Gloria Oliver (7 page)

From out of the silence, one of the rowers raised his voice in song. With each line others joined in.

Astounded, he listened carefully as they continued. It was a happy song, one about sake and parties going long into the night, an even bigger surprise. And it was one whose rhythm matched that of the rowing and helped make the sea seem less forbidding.

He stared in disbelief as Asaka did nothing to stop them. He had expected the samurai to shout them into silence, but he didn’t. It was almost as if he didn’t even hear them. Until then, Toshi had thought singing was only something for the living.

“Boy.”

Asaka’s deep voice made him jump. He scrambled to his feet waiting for the samurai’s command. The old retainer walked forward, but Toshi stayed still until Asaka’s green lit stare focused on him. He rushed to stand before him.

Asaka stared at him for a long moment. “It is time.”

“Hai.” Taking the weighted line, he completed a depth reading. He then took a coil of rope with a triangular piece of wood at the end and a small hourglass. Setting the wood upright in the water, he let it go and tipped the hourglass over. When the sands ran out, he took hold of the rope, noting how much of it had played out, and dragged it all back in. He took the compass next and found their bearing before returning it. He entered all the information into the logbook. Feeling nervous, he remembered what had happened the night before, yet his nausea was mild enough for the moment not to distract him too much from his task.

Trying to keep his hands steady, he borrowed the cross-staff. Taking a better look at it than he had the previous night, he felt a cold film of perspiration spread over his face as he realized he’d seen that specific instrument before. With a sense of growing dread, he cast a furtive glance toward Asaka. Seeing the samurai’s attention wasn’t focused on him at all, he turned the cross-staff over to look at the underside of the crosspiece, hoping not to find the gaijin initials he already knew would be there.

He closed his eyes and struggled to take a deep breath as the initials R.V. glared at him from where he’d known they’d be. Ramon Valez—it had been difficult to learn to say the name the way the Spaniards did.

The captain had been most patient, in this and many other things. He’d not fit the mold painted about foreigners. Unlike many of his counterparts, the captain had even been willing to learn about the ways of the people of Nihon. A storm had damaged his ship, but Master Shun’s mapping proposition had helped take the sting out of having to stay in Nihon while they managed repairs.

Though the captain was a foreigner, Toshi thought they understood each other and were friends. And after the many months the foreigners had spent there, the captain had told him the time when they could leave would be arriving soon.

Captain Valez couldn’t possibly afford to lose his instruments. How had the samurai gotten them, anyway? At times the captain had talked of nothing but his strange country and his wish to go back home and perhaps retire. Because Toshi had worked with the foreigner, might this be why it was Valez’s instruments which were taken instead of someone else’s? How long had these people been watching him?

“Boy.”

His head snapped up as he realized he’d stood still for much too long. Trying to hold his growing anger in check, he brought the stolen cross-staff up to his eye so he could take a reading. Mechanically, he went through all the steps, feeling somehow traitorous to his gaijin friend.

He tried to think of nothing but what he had to do. Returning the cross-staff, he then began his calculations.

“Well, boy?”

Hearing Asaka’s impatience, he hurried to him with the open map. Trying not to look at him, lest his stewing anger show, he bowed and showed him their calculated position. They were halfway up the coast of Honshu.

“We are here, sir.”

“Very well,” Asaka said. “Show this to the steersman.”

“Hai.” Still not looking at Asaka, he bowed again and walked over to the skeleton holding the ship’s tiller. Just as he had done for the samurai, he held open the map and showed the steersman their present position.

Toshi suddenly wished the man before him were still made of flesh so he might have a hope of reading his expression, as the steersman stared at him with the never-ceasing skeletal grin.

“You’ve gotten lucky twice, boy,” the steersman sneered. “You’d better hope you can figure out how to make it last.”

He ignored the other’s unkind tone and said nothing. He calmly rolled up the map.

“We don’t need the help of gaijin-tainted peasants,” the steersman continued.

Toshi looked up, more startled than angered by the steersman’s attitude. Two points of yellow light flared in his dark, empty eyes as if daring him to contradict him. Though the steersman’s opinion was one he had encountered often back home, still, he wondered why this spirit would speak to him like this when, according to Miko, they had true need of him.

