Disciple of the Wind (32 page)

“Are you threatening me?”

“I don’t need to. It is a simple truth: the Wind will not abide the assassination of one of its
chunin
. But that is irrelevant, since you have no intention of pulling that trigger. You want Joko Daishi, and I am the one who can give him to you.”

Mariko focused on the Glock’s sights, then on Furukawa’s skinny, sunken chest. She wasn’t going to pull the trigger. He was right.

“You see, Detective Oshiro, this is how the Wind operates. What need is there for coercion? We put people in a position where their interests align with our own. They only need to do what they always do. What they inevitably do. Then they do our work for us.”

“What if I’m stubborn? What if I refuse?”

“You won’t, or else you and I would never have met. Do you think I would allow you to see my face if there were any possibility that you could arrest me? Do you think I would put myself in a room with you if I thought you could actually kill me? No. I placed your captain in a position to suspend you. I placed you in a position to indulge your own impetuous curiosity. It is no different than playing billiards. Apply the right impetus from the right angle and the balls will do exactly as you bid them.”

Mariko glowered at him. She hated that he’d read her mind so easily, that she’d allowed herself to be so easily read. She never would have shot him unless he presented a lethal threat, but
he
didn’t have to know that.

A glint of triumph glimmered in his eyes when he saw he’d struck
the bull’s-eye. Mariko recognized that look, and all at once she understood that ineffable similarity she’d seen in him all along. She’d known one other person who had that maddening knowledge of her own affairs, someone who was always a step ahead of her, who stood in judgment over her like a stern grandfather. Not many people could make her feel like she was always catching up, but Furukawa did, and one other man did too: Yamada Yasuo.

“You
did
know him,” Mariko said. She’d harbored a healthy skepticism about that before, but now there was no doubt. “You two are so alike. So why was he a good man, and why are you such a corrupt son of a bitch?”

There was that wince again, as if her words stuck him like a needle. The attack on his character didn’t seem to bother him at all; it was her discourtesy that rankled. “We both know you’re not going to shoot me, Detective. Would you be so good as to lower your pistol?”

She did as she was told. Her thumb automatically groped for the safety, but there wasn’t one. Glocks weren’t built that way. But Mariko’s brain was running on autopilot, coasting on its default position that this was her favored SIG P230. The sight of the Glock in her hand made her realize something she should have registered already: she was now illegally in possession of a firearm. If this were a legitimate police operation, she’d call in the cavalry, turn over the weapon in the course of processing the crime scene, and that would be that. But now she was on suspension and trapped by a criminal syndicate. She didn’t have to think long about whether she planned to turn the Glock over to Investigative Division. She spent more time thinking about how much she didn’t like the prospect of stuffing an unsafetied weapon into her waistband, and what a hassle it would be to run Norika down and steal the holster the crafty bitch must have had on her.

Since she didn’t have anywhere safe to put the weapon, Mariko just held the damn thing. Her trigger finger tapped irritably on the outside of the trigger guard. “So? What now?”

“Now you accept my offer. Join the Wind. Bring an end to the reign of Joko Daishi.”

“Bring an end to—?” Mariko didn’t like the sound of that at all. “You can’t be serious. You want me to kill him?”

“It’s the only way to stop him.”

“Okay, first of all, no, it isn’t. Prison works just fine. Second, do you understand what happens when I follow you down this road? Do you have any idea how often I run across a perp who I
know
is guilty, but I can’t prove it yet? It happens every week. If cops start taking the law into their own hands,
there is no law
. I’m not crossing that line. Not for you, not for anyone. Go sell your ninja suits someplace else.”

Furukawa deflated with a sigh. He had the air of a disappointed schoolmaster. “Ninja suits! I suppose you’d like that. I could wear the black
shozoku
and you could wear a white cowboy hat. Quite the appropriate garb for your movie theater moralizing. The world is not black and white, Detective.”

“If you don’t like how I see it, find someone else. Don’t you have assassins of your own? Send that bitch Norika after him.”

“We tried. For years she posed as one of Joko Daishi’s concubines—originally to serve as a bodyguard, you understand. That was when we thought we could control him. Terminal 2 changed all of that. Norika was given the order. She tried to kill him but failed; the man is too well protected. It was all she could do to recapture the mask and escape. I sent her straight to you.”

“Why me?”

“Because we believe you are the only person who can kill him.”

“Then you’re an idiot.” When he gave her a quizzical frown, she aped it right back at him. “Seriously? What do you not get about this? I’m not doing it.”

“It is the only way to stop his reign of terror.”

“It’s first-degree murder!”

Mariko thought that was pretty self-explanatory. When she saw it
didn’t move him, she turned and headed for the door. “I’m a cop. You want a vigilante. We’re done, Furukawa-san. Have a nice day.”

“Detective Oshiro, I haven’t given you permission to leave.”

Mariko press-checked the Glock, confirming she had a round chambered. Waving good-bye with the gun, she said, “I’ve got my permission slip right here, thanks.”

“You’ve killed before.”

That stopped Mariko in her tracks. “Excuse me?”

“Akahata Daisuke. You shot him right through the head.”

Mariko didn’t need a reminder. She had replayed that nightmare in her mind a thousand times. “That’s none of your damn business,” she said coldly. “And it was in self-defense, by the way.”

“Oh, you don’t believe that’s relevant, do you? There were fifty-two people on that subway platform. You saved them all. If you hadn’t been there—if you had been a sniper far out of harm’s way—you’d still have taken the shot, wouldn’t you?”

Damn right I would, Mariko thought. But she wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of hearing her say it.

“Do you know what I think? I think you’d have shot him even if he were innocent.”

