Ring of Fire III Read online

  The enemy saw what they planned and pressed forward, but the Japanese were ready for them. The four samurai stood their ground at the water’s edge, their superior swordsmanship holding back the Siamese onslaught. There was no doubt the Siamese were fearsome warriors, they simply weren’t as disciplined as the samurai. Still, the four of them were taking a terrible beating, as soon as they cut down one man another jumped in to take his place. Yoriaki’s muscles were on fire, he had not practiced with his weapon for several years and he suffered for it now. His blade grew heavy, feeling as if it had been alchemically transformed into lead, but he kept on, never slowing his ever-changing patterns of attack and defense, slaying one enemy after another. Behind him he heard a gasp; out of the corner of his eye he saw Nakagata fall, pierced through the heart by both of his opponents’ dual wielded daab swords. His killer was having difficulty pulling one of the blades back out of the dying samurai; Yoriaki helped him by cutting that arm off at the elbow before turning back to his own foes.

  All along the beach similar scenes were taking place, small bands of samurai holding the king’s soldiers back from the shore as women, children and the elderly swam or boated their way to what safety they could find. Stealing a split second’s glance, he saw more boats had come, mostly Portuguese but some Chinese junks as well. Apparently they were not alone in their darkest hour; the Siamese may have let a madman rule them but the other peoples who called Ayutthaya home felt pity for their long-time friends and neighbors in Nihonmachi. This made Yoriaki smile. The Siamese chose that moment to fall back to regroup, making ready to finish off Yoriaki and his two remaining warriors. He took that opportunity to search the river for Momo again. Farther down the beach he saw a Christian Japanese, no samurai, just a merchant, holding off several soldiers with nothing but a garden shovel while his family fled into the water. The brave man went down beneath the Siamese swords as his loved ones screamed. Yoriaki saw with horror that the soldiers were now wading out after the women and children, who were clumsily trying to swim away now. Snarling with renewed rage he took a step in that direction but the enemy at hand had returned and he was forced to hold his ground.

  The fresh troops came in hitting hard and Yoriaki felt his body begin to falter. The mind could only control the matter so long before it had no more to give. A lucky blow from a young Siamese warrior cut him across the belly, not too deep but he felt a tide of blood seep down his abdomen. In return his katana skewered the youth through the mouth, then thrust down through the chin, slicing open the neck all the way to the clavicle. Blood sprayed like the waterfalls he had once meditated under in the cool mountain forests of Japan. As that one fell, another stepped in to take his place. Deep within Yoriaki’s mind he began to pray to Lord Jesus that his wife would be spared and taken to safety. There wasn’t much time left to him so he also asked for forgiveness before his imminent exit from this world. He would die with honor, protecting his people from treachery, and he hoped the Heavenly Father would not judge his many sins too harshly. Just as he felt his sword had at last grown too heavy for another swing, there was an ear-rattling explosion from a few feet beside him. The face of the Siamese who was closing in on him for the kill disappeared in a pall of smoke, leaving behind a broken mess of shattered flesh and bone. There was another such explosion and the next man fell as well, a gory, smoking hole where his stomach had been.

  Momentarily free from attack, Yoriaki turned to see Blom reloading first one massive pistol, then a second. The mustachioed Dutchman looked over at him and grinned. “Ah, Yo-san! How nice to see you again! Great bento, by the way; the grilled fish was perfect!” Having finished reloading, the plump fellow stepped forward with a pistol in each hand to shoot first one Siamese full on in the chest, then another. As Blom paused to calmly reload, again more blasts were heard and Yoriaki realized the plump Dutchman wasn’t alone. His usual mates were beside him and several more of what looked to be sailors, all cheerfully mowing down the Siamese with their blunderbusses and pistols. The battle was over a scant few seconds later, the Siamese swordsmen being no match for the barrage of Dutch firepower. Of Yoriaki’s fighting companions one was badly injured and being helped toward a longboat by the Dutch sailors, the other stood unsteadily on his feet beside Yoriaki, nearly overcome with exhaustion. Yoriaki felt a tear in his eye, a tear of glistening joy that a merciful God had sent these good Christian men to their aid.

