The Oni, page 3
“Surely that is for your son to attend to.”
Uto’s mouth twists. His pale cheeks color slightly. “At this moment, Jiko paces my courtyard, anxious for the moment he can close my eyes in fulfillment of his filial duty—and incidentally claim his inheritance. If the warriors in this room were not so loyal—that is to say, if they did not fear my wrath more than Jiko’s—he might long ago have found it in his heart to shorten my suffering.” Again the unpleasant smile. “I taught him well. No, priest. You are the only man I can depend on. In lieu of the full burial ceremony, my remains are to be cremated.”
Monaga tenses. His fingers brush the shaku, the tapering wooden slab in his belt that is a symbol of his priesthood, in instinctive distaste for Uto’s apostasy. “I see. You turn your back on the worship of your ancestors, only to embrace the foreign Buddhist teachings.”
“Those Buddhists will put you out of work one day, priest. More than one emperor has been converted to their teachings. You would do well to incorporate their wisdom into your own lore.”
“I know something of their superstitions,” Monaga says flatly.
Lord Uto lifts a thin eyebrow. “Pity you never mentioned that before. We might have had some interesting discussions.”
“Not so very interesting.”
The eyebrow lowers. “Nonetheless, I insist on this unorthodox arrangement. There are full instructions in the compartment of my pillow. You will see that they are carried out exactly. Else my restless spirit will haunt Imuri for generations.” He pauses to discharge a wad of phlegm. Hoke opens a drawer at the back of the wooden pillow and removes a roll of rice-paper. He hands it to the priest.
“If it appeases your scruples,” Uto adds, “I assure you that I expect no heavenly reward from this request.”
Monaga shifts the weight on his knees, which are starting to stiffen. “I do not like it. But I do not like anything about you, Lord Uto.”
“Then you will do as I wish.” It was not a question.
Monaga thrusts the rolled paper into his sleeve. “It seems little enough to ask, and can harm no one … except yourself, and I doubt you can blacken your soul much further.”
Lord Uto’s hard black eyes drift from the priest’s face to Hoke’s. His withered hand rises to stroke the boy’s buttock. Hoke endures the caress stoically, but trembles at the lord’s next words.
“Naturally, I should like my pillow boy to accompany me in my final journey.”
Monaga grasps the boy’s shoulders and pulls him out of Uto’s reach. Hoke gasps in horror at the priest’s breach of hierarchical respect. Punishment for such is worse than simple death. He struggles to return to his master’s side so that none can accuse him of sharing in the disobedient act. The chamber echoes with the snicking of long swords being drawn from their scabbards.
“You press too hard, Lord Uto,” Monaga says, aware—as in previous confrontations—that each word may be his last. “Will you continue your foulnesses even after death?”
At that, Uto roars with laughter. His thin arm falls to his side atop the covers. Another coughing fit cuts him short. Blood trickles down his chin. It is hastily removed. A fresh silk cloth is sent for.
Breathing easily again, Lord Uto signals his retainers to sheath their blades.
“So close, priest,” he mutters. “So close.”
“It does not take a physician to see your end is near,” Monaga replies.
Lord Uto shakes his head. “I can restrain myself, priest, when it suits me to do so. Do not be concerned for Hoke. I bequeath him, with the rest of my possessions, to my son … for as long as Jiko can hold on to him. Just attend to my cremation as instructed.”
“I will do what I can.”
“You will do as I say.”
Monaga licks his lips. “Agreed. May I leave now?”
“Of course. There’s nothing here of interest to keep you. Anyone can die. It’s as easy as twisting a baby’s arm. Hoke will keep me company to the end. Right, lad?”
The boy wriggles free of the priest’s grip and kneels at the head of his master’s straw sleeping mat. Monaga offers a smile of compassion, but Hoke dares not meet his eyes. It is ironic that Uto’s deathbed is attended by a kidnapped peasant boy because the lord cannot trust his own son, even in the presence of a score and more armed bodyguards—warriors whose allegiance transfers to Jiko at the moment his father dies.
With a sigh, the priest gets to his feet. None of the warriors offers to help. He wishes that his staff had not been confiscated at the gate, as a potential weapon.
