14. Lord of the Mountain Shrine
In the mornings a thick, impenetrable mist hung over the steep ridges and crags where Lord Asano had set down his army the previous night before. The harsh, complicated geography of the area meant all his forces were scattered all over the slopes, and across the tiny stream which poured through rapids into the valley and again over the entrance to the entire basin. In the cold, dark hours just before dawn, the dying crimson glow of hundreds of soldiers' fires appeared as a mirage of brick red trees on the slopes.
At the very bottom of the basin, cut into the valley at an almost defenceless position, lay the cluster of houses which they called a village. The stream ran right through its centre, and the proximity of the lake it emptied into could account for rice crop and barley growing in sparse pockets all along the closest slopes to the village. Compared to Minami, it was a mere blip in the landscape; to compare this hamlet to Nara, on the other hand, was just plain insulting. As it rested in all its innocence and quietness in the valley, the villagers would wake that morning to find themselves surrounded by five thousand samurai of Lord Asano's army.
She perched herself on a boulder, precariously overlooking the valley. She could see the winding, lonely track which squirmed down from the mountain ridge to the village, but her view was obscured by the clouds which, passing at the peak of the rise, embraced her and clung to her as they threatened more rain.
Beyond these low-lying clouds, she could see, was a disturbing, awesome distance of deep forest for hundreds and thousands of miles north.
Again – that familiar feeling: something was calling out to her. Whenever she found herself alone and face-to-face with menacing nature, she could hear its pervasive, distant voice speaking to her. And now, at the edge of this wilderness, it was mumbling, whistling, with a definite consistency. But, unlike the previous times, the message was clear now; this was not just about some petty samurai revenge which was burning in her heart or some questionable debt of honour to her family name.
It had an almost demonic muttering, a perverse repetition of the same words in the hushed breath of quiet, growling syllables; it flew past her with the echo of whispers speaking from the wind, made more intimidating because she was staring at the forest.
Cursed one.
I see you.
You bring your curse to these lands.
She did not want to admit it, but she knew clearly there was something waiting for them in the forest. Whether it was this exact thought or the blast of wind now flowing from that direction, she shivered slightly, her hands automatically reaching for a fire-cannon that was not by her side. So accustomed was she to having it with her all the time, its absence pained her.
You challenge me.
She squeezed her eyes shut for a second. That unsettling voice being carried on the wind broke into a thousand different sound, before she forced her eyes open. Am I dreaming? There was nothing more to be heard, save the clattering of leaves roused by the winds and the vague noise of flowing water. She did not look up at the forest. Instead she glanced down at the open mouth of the valley, back to the original reason why she was here.
Far below, along the road untouched by the red and black colours of his army, Lord Asano and his escort were making their way down to the village.
She sat at the same place overlooking the village at the same time the next morning. On all accounts, she should have felt better after an entire day of inactivity, where the entire army waited for orders from Lord Asano which never came. The man was unusually quiet after returning from his tour.
But she was far from rested. She was used to bad dreams; however, last night had to be a record: a repertoire of nightmares, winged creatures worst looking than tengu and a blatantly grotesque chorus of the same voices she had heard yesterday. I'm a practical human being. I don't get bothered by such things, she told herself, although she knew, from their repetition, they were a serious inconvenience more than anything else. She was disturbed she could remember them so vividly.
And the one thing which she found hard to forget, was the image of what she believed was a blood soaked animal, its eyes replaced by flaming iron mounds, screaming and roaring, spouting a black, sinuous substance from its mouth. She could remember it charging at her; she could still feel the stench of something worse than death when it slammed into her vision and returned her back into the coolness of the night, breathless and panting.
Again, she avoided staring at the lush, green mass of forest tempting her from her vantage point, preferring instead to trace the road to the village.
By the gods I hope I'm not losing my mind. Footsteps broke her thoughts. Unconsciously her hand wrapped itself around her katana, as she turned to face the intruder. Only Osa.
"My Lady, out for a morning stroll?" Osa greeted her. She sensed a hint of sarcasm in his voice. After all, the sentries he stationed to guard her would have told him all about her insomnia.
"How was the watch?" she replied, preferring not to answer.
She saw Osa's eyes perform trademark narrowing when he was troubled through the slits in his face bandage.
"My Lady, we lost several men last night just north of here."
