There was a burst of laughter from the ladies as the two little boys started strutting up and down importantly, their scarlet kimonos dancing. "It's good to have children here again. I thank all gods mine are at Yedo."
"Yes." Yabu was looking at the women speculatively.
"I was wondering the same," Sumiyori said quietly.
"What's your answer?"
"There's only one now. If Ishido lets us go, fine. If Lady Mariko's seppuku is wasted, then ... then we'll help those ladies into the Void and begin the killing. They won't want to live."
Yabu said, "Some may want to."
"You can decide that later, Yabu-san. It would benefit our Master if they all commit seppuku here. And the children."
"Yes."
"Afterward we'll man the walls and then open the gates at dawn. We'll fight till noon. That'll be enough. Then those who are left will come back inside and set fire to this part of the castle. If I'm alive then I'd be honored if you'd be my second."
"Of course."
Sumiyori grinned. "This's going to blow the realm apart, neh? All this killing and her seppuku. It'll spread like fire - it'll eat up Osaka, neh? You think that'll delay the Exalted? Would that be our Master's plan?"
"I don't know. Listen, Sumiyori-san, I'm going back to my house for a moment. Fetch me as soon as the Lady comes back." He walked over to Blackthorne, who sat musing on the main steps. "Listen, Anjin-san," Yabu said furtively, "perhaps I have a plan. Secret, neh? 'Secret,' you understand?"
"Yes. Understand." Bells tolled the hour change. The time rang in all their heads, the beginning of the Hour of the Monkey, six bells of the afternoon watch, three of the clock. Many turned to the sun and, without thinking, measured it.
"What plan?" Blackthorne asked.
"Talk later. Stay close by. Say nothing, understand?"
"Yes."
Yabu stalked out of the gateway with ten Browns. Twenty Grays attached themselves and together they went down the avenue. His guest house was not far around the first corner. The Grays stayed outside his gate. Yabu motioned the Browns to wait in the garden and he went inside alone.
"It's impossible, Lord General," Ochiba said. "You can't let a lady of her rank commit seppuku. So sorry, but you've been trapped. "
"I agree," Lord Kiyama said forcefully.
"With due humility, Lady," Ishido said, "whatever I said or didn't say, doesn't matter an eta's turd to her. She'd already decided, at least Toranaga had."
"Of course he's behind it," Kiyama said as Ochiba recoiled at Ishido's uncouthness. "So sorry, but he's outsmarted you again. Even so you can't let her commit seppuku!"
"Why?"
"Please, so sorry, Lord General, we must keep our voices down," Ochiba said. They were waiting in the spacious antechamber of Lady Yodoko's sick room in the inner quarters of the donjon, on the second floor. "I'm sure it wasn't your fault and there must be a solution. " Kiyama said quietly, "You cannot let her continue her plan, Lord General, because that will inflame every lady in the castle."
Ishido glared at him. "You seem to forget a couple were shot by mistake and that didn't create a ripple among them - except to stop any more escape attempts."
"That was a terrible mistake, Lord General," Ochiba said.
"I agree. But we are at war, Toranaga's not yet in our hands, and until he's dead you and the Heir are in total danger."
"So sorry - I'm not worried for myself - only for my son," Ochiba said. "They've all got to be back here in eighteen days. I advise you to let them all go."
"That's an unnecessary risk. So sorry. We're not certain she means it."
"She does," Kiyama told him contemptuously, despising Ishido's truculent presence in the opulent, overrich quarters that reminded him so clearly of the Taiko, his friend and revered patron. "She's samurai."
"Yes," Ochiba said. "So sorry, but I agree with Lord Kiyama. Mariko-san will do what she says. Then there's that hag Etsu! Those Maedas are a proud lot, neh?"
Ishido walked over to the window and looked out. "They can all burn as far as I'm concerned. The Toda woman's Christian, neh? Isn't suicide against her religion? A special sin?"
"Yes, but she'll have a second - so it won't be suicide."
"And if she doesn't?"
"What?"
"Say she's disarmed and has no second?"
"How could you do that?"
"Capture her. Confine her with carefully chosen maids until Toranaga's across our borders." Ishido smiled. "Then she can do what she wants. I'd be even delighted to help her."
"How could you capture her?" Kiyama asked. "She'd always have time to seppku, or to use her knife."
"Perhaps. But say she could be captured and disarmed and held for a few days. Isn't the 'few days' vital? Isn't that why she's insisting on going today, before Toranaga crosses over our borders and castrates himself?"
"Could it be done?" Lady Ochiba asked.
"Possibly," Ishido said.
Kiyama pondered this. "In eighteen days Toranaga must be here. He could delay at the border for at the most another four days. She would have to be held for a week at the most."
"Or forever," Ochiba said. "Toranaga's delayed so much, I sometimes think he'll never come."
"He has to by the twenty-second day," Ishido said. "Ah, Lady, that was a brilliant, brilliant idea. "
"Surely that was your idea, Lord General?" Ochiba's voice was soothing though she was very tired from a sleepless night. "What about Lord Sudara and my sister? Are they with Toranaga now?"
"No, Lady. Not yet. They will be brought here by sea."
"She is not to be touched," Ochiba said. "Or her child."
"Her child is direct heir of Toranaga, who's heir to the Minowaras. My duty to the Heir, Lady, makes me point this out again."
"My sister is not to be touched. Nor is her son."
"As you wish."
She said to Kiyama, "Sire, how good a Christian is Mariko-san?"
"Pure," Kiyama replied at once. "You mean about suicide being a sin? I - I think she would honor that or her eternal soul is forfeit, Lady. But I don't know if..."
"Then there's a simpler solution," Ishido said without thinking.
"Command the High Priest of the Christians to order her to stop harassing the legal rulers of the Empire!"
"He doesn't have the power," Kiyama said. Then he added, his voice even more barbed, "That's political interference - something you've always been bitterly against, and rightly."
"It seems Christians interfere only when it suits them," Ishido said. "It was only a suggestion."
The inner door opened and a doctor stood there. His face was grave and exhaustion aged him. "So sorry, Lady, she's asking for you."
"Is she dying?" Ishido asked.
"She's near death, Lord General, yes, but when, I don't know."
Ochiba hurried across the large room and through the inner door, her blue kimono clinging, the skirts swaying gracefully. Both men watched her. The door closed. For a moment the two men avoided each other's eyes, then Kiyama said, "You really think Lady Toda could be captured?"
"Yes," Ishido told him, watching the door.
Ochiba crossed this even more opulent room and knelt beside the futons. Maids and doctors surrounded them. Sunlight seeped through the bamboo shutters and skittered off the gold and red inlaid carvings of the beams and posts and doors. Yodoko's bed was surrounded by decorative inlaid screens. She seemed to be sleeping, her bloodless face settled within the hood of her Buddhist robe, her wrists thin, the veins knotted, and Ochiba thought how sad it was to become old. Age was so unfair to women. Not to men, only to women. Gods protect me from old age, she prayed. Buddha protect my son and put him safely into power and protect me only as long as I'm capable of protecting him and helping him.