Linnear 03 - White Ninja (45 page)

'He lay me down on a straw pallet, and began his masterpiece. He did not chain me up after that. He did not have to. And each day, he would work on my back, giving painful birth to the giant spider.

'When, after two years, he was finished, Zasso believed

that he had transformed me, that the soul of the spider had sunk into me as his inks had, that he had conferred on me a kind of godhood, or' - she shuddered - 'something far more frightening. Zasso said to me, "Now you may stay or go, it makes no difference to me. You are no longer human. You are a weapon. The Dread Female of Heaven, the demon woman who destroys all men she entangles in her web."'

There was silence for a time. Then Shisei, feeling him slipping out of her, clutched Branding. 'Don't leave me, Cook! Oh, please!'

'Is this what you believe, that you are a demon woman?'

'Dear God, if you leave me now I'll die!'

Branding, attuned as he was to her, felt the fear emanating from her in waves. 'I want to know if you believe this nonsense.' He seemed angry.

Shisei was bewildered. 'It's not nonsense. It's Shinto-ism.'

'No,' Branding said firmly. 'It's the product of one man's sick mind, that's all.'

To contemplate such a thing, Shisei knew, was to look into an abyss beyond understanding. It was to contemplate the thought that her life was a hideous parody, warped beyond all comprehension. The product, yes, of one man's mind.

'Cook,' she gasped suddenly, 'I want to be with you tonight. I cannot stand the thought of being alone. Take me to the dinner with you.'

Branding looked at her. He had been certain that knowing the origin of the spider tattoo would unlock for him the mysteries of this fascinating, enigmatic woman. But now he became aware of the many layers of mystery that overlaid Shisei's personality. Perhaps he would never be able to understand her fully, but that knowledge only drew him on, a seductive siren's song as ancient, as irresistible as the one that had lured Odysseus.

'Oh, God, Cook!' Shisei was crying.

Nicholas thought, I have dreamt it all: my rescue, the warm house, Kansatsu-san. Panic gripped him in its icy fist, and he shuddered. A blast of wind hit him full on, and his rear foot slipped off the rock groove. He could feel his position deteriorating. If he fell off the Black Gendarme he had no way of knowing how far he would drop. Mist occluded his vision. He could not see Kansatsu's stone house built into the side of the rock. There was no trace of Kansatsu himself, and Nicholas was frightened that the bone-chilling cold had combined with his deteriorating condition to make him delirious. In that case, there was no Kansatsu, no warm house on the mountainside that would provide him with shelter, no salvation from Shiro Ninja.

Falling, endlessly falling...

Desperately he reached up, feeling with his fingertips for purchase, but the rock had turned to glass. He encountered only layers of black ice which, indifferent to his plight, shrugged off his grip.

He could not see: snow, lying long in the dark hollows of the Black Gendarme, swirled up by the wind, blinding him. He could not hear: the howling of the wind in the crags was incessant. He could not feel: the cold penetrated his gloves, numbing his fingertips. In the thin, frigid air he could smell nothing, not even himself or the matted fur collar of his parka. He opened his mouth, put his lips against the stone, trying to taste the minerals which would tell him where the Black Gendarme was the most solid, where there were dangerous fissures that might crack beneath his weight. He-stroked on the dark granite but he could taste nothing. Now, with Shiro Ninja blocking his sixth sense, he was truly defenceless.

He clung to the rock face like a fly on a window-pane, with a blind tenacity that came solely from instinct. But the

wind was increasing in intensity, its gusts raging, scouring all in its path. His foot slipped again and be almost pitched headfirst into the abyss. It was at precisely that instant, with the sensation of being jerked awake, that Nicholas knew that he was not ready to give up.

I am strong, he thought. I am weak. It isn't that the two are indistinguishable, it is that they don't matter. And then he understood what Kansatsu-san had said about life and death. They did not matter.

This is what mattered: the Darkness.