The retainers fall back, forming a path for Monaga. He turns to the door and starts walking.
“Priest.” Uto’s voice is empty of blood and tears.
Monaga stops but does not look back.
“Pass by the courtyard on your way out. Tell Jiko I won’t delay his chance to close my eyes much longer. Blood is only blood, and my death must be natural.”
The priest bobs his head once, in acknowledgment, and hastens from the chamber. He feels more disquieted than seems warranted. He is inured to the presence of death and familiar with the lord’s inhumanity. Uto’s parting words express a perfectly understandable desire.
Why, then, does their memory form a small, hard knot in his empty stomach?
CHAPTER 5
Amid the bamboo huts of the village overlooked by the late Lord Uto’s residence, a short whistle trills. To the uninitiated, it sounds not unlike a nightingale. Light sleepers toss on their beds of loose straw, giving no thought to the bird’s unseasonal visit. Certain villagers, however, have been sitting in darkness for more than an hour, awaiting this signal.
For a moment, stillness. Then a cloaked figure steps into the narrow, shadowed road, shielding the glow of his paper lantern with his body. Two huts away, the action is repeated. And again; now three shapes are abroad this bitter eve, crunching frost beneath the wooden clogs called geta. Then five, clutching tattered double-lined cloaks over goose-fleshed bodies. Seven, snuffling as the crisp night air steals from their nostrils the stench of family and livestock huddling for warmth in single-room dwellings. Finally, ten sets of teeth clacking in the cold despite their owners’ efforts.
Farmers are not trained like warriors to endure without flinching. Yet their hardships are often greater.
The ten converge on the only structure in the village from which a dim light shows through the cracks in its walls: the sake shop. Oiwa, its proprietor, greets them wordlessly at the door. Palsy of the hands put an end to Oiwa’s farming days, but does not interfere with his qualities as a host—nor with his duties as village headman, which consists primarily of agreeing without protest to the lord’s demands.
The peasants kneel, or crouch, or sit cross-legged in a rough circle around the feeble warmth of the irori—the hearth—in the center of the main room. Wood smoke stings the eyes of those seated nearest, who nonetheless keep to their places.
Oiwa latches the door shut with a length of bamboo pole. He rubs his aching fingers together and speaks to his guests.
“A cold night, my friends. Never mind. Hot rice wine will prepare us for our work, and more is warming to take the chill off afterwards. If one of you will assist me?” He points to a chipped porcelain jar resting on a trivet at the edge of the fire.
Cups are distributed. The youngest of the group, a newlywed named Echi, pours for Oiwa. Steam rises from the liquid. Lips smack politely.
“Well and good,” growls burly Kujo, at the third filling of the cups. “I want to know why we must construct that bastard’s funeral platform. Let the eta build it! It is their duty!” His lips twist at the mention of those despised outcasts, mostly Ainu half-breeds, who scrape minimal livings from begging and tasks no self-respecting person would stoop to. Even their hovels are isolated from the village proper.
“That is why we meet in secret,” Oiwa replied. “I regret there was no opportunity this afternoon to fully explain. The eta will, rightly, transport the corpse, but Monaga says it was Lord Uto’s will that the platform be built by clean hands.”
“We have only the priest’s word for that,” Kujo answers sourly. “Suppose he only wants to teach us a lesson? All know he is displeased that so few of us worship at his shrine.”
Oiwa’s scowl is invisible in the darkened room, but his eyes glow bright with anger. “This is unworthy, Kujo. Monaga knows our situation. We haven’t enough to feed our families properly, much less to spare for sacrifices. Did not he himself announce that the kami of the shrine had fled Imuri, making such sacrifices pointless? He knew what that admission would mean.”
Kujo grunts as though slapped. “Huh! I only bring up the possibility. Did I say it was so? I am the last man to accuse our priest of ungenerosity. Still, with the old lord dead, where is the need to comply with his whim?”
“Would you prefer his spirit haunt our valley? Would you welcome a visit from the footless shade of Lord Uto?”
