The makeup and dress of Oichi and her three daughters lent an unbelievably fresh and even elegant air to the event. The youngest of the three sisters was only ten years old, and when they saw the child making merry among the trays of food and the noisy people, gulping her food and playing pranks on her older sisters, even the old warriors who thought nothing of their imminent deaths had to look off in another direction.
Katsuie had drunk too much. Any number of times, as he offered a cup to someone, he would let his loneliness slip, saying, "If only Genba were here." When he heard someone expressing chagrin at Genba's failure, he would protest: "Stop blaming Genba. This disaster is fully on account of my own mistakes. When I hear you blaming Genba, I feel worse than if I were being attacked."
He took care that everyone around him was drinking and distributed the best sake in the storehouse to the warriors in the towers. With the sake came his message:
"Express your farewells to your hearts' content. Reciting poems wouldn't be at all amiss."Songs were heard coming from the towers, and laughing voices filled the room. Even in front of Katsuie drums were sounded, and the silver fans of the dancers drew elegant lines in the air.
“Long ago, Lord Nobunaga would get up and dance at the slightest provocation and try to force me to do the same, but I was always ashamed of my inability." Katsuie reminisced. "How regrettable! I should have learned at least one dance just for tonight."
In his heart he must have truly missed his former lord. And there was something else. Even though he had been driven to his present predicament—which was truly nothing less than hopeless—by a single monkey-faced soldier, it is certain that he secretly hoped at least to die a glorious death.
He was only fifty-three years old. As a general, his future should have been ahead of him, but now his only hope was for a noble death.
The sake made the rounds. Cup after cup was consumed, and the many barrels dried with the night. There was singing accompanied by drums, dances with silver fans, and cheerful shouts and laughing voices, but nothing that they did could completely sweep he atmosphere of sorrow.
From time to time, an icy silence and the black smoke coughed into the night by the flickering of the lamps exposed on the eighty drunken faces a pale color that had nothing with drinking sake. The lamps showed it was midnight, but still the banquet went on. Oichi's daughters leaned against her lap and began to sleep. To them, this banquet scome too boring to bear, it seemed.
At some point the youngest daughter had taken over her mother's lap as a pillow and was now sleeping silently. As Oichi touched her daughter's hair, she struggled to hold back her tears. The middle daughter also eventually began to doze. Only the eldest, Chacha, seemed to understand what her mother was thinking. She knew what the evening's banquet was about and yet, she still managed to look serene.
The girls were beautiful, and all three resembled their mother, but Chacha was especially-endowed with the aristocratic bearing that ran through the blood of the Oda. The combination of her youth and natural beauty could not help but make the beholder sad.
“She's so innocent," Katsuie said suddenly, looking at the sleeping face of the youngest child. He then spoke with Lady Oichi about the fate of the girls. "Your own status is that :d Nobunaga's sister, and it has not yet been even a year since you became my wife. It would be better if you took the children and left the castle before dawn. I'll have Tominaga accompany you to Hideyoshi's camp."
Oichi answered with tears in her eyes. "No!" she said through her tears. "When a woman marries into a warrior family, she is resolved to accept her own karma. To tell me to leave the castle now is truly cold-hearted, and it's unthinkable that I should go begging at Hideyoshi's camp gate, asking him to spare my life."
She looked at Katsuie, shaking her head behind her sleeve. But Katsuie tried once again. "No, no. It gives me pleasure to think that you would be so faithful to me when our relationship is still so shallow, but your three daughters are the children of Lord Asai. than that, Hideyoshi would certainly not be heartless to the sister of Lord Nobunaga or to her children. So you should go ahead and leave, and leave quickly. Go prepare yourself."Calling over one of his retainers, Katsuie gave the man instructions and told them to get started. But Oichi only shook her head and refused to move.
"But even though you are so determined, may these innocent children at least leave the castle as my lord wishes?"
She gave the appearance of agreeing with him. Then she shook awake the youngest child, who was sleeping on her lap, and told the children they were to be sent outside the castle.
Chacha clung to her mother. "I don't want to go. I don't want to go. I want to be with you, Mother!"
Katsuie spoke to her and her mother tried to persuade her, but they were unable to stop her desperate tears. Finally she was led away and forced out of the castle against her will. The sobs of the three girls could be heard as they moved far into the distance. It was already close to the fourth watch of the night, and the joyless party was over. The warriors quickly retied the leather straps of their armor, picked up their weapons, and began to disperse to their final posts, the posts that would be the places of their deaths.
Katsuie, his wife, and the several members of the clan moved together into the interior of the main citadel.
Oichi had a small desk brought to her and began to grind the ink for her death poem. Katsuie also left a poem.
While the night was the same everywhere, it was not the same for everyone. The dawn was quite different for the vanquished and the victor.
"Make sure we have taken the surrounding walls by the time the sky turns white,” Hideyoshi ordered, and then waited peacefully for the dawn.
The town was also relatively calm. Fires broke out in two or three places. They had not been set by Hideyoshi's soldiers but more likely had been started accidentally by the confused townspeople. Because they could serve as bonfires that would illuminate surprise attacks from the soldiers in the castle, they were allowed to burn all night.
Various generals had gone in and out of Hideyoshi's quarters from evening until midnight. Because of that, there was talk that either a movement was afoot to spare Katsuie's life or that the castle would soon capitulate. Nevertheless, even after midnight, no change was made in the original battle strategy.
The quick activity in every camp meant that dawn was close. Soon the conch shell was sounded. The beating of the drum began splitting the mist. It reverberated with a boom throughout the entire camp.
The assault began precisely at the Hour of the Tiger as had been planned. The attack commenced as the troops facing the castle wall opened a barrage of gunfire.
The popping of the guns reverberated uncannily through the mist, but then suddenly both the gunfire and the war cries of the vanguard stopped.
Just then a lone rider broke through the mist, whipping his horse from Kyutaro's position to Hideyoshi's camp stool. Behind him ran a single enemy samurai and three young girls.
"Hold your fire! Stop the attack!" the rider shouted.
The fugitives were, of course, Nobunaga's nieces. Ignorant of the wearers, the soldiers watched as six elegant sleeves went by, soaked in the mist. The eldest sister held her middle sister's hand, while she in turn took care of the youngest. They tiptoed over the stony road. It was considered the proper etiquette for fugitives to go with very little to protect their feet, and the little princesses were no exception, walking on the earth in nothing but heavy silk socks.
The youngest stopped walking and said she wanted to return to the castle. The samurai who had accompanied them from the castle calmed her down by putting her on his back.