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  “Well, no. He’s not here, exactly.” Emiko pouted. “He’s gone on a hunting party at Akafumu-san’s hunting lodge. Isamu’s taken Father’s eagle with him to impress Akafumu-san. I hope Isamu will bring Reo back with him when they’ve finished playing their games. Reo really is well connected, isn’t he?”

  Ah! Now I understood. Akafumu was our daimyo; our overlord. He was a great noble, who was close to the shogun himself. And it appeared that Reo knew him. I was delighted; the higher Reo’s standing, the sweeter and harder would be his downfall. Once he was stripped of his veneer of iki, even my sister would see him for the shallow idiot he really was. Emiko obviously misunderstood my sudden good humor.

  “Such a shame you didn’t meet Reo last time he was here. You would have found him charming. And such a handsome man.” She glanced at me slyly. “Of course, now that Father has decided to own you as his daughter, he may well introduce you next time he’s here.”

  “I look forward to it,” I said wryly. I glanced at her face casually and understood at once I had no need to take care. Her expression was dreamy and far away. It wanted to shake her; it was evident that she had convinced herself that Father could somehow be persuaded to release her from her betrothal to Soji. And when he did, she thought Reo would be waiting for her. For a wild moment, I wondered about the tangled outcome if Emiko did tell Father about her feelings for Reo only to find her lover backing away in horror when Father confronted him.

  Still, her news delighted me, but for no reason she would ever know about. Father was away. I doubted very much that Reo would come back to our estate. The hunting party would surely take at least three days; he would go straight from Akafumu’s lodge to his assignation with me in the Floating World.

  Which meant I was free to go on with my own plans with no chance of any of my menfolk seeing me. I truly began to believe that the gods were smiling upon me.

  Seventeen

  Anything may be

  Discarded from my life. All

  But my memories

  My thoughts chased like scraps blown in the wind. I knew that it was essential that I achieve tranquility, and that the ability to grasp it was in my mind somewhere. But each time I came close, it was gone before I could hold it. The more I told myself to concentrate, the worse it became. And I could no longer even meditate; perfect peace eluded me.

  Tonight, I was to meet Yo. But I wasn’t ready! Panic flooded me. I was angry with myself. I had been so nearly sure I would win. Sourly, I acknowledged that “nearly” was no use at all to me. My mental state had to be perfect or I might as well not bother at all. I might be as skilled a warrior as Yo, in theory. But instinctively I knew he had the edge on me. He had fought when it mattered, when his life was at stake. My skills were excellent, but never had my life depended on using them.

  Until now.

  I could neither eat nor drink. Nor could I settle to anything. Matsuo came and nudged my hand. I glanced at him and saw the appeal in his eyes.

  “Do you want to go for a walk, Matsuo?” He wagged his tail and I smiled. Why not? It would at least pass the time until my dream of being onna-bugeisha lay in shards at my feet. Until the moment came when I went from being the slave of my family to being Yo’s slave. I wondered sadly if anybody in my family would miss me for long, and then was furious with myself yet again for my self-pity. I had walked into this with my eyes open. I deserved no pity from anybody. Especially myself.

  Matsuo led me out of the house garden. Every now and then he turned and looked at me, as if making sure I was following him. He finally stopped quite far from the house, at the side of the river that was diverted into smaller channels to water the peasants’ paddy fields. At a price, of course. I noticed that the water was very low; in fact, I could not remember ever seeing it so far below the river bank. Matsuo sat down. I sat beside him and pulled his ears gently.

  The flow barely covered the riverbed. Small boulders that I had never seen before caused eddies in the water, forcing it to part with a sweet murmur of sound. I lay my head against Matsuo’s coat and felt peace fill me. Lazily, I tried to recall what the river usually looked like. Eventually, I saw it in my mind when it was in full flood. Then, there was no gentle murmur, but a harsh roar as the current pushed fast and hard. White foam topped the water. Occasionally, a brave waterfowl allowed itself to be pushed and shoved by the current. I smiled; so real was the vision that I stretched out my hand to scoop up some water and blinked in surprise when my fingers met nothing but air.

