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- Herausgeber: Stillpoint/Atalanta
- Kategorie: Für Kinder und Jugendliche
- Serie: Seasons of the Sword
- Sprache: Englisch
The thrilling conclusion to Seasons of the Sword!
Can one girl survive?
An easy mission promises to be Risuko’s last
Kano Murasaki (called Risuko), Emi, and Toumi are accompanying a spoiled young noblewoman to her wedding. What should be a simple assignment—get the bride to the wedding, make sure she’s properly dressed—is anything but.
Because someone wants the lady dead.
And because Risuko and her friends aren’t just lady’s maids. They are kunoichi.
Trained spies, assassins—and in this case, bodyguards.
The wedding—which Risuko herself negotiated at sword-point—has the potential to unite the most powerful clans in Japan under a single banner, ending over a century of bloodshed. And so Risuko must do everything she can to keep the brat of a princess safe and deliver her to her groom. Failure would mean death not only for the bride and her bodyguards. It might mean another hundred years of destruction for the whole empire.
Along the way, Risuko and her friends must confront hidden enemies and uncover who is behind the plot. She must face the ghosts of her past to become, finally, herself.
Can Risuko survive?
Can Risuko kill?
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Seitenzahl: 334
Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025
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Seasons of the Sword #4
紫
Murasaki
A Kunoichi Tale
David Kudler
Stillpoint/Atalanta
Also by David Kudler
Seasons of the Sword
Risuko• BrightEyes• Kano • Murasaki
Kunoichi Companion Tales
(Seasons of the Sword Prequels)
Deadly Blossoms:
White Robes, Silk & Service, Waiting for Kuniko, Wild Mushrooms, Ghost, Schools for Gifted Youngsters: Headmistresses' Monthly Dinner
Shining Boy*, Blade*, Little Brother*, Old Wood*
* Coming soon
Find out more on SeasonsoftheSword.com
Follow on:
twitter.com/RisukoKunoichi • risuko-chan.tumblr.com
facebook.com/risuko.books • instagram.com/RisukoKunoichi
risuko.livejournal.com • tiktok.com/@kanomurasaki
Murasaki
ADVANCE READER COPY — NOT FOR RETAIL
It does not contain the final, fully edited text of the book. Please overlook any errors in spelling, puncuation, formatting, etc.
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Murasaki: A Kunoichi Tale
Seasons of the Sword #4
Stillpoint Digital Press
Mill Valley, California, USA
Copyright © 2025 by David Kudler
All right reserved.
This book may not be reproduced in whole or in part, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, or other—without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer, who may quote brief passages in a review. For more information, contact the publisher at
Cover design by James T. Egan of Bookfly Design
Book design by David Kudler and Stillpoint Digital Press
ISBN: 978-1-938808-75-3 (hardcover)
ISBN: 978-1-938808-73-9 (pbk.)
ISBN: 978-1-938808-74-6 (e-book)
1. Japan—History—Period of civil wars, 1480–1603—Fiction. 2. Ninja—Fiction. 3. Conspiracies—Fiction. 4. Determination (Personality trait)—Fiction. 5. Young adult fiction. I. Title.
First edition, September 2025
Version 0.9.0a (Rev 0)
SeasonsoftheSword.com
To Maura My companion, my guide, my destination
—
春なのに紅葉思う初終
—
Contents
Characters in Murasaki
Prologue - Destiny
1 - Autumn Flame
2 - Steel on Steel
3 - Dry Land
4 - The River of Heaven
5 - Oak Leaf
6 - Pelicans
7 - Tranquility
8 - Seabell Station
9 - Boundary
10 - A Flower Opening
11 - Quiver & Quaver
12 - Squiggles in the Dirt
13 - Golden Light
14 - Red Flowers, Golden Dreams
15 - Blood Diamonds
16 - Nightwatch
17 - A Reckoning
18 - The Right-Hand Path
19 - No Place
20 - A Teller of Tales
21 - Mobilization
22 - Red & Gold
23 - A Feast
24 - The Mountain & the Bee
25 - Shadow Warrior
25 - Owari
Epilogue - Murasaki
Coming Attraction?
Place Names
Characters in Murasaki
Glossary
Author Note + Acknowledgements
Page List
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Landmarks
Cover
Characters in Murasaki
Note: In Japan, as through most of East Asia, tradition places the family name before the given name. For example, in Kano Murasaki, Risuko’s proper name, Kano is her family’s name and Murasaki her given name—what English speakers would call her first name.
Historical figures are marked either with an asterisk (*) or, if they do not appear in this book, with a dagger (†).
