"Now, for the first time, I will draw the sacred blade of Prince Yamato Takeru from its scabbard," Shiina said. The mist seemed to shrink from the magic of that hand-forged steel so that, as he remembered it, a kind of aura, an aureole of emptiness not unlike the Void, surrounded the weapon.

The young Kozo Shiina held the blade aloft in such a manner that, for an instant at least, he and the blade-both perfect beneath then- sheens of oil-were one. "When next I draw this sacred sword, it will be to consecrate the successful fruition of the seeds we plant here today."

In a swift motion, he sliced the tip of his finger with the very end of the katana. Dark red blood dripped into a sake cup. He dipped an old quill into the cup and wrote his name in blood at the bottom of the Jiban's charter.

"Here, for all time," Kozo Shiina told them, "is kokoro, the heart of our philosophy, the essence of our purpose, the details of the future to which we are this day dedicating our fortunes, our families, our very lives." He pa.s.sed the doc.u.ment to the minister on his immediate left, drew the blade across the tip of the man's finger. As the minister dipped the quill into the mingled blood and wrote his name beneath that of his leader, Shiina said, "Here also for future generations to ponder are all the consequences of our actions, witnessed by all the unseen ancestors whom we revere beyond all else and in whose name the Society of Ten Thousand Shadows is dedicated." The doc.u.ment was pa.s.sed on, more blood was spilled, another name was added."We have here a living diary of the Jiban's work," Kozo Shiina continued.

"Soon it will become both our banner and our shield." Now the last of the ministers was signing. "By its very existence it engraves on our brains this truth: We who have entered our names on this roll have in the same way entered into that state of virtue from which there can be no turning back."

The drip of blood, the scratch of the quill against the stiff paper. "This Katei doc.u.ment-named so because it is the curriculum of the Society of Ten Thousand Shadows-will constantly serve to remind us of our dedication of purpose, of the sacredness of what we do. For we seek nothing less than to preserve the purity of the emperor, the surety of the legacy of the unifying shogun, Ieyasu Tokugawa. We seek a fusion between past, present and future, a continuity for the greatness of the Land of the Rising Sun."

Now, in the spring of the present, Kozo Shiina sat in his study, contemplating the bower that the quince blossoms created outside his window. That summer, he thought, I believed, in my G.o.dlike immaturity, that the battle had already been won. Yet it had only been joined. I had not counted on Wataro Taki. His power within the Yakuza grew, and as it did, he directed all of that power against the Jiban. Where had he come from? Why was he my enemy? I did not know. But we fought in every arena: political, bureaucratic, economic and military. He foiled our plans time and again. Even when we hurt him, he rebounded, gathered his forces again and attacked once more.

Until two weeks ago, when I finally succeeded in destroying him. But I had not counted on his closest ally surviving him, if only for a short while. I underestimated Philip Doss's cunning. It had been he who had taken the Jiban's sacred katana so many years ago. And what had he done with it? He had given it to his son, Michael.

Kozo Shiina's hands tightened into fists. It galled Shiina that he never would have known what had happened to the sword had not a sensei in Paris seen the sword and, recognizing it, telephoned Masashi. "Get it back," Shiina had told Masashi, "whatever the cost."

The trilling of the songbirds was sweet, but not to Kozo Shiina's ears. The food that had been laid out before him was fragrant, but not to his nose. The burst of pink of the quinces' first tender blooms was pleasing, but not to his eyes. He still did not have the katana of Prince Yamato Takeru.

But there was another matter, fully as pressing as the sword. The Jiban's Katei doc.u.ment had been stolen. It detailed every step of the Society of Ten Thousand Shadows' plan to bring j.a.pan into world prominence, to bring it slowly but surely back toward a firmly militaristic posture, its intentions-with the aid of allies both within and outside j.a.pan-to launch a coordinated invasion of the Chinese mainland.

