The Heavenward Path (3 page)

    I fidgeted with the edges of my sleeves. "But surely we can make the kami understand that such a thing is impossible."

    "Impossible? Is this the same Mitsuko who bravely kept her sister out of the castle of Lord Tsubushima? Is this the same girl who wanted to storm the heights of Mount Hiei and order the warrior monks to properly bury her brother-in-law? The same girl who, if the tales be true, dared enter the realm of the Lord of Death himself?"

    I wished he had not remembered that. I swallowed hard and wished the sunlight, which now was brightly burning the mists away, would hide itself again behind the clouds. "My father once told me that great battles were easier than the little bureaucratic problems he faced at Court. It is not so simple, Dento. And the girl who did all those things has… changed." Where had my courage fled these past two years? Had I hoped that by hiding among pilgrims in temples, I would never have to face my past?

    I didn't feel powerful, or important, or brave. It wasn't bravery that had let me search for Amaiko's soul. Visiting the netherworld had been Goranu's idea. I had merely traveled along and done what I had to when I got there. I only dared visit the Lord of Death because I loved my sister so.

    "That Mitsuko has changed? Nonsense. She is merely sleeping, dreaming of the Buddha and the Life to Be. It is time to reawaken to the world."

    "But we are taught that the world is illusion," I protested.

    "It is easy to think so, until you stub your toe on a rock," said Dento. "Come now, you are not without resources. Are you not a Fujiwara? With the most powerful clan in the Empire behind you, what could you not do?"

    "It is not so simple," I said again, twisting a strand of my long black hair between my fingers. "It is because I am Fujiwara that they may not let me do
anything
. I am too important in… other ways. You are free to travel. I am not."

    "Then you must convince your family of the importance of your task. It is to you the kami calls. It is your duty to appease it."

    "I seem to be gathering duties," I grumbled.

    "We have them from the day we are born. That is gimmu, neh? But you need not be crushed by such burdens, Lady Mitsuko. Doesn't the porter or the stonemason become stronger from the weight he must carry? As I see it, there is much to be said for shouldering one's debts cheerfully and discharging them well. The challenge invigorates the spirit, and helping others brings grace to one's nature. Surely fulfilling your promise to the kami will further you upon the Heavenward Path."

    This philosophy was somewhat different from what the monks of the temple taught about distancing oneself from the sin-filled world. No wonder the monks disapproved of Dento.

    "You know," he continued, "there is a Tightness to this duty you must perform."

    I turned and frowned at his shadow on the kicho.
Even he does not listen to what I say
. "Rightness? For a noble girl to rebuild a shrine?"

    "How much do you know of your clan's history, my Lady?"

    "Only the stories I heard as a child." Most of them had been about great wars and who married whom. I had not paid much attention to them.

    "The Fujiwara have been powerful for many centuries, Mitsuko. They served the Imperial family even before the Capital was at Heian Kyo, before it was at Nagaoka. Even back when the Palace was in Heijo, the Fujiwara served at the Emperor's side. Your clan was called Nakatomi then, and their specific office was to serve and chant Shinto prayers before the Sacred Mirror. This was before the Way of the Buddha became known on these islands."

    I sighed, losing interest in his words. I could not see what this history had to do with me.

    As if he read my thoughts, Dento moved closer to the kicho and said, "But the women of the Nakatomi were different than the Fujiwara are now. Many Nakatomi ladies were shamans and ubasoku-diviners and healers of great power-such as Queen Himiko of Yamatai."

    "They were?" My hair started to stand on end, though I could not say why.

    "Yes! And although such magically talented women have not been seen in the Fujiwara line for many, many years, I think at last one may have come forth again."

    "Me?"

    "Just possibly. This may be why the kami of the forgotten shrine is so angry. Your promise had sacred power, while one from an ordinary girl would not."

    "Oh. I see." I pulled my kimonos tighter around me.

    "I believe I have seen that shrine," Dento said, "during my wanderings. If I am thinking of the right place, it is an odd little structure."