At that, a deep groan echoes in the room. Several of the farmers look uneasily around. Some reach for short, crude knives hidden beneath kimonos. Young Echi leaps to his feet and points a shaking finger at the blackest corner of the room.
“Hai! Something moved there! Not dead two hours, and already he returns!”
Oiwa laughs gently. The others, realizing who the groaner must be, gradually join in. Flickering hearth light plays across Echi’s features, rendering his initial distress and increasing discomfort plainly visible.
The shopkeeper takes pity on the young man, and explains. “It’s only poor Beni. His agitation has been growing all day, as though fed by the waning of Lord Uto’s life.”
Echi looks as if his head had been set on fire, and well he should. Everyone in Imuri knows of Beni and his bitter tragedy. The farmer had been a widower for less than a year when Lord Uto chose his only son as the first of the notorious series of pillow boys ending with Hoke. Like most of those boys, Beni’s son was not permitted to leave the lord’s palace. He was never seen again. One night, the following spring, Beni claimed he’d heard a scream that could only have come from his son’s throat. Of course, this was his imagination. Uto’s residence is too far from the village for any peasant to hear what goes on within, not even when the wind blows from that direction. Beni’s neighbors deny hearing anything that night.
A fortnight later, Lord Uto chose a second pillow boy.
Many times since has Beni heard that scream, in monstrous dreams so vivid he wakes bathed in sweat on the coldest winter nights, such as this one. Villagers could barely keep him from attacking Lord Uto on sight. That rash action would not only have cost Beni his head—a price which, privately, a few impatient neighbors would have gladly paid—but would have earned punishment for the whole province, followed by stiffer taxes. The inhabitants could not imagine anything crueler than Uto’s usual governance, and had no desire to learn.
Thereafter, whenever Lord Uto passed through the village, Beni’s neighbors got him too drunk to stand and tied him to a post in the sake shop for safety. Lord Uto never noticed Beni’s absence from the crowds which gathered, with some urging from his retainers’ blades, to honor him. He knew few of his subjects by sight or name. Fewer still survived his notice for long.
“How was I to know?” Echi protests. “Of all people, Beni is least likely to bemoan the tyrant’s passing.”
Oiwa sighs indulgently. “Lord Uto took with him Beni’s last opportunity for revenge. This dawn, I found Beni swinging a mattock like a sword, glaring upward at the lord’s residence. He obviously hoped to deny his tormentor a natural death. I lured him to a bowl of wine and kept him here all day.”
Kujo claps his meaty hands in approval. “Quite right, headman. In fact, we should keep him confined until after the funeral. He might cause a scene. Once he realizes nothing can be done, he’ll settle down. Most of the time he’s lucid and taciturn.”
A tall thin man on Kujo’s left thrusts his head forward. Shadows play eerily on his pock-marked face as he speaks. “Yes, Beni will understand. After all, it’s the last time we’ll have to do it.”
“We hope,” comes a whisper from behind.
“Kujo speaks wisely,” Oiwa says. “We don’t want our new lord to get a poor impression. Jiko may prove a kinder ruler than his father.”
“He could hardly be less so,” snaps the pock-pitted man.
Echi laughs. “Perhaps he’ll let us keep our anus hairs at tax time!”
A ripple of amusement passes through the group. Oiwa turns a stern eye on each man, stifling them in turn. He steps into the irori’s glow. His face is drained of blood.
“Fools!” he hisses. “You go too far! Already you forget the prudence so painfully learned under the late Lord Uto.”
Echi rubs the back of his neck nervously. “Come, Oiwa! You wouldn’t cross a stone bridge without tapping it like a blind man. Uto is dead. What good would it do a spy lurking beyond your shutters to carry tales to his corpse?”
Echi points to a barred window behind the aged shopkeeper. The others follow his finger suspiciously. The shop grows quiet. Ears strain to detect the faint crunch of a sandal on the time-frosted ground, the brush of a sleeve against the bamboo wall, the snag of cloth on a splinter.
Straw rustles as Beni rolls onto his back. He belches.