Her gaze was immediately upon her deputy. Since she had taken over her brother's mantle as the Eboshi head, she was proud she had a zero casualty rate. She never lost men, especially not while they were sleeping soundly!
"Damn it. Whose gun misfired now?" she imagined it an accident rather than anything else.
"There was no misfire. They were gutted and dead when we found them this morning," Osa's tone turned unnaturally sympathetic. "There was a lot of blood. And the rest of the men say it was the work of spirits and demons on whose territory we have trespassed."
"Trust these samurai idiots to blame the unexplained for everything. How many men did you find?"
"Two. North of here, where most of Gonza-san's men took up their positions since yesterday. I've ordered some of the riflemen to keep watch over that area. But there shouldn't be any more disturbances. The men too afraid to go anywhere near the forest."
Musing on Osa's words, she mentally calculated the location where Gonza and his men would be. She found herself flanking north-east, straight into the thick forest flanking the valley.
Osa was almost expecting the question, and she knew she was getting accustomed to asking it. She looked him in the eye, and said: "Be truthful with me, Osa. What do you think?"
She knew he was both rational and not given into what she would term a 'samurai mentality' of mindless ritualism and inflexibility. But he took longer than usual to address her question.
"I heard some of the other commanders have lost men in questionable circumstances as well. So if I view all these happenings through these eyes, I'd say Imperial samurai have caught up to us, and are making us believe in myths when we are just careless."
She grinned. That was what she needed to hear from her closest friend.
"But you've always warned me to be truthful," he persisted, and the grin dropped from her face. "Because there is something very… how do I put it? – disconcerting about this place, that defies rational judgment, My lady. But I'm sure if we met the locals, they will enlighten us."
She frowned. Not exactly what she expected from the most forward-thinking among her men. There must be something about this place to even make Osa consider the mystical over the rational,she reasoned. She stared full at the forest blossoming out from the valley under a creeping, hung-over sun. Have I come to the abode of gods and the resting place of demons?
She was conscious that there needed to be some logical explanation for this. Eyes drifting like the wind she swept away the forest, and rested her thoughts instead on the village cuddled in the valley below. She glanced at the twisted breaths of smoke rising from the open fires and fixed her eyes on a tiny, crumbling black mass which was the central, focal point of the village, which Lord Asano had visited so quietly the day before.
"Osa, leave Gonza-san and his men here to run the show for a while," she ordered. "I would like to see the village in the valley myself."
The raised crest above his eyes indicated his surprise. "Following in your noble lord's footsteps?"
She shrugged off the stabbing joke. "No. I just want to know if anyone down there has a better explanation for what's going on to us."
"Sounds reasonable." With a chuckle, he called to an ensign to relay his orders. If anyone asked, he strictly charged, he had Lady Eboshi were in a discussion. She watched him dismiss the messenger, swing the fire-cannon across his shoulder and hurry up to her.
"You know I heard the Chinese mercenaries the Emperor has bought over to fight us have got weapons like these too," Osa mentioned, his matter-of-fact tone telling her he was only half-serious. "They call them Ishibiya."
The thought entered her mind and exited it without much effect. "No matter, we'll deal with that when it comes. This is more pressing now."
They found a way down the mountain from the ridge, and as they descended below the level of clouds which fringed the valley, a slight drizzle graced their downward trek. There was no discernable pathway, but following the lichen-scarred rocks and wind-chewed shrubs, they avoided the steep cliff faces to the north which fell directly into the forest; all the while, they took the distant winding white of the main path into the village as their guide.
Taking short, sharp breaths, they let out a collective sigh of accomplishment when incline of the ground beneath their feet was finally level. Osa grinned at her. But she sought out the vital pathway: a lonely pass dominated on one side by sheer rocks faces, dwarfed on the other by an absolute drop into the valley below and scattered with rock scree nobody bothered to clear. Above her, their traversing walk across the side of the mountain was soaked with mist and cloud.
How picturesque.
She could tell from the roadway why Lord Asano had stationed his army all over the mountain: the geography made it impossible for anyone walking on the road to see – or defend himself – from anything which come from above. The pass was a treacherous stretch into a kilometre of vulnerability; through their entrance into the pass, she could only just make out the men from Lord Asano's armies dotting the slopes.If we were ambushed here, she thought, neither gods nor men would know anything about it.