Kano Clan (Risuko’s Family) and Neighbors:
Risuko—Kunoichi bodyguard to Oda Hachihime; proper name: Kano Murasaki but also called “Squirrel,” “Bright Eyes,” and “Mouse”
Okā-san—Risuko’s mother; proper name: Kano Chojo
Usako—Risuko’s sister; proper name: Kano Daini.
Otō-san—Risuko’s father, a disgraced samurai turned scribe; proper name: Kano Kazuo (Believed dead)
Miku—
?????—
Mochizuki Clan (Residents of the Full Moon):
Mochizuki Chiyome*—Mistress of the Full Moon; called “Spiderface”
Yuri Mieko—Lady Chiyome’s maid, kunoichi assassin, armed combat and poisons teacher, and miko dance master; currently impersonating Monogami Kuniko, rightful Lady of Wingtip (Dewa) Province, and also called “Serpent” and “Koko”
Tarugu Toumi—Kunoichi spy, bodyguard to Oda Hachihime; called “Falcon”
Hanichi Emi—Kunoichi assassin, bodyguard to Oda Hachihime; called “Smiley” and “Sourpuss”
Aimaru—Servant, soldier, and a former initiate at Mount Wisdom; called “Moon-cake” and “Moon Face”
Little Brothers—Lady Chiyome’s carriers, bailiffs, and bodyguards; former warrior monks at Mount Wisdom
Kee Sun—Cook and herbalist (Korean)
Shino—Kunoichi bodyguard; former senior initiate
Sachi—Kunoichi spy, espionage teacher, and miko music master; called “Flower”
Hoshi—Kunoichi bodyguard, armed combat teacher, and miko calligraphy master; called “Horsey” and “Ho-chan”
Mitsuke—Kunoichi spy, strength and archery teacher, and miko etiquette master
Rin—Kunoichi assassin, garrote teacher, and miko dance master
Chinatsu—Novice; friend of Emi
Junko—Novice; friend of Emi, also called “Ju-chan”
Yoshi—Novice; friend of Emi
Monogami Kuniko—Lady Chiyome’s maid, kunoichi bodyguard, combat teacher, and miko ritual master; rightful Lady of Wingtip (Dewa) Province (Dead)
Mai—Former senior initiate; called “Foxy” (Dead)
Fuyudori—Former senior initiate and spy for Lord Oda; called “Ghostie” (Dead)
Takeda Clan:
Takeda Shingen*—Lord of the Takeda clan of Worth (Kai) Province, allied with the Oda and the Matsudaira; called “The Mountain” and “The Tiger of Kai”
Baba Nobufusa*—Takeda captain
Hara Masatane*—Takeda captain
Takeda Masugu—Takeda lieutenant; called “Gugu”
Tsukiko—Masugu’s eldest sister; married to an Oda general
Yamamoto Yaeko—Masugu’s second older sister; Fūto’s wife and chatelaine of the Takeda capital townhouse
Yamamoto Fūto—Masugu’s brother-in-law; Yaeko’s husband and chatelain of Takeda capital townhouse, called “Fufu”
Takeda Himari—Masugu’s youngest sister
Inuji—Takeda cavalryman; Masugu’s second in command
Shirokage Akira—Takeda lieutenant
Oda Clan (and guests):
Oda Nabunaga*—Most powerful lord (daimyo) of Japan, controlling the capital (Kyōto) and the military government headed by the warlord (shōgun); lord of the Oda clan of Rising Tail (Owari) Province, allied with the Takeda and the Matsudaira, and called “Nobu”
Azai Oichi†—Lord Oda’s next younger sister, widow of Azai Nagamasa
Oda Hachihime—Lord Oda’s youngest sister; called “Lady Bee,” “Brat,” and “Hime”
Akita Chikasue—Lord of the Akita clan, usurping Lord of Wingtip (Dewa) Province
Harē—Oda lieutenant; nephew of Kano Chojo and Risuko’s cousin
Kamenote—Oda admiral and commander of flagship, the Fukurukuju
Kuroi—Oda captain of the guard
Oda Nobukane*—Nobunaga’s brother; monk, ordained name Rōtaisai
Oda Nobutada*—Nobunaga’s son and heir; commander of Oda forces in Rising Tail (Owari) Province
Oda Kichō*—Nobunaga’s wife, mother of Nobutada
Oda Washihime—Hachihime’s mother and Oda Nobunaga’s step-mother (Dead)
Matsudaira Clan:
Matsudaira Motoyasu*—Lord of the Matsudaira clan of Three Rivers (Mikawa) Province; also known as Tokugawa Ieyasu
Tokugawa Tokimatsu—Lord Matsudaira’s nephew and friend of Masugu
Matsudaira Ietada*—Matsudaira captain
Hattori Hanzō*—Matsudaira captain
Sakai—Matsudaira lieutenant
Kobayashi—Matsudaira guard
Jesuit Missionaries:
Father Francisco—Jesuit priest (Portuguese)
João Afonso Alves de Sousa de Mandrágora—Jesuit novice; called “Jolalo” (Portuguese)
Aodh Og O’Shea—Jesuit novice; called “Ēyogoshei” (Irish; dead)
Other Major Historical Figures:
Imagawa Ujizane*—Head of the Imagawa clan, former lord of Serenity (Tōtōmi) Province, recently defeated by the Takeda and the Matsudaira
Hōjō Ujimasa†—Lord of the Hōjō clan of Armory (Musashi) Province
Uesugi Kenshin†— Lord of the Uesugi clan of Crossover (Echigo) Province
Ashikaga Yoshiaka†—Hereditary warlord (shōgun) of Japan; for all intents and purposes Oda Nobunaga’s puppet since Oda-sama took control of the capital
Prologue -Destiny
My name is Kano Murasaki, but everyone calls me Risuko. Squirrel.
