The Snow Empress: A Thriller (12 page)

“The truth is that our lady is innocent,” Lady Pansy said with staunch, childish loyalty.

Lady Soldier picked up Lady Matsumae’s hands, peeled the gloves off them, and held them up. “Can you imagine these setting a spring-bow?” The fingers were tapered and soft, typical of a high-class woman who’d never done any physical work in her life.

An alternative had become clear to Reiko. “You wouldn’t have had to do it yourself,” she said to Lady Matsumae. She turned a significant gaze on the ladies-in-waiting. But instead of being frightened because her suspicion had turned to them, they smiled.

“Well, I suppose I know how to set a spring-bow,” said Lady Smart. “My father is a trade official, and my family spent a lot of time in Ezo country while I was growing up.”

“The same with me,” Lady Soldier said.

“I knew that Tekare liked going to the hot spring at night,” Lady Pansy simpered.

“We could have plotted to kill her,” Lady Soldier said, “and punish her for hurting our lady. But even if we did, you’ll never be able to prove it. And we’ll never tell.”

Her smug smile was reflected on the faces of her two friends. Lady Smart said, “I’m afraid this visit with us has been a waste of your time, Lady Reiko. You came after one person you thought might have killed Tekare. Instead, you found four of us. Are not too many suspects as bad as too few?”

Reiko experienced the same weird disorientation as when she’d first met the women. On the surface they were as familiar as any at home, but inside they were infected with savagery native to Ezogashima. Violence and murder were in their blood, under the veneer of civilization.

Lady Matsumae beheld Reiko with an expression of hard, humorless triumph. “I think it’s time you left.”

The sound of angry voices came from the Ezo camp as Hi-rata and his companions approached it. He and Detective Marume, the Rat, and their guards arrived to find the barbarians facing off against three Matsumae troops. The barbarians had bows and quivers slung over their shoulders; they wore snowshoes made of bent wood and leather straps. Two of their dogs were harnessed to a sled. Barbarians and troops shouted at one another in Ezo language.

“What are they saying?” Hirata asked.

The Rat looked especially miserable this morning. He sniffled and coughed. His eyes were bleary, and frozen mucus matted his whiskers. “The Ezo want to go deer hunting. The Japanese won’t let them.”

Hirata had never been hunting, even though the idea had always intrigued him. The Buddhist religion prohibited slaying animals as well as eating meat. So did Tokugawa law, upheld by the shogun, a devout Buddhist. But there were exceptions to law and tradition. People weakened by illness or injuries were given meat stews and broths to cure them. Edo had a flourishing wild game market for that purpose. Here in Ezogashima, the barbarians hunted in order to survive, and the Japanese usually allowed them-but not today.

“The Japanese say the barbarians have to stay in camp. Lord Matsumae’s orders,” said the Rat.

Urahenka, the onetime husband of Lord Matsumae’s mistress, raged at the troops, who retorted. Hirata jumped into the fray. “Let them go,” he said.

Both sides looked at him in surprise. The lead Matsumae soldier said, “You don’t give orders around here.”

“I’m investigating the murder,” Hirata said, “and I have Lord Matsumae’s permission to question the barbarians. I can talk to them while they hunt.”

“You want to go hunting with them?” The leader and his men were flabbergasted. The barbarians muttered among themselves, trying to figure out what was being said-except for Chieftain Awetok, who watched Hirata with unmistakable comprehension.

“Yes.” Hirata wanted a new experience as well as a chance to speak with the Ezo away from their masters.

“Well, we’re not letting you,” the leader said. “If they run away, we’ll be blamed.”

“I won’t let them,” Hirata said. “My men and I will bring them back.”

“That’s what you think. You don’t know these sneaky devils. As soon as they get to the forest, they’ll give you the slip. You’ll be lucky if you find your way home before you freeze to death.”

“Please listen to him,” the Rat said with a loud sneeze. “He’s right.”

“We’ll compromise,” Hirata said. “I’ll take just those two”-he pointed at Urahenka and Chief Awetok-“if they’ll promise to be good.” He turned to the Rat. “Tell them what I said.”

