Shogun

"Why not come with me to Osaka, Yabu-san?" Hiro-matsu said as though it was a sudden thought. "Lord Toranaga would be delighted to receive all these things from your hands. Personally. Please, there's room enough." When Yabu began to protest he allowed him to continue for a time, as Toranaga had ordered, and then he said, as Toranaga had ordered, "I insist. In Lord Toranaga's name, I insist. Your generosity needs to be rewarded."

With my head and my lands? Yabu asked himself bitterly, knowing that there was nothing he could do now but accept gratefully. "Thank you. I would be honored."

"Good. Well then, that's all done," Iron Fist said with obvious relief. "Now some cha. And a bath."

Yabu politely led the way up the hill to Omi's house. The old man was washed and scoured and then he lay gratefully in the steaming heat. Later Suwo's hands made him new again. A little rice and raw fish and pickled vegetables taken sparingly in private. Cha sipped from good porcelain. A short dreamless nap.

After three sticks the shoji slid open. The personal bodyguard knew better than to go into the room uninvited; Hiromatsu was already awake and the sword half unsheathed and ready.

"Yabu-sama is waiting outside, Sire. He says the ship is loaded."

"Excellent."

Hiro-matsu went onto the veranda and relieved himself into the bucket. "Your men are very efficient, Yabu-san."

"Your men helped, Hiro-matsu-san. They are more than efficient."

Yes, and by the sun, they had better be, Hiro-matsu thought, then said genially, "Nothing like a good piss from a full bladder so long as there's plenty of power behind the stream. Neh? Makes you feel young again. At my age you need to feel young." He eased his loincloth comfortably, expecting Yabu to make some polite remark in agreement, but none was forthcoming. His irritation began to rise but he curbed it. "Have the pirate leader taken to my ship."

"What?"

"You were generous enough to make a gift of the ship and the contents. The crew are contents. So I'm taking the pirate leader to Osaka. Lord Toranaga wants to see him. Naturally you do what you like with the rest of them. But during your absence, please make certain that your retainers realize the barbarians are my Master's property and that there had better be nine in good health, alive, and here when he wants them."

Yabu hurried away to the jetty where Omi would be.

When, earlier, he had left Hiro-matsu to his bath, he had walked up the track that meandered past the funeral ground. There he had bowed briefly to the pyre and continued on, skirting the terraced fields of wheat and fruit to come out at length on a small plateau high above the village. A tidy kami shrine guarded this tender place. An ancient tree bequeathed shade and tranquillity. He had gone there to quell his rage and to think. He had not dared to go near the ship or Omi or his men for he knew that he would have ordered most, if not all of them, to commit seppuku, which would have been a waste, and he would have slaughtered the village, which would have been foolish - peasants alone caught the fish and grew the rice that provided the wealth of the samurai.

While he had sat and fumed alone and tried to sharpen his brain, the sun bent down and drove the sea mists away. The clouds that shrouded the distant mountains to the west had parted for an instant and he had seen the beauty of the snow-capped peaks soaring. The sight had settled him and he had begun to relax and think and plan.

Set your spies to find the spy, he told himself. Nothing that Hiromatsu said indicated whether the betrayal was from here or from Yedo. In Osaka you've powerful friends, the Lord Ishido himself among them. Perhaps one of them can smell out the fiend. But send a private message at once to your wife in case the informer is there.

What about Omi? Make him responsible for finding the informer here? Is he the informer? That's not likely, but not impossible. It's more than probable the betrayal began in Yedo. A matter of timing. If Toranaga in Osaka got the information about the ship when it arrived, then Hiro-matsu would have been here first. You've informers in Yedo. Let them prove their worth.

What about the barbarians? Now they're your only profit from the ship. How can you use them? Wait, didn't Omi give you the answer? You could use their knowledge of the sea and ships to barter with Toranaga for guns. Neh?

Another possibility: become Toranaga's vassal completely. Give him your plan. Ask him to allow you to lead the Regiment of the Guns - for his glory. But a vassal should never expect his lord to reward his services or even acknowledge them: To serve is duty, duty is samurai, samurai is immortality. That would be the best way, the very best, Yabu thought. Can I truly be his vassal? Or Ishido's?

No, that's unthinkable. Ally yes, vassal no.

Good, so the barbarians are an asset after all. Omi's right again.