Shō Nei looked at him with contempt. “You’re letting yourself be played as a piece in Felipe’s game. Surely you remember the executions in Nagasaki.”
Tsunenaga lowered his gaze. He knew well about that incident. A couple of decades earlier, a Spanish galleon bound for Acapulco had shipwrecked in Shikoku, and during his interrogation he had boasted of the prowess of his homeland. In response, the Shōgun had ordered dozens of converts to be crucified. Far from discouraging Christianity in Japan, the sentencing had turned them into revered martyrs.
“I may be but a vassal king, but I still have my informers. I heard what that captain told the lord of Shikoku. It was an imprudent misstep on his part, but it does explain much of what is happening in Japan. He said there is an invasion plan underway. Priests are actually the first line in a meticulous, large-scale offensive. The conquest plan is always the same: wherever the king of Spain has sent priests, he’s not long in sending soldiers. And Japan already has priests.”
“The priests came years ago, Your Majesty. In all this time, Spain has sent no armies to Japan.”
“But when you see your lord, you will give him an enumeration of cities, officers, castles and ships. You may not intend it so, but what he will gather from your report is not mere news, but a warning. And when he reports to the Shōgun, the result will be the banning of Christianity and the expulsion of all priests from Japan.”
Tsunenaga nodded reluctantly. “It is true that he might decide to do that.”
“But you would not be the one to make the suggestion.”
Tsunenaga found no words to say to that, and the king’s eyes showed the satisfaction of a correct conclusion. “You are a loyal emissary of your lord. You don’t wish to see your country enslaved by foreigners. But at some point in your journey, the Spanish religion seduced you. You joined them. And now you’re loyal to their god, too.”
“I am aware of my duties.”
The king considered the troubled man sitting in front of him and said, “In their way from Manila to the larger islands of Japan, a few of those priests have stopped by my realm. They have spoken to my people. I have let them build temples where they gather and worship their Heavenly Lord. I even asked one of them to come to my palace and explain his religion to me. He spoke a pitiful Japanese, but I listened.” That account brought light to Tsunenaga’s eyes, and the king hastened to quench his hopes. “You should not imagine that I became a Christian. The doctrine they bring is a strange and at times heartless one. To be born only once, to be allowed to err only once in all eternity—that is a teaching I cannot accept. I suppose that is why Europeans want to get everything done at once: they fear they shall not have another chance.” Seeing that his guest remained silent, he went on, “I wonder what about that religion lured you.”
The ambassador himself didn’t fully understand the nuances of Catholic theology, and he wished he’d had more time in Europe to learn Latin properly and read the commentaries by the Fathers of the Church, but one thing his confessor had made very clear to him was how the apostles had been fearless in giving witness before the temporal powers, even before the perverted Caesars of Rome. Looking directly at Shō Nei’s eyes for the first time, he said, very calmly, “I have sworn my soul over to the Son of the Heavenly Lord. I don’t pretend to know his mind, but I do trust his all-encompassing forgiveness.”
“You know the Lord Buddha teaches universal compassion too.”
“The Lord Buddha did not give his blood to save me.”
“Of course not. The Lord Buddha teaches that no one but you can save you. But I see that the god of the Spanish has got you fully convinced.” Tsunenaga nodded, having exhausted all his bravery in that confession. “Look, I still get news of what goes on in Edo. From what I hear, the Spanish religion doesn’t have a future in Japan.” He looked at his own hands, which a decade before had fought for independence and lost. “I am old, more a denizen of the next world than this. What little effort I could spare would be useless against your devotion. But Lord Masamune is still strong, and has a wider variety of tools.”
Tsunenaga couldn’t stop himself from shaking at the reminder of the increasing tendency to torture converts. “I must see him nonetheless. I must complete my work.”
Shō Nei leaned toward him, and in his expression Tsunenaga could see he was sincerely concerned. “As much as I dislike this new doctrine, it has a few good principles, which no one with a good heart will disagree with. One of them is that it is impossible to serve two masters.”
“I thank Your Majesty’s generous advice. But having seen Spain with my eyes, and having talked to the people who live and rule there, I am confident that they bear no ill will toward us.”
“Your capacity for self-deception is impressive. Let me clarify your situation for you: if you talk to your lord, your religion will suffer; if you don’t, your country will. Either you don’t recognize the danger, or you do and are too terrified to name it.” The king sighed, wishing he hadn’t revealed so much about the ways a human being could fail. “I know something about trying to avert an invasion. It is the kind of endeavor that can define a life. Believe me, you don’t want to give yourself reason to live in regret.”
An enigmatic smile appeared on Tsunenaga’s face. “I am moved by Your Majesty’s wish to save me. I would prefer, however, the humble joy of helping save Your Majesty.”
“I thought you wanted to ask a favor of me. You’ve been asking for a ship since you appeared.”
“Yes, and I still need it. But if I could, before leaving these islands, present to Your Majesty the good news of the Son of the Heavenly Lord, my mission would be even more complete.”
Shō Nei chuckled, feeling more pity than any real offense at the ambassador’s presumptuousness. “I am nearing death, but you arrived at the right time for me. You need not worry. I have listened to your good news. You have already saved me.”
Tsunenaga tried to find something to say, but was too surprised to form any coherent thought.
“That will be all. You will board the first ship departing from Shuri. You may leave me now.”
Japanese was not spoken aboard the ship, so Tsunenaga had no one to ask how many days it would take them to get to Sendai.
When they reached a town he didn’t recognize and they dragged him out of the ship without explanation, he had no one to ask where he’d landed.
His life did not end then and there, but he was going to spend the rest of it learning how simply, with the quiet wrath of a deathbed curse, the king of the Ryūkyūs had taken revenge on Japan.
Noon, September 23 (Gregorian), 1620
Yuegang
Making what his superiors would have judged too obvious an attempt at discretion, the waiter maintained no eye contact with Xiaobo as he brought her the plate of lamb skewers she’d ordered and tapped twice with his fingernail the bowl of dark tea she hadn’t. She closed her eyes, to refrain from chastising his clumsiness, and started eating the roasted meat. She kept a conscious count of the number of times she’d taken a bite and swallowed it before it would look natural for her to take the bowl in her hands, remove the lid, use it to push the leaves aside, and drink the tea. She was anxious to see the bottom of the bowl, but she had to avoid finishing it in one gulp, lest she drew the slightest curiosity. In her first assignments, closer to her hometown in the inner plains of China, a more carefree behavior would have been acceptable, but here, in a port city full of barbarians, she could afford no mistakes.