The Shogun's Daughter (39 page)

“All right, I shouldn’t have said that. I’m sorry. Let’s talk about this.” Tahara gave a strained version of his roguish smile. He and Kitano obviously didn’t want a two-on-two fight. “Hirata-
san
has mixed up your mind. You’ve forgotten what we’ve accomplished together.”

“Without us—without the rituals and the ghost of General Otani—you would be nothing special,” Kitano said. “Just another piddling martial artist priest.”

“I’ve brought him to his senses,” Hirata said. “He realizes that he should quit before General Otani gets us all in trouble.”

Deguchi nodded, but Tahara said adamantly, “Nobody quits our secret society.”

Hirata didn’t mention the former member he’d met. “There is no more secret society. Deguchi-
san
and I are dissolving it.”

“Oh, really?” Tahara laughed with sardonic humor. Kitano’s eyes crinkled in his paralyzed face. Their aura boomed; the sky shook. “How, pray tell?”

“You’re going to cooperate with us.” Although prepared for battle, Hirata wanted to avoid it if he could. “Give us the magic book. We’ll work the spell that will send General Otani’s ghost back to the netherworld for good. Then we’ll burn the book. We’ll go our separate ways and never interfere with the Tokugawa regime again.”

“We won’t.” Kitano’s voice was insolent.

“Then I’m sorry,” Hirata said, truly regretful. He didn’t want anyone to die, least of all himself, and Tahara and Kitano were fellow disciples of his teacher, his brothers. He longed to resolve matters peacefully. But he’d known they would never agree to banish the ghost, their source of supernatural powers they had yet to attain.

They went still and somber as they realized that Hirata and Deguchi meant to kill them. Now came the showdown Hirata had been dreading, the fight to the death.

Hirata and Deguchi drew their swords so fast that their hands and arms were blurs of motion. Blades exited scabbards with such speed that the shrill rasp was barely audible. Energy currents sizzled through Hirata. Every muscle swelled with power, every nerve tingled with exhilaration. All his training had prepared him for this. In the same swift, fluid motion, Hirata and Deguchi lunged at Tahara and Kitano. Their bodies and their swords whizzed through air that flattened the skin of their faces against the bones. Hirata’s roar distorted into a deep groan. Heat shimmered off him and Deguchi as they lashed out with their swords.

Their blades carved empty space.

Tahara and Kitano disappeared in the same instant Hirata and Deguchi attacked.

A boom rocked the hills, louder than the one after Deguchi had thrown the bullet at Ienobu. Landing on their feet, Hirata and Deguchi circled, their backs to each other, preventing an attack from the rear, as the boom echoed.

The clearing was empty.

An updraft of warm wind raised Hirata’s eyes skyward.

*   *   *

TAEKO CROUCHED OUTSIDE
Lady Nobuko’s quarters. Hidden behind a bamboo thicket, she’d watched Masahiro run out of the house, then come back. She hadn’t let him see her because she was afraid he would scold her for staying in the castle. She didn’t know why Masahiro and Reiko had stayed, but if they found out that Taeko was here, they would be angry.

Her mother would be angry, too, and worried. Running away from her mother had been a bad thing to do. Maybe her mother was still inside the castle, looking for her, instead of taking the other children away. If so, Taeko had put Tatsuo and Akiko and the baby in danger. If anything happened to them or her mother, it would be her fault. Tears welled in her eyes. But crying wouldn’t change what had already happened. She was stuck with her decision. She somehow had to make it right.

Masahiro raced out of the house. This time Taeko followed. He ran too fast through the palace grounds; she lagged behind. Nobody else was there. Everybody had gone to the funeral. Masahiro slipped through a gate in the wall that surrounded the palace. Taeko sped after him. The passage was empty, but she heard voices, bells, and drums. Rounding a curve, she saw a straight stretch of the passage below her, jammed with people dressed in white. They stood behind a group of saffron-robed priests. The funeral procession was stalled inside the castle.

Taeko didn’t see Masahiro, but the crowd stirred, like water when a fish swims just below the surface. People shifted around whatever was causing the disturbance. Taeko glimpsed the top of a head with a long forelock tied at the top, bobbing along. It was Masahiro.

She plunged into the crowd and followed in his wake.

*   *   *

“EXCUSE ME,” MASAHIRO
said, pushing his way through the passage.

