Thousand Shrine Warrior (17 page)

The maid-in-waiting draped a padded winter kimono around the sickly Lady Echiko and tried to get her to stand. Other young women moved about the dark room like shades, their moods habitually dour. The youngest maidservant, scarcely more than a child, found a huge umbrella in a cabinet. Another of Echiko's companions opened a door onto night's snowy garden.

“Come and see the snow from your veranda,” the maid-in-waiting whispered, her voice edged more with resignation than concern, for concern had long proved unavailing. Echiko was brought to her feet with the aid of two maidens, one of whom had put new, thick tabi-socks on the princess.

She was a ghastly thin puppet in their hands, going where they led her. Her feet shuffled past a tray of untouched food, then out of the room. At the edge of the veranda, she stepped down onto a pair of high wooden geta; one of her servants made sure the princess placed each foot properly. The geta were high enough to keep her feet above the snow.

As they took her through the garden, between stones and stunted evergreens and amidst the naked, twisted branches of slumbering trees, she went with an eerie kind of poise, an ethereal, skeletal grace. She was like a corpse-princess on high clogs, many layers of clothing askew, hair not quite in place. She was Death's most decorative beauty. She was the consort of King Emma of the Dark Land.

The littlest maidservant had a bit of trouble handling the long-poled umbrella whenever there was a breeze. She was not concerned whether the lady's maids were struck by snowfall; nor did she regard her own chill. But she made sure the princess was protected. It was her duty, which she took most seriously, and it was her genuine desire to defend Lady Echiko from any added plight, however minor.

Soon they were leading Echiko less than it appeared, for she chose her own direction. They passed through her private gardens without once looking at the snow-softened contours of things. The mansion was built atop high stone masonry, the masonry surrounded by moats. It was a castle only in the widest sense, richer than a mere fortress, a great house built atop an artificial mountain of granite blocks. Echiko, braced by her least taciturn maidservant, went down a steep path, away from the mansion, toward a practice range where, in better times and better weather, samurai sported and trained. It was currently a flat, miniature wasteland. She and her maids-in-waiting crossed it without looking about.

They came at last to battlements on the pseudo-cliff's edge, overlooking Lord Sato's private estates. Echiko could not see far, for it was after nightfall, and there were no stars, no moon, only a sky filled with icy feathers.

She pushed feebly at the girl holding the umbrella, wanting as she did to feel snowflakes on her cheeks and lashes. The women fretted that they had encouraged their lady too far. She might let herself catch a chill, which in her weakened state would surely lead to death. But they could not force themselves on her now, for the princess was in rapture, her thin face turned toward the sky, her eyes closed. Heaven cooling her fears and sorrows.

When she opened her perpetually sleepy eyes, it was to watch her own arm rising slowly, palm upward, catching flakes as they fell. When several snowflakes rested on her hand, she squeezed them. Then she opened her bony fingers to see the flakes had melted into tears. Her weak, weary voice spoke tragically, laconically:

“Isn't life a snowflake? Aren't all of us in the palm of great, warm hands?”

She tried to see through the darkness and the falling snow, gazing uselessly across the vast Sato estates. She looked in the direction of the peasant village. On a clear, bright day it would have been there before her, small and distant. On a clear night, it would be there smokily, as in a dream. Now there was nothing.

“Has Furusato vanished?” she asked, calling it by a traditional name. “Have the peasants of Old Village ceased to be? How sad it is.”

“They are there, Princess,” whispered the maidservant who was always closest. “The snow and darkness hides them, that is all.”

“No. There is nothing there. They have followed Heinosuke into the Land of Darkness.”

“Heinosuke will come for you eventually, Princess. Please do not lose heart.”

“Oh! Do you hear it?”

“What, Lady?”

“That song we heard this morning, when you brought me here before!”

“No, Lady. That was hours and hours ago. There is no music now. And we were unable to find out for you whom it was.”

“I can still hear it,” she insisted, dreamy eyes gazing, head turned just so, as though to capture more of the distant harmonies. The maids-in-waiting looked extremely worried. Echiko's health had deteriorated so much, she often hallucinated. “Every note,” she said, “is a veiled allusion. Have you ever heard anything so sad?”

“That was this morning, Princess.”

“It has a rough elegance, don't you think so?”

“Yes, Princess,” said the maidservant, giving in.

“It must be a warrior's performance. It's very good. Does one of my father's retainers play the shakuhachi? It comes from amidst the vassals' estates, I'm sure.”

“It came from an old pagoda,” said the fretful maiden. “We found out that much for you. But that was before. It was probably just a wanderer, who has continued along the Way.”

“Oh! It comes nearer! Does the player bring news of Heinosuke?”

Echiko moved nearer the edge of the wall. She lurched forward and would have vanished downward along with the snow, leaving only the echo of her plunge into the moat. But that ever-present maidservant grabbed Lady Echiko's sleeve and drew her back.

“Don't stop me!” Echiko complained, batting at her helper. “Heinosuke calls me!” The other maidservants pressed near, trying to keep their lady from struggling, lest she fall from the ledge or merely exhaust herself to the point of collapse. The youngest maiden, holding the umbrella, was struck soundly in the face by Echiko's thrashing. The little maid went off the edge, not making a sound. The other maids-in-waiting had their voices catch in their throats. They looked down to see the top of the umbrella floating away, away. Then there was a faint splash.

“A snowflake,” Echiko murmured, more dreamily than ever, her hostility gone as quickly as it came, her suicidal effort ended. “A snowflake.”

