is this how it has to be? Doesn't
it ever stop until someone's dead...?"
"Ya dumb kid. It doesn't end even
when someone dies... Not really."
--Rin and Manji, On Silent Wings II
"When Dreaming Ends"
Part Two -- The Circle of Revenge
"And here..." The wiry old man lifted a sword from its holder with trembling hands. Renzo watched him do this with some degree of surprise -- one would think that a sword polisher would be a whole lot steadier. This was no small job, what the man called Kageyama did. It was an art, something delicate and beautiful that was not the same for any two weapons.
"They are not of great value, but here..." He pulled the blade from its sheath delicately, exposing only a short fraction below the hilt. "...Is the quality of my workmanship. Look there, at this grain..." Renzo tried to look like he knew what the man was talking about. He hadn't a clue -- this sword didn't look any different from the rest that were scattered about the small storage room. Metal and lacquer, that was all that he could really see. But the old man did not have to know this.
Two days had passed. Renzo had combed Edo for a place to restart his life, albeit temporarily. He was too weak to carry carts, too young to sell higher-quality wares and too old to sell things of lower-quality. The potter would not take him in because he didn't have enough potential, and weavers thought him too clumsy.
On the first night, Renzo had tried desperately to make a mask. His father's name was relatively well-known, and perhaps, with luck...
...Someone would buy the trash that came from Renzo's hands. The boy could not mold, he could not cut smooth holes, and his painted designs were off-balance and unattractive. It was hurtful, realizing that his father's talents had died with him. Why couldn't Renzo have inherited some useful skill from Araya?
The sword polisher was getting old, and he had no apprentice or help. Renzo was surprised to have been accepted; although old Kageyama told him that he was only an errand-boy at his point... he could keep an eye on things, and perhaps if he picked up enough from observation Kageyama could start him on one of the old swords in the back. Perhaps. There were no guarantees.
That was the room that they stood in. Next-door was the sleeping area. For the first time in what seemed like an eternity, Renzo did not sleep in an empty room. The nights were chilly, and the old man was in great need of a younger body to keep his bones warm. There, in the dark, with an ancient heartbeat thudding against his skin, Renzo slept better than he had thought he would.
It felt so good to have gotten out of that house of ghosts. It made Renzo guilty to feel this way, but he felt it all the same. He was glad to not have to stare at the walls of that empty room at night... to feel his eyes seek out that persistent blood-stain and stare at it until fatigue tore him out of his misery and into a fitful sleep.
Old Kageyama returned the sword to its niche, and then tiredly rubbed at his back and slid his watery brown eyes off toward the front of the shop with a fatigued little upward-and-sideways circle. "It may seem slow at times, but you'll get to appreciate it, boy, as long as it doesn't stop completely."
"After all," he continued with an elastic little grin. "A dirty blade usually means a couple of corpses!"
- - -
Renzo frowned idly to himself and swung the narrow tree branch out with a lazy little flick of his wrist. It was late afternoon, and he had slipped out of the back of the shop while old Kageyama dozed out by the foyer in the warm sunshine.
His feet were tiredly a short distance apart, as if he were a bored child playing with a sparkler. Back the branch went, forth, and then back again.
"This is dumb, Dad."
Araya's thin mouth lifted up on both sides, and his eyes narrowed warmly with his smile. It was odd, how the man could look so loving and stern at the same time. There was a practiced, controlled grace about him as he eased into his low eye-to-eye crouch. A tengu mask was pushed up on the top of his head, Renzo could see the long beak rise up like a white horn against the festival lanterns that hung in the street all around them. The sound of drums sang in the air, mingling with children's laughter. So much gaiety...
"C'mon, Renzo," Araya said in his measured tenor. He took Renzo's wrist in his strong hand and held it there, before taking a small blazing strip of kindling to the paper tip of the firework that was clenched in the boy's small fist. It flared, and then burst into a small fountain of sparks.
"Only little kids use these things!" Renzo cried.
That tiny, narrow smile widened slightly on one corner. "Well," He replied slowly, before blowing out his kindling with a tight little puff. He released the boy's arm and set his elegant hand atop of Renzo's head. With a ruffle of his hair, he quipped, "Last time I checked..."
"Daaaad," Renzo whined. "You're embarrassing me."
Araya set his hands on his hips and playfully cocked an eyebrow at his son. "You're complaining now," He said. "But I'm willing to be my life that someday you'll look back and wish that you could do stuff like this again."