“Don’t be in such a hurry,” a priest said. “We’re not going anywhere until the line ahead of us starts moving.”

“It must be stretched out all the way through Edo,” someone else said.

Masahiro had to catch Korika. He’d already checked the other passages that led downhill and not found her. If she was trying to leave the castle, this was the only other route. Masahiro stepped on someone’s foot, said, “I’m sorry,” and squeezed between the crowd and the wall.

“Hey! There goes Sano’s son!” came a shout from above.

Masahiro saw a guard leaning out of a watchtower, pointing down at him. Alarm clenched his stomach. The guards at home had discovered that he and the others had escaped. Footsteps pounded down the passage behind him. He wriggled faster through the crowd. Troops called from the covered corridor atop the wall, to guards accompanying the procession. “He’s headed toward you! Don’t let him out of the castle!”

Talk buzzed as people realized that a fugitive was in their midst. Shoving and jostling, Masahiro felt someone grab his collar. He tore free. He had to get Korika before he was caught. The guards pushed toward him, coming closer. As Masahiro squirmed through the procession, the passage gradually sloped downward. On the right side of the mourners and priests, the hill soared vertically to the retaining wall and covered corridor that encircled the castle’s uppermost tier. On the left was a section of wall that had collapsed during the earthquake. Reconstruction had begun. A dirt foundation, faced with flat stones, climbed in irregular steps to the high, square base of a new watchtower. The tower was wide at the bottom, tapering upward. From its base rose a wooden framework. Below the new wall, the hill dropped off steeply. Folks ahead of Masahiro, on the lower stretch of the passage, turned to look for him. Some twenty paces distant he glimpsed a woman’s broad face with a low forehead beneath a round puff of hair.

It was Korika.

Masahiro fought his way toward her. Troops yelling at him drowned out the bells and drums. He caught up with Korika. Her shiny black eyes goggled with fear. He seized her arm.

“Stop him!” called the troops behind Masahiro.

“My father didn’t kill the shogun’s son!” Masahiro yelled. “She did!”

Korika screamed, “Let me go!” She tried to jerk loose.

Masahiro held on. People shrank from them. They stood in the only empty space in the passage. “You set the fire. Admit it!”

“No!” Korika clawed at his hand, digging bloody gouges in his skin.

Furious at her for the trouble she’d caused his family, Masahiro grabbed her other arm. “Your fire hood was found on a bush. I showed it to Lady Nobuko. She said it was yours.”

“Leave me alone!” She was breathless, frantic, trembling.

The crowd quieted. Priests stopped their drumming and bell-ringing; troops leaned out the windows of the towers and corridor to listen.

Masahiro shook Korika. Lacquer combs fell from her hair, clattered on the paving stones. “She said you went out that night and came home smelling like smoke.”

Korika abruptly ceased struggling. Her mouth hung open, mute. Her eyes filled with woe because she’d been betrayed by her mistress.

“You murdered Yoshisato!” Masahiro said. “There’s no use denying it. You’re guilty!”

His words rang out loudly in the silence. Mutters swept through the procession. “Who’s that woman?” “It’s Lady Nobuko’s lady-in-waiting.” “
She
killed Yoshisato?”

Masahiro looked around. Priests, mourners, and troops massed above and below him in the passage, gaping at him and Korika in surprise. The mutters continued up and down the line, echoing through the castle. The sound of bells and drums in the distance gradually faded as the news spread outside. Masahiro kept his grip on Korika.

Hunching her shoulders, she offered him and the spectators a sickly version of her usual, ingratiating smile. She looked guiltier than anyone Masahiro had ever seen. The people nearest them saw her guilt, too. Skepticism in their expressions gave way to belief. The troops stood dumbfounded.

“Everybody can see that you did it,” Masahiro told Korika. “You might as well confess.”

Huge sobs wracked Korika, as if she would vomit up her guilt. She doubled over, leaning on Masahiro. “I’m glad I did it!” She seemed as much relieved to give up her secret as she was distressed at being caught. “He was a fraud! I couldn’t let him be the next shogun!”

Voices babbled as people farther down the procession asked what was happening and spectators closer to Korika told them.

“His real father hurt my mistress,” Korika wailed. “My mistress and I were afraid they would get away with it. We wanted them both to suffer. So I burned Yoshisato’s house.” Tears streaked her makeup. They trickled over the self-righteous smile she gave the spectators. “Was I so wrong to make them pay when nobody else would?”

