Yamada Monogatori: The Emperor in Shadow (25 page)

“Lord Yorinobu did speak of a family squabble, but I had no details,” I said.

He smiled. “Yet seldom do such squabbles have such immediate consequences. Yorinobu has made good on his promise—he has appointed his adopted son, Yoshinaga, plus a member of the Murakami Genji, to the Daijo-Daijin. These two, in turn, are appointing other more minor but very important officers, and all from the emperor’s own faction, bypassing the
sekkan-ke
altogether. The Fujiwara were powerless to stop it, all because their two supposed leaders are at each other’s throats.”

I took a few moments to let what Kenji had told me sink in. “Well.”

“Well, what?”

“I was merely taking time to appreciate a brilliant piece of strategy. I remember when I first heard of Princess Shigeko’s passing. Six years ago, was it not?”

Kenji frowned. “About. What is your meaning?”

“Just if Prince Kanemore, and at the time, Prince Takahito wished to be of service to Lord Yorinobu—and I would think they would, as my understanding is that Lord Yorinobu has long supported Takahito’s ascension—why would they wait until now? I flatter myself and you as well we could have been of some use once the haunting was discovered.”

Kenji stroked his chin. “My instinct tells me Prince Kanemore wouldn’t wait, but such an act would bring His Majesty no immediate benefit, as Yorinobu was already committed to his faction. No, Lord Yamada, I think we were held in reserve, like a squad of mounted archers during a battle, until the time to strike had come.”

Perhaps His Majesty takes after his mother even more than I realized.

“I no longer care what he is or is not doing,” I said. “I need to find Prince Kanemore.”

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

It was one thing to resolve on a plan of action, but quite another, in the cold light of a new day, to put that plan into practice.

“Kenji-san, do you think any of your temple contacts know of the whereabouts of Prince Kanemore?”

“None of the few I’ve spoken to did. Honestly, Lord Yamada, did you think I would forget to ask?”

“I suspected such, but I simply wanted you to confirm it. My next question is, do you think they could find out? If he’s not in the Capital, I would like to know where he is.”

“A bit trickier,” he said, “but there are few great households who do not have priestly visitors for instruction and healing services, and people do talk. So long as we understand our looking for this information will not remain a secret for long.”

“Nothing remains a secret here for long. We must risk it, I think.”

“Very well. I will see what is possible.”

Kenji left then to meet with his friends and associates within the temple community. I suppose I should have been more concerned for his safety, but as he had been out of the city long enough that most of his past transgressions had faded in everyone’s memory, I wasn’t unduly concerned. Rather, I envied his ability to move freely about the city, a right I had long since forfeited.

A short time later Takamasa brought me word the former governor of Kawachi province was to be permanently exiled to the northern coast of Suma in Eichigo. I had wondered what the emperor’s justice had in store for him. I would not have been completely surprised if the sentence had been death, but after all he was a protégé of Fujiwara no Michinaga, and that was still a name to conjure with in the Capital. I’m sure His Majesty considered it far more pragmatic to exile the man rather than hand out the punishment he so richly deserved and risk pushing the Fujiwara into a more united front. While exile would have been considered far more severe in the case of a courtier, for one such as Minamoto no Yorinobu, it was simply a new place to live—without the servants and attendants and
bushi
at his beck and call. He could either make the best of his situation or spend his remaining years planning toothless revenge. Even so, the news triggered a new thought.

I wonder who still cares about this man?

While it was unlikely the real instigator of the assassination attempt on Princess Tagako would show himself for the execution of the warrant of exile, I thought it might be interesting and perhaps informative to see who would be there. I allowed Morofusa and Ujiyasu to collect me and we set out for the Demon Gate.

