Shike, p.5
Shike, page 5
Thanking Taniko and Jebu many times over, Moko ran off to join the surviving porter and the maids.
"I hope your kindness doesn't bring trouble down on us later on," Jebu said to Taniko.
Jebu was so tall and Taniko so tiny that even though he was on foot and she on horseback, their eyes met almost on a level. She smiled at him for the first time.
"You are a remarkable fighter, Jebu. I've never seen anything like the way you killed that Muratomo lout. When you were fighting him your eyes met mine and I felt something-I cannot describe it. Perhaps some day I will be able to express it in a poem. For now, I want to apologize for my rude words to you. I didn't want you to spoil my new appreciation of you by killing a helpless man."
Jebu was pleased, but he kept up the pose of the stern warrior. "An egg is helpless, but it may hatch a deadly serpent."
"One thing the Zinja taught you well."
"What?"
"How to be a windy bore." She whirled her bay gelding and rode off, calling mockingly over her shoulder, "Shike!"
Chapter Five
Sliding back down the hillside, Jebu stopped at the body of one of the tsuibushi. He rolled it over and studied the young face, tough and stupid-looking even in death. Yet this commonplace countenance had been in life a marvel of intricately co-ordinated parts. The most skilful artist in the world could not create a statue that could duplicate the delicate and complex movements of that mouth, now slack. And the miracle of beauty that had been this country ne'er-do-well was now ended by a single crude blow from a feathered stick with a metal point. That exquisite structure, its movements ceased, was now already beginning to turn back into slime. Jebu squatted beside the body, his hands hanging limply between his knees. I did this.
In his mind he recited the Prayer to a Fallen Enemy. I am heartily sorry for having killed you. I apologize to you a thousand times and ask your forgiveness a hundred thousand times. I declare to all the kami of this place who witnessed our encounter that I alone am to blame for your death, and I take upon myself all the karma stemming from killing you. May your spirit not be angry with me. May you find happiness in your next life and may we meet again as friends.
He said the same prayer to the other tsuibushi and then to the headless, leather-and-steel-clad body of Nakane Ikeno, the first man he had ever killed.
The safest thing to do with the bodies, Jebu decided, was to dump them into the sea. If the waves cast them up on shore again, it might be days or weeks from now, by which time Taniko and he would be far away from this part of the country. And with luck the bodies would be eaten by fish and never seen again.
As if reading his thoughts, Moko came to stand beside him and said, "I make bold to tell the shike, this oryoshi stood well with the Muratomo. If it became known who killed Ikeno, the shike would have powerful enemies."
"You give me a reason to kill you."
"You already have reasons, and you have decided not to kill me. My life is in your hands at all times."
Jebu led Moko and the porter in prayers over each body. Then they rolled the bodies down the hill and dropped them into the white foam.
Ikeno was the last. The porter protested. "This armour is worth a lot."
"It was worthless to him," said Jebu, even as he admired the pattern of orange silk lacings that lashed together the leather and steel strips of armour. "And it is easily recognized. If we were found carrying Ikeno's armour, it might be embarrassing for us."
"At least keep the sword, shike," said Moko. "A sword is a thing of beauty. It has a soul. The art of a master swordsmith has gone into forging it, and the Fox Spirit has presided over its creation. It would be a shame, a blasphemy, to throw it into the sea to rust."
"You are almost a poet, Moko. Very well, I'll keep the sword." Moko unbelted the scabbard and gingerly picked up the shining weapon that lay where Ikeno had dropped it. Jebu took the sword from Moko and examined it.
A shadowy temper line ran along the blade where the hard steel of the edge met the flexible steel of the core. The swordsmith had worked the temper line into a decorative pattern reminiscent of bamboo leaves. There was writing engraved on the blade as well.
"There is nothing between heaven and earth that man need fear who carries at his side this magnificent blade."
Jebu shook his head. Foolish. Such words taught the samurai to rely on his sword and throw away his life. Far wiser was the Zinja maxim: rely on nothing under heaven. He handed the sword to Moko. He might send it, he thought, to his mother and Taitaro.
