L5r - scroll 05 - The Crab (12 page)

"Is it wise to allow this to go on?" Sukune whispered to Yori.

"Do you know of a way to stop it?" the shugenja returned.

The young Hida leaned his head to the left as he thought, then simply shook it.

"There is a tension between these two that
must
be released," Yori said. "Their karma has been intertwined for many years. This day was unavoidable. What's more, this may not be the end of it."

Mirumoto Hitomi stood and faced her opponent.

"Come," she said, "let this battle—the same battle we began here at Otosan Uchi during the Scorpion Coup—be finished here and now!"

Yakamo spat at her feet.

At the sensei's direction, they both took their stances. Hitomi adopted a classic dueling pose. Yakamo held his tetsubo over his head as though he were going to bring it crashing down on the referee.

"Remember," the sensei said, "this fight is to first blood only. May your actions bring honor to your clans."

Both contestants grunted.

"You may begin."

Hitomi stood still, studying her opponent. She looked for a point of weakness, a chink in his defense.

Yakamo snarled. He did not anticipate this kind of thoughtful fight from the Dragon. She was so angry and belligerent, he expected her to come right out and charge him the way she had last time. But apparently the young Mirumoto remembered what happened when her brother used that tactic in his final duel.

The Crab stomped one tremendous foot as though he would make the first charge. He pulled back and lowered his tetsubo. Standing with the weapon poised overhead would only tire his arms and slow his defenses.

Some of the novice students whistled and called for the pair to "stop dancing and start fighting!" Wiser members of the audience avidly watched the tension and drama unfold.

Both Hitomi and Yakamo made subtle shifts in their posture, testing the other's reaction. Hitomi dropped her left elbow and turned her katana perpendicular to the ground. Yakamo held his tetsubo directly in front of his body, pointing down at the Dragon's feet. Yakamo began to swing his club in looping figure-eights. Hitomi stood with her sword inverted directly over her head so the blade tip pointed at the bridge of the Crab's nose.

The moment lasted long.

Yakamo swung at Hitomi's midsection. She pivoted on her heel, spun, and lashed out, narrowly missing Yakamo's forearm. Some would argue later that the sarnurai-ko could easily have nicked the Crab then and there, ending the duel. For these combatants, though, merely winning was not enough. They wanted only the complete destruction of their foe.

Hitomi launched the next volley. She took two steps toward her opponent and nimbly ducked under his tetsubo. It whizzed where her head had just been. Doing a forward tumble, she rose within inches of Yakamo and struck directly up with her katana.

The crowed gasped.

The gigantic samurai thrust himself into a backward somersault, avoiding the deadly blow and coming up in a swinging stance.

He feinted for Hitomi's head, then swung down and across her body, hoping to clip her shoulder or knee—but missed entirely. The swing left his neck exposed, and he hoped the samurai-ko would take the bait. All it would take was one step toward her and a pivot of his hips to send her flying out of the pit and three rows deep into the spectators.

Hitomi's blade flashed in the sun, slicing toward the Crab's unprotected neck.

Yakamo stepped toward his foe and began his pivot.

She, too, changed targets. Instead of following through on her attack at his neck, Hitomi leapt into the air, spun to face him dead-on, and struck at his left arm.

Yakamo heard a faint, moist sound that thrilled and repulsed him.

The audience took a single deep breath and groaned.

Yakamo had no idea what happened until he tried to follow through with his pivoting blow. His right arm brought the tetsubo up toward Hitomi, but his left provided no support. The club slipped from his grip and fell to the ground. He reached down to regain his weapon but came up holding something warm and wet.

Glancing down, he realized he held his own severed left hand.

The world ceased to exist for Yakamo. He did not hear sen-sei yelling that the match was over. Nor did he see Hitomi spinning in preparation for another strike—this one to separate the Crab's head from his shoulders. Yakamo stared blankly at his lost hand as a group of ten strong samurai grabbed Hitomi and struggled to drag her away. He did not recognize his brother Sukune when he slid to a halt with Kuni Yori close behind, both trying to find a way to stanch the bleeding. He knew nothing until he threw his head back and howled. Then the world came back into focus.

"I'm not done with you yet, Hida," snarled Hitomi as her own samurai pulled her away. "Your life is mine! I will be back to claim it!"

Yakamo tried to go after the Dragon samurai-ko, but his legs would not support him. He tried to yell after her—-that even with one hand he was still three times the warrior she ever could be—but his voice only came out as a baleful growl.

Kuni Yori placed three fingers on Yakamo's brow and whispered an arcane phrase. The injured Crab slipped into unconsciousness.

"What will we do?" asked Sukune.

"You must continue on to the Forbidden City," Yori told him. "Nothing that happened here today changes the fact that the emperor awaits the Crab envoy."

"But Yakamo—" Sukune disagreed with his brother, even disliked him on many occasions, but he could not leave Yakamo in this condition.

"Between my spells and the city's healers, we will make him well enough to ride back to the Crab lands," Yori assured Sukune. "Once there, I may be able to do something to alleviate the problem."

Sukune nodded. "You must help him, Yori-san. You must!"

"And
you
must go to the Forbidden City. Focus on the task before you. You know what your father would say."

"Yes," Sukune agreed. "'No matter how many battles you have won or lost, the only one that matters is the one you are
in!'"

The dueling school's healers came running up to Yakamo's side.

Elsewhere, the school's sensei argued with a representative of the Dragon Clan. Half the sensei were considering banning Miru-moto from setting foot in the academy ever again. The others demanded compensatory payment for the shame Hitomi brought by not following the agreed-upon rules and attempting to kill her opponent after the match was done. No talk was given at all to recompensing Yakamo for his loss.