  “Thank you, Lord Jesus,” he whispered in Latin. He turned to Blom, who shoved his pistols into his belt in order to take Yoriaki gently by the shoulders to steady him. “My wife. Momo. I can’t find her.” Yoriaki’s voice a croak, rough with fear.

  “She is safe with us, my friend. She and her parents were out in the middle of the river directly offshore from here; they were all crammed in her father’s little fishing boat. I hardly think they would have made it out to sea in that, so we brought them aboard the Groenevisch. She is the one who sent us to your aid; she knew right where to find you.” Blom carefully put pressure on Yoriaki’s left shoulder, turning him gently and then leading the exhausted man toward the water. “See that fellow there?” He pointed to the dead soldier Yoriaki had found earlier. “Your wife’s work. She told us she slit his gut with that nasty little shortsword she had. I hardly think he expected that. She’s a pretty peach but I wouldn’t get her angry for any reason! Now, I better bring you to her or she’ll have my hide. I promised her I’d fetch you!”

  Yoriaki looked at the dead soldier with a mixture of horror and pride at his wife’s fierce courage. She had cut him open in a neat slice up the abdomen just like she would a dinner catfish. “She has many talents,” he managed to say as the world begin to swim blackly before his eyes. Too weak to go further himself, he let sturdy Blom lift him up and load him into the longboat. “Thank you, Blom, you are a true friend,” he managed to say before drifting into a scarlet-tinged unconsciousness.

  He came to on the deck of one of the Dutch merchant ships he had seen earlier. Around thirty Japanese families were there, too, some wounded and being tended by a Dutch doctor and his assistants, but most stood staring at the conflagration that had once been their home. He heard a woman’s wordless cry come from nearby and then he was nearly knocked down as his wife hugged him fiercely with a tightness that was painful to his combat-tortured muscles. He felt the handle tip of the wakizashi blade she still clutched in one hand dig in painfully beneath his shoulder. “My love, please put down the blade. You may kill someone,” he breathed in her ear, managing a weak chuckle. She let him loose then and, both of them bloodstained and bedraggled, they looked long into each other’s eyes.

  “I fear I already have,” she confided in a hushed tone.

  “I know, I saw. Well done, wife, well done.” He gently took the crimson stained wakizashi from her tremblng fingers and slid it into his sash next to his battle scarred katana before he took her in his arms again.

  * * *

  Dawn found them headed south in a fleet comprised of all manner of vessels, now approaching the mouth of the Menam where it met the Gulf of Siam. There were two Dutch and three Portuguese merchant ships, a Chinese junk and a variety of smaller seaworthy vessels that were owned variously by Japanese and their former foreign neighbors. They all followed the massive and well-armed red seal ship, with its cargo of goods brought from Japan still onboard and unmolested, bound for Yamada, Nagamasa’s new kingdom in Ligor on the east side of the long peninsula that eventually became the lands of the Malay. All in all, some six hundred of the thousand or so who had inhabited Nihonmachi were making their escape to the holdings of their former leader. The rest had either been killed by Prasat Thong’s forces or were in hiding among the Portuguese or other folk who might be sympathetic to them. Yoriaki prayed for their safety and was grateful that so many had escaped what could have been a horrendous massacre. Along the way they sighted several Siamese warships but were given a wide berth. It seemed that not all of the kingdom’s military cared to persecute their former
neighbors and allies.

  After a few days sailing on fair seas, they reached Ligor and were welcomed by the people there, albeit a bit coolly. Yoriaki, his wife and in-laws were given a simple mud brick cottage to stay in and were brought food and a change of clothing. For the next two days meetings went on between their host Nagamasa and the higher ranking citizens that had escaped Nihonmachi, such as Ishida. Yoriaki, being a retired samurai who had chosen the life of a Christian commoner, was not invited, nor did he care; he was simply grateful to be alive with his loved ones.

