Death Before Dishonor Read online

Yuri threw both hands up with resignation before standing to his feet.

  “Let’s assume for the moment that this was, in fact, a test, Saki. If there is an obscure clue we are supposed to find but we don’t, what are the implications?”

  “The implication is that this kill was not honorable; therefore, we will depart without honor. We are not able to perform the ritual combat without honor.”

  Terry looked around the room—at its walls, the desk, the bookshelves—and then fixed his eyes on their target’s still corpse. The situation was vexing. Saki’s point was strong, but Terry was more inclined to support Yuri.

  Surveillance did not yield an objection to the hit. A major part of surveillance was to confirm a target and then double-check that the confirmation was valid. If Saki had doubts, he should have voiced them long before they’d plunged a knife into Oharu’s back—or whoever he was. Now that the target was dead, going back wasn’t an option. If this was the wrong target, then the consequences were a matter of when not if. Besides, if they set out to find an obscure clue and managed to find it, Terry reasoned that dishonor wouldn’t be lifted on a technicality. And they weren’t on the proving ground anymore. They weren’t initiates; they were the initiated. Kintake had no reason to question their dedication to Ninpo; they’d proved that years ago.

  Yuri started sorting through documents on and inside the desk. Saki followed Yuri’s lead while Terry maintained watch over the door.

  “Looks like Oharu to me,” Yuri said, lifting documents and mail from a drawer. “Reads: Oharu Shinji. We got the right guy. Now that that’s solved, let’s disappear.”

  “That does not solve the question of why I do not know this man.”

  Everyone was quiet.

  Yuri rapped his knuckles on the cage of thoughtful silence. “Look, Kintake instructed us to kill plenty of people in our teenage years. We never asked questions. Why are we suddenly overanalyzing this?”

  “We were teenagers then, Yuri.”

  “So, we weren’t expected to behave like proper Shinobi? What clan did you grow up in? Because the clan I grew up in didn’t seem to show much leniency regardless of age.”

  “The kills we made as teenagers were different. They were different because—”

  Saki cut him off. “What are you talking about? Who did you kill as teenagers?”

  “Fuck, dude, I don’t know. Plenty of people. Ten—twelve maybe.” Yuri shrugged and then whipped a hand at Terry to continue.

  Saki’s inquiry, however, had derailed Terry’s original point. “Why do you look so alarmed?”

  “Omiyoshu Sensei instructed the two of you to kill people?”

  Yuri’s eyes became tight slits. “If this is one of those ‘you shouldn’t be allowed because you’re not Japanese’ comments, I swear I’ll leave your body right here next to this stiff.”

  “No, Yuri, I would never say such a thing. But you have to understand that no one was ever sent to kill a person…that I am aware of.”

  Even through their balaclavas, Saki could see their faces twist with skepticism. Terry started before Yuri could, “They were part of our final trials. You had to do them too.”

  “I swear to you that I was never sent to kill anyone. This is the first human life I have ever been responsible for taking.”

  Terry and Yuri locked eyes. Their brotherly skepticism instantly became suspicion. How was this possible? Part of the initiation rites was to return with proof that a Shinobi could exercise their mandate in accordance with the code. To prove his dedication to Ninpo, Terry had returned with a photo that a target had held dear; Yuri had returned with his first target’s severed finger. They each had made their first human kill alone, but after that, Kintake had dispatched them together for successive trials. How was it that Saki had never done the same?

  “How many times have you done this?”

  “Like Yuri said, ten—maybe twelve—for the Fujibayashi that is. Countless away from the clan. I’m confused, though. Why would every initiate be required to perform a kill to cross over except you?”

  “No other Kodomo or Genin has. Not me. Not Akiko. No one.”

  “That makes no sense.” Terry shook his head.

  “I find myself suddenly full of questions,” Saki replied.

  “Me too.”

  “Admittedly, my curiosity is piqued, but not enough to continue this conversation here,” Yuri said. “It’s only a matter of time before someone shows up and finds us standing over this body.”

  “Why would Omiyoshu Sensei send us to eliminate a criminal soldier?”

  “For the same reason anyone would: He was probably a rival. What difference does that make?”

