Gonji: Red Blade from the East (4 page)

Sleep pressed close. A nighthawk squalled in triumph and dove through the tree line at some unfortunate prey.

Gonji let his mind drift, sensing a bit of respite from unholy assault. No night fiend’s eyes glittered in the brush, no hunter of souls hissed or gibbered or slithered at his back. The charred remains of the Weeping Sisters lent a perverse air of special comfort. Even Tora snorted in satisfaction like some fiery equine god who had been appeased.

The moon reappeared from behind the cloud cover, and Gonji reached up a hand and cupped it for a time. He thought of his mother, that storm-tossed Nordic woman whose birthing had both blessed and cursed him. He thought of his repudiated—and by now surely lost!—heritage in Japan. The lands, the wealth, the samurai who would die for him. He must be a man of destiny. Who had lived such a life? Who had braved a thousand kinds of death and emerged the victor? Yet he was in self-imposed exile on the continent of his maternal roots. A landless nomad, a warrior duty-bound to himself; a man of vast accomplishments in warfare, of fleeting glories and countless kills and (of this he was sure) the toast of balladeers in far-flung lands!

He laughed mirthlessly.

Nothing matches this Europe for horrors, he mused. But if the evil is great, then so must be the good...somewhere. The needs, always the needs. Companionship. Brothers of the sword. Love that doesn’t die. Friends—true friends. And duty, sacred duty—the only worthwhile duty here is to oneself. It seems nothing can be shared as inviolate for very long. All is shattered. But that is karma,
neh?
So here I am, a poor victim of self-mockery, pursuing my silly quest, a quest in name only by now—if indeed it was ever anything more. Where are all those priests, Buddhist, Christian, some I never even heard of before, who have put me on my way, eh? And what next on my tortuous trail? Vedun. Ah, Vedun. The storied city nestled on a cliff in the mountains. Wonderful. More sullen faces, more distrust, more cold steel raised in threat—
hai
, and mine is colder still,
neh?

“And what say you, spirits of my fathers?” he asked of the indifferent night. I go on, as always I go on. I seek what is not, glory in the moment, and damned be tomorrow! Twice cursed past and thrice ahead! When my time comes, then that is karma, but I’ll strive to end it on
my
terms.
Hai
, that is good.

And as sleep overtook him, Gonji’s mind succumbed to the futile urge to try to divine those things that lay ahead on his course, for this was surely preferable to dwelling on his present state of stoical misery.

His last waking thought was of the name. The name of that evasive thing whose trail he dogged, the name that had captivated his fancy and enticed him with its very perversity:

Deathwind
.

CHAPTER TWO

It was the spectacle of a lifetime.

A thousand knights under the wind-snapped banners of Hapsburg Austria thundered across the floor of the valley, pounding over littered corpses as they pursued a broken enemy. The stench of blood and death lofted on the rising heat waves. Gonji leaned forward with keen interest, an anxious hand massaging the Sagami’s hilt. Tora shuffled nervously on the brink of the escarpment as his master edged him closer for a better look.

The samurai’s pulse raced. He wiped the sweat from his brow with an impatient motion, flicking his tongue across a beaded lip. His neck wounds ached, but he paid them no heed. Howls of bloodlust and the clanging din of naked steel issued from the battlefield. The silver glint of arrows and arbalest bolts raked the air. Sporadic gunfire cracked in Gonji’s ears, puffs of ignited powder belching in advance of the echoing bursts.

Eyes like living coals, salt-burned neck craning for a better view, Gonji assessed the clash. The battle must have raged since almost dawn. The mercenary army had taken a beating. Already at the far end of the valley, the priests who directed the knights had erected a great command tent, a huge flag bearing the Christian cross rippling overhead.