“Boy.”

He broke away from the steersman’s stare to glance back at Asaka. Hurrying toward him with downcast eyes, he waited for whatever he would say.

“Estimate our time of arrival to the Shakute Islands.”

He could feel the samurai’s cold stare on him as he began to unroll the map.

He found the chain of small islands and, using the distance they’d traveled over the past day as a gauge, he calculated how long it would take for them to get there. He debated whether he should adjust the estimate due to the bad weather they’d traveled in last night, but decided against it. He really had nothing to base the adjustment on.

“Lord, with what I know, it should take at least three more nights.” He expected a scathing glare at his slight safeguard, but the samurai never even glanced at him.

“You’ll be given the responsibility of caring for the map and the gaijin instruments.” Asaka’s gaze bore down on him. “Also, from now on, I will expect you to arrive no later than five minutes after the ship has risen. Do you understand?”

“Yes, Lord.”

The samurai barely nodded. “You may return to your room.”

Bowing at the dismissal, he headed for the stairs. The bent skeleton met him there and handed him a basket containing the gaijin instruments.

“Thank you,” Toshi said.

The skeleton bowed to him before returning to his master’s side.

Holding tightly onto his new responsibilities, he gratefully returned to the interior of the ship.

Toshi went back to his room and found Miko waiting there for him. He smiled as she half-bowed to him in greeting, before returning the gesture.

“Did all go well, Toshi-san?” she asked.

He hurried to his blankets. “I—I think so. Though I don’t think the steersman is too happy to have me here.”

Miko’s silver bells tinkled softly as she nodded in understanding. “You should not take it personally. I doubt he really means to seem that way. Though he should know better, Kojiro is bitter, thinking Lord Asaka blames him for our inability to reach our destination.” For a moment she appeared as if she would say more, but she didn’t.

“Miko-san, do you have any spare paper, ink and brush I could borrow?” He asked with a little trepidation. “I’d like to make a partial copy of the map to track our progress on.”

“Of course, but only if you’ll let me watch you while you work.” Gracefully rising from the floor, Miko left the room to fetch the items in question.

As he huddled in his covers waiting for her to return, his gaze wondered over to the basket with Captain Valez’s instruments. He felt his shoulders tense. Perhaps making a copy of the map would prove a useless gesture. How would he get it into a living being’s hand? And if he somehow managed that, how would they help him? He had no ideas on that score. It seemed so futile, to hope he could somehow alert others of where they were going and perhaps get help, but there was nothing else he could try. And he owed the captain at least that much. Didn’t he?

Before long, the geisha came back and laid a number of brushes, an ink bowl and a bundle of wrapped paper at his feet. As he sifted through the different brushes, Miko cleared off the small table and brought it over to him.

“Thank you, Miko-san.”

Getting the geisha to sit beside him, he spread the map on the table. Hesitantly, he tried to explain to her the gaijin way of mapping—their concepts of longitude and latitude and how they made traveling from place to place easier. Seeing, as she asked a number of pointed questions, that her interest was genuine, he expanded on his explanations even as he copied part of the map. He confined his copy to the area from the point they were at now up to the chain of small islands that was their destination. With delicate care, he copied the section he’d chosen, his experience and technique plainly showing in his work. Time passed quickly, but it was barely noticed. Miko’s continued interest coupled with the comforting familiarity of the work drove him long past his normal stopping point.

Sometime during the night, Miko sought her own paper and, stealing only a small part of the table, attempted to emulate his work.

Eyes squinting in order to cut out the glowing deck’s glare, he missed the odd sensation signaling the submergence of the ship.

“Toshi-kun.” Miko’s bells rang softly as she lifted her head to look at him.

He didn’t return the glance until he’d finished the delicate stroke he was working on and had placed the brush safely out of harm’s way.

“The day began a number of hours ago,” she said. “You might want to think about eating and then getting some sleep while you still have time, no?” Her head tilted slightly to the side with the question.

