Eisen said, “Long ago men whose names we no longer know went into the forests and up to the tops of mountains and thought about why people are not happy. And they came to the same conclusion: we should seek happiness in nothing at all. The Brahmans of India learned from those original sages. The Buddha and Lao Tzu both restated their teachings. The same wisdom is the heart of the lore of Zinja and Zen monks. I find there is much similarity between our two paths. Only, if you will forgive my saying so, we part company on the matter of warfare. We students of Zen believe that violence is an obstacle to enlightenment. The Zinja do not hesitate to kill or injure others.”

“Like you, we seek enlightenment,” Jebu said, “but we do it through the practice of the arts of warfare. We learn to be forgetful of the conscious mind. We learn to love our opponents and not to fear death. Even the samurai, if they learned the Zinja principles of fighting, could aspire to the same sort of enlightenment you teach, sensei.”

“Perhaps I am wrong about the military arts,” said Eisen. “If any samurai should come to me for teaching, I will not turn him away.”

He sat down before the entrance to the hut, facing out to sea. Jebu and Yukio sat with him.

Yukio said, “Tell us about China, sensei. I hear the Emperor of China is fighting barbarians. I am thinking of taking fighting men over the water to serve the Chinese Emperor. There are many of us whose lives are forfeit if we stay here, many who have lost everything to the Takashi. Perhaps we will find better fortune in China.”

“Too bad you are not going, as I did, to learn from the Chinese. But if the Central Kingdom, as they call it, is not saved from the barbarians, there will be nothing left to learn.”

“Who are these barbarians?” Yukio asked. Jebu knew these barbarians were his father’s people, but he wondered what Eisen would say about them.

Eisen said, “There are many peoples who live in the grasslands north of the borders of China. They are called Cathayans, Kin, Manchus, Tartars—and Mongols. They spend their lives on horseback, herding cattle and other animals. They live in tents and have no fixed abode. From time to time they make war on the farming people to the south. Ages ago a Chinese Emperor built a Great Wall to keep them out, but as with all walls its promise of security was false. A hundred years ago people called Cathayans crossed the Wall and took the northern half of China for their own. Then a people called the Kin conquered the Cathayans. They seized all the riches, settled in the cities and learned Chinese ways. Now the Mongols have come. They have utterly destroyed the Kin. They threaten the native rulers of China, the Sung dynasty, who still hold the southern half of the country.”

Yukio said, “I have heard of these Mongols. I have heard that they have no human law and are more ferocious than tigers or bears.”

Eisen shrugged. “You know how men will exaggerate when describing their enemy. Actually, their laws are very strict, and among them many transgressions are punished by death. They are a fearless, energetic, intelligent people. They are capable of enduring incredible hardships. What they have achieved in recent years they owe to a leader called Genghis Khan. In their language his name means Mightiest Ruler. He wrote their code of laws, which is called the Yassa.”

He was the ruler who sent Arghun to kill my father and me, thought Jebu. He who commanded the obliteration of whole families, of whole cities.

“This Genghis Khan was a master of warfare,” Eisen went on. “Other barbarian horsemen from the grasslands simply swarmed like locusts, overwhelming the civilized peoples with their numbers and ferocity. But Genghis Khan shaped the Mongols into a well-organized, well-drilled army. That is why their conquests extend beyond all others. Even though Genghis Khan died many years ago, long before I went to China, his successors have continued to use his methods of making war to extend the Mongol territories even further. Genghis Khan was a ruler more awesome and brilliant than any Emperor of China or Japan has been in the last thousand years.”

Yukio looked shocked. “You would compare a barbarian warlord to our Emperor?”

Eisen raised a placating hand. “Not at all. Our Emperor is a manifest kami. He is the child of the sun goddess. But there are times when clouds obscure his light. At present, I think, the clouds are thick and numerous in this Sunrise Land.”

Yukio nodded. “For many of us the clouds are too thick. That is why we are willing to seek service with the Emperor of the Land of Sunset.”

