He was dead. Pallbearers were carrying his body to a blazing funeral pyre.

“Please,” he whispered. He couldn’t die without telling his story and finally having someone believe him.

“Rest now, talk later,” a gruff voice ordered.

Jolted out of his nightmare, Sano looked down the steep road at what he’d mistaken for a funeral pyre. It was a boat, bobbing on the black river beside the Yoshiwara dock, its cabin decked with glowing lanterns and its masts flying a banner emblazoned with the Tokugawa crest. The litter tipped beneath Sano as the men carried him aboard. He groaned when they slid him onto soft cushions in a small, bright compartment. He saw Tokugawa Tsunayoshi’s anxious face hovering over him, heard a voice ordering the boatmen to cast off. Someone cut away his garments and dabbed his wounds with something that burned and stung. He closed his eyes again.

Merciful unconsciousness descended as the boat bore him down the river toward Edo.