Quipu: Sowing Ghosts 18.6

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[concluding chapter 18... and the story]

“I’m going to miss that mansion,” Shiro said. “I wonder if Lord Tanuma employs anyone who would be able to make tatami. Those mats are amazingly comfortable.”

Ahead of them a troop of soldiers came to attention at the Kurama Barrier. Hiroki watched them more closely this morning than he had on his previous trip through the barrier, only a week or so before. I have learned much, he thought, and I don’t necessarily like all I have learned. Those warriors, for instance: they were not samurai; they were townspeople who worked for the neighbourhood-safety organizations. How had Katsumi put it? Something like, Soon there will be no point in you people coming back to the capital at all. The thought she might be correct was disconcerting. The world is disarranged enough as it is, without townspeople taking over control of the capital. What has happened to our leaders?

“We never did find out what was really expected of us where Yanagimoto is concerned,” Tetsuo said. “And if we were ever told to fight the man, nobody has passed that order on to me.”

“I don’t know that Yanagimoto had anything to do with what happened to us,” Hiroki said. “As for our fighting for — or against — any of the factions in the capital, I don’t believe anyone in the capital is organized well enough anymore to command Lord Tanuma — or anyone else in the provinces.”

One man is well-enough organized, he realized, and that’s Miyoshi Motonaga. The one who seems to enjoy working with men from the provinces, who keeps himself outside the capital. Hiroki wanted to believe that Miyoshi Motonaga was just another ambitious samurai leading yet another faction fighting for Kyoto. But is he really? Something about him is very different. And though he could have given us much more trouble than he did, yet he is leaving us alone. Why?

You’ll want to learn everything you can about that man, Hiroki told himself.

“Just as well,” Shiro said. “We’re going to be busy enough this spring and summer just defeating all of Lord Tanuma’s enemies in Kozuke. We won’t have time to worry about the capital, next year or any year.”

“There will be time enough to worry about Lord Tanuma’s enemies in Kozuke,” Hiroki told them, “once we have safely got back to Kozuke. One task at a time, gentlemen.”

Pausing to let Lords Naitō and Matsukata, the servants and their baggage catch up, Hiroki, head held high, led them through the barrier.

They began to climb the north-eastern hills, leaving the smell of wood-smoke behind them.

THE END