The Rat obeyed. The two Ezo nodded. Urahenka looked wary, Chieftain Awetok curious.

“I’ll leave the others behind. If their friends don’t come back, you can take it out on them,” Hirata said to the soldiers. “Well? What do you say?”

As the soldiers exchanged glances, sly grins crossed their faces. They liked the idea of giving their superior from Edo a taste of northern life. “Suit yourself,” the leader said, and conveyed the information ›n Ezo language to the barbarians.

Chieftain Awetok pointed at Hirata’s, Fukida’s, and the Rat’s feet. He spoke a terse sentence.

“He says that if we’re going hunting, we’ll need snowshoes,” said the Rat.

“Well, Honorable Chamberlain, it looks as if you’ve taken your investigation as far as it can go,” said Gizaemon.

“Not quite,” Sano said.

Snow had begun falling, and as they and Detective Marume trudged from the scene of the murder to the castle, swirling white flakes filled the sky and landscape. The footprints they’d left on their way out were almost filled. Sano could barely see the castle, its walls and turrets dissolved into a white blur. They reached it to find the sentries absent from the gate. Gizaemon muttered in disapproval.

“They should know better than to desert their post. As soon as I can get somebody to let us in, I’ll take you to Lord Matsumae. He’ll be wanting to hear what you’ve found out, even though it’s nothing.” He stalked to the base of one of the turrets that flanked the gate. “Hey! Anybody up there?”

Sano spoke in a low voice to Marume: “It’s time for a talk with Lord Matsumae. He’s the next step in our investigation.”

Marume gave Sano a look of surprise. “You can’t be thinking he’s the killer.”

“The killer is often the person who was closest to the victim.” Sano spoke from years of experience as a detective. “In this case, it’s him.”

“But he was in love with the woman,” Marume said.

“Love can be a stronger motive than hate. Particularly when the loved one had a talent for stirring up jealousy.”

“But he’s letting you investigate the murder. Would he do that if he were guilty?”

“Maybe.” Who understood what went on in the mind of a madman apparently possessed by the victim’s evil spirit?

A soldier popped his head out a window in the turret. Gizaemon told him to open the gate. Soon Sano, Marume, and Gizaemon were inside the castle. Snow blanketed the courtyard, and the air seemed colder here than outside. As they walked through passageways, the castle seemed deserted, a ghost village. The palace had the air of a beast hibernating.

“I would prefer to see Lord Matsumae alone,” Sano said.

Gizaemon looked weary of arguing. “Fine. Your man and I will wait nearby.”

Lord Matsumae was seated in his private office, poring over ledgers by the light of a lantern hung from the ceiling. Heat simmered up through grilles in the floor, from charcoal braziers underneath. When he saw Sano at the threshold, he said in a loud whisper, “Come in. Please sit down. I’m reviewing the account books. They seem to have become disordered.”

Surprised to find him so calmly and productively occupied, Sano entered, knelt, and glanced at the ledgers. Even reading upside down, he could tell that the entries for the past few months were sketchy, the writing almost illegible. Lord Matsumae’s officials must have been too busy coping with him to keep the books.

“I’m sorry to admit that I’ve been neglecting the affairs entrusted to me,” Lord Matsumae said ruefully. “I can only hope the shogun will forgive me.”

His remorse seemed genuine, his state of mind normal. But Sano detected something in the air around him, like the smell of a sick person who has only temporarily rallied from an illness.

“But my work can wait,” Lord Matsumae said, folding his hands atop the ledgers. “Have you found out anything new?”

“Not yet,” Sano began.

“Shhh!” Putting a finger to his lips, Lord Matsumae whispered, Keep your voice down. Tekare is asleep. Don’t wake her up.“

Sano’s flesh crawled at the thought of her spirit coiled inside Lord Matsumae like a dormant snake. He said quietly, “I must ask your help with my investigation.”

“Of course I’ll help,” Lord Matsumae said readily. Now Sano noticed a strange quality about his breathing. It rasped softly, like a Roman’s gentle snores. “What can I do?”

