The Ring of Earth - Chris Bradford [86]
Ever so gently, Miyuki slid open the shoji. A single guttering candle lit the room. The floor was matted with finely woven tatami. In the centre, Gemnan lay upon a futon, a crumpled blanket covering his skeletal body. Protruding from beneath his pillow was the hilt of a knife. Next to it was a set of keys.
Jack just hoped one of them unlocked the pit cage.
Just like stealing a pillow, he reminded himself.
Stepping inside the room, Jack stealth-walked over to Gemnan. Miyuki, keeping one eye on the corridor, covered his back in case of trouble.
As silent as a ghost, he approached the sleeping torturer.
His skin crawled at seeing the man up close again. In the flickering gloom, the sallow-faced Gemnan looked like a corpse, only the sound of his laboured breathing indicating he was alive.
Reaching out, Jack’s fingers closed round the keys. Very carefully, he picked them up, but still they made a slight jingling noise. Gemnan snorted and Jack froze as the torturer’s head turned towards him. But the man was just settling in his sleep and his wheezing soon resumed.
Jack didn’t want to linger any more than he had to. Pocketing the keys silently in his pouch, he turned to leave. Suddenly a tantō appeared, its blade catching the dying light of the candle. Jack seized the attacker’s hand, trying to wrestle the knife away.
But Miyuki wouldn’t let go. She was determined to kill Gemnan. Her dark eyes blazed with hatred. The tip of the blade hovered over Gemnan’s heart as a mute battle was fought between Jack and Miyuki.
She’s gone crazy! thought Jack. An unplanned assassination could jeopardize the entire mission. Releasing Hanzo and the others had to be the priority.
Miyuki made a final bid to thrust the tantō into the samurai’s chest, but at the last moment Jack prised the knife from Miyuki’s grasp. She glared at him, then at Gemnan. Miyuki looked ready to leap for the man’s throat and Jack grabbed her, pulling her out of the room. He closed the shoji behind them, leaving Gemnan to sleep in blissful ignorance of his near death.
Miyuki fumed, but said nothing. Jack’s heart was thumping in his chest, bewildered at what had just happened in there. Unable to ask for fear of waking the torturer, he merely signed for Miyuki to lead the way back over the Nightingale Floor.
A tense walk ensued. Jack was concerned that Miyuki might no longer be focused on the task in hand. He was right. She misjudged the last floorboard and it chirped loudly. Miyuki immediately corrected her step, but the damage had been done.
Reaching the stairs, Jack glanced back. Neither Genman nor a guard had appeared. But a tear is a tear, he thought.
Not wanting to risk the samurai’s sleeping quarters again, Jack opened a shutter in the outer wall. They clambered out of the window and on to the roof. With the shutter closed, Jack could no longer hold back.
‘What were you thinking?’ he hissed. ‘Zenjubo said leave no trace!’
Miyuki, seething, trembled all over. In a tense whisper, each word delivered with venom, she replied, ‘That man killed my family!’
Jack stared in shock. ‘You’re certain?’
She nodded once. ‘That horrible, gloating face haunts my every dream.’
From his own experience, Jack knew that being so close to her family’s murderer must have been insufferable.
‘I understand your torment –’
‘Then why did you stop me?’ Miyuki whispered with icy malice.
‘His screams would have woken the whole castle,’ said Jack, trying to get her to see sense.
‘I’d have slit his throat –’
‘Assassination is not the mission,’ Jack reminded her. ‘Saving the clan is!’
‘I want my revenge!’ she said, tears welling in her eyes.
Jack took Miyuki’s head gently between his hands, fixing her with his gaze.
‘The greatest revenge you could have is for us all to escape.’
53
TRAITOR
‘What took you so long?’ demanded Momochi.
‘A Nightingale Floor,’ Jack replied, leaving out Miyuki’s assassination attempt and their misjudged steps.
Tenzen found the correct key and had the grille open in seconds.