"I'll pack it in the baggage for you and no one will see it till you want it again," said Moko.
And so Ikeno, his armour, his bow and his head, but not his sword, all went into the sea. Jebu slapped Ikeno's black roan on the rump and sent it galloping up the Tokaido Road to the north-east, away from Ikeno's village.
The three men and three women hurried down the coast, riding as rapidly as they could, avoiding houses and villages and hiding in the forest whenever there was a chance of meeting someone on the road. Still not sure whether Moko might betray them, Jebu did not give him a watch to stand, but divided the night between himself and the Shima porter.
The day after the fight with Nakane, they were riding over grassy hills when Taniko drew alongside him.
"The company of those women has become such a trial. They have been my servants all my life, and there is nothing they can say that I have not heard a hundred times before."
"You have mentioned that I, too, can be boring."
"At least you say things I haven't heard before."
Jebu smiled at her. "I sympathize. I've had no one to talk to but myself since we began this journey. And I know myself better than you know your maids. I find myself even more tiresome company." He and Taniko had warmed towards each other. It was obviously the killing of the samurai that had won her over to him. Well, what of that? Some good must come from every act that harmed someone.
He recalled that moment in the heat of battle when their eyes met. He doubted that he would ever forget it. Today she looked more beautiful than ever, and knowing her better, he now saw that the seeming ruthlessness in her eyes was simply a candid intelligence coupled with a clear certainty about how she felt and what she wanted.
She said, "You are reminding me of my rudeness to you on the first part of this journey. I'll make amends. We'll keep each other company. What bores you in yourself might intrigue me. And you might find me interesting, though I believe myself to be quite ordinary. Just as the bodies of men are of no interest to other men, but are quite fascinating to women."
How bold of her! "I am sure that you are too young and too modest to know anything about the bodies of men, my lady."
"Even so, I can talk to you about such things without fear of seeming foolish. You are young also, and a monk."
"The Zinja take no vow of celibacy." Jebu looked her in the eye. Just because I may not touch her, I need not hide from her that I am a man.
Taniko turned pink. "Oh, I see that I am in great danger. I'd better ride back to the protection of my ladies." Her laughter tinkling in the warm air, she rode off through the high, yellowing grass. He felt such an ache of desire for her that his stomach knotted itself. Was there, perhaps, some way he could manage to lie with her without shaming her, endangering himself and dishonouring the Order?
Next day, after their midday meal of rice cakes, seaweed and dried fish, she was back again, riding beside him.
"How old are you, Jebu?"
"Seventeen. I was born in the Year of the Pig of the previous cycle."
"And I was born in the Year of the Hare. You are four years older than I. That isn't a great difference. I am old enough to be married, it seems."
"I didn't mean to suggest that there was anything childish about you, my lady."
"Quite right. There is nothing childish about me." The secretive smile and the sidelong look left him in no doubt of what she meant. "And since you Zinja are such lusty men, at what age do you marry?"
"Usually not until we are over thirty. If a Zinja can stay alive until he is thirty, he is considered a safe prospect to take a wife. Monks over thirty are given the less dangerous work to do. They are inducted into one of the inner circles of the Order, the teachers or the abbots." Jebu smiled and met her eyes. "But when I said the Zinja are not celibate, I wasn't talking about the fact that we eventually marry."
Her wide mouth, the lips carefully painted a bright red, parted momentarily, and she turned pink again under the light dusting of white face powder. This one had a real problem with blushing. She gave herself away. Then that hard, intelligent look was back, the look that had surprised him the first day he met her.
"In your case I should think paying for a woman's services-if she were that sort-would be the only way you'd get to lie with her."
"Why do you say that?"
"Because you are the ugliest man I've ever seen. You're not deformed, but you are strange-looking. Like a demon mask. Everything is the wrong colour. For instance, your skin is like the belly of a fish."
"The very colour you try to make yourself with your face powder, my lady."