Sano knew he’d better proceed carefully. Lord Matsumae and Tekare weren’t the only ones inclined toward violence. Sano was furious at Lord Matsumae for holding Masahiro prisoner and refusing to admit it. Hiding his fury, Sano forced himself to concentrate on the investigation.

“For me to solve this crime, I need to understand Tekare. I’d like a little background information on her. Could you please give me your impressions of her?”

Grief and nostalgia colored Lord Matsumae’s features. “Tekare was like the iris that blooms wild in the far north. So bright, so beautiful, so fresh. So untouched by the evils of society that pollute Japanese women. A truly gentle, innocent spirit. She was rare even among Ezo women. The others are eager to take whatever they can from Japanese men. They always want food, clothes, jewels, and gold in exchange for their favors. But not Tekare. She never asked me for anything. When I gave her presents, I practically had to force her to accept them. She always said that all she wanted was me. All she asked was the privilege of making me happy.”

Lord Matsumae leaned forward, his eyes moist with tears and gratitude. “Can you imagine how wonderful it was, to have a woman want me for myself, not for my status or for what I could give her? To know that she loved me as much as I loved her?”

Sano could imagine that Tekare had used the same ploy as did the most popular courtesans in Edo. They pretended to fall in love with their clients. They made a show of refusing gifts, which made the men heap even more upon them. They were consummate actresses. And so might Tekare have been, if she’d hidden from Lord Matsumae a mercenary side she’d revealed to the gold merchant and her other lovers.

“I understand that she was special to you,” Sano said tactfully.

He also understood that he now had four very different portraits of the murder victim. Shamaness, social climber, innocent spirit, vindictive ghost-which was the real Tekare? Lord Matsumae seemed to believe his version of her. Love could be spectacularly blind. If that were the case for Lord Matsumae, there went his potential as a suspect.

“Did anyone have any quarrels with Tekare?” Sano said.

“Not that I know of,” Lord Matsumae said. “And she had none with me. We agreed on everything.”

During his time as a detective, Sano had learned that there was a point at which one couldn’t break a witness or suspect without provocation, threats, or physical force. He knew he’d reached that point with Lord Matsumae. Push too hard, and risk another violent episode.

“That’s all I have to ask you for now,” Sano said. “Thank you for your cooperation.”

Gizaemon and Detective Marume appeared in the doorway: They’d listened to the whole conversation and heard it ending.

“If there’s anything else you need, just let me know,” Lord Matsumae said.

“There is,” Sano said. “I’d like to look around the castle.” Not only did he want to search for clues and witnesses, he wanted to find out if his son was in the keep, as the Ezo woman had told Reiko, as Sano was desperate to believe.

“Why?” Gizaemon was quick to challenge Sano.

“Standard procedure, I suppose,” Lord Matsumae said. “It’s all right. We’ve nothing to hide.” A shadow moved behind his gaze. “But you’ll confine your exploring to the palace. My uncle will escort you.”

As Sano was led away, he heard Lord Matsumae whisper, “Don’t worry, my beloved, I didn’t tell him any of our secrets.”

Now Sano knew that Lord Matsumae did indeed have something to hide. And he was sure it included Masahiro, imprisoned in the keep, as well as information about the murder.

Walking in snowshoes was harder than Hirata had expected. As he plodded along a trail through the forest north of Fukuyama City, he tried to imitate the two barbarians, who moved as easily as across bare, solid ground. But his shoes scooped up and dug into the snow. The old leg injury that hadn’t pained him in years began to ache. He and Detective Marume lagged farther and farther behind the Ezo men, their dogs and sled, and even the Rat, who’d remembered the snowshoeing techniques he’d learned in his youth. Hirata climbed out of a thigh-deep drift, shook snow off his shoes, and paused to rest. Breathing hard, sweaty despite the cold weather, he cursed as he recalled the soldiers’ warning that the Ezo would shake him off and escape.

“If we go back to Fukuyama City without them, the soldiers will laugh at us,” Marume said, panting and doubled over beside Hirata. “Sano-san will be angry because we lost two of his murder suspects. And heaven knows what Lord Matsumae will do.”

