Isla’s heart beat a frantic rhythm. She marched alongside Nene as they drew closer to Kumamoto Castle.
They would lose this assault, but she had no idea precisely what would happen or on which date.
For days they had marched, stopping in the evening to dig into their rations of sweet potatoes and dried fish before collapsing, exhausted, to sleep. Now, they marched again, north, as more wind and snow pelted them.
The women camped in the middle, surrounded by samurai, farmers and merchants’ sons alike. They talked quietly as they cooked above the fires or sparred, the firelight reflecting on their cheekbones and dark eyes. Isla yearned to reach out to someone, to tell them this was folly and they should go home, but she knew nobody would listen. The trust she had gained was far too fragile for anyone to believe her. Well, anyone other than Keiichirō, and he wouldn’t say anything for fear of being thought disloyal to a great cause.
She wrung her hands as she sat alone, a chill at her back. What should she do?
The women slept in groups, sheets and spare clothes laid out on the snow, using each other’s bodies and the fires for warmth. In the distance, men leaned against trees or rocks, hands on their swords or rifles laid across laps. Isla’s legs and feet ached from the non-stop marching, and she grimaced as she massaged her sore calves. Her thoughts strayed to Hisakichi Kuroki. Keiichirō hadn’t found any sign of him at the shi-gakkō. Maybe he hadn’t been a samurai after all.
The second night after they’d left Satsuma, Isla had woken in the pitch black to discover Nene was gone from her side.
‘Nene,’ she whispered. But she wasn’t in her sleeping spot. Fear spiked through Isla. The other women slept around them, their breathing slow, but Nene’s blanket was tossed aside. Fresh footprints in the snow led towards a group of trees.
Maybe she should go look for her.
No . . . She was simply off to empty her bladder, surely. Nene wasn’t stupid.
Isla rolled onto her back, looking up at the stars. The snow had settled, a white blanket in the night. It wouldn’t be long before they reached Kumamoto and the castle where this regiment of samurai would lose horribly to the imperial soldiers.
She had no idea how to stop it. Samurai wanted to die in battle. So long as they thought their cause was just and they did it for their lord, in this case, Takamori Saigō, they were willing to throw their lives away. Thousands of samurai had done it before them.
But none would do it in the future. As of September 1877, the samurai would be no more. The thought was heartbreaking. It was one thing to read about it in a textbook or at a museum, but these people surrounding her were living, breathing soldiers. She talked with them, bathed and ate with them. Was history destined to follow its course? If so, what was the point of her being here? She was as powerless as a leaf being swept along by the river.
Isla listened to the steady breathing of the women around her as she tucked her clasped hands between her thighs, curling into a ball and listening to the quiet pop of the nearby fire. What if she approached Takamori Saigō directly? The museum had said he was reluctantly taken out of retirement to lead this rebellion. He had a condition that made it difficult for him to ride a horse, and he was nearing fifty. Surely he would rather be fishing and hunting and spending time with his children than marching through the snow to a war he couldn’t win? Surely he didn’t really believe he’d reach Tokyo without resistance?
The thought of approaching the leader personally, however, was intimidating. He was an imposing person, of great importance, loved by his followers. Shinpachi Murata had treated her like a dangerous wild animal when she had accidentally bumped into him. The foreign girl, an unwelcome burden who had sneaked to join them, likely wouldn’t even be granted an audience. And even if she was, what could she say? ‘I’m from the future, your soldiers will lose, and you will die on top of a hill near your hometown in September’?
She’d be ridiculed at best. At worst . . . well, those were real swords, and many of the older samurai had killed before.
Isla absent-mindedly massaged her neck as she glanced into the darkness, listening to the wind blow the trees. Fires flickered here and there in the camp to keep away wolves and yōkai. She imagined what it must be like to believe in fabled creatures like those, to suspect them of lurking in forests and rivers.
What if she approached Keiichirō? Somehow convinced him this was useless? If she could save him . . .
But there were thousands of people here, and it wouldn’t be sensible to go looking at sleeping men’s faces hoping to find him. Sighing, she settled to try to get some sleep, but then hurried footsteps reached her.
It was Nene. She lay down, not noticing Isla was awake.
Isla thought about asking her what she had been doing, but it felt too much like prying. Instead, she asked, ‘The shrine, the one near Kagoshima. Why is everybody afraid of it?’
‘I don’t know much about it,’ said Nene, ‘but it’s said that animals are sometimes found dead there. And people who stray inside go missing.’
Missing? Isla’s heart flipped.
Could that mean what she hoped?
The next morning Isla felt as if she hadn’t slept before the army rose to continue their march north.
They reached Satsuma’s castle and bowed at the gates before passing through, but whispers ran through the army that the samurai lord didn’t acknowledge them.
Isla kept her head low. Satsuma’s feudal lord wasn’t fond of foreigners.
Her heart was heavy. Kumamoto would be a disaster, bloody and pointless. But turning back alone was a thought more awful than pressing on.
* * *
Mid-February, they crossed into Kumamoto Prefecture. Despite the sometimes deep snow, it had taken them only a few days to march from Kagoshima to the town of Kawashiri.
The castle stood above the treeline, regal and elegant above a vast moat. If the rebels gained Kumamoto, all of Kyushu would fall to Satsuma forces.
Keiichirō joined the other samurai lining up cannons outside the castle walls.
