Blood Ninja (17 page)

Shusaku spread his hands. “Our enemies were willing to send dozens of ninja to kill a single boy. That alone is proof enough to me of your importance.”

“Perhaps,” said Yukiko, “you should have just let them kill him, if they wanted to so badly.”

“Yukiko!” said Heiko.

“Perhaps,” said Shusaku in a conciliatory tone. “But what is done is done. And now I’m hoping that your guardian will tell Taro’s fortune. I believe it will support my belief that he will be crucial in the coming war.”

“What war?” said Hiro.

“The one that the daimyos will soon be fighting,” said Shusaku, “to decide who will be the next shogun.”

“We already have a shogun. He’s only a boy.”

“Yes, exactly. Boys are so fragile, so easy to kill. Most of them,
anyway,” added Shusaku, with an ironic bow to Taro.

“No one will allow another war,” said Heiko. “The one against Yoshimoto was so terrible, it would be madness to contemplate another.”

“Well, let us hope that is true,” said Shusaku. “In the meantime we should try what we can to look into the future.” He turned to the abbess. “I presume you will consent to look into the Tao for us? Then tomorrow evening we will leave you and continue on our way.”

“Of course,” said the white-haired woman. “Allow me just to gather my things.” From the edges of the room she brought soft pillows, which she arranged on the tatami mats. Taro lowered himself gratefully onto one, and saw Hiro do the same. Shusaku remained standing, always alert. The two girls sat down together, whispering to each other. Taro could not hear what they said.

The old woman then went to the corner of the room and lit a small fire under a teapot that hung from the rafters. She lit sticks of incense that were placed all around the room. When the tea had boiled, she brought it over, and beckoned to Taro.

As he stepped forward, she smiled and took him by the arm, peering into his eyes. “Ah, boy,” she said, “you are set for greatness. Even thus, when I am awake, and separated from the Tao, I see it all about you. It lies on you and sets you apart, like the clothes of high office that you wear now.” She paused. “Only your destiny fits you far better.”

Taro followed her glance to the arms of his kimono. It was not as vastly oversize as the ambassador’s had been, but his hands nevertheless disappeared in the long, wide sleeves.

Then the abbess poured herself a cup of fragrant tea from the pot, but did not offer any to anyone else. She sat back on her heels in front of the sand tray and began to chant.

Taro watched her, curious. Suddenly he jumped—the woman’s eyes had rolled back into her head, exposing only the whites, as when a whale rolls over and shows its belly.

She began to write on the sand with the metal rod. She wrote
with a flourish, composing only a handful of characters, then gently put the rod down on the floor. Her eyes rolled back to their original position. She looked down at the message she had written and gasped.

“You are not surprised?” she said to Taro.

“He doesn’t read,” said Shusaku, stepping forward so as to see the writing. He breathed out slowly.

“Astonishing,” said the woman. “No wonder they took no risks in order for him to be killed.” She stood, her legs creaking audibly.

“What does it say?” asked Taro.

Shusaku looked down at the box of sand. “It says, ‘This boy will be shogun.’?”

“Shogun?” said Hiro. “Very funny. Come on, let’s go.” He stood as if to leave.

“The abbess never lies,” said Shusaku. “She cannot. When she enters her trance, she is one with the Tao. She sees what our eyes cannot.”

“Well,
my
eyes can’t see Taro being shogun,” said Hiro. “He’s just the son of a peasant and an ama diver.”

“The son of a peasant?” said Yukiko incredulously. “And he gets to be a vampire before me? I’ve been part of the ninja world since I was a baby!”

“Shh,” said Heiko absently, but she was staring at Taro with mingled wonder and suspicion.

The fortune-teller was also looking at Taro curiously. “Your mother was an ama?”

“
Is
an ama,” he replied. Or was she telling fortunes again? Was his mother dead already? “She is still alive, isn’t she?”

“I have no idea,” said the abbess, and Taro breathed a sigh of relief.
“But she is definitely an ama, nonetheless? This is important.”