“Come on,” Hirata said grimly.

They slogged onward until they caught up with the group. Urahenka spoke, and the Rat translated, “‘What took you so long? You’re slowing us down.”“

Hirata had no chance to retort, because Chieftain Awetok said in clear, fluent Japanese. “Now we are far enough from the city that you can ask me things that you could not before.”

“Now we’re far enough from the city that we can quit pretending you don’t speak my language,” Hirata said with a smile.

“He speaks Japanese?” the Rat exclaimed. “And you knew?” Indignant, he said, “You dragged me all the way out here, when you don’t even need me to translate! Well, I’m going home.”

He huffed down the trail, but Hirata snagged his arm. “Oh, no, you don’t. We still need an interpreter.” Awetok wasn’t the only barbarian Hirata needed to talk with. “And if you tell anyone he speaks our language, I’ll wring your scrawny neck.”

Hirata walked with the chieftain, who slowed his pace for the Japanese. Detective Marume brought up the rear, but Urahenka forged ahead.

“What did you want to ask me?” Chieftain Awetok said.

Hirata had many questions about the barbarians’ world and spiritual practices as well as the murder. “There’s an energy in Ezogashima, like a pulse. I sensed it as soon as we landed here. What is it?”

The chieftain glanced at Hirata, as if surprised that he’d noticed something which Japanese usually didn’t. “It’s the heartbeat of Ainu Mosir.”

“Who is that?” Hirata said, wondering if the chieftain meant some barbarian god.

“Ainu Mosir is our name for this place. It means ‘human land.”
Ainu
-human-is what we call ourselves. It’s you who call us barbarians and our home ’Barbarian Island.“”

“Oh.”

Hirata hadn’t realized how insulting was the Japanese word for the natives. He was ashamed because he hadn’t known that they minded, or that they didn’t think themselves the wild, half-animal creatures that the Japanese did.

“Why does… Ainu Mosir have a heartbeat?” From now on he must avoid using the words
Ezo
and
Ezogashima
in the presence of the natives. “I’ve never felt one in any other land.”

“Ainu Mosir is alive,” said Chieftain Awetok. “She hasn’t been killed by men who cut down forests, plow land for farms, and build cities.”
By the Japanese,
implied his tone,
in your own land.

“The heartbeat is growing stronger.” It vibrated in Hirata’s bones, behind his eyes.

“The Matsumae have driven Ainu Mosir’s spirit away from the coast. Her interior is where it is most powerful.”

It tantalized Hirata, beckoned him, promised him secrets. He wanted to learn more about it, but snow had begun falling. A few flakes sifting to earth rapidly became thick white veils. The hunting party would have to get to work fast or return home empty-handed. And the murder investigation was Hirata’s first priority.

“I’ve heard some things,” he began.

“People will tell you many things,” Chieftain Awetok said. “That doesn’t mean you should believe them.”

That was wise enough advice, if not the kind Hirata ultimately wanted from the man. “What I heard was about Tekare.” Although the chieftain didn’t react, Hirata felt his guard go up. “She seems to have been a bad woman.”

He described what the gold merchant had told him of Tekare’s ambitious, conniving nature. “Is that true?”

“The truth has many faces,” Awetok replied. “A man may see only one because his prejudices blind him to the others.”

Hirata noted that the chieftain could be as deliberately inscrutable and obstructive as Ozuno, his mentor. Must his fate always lie in the hands of old men who made younger ones work hard for every scrap of information doled out? Impatient, Hirata said, “Did Tekare in fact give herself to men, then climb over them to her position as Lord Matsumae’s mistress?”

“In fact, yes,” Awetok admitted. “But there is more to truth than fact. There is more to knowing Tekare than knowing what she did.

“What else is there?”

Awetok gazed through the veils of snow. Ahead of them, the Rat and Urahenka were barely visible, shadows in a whitening landscape. “Life is dangerous for our women. Japanese men like the gold merchant invade our villages and help themselves to the girls. When Tekare was fourteen years old, a band of traders caught her in the woods while she was gathering plants. She was missing three days before we found her, badly beaten and left for dead. It took months for her body to get well. Perhaps her mind never did.”

