Linnear 02 - The Miko (63 page)

“Keep away from him,” Russilov said sharply. Koten glowered at him.

“You’ve just lost him face, Pyotr Alexandrovitch,” Nicholas said.

“The two of you are far too dangerous to pit one against the other.”

“Really?” This exchange was beginning to interest him. How in the world did this KGB operative know so much about him? “Surely you can’t have a file on me. I’m a private citizen.”

“Oh?” Russilov’s dark eyebrows lifted. “Then what are you doing here?”

“Sato-san and I arewerefriends as well as business partners.”

“And that’s all.” The Russian’s voice was brimming with irony.

There was no point in keeping things at this level. “That car bomb couldn’t’ve been meant only for Sato. There’s no way you could have been certain that just he would be at the car when he opened the door.”

“If you went, so much the better. As long as we got this” he patted the pocket where he had dropped the packet”we didn’t need either of you. If our agent had been intercepted”

“By Phoenix or myself.”

“Oh, I believe Koten here would have found some way to deter you. But as I was saying, had our agent been intercepted, we would have brought you in.”

“If you want to live,” Nicholas observed, “you’d do well to shoot me now.”

“I plan to.”

“Then you’ll never know the modifications we recently made in Tenchi.”

“We?” For the first time Russilov seemed uncertain.

“Why do you think Tomkin Industries is merging one of its companies with Sato Petrochemicals? Not for the sheer pleasure of it, I assure you.”

“You’re lying,” the Russian said. “I don’t know anything about this.”

Of course you don’t, Nicholas thought. But you can’t be sure. And if you don’t get me to Protorov it might be a grave error. Time is short; this is no time to blunder.

“Well there is something you don’t know then.” Part of his training had been in speaking. Just as kiai was used as a war shout to terrify and, in some cases, paralyze one’s opponent, so there was a more subtle offshoot, ichi. In this case it meant “position” because of what the wielder could accomplish with inflection and intonation. It was immensely difficult to master. This, combined with the fact that ichi was often affected by outside factors beyond the wielder’s control, made it virtually a lost art. Akutagawa-san had, among other things, been an ichi sensei and he had seen in Nicholas an apt and willing pupil. “I was beginning to think of Gospadin Protorov as omniscient.” He thought that ichi just might save his life now.

“Kill him,” Koten growled. “Shoot him now or I will kill him for you.”

“Quiet, you,” Russilov said. He had not taken his eyes off Nicholas during the entire exchange. He cocked his head. “Come here, Comrade Linnear,” he said as thunder rumbled east to west above their heads. The rain beat down on them, silvered as it spun through the lights. “You are going to get your wish, after all.”

And Nicholas thought, Protorov!

KUMAMOTO/ASAMA KOGEN/SWITZERLAND AUTUMN-WINTER 1963-SPRING 198?

This is how Akiko came to save Saigo’s life and how he paid her back in kind. The autumn of 1963 was a cold and dismal one, filled with an inordinate amount of rain, sleet, and even snow, premature and the color of silver, dying upon the ground like stranded carp.

Already, in Kyushu, where Sun Hsiung sent Akiko for the next phase of her training, the farmers were hard at work atop stained wooden ladders, spinning delicate cocoons of retted linen gauze over their precious trees to keep them from winter’s harsh hand.

It was unusual to see them at this so relatively early in the year, and like the unpredictable inclement weather it boded ill for the coming winter, whose expected virulence had been spoken of in hushed whispers throughout the countryside ever since summer evaporated overnight like woodsmoke.

Mist shrouded this part of Kyushu so thoroughly that upon her arrival Akiko could discern neither Mount Aso nor the giant smokestacks of the vast industrial complex sprawled through the valley to the northwest of the city.

She hated Kumamoto immediately. Once in feudal times perhaps it had possessed a certain charm, but in these days of Japan’s mighty economic leap forward the blued patina of industrial wastes coating the old buildings were merely a reminder of how tiny a backwater Kumamoto really was.

