Thousand Shrine Warrior (22 page)

By day, nothing could hide for long in the snow-flattened fields. But by moon and starlight, something might evade them for a while. The mounted hunters danced their horses this way and that. They shined their candled beacons along the snow, but had left so many of their own tracks along the ravine's margin that they could not be sure they hadn't obscured the marks of fleeing prey.

A few shouts were passed back and forth, but nobody made a call of discovery. They began to wander further apart. The land sloped upward, affording a fair view of the dips and rises, which were few. Some of the men were highly familiar with the terrain, having hunted here often and having learned to assure Lord Sato good sport. They knew that the apparent lack of hiding places was somewhat illusory. A few narrow streams and occasional gulleys could not be seen at a glance or from a distance. The hunters began to wander further and further from one another, each having in mind this or that spot where prey had huddled on past occasions.

It was Norifune's group that passed the spot where the nun had been sitting, panting, trying to collect her wits despite what she had been forced to drink; but she had vacated the spot. None detected the sign of her having been there, or having left, except one man. He looked askance at his fellows, more and more certain that
they
honestly believed their prey was merely a dumb beast. This man searched the area with the others, and held back when they began to ride further on, going slowly, looking at the ground for evidence of a deer's passing. The straggler rode back to the end of the long ditch, shone his beacon into it, and looked pensive.

He saw the markings of human feet, naked but for tabisocks. Though he could see where she had been sitting, he could not quite tell how she had gotten out without leaving a trail. But, since he had some sense that the prey was not a beast (the glamour had enough effect that he was not actually convinced of anything), he suspected his quarry's human cunning. Furthermore, he was aware of the methods by which a human being, though not a beast, could pass over snow without leaving much evidence. The others had not thought to check for such signs, being more fully convinced that the prey was more than two-legged.

The hunter had his horse's reins attached to the saddle and controlled the mount by knee pressure. He hooked his lamp on the saddle as well. Then he pulled an arrow through the bottom of his quiver (the arrows being kept with fletched ends down and accessible through an opening at the base of the quiver). He sat ready to nock the arrow, but had not yet comprehended the prey's location. He did have clues.

As the horse obeyed its rider's subtle encouragement, the hunter was able to locate—barely visible in the moon's glimmer—a strip of snow that had been oddly unsettled, as though someone had dragged a bail of rice over it. He knew it to be the kind of track left by someone who lies flat atop snow and inches along in a wormlike fashion, skimming the surface, leaving little evidence of having passed.

This trail ended a short ways on. The hunter became puzzled. He nocked the arrow but could not see where to aim. His companions were now quite scattered over the terrain. Lord Sato and his group were furthest off mark. The hunter knew that he alone was onto something; but, selfishly, he did not call the others back. He danced his horse around the area, trying to guess what further trick the prey had used, what direction she next had taken.

He pursed his lips and glowered downward from his mount, unable to resolve the mystery.

Without warning, a patch of snow erupted, directly beneath the horse. The nun stood, her sword bared, stabbing straight upward through the horse's stomach, pushing the stomach with her shoulder. The hunter felt the horse tense its every muscle, heard it scream, and almost simultaneously felt his rectum punctured.

As the horse went down, the hunter unleashed his arrow at random; it went deep into the snow, to no purpose. He began to shout with panic and horror as he hopped away from his thrashing horse, trailing blood in his wake. He clutched his buttocks and cried for aid, then fell, thrashing, much as the horse was thrashing. Meanwhile the nun had gone a surprising distance over the snow, though hampered by deep drifts.

Nineteen hunters were on their way, responding to the cries of their fallen companion. A barrage of arrows was unleashed. The drunken nun wheeled, staggered, made a sweeping arc with her sword, standing less than perfect for a proper
yadome-jutsu
arrow-deflection. The arrows shattered against her blade, missing their mark, but a splinter lodged in her arm. Her clogs, dangling from her obi, clattered like wooden ox bells as she dashed in the direction of the stand of trees. She heard the twang of bowstrings and turned again, deflecting death. There was small chance of getting as far as the woods. She had to consider offensive action rather than try to outrun horses and arrows. The hunters were still scattered and it would take a while longer for them to regroup. She must act swiftly.

