The floor creaked once, then twice more.

Sano hadn’t made those sounds. He stood paralyzed, listening to the Ghost’s footfalls steal up on him, trying to sense from which direction.

“Here I come,” whispered Kobori.

Sano turned toward the voice. He held his sword raised in both hands. As he waited, he felt at once invisible and exposed, terrified of the confrontation yet ravenous for it.

Footsteps approached from all directions, as if the Ghost had multiplied himself into an army. Had Kobori created this illusion, or had Sano’s own mind? Sano had never felt so alone, confused, or vulnerable. His high rank and his legions of subordinates couldn’t protect him. That he had power over virtually every citizen in Japan didn’t matter here. The Ghost had reduced him to the masterless samurai, struggling to survive by his own devices, that he’d once been. His wife, his son, and his accomplishments seemed as remote from him as if he’d dreamed them. All Sano had now, as then, were his swords.

Even though he knew that his enemy intended him to feel this way in order to break his confidence, Sano’s sense of vulnerability and isolation intensified against his will. The Ghost’s footsteps quickened and closed in on him. In blind haste Sano stumbled through a door. Abruptly the footsteps ceased. Sano felt a warm current of air behind him.

It was the Ghost’s body heat..

Panic jolted Sano. Before he could react, he felt a tap on his back, below his right shoulder. Fierce pain sped down his arm. His muscles stiffened in a spasm. His fingers let go his sword, which dropped to the floor. As he doubled over, his teeth clenched in agony, he was seized from behind. Hands groped over his body. He struck out with his uninjured left hand, but it swished through empty air. His right arm dangled useless and aching. He felt a yank at his waist, then heard rapid, retreating footfalls.

Kobori had come and gone.

Alone in the darkness, Sano fell to his knees, shaken and panting from the sudden, violent attack. The pain in his arm ebbed into heavy numbness, as if the blood circulation had been cut off. Sano moved his fingers, but he couldn’t feel them. Kobori had struck some vital point that had disabled his arm. He felt around on the floor, desperately trying to find his sword before Kobori attacked again. But his hand swept vacant floor. He felt for his short sword at his waist, but it too was gone. Kobori had taken both his weapons. He heard Kobori’s laughter, which crackled like flames.

“Let’s see how well you can fight me without your swords,” Kobori whispered.

“My father was an executioner,” Yugao said.

She eased the knife’s pressure against Reiko’s throat. Reiko cautiously let out her breath and relaxed her muscles.

“He would come home and talk about how many people he’d killed and what they’d done to get in trouble,” Yugao went on. “He told us how they acted when they were brought to the execution ground. He talked about how it felt to cut their heads off.”

Reiko focused her gaze on Yugao’s face, in the hope of keeping Yugao’s attention on hers instead of on her hands.

“After the war, there were many samurai from the Yanagisawa army who were executed. They were his comrades.” Fury on her lover’s account kindled in Yugao’s eyes. “My father killed lots of them. He bragged about it because they’d been important men and he was a hinin, but they were dead and he was alive. Every time he killed one, he cut a notch on the wall.”

Reiko remembered seeing the notches in the hovel. She inched her right hand to her side, toward the knife behind her.

“I couldn’t let him keep killing them,” Yugao said. “That night I couldn’t stand to listen to him bragging anymore. So I stabbed him. It was the most I could do for my beloved.”

Finally Reiko understood why Yugao had kept her motive secret-to avoid mentioning Kobori and exposing his crimes. But Reiko also sensed that past and present grievances had combined to push Yugao over the edge. Yugao had long been nursing a bitter hatred toward her father for violating and then rejecting her. She might have endured it forever, or stabbed him at any other time, but his offenses against Kobori’s comrades had finally tipped her unstable mind into killing her father.

“Why did you kill you mother and sister?” Reiko asked.

A contemptuous smile twisted Yugao’s lips. “While I was stabbing him, they just huddled in the corner and cried.” Her manner turned argumentative. “They could have stopped me. If they’d cared about him, they would have. The miserable cowards deserved to die.”

Perhaps Yugao had wanted them to stop her, Reiko speculated. Perhaps she’d still loved her father despite everything. If so, then she’d punished them for their failure to save him from her as well as for past injustices toward her. Now there remained only one more issue to resolve.

“Why did you confess?” Reiko asked.

“I did it for him,” Yugao said. “And I wanted him to know. I didn’t expect to ever see him again, but he would hear what I’d done. He would understand why. He would know I’d died for him and be grateful.”

The magnitude of her delusion astounded Reiko. “Then why did you run away from jail instead?” Reiko had her arm bent behind her, fingers on the hilt of the knife.

“The fire was an omen. It said I was meant to reunite with him instead of die for him.” Yugao frowned in sudden suspicion at Reiko. “What are you doing?”

“Just scratching my back,” Reiko lied.

“Put your hands where I can see them.”

As Reiko obeyed, she gave up hope of striking at Yugao before Yugao could strike her. She thought up a new tactic. “You killed for Kobori. You were ready to sacrifice your life for him. What did he ever do for you?”

Yugao looked at Reiko as if she was stupid to ask. “He loves me.”

“Did he say so?”

“He doesn’t have to. I know.”

“How do you know?”

“He makes love to me,” Yugao said.

“You mean he takes his pleasure from you,” Reiko said. “That doesn’t mean he cares anything for you except physically.”

“He came to me after the war. It didn’t matter to him that I was a hinin.” For the first time Yugao sounded eager to prove that she meant as much to Kobori as he did to her. “He wanted to be with me.”

Reiko thought of the beating taken by Yanagisawa’s faction during the war, and she spoke on a hunch: “Was he injured?”

“Yes. What of it?”

“So he was hurt and he didn’t have anywhere else to go. And I bet that as soon as he was well, he left. Didn’t he?”

The distress on Yugao’s face told Reiko she’d guessed right. “He had to go. He had important things to do.”

“More important than you,” Reiko said. “Tell me, when you escaped from jail, was he glad to see you?”

Yugao snapped, “He has problems on his mind.”

“And you became one of them,” Reiko deduced. “He knew you could be his downfall. And he was right. You brought the law to him. He’ll dump you as soon as he can.”

“I don’t care,” Yugao said, but her eyes glistened with tears and misery; her voice shook as her bravado deserted her. “He’s all I have.”

At last Reiko saw through Yugao, to the spirit inside her hard shell. Loss and deprivation had charted the path of Yugao’s life. Yugao had lost her innocence, as well as her mother’s love, because of her father’s depravity. She’d lost her home, her affluent life as a merchant’s daughter, and her place in society. She’d lost her father’s affection to her sister. After she’d murdered her family, she’d lost her kin and her freedom. Now she clung desperately to the one thing she hadn’t yet lost.

“I won’t let you take me away from him!” she cried.

Even as Reiko pitied her, Yugao blinked away her tears. The familiar shield of hostility hardened her gaze. “I’m sick of listening to you.” Her voice was raw but tough. Her eyes blazed with hatred that had worsened because Reiko had forced her to expose herself. “It’s time to shut you up for good.”