returned with a ceramic jar and cup. Kneeling, she poured amber-colored liquid. “Here. Drink this.”
Reiko took the cup and sniffed. Alcoholic fumes stung her nostrils. “What is it?”
“Native wine. Made from millet and rice. It’ll make you feel better.”
It could hardly make her feel any worse. Reiko drank it down. The liquor was tart and strong. It burned her throat, but her nausea abated, and a calming, sedative relief crept through her. “Thank you.”
Lilac beamed, happy to be of service. As she took the cup from Reiko, their fingers touched. “Your hands are like ice. Here, let’s warm them up.” She pulled a brazier close to Reiko.
“You’re very kind,” Reiko said, gratefully holding her hands over the heat.
Yet she still didn’t care much for Lilac. She felt the pressure of an ulterior motive behind the girl’s kindness. But if the girl wanted to be useful, Reiko would give her the opportunity.
“What do you have to tell me that you couldn’t when we were with Lady Matsumae?” Reiko asked.
Lilac’s eyes sparkled with eagerness, but she hesitated. “I don’t know if I should say.”
“Why not?”
“I’ll get in trouble if I talk about Lady Matsumae.”
That was an understandable fear for a servant at the mercy of her mistress, but Reiko suspected a less admirable reason behind Lilac’s sudden reticence. “In that case, I’d like to be by myself,” she said, not in the mood for games. “You’re dismissed.”
As Lilac rose, she seemed torn between her need to keep quiet about what she knew and her wish to stay with Reiko. She said slowly, Lady Matsumae wasn’t jealous about her husband. That’s not why she hated Tekare.“
Reiko motioned Lilac to sit. “Why did she?”
Lilac obeyed, although Reiko could see her calculating how to make the most of the least that she could tell. “It was what happened to her daughter.”
The last thing Reiko wanted was to hear another story about Lady Matsumae’s dead child, but it might illuminate a possible motive for the murder. “What happened?”
“When Nobuko got sick, the Japanese doctors couldn’t cure her. Lady Matsumae was desperate. Tekare was a shamaness. She was supposed to be able to cure diseases with magic. Lord Matsumae said to let her try to cure Nobuko. Even though Lady Matsumae doesn’t like the natives, she agreed. So Tekare performed a spell.”
Lilac paused. Thoughts creased her brow. Reiko prompted, “What kind of spell?”
“A spell to drive off the evil spirit that was causing the sickness. Tekare burned a branch of spruce. She beat on a drum and sang prayers. She wrapped Nobuko with bulrush cords. Then she cut them off with a knife. She said that would cut the spirit’s power, so it couldn’t hurt Nobuko anymore. And she gave Nobuko a potion to drink, to make her strong again.”
“But she didn’t get better,” Reiko finished.
“She died the very next day. Tekare said it was because the spirit had too strong a hold on Nobuko. Lord Matsumae believed her. But Lady Matsumae didn’t. She said Tekare had put poison in the potion. She accused Tekare of murdering Nobuko.”
Surprise jarred Reiko. No wonder Lady Matsumae had laughed at the suggestion that she’d killed Tekare because the native woman had stolen her husband’s affections. It was so far off the mark-if Lilac was telling the truth.
“Ask the other servants,” Lilac said, noticing Reiko’s distrust. “They’ll tell you that’s what happened.”
“But why would Tekare have killed Nobuko?” Reiko asked.
“You’ve seen how Lady Matsumae treats the Ezo women. Maybe Tekare wanted to get even with her.”
“Badly enough to poison the child?” Incredulity filled Reiko.
“Tekare wasn’t a nice person,” Lilac said. “She didn’t put up with Lady Matsumae or anybody else being mean to her. She could have done it.”
“But to kill Lord Matsumae’s daughter?” Reiko couldn’t believe Tekare had dared kill the child of a man who was not only her lover but the ruler of her land.
Then she remembered another woman who’d tried to murder a child of another powerful man because of her cruel, sick hatred for the child’s mother. A shiver rippled through Reiko, as it always did when she thought of Lady Yanagisawa, now exiled to Hachijo Island with her husband, the former chamberlain. She felt the same rage as on the day that Lady Yanagisawa had almost contrived Masahiro’s death. Lady Matsumae’s belief that Tekare had poisoned her daughter gave her a far better cause for murder than did sexual jealousy.
“Lord Matsumae thought Nobuko was going to die anyway,” Lilac said. “Tekare knew he wouldn’t have blamed her. And he didn’t. He thought she could do no wrong.”
Reiko shook her head, deploring the idea that Tekare had been a woman capable of such an atrocity, that Sano and Reiko were trying to get justice for a victim who hardly deserved it. “What was in that potion?”
“Native plants, I guess. Ezo shamanesses keep that kind of thing secret.”
But even if Lady Matsumae was the murderer, how could Reiko prove it? She contemplated Lilac. “You spend a lot of time with Lady Matsumae, don’t you?”
“Yes,” the girl said. “She works me practically to death.”
“Has she said anything to indicate that she killed Tekare?”
“Not that I heard. She’s careful about talking in front of the servants.”
But Reiko suspected that Lilac was adept at spying. “Did you see her do anything that looked suspicious?”
“No.”
“On the day that Tekare died, did Lady Matsumae leave the castle?” Reiko said. To set the trap, she would have had to go to the path before nightfall.
I don’t know. But I wasn’t with her that whole day. I remember she sent me out shopping in town.“
Perhaps to rid herself of a nosy witness, Reiko thought. Or perhaps to cover for someone who’d set the trap for her. “What about her ladies-in-waiting? Did they go out?”
“I don’t know.”
Frustration slid Reiko’s spirits downward. Even though she’d discovered a new, strong possible motive for the murder, she was back where she’d been when she’d left Lady Matsumae-with four suspects and no evidence. Even though somebody in the castle might have seen one of them sneaking outside, spring-bow in hand, how could Reiko search for a witness while she had such limited freedom?
She said in desperation, “Lilac, do you know anything else?”
The girl’s gaze slithered away from Reiko.
“What is it?”
Thoughts flitted across Lilac’s face. She toyed with a patch on her coat. The threads were coming loose.
“Tell me!” Reiko ordered, bursting with impatience.
“Suppose I do.” Lilac put one word slowly after another, as if giving herself time to think. She watched Reiko from the corners of her eyes. “If I tell you, what will you do for me?”
Here it was, the real reason Lilac had at first balked at revealing the story about Lady Matsumae: She wanted to barter her knowledge for personal gain. She didn’t want to throw it away for the mere sake of helping Reiko. Although Reiko disapproved of the girl’s attempt at extortion, she was in no position to resist.
“I’ll do anything you ask,” she said. “Just name it.”
A smile twitched Lilac’s mouth as she sensed her fondest wishes within reach. “I want to get out of Ezogashima. I want to go to Edo, to live in the big city. Maybe you need a maid? When you go home, you’ll take me with you?”
Under any other circumstances, Reiko wouldn’t hire such a shifty character as Lilac, but now she said, “Yes, if that’s what you want.”
Lilac turned to her, eyes agleam. “It would be better if I didn’t have to work. Maybe I could be your companion instead?”
At the girl’s mercy, Reiko said, “All right.”
“Someday I’d like to marry a rich samurai. Could you find a husband for me?”
Obviously sensing she’d overstepped herself, Lilac said, “Yesterday I told you I’d look around for your son. What if I know something about him, too?”
“Do you?” Reiko gasped with hope even as she hated Lilac for playing on her vulnerability.
“I might,” Lilac said, crafty and enjoying her power over Reiko. “But if you want me to tell you what, you’ll have
