Child of Vengeance (17 page)

“I apologize wholeheartedly for the inconvenience,” said Munisai, and once more he turned back to Nakata’s samurai. “Now—you. Who are you?”

The man did not stride forward. He came with his thumbs tucked into his belt, glancing around casually—showmanlike—until he sighted a length of bamboo across which paddies of rice had been hung to dry before their threshing. He shook the bundles of stalks free and then held the bamboo upright before him, inspecting it as a craftsman would. It was twice the height of a man, the trunk green and ridged and thicker than a human thigh. The samurai nodded, satisfied, and then gestured for a peasant to come hold it.

The peasant he had chosen was a young man, and he did so hesitantly, his eyes upon the ground. Nakata’s man smiled at him, and when the peasant held the bamboo upright before him, the samurai put his hands back into his belt once more and turned to Munisai.

“You must know of bamboo-cutting tournaments, my honorable Munisai?” he said amicably.

“I do. That does not answer my question,” said Munisai.

“Have you participated in them?”

“Yes.”

“What was your record?” said the man. “How long after you cut through did it take for the split trunk to fall?”

“Two heartbeats,” said Munisai.

“Two heartbeats?” said the samurai, and he nodded as if impressed. It was a minor feat—not the best, but a substantial show of skill.

Casually Nakata’s samurai rolled his head on his shoulders, and then settled himself and locked his suddenly cold eyes on Munisai. Then, his sword was up in the air as though it had skipped any form of motion—it was just in the scabbard and then it was free and high in the sunlight.

What it had done was slice through the bamboo trunk. There were three heartbeats before the cut appeared, a sliver of beige emerging in the green, and it began to topple. What it had also done was slice through the left wrist of the peasant, the speed of the blow batting the severed hand into the air, and on the fourth heartbeat it and the top of the bamboo trunk met the earth.

The peasant shrieked and tumbled backward clutching at his wrist, his feet scrabbling in the dirt in some spastic attempt to flee. Dorinbo gave a cry of horror, and he went to the man’s side to do what he could, other peasants coming to try to hold him still as he bucked and thrashed.

To look at Nakata’s man was to know that it was no accident. The samurai ignored the desperate flurry of suffering, his eyes locked solely upon Munisai. With perfect stillness and control he lowered his sword to point at him.

“My name is Kihei Arima,” he said, and he grinned a vicious grin. “I am known as the Lightning Hand, and men the length of this country call me sword-saint. Munisai Shinmen, I have come to take the title of Nation’s Finest from you. Duel me. I have killed six men in single combat—you will be my seventh.”

In a fluid motion he sheathed his sword and held his arms wide, waiting for formal acceptance of the challenge. He and Munisai were in a world apart from what was happening just paces from them, and Bennosuke found his gaze flickering from the pair of them to where Dorinbo was trying to force a piece of torn cloth over the stump of the peasant’s wrist, his hands slick with blood.

It was an awful calmness, and it grew stranger still when, after a pause that was too long to be considered natural, Munisai began to laugh long and slow and deep.

“You think to impress me with butchery, Arima?” he said. “I’ll tell you who dismembers peasants—the degenerate corpsehandlers.”

“Watch your mouth, Shinmen,” growled Arima, and to his side the peasant whimpered for his children to be taken away so they would not have to see.

“I will watch my tongue in the presence of those I deem worthy,” said Munisai, and he was not snarling but speaking as though he were
stating amusing facts. “You are a pissant torturer, and you belong in a filthy exiled hamlet along with those subhumans. This is my hall, and this is a place for warriors only.”

“I am a warrior, Shinmen—and I am here to fight!” said Arima.

“Then fight Bennosuke here. He’s more than a match for you,” said Munisai casually, and nodded toward the boy.

It took a heartbeat for Bennosuke to comprehend just what Munisai had said. Stunned, he tore his eyes from the peasant to look at the man. He was amused still, but there was no sign of jest in his eyes. The boy felt any strength and warmth he had within himself being sucked away down some secret hole behind his stomach.

