Her leg ached. She woke early the next morning, dizzy, half frozen.
I’m sick. The gods are cursing me. They send me a fever so I’ll die.
The world does what it wants, she thought. With me, with everyone. Tomorrow is gone, there are just the watchers, the ones who say,You’re no one.And now, she thought, now there is a young boy who was a guard, who tried to do what they told him; and in her darkest moments she hated him, for being there, for being stupid, for getting in her way.I didn’t mean to, she found herself mumbling again. I didn’t mean to. But there was no difference. What she meant or didn’t mean, it was the same. Because in him, the boy who slept on earth, who slept in her heart now like a scar, she thought,I see her. I see the Rui I once was. And I see what the future will be.
She spent another day hiding in the cave, afraid to start a fire. She ate icy winter berries and was sick again. Then, on the third day, she forced herself to rise. She couldn’t bear to think that the other villagers would be punished for her crimes.
What is wrong with us?We all make choices.Why do we do such evil things? Why did this happen?The ghost of him still lingered, waiting, accusing her each time she closed her eyes.I didn’t choose the path I’m on, she thought again.I can’t change the past.
But maybe I can change what I do now.
The gate at Kannagara seemed unoccupied when she approached; she stepped through, as she had so many times before, when she’d gone to the monks and their school. Now it seemed a lifetime ago. To her surprise, the crow monks smiled when they saw her. One started banging on the iron bell.
“Come in, young one,” they cried. “Come in from the cold.”
But there were horses in the courtyard. A glint of light on lacquer: one of Iyo’s warriors came before her, towering on his stallion, armor black and purple and the color of the moon. He stared over an iron mask, sculpted in the figure of a demon-fox with horsehair whiskers. His eyes burned red.
She felt, in his glance, the fate that awaited her, thought,I’m already being judged.He took off his mask, and she recognized Azamaro, Lady Iyo’s paramour, strongest warrior in the north, with his hands like steel, his eyes like stone. They said he was a prince of the Iteki, said he worshipped the bear-god above all things. It wasn’t hard to imagine him a bear-god himself, angry, harsh, and cold.
Yes, she thought,I am being judged.
She said, “I’m sorry.”
His face offered nothing. A commotion brought her gaze back to the gate, where bright white-and-purple flags fluttered about on poles, the banners of Iyo’s son. Hakaru stormed into the temple.
“Go!” he shouted. “Bring her to me now!”
They ran at her with ropes, grabbed her, threw her to the ground, their feet on her back, her face in the dirt.
“Lords, gently!” Old Jiko the crow monk called. But Hakaru would have none of it.
He shouted, “Bring me her head!”
The Kitano soldiers pulled her arms behind her with ropes, forced her head down and made it painful just to breathe. A sword flashed in the chill dead air. She gave a trembling cry.
At last Azamaro spoke. He came forward and said, “Wait,” with such force that they stopped in their tracks. The Taga warrior now removed his helm. She felt his gaze pass over her.
“Bring her to Kitano,” Azamaro said. “The Ogami’in will want to see her.”
Hakaru scowled, but was in no position to go against his elder. He merely nodded with a jerk, and Rui had time enough to see, before they tied her up, that the great Azamaro hadn’t moved. He was still staring down at her, impossible to read – a blank, stone wall. But there was something else now. Something in his eyes had changed.
The second thing she saw, before they threw her to the ground and theicy dirt bit her cheek and split her lip again, was Sen, standing in a corner of the pavilion, with his fists clenched.
Then they hauled her to her feet, re-bound her arms, and threw her into the cart, tying her to a joint before they started down the mountain, along the path to Kitano, the fortress where Hakaru wanted her dead.
It took an hour to tie her to the great tree in the Kitaiji temple yard. Her arms were still bound, but now they coiled her with thick hemp rope from shoulder to hip, and strung her at a height from the branches, leaving her feet kicking and dangling in empty air.
When they looped the thick rope around her, Rui panicked. Forgetting everything she had decided, everything she thought, she lashed at them, writhing, trying to break free. She sounded like a wild animal when they brought her up. Spitting, shouting, screaming at the guards, cursing them, lashing out. She caught one of them in the knee: a sharp cracking sound and the man fell to the grass with a cry of pain. Then they hoisted her up, secured her with a counterweight, so that she swung with every movement of her flailing feet.
“Get off me!” she shouted. “Get off!”
Hakaru shoved at her, sending her in a wide rolling arc until the rope jerked to a stop and she spun around.
“Leave her,” commanded the crow monk, Jobo, from under the awning. Hakaru cursed silently, but turned away, and they left Rui to dangle above the ground alone. At the end of it, she saw Sen at the edge of the courtyard, lingering until his teacher brought a hand upon his elbow.
“Sen,” he said. “Let her be.”
She slept; she shivered. She slept and woke again. In the pale predawn, she heard a voice, something moved, a candle flickered, and finally, he came through the garden doors, a plate in one hand and a bamboo flask in the other.