‘Most of Tani Tateki’s soldiers are conscripts,’ Kono reminded everyone, face twisted in disgust. ‘He fought with Saigō-sama for the emperor, but now he’s reduced to leading a pack of weak imperial conscripts. We’ll show them a real fight.’
Keiichirō could see his fellow samurai were confident that their might, their warrior blood, would easily flatten the conscripts who’d stayed hidden in the castle as Tani, the major general, had barricaded them all inside, opting to defend the castle rather than meet the samurai in an open field.
Cowards, Keiichirō thought, this is why you are not samurai. Even if it was a smart war tactic.
Kirino-san and Beppu-san patrolled the ranks, telling them they were to stay here until they were given further orders. The leader of the second regiment asked if they had enough food. All the samurai had their own provisions and ammunition, though they were getting plenty of extra food from hunting. Murakami came back one evening with an entire sack of fish from the river, which he shared that evening with his closest friends. They praised their friend and all his ancestors. Tatsuzō spoke of his dreams again, which his friends poked fun at, and they swapped stories of their childhoods. It was almost pleasant.
Before the last of the sunlight died, Keiichirō found Toramasa sitting at the edge of the river, his kamisori razor in his hand.
‘Unbelievable,’ he said, laughing. ‘You’re shaving at a time like this?’
‘Of course.’ Toramasa slid the blade gently over his chin. ‘Ikeda-san says I look good without facial hair.’ He finished and patted his topknot. ‘One of us has to keep up appearances. I want to look beautiful even in death.’ He waved his razor, looking to Keiichirō, who was sporting a bristly layer of stubble. ‘How about it, Maeda? They say I have a feather-like touch. You won’t feel a thing.’
‘I’ll take your word for it.’
Several hours later, when the stars twinkled in the sky, Keiichirō was jerked to consciousness by someone violently shaking him. His fingers closed around the handle of his katana, which was nestled in the crook of his arm as he’d slept against the cold bark of a tree. He gave a start as his eyes opened, but it was only Toramasa, excitement gleaming in his eyes.
‘Let’s go and see the castle grounds up close.’
Blinking away sleep, Keiichirō rose with a rustle of cloth. He tucked his sword into his belt and followed Toramasa like a shadow in the night. Ikeda, unsurprisingly, joined them, as did Keiichirō’s cousin Tatsuzō and their classmate Murakami.
‘An army, those in the castle would see coming,’ Toramasa said. ‘But not a few of us.’
‘What are you carrying?’ Keiichirō noted the bulging sack at Toramasa’s back. ‘Where’d you get it?’
‘One of the carriages. Hurry up, will you?’
Men slept back-to-back or against rocks or trees. Some were awake, but nobody paid attention to their small group walking past. Others stoked fires or polished their swords.
The stars lit their way, though the castle district was alight with lanterns. Stone walls surrounded sprawling grounds, the castle itself in its centre, glowing with lamplight and its roofs, several storeys high, sloped and elegant. The imperial soldiers stood poised at the gates, ready for any sign of attack. A silhouette of an enemy soldier, armed with a rifle, patrolled the wall.
They waited until he walked away and then sneaked near the moat before the castle wall, keeping low to the grass.
The samurai avoided the main gates guarded by imperial soldiers, and kept to the bushes. Someone’s foot hit a stone and it rolled. They froze where they stood in the treeline, hands moving to sword hilts when an imperial soldier glanced in their direction, but only briefly.
They sneaked further around the moat and Keiichirō thought the walls of the castle looked impenetrable, which didn’t bode well for the attack the next day.
Toramasa stopped and quietly put down a sack he’d been carrying. He knelt and fiddled with something. It was several feet long and resembled an arrow, except it was much thicker, almost the size of Keiichirō’s arm, and it had metal fins.
‘Bō-hiya I stole from the Somuda arsenal,’ boasted Toramasa.
A fire arrow.
Keiichirō watched his best friend in silence as he slid the enormous arrow into the firing mechanism and aimed towards the top of the wall across the moat.
‘Wait,’ urged Keiichirō, ‘shouldn’t we use this in the battle? Beppu-san will want to use it.’
Toramasa replied, ‘But this is so much more fun.’
‘We are not here for fun,’ said Keiichirō as Toramasa lit the fuse wrapped around the shaft and pointed it above the wall towards the storehouse.
‘That’ll make a noise when it goes off,’ remarked Ikeda, his voice serene.
‘Yes.’ Toramasa laughed again. Then his mirth melted away and he suddenly looked alarmed. ‘Oh, yeah. You’re right.’ He bolted from the cannon.
Keiichirō, Tatsuzō and Murakami all glanced at each other, then they ran, too.
They fled deeper into the forest, and there was a boom behind them.
Startled birds took to the air and the samurai heard an angry yell that echoed through the castle grounds.
Keiichirō looked to where they had been to see flames crackling on the other side of the wall, orange reflecting brightly in the moat. The fire arrow had hit a storehouse, and a fire was taking hold.
By the time Keiichirō and his friends reached the top of the hill where their fellow samurai were sitting up and rubbing sleep from their eyes as they wondered what had happened, a whole building was ablaze in the castle grounds.
‘Toramasa,’ said Keiichirō, ‘you might have just turned the odds in our favour. But we can never let anyone else know that we were part of it.’