At the extreme opposite end of the valley, to the east, the retreating mercenaries scurried up the myriad trails that led back into the hills. Charging knights lanced the stragglers, dropped them with bow and musket fire, or beheaded them as they ran them down. Hemmed-in pockets of mercenaries fought fiercely against the outnumbering Austrian troops at various points on the field. The leading edge of the fleeing mercenaries was already lost among the grassy knolls and thick forests to the east, and far ahead of them—perhaps miles away—Gonji could mark through the shimmering haze a massed party that poured into the forest like a sinuous spotted serpent.

Curious—such a division in a retreating force was unusual. And mercenaries seldom exhibited such devotion—to cover a retreat so lustily. The thought was cut short. Somewhere over the horizon a large dark shape momentarily loomed above the line of mountain peaks, then dipped out of sight again.

“What the—! What the hell was
that
, Tora, eh?”

But the charge had passed him by, and Gonji wheeled Tora to follow it along the cliff ledge. Several hundred yards onward the woods encroached to the brink, and he was forced to plunge into a stand of pine for a half mile or so, losing sight of the valley. He cursed petulantly as Tora’s pace was slowed by the dense underbrush. His mind whirled; this was the first armed clash he had seen in weeks, and it aroused his fighting instincts.

He spurred Tora through a gauntlet of slapping pine boughs and snaring thickets, finally emerging in a sun-baked clearing. The precipice again lay bare against the mountain vista for a space of a few hundred yards. Beyond, it sloped gently toward the eastern end of the valley, where the cliffs broke to permit descent.

Gonji trotted to the edge of the escarpment and reined in. Below, the main body of knights had ceased pursuit and was falling back toward the command center, columns occasionally splintering off to lend aid in rooting out straggling mercenaries. Voices crying out in command or anguish and the rumble of hoofbeats now supplanted the din of combat. It was over. Gonji slapped his leg and cursed, shaking his head. He had arrived too late. The fighting itch prickled deeply as he considered a course of action.

Then a pistol shot exploded somewhere beneath him, followed by another. Harsh cries rolled up the cliff face, punctuated by an occasional scream. He leaped off Tora and leaned over the ledge for a better look. A hundred yards to the east a band of mercenaries was trapped in a shallow, dusty canyon by a mixed company of Austrian cavalry and infantry. A single rank of lightly armored horsemen blocked the canyon exit, shields raised before them to deflect arrows and pistol balls. To their rear, longbows and arbalests launched volley after volley into the cornered bunch, who scrambled for cover behind horses, rocks, and brush. Their return fire served only to prolong the agony.

Steeds dropped, kicking and screaming, under the Austrians’ insistent fire. Here and there a man would panic and scrabble uselessly up the crumbling shale prison wall, only to be bristled like a burr by a hail of arrows. At these the Austrians roared their approval, reveling in the thrill of an impromptu pheasant-shoot.

A squad of infantry, some with crossbows, had flanked the mercenaries on the slope beneath Gonji—their one possible avenue to escape. These approached the ragged company’s desperate position, cautious only for the trapped men’s pistol fire. The last strands of the spider’s snare were immobilizing the fly for the kill.

Gonji absently hummed a battle hymn he had heard while he watched with gritted teeth. The heat of battle readiness swelled in his gut.

“Time to earn a living, Tora.”

He leaped astride the charger and seated his swords comfortably, glancing along the cliff to calculate the swiftest path.

“Which side do we choose this time, eh? Eeyahhh!” They galloped off, the question hanging in the humid air, as unintelligible to the horse as its answer was obvious to the man.

There was no choice here. He had run up against Hapsburg power before. To them he was an infidel, a heathen savage. They would no sooner have him among their number than they would invite a plague into their camp.

But mercenary armies always welcomed another skilled warrior, and there was always stolen gold aplenty waiting to reward the stout bladesman. Gonji had learned to abide the guilt, the samurai’s hatred for the crass life of the mercenary, for it was only by the hiring out of his battle savvy that he had been able to survive these long years in barbarian Europe. But this life had fixed him as
ronin
—masterless samurai. Knowledge of this unspeakable outrage would, he knew, cause his father to take his own life out of shame. Indeed, Gonji himself should have long since committed
seppuku
, the ritual suicide!