Fortunately, they entered a bend, and from then on the slope leveled into what was a clear ridge, a plat plateau on which the village was located, surrounded like an island by rivulets and streams. The path started a consistent descent downwards and soon the claustrophobic cliff walls broadened out to reveal not just rocky ground, but scrub and grass. Prior to their reaching the gates of the village, the path was at its broadest, and other smaller, less noticeable paths led either back up the mountain or down to where rice grain appeared to be growing on the terraces.
A man was tending to his oxen at the gates. When he noticed them, she saw that he almost doubled over. When they neared, he gawked at them openly.Well, a lady and a man in bandages would be quite a sight, I suppose.
But he came up to them and was surprisingly polite: "My lord, my lady, excuse my behaviour. Please enter and treat our village as you would treat yours."
He followed them, and barked orders to several villagers who were also staring in disbelief at the new visitors.
As she stood at the main intersection just within the gates, she could see the entire village in one glance. The houses were shabby, the children gathering to ogle them seemed scrawny and unused to seeing strangers, and as a whole the village compound appeared very small. But almost every house appeared to tend cattle, a sure sign of some wealth; a sonorous, repetitive noise from nearby told her that the village housed a blacksmith within its gates. And along this main street, she could make out the tables and chairs and diners in what she supposed was a tavern.
"Do you get many visitors to this village?" she asked their host casually.
"No, my Lady, not many. The great Lord was the first in many months. The tavern was built for those who come in the summer."
It's already fall. Andshe made a mental note to ask him about that later as she and Osa started down the main street.
Passing the tavern, several men kept their eyes on them warily; from their gait, their axes and the firewood strung up in bundles around them, they were here to gather wood. So it seems this village exists as a stopover for resource gatherers – it was the first assessment of the village that came to her mind. Staring down the hard glances of the men, she kept pace with Osa, who was heading towards the centre of the village, to the podium which dominated her view of the place when she had been gazing down at it from her position in the mountains.
When she reached the point where the structure stood proudly in the centre of the huts, Osa and her were staring at a statue, altar and shrine, all in one.
It was built out of a murky white marble, which had lost all its lustre and colour, in the shape of an altar. There, lit joss sticks, offerings of fruit and the dead whiteness of hard-boiled eggs were evidence the villagers paid homage at this shrine. The marble surrounding the offering table appeared shattered; it crumbled as it continued into the sloping roof of a trademark mini-pagoda which held the idol. She noticed their guide hung behind and watched them.
But the idol, leering out at them from the darkness of the half-open, was grotesque. It was a boar, stooping on four legs, with its fangs bared, and its eyes the blood-red of either potted shards or jewels. Its body was coated with what could have been torn edges of a real animal's fur and hair. It waited, completely overshadowed by the roof, but with its head sticking out briefly into the sunlight. As they looked closer, someone had smeared a red paste on its tusks and teeth, which seemed sickeningly like blood. In its frozen grimace, they half expected it to pounce on them.
"What is that – thing?" Osa asked the guide. He made no secret of his repulsion of the idol.
"He is the boar god of these mountains, my lord. He is the guardian spirit of the forests and the boars. We set up this altar to him so that we might pray for safety when we go out and work in the forests."
"This monster keeps you safe?"
The guide took Osa's comment like he had been scalded by hot iron, but he looked away with a kind of self-restraint she had seen all her life in that sleazy Kyoto street. She made a gesture to Osa, then eyed the man.
"Speak, sir. We are yet strangers here and we would be glad if you have any advice for us," she spoke to him.
His face lit with surprise, and he spoke as if afraid the ugly idol might overhear them: "Don't insult Lord Nago. He is a brutal and jealous spirit, who does not hesitate to take human life."
Silence flooded the space between them. But she eyed the man seeking something more believable.
"Old man Hyoko went into the wood last winter to gather firewood, and because he was old or because he was forgetful he did not pay his respects… when he did not return we dared not find him, and sure enough, when we sought firewood the snow was red with his blood, so red it was as if it was screaming out to us.
"And the time when we did not make a sacrifice before clearing a patch of wood," their guide's face paled and his hand gestures started becoming wild. "And we were attacked… and the creatures dragged four of our strongest back to the forest!"
"Wait," she intervened in what she believed was an over-dramatization, "what creatures are you talking about?"
