Reclaimed – Chapter 24

At the shuttle base, Jiro and I stand on the edge of the landing platform, waiting for the shuttle to return from a supplies run to Takayama. Wary employees pass us, their eyes skating over what we’re wearing. We’re dressed for travel across the continent, backpacks stuffed full, swords, and Himitsu. I miss Kumo. I can’t wait to be reunited with my dog and horse sometime soon.

I look down at the ring on my finger and wonder if I should have given it to Mariko. Rubbing my thumb along the band on the inner part of my hand, I watch the diamonds catch the evening light, throwing rainbows across my skin.

“Hey, Jiro.”

“Yeah?” he asks, looking up from his tablet.

“Promise me something? If I die, will you take this ring and hold onto it until you have someone else to give it to?”

He pauses for a long moment, blinking his unbelieving eyes at me. “What’s prompting this?” He sighs and turns off his tablet.

“Oh, I don’t know. Certain death?” I try to laugh it off. “Just, do me a favor and keep the ring for yourself or give it to someone else you may fall for after I’m gone.”

He huffs and rolls his eyes. “You’re not going to die, but if you do, you’re taking the ring with you. It’s yours.”

I nod my head and look at the ring again. I can live with that. At least it won’t go to Mariko.

“Sanaa, Jiro!”

Kazuo comes running up to us on the platform, winded and sweating.

“I’m glad I caught you before you left.” He lets out a deep breath before sucking in a new one. His hair is unruly, clasped in a tail at his neck, but everything else about him is put together. “I want to offer some help, other than around town.”

I glance over my shoulder at the ocean skyline, brushed salmon pink with the waning light of sunset, and a small blip on the horizon grows larger. The shuttle will be here soon.

“What did you have in mind?” I already turned the city over to Sakai and Lucy and relieved Usagi of duty for the time being. I didn’t think about Kazuo.

“Well, Julia is really upset about Maeda gone missing. She’s organizing people to perform a search and rescue —”

“I know,” I interrupt, trying not to be impatient. “I gave her free rein to do what she felt necessary. But we’ll be in contact so we can join them later.”

“I want to go after Sachi. Julia is heading to the towns in the Northeast because that’s the last known whereabouts of Taira Clan, but I was thinking I’d trace the ninjas who attacked Yamato. I’m sure Sachi was with them. She knew every house and restaurant in the town.” He gulps, still obviously uncomfortable about the fact he followed me around for weeks before I was kidnapped. Sachi must have helped him with that recon work.

“Do you know where to look?”

“I believe so. I was going to concentrate on the farming towns west of here. I doubt the ninjas would head back home after defecting, and I’m sure they needed a jumping off point. Takayama is out of the question, so Mino is my next best guess.”

“Go.” I wave at him as the shuttle descends on the platform. I pull Himitsu from my shoulder and cradle him against my chest. “You have two days. We’ll gather at the Oda prairie compound and form a plan for war once everyone has returned with information.”

Kazuo bends at the waist, bowing to me.

“I hope you learned a few things from Julia while we were on the road.” I cock my head and study his casual stance, open shirt, and soft expression. He’s not the buttoned-up assassin he used to be.

“I did,” he says, smiling. A chill makes the hair on my arms stand up. This is the first time I’ve seen Kazuo smile. “It was an educational experience. I apologize for giving you such a hard time about it.” He turns and walks away before I can ask him why.

“That’s a bit freaky, don’t you think?” Jiro asks, once we’re seated in the shuttle and in the air.

“Kazuo? Yeah. But I’ve seen it all lately. It shouldn’t surprise me that he’s changed too. Everyone has.”

“Not me. I’m still the same.” Jiro reaches over and takes my hand.

“Not true. You’re different too. A year ago, there’s no way I would have convinced you to leave your family on this kind of crusade. You were so certain we needed everyone to make this colonization work.”

“Now, it’s just us. If we can’t fix this, I doubt anyone can.” His confidence is astounding. I would think we’re too rash, too crazy to solve all the colonization’s problems. I show a lot of confidence. I can smile, snap my fingers, and say I’ve got it covered, but I rarely believe it. Jiro believes, straight to his core. Confidence is his religion. He squeezes my hand before letting go to rub Himitsu’s head. The nearer to night we get the more he wakes up and wants to be close to us.

The shuttle drops us off on the eastern side of Akuyama, the large dark mountain of hell that sits on the northern edge of Kuroko Lake.

