Yasuda Izu-no-kami Jinbei looked more ghost than man. His face was almost as pale as his snow-white topknot. He clutched a railing with bone-thin hands, but a fire burned in his eyes. Before leaving his sickroom he’d even taken the trouble to don his swords. Wracked by ague, he could scarcely bear their weight, so he kept his feet only through sheer force of will. He was, in short, the living spirit of bushido.
“He has our support,” the aging lord said. “Young master Daigoro is the third Okuma lord I have served. I had not thought to live long enough to kneel before a fourth, but by the gods, Kenbei, I would have guessed I’d live to serve a hundred more before I guessed one of my own sons would betray our closest friend.”
“Father, I—”
“Shut your mouth!” Kenbei shriveled like a dead worm in the sun. Azami remained adamant, balling her fists. “And you,” Lord Yasuda told her, “I have been patient with you for far too long. I have called you a she-bear before, but now I see you for what you are. Your tongue drips venom into my son’s ears. Now you have made him one of your own: a viper.”
“Wrong,” she shouted back. “If I were a viper, I’d have poisoned you ages ago.”
“Azami!”
No one expected her husband to strike her, least of all Kenbei himself. Evidently he still retained enough filial devotion to take offense when his wife insulted his father. The whip-snap sound of his slap across her cheek seemed to hang in the air. He was well within his rights as a husband, but clearly it was a line he’d never crossed before. He froze like a rabbit, stunned at what he’d done.
Azami all but growled and bared her teeth. The breath came loud and long through her nostrils. Then she punched him in the jaw.
The woman had the forearms of a blacksmith. Her fist caught him on the tip of the chin and knocked him cold. If Kenbei’s slap made everyone gasp, Azami’s punch rendered all of them speechless.
Except for Lord Yasuda. “Be gone! And drag my fool of a son with you! Find a new hole to make your den; you are not welcome here anymore.”
The outburst was enough to make Lord Yasuda light-headed. He swooned, but his white-knuckled grip on the railing prevented him from falling over. Before he could right himself, a fit of coughing bent him double.
His eldest son, Jinichi, rushed to his side. Daigoro wanted to as well, and with Aki’s help he made a few hobbling steps in that direction. Lord Yasuda waved all of them off. “I’m all right—or if not all right, then at least right enough to keep my footing. Damn this demon in my lungs! And damn you, Jinichi, for letting things go this far.”
Jinichi kneeled and bowed. “I’m sorry, Father. When you made Kenbei steward of the Green Cliff, I thought—”
“You thought what? That he was fit to lead? I stationed him here so I could keep an eye on him.”
All eyes turned to Kenbei, who still lay as limp as a wet rag. Azami proved she was not quite as heartless as Daigoro supposed. She did not drag her husband across the flagstones, as Lord Yasuda had commanded. Rather, she left Kenbei lying there to gather raindrops, and stormed off to their quarters to collect her things.
The wizened little lord bowed to Daigoro as deeply as he could manage. “You have my most abject apologies, Okuma-sama. I knew Kenbei was trouble from the moment I first met his sons. Mountain monkeys, all of them. I cannot imagine where he learned his fathering instincts, but I pray to all the gods and buddhas that it was not from me. I should never have agreed to marry his grandson to your mother, but you were in such need, and it seemed such a clever idea at the time. . . .”
“No apology is necessary,” Daigoro said. Together he and Aki finally made their way to Lord Yasuda’s side. “I asked a favor of you and you granted it without hesitation. What more could anyone ask? Azami spoke the truth: of all the lords protector, the only one to stand by the Okumas was you.”
“The only one to make trouble for the Okumas was me.”
“No, Yasuda-sama—”
“Enough with that sama nonsense. You are Lord Okuma Izu-no-kami Daigoro again. Now you listen. You will not know it, Okuma-sama, but once I was young like you.