Shōgun полностью

“I can’t. I can’t, Lord,” Buntaro had said. “She’s—I’ve wanted her from the first moment I saw her. When we were married, the first time, she was everything a man could want. I thought I was blessed—you remember how every daimyo in the realm wanted her! Then . . . then I sent her away to protect her after the filthy assassination, pretending to be disgusted with her for her safety, and then, when the Taikō told me to bring her back years later, she excited me even more. The truth is I expected her to be grateful, and took her as a man will, and didn’t care about the little things a woman wants, like poems and flowers. But she’d changed. She was as faithful as ever, but just ice, always asking for death, for me to kill her.” Buntaro was frantic. “I can’t kill her or allow her to kill herself. She’s tainted my son and makes me detest other women but I can’t rid myself of her. I’ve . . . I’ve tried being kind but always the ice is there and it drives me mad. When I came back from Korea and heard she’d converted to this nonsense Christian religion I was amused, for what does any stupid religion matter? I was going to tease her about it but before I knew what was happening, I had my knife at her throat and swore I’d cut her if she didn’t renounce it. Of course she wouldn’t renounce it, what samurai would under such a threat, neh? She just looked up at me with those eyes of hers and told me to go on. ‘Please cut me, Lord,’ she said. ‘Here, let me hold my head back for you. I pray God I’ll bleed to death,’ she said. I didn’t cut her, Sire. I took her. But I did cut off the hair and ears of some of her ladies who had encouraged her to become Christian and turned them out of the castle. And I did the same to her foster mother, and cut off her nose as well, vile-tempered old hag! And then Mariko said, because . . . because I’d punished her ladies, the next time I came to her bed uninvited she’d commit seppuku, in any way she could, at once . . . in spite of her duty to you, in spite of her duty to the family, even in spite of the—the commandments of her Christian God!” Tears of rage were running down his cheeks unheeded. “I can’t kill her, much as I want to. I can’t kill Akechi Jinsai’s daughter, much as she deserves it. . . .”

Toranaga had let Buntaro rant on until he was spent, then dismissed him, ordering him to stay totally away from Mariko until he considered what was to be done. He dispatched his own doctor to examine her. The report was favorable: bruises but no internal damage.

For his own safety, because he expected treachery and the sand of time was running out, Toranaga decided to increase the pressure on all of them. He ordered Mariko into Omi’s house with instructions to rest, to stay within the confines of the house and completely out of the Anjin-san’s way. Next he had summoned the Anjin-san and pretended irritation when it was clear they could hardly converse at all, dismissing him peremptorily. All training was intensified. Cadres were sent on forced marches. Naga was ordered to take the Anjin-san along and walk him into the ground. But Naga didn’t walk the Anjin-san into the ground.

So he tried himself. He led a battalion eleven hours over the hills. The Anjin-san kept up, not with the front rank, but still he kept up. Back again at Anjiro, the Anjin-san said in his almost incomprehensible gibberish, hardly able to stand, “Toranaga-sama, I walk can. I guns training can. So sorry, no possibles two at same timings, neh?”

Toranaga smiled now, lying under the overcast waiting for the rain, warmed by the game of breaking Blackthorne to the fist. He’s a short-wing all right. Mariko’s equally tough, equally intelligent, but more brilliant, and she’s got a ruthlessness that he’ll never have. She’s like a peregrine, like Tetsu-ko. The best. Why is it the female hawk, the falcon, is always bigger and faster and stronger than the male, always better than the male?

They’re all hawks—she, Buntaro, Yabu, Omi, Fujiko, Ochiba, Naga and all my sons and my daughters and women and vassals, and all my enemies—all hawks, or prey for hawks.

I must get Naga into position high over his quarry and let him stoop. Who should it be? Omi or Yabu?

What Naga had said about Yabu was true.

“So, Yabu-san, what have you decided?” he had asked, the second day.

“I’m not going to Osaka until you go, Sire. I’ve ordered all Izu mobilized.”

“Ishido will impeach you.”

“He’ll impeach you first, Sire, and if the Kwanto falls, Izu falls. I made a solemn bargain with you. I’m on your side. The Kasigi honor their bargains.”

“I’m equally honored to have you as an ally,” he had lied, pleased that Yabu had once more done what he had planned for him to do. The next day Yabu had assembled a host and asked him to review it and then, in front of all his men, knelt formally and offered himself as vassal.

“You acknowledge me your feudal lord?” Toranaga had said.