    "Odd? How so?" As my family is Buddhist, I was not at all familiar with the different sorts of Shinto shrines.

    "Normally, a shrine is placed in an impressive setting: near a waterfall, or a mountainside where there are beautiful views, or even an interesting boulder. Your shrine, if it is the one I think, had no such landmark. In fact, its setting is quite ordinary."

    It had not seemed ordinary to me, but then it had been a haven amid the dark, forbidding pines. "Perhaps it was built to honor the kami of the whole forest," I suggested.

    His shadow on the screen shook its head. "Had that been true, my Lady, a better location would have been found, and it would have been a more elaborate structure."

    I tugged on my hair as if trying to pull thoughts from my head. "Well, perhaps the shrine is terribly ancient and devoted to something else, and the forest grew up around it."

    "Ah. That is a very perceptive thought. I do recall there may be some historical significance to the place, but I cannot recall what it is."

    I confess, I began to grow more curious about the strange little shrine and how a kami of great power might have come to reside there. A part of me had been feeling caged living in the temple dormitory, and I looked forward to traveling again. "You are right, Dento. I am being too stubborn. Surely my family could help me repair a simple little shrine. After all, my sister Sotoko lives near there now, with her new husband. I am sure they would know what to do."

    "Ah. There is the brave Mitsuko I remember. And besides, if all else fails, you can always call upon your tengu friend for assistance, neh?"

    "I suppose," I murmured, although I hoped that would not be necessary. I had asked so much of Goranu in the past, and given him so little in return.

    "Your way is clear, then. You must go back to Heian Kyo to enlist your family's help."

    "Will you come with me, Dento, to help explain things to my father?"

    "I wish I could, Mitsuko, but there is a village to the south of here haunted by sickness. I must go and perform cleansing rites, and perhaps learn the source and nature of the ailment to rid them of it."

    "Oh." I was disappointed, but what could I say? I could not order him to choose one duty over another.

    "But you are clever, Mitsuko, as well as brave. I am sure you will be able to manage things."

    "I will do my best," I murmured. "Thank you, Dento. I will remember all you have told me."

    We said our good-byes then, but as his shadow vanished from the kicho curtain, I wished I could reach my hand through the cloth and grasp the hem of his jacket to keep him from going. Without his guidance, I feared I would be lost. I heard his footsteps departing on the garden flagstones, and soon I was alone. I hurried back to the temple to make my preparations. I sent Tadashi a note:

    

    
Like grass in the wind,

    
this dutiful daughter bows.

    
I will return home.

    

    That night, my dreams were different. I saw a woman in many bulky old-fashioned kimonos, her long hair waving wildly about her, dancing in a forest of pines. She was shaking sakaki branches in her hands and chanting something I could not hear. I felt I had seen her face before-dimly glimpsed in the Land of the Ancestors. Again the wind entered my dream, but it was calmer than before. The pines did not whisper my name, and I slept better than I had in days.

    

    

    
What a cheerful sound! The turning of a carriage wheel on the homeward road.

    

    Only five days later, a carriage arrived from Heian Kyo to take me back to the Capital. The messenger bearing my letter to my father must have run like the wind! Twenty Guardsmen of the Inner Ward, looking splendid in their red capes, accompanied the carriage. It was one of my father's finest: black lacquered wood with red and gold cords woven into the latticework sides, the Fujiwara crest printed on the silk curtains, and a roof-canopy of carefully split palm leaves. The two oxen that drew the carriage had polished horns and shiny black coats, and were very well matched. Surely anyone seeing this procession would say, "There goes a lady of importance indeed!"

    As I watched the servants loading my things into the carriage, Tadashi came up beside me. "So, Lady Mitsuko. Off to your grand future at last. I am sorry to see you go, for you have brought some noble grace to our provincial temple. I hope your journey home is safe and pleasant."

    I bowed to her. "I thank you, Holy One, for allowing me to study here. I have learned much, and I hope to return someday." I looked back at the carriage and sighed. "Why did my father take so much trouble for me?"

