“All right.” Sano thought how bizarre this was, discussing which murder to commit first, as matter-of-factly as deciding which dish to order at a food stand. It occurred to him that he would probably never eat again. Even if they succeeded in killing all three targets, they wouldn’t live much longer until the troops ganged up on and slaughtered them. “Wente it is.”
“Follow me,” Hirata said.
He slithered across the ground under the palace. Sano trusted that he knew where he was going; maybe he could sense the native women’s energy. Sano and the other men crawled less gracefully after him. They’d traveled long enough for Sano’s knees and elbows to grow sore, when Hirata stopped. He pointed upward, then at the lattice at the bottom of the nearest wall. He inched over to the lattice, peered outside, then heaved his shoulder against it.
The wooden grid broke loose. Everyone emerged into the garden outside the women’s quarters. Troops called to one another, but none were in sight. Sano and his men ran up the steps, through the door, then down the corridor. Sano heard the concubines speaking in their language. Marume halted outside a sliding door, cracked it open, glanced in, and nodded to the others. They all invaded the room.
Women were kneeling grouped together, their tattooed mouths wide, staring at him and his men. Sano saw their ancient fear of his kind. The room was a shambles, with clothes and furniture flung around, ashes from the fire pit scattered on the mats, a loom broken. The women looked so much alike that Sano had to study their faces closely. He noticed fresh bruises, bleeding lips, and swollen eyes, but the person he wanted wasn’t among them.
“We want Wente,” he said. “Tell us where she is, and we’ll leave you alone.”
The oldest, a woman with a strongly beautiful face, uttered a brief phrase. The Rat translated, “‘Wente’s gone.”“
“Gone where?” Sano said, impatient.
As the woman spoke, the Rat said, “She left the castle. She took dogs, a sled, and food.” The woman pointed at Sano, and surprise altered the Rat’s expression. “She took your wife.”
“Reiko?” Sano’s impatience turned to puzzlement. “Why?”
A torrent of words issued from the woman. “She doesn’t know,” the Rat said. “None of the concubines do. But Reiko and Wente were going on a long journey. They took enough food for several days.”
Sano shook his head, trying to make sense of this. Things were changing too fast. What had diverted Reiko from her original plan and sent her off on a trip with Wente? A possible answer alarmed Sano.
“Maybe Wente pretended she’d found out that Masahiro escaped from the castle and he’s alive,” Sano said. “Reiko would have been desperate to believe in miracles and easily tricked. She would go to the ends of the earth with anyone she thought could give her back our son.”
“Anyone, including a murder suspect,” Marume said. His and the other men’s faces showed dismay as they caught Sano’s meaning.
“Reiko could have stumbled onto evidence that incriminated Wente,” Sano said. “Maybe Wente was only afraid Reiko would. But whatever the truth, Wente must have lured Reiko out to the wilderness, to silence her permanently.”
He didn’t think Wente would use outright physical violence against Reiko. That seemed not in character for Wente, considering her part in Tekare’s murder. More likely, Wente would take Reiko far enough from town that she couldn’t make her way back alone, then abandon her to die of the cold. Wente’s devious cruelty shocked Sano. The thought of Reiko, innocent and vulnerable, alone with the murderess!
The native woman shouted something at Sano, waving her hands to get his attention. It sounded like a warning. The Rat said, “She says your wife and Wente are in danger. Gizaemon knows they left. He’s gone after them.”
Misfortune piled on top of misfortune. Reiko was at the mercy of one killer and under pursuit by the other. “How did Gizaemon find out? When was this?”
As the woman spoke, the Rat anxiously translated: “Wente and Lady Reiko left about three hours-ago. Gizaemon came here just before us. He was looking for Lady Reiko.”
Sano realized what had happened while he and his men had been out solving me crime. The guards in the guest quarters had regained consciousness, had reported that the prisoners were missing. Gizaemon had launched a hunt for them and searched for Reiko in the women’s quarters.
“He asked these women if they’d seen her,” the Rat continued. “They said no. Wente had sworn them to secrecy. But he guessed that they were lying.” The woman gestured at the tumbled furniture and clothes. “He got mad and wrecked the room. Then he noticed that Wente wasn’t here. He asked where she was. He seemed even more upset about her being gone than about Lady Reiko. He beat the women until they gave up and told him Wente had taken Lady Reiko away.”
Sano put together the rest of the story. “After Tekare’s murder, Gizaemon would have ordered Wente to keep quiet.” Gizaemon had thought himself safe because she knew that incriminating him would incriminate her as well. “But when I started investigating the murder, he became afraid that Wente would crack.” Now Gizaemon was less concerned that Reiko, Sano, and their comrades were at large than threatened because Wente had escaped his control. “He can’t let her go free to tell anyone about his part in Tekare’s death; he can’t risk that Lord Matsumae might hear. He has to cover his tracks by doing what he knows he should have done sooner.”
“Eliminate Wente,” concluded Marume.
Sano’s horror multiplied as he realized what that meant for his wife. “When Gizaemon kills Wente, he can’t leave a witness. If Reiko is there to see, she’ll figure out why he did it. She can’t be permitted to live and tell. Gizaemon will kill her, if Wente hasn’t yet.” The situation altered drastically once more, as did Sano’s plans. “We have to get to Reiko and Wente before Gizaemon does.”
“All right,” Marume said. “We’ll go after them. But what about Lord Matsumae? Should we forget about him, or kill him first?”
Sano’s attitude toward Lord Matsumae shifted to fit the new reality. Lord Matsumae hadn’t murdered Tekare. And although Sano wasn’t willing to forgive him for everything else, including Masahiro’s death, there was a reason to keep him alive. Sano thought of Reiko and Wente somewhere in the vast, winter wilderness of Ezogashima. He and his men lacked the equipment and skills to find the women. They would surely get lost and freeze to death before they could save Reiko, and Gizaemon had a big head start.
“No,” Sano said, “we shouldn’t forget Lord Matsumae, but we won’t kill him-at least not yet. We need him.”
32
Sunset painted brilliant copper bands across the sky. Reiko and Wente rode the sled through a meadow whose snow glowed with fiery, reflected light. They and the dogs trotting ahead of them were alone in the wilderness landscape that spread as far as Reiko could see.
They’d spent the long day following a trail that Masahiro must have stumbled onto when he’d run from the soldiers who’d chased him. Before the snow it would have been visible; now it was buried. They’d met no one, seen no human footprints. At first Reiko had spied small villages in the distance, settled by Japanese traders and farmers, but in late afternoon they’d crossed into Ainu territory.
Now Reiko felt as if she’d truly broken loose from everything familiar. Ainu territory was the loneliest place she’d ever been. She experienced a city-dweller’s fear of nature untamed by man and the fear that she wouldn’t find Masahiro. All that connected her to him was an invisible trail of scent. She clung to Wente as the sled bumped over ice. Her body was stiff from the cold. The full moon rose; the sky darkened into cobalt that quenched the sunset. More stars than Reiko had ever seen glittered like crystals. The cold intensified. How would she and Wente survive a night in this frozen kingdom?
Woods abruptly immersed the sled. The moonlight on the snowy trail didn’t penetrate the thick shadows among the trees. The trail was a tunnel roofed by the starlit sky, a road to nowhere. Reiko was beginning to dread what she would find at its end, when a clearing opened ahead of her. Wente called to the dogs and dismounted from the sled as it coasted to a stop. The dogs barked at a hut that had materialized as if by magic. Reiko clumsily rose as