Dorinbo too had heard, and turned from where the peasant was being borne away by his friends to stare aghast at Munisai. “What are you thinking, brother?!” the monk blurted before Bennosuke could stutter a refusal. “Are you serious?”

“The boy needs more practice than sparring and empty recitals of pattern. This isn’t
much
more,” Munisai said, waving a dismissive hand at Arima, “but it’s a start.”

“You arrogant swine!” hissed Arima furiously, hand on his sword. “Fine! I accept! I’ll kill your son, and then you must fight me! Agreed?”

“There’s nothing to agree to—you won’t get past the boy. But so be it. Agreed,” he said.

Bennosuke’s head was darting around, unsure of whom to look to or quite what was going on. Dorinbo was horrified, Arima was furious, Hayato was interested, but Munisai … The man still had the tight grin on his lips, but he was watching Bennosuke with curious, piercing eyes. Was it a challenge? If it was, Bennosuke was happy to concede defeat and back out of fighting Arima.

For the slightest of moments, Munisai’s face hardened. It was almost unnoticeable, but his eyes went quickly to his own left arm, and then back to Bennosuke. The boy looked closely, and there he saw the sling. It had been concealed well, wrapped around the samurai’s wrist and neck to bind the arm into a façade of strength—but it was façade alone.

The man’s eyes asked if he understood. The boy did, but it did not
make him feel any stronger. There was a coldness creeping through him.

“Just do it, boy. He is nothing to you,” said Munisai, loud enough for everyone to hear, and then gestured with his head for the boy to get to it. Bennosuke took an uneasy step down toward the earth.

“What is he to you?” said Munisai again, his voice loud and harsh but now directed at Arima. “This piece of horseshit? This vermin who comes here and calls himself a sword-saint? This tiny-assholed, gurgling vessel of frailty and sodomy, not fit to lick the piss of dogs from the dirt beneath them? Kihei Arima, who—”

“Stop this madness!” cried Dorinbo at Munisai, and then he threw himself into Arima’s path. The samurai had risen to Munisai’s insults and was making toward him with his sword half out of its scabbard, wanting simply to kill rather than duel. Dorinbo tried to force the blade back in with one hand, the other vainly attempting to push him back, painting dark handprints of the peasant’s blood upon the samurai’s chest.

“Please, Sir Kihei—I beg you to reconsider. Bennosuke is but a boy! What purpose is there in slaying him? I beg you to stop!” pleaded the monk, but Arima had only murder on his mind. Seeing that, Dorinbo desperately thrust the samurai backward with all his weight, and did the one thing that would distract Arima—he made for the samurai’s lord.

“Please, Lord Nakata,” said Dorinbo, his bared arms imploring, “I understand you have grievance with Munisai, but Bennosuke is not part of it! What kind of duel is it when a man fights a boy?”

“The best kind,” said Hayato with relish, and he tried to wave Dorinbo away. The monk instead fell to his knees and buried his head in the dirt at Hayato’s feet. He grabbed ahold of the lord’s foot and continued to plead.

“Please! I beg you! I beg you! I’ll do anything you ask of me. I’ll kill myself! Take my life, not his!” Dorinbo blabbered furiously. Hayato tried to step back from the monk, but Dorinbo clung on.

“Arima,” the lord said disgustedly.

The samurai, eager to get back to Munisai, strode up and kicked Dorinbo hard in the ribs. The monk fell on his side wheezing, and
Arima kicked him again just to make sure. Dorinbo curled up into a ball. The Lightning Hand hovered over him, seeking any sign of defiance, then finally he spat on him.

H
istory is changed by the smallest of things; a single drop of rain, say, is blown by a freak gust of wind into the eyes of a ship’s captain, so that in the blink that follows he misses the sign of the reef ahead, and thus a shipload of men are doomed to the depths of the sea. What left Arima’s mouth was no more than a pale green gob of phlegm, but within it was the catalyst that put fire in Bennosuke’s soul.