“What if I’m wrong about this?” I ask Jiro as we hike towards the water. He’s two steps in front of me, guiding us through the woods by a GPS locator and the light of the major moon. No flashlights.

“I don’t know. There are so many things we could be wrong about. What particular thing did you have in mind?”

“The location of the Koga Clan.”

Jiro blows a breath between his lips and laughs. “It’s not a secret. We tagged several of the Kuroi Ninjas the day they left us after we rescued you from Tengoku. They ended up in the southern bamboo forest.”

“Why didn’t those same trackers alert us they were going to attack Yamato then?”

I strain my eyes to see Jiro and read his body language, but all I can discern are shrugged shoulders.

“We only managed to tag five of them. Those clothes may have been discarded since then. Or maybe all the people we tagged were people who agreed with Koga. It’s hard to say.”

“Maybe,” I concede, stepping over a log. The trees rustle in front of me as Himitsu lands on a branch.

“You’re clear to the campsite?” Himitsu says, and I bite my lip to stop myself asking if he’s sure.

“We’re clear around the bend, Himi says. What if I can’t negotiate their help? What then?”

Jiro is silent as we exit the trail to a small clearing. The moon hovers over us, squat and pregnant in the sky, almost as bright as the sun. We’re not going to light a fire. That’s just asking for trouble. Himitsu launches into the air around us, no doubt hungry for dinner.

“You’ll do what it takes to win.” Jiro reaches for my backpack so I turn and let him pull it off of me. “I’m sure you’ll see the perfect opportunity and take it. Just like you did with Maeda walking into his casino in a little black dress. Just like when you put Kentaro at the head of his clan or when you decided to get the chip. They were all the right decisions.”

He rolls out our giant blow-up bed and inflates the bottom portion to give us a cushion to sleep on. I reach into the bag and pull out the protein rations we packed for tonight and tomorrow. My eyes smart with tears looking at the bars in my hand. They were made for me by Oyama before he died.

“But I’ve made horrible decisions, too. Ones that have cost us the lives of people we love.” I sit on the warm grass and drag my thumb along the edge of my dinner.

Jiro sits next to me and snaps the bar from my hands. “Oyama’s death is not your fault, nor Miko’s parents. Their deaths and the deaths of everyone else in the city are the result of Miura acting like a spoiled baby.”

I imagine Miura as a balding, ugly baby waving his meaty hands around and smile before sighing.

“I should have been there, instead of up north with the Odas.”

“What’s done is done. You were building an important relationship and left the city in good hands. Miura had an advantage over us and took out his anger on a bunch of innocent people.” He nudges the protein bar in my hands labeled ‘Sanaa,’ so I peel it open and bring it to my nose first before biting. The sweet scent of honey mixed with apricots and some native nut hit my tongue in a burst of happiness and regret. Oyama always knew what I would like to eat.

“How am I going to get by without him?” I chew slowly, inhaling through my nose to keep the tears away.

“Oyama?” I nod as he slides his arm over my shoulders. “It’s hard for some people to remember that Oyama was trained to help you. It was his job to protect you and your loved ones.” Jiro stares forward into the quiet forest. “He died doing his job. It was important to him.” He squeezes me before letting go to eat his own protein bar. “And he trained Sono to take his place if anything happened to him. If we hadn’t left tonight, we would have been eating dinner Sono prepared.”

Sono was a good choice. He’s the only person I trust to cook after Oyama.

“Isn’t Miko pissed that I took Sono?” I ask, and Jiro’s arm stiffens beside mine.

“She… did not have nice things to say, no.”

“Great. Let’s go to bed before my guilt keeps me up all night.”

I sleep under the cover of the sleeping bag, knotted into a ball against Jiro’s side. I have trouble sleeping outside. I need walls to feel safe but completely covered by the sleeping bag is the closest thing to walls I’ll get while camping. I trust Jiro to wake if we’re in danger because I certainly won’t hear anything. Himitsu is on guard, ready to rouse us should we be in trouble.

I flit along the stages of sleep, dreaming but never really falling into a deep, relaxing slumber. I wake sometime in the night, panting and gasping, the last image in my mind of a fox spirit climbing out of Miko’s belly instead of a baby. The fox laughed and said, “I do this for my empress, ungrateful woman,” as Miko sobbed and screamed for her baby girl. I strain my eyes to see anything under the sleeping bag cover but Jiro’s chest rising and falling, my heart beating swiftly in my ears. Was I the ungrateful woman or Miko?

It’s just a dream, Sanaa. Go back to sleep.