Cadillac believed the time when Talisman would enter the world was drawing near, but he was equally sure there would be no overnight miracles. 'Man-Child or Woman-Child the One may be . . . and He shall grow straight and strong as the Heroes of the Old Time." So ran the Prophecy.

No matter how prodigious his or her talents were, the Saviour had first to reach adulthood. The promised victory under Talisman's banner lay far in the future.

Meanwhile there was a great deal to be done, and very little time in which to do it ....

CHAPTER NINE.

Cadillac had been overly optimistic. When the packed long-boat grounded in pitch darkness on a stretch of beach to the east of Bei-poro, his concealed digital watch showed the time as 2:58 am.

Mishiko's eight guards had been taking their turn at the oars for nearly six hours instead of the estimated four.

The first task was to deposit Lady Mishiko and her children on dry sand. When this had been done, the guards returned for Roz and Cadillac to discover that both had climbed out of the boat. As the tallest person in the party, Cadillac did not intend to suffer the indignity of being given a chair-lift by a couple of bandy-legged j.a.ps whose heads only just came up over his shoulder.

That they had any energy left at all was testimony to their toughness and resilience. But then these guys didn't have an ounce of excess fat on them, and as Roz had pointed out, their diminutive stature and the shortness of their well-muscled limbs gave them an excellent power-weight ratio.

They had been born and raised as work-machines. That was one of the more admirable aspects of Iron Master society - its vigour. Once these guys woke up, they were on the case. Calculating the profit on a deal with an abacus, writing contracts, hammering, sawing, forging and beating metal, fashioning swords, creating beautiful objects, constructing boats and buildings - they put body and soul into it. And they applied the same zestful energy to eating, getting drunk, s.e.xual intercourse and killing people.

All in all an amazing race. As he waited for the baggage to be unloaded, Cadillac's thoughts turned briefly to the Mute slave population. The Lost Ones. What would happen to them if Ne-Issan became embroiled in a civil war?

It had been foretold that one day they would cast aside their chains and rejoin the Plainfolk- before the climactic moment when Talisman would draw the clans from each of the bloodlines together under his or her banner.

When it came, their departure would trigger another round of bloodletting. Ne-Issan's prosperity was based on the concept of firstand second-cla.s.s citizens, underpinned by a pool of slave labour non-persons. The Iron Masters would not let them go without a fight.

But even if they did escape what would happen when they returned home?

A considerable majority of the Mute slaves had been born in captivity.

Would they cope with their new-found freedom when it came? More important still was the question of their reintegration into Mute society. Would they be able to adapt to a way of life they had never known? Would they even want to or was it the Plainfolk who would be forced to adapt to accommodate them?

Sweet Sky Mother! As if he didn't have enough to worry about!

Cadillac silently berated himself for having dredged up yet another insoluble problem. That was what happened when you sat on your b.u.t.t while other people did the work. Ever since Sioux Falls there had been too much talking and scheming. Too much 'How about?" and 'What if?", and not enough 'Who cares?" What he needed was some action. A chance to get out from behind the fancy dress, the wig, the stupid pasty-faced mask and into some mindless mayhem: the kind of thing his rival, Brickman, enjoyed. Roz was right when she'd said he sounded like Steve; he was beginning to think like him too.

Before leaving the junk, Mishiko had secured a number of tarred torches from the captain. With the moon now back behind the clouds, four of these had been lit and stuck in the sand to provide some illumination.

With the exception of Mishiko, her children, Cadillac and Roz, everyone helped to turn the boat over, then got ready to carry it into the sand dunes. Cadillac and Roz picked up two of the torches and walked alongside to light the way as mi'lady's servants staggered off under the weight of the boat like a tipsy centipede. When they got to the dunes, they lowered the boat onto its port side, then propped up the hull with the oars to make a shelter from the wind.

Leaving Roz standing on top of a dune, Cadillac went back to Lady Mishiko and her children. Giving five-year-old Miyori the torch to hold, Cadillac hoisted her onto his left hip. Katiwa, the nurse carried Narikita, and Lady Mishiko in a breath-taking display of egalitarianism, gathered her son Toshi into her arms and actually walked the fifty or so yards to the upturned boat, while the guards and the maidservants transferred the baggage from the beach to the dunes.

Roz beckoned to Cadillac as he pa.s.sed. He set down Miyori in the shelter of the long-boat then scrambled with as much decorum as he could muster to the top of the dune. 'What is it?"

Roz pointed inland. 'There's a light over there.

See... ?"

Cadillac sighted along her arm and peered into the darkness. 'Can't see a d.a.m.n thing. Where is it?!" 'There! But it's just gone out!'

