The Seabird of Sanematsu (14 page)

The illusion came from her appearance. With a statuesque and proud posture, she towered over the women of his world. Her full bosom and rounded buttocks made her appear as though she had borne children. Her confident poise projected wisdom.

The women of Nishikata-jyo had control of everything from the servants to the purse strings, so the men of the castle could concern themselves with the things of manhood, that is, war. They ran his household, satisfied his lusts, bore his children. Tori had no idea how to perform these duties; and although she was mature enough for childbearing, he knew from Sachi she was appalled at the idea. As for lust, did she know it existed?

So much about this woman-child attracted him, but he could not let that happen. He could not let himself be attracted to her or allow her into his most personal areas. She had never done anything to stir his blood on purpose, yet her very existence made his heart pound and blood rush to fill his loins. He squelched such thoughts before they could take hold of his body.

Tori was a danger to herself. Many things she had done with or said to him could cause her to lose her life with another samurai. If she were to survive, he would have to spread his wings to protect her. What was his would not be harmed unless he so ordered.

Yet because of Tori, he, too, was in danger. Her presence threatened the chauvinism of the Nihonese, who feared outsiders. How could he explain to Lord Ashikaga, Shogun by Emperor Go-Tsuchimikado’s edict, why he let her live on the Sacred Isle?

He glossed over the potential peril with the thought that the Ten-nou and Shogun were far away in Kyoto and no threat. He was safe on Kyushu, in his ryo-chi…for now.

Then again, perhaps the Ten-nou was correct about foreigners. They brought strange ideas and new thoughts to the Land of the Gods. Sanematsu questioned his role and those of the people around him. Most perplexing was his loss of interest in Tsuta. His attention, and body, was pulled in a different direction.

**
*

Tsuta wandered Nishikata’s market. Trailed by her guards, she picked over fruits, vegetables, fish, and moved to other vendors with items from all over Nihon. Without seeing what she looked at, the courtesan examined silk, sandals, hats, baskets, dolls, beads and jewels. What she wanted was not a trinket, but an end to her turmoil.

Turning, she trotted to her kaga. She barked orders to the bearers before she climbed in and slammed the panel shut. Her mood lightened by slight increments with the decision to seek resolution.

The kaga came to rest at the teahouse of Sayo. Tsuta alit and marched through the gate. The guards positioned themselves at the doorway. Sayo was with her seconds later.

“Oh, Foster-mother!” Tsuta wept. She fell into the older woman’s arms. Since her own parents had sold her to the woman at the age of two, Sayo had been her mother.

“What is wrong, my daughter?” When the girl’s tears subsided, Sayo guided her to sit on the mat. “You have no reason to cry. You are treated well by Lord Sanematsu, are you not?”

“I suppose.” Tsuta wiped her eyes with the sleeve of her osode.

“He does not beat or abuse you in any manner, as other samurai are known to do. He restricts his pleasures to you and showers you with as much affection as a Nihonese man is capable of.”

A female child came with tea and disappeared.

“I am very fortunate.” Tsuta sniffled. “I am so foolish for crying. It will be hours before I can show my face outside!”

“You are correct. You cannot allow anyone to see your puffy, reddened eyes,” Sayo admonished. “Why are you acting this way? It is not becoming to such a lady of Sanematsu’s house.”

“I have failed to serve my master,” Tsuta confessed. “Now I shall be punished for it.”

“Why this change of situation? You have held Lord Sanematsu content for the past two years.” Sayo poured tea with practiced calm.

“You have trained me well, Foster-mother.”

Sayo’s spies within Nishikata-jyo reported to her at regular intervals, or her foster-mother would have seen to it she was properly punished for any infraction, even if Sanematsu did not.

Tsuta’s placement with Sanematsu had been the second highlight of Sayo’s life, for which she still reaped rewards. When Sanematsu became Tsuta’s sponsor, he agreed to set Sayo up in Nishikata, though he had not purchased the courtesan’s contract outright as he could have done.

The notoriety of Sanematsu’s patronage brought many samurai to her house. And there was always the possibility of his buying Tsuta’s contract. This entire monetary burden was on the courtesan’s slim shoulders.

“For the last three moons, I have come to his pillow sporadically, where before it was every night,” Tsuta explained. “Sanematsu-sama is a young man and very virile. His lust never flags for long. Last night he called for me for the first time in ten days. I cleansed myself with care and dressed with particular thought. I laid out the instruments I knew would please him from my pillow box.

