A Woman of Edo

He was silent in thought a good while, and the while my heart beat not once.

At last he sighed and spoke. "I will decide in the morning. But if you do not go with your father, what then would you do?"

I could not speak. I ran to him and clasped my arms around his head, and wept tears on his neck. He stroked my hair as I kissed his shoulders, his smooth chest. He cupped my face in his hands and pressed his lips to mine.

He crawled to the mat and sat down. He pulled a mischievous face and beckoned me to sit by him. Laughing with joy and surprise, I scrambled over to him. Like puppies we became, rolling and laughing, licking and nibbling at each other.

He rolled atop me and paused. We breathed quickly and in rhythm, our chests pressed together. His strong, smooth thigh squeezed between mine, and he bent his knee, opening me up.

I let out a cry, a deep shout that never had I uttered before when he entered me. We became one. Our breathing became a rising wave, overwhelming in its power, that we rode together. I arched my back and tore at the matting with my nails. I dug into his hard backside, which squeezed and pulsed, faster and ever stronger, thrusting him deeper into me.

Then the fire in me leapt into a blinding sun, and I knew no longer what I did. I became wild and deranged with lust. I bit his lip, savouring his blood. I slashed and gouged at his back, the backs of his thighs. He roared like a tiger, deep and terrifying, and I felt myself explode.

He rolled over, laughing, his body twitching. I sat up trembling, holding my knees.

"Why do you laugh?" I asked, although I could not help but to join in his laughter.

"I don't know. I also feel like weeping. Would you prefer it if I wept?"

"At the summit of the mountain, two roads meet."

He smiled. "Now you become the teacher. I don't understand what that means."

"It's just something I've long known. Joy and sadness meet at the top of a mountain. Do you not see it as I do?"

But he answered me not, for he slept.

I did not wish to sleep. I went out from the house, and under the moon until the sky began to pale with the dawn.

I returned to the house, and saw from within a red glow. I wondered at this, and went up to the door. But as I did, there was an awful crash, and the roof collapsed. Black smoke billowed out towards me, and huge flames flickered into the sky.

I ran to the door and opened it. Immediately the heat became intense. I could see Kano silhouetted black in the flames, scrambling to pick up his pack. He bolted towards me, then grabbed my arm and pulled me hurriedly from the house, as the walls collapsed and red sparks and glowing cinders surrounded us.

Kano sat on the ground. He was badly burned. I feared for his life. His pack was charred, and had burst open, scattering his few possessions with a clatter. Something rolled down the hill to the path below. I ran to get it for him, but suddenly he called for me to stop. I stopped, and I heard the sound of horses hooves. It could only be Samurai, I thought; for nobody here could afford to own a horse.

Three mounted men appeared on the path. They slowed to a stop when they saw me, and I became aware that I was naked. I turned to run from them but one man shouted to me.

"Akiko, wait!"

It was my father.

He dismounted. He pulled a kimono from his saddle pack and threw it to me.

"Get dressed. Where is Ko? Where is the one who took you?"

"I know not."

"Here." Kano descended the slope. He stumbled and fell, raised himself up slowly, and continued. I ran to help him, in spite of my father's orders to stay by his side.

"You are Master Ko?" said my father. "You look unlike him."

"I am the one you called Ko. And I have fulfilled my task."

"Have you indeed? And where is the proof?"

"It lies at your feet."

My father looked about him, and saw that which had rolled from Kano's pack. It was a human head. It was the head of Jordaens. My father picked it up by the hair and observed it closely.

"I see that it is so. But why did you take from me my daughter, whom I love more than my own life?"

"Because I know of you, Riu Hideoshi. I know you would not pay unless your life or your daughter's life depended on it. And so, I took from you your daughter as security. Would you travel here, with fifty ryu in your saddle bags if it were not for her?"

"But you look fit to die. Fifty ryu is a wasted extravagance for a coffin. Especially for a thief and a hinin."

"I have lived a poor man's life. Why should I not then be allowed to die a rich man's death?"

"I have no time for this." He turned to his men. "Kill him."

The men dismounted, and drew their swords. I ran to save him, but my father held me. Kano uttered not a sound as they pierced him through his heart.

My father went to his saddle bag and pulled out two coins. He dropped them on the ground by Kano's body. He spat.

"That is a fitting payment for a man who dares to defile my daughter."

I will now conclude my tale.

Thereafter, I was brought back to my house and remained there under the care of my maidservants. My father wept long when he heard my tale, but showed no remorse for his killing of my beloved Kano.

He told me of Kano, and how my father employed him to assassinate Jordaens. Kano had been already been hired by Jordaens to murder my father on the road to the Edo palace. But when he saw that my father was well guarded at all times by his henchmen, he made an offer to my father that he should turn the tables and do away with Jordaens instead.

He had previously arranged to meet Jordaens in a distant cave once my father had been killed, where Jordaens would pay him off. Jordaens had arrived with no payment, intending to kill Kano. But Jordaens had found me there when he arrived. My father did not say it, but I knew what he was thinking: I had been deliberately left in the cave for Jordaens to find me.

It soon became known to all what had befallen me, and I was therefore no longer fit to be given in marriage, not even to the lowliest tanner. I resolved therefore to take my life and spare my father his humiliation.

But this was not my fate, for on the very day I had chosen to end my life, my father had a visit from a monk; the same one who we had encountered at the cave.

He spoke long with my father, who afterwards bade me go with the monk to where he would lead me.

We went on foot into Edo, into Yoshiwara, the Pleasure Quarter, wherein lived the painted prostitutes. They ranged from the most cultured daughters of Daimyo, skilled in music and painting, to the unmarried mothers of the lowest stock.

I was introduced to the proprietor, one Mrs Tadasuke, as "a Go player of the 9th dan, who goes by the name of Chilli Fire, on account of her warm and pleasant countenance."

After a few minutes of discourse, Mrs Tadasuke smiled a toothless smile and told me that she would expect no more of me than to "play some of the gentlemen visitors at Go, and be sure to always let them win, but not by much."

That concludes my story.

The man bowed to Chilli Fire and thanked her for her tale. As he stood to go, he asked her if it was true that she had been told always to let the man win.

She bowed, smiled, but said nothing.