Gonji: A Hungering of Wolves (22 page)

CHAPTER NINE

“Jesus-Maria
—the samurai himself!”

Anton the Gray Knight caught his breath and rushed into the stable to clasp Gonji’s hand warmly. Then, remembering the samurai custom, he drew back and bowed to Gonji, who replied in kind.

Gonji held up a staying hand. “I will speak with you at length about what’s become of me. But first—what is this business they say about Wilf and the others being off to France on some errand of violence? Speak German,
bitte.”

“That’s about the whole of it,” Anton replied. “A young French woman came. Said she was Simon Sardonis’ lover. That he might need help against some usurpers of power there. Enemies of Simon, we gathered. It didn’t exactly wash with me, but—”

“Cholera,”
Gonji breathed. “Wilf is mad. He has no idea what he’s gotten himself into.”

“That’s what Genya fears—uh, these are your sword-brothers?”

Gonji apologized and introduced Orozco, Buey, Leone, and Father Sebastio. Their mutual respect was instant, born of instinctual understanding that they had all accepted the most uncertain of destinies in throwing in with the ill-starred samurai.

“Hernando Salguero is with them?” Carlos Orozco asked, at length.

“Ja,”
Anton agreed. “He often spoke of you two. Fond memories,” the knight added, smiling crookedly at Orozco and Buey before returning his complete attention to Gonji.

“What’s happened to Michael Benedetto?” Gonji was asking. “Galioto spoke strangely of him when we saw him on the road.”

Anton shook his head dismally. “Nothing but trouble here, friend samurai, ever since we arrived. And Michael seems more affected than most. He’s ill, for one thing. And his attitudes are twisted. I don’t know…” He held his hands palms up, then brightened. “But tell me how you’ve been! God, we’ve spoken of you so much. Wondered when you’d see fit to visit us—hell! What days those were in Vedun! God rest every blessed soul that fought and died there to free us from evil.”

“Hai.
Tell me…do they still blame me for what happened there?” Gonji asked glumly.

“Of course not! It was you that helped us save ourselves from complete annihilation, for Christ’s sake. And we’ve heard you’ve added some mighty deeds since then, eh?”

“Not so mighty, maybe, but…
arigato.”
The samurai bowed.

“Well,” Anton responded, “then like the Italians say,
Se non e vero, e molto ben trovato
—if it’s not true, it’s a happy invention, eh?” He and Luigi Leone shared a laugh over the popular saying. Then: “Oh—perhaps you haven’t heard, but Jacob Neriah’s gone. Died in his sleep, God rest his Jew’s soul. And Milorad Vargo, almost the same time. His widow, Anna, still abides, sweet lady.”

“And…Helena?” Gonji inquired gingerly of the girl who’d fallen in love with him in Vedun.

“Gone away with her mother,” Anton said. “They didn’t stay here long. Six months or so, I’d say.”

No one who recalled that awkward romance from Vedun could eye Gonji squarely over its recall.

Not long after, Galioto, the dairy stockman from Vedun, arrived with Genya Gundersen. There was much ado amidst the animated introductions and Anton’s capsule reminiscences. Good cheer spread through the growing band in the stable near the Gundersen smithshop.

“We should have an impromptu feast, no?” Anton asked.

“Nein—
just the opposite, my friend,” Gonji said. “The fewer who know we’re here, the better. We’re…on the run again, you see.” His companions’ expressions remained fixed. He’d told them what to expect.

“Then you can make your stand here,” the perpetually excitable Galioto declared. “We’ll stand together. Just like in Vedun.”

“Nein.
I’m afraid this is trouble I must deal with in my own way. I’ll be sailing for
Dai Nihon
soon. My homeland.”

“What about Wilfred?” Genya fretted, her brow darkening as she moved closer to confront the samurai. “You can’t leave him alone in France!”

“Hush, child,” Anton urged.

“Genya,” Galioto added, “not everybody knows where they’ve gone. Keep your voice down—please.” His dark eyes flickered intensely as he peered out to the street.

“Gonji?” Genya persisted. “Wilfred’s your friend. He risked his life for you before. He might
die
in that place. He believes he’s going there to help Simon
and
you. You can’t leave him there!”

Gonji folded his arms across his chest and sighed, staring into the dark recesses of the loft. “I’m afraid I must do…what I must. I’ll see that he is aided by the…Wunderknechten.”

