Shōgun

“We stay! Can’t you get it through your head? We stay until we’re allowed to leave. We stay until Ishido says we can go even if the Pope and the King of Spain come ashore together with the whole God-cursed Armada!”

Again he had gone below but sleep had avoided him. At noon, Grays arrived. Heavily escorted, he went with them to the castle. They wound through the city passing the execution ground, the five crosses still there, figures still being tied up and taken down, each cross with its two spears-men, the crowd watching. He had relived that agony and the terror of the ambush, and the feel of his hand on the hilt of his sword, the kimono about him, his own vassals with him, did not lessen his dread.

The Grays had guided him to Toranaga’s part of the castle that he had visited the first time, where Kiritsubo and the Lady Sazuko and her child were still ensconced, along with the remainder of Toranaga’s samurai. There he had had a bath and found the new clothes that had been laid out for him.

“Is Lady Mariko here?”

“No, Sire, so sorry,” the servant had told him.

“Then where can I find her, please? I have urgent message.”

“So sorry, Anjin-san, I don’t know. Please excuse me.”

None of the servants would help him. All said, “So sorry, I don’t know.”

He had dressed, then referred to his dictionary, remembering key words that he would need and prepared as best he could. Then he went into the garden to watch the rocks growing. But they never grew.

Now he was walking across the innermost moat. Flares were everywhere.

He shook off his anxiety and stepped out onto the wooden bridge. Other guests with Grays were all around heading the same way. He could feel them watching him covertly.

His feet took him under the final portcullis and his Grays led through the maze again up to the huge door. Here they left him. So did his own men. They went to one side with other samurai to await him. He went forward into the flare-lit maw.

It was an immense, high-raftered room with a golden ornamented ceiling. Gold-paneled columns supported the rafters, which were made of rare and polished woods and cherished like the hangings on the walls. Five hundred samurai and their ladies were there, wearing all the colors of the rainbow, their fragrances mingling with incense perfume from the precious woods that smoked on tiny wall braziers. Blackthorne’s eyes raced over the crowd to find Mariko, or Yabu, or any friendly face. But he found none. To one side was a line of guests who waited to bow before the raised platform at the far end. The courtier, Prince Ogaki Takamoto, was standing there. Blackthorne recognized Ishido—tall, lean, and autocratic—also beside the platform, and he remembered vividly the blinding power of the man’s blow on his face, and then his own fingers knotting around the man’s throat.

On the platform, alone, was the Lady Ochiba. She sat comfortably on a cushion. Even from this distance he could see the exquisite richness of her kimono, gold threads on the rarest blue-black silk. “The Most High,” Uraga had called her in awe, telling him much about her and her history during their journey.

She was slight, almost girlish in build, with a luminous glow to her fair skin. Her sloe eyes were large under painted, arched brows, her hair set like a winged helmet.

The procession of guests crept forward. Blackthorne was standing to one side in a pool of light, a head taller than those nearby. Politely he stepped aside to get out of the way of some passing guests and saw Ochiba’s eyes turn to him. Now Ishido was looking at him too. They said something to each other and her fan moved. Their eyes returned to him. Uneasily he went toward a wall to become less conspicuous but a Gray barred his way. “Dozo,” this samurai said politely, motioning at the line.

“Hai, domo,” Blackthorne said and joined it.

Those in front bowed and others that came after him bowed. He returned their bows. Soon all conversation died. Everyone was looking at him.

Embarrassed, the men and women ahead in the line moved out of his way. Now no one was between him and the platform. He stood rigid momentarily. Then, in the utter silence, he walked forward.

In front of the platform he knelt and bowed formally, once to her and once to Ishido as he had seen others do. He got up again, petrified that his swords would fall or that he would slip and be disgraced, but everything went satisfactorily and he began to back away.

“Please wait, Anjin-san,” she said.

He waited. Her luminosity seemed to have increased, and her femininity. He felt the extraordinary sensuality that surrounded her, without conscious effort on her part.

“It is said that you speak our language?” Her voice was unaccountably personal.