lacks … experience in dealing with … certain types of people. You would certainly be able to assist her.”
Sakura’s face remained immobile; pretty and false.
“Of course, if Yukitaka does not return, I will still need you here—perhaps more so than previously. Magistrale and his friends are becoming thorns.” Tamenaga noticed her tense slightly, and he smiled inwardly. “Until they are dealt with, I doubt that I can … spare you. You’re not pregnant, I suppose?”
If Sakura’s eyes had been real, she would have blinked. “No.”
“Good. If you were, I would have to temporarily relieve you of such hazardous duty—at your full salary, of course. Your child would be far too precious to … risk.” He stared at his wrist as the chain became a tattoo again. Then, dismissively, “See that Hegarty’s body is disposed of—an ‘unexplained disappearance,’ I think. I want to see Yukitaka as soon as he returns, or to be informed if his body is found. Send someone out to look for his car. And have Lamm watch Takumo’s file; tell me the instant he dies. If he doesn’t, if he is discharged …”
He stared unflinchingly into Sakura’s phantasmal face. The mujina stood, backed away from the desk and bowed.
22
The Hard School
“So,” said Takumo, pulling a pair of boots out from the closet. “You’re going to need a hat, some long-sleeved shirts, and—believe it or not—something warm for the nights. I’ll buy the munchies, and I’ve got nearly everything else.” He unzipped one of the boots and removed a dark gray object that resembled a sandal with claws.
“So I see,” said Mage. “What the hell is that?”
“Neko-de,” replied Takumo, removing another from the other boot. “You put your hand through here, the spikes go over the palm, and you strap these to your wrists. You use them for climbing walls, or parrying swords, or minor damage—bleeding forehead wounds, stuff like that. Or you can envenom them, but I’d rather not at the moment, if that’s okay by you.” Mage nodded. “The thing on the bed’s a kyotetsu-shoge. You can use it like a grappling hook, but the usual trick is to throw the ring end and tangle someone up with the rope, then pull him in close and stab him with the sharp end. The ninjato and sawa—the scabbard—have more uses than I’ve got time to explain.”
“No shuriken?”
Takumo grinned. “There’re a few hidden in the sitting room. See how many you can find.”
Ten minutes later Mage returned to the bedroom gingerly holding three cross-shaped shuriken. “Where were they?” Takumo asked.
“Taped behind the Ronin poster, the block-mounted one.” Takumo nodded. “Where’re the rest?”
Takumo sighed, walked over to the library and passed his hand quickly under several shelves. Six shuriken— trefoils, stars, and a swastika—flashed through the air in quick succession, embedding themselves in a large chopping block that stood in the kitchen. He returned to the bedroom and produced another six from behind the framed Olivia print.
“You’re taking those as well?”
“Yeah, why not? I could use the practice.”
Mage glanced over his shoulder at the chopping block and shook his head. “Who made all of this?”
“My grandfather did most of the shuriken when I was a kid. I killed a pigeon with one once, and he damn near split a shinai—a bamboo sword—on my ass for it.” He shuddered. “The neko-de and the iron sleeves were props from Red Ninja—stolen, I admit, but the bastards owe me residuals. And the armorer was a real buff, an old navy guy who really got off on doing good reproduction stuff; he did the ninjato and the kyotetsu-shoge for me, at cost and for fun. I made both the shinobi shozuko myself. Movie ninja suits are a joke, but I guess you can’t have your hero and villain looking exactly the same. Besides, it makes it easier to switch between the actor and the stuntman.”
There were two complete ninja costumes on the bed: multi-pocketed jackets, baggy pants, hoods, broad sashes, and split-toed moccasins. One of the sashes had been folded over, showing a gray side and a black. Mage picked up a black hood and realized that it was gray inside, and apparently reversible. The other suit could be either white or dusty brown.
“No jungle camo?”
“No need for it; not where we’re going.”
“Where are we going?”
“Death Valley.”
“What?”
“I know this abandoned ranch where we can hide out for a while, out in the general vicinity of China Lake. It’s where we did the locations, second-unit stuff, for Age of the Sword.”
“Why was it abandoned?”
“The wells ran dry a few years back. And it’s kind of inaccessible: rough terrain, no real roads, no electricity, nothing. There is a house, but I don’t know what sort of condition it’s in. Even the horses thought it was the end of the world. Don’t worry, the Family never squatted there—at least not as far as I ever heard. We won’t dig up any bodies.”
“What about our own?”