My whole childhood—the part that I can remember, at least—I was the daughter of a ronin, a disgraced samurai. After refusing to kill a group of children for his lord Oda Nobunaga, my father was banished and stripped of his rank. He became a poor scribe in Serenity Province. Impoverished and dishonored we may have been, but we were together. Until Lord Imagawa summoned my father to the castle and he never came back.
Even so, I was better off than my friends Emi and Toumi. Their fathers had also refused Lord Oda’s order, and had committed ritual suicide, sepukku. My friends grew up on the streets of the capital, doing whatever they had to in order to survive. I got to do the thing I loved most, there in the shadow of Lord Imagawa’s castle. Climbing trees and rocks and even the walls of the castle itself.
That was before my mother was forced to sell me to Lady Chiyome, who brought me, Emi, Toumi, and our friend Aimaru to the Full Moon, her mountain school for shrine maidens. Chiyome-sama, Mieko, and the rest of our teachers didn’t merely train us to be miko, however—to dance and sing and serve the old gods.
They also taught us to be kunoichi.
Assassins. Bodyguards. Spies.
My climbing found a new purpose.
I do not want to be a killer. The last time I saw my father, on the way to answer Lord Imagawa’s summons, he told me, “Do no harm, Murasaki. No harm.”
And yet how can I do no harm?
Over the past year, I have defended myself and my friends. My actions have led to death. Deaths. Fuyudori, Lord Oda’s spy at the Full Moon, who was trying to poison us all. The Torai brothers, who were spying for Lord Hōjō. Kumo, who was trying to kill the Portuguese boy Jolalo. Three Uesugi soldiers. An assassin at the theater. An Irish boy who was paid to kill Lord Oda.
I did not kill any of them, though my actions led to their deaths. But if they hadn’t died, if I hadn’t acted as I did, so many others would have suffered. They would have caused so much evil.
I don’t know how to feel about that.
Now, Toumi, Emi, and I are riding with Lady Oda Hachihime, Lord Oda’s half-sister—the half-sister of the man who destroyed our families. To the lady we followed when we were little like a pack of ducklings.
We are on our way to Hachihime’s wedding to Lord Takeda. The wedding I convinced them all would be the best chance for peace.
The wedding in Serenity Province, where it all began. Where I grew up climbing trees.
That’s what I wish I were doing right now.
The leaves are falling once again. The year is coming to a close.
I have come full circle.
Where shall I go from here?
1 - Autumn Flame
Rising Tail Province, Land of the Rising Sun, The Month of Leaves in the Second Year of Genki
(Owari, Japan, autumn, 1571ce)
Enormous old ginkgoes and maples towered over the road on either side, burning with autumn flame.
Red. Gold. Orange.
After four months in the capital it felt so indescribably good to be among trees again—and trees that paraded the change of seasons with vibrant colors.
On the horse next to mine, Hachihime looked around, eyes quick and wide. “Nobu hasn’t let me out of the city in years. At least, no further than Millet Ferry or to see the cherry blossoms along the shores of the lake.” She peered around. “This seems… nice. Certainly very pretty.”
I was going to say that it wasn’t nice — it was glorious.
Emi spoke first, however, riding on Lady Oda’s other side. “Why do you call him ‘Nobu,’ Oda-sama?”
“Hachihime, please, Emi-duckling. We’re not in public.”
“Yes, Hachihime. But—”
“I call him Nobu because that’s who he is.”