In the hands of the enemy-if it were, for instance, to appear on the desk of the president of the United States-it would sound the death knell for the Jiban. This he could not tolerate. If the Jiban was to fulfill its destiny, to lead j.a.pan into a new era where the Land of the Rising Sun would never again be dependent on foreign oil or foreign energy sources of any kind, then the Katei doc.u.ment must be returned.

Kozo Shiina's powerful fingers tightened their grip on his knees. Still he was haunted by the enigma of who had killed Philip Doss. If Doss had survived, Shiina was certain that Masashi's people would have run him down. Ude had been so close, until Doss dropped out of sight. Then, in Maui, he had died. By whose hand? Kozo Shiina did not know, and this disturbed him because it meant that there was a force at play of which he was ignorant.

Soon, he thought, calming himself, with the unwitting aid of Masashi Taki, this sword will be returned to me. Just as the Katei doc.u.ment will be returned. Then the sword of j.a.pan's soul will at last be freed from its scabbard, and my work will be done. j.a.pan will be a world power in every way, to rival even America and the Soviet Union.

Michael was sure that the darkness would never end. And yet it did.

"Audrey!"

The clamoring of temple bells shaking him out of a long slumber."Oh my G.o.d! Oh my G.o.d!"

Head full of noise, reverberating on and on. Wanted to blot it out, go on sleeping for another hundred years.

"She's gone!"

Light like splinters of gla.s.s in his eyes.

"My baby's gone!"

Groaning, light-headed, he awoke.

Uncle Sammy was shaking him. "Michael. Michael! What happened?"

Temple bells and a bamboo flute, a reedy melody, a sonorous percussion accompaniment.

"Michael! Do you hear me?"

"Yes." Gauze pulling apart, the atmosphere inside his head clearing.

"Where is Audrey? For G.o.d's sake, Michael! What happened?"

"I-I don't know." His head hurt when he spoke or moved. Aftermath of the chemical.

"What do you mean you don't know!"

His mother's face was alight with feverish anxiety. "I called Jonas at home.

He came right away. He said no police." Taking a step toward him. "Are you all right, darling?"

"I'm okay," he said. He looked at Jonas. "How long have I been out?"

Jonas was crouched down beside him. "It's been-what, Lillian?-forty minutes since you phoned me."

Lillian nodded.

Michael looked around the study. A whirlwind had come in through the window, or so it seemed. Lamps, overturned chairs, books looked as if they had been blown out of their neatly aligned rows. All scattered across the carpet.

"Christ!" he said softly. Began to rise.

"Michael!"

He saw the slash as he lurched off balance. Jonas caught him, and he steadied himself. The slash went all the way through the carpet, as neat an incision as a surgeon makes in his patient. Where is my katana? Michael thought. What in G.o.d's name has happened to Audrey?

"Michi," the woman said. "It is the path I chose. And now I have been humbled by it."

Michiko was weeding her garden. "There is danger everywhere these days," she said. "In the mysteries inside the Taki-gumi. In the tenor of j.a.pan itself.

The younger generation has grown up disaffected. They no longer understand short-and long-term goals. Everything is viewed in extremes.

"They do not even understand what it is they want. They are for the most part inarticulate, uninterested in anything save their own fleeting pleasure. They only know that they do not want what is. This makes them exceptionally vulnerable. To suggestion. They join the Yakuza but openly flaunt its strict code. They join radical splinter groups, or even anarchic revolutionary cells which, quite ineptly, manufacture homemade missiles, which they fire, also ineptly, on the Imperial Palace. Meanwhile our ministers become more and more intractable in their reactionary views. They see America as becoming inflexible, no longer willing to extend its magnanimous support to j.a.pan. They see America reneging on its unspoken oath to keep j.a.pan strong, as j.a.pan keeps the Pacific Rim safe from communism.

"Is America truly our friend or our enemy? they ask. I feel as if we have returned to the emotional state before the war of the Pacific."

