Year of the Demon

“Impossible now. Had six then. Now there is only me.”

“But you had a second plan in place, neh?”

The shinobi nodded. “Sneak you in over the wall.”

Daigoro could not keep the shock from his face. “That was your second plan? It’s easier than the first.”

“No. Killing men is easy. Easier still to make them desert their posts. Much more difficult to move among them unseen.”

“But that’s what you do. You’re shinobi.”

“I am. Not you.”

“And the message can only come from me.” Daigoro frowned. “It will do no good for Lord Yasuda to hear it from anyone else. But why can’t I just follow you over the wall?”

“Loud. Clumsy. Could have managed it before. Impossible now.”

“Why?”

“Had many targets before. Now only two.”

“No,” Daigoro said. “There must be fifty targets down there—”

He cut himself short, because suddenly the shinobi’s meaning became clear. His concern wasn’t with finding Toyotomis to kill; it was with Toyotomi arrows finding targets.

Daigoro didn’t care for being thought of as a target. Still, he supposed the shinobi had a point. His initial complement of six could have created distractions in every direction. They were trained in such arts. Now there was only one to distract the enemy—enough for a lone sentry, but not nearly enough to draw every last arrow away from Daigoro.

“I don’t suppose you have a second backup plan,” Daigoro whispered.

“Ten plans. Twenty. No matter. What you lack is time.”

It took Daigoro a moment to unravel what he meant by that—he was so tired— but at length he understood: Shichio was coming. Thus far he’d foreseen Daigoro’s every move. He’d placed an assassin in Daigoro’s bedchamber, he’d locked Izu under a blockade, and somehow he’d even stationed a garrison at the Green Cliff. The one gambit he hadn’t expected—commandeering the ketch—was only possible because he had foreseen the need to put the entire coastline under watch. If the storm hadn’t driven the ketch’s crew to port, Daigoro might never have made it as far as he did. Shichio had known Daigoro was heading north almost as soon as Daigoro set out. That would only accelerate his plans to marry Daigoro’s mother; in fact, he was probably already en route. If he came by road, Daigoro had a day or two at most. If he came as he did last time, by sea, he might arrive by morning.

Daigoro needed to deliver his message to Lord Yasuda, and he needed to do it now.

He looked at the shinobi, who still wore his pirated Toyotomi garb. The kiri crest drew his eye. “I know of one distraction compelling enough to draw off all those men,” he said. “Me. I’m the only bait they’re sure to go for.”

The shinobi gave him a nod.

“Then what choice do I have?” Daigoro said. “It’s time to give them what they want.”

55

The Toyotomi lieutenant could hardly believe his eyes. There he was, the Bear Cub of Izu. He went disguised, wearing Toyotomi colors, but there was no mistaking that enormous sword of his. It flashed in the moonlight, and even from a hundred paces off the lieutenant could hardly believe the size of it.

The boy was in hot pursuit, chasing one of the lieutenant’s own men. Both of them limped as much as ran. Rumor held that the Bear Cub had a lame leg; his quarry probably hobbled because the Bear Cub had wounded him. “Archers!” the lieutenant said. “Nock!”

Ten men leaped to their feet and put arrows to their bowstrings. “Mark,” the lieutenant said. “Draw.” His man was increasing his lead, but that made no matter; he should never have fled the enemy in the first place. If a stray arrow found him on its way to the Bear Cub, so be it. An ignominious death was exactly what he deserved.

Unless. Was there some conceivable reason to retreat? Or if not to retreat, to quickly return—and perhaps to report? That was it. General Shichio had authorized the lieutenant to handpick his detachment, and the lieutenant chose only good soldiers. Brave men, seasoned men, men patient enough to endure the boredom of garrison duty. Such men knew not to flee combat, especially not when the enemy was so a prized target. General Shichio had already promised a thousand koku to the one who claimed the Bear Cub’s head. The lieutenant didn’t approve of such incentives himself—it was merchant’s thinking, offering a reward simply for fulfilling one’s duty—and he’d chosen soldiers of similar mind. Not one of them would flee the Bear Cub unless he had something invaluable to report, something so important that the Bear Cub would risk exposure to cut him down.

The lieutenant ordered his men to relax their bowstrings. “You there,” he barked, pointing at the four door guards, “go protect that scout. Drive off the Bear Cub if you must, kill him if you can—”

It was too late. The Cub’s sword shone like a comet. It flashed in a wide glittering arc and the scout’s legs died under him, limp as wet rags. He collapsed bloodlessly; with a sword large enough to chop a man in half, the Bear Cub cut just deep enough to nick the spinal cord.

“Go, go!” the lieutenant yelled. The door guards were already in motion, spears leveled. “Archers, loose! Loose at will!”

The Bear Cub stood his ground, waving his sword defiantly above his kill. Arrows sang as they took flight. The lieutenant redeployed eight spearmen to guard the Yasuda gate and rallied the rest of his unit into formation.

The first salvo from the archers fell short. They adjusted their aim and shot again, loosing haphazardly now, no longer in unison. Still the Bear Cub stood his ground, and with a deft swipe from that massive sword, he struck ten arrows right out of the air.

It was impossible. The boy must have been part cat; how else could he have seen an arrow in the dark? The thought of deflecting ten of them sent the lieutenant’s head spinning. At last he understood why General Shichio deployed fifty men to dispatch a single teenage boy.

Still his men had not formed ranks. He knew they were well trained, knew it was only the heat of the moment that confounded his mind, but to him his unit seemed to be wading through water. “Pick up your feet, you damned sluggards! Move!”

At last the Bear Cub turned to run. The lieutenant could wait no longer. He led the first platoon himself, commanding the rest to follow as soon as they managed to form up. His archers fell in behind him, dropping their bows in favor of swords.

He was the first to reach the fallen scout, who still attempted to crawl, dragging his legs uselessly behind him. The man seemed so small. “Easy,” the lieutenant said. “Easy, soldier.” He crouched beside the scout and sent the rest of his platoon around the bend in the road. “Report. What are you doing out here alone?”

“Not alone,” grunted the scout, his head hanging heavily between his shoulders. He clutched the lieutenant’s sword belt as if trying to pull himself upright. “My patrol. All killed. Ran us down outside the Okuma compound. Killed us all.”

A prayer for mercy escaped the lieutenant’s lips unbidden. He did not want to believe in boys with magic swords and cat’s eyes, but what else could explain what he’d seen tonight? There, twenty paces ahead, he spied another corpse along the roadway, lying facedown in the weeds and clad in Toyotomi colors. How many more littered this road? Could the Bear Cub have felled an entire patrol?

“You men, up here!” barked the lieutenant, his voice echoing off the Green Cliff. The remainder of his force came running, save the eight men reassigned to guard the door. “Our quarry is out there in these hills,” he said when they reached him. “Watch yourselves; this one is as dangerous as they come. Half of you, over the hill. The