“I wish you a safe journey, and may you return some day to a happier country.” Eisen pulled himself into a more rigid sitting position, crossing his legs and hooking his feet over his thighs, then folding his hands in his lap.

He said, “I know the Zinja do not use any special position when they meditate. But I have found that once you have assumed this position, it is impossible to lose your balance and fall over, even if you drop off to sleep.” And he rolled from side to side like a doll with a weighted bottom that cannot be tipped over. Jebu and Yukio laughed as they bade him goodbye.

“My mind is made up,” Yukio said at the bottom of the hill. “I am going to China. Come with me only if you want to. I don’t care that your Order says you must accompany me. I don’t want you with me unless you want to come.”

“Please let me come with you. I want to go to China for many reasons.”

“Fine. I intend to send out a message secretly to our friends in all the provinces — Muratomo no Yukio is going to China and calls for every samurai who supports the Muratomo cause to come with him. Normally it would not be proper for me to issue such a call without the permission of my brother Hideyori, our clan chieftain. But Hideyori is a prisoner in exile in Kamakura and cannot speak freely. His captors might even force him to denounce me for doing this. But I know that in his heart he will be cheering me on.”

Somehow, Jebu could not picture the grim, controlled Hideyori cheering for anything that did not benefit him directly.

Yukio went on, “There is nothing left for us now in these islands. The Takashi rule everywhere. Those who have been loyal to the Muratomo have been stripped of their lands, many of them hunted as outlaws. All the wealth of the world is in China. We can help save the greatest civilization in the world from the barbarians. And the day will come when the Takashi will be weaker than they are now, and we may perhaps return when fortune favours us, and take back what is rightfully ours. Meanwhile, we will gather men and hire ships, and we will present ourselves to the Emperor of the Sung as a fighting force. You and I will lead.”

That night, when Moko was through working on the granary, Jebu told him of Yukio’s decision. Moko smiled broadly.

“Long ago, shiké, when we first met, I told you I would go to China with you if need be. Now, even though I have found the joys of love here in Hakata, I am ready to prove that I mean what I promised.”

“Is there any news of my father?” Jebu asked roly-poly Abbot Weicho.

“The great Taitaro has left these Sacred Islands. He came to visit us here a year ago. His teachings on the Zinja way of life were incomparable. Unfortunately, though, he only stayed with us a few months. Then his Zinja insight told him that it was time for him to cross the great water. There are things to be learned in China, he said, that will be lost in another few years.”

“I have been thinking of making the voyage to China myself, holiness,” said Yukio.

Weicho nodded. “If Lord Yukio goes, Jebu, you must go with him. The Order has decreed that your task now is to accompany him, to serve, protect and fight for him.”

Yukio joined with pleasure in the daily routine of the monks. Moko was set to work repairing the monastery’s granary, which was old and about to fall down. He found occupation for his free time, he told Jebu with pride and pleasure, in the company of a woman of the village, who thought his tales of adventure more than adequate compensation for his odd appearance.

Jebu spent a day visiting with Nyosan. “I can’t understand why Taitaro does this to you,” he said to his mother. “This pursuit of insight without concern for others is a kind of spiritual greed.”

Nyosan patted Jebu’s hand. “I am pleased that you are indignant for me. But my life has given me three of the most splendid men I have ever known—my husband, Jamuga the barbarian, a giant of a man and a magnificent warrior, and my husband Taitaro, a giant of the spirit. And it has given me a son who combines the best of both. I am well content.”

“You may be content, Mother, but you have not got all you deserve.”

“If each of us got what we deserve we would have to be in both heaven and hell at the same time. The way things are makes more sense.”

One afternoon Abbot Weicho sent for Jebu and Yukio. They met in a cryptomeria-shaded grove at the base of the path leading to the peak overlooking the temple.

Weicho had a visitor with him, a round-faced, shaven-headed monk in a black robe. “Normally,” Weicho was saying to the visitor, “our temples are placed at the very tops of mountains. But here the peak is too sharp, so we built the temple down here and put a small hut for meditation up there instead.”