Hirata pondered this story and its relevance to the murder. “I don’t understand. If Tekare was mistreated by Japanese men, why would she want anything more to do with them? How could she bear to have them touch her? Wouldn’t she have wanted revenge instead of sex with them?”

“There is more than one kind of revenge.”

Tekare had apparently taken hers by driving the Japanese wild with her charms, extorting gifts from them, then enjoying their pain when she dumped them. But there was something else Hirata didn’t understand. “Was Tekare’s behavior considered acceptable by the Ezo-I mean, the Ainu?”

“Not at all.” The chieftain frowned, as though Hirata accused his people of condoning immorality.

“Then how could she be your village’s shamaness? Isn’t that too important a position for a woman like her?” In Hirata’s opinion, that would be akin to making a courtesan the abbess of a nunnery. “I should think you’d have chosen someone of better character.”

“We do not choose our shamaness,” Awetok said. “The spirit world does.”

“Oh? How?”

“Early in life, a girl who’s destined to be a shamaness will show a sign that the spirits have chosen her as their vessel. When Tekare was young, she caught a terrible disease. She was unconscious for a long time. But she survived. That was the sign. While she was unconscious, her soul left her body and joined with the spirits. They agreed to speak through her and none other in our village.”

Skeptical, Hirata said, “Yes, well, then, didn’t the spirits mind that she was a troublemaker? Didn’t that upset the equilibrium of the cosmos?”

Chieftain Awetok gave him a thin, sidelong smile. “I see you’re still ready to believe everything you’ve heard about us from those who would slander our people. But, yes, Tekare’s behavior did put our relations with the spirit world in danger.”

“And it was your job, as chief, to bring her back to the village and make her behave properly?”

“Yes.”

“Or to get rid of her when she wouldn’t cooperate?”

Awetok’s smile hardened into a grim fissure in his weathered face. “By ‘get rid of,” I suppose you mean ’kill.“ You misunderstand our traditions. We Ainu have no penalty of death for crimes.”

Unlike you Japanese.
Hirata heard the message behind Awetok’s words:
Which of our races is more barbarous?

“I would have performed an exorcism, to drive out the evil spirits that had possessed her,” the chieftain said.

“And what would that involve?”

“A ritual, not a spring-bow trap.”

Hirata wanted to believe the chieftain was innocent, but he wasn’t sure a ritual could cure a habit of causing trouble. And he mustn’t forget what Awetok had said:
People will tell you many things. That doesn’t mean you should believe them.
That advice applied to the chieftain as well as anyone else.

“Suppose you had performed this exorcism on Tekare,” Hirata said. “Does that mean everything bad she’d done in the past would have been forgiven?”

“All would have been forgiven,” Awetok said. “That is our custom.”

But Hirata doubted that a ritual could erase years of bad feeling. Forgiveness didn’t come that easily, and Hirata could think of one Ainu whom Tekare must have hurt the most. He peered through the snow at Urahenka. The young man had trekked so far ahead and was so covered with white flakes that he was almost invisible. Hirata sensed that Urahenka was less eager to reach the hunting grounds than determined to avoid conversation. Hirata called to him, “Hey! Wait!”

Urahenka reluctantly turned and stopped. When Hirata and the Rat caught up with him, he began walking faster, to shake them loose. He grumbled, and the Rat said, “He wants to know what you want.”

“To talk about your wife.” Hirata tried not to pant as he struggled to keep pace. Chieftain Awetok and Detective Marume had already fallen behind.

“I already told you everything yesterday.”

“Not everything,” Hirata said. The path had disappeared, and they were forging through dense woods. The slope of the terrain rose into the hills. Hirata had a sense of moving deeper out of his own element. “You said Lord Matsumae stole your wife from you. But that’s not true, is it? You didn’t tell me that she went to him voluntarily.”

A terse, defiant reply came from Urahenka. “He stole her.”