Toumi, who was riding behind Emi, jumped in. “But wasn’t your dad Nobu-something?”
“Oda Nobuhide was our father, yes. And his sons, our brothers, were the bastard Nobuhiro—literally a bastard, I’m not being mean—and also the awful Nobuyuki. Nobukane, who’s a monk, now. Nobuharu. I think I’m forgetting a couple. And then there’s Nobu’s sons! Nobutada, who we’re going to meet at at the castle later—he can’t stand me, it’s so funny. The twins, Nobukatsu and Nobutaka…” She clicked her tongue, searching the brilliant leaves above for the names of more kin.
“Well, then, Hachihime, ma’am,” Emi asked, “isn’t it confusing that you call Oda-sama ‘Nobu’?”
“Is it? I call him that because—” Hachihime turned to my friends and then to me with half-lidded eyes, the clever expression that always made me think of her brother. “Because, ducklings, he’s the only one who matters.”
“Ah,” Emi granted. “I see. Hachihime.”
In front of us, a furry parade scurried out of the road and into the woods.
Toumi sniffed. “What’re those? Rats?”
“No!” I laughed. Fluffy black-and-white bodies, low to the ground—a mother tanuki and three kits, one draped across her back. “Raccoon dogs.”
My surly friend’s lip curled, predictably. She had no interest in wildlife, aside the kinds that were edible or that might bite. “So big, furry rats.”
Hachihime tittered, shifting on her red-and-gold saddle, but I felt I had to defend the creatures, now disappearing into the underbrush. “They’re supposed to bring good luck. Prosperity. Fertility.”
“Yeah, yeah,” said Toumi, rolling her eyes. “Just what we want.”
Emi clicked her teeth. “Actually, prosperity would be nice. And in some of the stories my mother used to tell, they’re shapeshifters—right, Murasaki?”
I agreed, and began to share a story that my mother had told me and my sister about a tanuki that repaid a poor woodsman who had freed it from a trap by turning itself into a magical, ever-full tea pot.
We were on the fifth day of leisurely travel out of the capital on the Great Ocean Highway toward Hachihime’s wedding to Lord Takeda in Serenity Province.
A marriage I had brokered at sword-point. Though everyone saw the the advantages for peace that I had. At least, they said they did.
A mounted honor guard of some fifty Oda cavalry accompanied us. A squadron of Takeda lancers brought up the rear, led by Lieutenant Masugu. Mieko rode with Masugu on his stallion Inazuma. She held a parasol over both their heads.
We were just approaching the river bordering the Oda home province, Rising Tale.
The flaming foliage overhead thinned, revealing blue sky streaked with wisps of white.
At the front of the company Lieutenant Harē led his white stallion down into a wide, slow-moving river. Harē, my mother’s sister’s son: the cousin I had only come to know that summer.
“This was where my mother died,” said Hachihime, and I turned at the odd inflection of her voice. Her face, usually animated and full of mischief, was still and sad. She looked, in fact, very, very young. “We were on our way to Harmony Castle, just like today. Because it was supposed to be safe.”
I rode my mount closer to her until our knees touched and reached out, placing my hand on her arm. I assumed if she wanted to talk about it, she would.
She remained silent, lost in memory. Grief.
Lord Oda had told me about that Imagawa attack. He had shared the tale on the night I had sneaked into his chambers, determined to assassinate him, to avenge the dishonor with which he had stained Emi, Toumi, and my fathers’ names.
He had admitted to me that his actions had been far from rational—from sane. He had said, in fact, that he had been mad with grief at the death of his late father’s wife, there at the ford of the Old Wood River. In his rage, Oda-sama had ordered our fathers to retaliate. To kill a group of Imagawa children—plus Takeda Masugu, whom the Takeda had sent to stay with Lord Imagawa in exchange for one of Lord Imagawa’s sons. A hostage swap.
Our fathers had refused.
Mine had accepted disgrace and exile.
Emi and Toumi’s, who served as my father’s lieutenants, had committed seppuku.
Endless retaliation. Endless, senseless bloodshed. Like the round of the seasons. Never-ending. Inescapable. A knot of sorrow that could only be cut through by the most subtle of blades.
I wasn’t sure that my improvised solution—Oda Hachihime’s marriage to Takeda Shingen—was actually that blade. But the opportunity to bind the two most powerful lords in Japan together seemed as if it offered the best chance to end over a century’s killing, intrigue, and revenge.
And it would bring me back to Serenity, where my father had taken his family in exile. Where I had grown up happily climbing trees, far from scheming lords and rampaging armies.
Would I be able to see my mother, my sister? Had they survived the Matsudaira invasion?