"Animals! All kinds! Boars, foxes, wolves, bears, deer – attacked us!"
She did not know where Osa was thinking; true or not, it was not the most wholesome way to welcome guests.
The man paused, trying to get a reaction out of them. At the focus of the village, a crowd was gathering in a crescent around the shrine and the two newcomers: children, their mothers, and a ragtag gang of woodcutters, ironsmiths and game hunters. She did not feel threatened; even though she knew the deadly sin of underestimating potential opponents, but with the fire cannon slung around Osa's shoulder, no threat would be serious enough.
If I'm so skeptical, then what about – She thought of something, and then announced it freely to the crowd: "What did the Great lord do when he came here yesterday?"
He returned her with a thoughtful gaze first, as some of the women in the crowd murmured accordingly at the subject of someone as powerful as Lord Asano. Then the guard gaze a sigh, his eyes skimming around with look that seemed to wonder why no one was following his reaction.
"I tried to warn the great lord," he said, "but he did not listen to me…No, he did listen to all I told him at first. But when I asked him that, because so many of his men were in the area, and that he should pay his respects… but he refused."
"And he insulted Lord Nago!" someone else in the crowd finished the sentence.
"The board god will get him for sure," said a man who she identified as one of the woodcutters she saw earlier. "All my mates who insulted the boar god never got out the forest alive."
This time it was Osa who was trying to signal to her; in between the villagers' frantic definitions and descriptions of how big or how many boar gods there were, their gazes met, and within their hardworking glares, they were trying to connect everything, every circumstance, every meaning –
"Does it fit your explanation?" Osa asked, leaning in to whisper into her ear.
"For that I think we'll have to find out for ourselves," she replied.
Making it look like they were compelled to give in to their guide's wishes, they paid their respects at the shrine. The villagers did not suspect anything, but were sincerely curious: one moment they had walked in both looking unconvinced and with just several simple stories they were pouring rice wine, and lighting joss sticks and tucking them neatly into those by the altar
"But please let it be known that we are not like the great lord Asano," she added. "We respect your traditions, and we won't want to anger Lord Nago."
They left the villagers hanging on her words; by then they were finished, and they left with their guide as their excited escort, their offerings becoming just another set in the mould and joss stick wax of hundreds more already there.
Both of them, leaving the ambling crowd behind, walked mostly in silence, completely understanding why they had done. And why it was needed, for now.
"I forgot to ask, sir," she turned to the guide, "but you mentioned the tavern was built for visitors in summer. But what do these people come to the village for in that season?"
"The frost in the lower slopes melts and the ground is good to dig into. So prospectors and men who work metal come, to seek the fortunes," he replied.
"To seek their fortunes? I don't quite follow."
"A fortune in iron. The hills are rich with ore."
Osa and her had gone through their strategy very carefully. If this god was to make his appearance tonight, they would at least get a glimpse of whether their guide was telling the truth or creating a very big and troublesome lie. And if it was true, it would be an interesting estimate of what Lord Asano was going up against.
Then again, they both really wanted to just dismiss everything that had happened earlier as mere villagers' superstitions and stories to scare young children.
She had allowed Gonza and his men to rest tonight. In turn, her retainers and personal guard of some one hundred and seventy men would take charge of sentry duty, and securing the perimeters of their campsite. It was a good excuse for reconnaissance. But she found herself at the western edge, down slope from the vantage point where she could observe the entire valley and uncomfortably close to the shivering, murmuring forest – with one rifleman as her partner.
She realised being a sentry was not easy. As the night wore on, she had difficulty staying awake. How did Gonza and his men stay alert the whole night, standing, with their blades, at attention? Protected from the blast of the wind by rock, and sitting comfortably with her fire-cannon at her feet, she still could not help but nod off to sleep. Her rifleman compensated by playing with his flint and steel, occasionally striking sparks and sometimes accidentally burning his fingers.
What in the name of Eboshi am I doing here?
The darkness was so thick, so pressing, that it suffocated her if she failed to clamp her eyes shut; even in her own head, the self-created black within her own eyes felt more comfortable than the night shrouding her. And even there, she could make out the dim smear, a mental obstruction, that was the forest, swimming like a dream she could not shake off in her mind.
She did not know how much time had passed, or how deep in the night was it. But her semi-conscious sleep was interrupted by something distinctly not natural. She did not fix a location to the sound, but she turned to her rifleman.