Takumo smiled thinly. “You want a safe place? Go back to jail; maybe they’ll let you stay there, maybe not. Lots of people die in jail. Or
you want to run? They found you in Calgary, they found you at Kelly’s—”
“They didn’t find me at Jenny’s, and I wasn’t trying to hide in Calgary. Or at Kelly’s. I wanted you to reach me, I left a message on your machine. If they broke in, I was stuck—and maybe they did. If I try to hide, change my name—”
“They found Amanda, man.”
Mage’s face fell. He shrugged, turned and flopped onto the bed, carefully landing between the weapons.
“I know how to hide,” said Takumo, “and they could catch me without any sweat. They got through my guard on the first attempt, sending around someone who looked like Mika. Old ninja tactic, gojo-gyoku—the five feelings and the five desires. Aisha, dosha, kisha, kyosha and rakusha: kindness, bad temper, lechery, cowardice, and boredom. Know your enemy’s weaknesses and use them. You got any weaknesses that you can think of?” Mage glared. “Yeah, I thought so. Okay, so maybe you can protect yourself; make yourself a hard-hearted bastard, help no one, say no to all the pretty girls … because believe me, man, if you do try to run, you’re going to end up scared of shadows. Like every girl you see could be another mujina, or just a kunoichi, female ninja—Tamenaga can probably afford dozens of them. You want to live like that?”
“Do you believe it’s Tamenaga?”
“‘Believe’ isn’t a word I use lightly; there’s not a lot I actually believe. Let’s say I suspect it. You?”
Mage shrugged slightly. Surrounded by blades, he reminded Takumo of a knife-thrower’s assistant. “I don’t know … but I get the feeling that if I disbelieve it, you’re going to keel over and die.” He lifted his head, his expression sour, then struggled carefully to his feet. “No, I don’t want to live like that, but that’s not why I’m not going to run. If I’d known yesterday that the focus belonged to Tamenaga, I might have tried giving it back to him.” He shook his head. “Or maybe not. He had Amanda killed. Maybe she stole from him, maybe not, but Jesus …”
“She had leukemia and the focus cured it.”
“Maybe. Maybe Tamenaga cured her and she stole it later. Maybe I wouldn’t die for Amanda, but that’s not the issue anymore. He’s tried to kill me, you, Kelly—”
“You killed the rukoro-kubi …”
“Self-defense,” growled Mage.
“Hey, man, it’s cool! I agree with you! I would’ve done the same! Like, that’s why we’re going! Dig?”
They stared at each other, and Mage relaxed slightly. “I guess I just had to talk myself into it.”
Takumo smiled. “That’s cool. If you hadn’t, Kelly would’ve done it; that lady doesn’t take shit from anyone. But you did such a good job that you get to talk her out of coming with us. Okay?”
In fact, it was Takumo who talked Kelly out of joining them. She had certainly dressed as though she intended to stand and fight, in hiking boots, dungarees, leather gauntlets, and a bulky down jacket. All she lacked, Takumo thought dryly, was a beret—and that would have looked silly on top of her afro. They had been driving for nearly three hours before she had carefully mentioned that she had her own camping gear in the back of the Range Rover. Mage spent twenty minutes trying persuasion, without any noticeable result; travel along the rough road was noisy and he had to raise his voice to be heard. Worse still, Kelly didn’t seem to be listening.
Finally Takumo leaned over the front seat, poked his head between them and said wearily, “Miss Barbet—”
“Kelly.”
“Kelly. For sure. When do you have to front up to your office? Monday morning?”
“I can phone in—”
“Yeah, you could. Buy another day that way, maybe two, before they come looking for you. They don’t find you, they call the varks, they—”
“Varx?”
“Fuzz. Cops. So maybe they find us. What’re you going to tell them? Like, you’re going to be missed and we’re not. Who’s going to miss a couple of unemployed hyphenates with criminal records?”
“He’s been charged and remanded. That doesn’t constitute a criminal record. What about you?”
Takumo stared out the window and shrugged. “Assault. Three years ago. I broke up a domestic in the street, he filed charges; he had a better lawyer, the wife wouldn’t testify, and none of the other witnesses bothered to show. Big guy against a little woman—I didn’t know they were married; they didn’t look married—and, like, I got carried away. Very uncool. They stuck me with carrying a concealed weapon too, though it never left my pocket.”
“What’d you do to him?”
“Took a few teeth out of his smile. And, like, he kept punching this brick wall; broke a knuckle, they tell me. She needed an ambulance.”
“Was she Japanese?”
“No. Filipina or Vietnamese, I think. Does it matter?”
The Range Rover lurched into the seventeenth pothole of the trip and Kelly carefully maneuvered it out again. “No. Did he hurt you?”