The visitor smiled and nodded. Since the Buddhists wore saffron, the Shinto monks white and the Zinja grey, Jebu wondered what way this black-robed man followed. His eyes, as he looked at Jebu and Yukio, were somehow at once warm and stern. He seemed an inconsequential fellow, just another monk in a land where there were tens of thousands until Jebu looked into his face. There was a rock-hard strength in the directness of his stare, the firmness of his lips and the set of his jaw. He looks at me as Taitaro did, thought Jebu.

“I am called Eisen. I bring a Buddhist teaching back from China. It is called Zen. In Chinese, Ch’an.”

Weicho chuckled. “You will not convert Jebu. He’s the most stubborn Zinja in the land. And Lord Yukio is too interested in fighting to care about religion. But I thought you might tell them something about China, since they are considering going there. And in repayment they will escort you to the top of the mountain, since I’m too lazy to take you myself.”

“A soft Zinja is no Zinja,” Jebu quoted The Zinja Manual.

“You are also the most sententious Zinja in the land,” said Weicho. “May I remind you that the Manual also says, ‘On occasion the soft serves better than the hard. Where the sword cannot cut, the pillow may smother or the silken cord strangle.’ You may escort Eisen-sensei to our meditation hut while amusing him with your borrowed wisdom.”

As they began to climb, Jebu said, “What does the word Zen mean? I never heard it before.”

Eisen laughed. “Some of us have spent years asking ourselves what Zen means. It comes from an Indian word, dhyana, which means meditation.”

“So you teach meditation,” said Jebu. “On what do you meditate?” Eisen smiled. “Some of us meditate on a question, such as ‘What is Zen?’ Others, like myself, meditate on nothing at all.”

“To what end?” Jebu asked.

“We meditate to meditate, that’s all.”

“I don’t understand.”

“It’s very simple. That’s why it’s hard to understand.” They were half-way up the stone steps leading through the small pines that grew on the mountain. Though Eisen was a stocky man, he was breathing easily and seemed to have no difficulty with the climb.

They took up the conversation again, Jebu and Eisen doing most of the talking. Yukio, having spent his boyhood practising the martial arts secretly at night and sleeping during the day when he was supposed to be studying philosophy, had little to say. Jebu doggedly argued that spiritual practises had to produce results of some sort, even if only rebirth in the Pure Land. Eisen sidestepped all his arguments with amusement, much as Yukio had evaded his sword thrusts on the Gojo Bridge. At last they reached the top of the mountain, where there was a small straw hut sheltered by pines that had dug precarious footholds among the boulders. Beyond the hut and the pines the shoreline stretched encircling arms out to the horizon to form Hakata Bay.

Eisen said, “Long ago men whose names we no longer know went into the forests and up to the tops of mountains and thought about why people are not happy. And they came to the same conclusion: we should seek happiness in nothing at all. The Brahmans of India learned from those original sages. The Buddha and Lao Tzu both restated their teachings. The same wisdom is the heart of the lore of Zinja and Zen monks. I find there is much similarity between our two paths. Only, if you will forgive my saying so, we part company on the matter of warfare. We students of Zen believe that violence is an obstacle to enlightenment. The Zinja do not hesitate to kill or injure others.”

“And now,” said Yukio, “let us go to join our friends at the Rasho Mon. Perhaps whoever shaved your head can perform the manhood ceremony for me. For some reason, even though I’m already fifteen, Lord Sogamori never would allow it.”

Chapter Twenty-Four

Surprisingly, for a trio as unusual in appearance and easy to recognize as Jebu, Yukio and Moko, the three continually managed to elude the samurai sent out by the Takashi to hunt them down. Sometimes they were barely out one door when their pursuers entered through another. Sometimes they enjoyed long periods of peace under the protection of one or another friendly local lord. Sometimes the idleness of safety grew boring, and they were almost happy when word came that a group of samurai flying the Red Dragon pennon was riding their way.