She ran straight toward Chamberlain Norifune.

The nun looked ghastly in the moonlight, her shoulder-length hair plastered by sweat to the sides of her head, eyes maniacal rather than afraid, sword raised above her head. Norifune was completely undone! He tried to wheel his horse about, to let other men take the initiative. He shouted the order, “Kill her! Kill her!” but this confused the situation further, since the others saw only a deer blundering into better range. Norifune half-saw the illusion—a misty deer with the image of a warrior nun superimposed—and his mind tried to withdraw from any such knowlege of sorcery. It really was a helpless doe, ripe for feathering, not a dangerous warrior.

She made a miraculous leap (must have been a deer after all!) and Norifune felt the edge of steel strike his neck. He plunged to the snow, his horse running off. He knew the blow should have decapitated him, but somehow he lay upon his back feeling good as dead but hardly headless.

The nun hovered over his prone form, point of steel to his neck; and if the illusion of the deer was utterly dissipated for him, he still would not see things as they truly were, but fancied that the nun had been the sorceress from the beginning, and led the hunters a merry chase for reasons all her own.

“
Who are you?
” screeched the panic-stricken Norifune, unable to move away from the threatening blade without injury.

“A lot of people want to know my name,” she answered. “All right. I will tell you. It is Neroyume. It means ‘sleeping in hell.'” She pressed the sword's point until Norifune was scratched the slightest bit. “You would be sleeping there just now, except I struck you with the backside of my sword and not its sharp edge. You owe me your life! Now, tell those other men to stop this business at once. I can't think so well and am liable to do something rash.”

She stepped back to let Norifune stand. He was about to shout exactly the proper order, but an arrow that missed its intended target buried itself in Norifune's kneecap, and he fell back down, howling.

There were hunters all around her in the next moment. The hot breaths of horses made pungent clouds. The hunters watched her, using their horses to urge her away from injured Norifune. The men looked as though they were curious and uncertain.

“Help the chamberlain,” one of them said.

“That's a funny deer,” someone said foolishly. “Kind of small.”

“Just a baby. Should we kill a fawn?”

“At once!” another answered.

The nun cursed, “
Kisama!
” which meant they were all asses. “Can't you see Priest Kuro brought you to this? His
saimenjutsu
mesmerising art is excellent!”

The men were startled. One said, “A magic deer! It speaks!”

An arrow was unleashed and her sword swept up to deflect it. The splinter in her arm hurt. Blood stained her sleeve.

“A weird beast, but wounded,” one of them said. “Look at its reddened shoulder.”

They were surrounding her. There was no chance of escape. Presently they raised their bows, almost as one. She could not deflect arrows on all sides.

An unexpected wind raised flurries of powdery snow, sufficient to keep Lord Sato's further men from finding their way quickly to reinforce the others; but it did not hinder the vision of those who surrounded her now. The panting, wild-eyed nun took her best yadome-jutsu stance, but knew it was hopeless. There was only a moment's life left to her, she was certain, but she would try her best.

The belling of a stag unsettled everyone. It was a surprising sound, barely natural; and the hunters turned their attention aside for the moment, thinking their prey's mate was dashing from somewhere to save the injured, cornered doe.

Out of the flurries charged a monstrous white buck with murderous red eyes. It charged with such ferocity that the hunters nearly forgot their original target, and unleashed arrows toward the monster instead. The buck caught the arrows in his thorny antlers, and belled again, proud of his ability.

The nun took the opportunity to escape the circle of confused and panicked men and horses. She had run some ways before the horrendous vertigo overtook her and, her foot striking a rock unseen beneath a layer of snow, she tumbled forward, and could not muster the courage to get up. As she lay there, she looked back to where the eight hunters were shouting conflicting demands of one another.

She saw that the source of their consternation was even more spectral than Priest Bundori's warring stag alone. The stag had a rider! The rider was a slender youth with a ghastly, sallow complexion and a white kimono embroidered with a yellow snake. He moved with preternatural limberness as he maneuvered a Shinto ceremonial rope as a lariat.