The northeastern gate was called the Demon Gate since it was located at the direction from which evil spirits were thought to enter the city. In my experience they could come from anywhere, so I never thought the gate’s sinister reputation was deserved. Even so, it was for this reason a sentence of exile would be carried out there, thus adding another layer of humiliation to the actual punishment. To reach the gate we had to travel within sight of the imperial compound and pass closely to the Gion Shrine, which was located due east of it. Needless to say, the streets in this part of the city were fairly busy places, which I knew made Morofusa nervous. If I had been traveling alone, I would have felt—and been—perfectly safe lost in the crowd. Now I was set apart, and that was quite a different situation.

“My lord, are all these people here because of the exile?” Morofusa asked.

I frowned. “They’re here for the shrine and for business within the imperial compound and for travel to the temples located at Mount Hiei. This is a busy area and always has been, the influx of demons notwithstanding. When we get closer to the gate, we’ll have a better idea of who is there for the ceremony.”

Glancing about, I silently hoped we would be able to tell anything at all, if the crowds did not thin out by the time we reached the gate. Fortunately, as we moved away from the shrine and the imperial compound, there were fewer people on the street. I started to pay more attention to the people left in the area as we approached the gate. For the most part they appeared to be the curious or those who had business in the area and the street merchants who served and profited by both, as well as the normal run of charms-and-talisman hawkers who normally hung about the gate in order to offer “protection” from the evil spirits entering the city by the dozens, supposedly, through that very gate. I remembered Kenji as just such a one, though with the distinction his charms and wards usually worked. I wondered how he would feel about knowing his place there had long since been taken. I couldn’t imagine he missed his old life very much, but then he had always been flexible about the possibilities life had offered him. In some ways I envied and tried to emulate that aspect of Kenji’s character, but I had never succeeded very well.

I saw the procession appear from the direction of the imperial compound, and I withdrew to the far edge of those gathered there. I was not interested in whether or not the prisoner knew I was there. I hadn’t come to gloat—my only concern was to see if anything unusual occurred or if he would simply be packed off to the northern coast at Suma with no witnesses save the official and the curious.

An official from the ministry of justice, a pompous-looking older bald man, held up a scroll, and even from that distance I knew it bore the emperor’s seal. He opened the scroll as the prisoner was led out between two scowling
bushi.
The former governor of Kawachi looked very different than when I had seen him last. There was nothing of the defiance remaining in him. The former protégé of the great Fujiwara no Michinaga looked beaten down, crushed. The officer held up the open scroll to read.

“Lord Minamoto no Yorinobu, you have been found guilty of the crime of the attempted murder of Princess Tagako, former high priestess of the Grand Shrine. Do you have anything to say before the sentence is carried out?”

A little of the old fire returned to the man’s face. No more than a spark, quickly fading, but it reminded me of the man he had been.

“I was betrayed!” he said.

Betrayed? What is he talking about?

There were no explanations forthcoming, as the prisoner fell silent and the official in charge read the sentence. “By Order of the emperor, you are to be escorted to the northern coast at Suma where you are to reside for the remainder of your life.
Shōshō
, carry out the sentence.”

Lord Minamoto no Yorinobu was escorted from the city by a group of Taira
bushi.

I turned to Morofusa. “They will likely camp overnight just west of Lake Biwa, yes? I think there’s a small village there.” When I had joined the escort of Princess Teiko on her way to Suma, she had requested we camp on the shores of Lake Biwa itself, which was only a little out of the way. Too late we had realized why she had made that request.

“I think so. Why?”

“I need to speak to the former governor. And I’d rather not chase him all the way to Suma to do it.”

I also preferred no one in the city saw us follow the procession, so we waited until they were well away and the crowd had dispersed before we chose our moment and followed. We caught up with the prisoner and escort after they had stopped for the day at a village north of the Capital. Morofusa went ahead to speak to the
shōshō
of the Taira
bushi
, but he soon returned.

“All is arranged. The Taira
shōshō
had no objection but deferred to his prisoner. Oddly enough, Lord Yorinobu was willing—rather, I’d say eager—to speak with you. There’s a small local temple. He has agreed to meet with you there . . . alone.”

