Shike by Robert J. Shea (the reading list txt) 📕

back to Yukio. “Yukio-san, I want you to trade places and clothes with Shenzo Totomi.”

“No,” Totomi said instantly. “It would be a disgrace for us to make our lord do the work of a porter, even to save our lives.”

“Exactly what Hideyori’s men will think,” said Jebu. “If we dress Lord Yukio as a porter and load this altar on his back, he is far less likely to be recognized, because no samurai would adopt such a degrading disguise. As it is, he is wearing the heaviest cloak of all of us and the finest robes. He looks like our leader. If they have a good description of him, they’re sure to recognize him. Indeed, there may be some who have seen him before.”

“This is intolerable,” cried Totomi.

“Do as you are told, Totomi,” said Yukio quietly. “A samurai never does things by halves. If we are to deceive our enemies let us deceive them as perfectly as we can.”

In a few moments Yukio was dressed in Totomi’s ragged robe and coat of straw. Totomi wore Yukio’s sturdy new wooden sandals, while Yukio went barefoot. The men, except for Jebu, had blistered and bleeding feet because they had been mounted warriors, unused to long marches on foot.

“There is a scroll of melancholy poems in the sleeve of that robe, Totomi,” said Yukio. “Take care of them but don’t read them. It would embarrass me.”

With great reverence and gentleness, Yukio’s men loaded the heavy altar on their lord’s back. Bent under the weight of the altar-chest and dressed in clothing too big for him, Yukio seemed a small, sad figure. He managed a smile, a ghost of his old gaiety, and several of the samurai turned away from him with tears in their eyes. Taking up the lead, a long staff in his hand, Jebu cautioned the men to ignore their ravaged feet and try to look like true yamabushi, who had been roving the mountains barefoot on spiritual journeys all their lives. Yukio brought up the rear. He limped forward, stumbled and almost fell, then pulled himself up and trudged on with a determined expression. Totomi caught Jebu’s eye and glared at him. These samurai, Jebu thought; Totomi would rather see his lord beheaded than forced to endure a few hours of pain and indignity pretending to be a porter.

The kami of the mountains chose to make their progress more difficult by sending ice-cold rain mixed with snow and hail to drum on their rice-straw hats and freeze their hands and feet. Their destination, the fort by the pass, disappeared in a gray swirl, and they could see only a few paces ahead.

Just as they reached the outpost, soaked and exhausted, the storm rolled away, chased by a howling wind that blew through their wet robes and, froze the rough cloth against their skin. A silk banner emblazoned with the White Dragon of Muratomo crackled above the gatehouse. The sky was blue now, and the sun, sinking into the snow-dusted teeth of a black crag to the west, glinted on the silver helmet ornaments of six guards who slowly, sullenly formed a line in front of the barrier pole across the road. Soldiers in peacetime quickly become attached to comfort, Jebu thought. These were obviously annoyed at having to leave shelter and a warm brazier.

“More monks,” said one of the guards. “Let’s take their heads now, as we did with those others, and get in out of this wind.” He spoke with the rough accent of the eastern provinces, Hideyori’s base.

“It’s bad karma to kill monks,” another man protested.

“Not if they aren’t really monks,” said the eastern soldier.

During this exchange Jebu stood serenely, hands clasped before him, as if he did not hear the guards discussing his possible fate. The men behind him stood patiently. It was all in the hands of the kami now, thought Jebu. After a little more talk the guards singled out Jebu and Shenzo Totomi and ordered them to go into the fort, which stood a short distance up the mountainside from the road.

“If our captain doesn’t believe your leader’s story, the ravens are still hungry,” the eastern warrior said to the rest of Jebu’s party. With a laugh he pointed to the six almost-bare skulls on the poles above the fort’s log wall. Jebu was relieved that Yukio would not be exposed to the eyes of the entire garrison. Now it all stood or fell on Jebu’s ability to convince the post commander that they were authentic monks. As he climbed the steep path to the fort, Jebu felt the silent tension in the men he was leaving behind. He himself felt exhilarated, happy to be shouldering responsibility for the lives of Yukio and the others. Now, if only this young hothead beside him didn’t make a mess of things.

The fort was actually a large old manor, a scattering of low wooden buildings perhaps fifty years old, in more peaceful times the mountain retreat of some nobleman. The only fortifications were the newly built log palisade and a few square wooden guard towers. The tumbling-down, one-storey halls were crowded with samurai and foot soldiers taking their ease, laughing and talking, gambling, quarrelling. Erom a distant house Jebu heard the tinkle of musical instruments and women’s voices. Discipline appeared lax; some of the men were drunk. Heads turned as Jebu and Totomi were led into the central courtyard.

“A hulk like that ought to be a wrestler, not a monk,” said a voice in the crowd.

“He’ll be shorter by a head when our executioner gets done with him,” said another.