Lord Imagawa I knew had survived. Oda-sama and Takeda-sama had agreed that it would be fittingly humiliating that the man who had once been the most powerful in all Japan be forced to host the wedding uniting their clans. A wedding at the castle in whose shadow I had played, all of those years.
If I met Imagawa-sama…
Could I get him to reveal to me, finally, what had happened to my father?
Would I kill him?
Do no harm, Murasaki. Those had been Otō-san’s last words to me. And yet as I grew, as I became more enmeshed in the world of conniving daimyo and cold-blooded generals, no harm seemed an impossible goal.
Action caused harm. Inaction caused harm.
And so I found myself constantly seeking for the path that promised, if not no harm, then the least.
I had chosen not to kill Lord Oda, who had destroyed my father’s life and ended those of Toumi’s and Emi’s.
Could I kill Lord Imagawa, whose sneak attack at the very ford we were crossing had triggered so much tragedy? Who had ordered my father to come to his castle… Could I force Imagawa-sama to tell me why?
Could I kill?
I had agreed to serve as Hachihime’s bodyguard. I had helped stop two assassination attempts. One on Lord Oda, the night I had sneaked into his chamber to assassinate him myself. Before that at the theater on Mieko-sensei, who had assumed the guise of the dead Lady Monogami Kuniko. (Hachihime, of course, had thought the black-clad assassin at the theater was actually attacking her.)
I had knocked men unconscious and slammed one boy to the ground. Twice. I had thrown spiked caltrops in a man’s face and repeatedly drawn the short sword that I carried at my back. I had escaped up a tree in the midst of a blizzard, refusing to give another of Lady Chiyome’s student kunoichi the letter for which she had been willing to kill us all. And though I had not pushed her, she had fallen nonetheless. I knew that I was responsible for her death.
I could justify all of it. I had acted not only to protect myself, but to protect others. And yet could I say that I had done no harm?
As we approached the river, as I maintained my grip on grief-devoured Hachihime’s arm, a question struck me. Why had the death of a step-mother so devastated the crafty Lord of Rising Tail?
Lord Oda had been young at the time, of course—he had admitted as much to me the night that I had stopped the Irish boy Eyogoshei from killing him. The night that Oda-sama had slit the would-be assassin’s throat with the dagger that he had hidden in his bed, placed the bloody blade in my hand, and then proclaimed that I had saved his life.
When Lady Washihime had died, Oda Nobunaga would have been about her daughter Hachihime’s current age—a handful of years older than me and my friends. He had just become head of the Oda clan at his father’s death.
Even so, it seemed like an extreme reaction to the murder of his late father’s second wife.
I would have to ask Hachihime. But I would have to do it… delicately. Not while the memory of her mother’s death flooded her.
Flooded like the water swirling around our mounts’ legs.
I glanced up at the trees overlooking the banks of the river—more ginkgo, stands of tall old oak and pine—and could only think that what I wanted to do more than anything was to jump off the horse, wade to shore, and climb.
A buzzing sound by my ear, and then a splash behind me like a trout jumping for a bug.
Strange. It was late for bees, and why would they be out in the middle of a river?
Another buzz, from the other side. Looking up, I saw a small cloud of black shafts arching toward us from the woods on the near shore.
“Arrows!” I shrieked, and then pulled Hachihime down into the water between our horses.
2 - Steel on Steel
I grew up swimming and playing in the small river and pools near our village. Though I preferred to be up in the air, I was very comfortable down in the water.
The same could not be said for Hachihime.
As we fell into the flood between our horses, she jerked and bucked beneath me, arms and legs flailing, eyes and mouth wide.
Then two weights crashed down, pushing us both beneath the river’s boiling surface.
I may have been comfortable in water, but as I slammed down onto Hachihime’s thrashing body, horse legs churning the water and my breath driven out of me, I panicked.
I hope you won’t think less of me.
I’ve spoken before about how time creeps for me in a crisis. Often that slowing is a wonderful thing — I can see danger before it arrives and respond. Sometimes, however — under water, under the weight of two other bodies — that slowed time felt like torture, as if I were being forced to gaze, unblinking, at my own death.
Actually, all that I could see was Hachihime’s wide eyes.
No. I would not let her die. I would not let myself die.
I fought to get my feet onto the sandy riverbed. Grabbing Hachihime by the shoulders I tried to lift us both back to the surface, but the burdens atop me were too heavy.
The river had seemed slow and placid from the surface. Now the flood whipped around and between us, scrubbing us with pebbles and gravel kicked up by the horses.
My feet scrabbled to find purchase against the sand. My lungs screamed for breath.
