The Sword Maker's Seal (2 page)

Mr. Roy broke the increasingly awkward silence, “Now, now Kenji, don't go filling this one's head with those stories. They are only stories after all,” he said, trailing off.

“Of course Mr. Roy,” Kenji said and smirked.

“Alright then, I had better get ready for this afternoon, a Mr. Dillinger from England is flying in specifically to see this exhibit. I'm told he's rather fond of Feudal Japanese History and owns a good chunk of Feudal Art himself. I daresay I'm not surprised; he is one of the richest men in Britain.

“Oh, and Kenji, keep your eye on this one. Ezra has a tendency of getting into trouble.” Mr. Roy placed extra emphasis on the last word with his horrible British accent.

Ezra and Kenji met each other's gaze, both of them holding back a laugh as Mr. Roy walked away.

“Is he always like that?” Kenji asked sincerely.

“Well, I've been coming here for a few years, and I almost never step out of line, but that guy always thinks I'm up to something. Half the time I come just to hear his fake accent.”

Kenji smiled even bigger and continued to the next part of the exhibit.

Ezra looked up at Kenji and realized he knew almost nothing about the man but his name. He also realized that Kenji had almost no foreign accent while speaking English. It must have been Kenji's proper speech that tipped him off as a native of Japan. He had noticed when speaking with foreigners in the past that the English they learn is often much different than what is spoken by native English speakers.

“So what's your story?” Ezra asked.

Kenji turned around and said, “Me? I work for the Japanese Sword Museum in Tokyo. I'm here on assignment as the resident sword expert.”

“What about Tanya?” Ezra asked. “Isn't she supposed to be the sword expert at this museum?”

“Oh yes, I met her this morning. She didn't seem too pleased to see me; while her knowledge of Japanese weapons is impressive, my presence was a condition of the exhibit's contract.”

“Why is that?”

“My employer is convinced I'm the only one who can do this job. After all, my grandfather was Hatake Okazaki, a world renowned sword expert, and he taught me everything I now know.”

Ezra spent the rest of the day at the public library trying to find information on Masamune. To Ezra's dismay, the book selection was limited and the information on the Internet was conflicting from site to site. He did find one book, Feudal Japan and the Way of the Samurai, and began reading it in a quiet corner of the library. Ezra had a tendency of becoming obsessed with a single subject for a short period of time and quickly absorbing volumes of information. Soon after, of course, losing interest but retaining much of what he had learned. What Ezra truly enjoyed was a good mystery; and discovering if the sword at the museum was really a work of Masamune was just what Ezra needed to finish his summer on a high note.

He looked at his watch and, shocked to find it was already four-thirty, checked out the book and ran to the MAX line. When he walked through his front door at five-fifteen, Matilda Thorne was waiting with arms crossed and a scowl across her frightening face.

“You're late!” she roared.

“Sorry…” Ezra responded meekly.

“I just don't understand,” his mother said, showing no signs of calming down. “What is it you do all day? Haven't you seen the exhibits and the same old books every day for the whole summer? Why don't you just go out and play like all of the other kids?”

Ezra didn't answer. After a few moments Mrs. Thorne scoffed, threw her arms up, and stormed off to the dining room to set the table for dinner. With every fork and knife Mrs. Thorne placed on the table there was a loud bang as though she were yelling at Ezra by doing so. Mr. Thorne placed several plates of food in the center of the table and sat down at the head, scooping heaps of mashed potatoes and gravy, a grilled chicken breast and snow peas onto his plate. Ezra hated snow peas but decided not to say anything to his mother since he was already in trouble. Instead, he dropped a few of them to the floor for Wilhelm, who loved any people food he could get.

“How was work today?” Mrs. Thorne asked her husband out of habit rather than genuine interest.

“Okay. My summer students are lazy but they know they need the credits and that I won't go easy on them like most summer teachers.”

“I have the rottenest bunch of kids this summer,” Mrs. Thorne said without showing the slightest sign she had heard her husband. “All they do is ask questions! How am I supposed to teach a class?”