The commander of the fort strode out of the doorway of the central hall. He wore a blue robe richly brocaded with silver. His face was square and hard, all bone and muscle, the mouth set in the harsh, lipless line Jebu had seen under many a samurai helmet in combat. He has the suspicious eye of his master, Hideyori, Jebu thought,

“I am Captain Shinohata. I am a kenin, a vassal of the Lord Shogun,” said the commander, his accent revealing another eastern warrior. “And who might you be?”

Jebu knew that the high-ranking samurai known as kenin owed allegiance to Hideyori alone. They were pillars of the new Kamakura government.

“I am Mokongo, priest of the Todaiji Temple in Nara,” said Jebu in a commanding voice. In the edges of his vision he could see a crowd gathering. These idle troops, he knew, lacked amusement and would be delighted to see a monk’s shaved head rolling in the dirt.

“Be careful what tone you use with me, priest,” said Shinohata with contempt. “Six of your sort met their deaths yesterday because their answers did not please me.”

“It is a great sin to kill the servants of Buddha, bringing down terrible curses on all who share the guilt,” said Jebu, putting all the authority he could muster into his voice. A murmuring arose in the crowd of soldiers around him, whether of fear or anger it was impossible to tell.

“We have our orders,” the captain replied. “Yukio and his henchmen must be brought to justice even if a thousand innocent men have to be slain.” In spite of the merciless words, there was .a note in his voice almost of pleading. This man is not comfortable with what he does, thought Jebu. He felt the excitement of one trying to lift a heavy stone, who finds the right spot to set a lever. He cast his eyes down and folded his hands piously.

“Such talk distresses me. My life has been dedicated to ahimsa, harmlessness to all sentient beings.”

In that same troubled tone Shinohata said, “Agree to turn back now,

Priest Mokongo, and you have nothing to fear from me and my men.” “That cannot be,” said Jebu calmly. “Like you, I have my orders.” “Why must you pass this barrier, priest?”

Relying on the Self to guide him through encounters such as this, Jebu had prepared no answers in advance. Even his assumed name and temple had just come to him as he spoke. Now he remembered that the Todaiji was one of the great Nara temples that had been burned by the Takashi as punishment for supporting the uprising of Motofusa and Mochihito in Heian Kyo. Most of its monks had been killed in that catastrophe. Why had the Self chosen such an unlikely place for Jebu to claim as his temple? Then inspiration came to him.

“Know, Captain Shinohata, that the temple I serve, the Todaiji, was burned by the Takashi in the late War of the Dragons. By order of His Imperial Majesty, it is now to be rebuilt. We surviving monks of the Todaiji are going to every part of the Sacred Islands asking each to give his gift to aid this holy work. My party has been charged with travelling through the provinces on the Hokurikudo, obtaining promises of offerings. If you choose to kill us rather than let us pass, you merely release us from a life of suffering. Doubtless our martyrdom will earn us a reward in incarnations to come.”

A voice from the crowd of samurai called, “Please let them pass, Lord Shinohata. These are no ordinary monks but holy men from one of the greatest temples in the land. If you spare them, you may balance the bad karma we brought upon ourselves by killing those monks yesterday.”

“The Takashi never won another battle after they burned the temples at Nara,” another man said. The samurai tended to be more in awe of religion than either Court aristocrats or commoners, Jebu thought. It went with the uncertainty of their lives.

“I’m of a mind to let you go through,” said Shinohata. “If I kill every monk who comes up this road, my karma will surely be as heavy as one of these mountains. But I must be sure you are what you claim to be.” He thought for a moment. “If you are seeking contributions, Priest Mokongo, you must be carrying a solicitation scroll to read to those whom you approach. Let us hear it, and I will judge if your mission is truly what you say it is.”

Eor a moment Jebu’s mind went blank. Then the Self came to his rescue. He remembered the scroll of poems Yukio had mentioned. And a flood of phrases from Buddhist literature filled his mind. Part of his early training as a Zinja had included familiarization with the dominant religions of the land, and later he had often listened to sermons by Buddhist monks.

Jebu turned to Totomi, who was staring at him apprehensively, and held out his hand. “The scroll, please.”

After a moment’s puzzlement Totomi remembered, took Yukio’s scroll out of his sleeve and handed it to Jebu. Jebu stepped up to the veranda of Shinohata’s headquarters building and positioned himself so no one could get behind him and read the scroll. He opened the scroll and, trying to look as if he were reading, he began to speak in a resonant voice.

“Contribution roll of the Priest Mokongo, who has been charged to travel through the provinces of the Hokurikudo, respectfully begging all, high and low, to give a gift to aid the holy work of reconstructing the Todaiji of Nara: As all know, we live in that time called Mappo, the Latter Days of the Law, when men give themselves up to passion and wine, and the land is afflicted with civil war, fire, earthquake, famine and pestilence. Alas! How pitiable!

“One of the foulest deeds of these dark and gloomy times was the sacrilegious burning of this most magnificent temple, the Todaiji. Eour thousand monks and their wives and children perished in the flames. Not all the cries of the sinners amid the fires of the fiercest of the Eight Hot Hells were