The sun peaked in the burnished blue of the sky as Gonji strove to strangle off his thoughts. He began to concentrate. A plan, a battle tactic.

Tora’s hide glistened with a light film of sweat as he loped easily sidewise down the breakneck slope, sensing the urgency that gripped his master. The noonday swelter washed over Gonji in undulating waves. As he approached the rear of the flanking footmen’s position, the trees thinned. Little cover here, but he had to get closer.

Lightly quitting the saddle, he unhitched his bow and quiver. Stringing the bow in a single adroit, powerful motion, he left the stallion in a place of relative safety and scampered down to the edge of the tree line, a scant fifty yards from the backs of the nearest of the creeping foot soldiers.

His eyes flashed brightly, squinted against the glare. A bawling cry rose from the mercenary leader, his oath clipped by the sharp report of his pistol. A knight’s mount shrilled and toppled on the canyon floor, sending its rider crashing to earth. Two more pistol shots split the air. A bowman at the canyon mouth clutched his chest and fell. A fusillade of arrows
whickered
into the canyon. Cries of warning. A mercenary shrieked in mortal agony, writhing and tearing at the wooden death spindling his torso.

Gonji riveted his gaze on the breach in the knights’ line created by the fallen horse in the canyon. He checked the squad of footmen below him; he hadn’t been spotted. He took two deep breaths and nocked an arrow, drew back mightily on the bow, his left side braced against a foot-thick larch. He rotated the bow overhead and down into line.

Breathe. Hold.
Feel.
Fire.

A difficult shot—he was nearly parallel to the cavalry rank. The shaft arced sleekly, slammed through a knight’s arm, bit into the ribcage. The shocked rider spurred his horse and was thrown backward, his foot locking in the stirrup as the beast broke ranks and dragged his metallic ruin through the canyon.

“Still got it, eh, Gonji-san?” Gonji’s jaw was set with battle fervor. He glanced over the field; still hadn’t been noticed. Good. He turned his attention on the foot soldiers farther down the slope. Perhaps a dozen. But how many bows?

As if in answer four of them rose in unison and fired their clacking arbalests at a mercenary clawing up the far canyon wall. Two bolts shattered flesh and bone. A wild pistol shot from the mercenaries
zanged
into the packed earth between the foot soldiers and Gonji, who flattened in alarm, indignant.

He grimaced.
Damned fools! I’m trying to help you!

The Austrian commander clumped to the head of the cavalry rank, sword raised, and shouted orders. The footmen to the rear of the cavalry massed for an attack. Then a pistol ball crashed into the commander’s steed, unhorsing him. Confusion reigned.

Time to clear the path.

Gonji emptied his quiver and laid out the shafts for rapid firing. He dropped to one knee and seated an arrow, braced, fired. A flanking crossbowman seventy-five yards downslope was skewered squarely through the back. The others froze, stared.

Before they could react, another lay thrashing at their feet, a crimson shaft protruding from his ribs. Ten sallets whirled, their wearers wide-eyed. A third man was knocked cleanly off his feet by the impact of a great cloth-yard shaft that clove his surcoat and breastplate.

Gonji fired at the last arbalester, missed, and a crossbow quarrel
thunked
into the larch, splintering bark in all directions. Gonji ducked behind the slim bole and nocked another arrow as the footmen clawed up the slope, low to the ground, howling epithets.

Then Gonji saw Tora, not twenty yards up the hill, nosing toward him curiously.

“Get
out
of here, dummy!” he cried, waving the animal back. “You want to get killed?”

The samurai spun into the open, bobbed tantalizingly to draw the crossbow’s fire. He launched an arrow that split a shin, the soldier flinging his mace wildly in rage and pain. Gonji rolled behind the tree.

“Tora—
move
!”

A bolt crunched into the ground at Tora’s hooves, erupting stones and clumped earth. Tora got the message and peevishly hopped up the hill at a lazy pace.