"Did you hear that?" she asked.
"Eh?"
"Baka. You didn't hear anything?"
"No, my Lady I…"
And then they both heard it. Unmistakably, the sound of an explosion ripped through the compressed silence, sending the darkness away with a burst of dull red and a muffled echo which could only be a fire cannon going off. Before she could order the rifleman, a horrid scream made them jump.
"My lady…"
"Enough talking," she threw the man's fire cannon into his arms before picking hers. "Get up and move!"
The flash of red was obvious in the pitch black, and she scarcely had time to notice where her rifleman was heading towards. Someone cried, "We are under attack!" But she paid no heed. The night was flying past her – she saw figures moving in the dark. And she half-expected it when another shot tore through the forest with flash of yellow that it burned her eyes.
A massive thick mount of blackness was stirring just a stone's throw from her; it occupied the entire space she was running towards. Without hesitation, trained by her instinct and her trembling urgency, she fell to her knees, flung the flint from her cloak to her fingers, and lit it. She stabled herself, and at the same time felt the flint burst into life with a single strike. In a breath, she took the fire cannon on her shoulder and stabbed the flint in the cannon's hollow.
It let loose a welcoming yell of fire, iron and light.
And in the crescendo of that flash she saw two things: a hideous, red-eyed, skeletal monster, in the likeness of a boar, the height of the tree, digging in its tusks into a bloody mould of a man – and it bloodcurdling squeal as it dodged to avoid her shot.
Then all became dark again.
Oh the gods!
She could hear it moving, the clatter of hooves getting louder, the rumbling of the very air around her in anticipation for the monster.Help help help! – she fumbled with the iron pellet and the powder and, her hands blackened, stuffed it into the shaft of the cannon – oh the gods! – by the time she brought the cannon to her shoulder, she felt the creature ram into her; for two seconds she seemed free of earthly restraint, then she landed painfully on her side.
"My lady!"
But she was not interested. Her fire-cannon was not with her, but I'm still alive! Another blast caught her eye: her rifleman had taken a shot at the charging boar, but missed. He turned to run, and she watched without helping long enough to see him get gored, and then run over by the huge animal –
The creature turned, tossed back its head to make another piercing squeal, before running back into the forest, accompanied by misguided attempts to shoot it down.
And just before it merged with the darkness again, she swore it glimpsed right at her: two convulsing, scarred red eyes like globes, mocking her –Aiyo Eboshi…
"My Lady! Are you hurt?"
It was Osa's voice – so who did the creature kill? Giving in to her reflexes, she clenched the arm that broke her fall; it responded, and then the feeling melted away. She could not feel any blood, but all she could think of was the plague of red eyes breaking through the dark foliage at her.It didn't kill me. She panted and then the pain began to flow from her injured arm. It didn't kill me for a reason, did it?
A vague memory of joss sticks and incense and an ugly stone statue strained her mind. That. And she knew the silly precautions she and Osa took had worked. Was it. She summoned enough strength to lift her wounded arm into the support of her other. That same strength was still keeping her upright and unafraid to peel her eyes off the spot where the creature – no, god – whatever – escaped. He had insulted and wounded her, and killed her men. She felt that this was a crime worse than Sesuke's taunts and his driving her brother to his grave.
I will slay you, boar god.
Her injured arm throbbed in response to her hardening heart. It would not be the last time it would sustain injury, while fighting against these beings she had not yet acknowledged as gods.
NOTES: Thanks for your patience. I've been having a sudden revival for prose writing for quite a while now; this chapter came out faster than usual. I'm concentrating on trying to reach a conclusion for my story, so that it won't drag on and on.
At this juncture, let me point out that it's getting difficult to be all-inclusive: trying to explain every aspect of Lady Eboshi's character is proving quite trying. Her association with lepers & brothel-girls, her weaponry, her feud with San… so, haha, please forgive me if I gloss over some things. Not that I would do so intentionally, but I might…
Exams next week, sial. 5 papers in 14 days! This is where writing really becomes catharsis. I used to write through my O & A level papers because it relaxed me. Now that I'm in university, these upcoming tests are going to help me prove that if you like writing, you can write anytime, in any circumstance. The next chapter will probably appear different – because it was written during the crunch time period! But till the next chapter… please read & review. Thanks!