For the first time in my life the thought bloomed, a fetid flower: I’m going to die after all.
That, of course, was the moment when the two leaden weights on my back shifted, hands grasping at me and Hachihime and pulling us back up.
“Areyouallright? Areyouallright? Areyouallright?” Emi and Toumi coughed and spluttered at me, at Hachihime.
I was coughing myself, what felt like a whole river’s worth of water streaming from my mouth and nose and ears.
I held Hachihime close to me, having no other choice.
Her eyes remained wide, white with panic. “Mama! Mama!”
“Mouse?” Toumi shouted in my ear.
“Fine!” I spat out a piece of gravel and looked around for more arrows. The only marks in the blue sky were white clouds. Just upstream, one horse lay unmoving, three arrows piercing its chest. Two more were lodged in its red-and-gold saddle.
Hachihime’s mount.
Most of the soldiers were splashing toward the shore we’d just left—toward the attackers. “Let’s get her to the far shore!”
A shadow blotted out the sun and we all looked up — Emi, Toumi, and I did, at least. Hachihime was still lost in the terror of another attack, I realized.
Harē had ridden between us and the shore upstream where the arrows had come from. “Injured?”
I was about to tell him we were fine, aside from almost drowning, when another horse splashed up.
“GO BACK!” screamed Mieko, grabbing at Inazuma’s reins with one hand. Her other still held her parasol, which had sprouted a bouquet of arrows. “GO BACK!”
Masugu grasped the wrist of her free hand. His eyes were on me and Hachihime. He looked up at Harē.
Both soldiers nodded.
In a voice that managed to sound both calm and steely, Masugu said, “Koko, girls, we’re going to get you to the other side.”
Harē turned his horse around, and he and Masugu slowly walked us across the river, acting as shields against any further missile attacks.
Mieko growled disapproval, trying to pull her hand free, but Masugu ignored her—not something I’d ever seen him do.
Hachihime wept. Eventually, Toumi and Emi helped me carry her through the flood to the dry eastern shore.
In that moment, as the water streamed from our clothes and our hair onto the dusty road, I didn’t think I’d ever want to swim again.
A small group of mounted guards formed up around us as my cousin and Masugu led us into a grove of gingkoes, their thin trunks providing some cover from any further enemy fire. Not that we had remained within easy range.
Muted sounds of battle erupted from across the wide river—steel on steel, cries of rage and pain. The silvery music of the water made it seem impossibly far away, dreamlike.
“Why didn’t we go back?” Mieko snarled. “We could have helped take them out! We need—”
“Koko,” said Masugu, voice still deadly calm, “think: who were they shooting at?”
She huffed at him, but her eyes closed.
I looked at my friends—Toumi was wringing out her kimono, while Emi was checking her throwing knives—then down at Hachihime, weeping wetly into my wet shoulder, and finally up at Mieko—at the dainty-looking parasol on her shoulder that I knew was actually a steel-ribbed leather shield. At the arrows that studded it. “They were aiming at us. At the women.”
Harē nodded. “Yes, cousin. They were. The best thing to do was remove you from the line of fire.”
Mieko blinked. Emi scowled. For once, Toumi joined her.
Masugu drew Mieko’s now-limp hand to his lips. “Koko. My lady. Harē’s troops and mine will deal with the assassins. We could not give them what they were clearly aiming for. Besides, you’re still recovering from a serious wound.”
Eyes still closed, Mieko let her forehead fall against Masugu’s armored back. “You are right, of course. Though the wound wasn’t that serious. But I don’t like being treated like a piece of baggage.”
“Never that, Koko.”
She smiled grimly. “Fine.”
Masugu too smiled, and looked down at us. “Ladies?”
“We’re good,” Toumi mumbled, now picking twigs and sand from her hair.
I tried to look at Hachihime, but she clung trembling to me like a baby tanuki to its mother’s back. “I think Lady Oda is physically unharmed, but…”
Harē dismounted and peered at Hachihime. “My lady?” When she responded with a sustained whine like an over-boiled kettle, he looked to me. “Cousin?”
“She was telling me,” I whispered, stroking her wet back, “this was where she and her mother were attacked. Where…”
Harē’s eyes flew wide.
Where Oda Washihime died.
He remove his cloak and wrapped it around Hachihime, who was shivering uncontrollably. Then he looked up to Masugu. “Hachihime-sama needs care. At this point, I don’t think we’ll make it to the castle by nightfall, and it clearly isn’t safe to travel in the dark. There’s a monastery just up the road renowned for its healers. Takeda-san, would you be willing to take command of the men here while this squadron and I—?”