His heart hammering painfully in his chest, Nicholas looked into the Void. He was so far up he could not see the base of the Black Gendarme. He was terrified, but he knew that this was what he had to do. The Path lay in only one direction. Or, all directions were the same. They led to this terrifying place. The Black Gendarme. They led to this moment in time.

Then the wind, howling in fury, tore him free from his tenuous grip upon the rock. In a sense, perhaps, he let go. He would never know.

Into the abyss he fell. Falling, endlessly falling...

Justine was on her way to church, backing her car out of the long driveway to her house, when she almost ran right into a man on a bicycle. He had appeared out of nowhere, emerging, it seemed, from the thickets lining the road.

She braked hard as, startled, he swerved into a stand of cryptomeria. He lost his balance, was flipped head over heels into the underbrush.

Justine said, 'Oh, God,' under her breath, put on the parking brake, and jerked open the car door. She ran to where the cyclist was lying, knelt beside him. She could see that he was conscious, said a little prayer for that.

'Are you all right?' she said in passable Japanese.

The cyclist nodded, immediately groaned, rubbed the

back of his head. He got up slowly, and Justine rose beside him. He was a relatively young man, handsome, smooth-skinned, with the kind of face Justine had seen many times on Japanese TV and posters. There was something slightly feminine about the fullness of his lips, the flare of his delicate nostrils, but this merely made him seem gentle, in need of help. He wore black shorts, a loose, short-sleeved white shirt, American sneakers.

He bent to pick up his bicycle, gave another tittle groan, and Justine instinctively reached out to steady him. He looked at her sharply, and she dropped her hand, abruptly remembering the Japanese prohibition against members of the opposite sex touching in public.

She wondered what she should do. Obviously, the man was shaken up - at the very least - and it was her fault. She was at once wary and eager to do the right thing, to not walk away from an incident she had caused. Then she understood that she was thinking like an American. Here, in Japan, there was so little crime that one did not worry about strolling around any area of Tokyo at night. Tokyo was perhaps the safest city in the world and the Japanese thing to do, of course, was to offer the cyclist rest and some tea. It was the polite, the civilized way to act.

'I-I'm sorry,' she said, flustered. 'Would you like to come up to the house for some tea? I live right here.'

'Thank you, no,' the cyclist said. 'I'm all right.'

The denial was also the Japanese way. The polite, the civilized way to act.

'It would be no trouble at all,' Justine said. 'In fact, it would make me feel a good deal better. Don't you think we should make sure you aren't really injured?'

He turned to her, nodded somewhat stiffly. 'How can I refuse such hospitality?'

He followed her at a sedate pace up the driveway.

'Why don't you make yourself comfortable on the porch,' Justine said. 'I'll bring the tea out.'

'I guess I am a bit more bruised than I thought,' the cyclist said. 'Perhaps there are some pillows inside I could use.'

Justine hesitated only a moment. 'Of course. It will be more comfortable for you inside.'

They removed their footwear in the small stone-paved entranceway and Justine placed them within the bamboo cabinet against the wall. She led them into the living-room.

The cyclist said nothing until the tea had been brewed, served and they had both finished a cup. As Justine was pouring more tea, he said, 'You have a beautiful home.'

'Oh, but it isn't much,' Justine said in ritual response. 'Are you feeling better?'

'Much better, thank you,' he said.

'I wonder if you speak English. It is easier for me.'

'But of course.' This elicited a smile from him. He really was quite handsome, quite striking. 'It would be my pleasure, Mrs - '

'Oh, I forgot,' Justine said. 'My name is -{ She had to stop herself from giving him her Christian name. That would have been most impolite. 'Mrs Linnear.'

'I am Mr Omukae,' Senjin said. 'I think we found the worst possible way to meet, don't you?'

Justine laughed, grateful that he could speak lightly of her almost hitting him with the car. 'I'm afraid so. I can't think why I didn't see you until the last minute.'

'The driveway bends and so does the road,' Senjin said diplomatically. 'It is difficult to see traffic coming from that direction. If I may make a suggestion....?'

