“Where will you go?” Sano asked her.

“For now, I’ll live in my family’s summer villa. We agreed on that when I visited them a few days ago and told them I wanted to leave the nunnery. Perhaps someday a new marriage can be arranged for me.”

In her eyes Sano read Kozeri’s hope for a good husband to love, a child to replace the one she’d lost. Now she opened the door of the palanquin and stowed her bundle inside.

“Goodbye, sōsakan-sama,” Kozeri said. “I wish you well.”

“And I the same to you,” Sano said.

With mutual relief, they smiled and bowed. Then they departed Kodai Temple, she in the palanquin and he on horseback, traveling in opposite directions.

The sun rose crimson over the misty hills above Miyako. While the imperial capital still slumbered, a procession of foot soldiers, mounted samurai, servants, and a single palanquin filed out the city gates, heading east along the Tōkaidō highway between lush green fields. The rhythm of hoofbeats and marching feet mingled with the waking cries of birds. Humid heat steamed from the earth, yet a hint of coolness in the air presaged autumn.

Riding beside Sano, Detective Marume said, “That was some adventure, but I will be truly glad to get back to Edo.”

Detective Fukida recited:

“My native city- longing recalls

The winding streets, the castle on the hill.”

Chamberlain Yanagisawa dropped back from his place near the head of the procession to ride alongside Sano. “Shall we congratulate ourselves on a job well done, sōsakan-sama?”

“You deserve much of the credit,” Sano said.

“That’s true,” Yanagisawa said complacently.

“May I look forward to a continuation of our partnership when we reach home?” Sano asked.

The chamberlain favored him with a long, unreadable gaze that boded an uncertain future. Who could tell how long their truce might last?

Yoriki Hoshina joined Yanagisawa. Looking at them, Sano felt a qualm of unease. Where he’d previously had one enemy, would he now have two?

Yanagisawa’s faint smile said he knew exactly what Sano was thinking. Then he and Hoshina rode ahead, leaving Sano to wonder.

About Laura Joh Rowland

Laura Joh Rowland is a detective/mystery author best known for her series of mystery novels set in the late days of feudal Japan, mostly in Edo during the late 1600s. Rowland takes some licence with known figures, creating fictionalised versions of Tokugawa Tsunayoshi and Yanagisawa Yoshiyasu. Objective historical details, however, are credibly accurate.