Masugu raised his hand, halting Harē. “I don’t believe it’s a good idea to split our force when there might be another ambush ahead. I think my uncle would be as unhappy as Lady Hachihime’s brother if we were to allow anything to happen to her.”
Mieko added, “And I think the fighting has ended. The riders are crossing toward us once more.”
“Ah.” Harē looked back at me and Hachihime. “Your points are well taken, Lieutenant. Lady Monogami.” To me and my friends, he added, “Keep her warm. She’s in shock. Understandably.”
As Takeda and Oda cavalrymen began to return, the three of us embraced Hachihime.
—
The soldiers returned in a good mood—just two men had been hit by arrows as they charged the archers, and neither had been seriously wounded.
Three horses had died—one of them, I already knew, was Hachihime’s.
The assassins, however, had provided five new mounts.
Inuji and the other Takeda lancers were teasing Aimaru for falling off his charger.
Our friend put up with the jokes with his usual good grace. He had, after all, been one of the ones who had defeated the men who’d attacked us.
The attackers had all been up in oaks overlooking the river, firing at us when the Takeda rode up beneath them. The Oda riders soon joined as well, cutting off the assassins’ escape.
It hadn’t been difficult to avoid their fire there among the trees, and once the attackers were out of arrows, a group of mounted Oda bowmen took down three of the enemy. The remaining two assassins had better cover and so Masugu’s second-in-command Inuji had sent a group of limber volunteers up after them, Aimaru among them.
“You’d have enjoyed it,” he told me as we rode away from the river.
“Enjoyed it?” I didn’t think I’d have liked knowing there was a desperate killer waiting at the top of the tree.
“Well,” he said with a shrug, “the climbing.”
I couldn’t disagree with that.
As we formed up, Harē ordered a pair of fast Oda scouts to ride ahead to inform the monastery of our arrival and request their aid with our wounded, and then to ride post haste to Harmony Castle to inform Lord Oda’s wife and son that we had been attacked and so would be delayed.
Once they had galloped off, we got back on our way. Our pace was more leisurely, but there was nothing relaxed now about the guards. Our formation was much tighter, and we women were kept hemmed in on all sides.
We forded two more rivers without incident, and then entered another forest.
Inuji reported to Masugu, Mieko, and Harē, informing them that the attackers had born no insignia, nor any sign of their origin. That the brands showed the horses had come from all over the provinces of the main island, Honshū. That the men’s hair had been recently shorn, as if they’d removed samurai top-knots.
“Ronin,” muttered Masugu.
“Like the assassin at the theater,” Harē added with a sigh.
Mieko hummed in agreement and glanced over at me, riding with Hachihime wrapped around me from behind. “Risuko, well done getting Hachihime out of harm’s way so quickly.”
In front of her, Masugu smiled. “That offer of a job in the Takeda scouts still holds.”
“No,” Hachihime said firmly, though her teeth kept chattering, though her arms still pulled me close from behind. “She’s staying with me. They all are.”
I looked at my friends, their eyes wide, their hair wet and messy, their still-damp kimonos revealing the weapons hidden up their silken sleeves. “Yes, my lady.”
—
We rode long enough for the sun to begin to lose its way among the trees.
A monk stood in the middle of the road, his bright saffron robes perfectly matching the maple leaves above him and littering the path. “Brothers, sisters,” he said, and bowed. “You are expected.”
He led us uphill off the main road, along a narrow, brick-paved lane lined with stone lanterns and across a small, red-stained wooden bridge that crossed a stream. Amidst a cool stand of enormous, ancient cedars and hemlock stood a temple—a cluster of wooden buildings around a courtyard. A tall red pagoda reigned over one side of the space and a large abbey the other. T he he abbey building brought me very much in mind of the great hall at the Full Moon.
A bell tolled, its deep tones rolling across the courtyard, over us, and out into the forest valley. From within the temple, we also heard a chant—not a prayer in praise of the Buddha or beseeching deliverance to the Western Paradise, but a repeated phrase in a foreign tongue I did not recognize.
I looked over to Aimaru, who had grown up in a monastery. His eyes were wide in rare surprise.
Two men approached us from the abbey, the older with a staff and a white cloth around his neck, the other with a face that I would have recognized anywhere—he was the sly-eyed spitting image of Hachihime’s brother, Oda Nobunaga.
Behind me, the lady herself finally released me, slid from the horse, and ran, weeping, to the younger monk. “Onī-san!”
“Little sister,” he answered, opening his arms to welcome her embrace.
3 - Dry Land
Hachihime wept into the monk’s chest.