  Meanwhile, the two Dutch and three Portuguese merchant ships who had come to their rescue waited around in port to see what the fate of the Nihonmachi refugees might be. Yoriaki visited Blom daily and learned the Dutch ships belonged to Blom’s uncles, men who were very sympathetic to the Japanese with whom they had a long and profitable relationship. The Portuguese ships were temporarily under the will of the holy fathers, their captains hard pressed to leave so many Christians to an uncertain fate and so they waited alongside the Dutch to see if further transport was needed.

  Yoriaki and Blom both shook their heads in sad wonder at the violence Prasat Thong had ordered against them, a foolish move surely driven by fear for his ill-gotten power, since it would not be at all profitable for a new Siamese king to ruin his relationships with both Ligor and Japan. Eventually the Shogunate would learn of Nihonmachi’s fate and would likely be immensely displeased at such treachery against other Japanese, even those who had chosen a life so far away from their island nation. Another day later, a stone-faced Ishida called a secret meeting of Nihonmachi’s surviving men and the sympathetic Dutch and Portuguese who had brought them here.

  “Yamada Nagamasa has heard our tale. We implored him to lead his army along with our surviving warriors against Prasat Thong, but he will not. He has a consort now, a woman given to him by the ursurper king and she whispers poison in his ear. He is not the man he once was; he has grown weak and complacent. He had many chances to kill Prasat Thong as that devil murdered the boy kings, but he didn’t act. Now he has no will to face him, preferring to sit here in his little kingdom and do nothing. He won’t be swayed. Worse yet, I don’t think we are safe here. No matter what we say, he will listen only to his serpent bride. It is with a heavy heart I tell you that Yamada Nagamasa can no longer be trusted.”

  “What should we do? Where should we go?” the men cried. “You samurai and merchants might have a chance, but we can’t possibly return to Japan. They will surely kill us if we do,” one of the older Christian men said plaintively.

  At this point Father Nixi, a Japanese Jesuit well loved by the Japanese Christians and one of the few of their community to enter the priesthood, stood up to address those gathered.

  “My friends and brothers in Christ, I know of a place where we may go. I can lead us there. There are many Portuguese and a few Japanese Catholics living in the Khmer Empire just across the gulf to the east. I am sure they would welcome you, especially since you may now be considered enemies of Prasat Thong who is their most hated foe. I correspond regularly with my brother Jesuits there and though it lacks the riches of Ayutthaya, you could live safely.”

  “What of those who are not Christians?” Ishida turned to the Jesuit and asked in a respectful tone. “Have you some place we can go? I left Japan never to return, a masterless samurai who made a life for himself here in this part of the world. There are some hundred more like me here, and their families. Have you a place where we may live in peace?”

  The Japanese Jesuit nodded. “You are brave men, sir, and when war came to Nihonmachi you fought side by side with the Christian men. We owe you our lives. The Khmer worship the gods of India just as the Siamese do; I see no reason why you Buddhists would not be welcome there. Please, let us all go together. You have survived a terrible ordeal, we can all sail from these accursed lands to find peace among the Khmer.” The priest sat down then, giving them time to consider his offer. The room was full of quiet discussion for a time.

  After a while Ishida again rose to face the crowd. “I and those samurai who follow me have decided to go with Father Nixi to Khmer. Any who join my men and I, of any religion, will have our swords to protect them, this I swear. Who will sail with us?’

  It was nearly unanimous; most of the Nihonmachi refugees would travel to Khmer. Ishida turned to the Dutch and Portuguese captains.

  “Fine sirs, can we prevail upon your good graces once more? It seems we need to cross the Gulf of Siam and have no vessels capable of such a journey of our own. We humbly beg your assistance and will repay you as best we can.”

  The captains conferred for a few minutes, the holy fathers browbeating the Portuguese captains while Blom was cajoling two older gentlemen who must surely be his ship-owning uncles to “do the right thing.” At last the captains turned to the crowd and agreed to transport them all to Khmer. Their kindness was met with a chorus of joyful cheers and blessings. It was decided they would sail at dawn, better not to give their unpredictable hosts much warning in case they should choose to try to stop them.