Renzo realized that his eyes were wet. When he tried to blink it away, he saw that he was no longer at the festival outside his house all of those...months ago? Years? He was behind the sword polisher's shop, and his limp arm was carrying a thin old branch wearily at his side.
He lifted a wrist and ran it messily across his nose. Swallowing back his anger and misery enough to control himself, he adjusted the rock in his throat enough to breathe through it, and looked down at the branch in his hand again.
That bastard's looming, smug face swam before his vision. He remembered that scar, that ugly disfiguring scar that ran down his eye... the sight of his good one glittering with cold amusement. Renzo was just a kid to him...A worthless, weak, pathetic little child.
He'd shown him.
Renzo's knuckles felt as if they would pop. He clenched the branch, set his teeth, and swung it around with a tight and double-fisted underhand swing. Letting out a hissing and energy-filled cry, he let the air split around him. Something felt good about it, something primal... the way that his feet locked into the ground as if every cell had merged with the earth, the feeling of his rage rising up and rumbling in his throat, the elastic tightness of his arms and sides, the feeling of the branch slicing through the air like ripping gossamer.
"Ahem."
Renzo jumped, and the branch cluttered dully onto the ground at his feet. Whirring, he found himself staring up at a stony man in a neat kimono. A blade was tucked nicely into his sash, and his chin was high in a way that screamed confidence. He was about six yards away, and stood in a way that seemed to make Renzo feel trapped. Swallowing back warily, Renzo shifted back a fraction.
"I...I-'m sorry." He said. "I didn't see you--"
"That's unfortunate. A training swordsman should be more aware of his surroundings." There was something dark about his voice, something that made Renzo squirm. Contempt.
"I, heh..." Renzo tried to lift a smile. "I'm not... I was just..."
"Never?" The man asked. "Perhaps you should consider, then. You seem to have some natural ability. The way you move your wrists -- it takes some people a great deal practice to do that."
"I...Thanks?" If the man had meant to compliment him, he didn't show it. He spoke to Renzo, and then it was as if Renzo did not exist -- or was not worthy of it, at least.
"Inomura!" The man did not flinch, but Renzo spun to spy old Kageyama as he hobbled toward them, waving his hand as if he were trying to communicate over a great distance. Bowing profusely, he managed to say. "I am sorry, I had started to close up shop. I did not mean to force you to enter back here." As he was supposed to, Kageyama made it sound as if it were his fault for the error. Inomura understood, and he nodded his head vaguely at the man's bowing.
"I heard your boy out back." He said. Kageyama shot Renzo a wide-eyed look, something mixed between fear and fury, before bowing to Inomura once more. "I apologize! The boy doesn't know right from left, yet. I am sorry that he caused you so much trouble." And then, with a jerky snap of his head, he urged Renzo to head inside. Renzo, blanching, moved quickly ahead and went to slide open the door for the two men.
Inomura looked so strong and rigid against the old man. Kageyama did not stoop that much, his back was still straight, but he was still crooked in comparison to Inomura's starched way of moving. With a swish of his hakama trousers, Inomura stepped out of his sandals and strode into the main room. Renzo immediately went to turn them around so that Inomura could simply step into him when exiting.
"Please, take a seat out front." Kageyama said, bowing in a way that was almost a cower. He looked oddly fearful of this imposing man, and Renzo silently flickered his eyes from one to another... curious. He said not a word, however, and kept his face placidly blank. And, at the moment Inomura turned his back, Kageyama whirred on Renzo and hissed.
"Bring a message to Iijima -- I will not have his weapons ready until the end of the week. Take your time, boy, and get yourself something to eat." Kageyama's calloused hand pressed a few coins into Renzo's palm, and then he gave the boy a little push toward the back door.
"But--" Renzo objected. He must have spoken too loudly, for Kageyama gave him another little spin and jerked him face-to-face, so that he could hiss in the ghost of a heated whisper, "Inomura is very particular about how things are run. It would be best if you would just disappear for a while, understand?"
"But I thought that I was supposed to watch--"
"--And do what you're told!" Kageyama snapped. Renzo, a little dazed at this point, was practically shoved out the door and into his sandals. Skittering out across the ground outside, he looked over his shoulder with wide eyes. There was the glimmer of Kageyama's somewhat detached nod, and then a snap as the door was closed behind him.