Yukio’s main objective was to survive and wait for the Takashi to make a mistake. They had risen so high, they must come down eventually. There was no possibility of the house of Muratomo’s accepting the permanent supremacy of the house of Takashi. During his captivity Yukio had tried to remain on good terms with Sogamori, but still Sogamori had been on the verge of having him killed when he escaped.

Yukio finally explained to Jebu that he had secretly taught himself the martial arts and devised his own exercises for practice. Jebu was almost inclined to believe Yukio’s tengu story. Somehow Yukio had made discoveries in the fighting skills that were not likely to occur to anyone who had learned in the usual way from a recognized teacher. Jebu and Yukio practised together constantly, and Jebu was quite willing to admit that in this youth he had met his master. Together the two men progressed to unparalleled accomplishments with their weapons. When, on occasion, they were forced to fight, legends were born.

Yukio was also interested in the theoretical side of war, and when he learned that a landlord in the land of Oshu, at the far northern tip of Honshu island, had a copy of the Chinese classic, Sun Tzu’s Art of Warfare, he could not rest until he had read it. The owner of the book being a Takashi adherent, Yukio could not simply present himself at the gate and ask permission to read the book. He had to gain entry to the household by stealth.

The landlord also had a beautiful daughter named Mirusu. Each night Yukio positioned himself outside her bedchamber and wooed her by playing the flute, so softly as not to wake the rest of her family. After he had charmed her for six nights with his flute-playing, Mirusu invited him in. He spent the following nights making love to her, and when he had pleased her sufficiently, reading the thirteen books of Sun Tzu.

Yukio was also fascinated by ships. He had studied books on naval warfare and examined the records of the old battles with pirates that had won the Takashi renown in the last century. Yet he had never been on a ship. He questioned Jebu closely about his few voyages and asked Moko what he, as a carpenter, knew about shipbuilding.

“Ships are the key to Takashi power,” Yukio declared one day. They were far to the north, enjoying the protection of the lord of Oshu, Fujiwara no Hidehira, who owed old debts of gratitude to the Muratomo and who bitterly hated the Takashi.

Yukio went on. “Half the Takashi wealth comes from overseas trade. My family can never defeat them as long as we are landlocked. We, too, must take to the sea. You may not know that the patron kami of the Muratomo, Hachiman, was once called Yawata and was a kami of the ocean. So our heritage is of the ocean, and in the ocean we will win the final victory over the Takashi.”

“We should go to Kyushu,” said Jebu. “It’s time we left here, we’ve imposed on Lord Hidehira long enough. My mother and my stepfather both live on Kyushu, and it has been years since I’ve seen them. My mother lives at the Zinja Teak Blossom Temple, and this is what will interest you—the temple is on Hakata Bay. There are fishing boats and a few bigger ships there, and you can study the sea and talk to seamen to your heart’s content. Hakata is a small port, and the Takashi have no forces there. We can live there unseen for as long as we like.”

“Might it be possible to cross the ocean from there?”

“Korea is very close.”

“I was thinking of China,” said Yukio pensively. “In China the arts of shipbuilding and navigation are advanced far beyond ours.”

Disguised as yamabushi-wandering Buddhist monks — Jebu, Yukio and Moko worked their way down the west coast of Honshu, crossing to Kyushu at Shimonoseki Strait.

“This is a short run, but it’s tricky,” said the captain of the fishing boat that weaved a twisting course past hilly islands. “In mid-morning at this time of year, the tide shifts and runs westwards through the strait at eight knots, and we have to navigate across it.”

“You see, that’s the sort of thing I want to know,” Yukio said to Jebu.

“You can’t expect to pick up every bit of seafaring lore in all the land,” said Jebu.

“We must learn as much as we can.”

The three made their way down Kyushu towards Hakata. Jebu insisted on a side trip to the Watefowl Temple, but though the temple had been rebuilt, it was deserted. His heart sank, wondering if anything had happened to Taitaro. Finally, they climbed the hill to the Teak Blossom Temple.

“Is there any news of my father?” Jebu asked roly-poly Abbot Weicho.