“That must be Nobukane,” whispered Emi. “One of the Nobu-brothers she was telling us about.”
Toumi muttered back, “How do you even remember that?”
“Well,” Emi murmured, her face set in its deep memory frown, “Nobuhiro is the illegitimate one. And Nobuyuki is the one she said was awful, though she didn’t say why. And then she said Nobukane was—”
“Whatever,” snorted Toumi, rolling her eyes.
Masugu and Harē were presenting the two wounded soldiers to the abbot.
“Come, brothers,” said the older monk. “Several of our number are quite gifted healers. Brother Rōtaisai, please lead these gentlemen to our infirmary.”
The wily-eyed Oda monk bowed. “Of course, your reverence.” Now he glanced down at Hachihime, who still clung to him. “May I see this lady and her attendants to the guest room? I believe that she is in need of healing as well, though of a more spiritual nature.”
The abbot’s placid smile flickered for a moment, but then he nodded. “Of course. Lady Kuniko,” he said, turning back to Mieko, “would you like to join these ladies tonight? The guest room is small and spare, I am afraid, but comfortable.”
Mieko bowed. “You honor me, Lord Abbot. However, I would not presume to impose on you or on Lady Hachihime. I have my own tent. I can stay wherever my guards are housed.”
“As you wish.” He returned her bow and turned to the two lieutenants. “Gentlemen, I hope that you do not mind staying out here in the courtyard tonight with your men. I am afraid we have no stables and little unused space here.”
Masugu and my cousin Harē also bowed. Harē said, “Your hospitality already honors us, your reverence. Thank you.”
That settled, Hachihime’s brother led us toward a set of small buildings between the abbey and the pagoda. A trio of monks met us at the first building, and took charge of the two wounded men.
Then, his sister still clinging to him, he led us to an even smaller building, set back among a stand of enormous cedars.
Hachihime continued to sniffle, clinging to her brother, but as he slid open the door, he smiled at us. “Welcome to our guest house. I’m afraid it will be a bit cold, since it doesn’t see much use. But we’ll light the brazier and get my little bumble bee here settled.”
We thanked him, but I felt I had to ask: “Pardon, your reverence. Are we to call you Nobukane-san or—”
He chuckled, leading us into the sparsely furnished room. “Ah, that is a name from another life, I am afraid. My ordained name is Rōtaisai. How did you know I was once an Oda?” He stopped and peered at me, then at Emi and Toumi, clever eyes widening. “Are you…?”
“Yes,” sniffled Hachihime. “Kano, Hanichi, and Torugu.”
“Ah.” He blinked at us. “Well, do come in, ladies.”
We finally got Hachihime to release him. Toumi and Emi prepared the one bed and helped her into it, and I helped the monk light the tiny brazier in the middle of the room.
“Do you know,” he murmured as the charcoal began to catch, “I would have known you for Chojo’s daughter anywhere.”
“Thank you, Rōtaisai-san. It is very kind of you to say so.” I had always thought my mother one of the most beautiful woman in the world. “That is how I knew who you were. You look just like Oda-sama, your brother.”
Again he chuckled and then winked. “Ah, don’t ever tell Nobunaga that! He always said I was the ugly one.”
One of the monks from the infirmary brought in a steaming pot of tea—a calming draught for Lady Oda, he said. Emi and I sniffed at it, causing the new monk to frown, but Rōtaisai to grin.
The familiar scents of ginger, jujube, and—of course—corydalis wafted up from the pot. A calming draught indeed. We nodded and Emi poured a cup, gave it to Toumi, who sniffed it herself, then presented it to Hachihime.
The room began to warm slowly.
Hachihime’s tears slowed and stopped. Her weeping was replaced by hiccups.
Her brother knelt beside her and stroked her head. “So, Lady Bee, I gather you have had a nasty experience?”
“Yes,” she said, leaning into his hand, tears beginning to flow again. “It was like a nightmare coming back to life. Arrows flying. Men screaming.” She blinked up at me. “Risuko saved me. She pulled me down off the horse before I even knew we were under attack. And then Emi and Toumi pulled us both out of the flood.”
“Did they?” Rōtaisai gazed at us, then back at his sister. “Even so, it must have been terrible for you.”
She nodded, weeping again, and buried herself in her brother’s chest.
Rōtaisai rocked her as her deluge of sorrow poured out once more. His quick eyes shot to the tea pot, then back to us. “Ladies, what I think Hime-chan most needs is rest. I can tend to her until she is able to sleep. Perhaps you might join Lady Kuniko and the guards for a meal?”
I shared a look with Emi, whose typical frown deepened. I turned back to the monk. “Your reverence—”