'Yes, of course.'

'A mirror hung on that large cryptomeria would show you enough of the road to give you warning.'

'Why, that's a wonderful idea,' Justine said. "Thank you, Mr Omukae.'

'It is my pleasure,' he said around his teacup. He looked around. "This is a large house for one person,' he said.

'Oh, I don't live alone,' Justine said. 'My husband and I live here.'

Senjin sipped his tea. 'What does your husband do, Mrs Linnear?'

'He runs my father's company. It's diversified: computer chip manufacture, steel, textiles. My husband's taken it a step further, into advanced computer research.' She cocked her head. 'And what's your line of work, Mr Omukae?'

'Oh, I'm afraid it's nothing so innovative or interesting as your husband's,' Senjin said. 'I'm a bureaucrat. I work at the Industrial Location and Environmental Protection Bureau, hi the Safety Section.'

"That sounds interesting enough,' Justine said.

He gave her an odd smile. 'Actually, it's quite dull.'

When he got up, she said, 'If you don't mind me saying so, Mr Omukae, you certainly don't look like a bureaucrat. My husband studies the martial arts, and your body is much like his. It looks like a well-tuned instrument.'

He turned, gave her a little bow. 'Since you are Western I can assume that is a compliment,' he said. 'Cycling is a hobby almost anyone can benefit from. But to me it is more. It is a sport; an obsession, perhaps, one could uncharitably say. Did I say that right? I am often not certain of my English.'

'You said it better than most Americans would have.'

"Thank you, although I'm sure you are merely being polite.' That smile came again. 'My obsession keeps me fit in mind as well as in body. I find that my obsession is akin to meditation: it is hi constant motion, providing a cleansing of the spirit.'

'The way you put it,' Justine said, 'I could use an obsession like that. Too much time alone with nothing to do, nowhere to go breeds its own kind of inertia which seems at times impossible to break.'

Senjin nodded. 'If I were your husband I would not leave you alone so often.'

'His... work is often difficult, demanding,' Justine said, abruptly annoyed at having to defend Nicholas to a stranger. Didn't Japanese have better manners?

'Of course,' Senjin said. 'That is most understandable. Life is never perfect. One must often make sacrifices.' He shrugged. 'This is natural; it is to be expected.'

Justine, close to him, was suddenly curious. 'What is it, I wonder, that I see behind your eyes?' She was stunned that she had spoken in such an intimate way to a virtual stranger. What, she wondered, had made her do that?

Senjin looked down into her Western face. 'What do you mean?'

She hesitated a moment, but found that she could not help herself. She felt abruptly lightheaded, the pulse of her heart like a, drumbeat in her ears. 'Despite what you've said about your English, you're very self-assured in any language. I can tell that just by the way you move.' Startled by her own revelation, she blurted, 'It's uncanny. You remind me so much of my husband.'

'Thank you, but I am sure it is merely your imagination,' Senjin said, with that note of humility only the Japanese can project.

His face in the waning light had the aspect of a statue of a hero long forgotten. There was about him a blend of the stoic and the melancholy that pulled on Justine's heartstrings.

'One learns in America,' Justine said, 'never merely to accept an unpleasant situation, but to strive to overcome it.'

'Unpleasantness, Mrs Linnear, is an inescapable element of life. The Japanese understand this implicitly.'

She watched him as he slowly circled her. 'Surely suffering is a natural part of life. But do you really believe that unpleasantness is natural? That it must be accepted?'

'Oh, yes,' Senjin said. 'Unpleasantness is essential to existence. Perhaps I should say human existence to be perfectly correct. By unpleasantness I mean pain. Without pain, Mrs Linnear, there can be no pleasure, certainly ecstasy would be entirely unknown because there would be nothing with which to contrast it. Do you see this?' He was smiling, but in a wholly different way. This was not the smile of the open innocent, but the knowing expression of a worldly man.