“The day before Tekare left the village with me, he ordered her to stay and threatened to kill her if she didn’t. She disobeyed. He shows up here, and a few days later she’s dead.” Daigoro raised an insinuating eyebrow.
Hirata thought how easy it was to visualize Urahenka setting the spring-bow for his wife, then chasing her along the path until she triggered it. It was as easy as imagining Daigoro doing it, wishing he could mount Tekare on the wall beside his other trophies. Who was the more likely killer, the exiled criminal or the cuckolded husband?
“But don’t stop with her husband,” Daigoro said. “Nobody in that village liked Tekare. Maybe they thought she was a disgrace to their tribe. Or maybe they were just jealous.” He grinned, showing jagged teeth that looked strong enough to dig gold out of riverbeds. “And what do you know? There were other Ezo who came into town with Tekare’s husband. If he didn’t do it, one of them could have.”
And they included Chieftain Awetok, whom Hirata had marked as the man who could lead him to his enlightenment. A man whom Hirata must not balk at incriminating if he must, to solve the crime and save Sano, Reiko, and his comrades.
11
“If you’re in there, come out!” Captain Okimoto banged his gloved fist against the door of the stable.
“Keep your voice down,” Sano said angrily. “Shouting like that will only scare her off.” He called, “Reiko-san, it’s me.”
The hunt for Reiko had gone on all day. Now the early winter dusk descended upon Fukuyama Castle. The western sky glowed with the cold orange flames of sunset, the trees and buildings black against them, the snowdrifts colored deep blue by the encroaching night. The temperature had dropped from cold to lethally cold. And still Reiko was missing.
Standing with his guards outside the stable, Sano heard other search parties crunching through the snow and calling to one another. Their lanterns flickered in the distance. Their desperation to capture Reiko vibrated the air like drumbeats. Earlier, Lord Matsumae had noticed his men rushing about the castle and demanded to know what was going on. He’d forced them to admit that one of his prisoners had escaped, then he’d announced that if she wasn’t found by dark, he would pick a soldier at random and burn out his eyes with a hot poker. Sano feared that if Lord Matsumae made good on his threat, the friends of the unlucky scapegoat would take out their anger on Reiko when they found her.
If she didn’t freeze to death first.
Okimoto flung open the stable door and stalked inside. His two comrades followed, pushing Sano in front of them, holding up their lanterns. Horses neighed in the stalls. The smell of manure filled air warmed by coal braziers. Okimoto hurried along the stalls, opening them and looking inside, as if Reiko were stupid enough to hide behind a horse that could trample her, as if they hadn’t already searched the whole castle.
The guards at the gates swore that Reiko hadn’t gotten out, and the walls were too high for her to climb. She must be still inside, running from one hiding place to the next, a few steps ahead of her pursuers. Sano could feel her fright even though he couldn’t see her.
At the end of the stable stood a huge pile of hay. Okimoto drew his sword and began hacking at the hay, shouting, “Come out from under there! You can’t hide!” His men joined in. “I’m going to get you!”
“Stop!” Sano yelled, horrified because if Reiko was under the hay, they would stab her. They were all so young, so cruel in their thoughtlessness.
He grabbed Okimoto, restraining his arm that wielded the sword. The other guards fell upon Sano. In the tussle, one dropped his lantern. It set fire to the hay. Flames leaped, crackled, and spread.
“Fire!” cried Okimoto as smoke filled the stables. The horses whinnied, reared, and pounded their hooves on the doors of their stalls. “Put it out!”
As he and his men stamped on the flames, they forgot to watch Sano. Sano knew that if Reiko were hiding in the stable, she would have come out by now rather than risk burning to death. She wasn’t here. Sano slipped out the door.
The sky had faded to dull copper along the horizon. Stars and a crescent moon winked in the onrushing ultramarine night. Sano heard barking, excited and bloodthirsty. They’d set the dogs after Reiko. He plunged across the snow, away from his guards. Ahead loomed a group of outbuildings. Sano didn’t see any lights there; other searchers must have already tried them. Maybe Reiko had slipped inside after they’d gone. He trudged down an icy path between two storehouses.
Their doors were open, revealing straw bales of rice stacked on pallets.
“Reiko-san?” he called.
Snow crunched under stealthy footsteps behind him.
He whirled and saw a blur of motion down the path, in the gap between the storehouses. At the same instant his mind registered a human figure hurling an object, something struck him. Sano cried out as pain jabbed between his shoulder and elbow. Stumbling, he skidded on the ice and fell. He grasped the place that hurt. A knife protruded from it. The blade had cut through his heavy coat and pierced his flesh. If he hadn’t turned, it would have struck him in the back and killed him.
Sano yanked out the knife. Even as he grunted in pain and felt warm, slick blood pour down his skin under his sleeve, he lurched to his feet, yelling, “Stop!” Brandishing the knife, he ran after his attacker.
But complete darkness had fallen in the last several moments. Lights flashing from distant lanterns illuminated dark buildings and empty snow. There was no sign of whoever had thrown the knife. From all around Sano heard footsteps beating the snow, men yelling, dogs barking. The assassin had blended in with the search parties.
“There he is!” said a familiar voice.
Captain Okimoto and his two friends surrounded Sano. Their relief turned to alarm as they saw the knife in his hand. “Hey!” Okimoto exclaimed. “Put that down!”
The guards drew their swords. Sano said, “Wait. Let me explain.”
“You were running away,” Okimoto accused.
“I was running after an assassin. He threw this at me.” Sano held up the knife.
That provoked yells and sword-waving from the guards. “Put it down, put it down!” Okimoto screamed.
Sano dropped the knife. The guards pounced on it, dug it out of the snow. “There’s blood on it,” one of them said. “He’s already killed somebody.”
“That’s my blood,” Sano said, his hand clasped over the wound. “I was hit.”
Suspicious and wary, the guards shone their lanterns on him. The blood had soaked through his coat, staining it red. “I guess you were,” Okimoto said, surprised. “Who did it?”
“I don’t know. I didn’t get a good look. He’s gone.”
“We’ll take you to the physician,” Okimoto said. “Lord Matsumae doesn’t need to know about this, but he probably wouldn’t want you to bleed to death.”
“No,” Sano said, even though his arm was sore and throbbing and he was afraid he’d already lost a lot of blood. “I have to find my wife.”
“Forget it! Shut up!”
In the physician’s chamber, Sano eased his injured arm out of his kimono. It was covered in blood. The physician, an old man dressed in the dark blue coat of his profession, peered at Sano’s wound. He soaked a cloth in warm water and bathed off the blood that still oozed from the cut.
“How bad is it?” Gizaemon asked. He and the men with him seemed less concerned about Sano’s fate than worried about how it would affect their own.
“Not too deep,” the physician said. “The honorable chamberlain was fortunate. His coat protected him. The wound should heal perfectly.”
Sano was relieved that his sword arm wouldn’t suffer permanent damage.
“But it needs to be sewn up.” The physician threaded a horse-tail hair through a long, sharp steel needle.
The sight opened a pit of dread in Sano’s stomach. “Fine. Do it,” he said, trying to act as though he didn’t care.
“This must be the work of an intruder who broke into the castle.” Gizaemon turned a fierce stare on Captain Okimoto and the other two guards.