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Ikedaya: Part 2

by Mir ::: 22.Mar.2002

They threaded their way through the crowded streets, two men in dark colors with heads bowed and swords thrust through their obi. There was nothing unusual about the sight itself -- even the Shinsengumi were brazen enough to parade through Kyoto with crowds nervously looking on. The smaller of the two figures, his face hidden by the shadow of a broad circular hat, trailed behind his associate as pedestrians streamed by. He glanced neither to the left or right but nonetheless noticed more in his peripheral vision than most men do head-on.

"The word is that Miyabe plans to burn the city to the ground. It's been so dry lately that the houses will ignite like tinder. Katsura's instructions are to tell anyone we care about to leave." They stopped before the familiar inn, and the speaker, as he pushed the door aside, glanced back over his shoulder with a hint of amusement in his gaze. "So, are you going to talk to Tomoe?"

Kenshin's eyes, trained on the bare ground beneath him, were hidden beneath the brim of the hat, but his lips moved, and he muttered a flat response through clenched teeth. "She can get out of Kyoto on her own."

Iizuka's shoulders lifted and fell indifferently as he stepped inside. "Just figured that since you saved her once, you might want to do it again." He turned briskly to the left, not waiting to hear a reply. Behind him the door remained open as Himura Kenshin slowly crossed the threshold with lips pressed together and eyes narrowed in annoyance. He stared as his mentor's retreating back, his thoughts spinning in circles like the wobbly revolutions of a child's top.

As he approached his room, the rhythmic cadence of bristles sweeping across the floor clearly indicated that *she* was inside. Despite rumors to the contrary, after the first night she had always slept downstairs with the other inn girls, never venturing past his door once the deep purple shades of dusk began to pour through the open window.

*

'I do think of you sometimes,' she had admitted one morning as she passed him on the stairway. 'Whenever I serve breakfast and don't see your face among the others I think about where you've been the night before.' At his surprised expression she'd shaken her head, her arms full of clean white towels. 'Of course I don't know exactly where you've been... but not knowing doesn't stop me from imagining. I'm sorry. I can't help myself....' She'd paused, not eagerly awaiting a response as some girls might have done, but rather merely catching her breath before continuing on her way.

'You shouldn't bother. It's not worth the time,' he'd replied distantly. His nocturnal activities were evident in the dark smudges beneath his eyes and the thin red capillaries that feathered outward from his pupils. They were manifest in the weary slump of his shoulders and the way he leaned against the wall behind him to disguise the weariness of exhaustion. And without further comment he'd left her standing in the stairway as he half-stumbled toward the kitchen, his movements uncharacteristically sluggish but he footsteps, as always, falling without sound.

*

"I'll be out of your way in a moment." She glanced up at his entrance although the broom continued to glide across the floor. Behind her the dark oranges of the falling sun dyed the afternoon sky and traced boldly along the windowsill. The clouds hung suspended in the air like images caught forever by the camera's lens

"I'm in no hurry." Despite the brevity of the response there was a trace of gentleness in his tone.

"I have other chores to finish." Her face remained expressionless as she continued to sweep, her voice flat.

Looking straight ahead he walked past her and out onto the balcony. Below, a lone man trudged wearily across the courtyard, his shadow trailing obediently behind him like an old dog, lame and half-blind. Above, the orange sun hung low in the sky, partially obscured by clouds that not even the fierce midday heat had been able to burn away. The temperature was dropping with the eminence of nightfall, but even as the swordsman reached forward and gripped the wooden railing, his forehead glistened moistly with beads of sweat.

"I -- I've been given the night off, and I would like to see the festival. Would -- would you...." Abandoning her sweeping, she stepped outside into the humid evening, broom in hand, eyes tracing the cracks that ran haphazardly across the floor. They rarely talked, rarely said more than a word or two in passing, and when they were together, by choice or by chance, neither had words for the myriad of thoughts that spun elusively though their minds.

His fingers curled tightly around the railing at the sound of her voice so close beside him, and replies like leaves caught in a river's swift current streamed though his mind in quick succession -- until he was left with nothing to act upon but instinct. "Sure." There were no regrets, no second thoughts. Time, measured by the edge of the sword, leaves little opportunity for the luxury of reflection.