'For chrissakes, Roz - I' 'No, look! There it is again! See? It keeps moving about!" Cadillac caught sight of a minuscule point of orange light and hugged her shoulders. 'Well done. Keep your eye on it." He turned towards the long-boat and called out a string of words in j.a.panese to the samurai who led Mishiko's guards.

Hearing that a light had been seen, the samurai and a couple of other guards scrambled up to the top of the dune to check it out. Agreeing with Cadillac that it could be from a house, they got a bearing on it with the aid of a pocket-sized compa.s.s box.

Cadillac and Roz followed them back down to the upturned long-boat where Mishiko and her children were now installed, surrounded by her precious luggage. A small fire, started with the aid of some driftwood, added a little warmth to the torchlit scene.

The samurai explained that a light had been seen and proposed to investigate. If it came from a house, or better still a farm, then the occupants might be willing to provide some transportation to get his mistress and her entourage to the Summer Palace.

Cadillac, who had learned from Lady Mishiko that she intended to enter the Palace via a secret tunnel known only to the Shogun and members of his immediate family, asked permission to speak with her in private.

The samurai withdrew to a discreet distance.

'Mi'lady, time is running out. If we are to achieve what we have set out to do, I urge you to follow this advice.

You and I, and my companion, should go forward with three of your guards and one maidservant to where we have seen the light.

'If it is a dwelling place whose occupants can provide help and shelter to a n.o.ble lady in distress, then one of the guards should return here to fetch your children, their nurse, and the other servants while we press on using whatever means of transport is available."

'Leave my children??

'Only for twenty-four hours, mi'lady! If we three plus two guards and a maidservant can get into the Palace tonight, we can prepare the ground as we have discussed.

When that has been done, we can make arrangements to bring your children and the rest of your entourage into the Palace by whatever means you choose, or as circ.u.mstances dictate. It is for you to decide when, but I think they should remain in hiding until tomorrow night."

'Very well."

'Now - is there anyone at the Summer Palace in a key position whose loyalty to the Shogun is beyond question - whom you could rely on to come to your aid?"

Mishiko replied without hesitation. 'Yes. Captain Kamakura, one of the senior officers of the Palace Guard."

'Good. Let us hope he still holds that appointment.

Now, mi'lady, if you will be so good as to tell your samurai what has been decided and pick those who are to go with us .... ' The faint glimmer of light Roz had been lucky enough to catch sight of turned out to be from a lantern carried back and forth by a farmer who was tending a cow that had fallen sick inside one of his barns. Cadillac blessed the Great Sky-Mother for striking the animal down. Had all been well, no lamps would have been burning, and the farm itself would not have been visible until first light.

Apart from knowing they had landed west of a place called Bei-poro which they dared not approach - no one in the party knew the lie of the land or where the roads and houses were. With no light to guide them, they could have easily missed the farm in the dark and wandered around for hours before finding another.

Walking due north with the aid of the compa.s.s would have put them in the vicinity of the castle, but Cadillac knew there was no hope of persuading Mishiko to travel nine miles on foot across open country, and after six hours of hard rowing he did not intend asking her guards to carry her - as they were doing now. With typical Iron Master ingenuity, they had cut up one of the oars to make two poles, and had used the sail to make a crude but serviceable litter on which she now sat with one of her clothes chests as a backrest.

And she had insisted on four guards plus the samurai and three maidservants. The lady might be going to her death but she was h.e.l.l-bent on doing it in style.

As it turned out, her apparent lack of consideration for her underlings worked to everyone's advantage. When they reached the outskirts of the farm, the samurai went forward alone bearing a torch. The startled farmer nearly died with fright when he saw an armed man bearing down on him. On learning that the Shogun's sister had been shipwrecked and needed his help to get to the Palace, the sudden onrush of emotion came close to triggering a cardiac arrest. Begging the samurai to bring the n.o.ble lady towards his humble and totally unworthy abode, he rushed inside to awaken his wife.

Neither of them knew Mishiko by sight, but when she was ushered respectfully into their presence, she was quite unruffled and her clothes were virtually spotless.

Compared to Cadillac, Roz and the guards, she was - to use a pre-Holocaust phrase - 'in showroom condition'.

Pristine, untouchable. In the eyes of the lowly farmer and his wife now rocking back and forth on their knees repeating a litany of greetings and apologies she could not be anything else but an ill.u.s.trious member of the ruling house.

Could they - she asked - furnish her, as a matter of some urgency, with an ox-cart and directions to the Summer Palace? Of course, immediately! Had she asked, man and wife would have willingly placed themselves between the shafts!

Could they shelter and feed her children and the rest of her servants until they were sent for on the following day? It would be an honour!