As he turned toward the Forbidden City, high and white above the clustered rooftops, Sukune could only think of what Kuni Yori's had said: "This day was unavoidable. What's more, this may not be the end of it."

THE CALL OF KARMA

I have bled all my blood ... I have no more. I must be dead."

"You are not dead, Yakamo-san," said Kuni Yori. "But you
are
delirious." Between a substantial loss of blood, pain-killing herbs, and Yori's own spells, Yakamo felt no pain. Unfortunately, he was also quite insensible.

"No blood, no blood, I'm an empty shell, a Crab without a claw." Yakamo said in a childish lilt. "I fought and fought, but I lost my hand to the tiny Dragon's maw."

Traveling was difficult with Yakamo in such condition. The samurai could hardly stay balanced on his horse. He needed to stop to rest at least four times per day. It had been six days since they began their return journey to Crab lands. The stump of Yakamo's left wrist, which they'd cauterized with white-hot steel, was healing acceptably. It now only oozed, and Yori was certain it would not become infected as long as he changed the bandage every day.

But no more of the herbs remained, and it would take at least a day to reach the Great Wall of Kaiu. Yori feared what would happen when the herbs ran out—not because of the pain. The shugenja worried how Yakamo would act when he finally regained his senses.

When Yakamo's mind was whole again, he might insist on turning his horse around and riding after Mirumoto Hitomi to seek revenge. Even in this weakened state, Yakamo could overcome any resistance Yori put up. But fighting the Dragon samurai-ko again in this condition would be suicide. Of course, seppuku was another possible reaction Yakamo might have.

The problem with bushi, Yori thought, is that they are too willing to throw away their lives needlessly. The shugenja still had plans for the young Hida, and they would be dashed if Yakamo decided he had been so dishonored he could not go on living.

The reaction Kuni Yori hoped for was that Yakamo would remain in a state of shock. Often a trauma such as this could induce a condition that resembled sleepwalking. This would have the advantage of permitting the young man to ride a little more strenuously without thinking clearly. With any luck, the shock would last until Yori got him safely back to Kisada's camp. The Great Bear would surely be able to talk sense into his wounded son.

"You are not the man you seem, Yori-kun," Yakamo shouted, though he rode no more than ten feet away.

"What do you mean, Yakamo-san?" Yori was intrigued.

"You paint your face like a geisha—making a new one you think is more pleasing," bellowed Yakamo. "But underneath you are just the same as you always have been. Your mask does not scare me."

"Why should it?" asked the shugenja nervously. Did Yakamo actually have a clue about his machinations and intrigues?

"That is what you want. I can tell. You want to be feared," Yakamo now began to mumble. "You paint your face and hide it beneath a velvet hood. You peer out with narrowed eyes, as white as death. You want to be feared, Kuni-san, but the truth is that you are my best friend." Yakamo slid in his saddle and nearly fell off the horse.

"I think it is time for you to rest again," Yori said, reaching over and reigning both horses to a stop.

"No, it's true," Yakamo insisted. "I lost my hand, and my own brother abandoned me. My father will certainly disown me for being such a failure. I can't even ride a horse right, and
you
are the only one who will take care of me."

Within the folds of his cloak, Kuni Yori smiled.

"I am glad you recognize that, my lord," he said as he lay Yakamo down on the roadside grass to sleep.

XXXXXXXX

"We're nearly there, Yakamo-sama, but we must make a short stop at my tower before we complete our journey."

Yakamo merely grumbled in response.

It was nearly two days later, and he had been without the pain-killing herbs for most of that time. He had not fallen into shock, as Yori had hoped. Instead, Yakamo emerged fully cognizant of what had happened but completely withdrawn. He seemed to feel nothing about the matter. The sharp throbbing at the end of his left arm kept him focused on the task of riding. Unfortunately, it had also made it impossible for him to sleep for the past two nights.

They'd reached the Wall an hour ago and were now riding north toward Hida Kisada's camp. The sky was a metallic gray. The ground was covered in a thin layer of mist that seemed to pass straight through the Wall.

Yakamo felt as if he was riding through a nightmare. If only he could awake to find the sun shining and his missing hand restored. But he knew that this world, as bizarre as it seemed to his sleepy eyes, was the real one.

The Wall looked exacdy the same as it did anywhere along its expanse—tall, crenellated lengths connecting blocky towers set exactly fifty yards apart. Regular. Predictable. Safe.

Something irregular loomed out of the mists. About three hundred yards ahead there seemed to be a station where
two
towers were built, one behind the other. The second tower was only half as tall as all the others, plus it was not actually connected to the Wall but sat four or five hundred yards removed like a tiny reflection. At first the young samurai thought he might be hallucinating. Then he remembered that Kuni Yori had this tower constructed to house his personal residence and magical library.

More than the tower's size distinguished it from the rest of the Kaiu construction. Rather than the gray, cold stones that made up the Wall, Yori's Tower was built of dark stones. Yakamo could not be sure whether they were black or an extraordinarily deep red. They seemed to breathe in and out in a ragged rhythm. The entire building appeared to be alive.

"So this is the cursed tower of Kuni Yori,' " said Yakamo. "Some of the bravest warriors I've ever fought beside tell me they are afraid to step within a hundred yards of your home."

Yori chuckled.

"It is good, sometimes, to cultivate a bad reputation," he said over his shoulder. "It makes the neighbors less likely to bother you at inopportune times."

Both riders dismounted and walked their steeds to the building's only entry—a large stone arch. The only other exit was a single window on what must have been the topmost floor.

"I'll admit, your home has a certain . . . sinister feel to it," Yakamo said. "But it's hardly anything to shake the nerves of a battle-tested samurai."

Just then, the air was split by an ear-piercing scream. It lasted about ten seconds, then faded into silence. It was not quite a human scream, but neither did it seem wholly bestial.