Genya backed away from his steely gaze, aghast. She fled the stable in emotional turmoil. When the tension had settled in her wake, the conversation turned to news of the road. Kuma-san quietly glided up behind Gonji and laid a comforting hand on his shoulder, eschewing Japanese dignity for European commiseration, sensing the samurai’s need.

* * *

“You weren’t able to keep your presence a secret for very long.”

Gonji felt the tingling of his spine that upset his harmony of spirit, his
wa.
He’d known the effect before in Lydia Benedetto’s presence. A benign smile enhanced her radiant beauty. He bowed shallowly to her and returned the smile. “It is good to see you well,” he said, forcing a casual serenity into the understatement. “And this must be…”

“My daughter, Miriam.” The tiny girl bore her father’s Roman features. She held her mother’s hand and, standing a bit behind her, stared at Gonji’s topknot. “We named her for Jacob’s wife. You needn’t be afraid of this man, dear. He’s a friend of your
padre.
A…a soldier.”

Gonji smiled and spoke reassuringly to the child, then drew up chairs for both of them and one for himself. He sat with graceful, noble bearing, there in Anton’s small parlor, feeling somehow out of place, wishing the pang in his spirit would abate so that he might find intelligent words to speak.

“So,” Lydia mercifully began for him, “are you here to help us overcome our troubles in Austria now?”

His eyes narrowed slightly. It wasn’t always easy to tell, he recalled, the meaning in Lydia’s speech. She was keenly perceptive, and her words could occasionally sting before one became aware of any threat. But there was sincerity in the azure depths of her eyes now.

He began to answer, but she halted him and sent Miriam out to seek sweets from Uncle Anton.

“No,” Gonji said at length, “I’m afraid not. My karma leads me elsewhere.”

“Home, I’ve heard.” She seemed disappointed when Gonji nodded, and he was perversely cheered by it.

“Tell me about your husband, before I see him myself.” He’d purposely kept his language vague, himself unsure of what he was trying to draw out of her.

“The others have said something to you, then?”

He made no reply, steering her into doing the talking as much as possible. She made small talk about their days in Noricum for a bit, then:

“He’s thrown over his faith, Gonji. He’s become something of a mystic under the tutelage of this…old wizard or whatever he is. He calls himself Brother Xeno. He plies Michael with cures for the body and soul. It’s strange…Michael talks more like
you
used to now. He doesn’t know what Wilf is about. Wilf insisted. He and the others. Do you know why they keep my husband in the dark?”

“No,” Gonji replied, concealing his unease. “But I’m sure it’s just general security. The fewer who know, the less chance of conspirators confounding Wilf. He’s smart. Listen, don’t worry about Michael, but I
would
like to see him before I go.”

“Is he in danger, Gonji?”

A pang of despair. It was clear that she was still in love with her husband. Yet Gonji was sure that she radiated some small attraction to him, even as he had been sure of it in Vedun. Or did he only need to feel that way, his own desires creating the illusion for him?

“I don’t know why he should be,” he said. “But I’ll look into it for you. It’s…the least I can do.”

She smiled warmly, gazing deep into his eyes in a way that discomfited him as few other women had ever done. Perhaps only one other. She inquired after his well being, and he found himself answering her questions truly, pouring out his feelings—save for those honor demanded he kept pent up. Once again, the presence of this strong-willed woman with hair like captive sunshine and the serene eyes of a goddess had disarmed him. He began to ramble.

“When I think of Vedun, speak of it again,” he told her, “I have an irrational desire to gather around me all those who have ever meant anything to me in Europe, and then wall off the rest of the world. We should have spared some of Mord’s monsters. Tamed them. Trained them to our service. And then stayed to scour the streets of the carnage. Kept out all but those who meant us no harm…”

The silence in the wake of his words seemed charged with yearning.

“I didn’t realize how much you…loved Vedun,” she said softly.

“More than I can ever tell you,” he replied without meeting her eyes. “I didn’t realize myself until much later.” He felt vulnerable, exposed. Took refuge behind platitudes. “O the valor we saw there! The height and breadth of Flavio’s vision of harmony for all!”

His eyes shone above lips pursed to stave off more tremulous words.

“You speak of an impossible ideal,” she reminded him in gentle rebuke. “You couldn’t have
both
the valor and the vision you speak of…”

He nodded. “Perhaps that’s what makes the memory so precious. For a time, we
had
both. In a way that can never be again.” They fell silent a moment. Gonji pondered something, decided she was the person to tell, if only to keep him in her mind awhile longer.

“Lydia-san, I am going to tell you something that you must withhold from everyone until Genya’s time has come. Then, you may tell her and her alone. I have my reasons.”