  And at that moment, I remembered what I had forgotten.

  I took a deep breath, wondering how I could have been so foolish. Now, it was easy. Of course I had not been confident that I could beat Yo. How could I beat him when I didn’t believe it myself? Hadn’t Riku-san explained that to me? If you cannot imagine something, Keiko-chan, then it cannot happen. If you can visualize it in your mind, then it will be so. But to do that, you must first believe in yourself. That is your power.

  Perhaps it was because I had stopped petting his ears, but Matsuo gave a soft woof and nudged me. I smiled and nodded.

  “Shush, Matsuo. I have work to do.”

  The peace of the river was in my body. I relaxed and once again I was at the dojo. But this time, there was no repetition of punches; no evasions or battle for supremacy. This time, only one scene filled my senses. Yo was on the ground, at my feet. He looked at me and raised both hands, palms out, in surrender.

  I had won. My life was mine to do with as I pleased. I was onna-bugeisha, and no man would ever give me an order and expect to be obeyed ever again.

  When I came back into my body and conscious thought was gifted back to me, I found tears streaming down my face. Matsuo licked them away for me, and I thanked him gravely.

  If I could beat Yo in my mind, then I could beat him in the flesh. I no longer had any doubts.

  When it was close to the time, I sat quietly on my futon. I listened for the heartbeat of the house; there was nothing. From far away, I could hear Emiko’s soft breath. Apart from her, everything was silent. I counted down from a hundred and was rewarded by the clatter of the watchman passing my window. As soon as he was gone—I noticed he had acquired a nasty cough; yet more noise to betray his presence—I stood and stretched.

  Emiko had given me a bottle of camellia oil for my birthday. I had used a very little on my face, but I had found it greasy and the bottle was still almost full. I stripped off my sleeping robe and poured a palmful of the oil into my hand. That went over my shoulders and belly. My legs, also, were smoothed with the oil. It was difficult to reach all of my back without help, but finally I managed it to my satisfaction. I left only my face naked, and that was in case the oil got into my eyes and distracted me. Finally, I tied up my hair. Not in a samurai knot, which might have given Yo the chance to get hold of it, but in the tightest, sleekest knob I could manage. I tugged at it myself until I made my eyes water in protest, but the pins holding it in place did not give way, and my hair was naturally silky enough to make it very difficult to grasp the knot.

  I was satisfied.

  There was no moon. No matter, I had no need of light. I made my way to the dojo naked except for a pair of sandals to protect my feet. That was important. It was possible that my future would depend on my agility. I kicked the sandals off at the edge of the dojo and sat cross-legged in the deepest shadow.

  I did not see Yo arriving. Nor did I hear him. I sensed movement, and then felt the tremor of air being displaced as he stood in the center of the circle, staring around him.

  “Yo-san. I have been waiting for you.”

  His head moved a fraction in my direction. I felt his surprise, and I realized my stillness had been so complete he had not seen me immediately.

  “Keiko. Am I late? I apologize if I am.”

  “Not at all. It’s me who was early.”

  How very polite we were! As if Yo had been invited to take tea, perhaps.

  I stood fluidly, and I heard the a
lmost inaudible sound of him taking a sharp breath. I had startled him. Good. I glanced down at my nude body and smiled, but carefully, so there was no light reflecting off my teeth to betray my pleasure.

  “Will you take the contest clothed or naked?” I enquired seriously.

  “I think that we need to be even.” He sounded amused. “If I keep my robe on, then you will win in the first moments.”

  I was disappointed. He was right, of course. If only I were naked, I would have the advantage. I would have robes to grab and clutch while he would have only flesh. Then I remembered the oil I had rubbed into my skin and I relaxed. My skin was slippery. His would be dry from a good rub down after the bath.

  Yo moved to the edge of the dojo and shrugged off his robe. It was quickly followed by his fundoshi. I noted that he wore his loincloth in much the same way as sumo wrestlers wore their far more bulky garments and I was quietly pleased. He had come prepared for a genuine fight, then.