“The great Taitaro has left these Sacred Islands. He came to visit us here a year ago. His teachings on the Zinja way of life were incomparable. Unfortunately, though, he only stayed with us a few months. Then his Zinja insight told him that it was time for him to cross the great water. There are things to be learned in China, he said, that will be lost in another few years.”

Jebu laughed. “So young and such a sage?”

“I have given some thought to military matters. Are you going to stand there talking, sohei, or are you going to come at me?” The youth crouched slightly, the absurd fan held out before him.

Very well, Jebu thought. He would try to subdue the young man without hurting him. Waving his naginata from side to side, he took a few menacing steps forward. Suddenly, he swung the naginata at the boy’s feet, trying to knock him down with its long pole. At the last possible second the youth stepped quickly backwards, and the naginata’s sword blade sliced into the railing of the bridge. Jebu pulled the weapon free and stepped back, trying to draw his opponent into an attack. But what sort of attack could he make, armed with nothing but a fan? The flute player simply stood his ground, eyeing Jebu intently.

Once again Jebu lunged, whirling his naginata in a great arc that was intended, not to hurt, but to force the boy off-balance in evading it. This time, instead of stepping back, the young man made a prodigious leap into the air. Jebu’s naginata whistled harmlessly through the space where he had been.

Jebu considered himself to be faster than any swordsman he had ever met, except for some Zinja teachers he had fenced with. But this lad’s bursts of speed were absolutely blinding. From a position of perfect stillness the young man could move so quickly as to make the movement seem invisible. Jebu repeatedly attacked places where his opponent had been an instant before, only to realize that the young man was now six paces away.

Then the boy darted in past Jebu’s guard, the fan thrust into Jebu’s face, blinding him. Then, folding the fan, the youth stabbed its rigid ribs into the backs of Jebu’s hands. The pain was excruciating, and it was all Jebu could do to keep his grip on his naginata. The boy beat him about the head and face with the folded fan, the blows coming as fast and furiously as the hammering of a woodpecker’s beak on a tree trunk. Growling like an angry bear, Jebu managed to shove the boy away.

To be so discomfited by a lad fighting with a fan—this was humiliating. He must defeat him and take his sword.

No, Jebu thought then. Why must he defeat the young man? His opponent was excellent, he himself was excellent. They were brothers in the warrior’s arts. It didn’t matter which of them won.

Satisfied to fight now for the pleasure of using his skill, Jebu found himself doing much better. He was driving the young man back. He had him pinned against the railing of the bridge. He looked into his opponent’s large eyes and saw there a slight amusement, and deeper than that, he saw the Self looking at him.

The young man leaped to the railing and stood there, balanced on the balls of his bare feet. He was laughing. Jebu slashed at his ankles and the young man jumped into the air, letting the blade pass under him. He landed and danced backwards along the railing, parrying Jebu’s thrusts with his open fan. His agility was awe-inspiring. Jebu remembered Moko’s legend of the demon of the Rasho Mon, and suddenly wondered if he were fighting with a spirit.

Enough of this, he thought. He stopped fighting and lowered his naginata. He chuckled, then started to laugh aloud. He stood there on the bridge, roaring with laughter and delight.

“You are the best opponent I have ever fought! The best! Who are you?”

Smiling, not even out of breath, the young man dropped lightly to the planks of the bridge, folded his fan with elaborate care and tucked it back into his green sash.

“Who are you?” Jebu asked again.

“The samurai ask who their opponents are before a fight, but you ask afterwards. I have known all along that you are Jebu, the Zinja shiké.”

“How do you know me?”

“For years I have been hearing tales of a large brute of a monk, who goes up and down the countryside attacking samurai and collecting their swords. He is said to have red hair. Your head is shaved—I suppose you consider that a disguise. How many swords in your collection now, Jebu?”

“Ninety-nine. I vowed to collect a hundred. Yours would have been the last. But meeting you means far more to me than collecting another sword.”

“I am glad of that. You fought beside my father and my brothers. I want to be your friend.”

“Who are you?”

“I am Muratomo no Yukio.”

