Lord Oda's Revenge (5 page)

Taro blinked when he entered, his eyes smarting. Most of the men were smoking pipes – a habit they'd acquired from the Portuguese and Dutch. There was also a hibachi in the middle of the room, and because the inn had no chimney, the smoke from the charcoal brazier simply hung in the air, a grey cloud that hovered at head height. Hana led the way to a table near the fire. Several men looked up at them curiously, but their gazes didn't linger for long. No doubt they took the three companions for ordinary travellers, bedraggled by the rain.

Then, as they passed one of the other tables, Hana gasped and stopped.

‘Hayao?' she said.

There were three people at the table: a woman and two men. One of the men was in the garb of a Taoist priest, the other a samurai, to look at him. The woman stood between them, her hand on the samurai's shoulder. It was the samurai who had drawn Hana's attention. He was a gaunt man, though Taro could tell he had once been handsome. He looked up at Hana, a confused expression on his face. His eyes blinked slowly, once, twice. With a pained, deliberate motion, he brushed the woman's hand so that it fell away from his shoulder.

‘H-Hana?' he said softly.

Hana stepped closer. ‘Gods, Hayao, are you unwell?'

Taro thought he must be. The man was painfully thin, his skin sallow and sick-looking. The woman, too, seemed unwell. She was desperately pale, like an origami person, a person made out of white paper. The samurai didn't answer Hana – the woman at his side was caressing his cheek, and he closed his eyes as if in bliss. Something about the situation struck Taro as
very odd. He wondered if the man was drunk.

The priest stood. His manner was grave, oddly formal. ‘My lady,' he said. ‘You know this man?'

Hana gave a bemused smile. ‘Of course! This is Hayao. He is one of – I mean, he is one of Lord Oda's retainers. He taught me. . .' She lowered her voice so that the men on the other tables would not hear. ‘He taught me to ride and to fight. What happened to him?' The samurai's eyes were still closed, and he was murmuring something through his thin, grey lips. The pallid woman at his side stroked and stroked his skin.

‘He is. . . suffering,' said the priest. ‘I'm taking him to Mount Hiei.'

Hana clasped her hands together. ‘That is where we are going,' she said.

The priest nodded. ‘I thought this could not be a chance encounter,' he said. ‘Perhaps we should go somewhere more private, and I can tell you about our friend here. Hayao is known to you – it's not impossible that you could help. I myself have known him only since. . . his illness.'

‘If I can help, I will,' said Hana.

The priest edged past the thin samurai, coming round the table to stand in front of Hana. Taro stumbled backwards, a strangled cry on his lips. He held out his hand for something, anything, to steady him – and found himself holding on to Hiro's shoulder.

‘What's wrong with you?' said Hiro. ‘You look like you just saw a ghost.'

‘You don't see her?' said Taro.

‘See who?' said Hana. Both she and Hiro were looking at him oddly. The priest didn't seem to know what was wrong either.

Taro was staring at the woman standing beside the samurai,
Hayao. She had not stopped her stroking, and it seemed to Taro that she was also whispering something, something only Hayao could hear. She had not once looked at Taro – or his companions or the priest, for that matter. It was as if she had eyes only for the samurai. She was in love, it was plain to see. But that wasn't what had shocked Taro.

It was the fact that the priest had just walked right through her, as if she wasn't even there – and even now he stood such that part of his body overlapped with hers, revealing her to be no person at all but an insubstantial thing, made of smoke or mist.

A ghost.

 

S
HUSAKU GRIPPED THE
rail, feeling his way up the ramp onto the ship. When he stood on the deck, he felt the incessant rocking of the sea, moving the wooden boat gently from side to side, as if to remind its occupants of its power. Shusaku had never felt comfortable on the water. But at least he was able to swim. The same was not true of the sailors – it was better to die quickly, they reasoned, if the boat went down, than to waste time and energy on a false hope of survival.

Shusaku couldn't understand men so resigned to the mortal danger of their profession. True, his own profession was lethal enough – but he was different. He armed himself. What these men did – sailing without knowing how to swim – it was like going into a battle without a sword. He felt Jun's hand, gentle, on his back, pushing him forward. Curse the boy. Shusaku did not like ships.

