Chapter 18 : Irezumi

'Akiko? Are you there?' whispered Jack through the paper-thin door of her

room.

There was no reply. He drew back the shoji and peeked inside. Akiko

was nowhere to be seen. Her futon was untouched even though she should

have been in bed by now.

Perhaps she had gone to the bathhouse, thought Jack, or else…

He shut the door and hurried on. A lantern was still burning within

Yori's room.

'Yori?' he called.

The little boy slid open his shoji.

'Have you seen Akiko?'

'Not since supper,' replied Yori, shaking his head. 'Isn't she in her

room?'

'No, I think she's…' Jack trailed off, distracted by the sight of

countless paper cranes littering Yori's floor. 'What are you doing?'

'I'm folding cranes.'

'I can see that, but origami in bed! You take Sensei Yamada's lessons

far too seriously,' accused Jack. 'Listen, if you hear Akiko come back, can

you let her know that I've gone over to the Butokuden.'

'The training hall? And you accuse me of studying too hard!' Yori

glanced dubiously at Jack's katana. 'Isn't it rather late to be practising your

sword kata?'

'I don't have time to explain. Just tell Akiko.'

Jack sped off, not bothering to wait for Yori's response.

As he reached the main door, he briefly considered alerting Yamato

and Saburo, but they would be asleep and he had wasted too much time

already. The intruders might have gone by the time they all reached the

Butokuden.

Jack rushed across the courtyard. The storm was approaching fast and icy

blasts of wind stabbed through his thin night kimono like a tantō blade.

Pressing himself flat against the Butokuden's wall, he edged towards its

main entrance. Poking his head round the wooden door frame, he searched

for the intruders.

In the gloom of the great hall, he could distinguish a number of

hunched figures sitting in a tight circle within the ceremonial alcove. But

from this distance, he was unable to make out their faces or hear what they

were saying.

Jack hurried to the back of the Butokuden, where the slatted windows

behind the dais were within easy reach. As quietly as he could, he eased

open a wooden shutter. Peering through, he discovered he had a direct line

of sight to the alcove.

Jack counted four intruders in total. They each wore a heavy cowl so

their faces remained cast in shadow. Pressing his ear close to the slatted

opening, he listened.

'…the daimyo Kamakura Katsura is going to wage war against the

Christians,' whispered a youthful yet commanding male voice in the

darkness.

A husky female voice took over. 'The gaijin are a threat to our

traditions and the orderly society of Japan.'

'But there are so few. How can they be a threat?' queried a third voice,

high and thin like a bamboo flute.

'Their priests are spreading an evil belief, converting honourable

Japanese daimyo and their samurai with their lies,' explained the male

voice. 'They're trying to overthrow our society from within. They want to

destroy our culture, control Japan and its people.'

'They must be stopped!' interjected the female voice.

'The daimyo is drawing loyal samurai to his cause in preparation for

an all-out assault on every Christian,' explained the first voice. 'My father,

Oda Satoshi, has joined his ranks and sworn allegiance to this righteous

cause.'

'Gaijin are the germ of a great disaster and must be crushed,' hissed

the female voice with venom.

'But what can we do about it?' asked the fourth shadow.

'We can prepare for war!' stated the male and female voice in unison.

Jack could hardly believe his ears. He had been right all along. Sensei

Yamada was mistaken. The killing of the Christian priest was not an

isolated case. It had been just the beginning. The daimyo Kamakura was

intent on slaughtering every Christian in Japan.

Yet what chilled Jack's blood most was the fact that he knew who the

ringleader of this mysterious group was. He recognized his voice. It was

Kazuki, following in his father's footsteps and calling for war.

Outside, the first drops of rain began to fall. The shower quickly

became a torrent and within moments Jack was soaked to the skin and

numb with cold. But he was determined to stay and learn all he could.

Ignoring his discomfort, he strained to hear the ongoing conversation above

the rain, which was now beating an insistent rhythm upon the Butokuden's

roof.

'…all Christians will be forced to leave on pain of death,' continued

Kazuki. 'Some may try to hide, but it will be our duty to hunt them down.'

'What about Jack?' asked the thin reedy voice. 'Surely he's protected

by Masamoto-sama.'