“He dined, and I sang, as he likes. But try as I might, his attention was elsewhere. I kept having to draw his thoughts back to me.” She choked back a sob. “When at last we did go to the pillow, it was not the same. He has never been so afflicted.”

“Could you not cause the Steaming Shaft to rise?” Sayo guessed, using the trade word for the peerless part of all men.

“Oh, no, Foster-mother.” Tsuta smiled. “It sprang forth as usual without aids, tall and rigid. I have never had to resort to the use of potions or devices.” She tried not to sound as if she bragged. It was not proper to boast of either one’s master or one’s own sexual prowess. “The problem was he did not complete the Cloudburst. He attended to my pleasure, but as for his own, he could not!” She covered her face with her hands. “Or would not!”

“Tsuta-ue, you will soon have his son.” Sayo reached out and stroked her foster-daughter’s hair. “You are young and have many years.”

“How can I if he will not spill his seed because of the barbarian woman?” Tsuta raised her head. Anger replaced her pain. “He can think only of her!”

“Ah, I understand. He is pillowing her?” The gray-haired head bobbed up and down. The loose jowls of her round face swayed with the movement.

“No. But since she arrived, she is with him during the day, and at night, I can tell he dreams of her. As we pillowed last night, when I thought the Cloudburst was upon him, he whispered her name.”

“It is as I have suspected.” Sayo pulled the opulent osode tighter over her breasts. “We must work to insure the barbarian does not displace you, my daughter.”

“We both know if Sanematsu-sama wishes to oust me, he will do so unless I have a powerful tool to use,” Tsuta reminded her. Neither of them wished to return to Miyazaki and the masterless samurai who found work on the ships in the port.

“Tsuta-sama, we will find a way to keep you with Lord Sanematsu. Send word that you will be staying here for a few days. That you are ill. We will decide what to do. In the meantime, your absence will make him miss you more.”

“I hope you are right.”

“Am I not always?” An idea was already forming in Sayo’s mind, as she patted Tsuta’s hand with her pudgy one.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

Alone, Sanematsu sat and pondered the dilemmas of his life. The day had been long, exhausting both mind and body. In the hours before he retired, he sipped sake and thought about what was happening around him.

He was not doing his duty to his people and threatened to fail his emperor. His highest-ranking officers now went to deal with tax collecting in the villages. Earlier in the day, he had received his generals’ reports regarding the tensions in the northwest. He dreaded the incipient war for more reasons than his own hatred of bloodshed. The thought of leaving his castle disturbed him. He sent others to deal with the conflict instead of going himself.

He had not met with the council in the last month. By not overseeing the elders’ decisions, he appeared to be conceding to their wishes. Pressures were building. The coming months would bring the appointment of
shugo
, the position of provincial governor, and he would be required to attend the Bakafu at Kyoto.

Ashikaga’s Bakafu was so named from the tradition of a battlefield government established inside the commander’s tent when the early shoguns had no fixed residence. As shugo, he would be required to maintain a yearlong presence at the Kyoto court where the Shogun met with the Bakafu, issued decrees and formed alliances. The appointment could not be refused and brought with it a heavy responsibility. Although the lure of Kyoto did present itself as an escape, Sanematsu did not want to leave Nishikata. He did not wish to be away from Tori, the source of his pleasure and his quandary.

Once he had found great peace and harmony, nestled in his castle; now it was all confusion. He was a boiling turmoil inside, the deepest part of his soul distraught and frothing. The chaos was about to spill over and destroy his contentment. He was no longer complacent about his life and the people in it; he chaffed at accepting his role and the rigors of it. For the first time in his life, he saw flaws and blemishes everywhere. Things he had overlooked for ten years came into focus, and he did not like what he saw.

When he had received Tsuta’s message a week earlier that she was confined to bed at Sayo’s teahouse with illness, Sanematsu was not concerned. He felt no guilt about being pleased to be alone. Since he could not have the body that dominated his thoughts, he would entertain fantasies. And it was not his mistress who stirred his blood.

He could hardly contain his passion for Tori. Events of that very afternoon had caused it to rise to its highest peak. The regions below his swords swelled as he recalled what had occurred.

