L5r - scroll 03 - The Crane (36 page)

Without thinking, Hoturi drew his sword, turning the blade in his hands. "Kuwanan, you have been deceived. The Hoturi who spoke to you, who destroyed Kyuden Doji—it was not your brother."

The Asahina stood as stiff as marble between them, his cold eyes unafraid.

"You are right, Hoturi." Kuwanan said angrily. "He was not my brother. You are not my brother. You have led the Crane to their death, and I will die before I turn this sword to your hand again." He held the sword of the Crane before him as a steel wall, ready to kill. "The Crane are better off without your service, samurai."

Staring past the Asahina's outstretched arm, Floturi lowered his sword and placed it in its sheath. "Then, Kuwanan, you must kill me. If I cannot make you believe, perhaps my death will prove my words." Hoturi placed his hand on the

Asahina's shoulder, pushing the man aside with a strong shove. "But kill me, knowing that if I could have done so, I would have gladly traded places with Teinko. I tried ... I tried to catch her, but my grip wasn't strong enough. Satsume watched as she jumped, lust watched. He did not even stay to see her strike ground. But I did. I saw her face on the rocks below. She was happy, Kuwanan. She was free of him at last."

Kuwanan's sword shivered in his hand. Tears filled his eyes. "No!" he howled, ignoring the pain in his side and forgetting the Asahina who tried to leap before his sword. "NO!" The sword fell with a single strike, arching toward Hoturi's neck in a powerful blow.

Hoturi simply stood, hands silent at his sides. He did not draw his blade, even to defend himself.

Kuwanan's strike carried true, swinging toward Hoturi with the fury of a Lion.

At the moment the ancestral sword of the Crane touched the flesh of the Crane Champion's neck, it released a single chime of such beauty and joy that Kuwanan's hands opened on its hilt and he staggered back.

The strike froze before it could be completed. For a moment, the sword hung in the empty air. Its ringing chime echoed through every hallway and chamber of the Asahina temples. The sound was a pure note of ultimate truth. In wide libraries, students looked up from their work, hearing the sound. The Daidoji who prayed in the temple's heart leaped to their feet with hope.

Stunned, Kuwanan fell to his knees. The sword swung slowly to the ground, landing gently at Hoturi's feet. Its note faded.

"The sword knows its true owner," Daidoji Uji whispered from the doorway behind Toturi. No one had seen him arrive, but he stood with the others, watching in awe. The sword glowed for a moment with a crystalline light, the echo of its note fading from the air. "It would not ring if Hoturi had truly dishonored himself ... if he were not truly the champion of the Crane. It is true." The dark-eyed Daidoji fell to his knees in reverence. His face glowed with renewed hope.

"Hoturi..." Kuwanan whispered.

"Brother," Hoturi reached for the sword at his feet, listening to the faint chime as he grasped its hilt and raised it to meet his eyes. "Can you believe me now?"

"Hai." Kuwanan bowed in shame. "The creature at Kyuden Doji... was not you."

"No, Kuwanan. And it is time we destroyed that creature and freed the Crane. I will need you, Brother." Hoturi took in the room with a single glance. "I will need all of you. This is a war not against men, but against evil itself. It is battle not against enemies of the Crane, but enemies of life—the very thing that the Asahina strive to protect. The armies of the False Hoturi are undead, stolen from their graves and from the afterlife of ligoku and thrown against helpless men and women. You say that the Asahina are peaceful, Tamako, that you respect all life—then defend it now, and put aside your reservations."

Tamako sank to his knees, unsure what to say. "The creatures you fight are undead, stolen from the eternal wheel of reincarnation, a blasphemy against the Fortunes and the spirits. They are abhorrent, even to us. But we have no weapons, nor skill or will to wield weapons."

"Then use your magic to fight them—or, if not to fight, at least to help us in our battle. Your spells, your healers, all these can be turned against the monsters that destroy the land. These creatures have blasphemed the Fortunes and slaughtered peaceful heimin across the Crane lands. Think of them, their lives wasted against undead servants of the Dark Lord. Can you ignore their cries for help?"