"Yes, but my face powder is beautiful because my skin is not that colour, do you see?" Jebu did not, but let her continue. "Your hair looks as if your head is on fire, and your eyes are the colour of the sky on a rainy day. The whole effect is grotesque and frightening. I've never seen anyone who looks like you. And then, you're so big-you're huge, a monster. If you came anywhere near me, I would run away screaming."
There was a time, a few years ago, when what she said would have hurt him. But Zinja training had taken hold, and he was able to respond with amusement. "All men are the same colour in the dark. And as for my size, some women have found it pleasant."
"You're vulgar, too. There is nothing more repulsive than a lecherous monk. What riff-raff the Zinja must be, if you're any example. I declare, I would sooner make love to Moko the carpenter than to you." It did not escape Jebu that it was she who brought up the subject of love-making.
"Doubtless Moko could construct a tower tall enough to please you."
"You disgust me." She rode away.
A moment later Jebu heard Taniko telling something to the maids, and all of them broke into peals of laughter.
Riding alone and in silence, he thought about Shima Taniko. Her small face with its mobile, expressive mouth attracted him. She was not really beautiful, but then, all beautiful women looked exactly alike. Hers was the beauty of a crooked tree, of an earthenware teacup, of an oddly shaped cloud. A sudden thought flashed through his mind: might he not possess, for some beholders at least, the same sort of rough, strange beauty? He wondered if this were a genuine Zinja insight.
He thought about the look that passed through Taniko's eyes from time to time, a look that suggested something strong and sharp and flexible as a sword blade. Her position might be that of third daughter in a provincial house, but in her own right her strength and wit might rank her first in the empire. He entertained himself with visions of making love to her. His daydreams became so vivid he could feel her small hands scratching his back, her slim legs twined around his hips.
Moko, drawing up beside him, interrupted his thoughts, which somewhat relieved him because the fantasies had begun to cause distinct discomfort. Moko grinned at him, and Jebu wondered whether the cross-eyed, gap-toothed carpenter could be said to have the same beauty of the non-symmetrical, the natural, the stark that Taniko and perhaps he himself possessed. Once again he was grateful to whatever kami supervised his destiny that he had not killed this man.
"Shike, I wanted to tell you, since we're going to Heian Kyo. I've been there before. I wondered if you have."
"No, Moko. My travels are just beginning. How did you come to visit the capital?"
"My mother's family lives there. It was the custom among her people for a pregnant woman to stay with her parents, so she went there and took me with her when my young sister was about to be born. I do not think she wanted to get pregnant again for a while, so she stayed there for three years."
"What is Heian Kyo like? I'm so anxious to know."
"Very big and very old. But you would think carpenters designed it. The streets are not winding and narrow as they are in other cities. They are straight and cut across each other to form squares, and they are very wide. Some are so wide you could put a whole village in the middle of the street and still have room left over on the other side. A hundred thousand people live within the city's walls."
Moko went on to describe Heian Kyo in detail and to tell Jebu tales of life there. Jebu decided he had guessed right about Moko. The man made a more interesting travelling companion than anyone else in the party. Except, of course, for Taniko.
The next day Taniko was riding beside him again.
"Please don't distress yourself out of kindness to me," he said. "It must be painful to ride next to one as hideous as I am."
She shrugged. "The maids are more boring than you are hideous. Actually, I find your appearance interesting. Tell me how you come to look as you do."
"I am my father's son."
"Well, then, why does your father look like that? Come, come, don't draw things out."
"My father is dead. He was murdered a year after I was born. He was a foreigner. His eyes were green, not grey as mine are." "Who killed him?"
"He was murdered by a tall, red-haired foreigner like himself, who came here to kill him."
Taniko stared at Jebu. "You mean that while I've gone almost mad with boredom for nearly a dozen days as we creep down the Tokaido on this unhappy journey, you could have been regaling me with the mysterious story of your life? You are too cruel!"
"I thought you would find the slaying of the samurai Ikeno entertainment enough." She was the one who was cruel; didn't she realize it was his life, the story of his murdered father, she wanted to be regaled with?
But a Zinja did not own his life. He owned nothing. He passed through this world without leaving a trace. If she wanted his history for her amusement, he would unfold it for her like a paper fan, and when she was through with it, she could throw it away.