Ezra snickered to himself and took another bite of mashed potatoes and gravy.

“Is something funny Ezra?”

“It's just–dad always says he loves taking questions, especially about literature.”

“He's right, honey, nothing brightens my day more than a student that actually wants to read The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock,” he said, then recited, “Streets that follow like a tedious argument of insidious intent to lead you to an overwhelming question…”

“For crying out loud Eliot, not at the table!”

They continued arguing for almost ten minutes, during which time Ezra finished his meal and retreated to his bedroom on the second floor of their narrow house. He sat in his windowsill looking down the lonesome street, his hands enveloped by his long sleeves—surely everyone was inside eating dinner at the time. Ezra was so used to his parents arguing he hadn't thought twice about encouraging it whenever he wanted to make his escape.

Ezra had a way of taking matters into his own hands. On several occasions he had helped his friends find lost items or proved their innocence when they were accused of cheating or other offenses. The biggest mystery he had solved occurred at the end of the previous year when he discovered a teacher in his middle school was selling drugs to students.

Since then, he had a reputation among the bullies of the school as a nosy snitch, and as a blessing to his friends and his nicer classmates. Now, however, he was going into high school. Ezra didn't know what to expect when he stepped through those daunting doors the following week. Would he be hailed as a promising young sleuth or a nuisance to be dealt with in due time?

Ezra shook off that thought and plopped himself down on his bed. He heard a whine from under his sheets. Wilhelm had somehow nuzzled his way beneath Ezra's sheets and was sleeping soundly. Ezra pushed Wilhelm aside. He yawned and immersed himself in Feudal Japan and the Way of the Samurai, which he read until he fell soundly asleep, his nose in the book's crease and his arm around his dog several hours later.

Eight houses away, another boy also lay in his bed, but this boy could not sleep for the life of him. Instead, he clutched an old photograph of he and his brother at the lake. His older brother had one arm around the boy's back and the other moving in for a noogie. He willed himself not to burst into tears as he remembered that autumn day, much the same as this one, three years earlier.

♦

“Help!” a small girl cried after wading too far into the lake.

Every year the boy went to the same lake in central Oregon with his family and his aunt, uncle, and cousins. The boy was floating on his back in the shallows when he heard the girl's muffled call. He stood up in the water and surveyed the lake, squinting his eyes in the September sun. After a moment he saw a pair of arms and legs thrashing about in the distance. It was his cousin Sophie. He froze. He was supposed to be watching her while the adults went to town to buy groceries.

“What are you waiting for?” yelled an urgent voice from behind the petrified boy.

The boy said nothing, only turned toward the dock and gazed in his brother's eyes with a look of sheer dread.

Wesley, fifteen at the time, grabbed the blue foam kickboard at his feet and dove into the water, swimming out to his flailing cousin. He wrapped his arms around her ribcage and lifted her head above water. Wesley swam back slowly, Sophie tightly clutching the floating piece of foam. He was never a very good swimmer himself; in fact, it had taken nearly all he had in him to swim out to Sophie.

“Sophie,” he said. “Can you—can you make it from here?” he asked between breaths.

She nodded and used the kickboard to make her way back to the dock.

From the shore the boy could tell his brother was running out of energy. He reentered the water and swam as hard as he could to Wesley. While he swam he never came up for air, only kept his head down and stroked with all his might. He came up for air after thirty seconds of constant strokes.

He turned his head left to right and left again. He could only see Sophie waiting at the dock. No sign of Wesley. He dove into the clear central Oregon water and turned 360 degrees. There!

He surfaced for air once more, and then dove again like a bullet to his sinking brother. The boy reached him and grasped his ribs like he saw Wesley do with Sophie. It was no use. His brother outweighed him tremendously and even if he could finagle him to the surface, there was no way to get back. He kicked his legs furiously and both boys' heads breached the surface. They gasped and flailed violently.

Why hadn't they gotten proper swimming lessons? They go to the lake every year, but they usually only waded in the shallows or fished off the dock.