"I have sent the boy for some better sake," Kageyama
said as he eased himself back into Inomura's company and bowed extremely low
again. "I fear that what I have is of extremely low quality, and apologize to
have to serve--"
"Cut the formalities," Inomura said. Kageyama's mouth twitched as the stiff man
unlooped and removed his sheathed blade from his sash. Quickly, Kageyama knelt
and laid down a square of white cloth on the mat in front of the man, and
without even slowing in his movements despite this, Inomura set his sword down
lengthwise atop of it. Kageyama took a moment to politely admire it, although
he did not have to pretend. The sheath was plain, of less quality of most
everything he had in the back... but the blade beneath was a work of art.
Everyone knew that Inomura carried an almost priceless weapon. Kageyama, after
that formal moment, set his palms down in order to bow again and stammer a,
"I am honored that you have chosen me for such an important task--"
"The last man did a poor job at it." Inomura interrupted. Something in his voice made Kageyama's innards draw up into cowering little knots. "There are a number of things that I expect you to fix. Let me assure you, if this weapon is in any way harmed or damaged, there will be great consequences. I will make sure of this. Do you understand? If not, I will take my business someplace else."
"Of
course," Kageyama said. "My family has been in this work for generations. We
have not dissatisfied a customer yet."
"Hopefully," Inomura said with a sideways nod, "It will stay that way."
It will, it will, you tight-assed mongrel, Kageyama thought, as he
sweetly set his forehead to the mats and offered his gracious thanks again.
- - -
Renzo brought the tiny cup of steaming broth up to his lips and idly shoveled some noodles into his mouth with a push of his chopsticks. His brown eyes shifted from side to side as he moved down and away from the already thinning crowd and back towards Kageyama's shop. Although part of him hated himself for it, it was not enough to stop him from feeling the barest glimmers of contentment. Warm food, the bustle of life, and something to do besides mope and mourn.
I didn't even have time to make an offering at Dad's grave, he thought with a mixture of anxiety and...Relief? It was a strange feeling, as if he had cleverly gotten out of a chore. Scolding himself, he vowed to spend a little more time praying when he went to visit his father the next day.
The sound of loud hammering broke him out of his thoughts, and he lifted his face out of his dinner in order to spy a young man who was struggling with something at the roadside. A hammer was in one hand, and four nails stuck out of his mouth like tiny tongues. Remembering that a festival would be rounding the corner soon -- there almost always was -- Renzo realized that the man must have been preparing a notice for some event. Feeling in better spirits than he had in a long time, he shifted his head and called out, a little hesitantly at first,
"Would
you like some help?"
The man looked surprise, and, after a moment of suspicious silence nodded his
consent. Renzo didn't look much like a thief, and the man obviously didn't have
anything of worth on him. Renzo set his cup on the ground, and knelt to hold
the empty sign-post in place. After a few quiet moments, it was steady and
upright.
"Mmnks," The man said from behind his nails. And then, after a bashful little grin, he pulled him out and said, "Thank you -- here, could you hold these?" Renzo took them idly and then took up his soup in his free hand, and watched through the dusk as the man turned and unrolled a sheet of paper and took the nails one-by-one in order to pounded the notice onto the sign.
Sipping at the broth and nudging his chopsticks out of his way with his nose, Renzo watched the man's back. As he took the last nail, the boy shifted off to one side in order to read over his shoulder and asked, "What's the event? Anything interesting?"
"It's not for a festival," The man said. "There are some murderers on the loose, they..." His voice slowed and trailed off, as he felt the boy's soup splash on his trouser-leg as the cup clattered soundlessly to the ground.
Renzo's eye twitched, and his heart clearly came to a halt in his chest. His lips went slack and tried to work out breath, but everything that tried to leave his mouth got caught and strangled, lingering like a mouthful of rotten food.
"Kid?" The man asked warily. "You okay?"
Renzo had dropped to his knees. He didn't notice the broth seeping up into his legs. He didn't notice the world around him. The man's question sounded distant and faded, like watermarks on white paper. His shoulders felt slack, and yet every bone seemed to have fused together and forced him upright, a wooden puppet hanging on its rack.
"...Kid?"
The world was gone, except for one thing -- staring at him was an image of two familiar faces drawn neatly on the wanted notice. That kimono, those girlish twin braids... and next to her, that smirk. That cold, scarred eye. Two criminals, two murderers...
One was the man who had killed his father.
He was dead. He was supposed to be dead. Renzo had slain him. He had closed the circle of revenge.
And the other was the girl that had assured him that his father's killer was gone and buried. She was the one that had held him as he broke down and realized that Araya was really gone. This was the girl that he had trusted as a friend.
An accomplice.
A liar.
...A murderer.