Now that he’d stopped, he felt a satisfied weariness wash over him. He’d missed doing the work. It was hard and something not many of his countrymen knew how to do, but he enjoyed it. He rubbed at his eyes.

“Yes, I guess I’d better. I hadn’t realized how late it was.” He reached to clear his things from the table but stopped as his right hand cramped.

Forcing his fingers to straighten out with a grimace, he rubbed them with his left hand, trying to soothe his protesting muscles.

“Here, let me take care of that.” Miko took his hands in hers.

“It’s all right, Miko-san. This happens all the time, I can—” He gasped in surprise as the pain in his hand abruptly stopped and a cool tingling sensation spread from her fingertips to his.

“How?” He stared at the geisha in astonishment, knowing what he’d just felt was different from the deep cold he had felt from her kind before.

Miko’s brilliantly burning blue eyes looked away from him, even as her fleshless fingers continued dancing over his own. “I don’t know. There are many things we can do now that we could not while we were living.”

As she glanced back at him, he noticed her eyes had dimmed back to their normal intensity. Searching for something to say as she retained the light hold on his hand, he thought of their lord. He felt his blood grow cold.

“Miko-san! Lord Asaka.” He couldn’t quite keep a note of panic from his voice. “Weren’t … weren’t you supposed to … didn’t you need to … hours ago?”

Miko’s smiling mask stared at his obvious and sudden worry in tilted curiosity before straightening up as she figured out what he was talking about.

Guilt rose within him at the punishment Miko would surely receive because of him. He watched in alarm as the geisha tilted forward, her hand rising to cover her face.

“This is my fault,” he insisted. “I will say so to Lord Asaka. I won’t let him hurt you because of me.”

He couldn’t bear to lose the one person that had been kind to him aboard this cursed ship. His worry grew as he saw her lean even closer to the ground. He reached out for her, sure of the terror now within her, and froze as bubbling laughter suddenly filled the room. He stared at the geisha in incomprehension as she tried hard to stifle her overflowing mirth.

“Oh, Toshi.” Laughter overrode what else she might have said for a moment. “I’m so sorry.”

Concern flitted across his face as he wondered if he had inadvertently driven her to hysteria. Recently, he had felt close to that himself once or twice. The punishments dealt out by Lord Asaka must be horrible indeed.

“I’ll try to fix it somehow, Miko-san. Honest, I will. I won’t let him hurt you because of me.”

Miko looked up, her fleshless hands still trying to uselessly contain her laughter. She shook her head rapidly, making her bells ring frantically, but couldn’t gain enough control to speak.

Sure she was unselfishly trying to stop him from taking the blame, he worked himself up to go and set things right before he might change his mind by thinking of the possible consequences. He started to rise to his feet.

“Miko-san, I will go to him now,” he stated. “I’ll fix this.”

Before he could stand, she reached out and closed her hand on his arm. “Toshi, no, please wait,” she said breathlessly. “Give me a moment!”

He hesitated. He was determined not to be swayed from his decision but wasn’t sure he could break away from the geisha’s hold. Miko’s laughter subsided as she stared into his concerned face.

“Toshi-kun, please forgive me,” she said. “I hadn’t meant to mislead you so. You are such a dear, worrying over me. Who would have thought it? You’re so thoroughly delightful.”

He stood with his mouth open as it dawned on him he’d made another mistake.

“There is nothing to worry about,” she added. “Lord Asaka knows I’m here, Toshi-kun. I asked for his permission earlier. I have been in and out of this room a number of times. I guess you never noticed.”

Miko gently pulled on his arm trying to get him to sit back down.

He looked away, red-faced, knowing he’d made a fool of himself.

“Please don’t misunderstand me, Toshi-san. I’m quite flattered by your concern. There’s just no reason for it.”

He sat down with a thump. “Yes, no reason.” From the corner of his eye, he saw the geisha’s hand rise to cover her mask’s mouth again. Her renewed amusement made his cheeks burn that much hotter than before.

“I do have to be going, though, and you need your rest for this evening,” she said. “From what I understand, you’ll be staying above longer tonight than you have before.”