The Harsh Cry of the Heron Read online

  Across the Nightingale Floor

  A New York Times Notable Book of the Year

  “Satisfyingly rich in incident yet admirably spare in the telling…Hearn has created a world I anticipate returning to with pleasure.”

  —The New York Times Book Review

  “The book seizes you from start to finish.”

  —The Washington Post

  “The stuff of truly original fantasy.”

  —Locus

  “As exciting a debut as any in recent years—part Shogun, part Lord of the Rings, and entirely enchanting.”

  —Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

  “[An] epic fantasy…The most compelling novel to have been published this year…Across the Nightingale Floor creates an imaginary landscape through which the characters move and suffer, to considerable effect…. In a genre as full of traps for the unwary as the nightingale floor itself, Hearn has crossed the first part with honor.”

  —The Times (London)

  “The most extraordinary novel…The passion and rapture of this story is so compelling that it’s almost worth delaying your holiday for.”

  —The Independent on Sunday (UK)

  “Takeo’s journey of self-discovery, his first great love, and his transformation from confused boy to brave warrior in a chaotic time will keep readers riveted. The Lord of the Rings phenomenon should pave the way for the success of worthy adventure trilogies, and this tale of love, loyalty, and courage is deserving of comparison to old favorites.”

  —Booklist

  “A rousingly muscular adventure, replete with shadowy assassins, fluttering battle flags, and doomed love.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “For fans of Japanese samurai warrior fantasy, this novel is…filled with swords, clan in-fighting, love affairs, invisibility, and magical Ninja powers.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Complex but fast-paced, a rousing adventure reminiscent of Arthurian legend that’s told with all the urgency of a modern-day thriller.”

  —Book magazine

  “An original and exquisitely wrought adventure story.”

  —The Observer (UK)

  “The plot is gripping and the writing is beautiful, packed with authentic, atmospheric detail.”

  —The Daily Mail (UK)

  “Powered by fairy-tale magic and an action-packed plot…good old-fashioned storytelling at its best.”

  —The Daily Yomiuri (Japan)

  Grass for His Pillow

  A New York Times Notable Book of the Year

  “A welcome sequel…deliciously readable.”

  —The New York Times Book Review

  “This is the second installment in Hearn’s trilogy and astonishingly it’s even better than last year’s Across the Nightingale Floor…. The beauty, savagery, and strangeness of Hearn’s gripping tale is heightened by [the] exquisite, crystalline prose.”

  —Independent on Sunday (UK)

  “Contains the same fantastic characters and fabulous events as its predecessor. The second in the series will certainly appeal to readers who enjoyed the author’s popular Across the Nightingale Floor.”

  —Dallas Morning News

  “Adept at creating vivid natural settings where the supernatural feels unusually plausible, Hearn catches fresh details of trees, birds, rivers, and mountains. With quick, direct sentences like brushstrokes on a Japanese scroll, she suggests vast and mysterious landscapes full of both menace and wonder.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Lian Hearn is creating an imaginary world every bit as absorbing as Middle Earth and Hogwarts…. This is the same mysterious oriental landscape that beguiled Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon audiences.”

  —The Guardian (UK)

  Brilliance of the Moon

  “The exquisite details of landscape and aristocratic life seem to make Hearn’s trilogy a living, moving Japanese scroll painting…. An enthralling and original work of fantasy.”

  —The Times (London)

  “Brilliance of the Moon is hard to put down.”

  —Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

  “There is heroism, to be sure, and many a noble speech, but there are also a sadness and an acknowledgment of human folly that raise Hearn’s writing far above where it’s been before. Lyric fantasy with a rare sense of the tragic.”

  —Kirkus Reviews

  “A worthy conclusion to a genuinely thrilling epic saga. Even more good news lies in the fact that the ending leaves open the possibility of another Otori trilogy.”

  —Booklist

  “Kinetic, blood-splashed combat alternates with contemplative stillness…. Extraordinary.”

  —The Evening Standard (UK)

  “Hearn continues her vividly related tale, set in an imaginary medieval Japan.”

  —Library Journal

  “Brings to a thrilling and graceful conclusion the three volumes of Lian Hearn’s innovative fantasy, Tales of the Otori…Retains in its visual beauty and distinctive character the entrancing atmosphere of Old Japan created in Across the Nightingale Floor…there are yet those moments of perfect stillness which make these books and their vision special.”

