Young Samurai_ The Way of the Sword - Chris Bradford [13]
As was typical of the sensei, he picked at nuts from a small bowl and crushed them with his bare hands, just as he was inclined to do with Jack’s spirit at each and every opportunity. The man despised Jack, and made no effort to disguise the fact that he resented a foreigner being taught the secrets of their martial arts.
After a moment’s hesitation, a strong boy with broad shoulders and a bronzed face walked over to the dais. He picked up the ink scribe and wrote his name upon the parchment. Soon afterwards three other students approached, encouraging a steady stream of hopefuls to queue up too.
‘Come on,’ said Yamato, striding over to the growing line.
Jack looked to Akiko for final reassurance, but she was already in line. Jack should have known. Akiko was no ordinary girl. She was samurai and, being the niece of Masamoto, courage was in her blood.
He joined her in the queue. When they reached the head table, Jack watched Akiko as she wrote her name on the parchment with a series of brushstrokes that formed a beautiful but mysterious pattern of Japanese kanji characters. The symbols made little sense to Jack.
Sensei Kyuzo glared over Akiko’s shoulder at Jack.
‘You are entering the Circle?’ said Sensei Kyuzo, giving a short incredulous snort at Jack’s appearance.
‘Hai, Sensei,’ responded Jack, ignoring his teacher’s contempt. He had waited with the others in the queue to sign his name and was not going to be put off by Sensei Kyuzo’s antagonism now.
‘A gaijin has never partaken in the Circle,’ stated Kyuzo, with deliberate emphasis placed on his use of the derogatory term for a foreigner.
‘Then this will be the first time, Sensei,’ said Akiko, pretending not to notice his blatant disrespect towards Jack.
‘Sign here,’ ordered Sensei Kyuzo. ‘In kanji.’
Jack paused as he looked at the paper. The names of the participants were all carefully inked in the Japanese characters.
A cruel smile cut across Sensei Kyuzo’s lips. ‘Or maybe you can’t? Entry must be in kanji. It’s the rules.’
To Jack’s frustration, the sensei was right. He didn’t know kanji. Jack could write easily enough. His mother had been a fine teacher. But only in Roman characters. While Akiko’s guidance, together with the formal lessons provided by Father Lucius, had enabled him to speak in Japanese, he had only limited experience of kanji. In Japan, the way of writing, shodo, was as much an art form as hand-to-hand combat and swordsmanship. The skill took years to perfect.
Sensei Kyuzo savoured Jack’s discomfort.
‘That’s a shame,’ he said. ‘Maybe you can enter in another three years’ time, when you’ve learnt to write. Next!’
Jack was elbowed out of the way by a student from behind and he could have guessed it would be Kazuki. The boy had been on his back ever since his arrival at samurai school. Now that Jack had gained the respect of the other students by beating their rival school, the Yagyu Ryū, in the Taryu-Jiai competition, Kazuki was on the lookout for any excuse to bully or belittle him.
‘I wouldn’t worry, gaijin,’ smirked Kazuki, signing his own name in the place where Jack’s should have been. ‘You won’t be around to participate anyway.’
Jack rounded on Kazuki even as he felt Akiko guiding him away. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Surely even you’ve heard the news?’ said Kazuki with vindictive pleasure. ‘The daimyo Kamakura Katsuro is expelling Christians from Japan.’
Nobu peered over Kazuki’s shoulder. He gave Jack a farewell wave of the hand and laughed, ‘Sayonara, gaijin!’
‘He’s going to kill any gaijin he finds in Japan,’ added Kazuki spitefully, before turning to Nobu with triumph in his eyes at being the first to tell Jack the bad news.
‘Ignore them, Jack,’ said Akiko, shaking her head in disgust. ‘They’re making it up.’
But Jack couldn’t help thinking that there might be a grain of truth in Kazuki’s story. Kamakura was the daimyo of Edo Province and the head of the Yagyu Ryū, the rival school to the Niten Ichi Ryū. He was a cruel, vindictive man with too much power. Jack’s overriding