“I know what you mean,” she said finally. “I would turn to any spiritual being who would give me relief. But I have offended deeply by killing my own child. I am unable to pray openly to the Enlightened One or go to the shrine. How can I turn to your god, to the Secret One, when your first commandment is not to kill?”
Eriko said, “He knows everything in your heart. His first commandment is to love him; his second, to love all men and forgive those who hate us. It is because of love that we do not take life. That is for him alone to decide. We live in the midst of the world; if we repent, I believe he understands and forgives us.”
“And will forgive you,” Sachie added, taking Naomi’s hand.
Eriko took her other hand, and they sat with bowed heads. Naomi knew the other two women were praying, and she tried to still her heart and her thoughts.
They delude themselves, she thought. There is nothing there-and even if there were, I would not be able to heed its voice, for I am a ruler and must rule with power.
Yet as the silence deepened, she was aware of something beyond herself, some greater presence that both towered above her and waited humbly for her to turn to it. She saw suddenly how this could be the highest allegiance anyone could make; one could kneel before this and genuinely submit one’s body and soul. It was the opposite to the earthly power of warlords like Iida, and maybe the only power that could check such men.
She did turn and whispered, “I am sorry,” and felt the lightest of touches, like a healing hand on her heart.
Throughout the winter she talked to Eriko and Sachie often and prayed with them, and before the beginning of the new year, she had been received into the community of the Hidden.
She realized there were many levels of belief, and many people held them whom she had not suspected of so doing. She became aware of the network they formed across her domain, throughout the West, indeed throughout the Three Countries, though in Tohan lands they were still persecuted. It was whispered that Iida himself took part in hunting them down, indulging his pleasure in killing.
In many ways, Naomi struggled against belief. It was not an easy decision. Her pride in her position and her family made her recoil from putting herself on the same level as ordinary people. She believed she had always treated them fairly, but to see them as her equals was strange and affronting to her. Yet belief brought her a sense of forgiveness, and forgiveness brought her peace.
There were other conflicts within her that seemed impossible to resolve. The beliefs of the Hidden forbade the taking of life, yet the only way to set her daughter free and bring not only happiness to herself but peace and justice to the Three Countries was for Iida to die. She remembered the discussions she had had with Shigeru about assassination; must she now abandon all these plans and leave Iida’s punishment to the Secret One, who saw everything and dealt with everyone after death?
Heaven’s net is wide, but its mesh is fine, she said to herself.
She thought of Shigeru constantly, though she had little hope of meeting him or hearing from him. The narrow escape from discovery had alarmed and shocked her: she could not bear to take such a risk again. Yet she still longed for him, still loved him deeply, wanted now to tell him about the child and ask his forgiveness. She wrote letters to him all winter, which she hoped to send with Shizuka, and then tore them into scraps and burned them.
Spring came; the snows had melted: messengers, travelers, and peddlers once again began their journeys across the Three Countries. Naomi had little time to brood, luckily, for she was always busy. She had to resume the control and leadership of her clan, which had slipped from her a little while she was ill. Even when the weather was too bad to ride outside, there were many meetings held with the clan elders, many decisions that had to be made regarding trade, industry, mining and agriculture, military affairs and diplomacy.
When she had time, she liked to retreat in the afternoons with Sachie and Eriko and prepare tea for them in the teahouse built by her grandmother. The ritual took on some of the holy qualities of the shared meal of the Hidden. The maid, Mari, usually waited on them, bringing hot water and little cakes of sweetened chestnut or bean paste, and often Harada Tomasu joined them to pray with them.
One day in the fifth month, to Naomi’s delight, Shizuka’s name was announced to her, and Mari brought her into the garden.
Shizuka stepped into the teahouse and knelt before Naomi, then sat up and studied her face. “Lady Maruyama has recovered,” she said quietly, “and regained all her beauty.”
“And you, Shizuka, have you been well? Where did you spend the winter?” Naomi thought Shizuka looked unusually pale and subdued.
“I have been in Noguchi all winter with Lord Arai. I thought I would be able to go to Hagi now, but something just happened, here in Maruyama, that has alarmed me.”
“Can you tell me what it is?” Naomi said.
“It may be nothing. I am imagining things. I thought I saw my uncle Kenji in the street. Well, I didn’t see him, actually, I smelled him-he has quite a distinct smell-and then
