The Way of the Warrior - Chris Bradford [21]
Their small craft landed on the southern tip of the island and they joined the thronging mass of villagers, women in brightly coloured kimonos and sword-bearing samurai. The crowd had formed an ordered semi-circle, but the villagers all bowed and gave way as Akiko and her entourage moved towards the front, joining a large group of samurai.
The warriors immediately acknowledged Akiko’s arrival with a low bow. Returning their greeting, Akiko then began to converse with a young samurai boy, who appeared to be of Jack’s age, with chestnut-brown eyes and black spiky hair. The boy threw Jack a disdainful look, before ignoring him completely.
The villagers, however, were astonished by Jack’s presence. They gave him a wide berth, whispering to one another behind their hands, but Jack didn’t mind since this allowed him a clear view of the makeshift arena.
A lone samurai stood, like an ancient god, under the torii.
The warrior was dressed in a black-and-gold kimono decorated on the chest, sleeves and back with a circular symbol of four crossed bolts of lightning. His hairstyle was fashioned in the traditional samurai manner with a topknot of black hair pulled forward over a shaved pate. This samurai, though, had tied a thick band of white cloth round his head. Stocky and powerful, with menacing eyes, the samurai warrior reminded Jack of a large bulldog, bred for fighting.
In his hands, the warrior held the largest sword Jack had ever seen. The blade itself stretched over four feet in length, and together with the hilt was as long as Jack was tall. The warrior, his eyes fixed on the distant shoreline of the harbour, shifted impatiently and his sword caught the bright sunlight. For a brief moment it flashed like a bolt of lightning. Seeing the amazement in Jack’s eyes, Akiko whispered its name: ‘Nodachi.’
The warrior stood alone in the arena and Jack wondered where the man’s opponent could be. No one else appeared to be preparing for combat. As Jack looked around the crowd, he noticed that a group of samurai on the opposite side to him were emblazoned with the same lightning emblem as the warrior, while those samurai surrounding him bore the round crest of a phoenix.
So where was their champion?
Jack gauged that an hour must have passed, for the sun had traversed some fifteen degrees further across the cloudless sky. The heat had intensified and the villagers were now growing restless. The samurai under the torii had become even more agitated and paced the beach like a caged tiger.
Another hour went by.
The mutterings of the crowd grew louder as the heat became unbearable. Jack dreaded what he would have felt like in his old shirt and breeches, instead of the silken kimono he now wore.
Then, just as the sun reached its zenith, a small boat cast off from the jetty.
The listless crowd instantly became animated. Jack could see a little fisherman rowing unhurriedly across the harbour, while a larger man sat Buddha-like at its prow.
The boat drew closer. The crowd let out a huge cheer and began to chant ‘Masamoto! Masamoto! Masamoto!’
Akiko, Taka-san and Jiro joined in the thundering refrain of the samurai’s name.
The group of samurai bearing the lightning crest challenged the call with a rallying cry of their own champion ‘Godai! Godai! Godai!’ and the warrior stepped forward thrusting his nodachi high in the air. His followers roared even louder.
The boat came to rest on the shoreline. The little fisherman shipped his oars and waited patiently for his occupant to disembark. Another huge cheer went up from the crowd as the man stood up and stepped barefoot on to the beach.
Jack let out an involuntary gasp of surprise. Their champion, Masamoto, was the man with the scarred face.
12
THE DUEL
The mass of dried skin and reddened welts fanned out like molten lava from above Masamoto’s left eye, across his cheek and down the line of his jaw. His remaining features