Jebu fell to his knees and pressed his forehead against the wooden planking. “I have been seeking you.”

“You have? Tonight I just escaped from the Rokuhara.”

“And you stopped to fight with me? What if the Takashi were pursuing you? You should have simply given me the sword and hurried on.”

Yukio laughed. “I could not miss the chance to learn the outcome of a contest with the great Jebu.”

“How did you learn to use a fan like that? I heard you were being educated for the Buddhist priesthood.”

“I was tutored in the martial arts by the tengu. Every night I used to slip out of the monastery to fence with them.”

“The tengu?”

“Little creatures, half man and half bird, who live in the mountains. Very skilled with all weapons, including the war fan and the tea kettle.”

“Do you expect me to believe that?”

Yukio laughed. “The monks of Mount Hiei did. Monks are generally very superstitious.”

“Not Zinja monks,” said Jebu. “Lord Yukio, I am part of a band of allies of your house who came here with the hope of rescuing you from Sogamori before he could harm you. We are camped outside the city near the Rasho Mon. I am delighted to see that you have rescued yourself, but we must get away from the city at once. Having fought you, I know that you are truly worthy to lead the house of Muratomo.”

“The leader of the house of Muratomo is my elder brother Hideyori,” said Yukio. “He is in exile at Kamakura, but he will come forward at the proper time.”

“As you say, lord.” Jebu bowed again. “No more sword collecting for me. This night I make a new vow. Because Lord Muratomo no Yukio has prevented me from fulfilling my vow of collecting one hundred swords and because he has shown me what the art of swordsmanship truly is, I vow to serve him faithfully and constantly as long as both he and I shall live. I swear it on the honour of the Order of Zinja. In token of this vow, I offer him my sword.” Drawing his Zinja sword, he held it out to Yukio. The handsome young man extended his hand over the sword without touching it—the customary samurai gesture to indicate acceptance of an offer of service.

“I accept your sword and I am deeply honoured. As a son of Muratomo no Domei, I expect many men to swear fealty to me as time passes. You are the first. I know that this is the sword that was presented to you by your Order at your initiation, and therefore it is a precious symbol of your holy calling. In the name of the house of Muratomo I accept your offer of service. I pledge you and your Order the same loyalty you offer me.” He handed the sword back to Jebu, who sheathed it with tears in his eyes.

“And now,” said Yukio, “let us go to join our friends at the Rasho Mon. Perhaps whoever shaved your head can perform the manhood ceremony for me. For some reason, even though I’m already fifteen, Lord Sogamori never would allow it.”

She felt a chill at Sogamori’s ominous words, “for now.” Kiyosi smiled reassuringly at her. Tomorrow, she thought, he would come, and they would talk as they always had.

Chapter Twenty-Three

Early in the spring of Jebu’s twenty-third year, he and Moko were camped near the Rasho Mon gate of Heian Kyo with a group of samurai disguised as silk merchants. They had been commissioned by the surviving Muratomo leaders to attempt the rescue from the Rokuhara of Muratomo no Yukio, who, it was rumoured, was in grave danger of being murdered by the suspicious Sogamori.

“The boy is a constant reproach to Sogamori,” said Shenzo Saburo, the leader of Jebu’s band. “He reminds Sogamori that the Takashi murdered his father and grandfather and his older brothers. The tyrant will not rest easy till he has killed off all the generations of Muratomo.”

None of the samurai, it turned out, had ever been in Heian Kyo except for Jebu and Moko, and none of them had seen the Rokuhara. Holding a council, the samurai agreed that Jebu would go into the city first, a scout.

“Dress as a Buddhist warrior monk, a sohei, Jebu,” said Shenzo Saburo. “Go into the city and enquire about Lord Yukio. Observe the Rokuhara and report back to me how strongly guarded it is and how we might get Lord Yukio out. And shave your head, Jebu. It’s your red hair that makes you conspicuous. There are plenty of tall monks and peasants in the world.”

As Moko shaved his head, Jebu drew his tally scroll out of an inside pocket in his robe. “I have collected ninety-nine swords. Only one to go.”