**
*

While Sanematsu met with his war council and Sachi attended to the duties of her own household, Aderyn walked the beach of the small cove. She hated the way her guards shadowed her. They moved with every step she took, and forming a claustrophobic human wall around her.

The air held a hint of the coming spring, alluding to its warmer weather. Even now, the heat was evident along the shore. The breeze calmed, leaving the humidity to fill the air, and the sun bore down. Sweat dripped to the small of her back and between her breasts. Droplets trickled down the side of her face, and her clothing became stifling. At the edge of the water, a strange summons seemed to call to her from the ocean.

“Hamasaki-sama,” she told the samurai, “please leave and take the others with you.” She waved a hand toward the guards.

“So sorry, Tori. Lord Sanematsu will not permit me to leave you alone.” Hamasaki spoke softly but with determination, ready to resist whatever argument she tried to offer him. He had witnessed her outbursts of stubbornness often enough.

“I do not care! I am tired of all of you surrounding me. I will not run away,” she asserted.

“I cannot.” He sounded certain he would have his way.

“Lord Sanematsu wishes me to be pleased.” Aderyn changed her tactics, adding a honeyed tone to her voice. “If you remain, I will not be pleased. I would have to tell him who was responsible for my unhappiness.”

She turned her back to him while she glanced over her shoulder, eyes askance.

Hamasaki Heishiro looked perplexed. She watched the battle between his orders and what she asked raged inside him then walked a few steps away. Let the young man stew.

“As you request.”

Hamasaki turned on his heels, snapped at his men, and they went away. Aderyn waited until they were out of sight then disrobed. Her conscience prickled at having put him through the agony of disobeying Sanematsu, but she needed to be alone. Rationalizing that nothing would happen to her, she pushed the nagging guilt away and waded into the refreshing, if chilly, water.

The fine sand slipped between her toes, and an occasional brave small fish brushed her legs. The cold water tingled her flesh with gooseflesh, and her nipples puckered. When she was in up to her knees, she dove into the waves and came up several feet away from shore. She swam out into the open sea.

**
*

Complying with Sanematsu’s commands, Hamasaki dispatched a runner to inform the daimyo of the barbarian’s activity. When the messenger arrived, Sanematsu had finished listening to his generals and planned to apply his free time to his martial training. Hamasaki’s man’s report dictated that he set out for the beach.

There he spied Tori swimming far out in the cove. Captivated, he watched and waited for her to return to shore. The sun seemed to shine brightest over her as she glided through the waves.

Contrary to her wishes but nevertheless following his lord’s orders, Hamasaki had dispersed men to stand on the cliffs on either side of the beach to keep anyone else away from “Tori’s Cove.” She must not have seen the men watching her because she began to splash and frolic. Several minutes had passed when he heard the warrior on the right shout as he gestured toward Tori’s playground.

Both Sanematsu’s samurai and Tori’s guards tried to get the girl’s attention, but she was too far out to notice. He ordered his men into the water to retrieve her. They hesitated for a moment then obeyed, handing their swords over to their peers. What seemed an eternity later, two of them emerged dragging her, who struggled between them like a fish on a line.

The way she shook off the soldiers when she caught sight of him amused Sanematsu. In knee-deep surf, she marched up to him, nude and dripping ocean water.

“How dare you?” she shouted. She stood before him as she always did, proud and dignified. “How could you treat me like this? I am tired of being watched, unable to be out of anyone’s sight! I was only swimming.”

Sanematsu could do nothing but stare. Tori’s anger blinded her to her state of undress. During all their conversations and time together, her thoughts and speech had never been that of a woman, so he tended to overlook her gender. Now he was confronted with it, and she was more beautiful than he could have imagined.

Her skin had a natural tan, as if she were sculpted out of teak. Her hair, sleeked back on her head, clung provocatively to her firm body. Her breasts stood upright, full and round, the pink-tinged nipples puckered in the cool air. Her abdomen was flat, with a nest of light-colored fur at the juncture of her thighs. A red flush covered her face and neck as it always did when she was angry.

“Do you have to keep those dogs on me?” she railed on. “I am suffocating! I cannot go anywhere. Do you think I can swim to Min-koku? Or Portugal?”

Sanematsu came to his senses, tearing his eyes away to see his men leering at her. Fortunately, her nudity distracted them from noticing the barbarian shouting at their feudal lord.