“I prefer the same, though stay close.”

“Depend upon it.”

The small temple was indeed a small temple, as one might expect to find in a farming village of no great size. I suppose both the temple and the village had a name, but I never heard them. Inside the temple was a tiny lecture hall with seating for no more than twenty people, a wooden statue of the Divine Kannon, and Lord Yorinobu. He sat on a bench as if to attend a lecture from the sutras, gazing not at me but at the statue of Kannon.

“I had not thought to see you again, Lord Yamada,” he said.

“Nor I you, to be honest. Yet something you said at the reading of your sentence caught my notice.”

“Since I said only one thing, I can guess what that something was. I wondered if you had been present. I thought you might.”

“I did not come to gloat, I assure you.”

He looked at me directly then. “No, though if our situations were reversed, I might have done so. I would guess you were either there to make certain I was removed from the Capital and sent far away from Her Highness or to gain some insight into the danger she faces, especially as you were denied this during our first unfortunate meeting. Possibly both.”

“I will not deny this,” I said. “And I realize you have little reason to wish to be helpful to me.”

He smiled then. “As things stand, there is little reason to avoid doing so. I am only too aware I will likely never see the Capital again, nor any whom I had reason to call my friends, and there is something I wish known. If you are willing to listen, well then, I am willing to speak. It was true, what I said at the Demon Gate. I was betrayed.”

“By whom?” I asked.

He sighed deeply. “This to me is the worst part of it—I have no idea.”

“I do not understand.”

He looked at me again. “You were right when you surmised I did not know why I was ordered to kill Princess Tagako, nor was it necessary that I know. I was given an order, and I was obliged to obey. The order arrived under proper seal, so I had no questions of its legitimacy, despite the unpleasantness of the order itself.”

“The only people in a position to give you such an order would be the Fujiwara,” I said.

“I will not confirm this, even now, but you are free to draw your own conclusions, as I’m sure you will. Regardless, when I was brought back to the city, I sent messages to . . . certain people, requesting their assistance in my difficulty.”

“They refused?”

“It was a bit more complicated, but, yes, they refused. I understand why, of course, yet I cannot help but feel resentful.”

I considered for a moment. “Lord Yorinobu, with your indulgence, I am about to speculate. You need not confirm or even comment, but I will ask that you listen to me.”

Yorinobu shrugged. “I have no objection, as I no longer consider this of concern. My life as I had always understood it is now over. My loyalties are my own.”

I gazed at the statue of Divine Kannon. “It is not a secret the two greatest leaders of the Fujiwara clan are in opposition. Suppose one of them heard of Princess Tagako’s impending marriage and believed it was not in their interests, for whatever reason. Now, no one would have attached their name to such an order as you were given. It would be treason, should it be discovered. There would be no name on the order.”

“I am still listening,” Yorinobu said.

“One of the brothers—Yorimichi, Norimichi, for our purposes it’s not important which—gave the order. After your plan was thwarted, I believe his brother’s role in this debacle would have reached the other. Reasonable?”

“I am still listening,” Yorinobu repeated, though he was nodding to himself. “Go on.”

“At this point the one who gave the order would deny it, as his brother could use this knowledge as leverage against him, even perhaps remove him as an impediment. The one who actually gave the order might find it expedient to accuse his brother of hatching the plot himself. Naturally, this would do little to heal a family already at odds. In neither case would they be willing or perhaps even able to come to the support of an old ally. A divided family is a weakened family.”

“If I said you were close to the heart of things, you would have no cause to believe me. I might still be acting out of loyalty to spread false information.”

“That is true,” I said.

“So do not believe me when I tell you that you are, indeed, close to the heart of things. It would be foolish of you to do so.”

“Agreed,” I said.

“Well, then. I have a long day ahead of me tomorrow,” he said. “I think I will need my rest.”

“For what little it may be worth, good luck to you.”

“And to you as well, Lord Yamada. I am not sure which of us will need it more.”