Even as she spoke, she wished she could take back the words. She felt a premonition, as if she had tempted fate. She feared that Yuki’s life would indeed be short.

“Be careful,” she said, as she heard her uncle step onto the veranda.

“She doesn’t know the meaning of the word,” Seiko grumbled, but she took Yuki’s hand gently and caressed her before leading her from the room. In that moment Shizuka saw that Seiko, for all her criticism, loved her daughter as deeply as her husband did.

“Welcome, Shizuka. It’s been a long time,” her uncle said, using the customary greeting perfunctorily. “You are well, I hope.” His gaze swept over her and she felt he saw everything about her. She gazed at him in the same way, her eyes trained to detect the slightest changes in expression and demeanor, to read the language of the body, particularly hard in Kenji’s case as he was so adept at disguising his own self and assuming any number of other roles.

“We’d better go within,” he said. “No one will overhear us or disturb us there.”

There was a concealed room in the center of the house, behind a false wall released by turning one of the decorated bosses in the rafters. Kenji lifted the wall aside effortlessly and replaced it from the inside. It fell into place with hardly a sound. The room was narrow, the light dim. Kenji sat cross-legged on the floor, and she knelt opposite him. He drew a small package from the breast of his robe and placed it on the floor.

“This is an exceptionally important document,” he said. “I’ve just brought it myself from Inuyama. It contains a letter from Sadamu to Noguchi Masayoshi. I’m not supposed to know its exact contents, but naturally I’ve opened it and read it. You are to give it to Kuroda Shintaro and to no one else. He will hand it on to Lord Noguchi.”

Shizuka bowed slightly. “Am I allowed to know what the message is?”

He did not answer her directly. “How are things between you and Arai?”

“I believe he loves me,” she said in a low voice. “He trusts me completely.”

“It’s very satisfactory,” Kenji said. “Of course, no one knew this would happen when you were sent to Kumamoto, but it couldn’t have worked out better. Well done!”

“Thank you, Uncle.”

“And you? I trust you are not going to lose your head over him?”

“Maybe there is some danger,” she admitted. “It’s impossible not to respond when such a man loves you.”

Kenji snorted disparagingly. “Be careful. He may turn against you as suddenly as he fell for you, especially if he feels deceived or affronted by you. He is as big a fool as any other warrior.”

“No, he is not a fool,” she replied. “He is quick-tempered and rash, but his mind is astute and he is very brave.”

“Well, this flirtation with Otori Shigeru has irritated Sadamu enormously. You’d better warn Arai to dissociate himself from the Otori and make a clear declaration of support for the Tohan, or he’ll find himself dispossessed this time next year, if he’s still alive.”

“So Iida will fight the Otori this year?”

“Any time now. He will move into the east of the Middle Country as soon as the Chigawa river subsides-three or four weeks by my reckoning. Your report last autumn of Shigeru’s meetings with Arai and Lady Maruyama gave Sadamu the excuse he needed to attack without warning. He’ll declare that the Otori provoked him and were themselves preparing to attack the Tohan. Everyone knows Shigeru has been mustering armed forces for the last year.” He tapped the package. “But your report made Sadamu think about the West and South. He first made advances to Shirakawa, hoping to have him host the Tohan for a rear attack, but Shirakawa’s a vacillator and will wait and see which way the wind blows before he makes up his mind. Iida needs a firm ally in the South. Hence this letter.” Kenji smiled almost with glee, but his voice held an uncharacteristic note of regret. “How I love treachery,” he said softly. “Especially among the warrior class, who talk so much about loyalty and honor!”

“Yet people talk of Lord Shigeru as an honorable man. Have you ever met him?”

She had never seen Kenji look uncomfortable before. He frowned and tapped his leg with his hand impatiently. “As a matter of fact, I have. There is something about him… Well, there’s no point talking about it.”

“I swore to Lord Otori that I would not betray him, but I did,” Shizuka said. She wanted to say more but did not know how to express her feelings, indeed was not even sure what those feelings were. She knew Otori Shigeru was doomed by the letter that lay on the floor beside her, and she could not help but be saddened. She had liked what she saw of him; people spoke highly of him and she knew many in both Yamagata and Chigawa pinned their hopes for a safe and peaceful existence on him. Their lives would be far more wretched under the Tohan.

She had entered his world and had made an oath to him according to the codes of that world. He was not to know that she was from the Tribe, who held no oaths binding, who answered only to themselves. Her betrayal was not great, perhaps, but it made her uncomfortable nonetheless. She had been obedient to the Tribe, but if she had been able to follow her own leanings…

Kenji was watching her closely. “Don’t become seduced by warriors,” he said. “I know that their beliefs and their lives have a certain appeal. All that talk of honor and character, physical and moral courage, the clans, the ancient houses with the crests and swords and heroes. Most warriors are thugs and bullies, usually cowards: the ones who aren’t cowards are in love with death.”

“The Tribe sent me to live among them,” she said. “To a certain extent, I have to take on their beliefs.”

“Pretend to take them on,” Kenji corrected her. “We expect your obedience to us above everything.”

“Of course,” she replied. “Uncle, that is always without question.”

“So I believe,” he said. “But you are still young and in a dangerous situation. I know you have the skills to survive, but only if your emotions are not involved.” He paused and then went on: “Especially if you bear Arai a child.”

She was startled despite herself. “Is it obvious? I have told no one yet, not even Arai. I thought I should tell you first, in case…”

She knew if it did not suit the Tribe, they would make her get rid of it, as they had before. Her aunt Seiko, like all Tribe women, had many ways to abort unwanted children. She would be given the brew immediately; the child would be gone by nightfall. She felt the muscles of her belly clench in fear.

“Normally, as you know, we are not in favor of mixing the blood,” Kenji said. “But I can see many advantages in your having this child. It will certainly give you a lasting relationship with Arai, even after your passion for each other wanes-it will, it will, believe me-but, more important, the child may inherit your talents and the Tribe has need of them.” He sighed. “We seem to be dying out slowly. Fewer children are born every year, and only a handful of them show any real talent. Deaths of people we can’t afford to lose-your father, Kikuta Isamu. Isamu had no children, your father and myself only one. We must not get rid of any more children; any Tribe blood must be maintained. So have this child; have others. Arai will be delighted, and so will the Tribe-as long as you remember where your loyalties lie and whom the child ultimately belongs to.”

“I am happy,” she said. “I really want it.”

For a moment a look of affection flickered on his face, softening it. “When will it be born?”

“At the beginning of the tenth month.”

“Well, look after yourself. After this mission I’ll try not to ask anything too difficult of you. Just the usual pillow talk from your warrior, which is obviously not disagreeable to you!”

As Shizuka took the package from the floor and tucked it inside her robe, she said, “What happened to Isamu? No one ever speaks of him.”