Joji Taki shook his head. Lately, Michiko seemed obsessed with the deteriorating trade relationship between j.a.pan and America. True, recent developments indicated that j.a.pan was unwilling to change its ground rules for another country. So what? Why should she? It was this mare's nest of restrictions against outside intervention or investment that had built j.a.pan up from the ashes of the war in the first place. Why weaken them now? For the United States? What had it done but try to recreate the new j.a.pan in its own image? So it could become America's steel fist against communism in the FarEast.

"Michiko, my stepsister," he said, waiting patiently for her to finish, "though you were adopted by my father, Wataro Taki, I consider you no less my family."

Michiko paused in her gardening. Her hands were streaked gray and brown from the earth. Her hair, which was piled atop her head and set with kyoki wood combs in the ancient fashion, was dotted with strands of wildflower clippings.

"You have not come here to flatter me, Joji-chan," she said softly. "I know you too well."

Joji glanced around at the burly young men standing a discreet distance from Michiko. Michiko's husband, n.o.buo Yamamoto, did not allow her to go anywhere without being accompanied by servants. But, oddly, Joji did not recognize any of them. And they certainly were not dressed like servants. They seemed more like bodyguards. Joji shrugged. Well, why not? he thought. There was no lack of wealth in the Yamamoto family. As the president of Yamamoto Heavy Industries, n.o.buo ran one of the largest conglomerates in j.a.pan. "As usual, Michiko-chan, you have seen through my poor facade," he said. "You were always able to see into my mind."

Michiko gave a rueful smile.

"It's about Masashi."

Michiko sighed, and her face clouded over. "It is always about Masashi these days," she said. "First, he clashed with Father about the direction the Taki-gumi should be going in. Now what?"

"I need your help."

She lifted her face to him, and the sunshine bathed her features in light.

"You have only to ask, Joji-chan, you know that."

"I want you to help me against Masashi."

There was an unnatural silence in the garden. A plover, hopping along the ground, paused to c.o.c.k its head and stare at them. In a flutter, it took off.

"Please," Michiko said, the unnatural terror turning the breath hot in her throat. All these days since Masashi had come to see her, to show her why she must now do whatever he asked of her, she had tried to hide away from the awful danger he presented. Otherwise, she would have ceased to eat and to sleep. As it was, she was plagued by nightmares from which she would jerk awake, filled with dread and panic. "Do not ask that of me."

"But you're the only one I can turn to," Joji pleaded. "You have always helped me before. When Father sided with Ma-sashi, you always spoke up for my side."

"Ah, Joji-chan." Michiko sighed. "What a memory you have. That was a long time ago."

"It's no different now."

"But it is," she said. There was a great sadness in her voice. "Listen closely to my counsel. Whatever the problem is, forget about it. Forget about your brother Masashi, I beg of you."

"Why won't you help me?" Joji cried. "We always joined forces before to keep Masashi in check."

"Please do not ask me, Joji-chan." There were incipient tears in the corners of Michiko's eyes. The sunlight turned them to jewels. "I cannot intervene. I can do nothing."

"But you do not know what has happened." Joji hung his head in shame. "Now Masashi has deposed me as oyabun of the Taki-gumi."

"Ah Buddha!" she cried. But she already knew this. Just as she already knew what Joji had not yet begun to suspect, what, if he remained uninvolved, and therefore safe, he would never come to suspect: that it had begun. The final phase of a strategy so vast, so terrifying that there was no hope of stopping it. And yet she had committed herself to the destruction of that strategy.

"Now Masashi is free to twist the entire resources of the Taki-gumi to his own ends. The clan business has already changed radically. Masashi has his drug networks in place. Already the first of the money is flowing in. Soon it will come so fast it will be like a tide. The Taki-gumi will be inextricably involved in the filth-the last thing Wataro Taki, our father, wanted.""But how is this possible?" Michiko said. "I thought matters were settled between you and Masashi."

