The Way of the Warrior - Chris Bradford [88]
To Jack’s immediate left, the Sound of Feathers waterfall cascaded over a sheer cliff and into a large rock basin, some five storeys below. The water churned into a frothy confusion of eddies and whirlpools before easing and then flowing down the gorge into the Kyoto Valley.
Jack looked up and saw that Yamato was already clambering up the rock face, heading towards the tiny stone shrine perched at the lip of the fall.
Jack judged that the waterfall was about the height of the crow’s-nest on-board the Alexandria. Yamato was a short way above the butai and clearly struggling. Even from where Jack stood, he could see Yamato’s legs shaking, his hands blindly feeling for the next hold.
Clambering over the rail of the butai, Jack spotted a narrow ledge from which to begin his own ascent. He would have to jump from the safety of the butai to the cliff. Way below him, the raging pool of water provided his only safety net. Jack took a deep breath, steeling himself for the jump, and leapt for the rock face.
He landed cleanly upon the ledge but immediately lost his footing on its slippery surface. He slithered out of control down the cliff face. His hands grabbed for a rocky outcrop, his days as a rigging monkey paying off a hundredfold as they instinctively found handholds and halted his descent.
Jack caught his breath and calmed himself. He would need to be far more careful if he were going to survive this challenge.
Looking up, he could see Yamato had made little progress, and Jack began his climb with renewed vigour. It might still be possible for him to reach the Jade Sword first.
Once Jack got used to the slippery surface of the cliff, he began to increase his pace. Rock climbing, Jack discovered, was little different from climbing the rigging on-board the Alexandria and, suffering no fear of heights, he soon levelled with Yamato.
‘Are you all right?’ asked Jack, concerned by the quivering form of Yamato.
Yamato said nothing. He merely glared at Jack, his face drained of colour, and his eyes stony with fear.
‘Do you need my help?’ said Jack, remembering how terrified he had been the first time he’d climbed to the crow’s-nest.
‘Not from you, gaijin! Once was more than enough,’ he hissed, but his voice cracked with fear as he grimly hung on to the slippery rock, his knuckles white with the effort.
‘Fine. Then fall,’ replied Jack and carried on past.
He reached the lip of the waterfall with no further difficulty. He gave a cursory glance at Yamato, who remained fixed to the rock face like a limpet, then crossed several large rounded stepping-stones to the little shrine erected in the middle.
He slipped inside and found the Jade Sword within a shady recess.
It rested upon a ruby-red lacquered stand, glistening in the watery light. The Jade Sword was a ceremonial katana, its saya a scabbard of black lacquered wood into which a golden dragon had been carved. A large jade stone was set into the wood as the eye of the dragon. Jack’s blood ran cold. Dokugan Ryu. Dragon Eye.
Jack tried to steady his hands as he lifted the heavy sword from its rack. He gripped the leather hilt, feeling the bubbled texture of the white rayfish skin beneath, and withdrew a gleaming blade of polished steel so sharp that it cut the eye just to look at it. The faint shadow of a second dragon had been etched on to the metal’s surface and Jack quickly re-sheathed the shining blade.
He slipped the Jade Sword into his obi, carefully tying the saya to him, and left the shrine.
Looking down, Jack saw that Yamato still hadn’t moved.
He quickly descended and came level with him once more. Yamato didn’t even look at him this time. He merely clung to the cliff wall, his whole body shuddering like a leaf in a storm.
‘Listen, you’ve frozen up,’ said Jack, trying to get his attention.
He had seen this many a time with sailors on-board the Alexandria. The mind seized up with fear and the body refused to move. A swimming sense of vertigo took hold and eventually