He looked for her clothes.

“Why are they here all the time?” Tori continued, still so angry she did not realize everyone was staring at her. “I do not desire to escape, and I am quite safe here.”

Sanematsu handed his swords to the man at his right--the man who always stood at his right.

“There…”

He untied the girdle holding his garment closed.

“…was…”

He removed the white hitatare, leaving his torso beneath bare.

“…a…”

He approached Tori and draped the hitatare around her.

“…shark.”

By instinct, she put her arms in the sleeves, and he closed the front. He tied the girdle with tenderness. The garment came to the top of her knees, whereas on him it fell just passed his groin. The sleeves, three-quarter length on the warrior, covered the girl’s hands.

“They…” He pointed to the men who had served as lookouts. “…saw it approaching you. Those ‘dogs’ saved your life, Ko-tori.”

His words were soft as he studied her green eyes.

Those unique eyes cut left then right to see the samurai lookouts. She then turned toward the open ocean. A triangle of gray flesh cut the surface in wide circles in the clear blue water.

“My men are here to protect you, not to keep you prisoner,” Sanematsu explained, his hands on her shoulders.

“I am sorry.” She inspected the sand between her bare feet. “Please, thank them for their watchfulness.” She raised her face to him. “I apologize for shouting at you.”

“It is your way.” He shrugged and removed his hands. “But, from now on, will you allow them to do as I have ordered? If they fail, for any reason, they will have to answer according to bushido.”

As she was not conditioned to consider the way of the warrior, he was certain she had not thought of how her demands could have resulted in Hamasaki’s death. He would have to insure that Sachi explained what bushido required of failures, about the ritual of self-kill, seppuku, along with the many other responsibilities of a woman of samurai rank.

“Yes, my lord, I understand. May we go home?” She held his hitatare closer.

“Yes.”

**
*

Sanematsu, naked to the waist, his long sword again in his right hand, led the group through the city to the yashiki. He deposited Tori in her quarters then went to the practice area. Sparring all afternoon, he worked up a profuse sweat and immense fatigue. He practiced long and hard, until he could not raise his sword. Then, after relaxing in a bath, he satisfied the resulting ravenous appetite.

Now, long after sunset, he sat with his sake, feeling the sensations continue to churn in his lower abdomen. He could do nothing to quell the desire the episode on the beach had stirred. Ko-tori’s nude image refused to leave his thoughts, and his feelings took on new and uncomfortable meanings.

He had never experienced such a strong desire, such hunger, such
need
, with any of his women. Pillowing was a duty performed to preserve the familial line and his personal health. Why had he not experienced this flame with the women of his past? Could the fire burning in him be a passion no other woman had uncovered?

Was this the emotion Tori spoke about when she related romantic stories from her own country? The stories, first told to Sachi were, as with everything concerning the foreign girl, reported in their entirety to him. Tori explained the European courting customs often so Sachi could understand the stories popular in the West. Her tales were filled with embracing, hugging, kissing and other such intimate gestures reserved for the privacy of the bedchamber here.

Since the age of thirteen, he had enjoyed the tingle of soft, moist lips on his body, but the casual touch of mouth on mouth in public seemed indecent. Yet, stirred whenever he was in her presence, he entertained thoughts of sharing such gestures with the foreign girl.

He pushed away the thoughts of touching her, of joining with her. His relationship with Tori was perplexing and complicated. Though she was a woman, he treated her differently than the women of Nihon. It seemed right to listen to her, to allow her to speak her mind, to treat her with the respect accorded to men.

He feared that if he were to take her to the pillow she would be lowered to the position of a woman; and as much as he desired her, he dared not risk losing her as an equal. Then he would think it unimaginable that he could not pillow with her and remain her friend.

His frustration grew, and he sent for his personal guard.

“Hikita-uji,” he addressed his most trusted man, “you have visited Sayo’s teahouse of the Willow World?”

“Yes, my lord.” Hikita’s dark eyes remained fixed on his as he knelt before him.

“Do you have knowledge of any lady worthy of my attention?”

“Perhaps my wife could be of better assistance. She has always provided most wisely in this area.”

“Have her come to me, then.”

Samurai did not just drop in at a teahouse--only lesser-level warriors took their pleasure with prostitutes. They were for the lower classes.