  His movements were so graceful they were almost feral. A memory came back to me sharply as I watched him. When he was much younger, Isamu had been given a leopard cat as a present. He had been much taken with the wild creature and had given it a collar set with pearls and had ordered it fed only the best meat, carefully prepared in our kitchen. The wild cat was beautiful to begin with, but day by day I saw its soul shrivel as it endured captivity. One day, it disappeared, leaving only its jeweled collar behind. Isamu always thought it had tired of captivity and had escaped. He soon forgot his pet, and I never told him that I had taken the cat’s collar off and left the way open for him to escape before it was too late. I shivered at the memory. The cat had been beautiful—and wild. Underneath his veneer of civilization, was Yo also wild? I hoped so.

  He stood facing me with his hands on his hips. I saw he was inspecting my naked body far more closely than I had looked at him. Excellent; the more I could distract him, the better. The wind was cold. I knew I was capable of controlling my flesh to the extent that I would feel no chill at all, but I didn’t bother. My nipples puckered and stood erect and my belly shivered. I saw that Yo’s gaze was resting on my breasts.

  I took my chance.

  Before he could raise his eyes, I darted forward and seized his arm in a classic move. I was hardly surprised when he disengaged himself easily. A moment later, his arms were around my waist. My oiled flesh slid away almost effortlessly. I felt like a fish in the deep sea, confident and swimming in my own element. The sensation was delicious.

  Yo rubbed his hands together. “Now why didn’t I think of that trick?” He was not at all breathless. His voice was light and easy. I smiled in response.

  “Ah, Yo. As a helpless woman, I felt I needed all the advantages I could find,” I said humbly.

  “My apologies. I should never have considered fighting with you had I known you were no more than a feeble girl.”

  We both laughed. We knew the banter was no more than a nibble before the main course was served.

  We circled each other. Yo darted for me. I feinted to one side and almost managed to trip him. After that, he was far more careful. He gripped me around the waist again. He was far stronger than I was. I went limp, but he was not fooled and merely tightened his grip. As he was about to throw me, I wriggled and rubbed my breasts against his chest. He glanced down reflexively and I banged the crown of my head so hard beneath his chin that I felt the pain in my own skull.

  Yo grunted and let me go. I spun on the balls of my feet and kicked out at the back of his knees. Or at least, I kicked at where his legs should have been, but he was no longer there. I turned quickly, guessing he would be behind me. He was not. He seemed to have vanished.

  I stood absolutely still. I knew Yo could move like a ghost, in total silence. The night was dark; there was not even a shadow to betray him. I had a moment of panic; where was he? How could I fight what I could neither see nor hear? The answer came to me from deep in the instinctual part of my brain. I was onna-bugeisha. I had no need for any physical senses.

  I closed my eyes and deliberately refused to hear. I was deaf and blind; there was no breeze at all, so my sense of smell was effectively gone. I thought I had taken long seconds to close down my senses. It seemed to me that everything around me had slowed. I turned almost languidly, feeling in my gut that Yo was off to my left, perhaps a body’s length away. He could come to me; I had no need to search him out. I felt him pause, puzzled by my apparent defenselessness. He shrugged; I felt the movement. Then he was moving so fast that even if my eyes had been open he would have been no more than a blur of blacker darkness than the night that surrounded him.

  I allowed him to come almost close enough to touch me before I stepped aside. The essence of jujutsu is to use one’s opponent’s strength against him so that the stronger he is, then the greater your advantage. Yo skimmed past me so closely I felt the hairs on his arm brush against me. He was moving so very fast he could not halt himself as quickly as he wanted and almost stumbled. In that tiny fraction of time, I was on him.

  I pivoted and caught his wrist, bending his arm so he was forced to spin around. While he was off-balance, I played the ending to my move in my mind. Mentally, I saw his hands reaching for me. Quick as he was, I was quicker still. I swayed to the side, allowing him to skim past me. Once he was moving out of my orbit, I simply put the palms of my hands in his back and shoved, hooking my foot behind his knee and yanking hard at the same time.