Nevertheless Akiko had resigned herself to be here at the Kanaka na ninjutsu ryu. Its symbol was a circle within which were nine black diamonds. Within the open heart of them was the kanji ideogram komuso. And when she saw it she knew: the Kuji-kiri. Black ninjutsu.

There was difficulty, even with Sun Hsiung’s personal chop affixed to her letter of introduction. The sennin, an ax-faced individual who appeared to be almost unhealthily thin, let her cool her heels for fully half a day before he summoned her within his chamber.

Then he was most effusive in his apologies. In his eyes Akiko could discover nothing, not even the basic spark that distinguished human beings from the less sentient creatures of the earth. And alone, kneeling before him on a bare reed tatami, she began to feel at last a sadness she needed some time to identify. At length she was surprised to discover that she missed Sun Hsiung, and part of her wished that she had never left his warm and comfortable house.

And yet there was a stronger, more urgent desire which had driven her from comfort and warmth. It was her karma to be here now, she knew that as well, and did not question it. Acceptance was all she had of her own now.

For his part, the sennin despised her on sight and silently cursed her former sensei for evoking his right of privilege here. There was absolutely no question of sending her away though the sennin wished most fervently for such an occurrence.

His only hope, he correctly detected, was if the training here and the lifewere too rigorous, too taxing both emotionally and physically for this woman. He shuddered inwardly and tried not to think about her presence here, the inevitable disruption of discipline and ritual her wa would cause.

Even now he could sense the peculiarly female flux of her spirit, experiencing it almost as a painful interruption in the confluence of forces he and those beneath him had labored so long and hard to perfect.

Therefore he smiled as benignly as he was able and with an inward exclamation of delight consigned her into the care of the one pupil who, at the very least, would drive her out of Kumamoto.

The sennin watched unblinking as she bowed formally and rose. As he watched her retreating back he smiled to himself, his thoughts on the best of possibilities regarding his newest student’s fate: that Saigo would destroy her.

Not literally, of course, for had that occurred the sennin would have lost enormous face with Sun Hsiung and that he could not have tolerated. No, no. If he knew anything about his pupils, he had chosen correctly. There was a peculiar and somewhat frightening demon which rode Saigo’s back, its talons sunk so deeply that the sennin had given up trying to exorcise its presence.

Let the Haunted One, as Saigo was known privately by a number of the sennin, drive the unwanted female out; let it be her choice. That way face was saved all around. The sennin could take no blame from Sun Hsiung and the female could return with honor to the areas for which she was best suited: the tea ceremony and, perhaps, flower arranging.

The moment Akiko came up to him in the dojo, and told him of his assignment, Saigo knew the low regard in which he must be held by the sennin. This was an outcast’s work, he thought darkly, holding the hand of a female student. He glared at her as anger and resentment welled up in him.

For her part, Akiko sensed immediately that she had been directed into the tiger’s den. Her wa contracted at the icy contact with Saigo’s hostile emanations and she knew that in order for her to survive here she must first win him over and then, one by one, do the same with every individual at the ryu.

Akiko spent more of her time that afternoon observing him as he took her on a tour of the ryu, which was in effect a world within a world, a secret dojo in the middle of a basically industrial town, wrapped in the trappings of a drab and windowless warehouse.

There were no other students or sennin about when they completed their rounds.

“I want you to stay here,” he told her, “while I go out on an errand.” She nodded in acquiescence. “Make no sound while I am gone and, especially, when I return.”

“What is happening?”

Without warning he hit her a heavy blow on the side of the face. Akiko staggered backward and fell on one hip. Saigo stood over her, his feet apart, his body totally relaxed.

“Do you wish to ask a question?” His voice was mocking, possessing an edge to it that caused Akiko to shudder inwardly. She made no sound or movement.

Grunting in some satisfaction, Saigo turned and departed.

When she was alone Akiko sank immediately into shinki. This involved keeping her tanden, that part of her called the second brain by some sensei, the reflex control center, immobile. In this way she detached a part of herself from the area where she burned.

After a moment of intense concentration, she felt no more pain.

Slowly she rose, staring at the door through which he had departed.