“She not only went to live with Lord Matsumae, but she had many other Japanese men before him,” Hirata said.

When the Rat translated, Urahenka didn’t answer. His mouth compressed behind his whiskers.

“Tekare left you,” Hirata goaded him. “She preferred Japanese men because they gave her more than you could. She whored herself to Lord Matsumae, the highest bidder.”

Snowflakes pelted Urahenka’s forehead and disappeared, as if vaporized by the heat of his anger. But was his anger directed at his dead wife or toward Hirata for insulting her memory? At last he began speaking rapidly. “I have nothing else to say about Tekare. It’s time to hunt now. Be quiet or you’ll scare away the deer.”

Primitive didn’t equal stupid, Hirata noted; refusal to talk was a good way for a suspect to avoid being trapped into admitting guilt, and Urahenka obviously knew it.

The chieftain and Detective Marume joined them. The Ainu men left the dogs with the sled, then led the way farther into the forest. Stay behind us so you don’t get shot,“ the chieftain told Hirata, Marume, and the Rat.

He and Urahenka carefully placed one snowshoe in front of the other, easing down their weight. Hirata and his comrades followed suit as best they could. The Ainu men aimed their bows and arrows from side to side, scanning the landscape for prey. The forest was so quiet that Hirata could hear the snow patter on a dead leaf here, plop onto the ground from a branch there. He watched and listened for movement, but the trees and the dense curtains of snow obscured his view. The land seemed empty, lifeless.

Suddenly the Ainu men froze. They simultaneously released their arrows, which zoomed into a stand of pines. Hirata heard thumps as the arrows struck wood. A deer with a silvery pelt bounded out from the trees and scampered away unharmed.

Urahenka muttered what sounded like a curse. Chieftain Awetok merely drew another arrow from his quiver. Amazed, Hirata said, “I didn’t even know the deer was there. If it had been a man, I would have sensed his presence.” His mystic martial arts training had taught him to detect the energy that people gave off. Nobody could sneak up on him.

Awetok chuckled. “You samurai focus too much on the world of humans. You ignore the world of nature, which is just as important. Until you learn to pay attention to what nature has to show you and tell you, you are as good as blind and deaf and crippled.”

A sense of revelation struck Hirata. Was nature the dimension missing from his awareness? Did it hold the key to enlightenment? The idea seemed too simple, yet alluring. Was oneness with nature and the entirety of the cosmos what he’d come to Ainu Mosir to learn from the chieftain?

As the hunt resumed, Hirata strayed away from the other men. He inhaled and exhaled deep, slow breaths in the meditation technique that he’d learned from Ozuno. Fresh, wintry air flowed through every fiber of him, stimulating yet calming. He let his thoughts drift up into the gray sky. The cold whiteness of the landscape and the sting of snowflakes on his face overwhelmed his senses, liberated his spirit. A trance possessed him.

His spirit inhabited the body trudging through the woods yet floated in a dimension free of himself. He felt his awareness expand as though his mind’s energy had burst out of his skull that confined it. He had a terrifying, awesome perception of the world as much vaster, richer, and more complex than he’d ever dreamed. Around him and through him flowed the spirit of Ainu Mosir. Her heartbeat drummed powerfully in rhythm with his own. The forest became animated with forces he hadn’t noticed before-the life dormant in the leafless trees and in the animals hibernating in burrows, the energy bound up in rocks, earth, and ice. Nature clamored at Hirata in voices beyond the range of normal hearing, in languages he didn’t know. Arms spread, face lifted to the sky, he grasped for comprehension.

A human presence suddenly intruded upon his awareness. His trance shattered. The voices were silenced. Nature’s dimension withdrew from Hirata as fast as a hermit crab scuttling into its shell. His spirit snapped back into the iron cage of his body. A premonition of danger blared through Hirata’s mind. He whirled in the direction from which it came.

Urahenka stood amid the trees some ten paces away. He held his bow vertical, string pulled back, sighting along the arrow aimed at Hirata. As their gazes met, Urahenka grinned. Hirata was looking death straight in the face.