  All the time, I had my eyes closed. I watched the movements in my mind and only opened my eyes when I heard Yo grunt. A split second later felt the thud of his body as it hit the hard-packed earth of the dojo. Even then, he might have been able to get up and continue with our contest. But I made sure he could not. I swooped down and slid my legs across his belly, my black moss brushing against his flesh.

  We were both panting. I leaned forward and splayed my fingers around his throat, less to cause him hurt than to emphasize that I was the victor.

  “Enough?” I asked.

  “Enough. I was foolish, Keiko-san. I should have believed Riku-san when he said that the pupil had come to be greater than the master. But if you had been a man, I would have beaten you!”

  I laughed in delight. He was probably right. A man would never have thought to oil his body. Nor would Yo ever have been distracted by the sight of another man’s nakedness. I didn’t care. I had won. That was all that mattered.

  “Will you allow me to rise, mistress?” Yo said quietly.

  I heard his words, and a little of my delight ebbed away. I had a sudden memory of our amah—our nursemaid—reprimanding Emiko gently. My older sister had always been spoiled, always utterly sure that she was going to get her own way. Our amah had doted on her and had only ever chastised her in the mildest possible terms. Her favorite reproof had been, “Be careful what you long for. You may get it.” Emiko had never taken any notice of her. She had simply tossed her head and sighed in exasperation, telling the poor amah she was talking nonsense. Even at such a young age, I had longed to look the same as everybody else, and no matter how I thought over the amah’s wise words, I couldn’t see that there was anything at all wrong with wanting to look normal. For once, I agreed with Emiko. In fact, it wasn’t until I heard Yo speak to me in a voice that acknowledged he was mine to command that I understood that our amah had been right after all.

  It had seemed the most important thing in my world that I should beat Yo. That only by doing so would I finally be free. Now, here he was—literally at my feet—asking my permission to rise.

  And I hated it.

  Perhaps it was because I had been a slave myself. Perhaps it was because I remembered how Isamu’s leopard cat had languished in captivity. I barely knew myself.

  But I did know that I had no desire to have Yo as my slave. I wanted a man who was my equal.

  I stood and held my hand out to him.

  Eighteen

  Ropes can fetter my

  Body, but nothing made by

&nbs
p; Man can bind my soul

  Yo grasped my hand. It was so slippery with oil and sweat from our exertions that it almost slid from his grip. His fingers twined in mine, and instead of allowing me to help him to his feet, he pulled me down to the earth at his side.

  “Have you forgotten your beating already, Yo?” I teased. I was oddly breathless. I had not been short of breath at all during our contest.

  “I have forgotten nothing, mistress,” he said slyly. “I am at your command. That was our bargain, and I will keep to it.”

  My breath juddered in my throat. “Until today, it was I who was the slave, Yo.” The words stuck and I cleared my throat with a cough. “Now, I am free. I would never make anybody else a slave. Like me, you’re free. Go. Stay. It’s up to you.”

  I thought again of Isamu’s leopard cat. It had seemed to me that he had paused, balanced delicately, and given me a fleeting glance of gratitude before he took his chance and fled forever. Would Yo do the same? Would the lure of freedom be too much for him to refuse? I could hardly blame him if it were. Yet my stomach clenched painfully at the thought.

  “You are truly an honorable samurai, Keiko-san. You have all the virtues of the bushido tradition,” Yo said quietly.

  I bowed my head, both to acknowledge the compliment and to hide my bitter disappointment. He had accepted my offer, then. He would go and—like the leopard cat—I would never see him again. It could hardly be otherwise. The loss of face would be far too great for him.

  “You have given me the gift of choice. For that, I thank you. But you must know there is no choice at all for me. I cannot leave you. Not now, not ever, unless you tell me to go.”

  We were two shadows, whispering of things that would decide our fates for the rest of our lives—and who knew how many lives that were yet to come—in a night that was so dark we could not even see each other. I spoke without thought from the heart.