‘There's a step in front,' said Jun. ‘Two paces.'

Shusaku nodded, grateful. It would be humiliating if he tripped. It was bad enough that the sailors and samurai could no doubt detect his fear, his nervousness of the sea. Shusaku had insisted that Jun come with him – the boy was his eyes, and he needed him. To his surprise, Lord Tokugawa had accepted.

‘There!' said a rough voice, as a hand held Shusaku's arm,
helping him up onto the deck. ‘Thought we'd never get you on board.'

‘Thank you,' said Shusaku.

He heard a gasp from the man. ‘Your eyes. . . and your skin. . . gods. Who did that to you?'

Shusaku smiled at the directness of the question, which no noble would have spoken. He could smell the sea on this man, its salt penetrating deep into his pores and his hair. This wasn't a samurai. Behind the man, he could smell others, too – men who were not the gun-carriers from the quay but rougher, sea-soaked characters. Their blood pumped thickly in their limbs, made strong and warm by hard work and sea air.

‘No one did this,' said Shusaku. ‘There was. . . a fire. I was burned.'

He felt and heard Lord Tokugawa moving up beside the sailor, or whatever he was. ‘Shusaku, I apologize for this man's brusqueness. Say the word, and he is dead.'

The man took in a sharp breath.

‘No,' said Shusaku. ‘He was only surprised. But. . . who are these men?'

‘
Wako
,' said Lord Tokugawa.

Shusaku's mouth dropped open.
Pirates?
What was Lord Tokugawa doing on a pirate ship?

Lord Tokugawa took a step forward and put his hand on Shusaku's shoulder. ‘Come belowdecks. I'll explain.' He turned. ‘You others – stay up here. Draw up the anchor. I want to be in Kyoto by nightfall tomorrow.' To Shusaku he said, ‘Your boy can stay up here. I'll help you with the steps.'

As they descended into the ship, Shusaku heard one of the men whisper to another. ‘That's the great ninja Shusaku,' he said. ‘They say he could sneak into the shogun's bedroom, if he
wanted to. I heard he's killed so many people while they slept, that once he woke one of his victims and gave him a sword, just to make it more interesting.'

Shusaku smiled. Actually, it had been a loaded arquebus. He had been curious as to whether the man could get off a shot before he killed him.

He couldn't.

Below, in the cabin, Lord Tokugawa indicated to Shusaku where there was a cushion on the floor, then sat down facing him. He pressed a cup into Shusaku's hand.

‘O-sake,' he said.

Shusaku bowed, grateful. He had never been served rice wine by a lord before, even when he was a lord himself, albeit of a lower stature, and fighting as a banner-carrying samurai by Tokugawa's side.

‘Pirates?' said Shusaku.

‘Of course. It allows me to travel secretly. And' – the lord lowered his voice – ‘it gives me a scapegoat.'

‘The pirates stole the guns,' said Shusaku slowly.

‘Yes. That is what the Portuguese will believe. Not for nothing are you a ninja.'

‘But. . . you need the guns yourself. No?'

‘Only one, with which to make copies. The others will be left with the
wako,
as my gift for their services.'

‘Left with them? This is their ship, then?' Shusaku had been on Lord Tokugawa's private vessel, in another lifetime, it seemed, another wheel of
dharma,
and it had seemed much larger and taller than this one.

‘It is. They will take us to my own ship, under cover of night. We should be there in one or two incense sticks.'

‘And then. . . you will betray them.'

Lord Tokugawa laughed. ‘Not at all. I will simply present them with the guns – all but one of them. They will use them, to carry out their dark work. And why not? They are impressive guns. They are also well suited to piracy. The
wako
up till now have been unable to use firearms – the spray from the sea puts out the fuses.'

Shusaku nodded. ‘Clever.' But of course it was – Lord Tokugawa was not known for rash action, or clumsy thought.

‘No, no, not at all,' said Lord Tokugawa, refusing the compliment as was customary. ‘Anyway, it won't take long for word of the
wako
with the special guns to get back to the missionaries, and to Oda.'