When it struck the prone monk on the side of the head, the boy felt a crazed surge of … he didn’t know what shudder through him. His body felt warm again. The anger of months seemed clear to him then; it had no direction, and it needed none. It just was, and so he used it. It was how he wanted to feel when he had learned the fate of his mother. His heart pumped beautifully. He was no longer afraid.

With a cry of rage so vicious that it hurt his lungs, Bennosuke sprang forward and struck a blow that was more worthy of the title Lightning Hand than anything Arima could ever muster. The staff whipped around and struck the man on the side of the head with a dull crack, just as he turned back to Munisai. The man blinked, and then his jaw came loose, the bone jutting awkwardly into the flesh of his cheek.

But Arima was good; his first instinct was not to scream in pain, but to reach for his longsword and strike. Bennosuke anticipated that, and by the time the man had the weapon but a finger’s breadth out of the scabbard the boy had already rapped the staff down quickly. It struck either flesh or steel, Bennosuke didn’t care which, and then the sword was loose and skittering on the floor.

Arima grabbed for it desperately, but he was dizzy from the first blow and so again Bennosuke was quicker and flicked it away with the end of the wooden pole. It flashed along the ground toward the dojo, where it came to rest at the foot of the steps. One of the burgundy
samurai made a move for it, but Munisai stepped over it. They glared at each other, but their focus quickly turned back to the fight.

Arima leapt back to afford himself the time to draw his shortsword. There was no legendary drawing strike this time, just a man desperately trying to defend himself. The sword slid into his hand and he raised it as a shield while he circled, all the while his jaw spasming uncontrollably.

The boy attacked warily, jabbing low at the man and keeping his distance. Arima dodged and parried, and then tried an attack of his own. Were it a longsword, it might have had some hope of striking Bennosuke, but the short blade was woefully lacking in range. It hissed by a hand’s length in front of him, and it may as well have been an ocean’s width for all it mattered.

Spurred on by the man’s weakness and desperate for the kill, Bennosuke attacked once more, ringing in blows from a distance. He soon became aware of the irony of the situation—if Arima’s weapon was too short, his was too long. The man was regaining his wits and his balance, and read every distant incoming blow well. He needed to get closer. He considered going for his own shortsword, but he had no doubt the gap he would leave as he changed weapons would be exploited lethally by Arima. They circled, and then an answer came to Bennosuke.

The boy arched the pole around once, deliberately slowly to draw Arima’s guard up, and then after he had parried he made as if to barge Arima in the chest with the pole held in two hands like an oar. The man’s eyes leapt with joy, and his sword arced down to strike the staff directly on its proffered center. The metal dug in deep, Bennosuke pushed with all his strength up against it, and then with a harsh snap the wood fractured and the staff was suddenly in two pieces. Arima let loose a small grunt of triumph, and Bennosuke let him savor it. It would be the last joy he felt in this life.

Casting one half of the staff aside, Bennosuke closed in and let the man slash at him. The arc of the blade seemed so slow and so clumsy, and to snatch the man’s wrist as it lingered before him so very easy. He jerked Arima’s arm toward him and then smashed the remaining half of the staff savagely into the sword-saint’s forearm.

Though a sword might cut through a war staff with ease, a human
arm is not hardened, folded steel. Arima screamed as his wrist shattered and his hand went limp. The sword slipped from his powerless fingers and Bennosuke kicked it away disgustedly.

The joyous, terrible ecstasy of his first victory came upon the boy then, and he smashed the man on the bridge of the nose with the butt of the staff. That too shattered and erupted in blood, and suddenly Arima, with his jaw hanging off and his nose flattened, looked unrecognizable.

His eyes were spinning in wild panic, and widened further as Bennosuke grabbed him by the collar in an iron grip with his left hand. He drew back the staff and struck him three times in the head, each blow horrendous. The man’s skull reverberated like a pot, and then his eye socket shattered on the second blow, and then he was on his knees at the third. But Bennosuke would not let him fall. He held on to the collar, blood dripping onto his fist, keeping the man from cowering into a ball.