“Yes. She is an ama. She dives for shells. Is that so unusual?”

“Actually, yes. But it is interesting for another reason also.” She turned to Shusaku. “Do you know the story of the first ama?”

He shook his head, and Taro did too.

“It’s an old story,” said the woman. “I had forgotten about it until just now.” She sat down opposite Taro. “Would you like to hear it? I think you’d find it interesting.

Taro nodded. “Please.”

“Very well,” said the woman. “About a thousand years ago, when men were either brutish warriors or foppish lords, an elegant young man arrived in the coastal village of Shirahama during the ume blossoming of the spring, when the flowers of the cherry trees burst into pink mist. Nobody knew whence he had come, or what his purpose was in visiting this washed-out place on the sea, and to begin with, therefore, no one was sure if he was a common warrior or a lord.

“One night, as he was soaking in the
onsen
waters, a serving girl brought him some food, and later the same girl heard him composing a poem out loud. That settled it—any man who enjoyed poetry was obviously a lord and not a samurai.

“But in the village was a girl of common stock and uncommon beauty, the daughter of a simple fisherman, who dived sometimes for snails and seaweed. One day the lord went down to the beach and saw her coming back from one of her dives, carrying a handful of pearls.

“He fell in love instantly.

“Soon after that, they were married, and exactly nine months after that, they had a son whom they named Fusazaki, after a local shrine.

“For many months they were blissfully happy. But then a strange thing happened: Increasingly, on his return in the evening from mysterious wanderings, the girl would find her husband crying.
This
, she thought,
is taking the poetic sensibility a little too far
.

“Eventually she could take it no more, and said to her husband,
‘You must tell me what is wrong. If you really love me, tell me what is upsetting you.’ And, seeing reflected in his wife’s tears the pain he had caused her with his own, he told her the following story, revealing once and for all his noble origin:

“His real name was Tankai, son of Fujiwara Kamatari, the emperor of Japan. When his younger sister had married the T’ang emperor of China, she had sent three invaluable gifts from the mainland, to be buried with her recently deceased grandfather. One was a magic drum that, once struck, produced a continuous and beautiful tone, only returning to silence when covered in nine layers of silk. The second was an ink stone that, when rubbed with a stick, produced an inexhaustible supply of the finest calligraphy ink. And the last was a crystal ball, containing many images of the Buddhas, so that whichever way the ball was turned a Buddha would gaze out at the holder of the object. These objects, so rare and beautiful, would give their grandfather peace in his grave, and help him to a glorious reincarnation.

“But while the ship containing the presents was sailing the Shido sea, the Dragon King of the sea sniffed out the treasures on board as clearly as though they were blood, and decided he had to have them for himself. He immediately asked his ally Susanoo,
kami
of storms, to conjure an enormous thunderstorm, while he himself sent legions of sharks as living battering rams to gouge holes in the sides of the ship. The men fought valiantly, flinging harpoons into the roiling sea, but to their great terror the ship started to limp in the water, and they became convinced they were going to die. Thinking quickly, the captain seized the Buddha ball and threw it into the sea. And it worked: The winds dropped, the rain stopped, and the sharks melted into the dark water. Even the family was happy: The remaining two gifts still made handsome grave goods for Grandfather Kamatari.

“But Tankai could not stop thinking about the Buddha ball, even though he had only heard it described. Setting off from home, he sailed to the site of the sea battle and dived into the water himself to try to recover the treasure. But the sharks were
waiting, and as they closed in for the attack, Tankai’s sailors hauled him out of the water, wet and undignified, in a tuna net. From there he sailed back to the mainland, and took to wandering the shores in shame.

“That was how he met his wife.

“Concluding the tale, Tankai gave a deep sigh. But his wife smiled with joy. ‘I am a diver! I could get the ball back for you.’

“Tankai worried. ‘But what if anything were to happen to you? I could not forgive myself.’ He looked at their son, Tankai’s sea-wet eyes streaming tears.