The spell is broken. Several held breaths are expelled. Oiwa sighs, disgusted that his admonition should even be necessary. “If the bird had not sung out, it wouldn’t have been shot,” he reminds them softly. “Lord Jiko has spent most of his life at the Imperial Court. He will have even greater need of spies than did his father. We knew, or suspected, who Uto’s informers were. Jiko will surely have found fresh worms in the lion’s belly.”
Echi opens his mouth, shuts it again. The group is properly chastised. Oiwa’s claw-like hand removes the empty sake jar.
“Enough wine for now,” the shopkeeper says. “More than enough talk. It grows late. There are ropes and knives, if any here have come unequipped to cut and tie bamboo.”
Without haste, Oiwa leads his fellows from the shop and over frozen mud trails that lead to the clearing chosen for the cremation. Echi, as youngest, brings up the rear. Thanks to Oiwa’s outburst of common sense, he found the discussion unproductive. As a novice spy, of course, Echi does not really expect useful results at once. He considers his pretended fear of drunken Beni a clever bit of misdirection to keep suspicion from clinging to him. He worries, though, because the most damaging words spoken this evening are his own, meant to draw out others. Suppose one of them is also in Lord Jiko’s pay, and reports Echi?
Well, he shrugs, it can’t be helped. There will be other chances. Surely a hint of the shrewd mind behind Oiwa’s bland features will be worth something to the new lord. Jiko knows already of the conspiracy regarding Beni. He cares nothing for the old farmer, but if the peasants can keep that from his father, what further plots might they hatch? No small concern for a man who has just assumed lordship over the tiny province.
His mind whirling with these thoughts and others, Echi straggles at the end of the line. More than once he comes out of his reverie alone on the forest path, fair game for any mischievous long-nosed tengu or malevolent ghost that might haunt these woods. Then he runs, clogs slapping, cloak streaming, puffs of human fog pouring from his mouth, until he reaches his companions.
If Echi’s lagging is noticed, it goes unmentioned.
CHAPTER 6
Eighth day.
Smoke from the pyre rises almost vertically against the dawn-pink sky, fanned by the slightest of icy Siberian breezes, to meld with the gray overcast. The blaze’s hungry crackling echoes in the clearing. A fat snowflake flutters in front of Monaga, tickling the priest’s nose. He stifles an urge to sneeze. Succeeding, he finds the new Lord Jiko studying him with amusement.
“Not restraining a tear for your old associate, are you, priest?”
Jiko’s voice is pitched higher than his father’s, but carries no less authority. The young man’s features are soft, mirroring those of his deceased mother as Monaga remembers her, but the black, over-bright eyes are his father’s legacy.
Jiko is an unknown quantity. He was exiled to the Imperial Court at the onset of his adolescence, followed the Emperor Kotoku when the court was moved to Naniwa, but was recalled three days earlier from the port city. Monaga hears the Emperor is a wise and gentle ruler despite his Buddhist leanings. His example should be more of an influence on Jiko’s policies than his father’s. So Monaga hopes.
The priest phrases his reply carefully. “These are not fit sentiments for one such as I, Lord Jiko, but I know of no man whose death better becomes him than your father.”
Jiko’s smile is almost as unpleasant as Uto’s had been. “You speak boldly to the bereaved, knowing that I now hold the power of life and death over all in Imuri.”
Despite his qualms, Monaga pressed the point. Fear for his own life is not sufficient to still his tongue. He has spent too many years in terror of one man—Uto—to so soon dread another.
“You loved your father as little as his subjects did.”
Jiko stands stiffly in his ceremonial kimono of crimson silk. His eyes dart to and fro, although his head does not move. He sees no one in earshot. The funeral is poorly attended. The new lord is too disinterested to compel anyone’s presence. Monaga, Lord Jiko, and the boy Hoke, whom the new lord keeps by his side constantly, form an island of three. Jiko’s bodyguards stand two dozen paces behind, alert but relaxed. It is unlikely that anyone, even the drunken Beni, will attempt the life of the new lord and risk social chaos, certainly not before his policies are announced. Jiko has wisely avoided mixing with his father’s cliques these past few days, preferring his own counsel and the safety of uncertainty.
“Not much more. I’ll grant you, priest,” Jiko replies through tight lips. “Quote me, however, and your head will crown a road post.”