Chamberlain Norifune shuffled through the dark hallway. His chilly toes were curled within his tabi-socks. He muttered to himself as he went, like a man two or three decades older. He ruminated about the world and his place in it, a comfortable place but not necessarily a stable one. He could not shake the notion that everything could be turned upside down at any moment, shaking him out into a dreary place, or snatching away his very life, reducing him to a pot of ashes.

Kanno, like many of the outlying provinces, had gone largely undisturbed during the clashes between the original Imperial armies of Heian-kyo and the upstart Shogun's forces from Kamakura. The wars began and ended without much effect on such a far-flung fief as Kanno; but a provincial government could not afford to be oblivious to the changes taking place in Naipon.

The outcome of the upheavals was that Kamakura became the new capital. The Emperor was finally and ultimately a figurehead. Kamakura's governance was not yet comprehensive, which might be a relief except that it rendered paranoia two-sided and responses unpredictable.

Some domains had resident Kamakura vassals as constables, answerable to the Shogun rather than a provincial lord, serving as a check against abuse of power and to insure fealty with the Office of the Military. Other domains, for the time being, retained the hereditarily supported Imperial constabulary, reporting to Heian-kyo, or Kyoto as it had late been called. Really these latter officials had lost meaningful contact with the throne thirty or forty years earlier, and it was this very type of weakening of authority that had caused the reshuffling of central power. The Kamakura shogunate was not about to let the situation repeat itself, laxity merely encouraging provincial lords to rise, even as the present Shogun's clan had risen with domination in mind.

Kanno was one of the domains that had only an antiquated Imperial constable. Furthermore, that constable happened to be one-and-the-same with Chamberlain Norifune, which was part of the cause of his concern. He continued to send annual reports to Heian-kyo, designed to placate rather than inform, and generally some kind of formal reply would be forthcoming from the old capital. Yet the changing world had rendered such sneakiness a pointless ritual, Heian-kyo pretending influence, her constables pretending fealty and appeasement.

The Imperial government was not precisely abolished, since the military could not be so audacious. The Shogun legitimized his rule by means of regency, not usurpation. All the same, by slow stages, Imperial posts were being undermined and ultimately displaced by shogunate equivalents. It was only a matter of time before the process reached Kanno.

A man could not remain successful if he were devoid of tactical considerations. Many of the Imperial constables throughout Naipon were eager to trade their old titles for new ones proffered by Kamakura. Norifune courted just such a notion. “If I can get a post similar to the one I've always held,” he thought, “then my position will be secure.” But this wasn't exactly true, he realized, for the shogunate was not the emasculated government Norifune's family had served since time immemorial. “The shogunate will insist I make reports about Lord Sato, who is a good friend nowadays.” Well, he thought, it would be possible to fabricate a lot of harmless stuff, but it wouldn't be as easy.

Thus the chamberlain's plans were to be on guard for government spies; to ingratiate himself if one appeared, so that he would be able to keep his position intact; and in the meantime, to follow Lord Sato's advice and enjoy life. Didn't Lord Sato like to say, “Won't those silly peasants grow rice whether I say so or not? Don't they pay their taxes every year? That's enough for me! Things won't fall apart if we play another game of chess. Hey, send some men to turn loose that stag they caught the other day! I want to shoot it down this afternoon!”

Yet the chamberlain had to admit he wasn't such a happy man, despite all evidence of good fortune. Duty didn't mean one grain of rice to him, so he ought to be able to look at present affairs as ideal, nothing tiring, worldly pleasures indulged. Somehow he could only think how cold it was in the castle, no matter how much charcoal was put in a pot. Candles never penetrated the darkness very far. Odd he hadn't noticed it when he was a young man. Had the castle changed? Probably only he had changed, had gotten older. “If I do get appointed constable for the new government, perhaps it will entail transferral to some other province closer to the center of things.” Preferably, it would be someplace warmer, where spring and summer were not so short and autumn was not a part of winter.

And he often felt depressed to realize all these self-serving plots and plans would come to nothing if, as he feared, he would not be able to impress those harsh men under the Shogun. They might see right through him and realize he wanted merely to enjoy life in Lord Sato's castle, serving minimally, participating in the hunts with his patron, relishing the prestige of titles, wearing handsome clothes. Norifune had few illusions about himself. He was not an extraordinary swordsman of the sort the Shogun's men admired. They might pass him over with scoffing laughter. Even if they did not strip him of the title originated by Emperors, a shogunate constable could very easily come to live in Kanno. Then Norifune's privileges would be as good as usurped, his position a redundancy and an anachronism. He might at least hope to remain chamberlain; but even that might come to doubt, since Lord Sato wasn't apt to impress the Shogun's men either. His fate and the fate of his patron were inextricably linked.

Norifune was diligent neither as a constable nor as a chamberlain. He could not deny it to himself, though he kept up a few public appearances. His duties had long been meted out to underlings who, one by one, came under the influence of Lord Sato's religious tutor, Priest Kuro, whose name meant “black” and who reveled in the irony of being referred to as Kuro the Darkness. Lord Sato had similarly delegated most of his duties to vassals, who by degrees began to count on Kuro for religious and temporal guidance alike.

Had Chamberlain Norifune been a wiser fellow, he might have warned his Lord about Kuro's wheedled power. But life was complicated enough as it stood. It was easier to be blind to things, or even grateful that Kuro kept the castle affairs in order while titled men exercised prodigal freedoms.

Having arrived in his private chambers, Norifune saw that his page had already laid out a mattress. The page helped Norifune out of his hakama. But Norifune was not ready for bed and did not allow his kimono to be removed. Instead, he slouched down in front of a pot of coals and, after the page laid a rich quilt over his shoulders and withdrew into an adjoining room, Norifune picked at the coals with a pair of tongs, and continued to worry and wonder why he felt so ill at ease night after night.