  “Maybe he didn’t,” Terry said reluctantly. “Maybe we hit the wrong target. He could have been a decoy. If the real target was Fujibayashi, he knew that we’d come for him someday.”

  “Even if that was the case, why would an organized soldier be here and Oharu not?” Saki said.

  Yuri gestured. “I’ll say it again: It’s possible that this guy was a rival. Kintake has always done business outside of the clan. Remember that Hattori Hanzo and he were always at odds. Maybe this guy was a loose end that Kintake wanted tied up. Tonight alone proves that the rabbit hole is deeper than we thought.

  “Now, can we go?”

  “Yeah, Yuri.” Terry nodded. “We’re moving.”

  “Wait,” Saki said, thumbing through a massive photo album. “Look at this.”

  “What now?” Yuri said, hovering on the edge of irritation.

  “There are myriad pictures of him in his youth. He is still covered in tattoos. He even took pictures of all the people he killed. Does the code prohibit that?”

  Terry shrugged. “I’m not sure. I think it would. A picture would be evidence of presence, right?”

  “Here is a photo with he and Omiyoshu Sensei—dated sixteen years ago,” said Saki, pointing at the picture where both men were surround by middle-aged men in tuxedos. “Here is another.”

  “Hold up. Go back a page, Saki,” Yuri said as he made a beeline to Saki’s side. “What the hell?”

  “What’s the matter, Yuri?”

  Yuri snatched two pictures out of the book and held them up. One was a picture of Oharu and an American man. The other was the American man with his wife and children. One child was a different color than other.

  “These are our parents.”

  Chapter Sixteen: For Honor, To The Death

  The time will come when Shinobi-no-mono—Hattori Hanzo—will be recalled to the heavens by the ancestor spirits. At such a time, three warriors from each of the Kato, Fuma, Momochi, Ishikawa, Fujibayashi, and Kirigakure clans will assemble on the site of the first Shinobi-no-mono’s death. There, they will do battle until only one clan remains. From the ashes of the most honorable sacrifice, a new Shinobi-no-mono will ascend, and the victorious clan will be held in Shogun’s favor.

  The Ninth Mandate, translated from Ninpo.

  Suzuka Mountains. Mie Prefecture, Japan. Today.

  The time had finally come. Saki, Terry, and Yuri marched through snow-blanketed forest dressed in leather armor and snow camouflage towards the border.

  All of Togakure Ryu—nearly every man, woman, and child—marched in a long column, three abreast, dressed in their most pristine vestments and ornate ceremonial weapons through the wooded hills that ascended to the sacred battleground. Men carried banners, women carried infants, children carried their excitement, and the elderly carried their piety. The Fujibayashi were a train of tradition and honor, puffing conviction into the air and pounding a trench through the snow as they followed Saki, Terry, and Yuri, and Kintake and his Jonin Council just ahead of them.

  Togakure Ryu walked as a congregation, as a community, as an army to show support and solidarity to their fighters. They marched to the border of the sacred battleground to see their prized fighters off, hoping—knowing—that they would fight with honor, brilliance, and aggression and return to the village aliv
e. If not alive, however, at least with honor.

  The overall tone of the community was focused, but everyone had their own demeanor. Kintake was stoic, distant even. The Jonin were resigned. Saki’s face was washed with consternation, even though he tried to hide it. Terry was tense. Yuri was a mix of turmoil and tenacity. Akiko felt repugnance.

  Each member of Togakure Ryu had different expectations of the ritual. Saki had dreamed of this moment his whole life. When he was a child, he would sneak onto the sacred ground and look for signs and relics of bygone eras. He had always hoped to find a signal that he would one day be worthy to be a vessel by which Ninpo was venerated. He’d never found a sign as a child, but he was still so honored to find that it would be through his blood that Ninpo would be uplifted. If he were to die tonight, it would be with great honor.

  From the border, Saki, Terry, and Yuri would cross, leaving the Fujibayashi behind to await the results. When it was all over, either Kintake or the Momochi kōchō would ascend to the holy office of Shinobi-no-Mono and the six chosen warriors between both clans would be commemorated for all time, like so many Shinobi generations before them.