Tamako tilted his head and said, "We cannot allow innocents to be sacrificed to our arrogance, but it is better to allow an unjust sacrifice than to cause one."

Hoturi knelt before the daimyo, bringing their eyes level.

"I do not ask you to fight against humans, but against demons. These are the same monsters that your family fights every day, kneeling in meditation for the salvation of mankind. Can you turn your back to us as we fight them now?"

At last, Tamako nodded. "You respected our temple and did not strike, Hoturi-sama." The Asahina's voice was shaking. "Even when your own life was in danger, you put away your blade. For that, I can respect you. Though we do not approve of fighting, the Asahina will repay his respect with their own. But there can be no fighting in the temple of the Asahina, or the Fortunes will turn their faces from us forever."

"You are right, Tamako-san." Hoturi rose and stepped to the window. "The Crane have hidden behind too many walls." Lifting the Crane ancestral blade, he pointed out toward the golden fields that surrounded the compound. A great torii arch stood on the horizon. "This battle will not be fought behind the gates of the Asahina, but there—on the Fields of the Golden Sun, that Amaterasu herself might know the valor of the Crane."

"My lord," Uji said from the doorway, not wishing to disturb the champion but knowing where his duty rested. "I have failed in my responsibility, and I humbly beg your permission to commit seppuku."

"How have you failed me, Uji?" Hoturi asked softly, not understanding.

With catlike grace, Uji stepped from the doorway. He reached into his belt and withdrew a long, shining lock of jet-black hair. "I have carried this since Kyuden Kakita fell. Where I could not protect her, I thought to save it... at least, so that something of her survived to greet you when you came home once more." Uji raised his dark eyes. For once, his stone face bore a hint of genuine grief. "Your lady, my lord. She is ... gone."

The news struck Hoturi like a blow. Where he had thought himself numb from the thousands of deaths at Kyuden Kakita and Kyuden Doji, the sight of Ameiko's hair brought tears to his eyes. "Ameiko ..."

"I allowed this to happen, Hoturi-sama."

"You allowed nothing. I was not there . . . when she needed me most." Hoturi took the hair from Uji's hand and touched it softly. "Forgive me, little one. I should have loved you for your imperfection, rather than despite it. May you have mercy on me for not understanding your true nature." Hoturi tied the lock of hair to his obi, touching its softness once more with a shaking hand. So much had been lost, and all because of his own pride. Looking up at Uji, Hoturi said, "No, Daimyo-san, you have not failed. You may not take your life. It is still too valuable to be lost. Tomorrow we fight this false Hoturi and his men, and we will have need of you."

"Hai, my lord." The sorrow in Hoturi's voice was echoed in the somber tones of the daimyo's assent.

Looking out the window at the golden plains of the Asahina, Hoturi could have sworn he heard a fox's mournful howl. Then the lands were silent in the coming twilight, absolutely still beneath a fading sun.

soul of thunder

Strengthen the spirit as well as the body, and the depths of the soul will become the steel of the blade....

Kakita's words rang in Hoturi's mind as he reached for his armor. He drew smooth blue laces through the enameled metal of his breastplate. The wide shoulders, edged in soft feathers from a long-dead crane, gave the appearance of wings. Hoturi reached for the silk cord that bound his white hair beneath the metal mempo. He tightly tied back the long strands. There must be no error today, no mistake. Any flaw in his technique or his strength could cost him more than his own life.

It could be the death of his family, and the final chapter to a thousand years of Crane history.

For them—for his brother, the spirit of his ancestors, and those samurai who still

lived and camped on the Asahina field—Hoturi must be everything they believed him to be. He pushed Satsume's voice from his mind and lifted his helm. His fingers brushed the smooth hair at his belt one final time before he stood. No time remained for doubt or indecision.

Tamako's students slid the screen door of the chamber slowly open. They looked down at the hard stone floor as he stepped by. "My lord Hoturi-sama?" The Asahina coughed, huddling in his robes and tugging blandly at a long braid of his black hair. "Lord Uji-san has assembled the men."