He closed his eyes and cried into his pillow. He knew his parents had never forgiven him, though they insisted he had done his best. He felt like everyone thought it was his fault. And who was he to argue? Maybe if he hadn't hesitated, he would have been the one to swim out to Sophie in the first place. Questions like this ate at the boy's mind day in and day out. That was the last time they went to the lake.

The boy turned over the photograph and read the note. “Wesley and Carson, 15 and 11, at Sparks Lake.”

The day finally arrived for Ezra to board school bus and be carted off to Truman High School. While he wasn't excited to face the throng of students haphazardly searching for their first classes, he was excited to see his best friends Madison and Mason. They were twins, and although they often bickered, in truth they were practically inseparable.

Despite the anxiety in the pit of his stomach, when he slept, he dozed heavily like every other day. An alarm like a siren woke Ezra at six-thirty. Wilhelm glanced up at Ezra with a look of disdain for ruining his sleep.

For a moment Ezra sat up in his bed trying to recall the details of his dream. Just as the details began inching back to him, Mrs. Thorne yelled up to Ezra to get moving.

Ezra took a lengthy shower, the only proven way to wake himself up, and dressed. Ezra was a boy of extremes. When he slept, he slept hard. When he was awake, he was perhaps the most aware person alive.

On his way down to breakfast he heard Mr. and Mrs. Thorne bickering about finances so he decided to sneak a granola bar from the pantry and walk to the bus stop early, rather than sit through a heated monetary dispute.

As he turned from the pantry he tripped over the German Shepherd lying stealthily in wait for him. Ezra fell over the dog, who began licking his face immediately.

“Ugh. Get off Jake! Down boy!” Ezra screamed.

Ezra pushed Jake aside and carefully slipped out the front door, making sure not to let the dog outside. Once Jake had gotten out without a leash and ran around the neighborhood for hours before anyone could catch him and bring him back. Both dogs were perfectly trained; except Jake would never heed Ezra's commands. In fact, the only person Jake would listen to was Mr. Thorne.

Ezra met up with the twins, Madison and Mason, at the bus stop. It was a cool September morning and Ezra wore a dark blue long sleeved shirt. On that particular morning, Madison was arguing with Mason, suggesting that she was the good twin and he was just an evil twin their parents should keep in the attic. This was a typical conversation for a morning at the bus stop; but by the time they got to school they formed a temporary twin alliance, which lasted only until the final bell rang.

Both Madison and Mason had blue eyes and brown hair and were nearly the same height. Madison however, was a hair taller, and never let Mason hear the end of it.

Ezra had always been the shortest kid in class, but the summer had been kind to him, and he was now only a few inches shorter than the twins. Since the twins had seen Ezra all summer they hardly noticed the change, but everyone else he saw at the bus stop commented on the sudden growth spurt.

Carson only sneered, crossing his arms and leaning himself against the fence, visibly annoyed with Ezra.

“You're taller than me now, Ezra,” Addie said blushing. She was wearing a bright pink skirt and matching fingerless gloves. Addie always dressed without regard to what was “normal.”

Ezra was still admiring Addie's outfit when Madison nudged him in the side and whispered, “I think someone has a crush on you.”

“Don't be ridiculous,” Ezra scoffed and crossed his arms, tapping his elbows with his lightning-quick fingers. “Shouldn't the bus be here by now?”

The twins laughed to themselves. As if on cue, the bus turned the corner moments later. Ezra and the twins could hardly fit in the same seat anymore so Ezra ended up sitting in the seat opposite them with Blain “The Brain” Bertrand. Blain looked as though he hadn't showered in a few days; his raven-black hair was greasy and knotted. Ezra noticed that Blain was never able to find a comfortable position for his glasses on the bridge of his nose, so he kept adjusting them, which smeared his fingerprints all over the lenses. When he couldn't see, he would have to take off the glasses and wipe them down, then repeat the process over again.

He was a nice enough kid and extremely intelligent, but he was always hyper and tended to drop things or stutter when he got excited. Although he had Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), when he was on his game he set the curve; when he was frustrated or was made fun of he would freeze up and flunk.