Young Samurai_ The Way of the Sword - Chris Bradford [42]
Although his fears of an anti-gaijin campaign were supposedly unfounded, he couldn’t help noticing that certain students seemed less friendly towards him. He had always been isolated by the fact that he was different. During his first year at the school, Akiko had been his only true ally, but after his victory at the Taryu-Jiai most of the students accepted him. Now, many had started to ignore him again, looking through him like glass.
Of course, he could be imagining it. He was struggling with his training and had lost confidence in making it into the top five in the forthcoming Circle of Three selection trials. It had been getting him down and this could be distorting his perception. But did he really have any hope of entering the Circle and going on to learn the Two Heavens?
Jack looked up at the night sky for an answer, but this time the familiar constellations his father had taught him offered cold comfort. The nights were drawing in and autumn would soon give way to winter, signalling the start of the trials.
‘Eh, gaijin! Where are your bodyguards?’ demanded a voice that made Jack’s heart sink.
He turned to face Kazuki. This was the last thing he needed.
‘Leave me alone, Kazuki,’ replied Jack, slipping off the cross-beam and walking away.
But other students emerged from the darkness to surround him. Jack looked towards the Shishi-no-ma for help, but there was no one around. Akiko, Yamato and Saburo would be in bed, if not asleep, by now.
‘Leave you alone?’ ridiculed Kazuki. ‘Why can’t your kind leave us alone? I mean, what do you think you’re doing in our land, pretending to be samurai? You should give up and go home.’
‘Yeah, go home, gaijin!’ echoed Nobu and Hiroto.
The circle of boys took up the chant.
‘Go home, gaijin! Go home, gaijin! Go home, gaijin!’ Despite himself, Jack felt his face flush with humiliation at the taunts. He desperately wanted to go home, to be with his sister, Jess, but he was stranded in a foreign land that now didn’t want him.
‘Just leave… me… alone!’
Jack tried to escape the circle, but Nobu stepped forward and pushed him back. Jack collided with one of the other boys who shoved him the opposite way. He stumbled into the cross-beam and, as he fell to the ground, Jack caught hold of a boy’s kimono, ripping it open.
‘Now look what you’ve done!’ exclaimed the boy, kicking Jack in the leg.
Jack was curled up with pain. Still he couldn’t help staring at the boy’s exposed chest.
‘What? You want another?’ asked the boy, drawing back his leg for another kick.
‘Goro, I think he’s admiring your tattoo,’ said Hiroto in the same thin, reedy voice Jack now recognized as belonging to the fourth person at the irezumi ceremony.
‘Look great, don’t they? We’ve all got one, you know.’ Hiroto pulled back his own kimono, revealing a small black scorpion. Then he gave Jack a cruel kick in the ribs.
He kicked him again for good measure and the Scorpion Gang laughed as each of the boys revealed their tattoos and lined up to kick Jack too.
‘Leave him!’ Kazuki ordered. ‘A sensei’s coming.’
The boys scattered.
As Jack lay there, shaking with a combination of pain, rage and shame, he heard the familiar click of a walking stick upon the stone courtyard and Sensei Yamada shuffled up.
Leaning upon his bamboo stick, he looked down at Jack just as he had done almost a year previously when Kazuki had first threatened him.
‘You shouldn’t play on building sites. They can be dangerous.’
‘Thanks for the warning, Sensei,’ said Jack bitterly, trying to hide his humiliation.
‘Someone giving you trouble again?’
Jack nodded and sat up, inspecting his bruised ribs. ‘Some of my class want me to give up and go home. The thing is I just wish I could go home…’
‘Anyone can give up, Jack-kun, it’s the easiest thing in the world to do,’ Sensei Yamada cautioned as he helped Jack back to his feet. ‘But to keep it together when everyone else would expect you to fall apart, now that’s true strength.’
Jack glanced uncertainly at his teacher, but met only a look of complete belief in him.