- - - - - - - - - -

The streets of Kyoto were overflowing with visitors and pilgrims who had journeyed to the capital for the annual Gion festival. As night fell upon the city, the festivities were illuminated by the colored light from a sea of paper lanterns strung from house to house across the streets. And even as the unrelenting heat pressed down upon the celebrations, the air was filled with the ringing of laughter, the soft glow of fireflies, the steady beat of drums, and the sharp winding of flutes.

Just before the hour of the dog, on the Kawaramachi Road a lone figure dressed in beige silk wove its way steadily though the crowds. At his waist were the signature swords of a samurai, and he although his pace was brisk, he kept carefully to the deep shadows at the side of the street. With so many visitors in the city no one gave him a second glance, let alone questioned his rank or business -- which suited him perfectly, for he was in a hurry to reach his destination and was in no mood for idle chatter with strangers.

The young man who greeted him at the Inn, one Akechi Masaru, bowed deeply as he pushed the door aside. "Welcome to Ikedaya, Katsura-san. Do you travel alone tonight?" His face, illuminated in the candlelight, was thin and marked by the dreaded teenage affliction of acne, but his voice was deep and smooth, an indication of his eminent adulthood.

"I come alone..." It was statement bound to raise questions in the boy's mind, but Katsura purposefully ignored the beseeching glances thrown in his direction. There was no need for the boy to know more than he already did. The less he knew, the less damage he could cause to the Choushuu clan if captured and interrogated.

Katsura waited silently in the entrance hall until Masaru had closed the door, but even with the thin barrier separating him from the city streets, he could still feel his heart beating in time with the cadence of the pounding drums, still see the strings of lights glowing before his eyes, still smell the pungent odor of human sweat as it evaporated from warm, swaying bodies.

"This way, then -- they're already upstairs." With a lantern in hand, the boy led his guest away from the door and through a narrow hallway. The old wooden stairs creaked in protest under their feet, and the ever- vigilant swordsman inside Katsura's head began to analyze the environment. There was nothing special to note about the halls and stairs save the unusual narrowness of the passages. 'I'd hate be caught with my back to the wall in a place like this. There's hardly room to swing a sword.'

But as the boy took him to the second-story front room, the impromptu architectural analysis was swept aside, and Katsura instead turned his attention to the words being shot like arrows across the room from one camp to the other and then back again. They were mostly youngsters, ronin fresh from the countryside with hardly anything to call their own besides their tired family names, the swords at their sides, and the worn clothing on their backs. And still they talked as if they'd just returned from personal audience with the Emperor himself.

"Miyabe's nothing but an old fool with a loose tongue and a grudge against the world." The speaker, his cheeks flushed in anger sat with his back straight and his short sword on the floor besides him. Sake bottles, like stones freshly dug from the earth, lay scattered around the room, and it was evident from the overall atmosphere of the meeting that the consumption hadn't been limited to one or two individuals. "It wouldn't matter if he were harmless, but when idiots like you listen to what he says and--"

An eerie hush fell over the room as Katsura stepped across the threshold. Neither camp wanted to admit that they'd been drinking like merchants and squabbling like children. 'Because they know they're barely older than children and hardly better off than merchants,' he though to himself as his eyes swept carefully along the walls in search of friends and foes alike. 'Neither Miyabe nor Sugiyama are here yet. Damn them -- there's no point in staying here and listening to this riffraff drink and debate politics all night.'

And so with a nod to his own supporters he turned back to Akechi and muttered softly through clenched teeth, "There's some business I need to attend to at the Tsushima headquarters. If Miyabe comes tell him I am on my way back. Under no circumstances is he to leave this inn until I return. Do you understand?" In fact, Katsura had no intention of proceeding to the Tsushima headquarters... but there was no need for anyone else to know the nature and location of his business that night.

"I understand Katsura-san. He will remain here even if I have to bar his exit with my body and my sword," the young man replied in earnest.... too earnestly? The thought, a mere flicker of suspicion, flashed through Katsura's mind as he nodded curtly to the assembled company and swept back down the narrow stairs. 'Is this the future of our country? Are these the men who'll continue the work when we're gone?'

