Risuko: A Kunoichi Tale (Seasons of the Sword #1)(17)

After a moment of silence, Masugu leaned close to my ear, “Murasaki-san, do you know... why you father ‘stopped being a samurai’?”

We were crossing a stream and I remember the slosh of hooves in water as I paused to answer. I knew what my father had told us: that he hadn’t wanted to kill any more. But I shook my head.

The lieutenant gave a deep sigh. “I am not sure that I am the one to tell you this,” he said, “but you should know. Your father was one of Lord Oda’s warriors. One of his greatest. When I was a boy, I saw him fight. Kano Kazuo was famous for his skill with a sword, as well as for being a great poet and courtier. Oda Nobunga ordered him on a mission—what it was, no one but Lord Oda knows, though it must have had something to do with the Imagawa—but he refused. The two samurai who were supposed to go with your father refused as well. So Lord Oda gave the three of them the choice: they could commit ritual suicide, or they could present themselves to Lord Imagawa as common servants. The other two warriors killed themselves rather than face such dishonor; your father became a poor scribe.”

I was stunned. And yet it seemed oddly familiar and true. Mother never told me what happened to him, that day when he walked off to answer Lord Imagawa’s summons. She never told me about any of it. To be honest, she hardly ever spoke of Father, unless she was sad or angry, and so Usako and I had learned never to mention him. Before Masugu had spoken it, I hadn’t heard my father’s name in two years. I had known that Otō-san was a samurai, known that he had seen battles, but the thought of him drawing his swords to fight, to kill... And the thought of what kind of mission could possibly have forced him to refuse...

“The other two,” I asked, trying not to let my voice dissolve entirely, “the ones who killed themselves, who were they?”

“Yes,” grunted Masugu-san, acknowledging that I had asked the proper question. “Hanichi Benjiro and Tarugu Makoto,” he said gruffly. “Emi and Toumi’s fathers.”

I peered around Masugu to where the others were riding. Emi was, naturally, frowning. Toumi looked like a knife looking for a place to plant itself.





10—Dark Letter


We spent the night at a small Takeda fort guarding a rocky, barren place called, for some reason, Rice-Paddy Pass, which marked the border between Worth and Dark Letter Provinces. We were so high that there weren’t any trees. I felt naked. The air was dry and cold, we were exhausted, and the soldiers manning the garrison were edgy, as if waiting for an attack, though how—or why—an army would march so far and high I couldn’t imagine. Perhaps they were frightened of ogres.

The next morning, everybody—even Mieko—looked as grumpy as I felt.

Lady Chiyome shouted to rouse us. “Let’s go! I want to be back at the Full Moon by mid-day so that I can take a real bath and eat real food.”

As it turned out, the Full Moon was down in the valley below Rice-Paddy Pass. We began to descend, and for the first time in days I grasped the mane of Inazuma, Masugu’s stallion.

“Easy,” murmured Masugu—I think more for the horse’s sake than mine. To me, he said, “I thought you liked heights?”

“Do,” I answered through clenched teeth. It felt as if a stumble would be all that it would take to send the horse falling down into the valley, and us with it.

“Ah. Perhaps being on horseback makes it harder?”

I nodded, ashamed. Here, Masugu-san thought of me as a great samurai’s daughter; how could I behave so disgracefully?

“No problem, Murasaki-san,” he said, his kind voice cutting deeper than Toumi’s sneering might have done. “We’re going to be travelling pretty slowly. Do you think it would help if you were on foot?”

I nodded again, a bit less tremulously.

Masugu called out a halt, there at what felt like the roof of the world.

From the back of the line I heard Chiyome-sama bark, “What’s the hold up? I’m sick of being squashed in this box like a ten-month pregnancy!”

“Murasaki-san has expressed the desire to travel on foot for a while, and I thought a few of the other passengers might enjoy the lovely walk.”

As I slid back off of the horse onto the narrow mountain road just one other person took the opportunity to get back on solid ground with me: Toumi, who hated every moment of being on horseback.

She and I looked at each other, each unhappy with the other’s company, but with no option. From above us, Mieko asked, “Would you like me to join you, Toumi, Risuko?”

We both shook our heads.

She peered at us, then nodded. “Please stay together. And please don’t get separated from the rest of us.”

“Yes, Mieko-san,” Toumi and I said together.

As the horses began once more to walk, Toumi spat on the ground, then walked as quickly away from me as she could.

“Hey!” I called to her. “We’re supposed to stay together!”

—

As we began to descend into the valley, Toumi and I played what, under better circumstances, would have been a game of something like Tag, in and around the horses. I was annoyed; it wasn’t as if I wanted to be near her either, but Mieko-san had said...

After a while, I chased Toumi just for the pleasure of annoying her.

The road was making a long series of switchbacks down the steep mountainside. It meant that we had to walk quite a distance just to get a little further down the hill. We could see the road beneath us, winding back and forth, and I will admit, as lovely as the view was, the walk was getting a bit tedious.