  The next morning Yoriaki and Blom once more stood at the rail of the Groenevisch, which was Dutch for “green fish” and had something to do with a lucky catch one of the uncles had made in his youth. Yoriaki grinned merrily as they left the feckless Nagamasa and Ligor behind, bound for the eastern side of the gulf.

  “What will you do now, Blom-san?” Yoriaki sometimes added the Japanese honorific to his friend’s name even though he spoke in Dutch. “Will you go back to Ayutthaya?”

  “Well, I could, but we may not be too popular there for a while. Still, that greedy little king likes Dutch money, so I have a feeling he will forgive and forget. But it doesn’t matter to me. I’ve decided to travel with my uncles and learn their business. Now that I’m at sea again, I find I’ve missed it. Being a dockmaster was safe and had good pay but it was a bit boring, and after all, I’m still fairly young. I have a few more adventures left in me. Besides, I’ll have to come check on you and that little peach of yours once in a while to make sure you are getting along in your new home.”

  Yoriaki thanked him and wished him good luck and the blessings of the Lord in all his ventures. When they arrived at the mouth of the Mekong from where they must take smaller craft upriver to Phnom Penh, they said their fond farewells. Yoriaki wouldn’t see Blom for another five years.

  1635, Phnom Penh, Kingdom of Khmer, Southeast Asia

  Yoriaki hated his new home. The Japanese, who had until recently been so closely allied to the Ayutthaya kingdom, had been welcomed with suspicion by the Khmer and it was probably only the earnest pleas of the Dutch captain, Father Nixi and the Portuguese fathers that had convinced the Khmer not to simply have them all killed. As it was, the last five years had been an exercise in misery.

  In their first year Momo had given birth to their daughter, little Hana, a blessing in their lives who was healthy and hearty enough, if a bit too thin. She had only gotten to know her grandparents a short time, they had passed away last year from one of the many wasting diseases that the filthy Mekong teemed with. First Momo’s mother went, followed not two months later by her father, who Yoriaki was sure had been getting better. Yoriaki knew in his heart that old Mori had actually died from missing his wife of so many years but said nothing of it to grieving Momo. His beloved wife, although still lovely at age twenty-seven, had also grown thin and seemed to have lost the peachlike flush on her cheeks. The oppressive heat and general filth of Pnomh Penh was stealing what was left of her youth.

  They made their living much as before, he and Momo getting up early in the morning to prepare the day’s bento lunches, then Yoriaki paddled up and down the river along the docks while Momo tended the little garden next to their very modest house on the city’s outskirts in what passed for their new Nihonmachi, a pale shadow of their former town. Momo complained bitterly that most of the seeds she had brought with her simply wouldn’t grow in this climate, or died before producing
any crop. She grew what she could of the heartier species and found some suitable replacements among the strange vegetables grown by the Khmer, but her cooking suffered for it, no longer quite reaching the level of perfection it had in Ayutthaya.

  Phnom Penh was definitely no Ayutthaya; there was little money here as the Khmer kingdom was squeezed between two more powerful neighbors, their long time enemy the Siamese and the Quinam to the west. With no seaport, merchant ships had to travel up the Mekong through Quinam, a costly and unpleasant voyage according to his customers, and impassable to larger boat traffic in certain seasons. Still, there was always some trade to be found on the Mekong and where there was trade there were hungry men, but he sold less than half of what he had back in prosperous Ayutthaya. The locals were, by and large, not friendly to him. They were poor and regarded him as competition for their own vendors, so he mostly sold his wares to the Europeans he could find. The rule of law was not always in evidence, gangs of bandits roamed in daylight and he kept his wakizashi on his person at all times. So far he had killed seven such scum who had attacked him on his rounds; now it seemed he had a reputation and he went about unmolested. Momo and Hana were never never to leave the confines of Nihonmachi without his attending presence.