from.
Here immense slabs of rock roseto an outer wall and to the black timbers of a gallery jutting into the stormygray sky above them. Dry shrubs and stunted trees grew from cracks in therocks. Kaoru moved along the path to one of the slabs of rock and felt it. Hegrunted and gave a push, and Akitada saw a crack widen into a thin blackfissure.
Like the tomb entrance, Akitadathought with a shiver. He said aloud, “What about the signal?”
Kaoru nodded. “We wait a littlelonger, but there isn’t much time left.”
So they stood, shivering in thesleeting rain with their sword grips freezing to their perspiring palms,wondering if Koreburo had been caught. Akitada heard distant drumbeats carriedon the wind in snatches. Takesuke was following instructions and exercising histroops. Akitada wished himself a common foot soldier, trotting briskly andunencumbered by heavy armor to the command of an officer. He was impatient toget this over with, to confront what lay in wait behind the stone door. Action,any kind of action, was preferable to this agonizing process of congealing inthe freezing blasts.
When it finally came, that cryof the snow goose, once, and quickly again, they exchanged glances, then tossedoff their straw wraps and gripped their swords more tightly. Kaoru and Toratogether pushed the stone aside. A dark and narrow stone stairway ascendedinside.
Suddenly, before Kaoru couldtake the lead, Hitomaro pushed past Akitada and disappeared into the darkness.Tora muttered a curse, and Akitada drew his sword and went after Hitomaro intothe murky shaft leading upward. Hitomaro’s rapid steps sounded ahead, but itwas too dark to see. What was the fool doing? At any moment he might run intodanger and give them away. More steps shuffled behind, but Akitada was bent oncatching up with Hitomaro.
The climb through a tight blackspace, only occasionally lit by air holes in the outer walls, seemed to lastforever. The steps twisted, turned, and switched back. Akitada’s sword onceclattered against the wall and he caught it. Someone behind him slipped andcursed softly. Sweat trickled down Akitada’s temples, and his fingers crampedaround the sword hilt. He tried to listen, but his breathing and the bloodpounding in his ears muffled all other sounds. If Hitomaro had encountered aguard, he was already a dead man. And so were they all.
Then he caught a faint whiff ofburning oil. Wood scraped on wood and, as he turned a corner, faint light camethrough a grate just large enough for a man to get through. Hitomaro coweredthere, a hulking black shadow, until Akitada saw his face flushed by the lightas he removed the grate and slipped through the opening.
“Come, sir,” he said softly,holding out a hand to Akitada. “It’s safe.”
“That was a very foolish trick,”Akitada hissed angrily. “You might have ruined everything by rushing ahead whenKaoru knows the way.”
Hitomaro’s face wasexpressionless. “Sorry, sir.”
Akitada climbed out into anempty enclosed gallery. The corridor was a little over a hundred feet long, itsnarrow shutters closed tight against the weather, and the dim space lit at eachend by large metal oil lamps attached to beams. It was silent and deserted, butthey could hear men shouting outside. No doubt Uesugi’s warriors were gettingready for Takesuke’s attack.
The other two joined them.Akitada said, “Very well. Let’s see about finding Uesugi and opening that gate.”It sounded ridiculously simple to his ears and, standing there in the enemy’sstronghold, he half believed it would be.
“Come and see,” Kaoru gruntedand opened one of the shutters a crack.
When Akitada joined him, helooked through a loophole from which an archer could shoot arrows into thelower entrance courtyard. Armed soldiers sat about in small groups.Black-and-white Uesugi banners were everywhere. One man carried equipment tothe tower above the gate. Akitada’s heart sank. They could not reach the gatewithout being cut down in the attempt. Even if the men in the courtyard couldbe distracted long enough, the watchtower above bristled with archers.
Kaoru closed the shutter andwent to put the grate back into place. “We cannot stay here,” he said softly. “Someonemight come any moment. Follow me, but remember the place in case you have torun for your life.” They ran down the corridor away from the main house.Akitada chafed at this and at the fact that Kaoru had taken over and was givingthe orders, but he submitted. He felt badly out of his depth.
The gallery adjoined another,equally empty, and this led to one of the service areas. Kaoru peered outcautiously. It was the kitchen yard, and deserted. No smoke came from thekitchen hearth. The cooking fires had been extinguished prior to battle. Kaorucrossed the yard, headed for a storage shed. They followed, slipped in behindhim, and he closed the door.
“You’ll be safe here for themoment,” he said.
They stood in a small spacefilled with baskets and brooms, kettles and pails, faggots and oil jars, allthe paraphernalia to keep a large household stocked. Akitada’s heart waspounding. He said, “The gate. We must reach that gate. How many men does ittake to open it?”
“One, at the most two.”
Kaoru still sounded confident,but Akitada had become all too aware of his own lack of planning. “You’re sure?”he persisted, wondering if two of them could engage the soldiers he had seen,some fifteen or twenty, long enough to let the other two slip past to the gate.With the archers above, it wasn’t likely.
“There’s a counterweight. I cando it by myself.”
“We need to draw some of thesoldiers away. What about that fire Koreburo was to start?”
Kaoru opened the shed door andpeered out. He closed it again. “No sign of it. He should have done so already.If you’ll wait here, I’ll try to find him.” Before Akitada could protest, Kaoruhad slipped out.
Akitada suppressed a suddenpanic and motioned to the other two to sit down. They sat, each caught in hisown thoughts, and waited in the murky semidarkness of the small shed. The smellof wood and dried grasses hung in the chill air.
Tora’s eyes were wide open andhis hands twitched occasionally with suppressed excitement. Hitomaro leanedback against the wall, perfectly still, his eyes closed, his chin on his chest.Looking at them, Akitada reflected how close these two men were to him, and howdanger affected them all differently. He remembered Takesuke’s fervent wishthat Uesugi would attack the tribunal, while he himself had been weighed downwith fears for his family and his people. Takesuke’s high spirits had struckhim as irresponsible and bloodthirsty then. Now he wondered if he was the onewho was inadequate to his duty. Takesuke, Tora, and Hitomaro were all trainedsoldiers, while he was an official. What did he know of war? Yet, by acceptingthis appointment, he had also accepted the possibility of having to fight.
Here he was, in unaccustomedarmor and uncomfortable, feeling ambivalent about the violence he was about toface and-worse-to commit. They had gained entrance to the stronghold withoutbeing discovered, but the real test still lay ahead, and Akitada doubted thathe could pass it.
If Kaoru was caught, he wouldbe questioned under torture. Whether he revealed their presence or not, asubsequent search would find them, and then they would die ignobly here,slaughtered among brooms and braziers. There was no defense against the odds,even if it were possible to swing a sword in these cramped quarters.
It wasn’t going to be easy atall.
* * * *
TWENTY-ONE
TO THE DEATH
A
kitadadid not want to wait for death.
Neither did the others. Torabroke into his thoughts impatiently. “Where in hell is Kaoru? He has nerve,telling us to sit here and wait for him. Who does he think he is? I don’t likeit. We’re stuck here like rats in a box.” He stood up and walked to the door,opening it a crack.
Hitomaro went to join him. “It’stoo quiet,” he said.
Tora asked, “What if it’s atrap, sir? To my mind the fellow’s just too well informed about this place fora mere woodsman.”
Akitada hated the inactivity,but he shook his head. “No, we must trust Kaoru. He’ll be back any
