Autumn Bridge (51 page)

She was so unprepared for marriage, even less so than the daughters of other lords. Most of them had spent considerable time in the Shogun’s capital of Edo, or the Imperial city of Kyoto, or in the bustling castle towns of the great domains. They knew of the subtleties in the relationships between men and women, because they had seen it played out before them in sophisticated society. Midori had lived her whole life in little Shiroishi Domain, in the far north of Japan, far from the centers of civilization. She was more like a farm girl than a Great Lord’s daughter. How could she please an urbane and experienced young man like Lord Yorimasa? She didn’t even know where to begin. Of course, she understood the crude outlines of sexual intercourse. She had peeked in on adults in the village, along with the most mischievous of the village children. But the behavior of peasants was no useful guide to the tastes and desires of a man like Yorimasa. She was sure to be a terrible disappointment to him.

Midori went to the door on her knees. She slid the door open as quietly and as gracefully as she could, and bowed to the floor. She was too shy to look up.

“My lord” was all she could manage to say before her nervousness made her throat too tight for words.

Yorimasa looked down at the bowing woman. Her hair was already coming undone. Obviously, it was not a coiffure with which she was familiar. There would rarely be a need for such an elaborate arrangement this far from civilization. From the opening in her collar, the scent of a freshly washed body rose to meet him. Had she been a child, he would have called it the scent of innocence. As it was, all it did was remind him further of her ignorance and crudity. Even the least skillful woman of the city knew the importance of perfumes in the art of seduction. His father had married him to a peasant with a noble name.

He went to his knees and returned her bow. In a voice far more gentle than he felt, he said, “Let us stop bowing and go within. We can do nothing appropriate in the doorway, can we?”

Lady Chiemi sat alone in the meditation hall of Kageyama Monastery. The rhythm of her breathing was greatly prolonged, with many heartbeats intervening between each inhalation and exhalation. It had been many years since she had engaged in meditation, and she was not doing so now. She was only using the breathing technique to impose a calm on her body she did not feel in her heart. She counted her breaths so she would not think of what was occurring in her daughter’s nuptial bed.

She had no faith in Lord Kiyori’s prophecies. That her husband believed them never failed to surprise her. He was an intelligent man who was not usually given to gullibility. The battles Kiyori and Nao had fought together as youths had apparently inflicted a permanent and unfortunate distortion on their relationship. Kiyori had saved Nao’s life, and that was that.

He was a fool in this one thing, and it would cost them their daughter’s life. Everything she had heard about Yorimasa convinced her Midori would not survive her wedding night, or if she did, she would be ruined, and not live long thereafter. When she inhaled, she felt the slight pressure of the tanto’s scabbard against her abdomen. It was not proper to carry a weapon into Buddha’s hall. It was not proper to shed blood there. She had done the first, and she would do the second as soon as she received the inevitable report she dreaded.

She had lost count of her breaths.

Lady Chiemi exhaled and began again.

Midori had wondered if she should offer a rice cake to Yorimasa, or wait until after. There was tea, but there was no sake, which was an unforgivable lapse in etiquette. What were the maids thinking? When she had called for them, no one answered. It was as if the castle had suddenly been abandoned. How strange. She had considered going to her mother’s wing, but thought better of it. What if Yorimasa came while she was gone? That would have been far worse than even the lack of sake.

Now he was here. They were together. Alone. She was already blushing most obviously and didn’t think it was possible for her to blush more. She was mistaken. When she saw his smile, she felt another wave of blood flooding her skin.

“My lord,” she said again. So far, these were the only words she had spoken to him. He must think her a fool. Of course he did, because she was a fool! What would a real lady say, or a sophisticated courtesan? A man like Yorimasa surely had much experience with both. How dull and immature she must seem in comparison. Should she do something, or wait for him to lead the way? And if she was supposed to do something, what was it she was supposed to do? She saw now that her mother had failed her terribly. She should have been told something, anything.

Yorimasa was still smiling at her when she looked up, and so caught her trying to sneak a peek at him.