  ***

  The air was thick with tension. Saki couldn’t feel the cold with Yuri burning a hole in his face. Yuri looked down only long enough to check his footing in the snow and then returned his gaze to boring a hole in Saki.

  When the train of Fujibayashi stopped finally, Saki took advantage of the moment to address Kintake. Terry and Yuri followed.

  “Omiyoshu Sensei, I must speak with you,” Saki said humbly.

  Kintake barely turned, peering at Saki from the corner of his eye.

  “Omiyoshu Sensei, we uncovered troubling information last night, and I really must seek your counsel.”

  “What is it, Saki?”

  “I have reason to doubt Oharu’s affiliation to the Fujibayashi.”

  Saki’s suggestion caused several of the elderly Jonin to perk up. Kintake signaled them with a finger to place their attention elsewhere while he attended the three warriors.

  Kintake folded his arms. “Saki, I understand it may have been difficult for you. But you must not allow anxiety to cloud your mind. Oharu was an errant Fujibayashi. He had evaded us for long enough.”

  “He did not have a tattoo of Mamushi. He had the tattoos of another affiliation—perhaps a criminal element. Pictures that we found provide chronological evidence that he lived in a city as a youth, and his tattoos came from somewhere not of Fujibayashi origin.”

  “Furthermore, Sensei,” Terry chimed in, “we found pictures of our parents. How did he know our parents?”

  Kintake’s lips twisted as he stared hard at Terry, then Saki, and then Yuri. Then his gazed softened. “It’s really quite simple, actually. You see, Oharu was an acquaintance of your parents, and he recommended them to my school.”

  Terry’s eyes found the snow-covered ground. Something still didn’t feel right. Something was off about this. There was still the issue of Saki’s claim that no other Fujibayashi had ever conducted an assassination. “Sensei, Saki says that he never killed anyone before Oharu—”

  “That is enough. You must focus. Beyond the border lies the most challenging event you will ever take part in. For the sake of the Fujibayashi, you must be focused and serious. You cannot trouble yourself with perceived deceptions and conspiracies. Death awaits you if you cannot focus.”

  “I’m looking at the forest, and something is wrong with the trees,” said Yuri.

  A single eyebrow rose on Kintake’s forehead. He drew in a deep breath and exhaled slowly. “When you return from this battle—those of you that do, anyway—I will answer all of your questions.”

  “Sensei—” Terry attempted but was cut off.

  “Honor is the soul of the Shinobi!” Kintake shouted before walking to the rear of the column. “You really should get going.”

  All in attendance, including the three warriors, who lagged behind the group slightly, made steeples of their hands in salute and replied: “Shadow is their blood!”

  ***

  In the spring and summer, the sacred battleground—nestled in a shallow valley with the temple from the warriors’ youth cradled at the center—was breathtaking, like a painting of a land in a fairy tale—at least that was the way Terry remembered it from the last time he’d been here. In the winter, however, it was not so endearing; in the winter, it looked haunted.

  The trees looked like thousands of ghostly arms trying to drag the black sky down. The gradual slopes to either side evoked a sense of claustrophobia and blocked the moon unless it was directly overhead, heightening the anxiety of the forthcoming conflict. The anxiety was compounded by the layer of snow crunching beneath Saki, Terry, and Yuri’s feet as they snuck down the eastern incline and into the shambling forest toward the temple single file, giving it their all to be as inconspicuous as possible. They weren’t exactly sure where they needed to go; they just knew that they needed to engage the Momochi warriors, and the best way to do that was to remain invisible, spot them, track them, and then ambush them.

  Yuri led, keeping a low profile and occasionally stopping behind a tree to scan the gray-blue horizon for movement. Saki let out a low, breathy whistle, and Yuri took cover, looking back.

  Saki was in cover too, looking at Terry between them. Terry squatted, looking into the distance where light turned into darkness, holding his naginata across his thighs.

  “What's the matter?” Yuri whispered, adjusting his insulation beneath his leather breastplate. “What do you see?”

  “A memory that I haven’t thought about since I was a kid.”