The lasso moved through the air like a winged serpent, grabbing men from their saddles, while at the same time the great buck ripped into the flanks of horses, his antlers a nest of knives.

Chamberlain Norifune regained enough of his wits to limp away, toward Lord Sato and other men who were approaching. He shouted at them to come no further, declaring a ghost or monster would destroy them. The eight men fighting stag and rider were to be abandoned.

Among those eight, one gave up quickly and rode off in fright. Another, whose horse was gored and dying, fled, even as did Norifune. The other six received lassos about their throats, clinging momentarily, long enough to jerk, to break their necks.

The nun was no less confused than the others, but was grateful for the time required to scrabble for the cover of the trees. The recent carnage would certainly not end the hunt. The other men might well take it into their heads that they hunted both a hind
and
a stag, a supernatural couple who could be hunted only by night and did not exist by day. Whether this frightened them or thrilled them did not matter. They would pursue the deadly sport, no longer requiring the encouragement of Priest Kuro's mesmerism. For they could never again call themselves hunters, let alone samurai, if they let such prey escape, and left the slain unavenged.

Even now her plan was uncertain. She must make it through the wooded area to the river. If she could not locate so much as a long-disused bridge, dangerous and rickety, then the river would be nothing but a dead end.

The sky had blossomed new clouds, while high winds brought others. The moon and stars were blotted out. Snow was falling anew, with increasing vigor, hampering her vision more than did the darkness or inebriation. As she loped and slid over the terrain, her lungs felt more and more expanded. She had lost all sense of direction.

Samurai were everywhere in the woods, seeking the prey. She heard horses blowing, their hoofs kicking through the snow. She heard samurai shouting to each other, some elated by the unearthly hunt, others fearful; some were merely lost and calling for orientation. It did not seem as though Lord Sato or Norifune were still among the hunters. The chamberlain doubtless had used the excuse of the turning weather as a point to cajole Lord Sato back into the castle, either to seek instruction from Kuro the Darkness, to obtain reinforcements for the devilish hunt, or merely to hide.

The nun was spotted. Two riders bore upon her as she ran an evasive route between close trees. The trees were too young and the underbrush too slight to provide effective cover. The two samurai did not lose her. One of them shone a beacon. The other prepared to unleash an arrow.

The arrow missed, for the bikuni came to an abrupt halt. Her path was blocked by Priest Bundori's albino stag. He stood snorting and pawing the snow. The stag's rider was also red-eyed and white-haired, but not quite a true albino, having an ocher coloration. The xanthic rider's lariat reached out once. A hunter's cry was stifled. His lantern dashed to the snow and went out, the hunter dead beside it with his neck horribly twisted. The horse ran on riderless.

The archer nocked a second arrow; but with the trees, the dark, and the blizzard, he was unsure of his target. As he hesitated, the lariat reached out again, snatching the longbow from his grasp. He drew his sword; but, thinking better of the uncanny situation, he wheeled his horse about and pounded a trail toward the sound of other riders.

The stag-rider leapt onto the snow and soon stood before the nun, who was twice reprieved by the youth's efforts. The stag remained a short distance away, standing so quietly that he was nearly invisible among the trees and snowfall.

The youth's sallow face was long. He was not entirely unpleasant-looking, but he was not attractive either. His looks were somehow inhuman, even aside from his lack of proper pigmentation. His red eyes were fiery gems. When a red tongue licked white teeth, that tongue was decidedly forked. He addressed the bikuni.

“I am that serpent whose life you saved. My name is Raski. It has been my fate to follow you through many lives and serve you.”

The bikuni recollected a fighting stallion by that name. She had ridden him into battle and he died courageously. She also recalled a valiant canine who had been awarded the death-name of Raski at his funeral. Both of those beasts were white-furred, though not albino. The bikuni had no doubt that there was such a thing as reincarnation; but she was unable, at the moment, to feel deep concern about the karma of a beast. It was only vaguely disturbing that a creature might be reborn with each life reduced to something lower than before.