Previous First
[Continuing chapter 7]
“I would appreciate some information from you, Lord Hosokawa,” Hiroki said as he poured the sake, “after the experience Tetsuo and I have just had.” He glanced across the room, to see Tetsuo very carefully not looking at him or at Lord Hosokawa. The shop they were in officially sold tea and chewy rice pastries, but Hiroki had had no trouble persuading the proprietor to bring a jug of sake. Very good sake, he was pleased to discover.
“Oh, dear. I hope it was nothing serious. Where is your other companion? The good-looking one.”
“Shiro is making inquiries at the arms master’s mansion,” Hiroki said. “It is not with the arms master that I am concerned just now, though. It is Yanagimoto Kataharu. Tetsuo and I have just escaped having to kill four of his partisans.”
Lord Hosokawa looked up from his cup. “Having seen your Tetsuo fight, and knowing what I know about the people Yanagimoto has in the capital, I don’t doubt you could have killed more than four of them, and easily. But what does this have to do with me?”
“I doubt,” Hiroki told him, “that there is anything directly concerning you.” He took a sip of sake. “However, it is clear to me that there is little that happens in the capital that you do not know something about.”
“You want to know what I know about the Yanagimoto faction,” Lord Hosokawa said. He smiled the way a fox might.
“There has already been an attempt on Lord Naitō’s life. It seems today’s incident also implies an intent to kill us or drive us away.” Hiroki tried to make his smile as predatory as Lord Hosokawa’s had been. “While it is true we are officially supposed to be investigating Lady Tomiko’s murder, I still consider myself responsible for the safety of our embassy. If Lord Yanagimoto truly thinks us an enemy to him, I must learn all I can about him.”
“Since the fighting last month we haven’t seen Lord Yanagimoto in the city. He mostly stays in Yamashiro Province, to which he seems to be attracting vassals from other provinces. Much like your Lord Tanuma, in fact.” Lord Hosokawa swirled a fingertip in a drop of spilled sake. “Of course, we haven’t seen Lord Miyoshi either. And he, too, is very interested in the men of the provinces.” He looked up at Hiroki. “As you may have gathered by now, they both like to have underlings do the fighting for them now. They are involved in a quiet game of seeking advantage without being obvious about it.”
Time for a change of tactics. “How much do you know about Yanagimoto’s love affair with your uncle?” That was a crude way of putting the question, but Hiroki wanted to shake this young man’s unnatural calm.
“The only thing I know for certain,” Lord Hosokawa said with a slow lifting of one eyebrow, “is that neither man has ever confirmed the truth of it to me. So far as I know, it’s a myth.”
“But there’s nothing preventing an older samurai from taking a younger as a lover,” Hiroki said. “In fact, some clans encourage it as a way of teaching young warriors. So if it were true, what would be the point of denying such an affair?”
“And if it were not true, what would be the point of alleging it?” Lord Hosokawa drew a character on the tabletop, using the spilled sake as ink. Hiroki resisted the urge to try to identify the character or its possible meaning. “The answer’s the same to both questions: the love affair has nothing to do with anything. It’s the connection between the two clans that matters.” He looked directly at Hiroki.
“To imply such a connection, at this time, would be extremely dangerous, Lord Hiroki.”
“I have no interest in causing any trouble to Lord Yanagimoto,” Hiroki said, ignoring the honorific with which Lord Hosokawa had addressed him. “I will only act if he—if anyone—continues to threaten the safety of my lords.”
“You will not find the Yanagimoto faction easy to deal with, and likely you will find things much more difficult than any trouble you might find in your home province. I warn you, my Lord Hiroki, that it is quite possible that the Miyoshi plan to sacrifice your lord Tanuma’s men in order to weaken Yanagimoto at no risk to themselves.”
“You might have the same idea.”
“I might. But in fact I do not. Unlike the Miyoshi, I have no more interest in the Yanagimoto faction than I have in any party. What’s more, I have little to no interest at all in your part of the world. Provincial warriors mean nothing to me: the strength and the power in the empire are in Kyoto and the Home Provinces.”
You might be mistaken there, Hiroki told him silently. He went to refill Lord Hosokawa’s cup and found it not yet half-empty. “I am not trying to get you drunk, Lord Hosokawa.” Though after this conversation I would like to do that for myself. “Shall I fill this anyway?”
Lord Hosokawa lifted the cup, drained it, and put it back on the table. “I am only a city-boy, and do not have the hard head for sake that you rough provincials have developed.” He gestured his willingness for more sake with a small wave of his hand. “My Lord Hiroki.”
“I will remember your weakness, Lord Hosokawa,” Hiroki said, pouring. “And I wish you would not address me in that fashion. You far outrank me, Hosokawa-dono.”
“Do I, my lord?” Lord Hosokawa’s smile made him suddenly look about ten years old. “As I told you once before, I rather have my doubts about that.”
Do not introduce this man to Katsumi, he thought wildly. He will confirm her every wild guess about my past. He willed his hand to steadiness as he held his cup for Lord Hosokawa to fill. “Are you suggesting that we should treat both the Yanagimoto and Miyoshi equally as enemies, my lord?”
“Everyone is a potential enemy, viewed from the bottom of a sake cup.” Lord Hosokawa drank; Hiroki filled his cup again. “The situation in the capital now is dangerously static. Neither side possesses forces sufficiently powerful to dislodge the other. You and your three companions—and possibly your superiors, if they fight even half as well as you do—would represent a significant threat to this deadlock. If you ask my honest opinion, I suspect that Miyoshi Motonaga intends to throw you and your men—and possibly as many of your Lord Tanuma’s forces as he can obtain—into the capital and hope that this weakens or even destroys the Yanagimoto faction, the Omi shōgun, or both.”
“Why have you told me this?”
“Ah. The significant question, and the question so few think to ask.” Lord Hosokawa raised his cup to Hiroki. “I could say that I’m doing it because I like and respect you. I could even say that it’s because I’m ever more curious about who you really are, my Lord Hiroki — and that excuse would be more truthful than the first.
“But I owe you honesty, I think, and the truth is that you and your lord are of little use to me, personally, if you have been squandered by the Miyoshi in a war against the wrong enemy. I told you the truth when I said I am not interested in Kozuke. I am not interested in Yanagimoto either; I sense his power declining. But I am interested in anything that might strengthen the Miyoshi and make them even more dangerous than they already are.”
“Dangerous to you, personally, you mean.”
“Of course, my dear Hiroki. Of course.”
Next Characters Chapter 1 Chapter 2 Chapter 3 Chapter 4 Chapter 5 Chapter 6 Chapter 7
No comments:
Post a Comment