“Didn’t touch me, which is not to say he didn’t keep trying. Maybe I should’ve let him. There’s the house.”
The “house” had never been more than a shack, and now it was rather less. It looked decrepit enough in the headlights; close up, it was even worse, a peasant version of the House of Usher that no self-respecting ghost would deign to haunt. The visible windows were cracked, mostly held together by faded newspaper stuck to their insides; the roof sagged; the paint had vanished altogether. Kelly stopped the car and the three sat there, staring uncertainly at the ruin.
“Okay,” Takumo murmured after nearly a minute of silence. “We get out simultaneously, so they hear only one door—”
“You said this place was empty,” whispered Kelly.
“Yeah. You want to go first?” Before she could answer, he slipped his black hood over his head and reached for his flashlight: a heavy black club fifteen inches long. Mage nodded.
“Three … two … one …”
Three doors opened and slammed shut, and still there was no movement from the shack. Kelly flicked her shotgun light on, swept the beam across the wall and then stepped cautiously toward the porch. Takumo hurried ahead of her and crept silently sideways over the warped boards toward the door. He crouched and reached up for the handle with his left hand, brandishing the unlit flashlight in his right. The handle turned stiffly and he pushed at the door; it stuck, having warped in the weather. Takumo put his weight behind it and suddenly it swung open. He let go the handle and somersaulted into the middle of the room. Kelly, behind him, stepped onto the porch; the board creaked loudly beneath her foot and Takumo whirled around, blasting her in the face with the beam of his flashlight. She started, thumbing the safety catch of her shotgun before both relaxed.
Takumo, barely visible in the beam of the shotgun light, waved her back, then looked around the room. Nothing. Slowly he walked through the shack, checking the other rooms—three empty bedrooms and a stone-floored kitchen/bathroom/ laundry—glancing under the few remaining sticks of furniture, looking behind every door. Several minutes later he returned to the porch.
“It’s safe.”
Kelly nodded. “I can see why they didn’t bother to lock it.”
“So it’s got character. Reminds me of Charlie Sheen’s pad in Wall Street. I’ve stayed in camps and hostels that were just as bad … well, they would’ve been without the furniture. Besides, it’s cover. We can rig up the tent in one of the rooms and no one’ll ever see us.”
“How long are you staying here?”
“We’ve got your basic life support for five days,” replied Takumo. “Can you come back Wednesday? We’ll need food and water, especially water. There’s a shopping list in your glove compartment.”
Kelly drew herself up to her full height and they exchanged glares in the near-darkness for half a minute. Finally she nodded. “Wednesday, then. Let’s get the stuff out of the car.”
Okay, that’s everything. Don’t forget your gun.”
Kelly, at the door, looked over her shoulder and said blandly, “I wa
sn’t forgetting it.”
Mage grabbed the shotgun by the barrel and threw it to her. She caught it easily without even turning around.
“I can’t use it,” he said.
“It’s like a camera. You point, and you pull the trigger …”
“You may need it yourself.”
“I have a crossbow at home.”
“Neat!” said Takumo brightly. “Bring it on Wednesday. I can use a crossbow.”
Kelly looked down at the stuntman again. “What’re you going to teach him? Karate?”
“No, just magic.”
The lawyer shook her head and looked at her watch. “I hope you know what you’re doing.” Neither man commented. “Happy Halloween,” she said and closed the door behind her. Takumo instantly wedged it shut.
“Okay,” he said as soon as he heard the Range Rover’s motor start. “First lesson. You don’t plead with Amazons; it just doesn’t work… .”
Mage? Wake up, man.”
Mage opened one cloudy eye and stared crimsonly at the stuntman, who was clad in his dust-colored shinobi shozuko. “Wha’ time is it?”
“Six thirty.”
“Are they attacking?”
“No.”
Mage began rolling over, but Takumo grabbed his shoulder and held it firmly. “It’s cool out, and light; it’ll be warm soon, and in a few hours it’ll be as hot as Hiroshima. So. This is the only smart time to get outside.”
“Why outside?”
“No room to throw a Frisbee in here. Come on, man, shake it while you got it.”
Slowly Mage disentangled himself from his borrowed sleeping bag. “Do I at least get a coffee?”
“For sure. Make me a cup while you’re there; the tea bags are on top of the stack.”
A few minutes later the photographer stepped out onto the porch, a mug in each hand. Takumo was standing with his back to the sun, throwing a Frisbee so it boomeranged back in his general direction, then leaping and rolling to catch it.
The Art of Arrow Cutting Page 17