'The great Masamoto-sama's got more important things to worry about

than some gaijin. I mean, have you seen Masamoto-sama at school

recently? No. His duty is to daimyo Takatomi. He couldn't care less about

Jack.'

'And without his samurai guardian around,' mocked the female voice,

'there'll be no rock the gaijin can crawl under where we won't find him!'

All of sudden, Jack felt very vulnerable. He'd been so busy with

training for the trials, he hadn't noticed the continued absence of

Masamoto. It only now occurred to him that his guardian's seat at the head

table during dinner had been empty for almost a month. The last time Jack

had seen Masamoto was when the samurai had overseen the start of the

construction of the Hall of the Hawk. Where had he gone? If the situation

suddenly turned serious, Jack had no one in authority at the school with a

personal interest in protecting him.

'We must be ready for the call to arms from our daimyo,' continued

Kazuki. 'That is the purpose of the Sasori Gang. We must now all swear our

allegiance to this righteous cause.'

'I'll need some light for the initiation ritual,' demanded the husky

female voice.

Jack heard the sound of a flint being struck and a couple of sparks

flared in the gloom. A moment later, a small oil lamp burned like a solitary

firefly in the cavernous hall.

Jack gasped in astonishment. The flickering flame illuminated a girl's

bleached-white face. Her oval eyes were like coals in a fire and a pair of

blood-red lips parted to reveal teeth painted black as tar. Jack instantly

recognized her as Moriko, the female samurai who had competed against

Akiko in the Taryu-Jiai. A cruel, vicious fighter, she trained at the rival

Yagyu School in Kyoto. Jack couldn't believe she was inside the walls of

the Niten Ichi Ryū.

'That's better,' she rasped, taking an inkpot and several bamboo

needles from her inro and laying them beside the lamp. She then uncorked a

small bottle of saké and poured a measure of the clear liquid into a cup.

This was placed in the centre of the group. 'So who will be first for

irezumi?'

'I will,' said Kazuki, opening his overcoat and kimono to expose his

chest.

Moriko inspected one of the needles, turning it slowly over the flame.

Satisfied, she then dipped its sharpened point into the pot of black ink. With

her other hand, she held Kazuki's skin taut above his heart.

'This will hurt,' she said, puncturing Kazuki's skin with the tip and

inserting a drop of ink beneath.

Kazuki grimaced, but made no sound. Moriko recharged her needle

before piercing his chest again. She continued slowly and methodically,

adding more dots of ink to the design.

Jack had seen such work performed before, on the sailors of the

Alexandria when they had had their arms tattooed. To Jack it had always

seemed like a great deal of pain for what amounted to a poor image of an

anchor or the name of some sweetheart the sailor soon forgot once they

docked at another port.

'Done,' said Moriko, a black slit of a smile spreading across her face.

'This is your mark,' announced Kazuki with pride, turning so that the

others could see. 'The sasori!'

Jack was too stunned to breathe. Tattooed above Kazuki's heart was a

small black scorpion – the creature of Jack's nightmares.

However hard his Christian beliefs tried to deny it, the coincidence of

this tattoo and his dream was too great to ignore.

Kazuki raised the cup of saké.

'Once you have your sasori and have shared saké from this cup, you're

forever a brother of the Scorpion Gang. Death to all gaijin!' toasted Kazuki,

drinking from the cup.

'Death to all gaijin!' echoed the others, pledging their allegiance and

eagerly opening up their kimonos for Moriko to begin the irezumi.

Outside the Butokuden, the storm thundered its approval.

Jack shook uncontrollably. He hugged himself for warmth, pressing his

body against the wall in an attempt to shelter from the relentless downpour.

His mind, like the elements, was a whirlwind of confusion. What

should he do? He'd heard all the testimony he needed. Japan was being

turned against foreigners. If someone didn't stop Kamakura, Jack would

become an outcast. The enemy. He needed to tell Masamoto, but how could

his guardian protect him against such forces?

Crack!

A blast of wind caught the wooden shutter, slamming it against the

window frame. Startled, Jack dropped his katana and it went clattering

across the stone-clad courtyard, disappearing into the darkness.

'Someone's there!' cried Moriko from within.

Panic rose up in Jack's chest. He quickly searched for his weapon, but

he could hear the Scorpion Gang fast approaching.

Leaving his katana behind, he ran for his life.