- - - - - - - - - -

She swept through the crowds with her features molded into an expression of indifference. The tapping of her wooden geta against the rough cobblestones caught the attention of more than one male pedestrian, but she'd long since learned to ignore their suggestive gazes. Ikumatsu was a geisha, beautiful, refined, cultured... and making her way home at the end of a long day.

The men from the Aizu Han, three lower samurai with money enough but no charm to speak of, had monopolized her attention for the better part of the afternoon. She'd suffered through their rough dispositions and uncensored conversation, all the while pretending to ignore the slander thrown against the Ishinshishi. It would not have been fitting for her to prove their statements false. They talked freely amongst themselves because she was a woman, but their ignorance would ultimately assure their deaths.

As she approached her house, a modest dwelling on the western bank of the Kamagawa, she threw a quick glance up and down the street. It was only after assuring herself that the shadows were free of assassins that she opened the door and stepped inside into the gentle darkness. She had no reason to fear for her life, but it was certainly better to be careful than to be dead.

She pulled a folding fan from her sleeve and snapped it open in the semi-darkness, but the slight circulation of the air before her did little to dispel the lingering humidity. And walking in her socks across the tatami with steps slowed by hesitation, she bit her lip and closed her eyes while lines of worry creased her forehead. Knowledge is power. It was a truism, a fact of life bestowed by parents on the disinterested ears of children. But as Ikumatsu paused mid-step halfway to the staircase she silently added her own amendment -- Knowledge is power if you're a man with resources.

She shook her head tiredly and a dark curtain cascaded downward as she delicately pulled the pins from her hair. It had been years since she'd worn her hair down, years since she'd been a young girl with nothing behind her bright smile save the blissful gift of innocence.

She reached for the round mirror with gracefully tapering fingers. It had belonged to her mother more than a decade ago, and when she stared at the reflection washed pale in the moonlight, memories of days passed crept tentatively into her mind. They were well received in the fleeting stillness of the moment, and for just an instant she indulged herself in the sights and sounds of her childhood. The air rung with the laughter of younger siblings as snow gathered on her shoulders and melted on the tongue.

Then, with the abruptness of a sudden gunshot, the quiet tap against her doorframe shattered the stillness, and Ikumatsu's head snapped up from where it had fallen against her chest. "It's me." Her eyes widened slightly at the greeting, and in an instant she had scrambled to her feet.

"You're safe." Their eyes met, and she studied Katsura's handsome features while her hands reached for his to pull him closer. "I never thought I'd..."

He frowned in concern, allowing himself to be led safely inside by his lover. "Did you find something out? Is anything wrong?" In the past Ikumatsu had acted as a spy for the Ishinshishi.

"No, nothing." A shadow crossed her face, but she shook her head and smiled calmly for his benefit. "Are you staying here tonight?" After closing the door she reached for the nearest lamp, and soon the room was warmed by the gentle yellow glow of candlelight.

He removed his shoes and followed her with light footsteps but lips pressed together in tense contemplation. "I am not. The meeting at the Ikedaya has yet to begin, and I must stop persuade Miyabe to give up his foolish plans. He'll be the ruin of us all." His ears still rang with the loud clanging of brass bells, and as he sank to the floor in his customary spot across from Ikumatsu, he found himself wishing he were back in Choushuu with his land solidly beneath his feet and the clear night sky arching from horizon to horizon above.

"Here, have some sake." She placed the saucer in his hands as he stared off into space, knowing that there was nothing she could say to persuade him to stay away from the meeting. Knowledge... is power to those who use it to their advantage, and Ikumatsu, although a woman, was certainly no fool. She allowed herself a quiet smile as she refilled the dish once, twice. And as the minutes passed by Katsura murmured softly to himself, stifled a yawn, and at last drifted into sleep.

She knelt beside him after turning him onto his back and gently slipping a cushion beneath his head, hands resting calmly on her thighs. The Aizu samurai had discussed at length their plans for attacking the meeting at the Ikedaya that evening. Working in conjunction with the Shinsengumi, they had been glowing with the bright prospect of their assured success. They never suspected that the painted beauty playing music beside them was in actuality an enemy spy.

*end of part 2*