"They were," Joji said. "Or so I thought. But at the clan meeting, Masashi moved against me. You know what a speaker he is. I had no chance once he opened his mouth. The lieutenants were frightened. The death of our father made us terribly vulnerable to incursions from the other clans. Masashi cleverly played upon that fear. Now the Taki-gumi lieutenants feel safe again.

They would follow Masashi into h.e.l.l if he asked them."

Before this is over it may come to just that, Michiko thought. Impulsively, she reached out, and Joji put his hands in hers. "Forget all of this, Joji-chan," she whispered fiercely. "There is nothing you or I can do. The changes have already been made. Leave him alone; you do not have the power to defeat him. Neither do I, now. Karma."

"But these changes you speak of," he said, "will affect not only us, but others in our family. Your daughter, for instance. And Tori, your granddaughter. How is she? I miss her little smiling face."

"She is fine," Michiko said. "Just fine." Pressing her cheek against his.

"Tori asks about you all the time." She did not want him to see the fear in her eyes. Masashi is playing a terrible game, she thought. For the highest possible stakes. Masashi is in control of the Taki-gumi. And this time, the call to battle will be the final one.

"The time has come," Jonas said, "for me to tell you the truth."

Michael blinked. "The truth." He said it as if it were an Urdu word that he could not quite fathom.

They were sitting in Jonas Sammartin's office in the BITE building.

"Yes," Jonas said, unperturbed. "The truth."

"What is it that you have been telling me up until now?"

"My dear boy," Jonas said. "You are closer to me than any nephew could be. I never married. I never had children. You and Audrey are as dear to me as if you were my own blood. Surely it isn't necessary for me to tell you this."

"No, Uncle Sammy," Michael said. "You were always our protection. I told Audrey recently that I thought of you as Nana, the Darlings' sheepdog in Peter Pan."

Jonas Sammartin smiled. "I take that as a great compliment, son."

They were both quiet for a time. It was as if invoking Audrey's name had made the dread return, of not knowing where she was or what had happened to her.

The phone rang and Jonas picked it up. He spoke in low tones for a moment.

When he cradled the receiver, the bleak atmosphere had dissipated enough for him to continue. "The fact is," he said, "I believe that your father knew that he was going to be killed-or at least that the possibility of his imminent death existed.

"The day before we received word of his death, I was sent a packet by courier.

It had originated in j.a.pan. So far, we have not been able to trace it farther than the Tokyo office of the air-express company. The packet was delivered to them by a j.a.panese man. That's all they know. We have no name and only the vaguest description, which is worse than useless."

Jonas took out a stiff oversize envelope and a folded sheet of paper. "In any case, the packet was from your father. In it was this letter, instructing me to speak with you in the event of his death."

"Speak with me?"

"I've done what he requested."

"Let me see the letter, Uncle Sammy."

Jonas emitted a deep sigh. He handed the sheet over, pa.s.sed a hand over his face, as if he could scrub away the events of the past several days. He looked tired, his face gray-tinged.

Michael looked up from the typescript. "It appears it was my father's idea for me to take his place if he died."

Jonas nodded.

"He refers here to a private will," Michael said.

"This is it," Jonas said, holding up the envelope. "It's sealed and, followingyour father's instructions, it will be opened only if you agree to take his place."

Michael had a flash of impending dread, then it was gone. "I see you have the will handy," he said. "Pretty sure of yourself."

"No," Jonas said. "I'm sure of you, Michael. You're here, aren't you?" He gave Michael a weary smile. "Your father always said you were precocious. I can just hear his voice. 'Mikey's smarter than the two of us put together, Jonas.

I know it now. But one day you'll see.' Prophetic words, son, considering the circ.u.mstances." He handed over the envelope. "I believe it's time you opened this."

Michael took it but did not open it. "What about Audrey?" he said.

"That's what that call was about," Jonas said. "There's nothing-so far. But it's early yet."

"Early!" Michael cried. "For G.o.d's sake, we don't even know whether she's alive or dead!"