  —The Advertiser

  THE TALES OF THE OTORI SERIES

  Across the Nightingale Floor

  Grass for His Pillow

  Brilliance of the Moon

  The Harsh Cry of the Heron

  THE HARSH CRY OF THE HERON

  LIAN HEARN

  The Last Tale of the Otori

  RIVERHEAD BOOKS

  New York

  THE BERKLEY PUBLISHING GROUP

  Published by the Penguin Group

  Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

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  Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental. The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  Copyright © 2006 by Lian Hearn

  Cover design © 2006 by Honi Werner

  The author gratefully acknowledges permission to quote from The Tale of the Heike, translated by Helen Craig McCullough. Used by permission of Stanford University Press. Copyright © 1994 by the Board of Trustees of the Leland Stanford Jr. University.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the author’s rights. Purchase only authorized ed
itions.

  RIVERHEAD is a registered trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  The RIVERHEAD logo is a trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

  ISBN: 978-1-1012-1748-1

  The Library of Congress has catalogued the Riverhead hardcover edition as follows:

  Hearn, Lian.

  The harsh cry of the heron / by Lian Hearn.

  p. cm.—(Tales of the Otori; bk. 4)

  I. Title.

  PR9619.3.H3725H37 2006 2006049364

  823'.914—dc22

  For J

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Chapter 43

  Chapter 44

  Chapter 45

  Chapter 46

  Chapter 47

  Chapter 48

  Chapter 49

  Chapter 50

  Chapter 51

  Chapter 52

  Chapter 53

  Chapter 54

  Chapter 55

  Acknowledgments

  THE HARSH CRY OF THE HERON

  MAIN CHARACTERS

  Otori Takeo: ruler of the Three Countries

  Otori Kaede: his wife

  Shigeko: their eldest daughter, heir to Maruyama

  Maya:

  their twin daughters

  Miki:

  Arai Zenko: head of the Arai clan, lord of Kumamoto

  Arai Hana: his wife, Kaede’s sister

  Sunaomi:

  their sons

  Chikara:

  Muto Kenji: head of the Muto family and the Tribe

  Muto Shizuka: Kenji’s niece and successor, mother to Zenko and Taku

  Muto Taku: Takeo’s spymaster

  Sada: a member of the Tribe; Maya’s companion

  Mai: Sada’s sister

  Yuki (Yusetsu): Kenji’s daughter, Hisao’s mother

  Muto Yasu: a merchant

  Imai Bunta: Shizuka’s informant

  Dr. Ishida: Shizuka’s husband, Takeo’s physician

  Sugita Hiroshi: senior retainer of Maruyama

  Miyoshi Kahei: Takeo’s commander in chief, lord of Yamagata

  Miyoshi Gemba: Kahei’s brother

  Sonoda Mitsuru: lord of Inuyama

  Ai: his wife, Kaede’s sister

  Matsuda Shingen: abbot of the temple at Terayama

  Kubo Makoto (later Eikan): his successor, Takeo’s closest friend

  Minoru: Takeo’s scribe

  Kuroda Junpei:

  Takeo’s bodyguards

  Kuroda Shinsaku:

  Terada Fumio: explorer and sea captain

  Lord Kono: a nobleman, son of Lord Fujiwara

  Saga Hideki: the Emperor’s general, lord of the Eastern Isles

  Don João: a foreign merchant

  Don Carlo: a foreign priest

  Madaren: their interpreter

  Kikuta Akio: head of the Kikuta family

  Kikuta Hisao: his son

  Kikuta Gosaburo: Akio’s uncle

  Horses

  Tenba: a black horse given by Shigeko to Takeo

  The two sons of Raku, both gray mane with black tail

  Ryume: Taku’s horse

  Keri: Hiroshi’s horse

  Ashige: Shigeko’s gray horse

  The sound of the Gion Shoja bells echoes

  the impermanence of all things.

  The color of the sala flowers reveals the truth

  that the prosperous must decline.

  The proud do not endure, they are like a dream

  on a spring night;

  The mighty fall at last, they are

  as dust before the wind.

  THE TALE OF THE HEIKE

  translated by Helen Craig McCullough

  1

  Come quickly! Father and Mother are fighting!”