“His wife stroked his forehead. ‘If I can get the ball for you, will you promise to recognize our son as your heir?’ Tankai willingly agreed. He could already see the marks of greatness in his son’s physiognomy.

“Early the next day they sailed out to sea. The wife tied a long rope around her waist and said, ‘Pull me up if I pull on this line. That means I have the ball.’ Her husband nodded and seized the end of the rope. Then, picking up a lead weight and dropping neatly from the side of the boat, his wife disappeared into the depths. Down and down she went, through the cold darkness, silently glad for the rope—since at least that had an end, while the sea seemed infinite in its depth. Eventually she reached a glittering palace of coral, guarded by eight sharks the size of boats, and two ferocious-looking dragons.

“For a moment she hesitated, seeing the indifferent ferocity in the sharks’ eyes. But then she called on the Buddhas for protection, and swam into the palace, using her weight to speed her progress through the freezing water. Quickly she grabbed the ball, which had been set on an altar of seaweed in the middle of the great room. But the sharks raced after her, snapping their enormous jaws. One of them caught her a glancing blow with its tail, and another darted in under her arm as she flailed, biting a hole in her chest. Scenting blood, the other sharks went into a frenzy, but Tankai had felt the tug on the rope when the first shark had hit her, and he pulled now with all his strength.

“On the surface, Tankai couldn’t believe the length of rope that came up, but eventually his wife’s body came over the side, bloody and lifeless and without the ball. He held her in his arms and rocked back and forth, lamenting the loss of his two most precious possessions. Then, with her last breath, his wife whispered, ‘Look inside my breast.’

“Reaching into the hole in her chest where the shark had bitten her, Tankai found the ball hidden inside—his own beloved wife forming the wrapping for the long-lost present. He clutched it, feeling its power.

“Then he threw his wife’s body overboard and forgot her. The ball had taken over his senses, you see, and all he could think about was the control it gave him over everything in the world—because the Buddha ball is Buddha’s own model of the world, and to possess it is to possess everything on earth and in the air and in the sea, and have them do your bidding.

“Some time later Tankai traveled back to the capital with his son Fusazaki, where he soon became emperor upon the death of his father, and ruled the country easily with the help of the ball. With it in his hand, he could raise up storms, blot out the sun, cause famines to destroy his enemies’ lands, and even—should he wish it—demand the death of the least of the country’s creatures, for the ball would show him every detail of the world, down to a fly on a stalk of grass in the next Province, and give him power over it.

“Many years passed, and Fusazaki grew to be a fine young man and a worthy heir. But only infrequently did Tankai think of, or mention, his wife and Fusazaki’s mother. If ever the boy asked about her, his father would close like a clam, not even confirming if the mother still lived, and only giving the vaguest information about their romance. He never made their son his heir, preferring instead the son of one of his concubines, who for political reasons made a better choice.

“Then one spring, in the month of the rabbit, the boy was playing in the palace gardens under the cherry blossoms. Looking
up at the trees, he saw a pair of birds keeping their eggs warm in the nest. Whenever the female would fly off to find a worm or a fly to feed to the chicks, the father would warm the nest. Thus, both parents took turns to nurture their brood. Seeing this, the boy was struck by
hosshin
—the desire for enlightenment—and knew that he must become a monk. But the sight of the female bird hunting for worms reminded him painfully of the biggest obstacle to his enlightenment: his attachment to a mother he did not even know. ‘Since the creation of the world, every creature—even those of the animal realm, and down to the lowliest lobster in the bay—has had two parents. How can it be that I, who am the son of the emperor, have no mother?’

“Hearing him, one of his serving girls broke down and wept. ‘If you wish to find your mother, you should seek her on the coast, near the village of Shirahama,’ she said. Fusazaki pressed her for more details, but fearing that she had already spoken too freely, she closed up like his father. Frustrated, Fusazaki set out the next day for the coast, determined to find the woman who had brought him into the world. At every village he visited he would ask about her, and whether a noble man had been there and married a local woman, but the people of the coast simply laughed.