"I'm not the kind of person who gets pleasure out of seeing people die," she said. "But a story, that's different. Where did your father come from? Who murdered him? How did you come to be born?" Like a little girl, she jumped up and down on her sidesaddle with eagerness. "Please! Go ahead! Start at once!"
"My father's name was Jamuga. He told my mother that his people came from a desert place far to the west."
"From China?"
"North of China. They were wandering tribesmen, like the Ainu, who live on our northern islands. They raised cattle and fought among themselves all the time. They were so poor they had no houses, and instead lived in tents made of animal skins. They had no family names."
"No wonder your father came to the Sunrise Land."
"No, he came here against his will, in a way. He was fleeing from something. He came on a trading ship from Korea, and my mother said that he paid for his passage with a jewel worth enough to buy a whole fleet of ships. He carried a dozen jewels like that with him, sewn into his clothing."
"It's a wonder the Koreans didn't kill him and throw him overboard and take the jewels. It is well known that the Koreans have no honour and would not be above doing such things."
"They wouldn't have dared. My father was the sort of warrior who could easily kill a whole ship's crew. He was a huge man, bigger than I am, but swift as the wind and master of every kind of weapon. It was only his honour that required him to pay for the voyage. For a barbarian he was an unusually good man, so my mother says. Anyway, he landed at Mojigaseki and set out for the countryside near by. There he presented himself to one of the local landowners and bought, with another jewel, an estate with horses. With a third jewel he purchased my mother, and the most beautiful woman in the area, to be his wife."
"Where did he get the jewels? You said his people were poor.
"They made war on other, richer people and won. The jewels were my father's share of the loot."
"It is against the law to sell land to a foreigner. And how could any man sell his daughter to such an outlandish creature as your father must have been?"
"The ink in which the laws are written fades rapidly, the farther one travels from Heian Kyo. And this landowner took the jewel my father gave him for some grazing land too poor to grow rice on, and turned around and bought a huge tract of rice land. That one jewel made him rich. As for my mother's father, he was a poor farmer, and his daughter, pretty as she was, was only another mouth to feed. Now he's the richest rice merchant in the province. A few of the wild young men in the area-some who had courted my mother-resented my father's coming and he had to fight them. He was careful not to kill any of them, which shamed them utterly and forced them to move away from the village. He was a master of the arts of war."
"But someone killed him."
"Someone who was a better fighter than he. I wish I knew who it was. And why."
"You said it was a red-haired foreigner like himself."
"Yes. There was a Zinja monastery, the Waterfowl Temple, in the neighbourhood. As soon as my father moved into the area, he visited the monastery and became friendly with the abbot, Taitaro. He would go frequently to the monastery and spend many hours drinking sake and talking with Abbot Taitaro. One day he heard that a giant Buddhist monk from across the sea was coming up the road from Mojigaseki, asking about a certain Jamuga the Cunning."
"The Cunning?"
"Apparently he was called that by his people because he was more intelligent than most. When my father heard that name, he said that an old enemy had come to claim his life. He took my mother and me to the monastery and commended us to the protection of Abbot Taitaro. If he were killed that night, we and his land and the remaining jewels were to belong to the Zinja.
"Then my father went back to the farm he'd worked for the past two years. He saddled his best horse, put on a suit of samurai armour he'd had especially built for himself, and took out a bow and arrows and a sword he had brought with him from his faraway desert country. He waited. After nightfall the monk from across the sea came riding up the road. My father went out on horseback to meet him. The stranger threw off his monk's robe. Underneath was a huge warrior wearing a red surcoat over his armour. They shouted at each other in a strange tongue none of the peasants, who were watching from hiding places, understood. They fired arrow after arrow at each other, and when their arrows were all used up, they rode towards each other and slashed at each other with swords. Both were men who preferred to fight on horseback. At last the stranger got past my father's guard and drove his sword into his throat. My father fell, and his enemy cut his head off. He wrapped the head in cloth and put it in his saddlebag."