“Shiké, this sword collecting of yours is madness.”

“Yes, it is foolish. But in an impulsive moment I made a vow. When I collect one more sword I can stop.”

After several hours of wandering the broad avenues and smaller side streets of Heian Kyo with his naginata over his shoulder, Jebu was frustrated. He found it difficult to approach people on the streets and in the wine shops, and the people he did speak to were terrified of talking to a stranger. He had only to mention the name “Muratomo” and the conversation would abruptly be broken off. The red-robed young men who patrolled the streets for Sogamori had terrorized the whole city. Several times Jebu encountered groups of them, and like the other citizens of Heian Kyo he prudently crossed over to the other side of the street.

No one would tell Jebu anything useful about Lord Yukio’s condition, his whereabouts in the Rokuhara, how well he was guarded, or the strength of the Takashi samurai. But the Takashi were so unpopular that his guarded questions aroused no hostility, only warnings that he was broaching matters better left alone. Jebu decided that he would go and look at the Takashi stronghold for himself and report back on its apparent defences. That would give him something to show for his journey into the city.

Then it appeared that his one-man expedition might produce another result. At the darkest hour of the night, Jebu, wandering westward towards the Kamo River to get to the Rokuhara, heard the music of a flute. Someone was playing an air of the eastern provinces. There was something almost magical in the pure, sweet sound carrying on the still night air. Jebu smiled appreciatively.

He stepped on to the bridge called Gojo, over the Kamo River. This was the very bridge on which he had first crossed into Heian Kyo with Taniko. In the moonless dark he could faintly make out the three towers of the Rokuhara on the far side of the bridge.

Then he saw the flute player strolling towards him from the other end of the bridge. It was a man dressed in a green and yellow hunting costume, with his long sword hanging from his belt. He was small and slender and looked very young. His long black hair hung unbound below his shoulders. He had no samurai topknot, but he wore a samurai sword. He must be very young, indeed. Strange that such a boy should be out so late.

To fight and perhaps kill this flute-playing lad would be a shameful way to collect his last sword. But an armed man in Heian Kyo must be on the Takashi side. Perhaps this was one of Sogamori’s young bullies, off duty and out of his red robe. If so, it was time he was taught some humility.

Swinging his naginata down from his shoulder, Jebu fell into, an at the-ready stance, barring the young man’s path across the bridge. “You play very well.”

“Thank you, sohei,” said the boy politely, raising his eyebrows ever so slightly as his glance fell on the long pole arm in Jebu’s hands. “Can I be of service to you?”

“I want your sword. Give it to me and I’ll let you pass.”

Calmly the young man sheathed his flute, drew a fan from his sash and snapped it open. It was white, with a red disk painted on it. What on earth did he intend to do with that? He was a good-looking boy, Jebu saw, though the eyes under his high forehead were larger than normal, which gave him a somewhat feminine prettiness. When he smiled, he displayed slightly protruding teeth.

“My sword is my most valuable possession, sohei. I find it rather an insult for you to suggest that I give it up without a fight.”

“Do not force me to attack you, young man. Do you intend to defend yourself with that fan?”

“If you are a well-trained sohei, you must be acquainted with the art of the war fan. I’ll use this until I see the need for a more puissant weapon. It is always better to use too little force than too much, don’t you think?”

Jebu laughed. “So young and such a sage?”

“I have given some thought to military matters. Are you going to stand there talking, sohei, or are you going to come at me?” The youth crouched slightly, the absurd fan held out before him.

Very well, Jebu thought. He would try to subdue the young man without hurting him. Waving his naginata from side to side, he took a few menacing steps forward. Suddenly, he swung the naginata at the boy’s feet, trying to knock him down with its long pole. At the last possible second the youth stepped quickly backwards, and the naginata’s sword blade sliced into the railing of the bridge. Jebu pulled the weapon free and stepped back, trying to draw his opponent into an attack. But what sort of attack could he make, armed with nothing but a fan? The flute player simply stood his ground, eyeing Jebu intently.