A hot tear rolled down Mariko’s cheek. “You don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”

“Oh, but I do. What do guilt and innocence matter in the face of arithmetic?” Furukawa laughed as much as spoke. “Suppose I put you there again. Suppose this time Akahata’s only crime is bad luck. I have wired a bomb to him. In ten seconds it will explode, but only if he is alive. Shoot him and you disarm the bomb. Hold your fire and he will innocently blow himself to pieces, and fifty-two others besides. Can you tell me the
law
matters?”

It does matter, Mariko thought. It has to. That was the oath she swore when they gave her the badge. The law was supposed to matter, even when morals and logic and everything else said it shouldn’t.

Suppose I put you there again,
he’d said, but he didn’t have to. She’d
placed herself on that platform as soon as he started comparing numbers. That’s what got the tears flowing.

The vision stood out in her mind as clearly as if Akahata were in the same room. Her left hand squeezed smoothly; a black circle appeared in Akahata’s forehead. The kick of the gun seemed to come much later. Its deafening thunderclap too. Even in the moment, Akahata seemed to stand on his feet for an eternity, clutching that high school boy he’d grabbed as a human shield. When they finally fell together, Mariko was dead sure she’d shot the kid.

What would that mean, shooting the hostage instead of the bomber? Mariko didn’t believe in karma, but if there were such a thing, would it matter that Mariko was the one who killed the kid, and Akahata who blew up everyone else? Did it matter that the kid would have died anyway?

It
did
matter. It
had to
matter. Didn’t it?

Furukawa gave her no time to ponder the question. “The proposition before you is simple, Detective Oshiro. Join us, kill Koji Makoto, and make your city safe again. Or do not, and live with the guilt of doing nothing.”

Mariko looked down at the gun in her hand. A teardrop fell from her eye. She watched it fall all the way down until it splashed against the front sight of the pistol.

She rubbed her eyes with the nub of her right forefinger. It came away wet and glistening. Shaking her head, she told herself, “I can’t believe I’m going to do this.”

“You must,” Furukawa said. His voice was gentle now, almost grandfatherly.

“No.” Mariko looked him right in the eye. “I’m not a pool ball. You want to knock me around, you better be ready for me to knock back. I’m going to walk out that door, and I don’t want to see you again. Ever. Find someone else to do your dirty work.”

Furukawa had no idea what to do with that. He watched, dumbstruck, as Mariko slammed the door behind
her.

BOOK SIX

AZUCHI-MOMOYAMA PERIOD, THE YEAR 21

(1588
CE
)

26

“Y
ou’re a little one, aren’t you?”

The man who asked the question was anything but little. He had shoulders like an ox and a belly like a whale. He carried a long
naginata
with a blade as broad as a butcher’s cleaver. It was rusty, ill kept but well used. There was no mistaking the notches taken out of its edge; this one had seen plenty of fighting.

The big man—already named Whalebelly in Daigoro’s mind—had two accomplices. On his left stood a flat-faced man wielding two short
kama
. The sickles were intended for farming, but they were increasingly used in hand-to-hand combat now that the Sword Hunt had disarmed most of the population. On Whalebelly’s right stood a lean, haggard, foul-smelling woman who looked tougher than the other two put together. Her yellow nails were broken but her knives weren’t. She had one in each hand and half a dozen more tucked into her belt.

For his part, Daigoro was armed primarily with a huge bundle of dried wattle. It was his best disguise to date. The sheaf was large enough, and bowed his back enough, that bystanders had trouble making eye contact with him. It was light but it didn’t look that way, so no one would question a boy of his size limping under the load. Better yet, it was long enough that he could hide his father’s
odachi
in the center of it. So disguised, Daigoro found he could pass unnoticed within an arm’s reach of Shichio’s patrols.

On the other hand, his hunched posture restricted his peripheral vision, which made it easy for
yamabushi
like Whalebelly to take him unawares. His disguise also made it impossible to draw Glorious Victory, so if it came to blows, he would have no choice but to face these bandits with his
wakizashi
. Even that was tucked up into the bundle, frightfully slow on the draw.

“Wattle don’t sell for much,” he said, affecting a lowborn vernacular. “Not much use to folk like you, neither.”

“What do you mean, ‘folk like you’?” Whalebelly demanded. “You think you’re better than us, farmer boy?”

“No, sir. Figured you’re not fond of building fences is all.”

A sudden gale brought the surrounding bamboo forest to life. Leaves rustled. Long, green stalks clacked and clattered. The wind carried the smells of the
yamabushi
too: old sweat, oily hair, clothes so dirty they would never be worth washing again. And yes, alcohol. Whalebelly was drunk and spoiling for a fight.

Daigoro looked past them, down the natural tunnel formed by the overarching bamboo. It ran straight downhill to the road. Once he reached the road, he knew he’d see the moss green banners of House Yasuda. No more than a hundred paces, he guessed. A hundred paces and he would have peace. Damn you, he thought, damn all you gods and devils. Why could you not give me just a hundred paces more?

A lone boy versus three armed bandits. A one-sided fight to say the least. “I’ll give you one chance to retreat,” Daigoro said.

“Hah!” Whalebelly whacked his
naginata
against the ground, just like a bull pawing the earth before a charge.

“So that’s the way of it,” Daigoro said.

A one-sided fight, if the lone boy was samurai. Daigoro predicted the woman for a thrower—no reason to carry eight knives if she wasn’t—and he made sure her first shot went into the wattle. Flipping his sheaf the other way, he intercepted Whalebelly’s charge. The oversized
naginata
entangled itself irretrievably in the tangle of bundled sticks.

Daigoro ducked the next knife. Then he pulled the first one from the wattle and rammed it into Whalebelly’s diaphragm. It sank all the way to the hilt. That was enough to send the other man running.