Of course she had felt the spit of his spirit microseconds before that vicious emanation had been transmogrified into physical action. She could have easily dodged the blow. But what good would that have done? Saigo’s anger would have been further fueled and he would have come after her with more serious intent.

Besides, she sensed that he was a man so unsure of his own masculinity that he needed to physically dominate those people around him, men and women alike. If she was ever to find an accommodation with him, she must first allow his natural tendencies to be made manifest to her. Only then could she choose her own strategy, and then could she tame him.

Saigo was gone several hours. During that time all light left the sky; the day burned out like the dregs of a Roman candle. It was dinnertime and Akiko found herself hungry. Since there was no food here she padded silently into the dojo and, opening her bag, dressed in her all-black gi. She did forty minutes of centristic meditation leading ultimately to shinki kiitsu, the unity of soul, mind, and body that is so essential to reaching the very apex of all martial arts. She felt the weight of the universe collecting in her lower abdomen. Shitahara.

She breathed. In: jitsu: fullness. Out: kyo: emptiness. Strike at the precise moment you feel kyo in your enemy, Sun Hsiung had said. Strike at the precise moment you feel jitsu in yourself. Thus will victory be assured.

Yet, he had told her over and over, if you are so foolish and full of ego that you allow yourself to think of victory then you are undone. Attach your awareness on saika tanden, the breath of the Void. From that central nothingness all strategies may be observed and formulated.

She did ninety minutes of formal exercise, increasing in difficulty until she was sweating profusely, working on her quickness and her timing, coordinating the two: alternating them and then combining them in sets of three, then six, then nine rapid-fire attacks and defenses.

Then, because she was still a student, still learning, because some essentials still had to be thought about consciously rather than accomplished as second nature without any volition at all, she returned to saika tanden.

From her bag she unfurled a length of strong cottonit was Sun Hsiung’s only gift to herwhich she folded twice and wrapped with deft economical movements about her abdomen so that the upper edge just touched the bottom ribs on either side. It was very tight; it was a cincture, a constraint. She worked on inhaling as deeply as she could down into her bowels. She sat cross-legged, her body soft and pliable, her shoulders curved and relaxed, her torso bent well forward so that the tip of her nose hung approximately over her navel. Saika tanden. Every breath she takes.

And breathing was what consumed her still when her keen hearing detected soft padding outside the metal door. In a moment the grate of the padlock could be heard.

Jitsu; kyo. Fullness; emptiness. In and out.

She heard Saigo in the dojo and her head came up. She focused fully on him.

“Get up,” he whispered. “Come here.” He stood just inside the closed door.

She did just as she was told, rising and unwrapping the cloth she treasured though it was quite plain and could be bought at any neighborhood store. Folding it reverently, she place it inside her loose black cotton blouse and moved to stand beside Saigo.

“Listen,” he said. His voice was as indistinct as the buzz of a mosquito in the distance. They both stood quite still. She would have known not to utter a sound even had he not cautioned her against doing so hours before.

There was nothing but the slight tickle of sawdust, a remnant of the original use to which this old building had been put. No sounds from the streets three stories below made it through the thick walls and massive floorboards. It was as silent as a tomb.

Someone coughed. And again. Akiko heard soft footfalls from behind the door. She glanced at Saigo, whose entire being was focused at the closed door and what lay beyond.

Who was there? Akiko wondered. She listened.

“What is it? Where are we?” A female voice, whispered.

“Come on.” Male voice. Then more insistently though no more loudly, “Come on!” Presence faded but Akiko had at least a semblance of the two spirits. Male and female. Yin and Yang.

Hate burned itself across Saigo’s face, turning him into a gargoyle. So much hate twisting him, she thought. Eating him up inside. Hate was an emotion that she could understand.

Perhaps it was at this moment that she saw them as soulmates: Akiko and Saigo. They were meant for each other, weren’t they?

After a while the chalkiness flushed from his face and he was about to speak again. But strangely, he said nothing further of the incident.

“You waited,” he said.

“Isn’t that what you wanted me to do?” She watched his eyes, which were like dead stones at the bottom of a silkskinned lake.