    Tadashi smiled. "A lady of the Good People is like a precious jewel, Lady Mitsuko. She must be surrounded by those things that display and enhance her quality. You must remember this when you begin your service at Court."

    "I will, Holy One," I said, although it seemed I was more like a songbird being coaxed into a cage than a jewel. I allowed the guardsmen to assist me in getting into the rear door of the carriage, where another surprise awaited me.

    "Hey, Little Puddle in the Clouds! Good to see you again!"

    "Mochi?" I fell ungracefully onto the carriage seat in astonishment. It was, indeed, the rice cake girl whose family had taken me in when my father's house burned down. But she had changed. She now wore the many-layered silk kimonos of a servant in a noble household, but in a most displeasing arrangement. Even I knew that one did not wear the pink kimonos of spring over the gold ones of autumn. She had attempted to shave her eyebrows and stain her teeth with purple berries in the classic Court fashion. Such attempts at the noble ideal of beauty looked strange on her sun-browned face.

    She tugged pridefully on her sleeves. "Not Mochi anymore. I hardly ever make rice cakes now that I serve in a great Fujiwara house. Now you may call me Suzume."

    So, I was not the only one gathering names. Sparrow, however, was at least an appropriate name for her to take, as she was such a common little creature. It may seem harsh to say so, but I was annoyed with her. Not so much because she was taking on the airs of those more noble than she, but because she had changed. I had been used to her plain clothes and blunt ways-that was what I had liked about her. It was disturbing to see her so different. It was as though I had never really known her.

    "Why must everything change?" I murmured as I tried to find a more comfortable position on the carriage cushions.

    "What did you say?"

    "Oh, pardon me. I said I am glad to see you well."

    She had on a grin nearly as wide as her face. "This is so exciting, neh? Me, getting to ride like a grand lady through the streets of the Capital! You must show me the proper way to let my sleeves show from under the bamboo blinds. Do you let them hang out a little or a lot?"

    I shuddered inside, for the arrangement of her sleeves was nothing to display proudly. "I am sorry, I have been at the temple so long, I have forgotten," I said. "Let us keep our sleeves inside and let people wonder which fine ladies are riding by."

    "That's true, you Good People make a big fuss over ladies being mysterious. Very well, let them wonder."

    The men outside closed the carriage door, and I heard the driver crack the ox-stick. The carriage lurched forward, nearly pitching Mochi-that is, Suzume-onto my lap. She scrambled back onto her seat giggling, and I began to fear that the trip might seem far longer than it ought.

    "You know, your papa picked me especially to come meet you," Suzume said proudly. "Did he?"

    "Yes! Maybe he will arrange it so that I am your personal maid when you go to serve at Court, do you think? Imagine! Me living with the People Who Dwell Above the Clouds."

    
Surely
I thought,
Papa would not be so mad as to make Suzume my handmaid at Court
. As Tadashi said, the quality of a noblewoman is known by her surroundings, and a former rice cake girl who couldn't even dress right-and then I caught myself. Suzume and her family had been kind to me when others had turned away. And I was not intending to go to Court. There was the matter of the kami shrine to attend to. Who knew how long that might take? If I could convince my father that a life seeking the Heavenward Path would bring as much honor to the clan as marrying well, I might never have to go to Court at all.

    But it would have been unkind to quash Suzume's dreams so. I smiled at her and said, "I thought you poor folk made fun of Those Who Live Above the Clouds and considered our way of life foolish."

    "Oh, of course we do! Because we are jealous and want to live just like you. Or at least have your nice things." She fussed with her sleeves as if not sure what to do with her hands.

    "But noblewomen and their servants have to hide behind screens and kichos. Surely you would miss being able to wander the city freely?"

    "Heh. Being pinched and leered at by drunk old men, and having to watch out for thieves, and being tired all day from carrying rice cakes all over town? No, thank you. A life behind screens writing poems seems like heaven to me. By the way, the gossip behind the walls is that your papa already has a husband picked out for you."