‘Oda?' said Shusaku, surprised.

‘Indeed. He bought the guns, you see. They were to be smuggled to him tonight.'

‘But Oda is dead.'

Shusaku felt the shift in the air as Lord Tokugawa leaned back swiftly. ‘What? When?'

‘Last autumn. The b— that is to say, I – I killed him.'

Lord Tokugawa let out his breath. ‘That would very much surprise me – because I saw him only last week. We inspected our troops together.'

Shusaku blinked uselessly. All was darkness around him still, and becoming blacker by the moment. Lord Oda was
alive
? When Shusaku had escaped from Lord Oda's castle, blind and staggering, he had distinctly heard a passing servant say that the daimyo was dead, broken by a fall down the winding staircase of which he was so proud.

And Lord Tokugawa – why was he still treating with him? The two daimyo had an official alliance, Shusaku knew, but surely the events at Oda's castle would have changed all that?
Surely now their hidden enmity must be known by all, spoken of openly?

Until one of the lords was shogun, and the other dead, there would be no
true
peace between them. He stammered, ‘I must. . . have been mistaken.'

‘Clearly,' said Lord Tokugawa. ‘Otherwise I would be shogun.'

Shusaku had not thought of that. ‘Ah. . . yes.'

‘The other person who is rather conspicuously not dead,' said Lord Tokugawa, a dangerous tone creeping into his voice, ‘is Lord Oda's daughter, Hana. You received instructions to kill the girl in the tower, didn't you?'

Shusaku sat back on his cushion. The tower. Of course. He must have misread the message, or it had been ambiguously worded. It had never been about Lord Oda – to attack
him
was unthinkable, would unbalance the whole teetering structure Oda and Tokugawa had created, the creaking complication of manners and protocol and open declarations of trust that kept all-out war from breaking out and engulfing the land. Nevertheless Oda had sent ninjas against Lord Tokugawa's son – his secret son, Taro, hidden in a fishing village. Of course Lord Tokugawa would want revenge. A daughter for a son.

His son,
thought Shusaku.
Oh, gods.
Suddenly he felt more vulnerable, more open to the harsh elements, than if he was standing on the deck in the sea spray, feeling the first gentle breeze that announced a
taifun.
He was in greater danger here, and Lord Tokugawa's anger was a greater storm.

He sat very still, thinking.

Lord Tokugawa cleared his throat. ‘And what of my son?' he asked. ‘Is that another mission you did not accomplish?'

Shusaku felt himself tremble a little. He was disarmed – literally
and figuratively. The samurai had taken his sword, and now he was sitting belowdecks on a pirate ship, blind, facing the most powerful daimyo in the land, while a small detachment of samurai paced the deck above, accompanied by vicious, murdering
wako.

It almost made him feel alive.

‘I failed you,' said Shusaku, feeling the lie as a weight in his chest. ‘Your son is dead. That is why I never reported back.'

Lord Tokugawa said nothing.

‘I. . . was outnumbered. The other ninjas were too many. And then. . . later. . . I was hurt. The sun, you see.'

He heard Lord Tokugawa shift on his cushion, waited for him to say something. Finally the lord spoke. ‘I see. Tell me, how did my son die?'

‘A sword,' said Shusaku. ‘In the stomach.' It was true – and not true. What he did not say was that after Taro was stabbed, he had bitten the boy, made him a vampire like himself. But one didn't make a lord's son a vampire, especially when that lord was in the process of making himself shogun.

To do so would be to make oneself dead.

Shusaku did wonder about Taro, of course. When he'd come to in the courtyard of Lord Oda's castle, he'd heard people running and shouting, saying that Lord Oda was dead. He had heard no one mention Taro, and he had been eager to escape. Feeling his way up the wall, he had made it to the top before the pain seized up his muscles, and he fell the height of six men to the moat below. The impact had driven the breath from his body and the spirit from his mind, and he had come to consciousness later, mercifully lying upward-facing in the shallows, among the reeds. He had stayed there for some days, covering himself in mud, living inside his pain.