  Yuri was incensed, puffing steam into the air through his white-gray balaclava. “Can you find a better time to reminisce? We’re right in the middle of something.”

  Terry looked at his brother. “There may not be a later.”

  “Well,” Yuri said, raising an indignant hand, “in that case.”

  “Terry, we have to keep moving,” said Saki, trying to appeal to Terry’s better judgment.

  “No, no, Saki,” Yuri said, trying not to bubble over a whisper into audible inflections, “let him have his moment. Memories are worth dying for.”

  Terry took cover. He alternated looking at his brother and Saki. “This memory is important.”

  “It better be important,” Yuri said sourly, “because if we get ambushed while you're telling your campfire horror story, I'm going to scalp you in the afterlife as payback.”

  “Saki,” Terry said, turning toward him, “remember when you brought me here the first time?”

  Saki nodded.

  “Well, you said that the worthy can hear the ancestor Shinobi fighting. On the night my parents were killed, I came here. This was quite nearly the same path I followed to the temple. As I was running, I rolled my ankle and fell just over there.” Terry pointed off to their right. “I was face down in the mud, and I swear I heard the strangest sounds. Distant metal-on-metal sounds. Like swords clashing in a battle. At first, I thought it was just the thunder, but the more I heard it, the more I was sure of what I was hearing. It was the ancient Shinobi that I heard.”

  “Do you know what that means?” Saki asked.

  “It means while you’re sitting here telling fairy tales, we're sitting ducks,” Yuri retorted caustically. “Or it means you’re schizophrenic. Either way, wrap it up.”

  Terry nodded. “It means that we're worthy. We were destined for this moment. Kintake said we weren't worthy and banished us, but here we are. Not even he can stop destiny.” Terry signaled Yuri forward.

  Yuri started to move, hurling a comment over his shoulder as he brushed past a tree: “Maybe he can't, but the Momochi can if we get caught camping.”

  Just then, he saw something move out of the corner of his eye, and his body reacted, his head whipping to the left and jerking his body behind the tree. An arrow whizzed by his eyebrow so close that the fletching tickled his flesh, barely missing its mark in his eye
socket. Yuri fell into the tree and slid to the ground.

  Terry and Saki did the same.

  "Sniper!" Terry whispered loudly.

  THWACK! Another arrow struck Yuri's tree. He gritted his teeth and bore down.

  "Are you okay?" Saki asked, unable to lift his head out of cover to see how badly injured Yuri was if he wasn’t.

  Yuri gave an insincere thumbs up despite his face being creased with pain. "Peachy." He sat forward, lifting his back off of the trunk just enough to reveal that the second arrow had penetrated the tree and its point had dug into the leather armor on Yuri's shoulder—the point had scratched him and drawn a little blood. The sniper shouldn’t have missed me, Yuri thought. He was going to make him eat that arrow.

  Terry checked both sides frantically, looking past Yuri on his right about five feet and Saki on his left nearly double that. He edged an eye around the thin trunk. His camouflage would hold up if the sniper hadn't seen him, but if he had, he'd spot Terry’s movement. Terry got a fix downrange and then jerked back into cover.

  THWACK! An arrow zipped past his tree and landed next to his leg. The sniper had seen Terry after all.

  "There's only one," Terry said calmly. "He's in a tree about one hundred yards off my left shoulder."

  Saki looked at him. "We must move. They are going to flank us if we do not."

  Terry nodded and swung his head toward his brother. “Yuri, you good?"

  Yuri's eyes were lupine. "I'm good. Can’t say the same for that Momochi son of a bitch," he said, pulling a grappling hook from his belt and coiling the rope into tight circles.

  “I'm going to make a break for that next tree. When he fires, Saki, you close-in on the sniper’s left. Yuri, you close in on the right. He'll have to choose one of us to fire at. Once we get too close, he'll have to come out of that tree."

  Saki nodded.

  Yuri did too as he stuffed his grappling hook back into his belt.

  Terry tossed his naginata forward and lunged out of cover on his hands and feet—THWACK! Another arrow whizzed over his back and struck a few feet downrange—and Terry barreled up to the next tree, snagging the end of his weapon and snuggling up to it.