Lian Hearn - Heaven's Net Is Wide

It had been a harder battle than Yaegahara, but it had not ended in defeat.

“I THINK I have found your Kikuta nephew.” Shizuka hardly waited for him to greet her or to take her safely inside the house before she whispered the news. It was almost the end of the sixth month. He had not expected visitors during the plum rains, but now that they were nearly over, he had been hoping daily that she would come.

“It has been such a long time!” he said, astonished by his pleasure in seeing her, astounded by her words. She herself was trembling with emotion.

“I had been worried about you,” he went on. “I had heard nothing from you for so long, and I have not seen Kenji this year.”

“Lord Shigeru, I don’t think I will be able to come again. I am afraid I am being watched. I came now only because this news was so important. And because I have been in Maruyama.”

“Is she well?”

“She is now, but last year… after your meeting at Terayama…”

She did not need to explain it to him; it was what he had feared each time they met.

“No!” he said. He could feel sweat forming on his forehead. Small spots danced in front of his eyes. He heard Shizuka speak as if from a great distance.

“She asks you to forgive her.”

“I should be asking for her forgiveness! All the difficulty of choice, the suffering was hers! I did not even know about it!” He felt rage such as he had not felt in years sweep through him. “I must kill Iida,” he said, “or die myself. We cannot continue living like this.”

“That is why I came to tell you about this boy. I think he is your nephew and Isamu’s son.”

Shigeru said, “Who is Isamu?”

“I have told you about him. His mother did work in the Hagi castle when your father was young. She must have been your father’s lover. She was married to a Kikuta cousin. Isamu, who was born in the first year of the marriage, turned out to have unbelievable Tribe skills, but he left the Tribe. No one ever does that. And then he died, but no one will say why. I think the Tribe killed him-that’s the usual punishment for disobedience.”

“And would be for you,” Shigeru said, amazed again at her fearlessness.

“If they ever find out! That’s why I can’t come to you anymore. I don’t think there is much more I can tell you anyway. You have your records now. You know more about the Tribe than any outsider ever has. But now this boy has appeared, among the Hidden in the East. The village is called Mino. He has an Otori look and Kikuta hands: he can only be Isamu’s son.”

“He is my nephew!” Shigeru said with a sort of wonderment. “I can’t leave him there!”

“No, you must go and get him. If the Tribe hear of him, they will certainly try to claim him, and if they don’t, he may well be massacred by Iida who is determined to eradicate the Hidden from all his domains.”

Shigeru remembered the tortured men and children he had seen with his own eyes, and his skin crawled with horror.

“And who knows, he may have inherited his father’s skills,” Shizuka said.

“He would become our assassin?”

She nodded, and they gazed at each other with excited eyes. He wanted to take her in his arms; it was more than gratitude, he realized, as desire for her flooded through him. He saw something in her expression and knew he had only to reach out to her and she would give herself to him; that they both desired it equally; that neither of them would ever mention it again and that it would be no betrayal, just a recognition of deep need. Lust engulfed him, for a woman’s body, a woman’s scent-her hands, her hair-she would rescue him from loneliness and grief. She would share his excitement and his hopes.

Neither of them moved.

The moment passed. Shizuka said, “For this reason also, I must not come again. We are becoming too close; you know what I mean.”

He nodded without speaking.

“Go to Mino,” she said. “Go as soon as possible.”

“I can never thank you for all you have done for me,” Shigeru said, speaking formally to hide his emotions. “I am in your debt forever.”

“I have risked my life for you,” Shizuka said. “I only ask that you make good use of it.”

After she left, Shigeru went to sit for a while in the garden. The air was humid and hot: not a leaf moved. From time to time a fish splashed. Cicadas droned. He realized his heart was pounding with far more than the sudden and unfulfilled desire-with excitement and anticipation. The boy was the piece in the game that opened up the way for a new attack, the unforeseen move that led to the downfall of the enemy. But more than that, the boy was the link between each of the separate seams of his life, the catalyst that united them all and opened them one to another. He was Lord Shigemori’s grandson, Shigeru’s closest relative, after Takeshi, his heir. He was the Tribe assassin’s son with the skills that would destroy Iida.

He could not sit still. He thought he would take one of the horses out; he needed to feel the animal’s rhythm while he made his plans. He had to share this news with someone; he would tell Takeshi.

Takeshi was in the former Mori water meadows with the colts, who were now in their sixth summer. He had broken them in two years before; he was riding the bay, whom he had named Kuri.

Shigeru called to him and Takeshi rode over.

“This horse is so clever,” he said. “I wish he were better looking.”

Kuri put his ears back and Takeshi laughed. “See, he understands every word you say. He’ll be a good warhorse-not that there’s much chance of me ever fighting a battle!”

“Is he fast?”

“Raku’s faster,” Takeshi replied, looking affectionately at the gray with the black mane and tail.

“Let’s race Raku and Kyu,” Shigeru said. “See if the new blood can beat the old.”

Takeshi smiled and his eyes gleamed as he transferred bridle and saddle to Raku. It was the sort of challenge he loved. They rode to the end of the meadow and turned the horses. Takeshi counted down from five to one, and both horses sprang into a gallop, rejoicing in the loose rein and their riders’ shouts of encouragement.

Shigeru did not care if he won or lost. All he cared about was the release the gallop brought and the tears the wind whipped from his eyes.

Raku won by a head, to Takeshi’s pleasure. Kuri did not follow them but seemed to watch the contest with interest.

Takeshi appeared to have put the turmoil of the past behind him, and Shigeru was proud of his brother, impressed by the good looks and manners of the horses. On an impulse, he said, “Come and eat at home tonight. It will make Mother happy, and I have something to tell you.”

“I will,” Takeshi said, “if I can slip away after dinner.”

Shigeru laughed. “Who is she?”

“Tase-a very beautiful girl. A singer from Yamagata, home of beautiful women. She’s got lots of nice friends, if you’d like to meet one!”

“You know so many beautiful women,” Shigeru teased him. “I can’t meet them all.”

“This one is different,” Takeshi said. “I wish it were possible to marry her.”

“You should marry,” Shigeru replied. “This girl is probably not suitable for your wife, but someone else could be found.”

“Yes, someone chosen by Iida Sadamu to strengthen our alliance with the Tohan! I prefer to stay single. I don’t notice you hurrying to marry, either.”

“For similar reasons,” Shigeru replied.

“Iida has far too much say in our lives,” Takeshi said quietly. “Let’s kill him!”

“That’s what I want to talk to you about.”

Takeshi breathed out deeply. “At last!”

They rode back to Hagi together, talking about horses, and parted at the stone bridge, Takeshi taking the horses back to the Mori stables before joining his mother and brother, Shigeru riding through the town toward his mother’s house. The unrest of the previous years had largely settled down: the town had regained its prosperous and industrious nature, but he hardly noticed it or the greetings that were called to him. He was thinking about the boy in Mino.