Hoturi lifted the beaklike mempo of his armor and brushed his fingers over the cool metal mask. A samurai's armor was designed to be impressive, to strike fear into the hearts of opponents and to give courage to one's own men. It also invoked the spirit of the ancient kami, the first of each clan.

Lady Doji, forgive me, Hoturi thought as he replaced the mempo on the wooden armor stand. Today, I cannot hide my face. I fight myself. I must be willing to accept that dishonor without shame.

Without looking back, he followed Tamako from the room.

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Two thousand Daidoji stood upon the golden plains. The Fields of the Sun were covered for the first time in steel and war.

Uji, commander of the Daidoji, looked up at the Asahina temple upon its singular hill. He wished for its stone walls and twisting corridors. There, the fight might have been even. They might have had a chance.

Over twenty thousand undead marched on the roads to the north. Their rotting flesh sloughed on Crane land. Their leader, white hair shining above his black stallion, cheered them on with howls of rage.

Uji closed his eyes, remembering the madness that had shone from Hoturi's face as he forced them from the cliff. Uji's wounds, barely healed, still felt the crash of rock and surf.

The Crane troops had been told that the undead were led by a false Hoturi, but for most of them, this was the first time they saw the truth.

One of the men stepped before Uji, kneeling as his lord opened his eyes once more. "Our true champion has arrived."

The Daidoji Daimyo looked up from his reverie to see a parade of figures emerge from the temple gates. The Asahina shugenja walked in slow columns, their prayers whispering to the heavens in remorse and piety. But the figure that caught Uji's attention was not dressed in the wide robes of a shugenja, nor in the hakima of a courtier.

Doji Hoturi, champion of the Crane, stood in his father's armor and gazed out on the field. His face was uncovered, and his white hair was bound in a samurai's topknot. At his side hung the sword of the Crane. Its ancient hilt was wrapped in new silk. The battered saya shone with care.

As the troops noticed their commander, an audible whisper flowed through them. Some shook their heads in shame, fearing the demon that had destroyed them at Kyuden Doji and trusting only to their oaths to the Daidoji family. Fully one fourth of the men had asked Uji's permission to commit seppuku when they were told their leader would be Hoturi. Uji had refused them all. It was better that they live to see the battle to come. Then, if they had been deceived, they could die in honorable combat, defending the Crane.

Smoke from the north began to rise, and Uji heard the marching beat of drums and thickly sandaled feet.

Hoturi, too, heard it. As Kuwanan knelt to receive his orders, the champion of the Crane reached for the sword at his side. He drew it forth, and the echoing chime reverberated through the field. It seemed to gain strength from the whispers of the men. It gathered their doubt and changed it to a single ringing note. Each man raised his weapon to salute his commander. Their fears began to vanish beneath the light of truth.

The sword's note faded. The drums ceased. In the silence, Hoturi lowered his sword. A golden ray of sunlight pierced the stormy clouds, sweeping across the battlefield with the light of Mother Sun.

From the hills to the north of the plain, a black tide rose. It rushed down the plains with stomping feet. Broken weapons and mad shrieks drowned the sound of Hoturi's sword. Upon the top of the hill, surrounded by thousands of crawling, running, bleeding corpses, a single figure on a jet-black steed raised his hand in war.

"It is time!" Hoturi shouted from the gates of the temple. "Show them what it means to be Crane!"

Uji screamed a wild battle cry, sending his men forward through the thick grasses that waved waist-high around them. The field of Daidoji was weak to the right, and Uji knew it. Seeing the defensive line breaking, the false Hoturi punched his fist to the side, commanding a legion of men to take advantage of the flaw.

Exactly as Uji had planned.

He lifted the horn from his side. In a long, bloody line, his men clashed with the undead horde. Uji blew a high-pitched tone from the instrument. The lieutenant to the right flank raised his fan in understanding, and the Asahina shugenja ceased their chant.

The golden field shimmered. Waves of light rippled through the high grasses and changed them to armored forms. The illusion of an empty plain faded away, and the Crane hidden beneath its power rose to join the battle. Behind the vanishing illusion, a thousand more Crane—two, no three thousand more—lowered their pikes to receive the undead charge.