“My lord,” she said again. She could think of nothing else to say.

“You are an excellent tree climber,” he said, “but not much of a conversationalist. Perhaps we should spend the night in the orchard.”

Mortified, she could no longer restrain her tears.

It was the moment Yorimasa had been waiting for. Now she was at her weakest. She was unsophisticated, inexperienced, unsure. She needed comfort and reassurance. She had every reason to expect it of him. Instead, he would help her transcend such mundane considerations. He would reveal to her a precious truth she never expected to discover, on this night of all nights, especially. The meaning of life.

Pain.

The void.

There was nothing else.

Yorimasa placed a hand on Midori’s shoulder and drew her to him. He did nothing crude or alarming. The experience of brutality had its subtleties, chief among them surprise and a sense of inevitability on the victim’s part. Without perfect timing, the first was diminished. Without patience, the second could not be savored. He was the embodiment of gentleness itself.

After a moment, she let her head come to rest on his chest. She was beginning to trust him.

Either Lord Kiyori’s prophecy would be realized no matter what happened here, or it would be denied by Yorimasa’s actions. Whichever it was, he hoped one result would be the same.

His own death at the hands of others.

Let the survivors inherit nothing more than ruins.

Let them fulfill only prophecies cloaked in the stench of blood.

No change of expression in his visage or increase of tension in his muscles indicated that Kiyori had heard the girl scream. He sat erect and impassive, as he had so far all night.

Nao flinched.

His vassals’ hands went to the hilts of their swords.

“Hold,” Nao said.

Again, they heard her scream, louder and more prolonged, and this time they could make out some of her words.

“Father! Help! Help!”

Nao’s men looked at him for orders. His jaws and shoulders were tight, his hands were balled into fists against his thighs, but he did not move or speak.

“Lord Nao!” The youngest of the vassals leaned toward him, pleading in his face.

“Hold,” Nao said again.

Midori’s voice died away. The vassal who had spoken listened more carefully. Nothing. He bowed his head and wept.

Another vassal said, “My lord, we should investigate.”

“No,” Nao said. “I have given my word. We will wait until dawn.”

“Lord Nao, it is inhumanly cruel to wait.”

“I have given my word,” Nao said. “Is the given word of a samurai subject to conditions?”

This vassal, too, bowed his head.

“Father! Father!”

Midori’s voice was no longer distant. It was coming from a corridor adjacent to the banquet room.

With a sob, Kiyori said, “Help her! I release you from your promise! Go!”

Nao and his men bolted from the room, drawing their swords as they threw open the doors. Midori was at the far end of the corridor, her sash gone, her kimono open, the entire front of her underclothing from breast to thigh wet with blood.

“Midori!”

When she saw her father, she staggered forward a step, and collapsed in a motionless heap.

Lady Chiemi heard the pounding hooves of a horse shatter the deep stillness of the hour before dawn. The messenger she dreaded was arriving. A small sob escaped her throat. Her torso contracted. The hilt of the tanto stabbed at her ribs.

In the silence of her grieving heart, Lady Chiemi called out to the Compassionate One, not for herself, but for the eternal peaceful repose of her beloved daughter.

Namu Amida Butsu, Namu Amida Butsu, Namu Amida Butsu.

Those few words, expressed with complete sincerity, assured Midori’s rebirth in Sukhavati, the Pure Land.

Lady Chiemi was not sure she believed it. But she cherished the hope, for it was the only hope that remained for her in this life.

She removed the tanto from her sash. She held the scabbard with her left hand and the hilt of the knife with her right. She heard the horse slide to a hasty stop and, moments later, the rider’s hurried footsteps on the wooden walkway outside the hall. She gripped the knife and prepared to draw it.

The door flew open.

“Lady Chiemi,” the messenger gasped. Exhausted by the hard ride, his duty to report battled with his desperate need to breathe. His words came out in ragged spurts. Even before he finished, Lady Chiemi hurried from the meditation hall.