  Otori Takeo heard his daughter’s voice clearly as she called to her sisters from within the residence at Inuyama castle, in the same way he heard all the mingled sounds of the castle and the town beyond. Yet he ignored them, as he ignored the song of the boards of the nightingale floor beneath his feet, concentrating only on his opponent: his wife, Kaede.

  They were fighting with wooden poles. He was taller, but she was naturally left-handed and hence as strong with either hand, whereas his right hand had been crippled by a knife cut many years ago and he had had to learn to use his left; nor was this the only injury to slow him.

  It was the last day of the year, bitterly cold, the sky pale gray, the winter sun feeble. Often in winter they practiced this way: It warmed the body and kept the joints flexible, and Kaede liked her daughters to see how a woman might fight like a man.

  The girls came running. With the new year the eldest, Shigeko, would turn fifteen, the two younger ones thirteen. The boards sang under Shigeko’s tread, but the twins stepped lightly in the way of the Tribe. They had run across the nightingale floor since they were infants, and had learned almost unconsciously how to keep it silent.

  Kaede’s head was covered with a red silk scarf wound around her face, so Takeo could see only her eyes. They were filled with the energy of the fight, and her movements were swift and strong. It was hard to believe she was the mother of three children—she still moved with the strength and freedom of a girl. Her attack made him all too aware of his age and his physical weaknesses. The jar of Kaede’s blow on his pole set his hand aching.

  “I concede,” he said.

  “Mother won!” the girls crowed.

  Shigeko ran to her mother with a towel. “For the victor,” she said, bowing and offering the towel in both hands.

  “We must be thankful we are at peace,” Kaede said, smiling and wiping her face. “Your father has learned the skills of diplomacy and no longer needs to fight for his life!”

  “At least I am warm now!” Takeo said, beckoning to one of the guards, who had been watching from the garden, to take the poles.

  “Let us fight you, Father!” Miki, the younger of the twins, pleaded. She went to the edge of the veranda and held her hands out to the man. He was careful not to look at her or touch her as he handed over the pole.

  Takeo noticed his reluctance. Even grown men, hardened soldiers, were afraid of the twins—even, he thought with sorrow, their own mother.

  “Let me see what Shigeko has learned,” he said. “You may each have one bout with her.”

  For several years his oldest daughter had spent the greater part of the year at Terayama, where under the supervision of the old abbot, Matsuda Shingen, who had been Takeo’s teacher, she studied the Way of the Houou. She had arrived at Inuyama the day before, to celebrate the New Year with her family, and her own coming of age. Takeo watched her now as she took the pole he had used and made sure Miki had the lighter one. Physically she was very like her mother, with the same slenderness and apparent fragility, but she had a character all her own, practical, good-humored, and steadfast. The Way of the Houou was rigorous in its discipline, and her teachers made no a
llowances for her age or sex, yet she accepted the teaching and training, the long days of silence and solitude, with wholehearted eagerness. She had gone to Terayama by her own choice, for the Way of the Houou was a way of peace, and from childhood she had shared in her father’s vision of a peaceful land where violence was never allowed to spread.

  Her method of fighting was quite different from the way he had been taught, and he loved to watch her, appreciating how the traditional moves of attack had been turned into self-defense, with the aim of disarming the opponent without hurting him.

  “No cheating,” Shigeko said to Miki, for the twins had all their father’s Tribe skills—even more, he suspected. Now that they were turning thirteen these skills were developing rapidly, and though they were forbidden to use them in everyday life, sometimes the temptation to tease their teachers and outwit their servants became too great.

  “Why can’t I show Father what I have learned?” Miki said, for she had also recently returned from training—in the Tribe village with the Muto family. Her sister Maya would return there after the celebrations. It was rare these days for the whole family to be together—the children’s different education, the parents’ need to give equal attention to all of the Three Countries meant constant travel and frequent separations. The demands of government were increasing—negotiations with the foreigners; exploration and trade; the maintenance and development of weaponry; the supervision of local districts who organized their own administration; agricultural experiments; the import of foreign craftsmen and new technologies; the tribunals that heard complaints and grievances. Takeo and Kaede shared these burdens equally, she dealing mainly with the West, he with the Middle Country, and both of them jointly with the East, where Kaede’s sister Ai and her husband, Sonoda Mitsuru, held the former Tohan domain, including the castle at Inuyama where the family were staying for the winter.