Masahiro was astonished. He’d feared that his mother’s plan to exonerate his father would fail; now Korika had confessed in front of hundreds of witnesses.

“Was the fire Lady Nobuko’s idea?” he asked.

“… No. It was mine,” Korika said.

Her pause raised doubts in Masahiro. “Did she ask you to kill Yoshisato?”

“No, she didn’t.” Korika called to the crowd, raising her voice above the hum of voices reporting her confession. “I acted alone! Lady Nobuko didn’t know I was going to do it!”

If she was telling the truth, then Lady Nobuko had done nothing wrong. If she was lying, then she was protecting her guilty mistress. But that didn’t matter. Masahiro called to the troops, “Here’s the arsonist. Take us to the shogun, so she can confess to him and I can tell him that my father and my mother and I are innocent.”

The troops that had been guarding his family were standing close to Masahiro and Korika. The leader said, “Let’s take her to Chamberlain Yanagisawa. He can sort things out.”

“Not Yanagisawa!” Masahiro was horrified. Yanagisawa would kill Korika, ignore her confession, and put Masahiro’s family to death anyway. “We have to speak to the shogun.” That was his only chance of overturning the court’s verdict.

“It’s not up to you,” the leader said. “You’re going back under house arrest, and you’re going to tell me where your mother and sister and friends went.”

He seized Masahiro by the arm. As they tussled, Korika broke loose from Masahiro, stumbled a few paces down the passage, and halted at the crowd blocking it. Soldiers advanced on her. Whimpering, she turned to her right and looked up at the vertical hillside. On her left, the unfinished wall was waist-high. She awkwardly heaved herself up on it. The soldiers grabbed for her legs. She squealed, kicking at their faces. They leaped backward. She crawled onto the surface of the wall’s dirt foundation.

“Get her down!” the leader ordered while he struggled with Masahiro.

Korika staggered up the foundation, which ascended above the downward-slanting passage beside it. Masahiro punched the leader’s nose. The leader yelled. Blood poured from his nostrils. He lost his grip on Masahiro. Masahiro climbed onto the foundation, which was some ten paces wide. Eight troops were already bounding up it after Korika. She looked over her shoulder, saw them, and screamed. Tripping on her white skirts, she veered toward the sheer drop on the other side of the wall.

“Look out!” Masahiro cried, hurtling up the slope.

Spectators groaned in consternation. Korika teetered at the edge, arms flapping. The soldiers were almost upon her when the foundation began to move. Their feet sank into the dirt as they ran. Masahiro felt the packed earth under him loosen and slide sideways. He heard clunking, skittering noises. On the wall’s other side, stones fell off and bounced down the slope. The builders of the wall had done a shoddy job, hurrying to finish it. The weight of people running on it had destabilized the structure. The whole foundation canted toward the sheer drop.

“The wall is collapsing!” someone in the procession exclaimed.

Korika screamed as the ground gave way under her, Masahiro, and the troops. She ran toward the unfinished watchtower. As the foundation spilled over the drop, Masahiro fell on his stomach. The soldiers, higher on the foundation ahead of him, went down, too. They all crawled frantically against the flow of earth, toward the side of the wall that bordered the passage. A sound like a waterfall thundered as the foundation cascaded down the slope. Masahiro reached the rim of facing stones. But the soldiers slid faster than they could climb.

“Help!” they shouted as the avalanche swept them downward.

Terrified, Masahiro flung his arms over the stones’ jagged edges. They held firm while the foundation collapsed and the crowd moaned. At last the thunder faded. The world went still. Masahiro could hear his heart pounding. His breath pumped so hard he thought his chest would burst. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw that he was lying on a long, narrow ridge of flat earth—all that remained of the foundation. Below him, dust swirled from a swath of dirt, rock, and sand that covered the hillside all the way down to a retaining wall on the lower tier of the castle. Nothing moved. The avalanche had buried the soldiers and apparently killed them all.

Masahiro turned to the people staring at him from the passage below. The angry leader with the bloody nose said, “Come down from there!”

The rest of the foundation could collapse and kill him, Masahiro knew. But he couldn’t go back under house arrest. He had to take Korika to the shogun. Alarm struck. He’d lost sight of her after the avalanche started. Had she been killed?