And when he had obtained her promise, he explained his intentions.

* * * *

When the others had spoken of Michael Benedetto’s illness, it seemed to Gonji, it was no wonder their speech had been couched in vaguery. If he was indeed ill, it did not seem to be an illness of the body, though he was thinner than the samurai remembered.

Gonji and Michael sat cross-legged, facing each other. The mystic, Brother Xeno, sat in a similar position about ten paces away beneath a solitary elm tree, lost in meditation.

“Do you recall the nasty arrow wound I took in the leg at Vedun?” Michael asked, indicating his smooth thigh triumphantly. “Not a trace, eh?”

“Magic?” the samurai asked in a voice loud enough to carry to the unmoving old wizard.

Michael looked at him curiously. “Zen meditation,” he declared, his brow furrowing with disappointment, as though he had expected Gonji to guess the answer. “I thought you understood that. You—who were the first to bring us the wonders of the East.”

Gonji glanced at the robed mystic, whose nostrils quivered ever so slightly.

“I know of no such complete healing ever occurring through Zen. Only the overcoming of the wound’s effects.”

Michael cocked his head, a trace of superiority in his mien. “You have perhaps been away from home too long. But I understand that that is where you are headed now. Is that right?” Michael sighed expansively. “Everyone is dashing off somewhere these days, it seems.”

In the man’s slim smile, Gonji thought he detected an intimation of privity. Did Michael know where Wilfred Gundersen had really gone? Gonji experienced a creeping chill of hostility. Even that did not prepare him for Michael’s next question.

“Are you still in love with my wife?”

Gonji felt the color rising to his cheeks, though he was sure his expression hadn’t changed. He abruptly found it hard to think for a moment. “I’m afraid your meditations have obscured your clarity of vision. That’s the opposite of the intended effect.”

Gonji could feel his skin crawl. Rarely had he stooped to such unmitigated deceit. Anger now took its place among the emotions that vied for preeminence. Michael’s unexpected sally had left him completely at a disadvantage. But now it was Michael’s move again.

“Come now, Gonji. I know you find her attractive, at the very least.” He smiled inoffensively now. The battle won. The enemy disarmed.

Gonji bridled. “I would suppose that most men find your wife attractive. Is it your practice to pose such a question to all who take note of her?”

“Relax, my friend. It was a simple question, that’s all. You’re a man of honor. Of all the men I know, I think I can trust you most. Do you recall what a temper I once had? I’ve conquered that, as well, with the aid of my
sensei.”

Gonji found the use of the Japanese word offensive. Perhaps it was intended to be, inasmuch as Gonji himself was sometimes called
sensei.

“I’d like to speak with Brother Xeno,” the samurai said.

“He may be beyond our reach for some time,” Michael replied.

But the wizard’s eyes snapped open, and he stared across the space between the two men as he said, “It would be an honor to speak with you now, Sabatake Gonji-no-Sadowara.”

Michael’s eyes flashed at Gonji, and his head bobbed encouragingly, as if the samurai were being done a singular honor. Gonji rose and, picking up his
daisho—
his matched set of swords—in one hand, he moved to face the old holy man. They exchanged bows, the wizard remaining seated, and Gonji sat to face him in the lotus position, carefully laying his swords in the place of easy draw: an open gesture of implied menace that any true Buddhist monk would have duly noted.

In a studied voice full of affected dramatic pauses, Brother Xeno spoke to Gonji of Japan, of the time he’d spent as a missionary on the island of Honshu, and of how he’d come to accept many Buddhist principles, amalgamating them with Christian tenets in an eclectic fashion that might have strained the tolerance of a Wunderknecht.

The quintessential Knight of Wonder.

Xeno went on to recall the many natural wonders of
Dai Nihon,
as well as its myriad cultural facets. Gonji listened to him closely, analyzing everything the old monk said. In truth, the samurai concluded that Xeno either
had
been to Japan or had been steeped in the details he related by someone else who had.

Brother Xeno explained the new order of Christian monks for which he was seeking papal sanction—the Order of Holy Piety, an ascetic order devoted to contemplation of the mysteries of the universe. In the midst of the Wunderknechten controversy, it seemed to Gonji, such a new order could not have been more poorly timed.

Xeno concluded with an appeal to their supposedly common way of thinking, assuring that his prayers would go with the Knights of Wonder wherever they ventured. Finally he asked Gonji to convey greetings to certain monks at a temple near Edo when he presently returned to Japan.